Meet the Press Smackdown! Joe vs. Lindsey

It was with more than a little trepidation that I approached my very first Tim Russert-less edition of "Meet the Press" yesterday morning. Sure, NBC gave us a buffer in the form of last Sunday's memorial/retrospective. But with the 6/22 edition, it was back to something resembling normalcy. Only this time Russert's giant shoes would be filled by...Brian Williams.

I'm a bit lukewarm to Williams. He's a throwback to the good ol' days of Broadcast Man, the white bread (and white) clean-cut Boy Scout of indeterminate accent, only without the obvious intelligence of a Walter Cronkite or a Tom Brokaw. He makes me yawn. If Broadcast Barbie ever needed a milquetoast Ken, she'd hire Brian Williams. But I hate to bitch too much...at least Williams has never gone within 100 miles of the self-righteous hysteria that's the stock in trade of Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews.

I should cut Williams some slack - it couldn't have been an easy job. And he did okay. But I couldn't help missing Tim Russert like hell at several points.

To recap: two senators, Joe Biden (Delaware) and Lindsey Graham (South Carolina) played proxies for the Obama and McCain campaigns, respectively. Let me go ahead and admit my bias - while Joe Biden, a former Democratic nominee for president, was not my first choice or even my fifth, I think he's cool as hell. He's on my list of people I want to have a beer with. As for Graham...Ah, what can I say about Lindsey Graham? His name fits him perfectly. He's the sniveling little f*cker with a Howdy Doody haircut that you hated in kindergarten, just on principle, who first arose to national prominance when he presented the House's case in the impeachment of President Clinton.

Apparently that particular exercise in hubris was only a dress rehearsal. Remember when Randy Moss was still with the Vikings, and he pretended to moon the Green Bay fans, and Fox Sports' Joe Buck had to go clutch his smelling salts for what seemed like several decades? Multiply that by a thousand, and you have a rough approximation of Graham's performance on Sunday. He would've been entertaining enough in his own right, but coupled with Biden's pugilism and Williams's total effeteness (effetery? I like that better. I think I'll officially make that a word if it's not already), Sunday's broadcast was a perfect storm - The Clash of the Talking Point Titans.

Basically, we got a preview of the McCain camp's big anti-Obama message: he's an opportunist who can't be trusted. Expected argument, and laughably easy to deflect. It's a presidential campaign after all. What took this to the next level, for me, was Graham's utter commitment to that angle. To hear him tell it, every disaster large and small can be chalked up to the fact that Obama is [gasp!] a politician, who, as politicians are wont to do, sometime tacks to the prevailing winds. (Not at all like John "torture is bad unless the USA is doing it" McCain. Not at all.) No matter what the question, Lindsey had the answer. I try to watch "Meet the Press" with clear eyes, but like I said, I fully admit a bias against both mindless spin. But see what you think...





I gotta ask...Lindsey seems pretty heartbroken by Obama's decision to forego public financing. Either he drank the Obamamania Kool-Aid, or he's full of what my high school Spanish teacher called caca. Spare me the crocodile tears, dude.

(Personally, I think Williams dropped the ball. I can't help wondering how Russert might have cut off Graham's concern-trollish blustering. Luckily, NBC announced late Sunday that Brokaw will serve as interim MTP moderator through November. Thank Heaven for small favors.)

I hate it when people f*ck with my uterus

Apparently, the American Medical Association needs some busy-work. Yep, now that our nation's doctors have cured cancer, AIDS and heart disease and implemented that efficient-yet-comprehensive public health care system, they clearly needed something else to occupy them. How else can you explain the AMA's resolution, introduced by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, to ban home birth? I mean, I can't think of any other reason, other than the erradication of every other medical problem on the planet, for the AMA to go and f*ck with my uterus.

I'm sorry, what was that? The AMA hasn't cured cancer, AIDS and heart disease? Millions of Americans still don't have health insurance? It's still easier to buy liquor than fresh fruit in East Winston? Huh. I guess the AMA are just f*cktards.

I'm a little pissy, in case you can't tell.

