Sarah Palin...R U Nuts???!!!

I've been reading a bit about Sarah Palin today and I'm watching a "Hardball" segment on her as we speak...so to speak.

Welcome the newest candidate for President of the United States...in 2012.

OMG!!!

...not HER god...or, whatever it is that tickles her innards.

I'm talking about MY god, who thinks she's out of her fucking mind.

She knows nothing about foreign policy. She knows nothing about domestic policy beyond the oil fields and military bases of Alaska. She was on a Presidential ballot before Hillary Clinton. To be honest, Hillary wasn't about to get my support in the last election. But Hillary would have gotten my vote every time over Bimbo Spice...did anyone bother to check Caribou Barbie for blonde roots?

The fear I have of any potential candidacy of hers...or anyone like her...is that she will be the tool for the Religious Wrong. If any movement in American politics has had the potential to divide this country like the agenda of the Religious Wrong, I haven't come across that movement yet.

Kids, we are NOT a so-called "Christian Nation". Personally, I take offense to the prospect of the Prince of Peace being used as a patriotic or political tool for ideological gain. If I may be so presumptuous, I believe that Jesus himself would take offense. Kind of like how the Jimbo character from "South Park" calls upon the help of God only to have Jesus sitting in the next seat telling Jimbo to "leave me alone".

This woman might not have cost John McCain election to the most powerful job in the world. But if I'm Sarah Palin's Jaysus,, I would politely tell her to "fuck off".

Studs Terkel and Captain Tony: R.I.P

Two great Americans died this weekend.

Studs Terkel was an American writer, historian and multi-purpose media personality. He was 96 years old. He is perhaps best known for his role playing writer Hugh Fullerton in the movie "Eight Men Out" and his interview in Ken Burns "Baseball". He also wrote the books "Hard Times" and "Working", which were oral histories of the Great Depression and working life in America, respectively.

Captain Tony Tarracino was best known as the proprietor of the legendary Captain Tony's Saloon in Key West. He passed at the age of 92 after a lengthy illness. Captain Tony was a fixture in Key West and once served as its mayor.

Both men were well known as raconteurs and master story tellers and two men that I, for one, would have loved to have drank a beer with.

That is especially true of Terkel, who was as interwoven into the fabric and lore of the city of Chicago as Mrs. O'Leary and her cow. A fair degree of his work dealt with Chicago and his love of the city of "Big Shoulders". But his was the voice of America and the voice of 20th Century American history. He gave voice to the struggle of the Great Depression, American working lives, war and recovery and the people who lived the 20th Century. He wrote of what he heard. He was the great American observer, and told her tale.

That spirit was also in evidence in life of Captain Tony, who escaped the gambling underworld of New Jersey in 1948 to arrive in Key West on board a milk truck. He would later buy a Key West bar and rename it Captain Tony's Saloon. In the 31 years he owned his bar, it would emerge as a Key West institution that, to this day, is as vital as ever and a must see destination at America's southernmost outpost on her mainland. He would sell his legacy to inherit the keys to his Key West when he became its mayor. His friend, Jimmy Buffett, would be the chair of his mayoral campaign and he immortalized Captain Tony in his song "Last Mango In Paris". Captain Tony embodied the warmth of Key West. His colorful life has now disappeared beyond the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, but his legacy remains.

A toast to two great American lives well and colorfully lived...to Studs Terkel and Capt. Tony and R.I.P.