Romney from the viewpoint of Seamus the dog

Yeah. He put me up on the roof and I rode all the way to Canada! Seamus the Irish Setter here who boldly went where no dog had gone before and lived to tell about it! The whole thing he said about the crate being sealed is a bunch of bull. So there is Mitt and his wife and five kids in the station wagon while I'm up in the slip stream while Mitt balls along at seventy sometimes eighty miles an hour. Go stick your head out your car window and go seventy miles an hour and you'll know what it's like. You get bugs in your mouth and your ears and you cant hear a thing because the wind is blasting through those air holes like bullets and whistling like a Stuka dive bomber.

The worst thing is my stomach did not dig the whole riding in a wind tunnel thing. The  temperature dropped down to like forty at night and so I opened my mouth a few times to try and stop the air because the wind chill was like zero. Well all the air blew right through me and the diarrhea blasted out the back. So now I'm in my crate going seventy miles an hour and I'm freezing and there is crap everywhere. Not fun folks. Not fun. So you know what old Mitt does when we stop? He hoses me down at the gas station! Nice guy, right? Then he sticks me back in the crate!

So now I turn into a block of ice. I mean the water froze and  my teeth are chattering while Mitt is singing away with his family  in the wagon all nice and warm. What a dope. This is not a guy who gets it. I mean I am the family dog right? Mans best friend and this guy doesn't give a thought that it may not be the greatest thing in the world to stick a dog up on top of your station wagon for eight hours while you blast down the highway between seimis and go under bridges that look like they are going to take your head off. He just doesn't get it, because he's inside, sipping his Starbucks, Latte, thinking about being President someday.

So anyway. I survived to tell the tale. But here is the thing. I can't vote. Pity right? But you can. Let me ask you a question, do you want a guy who would strap you to the roof of a station wagon and let you shit everywhere and then wash you down with a hose and stick you back up there to freeze your you know whats off.I wouldn't. The guy has no sense of anybody but himself. How would Mitt like it if someone put him on the roof and hosed him down. You know what Mr. Empathy said to me when we finally got to Canda? How'd you like your ride boy? He's asking that to a dog with his hair plastered back like a jet engine just blasted him in the face! I got to tell you...sometimes I really wish I could talk.

Woof.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

One free large pizza, a litre of Coke and Herman Cain

The self made angry black man is really pretty interesting. He is the other side of the Obama coin. He didn't come up through the Ivy league he came up through he sausage and onions and Pepperoni school of hard knocks. And he is angry. An angry black man, go figure. Lot different from the dude in the White House who recently got angry but for the most part was pretty mellow. Herman breathes angry because he had to scrabble his way through America and make it on his own.

His nine nine nine plan shows what a man who is practical can come up with. You can just see him figuring up special offers on pizza. One large with everything and free wings. Why not? The best thing about Herman besides wanting to mix in gospel to Hail to the Chief and calling out Jon Stewart on The Daily Show for Amos and Andy rifts, is that he thinks he can do it. Now who would have planted that idea?

Maybe Obama is the Jackie Robinson of American politics. Maybe he will be a one termer who paves the way for others. But could there be a Herman without an Obama? I don't think so. Obama broke the color barrier and now Herman can get up there and whip pizza inspired economic plans and not be worried being black will take all the fight out of his pie slinging based empire. Four years ago it would be unthinkable.

And Herman will not get the nomination. America still needs a black man who sounds white and Herman does not sound like that. And he is a little bit of a loaded gun and shoots off at the mouth a bit too much for Republican sensibilities. But you have to admire his moxie and can do spirit. So a large pizza, a litre of Coke, and a Presidential nomination for Herman Cain. Free delivery on Saturdays.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

The Pigs Will Have Their Day

Pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered. An old mortgage man said that to me a long time ago. The hogs it would seem are about to get slaughtered. You may laugh at the small size of these gatherings on Wall Street but you should start watching this. The middle class has been decimated and the children of the middle class have nowhere to go, but to the streets. And no one has been listening.

