So usually when I'm in a crowded public space and I have to be talking on my cell phone, I like to give back to the people around me who have to hear me talk. Par example, Saturday night I was on the L shuttle bus on the way to Alligator Lounge in B'Burg to meet some friends, and I'm on the phone with mother, because when else do I have time to catch up with my mother, and we're talking and I'm telling her what I'm up to, my thoughts and feelings on all this mind blowing stuff going on in my life, like unsafe group sex (just kidding!) and then, as the bus is getting more and more crowded, I fall into my usual routine. I start giving out useful information. Sometimes I like to rehash an interesting news article, nothing about current events because that comes out sounding editorial, but you know, some interesting scientific finding or modern romance human interest story. Or sometimes I'll share an amazing new album that everyone has to run out and byy, or movie, book, etc, etc. So this time I went with book and started telling my mom about this incredible Shirley Jackson novel I'm reading called, We Always Lived In the Castle. My mom is a writer so this info is useful to her. I'm telling her a little bit about Shirley Jackson how she, like my mother, lived in a small university town, how she was married to this intellectual from an upperclass NYC/Jewish family, how she wrote this insanely creepy short story called The Lottery (please google and read now), and on and on I'm going in a very clear, monotone voice like my name is LexisNexis. Then I get off at the Lorimer stop, I'm kinda of wandering around and this girl runs up to me. "Hey!" She says. I look at her. "Hey."
"You're going the wrong way, the Alligator Lounge is over there."
"But how did you..."
"I heard you talking on the phone."

Molly Ivins makes me feel guilty for being lazy. I didn't notice this guilt until she passed away. Now, in her honor, her long career of speaking her mind and being true to herself, especially that priceless profane mouth of hers, it's pedal to the metal time. I'm starting by gearing up for 2008. There will be...a special campaign cause for this girl. TBA.

Last Wednesday I went to Barnes and Noble in Union Square here in NYC to hear former DNC chair and Dem Party fundraiser extraordinaire Terry McAuliffe give a Q&A session promoting his book WHAT A PARTY!: MY LIFE AMONG DEMOCRATS: PRESIDENTS, CANDIDATES, ACTIVISTS, ALLIGATORS, AND OTHER WILD ANIMALS. Standing on stage at the podium overlooking a crowd of 50+, he appeared up beat, hyper, star-struck like he was about to welcome one of his political idols into the room. But it was just him up there, alone, talking about his long career of building the careers of others.

I’ve heard a lot of great things about Terry’s leadership at the DNC, that he was a cigar-passer-outer, how he let his Irish-American-side get the best of him by being this open, jovial, back-slapping man about DC. He gushed when he spoke of Bill Clinton, his voice raising a few octaves as he told the story of hundreds of thousands of Irish singing God Bless America and raising our flag when Bill Clinton made a public appearance in Dublin. He said America needs to get back to that, those warm receptions, the ones Clinton was famous for being showered with when he traveled the globe as our President, unlike the ranch-crawler we have staining the White House curtains with his wife’s Laura’s chain smoking. Not to mention Jenna’s spilled Sex-On-The-Beach party fowls.

So, Terry was, as he’s famously known and paid for being, right on point. Happy and positive, making you feel like, “We can win this thing!” I decided to test him out with a hot button issue of my own after other audience members asked the usual boring questions of: “What do you think of Hillary? I love Obama! What do you think of him?” Here’s my latest thing: Healthcare is important. As is education and pulling out of Iraq. So is fixing social security and getting back the goodwill we’ve been riding since we saved Europeans from themselves. But now, after one hundred years of CIA gang bangs of South America, FBI plotted assassinations of our very own cultural leaders and activists, and general Joe McCarthy and Ann Coulter drudgery, how about if our mainstream politicians finally address what easily intimidated and scared people like to call American conspiracy theories, you know, the ones behind such catastrophes as Kathleen Harris landing a Congressional seat after fixing Florida in 2000 for Bush. I think it would make politics a whole lot sexier and more interesting, finally reeling in and snagging that fringe liberal vote the Democratic Party has been afraid to be seen with in public.

Here’s my brief exchange with Mr. Terry “Smile Like You Mean It” McAuliffe:

Me: Mr. McAuliffe. I worked as a Community Organizer in Portland, Oregon for the 2004 election.

Terry McAuliffe: Thank you. Thank you very much for that.

Me: No problem. Now, I actually encountered a handful of voters who refused to vote because they were convinced that our country is in the hands of some CIA/FBI conspiracy.

(nervous laughter and eye-rolling from the audience)

Me: What would you say to someone like that to get them to vote Democrat? Thank you.

TM: (paraphrasing) First off, the CIA warned President Bush that Al Queda was determined to attack us by using our own planes against us. So this President doesn’t listen to the CIA. I would tell them, we had eight years of Bill Clinton where we balanced the budget, cut the deficit, and...everyone got free Sundaes on Sunday.

Ah Clinton. As soon as McAuliffe dropped the C word his face lit up like a police taser at a Brooklyn block party. Doesn’t he realize that according to Hillary the Clintons were victims of a right-wing conspiracy? We have another Presidential election in less than two years. Now is the time for the Democratic Party to finally take notice and start talking about that giant elephant in the middle of the room.

Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.

-Sir Winston Churchill

He's young. He's beautiful. He's articulate, and he's black. What's not to love and lust after. But he's no Darfur visiting Bill Richardson, Governor of New Mexico. We need a Governor, not a Senator to run. Sorry Hillary.