We're Back and We're Running

Well, I’m back.

Yes, I know that a two and a half year leayoff is a bit much. I offer no apologies, but maybe a bit of an explanation.

I guess after the election, I was a bit burned out. We got busy with other things. I remember reading once that someone said “I allow the world to live as it chooses, and I allow me to live as I choose.”

So I started ignoring the world at large, just paying attention to my little piece of it. Living at the farm made hiding out easy.

A few months later, we lost our beloved Pomeranian Icarus. We called him “Icky”, and it fit. I’ve never been so affected by a pet nor more devastated by one’s loss.

So we withdrew a little further into the farm life.

Sadly, we had a visitor just a few months later. Her name was Katrina, and the world got turned upside down. We got only cosmetic damage at the farm, but our world’s changed forever.

She taught me how little I understand about some things. I thought I understood some things in history, but I was wrong. I thought I understood the Depression, World War II and other times. But to me it was just an intellectual exercise. I didn’t live it every hour of every day. I can comprehend, or sympathize, or empathize. But I’ll never understand.

And neither can those who haven’t been here this last year and a half.

For us, it’s been a roller coaster ride. We’ve had a few decent ups, and some of the deepest downs of our lives.

With all that going on, I’d love to have stayed in hiding. But sadly, the world finds its way in.

There’s now a house being built on the property across the road, our road got paved, and there’s a new subdivision going in up at the highway. There’s even a new Wal-Mart in town as of last July.

They said if you built a better mousetrap, the world would beat a path to your door. I tried building the worst one, but they still came. So I’ve got to deal with the world, I can’t just run away from it.

So I’ve been listening to the news more, reading more. And the old problems came back.

The reason I write is because the world doesn’t make sense. Everybody up in arms about Anna Nicole Smith’s death. Does this make sense? I didn’t know her personally, never saw her movies, or layouts, and only saw her TV show (reluctantly) with the wife once.

There are so many important things to cover, and our society fixates on such drivel. This is just one small example.

Politics is just loaded with nonsense. And it just makes me want to stand up and shout “Does anyone actually believe this tripe?”

But standing and shouting is likely to get you arrested as a nut job. So I wrote instead.

The world won’t let me live as I choose. So now I return to write once again, and blog.

II’ll probably not change the world. Or even change a mind. But If it won’t leave me alone, I’ll just stand and tilt at the windmills. At least I’ll have stood for something, and I’ll go down swinging.

So what will we discuss? There are so many things weighing on my mind. Immigration. Iraq. Taxes. Global warming. Katrina response. Election Reform. Racial issues. Leaving the Republican party

These sounded like planks in a political platform when I thought about them. Since I need to write about them anyway, why not make them a platform for real.

So I’ve decided to run for President of these United States in 2008.

But why?

Once there was a movie called “Network”. The main character had a meltdown and got everyone to shout out their window “I’m mad as hell and I won’t take it anymore”.

In one MASH episode, Alan Alda described a hero as being too tired/cold/hungry to care anymore.

These days, I’m just mad at the senselessness of modern society and politics, and tired enough of it to not care about the consequences.

And Away We Go.....

I ‘m not going to be your traditional candidate. No conventions, I won’t kiss babies, no private jet.

Instead I’m going to run from blogosphere. I’ll be (with no research to back this up) the first to mount a candidacy purely from cyberspace. So basically I’ll write my ideas as they dribble from my head.

To start things off, any candidacy must make campaign promises.

I promise to be as articulate as George Bush 43. I’ll be less aloof than Kerry. I promise to have worse hair and a smaller house than John Edwards. I’ll try to keep my Flip-Flops on my feet and not in my mouth. I promise to never jump on Oprah’s couch.

I promise to have fewer affairs than Kennedy or Clinton. And If I break that, I promise they’ll at least be as attractive as Kennedy’s. If I break the affairs promise, I promise to have a nice sedate state funeral, and to leave a signed Presidential pardon for my wife.

I promise to not try to look cool in a silly looking suit. I promise to annoy France. Hell, just speaking English does that, so I’ve fulfilled my first promise!!

I promise to never read polls and decide an issue with that basis. I promise to have Air Force One do a buzz job on the farm. (sorry neighbors, but that would be SO cool.!!)

But above all, I promise to speak my mind and speak plainly. No legalese, no spin, no parsing. I won’t debate what the meaning if “is” is. With no offense to American agriculture, we have an overabundance of bullshit here. I won’t speak it and I won’t tolerate it. And that, I promise you, will piss off Washinton something fierce.

The Naked Emperor