Obama and Netanyahu, Two Short Stories, Chip on a Pill and Some Punch Lines

We start out with some comments on the President's diplomatic efforts, a scientific article, and finally, two short stories from two of our regular contributors.  Join them with your writing.  It can be fiction, opinion, poetry or whatever you want.  And I see there's a new location pictured over to the right to identify.  Email me with your ideas as to where it is.

                                                      

Obama and Netanyahu

President Obama walks a tightrope.  He supports Israel with the very latest defensive military technology.  He assures the world that he is not bluffing when he talks about making certain Iran will not become a possessor of nuclear weapons.  And still, he tries to maintain a position whereby he can still work indirectly to promote a solution to the problems of the Middle East which not only include Iran’s nuclear program, the Israeli-Palestinian stalemate but also the rising democratic aspirations of Muslim populations trapped in non-democratic states.  This is not an easy job.  

Arab nations recognize that the President supports Israel, which in turn is fearful of the dangers Obama courts in his continued search for a non-military solution to Iran’s suspected program to produce nuclear energy for other than peaceful purposes.  This week, the President and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu meet.   

                                        

The President will be asking Israel to hold off on attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities and to give non-military steps, like economic sanctions, more time.  The five or six months the President will ask for is beyond the cut-off date after which Israel feels it will lose the capability of taking out the Iranian nuclear facilities, but not beyond the comparable date the greater capabilities of the United States will permit us to do the job.  Hence, Israel’s holding off will require an ironclad commitment from the United States to act if an additional period of sanctions don’t work. This is what the meeting is all about.  We will be keeping an eye on their discussions.  What they don’t say will be as important as what they do say.  

And the United States' position on continued settlements in the West Bank and Jerusalem, something which is of great political significance to Netanyahu in holding his coalition government together, will certainly be discussed, be a bargaining chip in the negotiations over Iran, but probably not be mentioned in any news releases.

Jack Lippman


                                                                   

1984

Right now, not tomorrow, but right now there exists the capability to attach a chip (made of vegetable matter) to a pill, and once digested into your system, that chip can send a signal which can be picked up externally, possible on a receiver resembling a nicotine patch and transmitted from there to your smart phone or your computer.  Information as to how the medication is working as well as certain blood or enzyme information can be included in the transmission. It can spot early signs of organ rejection in transplant patients. This is vital information for your doctor and also for the company who manufactured the medication.  Once the information is in your computer or smart phone, of course, it can be sent anywhere.  The manufacturer of this device is a California company, Proteus Biomedical.  It is already approved in a few European countries and is receiving support from the Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Novartis.  The National Institutes of Health is also planning clinical trials for the device here, particularly for heart patients.

                                         

But this is only the beginning.  The idea of an internal chip reporting data from within your body is almost frightening.  Your brain is part of your body, you know, and how distant in the future is a chip which reports brain activity reflecting what you are thinking?  Add to this the fact that right now, between Google and Facebook, more is publicly known about you (from the use you make of your smart phone or computer) than you can imagine.  It is inconceivable that the government will not eventually get their hands on this information.   

Think of this when you ingest your first “chip on a pill” device, when you learn about  the internal effect the pill had on your whatchamacallit levels and when you post that information on Facebook or tell your cousin about it via Gmail. If the pharmaceutical company which made your pill hadn’t already spread the word, Facebook and Google will, and consequently, your insurance rates may change or you may start getting pop-up ads from funeral directors.  Privacy is now no more than a word in Websters New Collegiate Dictionary located somewhere between “prithee” and “privatdocent.”

Jack Lippman


                                                        

Punch Line Paradise

Senior citizens in South Florida have heard so many comedians telling the same jokes so many times that, unless senility has set in, they know them all.  So, let’s imagine a new kind of comedian, one who doesn’t tell funny stories, but one who just delivers their punch lines.  Everybody has heard the joke before and will be reminded of it by the punch line and break into a hearty guffaw.  This methodology can result in a comedian telling many times the number of stories he would normally be relating if he had to utter more than just the punch lines.  

Here are some examples.  I am sure most of you know the full jokes they complete.  If not, ask me and they will appear in future postings.  Meanwhile, I am not quitting my day job. (I don’t have one, but that’s what people keep telling me not to do when I try to tell them the full joke preceding these punch lines.)

