You Are Invited

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

YOU ARE INVITED

Carpe Diem!

Seize the day!

My mother did not raise a man unable to see an opportunity! 

Pundits and pollsters are all pointing fingers after the recent Presidential election.

Republicans are pointing a finger. I think you know which one.

Anyway, it is time for a NEW party and I am just the guy to start it. I have been giving a lot of thought to this and I think I am on to something really big.

No one wants the old white guys anymore. I am not sure why they are not wanted but they are ripe for the plucking. The Democrats say they never wanted to spoil their mix although they have permitted a sprinkling of “OWG’s” over the years. The Republicans previously welcomed “OWG’s” and cornered the market but now they want to throw them under the bus.

The major parties are engaged in a contest to attract any segment of society other than “OWG’s”. The two major parties believe the future is with women and Hispanics. Before Governor Mitt Romney could get a shower and a set of new Mormon underwear on after November 6^th, Senator Marco Rubio was on a plane heading to Iowa to give a speech!

Iowa?

A United States Senator who represents the people of Florida, often known as the “Q-Tip” generation, finds a reason to address Iowans.

Who would have thought it.

Then it is announced that current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has also been enamored of that little state out west and will break into her schedule of traveling the world, speaking with Kings and Queens and dictators to fly out to Iowa and deliver a major policy address.

Iowa?

What possible major policy could the department charged with foreign affairs need to announce in Iowa? This question challenges the minds of some of our biggest thinkers. In fact, I expect you are pondering it right now as you are reading.

In any event, I have taken a look at my own poll numbers. There are tons of OWM out there without a political party. They are disillusioned and depressed. It is hard to start a party without some ready cash and I know the press has said the usual suspects, the billionaires and millionaires that fund Republican candidates are a little irritated over recent election results and not ready to lay out any more cash, so I am turning to new sources: the companies that make Viagra and similar products as well as to  any company currently marketing products for arthritis, new hair growth, diarrhea, constipation, “end of life” planning, and cemetery vaults.

I can see the political ads of the future. A man sitting on the edge of the bed with a smile on his face while a narrator outlines the great positive effects of “E-D” products and then spins into a litany of all the bad side affects that might be experienced. One of the great things about using OWM for these kinds of ads is that we are not too worried about side effects. What do we have to lose? We are in the “zone” anyway at our age.

Another commercial would show an OWM on the front of a box of cereal. He could look like Jack LaLanne. I think kids are getting tired of seeing sport heroes on cereal boxes. Frankly, I think they love their granddads and this new approach to selling cereal could be a trendsetter.

How about an OWM in an ad where you push a button on your computer screen and his hidden joints are immediately shown to you. And on each steel or plastic hip or knee the manufacturer has a smiley face and their corporate logo. The cash would just roll in to the surgeons and hospitals.

I am sure you can see how reaching out to OWM and giving them a party of their own could revolutionize American politics. I would give honorary memberships, with accompanying platinum identification cards to well known OWM who will, presumably, be abandoned by their former political parties, men like William Jefferson Clinton, James Earl Carter, George H.W. Bush, and George Bush. In a flash of brilliance I have already started looking for a mountainside and a sculptor. I cannot reveal the details yet but lets just say four handsomely carved portraits might one day be looking down on America while people recall that these four OWM started the new party.

As I mentioned earlier, I have no idea why Iowa seems to be so popular with politicians but I am going to start my mountain search right out there. They are known for cornfields but they must have at least one mountain somewhere that can be carved.

The biggest problem facing me at the moment is the name for the new party. The best name is taken: The Grand Old Party. Maybe since the Republicans are going to throw out all the male “Q-Tips” they would consider relinquishing their former name. The Grand Old Party will hardly be appropriate for the new accumulation of minority groups that will be welcomed to their tent. So I will approach Reince Priebus, the GOP Chair, and see if we can get dibs on that name.

My planning is still in the formative stages. I will continue to work on the small details before announcing the broader more sweeping plans.

The only thing I am certain of is that no one from this new party is going to Iowa anytime soon. Florida is where it is “at” for us. Everything will start and conclude in the land of the “snowbirds.”

