Which way do we swing, if we swing together at all?

     One of the less attractive traits of humanity is how fast the pack mentality takes over when a little malice is introduced.
     Trolls are the electronic version of the dog pack.
     Only an alpha dog will move in and risk getting hurt when it attacks a prey, but any old coward in the pack will sneak in and bite once the quarry is down, or on the run.
     You see it all the time among teens, because they're not quite grown up but they've lost most of their innocence. In order to be a part of some crowd, they'll join in to find their place in the pecking order if another teen becomes the target of exclusion or ridicule. It can escalate into actual physical violence, but the psychological damage can be enough to change lives.
     Most religions teach some variation of compassion for the downtrodden, but compassion is the first to go among the low in self-esteem, the greedy, the narcissistic and the downright mean-spirited.
     A man I respect passed along an email prior to the election that I passed along in turn. It made the point that regardless of the names of those running for particular offices, the real candidates are followers on one of two philosophies: Adam Smith, who said government has a duty to help the less fortunate, or Ayn Rand, who proselytized that only the strong and ruthless should survive. Smith saw a Higher Being as work in us; Rand sneered at the idea of Godliness.
      Selfless or selfish. Close, but souls apart in definition.
      I remain convinced that the public conscience will swing back to some degree of moderation between those two extremes -- but that presupposes that we are, collectively, more like Smith and less like Rand, who did not even acknowledge any virtue in collectiveness, which includes, I suppose, elections.

Too much information, not enough comprehension

     Ben Bradlee died this week. He was one of the kings of what we once knew as journalism. He made sure that two frisky young reporters got their facts right -- well, mostly right -- before he allowed them to put the credibility of the Washington Post on the line to run stories that would eventually lead to the resignation of a President.
     Like most good editors, he would send the story back to the reporters and say, "You need more facts."
    Yeah, we actually used to do that. Try to get it right.
    Now you can get your news in more ways more often from more sources than any time in history.
     But that doesn't mean you will be any better informed. In fact, you may just be more confused, because the purveyors of information have fewer gatekeepers, editors, challengers and -- in many cases, ethics -- than before.
     Anybody can write or say anything about anything or anyone at any time, all the time, any where, and not even have to put their name on it, and people will read it.
     The wilder it is, the more some will believe it, and even those who are skeptical will still pass it on with a keystroke to others on their email list.
     I liked it better when you had to sign your name -- your real name, not some fantasy tag -- to what you purport to be a statement of fact.
     As for responsibility or ethics, the only justification needed for slander or an outright lie is, "I'm entitled to my opinion."
     Of course you are, but sign your name to it.
     I'm not convinced that even that would put the genie back in the bottle in this, the Misinformation Age.
    It's bad enough to be ignorant, but it's worse to be proud of it. Ignorance plus pride is enough to begin a new political cult.
    Maybe it's just the thing for a population that seems to believe in little besides winning an argument.
   
    

It's in the news ......

    FENCE JUMPERS

     Another guy jumps the White House fence.
     Note to fence-jumpers: The Secret Service has been embarrassed and is ticked off, and they have dogs. Do not jump the White House fence.
     Go jump the fence at the nearest maximum security facility. You'll know it by the razor wire. Jump in and see what a real challenge is like....

     As for why the story about the original jumper changed over several days, my theory is that like everything else, the SS now has marketing people who want to weigh in and make sure the best image is put out there. It would be impolitic to mention that the guy got as far as he did unless it could be no longer denied.
     Then they had to deal with the fact that an agent did encounter the trespasser, but was overcome by the bad guy.
     Then they had to admit the agent that was overcome was female, which someone might consider a politically incorrect topic.
     So they got more dogs.

     Maybe the Homeland Security folks could guard the fence at the White House and pretend that the jumpers are trying to board an airplane to go to Disneyworld.
     And put bomb-sniffing dogs at the airports.

 A ROSE IS A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME
   
  Polls in Kentucky show that most state residents hate "Obamacare" but they love the state's new health care plan. When it was disclosed that the state health care plan IS "Obamacare" by another name, there was silence from the Right.
     The same silence you hear when it is pointed out that "Obamacare" is really Romneycare -- former GOP presidential candidate who pushed the health plan through Massachusetts when he was governor. Same plan, essentially, different name.
     These people vote.

