worstoftheozarks.com

Recent polls indicate Missouri is still a tight race.  Here in Springfield, the reddest corner of the state, signs are mixed.  But a short section of Meadowmere Place appears to have already made up its mind.  As of today, Sunday afternoon,  I counted an amazing 13 Obama signs lined up and down either side of the parkway in a mere 2-block section of the street.   Across Fremont Avenue from the stone columns flanking the entry to this venerable upscale neighborhood of classic craftsman bungalows, yet another Obama sign, this one attached to a wood fence, brackets the east end of what has come to be known, at least to one family, by another name. 

A car came down the street and turned into the driveway of one of the houses where I was kneeling in the front yard, trying to get a picture, around 12:30 p.m.   The couple, dressed in church clothes, got out of the car, and I waved.  They didn't know how many signs their street had, but they knew it was a lot.  The woman laughed,
"My granddaughter calls this 'Obama Lane.,' she said. 

People are talking openly(kind of unusual) and enthusiastically(very unusual)about voting Democratic here.
It's not that there aren't any McCain supporters here---there are.  A lot of them.  But we are---dare I say---ubiquitous.  Bumper stickers on the way to pick up my newspapers---Obama, 2.  McCain, O.  And so it goes.
The young lady scanning my Times and KC Star whispered, "I like your button." 
"Huh?" I asked.
"Your Obama button," she hissed.  "I like it."
I whispered back, conspiratorially, as I left, "We're going to win!"
She nodded, emphatically. Yes!  And smiled.  Conspiratorial.  The good guys are winning.  We who have hated
what has been done in our name.  We who long for something better without knowing how to get it.  Getting it.   Winning. 

My neighbor shouted it from the alley to my back door.  "Only one week to go!"
"We're going to win!"  I shouted back. 
"I know! " he hollared in return. 

Here in Springfield, our feet our still on the ground.  But our souls can't help soaring. 
And whatever else happens, we'll always have "Obama Lane."  They can't take that away from us.
Let them try. 

(See photo displays "Best of the Ozarks & Sign Sociology for a few pics of Obama signs in Springfield, MO. I plan to blog on the "sign sociology" theme later, if I have time.  I also plan to try to get more and hopefully better pictures of Obama signs here in Springfield, again if I have time so my out-of-the-area friends can see we support Obama in SW MO, too.)

I have a confession:  I have been chauffeuring General Colin Powell around in my car for several months now.
We have gone to the supermarket together,  I have taken him to the pharmacy, to the doctor,  the post office, to pick up the Sunday Times, and  on countless other little errands. He has even ridden along on my visits to our local Obama for President headquarters and a canvassing gig or two.  If he had a problem with that last, he never mentioned it.  Now, of course, I can begin to understand why.

As a matter of fact, General Powell had a place in my life and auto several months before the Obama campaign ever came to town.  Now, in retrospect, I probably should have taken "My American Journey" out of the back seat where it has been sitting lo these many months.  For the sake of my own respectability as a Democrat and
liberal, I should at least have kept it hidden until The General endorsed Obama.  But, as I say,  the good soldier  never uttered a word.  I had quite forgotten he was sitting right behind me everywhere I went.   Until yesterday. 

You might wonder how I,  proud Democrat, came to be carrying this work of political contraband everywhere I went.   I could excuse myself by pleading, "It wasn't mine."  But it was.  And is.  It's still there, by the way.  Have not taken it out, no, not even after yesterday's announcement. 

How the book really got to be there?  It was meant to be a gift.  Fathers' Day or Dad's birthday.  Possibly Christmas.  I can't remember which.  Dad prefers non-fiction, especially biographies.  He's conservative, and votes Republican.  I vote for Democrats.  The Powell book was meant to be a kind of  olive branch:  Dad has always liked Powell;  I've never actually disliked him.  Which is a lot better than I can say about most Republican politicians these days.  A compromise.  Not a truce.

