SMOKE ON THE WATER

Dear Readers,

Does anyone else think that, with all the technology typified by Facebook, Twitter, I-Phone Stuff and billions of blogs on the Internet, we just might know a little bit too much about each other? I don't know, but it doesn't seem to be doing all that much good, IMHO.

Over the weekend, President Obama got his first physical since becoming Commander-In-Chief, and the details were widely available to the entire world a short time later. In addition to size, weight, blood-pressure, etc... we also heard about the physicians suggesting that the President might want to try and stop smoking, advice we've heard given him before. Now, I'm not a smoker, but those I know who are see it as a way to relax, reflect, and take a brief time out from the cares that beset most of us to one extent or another. In the case of Obama, I would imagine having a sneaky smoke every now and again might be a habit he might want to continue, as he's got the best/worst job in America, and more and more people seem to think he's not very good at it.

Last week's televised health care summit - that both bored and disgusted a lot of us - was a qualified failure, but it at least served to codify the ugly status of politics in the country. For the President, it was a desperate attempt to show the nation what he had to deal with in the case of the Republican opposition. And as it comes at the end of a hideous, venomous process, I was struck at how much better it would have been had it come at the beginning of the process, before a line of legislation had been set to paper. As soon as you saw the Republicans plunk a massive stack of documents, supposedly representing the Health Care Bill's bulk, you just knew that this meeting was going no place, and the ensuing posturing-thinly-disguised-as-debate as a massive waste of time. A summit like this before it got to Congress would have left the GOP with no War And Peace-sized, pork laden bill to cower behind, and perhaps the case for and against reform could have been more simply drawn.

But maybe the most squirmy moment of the 'summit' was when Obama, replying to a charge by a GOP'er that he was taking more speaking time, said "that's because I'm President". Ouch. More red meat to the disloyal opposition who already think Obama's a snob and an elitist. Also, the remark might have revealed a nagging insecurity on the President's part, having to remind his audience who's the boss here. The boss should never have to say things like that.

On one hand, I like a politician to be what he or she is, not put on some phony, corny, all-American, aw-shucks-I'm-just-one-of-y'all fake front. But on the other, nobody much likes an elitist (a somewhat hypocritical stance in this nation of varying degrees of elitism). The fact that every detail of everybody's life is potentially available to anyone else allows for a lot of pre-judgement anyway, so why not just go ahead and act like an elitist, if you are one. How much worse could that make things?

Well, things are worse and getting worser, and positions have only hardened as the dark forces of the right hold fast against the 'elitist, socialist' left. President Obama came to Warshington with a mandate for change, but he's been suckered by a bitter and twisted opposition into playing the same old political games - so much for change. But perhaps the President's smoking vice could be used to his advantage. Consider this; what if Obama found out (easily done, no doubt, by any 12-year old with a Blackberry) who in the Republican Party smoked? He could then call for a "Smoke Summit", that could take place in the back yard of Blair House (where the health care summit was held). Just imagine the President surrounded by pols of all stripes, leaning up against the wall and chatting casually about a big issue, all cupping cigs and getting things accomplished underneath a thick, nicotine fug. No elitism here, just a bunch of guys with a shared habit, getting down to business. Gotta be better than a tea party.