FDR saw this coming in the thirties. He knew that if inequities were not addressed then there would be trouble. So The New Deal emerged and he gave the middle class a piece of the pie. Now you have that pie divided into tiny slivers with the one percent taking the giant gulp. Should there be this type of inequality in society? This is the basic question of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Strip it down and it is about the removal of representation for the middle class. America is truly an oligarchy with only the wealthy represented in Washington. The Middle Class simply does not have a lobby to push their concerns. The middle class is not represented because there is no room at a table composed of bankers and corporations. So what is left for them but to take to the streets for those who have disenfranchised?

Dis-comfort. That is the opposite of comfort. The people in Washington are all comfortable. They have no dis-comfort. Demonstrations by their nature create dis-comfort. They shake up the status quo. There is no clear agenda and there are no leaders. But there will be dis-comfort as the protest grows. This is the age of social media and it could well spider out. And it would seem Washington will not see the writing on the wall until it comes to their door.

That old mortgage man went on to explain that if you take too much, if you are greedy, then you might end up getting nothing. Pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered. Someone should write it down and send it to every person in Washington who has forgotten about who they really are supposed to represent.

Because the pigs will have their day.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Rocket Man...a story of one man trying to find the American Dream

                                                                   

Ban Lifted on Twain Book "Eves Diary"

Seems Mark Twain knew all about book selling. Ron Suskind writing the second he scurries out of government has nothing on him. Salaciousness sells. Just ask the author of the Palin tell all Joe McGinnis. Sarah had  an affair with a basketball player. And he was black. Or Suskinds contention Obama doesn't like women. Even that sells in a sort of reverse misogynistic boys club man cave oeuvre.

But Twain wrote Eve's Diary in 1906 and it was too racy for a library in Charlton Mass and was banned for one hundred and five years. Talk about being out of print. The book about the relationship of Adam and Eve had racy pictures that one Hattie L Carpenter (librarian) did not care for and started the  ball rolling. The ban held and patrons of the library could not find the racy little book anywhere in the stacks.

And Twain knew even then it would be good for sales and called the banning parties "freaks of of the Charlton library." But now all has been forgiven.The book has been restored and people can now read Eves Diary dirty pictures and all. I suppose there is nothing new under the sun. Sex sells. Even anti sex sells. I am sure Hattie L. Carpenter would not have let Joe McGinnis's book into her hallowed library . Maybe she wouldn't have even let that misoginistic Suskind tell all in the door either.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Do We Really Need Congress Anymore?

Alright. You have a bunch of guys and gals who make very good money and get great health insurance and pensions and perks are able to publish books and go on television and parlay connections into making even more money and then we ask them to vote and put the people first and not their own jobs. Right. That's going to happen. Not in this I got mine economy. Those people do not want to fall back into the great unwashed of the sweaty middle class. They got there and they want to stay there and they will vote for what is politically expedient every time. So to hope that the fat cats in Washington are going to pull a Jimmy Stewart and suddenly become Mr. Smith is a fantasy.

So where does that leave us. Well, here is my proposal. Get rid of congress and let the people decide for themselves. In the beginning we needed a representative body because people could not vote on every issue of government. Not so anymore. We have the Internet. We are wired. Why can't the people decide for themselves? Think about it. The American Jobs Bill comes up. Ok the deadline is thirty days from now. The nation votes. You go to the site and click YES or NO. Think about it. A democracy deciding for themselves beyond the reach of Special Interests!

We can do this now. At the end of the thirty days the votes are counted and the people decide. Should the Bush Tax Cuts be discontinued for the wealthy? You have thirty days to decide. Bam. Just like that. If the people want the wealthy to be taxed then they will be taxed. This would be true Democracy because there are too many people to be bought off. Congressman get bought off routinely. Sad but true. But the people would decide what is their best interests and majority rules.

The age has changed. Congress has worked well for over two hundred years but we now have the technology to take representative democracy to the next step. We have to break the Washington Wall street Corporate stranglehold. So why not give the power to the people? It would be the triumph of the people over the oligarchy. So...why not? Just give Congress their walking papers and we become congress.

