A few political and non-political thoughts on this Mother's Day:
1. I miss my Mom terribly: she died of her worst fear - a stroke - six years or so ago, and her loss to the family, to her friends, to the Progressive movement at the Jersey Shore, was immense. She was of course, irreplacable to me, but the whole generation is irreplacable: the mixture of altruism, of experience through the Depression, through WW II, through the rise of technology from radio through the computing age, from Hoovervilles, through FDR, through the Great Society, Vietnam, and Reagan/Bush/Bush II is a remarkable lifetime. She once told me upon reflection, that the mostg amazing occurrence as far as she was concerned was the fall of the Soviets: that she was born into the pre-Revolution and thought that it would last for centuries. She was interesting: he first husband, my brother's father, who died very young, had received an invitation to attend a meeting in the late-thirties. She told him, an aspiting actor (his Best friend was a very young Burgess Merideth), that you can't go to a Communist meeting - that he/they will be blacklisted forever and probably 'outed' by someone there who claimed to be one of the most fervent 'adherents'. They didn't go, and she was absolutely right: no one who attended could find work locally or in New York, practically forever, even though many were considered 'rising stars'. That she never believed in the forcible overthrow of the governement and that it was treasonous behavior to believe that it was the right thing to do. She was a real patriot, unlike these BS artists you see on FOX and in the rest of the media today. Really, my only regret with respect to her life, is that I didn't sit down with a video camera and ask her all the questions I should have...most of this information is now lost forever, since she was the last of the generation of the family.
2. This Romney business, as I pointed out last week, is just despicable. I'm only a couple years younger than he is, and if I had a nickel for everytime I heard the word/accusation "homo", "fag", "dyke" or other epithet relating to gay or lesbian students or those accused of being same, at my boarding/day school in New Hope, PA I would not have any financial worries. i could tell you about the 'pranks' that were played upon these people, but it would nauseate you beyond belief on this day. Suffice it to say that Romney's statement that that issue was the last thing on his mind was a BALD-FACED LIE as far as I'm concerned. All of these assholes, and believe me, we thought they were assholes at the time, could talk about was who was or wasn't probably gay - although that word was never used in my day, as I outlined abve. It reminds me of when the Lower Merion School Administrator made the statement that their IT people were so busy doing sork, that they didn't have time to view Porn, during the infamous Webcam case which indirectly and directly involved my own child. i knew at that point that they were lying through their teeth. It's just that one statement that makes you KNOW.
3. As I've mentioned numerous times, I watch old TV shows while I do my bookwork and charts in my office, and I'm on the first season of Mission: Impossible now, and just saw the episode where the Team has to discredit a Nazi living in South America. Many of the statements made by his cohorts, i've been reading lately, just not in Fiction, but on 'mainstream' channels and outlets. We sure have come 'a long way' since the thid 1960's haven't we?
4. We just got a PA photo ID for my 96 year-old FIL, and we were lucky that the lady working had just gone thru some emotional crisis and really didn't give a crap that he didn't have all of his documents just the way they like to have them with 'raised 'seals' and all. His Drivers' license had expired technically too long ago, but she looked at it and said, OK and now he'll be able to vote for sure. He used to be one of those "Independents" but now he's a Dem due to the pure, unadulterated hatred which is emanating form the Rethugs. He's actually quite amazed by: he's fully lucid and lives independently - his mother made it to 104, also fully sentient. I think he's one of those Ashkeazy Jews that New York mag profiled last November. Amazing group of individuals.
5. A Happy Mother's Day to All...may you have the blessings of the Age.