UNDERDOG of PERFECTION

This is the kind of stuff I have been hoping for from the media for the past 8 years. Better late than never, I guess. Then again, imagine what sorts of disasters might have been avoided if more people with the ears of the nation would actually call out the incompetence of our leadership.

Of course, we also have Wolf Blitzer’s wishy-washy response here. But I was heartened by a comment he made last night after interviewing Joe Biden post-debate. He said (and I’m paraphrasing a bit here) “It would be nice if we could also get Sarah Palin but I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

Yet again, I’m spending a good portion of the day stewing over the selection of someone who’s grossly unprepared to serve as our nation’s vice president and the terrifying reality that, by one means or another, there’s a real chance that she’ll win that title.

My latest source of frustration and anxiety (in the event that she actually, by some act of God or Karl Rove, manages to get elected) is her disastrous interview with Katie Couric.

I read part of a transcript of the interview yesterday and my immediate thought was, “My God, she sounds like a beauty pageant contestant.” (Which, of course, she was in the 1980s.) And that was just reading the transcript. I could only imagine the visceral discomfort I would have felt actually watching the interview.

I guess I was not alone in my assessment of her performance. And here you can not only watch it, but also a painful comparison with a more recent pageant contestant as well. (Luckily, Sarah Palin sounds better than Miss South Carolina, but not by as much as I would like in a vice presidential candidate.)

Right now I am really wishing Obama had picked Hillary Clinton to be his running mate.

My latest full-length album project is going to be entitled simply Room 34 but, honoring some of my favorite bands that have released self-titled (or untitled) albums, such as The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Peter Gabriel and Weezer (and probably others I’m just not thinking of at this second), it has an unofficial title, based on the cover: The Bee LP.

For the first time since I began recording music in 1990, I’ll be putting out a release with cover art not designed by me. The cover art was drawn by my five-year-old son, Fletcher. It also serves as inspiration for the music on the album… or at least for the titles of the songs, each of which will be bee-themed.

Learn more at the album’s official page!

In other news, Keith Olbermann assumes his new role as Dave’s Ed McMahon.

I am not a free market capitalist. I don’t believe that those whose primary objective is to obtain as much money as possible can always be trusted to do so scrupulously (or, for that matter, competently). I also do not see the government as a malevolent force. In the words of Abraham Lincoln, ours is a “government of the people, by the people, and for the people.” The government is us. This, given the current widespread disdain of “Big Government”, would suggest that America has been struggling through an extended period of self-loathing. But mostly it just means that the government exists to manifest the will of the people.

Is it the people’s will that we give investment banks $700 billion (that’s about $2300 for — or rather, from — every single one of us, infants and elderly included, by the way) as a reward for proving themselves wrong about the merits of deregulation? Government is bad when it keeps them in line, but it’s good when it saves them from suffering the consequences of their mistakes. Wonderful for the rest of us.

A couple of other developments today have my blood boiling at an even more rapid pace than it already was: first, I learned that Congress is also preparing to give $25 billion to the auto industry to upgrade its outdated plants to produce more fuel-efficient cars. Fuel efficiency is a good thing, and if GM, Ford and Chrysler manage to improve it, rock on. But let’s be honest: this has nothing to do with protecting the environment, or even reducing our dependence on foreign oil. It’s about saving the asses of more free market capitalists who suddenly find themselves facing the music over years of bloated incompetence and obscene executive salaries.

Second, John McCain has proudly declared his intention to suspend campaigning, and also wants to postpone Friday’s debate with Barack Obama. Never mind the fact that suspending campaigning was actually Obama’s idea (O called M this morning to discuss the idea of a joint announcement, then M jumped the gun and stole the thunder). How exactly does it benefit the people, who very soon will head to the polls and hand over the reins of government to one of these guys, to postpone the debate? Is the Senate really going to be in session at 9 PM this Friday? If so, I’m sure they’ll give themselves overtime pay.

Meanwhile, the rest of us might spend the weekend contemplating this.