Oh-bomb-uh

Before we head too far down the overgrown path of my psycho-sexual (emphasis on psycho, definitely not on sexual) life, let's recap for a moment (and analyze ad nauseam) that very American, summertime reality show, The Race for the White House.

And what a jaw-dropping, mind-boggling, space-time-continuum-imploding series of episodes we sat through this week!

We saw the first African-American man nominated for president by a major party. We witnessed a Kennedy (Teddy, to be specific) rise from the dead (rather than leaving someone for dead) to inflict his has-been family's legacy upon the Democrats once more. Next up, we beheld the Republicans make a bold move and nominate their first female vice president--none other than Designing Women's Suzanne Sugarbaker. (Former beauty queen, fond of guns and right-wing politics--all that's missing is the pet pig and Consuela the maid. You tell me the difference.)

And, finally, we saw the nation's first major-party presidential candidate make an equally bold move by doing the exact opposite of all popular expectation--ignoring his experienced, well-known female opponent and choosing instead as his running mate the most boring, ineffectual white guy in American politics (after Joe Lieberman), none other than the Delaware (Dream) Destroyer, Joe Biden.

Wow! The Nielsen's must be through the stratosphere.

I won't even attempt to cover all these topics in this one posting--there aren't enough bytes in the universe, and my attention span isn't that good to begin with. So I will instead just try to focus on one (or two) topics at a time, leaving further snide comments about those damned Kennedys and Miss Half-Baked Alaska 1977 for another day, another entry.

* * *

To say I was majorly underwhelmed and grandly disappointed by Barack Obama's choice for vice president doesn't even begin to explain the depths of depression I experienced upon hearing the news while visiting family on the Cote d'Kansas last weekend. For you see, I fear that this choice for veep was a fatal mistake, that by ignoring Hillary Clinton's supporters in favor of the same ol' same ol'--an old-line, ineffectual, establishment white guy from the Northeast, Barack and Company have just cost the Democrats the election in the fall.

I hope I'm wrong. After all, my track record at picking presidents is spotty at best, famously thinking that Mondale stood a chance of beating Reagan in 1984. However, I can't help but think that in one amazingly bone-headed move, the Candidate for Change and the fresh-from-life support Democratic Party just did a political 180, reverting to type, sticking with the tried and the torpid, and have thus ruined for all of us any chance at a speedy retreat from Iraq, the provision of universal healthcare, the development of a decent social safety net, and an earnest focus on global warming and alternate sources of energy.

Moreover, I am concerned that the Democrats, through their amazing ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory at every turn, have resigned us all to more greed, more social conservatism, more polarizing national discourse, and perhaps worst of all, the sort of Ice Princess glamour that can only be proffered by a beer-distributing heiress from Arizona.

I think the Dems owe us all big time for these indignities. They not only ruined our weekend; they may well have sacrificed our lamby little lives for at least another four to eight years.

* * *

Unfortunately, it was never as simple as choosing Hillary for V.P.--although perhaps it should have been. It was a lengthy, hard-fought, and somewhat nasty battle through the primaries, and perhaps those wounds, mistrusts, and jealousies don't heal easily, even (or especially) among the Statecraft Class. Plus there is so much baggage with the Clintons, as big-mouthed Bill Clinton seemed to want to remind us of at every turn, despite his wife's and the country's best interests otherwise.

Still, if you can't let bygones be bygones within your own party, how they heck are you going to make peace in the Middle East?

But American Tourister aside, 18 million votes and a delegate count that was on par with or (with Michigan and Florida in full and fair play) exceeded that of Obama's should have been extremely hard--if not, what? illegal? unethical? impractical?--to ignore.

Yet ignored it was. In favor of . . . Joe Biden, of all things. The beige carpeting, pressed wood paneling, and dingy Laz-e-boy recliner in the national basement rumpus room known as the U.S. Senate. What a world, what a freakin' world.