1.    “His brother Ben was worse!”

2.    “Oh my God, there come my wife and my mistress, walking together!”

3.    “Morris, cut velvet!”

4.    “But my dog was dead; I came to Israel to bury him.”

5.   “If you ever tried to squeeze into a size 14 collar, Mister, oy, would you   get  a ringing in your ears!”

6.    “Abie, look who’s trying to give us a lesson in marketing!”

7.    “Fountain pen, wallet, spectacles, testicles.” 

8.  "All I know, Sergeant, is he got the Lubavitcher Rebbe for a chauffeur."

9.  "Couldn't keep away from the women, Father, could you!" 

JL

                                              

Sal The Sneak

Harvey Sage    www.harvo1.com

                                    

He was as lean as a string bean. Sauntering into the sports store Sal certainly looked like he belonged there. No one took notice of an eighteen year old, dressed in shorts and a NY Mets t-shirt. Only his dilapidated sneakers looked out of place. It made sense when he told Remy, the sales associate, that he was here to buy a new pair.

“Sure my friend, right this way.”

“What kind do you want?”

“The new Nike Air Kings are supposed to be real good.”

“They are. They’re light weight and have a fully sealed air chamber. They’re high tech, the best in the market.”

Sal tilted his head and looked at Remy who was six feet and slender. Sal thought “I wonder how fast this guy can run. Well we’ll soon find out. With these new Nikes I have the edge.”

“They sound good. How much are they?”

“They’re top of the line. Naturally they cost more and…”

“Skip the sales pitch Remy. How much?”

“Two fifty. Now, if that’s too pricey I have a knock off that’s a hundred less.”

“No. That’s all right. Can I try them on?”

“Sure. What’s your size?”

Sal looked to be wrapped in thought. “I think size ten.

Remy went to get the sneakers and brought them back. As Sal took off his old ones he asked “I see you have a red button hooked into the side of the sneaker. What’s it for?”

“That my friend is for security. It stays on the sneaker till it’s removed at the register. You might call it flight insurance. Sort of keeps the sneaker grounded. Know what I mean?” Remy smiled. Sal laughed. Remy was challenging him. This was going to be fun.

After putting on the new sneaks Sal started to walk around. “How do they feel,” asked Remy.

Sal gave a little limp. “A wee bit too tight. Do you have ten and a half?”

“Sure. Take those off while I get you a size larger.”

As Remy went to the back to retrieve the next size Sal stood up and headed for the men’s room. He knew the better quality sneakers were kept in the back for security purposes. He had a minute or two.

Remy had his eye on him but felt no alarm. Going to the men’s room was a natural thing. He just hoped the customer didn’t pee on the new Nikes.

After the door closed Remy kept on. Sal opened the men’s room door to see that Remy had disappeared. Very nonchalantly Sal went to the store front as if to look at a display of watches. A few seconds later a customer entered from outside. In a flash Sal was out the door as alarm bells sounded. The race was on.

Sal could run a quarter mile in less than 55 seconds. Before Remy had realized his customer had absconded, Sal was already rounding the corner to where he had placed his bicycle. Surprise. The bike, his getaway vehicle, was missing. Someone had stolen it. He had placed the old relic next to the side of the building. Who’d steal that piece of junk?

From behind him Sal heard shouting. “Oh well, gotta keep moving?” He laughed. “They’ll never catch me.”

He scooted toward a nearby super store. “I’ll duck in there, grab a different T and a hat and mingle till the coast is clear. I’ve done this before. No problem.” As he sprinted through the parking lot, leaping over the concrete curbs, Sal the Sneak stepped onto an oil slick. He flew through the air and landed on his back. Crack! Ouch! That’s where they found him, immobilized, never more to run, or walk for that matter.

A young man with sneaks on his feet

Was assured he could be very fleet

So he stole them and ran

As fast as one can

Then he slipped, flew and crashed on his seat.

                                                       
                                                        

Fantasy Fest  
                                                         

Sid Bolotin

“Al, you’ve got to fly down to Florida and check on mom and dad.”

“Why?  What’s wrong?  And why me?  What about you or Scott?”

