I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: politics

  • The Race is On – And the Winner Loses All


    Well the race is on and here comes Pride at the backstretch,

    Heartaches are going to the inside.

    My tears are holding back, they’re trying not to fall…

    The race is on and it looks like Heartaches.

    And the winner loses all.

    written by Don Rollins 

    immortalized by George Jones

    In May, 1964 I graduated from Columbia High School in West Columbia, Texas. There were eighty-seven other seniors in my graduating class that year. Two weeks later I was standing in registration lines in a gymnasium at the University of Texas in Austin to enroll for summer school as a freshman along with 19,000 other students. The dorm I moved into had seven floors – with elevators, thank goodness – and was huge to me. No wonder – I looked up the size today and it had 69,754 sq ft. The home I came from was a tiny cottage of maybe 1,200 sq. ft. that my parents rented from the people who owned the grocery story we lived behind. To paraphrase one of my grandmother’s favorite sayings, I was country come to town when I moved to Austin, and I felt it.

    Three months later in September, 1964,  a fellow Texan named George Jones released his hit single The Race is On. Supposedly the song was one of his personal favorites and one that he usually sang in concerts. He definitely tried to sing it at a concert I attended on the UT campus in the spring of my first full year (1965) but as I recall George was under the influence of alcohol and forgot the lyrics of that song and several others before making an early exit. No Show Jones was an appropriate nickname for him that night, but I really didn’t care because I was also under the influence for the first time ever in my nineteen years.

    The two friends who invited me to go with them to the concert had brought a bottle of scotch to mix with Seven-up. They poured my drinks with a heavy hand, and No Show Sheila walked back to her room on the third floor of the 69, 754 sq. ft. – dormitory…and threw up. I never drank scotch again.

    Thirty-six days from today until the election of 2016 on November 8th.; I heard that on the news this morning, and I have to say that seems like a long, long time to me. When I was a teenager, I couldn’t wait until I turned twenty-one. I thought that day would never get there. Starting on my sixteenth birthday, I counted each birthday in relation to that twenty-first. The wait was painfully slow. After the momentous twenty-first birthday, however, the years picked up speed; and the race has been on toward an unknown finish line at the speed of light…

    Until this election year when time has apparently stood still. The race has been on to the White House and the houses of Congress for the past two years with primary debates, billboards running rampant throughout the landscape of our cities and interstates, thousands of television and radio and cyberspace commercials approved by the people who are promoting themselves and unending polarization of the country that has a divided view of its direction. Yes, my friends, the race is on.

    Please forgive me, spirit of George Jones, for my transgression of making your love song into a political one. In this 2016 race for the White House I have seen Pride at the backstretch and Heartaches going to the inside and have had to hold back my own tears. I could weep for the absurdity of this race with its personal punches and counter-punches. I could weep for a nation so divided that I wonder if our house will stand. The race is on alright, and I feel Heartaches as it heads into the last days. My fear is that the winner loses all.

    It’s old Blue Monday for me, and I’m thinking about one of my favorite country music artists and his songs. George may be gone, but the race is still on.

    I’m voting early and often, as Lyndon Johnson used to ask us to do in Texas. I urge you to join me.

     

  • Texas Beer Joints – and the Undecided


    When I was a little tomboy growing up in southeast Texas, I had dreams of one day – sometime somewhere – being able to go to a beer joint. My family was Southern Baptist and the very mention of an adult alcoholic beverage would send my mother into horrible face contortions and very loud condemnations of beer and beer drinkers. Beer joints were the epitome of evil. Naturally her hyperbole aroused my curiosity.

    My mother’s aunts, my grandmother’s German sisters, worshiped at the Church of the Blessed Beer Joint, however, and I loved to listen to their tales when they came from Bright Lights, Big City Houston to visit us in No Lights, Tiny Town Richards. They were a personal trip for me…and a glimpse of possibilities for me down the road.

    The road did bring me to my share of beer joints in my adult life, although I confess I never shared the same enthusiasm for them as my Aunt Dessie and Aunt Selma did. Most of the ones I went to when I got old enough were drab, dingy, smoke-filled rooms with a jukebox, a few old tables and a bar with stools too tall for me to belly up to easily. I loved the jukebox more than the taste of the Lone Star beer.

    As the fickle finger of fate would have it, Teresa and I moved back to Texas in 2010 and bought a home on Worsham Street in Montgomery, Texas – only 18 miles from Richards. We drove many times to visit my family in the Fairview Cemetery outside of Richards and on one of those drives up Highway 105  I discovered the Texas beer joint of my childhood dreams in the little town of Dobbin. Some dreams really do come true!

    023

    We stopped for the burgers and bbq

    021

    020

    Best burgers EVER

    007

    We waited in the bar which the owner Bobby Holder built himself – took him three years to finish – perfection

    014

    A little something for everyone

    012

    Thirst quencher

    017

    Old family pictures on ancient organ

    016

    Bobby as a little boy

    022

    All in all, Holder’s had delicious food, and had I been younger, I would have come back for the night life…or maybe not. My Texas beer joint dreams had come true without the first sip of a Lone Star.