While in some corners, Obama is widely derided for being a good speechmaker and little else, I think the power of making a good speech--that is, empowering people through leadership--should not be so easily dismissed. Still, in practical terms, he does lack a great deal of national and international experience. (He's only a year older than I am, after all, and I have enough trouble figuring out international electrical currents and small appliance plugs.) It's a fair complaint, and, all in all, I'd feel more comfortable with him if he'd done a Hillary and not a John Edwards and bothered to finish out one or two terms in the Senate, rather than using the first term as a launchpad for national and international stardom.

Granted, the critique of experience is unevenly applied. Bill Clinton had little national or international experience prior to becoming president, as most certainly did George Dubya--although, admittedly, summoning the specter of the Doofus of the Century is hardly a pro statement in favor of winging it and learning on the job.

So I understand the necessity for Joe Biden, as opposed to, say, Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius--a savvy politico but one without national recognition (yet)--but I can't get excited over the prospects of a Joe Biden anywhere near the White House either. What does Biden bring to the table other than a too many years of service in the same job? Three electoral votes from Delaware? Wouldn't those have more than likely gone to Obama anyway? Old-line liberal Dem voters from the East and Midwest? Again, likely to support Obama regardless. Women voters? Western and Southern voters? Bitter, working-class Pennsylvania voters? Not bloody likely on any of the three counts.

And exactly what experience, what accomplishments, does ol' Non-Smokin' Joe bring to the table? Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock--time's up! Exactly. As last Sunday's political pundits waxed on about the Joe-you-don't-know, regaling us with tales of his Pennsylvania roots, the death of his first wife and child, and his daily rail commute from his home in Delaware to Washington, D.C., all I could focus on was this--if Ol' Joe is so effective a leader in the Senate, then why, after nearly four decades of commuting via Amtrak, is Amtrak such a steaming pile of caca as a national transportation system?

Thus, without a bold move--like selecting Hillary Clinton for veep, or maybe someone like Madeleine Albright (part of the Clinton legacy but not one necessarily tainted or ruined by it)--one that takes into account the more conservative nature of this nation (and I'm not sure selecting Hillary would have done that), the political disenfranchisement that I know many outside the Northeast feel (and I'm not convinced selecting Madeleine Albright would have accomplished that either but a Kathleen Sebelius or Janet Napolitano might), and one that recognizes the strongly motivated faction that Hillary represents--I'm just not sure November will bring about the changes that we all say we crave and which, whether we realize it or not, we desperately need.

* * *

Just because I have been massively depressed over the prospect of the likes of Joe Biden one heartbeat away from the presidency, doesn't mean that my family and I haven't been able to find some humor in these happenings. It is indeed a case of should we laugh or cry? I've attempted to do the former, at least a little, even though I really have wanted to do the latter to anyone who will listen.

Lucky you.

The first funny for me was the acclaim that Joe Biden's nomination seemed to engender among the news media--with the lone exception of a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle who flatly stated, "Joe Biden came in fifth in Iowa--how is this going to help anyone?"

Honestly, who knew people in San Francisco were that aware?

From the pro-Biden-nomination camp, my favorite accolade came from CNN's Candy Crowley, who remarked that Biden was an excellent choice because he is "beloved" by Pennsylvanians, apparently because he hails from Scranton and lived there until he was aged 10 or so.

Ah, Scranton. The Dunder-Mifflin of American cities.

So I guess your argument is as goes Pennsylvania, so goes the nation? Oh, Candy, be careful what you wish for.

Look, I know we Pennsylvanians are 10 million strong--and there must be at least double that number that fled the state and reside elsewhere now, chiefly in Florida. Nevertheless, I kinda don't think the Keystone State represents the national zeitgeist. Maybe the Northeast and Midwest zeitgeist (maybe), but there are several million more people and 30 or more states scattered around this country. Being that most Americans outside of Pennsylvania still envision our Commonwealth as a decaying, industrial rustbucket with miserable weather (none of which is really true anymore, at least, in the case of the former, if you don't leave Pittsburgh's East End or stick to Philadelphia's Main Line, and at least, in the case of the latter, for six months out of the year), I can't trust that the rest of America is in sync with this particular state of independence.