“Al, I’m just too busy with a real estate deal that’s about to close, and Scott can’t leave the farm during planting season.  You can conduct your business from anywhere in the world using your Blackberry.”

“Okay, okay.” Al sighed at his youngest brother’s arguments.  Being the oldest, it seemed that all such duties wound up on his doorstep.  “What have they done now?”

                                        

“Remember how you’ve been wondering if mom is losing it?”  Mitch asked.  “Well, I think that they’ve both flipped over the edge.  My son, Ben, was surfing You Tube and found a video from Key West’s body-painting celebration, Fantasy Fest. It showed mom leading a group of senior ladies strutting down Duval Street with purple, airbrushed designs covering their naked bodies. They each wore a red hat, and, behind them was dad standing in a cart pulled by a donkey.  He was waving his airbrush and dressed in only a purple loin cloth and a red bandana.  Mom was holding a sign over her head that read ‘Red Hat Grannies From Cascade Lakes’.

                  
                                                   Key West Fantasy Fest Pictures

“Jeeze”, Al groaned as he speed-dialed his mother’s cellphone.  When she answered, he bellowed, “Mom, Ben just saw you on You Tube!  What the hell’s going on?  When you said you’d be in Key West for an escape weekend, you never mentioned parading in the nude.”  

“Oh, pish-tush, Alan.  Don’t act like a 52-year old fuddy-duddy.  I wasn’t totally naked…although some of the other ladies were.  I wore a g-string which dad covered with a camouflaging design, and he painted my mammaries to look like eyes.  We looked delightful, and we actually won an honorable mention.”

Al gritted his teeth and hissed, “Mom, ever since you moved into Cascade Lakes, you’ve acted like a Whirling Dervish, spinning from one activity to another like a caroming billiard ball.  Bridge, poker, Kabbalah, canasta, Mah Jong, Caring Committee chairperson, Red Hat Society, study groups, and socializing.  Now you’ve got dad joining you in public nudity.  What’s gotten into you?  How’d you get involved with those weirdoes?”

“Oh, Alan, the ladies with me are not weirdoes.  They’re in your father’s meditation group…the one he facilitates each Sunday morning in our clubhouse.  Knowing that he airbrushes tiles to make refrigerator magnets, we asked him to paint our bodies so that we could be in the parade instead of just watching.  And, because we’re all Red Hatters, we had him create purple designs and wore our red hats.  Not only did he paint us, but he came down to ride in the cart as well.  What a blast we all had!” 

“But, mom,” Al grumbled, “what if one of my clients recognizes you?  Or Mitch’s?  What if another of your grandchildren see you?  Or their friends?  Our friends?”

“Well, Alan, start thinking of what you’ll say.  Blame our medications if you like.  With all the media covering the Fest, we’ve been approached by both the Today Show and Oprah.” 

Alan’s sputtering of, “but, but” were cut off by his mom’s cheery, “Oops, gotta run, hon.  The girls are honking.  I’m off to a Brandeis luncheon.  I’ll call ya when I have a sec.”

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Most readers of this blog are alerted by Email every time a new posting appears.  If you wish to be added to that Email list, just let me know by contacting me at Riart1@aol.com. 
Also, be aware that www.Jackspotpourri.com is now available on your mobile devices in a modified, easy-to-read, format.

Our family of web sites includes:   www.computerdrek.com  - www.politicaldrek.com  -  www.sportsdrek.com  -  www.healthdrek.com. 
Check all of them out, find out what “drek” really means and feel free to submit your thoughts and articles for publication on these sites, which, while still “under construction,” already contain some interesting content.

Jack Lippman

                                                    * * *   * * *   * * *

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Romney Wins Two Primaries: So What!, a Short Story and Some Haiku

Signs of Schizophrenia in the G.O.P. Race

Even though Mitt Romney edged out Ron Santorum in the G.O.P.’s Michigan primary (he won by three percentage points) and waltzed to a victory in Arizona, there still is much cause for alarm among Mitt’s supporters for the Republican nomination.  Having sold its soul to the its right wing in order to win their majority in the House of Representatives, the party is forced to take an ultra conservative view on social issues (abortion, contraception, education, woman’s rights, welfare, labor unions, the environment) which automatically weakens its appeal to the middle-of-the-road independent voter.  Without them, victory in a national election is impossible.   