Here's the thing. I'm not going to get into a debate about how safe home birth and/or midwifery is vs. a traditional hospital birth. I know plenty of women who've opted for non-traditional birth (at home with a doula, at birthing center with midwife in addition to doctor, etc.), and I know just as many women who had radical, unforeseen complications during childbirth and likely would've died had they not been in a hospital. When I have kids (a LONG ways off), I'm leaning toward home birth because I hate how the modern "health" care system treats pregnancy like a disease to be cured. I hate the horror stories about women forced into taking potentially dangerous medication, or into having C-sections. I really hate hearing from Medicaid patients who got second-class treatment.

But I may change my mind on that. That's the thing about options - having them allows one to choose what's best in a given situation for herself and her family. Not, say, what's best for her OB/GYN's tee-time.

Some say the AMA and ACOG are motivated solely by the business they stand to lose if more women go the home-birth route. That may be a piece of it. But I'd say a good portion of their motives come from pure old-fashioned paternalism. (Hey, I don't blame them...It must suck to realize that an 80-year-old woman on top of a mountain somewhere knows as much or more about birthin' babies than you do with your $100,000+ education.) (Not to suggest that all midwives fit that stereotype. They have to go through a pretty rigorous licensing procedure.)

As far as I'm concerned, they're no better than the fundies who want to outlaw abortion, early contraception or birth control pills. In both cases, the argument goe like this: You, the woman, don't have the capacity to research your options. You don't have the judgement to make an informed decision. And you're far too emotional to deal with any consequences arising from your decision. It's best to let us, the (typically) privileged old white men, make these choices for you. And if you ignore our measured counsel, you deserve whatever you get.

If this were only a resolution confined to a meeting of a professional group, it would be disturbing enough. But that last "resolved" item gives me the willies:

RESOLVED, That our AMA develop model legislation in support of the concept that the safest setting for labor, delivery, and the immediate post-partum period is in the hospital, or a birthing center within a hospital complex, that meets standards jointly outlined by the AAP and ACOG, or in a freestanding birthing center that meets the standards of the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care, The Joint Commission, or the American Association of Birth Centers.”

Gosh, if I had the capacity and judgment to, I dunno, think through consequences, I suppose I might find a few quibbles with the AMA's logic. If you legally ban - that is, outlaw - home birth, what happens to the woman who just goes into quickie labor at home and pops Li'l Johnny out before she gets to the hospital? Does Mom go to jail? What if I'm walking by selling Girl Scout cookies or something and I happen to be there when Li'l Johnny crowns, and I help Mom with her pushing? Do I go to jail? What if I'm a now-underground midwife? Do I get a heavier sentence than if I were just a random citizen, like first-degree murder vs. manslaughter?

Since (in Happy AMA Land) all women magically give birth in hospitals...um, who's paying for this? And are other medical conditions next? 'Cause, if so, my Mom might be in serious trouble - she had a "stomach ache" for more than a month before she finally let them take out her appendix. Come to think of it, don't we have laws in this country that protect the rights of people who decline medical treatment (such as vaccines) for religious reasons?

It's worth a reminder that "pro-choice" includes a whole array of reproductive issues, of which abortion is only one. In this presidential race, one candidate wants to f*ck with my uterus and one thinks I can handle her just fine on my own. Something to think about when you go to pull that lever in November.

Happy Fathers Day!

Here's to fathers and father figures! I'm blessed to have so many wonderful, brave and giving men in my life, and hope you all are as well.

Now for some warm fuzzies...

Barack Obama's sermon/speech today in a Chicago church where he slaps down absent fathers, particularly in the African American community.

The tribute to Tim Russert that capped today's moving edition of "Meet the Press." Yes, I cried.


And, finally, the warmest of all warm fuzzies. Congrats, Junior. I wish I'd remembered there was a race on today. (For some reason I completely zone out on NASCAR between Richmond and the Bristol night race. Happens every year...)

Little Russ and Me

So, last Sunday, I rolled out of bed at 8:50 a.m., as usual, which leaves me just enough time to nuke a crab cake and mix up some chocolate milk before tuning in to "Meet the Press." It just isn't Sunday without my weekly date with Tim Russert and a ridiculously high-calorie brunch. Only last Sunday, I flipped over to NBC to find that my weekly dose of intellectual Beltway smackdown had been replaced by...some tennis thing.