And if it is, then as a nation, we're all far worse off than we ever imagined.

Furthermore, regarding the "native son" factor, I can truthfully say that in my four years living in Pennsylvania, I've never once heard anyone mention Joe Biden's name, let alone tell me how much they love him. Hell, no one even talks about Snarlin' Arlen Specter, and he's been one of our U.S. senators since at least before Cher's first farewell tour.

Governor (and heavyweight Hillary supporter) Ed Rendell, check. Senator (and middleweight Barack supporter) Bob Casey, check. Even that right-wing asswipe, former Senator Rick Santorum, check. All mentioned.

But Joe Freakin' Biden? Un-unh.

Still, that "beloved by Pennsylvanians" comment struck me funny and rather inspired me to think about the ways that Pennsylvanians might have paid homage to Joe Biden, if only they'd remembered him from the ten years that he lived in state.

For example . . .

• Being that it takes less than 6 hours to drive from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia but nearly 9 hours to travel via Amtrak the same distance--which you can do only twice a day in either direction--the Keystone Limited could be renamed the "Biden Our Time." Very Limited.

• Or if Joe decided to drive the distance in one of his many motor tours of the Commonwealth, apple-cheeked residents bedecked in our traditional state costumes of lederhosen and dirndl skirts might shower his limousine with freshly made scrapple and pierogies as he wends his way along the Pennsylvania Turnpike. (Scrapple in the east, pierogies in the west, maybe some chicken-and-waffles in between.)
  

• Or perhaps up in State College, once the snowpack melts, it could finally be revealed that Joe's visage had been carved into the face of Mount Nittany.

• Or possibly birds on their migrations north and south could spontaneously fly in formation, organizing themselves into a flight pattern resembling Joe's profile, the whole while vowing not to crap all over the countryside, at least until they made it as far as New York or Maryland.

• Or maybe here in Pittsburgh, they could resurrect plans to construct the Colossus of Steeltown--the oft-delayed, 1,000-foot high, fully nude sculpture of our beloved Joe straddling the confluence of the Three Rivers. Patterned after one of Jean-Claude Van Damme's famed mid-air splits, Joe's left leg could stretch to Mount Washington, his right to the top of Heinz Field, and his rather optimistically endowed nether regions cast a shadow somewhere over Point Park. Triple X marks the spot.
  

What? Too much? Not enough?

Hey, it's this or I tell you how my Mom, sis, and brother spent the weekend comparing the current crop of presidential and vice presidential contenders to regular cast members and bit players on The Andy Griffith Show.

In short, we concluded that Joe Biden was either dull-as-dishwater civil servant Howard Sprague or possibly community goofball Floyd the Barber. We were more sure about John McCain, who is most definitely inveterate rock-thrower Ernest T. Bass at the moment when Andy and Barney tried to clean up his act and make him presentable to Mayberry society. Suit, tie, improved diction, but still, it didn't take, and he was back to throwing rocks by the end of the episode.

We drew the line, though, when a friend of the family suggested that George Bush was best represented by town drunk, Otis Campbell. We thought that was too extreme a critique--the comparison defames town drunks everywhere.

Damn you, Anderson Cooper

Yes, yes, I know already--I haven't written in a while. Got the message, got the call, got the point! Here, on this lovely Labor Day Weekend, as I sit home alone with my cat and my canary, I'll try to make up for my lack of words.

Oh, you've definitely been forewarned . . .

* * *

It's somewhat pathetic then that my first post in a month's time should be about none other than my former crush, Anderson Cooper, that pasty, prematurely gray, adventure junkie-slash-news puppet who works for CNN but occasionally (and quite bizarrely, I might add) subs for Regis Philbin on Live with Regis and Kelly Lee.