Rick Santorum represents these antediluvian positions, and to a lesser extent, so does Newt Gingrich.  Last week, I suggested that Newt’s financial backers are keeping him in the race only to prevent his support from drifting over to Santorum which would enable him to outgun Romney in any and all primary races.  Thus, Romney’s chances are preserved by Gingrich’s presence in the race by those who know that Mitt is the only Republican candidate who has a chance of giving the President a battle in the November election. With each step he takes to the right in order to get votes in the primaries, however, Romney loses appeal to independents.

Obviously, Romney is uncomfortable in treading on this ground.  It is strange to him. And it shows like a beacon.  He blurts out words he thinks will appeal to the voters like “I like the trees in Michigan; they’re just the right size” and counters his opposition to the bailout of the auto industry by saying that his wife drives two Cadillacs. Drivers of five year old Fords don't like to hear this.  He is the picture of someone ill at ease with himself, as if he is wondering whether to continue being a right-winger if he gets the nomination, or whether he should move back to the center at that point, or whether he can go in both directions simultaneously.  He is turning into a schizophrenic candidate, and that certainly is no qualification for the White House.  Watch his eyes when he speaks.  They are revealing.

And getting back to Santorum, I guess Rick couldn't afford the tuition at private Catholic colleges so he went to Penn State for his undergraduate degree, Pitt for an MBA and finally back to Penn State's law school (Dickenson Law School) for his law degree. Other than the MBA, Rick's education was partially tax-payer funded since he attended state schools.  I suppose that is where he learned all about the liberal nature of the university community which he now feels causes students to lose their "faith commitment" and are no more than "indoctrination mills."   

This is just one more nail in the coffin of what used to be the Republican Party. It is now starting to dawn on me that Obama may possibly be the first presidential candidate to carry all fifty states, if only by virtue of women voters.  A Santorum candidacy may make that possible, so that is precisely why that will not happen.  There’s a whole mess of primaries next week.  Let’s see what happens.  If the unelectable Rick Santorum dominates them, look for someone else (Mitch Daniels or Jeb Bush) to get the G.O.P. nomination this summer. 
Jack Lippman

                                                                              *   *   * 

                                   

Let me quote from David Brooks' recent column in the  New York Times, in which he accused mainstream Republicans (Brooks is a Republican) of behaving like opossums, slipping into a coma every time they are challenged from the right. He concludes his column with these words adapted from a phrase used about others who ignored what what was happening around them: "First they went after the Rockefeller Republicans, but I was not a Rockefeller Republican.  Then they went after the compassionate conservatives, but I was not a compassionate conservative.  Then they went after the mainstream conservatives, and there was no one left to speak for me." 

                                                                

Haiku - Sandals in the Snow

There are many forms which the Japanese poetry style known as “haiku” takes.  The easiest to compose usually describes something in nature, with five syllables in the first and third lines, and seven in the middle line.  They need not rhyme.  An example might be:

  Snowflakes will not grow,

  Into three foot drifts if they

  Melt under the sun.

But a haiku can be about anything you wish.  Try writing some (in that 5-7-5 pattern) and send them to this blog at the E-mail address indicated in the heading.  Here are a few ideas.  Perhaps you will win a prize.

  If your feet are cold,

  That’s what you get for wearing

  Sandals in the snow.

                              

  Banks too big to fail

  Can do exactly that if

  Uncle Sam allows.

                                            
I was "googling" for a picture of a bank to include at this point, but I came up with this picture of Tyra Banks which looks a lot better than what we all know bank buildings look like.

JL

                                                         

Scorecard:  Over the past seven days, this blog was viewed by 48 viewers in the United States, six in Russia, three each in Germany and South Aftrica, two in Slovenia and Brazil, and one each in the United Kingdom, France, South Korea and Nigeria. 


                                                         

And here's that short story taken from my "archives." 

