So, my Mom is 79 years old.
She was born in 1932.
She was telling me today, that she remembers when her father got “laid off” and he walked his neighborhood in New York City taking fifty cents to string a clothesline in people’s backyards.
“AND he did a good job!” she added.

Then she said to me “He was still fighting back then”

See, that’s my grandpa John.
I’m named after him.
He died when I was about 11 years old.
He used to call me “The Champ” and when I was four or five, he gave me a pair of boxing gloves that would fit my little hands and he signed them.
“To the Champ” Jack Brady.
He used to fight under that name.
Jack Brady.
Can you get any more Irish than that?

He sparred with Jack Dempsey, and my grandpa was a BIG barrel chested Irishman, a hard drinking man, and a kick ass Democrat.
From what I've heard, he would work the neighborhood beer gardens and bars, and he would recruit people who would listen to him to vote for the Democratic party come election time.
If they gave him any shit, or if they spoke ill of the Democrats, I’m guessing he would kick their ass.
And then, either way, he would join them in a beer.
If you were with him, he was buyin’.
If not, then you were buyin’.

The year my Mom was born, Herbert Hoover's popularity was falling as voters felt he was unable to reverse the economic collapse.
Franklin D. Roosevelt used what he called Hoover's failure to deal with these problems as a platform for his own election, promising reform in his policy called the New Deal.

The “New Deal”
How cool was that?
He won by a landslide, and this was the first election in fifty six years in which the Democratic candidate won a majority of the popular vote.

I drove 127 miles each way today to mow my Mom’s lawn, which looked like the rough at the U.S. Open.
I was sitting in a chair in her garage in Florida, north of Tampa, sweating my ass off and trying not to have a heart attack at 56 years old.
My Mom told me that my Grandpa used to hang clotheslines for fifty cents.
And that he used to kick ass.

It occurs to me that my Grandpa had what we need right now.
And it also occurs to me that my Mom, who has been around since 1932 has some stories to tell if you hit her with the right questions.
Goddamn, when I asked her today if she knew what a “hedge fund” was she replied quickly “Yeah, it like hedging your bets, either way you win”.

I’ll continue to drive 127 miles each way to mow her lawn if she shares shit like this, and may I add that I love her more each day.

I'm different.
I look different and that's not my fault.
I was born that way.
It's a birth defect called NF1, and it causes tumors to grow all over the body, inside and outside.
I didn't ask for this shit.
I had the most difficult type of NF1 at least for me, what's called "spontaneous NF1" which is one fucked up way of describing what happened.
Spontaneous is a three car accident on a Saturday morning in a Starbucks parking lot.

Spontaneous NF1 means you look one way at 35 and by 40 you look "different"
And by different, someone with NF1 has what I can only describe as pieces of rice under your skin.
Some bigger than others, and lot's of them.
It's wonderful for first impressions, and working in a professional environment as I do for a fortune 500 company.
Walk into a room one day with 20 people that you don't know with a face that looks like a cheese pizza and you will understand.
I deal with it.
I ain't fucking different.

I was the shit in my 20's and early 30's.
Full head of brown, thick hair from my grandmother on my mother's side.
Irish, tall at 6'4 and 180lbs of shit talking New Yorker.
I had a big mouth, and a sharp wit, and I pretty much fell into a good life after a not so good start that included a divorce and a well deserved stint in jail.
Then I changed things up and things broke for me and in reality I got lucky.
Good job, a couple of long term girlfriends, and many friends.
Some of those friends were gay.

Lydia was my friend.
Lydia was gay.

She worked with me in Dallas in the 80's and she used to cut my hair, and we would smoke joints and listen to jazz music.
Her Mom, Shirley owned a neighborhood hair salon in the hood.
Every time Lydia dragged me in there, Shirley would grab me by the arm and scream "feel this white boy's hair" and I had five black women running their hands through my hair with admiration.
And when we would leave Shirley, a big proud black woman herself, would give me a big hug and tell me "you're good by me".
Because I was a stupid white boy, that somehow was friends with her 6'3" gay daughter, and she knew I didn't give a shit about that.

Lydia loved Sheena Easton and Miles Davis.
She looked like Kareem Abdul Jabar.
She had a spat with a girlfriend, and she started dating someone else, and the old girlfriend got pissed and gave some crack to some street hood.
That street hood caught up with Lydia as she was checking her mail after church, arms loaded with groceries on a sunny Sunday morning, and shot her in the head three or four times.

I never thought about the fact that she was gay, all I cared about was that she liked the same music I did and she made me laugh.
And I'm thinking about her tonight.
I'm thinking about the gay people that I know right now, and that I have known in my life, and in my heart I know that everyone of them that I called my friend is hurting tonight.
I was pissed when I started this, and now I'm just sad.

Tomorrow morning some people will walk out the door gay, and I'll walk out the door with a fucked up face and a attitude.
We're just people.
Trying to get along and ahead, despite what people think of us.
All I want is to be happy, and I don't think that anyone should get to vote on that for me, or anyone else.
That ain't right.

It's like the Dude said in the Big Lebowski.
"That's like, your opinion man".

