Halloween Redux

Ah, the good old days. I'm going to lapse into my "I'm turning into my Mother" mode for some nostalgic memories. Halloween. It isn't what it used to be. Last night we had three trick or treaters, none of whom we knew. The first two came by car.

When I was growing up we lived in a neighborhood where everyone knew one another and holidays such as Halloween were embraced by all who called it home. One or two nights before Halloween the older kids were allowed to go "Halloweening". They'd creep through neighborhood yards to soap windows and create other types of harmless mayhem.

It was a time when stores were not filled to the brim with elaborate costumes. We made our own. I can remember my brother getting gussied up as a black faced Aunt Jemima before it was politically incorrect. It was a hoot.

Our house was about the halfway point on our street. We had a game room in the basement so we became the midpoint warming place. Dad and my brother, when he was too old for "trick or treating", would rig our long driveway with eerie lights and fog and weird noises. Finally, into the game room to be greeted with a fireplace to warm by, fresh donuts for a final burst of energy and hot cider to ward off the chill. Mom would be there handing out the goodies, oooing and ahhhing over the cleverness of the costumes and making an elaborate game of guessing who was hiding within.

I took over my brother's spot along side Dad when he moved on to more "adult" activities. We kept it up until I too was "too old" along with the rest of the kids my brother and I grew up with. Years later, when I was working in Pittsburgh, I'd still head for home to help hand out the goodies though by then it was at the front door to unknown youngsters.

I have so many memories of those growing up years and the events that made them special. One can say they were more simple times but on reflection I think not. The folks had the same worries parents have today. How to make the pay check stretch. Was there going to be enough money for college. Were taxes going to go up. The price of groceries. The very same issues we face today.

I yearn for those days though. The folks were resourceful and resilient and not given to complaining. My brother and I were loved and protected and given every opportunity we could have wanted.

That was the American Dream. What many of us have done or not done with it has become the American Nightmare. It is said one can't go home again. That may be true. We can however learn from the past and it doesn't have to be past mistakes. It can well be from wonderful, past memories.

Our Love Hate Relationship With Sarah Palin

I laughed out loud this morning as I read Kathleen Parker's column regarding undecided voters. In it she described Sarah Palin as "the winking wonder woman of Wasilla".

It got me to thinking about how voters either love Ms. Palin or hate her. There seems to be no middle ground. Everything about her seems to be polarizing but I think there is a middle ground truth to be found.

Let's look at those who love her. Men who think she's hot! Parents of children with developmental disabilities. Staunch believers of the ideology of the Christian right. Those who see her as the girl next door who made good. She is not a "wonder woman" to them; she is "every woman".

Those who hold her in far less esteem are like me. They see someone who has done little since day one than pad her resume and hasn't made much of an effort to hide it. A woman with a modicum of raw ability and more than a modicum of ambition. One savvy enough to create an opportunity for herself yet naive enough to allow herself to be used to her own detriment. An unworldly lightweight.

The campaign has cried foul when her detractors have called her on her less than impressive credentials, especially members of her own party.

There are similar feelings about "Joe the Plumber". We either love him as an "every man" or we hate him as an opportunistic fraud.

What has caused this polarization? Where is the middle ground where each would have been met with a shrug then dismissed as a non issue? I think it's because we sense so much of ourselves in each of them. Perhaps we even recognize, through them, we have been a part of the problem in which we now find ourselves immersed.

We're not the intellectuals we'd like to think we are. We see ourselves as more important than we are. We exaggerate our strengths to minimize our weaknesses rather than facing the truth. We take to the stage for our fifteen minutes of fame whether or not it may do harm to others. It's all about us and not about us at all.

Even though the race is far closer than I'd have thought at this time, perhaps the reason Obama has been so successful is he always emphasizes it is not about himself, but about us. And perhaps the reason John McCain hasn't done better is because it always seems to be about him.

Mudslinging Ad Nauseam

If the candidates were really as horrible as their opponents would like us to believe this country would really be in big trouble. I expected fall out after the Obama "infomercial" and was not disappointed.

What I don't get, however, is how much energy is being devoted to trying to ruin the opposition rather than defending one's own positions this late in the game.

I haven't been listening to the campaign whistle stops today but did suffer through some of Hannity, and of course the headlines on the news sites. Will something finally stick in these last few days? The Aunt of Obama found in a Boston "slum"? The idea his half brother lives on the equivalent of $1 day in Kenya? That he didn't meet with his step mother, who resides in London, while on his whirlwind tour of the world? Or another association with a person of questionable repute in Fashid Khalidi, a professor of mid east studies at Columbia and a critic of Israel? Caught on tape!

You'd think that mud pit would be just about empty by now but apparently it is not. The thing that has piqued my curiosity is where was all of this during the primaries? If anyone could have unearthed this information and used it to their advantage you'd have thought the Clinton team would have done so. The Aunt was certainly in Boston at that time, the step mother in London and the half brother in Kenya.

Those terrorist associations, Ayers and Khalidi. Why is it they are professors at prestigious American universities?

