Facebook Almost Ruined My Marriage

Last week a young lady of my acquaintance posted a humble plea on Facebook that set off a totally mundane chain of events that, while being the very definition of the term "first-world problem," nonetheless raise a number of ultimately unimportant questions I feel compelled to examine.

Her plea (paraphrased): "Help me win a free vacation! Go to [beach resort's Facebook page] and Like or Comment on my post on their Wall! The person with the most Likes and Comments wins 2 nights at the resort, all expenses paid!"

Being the charitable sort -- by which I mean willing to click something if it will help someone I know -- I clicked through and found the photo in question: it was of this young lady of my acquaintance, looking beautiful in a bikini, sitting on the beach. I saw that only one person had Liked this photo before me, I brought the tally up to two, and went on about my important business at work: writing "Manimal" fan fiction, bidding on commemorative coins from the Bicentennial, and trolling the "Smallville" message boards.

Maybe five minutes later, the IM window pops up on my screen:

Jennifer: why are you liking photos of
hot young girls on facebook

It's my wife. (The question mark on her computer is broken.) It had not occurred to me that she would see that I had Liked this photo, nor had it occurred to me how it would look when she did. My wife and I are almost 40. The young lady in the photo is indeed a hot young girl of, I dunno, 25? 26? Not sure, but under 30. I felt confident that my wife would be satisfied by my explanation, which had the benefit of being the truth:

me: she asked everybody to like it so she can win a free vacation.

Mrs. Wiferson seemed placated by this:

Jennifer: oh ok

I never doubted that my wife would believe that there was nothing untoward going on, because a) there isn't, b) the marriage is solid, we get along great and always have, and c) she is my alibi for my whereabouts nearly every waking, non-working moment over the last 13 years. She knows this dog never leaves the porch.

But even though my wife has heard my explanation that I only clicked on the bikini photo because I was explicitly asked to and I swear I'm not a creep no really I'm not, none of my other Facebook friends (18 and counting!) has heard that explanation, and now they all have "Alex Castle likes a photo" of a hot chick not my wife in a bikini in their news feed. I barely even remember the photo, so I go back and look at it again to see just how creepy I am for Like-ing it. It is not like a super-erotic Sports Illustrated photo of a well-lit underwear model slathered in vaseline, wearing just bikini bottoms, and covering herself with her hands. It's just a candid shot of a very pretty girl at the beach.

By now many more people have acquiesced to her request that they Like or Comment on the photo; she is up to 25 Likes and 10 Comments. My eye is caught by one of the comments (paraphrased):  "[Name of beach resort] looks amazing. As do you babe!"

Now, I'm sure this person meant nothing by that comment, other than that this gal looks good in a bikini, which anyone with eyesight would agree. But I feel a little creeped out by his comment nonetheless, the same way I'm creeped out when another lady friend, who's sort of famous from having been on a reality show, gets 85 "You're so beautiful" comments on any picture she posts of herself. If you verbally said "you look amazing" or "you're so beautiful" or "you're really wearing that bikini" to someone of the other gender who you weren't dating, you'd feel a little creepy/desperate, right? It's not like I made a creepy comment, but I almost feel like the thumbs-up of a Like is even worse, like the Facebook equivalent of a wolf whistle.

Since my lady friend here openly solicited the Like, I know there's nothing creepy about it in her eyes, and I know that my wife bought my explanation, so I'm not worried about either of them. It's just that Like-ing a bikini photo of a hottie ten-plus years younger than I am on Facebook doesn't look good to all the other people are seeing it, and I'm not comfortable with it. I'm Facebook friends with my parents. With my wife's parents! This does not look good, so I think about my options.

Should I un-Like the photo? If I do that she might not win the contest, and since the contest depends on her Likes, she'll notice that I un-Liked it and that would be weird under the circumstances. Would it even get the Like out of people's news feeds? How does that even work?

Do I post a Status Update with a short explanation of what happened? That could only read like the paranoid rantings of a deranged psychopath (quite unlike this blog post). Right?

Alex Castle
You may have seen that I Liked a photo of a lovely young lady who is not my wife. Rest assured that I do not like her like her -- I'm quite happily married and have been since the Florida recount -- I just "Like" her like her, like a friend Likes another friend so they can go on vacation. Seperately! Not together! She's going on vacation, with the friend of her choosing (not me) if enough people "Like" her photo. So you see, It's the friendly thing to do! #KONY2012

Yeah, we're not going to be doing that.  So where does that leave me? Nowhere! I look like some kind of weird Internet pervert trying to hit on my Facebook friends. Thanks a lot Facebook! Why does everyone have to see everything I Like anyway? I see headlines for news articles that interest me and I don't click on them because I don't want "Alex Castle read  'Lindsay Lohan's Mochachino Disaster' on Washington Post News Reader" to be popping up on everyone's news feed.

And while we're at it, why do I have to see everything everyone else Likes? I know everyone has privacy options for what portion of their Facebook activity is visible and to whom. Any chance I can change my incoming options? Can I opt out of seeing what other people Like? Do I really need to be alerted when one of my friends communicates with another of my friends? Is there a "Don't show me strangers' sonograms" box I can check? (That last joke was actually my wife's. It's one of the reasons I don't cheat on her.)

Maybe it's not Facebook's fault, maybe it's my fault for not thinking it through, that everything I do on this stupid website can be seen not just by all my friends but potentially my friends' friends' friends, which could add up to like 30 or 40 people (I'm not much good at math). Or maybe it's my friend's fault for putting me in this position. Sure, she needs a vacation, but what about me? What about my marriage? Did she ever once think about that? I have a wife and a son! Actually, it's that stupid resort's fault. How dare they get people to post pictures of themselves half-naked for other people to see and look at and Like and post vaguely creepy comments to? And for what? I never did find out if my friend won that vacation!

Delta Is Like A Soviet Airline

I first realized maybe things would not go so smoothly when I went to the Delta website and poked around until I found out the extra baggage fee to bring my snowboard on the plane: $150. Each way. Almost as much as another ticket.

