When are you running for President?

I have been doing quite a bit of political blogging and commenting on others’ blogs at the Des Moines Register this past week or so. So much that my husband asked me tonight if I was planning to run for office myself. I told him I would be running for election right after I started to glow with the ethereal light of the chosen and asked him if he had noticed me lighting up the room at night with spiritual incandescence. He said no, but he had noticed that I fart in my sleep and offered to bring a lighter to bed.

My husband would make the perfect first husband however. He has a quiet presence of authority and is just apathetic enough to put to rest the fears of my fellow Americans who might worry that the United States would end up a mere puppet government in thrall to our empire building northern neighbors. I can assure you all that I am my own woman. Independent in thought and action (but I don’t clean litter boxes - that’s man’s work).

I am highly suspicious of those who seek the presidency too eagerly and am not at all surprised when their hypocrisy or true natures are exposed. Take for example the Republican, Ron Paul. He has been enjoying quite the cult-like build-up of late. His campaign raised something like $6 million over a short time period recently. But, interestingly and yet not surprisingly, about $500 of this money came from a known hate group. When called on this, the Paul organization went into a spin cycle that was as impressive as it was sad. Impressive because it was classic rationalization and sad because it seemed so effortless. So much for being different. I ran across a video on the Newsweek site which featured a Drake College student waxing rhapsodic about how wonderful and well-respected a guy Rudi Giuliani, of all people, is. It was especially ironic when you remember that he has children in college who dislike him enough to join Facebook groups supporting other presidential candidates.

Wouldn’t it be nice if real human beings ran for the presidency? People who realize that it’s just a job, albeit one with a great address, awesome health coverage and your own really cool jet so you can avoid the TSA entirely. I even bet when you’re president you don’t have to take your shoes off or check your shampoo at baggage. It is a job. I wonder if anyone remembers that? Seems odd that such an important position can be attained with vaguely detailed goals by people that many of us wouldn’t want to know personally.

I suppose though that someone has to want to be president just like someone has to clean rooms at Holiday Inn Express, chop up cow, pig carcasses for IBP, and roam from farm to farm during harvests, dragging their families behind them. Dirty work that most Americans won’t do. We leave it up to those without better options, leaving us free to up-size, accessorize and accumulate. I guess I should be ashamed that I don’t feel the tingly glow-worm of democracy pushing me to run for office.

No Crying in Presidential Campaigns! Unless you need to prove your Warmth

So, Mitt Romney stepped up to the plate and shed a tear or two for the team because if you want to be the president of this country (the U.S. not Canada - they don't have a president and I don't have space to explain what they do up here), you have to be warm, likable (there's that word again) and fuzzy. You have to prove that on top on of that intellectual core that is aflame with great policies destined to change the very essence of America is the next door neighbor of our dreams. Not the unemployed 40 something guy with man-boobs in the cut-off shirt and gym shorts who sits in his garage smoking and ogling the stay at home mom's as they go about their momming. Not him. But the great person who always has a smile and a greeting and comes out in -30degree weather to help you shovel off that oversize drive you have to accommodate the two vehicles you can't park inside due to the overflow of stuff. That person. It boggles the mind at times, but the fact is that only human beings through whom the milk of human kindness flows by the quart need apply for the the presidency. Competent. Smart. Experienced. That may get you in the door with your app, but if you can't smooze, ya lose.

Hillary Clinton knows this - now (though Bill surely knew it before and I wonder why he didn't share that with her) as she hustles about on her "If You Knew Hillary" tour of Iowa. She spent so much time playing the man's game that she forgot a small but significant part of the game was being ingratiating and radiating a holy healing light that provides warmth to all. Interestingly MSNBC ran a short article today about a recent study that found that while male bosses were not expected to be overly caring and could be forgiven for not reading their employees moods/minds, women bosses were cut no such slack.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22343419/

So, for not being a mind-reader, Hillary was sent back to go - almost - without collecting the 200 warm and fuzzy points and made to parade her inner self for the next two weeks.