A Congress of the People. It has a ring to it.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Rocket Man

Republican Debate From the Viewpoint of the dog and the coyote

The Dog
You know I really think Mitt could have done better if he just didn't strap me to the roof of his car and drive to Canada. Hasn't he heard about the SPCA? I'm a dog! I'm not that dead grandmother in National Lampoons Vacation although Mitt does seem a lot like Chevy Chase now that I think about it. But it's no wonder he looked kind of wimpy next to the Coyote killer from Texas. A man who would strap a dog to the roof of the family car can't be expected to be the great defender of Social Security. He sure wimped out of that one. He didn't call it a ponzi scheme but he didnt' defend it either.

The problem with a guy like Mitt is that he saw nothing wrong with putting me on the roof and letting me end up with bugs in my teeth and my ears permanently blown back. When we got to Canada he's like, how'd you like the ride Rover? Imagine what a guy like that will do to the American people? He just doesn't get it. He thinks it's perfectly fine for a dog to inhale a seventy mile an hour wind for six hours! So I looked like someone had just blown back my hair with a blast furnace. To Mitt everything was just fine. You know why? Because he rode in the nice warm car below while I froze my tail off! Is that the kind of guy you want for your President? Woof.

The Coyote:

That aint nothing.  Let me ask you this: what kind of a guy goes jogging with a .380 Ruger with hollow point bullets? Think about that one. Let's see sweats, socks, tennis shoes, headband, IPOD, Ruger. Come on. Somebody with some serious issues carries a gun when they for their workout. Can anybody say PARANOID. PSYCHO. WACJOB. I can because I'm the one that he shot at! First of all let me say for the record that wasn't his puppy I was sniffing after. And secondly what business was it of his. In fact I was just walking across the field to see what all the commotion was when BLAM BLAM BLAM. I look up and see this WAC JOB in a powder blue workout suit with those over sized headphones like out of that movie Starsky and Hutch, unloading like' John Wayne.

This is a residential neighborhood and the guy is shooting up the place like it's the OK Corral. Do you really want a guy to be your President who packs when he goes for his morning jog? Or starts shooting at some innocent Coyote because I was crossing a field and there happens to be a puppy on the other side? Imagine what this guy would do to people who need a little extra help though hard times. BLAM BLAM BLAM. That'll take care of them. I mean and then the guy reloads and fires another full clip at me! Yeesh. Come on. Is that normal? Do you want some psycho in a powder blue workout suit with headphones listening to Yanni blasting away at your dog? Because I could have been your dog, we look about the same.

Anyway. I don't. And he wont get my vote or any other Coyotes. And as far as that puppy is concerned. It turned out he was stuffed animal someone left in their garbage. Mr. Secessionist  didn't tell you that one did he? Mr. Powder Puff protecting Snoopy from the big bad Wile E Coyote. Give me a break. I'm telling you and you heard it here first, you dont' want this guy for your President. Because this guy is straight out nuts!

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man

Art Alone Endures

We were doing the Chicago thing with the train and the kids and the rushing to the water taxi to Michigan Avenue to seeing Marilyn Monroe with her dress blowing up in front of the NBC building and then down to Billy Goats Tavern for some burgers that would kill a Tri Athlete then up and across the river toward Millennium Park to see the Bean. It was  a beautiful August night, one of those nights so rare in Chicago that feels more like Florida in Spring. We had just about reached the park when we heard music.

My wife said it looked like a concert in the park and so we drifted up to the fence and and there was a symphony. And then we heard a voice. It was an opera and the singers voice rose up across the city like a God. We just stopped and listened and all our worries and hurries fell away. We were transfixed by this man singing and the beautiful music. The park was filled as far as the eye could see with people quietly listening on a warm night on the end of summer.

And I looked around and I saw young and old just staring. No one moved. Everyone just listened and they were transfixed. And that is when I thought about our world with it's horrible problems and our cartoon culture and our grotesque politicians and the zealots who have take over our lives and I realized then the only thing that trumped all that was Art. It moved at a different speed and a different level and all these people will pass on, but Art will survive.