I ain't fucking different, and neither is anyone else.
People can't control the fact that we grow into who we are.
And gay or straight, like Shirley used to say when she would hug me, "you're good by me".

I wish the people who voted against my friends, dead or living, had half the heart that Shirley and her daughter did.
And the fact that they don't makes me sad, and I'm going to bed thinking of my friend.
I miss her.

I just read this back to myself and I almost deleted it, but on second thought, fuck it.
I'm posting it anyway.

I LOVE THIS GUY!
And HE'S MY REP!

http://grayson.house.gov /

Not only am I going to write him a check, I am going to DRIVE to his office and write him a check!

Send him an e-mail, and tell him where ever you live that you have his back, and we love his spirit.

"Foot-dragging, Knuckle-dragging, Neanderthals" is how he described the Republicans after working in Washington a mere nine months.



I called his office and told him don't give an inch, we need more just like you.
We have been getting punched in the face for so long it's about time someone on our side punched back.
And Grayson is a BIG man and he don't need to be afraid of any of these Rethugs.
What are they going to do?
Sic Trent "Mad Dog" Franks on him?

This is so well said.
I hope they are wrong.
I fear not.

http://www.americablog.com/2009/08/hate-is...

What's increasingly interesting (http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/2... /) and disturbing, is how it's looking more and more like the hate the right-wing is whipping up surrounding health care reform is quite real. Meaning, these nutjobs aren't faking it. The Republicans, FOX News, and conservative talk radio have actually convinced a vocal minority of the country that Hitler and Stalin have been reincarnated as a black fellow from Chicago. I'm not sure what this all means, but I do think it's on a path towards some serious violence. You don't wind people up to this degree against the government, and against specific political leaders - tell them that their worst nightmare has come true, that we are literally losing our nation to the equivalent of Adolf Hitler - and not have some nutjob act out violently a la Oklahoma City, or worse. I'm still rather amazed that the Democrats aren't discussing the potential for violence among the Republican masses.

Americablog is a treasure, give it a look.

Stolen from my friend bart at bartcop.com

That's Max Cleland.
He's a Democrat, a Viet Nam Veteran.
He's MY HERO.

He's like John McCain, only he has three less limbs.
He pisses and shits into a plastic bag.
He's a triple amputee.
He's been like this for years.
He's not a long term senator.
He's not married to a beer heiress, who can afford a $300,000 outfit, most of it in diamond earrings.
He's just a Viet Nam vet, and he ain't running for shit.
Know why?

Because people like Shawn Hannity (what an honor it is to speak to such a great American, Mr. Hannity).
Mr. Hannity, who has a radio show, and Ann Coulter said he was a drunken ass, liberal pussy.
A drunk, someone who caused his very OWN injuries because, he had too many beers, and he was playing around with a live grenade, while sitting around a camp fire.
Remember that?
DO YOU?
How about Saxby Chambliss?
Who stole his seat?
Remember that?

Because THAT'S what Democrats do.
Like John Kerry.
They FAKE their war injuries, for a run at a public office, later on in their ill gotten careers.
Shit, we are so low and Anti-American, that good Republicans, who LOVE America, HAD to wear "Purple Heart Band-Aids" to voice their opinons against the "FRENCH LOOKING" Senator John Kerry.

BUT -

NOT like John McCain. A cross in the sand, thumbs up to his fellow prisoners as he was returned from being tortured.
I can look at Max, and I can immediately see what he's been through.
John McCain?
Not so much.
All I have to go on with John McCain is what HE has told us.


There is a thing or two that I know for sure.
He tossed his first wife away like an empty Budweiser can, because she was crippled in a car accident and she wasn't "pretty" enough anymore.
He started fucking around with a VERY rich blond, worth millions, while he was still married to his crippled first wife.
Nice guy, huh?
So, he got divorced, married Miss Budweiser and set upon his new life.
Politics
He got caught up in some scandals, Keating Five and others, but money and lots of it, often makes problems like that go away.
And we were reminded over and over and over that he was a POW, a WAR HERO.

Not like Max Cleland, who was a drunk, and not like John Kerry who was a "gigolo".

Then, John McCain decided he would run for President.
Against a ne'er do well "gubner" from Texas called "Dubya".

McCain came out of the box strong, winning, actually destroying "Dubya" in New Hampshire.
Then came South Carolina and it was over.
Why?
Because the "Christian" guy I'd like to have a beer with, "Dubya" said he had a illegitimate "colored" daughter, and HOW "Christian" was that, and John McCain was done.

Now, here he is.
"Code Pink" being dragged out of his convention speech, to the zealots screaming "USA! USA!"

John McCain ain't no "war hero" let's get that straight.
John McCain is a right wing whore, who is prepared to get down on his knees and suck any right wing dick that's put in front of him.
He's already proved it.
He ain't no "Maverick".
If he was a "Maverick" he'd be in jail right now for strangling who ever levied that insult against his "colored" daughter.

John McCain is speaking right now, delivering his "BIG" speech.
How fucking inspiring.

This crook ain't fit to carry Barak Obama’s briefcase and tomorrow morning I plan on getting in any body's face that differs with me.
War Hero?

Blow me.

Whore?

Let's talk.

THIS is a war hero.