SERIOUSLY?
 
  More people will die because parents refuse to have their kids inoculated against measles, whooping cough and other "old" diseases than will die because of the ebola virus -- even in Africa.
The story made the news once or twice, backed up by science and officialdom, but the media continues to scream headlines about another person with a fever passing through an airport near you.
      To regain your perspective, if not your sanity, read a good book for a day or so.

WE LEAD BY EXAMPLE

   A shooter gets into the government house in Canada and people in that country can't imagine how it could happen there. They had only five murders in Ottawa in the past year.
     Here in the U. S. we might be at the point where we have forgotten the name of another school shot up this week in -- where was it this time?

The image reflects the message

     Just about the time I think this board of commissioners cannot stoop to a new low, they prove me wrong.
     Previous commissioners and candidates for office have let it be known they do not support the expansion of mass transit to and from the Baltimore area. But this is the first time I know of that they have tried to make it official.
    It's one of the questions I got when I ran: Will you keep us out of the Baltimore metro plans for mass transit? The implication is that if you build it THEY will come.
   You know, Those People.
   We have this image around the state for being a bit of an isolationist county. Many new residents have even said, in effect, now that they have moved to Carroll County, you can burn the bridges and pull up the drawbridge and make sure the moat around us if filled with alligators -- or the NRA.
   It's so prevalent that the working title for my novel, What Price Eden, was Fortress County. That was a term that I used in remarks before the metropolitan transportation council in Baltimore as a new commissioner back in 2003 or '04.
    They were surprised I attended. A few said the only thing they heard from Carroll County was NO when it came to working with other metro area counties on long-term plans for the future of commuting to and from jobs in the Baltimore/DC corridor. Or for workers to get to jobs in Carroll County.
    I ran into a young African American woman at the University of Maryland who said she turned down a great job offer from Western Maryland (the name of McDaniel at the time) because everybody she knew said this was Klan country.
    A young black student who interned for me when I was editor of a local paper turned down my offer of a job for the same reason -- and he grew up here.
    I know, I know, it's not the color, it's the criminal element that locals want to keep out. We're not racists, right?
    When I hear someone say that a rail line or bus routes bring criminals to rob us and then return to Baltimore, I point out that most of the criminal charges I see in the paper are filed against locals, and they're white and under-educated and virtually unemployable. Many are drug addicts.
    We have an image problem.
    When you're looking in the mirror before leaving for that job in Hunt Valley or Howard County, consider that the nice outfit or hairdo is what you see, but others see something else.
    Your elected officials are the face of all of us around the state. Their words are how we are known.

Ferguson story is a lesson to us all

   Only about 12 percent of the registered voters in Ferguson, MO., voted in their last election.
   Now, after who knows how many trumped up charges that produce fines to keep tax rates down in the suburban St. Louis community, and the death of a young black man -- some would say another death of a young black man -- people have taken to the street to demand more say in how the town is run.
   Good for them. Take charge of your own town, send the bad cops packing, change the leadership, participate, campaign, debate, get engaged, back a plan and vote. Then stay up on things and speak out, write letters to the editor or, if you have to, start your own news letter and walk copies door to door.
   Better that walking down the street after the disaster.
    Then all the spectators, including the gluttonous media, can go find another source of entertainment.
    If you think it can't happen where you live, sit back, don't give a hoot who runs for office or how those who do administer everything from public contracts to public safety, and you, too, can become a victim of those who will step into any situation that can be exploited for their own power and wealth.

You need to wonder who said what

     I saw a letter to the editor the other day that praised the virtues of an incumbent county commissioner in ways that suggests the politician has influenced the writer to the extent that you might wonder who wrote it.
     It starts off with an assertion -- the commissioner is very assertive; obnoxiously so, in my opinion -- that what follows are irrefutable facts. It continues in the way of engineers and other linear thinkers to set forth opinions.
    Also, like the politician to which the facts are attributed, it sets forth the opinions in numerical list form. First, Second, Third -- like that.
    Also, the facts are stated in such a way as to discredit not only the position of an adversary, but the critic, in a personal way.
    It's classic propaganda speak, such as has elevated this politician and made him the darling of shallow thinking followers (see how that works? That's a sample of what I said in the previous sentence, but at least I'm not being devious about it).
    You've noticed I have not mentioned the name of the politician -- or the writer defending him. The letter writer, assuming he wrote the letter, was exercising his right to freedom of speech. As for the subject of all this, I prefer to quote Samuel Johnson, who said, "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."