So I began my flight experience with Delta Airlines on the wrong foot. It’s not like my snowboard is amazing or irreplaceable or anything -- but as this was a ski trip, it would have been nice to have it, and having to rent gear, although far cheaper than the baggage fee, adds an unwelcome layer of hassle to the proceedings.

I pack my boots and helmet and other gear into a regular suitcase, put my computer, iPod, and a book in a backpack and grumble about this bullshit baggage fee. I check the website again to make sure everything’s on time, and see that it’s recommended I arrive 75 minutes before my flight.

My arrival at the check-in beats that target by 15 or 20 minutes, but I’m disheartened to see that both the check-in line and the line for security are really long and show no sign of moving.
 

I get into the check-in line but it is soon shouted at me that I can’t get in the line without a boarding pass, and I (and several of the people in line in front of me) are directed to a bank of self-serve kiosks.

I swipe my credit card a few times but it doesn’t work, and then I notice the barcode reader on the machine, and remember the confirmation email I printed is in my backpack. I hold the barcode under the reader every way I can think of, but it won’t scan. There is a blank and an onscreen keyboard so I can enter my confirmation number, but I can’t find it on the document.

Just then a lady in a Delta jacket steps up and asks me where I’m going. Denver, I say, and she glances at my sheet, types in the confirmation number, and I get in the check-in line, which has not moved at all in the eight minutes I’ve been wrestling with this machine.

A few minutes go by and just when I start to think about the possibility of not making it to my plane in the next 75 minutes, a new desk worker appears and asks if there are any 6pm departures in line. My plane’s leaving at 6:05 so I raise my hand, and I and seven or eight other people are waved forward to the front of the line.

“Things are going my way,” I allow myself to think, somehow forgetting the awful psychic scars of all my air travel of the past ten years or so, the way abused children block out their abuse and mothers forget the pain of childbirth. I go to the front of the line and yet another new clerk appears, and she checks my bag.

I feel a small sense of victory at having completely jumped the line, but it evaporates when I turn my attention to the line for security. Whereas the line for check-in was long, it was single-file and somewhat orderly; this one looks more like a mob, like the line for U2 tickets or the new iPad or whatever other kind of long long line that’s not moving you can think of. I let out a deep sigh and feel an odd sense of deja vu as I take in the scene, but can't quite put my finger on it.
 

There appears to be only one table to search people up at the front of this security line, but I’m so far away it’s hard to tell. In any case, it's clear I'll be waiting quite a while. Just as I start to adjust to this new reality and once again consider the possibility that I won’t make my flight, the line parts like some kind of huge body of water in a sci-fi novel or something, and before I even see anyone doing it, the stanchion ropes are up, and the first 50 people or so in the security line are on that side of a velvet rope (actually retractable nylon strap), there is a gulf, and I and the next 50 people in line are behind another retractable nylon strap.

Everyone is disoriented by this sudden stanchion change, as those of us in back no longer seem to be in a line at all, but it’s immediately shouted at us to follow the Delta jacketed agents outside: “It’ll be quicker, trust me,” we are assured.

Forty people are then led out the front door and into the roadway leading out of the terminal, toward the parking garage. Everyone looks confused and apprehensive. We go down a hill and double back under the building. As we go into the parking garage underground, the sound of loud creaking metal can be heard, and it suddenly hits me where I’ve seen all this before.

When I was a kid in the 70s and 80s, the Cold War was still going strong and there was a lot of talk about the quality of life in the Soviet Union, and how Communism had turned every day into an interminable slog of long lines and decomposing infratructure. Footage of this aspect of Russian life always seemed to be in black and white even when it wasn’t. Walking out of that terminal, with its filthy carpets and cheap folding tables and blinking fluorescent lights, full of miserable faces and people in bad blazers shouting at them, out into the groaning, creaking parking garage felt like we lost the Cold War.
 

The walk through the parking garage was long, and the walk after that even longer, through empty hallways and past unused baggage carousels. We went around a corner and suddenly we were indoors again, in a busy part of the terminal. I had a short moment of panic when the road forked and I realized I wasn’t paying very close attention to the rest of the exodus, and couldn’t be sure which way they’d gone. I swallowed, made a mental coin flip, and went left, and soon recognized the back of someone’s ugly jacket and followed the crowd through yet another door and another unused carousel. Is Delta sneaking us all past security? How much of this airport is not in use? What is that smell? Do I really want to get on this plane?

After wandering the bowels of the airport for at least ten minutes like Spinal Tap looking for the stage, we come into yet another dimly lit room and another bunch of stanchions with retractable nylon straps and a line almost as long as the one we got out of to embark on this safari.

Like all the previous lines I’d encountered so far, this one did not appear to be moving, and unlike the previous lines, I was not given a miracle reprieve from waiting in it. Of all the shouting that was shouted at our weary band of travelers, the shoutiest was shouted in the manner of a drill sergeant by the lady at the folding tables, loud enough for the whole line of 80 people:

“Your footwear! Will come off! Your jacket! Will come off! If you are wearing a belt! That will also come off! Empty everything from your pockets! Keys! Change! Phones! Any electronic devices! Must be removed from their bags! And put in their own white bin! Your ID! And boarding pass! Should be visible in your hand!” A guy at the front of the line kind of bumbles his way through the process and I worry that she’s about to assign him 50 push-ups.

My turn comes 15 minutes later or so, and as I’m she barks something at me that I don’t quite make out, and she repeats, “Where are you flying in from?” I say, “I’m not flying in, I’m flying out,” and she shrugs and waves me through. As I put my shoes back on, I wonder: is it that security lady’s first day? Nobody goes through security when they’re flying in! Is this a setup? Are the real security guards bound and gagged in a nearby closet?

There is another 10 minutes of walking to my gate after I get to the terminal, but I can follow the signs rather than my fellow travelers. As I reach the gate, the plane is just beginning to board, so I’m right on time -- advising me to be there 75 minutes before the flight turned out to be right on the money.

