Sunday, February 19, 2012

Moon landings, trees, and Santorum's multiple choices

AS YOU MIGHT KNOW by now, my eyes wonder off the page in my dedicated efforts to comprehend the remarks of the current Republican herd of presidential McElephants. It happened when Newt Gingrich predicted he would stage a moon landing - in his second term! Cognizance was further abused when Mitt Romney told a Chamber of Commerce group in Michigan that one of the big reasons he loved his native state was that its trees were the "right height". (As one who lives among trees, I can tell you that I instantly checked ours for arborial equality and conceded there must be another way to express your love of your community.

Now comes Rick Santorum to the Summit County Lincoln Day Dinner to bestir the usual suspects - the party's enduring glitterati at these annual affairs. If I read the Beacon Journal account correctly - and possibly I didn't - he gave us a multiple choice of the same theme in the first five or six paragraphs.

No. 1. "America doesn't need a president it can believe in."
No.2. "We've always succeeded when we have a president who believe in them." (Them?)

No. 3. "That is what this election is all about. Who do you believe in?" (Them? Us? Me?)

In fairness, I should add the hometown Republican crowd reportedly gave him a standing ovation, although I'm not sure whether it was for No. 1, 2 or 3.The guests also gave him a 74 pct. triumph in a predictable straw poll.

Meanwhile, oddly enough, the county's party chairman, Alex Arshinkoff, who was seated next to Santorum, never appeared in the BJ account - another first for such festive political occasions. The thrill of announcing a meaningless straw poll was left to Bryan Williams, former county Elections Board director and now a Santorum booster.

Arshinkoff did tell me that as a matter of traditional party policy neither he nor the party would endorse anybody until the nominee is chosen at the convention. Politically speaking, that much caution I could understand. It's still February, folks.

2 comments:

JLM said...

Crazy Guggenheim not only wants a moon landing, he declared that America would have a moon BASE under his Presidency. Regarding Little Ricky, I recall that when John Kennedy was running for the White House, his opponents charged that he would use the Presidency as a platform for his Catholicism. Funny, I hear no such commentary aimed at Ricky NOR the newly Catholicized Crazy.

David Hess said...

As one who would welcome Newt's departure for the moon, I would suggest he take it sooner than later. As one who grew up in the forested redoubts of Appalachia, I never troubled myself to measure the height of the trees. What troubled me most about the trees was their safety and protection from the clear-cutters whose saws bared acres of slopes, causing massive erosion of the soil and the silting up of pristine streams. Not to mention the sheltering cover for wildlife, the role that forests play in clearing the air of CO2, and the depletion of oxygen in the silty waters that kills fish by the thousands. I take it that Mitt, the self-celebrated businessman, hasn't calculated the value of trees in such terms but rather measures their worth in board-feet.