And they can't touch it. They can try and ban books. Wash out an opera with Rap or noise or sex or violence or whatever they can come up with, but Art survives. I saw it in the people who didn't speak, didn't move. They were mesmerized like I was. And even my seven year old who could barely see over the fence wanted to just stay and listen. It simply soothed the soul.

And then of course we left and hurried on to catch the water taxi to catch the train to get to our car to get home to go to bed to start all over the next day. But there was that interlude. It only lasted fifteen minutes but the world was in order. All was right. There is an engraved saying in the Fine Arts Theatre of Chicago. "All Passes, Art Alone Endures." Amen.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Rocket Man Kindle

The New Guy is going to have to Punch Back

When I moved from Baltimore to Chicago I was the new guy. I had a weird accent and I dressed weird and I had bad hair. And I had no friends. We had moved to a suburb of low tolerance for weird. We had moved into a town of Midwestern guys who wore checkered shirts and blue jeans and boots. I dressed like a refugee from the seventies and grew my hair to Afro length. A clash of cultures. My parents were Kennedy liberals and we had moved into a red enclave of button down Yankees. But I was a kid, what did I care?

So I walked into the lunchroom past a group of football players when one of them calls out. "Now there goes a real faggot." I stopped, dropped my lunch, and saw the blond haired blue eyed Captain of the football team. I didn't know he was the Captain, but I also knew from Baltimore days that you had one chance to set your line. So I threw my lunch on the ground and walked up and pinned "Randy" against the wall, not knowing I had just grabbed the most popular guy in the senior class. "Who are you calling a faggot?" I screamed.

Randy turned red and struggled against my grip. Hey...Hey! He finally got free with his face burning and told me to get my lunch, but his homeboys were in shock. Somebody had pinned the Captain against the wall. This is what the President has to do now when he gets back.  He has to pin anybody who tries to bully, extort, or blackmail him again against the wall. He has to set a line for these guys. A funny thing is once you take down the leader, then all the other guys slink away. But he has to do it now.

A week later I saw Randy in an empty hallway. I had not seen him since the lunchroom. We walked past each other and then he nodded to me. I nodded back.

Rocket Man Has Been Released

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Kindle Download of Rocket Man

The funniest serious novel since Richard Russo’s Straight Man, rich with the epic levity of John Irving and salted with the perversion of Updike." - Chicago Sun Time

"Rocket Man is a hilarious, well written novel about one man's search for the New American Dream." - James Frey, author A Million Little Pieces and Bright Shiny Morning

Why Michele Bachmann gets migraines

You have probably heard that Michele Bachmann gets excruciating migraines. This is not surprising. Imagine her poor brain trying to follow her mouth. Migraines are caused by many things but the biggest is what's called inconsistent thinking. This is where her own brain rebels against itself. It is all very scientific and Michelle is a perfect example of inconsistent thinking. Take the debt ceiling. She says let it rip. Don't raise it. Everything will be just fine. Of course that is one half of her brain talking. The half wired to her mouth. The other half that is musty and smells like a closed up box is saying what are you crazy? Our credit rating will be destroyed and interest rates will skyrocket!

This is but one example that drives her own brain crazy and into migraine territory. Or how about water the tree of liberty. Again her own brain doth protest too much about watering the tree of liberty. Is she calling people to commit violence if they don't get their way? Or how about gay marriage? This one really ties her brain up in knots. She is against it and her husband is against it and they run organizations trying to talk people out of homosexuality. Her poor brain just goes into fits trying to stop her mouth on that one.