I guess there’s two ways to look at it: that I got sent on a wild goose chase by the worst-run airline in the world, and missed out on an hour of valuable sitting-at-the-gate time, time I could have used to buy something I didn’t really want to drink at Starbucks and something I didn’t really want to read at Hudson News; or, I got to go through a wormhole to 1988 Moscow and experience the very thing we bankrupted ourselves to prevent. Yay capitalism!

Oh, and I saw this on the way onto the plane:

A company that gouges its customers with outrageous baggage fees, has downsized its workforce and replaced it with self-serve technology that doesn't actually work, passes the extra hassle on to its customers, and treats its customers almost literally like cattle is one of Fortune Magazine's "World's Most Admired Companies" for 2011. Yay free market!

PS: In the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit this flight experience wasn't all bad. Once I boarded, I got my first glimpse of an endangered species I’d long thought extinct. There was a genuinely hot flight attendant on the plane. I’d never seen one before! Have you ever seen one before? Back in the day, "stewardess" was like shorthand for "gorgeous and willing" -- at least it was when Jack Tripper's neighbor Larry said it. But in my 30+ years of air travel I've never seen a flight attendant more attractive than a defensive line coach, and this gal could have been an underwear model. It was like a unicorn was handing out peanuts! Well played, Delta.

Boycotting Rush Limbaugh Is A Waste Of Time

For the last week my Facebook feed has been full of outrage and petitions (and, like every week, photos of people's dinner). The outrage and petitions, if not necessarily the dinners, have been directed at Rush Limbaugh, the radio talk show host who despite various moral failings, intellectual shortcomings, and a glaring honesty deficit over a 20-year career has suddenly come perilously close to hitting bottom (if he actually has one).

Rush managed to wriggle his way into a slow news week by saying a number of unchivalrous things about a young law student called to testify before a Democratic subcommittee on health insurance and birth control. These hearings were purely symbolic, called to draw attention to the fact that the Republicans' own hearings on the matter forgot to invite any women, and to get at least a couple of female opinions on the matter on record.

Limbaugh's rantings on the matter were coarse, and insulting, and illustrated a disturbing, deep-seated hostility to women, and I don't intend to quote or repeat them. Suffice to say, they were ungallant enough to prompt an online campaign to boycott his advertisers and get him pulled from the airwaves.

I certainly understand the impulse, and I wouldn't miss Rush if he were gone. I never listen to his show, except on long drives when I lose NPR and can't get a good classic rock station, and even then I never last longer than one 7-minute segment. Even though I've never agreed with anything I've heard him say and I find his know-it-all tone insulting and obnoxious, I do find him compelling in a weird way. Even so, the 7-minute bile eruptions he calls segments are punctuated by 19-minute blocks of ads even more annoying and unlistenable than Rush himself, and it is they that usually drive me to change the channel.

But of course those ads are Rush's bread and butter, so pressure is being put on the advertisers to bail from Rush's "Accounts Receivable" ledger in protest of his comments. While I don't disagree with the sentiment, I'm not sure I see the point.

"Get Rush Off The Air." Does that even exist anymore? Let's say these petitions succeed and all of Rush's sponsors pull out and Clear Channel fires him. Is there anyone anywhere who thinks that would be the last we hear of Rush Limbaugh? He would go from being the highest-rated political commentator on the radio to being the highest-rated political podcaster on the Internet in about four seconds.

Because even if you get rid of Rush, his audience is still going to be there, and is there anyone who thinks that his audience would not follow him to whatever media he chooses, be it Sirius, iTunes, or smoke signal? It's not like these people are waiting for all the facts to come in on Rush -- their minds are made up. Because while Limbaugh seems to be losing advertisers, I'd be more interested in whether he's lost any listeners and I would bet a steak dinner that he's lost close to none.

The things Rush said about this woman were pretty gross, but I'm not particularly bothered by them because they're consistent with his entire career. I don't know that he's ever gone quite so overboard before, but the only time anyone notices him at all is when he goes overboard, so he does it on purpose -- everyone knows that, right? -- so it's only natural that he would eventually go too far.

What I find interesting here isn't his lapse in taste and honor in discourse, because he's always been an asshole. It's how completely he exposed himself has having no understanding whatsoever of what he's talking about.

The woman he insulted so mercilessly, Sandra Fluke, is a law student at Georgetown University, and as a student at that private institution, buys into the private health insurance plan offered by the University. Her appearance before the Congressional subcommittee was to argue in favor of the University continuing to include birth control as part of the insurance plan that, once again, she pays for. At issue was whether a (it bears repeating, private) Catholic organization should be obliged, as all other health insurance providers are obliged, to provide birth control, even if that coverage is at odds with the school's own religious doctrine to students and employees not themselves Catholic. Ms. Fluke spoke eloqently of the various non-reproductive applications of the pill for women, and did not mention herself or her own sex life at all.

Somehow, Rush contorted that innocent, benign, wholly sensible argument into a harpy's craven demand that the the government, and thus the taxpayers, fill her own bottomless demand for morning after pills to abort the babies that she is conceiving with a platoon of faceless partners every night and twice on Sunday.

The insult to Ms. Fluke's character is one thing -- it's gross, and childish, and creepy, and totally undeserved -- but the total distortion of the issue at hand is something else. Because when you put it the way Rush put it, no, I don't want my tax dollars to pay for hooker abortions! (Actually, I wouldn't really have a problem with it, but I can at least see that point of view.)

But that is not remotely what Ms. Fluke was arguing, and taxpayer dollars accounted for no part of her testimony, and had nothing to do with the issue at hand, which begs the question: Is Rush Limbaugh misrepresenting the facts on purpose, or does he just not understand them? Whatever the answer, he's been doing this for a long time on a wide range of issues, and it's only dumb luck that this is the issue that finally blew up in his face.