Too many choices add to life's stress

   I am in the toothpaste aisle of the grocery store having a meltdown moment.
   All I want is a toothbrush. Simple hand-held thing with bristles that you shove around inside your chow-funnel to clean the debris and keep the dentist from lecturing you at your next scheduled cleaning.
   I have a coupon that I clipped out of the Sunday paper. Sensodyne toothbrush, so much off, and I don't even have to buy three.
   But I have run into a wall of toothbrush choices, and I am paralyzed by indecision.
   Do I want hard, medium or soft bristles? Pick-tip, whatever that means?
   Remember when all you had to do was choose between red, white, green or blue?
   Now they come with racing stripes. More color combinations on one toothbrush than a car painted in a Tijuana chop shop.
    Do I want a battery powered, electrified, or manual shift?
    I can have a Wave, a Zig-Zag, flat-head, tapered, gum-massager, side-picker, over the shoulder, upside down, inside out -- the choices are endless.
    And I can have the store brand, two or other off-brands, an Oral B or anything except, it seems, the Sensodyne for which I have a coupon.
    Let's move on to the case where they sell ice, where I have a choice between a big bag or a small one, with large cubes or cocktail crush.
    Which reminds me that  a scotch would go well right now.

Post office doors sound like the inner sanctum

    You can actually hear the effects of government budget cuts as you enter the Westminster Post Office.
     Push the button and the automatic doors slowly, grudgingly, moaning and groaning, screeching and dragging will open to allow you entry to -- well, there was a radio show back in the day called, The Inner Sanctum, and it was designed to scare the pants off listeners.
     That's what the post office sounds like -- The Inner Sanctum.  All we need is the voice of a zombie saying, "Welcome...to the inner sanctum. Beware, all who enter here!"
     What I wonder is, how do the postal employees stand it, hearing the screeeeeech, ssshhhhh, klunkkkity screech every time the doors open. Then the patrons leave, and it's like, all over again.
     Some scientists out there say that repeated exposure to loud noise can make people crazy -- that's not a recognized medical translation, but you know what I mean.
     If certain people I know of worked there, they would fix the doors. They'd have to, because somebody -- not me, myself, you understand -- would sacrifice an old truck to create a drive in situation about 3 a.m.
     What would happen if a thousand letters showed up on elected officials' desks containing a recording of the noise at the PO? With an invitation to spend a day greeting constituents just inside?
    Somebody would grease something, you can betcha.

Griping about baseball's drift

   If I sound a little befuddled it's because I am trying to stay up late to watch the baseball playoffs.
   If God wanted baseball games to run four hours plus, He would have called it golf.
   Four minutes for commercials and network hype between every half inning adds up to the average length of a baseball game in the 1950s, the last time the game was true blue.
   I like watching baseball, but there is no way I could sit in a ballpark seat for four hours. And no way I could stand in line to use the bathrooms every two innings.
   At home, I can nap during the 45 pitches that get fouled off on a 3-2 count, get a snack up in the kitchen, make a soda pop run to the fridge in the garage, make a potty break and if I miss anything, I can catch the play on one of the 23 replays they will run over the next five minutes (except during commercials; they never run replays during commercials).
   While I'm grumping, can I just say the game would also be faster if players were not allowed to wear batting gloves and various forms of body armor at the plate? It wouldn't be so bad if they'd just show up with the batting gloves, but they have to adjust the gloves, both of them, after every pitch, which requires that they step out of the batting box, look around, fidget, and do it all over again.
   Then they also have to adjust their shin protector, elbow or bicep protector, and whatever other protector that they deem out of place before the pitcher gets the sign for the next pitch. By that time, I'm thinking about getting into my Doctor Dentons.
   I'm not finished: Can we leave our jewelry collection at home, please? If you wear the good stuff on the ball field, what do you have left for the Grand Ball?
   And it's not Halloween all year, so get rid of the lumberjack beards, buccaneer moustaches and  pirate tattoos.
   It's a ball game, not a costume party.