As typically happens with a really good gift idea for a person who's hard to buy for, Dad had naturally already read the book. So  I made a place for it in one of my bookcases for a while, thinking I might decide to read it.  Then, when I realized I just couldn't read that many words written by a Republican while President Bush was still in office,  I took it out, thinking to include it in a box for a charity thrift shop. Or was that as trade-in credit at a used book store?  Honestly, it's been so long I can't remember how that book got where it is.  But, be it laziness, indecision or due to some well-hidden psychological need for authority figures on my part,  it has stayed put.  And now, after all this time, I think I might actually have to read it, after all.   At least, I'll take it out of the car and put it back on the shelf.  I won't have time to read it until after the election. 

Did General Colin Powell just change, or did I?  Somewhere in the future way out ahead of us we merged onto the same supersonic highway.   And to think.  I had been plugging along, going to rallies and canvass events, driving the General, sedate in my back seat.  He seemed to be fine with that.   For months I saw him in my rearview mirror, a non sequitur to the events on my mind.  So how did he suddenly get so far ahead of me? 

They don't call him The General for nothing.  Or the rest of us, "boots on the ground."

Don Wyatt, editor of the News-Leader Media Group, had a column in the "Voices" (opinion) section of our newspaper
today, justifying their prominently placed Thomas Sowell series.  For the record, I read Wyatt's column, agree with some of it, and don't buy other parts.  Bottom line: It's their paper, and they can print what they want.  This is a conservative area.  Meanwhile, the front page news here has been more troubling---headlines giving credence to the GOP "voter fraud" scare in a way that apparently allows the other side of the story, wrongful voter purges, to pass by unnoticed. 

 I've been pestering poor Dave Iseman, the opinion section editor, about both issues. I've written letters to the editor, suggested a thorn for the "Roses and Thorns" section, and directed a few choice bits of wisdom at "To the Point."  I think by now the newspaper editorial staff knows how I feel, but just in case, I sent them one more gem, this last suggesting that since they found it so interesting to run a series by a solid conservative(Sowell) who shares Obama's race (Wyatt's characterization, not mine) I will now expect a front-page iteration of Colin Powell's endorsement of Barack Obama "accompanied by a good photo" just in case we need to be reminded that, well, so does Powell.   We'll see how that plays out. 

The old partisan gamesmanship is wearing.  Fact is, I would not be here working so hard and pestering the paper so ferociously if I didn't fear for my country.  A large portion of that fear has to do with a possible Palin presidency.  She has convinced me she is not only ignorant, but not very truthful, not especially intelligent, and would be a danger to the country in ways we can't even begin to imagine. 

But I'm putting all of that behind me because as of today I see the News-Leader's coverage as regrettable, but
not terribly important to the outcome of the race.  Why?  Because I know how my white Republican relations in a couple of other swing states feel about Powell.   They won't listen to what I have to say about Barack Obama.
But they will listen to Colin Powell.  He is the one man, the only man who has the ghost of a chance of changing their Fox-News-ridden minds.  Words matter.  My words, and those I read in the News-Leader last week or even a few hours ago matter far less than they did before.  We have now reached the land of giants, and anything we add to Powell's words will only make us seem smaller.  And we already look plenty small as it is.

I can clean house with a clear conscience today.  All of yesterday's worries are forgotten in the joy of this moment.   And tonight, I'll be able to sleep.  "The General" is watching over us all.

"I'm afraid if he wins, the black will take over."  woman at Ohio Palin rally.


I'm Barack Obama and I approved this message.  As of January 2009, when I become president, the era of white dominance will be automatically terminated. 

In order to ensure a smooth and peaceful transition of power, all citizens of pure caucasian descent will be required to wear a cardboard cutout of a large black hand either on a chain around your neck or pinned to the lapel of your jacket, on which you have legibly printed your name in block letters, all caps please.  This will identify you as a white citizen, and will help us tell you apart, should we need or want  to for any reason.  It will also allow us to continue to treat you in the manner to which you have become accustomed and tend to assume is your due.    Only those individuals wishing to unequivocally identify themselves as white need wear this identification. Everyone else will be known simply as US citizens.  Since this special white-only identification will not be visible from the back, however, please be prepared to answer to, "Hey, you!" or "Pass, please."  The pass will consist of an ordinary drivers license which has been stamped with the word, "white."  In black.

