Opposites Day

All last week I was gripped by the unsettling feeling that I’d somehow been dropped into some weird parallel universe.

This suspicion was especially acute whenever I saw John McCain’s face on television, and peaked if, by accident, I actually heard him speak.

There seemed to be some sort of intellectual E. coli at work. People who were speaking for John McCain—or even those who were simply speaking of him—would suddenly fall victim to the same malady that so often afflicts the candidate himself, and find themselves saying things to television cameras that, a short time later, would be likely to turn their stomachs, especially if they happened to see themselves in playback.

On Friday afternoon, in the networks’ televised run-up to the debate that night, we saw an urbane and confident Barack Obama deplaning in Jackson. A voice-over presenter—I don’t remember who—was narrating the arrival in a perfectly normal way when, all of a sudden, apropos of pretty much nothing, he observed of Obama, “Doesn’t he seem just a little too proud of his own bearing?” And, after the obligatory remark about Obama’s elitist [sic] education, “Doesn’t he seem just a little too cool?”

That’s when I realized I’d landed in John McCain’s own personal universe, where every day is Opposites Day.

Proud is something to be ashamed of! Taking advantage of the educational opportunities that come your way puts you out of touch with average men and women everywhere! Cool is the new loser!

Oh, John, I am so on board now.

At last, I understand what is driving your incomprehensible presidential campaign.

Like, a few weeks ago you said of Sarah Palin on Fox News Sunday, "She's a partner and a soul-mate," even though you'd met the woman exactly once before tapping her as the other half of the Republican ticket. But now I understand that you were simply saying, in the nicest possible way, that you have no clue who this woman is or what she stands for and hope to h**l that if the two of you actually manage to win this election she'll keep herself busy in ways that don't involve many visits to the Oval Office.

Oh, and during your trip Birmingham [Michigan] on August 13th, you called Russia out for its military action against Georgia, saying that "In the 21st century nations don't invade other nations." To some, this comment might have seemed a teensy bit disingenuous, coming as it did from a man whose homeland has a penchant for launching unilateral military excursions into other people's countries and pressuring its allies to go along for the ride. But I get you—I seriously do. To me you were saying, plain as day, that John McCain's America will pretty much continue to do as she pleases when it comes to intensifying miseries in other parts of the world.

I'm really happy that I've figured this whole "opposites" thing out.

I am confused about one thing, though. In John McCain's universe, am I cool? And if so, should I be proud?

Spackle Camshaft? You betcha'...

I've always kind of liked the name my mother gave me at birth, Juliette. It's a family name, for one thing, going back several generations.

Plus, it has a nice old-fashioned air about it.

But I've never felt it had much power. It's a soft name. If you're named Juliette, you are going to grow up to be creative, compassionate, and a fabulous listener who also has great taste in clothes. But you are never, ever going to be an astrophysicist; an Olympic triathlete; the head of an oil company; or, for that matter, the "hot" mayor of a small cold town in Alaska.

Once I briefly changed my first name to Sidney. I felt it was a name that would take me places, but the new places turned out to be pretty much like the old places, so I switched back.

But now blogger David Harrington has rekindled my interest in power names, and today I tried out his Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator.

The name given me by The Generator was "Spackle Camshaft" -- a moniker that just reeks with inexplicable authority. Power-wise, compared to my birth name it's no contest.

My mother is not going to be at all happy about my new name, but I think you'll agree that now, at last, I have a shot at greatness.

Rhymes with Pain

So is this lucky or what? The very day that I decide to indulge myself by starting a blog to share my random hits (entirely personal and unashamedly subjective) about what's going on in the universe, or at least what's happening on my block, the Republican candidate for President of these United States makes a move I didn't see coming.

As you know by now, in a statement released at 8:30 a.m. ET this morning, the McCain/Palin campaign, entirely without irony, announced that the man who as late as last Monday was still saying the economy was fundamentally sound; the senator who before the doo-doo hit the fan was one of the unrepentant deregulators whose unshackling (read: anything goes) of mortgage and other financial institutions eight years ago helped start us down this road in the first place; the myopic politician who wrote in a magazine article published a week ago that "Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation" (one presumes that, as noted wryly by the Toronto Globe and Mail, "the piece was submitted before Lehman Brothers went belly up") was...still with me?...suspending his campaign to return to Washington to help address America's economic meltdown.

If you've got the stomach for it, you can link to a video of the candidate's announcement right this very minute at http://www.johnmccain.com/Informing/News/Speeches/Read.aspx?guid=3f8dec5a-52e2-44bf-b665-ebac609433a4

Not long after the McCain (rhymes with pain) Wednesday surprise, Barack Obama, at a news conference in Clearwater, Florida, said that while he agreed "There are times for politics and there are times to rise above politics and do what's right," he saw no need to cancel the debate, scheduled for Friday night at the University of Mississippi.

“This is exactly the time when people need to hear from the candidates,” he said, adding that “Part of the president’s job is to deal with more than one thing at once...".

And part of a senator's job too, Mr. McCain. But we can save the importance of multi-tasking for another day.