Posts Tagged ‘like’
I genuinely like Sarah Palin.
I don’t mind that picking her was probably a cheap, desperate ploy by John McCain to mine votes from still-fervent Hillary Clinton supporters. That’s politics, the same politics that prevents Obama from calling Clinton out as a divisive, harmful, transparent politician not worth Spider Jerusalem’s tugs.
Naturally, MoveOn didn’t waste any time sending me an smear e-mail. (I got on the list for criticizing their weak criticism of John McCain, and I haven’t bothered to get taken off, yet. I have a voyeur’s curiosity.) Most of their arguments against her were especially weak, and the rest are all a matter of perspective.
She was elected Alaska’s governor a little over a year and a half ago. … She has no foreign policy experience.
Neither did small-state Govs. Clinton and Carter. Neither does Obama, for that matter.
Her previous office was mayor of Wasilla, a small town outside Anchorage.
Obama’s previous office was in the Illinois state legislature. I don’t hold that against him, either.
Palin is strongly anti-choice, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest.
Sounds good to me. Oh, and take a cue from the Associated Press — it’s “abortion-rights” versus “anti-abortion,” not “pro-choice” versus “anti-choice.”
She supported right-wing extremist Pat Buchanan for president in 2000.
The same Pat Buchanan who praised Obama’s convention speech for two straight minutes in 2008, only stopping because some uppity producer off-screen called time. Buchanan ain’t all that bad, people.
Palin thinks creationism should be taught in public schools.
She later clarified this, saying that “alternative views” should be debated, but not part of the curriculum. This is political waffling, but her very first. I’ll give her some slack.
She’s doesn’t think humans are the cause of climate change.
I’m not sure this is the indictment you think it is, MoveOn. A lot of humans outside your inner circle believe this — more than you’d care to admit.
She’s solidly in line with John McCain’s “Big Oil first” energy policy. She’s pushed hard for more oil drilling and says renewables won’t be ready for years.
Wrong. Viable renewables won’t be ready for decades. In the meantime, pushing hard for more oil drilling, or at least seeming to, could lessen the effects of speculation.
She also sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species — she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska.
Read her real reasoning, instead of speculating.
How closely did John McCain vet this choice? He met Sarah Palin once at a meeting. They spoke a second time, last Sunday, when he called her about being vice-president. Then he offered her the position.
Considering all the grief you guys give Cheney for being the master puppeteer behind Bush, that Palin and McCain barely know each other is a breath of fresh air for the GOP.
MoveOn should be able to paint anyone as a right-wing nutjob — not that it should, but that’s its speciality — and so that it’s having such trouble staying coherent about Palin is very good news for the McCain campaign.
Today was my first bad week of adulthood. That is what we’re calling 21 years old, right? Adulthood?
To provide the slightest sample, it was relatively early in the work day today that I didn’t mark down a staff member at a school her complimentary photo package, as is customary. It’s a relatively minor error, for which there is a form provided. Asking for what we call a variance report, I hear, coming from the mouth of a coworker who has no seniority over myself:
You’ve already messed up?
Well, yes. I admitted to it out loud before anyone present called me on it. Your condescending tone of voice is not appreciated, you fictional expletive.
I chose not to say that, instead smiling and laughing along with her. Even as I joined in with her cacophony, I recognized her laugh as the thinly veiled horse laugh of belittling — three short, barking guffaws. Our supervisor was present. Out of fairness, I hesitate to characterize her motivations.
I’m sure, though, that she really doesn’t like me, and my Bokononism-motivated turn of the cheek doesn’t save me from very much disliking her, and I’m one of those guys who tends to be pretty chipper. It isn’t that hard.
All it takes is to accept the unquestionably outrageous lie that feelings are always a choice, and that one is always in complete control of one’s actions. I figured that if I could swallow that whopper, I could believe just about anything — particularly the tautologies involving honesty and best policy, how one is always personally accountable for one’s actions and that thing about turning the other cheek.
Accepting all of the above, or at least at the appearance of them, keeps me a merry sort of fellow. Outside work, it bleeds over — I don’t want to help set up the band room, but I help out, anyway. Inside work, I feel like I bleed internally — I don’t want to put up with that condescending jerk from the office, but I do, anyway.
More specifically, as far as the office knows, I don’t mind waking up at o’-dark-hundred — true, because I like deserted roads; I get along pretty well with even all the staff — false, because more than a few don’t disguise what seems to be their hate of me; I like working as much as possible — true, because I need the duckets; only infrequently have I the urge to shove timesheets down the collective throats of two or three specific photogs — very, very false.
It’s only just barely that I put up with that whole responsibility gig that comes with coming of age, because it means I have to accept secondary and tertiary responsibilities, too. If I have to put up with one more of these zarking farkwarks, though, they’ll be the straw that broke the camel’s back — I might just renounce my membership from adulthood.
If only I didn’t need those duckets.
I’ve been loosing the pursestrings a little, lately, as much as my reputation as a miser had pleased me. It’s a bit of an experiment. This has been a rather successful experiment, by any appropriate measure.
One of my new coworkers needed a ride back to the office from the school we were training at. He seemed trustworthy, and a decent sort of chap, so I gave him one.
My instinct was to charge him gas money, prices being what they are, but, for whatever reason, I swallowed the impulse. This ride was on the house.
It exponentially blossomed from there.
The next day, I forgot my wallet. He paid for my half of a Grande Meal from Taco Bell, out of the same stores of goodwill I had only a day earlier traded to him. Another day, we were about to buy a pizza, but because it turned out that he didn’t have cash, only card, I paid and shared. He needs a ride most days, so we carpool regularly. He slipped me a $20 bill the other day, without my asking, because of it.
There’s enough back-and-forth that, financially, we’re even, or close enough that I can fairly call it a wash. To boot, we’ve each gained quite a bit of goodwill, at no cost to either of us. We each genuinely like the other’s company, or have grown to.
If I kept better track of my money, — say, down to the very last nickel — I’d have fewer friends. To think: I always believed that because money can’t buy friends, it doesn’t affect them, either.
So very wrong.