But it doesn't really matter. Short of appearing in a three-way gay porn video with Barack Obama and Saul Alinsky (whoever that is), there's nothing Rush can do to lose his audience now. They have drunk the Kool-Aid and remade themselves in his image -- they proudly call themselves "Dittoheads," for God's sake.  If Rush dropped dead of, say, an oxy-induced food coma, is there any doubt at all that his people would find another stridently xenophobic, misogynistic, racially hostile blowhard to listen to?

His remarks may have turned off a few new listeners, but that raises another question: how many new listeners do you really think Rush is picking up these days? Is his cultural influence ongoing, or is it more or less complete? Are his people getting dumber by continuing to listen to him, or do they continue to listen because they're dumb?

All of which is to say that I don't see his firing, if it were to happen, having a very big impact in the world at large. As Rush himself loves to say derisively of left-wing goals, it would make everybody feel good for a minute, but accomplish little else. Those of us who never listen to him will continue to never listen to him, and those who do will either find another asshole to hitch their wagons to, or, more likely, follow Rush to his next enterprise.

Seems to me the best thing we can do to Rush is ignore him, even (and especially) when he goes this far overboard, and if we really want to apply pressure somewhere, apply it to the news outlets that spent a week breathlessly repeating and deconstructing his remarks and telling us something everyone already knew -- Rush Limbaugh is hostile to women and women's interests, and is either too stupid or too mendacious to argue an issue on the merits. Thanks, Woodward and Bernstein, but that's not exactly news.  

Incidentally, Congress passed a bill last week that would outlaw the right of citizens to assemble or demonstrate at any public event attended by someone receiving Secret Service protection, which would include presidential candidates.

So while we're all shrieking about Rush Limbaugh's First Amendment rights (which are in no kind of danger, by the way -- his beloved free market is merely doing what it does), our own First Amendment rights are in actual jeopardy, and nobody's paying attention. I Googled "HR 347" and look at what came up (note who's covering this story, and more importantly, who's not) : 

Rick Santorum Will Save The GOP

Rick Santorum

I like to think that I try harder than most people I know to understand Republicans. (Emphasis on "try.") Whereas most of the people I know in my two adopted hometowns (New York and San Francisco) are content to believe that the folks on the right are the Earthly manifestation of pure evil sent to hold dominion over the weak, I always try to look a little deeper and to understand how and why they vote the way they vote.

The reason for that of course is that both of my parents and some of my extended family vote Republican, and I happen to know that they are all very intelligent, very compassionate, very pleasant people. They are not social conservatives, or fundamentalists, or strident pro-lifers. So there is a disconnect that I struggle to understand, because these are the issues that increasingly seem to define right-wing pundits and politicians.

It's been my observation that in politics, people seem to be much more passionate about what they're against than what they're for. When I vote for Democratic candidates, am I affirmatively voting for a cradle-to-grave safety net and unlimited power to labor unions, or am I voting against the party that is historically most hostile to minorities, seems to relish sending people to war, clings desperately to economic policies that in the last 30 years have twice failed catastrophically, and appears to be in the grip of religious crazies?

I have no great love of Democrats or the Democratic Party, but as it is, they are the less unappealing option. I'm not particularly thrilled by the idea of paying higher taxes, or people abusing welfare, or corrupt unions killing our kids, or any of the other things that come with the Democrats, but I am definitely, strongly, actively opposed to outlawing contraception, or starting more wars in Asia, or letting the Old Testament guide foreign policy. I vote Democratic more as a vote against Republicans than a vote for Democrats.

My dad, on the other hand, worked in upper-middle management for a manufacturing behemoth for 35 years, took advantage of a very generous employee stock program, and came away with a great deal of negative experience with unions -- he once caught an employee employing an escort on the hood of his car in an outdoor parking lot, and was prevented by the union from firing him -- and made enough money to get pissed off about how much he paid in taxes. So while I have never known him to give a shit about gay marriage, drug sentencing minimums, abortion rights, or going to church, that's not what he's voting for -- he's voting against unions and against higher taxes. If the only guy available to carry that torch also happens to be pro-life, anti-gay, fundamentalist, well, politics makes strange bedfellows.

I have no doubt that there is an important role in the government for a strong conservative party to watch the money and curb the excesses of the hippies on the Left. I generally agree with the spirit and the goal of what Democrats do but they also seem to be chronic bunglers, unorganized and undisciplined, so I think it's important that all of that be kept in check by someone sternly watching the money. And I don't even have any money to watch -- just think how strongly must people who actually have money feel.

It seems that they feel strongly enough to look the other way while a militia of religious nuts slowly infiltrated and gradually took over their party over the last 30 years. It was a marriage of convenience: the GOP needed their votes, the crazies needed the GOP's power. For a long time it was possible to ignore and marginalize the ranting religious wing, but their ranks have increased within the party to the point that the tail is now violently wagging the dog.

Sure, every presidential candidate in modern history has bent over backwards to prove their piety and religious bona fides, but I think the less religious among us have always just assumed they were faking. Right? Not that they didn't believe in God necessarily, but they're more that lazy American kind of religious, where you believe but not enough to plan your life around.

Is anyone that ambitious, that consumed with work and obsessed with a goal, also super religious? I would think there simply wouldn't be enough time in the day, and I'm sure all these guys are faking, including Obama. I don't even believe that George W. Bush is really religious, even though he claims to be born again. I think that was just his "Get Out Of Jail Free" card to wipe the embarrassing first 40 years of his life off the books.

Anyway, of the Republican voters I happen to know personally, roughly 100% would still vote Republican if the party dropped the words "abortion," "immigrant," "marriage," "drugs" and "Iran" from its platform and just focused on the money. But since there's not a party like that, voting Republican will have to do.

(Also, when you boil it all the way down, Republicans just think liberals are pussies, an impression the Democratic Party has bent over backward to reinforce over the last 30 years. People who don't want to be pussies vote Republican.)