Any registered caucasian citizen who later desires to apply for a regular citizenship  or who  believes you may be the target of racial profiling due to white or palish skin may apply by mail  for a DNA test to be administered by selected government workers at irregular dates and times at pre-arranged testing sites subject to change without prior notice, and be located on non-existent streets or in cities several hundred miles from your place of residence, possibly both.  Please be patient.  You must bring the notification card we may or may not mail you as proof of your  eligibility for testing, as well as at least three other forms of identification which we may or may not decide to accept.  Oh,  and bone up on your black history lessons.  There may be a knowledge and comprehension test.  Watch out for the trick questions.

I'm Barack Obama and I approved this message because I'm the president and you're not.

Just since yesterday, I have: read at least one column deploring racial undertones in the final presidential debate and suggesting Barack Obama should have delivered John McCain a sharp rebuke, I have read a second column accusing the Obama campaign of cynically playing what is just as cynically referred to as "the race card",  I received and responded to an e-mail solicitation to add my name to a group calling for John McCain to renounce all the race-tinged rhetoric of his campaign, and lastly, I acquainted myself with a blog which declared all of us in my state to be "racist b******s." 

Yes we are, to that last, and you just might need some of our votes.  So lay off the rhetoric. 

While canvassing, a friend of mine ran into a couple of union men whose organizations were supporting Obama.  But these guys, who generally vote Democrat,  declared they were considering voting for McCain this time.  One of them even expressed regret that Obama is black, because otherwise he would want to vote for him.  Beats me!   I usually don't like half 'n' half remarks, but this one works somehow:
My friend is the daughter of a Kansas wheat farmer, and she had this to say to those men:   "Barack Obama's mother and grandparents were white Kansans.  I have more in common in them than I do John McCain.   If you don't want to vote for "the black side" of Obama, vote for "the white side" like I am."

Anyone catch Obama and McCain in their last joint appearance before the election last night?   Don't you wish the whole campaign could have been this way, instead of deadly serious?  Nothing like jokes at everyone's expense to bring the country together.  Maybe the only thing that could.   On the other hand, I think John McCain may have won the Al Smith round. . . I'm awaiting poll numbers and focus group blips on the jokes.  Obama got in some good lines too.  Like, his middle name is really. . . Steve.  Who knew?

Re: More on Colbert I King's Washington Post blog about Barack Obama's missed opportunity to deliver a well-deserved sharp rebuke to John McCain during the final debate. 

In this, the longest campaign, we are all so weary.  What has dragged on for so many months for me, though, has surely been a life-long battle for people like Mr.King.  Every step is hard-won.  And there are so many baby steps forward, so many shoves back.  Day to day survival means you don't get to choose your battles.  So many small battles can add up to very little left to give when the big ones, sometimes unexpectedly, arrive.  Countless lives have been spent on innumerable treadmills.  These battles aren't peculiar in kind to African Americans, though.  Many of us have fought  battles due to gender, age, disability, or mental illness.  We need to respect each other's battles, especially the similarities in them--those help us empathize.  Here, a hillbilly digression, again from the classic movie, "Deliverance."  Recall the duelling banjo scene, when the old hillbilly breaks into dance as the  city-slickers condescendingly enjoy the entertainment his little jig provides them.  This scene might even remind you of some old race-based movie scenes.  A difference here is that all the actors are white. 

In thanking The Black Caucus for speaking up for me(see previous entry), I guess I need to thank the constituents of those representatives for keeping them on their toes.  I strongly suspect that those constituents' insistence on honest and vocal representation and respect is a major the reason the caucus made so much noise.  They knew the home crowd wouldn't stand for any pussy-footing around about something so vital and important.  So they put themselves out there and did what was expected.  Expectations count. 

As so many have said, commenting on the King blog,  Barack Obama couldn't demand respect from John McCain, but he commanded it from the crowd all the same.   To those who have not always had that luxury of commanding(and their numbers are legion)-- thanks to you for demanding respect from those sworn to deliver their judgments in your name.  To the Black Caucus, thanks for standing tall when it mattered the most.

