Easy Like Sunday Morning

I spent all Sunday drinking beer and watching football. I'm paying the price today. Terms like "tremendous athleticism," "overcoming adversity," "smashmouth football" and "deep penetration" have been clanging around my head all morning, like so many empty soup cans being kicked down an alley. It was nice to see the Colts and Payton Manning get knocked down a peg by the Bears. I don't have anything against the Colts or Payton Manning. They're a good team and he's a good quarterback, but can we leave it at that, please? To hear Messrs. Michaels and Madden, you'd think Payton Manning can walk on water or is about to sprout wings and fly to heaven at any moment. They were also weirdly solicitous of his health and well-being. After his injury, Payton Manning lost fifteen pound. You can see the suit he wore to the stadium didn't fit properly. Or, Payton Manning is frowning on the sideline. Will this affect his poise in the pocket?

Earlier, I'd flipped over to This Week With George Stephanopoulos. For the ten or eleven seconds I could stomach it, little Georgie appeared to be playing a Tim Russert style game of Gotcha! with Barack Obama, which is what passes for tough journalism in our decadent political culture. "So, Senator Obama, if you believe in a Time Table, does this mean you don't think we can win in Iraq? And, if you don't believe in a Timetable, does this mean you do think we can win in Iraq? And, if you do believe we can win in Iraq, why do we need a timetable at all? Yes or no, Senator Obama?" Or something to that effect. Good God, my twelve year old niece and her friends have more intelligent conversations.

It's really sad to see how Obama has to slum around with twits like Stephanopoulos, Brian Williams, or Tom -- doesn't it always sound like I have a broomstick shoved up my ass -- Brokaw. He's so clearly their intellectual superior, yet he has to tolerate their shallowness and abase himself on their insipid Sunday morning shows, otherwise they'll get all catty, start calling him an elitist, and rush back into the waiting arms of John McCain for some thrilling, post-Convention make-up sex. I'm trying to think of an historical precedent for so powerful a nation being held in thrall by such puffy, fluffy non-entities. The closest thing that comes to mind is Lous XVI and his court. They were the ones who were eventually overthrown. Dare to dream.

I like to think that Obama is simply keeping his freinds close but his enemies closer so he can attain power and gently steer the good ship America towards a more liberal and progressive future. Then again, I like to think of having sex with Charlize Theron too. It's looking more and more like neither one is going to happen, alas.

It's unlikely to happen because even if Obama pulls off the unlikely miracle of being a black man and President of the United States at the same time, he will have the same bosses as every other president -- Exxon-Mobil, Chase Manhattan, et al., as well as their mercenaries at the Pentagon. And they don't like change. They will keep Obama on a very short leash. If he ever strays too far away from the yard, the yapping poodles in the press will herd him back in, just like they did to Clinton. But now I'm getting into that whole miltary-industrial complex thing, and my head is hurting too bad to get into that.

Come to think of it, listening to Al Michael's and John Madden discuss Payton Manning's ill-fitting suit doesn't sound so bad after all.