John My Man Jim Zien ~ Copyright c.
2008>
Sing to Barbara Ann, by the Beach Boys.
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John, bombed, bombed, bombed when he ran
John, bombed, bombed, bombed when he ran
Oh John my man, fold up your hand
John my man
You had Barack down in the pollin’
Barack ‘n Biden reelin’
John my man, you bombed
Bombed when you ran
Hitched up your pants, hoisted up your lance,
Snatched up Sarah P on a glance just for a chance
With Palin’s brand, brand, brand, brand Palin’s brand
To make your stand
You had Barack down in the hole ‘n
Barack ‘n Biden kneelin’
John my man, John, John
Bombed when you ran
John, bombed, bombed, bombed when he ran
John, bombed, bombed, bombed when he ran
John my man, lost your last hand
John my man
You had Barack down in the hold ‘n
Barack ‘n Biden heelin’
John my man, John, John
Bombed when you ran
Lied to the news
Lied your face blue
Lied like a fool
But you knew you dished doo-doo
John my man, John, John,
Bombed when you ran
Bombed, bombed, bombed when you ran
You had Barack down at the goal ‘n
Barack ‘n Biden sealed in
John my man, John, John
Bombed when you ran
John, bombed, bombed, bombed when he ran
John, bombed, bombed, bombed when he ran
John my man
Made your last stand
John my man
You had Barack down in the pollin’
Barack ‘n Biden kneelin’
John my man, John, John,
Bombed when you ran
John my man, John my man,
John my man, John my man,
John my man, John my man,
John my man, John my man,
You had Barack down in the pollin’
Barack ‘n Biden kneelin’
John my man, John, John,
John Also Ran
Chuck the Plumber Speaks Up
Coming from a long line of plumbers myself, I felt a real kinship with
Joe Wurzelburger, or Wurzelbacher, or Worzelbacher, as I cheered John
McCain for whupping that foreigner Obama’s you-know-what in their dust
up at my guy Jimmy Hoffa’s alma mater.
‘Cause I know that Joe knows what it feels like to squeeze your tired
butt under a bathroom vanity on a Sunday morning at 6 AM for some blowzy
socialite wife of a rich-guy banker in a nosebleed tax bracket who had
too much Chablis at a liberal democrat fund raiser and dropped an emerald-studded
diamond ring down the Florentine marble sink drain under the gold-plated
faucets in the fancy can off her million dollar boudoir when she came
home drunk.
I’m actually kicking myself for not going to that Obama rally too, since
if I had I might of run into Joe What’s-his-wizzel and introduced myself
to him -- Chuck the Plumber, like the side of my truck says. Then we
could of made common cause together getting that tax-and-spend Yahoo-sayn
to ‘fess up to the fact that he’s after 36 cents out of every dollar
I clear after the first a quarter million at $55 a journeyman’s hour
roto-rooting backed up sewers and roughing in toilets and salvaging copper
pipe out of half-built houses in wasted subdivisions croaked by all those
subhumans who made out like bandits with all that subprime mortgage lending.
I’m not really too sure what McCain’s going do for me personally tax-wise
when I grow my plumbing shop to the point where I’m so rich that that
terrorists’ pal would take away most of the profits anyway. But the old
maverick says he plans to put some more cash in the pockets of wealthy
folks who still have enough dough stashed away after the market tanking
to remodel their gourmet kitchens and designer bathrooms. Now that sounds
like a jobs program for guys like me if I ever heard one! And I do believe
as soon as fightin’ John gets a handle on the war over in Eye-rack he’ll
cut some slack to us Plumber Joes and Plumber Chucks and all the rest
of our six-packing middle-classmates with all the money he’ll save by
winning big there. Plus that foxy Sarah Palin’s locked and loaded to
hunt for more oil off Alaska, which is good for me also if I want to
expand into the home heating side of the business.
It won’t be long now ‘til we know if our next President will be a real
war hero who’s been around the block a few times and knows like he says
how to fix everything that’s gone wrong in Washington since George Bush
tricked us into voting for him and then sold us all out, or if we’ll
get a guy who’s wet behind a pair of pretty big ears that seem to get
whispered into by a lot of very questionable friends.
I know who I’m voting for anyway.
Oh and John, after you and Sarah finally take over the White House I’m
your main man when it comes to stopping embarrassing leaks. Joe the Plumber
doesn’t have a license.
J. Zien / October 2008
Jim Zien is the Executive Director of The Aloha Foundation, which operates
summer youth and family camps and an outdoor education center in Vermont -- www.alohafoundation.org. Before
joining the Foundation in 2005, he lived in Boston for 35 years, serving
in management and consulting roles with cultural organizations and public
agencies including the Boston Children's Museum, the Massachusetts Cultural
Council and Massachusetts’ capital planning department
Ellen Solomon
Powerful Women
Sarah Palin, veteran beauty pageant cutie, wife of a stud husband, and
governor of Alaska, has now been made over into the Republican party
candidate for Vice-president of the United States.
Has her transformation added to the images we have of powerful public
women, women who usually threaten and confuse men and often other women?
That’s why the stereotypes have arisen: to blunt the threat and straighten
out the confusion.
There’s the ball-buster, the aggressor-woman who, the popular hope goes,
will be punished for transgressing the gender image by never being able
to keep a man. Think Betty Friedan. There’s the woman who uses her sexuality
and allure as a come-on, and in doing so becomes an icon that women don’t
have to compete with and men have to dream about—night and day. Think
Marilyn Monroe. Or Mae West, who dressed her sexual power with good humor
and knowing glances until she approached the edge of camp. Then there
are women like Hilary Clinton, who’ve reduce the threat by trying to
appear more like ordinary women, who downplay their smarts with ready
smiles, attractive clothes and hairdos, and jokes.
But Sarah's winks are meant to disarm, to signal her audiences how cozy
she is among them, how she knows they’ll understand her. She’s the pretty
girl-next-door, the mother of disobedient and imperfect children, and
she forgives them for their limitations as she’ll forgive you yours and
hopes you’ll forgive hers.
That’s why she knows you won’t take it the wrong way or hold it against
her if she stands in church while her minister prays that she won’t be
attacked by “witches.” And if you told her that this minister’s colleagues
in Africa have accused innocent women of witchcraft and encouraged their
murders, Sarah (for we can call her by her first name, we are that intimate)
would probably say she had no idea and that she’ll certainly look into
it. And she’d be happy to look as well into the implications of a sermon
she heard more recently which suggested that terrorism in Jerusalem is
God’s judgment on Jews for not being Christians. .
Sarah’s wants us to believe she’s as cute as a button, as nice as the
widest eyed ingénue, as savvy as a hunter, as maternal as the woman who
lived in the shoe, as enthusiastic as a cheerleader. And if she lived
among eastern intellectuals, she might know more facts and read more
newspapers, but she’d be no wiser, because wisdom comes only out on the
frontier.
What Sarah Palin and her handlers don’t want us to know is that she
tries to ban books and fire people she disagrees with. That she uses
her executive powers to punish and frighten. That she, like all women,
who keep their powerful natures under beautiful wraps, can be very very
dangerous.
Ellen Solomon is a political organizer and writer who lives in Gloucester,
Mass. Born and raised in South Carolina, she has lived in the Northeast
for most of her life. She's taught at Harvard and Bard colleges, and
the Waring School in Beverly. Currently she edits, gives writing workshops,
tutors, and is working on a novel.
