The LuLac Edition #2506, August 31st, 2013

Our “Maybe I’m Amazed” logo.

MAYBE I’M AMAZED

MAYBE I’M AMAZED………that the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights march on Washington has come  and gone, but the same battle over the Voting Rights Act seems to be in the forefront again. The gutting of a section of that act by the Supreme Court tells us that there still is a need for vigilance against discrimination in some states in voting. Just minutes after the Court eliminated the need for oversight of voting practice changes in southern states, Texas acted to make changes in the way people vote there.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……….that every time you see or hear about the murder of a young minority in this area, you’ll always see a pastor or neighbor interviewed on TV. Said person will lament about what a good person the deceased was and how his whole future was just ahead and what a waste of a life. I get that. But if the crime happened during a criminal enterprise, like drugs should said clergymen or friend had been on the scene earlier? Good boys and girls don’t hatch at the age of 12 or 13, they begin in early childhood. Not to be sure there are victims that are in the wrong place at the wrong time. But there are shootings that are connected. And talking about the murdered person after the fact is a little bit too little too late as far as I can see.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED….. that the only sane Congressman who isn’t itching for a government shutdown is 17trh District member Matt Cartwright. Threatening to hold Medicare hostage is madness and the GOP just might overreach on this one. There are people who are not thrilled with President Obama’s performance legislatively on both sides of the aisle but he is being helped by the enemies, rather than the friends he has in Congress. A government shutdown will again blow up in the faces of the Republicans like it did in the 1990s. Don’t these guys read history?
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……..that a song that repeats over and over or is stuck in someone’s mind is called an earworm.

MAYBE I’M AMAZED…….that when Alex Rodriguez got hit a few Sunday nights ago delibertly by the Red Sox pitcher, (Ryan Dempster) it reminded me of the 1964 incident where Phil Linz was playing the harmonica on the bus from a double header loss to the White Sox and Yogi Berra knocked it out of his hand in anger. After that, the struggling Yankees seemed to surge. You might see this Yankee team of 2013 do the same thing. I don’t see a division title but with two wild cards you never know.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……..that old WARM survey sheets are now being sold on Ebay for about 11 bucks.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that people were actually bitching about a visit from the President of the United States. Oh the traffic, oh the congestion, oh those damn politicians. In the last half of the 20th century, from ’64 to 2000, Lyndon Johnson, (at the airport during his campaign) Richard Nixon, (at the behest of Dan Flood during the Agnes event) Jimmy Carter (at Pittston Area High School during his reelection bid) and Bill Clinton (in 1993 for his father in law Hugh Rodam’s funeral) all came to this region as sitting Presidents. From 2001 to now, we have had 4 visits by sitting Presidents, (Bush and Obama). That’s pretty good for a 12 year stretch.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED…..that a pearl can be dissolved in vinegar.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……but glad that one of the few balms to the sting of summer leaving is the specter of fresh grown tomatoes on the vine. Nothing against store bought mind you but there is nothing like a fresh grown juicy orb to make your day as the darkness comes earlier and earlier and the fast rush of oncoming winter death approaches.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED…..that it is now 4 years that Senator Ted Kennedy passed away. Last week in church, the Gospel according to Luke referenced how the last shall be first. After the tragic death of his three older brothers, Kennedy, not yet 40 was put into that position, being the first after being the last, way before he was ready for it. Kennedy had an impressive legislative record in his long and storied Senate career and would be appalled at how Senators are treated like second class citizens by reactionary House Republicans blocking any type of progress at all. During his career, Kennedy was accused of socializing the free enterprise system with his support of social programs and disarming this country with his support of sensible gun regulations. Four years under the ground and business in this country is booming and no one has had their guns taken away! Go figure!
MAYBE I’M AMAZED…..on the performance enhancement situation in baseball at these statistics. This year there were 28 percent of foreign born players on the Major League level. But since 2004, at least according to Sports Illustrated, 63 percent of PED use were from foreign born players who wound up suspended. Not sure what to make of that in such a short period of time but I thought that was interesting.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……that Victor Conte, the guy who started this steroid ball rolling with his Millbrae Holistic supplement company was a side musician in the early 1970s band Tower of Power. When I lived in Washington, D.C. in the summer of 72 I got a chance to see them and they were incredible. Not sure if Conte was with them then, but man, what a sound!

MAYBE I’M AMAZED………about this conversation I heard in church. Now for some reason, people in our church don’t whisper. But a grandfather was giving advice to his grandson about protecting himself on the streets of Wilkes Barre. The subject of the King’s student being robbed of his cell phone on Madison Street (big surprise) by five black men (bigger surprise) got the ball rolling. The older gentlemen said, “Carry a blackjack. Hit them in the noggin..hard. When they least expect it. Don’t be afraid to thrash them. Blackjacks will do the trick”. Except of course if there are five against one (talk about cowards) or a gun.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED……but not so much that Donald Trump is being sued for 40 million smackers. The would be Presidential candidate is being nailed because of his Trump University scam from a few years back. Trump was on the radio telling unsuspecting morons that they too can be as rich as Trump if they forked out fifty buck for his special kit. And he has the nerve to question Barack Obama's authenticity as an American? Trump will blame someone else for this but what a piece of crap this faker is.
MAYBE I’M AMAZED…at the Republican party. Matt Cartwright is a formidable one term Congressman. He has put together a very visible presence, has been prominent in both the district and the national scene. So do the Republicans try to get behind one candidate to knock him off in a general election in a heavily Democratic district? Nope. There are two candidates running for the seat. Matthew Dietz of Windgap and Dr. David Moylan, the Coroner of Skuylkill County. Those Republicans, they’d rather fight among themselves than field a united candidate. It has to be in their self destructive DNA although any GOP running against Cartwright will be a long shot at best.