Life as a Widower
First, let me say that I was overwhelmed that so many of you sent along your condolences when I wrote about the passing of my wife Yvonne. Unfortunately, with all the things that suddenly called for my undivided attention, I barely had time to acknowledge my gratitude.
First, let me say that I was overwhelmed that so many of you sent along your condolences when I wrote about the passing of my wife Yvonne. Unfortunately, with all the things that suddenly called for my undivided attention, I barely had time to acknowledge my gratitude.
Furthermore, I fear that some of you didn’t even receive an acknowledgment because one night, I believe my computer began misfunctioning because it suddenly struck me that I hadn’t been hearing the customary whoosh when my email does out. So, if some of you didn’t hear from me, now you know why.
One of my subscribers, Charles Boley, was curious as to how Yvonne had viewed my columns and opinions. Thinking others might also be curious, I stalled for time, telling Mr. Boley I would reply in a column.
For the most part, Charles, being a conservative, she was usually in sync with my take on events, issues and personalities.
However, she didn’t like it when I commented negatively on someone’s looks, as when I’d point out that with his two extremely prominent nostrils, former congressman Henry Waxman looked a lot like Porky Pig. It’s not that she disagreed, but thought it was beneath me to point it out. I explained that, one, he didn’t read my stuff and, two, it was beneath her, but not beneath me. She was a much nicer person than I am.
She also didn’t care for it when I would occasionally take President Trump to task. Yvonne felt the Never-Trumpers didn’t need my assistance. But I would argue that my job wasn’t to be a cheerleader, it was to be as honest as I could possibly be.
If I didn’t let people know that I thought some of his tweets were juvenile, and a lot of his boasts, such as bragging that the turnout for his inauguration was the largest in history when it hadn’t even been the largest in a decade, I’d be just as useless as those jerks at MSNBC and CNN who can never bring themselves to say something positive about the man.
After all, I would point out, I had already come a long way. I had confessed more than once that I wasn’t particularly impressed with candidate Trump. After all, I was only too aware of his close ties to the Clintons. I knew all about his campaign contributions to hordes of Democrats, including Sen. Clinton and Senate Majority leader Harry Reid. Scariest of all, he had announced that his sister, a rabid New York liberal, would make a terrific Supreme Court justice.
I figured, at best, he would be a president in the tradition of the Bushes.
I voted for Donald Trump for the same reason I’d voted for George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, John McCain and Mitt Romney, and that was because the alternatives were so bloody awful.
But once he assumed office, the transformation was mind-boggling; it was like he entered the telephone booth as Clark Kent and emerged as Superman.
So, if I occasionally upset Yvonne by sniping at Trump’s boasts and his tweets, I couldn’t help myself. I figured I could safely leave the cheerleading in the very capable hands of Sean Hannity and Judge Jeanine Pirro. I had my own integrity to worry about.
One of the things about Yvonne’s critiques that I came to appreciate is that she found what I wrote funnier than the jokes I often include.
She could often recognize my fingerprints on some of the jokes, recognizing that I often had to rework the ones people sent me, shortening them or re-wording them for comedic emphasis, but she wasn’t a big fan of jokes; she preferred wit.
She also enjoyed it when I took a break from politics and wrote about old movies, old movie actors and film scores; and especially appreciated it when I’d share anecdotal accounts of my life pre-Yvonne.
Of course I miss Yvonne. We were married for 33 years. But it’s the small things that catch me up short. For instance, I now refer to Angel as “my dog,” no longer “our dog;” “my house,” not “our house.” I also remind myself that I only occasionally have to lower the toilet seat.
But the most striking thing that drove my loss home was when I went to the supermarket the other day and realized that for the first time since 1985, I was shopping only for myself.
Getting back to politics, I must admit I can’t wait for the primary season to get started. As a conservative, I’m sitting on the edge of my seat, anticipating the blood-letting once the likes of Cory Booker, Michael Bloomberg, Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom, Bill DeBlasio, Joe Biden and the other 30 or 40 schmucks go after each other with switchblades and pickaxes.