The only person who might be thinking of going to Iowa now, General Petraeus, is free to do that. With that dark black hair thing, and the comb-over he has going, he isn’t going to join us anyway.

O * W * M

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

O * W * M

I am told that I belong to the party of Old White Men.

Who knew?

Things have changed fast.  Just a few weeks ago I belonged to the same party as Sandra Day O’Conner, Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, United States Senator Marco Rubio, Pizza King Herman Cain, Columnist Peggy Noonan, former United States Senator Rick Santorum, well the list of folks hardly considered Old White Men was endless but evidently they all disappeared around November 6^th. How all these younger, blacker, more female folks just vaporized is beyond my comprehension but evidently it was like the “Rapture” called for by people of the Bible. In this case, my political friends who were not male, old or white just vanished from the Grand Old Party.

In addition, everyone tells me that the GOP better just jump right off its set of long held principles because unless they get more hip, jive a little better or abandon many of their moral and financial “creds” they are doomed to this kind of defeat on a regular basis.

Everybody wants the GOP to change.

Not me.

I want them to revisit their basic principles, cast them in verbiage understood by the non-white, the young and the female and wait for the “turn.”  And the “turn” will most surely come. In history, it always does.

Our country has chosen a road to follow.  If it turns out to be a successful road, easily navigated and leading to a pleasant end point no amount of principle changing by the GOP is going to make any difference in the elections to come.

Not to mention, are we identifying with party because we believe in philosophy or do we simply want to win elections.

Most of the Old White Men I know who identify with the GOP are interested in party philosophy. Sure, we would like to win some elections, but not at any expense.

This is a good time for the losers to wipe their tears and tend to their wounds and then use the next four years, or longer, to get back to the principles of party that brought Republicans like Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan to national prominence.

There is an obligation here.

There are no assurances that the Barack Obama plan will work.

So it is important for America that an acceptable alternative is in place.  Hopefully, it will not be needed. All of us benefit from the second Obama administration being a great success.

But it is best for our country that we are prepared for any eventuality.

Breaking the China Cups

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

Breaking China Cups

I can honestly say I have not been to many tea parties in my life.

The little girls in our neighborhood used to have them but the boys were not invited. We didn’t care.

In the weeks leading up to the November elections all Americans were invited to a Tea Party.

It would seem no one went.

                     ----------------------------------------------

As I traveled more internationally I came to learn that some of the most interesting people got a lot accomplished over afternoon tea.

It is a tradition that never caught on in the United States.

In London, tea parties have always been important. They are a part of the fabric of everyday life. Most “Brits” have afternoon tea every day. Every major hotel offers afternoon tea and the really classy ones label it “High Tea” and do it with great attention to detail and custom.

More recently the label “Tea Party” has been applied to a group of Americans who are very conservative in their political beliefs. Although conservative in my political beliefs I am not a member of this “Tea Party” and I will not attempt to outline their beliefs other than to say they have nothing to do with “High Tea.”

Many of my friends who consider themselves part of the Tea Party are patriotic, loyal, hard working Americans with a deep love of our Constitution and our country.

Simply put, one might call them a “back to basics” crowd.

They came by this unusual name for their political movement because they see themselves rebelling against the idea, as Ron Paul has said, that America wants to take responsibility for the entire world while managing a totally irresponsible entitlement program at home.

So these conservative thinkers relate to our earliest “rebels,” who enjoyed their own tea party in Boston when they threw British tea into the sea to signal their outrage with the government of Great Britain’s treatment of the American colonies.

Simply put, they hit the “Brits” where it hurt the most: by ruining their tea; by showing a disregard for British custom.

They trashed a major symbol of British life.

I would argue that the contemporary Tea Party movement has perhaps selected the wrong moniker.

Most Americans don’t “do” tea parties. 

We are more a nation that likes coffee. A “coffee klatch” just sounds more American than a “tea party.”

We just aren’t into all the beautifully decorated bone china cups and saucers, the petit fours, or the crust-less cucumber sandwiches that require a magnifying glass to find. And then there is that whole thing with the “pinky finger” in the air while raising the bone china cup off the saucer.