I'm sure it was hugely important. But I didn't care. In fact, I was kind of pissed. There I was standing in my living room, with crab cake and milk I'd bought especially for the occasion, and no Tim. I was unmoored. It threw off my whole day. I grumbled, allowing that Russert was allowed an occasional vacation like anyone else.

It turns out he was in Italy with his wife and son, celebrating his only child's graduation from college. I read that today in the same news alert that told me that Russert had died suddenly earlier this afternoon. While I was debating whether my wildfire fume-induced headache was severe enough for me to cut out early, this man whom I count as one of my top ten heroes of all time was being rushed to a D.C. ER following what may have been a heart attack. He was in his office at NBC's Washington bureau (which he headed), recording the voice-overs for this Sunday's edition of "Meet the Press."

Russert was to be the second in our annual series of speakers on campus - Nov. 18. I've been more focused on getting to meet Salman Rushdie (Feb. 10), but I reserved a fair amount of excitment for Russert. How could any political news junkie do otherwise?

I'm completely and totally flummoxed. I don't know what on earth I'm going to do this Sunday at 9 a.m., or how I'm possibly going to get through the elections this November without Russert and his dry-erase board, which is still way more informative than any computerized electoral map simulator on any network. I don't know if I'm ever going to get over watching Tom Brokaw announce Russert's passing with his iconic newsman's voice cracking with emotion.

Tim Russert's family and friends will grieve for the man they knew and loved. I - and other thinking news junkies - will grieve for one of the only TV journalists I'd grown to trust. I'll worry about who NBC will send to replace him at the head of "Meet the Press"'s odd hexagonal desk - Keith Olbermann? Chris Matthews? Dear God in Heaven, please, no... - and at the same time I'll pity that person, who has such beloved shoes to fill.

In other words - It's going to take me some time to come to terms with a world that doesn't have Tim Russert in it.

A Wednesday Funny for Ya

I love Scott Bateman's cartoons, and this one's another classic:



By the way, after the behavior of the Hillary Clinton supporters at the Democratic National Committee's rules hearing last Saturday, I never, ever in my entire life want to hear about how "immature" Obama supporters are. Seriously, where's a Taser when you need one?

Putting it in perspective

This essay in today's New York Times should be required reading, whether you're pro-choice, anti-choice or just indifferent. It's written by former gynecologist Waldo L. Fielding, now in his 80s, about what abortion was like in the bad old days before the Roe v. Wade decision. You know, when as many abortions were performed in the U.S. each year as there were, well, last year. Or, as Fielding puts it:

"It is important to remember that Roe v. Wade did not mean that abortions could be performed. They have always been done, dating from ancient Greek days.

What Roe said was that ending a pregnancy could be carried out by medical personnel, in a medically accepted setting, thus conferring on women, finally, the full rights of first-class citizens — and freeing their doctors to treat them as such."

In related news, Dana Stone, MD writes on Feministing.com about the right-wing movement to ban birth control pills. By the way, I don't know a single woman who takes "birth control pills" to actually control birth - meaning that they're either not sexually active, not in heterosexual relationships where sperm is an issue or just rely on more effective forms of birth/disease prevention, such as condoms. But I guess it's more fun to depict women (and their partners) who have the temerity to want to control the timing of their pregnancies as wanton ho-bags who want to have sex without any consequences. (Not like men...)

Even the ads for BC [sic] focus more on the lifestyle benefits of "the pill," such as the elimination of psychotic mood swings and the "how the F*CK did I gain six pounds overnight???" effect. (Could it be that the latter has some impact on the former? Hmmm...) Can we officially start referring to "birth control pills" as something more reflective of their actual use - hormone regulation pills? Skinny jeans pills? "But I've waited a year for this vacation!" pills? I'm open to suggestions...

The Week in White Trash

So, I'm driving home Monday around lunchtime after spending part of the weekend at my parents' house up in Pilot Mountain. It was such a gorgeous, sunny day. On a whim, instead of turning off to get on the freeway, I decided to take back roads the whole way to Winston-Salem. This was how I found myself on a two-lane road between Tobaccoville and Bethania behind a black Pontiac of mid-90s vintage that was driving right at or just over the speed limit. Not what I'd prefer, especially on a road that I could drive in my sleep...But they weren't so slow that I could pass them easily, so I just fell in behind them.