Artwork speaks to values that are for sale

     Some politico once said of opponents on a spending bill in the legislature, "They're voting against it now, but when the ribbon-cutting takes place, they'll be in the front of the line for pictures."
     That was the truest thing I ever heard a politician say. But exceptions test the rule.
     Case in point was the occasion of the unveiling of Toby Mendez' magnificent addition to the Mary Lou Dewey Sculpture Park at the Westminster branch of the Carroll County Library Friday.
     During the "speechifying" part of the public reception, some the usual political suspects were there, representing state, county and city government, but his colleagues left it to District 3 representative Dave Roush to speak for the board of commissioners. Commissioner Doug Howard stood to the side, but at least he showed up. Robin Frazier and Richard Rothschild did not. They'd probably tell you that this was happening in Roush's district, but that didn't keep them from horning in on meetings that Haven Shoemaker and Howard were having in their districts when there was an opportunity to pound on a podium for less spending, less gov'mint.
     Roush said nice things about the library and the dedicated people who work there, and about how the Main Street location was good for business and the overall community, and how it was an example of what you have when volunteers work together.
   Then Sandy Oxx, executive director of the Carroll Arts Council and vice chair of the state arts council, brought a check for $5,000, made possible by Gov. Martin O'Malley and the state legislature, which is dominated by -- shhhhh -- Democrats.
    Money talks, that other stuff walks.
    But a good library system, like a school system and recreational programs, and fire and emergency services, police and courts, and programs for senior citizens -- they all require public money, in addition to what is provided by donors and volunteers. And that's a sticky subject for any member of the current board of commissioners.
    They talk the conservative talk, which is the other stuff, but money is required for the quality of life we like to take pride in around here.
    It's easy in a county full of libertarians posing as Republicans to talk about less government; most of us don't want big government, but we like our government services, and our government supported programs. It's the money spent on what other people find important that irritates us.
    Go take a look at the heritage of the county as it was frozen in bronze so very well by Toby Mendez. It tells part of our story: The rural legacy depicted by farmers with a mule team taking in the hay.
     Nice to hold that in reverence, but our children will be needing good schools. And we will all need more and better means of transporting a growing population that has bought into housing developments where the hayfields were.
     As the sculptor says, he was looking for a thread that speaks to our values and heritage. The agricultural heritage of those farmers depicted in his bronze is under pressure from some so-called "business friendly, property rights" advocates who would sell it all for power and profits benefitting a privileged few.
   
   

I wish they'd stop telling me I have no worries

  They keep telling me I have no chance of getting ebola.
  I want to believe it. I did believe it. Until they kept telling me that I had no chance of getting ebola. Now, I wonder.
   That tells you something about how much faith we have in the media. Or the government. Both.
   My common sense tells me that my life is threatened more by a neighbor texting while driving or by a lab attendant who is on the cell phone while labeling my samples.
   But when it comes to the dark stuff, like pandemics, we drop all common sense and become the kind of people you see on those reality TV shows. You know: Mud-diving tattooed chicks with guns.
   I know the odds are that the chicken salad I will eat tomorrow is more of a threat than the Islamic terrorists who hide bombs in their underwear to blow up airplanes so they can meet virgins in the afterlife. (My questions is, if you have a bomb in your drawers on your way to meet a virgin, what are the chances for a happy date?)
   But there I go, mixing logic with paranoia. Call me your average American middle class white guy.

Not starting over, but adding chapters

Oct. 7, 2014
        


            This is my first posting on this blog since Sept. 30, 2012, when it was sabotaged by people who do not want you to know what they do and how they do it.   Since then, I have been busy writing a weekly column for the Carroll County Times, short stories, essays, and for the past few months, a novel -- What Price Eden -- about the consequences of giving up our public policy decisions to those who would exploit people, land, your rights and the future of our country -- locally and nationally -- for their own personal gain and power.
              It's an old theme; as old as the bible stories of men and tribes warring over who owns the land, who makes decisions, who God loves most.
              I will continue to write newspaper columns as long as there is a newspaper willing to run them, and I will supplement what appears in those in this space whenever I have something to post -- it may be daily, or it could be sporadic. I also plan to write more stories and novels because only in fiction can you leave the press agents behind and get down to basic truths about the spectrum of human behaviors that affect everything from our personal wealth and safety to what kind of lives out grandchildren will have because of what we know, what we stand for, and how we want to be remembered by history.