    And finally, here’s a wall hanging at Holder’s that I thought of yesterday after the presidential debate on Monday night. I talked to my friend Carmen about the debate, and she said many of her friends weren’t going to vote this year…or were undecided…

    011

    And there you have it.

     

  • The 400-Pound Hacker in the Room


    Donald Trump on our national security in the debate tonight:

    “Hackers could be anybody sitting on their beds weighing 400 pounds.”

    Whaaaaaaat? What did you say? What does that even mean?

    Donald Trump on foreign affairs:

    “I haven’t given lots of thought to NATO…I just know we have to knock the hell out of ISIS.”

    Really? Not much thought to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization? You might want to add that to your debate prep topics for next time.

    Donald Trump on the war in Iraq:

    “I was against the war in Iraq…all you have to do is call Sean Hannity and ask him. He knows I was against the war in Iraq.”

    Somebody please call Sean Hannity… and restore a little sanity.

    Donald Trump on deal-making in the Obama administration:

    “You almost can’t name a good deal they’ve made.”

    I can name that deal in three notes…or was that tune…deal, tune…whatever.

    Donald Trump on what it takes to be President:

    “To be President of the United States, you have to have the stamina.”

    It also helps to have an understanding of the job description.

    Hillary Clinton on preparation:

    “Yes, I prepared for this debate. I’ve also prepared to be President.”

    And with that I say to all good night and good luck.

     

     

     

     

     

  • Yikes! The Presidential Debates are Coming! RUDE – Call Security!


    The campaign slogan for one of the Presidential candidates in the debate that night was It’s experience that counts to which the other candidate responded  I’m not satisfied with the way things are… I think we can do a better job.

    “A good record is never to stand on, but sometimes it can be used to build on,” said the older man with skin so white he looked pasty to the television viewing audience.

    “I want to say these are the years when the tide came in for America – not when it rolled out,” said the cool confident handsome younger man.

    I was fourteen years old in September, 1960 when the first presidential debates aired on television and radio by the only three networks operating at the time: NBC, CBS and ABC. I’d like to say I have fond memories of the debate – or really any memories of the debate – but I must have filed them in a safe place where they are currently unavailable for recall so after watching Bon Qui Qui at the King Burger again today for the umpteenth time because that youtube video guarantees me a good laugh, I inexplicably clicked on the video of the initial Kennedy/Nixon presidential debate.

    Now why would I connect Bon Qui Qui to presidential debates…who knows…perhaps because her hilarious Rude – call Security lines from that routine jump-started my brain to the  images I’m already dreading of the first debate of the 2016 presidential campaign which is coming up in prime time Monday night. My approach/avoidance nerves are already jangling at the prospect of a forum that will be less than inspirational. Rude – call security.  Play nice, please.

    Richard Nixon was the Republican Vice President of the United States when he decided to run for President the first time in 1960.  He had served under President Dwight Eisenhower for seven and a half years and his campaign slogan was It’s Experience That Counts. In the course of the first debate that evening in September, 1960  he touted his contributions to the Eisenhower administration and powerfully argued their two terms in office had been successful ones for the nation.

    John Fitzgerald Kennedy was a Senator from Massachusetts when he entered the presidential race in 1960 and the televised debate was a huge opportunity to introduce himself to a country that didn’t really know much about him other than his religion was Catholic and he was very young. In his first eight minutes of television time, he defined himself as the candidate of change with a skilled oratorical style reminiscent of a Baptist revival preacher about to give an altar call.

    Following Senator Kennedy’s passionate I’m not satisfied rhetoric in his opening remarks, Nixon agreed that both candidates wanted to see the country moving forward but their disagreement was in the means to make that happen. One of the biggest disagreements was the role of the federal government in dealing with issues such as  farming supplements, health care for an aging population, balanced budgets,  income taxes, labor unions and a host of other problems. Nixon implied the Democrats looked to the federal government for too many answers. “I don’t believe in big government, but I do believe in effective government action,” Senator Kennedy argued.

    The first debate was supposedly on domestic issues, but both candidates linked domestic problems to foreign affairs.  Senator Kennedy’s boogeymen were Soviet Premier Khrushchev and the Chinese Communists, and his warning If the United States fail, then the whole cause of freedom fails was a strong statement advocating global leadership for America.

    Unfortunately for Vice President Nixon, the television cameras were not kind to him. While the radio listeners subsequently declared Nixon to be the winner of the first debate, television viewers gave the nod to Kennedy.  One historian said that Nixon had hurt his knee getting out of a taxi before going  into the debate and was in a great deal of pain throughout the debate which probably didn’t help his onstage look.

    His pale skin was due to refusing any makeup, and he didn’t win points when he kept glancing at a clock on a wall in the room which made it appear that his eyes were shifty and he was unfocused on the topics. All in all, Richard Nixon had poor optics and poorer preparation for television.

    It wasn’t Nixon’s eyes or Kennedy’s delivery that struck me most about these debates of fifty-six years ago, however.  No, what gobsmacked me was how little the campaign themes have differed through the years but how much the style of the debates has taken a flying leap out of control to the dark side.  Experience versus change. That is still the language of today’s candidates, although the party roles are reversed from the 1960 campaign.