Or whenever she speaks to her tea party brethren and the lies and half truths come out so fast her brain overloads with flashes of DID SHE REALLY SAY THAT. IS SHE REALLY THAT STUPID. And then her brain realizes she is that stupid and this depresses the part she rarely uses and the whole thing just shuts down and she goes into a migraine meltdown. The only known cure for this horrible disease is a radical cure. Masking tape over the mouth. The good news is there is a one hundred percent cure rate.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Rocket Man will be released in July

Little Eric Cantor Doesn't' Share with the other kids

Eric just doesn't share well with the other kids. He must have been hell on wheels in high school and college. The feisty guy who got the grades the girl and bulled his way past the big dudes who always put him down. Little skinny egghead. But he showed them by his bluster, his will, his gonads. So he rose up and became a congressman and everyone just knew he would do it one day. The problem is he never learned to share.

He always took the other kids blocks and kept the truck for himself. Eric. Now you have to share with the President. No! I won't. I want what I want! Yes, yes, but this is a democracy Eric! NO! This is not a democracy and I don't want to play with anyone else! These blocks are mine. This truck is mine. The sandbox is mine and I want to have it my way or I won't play! Hmmm....teacher conference.

And Eric is a nice boy but he doesn't seem to want to give in. He won't compromise. Eric's parents nod because they know their little achiever while smart and able and competent and just about everything a parents wants...is strangely self absorbed. It's his way or the highway and even though they have tried to reason with him, little Eric just doesn't get it. Why should he compromise on anything? The way Eric sees it, he should just have his way.

The teacher also is worried about respect. Eric  doesn't seem to respect authority. He wants to let his opinion be known above all others. Even with a President of the United States! Little Eric just gets red faced and screams out that no one can tax the rich. No one can tax billionaires and he doesn't care if the government defaults. He wants to have his way.

The teacher conference ends and Eric's parents go home. His dad finds little Eric in his garage building a podium. What are you building son? It's my Presidential podium dad. Ha Ha. You going to be President one day son? Little Eric stares at his dad like he's the biggest moron on the planet. Of course dad. He frowns. What did you think?

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will be out July 26th

Anthony Wieners Wiener

It isn't so much that Anthony Wiener snapped a picture of his own wiener and shot it out into cyberspace via twitter it is that the media machine between Palins Wallyword vacation takes a break and puts Wieners Wiener page one in cable and network land. The wiener in question hacked by the crazed hacker who shot it off to the unsuspecting innocent is now abroad in some cafe on the left bank with a mask on and a handheld, laughing into his latte as Wiener explains his wiener to Wolf Blitzer who looks like he never had a wiener and if he did it had a beard.

But famed nobody Andrew Brightbart could not wrestle this wiener to the ground as twitter pulled in every network and newspaper in one hundred forty character hubris or the equivalent pixilation which makes for a very grainy wiener shot indeed. Anthony Wiener on explaining his wiener told Wolf and anyone who would listen that a hacker prankster punk took a shot of his wiener unbeknowst to him and tweeted his weiner to all would follow a Wiener. But is it your wiener Wolf persisted. Lets just say I wont dignify that with an answer Mr. Wiener responded.

And even as Lawrence O'Donnell berated the Wiener followers and Weinter cabitzers for being so fascinated with Wieners wiener he led with the story also to say no one should lead with a wiener story and haven't we fallen to a new low? Indeed. Mr. Wiener held fast to his hacked punked pranked story but did not specifically deny the wiener in question was his wiener bringing more wiener speculation from the Wiener watchers and followers.

At the end of the day all we know for sure is that a mans' wiener was compromised by being tweeted by someone and we cannot be sure that the wiener was not Anthony Weiner's weiner who tweeted his own wiener but that it is someones wiener even though Anthony Wiener will not say that is it not his wiener but that he was punked hacked or pranked by somewhere out there in cyberspace by someone who possibly took Anthony Wieners weiner and tweeted it for all the world to see. The moral to the story is that no man  should ever tweet another man's wiener. Especially not Anthony Wieners wiener.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

The Kind of Cialis Commercial You'd Like To See

You never know when a moment can turn into something more. The couple doing laundry embraces and wham the set falls away and they are in a hut on a moonlit night and the sexathon begins. All is well for men who can't get it up and need a drug called Cialis.  And we watch the couple dance and make eyes and drink their Pina Collodas and watch the ocean and then they make an exit up some stairs or through a door while locked in a sex trance.