But now the day of reckoning is arriving, because the religious crazies' very own candidate, Rick Santorum, who is definitely not faking, might plausibly overtake nobody's favorite Mitt Romney for the GOP nomination, putting the crazies' views and agenda front and center for everyone, most importantly the non-crazies in their party, to see.

I think it's important that they see it: that their entirely reasonable preference for low taxes and small government has borne a socially regressive political entity that is as far from "personal liberty" as one can imagine.  Consider these recent quotes by Mr. Santorum:

"One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country.... Many of the Christian faith have said, well, that's okay, contraception is okay. It's not okay. It's a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be." — Rick Santorum, October 2011

"I understand why [Obama] wants you to go to college. He wants to remake you in his image.” –- Rick Santorum, February 2012

There are a couple things I find troubling here. The first is that anyone thinks that any part of society's progress, good or bad, can be reversed is shockingly out of touch with reality. Drug use, sexuality, technology -- a vast array of genies have left their bottles and it's insane to think that any of them are going back in.  Second is that a contender for the Party of Individual Freedom's nomination has a notion of "how things are supposed to be" and wants to impose it upon the rest of us. For all his sputtering about how Barack Obama wants to control all of our lives, there's rather a sharp irony there.

When discussing gun control, serious conservatives always mention the "camel's nose in the tent" argument -- that absolutely no kind of restriction on gun ownership can be tolerated because once the camel's nose is in the tent, we'll never get it out, and gun laws will get more and more restrictive until the activist crazies are satisfied and the second amendment is abolished. I can't think of a clearer illustration of the "Camel's nose" principle than the way the Christian crazies got their nose into the tent and little by little have taken it over.  I sincerely hope that Santorum wins this nomination, and not just because Obama would beat him like a cheap drum.

Santorum's nomination would force all those reasonable Republicans out there to really look at the increasingly crazy people they're voting for just to keep the pussies and the hippies out of power.  I have no illusions that reasonable folks like mine would ever vote Democratic, and I'm not sure I'd want them to. As I said, I think we need small-c conservatives in government. Oddly, some of my favorite political analysis for the last few years has been coming from guys like Andrew Sullivan and David Frum -- true conservatives disowned by their party when they stuck to principle rather than follow blindly on the party's increasingly radical social agenda. I disagree with these guys frequently, but at least I know that they're not toeing any kind of party line, and that their thoughts and ideas are their own, that they're not working backward from "This is a Christian nation" or "Whatever Obama does, I oppose."

Anyway, I'm hoping Santorum's nomination will lead to either a fracturing or a restructuring of the Republican party, with actual hands-off, free-thinking small-government moderate conservatives given a seat at the table. You know, guys like Barack Obama.

Van Halen Remembers How To Not Suck

I feel like I've been waiting my whole life for this. My favorite band ever has reunited and made their first album together in 28 years, an album I've anticipated and feared in nearly equal measure for as long as I can remember. Anticipated, because it seems such a massive cosmic injustice that the band that so effortlessly fused Big Loud Rock with Disco Dance Party has spent the last three decades pointing fingers at each other, talking smack, and (worst of all) making bad records. I've missed this band's signature sound for my entire adult life, in no small part because even after all these years it remains sui generis, a totally unique sound that no other act has ever come near duplicating. Feared, because over the course of those three decades everyone involved has been diligently submitting proof that they've all forgotten how to do anything but suck.

Everybody loves original Van Halen. When you ask them (or at least, when I ask them), people invariably say, "I love original Van Halen, with David Lee Roth -- Van Hagar, not really." I don't think I've ever heard anyone say "I don't like Van Halen," and I don't think I have ever known anyone who preferred the Hagar era to the Roth era (though the Internet certainly tells a different story). I loved Roth-era Van Halen so much, I talked myself into the first two Sammy records just so I wouldn't have to let go. But even I never listened to Balance (the last record with Hagar) or Van Halen III (the one with Gary Cherone).

When they finally got back with Diamond Dave in 2007 and toured, I and quite a few of my friends went to see them to the tune of $150 a ticket. I can think of no better illustration of the early MTV generation's enduring love toward this band with this singer. Yet, oddly, my informal polling reveals that in the two weeks since Van Halen released A Different Kind of Truth, their first record with David Lee Roth since 1984, exactly nobody I know has listened to it. I say oddly because quite unlike the early '80s, it is possible to listen to most new albums (this one included) for free on Spotify or whatever. I have been listening to this thing a lot for the last two weeks and I want to talk to someone about it, but I can't because no one has heard it and apparently doesn't care to.

I can understand that: as much goodwill as the original band still enjoys (strangely, considering how little goodwill they had for each other), they did so, so, so much to wreck it in the last 15 years. First, under the expert tutelage of Sammy Hagar, they learned how to suck. They put out a few bad records. Their performances became erratic. And then they went on a Nixonesque firing spree, terminating Sammy Hagar, David Lee Roth, and Gary Cherone in a three-year period, and then firing Sammy Hagar again after a disastrous reunion tour a few years after that. They became the worst thing a rock band can be: they became a joke.

So even though they sounded great on the 2007 tour, even with Eddie Van Halen's 16-year-old son playing bass, and everybody went and everybody liked it, nobody seemed -- indeed, nobody seems, present tense -- to imagine that these dudes are even capable of making a decent record.

The early evidence was not promising: a month ahead of the album's release, a single called "Tattoo" hit YouTube, and although it was not altogether horrible, it didn't really feel like something they couldn't have done without Diamond Dave, or wouldn't have done with Sammy Hagar. I watched the video a few times and realized that, while the song was definitely not that great, the video was so bad that it actually made the song seem worse. (I appreciate that they made a performance video like the ones they made in the '80s, but not even bothering to sync the video with the song is a strange, strange choice.)