Once upon a time, I believed a grave unjustice had been done me.  I looked around for comfort, and there seemed to be none.  Every person I tried to talk to seem to be of the mindset that I should just get over it and move on.   I soon concluded that no one else perceived, indeed, could perceive, the deep grief I felt over what had just transpired.   I had never before  felt so wronged and so alone.  It's no exaggeration to say that I was devastated.  And that's when I met:  The Congressional Black Caucus. 

Well, not personally.  On TV.

This was early November of the year 2000.  Some of you may remember back that far. Especially if you voted for the  Democratic candidate that year.   I could not believe the decision the Supreme Court had handed down. Could not believe or accept it.   You want to talk about activist judges.   But no one else did, or would.  No one, it seems, except this scarcely-heeded group of people of color.   I don't remember which of them said what.  Every time one of them opened his or her mouth, I cheered.   Practically everyone not-of-color ( i.e., folks whose skin looks much like mine), was explaining to me why I had to accept the awful injustice that had just happened.  But these folks, called  The Black Caucus, didn't accept it.  And they said so. Publicly.   In doing so, they spoke to me, and what is even more important, for me.  In speaking for me when no one else did or would, they changed my attitude forever.  African American people have done a lot of speaking for me for the past 8 years.  To all of you, thanks.
I am eternally grateful.

It was around the same period of time, late 2000,  that someone else appeared on TV and spoke my language in much the same way as the Caucus had done.  This man, I learned, was a writer for the Washington Post.  His name was William Raspberry.  Soon I was logging onto the Post and reading this Raspberry's column.  It was the first time I had gone out of my way to read anything a black person had written.  As a matter of fact, when I picked up the opinion section of a newspaper, I automatically skipped over the black writers.  I thought these were black people talking to other black people, and what they talked about was none of my concern.  But all that changed when the presidency was decided by the Supreme Court.  Now I had something in common with "those people."  Yes, my opinion. 

So when Colbert I. King says he believes that John McCain disrespected Barack Obama and that Obama should have delivered a sharp rebuke, I can't ignore that.  It will keep eating me until I deal with that thought. 
Because of this past history of mine, Mr. King's words have significant impact on me. 

I'll return to this thread later when I've figured out what I want to say. 

I skipped the cable news shows last evening, and watched "Deliverance" instead. You recall the plot about the canoe trip from hell, based on the James Dickey novel of the same name.  The classic movie was made a lifetime ago---in 1972.  I remember seeing parts of it much later on television, but can't honestly recall if I ever made it through that wrenching  "squeal like a pig" scene before.   That's the part nobody forgets, even those who never saw the movie.  I understand that to this day Ned Beatty won't talk about that scene.

Oddly enough, it was the following remarks from Countrygal that sent me back down the fictional Cahulawassee River in search of clues to those deep-seated visceral fears we all harbor.   She wrote:

"I for one, and several other people I know, we are scared of BHO. He's a smooth operator like so many of them who have run for president in the past. And didn't do a darn thing, but Promise the moon and stars to get us to vote for them. Then do NOTHING when they won the election. Did they forget??"  

Countrygal, I take you at your word when you say you're afraid.  And I pretty much agree with your assessment of politicians.  When I cast my vote on November 4th, as I will, God-willing, for Barack Obama, I will be voting for a politician.  I won't be voting for him because he's the one, the Messiah, or even because I think he's going to fix  the mess we're in.  Whoever wins the election will have to face  the same basic realities, and neither candidate seems to be doing that yet.   The fact is, though, in my view,  Barack Obama and Joe Biden are the lesser of the evils being offered.   I can accept Barack Obama's personal narrative through a combination of faith, gut feelings, and factcheck.org as well as a multitude of other sources.  The same goes for  John McCain and Sarah Palin.

Note: I admit I am curious as to why John McCain with his now-famous 7 houses(the Obamas and the Bidens have one nice house apiece)  and something like 13 cars(the Obamas have 1) and a wife who is heiress to a beer fortune,  is more a man of the people and thus less to be feared than Senator Obama.   And Sarah Palin, with a six-figure family income and a net worth of over 2 million has convinced rural voters that she is "like us."  People wonder about Obama's  sudden rise to prominence.  But what about Palin's?  If you want to argue that Obama came from nowhere, well Alaska is hardly typical mainstreet America to most of us.  So how come we know Sarah Palin so well all of a sudden?   Well, there was some marketing involved.  See sourcewatch.org for more about Sarah Palin's rise.  See also "PR Consultant Helped Palin Grab Spotlight," Washingtonpost.com 10/10.  She's a little more savvy than that hockey mom trademark might imply.