I don’t think the patriots who made up the first Tea Party at the time of the American Revolution would have related to the current form of Tea Party in American politics.

So what was a very appropriate attack on a political symbol in the 1700’s bears little relationship to an attack on the direction of political life in America in 2012.

A good example of how many Americans have no affinity for any “Tea Party” was offered up in the November election results.

The results of the recent election might be summed up as follows:

                “there was the sound of china breaking everywhere.”

GOOD Morrnings

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

GOOD Mornings

I am writing this before Election Day as it is due to my editor.  As much as I enjoy watching politics unfold and trying to make predictions I am much less into analyzing the actual results.

Once the people have spoken, for me, it is over!

The Fat Lady has sung!

Hasta la vista pols (and polls)!

Whether we are dealing with a President Obama or a President Romney the work ahead is clear. The President-elect needs to get on it and he doesn’t need any of us to be in the way with grudges or bad feelings or “could have beens.” So this column has nothing to do with politics.

I can hear the cheering!

Once upon a time I would get up each morning in Connecticut while everyone else in the house was still asleep, dress and head over to the local train station where I would board a commuter train to New York City. On arrival in New York at Grand Central Station, I would get off the train and walk through the station and down into the bowels of that grand old building and stand on a platform awaiting a subway train heading downtown to Wall Street. I would board the subway and ride down to the area of Old Trinity Church, where the big bronze statue of the bull stands. Then I would walk to One Wall Street Plaza and commence a day of work.

Door to door: two hours. 

Round trip:  four hours.

In the particular business in which I was involved no one put in what is commonly called an eight-hour day. If you tried that you did not last long. So I spent a lot of time every week getting to work and working.

I mention this because I want to talk about mornings.

I did not realize how wonderful mornings could be in those years. Now that I am retired I cherish my mornings. I have a routine that I seldom break.

I awake when my wife is heading out to work. I am back asleep before the bedroom door shuts. When I awake again it is because I am no longer sleepy. My body tells me when I have had enough rest. These days, I listen to my body.

Although I am not writing about “evenings” I should mention that I also listen to my body then. When I am tired, I go to bed. Sometimes that might be 10PM. Other times it might be 2AM.

After rising in the morning I turn on the news and jump in a hot tub. While this might sound really sinful I actually do it because of arthritis. Anyone who has arthritis will tell you it is roughest in the morning because of your being so still all-night.

The hot tub takes all that away.

That time also lets me know if the world is still on her axis, if any foolish things have been said or done overnight, and if the weather is planning to play nice with me the rest of the day.

After the hot tub experience my Labrador retrievers have about had it without more individual attention. They get some pats on the head, a lot of conversation (who knew I would spend my days talking to dogs?), and we head to the living room and the fireplace.

Time in front of the fireplace, freshly brewed coffee in my mug, dogs at my side, newspaper and laptop news and columns on my lap: ready for the rest of the morning to unfold.

Nope.

The only thing that “unfolds” is the paper. I am ensconced for the better part of whatever morning remains. I have everything I need at the ready: my cell phone, my land line, a nice ship’s clock given to me one year by my wife, a good reading lamp, pencils and erasures for the daily crossword. 

Most importantly, our house has some really nice windows and from my chair I get a good look at the morning unfolding outside.

This is also a great time for making or receiving phone calls. If it is your regular schedule, people who need to reach you know when you will be home.

As lunch time approaches I begin to think of walking the dogs, meeting someone for a quick bite, joining my wife for lunch at her place of work, or preparing for any meetings I might have scheduled for the afternoon.

Many people will comment on how “lucky” I am to have this time.

I smile and let it pass.

Those friends who are retired know what I mean. You know, as do I, that we worked for these years. We earned them the old fashioned way, and we have no way of knowing how many of them we have “banked.”

They could run out at any time.

So we enjoy each and every one of them.

Afternoons are reserved for “honey do” lists, dog romps, my own errands, or anything that might be really productive.

Productivity is a word banished from my mornings.

Words saved for my mornings are: contentment, relaxation, enjoyment and contemplation.

Sometimes I think of those four-hour commutes and ten-hour days.

But not often.