The problem with gov'mint by populism

     Okay, I see that the county commissioners are considering making English the official language of Carroll County.
     Wonderful. Why is it that the very candidates who run for office on a platform for getting rules and regulations out of our lives are the same ones who come up with this kind of silliness?
     Oh! I know: They have their fingers on the pols of We The People. A poll in the paper says 65 percent of Carroll County residents favor such a law, as if it protects us from alien life forms or something. This, from a populace that can't speak six words without saying, "...like, I think we, like, need to have everybody be, like, alike, y'know?"
     This is what you get when elected leaders -- wrong word: Followers is the right word -- follow populist emotion instead of thinking things through to consider the relevance or consequences of their actions.
     I would be prouder of my fellow citizens -- and my elected leaders -- if 65 percent of however many bother to really respond to polls said they want to spend county government time on a reasonable master plan for controlling sprawl and congestion, public services such as fire and ambulance training and recruitment, continued improvement in educational staff and facilities, and more recreational facilities for our kids.
     That's enough without worrying about whether language is made "official" by decree.

  

Why have a plan at all?

     Commissioner David Roush wants to remove any and all references in a master plan to saving streams, wetlands, woods, animal habitats. He says there's nothing in the code that defines benefits enough to tie the hands of local government -- make that read development and mining interests -- with a lot of silly rules about clean water and air.
     This kind of thinking is what made him so popular with Union Bridger area residents when he was running the Lehigh Cement plant over there, and with environmentalists in general.
     Silly me, I thought he'd be a better choice for Westminster District than Michelle Jefferson, or even Doug Mathias, the only Democrat to run for the post. Big problem with Mathias was that he was so desperate to get some Republicans to vote for him that he did a Mitt Romney and started saying stupid things to appeal to the Right.
     Roush didn't say much at all, in public, which is in keeping with his style while he was on the county economic development commission.
     He seemed a good fit on the EDC: his voice was a counterbalance to the sometime over-reaching and strident rhetoric of the more zealous voices at the other end of the spectrum. But he had plenty to say off the record, in the audience that he thought would agree with him (same tactic that backfired on Romney). While a member of the EDC, Roush let it be known among insiders that he disapproved of any attempt in a master plan to preserve the homes of people in the Mount Airy area where there was a proposal to zone for industrial development.
     You have to be tougher than that if you want to zone for business, was his position -- then. Now, it's property rights, so long as you are the landlord owner of the site under consideration. You can bet that in his eyes, Lehigh's property rights trump the property rights of any homeowners or farmers between a mine and the Union Bridge plant.
     Now the commissioners are reviewing the master plan and it would appear -- no surprise -- that what they're after is essentially no plan at all. Just a laissez-faire, open season for a  big money approach to making more money.
      Clean water comes in plastic bottles, and clean air from air conditioning and household filters, right?

More reasons to leave the Republican Party

      Reasons 34, 42, 51 to change your party affiliation to Independent if you are now a registered Republican:
     34. Hypocrisy about voter fraud. On the pretext that Democrats were stuffing ballot boxes with the votes of dead people, the GOP has engaged in an on-going strategy to disenfranchise voters who are not registered Republicans. It started years ago, and during the early 2000s, Republican "volunteers" pushed to have Democrats purged from the voting lists, particularly in Baltimore and the Washington suburbs. Meanwhile, other "volunteers" offered to help senior citizens register to vote by going to nursing homes and attempting to not only register voters, but to get the proxy to file their ballot for them. How generous.
      It was going on all over the country, part of a national GOP strategy. Now, in Texas, 80,000 voters have received letters from the state saying they are officially dead, and if they do not call in to re-register, their votes will not count in the next election. People who call in are put on hold, sometimes for as long as an hour. An examination shows that most of the people receiving the notification are, indeed, alive, most are black or Hispanic, and almost all are Democrat. When the mayor of Houston called out the state official (Republican, of course) who ordered the notifications, the state official threatened to cut off state funding to Houston.
     42.  When candidates Romney and then Ryan were caught deliberately misrepresenting welfare facts in an attempt to discredit the Obama administration, a GOP campaign official said, "We're not going to have our campaign strategy dictated by a bunch of fact-checkers."
     51.  In the midst of an international crisis during which an American ambassador and three other U.S diplomats are murdered in Libya, a desperate Mitt Romney blames it all on President Obama for "apologizing for America," an egregious display of pandering to the more jingoistic elements of the Right Wing. When even Republicans question the tactic, pointing out that 1) there was no apology, just a condemnation of an irresponsible film insulting Islam, made BEFORE the attack on the consulate, and  2) the comment was made by the very people who were then killed, and not the President, the GOP candidate doubles down and says the President was still responsible because it happened on his watch. Really!
     If the GOP is so desperate to return to the White House that it won't even stand with the rest of us in times of crisis, why should we trust them to serve anyone but the money changers later.
     Those who cannot stomach changing their party affiliation to Democrat can still salvage their integrity by changing to Unaffiliated, regardless off how they vote on election day.
     There are three reasons. If you can't fill in some of the blanks, you haven't been paying enough attention.