The road took us through "downtown" Bethania, where I freely admit that the speed limit drop to 25 m.p.h. caught me off-guard. (No excuse for that - I mean, I'm on the friggin' board of the Historical Association, for crying out loud...) Apparently the driver of the Pontiac took this as a sign of aggression. Because, just after leaving Bethania, on the one-mile (or so) stretch before the two-lane spills into Winston-Salem's bustling Reynolda Road, he/she/it slammed on the brakes. Hard. As in, I WAS NOT following too closely (having just pulled away from a stop sign), and I still had to lock it down to keep from hitting them.

(Tip: when you're trying to wreck someone who, say, is tailgating you and pissing you off, for crying out loud, at least throw on your turn signal! At least pretend that your sudden stop was legit! People, I swear...)

Now's the time for a more thorough description. Like my car, the Pontiac was crusing with all four windows down. Unlike my car, out of each window dangled a painfully white and Spam-fattened arm clutching a burning cigarette. Judging by the passengers' silhouettes, they were rockin' some first class, Grade A mullets, too.

One other thing the Pontiac had that my car didn't - An unrestrained toddler. If memory serves, North Carolina requires children to use car seats until they're eight years old or weigh 80 pounds. This child was neither - couldn't have been more than four or five. And if he or she was in a car seat, then my chain-smoking friends need to invest in a new car seat. That's judging by the way the kid flew around the back seat when they brake-checked me a second time.

Reynolda Road is a four-lane, and my engine's both larger and in better repair. As I passed them, one of the women removed her Doral long enough to shout - out of the window of her moving car - "I GOT A BABY IN 'IS CAR, YA STUPID BITCH!" It's too bad I was laughing too hard to holler back, "And what a lucky tyke it is!" Seriously, let's hope the child who was so imperiled by MY driving survives the illegal car ride long enough to develop asthma from the second-hand smoke inhalation.

I guess I should count myself lucky that none of them shot a stream of Skoal juice at my car...Or I guess I should say, they're lucky. 'Cause you don't f*ck with a redneck's wheels. If they'd laid one single ash on my car, I would've been the one leading the patrol cars on the low-speed chase back to whatever single-wide on concrete blocks these classy folks call home. But I had a book to finish, and sunscreen to use, so I guess I'll never know exactly which of the north-city trailer parks they belonged to, and precisely how many pit bulls they had managed to cram into the 10-by-12 chain-link enclosure out back...I guess that's what I get for being a stupid bitch, huh?

I'm a stupid bitch with electrical issues, is what I am. The breaker which controls almost everything in my house that matters flipped its lid late Saturday night. So now my refrigerator's plugged into a power strip in the living room via one of those long orange extension cords running through half the house. I'm mortified, obviously...But it's consoling, in a way. The difference between ordinary rednecks like me and Honest-to-God white trash is that, when true white trash plug major kitchen appliances into outlets in inappropriate rooms, they don't care. Hell, they probably do it on purpose. (What could be more convenient than having the repository of beer and the TV in the same room, anyway?)

In other news, I'm prepared to grant my future husband Joakim Noah Honorary White Trash status. Over the holiday weekend, Noah observed the sacrifices of millions of U.S. military personnel in classic white trash fashion - boozing it up in public. According to ESPN.com, Noah (who was drafted by the Chicago Bulls last year), returned to his alma mater, where University of Florida campus police busted him on some minor traffic violations. His wheels out of commission, Noah was further busted for walking down a public street at 2 a.m. with an open container of what appeared to be beer. (It turned out he had a small amount of pot on him at the time.)

Well, I mean, really, who hasn't been there? They take your ride, what are you supposed to do? Just not party? Oh, come on. See, this is why Noah can only be honorary white trash. If he were honest-to-God, true white trash, he'd still be on the front porch of his mansion in Chicago on a Goodwill couch hollering at his bug-light.

(In all seriousness...why is it ok to walk around visibly drunk with gads of open containers - say, tailgating at a race or football game - but not at others? Inquiring rednecks need to know. Really, I need to know.)