Wow. Here is a man running for the Presidency of the United States because he has a vision for a nation better than what we have today. If we share that vision we will vote for him. If we don't we will vote for his opponent.

I don't buy, for one minute, that he is not a patriot because he hasn't always worn a flag pin, that elitism is some sort of fatal disease or that he is a closet Muslim with terrorist leanings.

What I do know is that he cannot bowl and probably can't field dress a moose. He is neither a rock star nor a messiah.

He's an intelligent, well educated young man with a devoted wife and two young daughters. He loves his country. He's an American.

Home at the dinner table, I don't imagine he's so very different from you or me. That's an assumption of course. I have no inside knowledge of his family dynamics. Until I do, and those of any and all associations he's had over a lifetime, I cannot judge.

I for one do not think the world as we know it will end if he is elected President. Is it not time to let that mud puddle dry out?

Presidential Pathos

This photo will probably not resonate with many of my readers. It is the forced grin McCain usually flashes after delivering an Obama put down. My readers probably don't see enough clips of McCain to realize this.

Having energy for little else then trying to beat a cold the past few days, I've seen quite a few of these on the various news shows covering campaign events. It has given me the opportunity to reflect on the rhetoric coming from both camps.

Obama has touched on substance to a degree; as much as I'd expect when trying not to provide fodder for the opposition. McCain tells me what Obama will do versus what he, McCain, will do but I have yet to hear him say how he actually intends to do anything.

The mantra has been reduced to ridiculous name calling; socialist, communist, redistributor and on and on. The stretch is so great I wonder that the whole nation hasn't tuned it out. He remains on the kick that Obama is too inexperienced and naive. I won't even go into the ranting coming from the Palin wing of the campaign other than to point out she hasn't improved her level of articulation, nor realize "Joe Mama" is not to be uttered lightly.

It seems to me McCain is accusing Obama of being a mirror image of himself as the one who doesn't "get it ". He promised to run an "honorable" campaign. What happened to it? A campaign of substance. Where is it? Oh, sure, all the policy positions can be found on the web site if one is so inclined to study them. In this age of instant gratification, it's unlikely many do.

Other than that the whole wrap up has been reduced to no more than a circus sideshow of personality bashing. It's McCain who doesn't "get it". Obama gets it just fine. That's what "change" is all about. A departure from the mudslinging and character assassination of partisan politics. An addressing of issues and ideas for solutions.

I've already voted, yet I continue to watch. Policy differences aside, an unaddressed issue is now the comportment of the candidates. Cool and composed versus hyper, bumbling, artificial and a deep seeded mean-spiritedness. There is no question in my mind which man I would rather have facing down the problems that loom before our nation.

As I have preached so often, campaign promises are only as good as the Congress in place and the circumstances of reality. They will change over the course of an administration. That is reality. Equally important to me is how the President will react to changing conditions; how willing he is to listen to advice and to alter his thinking if necessary. Wisdom. Prudence. Pragmatic.

Which candidate? To me it's a no brainer. I'm sorry the polls aren't reflecting a like minded constituency.

Is Blind Justice Also Deaf And Dumb?

This is the second time in as many years Hub has been tapped for jury duty. Last go round he was shocked to find out that no transcript was available for use during deliberations. Because of that and memory issues of the jurors the result was a hung jury.

Yesterday he was not chosen to sit on the panel but he had an equally disturbing tale to tell of the proceedings prior to jury selection. The case was a complex one. A doctor was being sued for an incident that resulted in the loss of a life. The particulars are not as important as the procedures.

Now here's Hub. A man in his sixties who has no children. Medical terminology, especially most things having to do with women, is a foreign language to him. He had never heard of the type of incident that had caused the death. Yet had his name been drawn he could have served.

He's a smart guy and would have followed the proceedings with no trouble but it would have been a definite learning curve. How many others that were chosen would have the same issue? I would guess most.

Just what exactly is a jury of one's peers anyway? Would it be people who had the same experience or members of the medical community with a different point of view? Certainly members of the public that have no idea of what's being discussed shouldn't qualify. But they do. They have to. There are only so many potential jurors to go around. It certainly puts a tremendous burden on the prosecution to prove beyond a reasonable doubt!

Once empaneled jurors seem to take their task quite seriously, as well they should, but I wonder at there not being a transcript available for reference. Even with avid note taking by individual members of the jury, what they think they heard may vary from member to member.

Take me. I can't sit for long periods because of back pain. I'd be spending more time fidgeting to find a position of comfort than I would listening, what's more concentrating. I don't hear so well any more. My eyes aren't what they used to be. If a detail was sticky I'd sure want that transcript to rely on for accuracy.

They keep raising the age and shortening the time between service for jury duty in this area. While I know many who have lived here far longer than we have never been called, we have several times over. Random selection so we've been told. I'll accept that premise with reluctance. I would guess they rely on retirees to a great extent because the five to ten dollars a day they pay doesn't make up for a much needed day's pay for a bread winner, small business owner or the self-employed.

All that being said, trial by jury is a right. I just think the jurors should be given all the help possible to reach a fair and just verdict. Having a transcript of the proceedings available should be a given.