Politics, Palin & Me

I'm not a political blogger. I sometimes write about politics, sure, but it's not like I'm a total news junkie, media hog, 24-7 politico-maniac. I know people like that, and I know I'm not one of them. But right now, I can't bring myself to blog about anything other than Sarah Palin's nomination because Palin's nomination feels like nothing short of a national crisis. I know that sounds melodramatic, but that's how I feel.

Over at Politico yesterday, they had a story about what the nomination says about McCain. The short answer: He's desperate and terrified of a landslide. But what does the fact that a desperate politician (who's 72 and has had FOUR bouts of cancer) can nominate someone clearly unqualified for a job that could be one of the most powerful in the world (should he die) whom he doesn't know and reasonably think that this decision will get votes -- what does all that say about us as an electorate? It blows my mind to think about how crass and how absurd our political landscape has become. I'm a little devastated by it. And terrified by it. And it's keeping me from blogging about anything else. Like this bicycle, which I think is really cool, but if Sarah Palin becomes Vice President, I might have to ride it to Canada.

Palin

If you haven't yet made your way over to Andrew Sullivan's blog, now's the time. He says almost everything there is to be said about the unbelievably and unremittingly cynical nomination of Sarah Palin. He links to many worthwhile postings, too.

At Politico.com, Jonathan Martin has a jaw-dropping story on the "history" of McCain's relationship with Palin (there is none). What the Republican consultants say is important, too.

I haven't been through the blogs yet today, but here's what I want to know: How is it that Palin is holding up Hillary Clinton as an icon (which she is), when her party has spent the last two decades tearing her down?

And I ask you this: Can anyone imagine a Democrat, who's a woman and a mother of five including a 4-month-old with Downs syndrome and who works full-time already who's then nominated to VP of the whole country who would be lionized as the next best thing since sliced bread by "pro-family" conservatives? Me either.

The Morning After Obama

So he did it, Barack Obama did. And here's what I keep thinking. I keep thinking that if we're lucky and Barack Obama wins now, and if he wins again, then my kids will be 12 when he leaves office. If we're lucky, we'll see Obama's hair go gray and we'll watch the lines of the office etch themselves deep into his forehead. So it's been for every young president who's survived.

But while my kids may see him with gray hair, they won't necessarily see him as exceptional because of his race. They may see other candidates and compare those candidates to Obama and notice his words are more beautiful or make more sense, but they're not going to think, "Can you believe what you're seeing?" They're not going to think an African-American president is a triumph, they're going to think it's normal. They'll get to think that if we're very, very lucky.

It's Not Just the Airport, Mr. Friedman

So I would blog about the convention and how impressed I was by Hillary Clinton's speech while it was happening and how it reminded me of the first time I saw her speak in Chicago in 1992, but I won't. All the backstory about how upset the Clintons are and how Hillary is stoking the coals for 2012 has really taken the bloom off the rose of that speech. Enough other people are writing about that this morning.

Instead, this morning I want to write about Tom Friedman's NY Times column about China. Because the China Friedman saw in Beijing for the Olympics was so clean! The broadband was so sophisticated! The airport so swanky! Those Chinese, man, they've really got us lapped, and according to Friedman, they did all that by dint of their hard work.

So here's what I want to know. I want to know if Mr. Friedman has already forgotten the horrible images of this spring. Picture filled with heaps of rubble which crushed thousands of school children in poorly built schools in an earthquake prone region of China. Has he forgotten the images of devastated parents holding up pictures of their children whose bodies were lost in the debris? Did he consider that the Chinese could have taken a few hundred million out of their Olympic budget and directed it toward safer schools, even if those schools serve poor, rural villagers and not airport travelers?

And to write this column, maybe Mr. Friedman simply pushed out of his mind the stories of hundreds Chinese dissidents jailed before the games for fear of some kind of disruption through -- what's that called? -- Free Speech. Maybe he didn't notice the cloak of grey smog that choked athletes and made every day look like rain, at least on TV. No, Mr. Friedman didn't notice any of that because the Bird's Nest was so pretty! The closing ceremonies so fantastic! The train to the airport so clean!

Sure, there's no nice clean high speed train from La Guardia to New York City. But if, as Friedman suggests, the future means a few over-priced buildings constructed by a repressive regime that won't build safe schools out of camera range of the Western media, that jails people for speaking their minds, and that can't figure out that long-term growth means attention to the environmental impact development has on things like air and water, then Mr. Friedman can have his future and move to Beijing. It sounds really great there. As long as you can afford to get to the airport.

Inspired

OK. So I was completely inspired by the Ted Kennedy tribute and wept through the whole thing. (To be honest, I even cried when I read about his cancer in the New York Times.) It's good, I believe, to be reminded that politics is not just about jockeying for power or controlling the news cycle. It's good to remember that, in fact, legislation can change our lives for the better and government can help and individual people really will make a difference.

And now you'll have to excuse me for I must go get my hammer, my hammer of justice, my bell of freedom and sing my song about love between......oh, you know.....Seriously. You know.

Convention Fatigue

The convention hasn't even started and already I'm completely exhausted by it. As if the Olympics weren't enough? All that planning and training, all those great hopes and dreams dashed in a split second. Friends convinced me that Joe Biden could be the best thing since sliced bread when I was all grumpy because he talks so much. But that's not the point. That Obama peaked early isn't the point either. The point is now that the primary is ancient history, I'm terrified that the Democrat will lose. For me at this point it kind of doesn't even matter who that democratic is. Had it been Hillary Clinton the general campaign would have felt different because she's so polarizing. But people being "unsure" of Obama just doesn't mean that much, because, let's face it, we should be "unsure" of how anyone will behave in the Oval Office. McCain was one person 18 months ago and now he's someone else so whom would he be should he win the office? I'm pretty unsure of the answer to that. And, like I said, I'm just terrified that we'll find out. So I can hardly stand the thought of watching the convention, but I also know I won't be able not to watch. At least I'll have my knitting.

Pancakes: River Cottage vs Joy

I really want to love The River Cottage Family Cookbook. Really, I do. So far, I've made two recipes from it -- chocolate chip cookies and drop scones, which are identified as "American pancakes." What I like about both recipes is their size; both make smaller batches than my regular go-to recipes, making me think I could really "whip up a batch" and not have to wonder what I'd do with the leftovers.

But, as it turns out, the batch size is about the only thing these recipes have to recommend them. I've already given a tepid review to the cookies. I still may adjust the ingredients and try again. Then again, I may not.

As for the pancakes, the first time I made them they came out gummy. I thought the problem was too much mixing. The recipe calls for a lot of it, and if you make pancakes from scratch (which we do all the time), you learn that mixing too much activates the gluten in the flour (writing that makes me feel like I'm playing some kind of cooking expert on TV). So, I made a note to myself to try again and mix less, which I did Thursday. Maybe if I thought of them as "drop scones" and served them with a glop of clotted cream (or Greek yogurt) and jam, I'd think they were just right. But thinking of them as pancakes made me think they were gummy.

This morning, I went back to my old stand-by recipe, the buttermilk pancakes in the latest edition of the Joy of Cooking. And these pancakes? My husband said they were the best pancakes without syrup that he's had. I have no idea why they turned out so well today -- my kids activated plenty of gluten when we all mixed the batter. But still, they were delicious and we have batter leftover for tomorrow's breakfast.

I still love reading the River Cottage Family Cookbook. I love thinking that "planting a lettuce garden" is an activity that my kids and I will one day join forces to do, and I think I'll still give the raisin bread a shot. But when it comes to pancakes, I'm sticking with Joy.