“Perpetual Wars and Birthdays”

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“It’s nice to know how much worse off we were when we were better off, and how much better off we are now that we are worse off.”  – man in the lobby of the Hotel Fairmont reading Robert Novak’s column

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The only Birthday that really bothered me was my fortieth. To escape it I took the train from New Orleans to Phoenix to L. A. to Portland to Chicago to New York to D. C. and back to NOLA, singing to any who would listen (surprisingly many would) a song Pete Seeger wrote for The Weavers’ 1980 Carnegie Hall reunion.

It went in part, “How do I know my youth is all spent / my get up and go has got up and went. / In spite of it all, I'm eager to grin and think of the places my get up has been . . .”

I didn't stop reverberating about turning forty for years, not until I had to start squirming about a rapidly approaching fiftieth. Now I’ve turned fifty-nine, and ageing is a cakewalk. Though the River of Sixty lies just over the hill, I roll down towards it with ease and the illusion of grace.

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It is hurricane time and we are having a grand batch of stormy/sunny days. Bad for mosquitoes and West Nile Virus (well, good for them). Bad for us, yet pleasantly eerie, like DEATH IN VENICE. The other day L. A. Norma heard a Pat Buchanan interview in which he complained of the right wing takeover of the Republican Party. “Just think,” she said, “the right wing complaining about the right wing of the right wing party!”

That wing talks of warring with the World, one evildoer at a time. Not exactly news, but stunning when you think of the simple mindedness of it. Stunning and bloody. They herald their plan, of course, as saving us from death and destruction. Others say it will assure it, leaving us secure as Ariel Sharon’s right wing has left Bethlehem, and Haifa, and Jerusalem.

“And maybe,” Norma said crushing her cigarette, “get our minds off Enron, Halliburton, insider trading, and that corporate corruption Landslide once advised from the boardroom.” A new cigarette and, “I don’t want to sound cynical, but elections – something Landslide is not good at – are coming.”

Buchanan spoke of our rift with NATO’s Germany and England; and independent-minded France. Not much new with those three, we have had great wars with England and Germany, and polite differences with France ever since the waning of our Revolutionary zeal – after which, oddly, the Brits became our everlasting darlings.

“It is the measure of how bad things have gotten that Pat Buchanan makes sense,” Norma lamented. “ ‘Make no mistake,’ Buchanan said, ‘the terrorists are here because we are there.’ ”

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Some politicians leave Gothic footprints, some walk softly. All are self-promoting. That’s fine, otherwise they wouldn't be promoting at all. We need politician-promoters, but not as holy-men. We need them as caretakers of our Earthly public affairs. The Pope can better satisfy our holy-man needs.

We could use honest leaders, of course, but whether we get them or not, it is their work that is important. What they do matters. Who they do does not. Bush was not elected to office and clearly had no mandate to plunder the national treasury, though his sex life may have been prim, and his war necessary (in which case we sorely need the treasure he just divvied up with his buddies). His aide Condalezza Rice, thumping European war drums (for funding?) fumbled the hammered theme, which was more-or-less, "war today reason tomorrow." A German friend e-mailed: “She doesn’t lie very well, and Baby Bush is not believable telling the truth. It looks like you guys are once again going over the cliff alone.”

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“There is a market forming,” Norma said between Sazeracs, “in original Bush statements later buffed with the rewrite air brush. Grumpy news workers now save White House releases for future sale as original Bush statement numbers one, two, etc.” She treated us to The Sazerac Room’s delicious Redfish with Crayfish Sauce over Yellow Rice. It was my Birthday. The house comped us Champagne and Crab Soup. It was a grand meal, too tasty for an old man’s words.

“Don’t you think it odd,” Norma mused over excellent deep-dish Key Lime Pie with buttery Graham Cracker Crust served with a dollop of Vanilla Ice Cream, “that Waco, Texas has now been the site for two major made-for-TV snake oil shows – the A.T.F.'s deadly negotiations with poor crazed David Koresh, and Landslide's fumble-tongued economic conference at Baylor?”

“Wasn’t it bad enough to have your life bracketed by Vietnam and the AIDS pandemic? Now it is bracketed by Vietnam and Dick and Dumb’s War Without End!”

Can that gal make a toast, or what?

The first Waco snake oil show (Koresh) was code named "Show Time," I read in Gore Vidal’s PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE. I read this slim volume after our lunch, sitting in the kitchen dormer at Squalor Heights. It was a lovely eerie afternoon with rain and sun fighting for control of the sky.