But back to the Cahulawassee River.  There's enough fear there to go around.  The movie tale is told from the point of view of the city-slickers.  The hillbilly view is more subtle, but no less real:  We are not sociopathic pig-screwing, tourist-attacking, anti-dentite half-wits.   The fact is, we look more like the city slickers than the way the movie hillbillies are portrayed.  And in our way we feel we've been raped, preyed upon by outsiders, too.  As Countrygal says, "Promise us the moon. . . Did they forget?"  And the city slickers aren't just  invading our territory momentarily, they're destroying our very way of life.  The fictional town of Aintry was literally about to be wiped off the map as the river was dammed up.  In the movie, buildings are already being moved.  It's not just incidental that one of those buildings happens to be a church.   In a more grizzly but just as telling scene, the town cemetery is being dug up, and the coffins carted away to be reburied elsewhere.

Here's some local trivia which you can skip over if you're not interested:   Old timers in the Ozarks may be reminded of the town of Forsyth, on the White River, which was also moved under similar circumstances.  Here's what wikipedia  says: "Around the middle of the century plans were being made in Washington that would bring great change to the little town of Forsyth. Plans were being made for the construction of a dam (Bull Shoals) on the White River, approximately 80 miles below Forsyth. Two choices were left for the town; the town could be kept intact and moved to a new location and be reimbursed for its property or it could do nothing and cease to exist. After some speculation and uncertainty a plan of action was initiated. The city limits of Forsyth were extended 2 miles west of the old town site (now called Shadow Rock Park) to an area that had once been a golf course. In the early 1950's the town of Forsyth was moved to this location lock, stock, and barrel."    I recall seeing pictures of this in library books.  I seem to remember, too, that some people defiantly refused to sell their land or move, and their property was flooded when the time limit had expired. I'd welcome hearing from anyone who knows more about this. But:  the most important word in the foregoing wiki entry might just be, "Washington."

What's happened since the dams were constructed and a series of lakes(Table Rock, Taneycomo,  Bull Shoals, and Beaver) was created?  Well, the sleepy little town of Branson, which used to be a nice place to visit, is a country music mecca.  They have some good shows and outlet malls, but the traffic is awful.   Most of us wish we'd invested in land along "the strip" while real estate was still cheap!   Nearby Rockaway Beach, which used to be a thriving White River resort town well-known for its wild dance parties,  is now located instead on the banks of a very cold lake, Taneycomo.  Trout were introduced and people fish off the docks.  Last I heard, the tiny community was trying to bring in a casino to revive the sagging local economy.  A proposal on a Missouri ballot a few years back was voted down.  You can hardly blame the locals in these parts for longing for the good old days when things were the way they were, and outsiders didn't even know we were on the map.  The roads were not as good, but the people driving them were folks like us.  Or so it seems. 

Folks like us?  Who's like us?  Who isn't?  Politics makes strange bedfellows, as the old saying goes, but so do
a lot of other things.  Like our values. And the way we feel about outsiders.  We in the Ozarks aren't the only ones who deplore the outsiders who come to our town and make us over to suit themselves.  There are people all over who feel the same.  Some of them are even in. . . .Washington?   Here's native Washingtonian Colbert I King speaking about his old neighborhood on the eve of a  reunion (Washington Post 04/12/08,'The History of Our Town"):

"Sure, they're just buildings of bricks and mortar, and a list of famous and not-so-respectable names and places. All long gone from the scene.

They are probably of little consequence to some of our newly minted Washingtonians who believe the District of Columbia didn't amount to much until they came on the scene.

But those items of the past are threads deeply woven into the lives of many of the people who will come together this evening. And that, perhaps, is one of the tragedies -- no, that's too strong a word; misfortunes, perhaps -- of a city that has so many people whose roots run deep somewhere else.

History matters."  Huh?