So I listened to it a few times without looking at the video, and it did indeed seem a little better (but still not that great) -- it feels like a conscious effort to revisit the crossover pop appeal of "Jump" without directly aping the song itself. It certainly sounded better to me than the two songs they did with Roth in 1996 when they did the big reunion headfake, "Me Wise Magic" and "Can't Get This Stuff No More." Those tunes sounded like unfinished Van Hagar riffs that they got Roth to write lyrics to, right down to the wet, chorus-pedal-y guitar tone that Eddie made his signature in the 90s. It's far from perfect, but still a step in the right direction, so I remained cautiously optimistic for the rest of the record (though I feared that I was just talking myself into it, the same way I did OU812). As it turns out, "Tattoo" is the first song on the album, which is a weird choice considering that tracks 2-13 are pretty much exactly what all the Van Halen fans like me have been waiting the last 28 years for. This album is loud, rude, fast, aggressive, and restores the sense of humor and mischief that Diamond Dave took home in the divorce. And, it occurs to me that skipping the first track, or even the first two tracks, on a Van Halen album is nothing new to me: I always skipped "You Really Got Me" and "Eruption," I always skipped "You're No Good" and "Dance The Night Away," and I always skipped "1984" and "Jump." So "Tattoo" falls into a grand tradition, and if you skip it and start with the second song, "She's the Woman," you immediately realize that THE IMPOSSIBLE HAS HAPPENED, and that you are listening to a new Van Halen record that actually sounds like Van Halen: propulsive, funky, hard-edged but not abrasive. "She's The Woman" has the same kind of grinding feel as "Mean Streets," only without the killer riff intro. (This song and five others are based on demos of old songs from Roth's original tenure, which some have leveled as criticism but I consider a non-issue.) Things stay promising with the first all-new song on the album, "You and Your Blues," which really should have been the first single: it's got more pop appeal and unlike "Tattoo" and every other song on the album, its lyrics aren't totally stupid. Instead, Roth recycles blues song titles in the service of a mid-tempo kiss-off to a depressive lover. (One might also read a kiss-off to the melancholy style of Van Hagar into those lyrics, if one were so inclined). Then, with "China Town," we finally, FINALLY hear the return of the thing that has been totally absent since Roth left the band and what made them so distinctive: the boogie beat, previously used to such great effect on "I'm The One" and "Hot For Teacher" and "The Full Bug" and several others; the exuberant, too-fast-to-dance-to, impossible-not-to-try beat. I guess they missed this beat as much as I did, because it shows up on a couple of other songs on the record: "As Is," which reminds me of "Sinner's Swing" from Fair Warning; and "Stay Frosty," an overt homage to "Ice Cream Man," from their debut album. Alex Van Halen, by the way, is an absolute monster on this record, and on the boogie-beat songs in particular. As for David Lee Roth, he sounds good, if a little strained at times. (I have a feeling he needed a lot of takes to sing some of these.) But Roth's vocal prowess was never his strength, nor was his gift for meaningful, insightful lyrics. Just like on all his past efforts with this band, his lyrics consist of memorable one-liners strung together with nonsense. There is no narrative, no message, no deeper meaning. (Having said that, he does uncork a few great lines: "Some days you're the dog, some days you're the hydrant"; "God is love, but get it in writing"; "Love 'em all, I says -- let Cupid sort 'em out!") He is the kind of singer who gets by on pure attitude and enthusiasm, who makes every song sound more like a party than a bloodless exercise in rock virtuosity -- which is what most of the band's work with Sammy Hagar sounded like.

All is once again as it should be
(except for that headset mic)

The clean-tone arpeggiated intro that kicks off "Blood and Fire" made me a little nervous that that style was about to creep back into the mix, but it thankfully doesn't, and here Roth sings some nonsense lyrics that nonetheless convey a spirit of triumph and seem to directly address the band's toxic history without really saying anything about it except that it sucked. And even though this is definitely a rock song, nowhere near a ballad, it is the last light moment on this record for a while, as the next five tunes are pummeling rockers. The word "Love" is not in the title of any of them, and the chorus pedal is nowhere to be found. I've written about this before, but I've slowly come to feel that adding Wolfgang Van Halen to the band is the best thing they could have done. Like any 20-year-old, the kid wants to rock, and like any parent to a 20-year-old, Eddie wants to do whatever he has to do to make his kid think he's cool, and even if that means ditching the harmonizer and the TransTrem, Eddie is all "sure thing buddy, I'll drive, popcorn's on me!" Michael Anthony was a great part of the band once upon a time, but Eddie did have a tendency to keep him down in the mix -- you can actually hear him getting turned down on "So This Is Love?" from Fair Warning -- but when it's his own son playing bass, he's more inclined to bring him up in the mix and the kid more than acquits himself, playing more active and inventive lines than Anthony tended toward. I have a feeling that Wolfgang's favorite Van Halen record is Women and Children First, because most of the all-new songs sound like they could be on that record, particularly "As Is" and "Honeybabysweetiedoll." Also because they played "Romeo Delight," one of the heaviest tunes in the band's entire early catalog, on every date of the 2007 tour (which Wolfgang supposedly wrote the setlist for) and they're also playing it on the current tour. I can't think of anything at all wrong with the spirit of Women and Children First guiding Van Halen Mark IV's efforts, now or in the future. It's not without a problem or two. Even though the tone is perfect, and the spirit is exactly as it should be, and there are no (no! none! zero!) ballads, and all the Van Halens are playing brilliantly and Dave is tossing out one-liners like he's been saving them up for 20 years, the big, memorable riffs are in short supply. There's no monster riff like "Unchained," or "Panama" that makes you want to grab your guitar and try and figure it out. It's also too long by 3 or 4 songs: as I mentioned, it would have been better without "Tattoo"; "The Trouble With Never" is a little too close to a Hendrix song ("Crosstown Traffic," to be exact) for comfort; and "Beats Workin'" feels like filler stuck at the end. Cut off three tunes and you've got a 35-minute Van Halen album that feels of a piece with the rest of the Roth-era records. But having said all that, the fact that there is a new Van Halen song that sounds like "Ice Cream Man" ("Stay Frosty") is cause to rejoice. My biggest worry about a new Van Halen record wasn't that it would be bad. Edward Van Halen and his brother don't know how to make a bad record. But they sure as shit know how to make a lame one, as they proved throughout Hagar's tenure and into Cherone's. My biggest fear was that they'd drag David Lee Roth down into anther limp, boring, adult-oriented-rock album, and I'm happy to say that whatever its other faults, this is not a lame record (if you do like I told you and skip "Tattoo"). It pushes all the same buttons that their early records pushed, buttons the band couldn't even find from 1985 to the present (and no other band has ever been able to find at all). That "Panama" and "Hot For Teacher" and "Unchained" left a smoking hole where those buttons used to be shouldn't detract from the fact that "Stay Frosty" and "As Is" and "She's The Woman" push the same buttons more than well enough to turn the little light on. But I think the best compliment I can pay this record is that once I started listening to it, I haven't been able to stop. The songs got in my head and made me want to listen to them, to hear all the buried layers and get as familiar with them as I am with Fair Warning and 1984. Even more surprisingly, I found myself wanting to go see them play these new songs live. For whatever reason -- and I'm on the record as to what I think the reason is -- they seem to have remembered what they're good at, and as importantly, how to do it. I am completely shocked that I like this record as much as I do, and the biggest surprise of all is that I am now finding myself sincerely looking forward to hearing what their next record sounds like, when Wolfgang is even more settled into the band and the pressure of this big reunion has been released. These guys are capable of big things, and they may be going places. Keep your eye on them! PS -- All of that said, Dave needs to lose that headset mic. It's embarrassing, and cured me of my urge to go see the tour.