And then, then the disclosures begin of all the side effects.  The man and woman usually give us the bad news with the poker face of a doctor. My point is why cut away? Lets follow the couple to the bed and while they are having sex, then  have them give us the list of side effects. The man could turn while they are doing it doggy style and give us that deadpan look. Don't take... cialis ...with alcohol...Sweat streaming down his brow.  As this may cause... serious problems.... Don't take cialis... if you have high blood pressure or diabetes... All the while he is pumping along. ...as this might be unsafe. 
Then the woman could turn on all fours, contorted. 

If you have an erection... lasting more than six hours... see a doctor... as this might be a... problem.... Also don't take cialis with other... medications as this may... cause... unwanted... side effects. If you feel your heart... speeding up or you feel... dizzy...see your doctor... immediately. Cut back to the man.  If you do have an... erection lasting... six hours...before you see a... doctor...you might think of... doing this... for... six hours to see how long you last....

Yeah, I know, over the top. Bad taste. Sophomoric. Silly. But I'd bet they'd sell a lot of Cialis. I mean you should know what you are getting, right?

www.billhazelgrove.com
Rocket Man will blast off this summer 

Food Lines in America for the Middleclass

Riding my bike back today from the attic and I see a line of people outside a church. In Oak Park it is not uncommon to see demonstrators. And so I wheeled off and cu t down the sidewalk and pulled across the people in front of this church. The first thing I noticed was  they were a mix of black and white people, professional and blue collar. I thought this must be either a demonstration or a job fair or something that would get this cross section of people to come together. Then I saw the sign: FOOD PANTRY. These people had not come to demonstrate or get a job, these people had come to get a meal.

Here in the year 2011 in an upscale neighborhood of Oak Park Illinois there are people lined up to get a meal because they have no where else to go. And so I sat on my bike and stared at them and I tried to get some comfort from the thought they must be poor people. But they didn't look poor. They had on nice clothes and coats and high heels and one guy had a tie on and one woman had a nice dress and several men looked like they could be businessmen. They looked decidedly, middleclass.

And that is what really shocked me. These people looked like me. They looked like people one check away from missing a mortgage or a credit card bill. One check away from a car breaking down or having a furnace malfunction or any of those things that wipe people out who are just hanging on. And here we are in this huge fiscal battle with people talking about cutting out the social programs in this country. They really should come to Oak Park and see these people. Because these are not welfare queens or deadbeats or people who are living off the system. These are people that are hungry in the land of the free and the home of the brave. These are middleclass people who just want a meal.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will blast off July 26

The Tea Party Brings the Country to It's Knees

You  knew these guys were bad news. The racial slurs, the threats, the bricks through the windows. The all white rallies, the Don't Tread On Me flags flown by guys in military fatigues. The far right of the far right views on everything from abortion to the environment to education. The anti intellectualism, the racism, the xenophobia, the Muslim obsession, the birther movement, Michelle Bachman, Dick Army, the phony family values, the Union busting, the cutting of every social program that helps poor people. But you never really thought they would get in a position to do the country real harm...until now.

Now they will shut down the country and it is the Tea Party members of the House of Representatives that is dictating policy to the whole country. Who are these guys? Who told them they were to think for three hundred million people? They have positioned themselves to be the arbiters of our social conscience. Don't spend. Don't give money to NPR. Don't give money to Planned Parenthood. Don't give money to enviromentalists. Who died and left them boss? Who allowed a minority view to become the majority?

The Tea Party is the worst of America. It is the paranoid, narrow minded, prejudice, mean spirited, old fashioned, backward leaning side of Americans usually kept hidden away. These people have brought the worst of ourselves forward and made it their mantra. People are good and bad, but the Tea Party has said that exclusivity and ideals based in their view of God and country and what is good for people should be the law of the land. They are like the old school marms with the rulers threatening anyone who thinks for themselves. And now they will shut down the government to punish America for spending. They are doing it out of spite, knowing what they are offering is untenable to the other side. They don't care. They have admitted they don't care.

