Roger Stone? Bo Diddley "woulda whupped him with a ugly-stick!"

Chronicle of a journey from youthful
know-it-all to old-fart astonishment.

Blues/Rock legend Bo Diddley died last week at 79. I listened to Bo in his prime at LA's Fairfax High which is now famous for turning out City, State and at least one #1 ranked national basketball teams. Yeah, I woulda dug that AND Bo Diddley back in the day. In my time the student body had legendary Wall of Sound music producer Phil Spector.
"http://it.youtube.com/watch?

That was then, this is now. I recall nothing untoward. Phil put together the occasional Saturday Night gig in Michael Spencer's parents' livingroom. Those gigs helped make me whatever I've become. They helped my Since-Grade-Six-Good-Friend Mike Spencer put together Hospital Audiences Incorporated which has helped who knows how many of NYC's disabled people; few if any of those who HAI has helped over 40 years have had my good fortune http://www.hospitalaudiences.org/hai/index.htm>.

In 1955, a year before I graduated from Fairfax High in LA, the entire school took the Iowa Test of Academic Proficiency [ITAP] We [Fairfax, a public school!] finished #2 in the nation. The whole USA! Allegedly behind a Private School in D.C. ITAP scores were percentiles. Most of my friends got 99-plus. I got 93. A "retard." Maybe it's why I hung with guys who took all-day Auto Shop too. They scored lower than me. Hanging with bad-ass muthas assured me I wasn't alone in costing Fairfax #1. Besides what the hell: I was gonna write sports by day. Be a Stand-Up by night. Screw the ITAP! So Mr. William J. Goodwin our Principal began his Rotary Club-style congratulations to the Student Body innocently enough. Mr. Goodwin then meandered into an Eisenhower-era deep muddy: "The problem with you Jews is that not enough of you like to work with your hands!" Say WHAT? http://images.encyclopediadramatica.com/images/0/0c/IYBRAINshattersupression.jpg
I'd been aware our chipmunk-cheeked Gym Teacher and assistant football coach sang variations on Dean Martin's "That's amore!" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtmsIq0-T54 ["When-a your nose hits-a your toes/Like a beeg-a rubber hose/You're at-a Fairfax!"]. Since Coach Smith was regarded as a good-natured "card" and generally wacky faculty all my "Hey, Coach Smith really HATES JEWS!" observations were usually regarded by classmates as just one more “Mother of Mercy, is this the end of Rico?” bit. "

So here we are in 2008; I should know better than to point out the obvious but do so anyway. To quote my long-time San Diego buddy-cum-honest-lawyer Steve Groen: "I can see the 30-second PrimeTime [527]
TV commercials in the fall." So meet Roger Stone's tattoo.

Roger's the king of GOP "527 ad," self-promotor uber alles. Rand is a functional dead ringer for a long gone UCLA summer dorm roommate named Don P. Don died of asthma complications decades ago - hise means of visible support tied to his wife and programming whiz, Bobbie. Don P. was never UCLA student. A friend remarked: "If P. lived in [the then-CCCP], he'd be arrested as an 'Idler.'" Like Roger, Don P. was a tailored suit-and-tie guy. Hanging with us starving students and grad-students there was nowhere to go that needed coat and tie. So what? Don was into "making the scene." Evidence of Don P's having "made the scene" was an 8x10 glossy of him shaking hands with an equally plastered John Wayne. I gracelessly refused my offered free copy. Upstairs from Don P's beach-front apartment [more fruit of wife, Bobbie P's, sought-after labor] lived a strange, glad-handing guy named Peter Maletesta. Peter turned out to be a Bob Hope shirt-tail relative, party-giver, and later Veep Spiro Agnew's aide. Aide for WHAT?http://encarta.msn.com/media_461515425/spiro_t_agnew.html No matter: Peter was a "scene-giver" and Don P. was always there.

The Roger Stone parallels with Don P. are endless. Wretched excess: 200 imported silk ties and a watch-fob fixation by one;
Steuben Glass ashtray angulation by the other. Joyless sui-generis cruelty: A Nero-esque, catered New Year's Eve Party in his hospital suite by one. Hectoring an 80-year old father of a naive New York Governor who convicted and jailed white-collar thieves by the other. Once I'd ceased being perversely amused by Don P., a dorm resident and UCLA Math Ph.D opined: "Someday when you're in New York look around. There'll be 50 Don P's on each corner!"

A few days ago Roger Stone or his wannabes began circulating the following on the Internet a few days ago. The real Roger Stone?
Not necessarily. Neither Stone nor the 50 Don P's per Manhattan corner belong in truly polite society. Sadly, from now til election day it only gets worse. Behold:

PICTURES OF THE NEW FIRST FAMILY??
PLEASE READ THE FINE PRINT
AND FORWARD TO OTHERS.
How come we haven't seen or
known about some of these....?



Barack Obama's grandmother, Sarah Hussein Onyango Obama
U.S. presidential hopeful Barack Obama's uncle has been a prisoner in his own home, trapped by post election violence that has left more than 600 Kenyans dead. 'If Barack Obama were elected, he would improve relations between Africa and America because he had his roots in Africa', his uncle said.



Malik Obama, older brother to Barack Obama, holds an undated picture of Barak, left, and himself, middle, and an unidentified friend in his shop in eastern Kenya

Luo dancers from the Senator
Barack Obama Primary School


Barack has stated his support for Luo Raila Odinga



With mother Stanley Ann Dunham. In his own autobiography Obama writes,'How and when the marriage occurred remains a bit murky, a bill of particulars that I have never quite had the courage to explore.' (His father was still married to his first wife Kezia in Kenya at the time.)

Mother's 2nd husband Lolo Soetoro (Indonesian Muslim),
their daughter Maya, and Obama.
Abandoned by his father and shipped off by his mother to his white grandparents, Barry Sotero becomes Barack Hussein Obama. Obama would describe his grandparents as 'white folk.' (Yeah, 'white folk' that would NOT abandon you, their grandchild. Shame on you Obama.)




Barack stands behind Kezia (stepmother) in a Kenyan family shot.
(Including brother Abongo ' Roy ' Obama who is a Luo activist and a 'Militant Muslim' who argues that the black man must 'liberate himself from the poisoning influences of European culture.' ) 'Abongo's new lifestyle has left him lean and clear-eyed, and at the wedding, he looked so dignified in his black African gown with white trim and matching cap that some of our guests mistook him for my father,' Obama wrote in Dreams
From My Father.




Obama's visit to Africa '06
(Where are the transcripts of the speeches he gave here? Campaigning for Odinga? Wouldn't it be great to be able to read these? Do the people of the state of Illinois know about Obama's radical background?)


SINCE CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, AND THE NEW YORK TIMES WILL NOT SHOW THESE PICTURES, AND WE WONDER WHY NOT, WILL YOU FORWARD THESE TO THE (APPROXIMATE NUMBER) 200 MILLION AMERICANS THAT HAVE INTERNET ACCESS?

THANK YOU.