Elton John vs. Madonna: The Real Super Bowl

Last Sunday the stage was set for a Super Bowl showdown of epic proportions. The two sides had met before, and there was clearly a lot of bad blood between them, so there was a lot at stake in the rematch: pride, bragging rights, the chance to avenge a humiliating upset loss.

I refer of course to Elton John and Madonna, who have been locked in a bitter blood feud since Elton's acceptance speech at the 2004 Q Awards, where he won the (honorary) Classic Songwriter Award and Madonna won the Best Live Act Award. Elton said a perfunctory word of thanks before devoting the rest of his remarks to his fellow winner: 

"Madonna, best fuckin' live act -- fuck off! Since when has lip-syncing been live? I think everyone who lip-syncs when you paid 75 quid to see them should be shot." Madonna's flack countered soon after: “Madonna does not lip-synch, nor does she spend her time trashing other artists.” Indeed, it must be noted that this feud is pretty one-sided in terms of public sniping. This comment is the closest Madonna has come to (publicly) insulting Sir Elton, though I imagine that behind closed doors her comments on the matter were tart enough to make her almost drop her mysterious accent. In any case, that was just the volley for serve, the regular-season game, if you will, before their first showdown on the big stage: this year's Golden Globes, where both Elton and Madonna were nominated in the category for Best Original Song. Madonna's song "Masterpiece" was for the movie she herself directed, W.E., while Elton's song was probably for some animated Disney thing that kids don't even like. Oh, all right, I'll look it up... Ah, yes, it was "Hello Hello," from the animated Gnomeo and Juliet. (It's like I'm psychic or something!) In an apparent lapse of chivalry, Sir Elton told reporters on the red carpet that Madonna "hasn't got a fucking chance." I haven't looked this up but I do believe that Sir Elton is the only knight of the Queen's order to have been photographed in a Donald Duck outfit. I Spotifyed both of these songs, neither of which I had ever heard of until the celebrity news machine started hyping this epic battle, and my unbiased opinion is that I would rather listen to my teeth being hammer-drilled than listen to either of these songs again. With gun to head, I would have to say that Madonna's is slightly less awful than Elton's, and apparently the Hollywood Foreign Press Association agreed, because she won the award. (There were no other nominees.) Madonna gave a rambling acceptance speech about how she wrote the song at the last minute, just kind of tossed it off amidst her million other duties as director and producer of the movie, which I suppose might read as a tweak at Elton, but she stayed clear of any direct response to Elton's taunts, thus averting the world's gayest rap beef. (When your venue is award show podiums, you've got a very gay rap beef.) Facing the press after the ceremony, Madonna said of Elton, ”I hope he speaks to me for the next couple of years. He’s been known to get mad at me so I don’t know. He’s brilliant and I adore him so he’ll win another award. I don’t feel bad.” Sir Elton's husband was not as gallant: "Madonna winning Best Original Song truly shows how these awards have nothing to do with merit. Her acceptance speech was embarrassing in its narcissism. And her critisism of Gaga shows how desperate she really is." Meow! When it was announced that Madonna would play halftime at the Super Bowl, Madonna seemed to have the upper hand. Not to be outdone, Elton booked a big Pepsi commercial to air in the third quarter, thus allowing him to get the last word and setting up the world's second gayest rap battle. (Award show podiums: slightly gayer than the Super Bowl Halftime Show). In an ABC News interview promoting the commercial (a news interview promoting a commercial -- God bless America!), Elton tartly offered Madonna one piece of advice: "Make sure you lip sync good."