The Tea Party is simply the worst of America brought to light from sustained hard times. They belong with the dark corners of our  history when one group decides what is best for the whole. They belong with McCarthyism and the Black Lists. They are a blight on our land.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will blast off April 26th

The Lie of Fiscal Conservatism

We are not a family. The United States is not a person who has run amuck and overspent and now has to be put on a mandated budget or go into bankruptcy. This argument is a lie and nobodies children and grandchildren are going to pay for anything. The statement we are putting a terrible burden on our kids and grand kids with the deficit is the worst kind of BS. Our kids and grand kids will pay the same amount of tax we pay. The deficit is not a balloon loan where it all comes due in ten years. And the Chinese are not going to stop financing our debt. How could they when they have billions invested in the United States? Would you sell a stock you have sunk millions into because you didn't like it's performance and take a loss if you didnt' have too? Of course not.

But the Tea Party cowboys wave this fiscal flag like a sword so they can ram through their agenda of social conservatism that will eviscerate the social safety net and destroy what is left of the  middle class. Social Security Medicaid and Medicare are up on the fiscal chopping block next. And they will go after it because they are a front for Corporate Interests that do not want to fund entitlements anymore at the risk of badly performing portfolios. These moneyed interests, these plutocrats are the Republican party and unless you are truly wealthy and I mean a millionaire you better learn what side your bread is buttered on. It is not buttered on the side of the wealthy.

Social Conservatism is a I got mine I don't care if you get yours philosophy. It says every man and woman and child for himself and any helping hand is at the expense of the taxpayer. This is total hogwash. Our taxes fund our wars and keep the government rolling. Little goes to social programs. One percent at  best. But the slash and burn fiscal zealots want you to believe they are saving us from fiscal Armageddon. All they are really doing is putting forth the agenda of the moneyed class who elected them under the guise of populism. It is the con of the twenty first century.  

www.billhazelgrove.com
Rocket Man will blast off  April 26th

The Bushwhacking of NPR

You should be concerned about this one if you go to movies, plays, the ballet, poetry readings, book readings, galleries, enjoy fine wine, a good book, a symphony on the lawn, Mozart, the Beatles, just about anything to do with culture. Because let's say the bad guys have a point in busting up the unions and cutting every social program they can get their hands on. You could almost say that they are doing some of this out of true fiscal concern or at the very least ideology. But trying to destroy National Public Radio is attacking what is left of culture in this country and every single Sesame Street watching child and Ken Burns devotee should really say enough is enough.

What? We want to cement Sarah Palins bet that America is truly a stupid country? That in fact the lowest common denominator should rule the land? That some short sighted ideologue who was probably the weird guy in the class who entertained Timothy McVeigh fantasies and saw the government as evil but then veered into fame as a better way to satisfy his tortured loner geek soul could now score points by trying to take down the wine drinking cheese crowd by getting an NPR executive to spill  his guts so he could prove what a left leaning organization NPR really is, is really pathetic and a true low point in what American society is capable of producing.

Let's say we get rid of NPR. Let's say we get rid of culture. Let's say the stupid men rule the land. Now what? Without culture you do not have a country. You have no collective national consciousness to balance the insidious vapidity of crass commercialism which rolls along F. Scotts Fitzgerald's definition of cheap entertainment as simply heroin of the soul. Even rabid conservatives  want to go see a fine play or enjoy a night at the symphony after a long day of taking bottles from children and cutting out funding for the education, women, infants, and poor  people. But alas, they cut out culture too and instead of Stravinsky  they are stuck with Die Hard 6.

