The Copper Queen

By Saul Bloodworth

My road trip took me to Brisbee, Arizona. I actually wanted to got to Tombstone, but I was too exhausted from driving those bumpy roads to make the last thirty miles.

Brisbee is an old mining town without mines; everthing has been closed down in the 1970s, due to a lack of copper, so now everybody is making a living off tourism, more or less. Probably less. The town has an organic coffee shop, a number of stores selling Indian jewelry, the Brisbee Grille, and quite a few hotels, the oldest and most fanciest being the Copper Queen Hotel.

That's were I spent the evening, at the bar of the Copper Queen Hotel. The TV was running — baseball — and three guys, who were local, were talking about, no, not the playoffs, about the election. The discussion went like — well, Obama will likely win, according to these polls we've just seen, but there are also two Republican Congressman from Arizona who could loose there seats, plus, the Senat, if you count ... — anyway, it was not what you expect to hear in an Arizona town in the Wild West, at 10pm in a bar. They also sounded quite enthusiastic.

And nobody was mentioning John McCain.

Highway to Hell

by Saul Bloodworth

Recently, John McCain had an appearance in one of these late night comedy shows — I believe it was Letterman, but I'm not sure — were he was joking about earmarks. He said he had never voted for an earmark in Washington, DC. In fact, when he became Senator, Arizona had hundreds of miles of federal highways, and now it has next to none.

Guess what: He was not joking! I arrived in Arizona today, and when you cross the border, coming from New Mexico, the Highway 10 suddenly disappears! Well, not completely, but it turns from a well-maintained street into a bumpy road, lined with potholes. It reminded me of the GDR in the 1980s, when they were already broke. Obviously, so is Arizona.

I then took a left turn to get into the Chiricahua Mountains, very scenic (and pretty hot, too), however, the road, that was not very impressive to begin with, turned into a dirt road! Dirt road really meaning a stone-and-stick road. I was driving a rental, and I haven't changed a tire since, like, Jim Morrison died, if at all.

I finally arrived at a coffee place in a tiny town called Portal, and the very friendly lady that runs it gave me a makeshift map. Guess what: pretty much all the roads in the Chiricahua Mountains are dirt roads.

So, thank you, John McCain. If my flat tire isn't covered by my insurance, is there any address I can send the bill to (probably not 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, I hope)? Also, I filled the tank with $50 worth of gas, so give my regards to your twin brother, George W. Bush.

To end on a high note, here is a joke my nephew told me: A sailor lands on the coast of Tasmania (far, far away, farther than Australia). He finds a strange looking bottle, and as he opens it, a Dschinn appears.

The Dschinn: Sailor, you have freed me. I will grant you a wish - anything at all!

The Sailor: Well, I would like you to build a highway over the Pacific Ocean, all the way from Tasmania to San Francisco.

The Dschinn: Uhh ... well, a highway across the ocean, tens of thousands of miles? Well, I am a Dschinn, buts thats quite an endeavor. Is there anything else you might care for?

The Sailor: Ok then. I want to understand women.

The Dschinn: Do you want you highway with six or with eight lanes?

A left turn at Albuquerque

By Saul Bloodworth

I stil don't know who will win the election (although I'm guessing, at this point, Obama) but I do know who will win New Mexico: Obama. Why? Because I'm currently traveling in New Mexico. Saturday, Obama had a rally in Albuquerque, at the University of New Mexico, and pretty much everybody who lived there, came.

Ok, nearly everybody. Albuquerque has a population of about 450.000 people, that would make, I guess, 200.000 voters. I attended the rally with a friend, we came one hour early, had a hard time fining a (legal) parking space, and also found the university gates packed. There was a long, long, long line (and a fairly broad one, too), we kept walking towards the end of the line until we were close to Santa Fé, the end never came. We decided to give up, walked back and we (ok, me) found an opportunity were we could sneak in, cutting the line short.

There were still some 10.000 people in front of us. We waited another hour, eventually, the people broke down the barriers to the sports field because security took too long, so everybody got in. And everybody was in a good mood. First, Bill Richardson, the Governor, spoke (whom my friend does not like because he reminds him of Bill Clinton), Richardson counted 300.000 people, that was probably a little over the top, but who cares.

Anyway, if that is already the number of supporters actually showing up and standing in line for three hours, you can guess that the number of voters will be through the roof. McCain also had a rally, only thousand people came. To be fair, they had to be pre-screened, and only committed Republicans got access. But still. Anyway, gotta run.

TV Land

by Saul Bloodworth

Three days ago I met Leslie Stahl. She spoke at the New York Historical Society. She looked good from afar, but up close you could that she was, like, sixtyish (no offense, I admire accomplished women). She talked with Peggy Noonan, about politics, the election, it was very cordial. The point, however, I'm trying to make is that it was like being on TV.

And with being on TV don't mean Ms. Stahls CBS appearances because I don't watch network news. I mean Murphy Brown. Currently, TV Land is re-broadcasting old Murphy Brown episodes. Occasionally, a real person shows up and pretends to be part of that fake news organization called FYI. And one of them is Leslie Stahl.

So I felt like I knew her already. At Murphy Brown they are also making jokes about Dan Quayle all the time. Dan Quayle was the dopey Veep of Bush the Elder, he got himself into the tank when he was trashing Murphy Brown for becoming pregnant while unwed (inspite that she did not even exist). So Bristol Palin can be glad that Quayle is not around any more.

Dan Quayle's chief of staff was, by the way, Bill Kristol. So, maybe, Kristol is not that smart - otherwise he would have prevented this PR desaster. At least he has learned: recently, he called Sarah Palin a "a working woman who's a proud wife and mother".

This might sound crazy, but I miss these times. Then again, they probably never were real. Anyway, if Sarah Palin shows up on 30 Rock, I'll become sick.

Fakiness

by Saul Bloodworth

I don't even think it's such a big deal that the Republicans spent $150.000 on clothes for Sarah Palin. After all, the election is about appearances (even though for that kind of money Obama could probably look like a less scary and whiter version of Michael Jackson).

However, the odd thing is the fakiness surrounding that decision. Sarah Palin is supposed to be the down-to-earth, small-town-values, ordinary-American-kind of gal. So how come she dresses like Carrie Bradshaw?

And speaking of fakiness in the Republican campaign, the money-making backbone of this country is not the Nebraskan cowboy who barely breaks even (no offense, I like cowboys). The economic backbone is — still — Wall Street, the corporations of Delaware, Silicon Valley and all of the West Coast, from Microsoft to Hollywood.

The rural Midwest, on its own, without farm subsidies and other Washington handouts, would collapse to the economic level of Guatemala, if the un-American part of America were to succeed. And so would Alaska. When Palin speaks about hard working small town Americans, what she really means is: white people, the same way Ronald Reagan meant black people when he was talking about Cadillac-driving welfare queens.

She might be in for a rude awakening.