Now look: I'm not sure how much of a feud this feud really is. I'm not at all sure that Elton wouldn't say the exact same thing to Madonna's face while he handed her a flute of champagne aboard an 80-foot yacht while they troweled Fleet Week, fishing for their dinner. We are talking about the cattiest queen ever to don a pair of oversized sunglasses, and the woman who understands catty queens better than anyone -- better than they even understand themselves.  But it was a big story in the 24-hour-news celebricycle, so I think we have a responsibility to determine who won: Madonna's halftime show or Elton's commercial? Madonna went first, and it is hard to imagine that on a visual level, even Elton wouldn't drop his queeny jealousy long enough to enjoy the sight of his rival being carried in on a litter by 144 bronzed, muscular Romans in gold lamé fetishwear. No matter how awesome Elton's Pepsi commercial turns out to be, it has no chance at even faintly challenging Madonna's decision to overtly ram 14 minutes of homoerotica down Football Nation's throat in terms of audacity or cultural relevance. The Pepsi commercial could be directed by the Coen Brothers and it will still be a Pepsi commercial. Before she even opens her mouth, Madonna's two points ahead, not unlike the safety that gave the Giants an early lead in the game. Madonna 2, Elton 0. As soon as she does open her mouth, it's clear that Elton is not wrong about the lip-syncing. There was an awful lot of debate amongst my friends about whether she was singing live or not, but that debate should have been settled even before she began the first verse of "Vogue." The voice coming out of the speakers is doing things that human voices can't do -- namely sample and repeat itself -- and the movement of her mouth did not quite match the sound coming out. I don't have a problem with the lip-syncing in this case: a single person at the center of a football stadium needs a lot of razzle-dazzle if they're going to get any kind of entertainment across, and choreography on the scale that Madonna brought (cartwheels, stairs, simulated tightrope bouncing) tends to undermine one's singing. I have definitely seen footage of Madonna singing loud and dancing hard at her concerts back in the day -- you can always tell for sure when someone isn't lip-syncing. As I remember, she always hit the notes and stayed on key but she also sounded a little husky voiced, like a gym teacher, and I have to say that takes a little of the awesome out of it. So maybe she really doesn't lip-sync as a rule but made an exception for the Super Bowl (most likely under withering pressure from the producers)? I dunno. I don't care if Madonna lip-syncs. Has Madonna's appeal ever had anything to do with her voice? I have seen a lot of articles over the years about the cultural impact of Madonna and her various personae and her mastery of PR and spectacle and even the quality of her material, but I don't think I've ever read a word of analysis of her as a singer, as a transmitter of emotion through song. Somehow, amazingly, the most famous singer of the last 30 years is not really famous for singing. She's famous for performing. I have known more than a few very, very big Madonna fans in my time, and I have been party to quite a bit of Madonna discussion, and nobody ever talks about her voice: they talk about the costumes, and the setlist, and the choreography. I mean Jesus, look at this. That's the stuff she really has to get right to please her audience. So if lip-syncing is what it takes to get that stuff right, of course she should do it. Right? Would you rather hear the sound of her chest caving in while she's being twirled in a cartwheel while trying to sing, or would you rather see the dance move happen without the distraction of the singing getting weak? Either way, Elton puts some "I told you so" points on the board because he called her out on it years ago, she's denied it, and he's now definitively proven right. Elton 3, Madonna 2.

Cee Lo.

The rest of the first half is a mixed bag. Madonna makes a direct play for youth and relevance by having the guys from LMFAO, who I finally learn are the ones responsible for that one song I hear three times every Friday night and who prove tragically inept at pretending to scratch records, mash up with her on "Music"; she rolls out a very crappy new song, "Give Me All Your Luvin'," with guest rap verses by living cartoon villain Nicki Minaj and laconic British politirhymer M.I.A., who flips the bird at the camera in a craven effort to replicate some of her hostess' early-90's provocations; and she appears maybe to have sung live on the closer, "Like A Prayer," with ex-M&M mascot Cee-Lo playing the role of the gospel chorus on the outro. I really thought she sang this part live, but the second time I watched it I saw a lot of sounds not matching the mouth so maybe she lip-synced that too.   Going into halftime, Elton had to be nervous: the video effects projected onto the field were amazing, the choreography was impressive, the sound mix was good, and Madonna looked great. She seems to have put on a little weight, and it suits her. She was starting to get a little old-ropey. I'm sure Botox has its advantages, but nothing tightens the skin like 10 or 15 pounds! My football-scoring gimmick is starting to feel a little unwieldy; let's call it a touchdown and two field goals. Madonna 15, Elton 3.

The Pepsi commercial begins the third quarter, and with his first line -- "No Pepsi for you!" -- Elton reminds us why he has done so little acting over the years. Though to be fair, John Barrymore couldn't make "No Pepsi for you!" work, it is an outrageously terrible line. His outfit is of course ridiculous, but it  doesn't even move the weirdness needle compared to some of his past outfits. It actually kind of suits him. The shoes are a nice touch, but they just remind me of all that gold Madonna had. So much more gold than a pair of platform boots. This commercial is very well shot, and the scenery and costumes are teriffic. After Elton completely fails to sell two more awful lines of dialogue, a young lady I'm told was the recent winner of The X Factor, Melanie Amaro, comes out and starts singing a dubstep remix of Aretha Franklin's "Respect." Elton taps his toe and clutches his Pepsi. The song ends and Elton begrudingly gives the girl a Pepsi with the only line that could ever be worse than "No Pepsi for you": "All right -- Pepsi for you."  It is an undeliverable line and Elton does nothing with it. The girl declares, in the only line that could ever be worse than "All right -- Pepsi for you," "No -- Pepsi for all," and showers Pepsi on everyone in the court and drops the King into a pit where he meets Flavor Flav. Somehow they resisted what must have been a powerful urge to put a rimshot in at the end. They didn't do it, but I'm sure it was discussed. So wait -- this commercial is over and Elton John didn't sing at all? Not a word? After all that? How do we score a performance like that? I hate to not even give him a field goal, but I don't see where he scores any points here at all. It looked good and the costumes were great, but it wasn't funny and he was terrible in it. Even if you thought Madonna's halftime show was terrible, we can probably agree it was better than this. The one thing this clip makes clear is that Elton John would make the greatest American Idol judge ever. How can he possibly not be doing that? Who has not offered Elton John enough money to break young singers' hearts on national TV twice a week? Because that person should be fired. They should get rid of all three of the current judges and replace them with Elton John. (He has to be wearing that King's outfit though.) The fact that he's so perfect for it makes me want to give him a field goal, but the fact that he isn't already doing it makes me want to take it away. Ah, let's just give it to him, he loses either way. Final score: Madonna 15, Elton John 6.