Nine Eleven, 11 years later; are we united?

     Eleven years ago today, as I paused in my walk up Westminster's East Main Street to chat with the owner of Guillanova's, Cal Bloom stepped out of his barber shop a few doors up the street and announced that a plane had just crashed into one of the big towers at the World Trade Center in New York.
     Wow! Big event. I walked up to stand in front of the TV with Cal and watch the story unfold. As we stood there, a second jet suddenly appeared on the screen and plowed into the second building.
     I don't recall either of us making a sound. I think we were incredulous. I said, "The world just changed."
     One plane was an accident; two planes constitutes a deliberate attack. Who would be stupid enough to attack the United States?
     The nation mourned the deaths of 3,000 people in the attacks in New York and the Pentagon, and in the crash of a third plane which was taken down by American citizens rather than let the terrorists fly into another building full of innocents.
     In the days following, America was one nation, indivisible, united in her resolve, her vision, her purpose.
     We finally killed the mastermind of the attack, but in the meantime, we lost much. We lost too many soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, killed too many civilians ourselves while seeking out bad guys. We soured credibility with much of the world, too, but that doesn't bother most Americans.
     Eventually, we lost that sense of nation that we had called on immediately following those attacks. We have, since then, become a nation divided as never before, except for the years during and immediately following the Civil War.
     All in just 11 short years. Makes me wonder what it would take to make this country's self-governance work again.

Let's hear it for servers

     Just for giggles, keep track of how often you've just shoved a forkful of food into your mouth when the server comes up on your blind side and asks, "How is your meal?"
     My wife says it happens to me more than others because I hardly give it a rest between shovels. Maybe, but I think it's a conspiracy among a group of people who absolutely must have a great sense of humor to do what they do, day in and day out.
     So I'm not here to make fun of servers, but to give them due credit for a generally great job.
     Get giddy over celebrities, if you will, and pore over the tabloids to see who's who on TV or in the movies. Get choked up over the fiery rhetoric of your favorite politician, but to me, those who serve us our meals in our restaurants are among the finest examples of solid, hard-working Americans you can find.
     Kitchen help is spotty these days; hard to get people back there who can manage to show up on time and stay for a whole shift -- admittedly a long shift and hard work. Don't want to take anything away from the best of them, but the fact is, they prep and plate and kiss it goodbye.
     It's the waitress or waiter -- I defend the honor in those job descriptions -- who takes the plate to the customer and will bear the consequences of the timeliness and quality of the food on arrival.
     The store manager will make the obligatory rounds to ask customers how is their experience. I've been known to say the service is great and will remain so if management doesn't screw it up.
     Indeed, in every restaurant I can think of, if there is a problem, it originates with or goes back to management: Lack of discipline in the kitchen reflects on the server, but shouldn't. It's a manager who won't deal with it.
     I once got up and walked out of a restaurant after a loud argument broke out between two kitchen helpers in back who were yelling insults at two waitresses out front. The manager weighed in but didn't stop it -- she should have set those cooks straight right there.
     Good cooks get my respect. Good servers even more, because they're on the front lines. Managers get credit when they manage, as opposed to enabling unreliable and unprofessional behavior.
     How much support the store manager gets depends often on the real culprits in chain operations, the district managers, who are like those politicians who think that serving the public is all about making numbers add up.
    Take care of the wants and expectations of customers and the needs of the people who serve them, and management gets easier.