Mitt Romney on the other hand just does what men in the public eye do when they want to prove they have a heart - somewhere. He cried. Because crying is womanly and proves that a man is in touch with that side of himself. Right?

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071220/NEWS/712200403

Frankly, now that he has the Tancredo endorsement, Mitt may be squeezing out droplets at every turn because Tancredo is not exactly a warm breeze on a summer evening.

I think the real issue is why warmth is an issue at all. Clinton and Romney may or may not convince the non-believers they are sincere and are wasting a lot of time that might be better spent showing the voters some of their stands on issues of real consequence.

Sexism in the City

I mentioned that I am blogging on a newspaper site in my old home of Des Moines. I try to be topical which it being Iowa and an election year means I do a fair amount of writing about issues and candidates. I have post a few of the things I have written for that site here. Two of those pieces being about sexism. My latest piece on the DM Register site is about an article I found on MSNBC about the difficulty Hillary Clinton is having in Iowa with wooing women voters. The article goes on to explain that aside from Mississippi, Iowa is the only state to have never elected a female governor or senator. In my assessment, I agreed with much of what was written implying that Iowa is a very traditional on gender roles despite the fact that more women work outside the home in Iowa than just about anywhere else in the U.S. and that it is so entrenched an attitude that even the women by into it. And this isn’t a new issue for me. I have been annoyed with the gender thing in my home state since I was a kid and couldn’t play summer little league baseball or join the Boy Scouts (because they actually camped and did cool outdoor stuff as opposed to the cooking and sewing the Girl Scouts had to do).

My latest efforts got my blog noticed and I received a flurry of responses - from guys - telling me I was full of shit (and those were the nice replies). So, I am wondering readers, my few and loyal, am I off base with the gender thing? Is the world, or at least the west, truly a gender-blind utopia - because it feels not so much different to me now than when I was growing up.

Any thoughts on sexism?

The Continuing Quest to Pee

It’s been away since I have discussed the state of facilities here in Canada though it occurs to me that I am perhaps being unfair in labeling the whole of the country a no-pee zone. It could be just an Alberta problem. For a province with a boom economy and a building streak that has buried an entire canola field under a slew of condos and houses in the Fort since I have moved up here, not much is being done to address the lack of public washrooms.

Americans are spoiled. I will admit that right up front. There are very, very few places one to go to that are not adequately equipped with restrooms. The need for elimination is sometimes covered to the point of overkill. Although I hadn’t thought of this before just now, it could be that Americans really are as incontinent as the dearth of commercials for ? would seem to imply. Or it could be that Canadians are just the camels of the continent in terms of bladder capacity. Rob’s girls assure him that the human bladder can only hold a litre of liquid. Rob doesn’t believe that as he was complimented not long ago in public restroom in Iowa on his capacity, but in retrospect that could be just evidence for my theory that Americans need to pee a lot. That could be a Pavol’s dog thing however. American’s have a lot of easy restroom access leading them to pee at whim which and thus retraining their bladders into wimpiness whereas Canadians often can’t find a public toilet and have mammoth capacity for storage and patience to wait as a result. Nah, Canadians just pee outside when they can’t find any place indoors. And believe me, that is the norm in public places.

Today, I was picking up photo reprints at the London Drug in Sherwood Park. It has exactly one washroom. Unisex. And you have to track down the guy who works in Electronics to get the key to open it. He is rarely behind the counter. When I asked for the key today, he informed me that someone was using the washroom. I went and waited by the door. Knocked. Waited. Jingled the doorknob. Heard noise faintly from inside. Waited some more. And finally in desperation I walked quickly back to my vehicle and headed over to the Safeway only to find that they too had one unisex washroom for the entire store. Fortunately it was not in use or this tale would have an embarrassing, for me, ending.

I am in awe of Canadians. There ability to forgo peeing when out in public spaces in something to admire and possibly even strive to emulate. I am not sure at all how to train myself out of the need to pee. I have tried not taking in liquid when I need to travel or be away from home in general. I end up with cracked lips and a bad headache however. One thing that still puzzles me though is why when there are so few of them to clean anyway are washrooms here always so dirty?