    I have watched presidential debates since 1976 with the same passion and critiques I usually reserve for the Grand Slam tennis tournaments. I don’t miss them, and ordinarily I would be ecstatic at the opportunity to watch the first female presidential candidate participate in the debate.  Yet, the debate style has gotten so off the grid from political issues to personal attacks I fear the worst. Most def…which leads me to a second Bon Qui Qui quote from her King Burger routine as a counter consultant for a major fast food chain: Have it your way, but don’t go crazy.

    Please, for all of our sake Monday night. Have it your way, but don’t go crazy… or we might have to say Rude – call Security and switch to Monday Night Football.

     

  • Okay – So Here’s The Deal


    OMG, the US Open ended Sunday after two weeks of intensive and extensive TV coverage that demanded my attention from sun- up to sundown every day. Beyond the obvious “live” matches that were fantastic, I had to get the late-night  commentary reviewing the day’s completed matches that occasionally went into the wee hours of the next morning and of course had to get the previews of the day’s matches every morning starting in the wee hours on the Tennis Channel. Honestly, Pretty and I were exhausted after the men’s final Sunday afternoon, but the tennis Grand Slams are my one weakness.

    Okay. So here’s the deal. I am somewhat of a morning person – not necessarily early morning –  but the dogs and I usually start our routine around 7:30. Pretty typically prefers the 9 o’clock range; consequently Charly and Spike and I are left to our own ramblings for the first hour and a half every day. As long as tennis commentary is on during that time, all goes well.

    Beep, Beep, Beep…danger lurks when there are no tennis matches for retired tennis pros to discuss on an early morning sports talk show because that means I will be surfing for…I’m not sure what for…just channel surfing.

    When I began the search this morning, the first image to pop up was a semi-attractive woman leaning on a small stand that held an open Bible which she was apparently using as a reference manual for her message to depressed people to get up and get going with their lives. No more lying around in bed until 9 o’clock. Absolutely not. Get out of bed and make something of yourselves. Depressed people of the world, unite – it was like a Create Space on steroids for adults.

    My goodness, I said to Charly who was lying on the floor next to my chair. Maybe Pretty needs to get up right this minute and we need to busy ourselves doing something. But before I could pursue going upstairs to wake her, the woman on the TV began promoting her new book that could be mine if I made a donation to keep her show on the air so I lost interest and switched the channel. No thanks, I have my own books to sell. Plus, my doctor prescribed wellbutrin for depression and that means I rise and shine every day full of piss and vinegar – well, piss certainly.

    Ding, Ding, Ding – step away from the TV, Charly said to me.  Oh, if only I’d listened to her. Instead,  I decided to watch a news show called Morning Joe because the ostensible co-host Mika the Meek was hosting in Morning Joe’s absence. My apologies to the Morning Joe lovers in cyberspace, but I find him to be rather rude. I may even agree with some of the comments he makes, but I do wonder why Mika Brzezinski stays with him sometimes. Perhaps it has something to do with the $2 million she receives every year whether she says a word or not. Which is mostly not word one when Morning Joe is around; Mika turns to mush when he’s at the table. I have to fight the urge to tweet: Mika, be no longer Meek. Speak up, your opinions are just as valuable as Joe’s.

    But I don’t know how to tweet on my cell phone so she’ll never know how much I’m longing for the day when she will speak  up and out loudly above the men who regularly sit at the MSNBC desk with her. This is a woman who writes about equality for women and then lets her cohorts ignore her.  Sweet Lady Gaga.

    Surprise, surprise. This morning’s topic was the 2016 presidential election and the ongoing public concern with the health of the two leading candidates – a concern that became a firestorm of news items after Secretary Clinton had to leave a 9-11 ceremony in New York this past weekend due to a highly classified secret that she had pneumonia. She needed three days of bed rest before rejoining the fray that is her life right now. I hope no one tells the semi-attractive Bible lady that HRC was in bed – the Bible lady might just vote for Trump who is not in bed and is in a dead heat with Hillary according to the most recent polls.

    Noted famous TV personality Dr. Oz interviewed Donald Trump about his general health on his wildly popular TV show and Mr. Trump produced a two-page note signed by his mother releasing him to run for President. Just kidding – the note was signed by a certified doctor who proclaimed him fit to serve…for something.

    Sigh. Then the Morning Joe conversation went downhill from there when visiting opinionated person Donny Deutsch interjected the interesting fact that 40 – 60% of men Donald Trump’s  70 years of age have erectile dysfunction.  Neither Mika nor I wanted to think about that fact. Charly barked at the TV and ran upstairs to get back in bed with Pretty. Spike jumped down from the living room sofa and walked back to get into his crate in the laundry room. Alas, only Mika and I wandered in the wilderness of erectile dysfunction together until the clock struck 9 and thankfully, Morning Joe was over.

    Tomorrow I plan to sleep until 9 o’clock. How many days until the Australian Open in 2017…hm…too many. Maybe I can get the Singapore tournament on the Tennis Channel – it’s almost like a Grand Slam.