Who are some of those people we've sent to Mr. King's hometown?  Folks "like us."  George W. Bush.  We wanted to have a beer with him, remember?  This reminds me of another recent Post column, "Palin's Imaginery Washington" by Anne Applebaum, another native Washingtonian.   Read it.   Who are the outsiders and who belongs?  It depends on your point of view.   No matter where you live, a lot of us  can lay claim to feeling kind of invaded by outsiders.  It's the nature of our world, and the fact that we--all of us-- have access to planes, trains, and automobiless.  No more covered wagons. No more Pony Express.  And we're all part owners of the venerable Wells Fargo as of yesterday.   We long for the good old days.  Yes, I really do.  So do you.  So do people everywhere.  Even some people who live in Washington.  People like us. 

Presidential politics and fear. Writing in the Oct. 13 issue of the New Yorker, George Packer quotes  Roger Catt a retired Wisconsin farmer and warehouse worker: "McCain is more of the same, and Obama is the end of life as we know it."  But I think the world as we know it has already ended. 

And will we have Deliverance this year?  Which one will it be?

Are all hillbillies, by definition, intolerant racists?  Or, as President George Bush might say, "Is our hillbillies learning?"  It might surprise you to know that the term "hillbilly" and the kind of people it has been used to represent are not so simple as you might think.  Yesterday I picked up an early definition from Anthony Harkins, from about 1900, quoted in wiki: "a Hill-Billie is a free and untrammeled white citizen of Alabama, who lives in the hills, has no means to speak of, dresses as he can, talks as he pleases, drinks whiskey when he gets it, and fires off his revolver as the fancy takes him."   And I thought:  "Alabama?"  I tend to think of hillbillies as coming from the Ozarks or Appalachia.  (And some are calling Sarah Palin a hillbilly, too, although I can't quite see it.)

But I'm a hillbilly in a hurry---wiki and google will have to do for now.  I just googled "racist hillbillies" and got 112,000 hits. "Hillbilly racist" gave me 241k.  Let's be fair and balanced.
I googled "tolerant hillbilly."  I got this:  hillbillyperspective.blogspot.com/2006/11/should-i-become-more-tolerant-open.html.     (and it's a must read). 

Here's a little more wiki hillbilly history to chew on:

"Historically, there were conflicts between the mountain-dwelling "hillbillies" and the planters who lived on the coastal plains. During the American Civil War, many residents of western Virginia were pro-Union in that they generally did not own slaves and resented the political dominance of planters who did. The image of the Unionist mountaineer in West Virginia is misleading, however, as the mountainous counties of central, southern, and eastern West Virginia all voted for the Ordinance of Secession on May 23, 1861.^[1] A total war was waged against the mountaineers in much of West Virginia, whose residents were deemed "savages" by Union military authorities."   Who you callin' maverick?   (Now I am wondering  from the foregoing if a little diplomacy on the Union side might have swayed that vote, but that is without delving into the complete history, which it would be interesting to know more about.  Anybody?)

Then there's this, for Ozarks' music-lovers:  "In 1927, the Gennett studios in Richmond, Indiana, made a recording of black fiddler Jim Booker with other instrumentalists; their recordings were labeled "made for Hillbilly" in the Gennett files, and were marketed to a white audience."  And this: "Popular songs whose style bore characteristics of both hillbilly and African American music were referred to, in the late 1940s and early 1950s as hillbilly boogie, and in the mid-1950s as rockabilly. Elvis Presley was a prominent player of the latter genre. When the Country Music Association was founded in 1958, the term hillbilly music gradually fell out of use. However, the term rockabilly is still in common use." 

It seems that wherever you look, whatever genre, our ethnic histories are interwoven. Think of the
old Carole King song, "Tapestry."  It's not just our background.  It's who we are.  Try to pull out any one thread, and any real sense of history unravels.  And so do we, as a people. Just imagine pulling out the threads of the music or  foods of any one culture, and imagine what we'd be missing.  For a start, try only listening to music made by white singers or just eating hotdogs and hamburgers for a while.   We have the best culture in the world.
Some people don't like the term "diversity."  So, how's this:  E Pluribus Unum. (See greatseal.com)