Romney needs no bump in Carroll County

     Pundits say Mitt Romney gained only a little ground in popularity as a result of the GOP convention last week, and now he and President Obama are tied in national polls. They call it a bump.
     The same pundits are saying that Obama will likely enjoy a bump after the Democrats' convention, and should pull ahead again, but it will be a close race down to the wire.
     But that's nationally, not in Carroll County. Carroll County will be tight with Mitt and you'll be seeing Mitt bumper stickers on pickup trucks for another five years, no matter who wins this November.
     What will be interesting to see, should Romney win the election, is whether he learns to relax in his skin as a politician.
     He looks uncomfortable, and I have a theory: I think he knows that political campaigns are populated by advisers who keep telling you how to act, who to be, what to say and -- more important -- what not to say, and how to clean up the mess after you've said the wrong thing.
     He's just not a natural at this image thing. Charisma is like hair; you either have it or you don't, and worrying about it just makes it harder to deal with realities.
     Romney has the hair, and the teeth, and lean fit tallness that makes muster with those who value popularity first by appearances and other superficialities. But he has to say things that don't mesh with things he has done in the past and, indeed, most likely still believes today. He has to tell the hard-core conservatives what they want to hear, and Romney chokes on the words.
     Ryan has shown that he has what it takes to campaign. He can say two things at virtually the same time and make it look like you must have missed something. He's obviously comfortable with expedient and glib rhetoric, and keeps winning a seat in Congress from a district that is considerably less conservative than the positions he pushes when he gets to Washington.
     His skills will be tested now that he is in the national spotlight, and his words and actions back home are going to be contrasted with the obstructionist, uncompromising positions that he has used in concert with other absolutists in what has been shown to be the most ineffectual congress in modern history.
     Like his colleague and another "Young Gun," Virgina Republican Eric Cantor, Ryan has great ability to revise the facts. Cantor smiled brightly and with a straight face told a public television reporter that it was Obama who refused to adopt the recommendation of the Simpson-Bowles Super committee on how to get the budget back on track. "He patted them on the head and sent them home," is the Ryan/Cantor talking point, when the fact is, it was they who voted it down in Congress. Had they been willing to build, rather than destroy, the plan would now be in effect, the so-called doomsday budget crisis would be over, and Wall Street and world markets would relax and be able to go back to working on a viable economy.
     They sank the ship, then blamed the President and democrats. It is a lie, but it's their lie and they are going to keep telling it.
    Same with the disinformation Romney's campaign people put out on the effects of the Obama plan for Medicare.The GOP claim has been branded "pants on fire, liar, liar" rhetoric by every non-partisan fact-checker covering politics, but as the Romney campaign chairman said, they're not going to let the facts get in the way of something that seems to be working for them.
     It's working for the zealots on the Right, but what about the rest of us?
     And is it giving Romney a bad taste in his mouth? I hope so.
     Ryan still has his supporters, but after his convention speech, a number of observers expressed the same thoughts expressed by syndicated columnist Mark Shields, who said Ryan has enjoyed respect until now for his reputation as a truth-teller, but his loose interpretation of truth in his convention comments have undermined that.
     Ryan was chosen because the extreme Right loves him. His ability to turn half truths and incomplete anecdotes into political fodder shows him to be capable of creating chaos if not a solution to complex issues. That's what the hard core wants.
     Romney wants desperately, I believe, to be President to all the people, and it grates on him to play the games that this new breed of obstructionist Republicans demand of him.
    I have to wonder if he'd get another bounce if he told us all what he really thinks and believes, and lets the chips fall where they may.
    It won't make a difference in Carroll County, because there are enough Republicans here who don't want to be confused with the facts. Ryan's their boy, along with Cantor and the rest of the worst congress ever.