So this is not about scoring points. NPR is part of America. America needs something elevated to balance the natural crassness of a country founded on the almighty dollar as it's guiding light after paying lip service to liberty and freedom. We need it if only to keep the creeps in the corners and our own hope alive that one day we will get beyond the infancy of  the mega commercial state. We can only hope NPR is still around when the dust settles after the conservative slash and burn orgy of 2011.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will blast off April 26th

Vice President Biden Won't Stop Emailing Me

Vice President Biden just wont stop emailing me. I mean I don't mind it every now and  then, but you would think he had better things to do with his time than to keep sending me emails and thanking me for my support. Joe sent me another one today and asked me where I wanted to have my personal thank you card from President Obama sent. Well, Joe, that's pretty obvious. Just send it to my home. Apparently the President wants to send me a card for supporting him through the year on the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell and the Start Treaty and the tax compromise.

So I figured what the heck. If the President really wants to take time and send me a thank you card I would give him my address. I'm kind of private about that, but I figure the President wont spread it around. So I followed the link and then it gets kind of weird. Joe wanted me to give him my credit card first! Now I understand sometimes you don't want to pay for the stamp but it's less than a buck to send a thank you card and I really think the  President can spare the price of a lousy stamp. So I tried to reply but that was another weird thing, it went to this DO NOT REPLY guy.

Maybe that is Joe's email. I mean he has emailed me a lot over the last year asking for my support and inviting me to the White House on several occasions and telling me the President wants to meet with me and get my input. I was a little surprised. You think he would have advisers to bounce ideas off of, but Joe said he wanted to meet with me so I followed the link again and don't you know, he wanted my credit card again! Maybe Joe needed some gas money or something to get the President to our meeting, but I mean come on, I think the guy should at least have enough for a couple of gallons to get him from the airport!

So I dont' know. Joe keeps emailing me and telling me they couldn't have done it without me. I really appreciate that and he also told me wanted to send me a sticker for my bumper to show how much he and the President appreciate me sticking by them. So I followed the link and you guessed it, another credit card number. You think they could spring for the price of some glue and paper! Talk about cheapskates. So I sent an email telling Joe at DO NOT REPLY that he has to quit emailing me and enough is enough. Otherwise I'm going to put him and the President in my spam filter. You'd think these guys would quit surfing the net and you know, go be the leaders of the free world or whatever. Sounds like they both need to get a job.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will be out in January

Dirty Sexy Books

Meghan McCain is making all the stops with her celeb book Dirty Sexy Politics. You can almost see John McCain's daughter sitting in a room with the publisher trying to figure out a title for a book about nothing. Put her on the cover with an elephant. Sex sells. Dirty sex sells more. Dirty Sexy Politics. The perfect black to McCain's white. The renegade daughter telling all the dirty sexy secrets of John McCain's political campaign. After her horror over Sarah Palin, I ask you, does anybody really want to hear the dirty sexy secrets of John McCain's campaign?

Probably not. But the book of nothing is the rage. You merely have to be related to someone famous or do something outrageous for a book. But publishers know these books have no shelf life. The book of nothing is mind candy that gets old fast so the only chance is the talk show circuit, the title, and the cover. If the author is good looking, outspoken, media savvy, and sexy, then so much the better. Even Rachel Maddow bowed to the mechanics of celebrity publishing by asking no questions on substance. Or maybe there wasn't anything to ask.

F. Scott Fitzgerald said, "all cheap entertainment is immoral...it is heroin of the soul." Celebrity books give that heroin with the promise of nothing more than maybe a salacious secret. We hope for an inside scoop, some sort of peeping through the keyhole for the price of a hardcover. Meghan was horrified with her father's pick of Sarah Palin. We all were. But once we know the secret and have looked at the pictures, then the book is worthless. We have no more emotional attachment to it than the empty wrapper of a candy bar, proving the point that fame without talent is an empty wrapper.

So Meghan McCain will do the tour with her Dirty Sexy Politics book and then she will finish with that and the book will fall from view and it will be dead. There are no redeeming qualities for the book of nothing. Literature, while quiet in it's launch, does have staying power. Simply because we invest something of ourselves in the story and while it may not be sexy, and the cover may be staid, we put it on our shelf to be read again. Maybe, just to know that there is something more to the world than dirty sexy books.

William Hazelgrove's latest novel Rocket Man is due out in the fall
www.billhazelgrove.com