Rumor has it that Robert Francis “Beto” O'Rourke is the frontrunner, even though I suspect the source of that rumor is none other than O'Rourke.
Some people (O'Rourke’s campaign manager) insist that the string bean is good-looking. And I suppose he is, if the new yardstick is Ichabod Crane.
At 47, O'Rourke has 18 years on Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but he is no brighter than she is. They have an equal number of over-sized teeth. His one real advantage over the other ditz is that he’s actually old enough to be president.
It is a close call, though, when O'Rourke insists that the Constitution is simply outdated and that other constitutional scholar, Ocasio-Cortez, insists that if owning a gun were constitutional, it would say so in the Constitution.
Only in politics or show business could a guy be so narcissistic as to post a video of himself having his teeth cleaned. And only in politics could a middle-aged guy seeking the presidency enter a stage to give a speech riding a skateboard just in case anyone was thinking about supporting one of those old, non-skateboard riding geezers like Joe Biden or Barnie Sanders.
On second thought, I suppose skateboarding ability is as good a reason as any to nominate one bumpkin over another.
After all, how else could you decide between a crowd that includes such pathetic examples of homo sapiens as the dozens who have already committed to running or on the verge of doing so? I’m serious. On what basis is someone supposed to choose between Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren or Andrew Cuomo and Angelina Jolie? Arm wrestling? A coin toss? Eeny, meeny, miny, moe?
A skateboard competition is as good a way as any to separate the chaff from the, well, chaff.
Say what you will about Democrats, they are perfectly shameless when it comes to labeling Republicans as bigots and racists. And considering what some of them have said about us, it takes a special kind of courage to throw stones while huddling in a glass outhouse. For instance, when Barack Obama sprang upon the scene, Joe Biden, who would become his vice-president, announced that, apparently to Joe’s great surprise, Obama “was clean.” What’s more, Harry Reid assured everyone that Obama didn’t even “sound colored.”
Everyone knows that Obama, himself, dismissed us as those people who “cling to their religion and their guns.” Hillary Clinton said we were “a basket of deplorables.”
Lebron James re-tweeted an anti-Semitic tweet; Jim Carrey compared Trump supporters to “apes;” and Rep. Hank Johnson, the pea brain who voiced concern that if too many people showed up on Guam, it might flip over, parroted Louis Farrakhan’s comparing Israel’s Jews to termites.
Instead of running around with their hair on fire over Russian meddling in the 2016 election, the oafs in Congress should be more concerned with what Google and the other tech companies are doing to stifle conservative voices while promoting the Left’s agenda.
Guys like Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and the other Silicon Valley Socialists, refer to algorithms as if the bias of removing conservatives from their platforms are God’s magical work and has nothing to do with the left-wing biases of themselves and their worker bees.
When it comes to skewing elections, the combined influence of the NY Times, the Washington Post, CNN and MSNBC, pales in comparison.
And because these billionaires have so much money at their disposal, they can buy up senators and congressmen easier than Al Capone bought up Chicago’s judges and aldermen.
I ridicule Liberals, but I admit I am somewhat in awe of them. They have to keep so many things straight, I sometimes wonder how they manage, especially when so many of those things are totally illogical.
For instance, because they don’t really care about what’s best for the society, but merely need to appear politically correct and fashionable, they are required to be pro-abortion, pro-homosexuals/transgenders, pro-black, pro-Muslim, pro-Roman Polanski, anti-Israel, pro-Palestine, anti-white, pro-illegal alien, anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-2nd Amendment, anti-Free Speech for those they disagree with, pro-Violence when committed by Antifa, anti-Trump, anti-Trump supporters, pro-Socialism, anti-Capitalism, pro-marijuana, anti-climate change, anti-fossil fuels and pro-windmills.
I’d like to think Yvonne would be pleased. Except for the cracks about O'Rourke’s resembling Ichabod Crane and the fact that he and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez have more and bigger teeth than Burt Lancaster and a school of sharks, I pretty much behaved myself.