                                                         Roses

The gate opened.  No longer blocked by it, I rushed forward with all of my might.  To my left and to my right, others were doing the same thing.  I couldn’t run as fast as some of them so I soon fell behind, but looking over my shoulder, I saw that there were others even behind where I was in the throng.  One had stumbled but quickly recovered his footing, probably fearing the lashing all of us remembered having been subjected to at one time or another.  The dirt being kicked up by those ahead of me was pelting my face uncomfortably.  I’m a pretty athletic guy but still, I couldn’t see myself running like this for much more than just a few more minutes. But that’s all I would have to do in order to be able to get to a point about a mile from where I had started running.  Then I would have made it and it would be over.  I settled in comfortably behind a couple of hurtling shadows in front of me, determined not to fall back any further, straining every muscle in my body to keep moving.  I saw one of my cousins to my left doing the same thing, as flecks of foam flew out of his mouth.  Suddenly, without explanation, a space opened up between the pair in front of me and almost simultaneously, I felt a stinging pain across my right side.  And then, sharply, I felt the stinging pain once again.  The opening was still there before me and summoning my last reserves of energy, I surged through it and continued running, although at that point, I couldn’t even see where I was going.  My head was spinning and my thoughts went back to when I was a toddler, playing with Mama in the grass.  Sweet memories, they were.   Continuing charging onward as fast as I could, I must have been drawing upon reserves of strength I hadn’t even known I possessed.  Suddenly, I could almost smell the roses.  “Go, baby, Go,” a voice from somewhere above whispered.  This is what it feels like to win the Kentucky Derby.

JL

Here's a question:  How far into the story did you read before you recognized that the story teller was not "home sapiens." 

                               ***   ***   ***                                                                                
Most readers of this blog are alerted by Email every time a new posting appears.  If you wish to be added to that Email list, just let me know by contacting me at Riart1@aol.com. 
Also, be aware that www.Jackspotpourri.com is now available on your mobile devices in a modified, easy-to-read, format.

Our family of web sites includes:   www.computerdrek.com  - www.politicaldrek.com  -  www.sportsdrek.com  -  www.healthdrek.com. 
Check all of them out, find out what “drek” really means and feel free to submit your thoughts and articles for publication on these sites, which, while still “under construction,” already contain some interesting content.

Jack Lippman

                                                    * * *   * * *   * * *

                                    
                                                 Animal Kingdom, 2011 Kentucky Derby Winner

To send this posting to a friend, or enemy for that matter, whom you think might be interested in it, just click on the envelope with the arrow on the "Comments" line directly below.

 

Why Newt Will Stay in the Race and A Poem by Sid

Why Newt Stays in the Race

If either Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich were to drop out of the Republican Primary race, the dropout’s support would go to the other, dooming Mitt Romney’s candidacy.  Libertarian Ron Paul is there for the long haul and will continue to get his 10% to 20% of the vote until the convention when he will try to wield whatever power that base gives him.   Other than that, he is not a factor. 

But right now, it is unlikely that Santorum, presently riding high, will drop out.  As for Gingrich, however, it is important to Romney that Newt stay in the race, keeping his supporters from merging with Santorum’s.  That is why Mitt’s attacks are now being directed at Santorum rather than at Gingrich.  In fact, funding from Gingrich’s big financial backer in Las Vegas may be continuing precisely to keep it a three way race.  That is in Romney’s interest.  Recently, when asked a question at a Florida debate about his feelings toward Palestinians, Romney’s answer was almost as negative in regard to the Palestinians as Gingrich’s have been.  Perhaps that was a message from Mitt to Newt’s Las Vegas banker assuring him that as the ultimate nominee, his position regarding the Palestinians was as strong as Newt’s, encouraging Newt’s backer to keep him in the race long enough for Romney to get the nomination.