Is this a trend? Having the highly overqualified sub for the mysteriously popular ailing or vacationing celeb? Can we expect Twyla Tharp to pinch hit for Britney Spears when she fluffs her next MTV Awards dance routine? Doctor Ruth Westheimer to stand in for Kim Kardashian the next time she fails to show up for a sex tape audition? Michael Phelps to announce that the show must go on when Lance Bass sprains an ankle on the upcoming season of Dancing with the Stars? And, finally, to completely (yet symbolically, PETA) flog a dead horse, when the Jonas Brothers' tour bus gets stuck in some Partridge Family-like hiccup in the rural Midwest, will anxious and overwrought tween girls at the Iowa State Fair that evening here these immortal words over the loudspeaker at the Corn Palace . . . ? "Ladies and gentleman, I present you with the Jonas Brothers' understudy band--Philip Glass, Steve Reich, and Arvo Pärt!" With maybe Pennsylvania's own Glenn Branca thrown in, 'cause he can keep a good beat?

No? Sigh. What I wouldn't give to be at *that* concert though, if for no other reason than to see Philip Glass ripped to ribbons by hysterical tween groupies.

And therein lies one of the reasons Anderson got out my car (not a Saab 9.3 canary yellow convertible it turns out, but a silver Mini Cooper) and into my dreams again--before going to bed last night, I was relaxing with some soup, that is, The Soup, formerly Talk Soup, the E! Channel program, which samples clips from a wide variety of TV shows and media events and pokes fun at them. Sometimes it's a little mean, but most of the time, it's quite hilarious, in a schadenfreudian "I love seeing celebrities suffer" kind of way. And who doesn't enjoy that?

The Soup showed a clip of Anderson with Kelly Ripa talking about some celebutards (I think it was the low-hand Lohans this time), with Anderson sagely pointing out that he felt himself unknowingly drawn into the story of these stupid, trashy people (or words to that effect). That's my Anderson, at least he's good at getting to the heart of the matter. Too bad he is so unironic as to realize that's how many of us felt hearing about the life of his mother, heiress and jeans slinger, Gloria Vanderbilt. Oh those camera-mugging, cash-trashing Knickerbockers . . .

So already we have the hypnotic suggestion close to bed time, "Remember the Anderson!" soon followed by a cry from--Jesus H. Christ--Neil Patrick Harris of all people to "Remember the 'Mo!" As it were.

For you see, earlier that same day, I had picked up a copy of Pittsburgh's Out, our horrible, horrible, horrible monthly gay newspaper, which as far as I can tell, does not so much cover the G/L/B/T/Q/?/W(hatever) news in our fair 'Burgh as serve as a sort of bar rag chronicle of who was out (get it!?) and about at various Pittsburgh socials, drag shows, nightclubs, and dear god in heaven help us, bathhouses.

Please note, should I ever be photographed in a gay male bathhouse enjoying "foam night" on the rooftop deck with a gaggle of scantily clad faggles, do drive a stake through my heart, shoot me with a silver bullet, decorate your house with garlic pot pourri pronto. 'Cause clearly I'm already gone and am now only a zombie-like, blood (or whatever)-sucking shell of my former sentient, shy self.

Which, of course, means, now that I've said it, that a) by the time I'm 50, such a photo will turn up in the pages of Out, b) I'll try to write an article for Out but be rejected because of c) the existence or lack of existence of such a photo, and/or d) the existence of this blog critique. Naturally, the article will be returned to me with the words "horrible, horrible, horrible" scrawled over the cover sheet. Because that's the kind of postmodern gal I am.

And, yes, e) all of the above is a valid guess.

Anyway . . . and I do have a point here and a story to tell . . . there is one regular feature in Out, "Quote Unquote" that features, as best as I can discern, gay people and their hags making fools of themselves in the media. A case in point, this quote from (Sir) Ian McKellen:

My own death threats have declined considerably. I think I've become rather boring now to the public at large on this [gay] issue so I'm thought to be unremarkable.

Oh, Ian, you just don't get it, do you? You are boring and unremarkable to the public at large because you're a navel-gazing, scenery-chewing douchebag. Jeez, to thine own self be true, Hammy-let.