George Therit passes on a little too early

     When George Therit Jr. passed away this week just short of his 91st birthday, it occurred to me that he died about seven years too soon.
     That's how many years I figure he lost when he thought he killed a six year old kid in Manchester many years ago.
     Mr. Therit, known as Junior to most adults in town, was just about 27 at the time. He was home from serving in the army during the second world war, and he and Mrs. Therit -- Miriam -- had two little boys of their own. They were known and respected as solid, decent, clean-living folks who would never hurt another person for all the world.
     But events conspire against us, and as George drove at a reasonable speed west on York Street, near the intersection with Main, a mop-headed kid came out of nowhere, dashing into the path of his gray '38 Plymouth. There was a thump!, and the kid went flopping and rolling into the gutter.
     I figure that's when George lost those seven years, even though the kid jumped up and started yelling, "Am I dead? Am I dead?"
     The kid was lucky, and a little slow afoot, as well as on the uptake of what constitutes dead. Beheaded chickens might run around after the big moment, but the kid was just bruised and scared.
     Almost as scared as George, they say.
     I was that kid. I recall that the steel in the right front fender of a pre-war Plymouth was as substantial as a cast iron frying pan, and could give you a fat lip, but that was better than going under the big front tire, which was a split second alternative.
     Not being dead, I was deemed fit to return to duty, which at the time was attendance in first grade class at Manchester Elementary School. I took an ice cube with me and a story to tell.
     The Therit family went to the same Immanuel Lutheran Church as my family, and his son, Dean (I always thought that had something to do with my luck) and I were in the same Sunday School class. Over the years, we would recall that moment and share a chuckle at the thick-headed kid who jumped up demanding to know if he was dead.
     I always figured I owed Mr. Therit something for scaring the life out of him.
     That close call was a lesson for me; everything can change in the flicker of an eye.
     A few years later, I grabbed a handful of my sister's hair as she was about to drown in the creek up at Dick's Dam, and held her there until adults could come and help.
     Many years after that, I saved a young man from choking to death on a burger in a Hanover restaurant, and later repeated that performance by smacking the back of a friend in a Taneytown restaurant when he was choking on steak.
     What are the odds?
     One day on a quiet street in Hanover, an elderly lady stepped out of her car to put mail in a corner box, but the vehicle was left in reverse. It backed up, the open door knocked her down, and she was about to be run over by her own car. I was able to get her out of the way in time, just because I happened to be walking by.
     So, George, you lost seven years because of me, but I like to think they got put back into the bank to give four others some extra time. Maybe it was part of some master plan.
    In any case, God bless you in your new adventure.

What if we used facts instead of talking points?

     We can't be too hard on that fella Todd Aiken for his comments about rape and abortion: He simply found his mind unable to conceive a thought and reverted to the talking points in his pocket. He may have aborted his campaign.
     That means he was trying to make a thoughtful comment about a complex issue, which is a bit over the head of the hard core right, which is his base.
     Talking points are sheets of answers to questions. Whether the question is related or not, give the response on the sheet handed out by the partisan spin managers.
     If you are not sure why talking points exist, think about how many times you've said to the person who shares your TV, "He didn't answer the question. Why don't they ever answer the question?"
     It's called deflection. It turns candidate forums into a verbal food fight.
     Watch the Sunday talk shows. Flip channels and pick up a few comments from either side -- Republican, Democrat, it doesn't matter. You will hear the same litany from the party line all morning line. See, they had a meeting, and passed out talking points.
     Sen. John McCain, still pretty candid, said the other day, "We have to keep the focus on our story, and stick with it."
     That's our story and we're sticking with it.
     If the question is, "What will your party do better than the incumbents?", the response will be, "The incumbents have had four (six, eight) years to keep their promises and they have failed. It's time for a change."
     There is never any acknowledgment that one of the reasons for failure was partisan gridlock. The side that loses the election spends four years pushing back to ensure the new leaders get only one term, never mind separating good ideas from bad, or perhaps -- gag -- compromise.
     It happens at the state level, too. When the Democrat Glendenning was Governor, the Republicans did everything they could to undermine his agenda. To hell with the fact that the people elected him governor.
     Then, when Ehrlich was elected, the Republicans whined for four years that the Democrats would not work with the Republicans.
     These wars are fought with talking points. Reporters -- good ones -- hate them. TV reporters and print slackers rely on them for quotes.
     Business uses talking points, too. Oil spill choking the gulf? We are leading the world in environmental research. Medications killing people? America's health care is the best in the world.
     Like that. Talking points.
     Facts are too inconvenient.
     Talking points are easy, and everybody has some. but if the dialog was based on facts, we'd see right away that no one has all the answers.