Jack Lippman

                                                              
                                                Venetian Hotel, Las Vegas, NV
                                                          

Sarah                          

Sid Bolotin

My friend prefers to read my fantasy stories, saying that

She has enough reality in her life

So I hesitated to write of this reality

Yet…and yet…I needed to

My recent read of Alice Hoffman’s At Risk

Involving the crisis of the family, friends and town

That erupts from eleven year old Amanda’s

Onslaught of AIDS from a run-of the-mill

Transfusion during an appendectomy five years earlier

Flashed me back twenty years to ten-year-old Sarah

Crippled by seizures since she was two

Eight years of treatments, conventional and experimental

Left her incontinent…able to only grunt and crawl

Tore apart the family and devastated Sarah’s mother, Carol

Mirroring the experience of Amanda’s mother, Polly

Suddenly I was again Carol’s trusted volunteer

Applying weekly techniques developed and used effectively

At the Option Institute in Western Massachusetts

For treating autistic children

Carol’s eight years of desperation searching for a halt, a reversal

Of the destruction of her child

Echoed that of Polly’s efforts for Amanda

Polly striving to keep Amanda out of the hospital

Carol fighting to keep Sarah out of an institution

So, there I was in my late fifties mirroring Sarah

Each week for three years I crawled with her

Replied to her grunts with my own

Played with her toys

Striving to join her in her world

While Carol observed through a one-way mirror

As with Polly’s loyal friends Carol derived much emotional support

And I benefited from the bonding with Sarah and her mother

Sadly, after three years it was evident to even Carol

As with Amanda’s Polly

That the Inevitable is the Inevitable

And Carol terminated the program 

                                                      

Racism on U-Tube

Have your read about the racist U-Tube video posted by a couple of white Gainesville (FL) teenagers?  Or seen it?  A lot of what they say is true, as seen from their perspective. They are reporting what they see around them in their 60% black high school, and it is pretty ugly.  Unfortunately, these kids do not yet have the maturity to see that these problems are things that society should be working to correct.  They report schoolmates who plan on getting pregnant, quitting school and going on welfare … and they identify them as being black.  They report schoolmates, again identified as black, coming from families collecting welfare but dressing in expensive high end clothing.  They see the injustices in our system and report them with the immaturity of teenagers reflecting what they see and hear around them, in school and perhaps at home.  These girls have been chastised for making their video, but I think they deserve some credit for at least being aware of the problems around them.  The next step in growing up would be for them to work for constructive solutions to these problems. And I bet they eventually do exactly that.  They seemed bright enough.  

(There was a similar U-Tube produced by two girls in a Palm Beach County school as well. Both are available on the internet if you search for them.)

And here in Florida, as an excuse to promote school prayer, the legislature is considering allowing daily inspirational messages originating from and delivered by students.  Considering what the students mentioned above did, this might be quite a Pandora's box they are opening.  Teen age judgement leaves something to be desired.

JL 

                                                              

                                                       

                                                   ***   ***   ***                                                                                
Most readers of this blog are alerted by Email every time a new posting appears.  If you wish to be added to that Email list, just let me know by contacting me at Riart1@aol.com. Also, be aware that www.Jackspotpourri.com is now available on your mobile devices in a modified, easy-to-read, format. 

Our family of web sites includes:   www.computerdrek.com  - www.politicaldrek.com  -  www.sportsdrek.com  -  www.healthdrek.com. 
Check all of them out, find out what “drek” really means and feel free to submit your thoughts and articles for publication on these sites, which, while still “under construction,” already contain some interesting content.

Jack Lippman

                                                    * * *   * * *   * * *

To send this posting to a friend, or enemy for that matter, whom you think might be interested in it, just click on the envelope with the arrow on the "Comments" line directly below.

A Letter to Mitt

Reminder: The POTPOURRI POLL and the photo below it off to the right are not updated at the same time as the rest of the blog is. That means that changes in it are not necessarily concurrent with new postings on the blog.  That's just the way things are set up by Google Blogspot, the system on which Jack's Potpourri is based.

There's a new poll question today (it'll be there until Feb. 25) about the deficit.  Please cast your vote. As for the last poll, "chocolate" was the big winner in our survey of ice cream flavors. 

                                            


Today's posting is a short one, but I hope an interesting one.  It would be lengthier if more of you would contribute your short stories, thoughts on the economy or politics, poetry or anything creative.  Send them to me at riart1@aol.com.
                                                      
                                                          

                                                                  

Dear Mitt

Here’s a word of advice for you.  And this comes from a registered Democrat. I know what kind of Republican you really are.  You showed that when you were governor of Massachusetts, when you fostered mandatory health care in that state and way back when you were for women’s rights and the public school system. Those were fine things to be for, and in no way subtracted from your Republicanism, the core of which is less reliance on the Federal government and more reliance on individual initiative within a framework of responsive State government.  Republicanism includes a belief that the free enterprise system can be made to work for everybody in the country’s benefit and I know that’s what you believe.  

