Month: February 2008

It seems Bill Clinton is coming back to our fair town — Beaumont, Texas — sometime this weekend. His visit comes about a week or so after he stopped here to campaign for Hillary at a Mexican restaurant as well as hold a rally downtown. I suspect he’s coming back for more Mexican food although I could be wrong.

Of course, Barack Obama, or as I like to say, that famous Irish tenor Barack O’Bama of County Cork, was here yesterday holding a town meeting.

It is unusual for us here in Southeast Texas and Texas in general to get the attention of national presidential candidates. Someone said the last time a presidential candidate of any magnitude visited here was almost 30 years ago. I don’t know if that’s a fact or who it was if so. But after years of Texas being a rubber stamp for GOP presidential candidates (whose names are Bush), it feels good being appreciated.

Speaking of appreciate, I am off this afternoon and plan to do nothing more strenuous than lift and turn pages of a book. I hope all who sees this, both of you, have a great weekend.

A thousand people — give or take one or two — form a line around a city block in downtown Beaumont, Texas, as they wait to see Sen. Barack Obama.

Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois is probably speaking or answering questions five or six miles from where I sit as I write this. If one notes the crowd photo above that I took about one hour ago, it is obvious that quite a few folks would have been ahead of me in line had I decided to attempt to see Obama. I said attempt because there was no guarantee that those in line would actually get inside the Julie Rogers Theatre for what was billed as a town hall meeting. The Obamaistas, or volunteers, said that Barack would be holding a rally outside after the meeting took place. That would probably be a good idea because seating inside the city’s performing arts center is somewhere around 1,600 and a report filed about 2 1/2 hours ago by the local daily Beaumont Enterprise indicated police had already estimated the lines for Obama to hold around 1,000 folks.

I would have liked to have seen Barack speak, not that I particularly support him, or Hillary and certainly not John McCain. But I think it must be a rarity to see a presidential candidate in person even though you see one ten thousand times a day on TV. I have never seen a serious presidential candidate during my entire 52 years. I say “serious” because I once interviewed for a newspaper story, a lawyer and Ace hardware store owner in the small East Texas town of Center who was running for the Democratic nomination against Bill Clinton. I also have only seen three presidents of the United States and only one — my pal Gee Dubya — when he actually served in office. When I was full time in the news biz I saw Dubya and his pappy several times. And last week I saw Bill Clinton, who was in town campaigning for Billary.

No matter how you feel about a candidate for president, I think it is an honor to see someone who is or has a real shot at becoming our head of state. It’s kind of like the office of president itself. I think George W. Bush is an a**hole — in his words “big time” — but if I were to ever to meet him again (I interviewed him one-on-one before he was Texas governor)I would give him all the respect due the president of the U.S. Like, “Mr. President, it is an honor to speak with you. With all due respect you are a big-time a**hole, sir.” No, I am only joking. I would be respectful and, yes, probably a little in awe.

Speaking of Bushie, I caught a little of his press conference on the tube this morning. He said we weren’t in a recession, just a little bump in the road or something to that effect. Obama, speaking in Austin this morning, said:

“We are not standing on the brink of recession because of forces beyond our control. This was not an inevitable part of the business cycle. It was a failure of leadership in Washington — a Washington where George Bush hands out billions of tax cuts to the wealthiest few for eight long years, and John McCain promises to make those same tax cuts permanent, embracing the central principle of the Bush economic program.”

Obama then produced an armadillo — the official small mammal of Texas — and ate it whole to emphasize the dire straits of the nation’s economy. Or maybe he didn’t, but I would definitely have waited in line downtown if I knew he was going to do that.

So far I am not terrified at the prospect of John McCain becoming president. I hope he isn’t elected as our head of state because, as I have noted here before, he supports continuing the lunacy which was started under false pretenses by our CinC, Gee Dubya of Crawford, Texas, U.S.A. But McCain and I share opinions on other issues although to reiterate the war is a deal-breaker.

McCain said today that he thinks the war will be over soon “for all intents and purposes.” But I am not so sure that what he meant was “all infants and porpoises,” which doesn’t make a lot of sense I admit. After all, he is the straight talk guy, right?

My contention that I am not yet scared of McCain is conditional. He hasn’t been nominated yet and he hasn’t picked a Veep. In the interest of merely winning the election McCain could pick some real, scary f**kwad like Ann Coulter or Tom Tancredo or Oliver North.

Should McCain be the nominee as expected the Veep pick will be of more importance than in years past. Well, at least pre-Dick Cheney. Who knew he would really run things? But the import is obvious because McCain is a geezer and one who suffered mightily for his country in a stinking place known as the Hanoi Hilton. Thus, the vice presidential candidate under McCain as the nominee would need to be someone who wouldn’t screw up things and start zipping off nukes toward our imaginary enemies at the drop of a hat in the event McCain punches out that one last time while in office.

So, if McCain indeed is the GOP candidate I will wait to see who the pick for understudy will be before counting Big John as “relatively safe.” But make no mistake about it, I hope he isn’t elected. What I really hope is that I will wake up tomorrow and realize that this is all a big dream, that McCain, Obama and Hillary are not really running for president, and that all the picks on both sides who are running are benign. Fat chance of that, however, if Obama shows up in my town tomorrow as expected.

Local media outlets are reporting that Sen. Barack Obama will be campaigning here in Beaumont, Texas, on Thursday. As I have noted here before, that is likely to create quite a stir in our fair town, provided he doesn’t get mugged on his way to speak. Only kidding. We have a nice city here with only a few crackheads and ne’er-do-wells as in every city.

Thursday is not a work day for me, at least not in my part-time government job. My writing biz hasn’t been exactly setting the world on fire lately either. But that’s another story. So I perhaps will go check out what Obama has to say if it isn’t too much of a hassle. I hate to be that way but after all, I am an old fart and hate being jostled ’round by a bunch of crazed partisans of any ilk. Hey, it would be the same if some performer was playing somewhere near here for free. I could handle those mob scenes in my younger days of laying about with thousands of drunk and stoned people watching ZZ Top or Bob Seger or whomever was getting down those days. But such spectacles don’t excite me enough nowadays for all the discomfort. And a politician? I don’t think so. But I might still go. We shall see.

Well, that headline is a bit overstated I think. But to be certain, some enthusiasm over the Democratic race for presidential nominee is beginning to gather steam in what has been a sullen Republican Texas since Gee Dubya and his pet rock Turd Blossom made their failed attempt to build a Republican world.

Today, folks lined up outside the old Jefferson Theater here in Beaumont to await the arrival of Michelle Obama. The Jefferson probably hasn’t seen that kind of excitement since Paula Zahn held the racial forum there live on CNN.

The local Beaumont Enterprise gave an update on its Web site every 15-20 minutes or so chronicling Ms. Obama’s process:

11:30 AM: Doors open, crowd files into Jefferson Theatre as they await arrival of Michelle Obama

12:15 PM: Rally begins and Michelle Obama’s arrival is imminent, security says

Hmm. Imminent sounds like the crowd were waiting on a flood or hurricane.

12:45 PM: Michelle Obama tells crowd “Yes we can”

Somewhere someone yells: “No we can’t!”

1:25 PM: Obama talks of reaching an ever-shifting bar, health care and hope for future

The coverage is a bit much, seemingly trying to manufacture excitement, but that’s a newspaper for you this day and age. Nonetheless, I would rather see the Enterprise overplay it than leave the story half-cooked.

So far Bill has been here campaigning and now Michelle. If Hillary and Barack make it to the “Golden Triangle” of Beaumont, Port Arthur and Orange, Texas I think one will see some excited Democrats.