I'm writing a novel now ... sheesh

I've officially entered into National Novel Writing Month, also known by its abbreviation, Nanny Nanny Boo Boo.

The goal of the event is to write a 50,000-word work of fiction by the end of November. The official website allows authors to upload their work, update word count, chat with other participants and professionals and plan meetups. If you accomplish the mission, you get a certificate (and, presumably, a big meal-ticket hunk of manuscript).

I've already got 1,000 words. I already feel like I'm going to fail.

But here's one taste:

Dynamic Communications Models, LLC was not the kind of place anyone worked to make a difference. People worked there because they had a lot of bills to pay, and wanted some cash left over to play golf or get mani-pedis for their pets. Initiatives came from the top and trickled down to everyone below. From an omniscient view, the cubicle farm on the middle floor seemed designed to catch those ideas like a stack of wine glasses arranged to catch rotgut. People came in, did their duty and left at 5 p.m. sharp to drink or pursue the spoils of affluence.

Craig didn't quite fit in with the DCM crowd, but that was OK with him. The office didn't really lend itself to camaraderie. Cubicle partitions walled up workplace neighbors, leading to the same benign isolation they no doubt preferred in their gated suburban communities. Punch in, punch out. As far as Craig was concerned, his life lay outside these walls. Whenever people asked him what he did, he told people he worked here only because it satisfied the query. In his mind, it didn't define him.

What he did like about the job is that, in his field at least, it held cachet. Meaning, he could put it on his résumé later and not have another gap to justify. Because there were already three of those. 

Also, it begins with a hostage situation. And it's funny. I hope.

Fumbling around in red states

Permit me to play one of my least favorite weapons, the equivalency card. Sorry in advance.

The Obama campaign recently released a video spot featuring Lena Dunham of Girls comparing her first time voting to, well, tee hee.

Predictably, Republican leaders and pundits got their chastity belts in an iron knot over this, saying a presidential candidate put his name on such filthy insinuation.

But the Party of Reagan (or at least the Party of the Idea of Reagan) overlooked that Ronald Reagan himself made a similar (but more explicit) version of the same joke in 1980. Oops!

Come to think of it, the equivalency card doesn't apply here. Last I checked, Lena Dunham isn't running for president and this isn't three days before the election.

Though it is equivalent in the sense that I'm fine with it in both instances because I'm not a hypocritical prude.

Paper bag hyperventilating

As of now, I'm officially turning in my New Orleans Saints fan card. At least for this season.

It's not because I hate the team (though its current bastardized form is in several literal and tangible respects the worst ever). It's because sports is supposed to be a release, and watching such subpar "football" only serves to make me depressed. And I'm already depressed. 

Depressed because the NFL has such a taint to it this year. It's bad enough as a Saints fan post-Bountygate; it's worse to see the Falcons be the best team in the league. It hurts to have snarling fans of other teams tell me things like, "Told you this would happen! You were naive to expect anything else." I never wanted the haters to be right. I wanted my increasingly selective optimism, not their smug pessimism, to rule the day.

Depressed because, on a more personal level, I'm struggling to get back on my feet. I've stayed busy and productive but have little to show for it. I'm not in the best place. It's mostly my fault, but that doesn't make it hurt any less. Sadly, this isn't the first time I've been here and it may not be the last. I'm hopeful for the future, but for now it's still the future.

This year's Saints remind me of myself. For both of us, 2012 is a mulligan year seemingly destined from the outset to bring disaster due to past mistakes and the questionable handling thereof. There's always next year, but it's a question of getting through the remaining months first. The fuel that will guide us back to success is what we learn from the hardship.

I feel that pain every time I look in the mirror. I don't need to see it on TV too.

That ever-fickle poseur vote

I once knew a guy, a poli-sci major, with whom I had numerous political arguments. This was because I was a firebrand liberal and he was a cocky, Republican-leaning libertarian. Our clashes peaked around the dawn of the Iraq War, with all the fun that implies.

Sometimes, though, he'd ask me what "we" could do as liberals to have "our" message resonate again. (I found that approach cynical even before he suggested with a straight face that Alan Colmes should be the national voice of the Democratic Party due to his forcefulness.) Our next encounter would see him right back at the Republican table. It was all so strange.

But I've come to see in the years since that quite a few people do this — all right-wingers masquerading as liberals, apparently, because I can't think of an opposite example who isn't Stephen Colbert. And he's kidding.

Take Rob Taub. Please. He's as bad at this game as anyone. Let us count the ways:

1) He's blogging for Fox News. I mean, come on.

2) Taub, a Democrat, takes every opportunity to remind us of his Democratic leanings and that he, as a Democrat, and other Democrats just like him are jumping ship on Obama. And we should take notice, because he's a Democrat! Because that is what Democrats do when talking to other Democrats! Constantly say they're Democrats!

3) His stated disappointment with Obama is that the president hasn't done enough to fulfill his promises, and thus the logical solution is to elect Mitt Romney. Sure, OK. I'll take "Things no actual liberal ever says" for $800, Alex.