                                           

To be elected to the Presidency, however, you need the votes of independent voters. Frankly, they will not vote for you if they believe that you have put the anti-Obama Care, anti-gay rights, pro-life, anti-entitlement and anti-public school agenda of the right wing of the Republican Party ahead of the traditional Republican values mentioned above which such great Republicans such as Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan have championed over the years.  If you adopt the positions of the right wing social conservatives in order to get the nomination, it will be a worthless one because you will automatically lose the votes of the independent voters as well as many Republicans who will feel that their party has deserted them.  Hearing you starting to cater to the G.O.P.’s right has already reduced the number of your supporters showing up to vote in the primaries.  And your parroting the false right wing mantra that the Democrats are weak on national security, for which even conservative columnist George Will has lightly rapped your knuckles, doesn’t help either.

Any of the other present contenders for the Republican nomination is a loser before they even get out of the starting gate. Your Party knows this. No right wing social conservative Obama-attacker can win the independent votes the Party must get, and that includes you if you choose to be one of them.  That will force the convention to nominate an electable candidate like you were back when the campaign started, but it won’t be you, for you are no longer that kind of candidate, nor will it be anyone else who is running in the primaries, either.  

You can still win the nomination, though, and still have a fair shot at winning the general election, but in order to do so, you must immediately set yourself apart from those to the right of you. Speak your traditional Republican mind and fear not that your Party’s right will desert you.  They have nowhere else to turn and on Election Day, you will more than make up for their possible loss with the votes of some independents and some disenchanted Democrats.  But mean what you are saying.  People recognize when you do not, and that includes Democrats as well as Republicans.

                                       

As a Democrat who will probably vote for Barack Obama, I hope that you will heed this advice so that at least, the nation’s two-party system will be preserved.  A Democratic Party running against a Republican Party committed to an unelectable socially conservative candidate’s platform would have no reason to veer further toward the center, and that would not be good for the country’s historic two party system.  A balance must be maintained.  And if for some reason, you actually manage to defeat President Obama, you would be a far, far more acceptable President than any of those to your right who put agenda before country. But first, you must follow Shakespeare’s advice: “To thine own self be true.”

Jack Lippman

                                                           

The Disappearing Supermarket

When I was growing up, my family bought its groceries from a neighborhood grocery store around the corner from where we lived.  Rosen’s grocery store was a mom and pop operation and sold everything except meats, fish and produce.  Those we bought from Rothstein’s butcher shop next store and Macklis’ produce and fish market half a block up the street.  Such mom and pop stores don’t exist any longer.  They have been replaced by supermarkets.  

                                          

But supermarkets are on their way out too.  Many grocery chains have been acquired and merged into other chains and some chains have closed many stores or disappeared entirely.  Their place is being taken by large supermarket operations existing within larger “big box” retail establishments such as Target and Wal-mart as well as the “wholesale” discount clubs such as Costco and BJ’s which sell grocery products packed in larger quantities as lower prices.  Specialty food stores still exist, but only to meet special needs such as healthier foods (Whole Foods), gourmet foods (Dean & DeLuca in New York) or Hispanic, Asian or Kosher foods.  Of course, in areas too small to support Target or Wal-Mart outlets, small supermarkets, some individual stores or high priced convenience stores still manage to survive.  As soon, however, as these locales grow populous enough to attract a Wal-Mart, these operations’ days are numbered. 

                                        

Another type store that is replacing the supermarket is the low cost “plain pipe rack” type store selling a limited amount of its own branded foods. Such stores (Aldi’s) charge for bags and don’t take credit cards to keep costs down.  Trader Joe stores (owned by the same interests as Aldi’s) are a mixture of the gourmet, health food and plain pipe rack approaches and are replacing supermarkets in areas where such marketing has an appeal, usually in larger cities and upscale suburbs.  With these trends increasing, supermarkets over the next few decades will be going the way of the mom and pop groceries.  Time marches on!  

And speaking of Time, have you noticed the thinness of that magazine lately?  It too, is going the way of the mom and pop store and supermarkets, along with its competitor, Newsweek. But that is a story for another day.

JL

                                      

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