Or this one from San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom:

I don't have much patience--particularly for people in my party, the Democratic Party--that are arguing for [civil unions for gay people] as somehow equal. That's not audacity. That's not authenticity. That's not about conviction. That's about accommodation and political posturing. And I'm done with that.

Well, you're not quite done with that, Gav. I mean, you're a politician: Posturing is in your blood. Goodness gracious, Mitt Romney as governor of liberal Massachusetts supported gay marriage at one point, and you see how that turned out when he ran for national office, don't you?

And then there's this quote from Doogie Howser, which got the dream ball rolling along a little further last night:

Mmmmmmmm. Anderson [Cooper]. He's dreamy. Just dreamy. I've been a fan of his since Season 1 of The Mole. I just thought he was so cool when he talked in this cool, low, secret-agent voice--'If you can accomplish this task . . . .'

Firstly, Anderson Cooper hosted The Mole?!?! Just how desperate was this guy to get noticed way back when? And, wow, I never realized that Doogie was still a 14-year-old dweeb; I thought he was older than that by now, even though he does certainly talk like one. Dreamy, indeed.

And that's pretty much what got the dream wheel turning last night. And the dream went something like this . . .

[Insert wavy TV image and trance-like music here]

Somehow I ended up in Baltimore, in a working class, rowhouse neighborhood (why I couldn't stay for that in Pittsburgh, I haven't a clue), at a family party of sorts. Whose family, I don't exactly know. It wasn't mine, and it certainly wasn't some Vanderbilt shindig. The weather was lovely, early September, sunny, and pleasant, so the party was held outdoors. There was potato salad and cole slaw and burgers and hot dogs and nary a morsel of tofu or seitan to be sniffed or suffered. Real food, real imaginary people.

Anderson Cooper accompanied me to the party, and I introduced him to the family who resembled something less than the freaks in a John Waters' movie and more like those out of Tyler Perry's Madea's Family Reunion, except that there were white people at the party and maybe only 10 or 15 or so, not a Cecil B. DeMille (or Demented) cast of thousands.

Then Anderson and I ended up in the back of a limousine (now, now) as it traveled across the Brooklyn Bridge (of course), talking with one another, sitting close, and enjoying the conversation and the growing physical and emotional warmth between the two of us. Our hands kept touching each other, and at one point, I enveloped his in mine, as we continued to talk. Before long, though, he stealthily removed his hand from my grasp, because, don't you know, even in my dreams, guys don't commit.

Suddenly, once again, we were back in Baltimore, around the corner from the party, talking to some other neighbors and wondering why a little boy covered in mud was trying to crawl through a doggie door to get back into his house. I invited the neighbors to join the party and walked back around the corner, holding hands with Anderson and a young hausfrau from the 1950s, ready to introduce them to the family matriarch.

And then, as they say, I woke up, Pam Ewing.

I should add, too, that other than the pasty Anderson and the neighbor lady, I had a hard time discerning who was black and who was white in the dream. It kind of kept changing, in fact. Why it should matter, well, I leave that to you psychology majors and minors in the reading public to dissect and reflect. All I will say further on that particular point is that it wouldn't be a dream of mine without a celebrity, some sexual and social discomfort, and at least one mode of transportation.

Make of that what you will.

* * *

None of this should imply that I still have a crush on Anderson Cooper. Yes, I did once, but that was right after I met him and before I saw him cry one too many times on national TV over god knows what. I don't mind a man that cries, mind you, and Hurricane Katrina was a horrible, horrible, horrible travesty that we've yet to deal with in any meaningful way. But, really, Anderson, no one, post-Regis and Kelly, is buying the tears anymore.

Besides, Anderson never bothered to track me down, get my number, start calling me at all hours of the night, and showing up at my workplace or home at inappropriate times--all things I would have done for him (and done quite well!). So why should I bother further with him?

Yes, you students of psychology, while there's no more to the dream, there's always more to the story. But it's a long holiday weekend. Best to pace myself.