4) He blames Obama's failings on his desire to balance his family and political lives, because all successful Democrats love government and hate families, right? Yeah. That's what made JFK special, and why no one remembers his family.

5) Divisive. Class warfare. Deficit. Bloated. Reform. George Soros. I bet Taub wanted to mention ACORN or Solyndra so bad, but that would be too obvious.

6) His only two pieces for Fox News include this one and another one titled, "I'm a Democrat and may vote for Romney." In that one, he says he's disgusted with Obama because "I’m unhappy with out of control spending and incompetent bureaucrats who seem to have no concern or regard about how they spend my hard-earned money." In other words, it's actually worse. 

First rule of propaganda: it's got to be believable.

Second rule of propaganda: Don't get Rob Taub to write it.

Third rule of propaganda: if you need propaganda, you are losing.

Found photo of the week

I'm starting a new, probably irregular feature called "Found Photo." I have thousands of photos both in my phone and in boxes. Sometimes I just want to share them for no particular reason and/or with no particular context. Just so you can scratch your head even more about my life. Happy Friday!

"First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes your mom in a baby carriage. But before all that, I gotta finish making the world safe for democracy."

What it takes to get elected in Louisiana

Quote of the Day, sponsored by Summer's Eve

"If your traffic sucks, it isn’t because your readers just don’t get your particular brand of genius, it’s that they have determined you aren’t worth reading. Period." — John Cole

I must have missed the enormous spike in traffic from everyone in America checking out my blog and deciding it wasn't for them. You're a sly mother, Invisible Hand!

And here I thought the dip in my readership — which could never be described as "not scant" to begin with — had to do with years of shifting from blogs to social networking as a prime form of online communication. Or that I perpetrated an elaborate April Fool's joke in 2005 that worked too well in getting me dropped from blogrolls. Or that presidents and political climates have changed over the past 8 1/2 years. Or the simple fact that people lose interest both in me and in blogs in general.

Turns out, I'm just not worth reading. Bummer.

Neither is Cole, really.

About that Donald Trump thing

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't a "bombshell" some kind of alarming revelation? I don't think some stupid publicity-stunt offer qualifies.

I mean, I offered a girl $3 for a program at a football game Tuesday night, and I don't think anyone would consider that a bombshell. 

The fact that I had $3 in the first place, on the other hand, might count.

The worst thing about being poor

Being poor in America is, in some respects, like having full-blown AIDS.

When you have AIDS, the virus compromises your immune system to the point where the most pedestrian pathogen can kill you.

When you’re poor, you can’t afford to fix small problems, which can then turn into huge ones. A leaky faucet. A flat tire. Illness. The list goes on.

There’s also the uncertainty that accompanies being poor, much like with any terminal diagnosis. That’s probably the scariest part of all. You can’t be sure where you’ll be a few months down the road. All you know is that it won’t take much for you to potentially lose everything, and that event is all but inevitable. It’s terrifying and exasperating. It’s hard to maintain a healthy and productive attitude with those thoughts and feelings beating down on you.

Plenty of people will never know this anguish, at least financially. They are the ones who, through whatever channel, have sufficient security to ensure that they can rectify a small setback. More power to them, but I hope that their situation does not detach them from the realities of struggle among others.

I hope I won’t ever forget what it’s like to struggle, either through my own observations or through the struggles of others I know and love.

The economic crisis in America is a preventable condition, but so many of our politicians treat it like AIDS. Not in the sense of urgency to treat the victims of the epidemic, but rather that it’s worth stigmatizing and marginalizing. “Live by sin, die by sin. If you aren’t smart enough to avoid affliction, then that’s your problem.”

Sick.

Romnesia, meet Obamfidence

Watch this video of President Obama giving a postmortem on the previous night's debate. On top of making great points, he does something at 4:02 that transcends his immediate remarks.

I jolted when I heard it. Maybe because I'm not used to politicians, even Obama, articulate a point that so badly needed articulating. It's like when someone in a group is being a jerk and everyone lets them get away with it to keep the peace, but then one day someone launches into them with one cutting statement and everyone's relieved. The build-up itself is something to behold, but the casual aside takes it to a new level. "There's a theme here — he keeps on loving stuff and then, wants to end it or cut it or not help it!" Even in the negative arena of politics, you rarely hear something that comes off so unmeasured in a non-gaffe sense (even if it was measured). 

But even more importantly is the manner in which Obama talks here. This is a man who is confident and playing offense. Even your most gifted orators can fake confidence only to a degree. For all of this media narrative about a horse race, the election reminds me more (as you might imagine) of Super Bowl XLIV. Obama is the Saints and Mitt Romney is the Colts — one team playing to win and another playing not to lose. One team that will chance the mid-game onside kick and one relying on a tried-and-true playbook that everyone's already read. It's close for a long time, everyone's nervous and it could theoretically come down to the last play — but the final score tells a different story. Let's hope.

I like confidence. And I love what's behind that confidence.