Apt. 11D

New Jersey: Protect Your Money!

I started a post last week about the politics in my new state of New Jersey, but never finished it. I was wondering why New Jersey, which traditionally goes Democratic, was polling very strongly for Bush. Was it because New Jersey was impacted greatly by 9/11? I didn't feel that I had enough information, so I never hit the publish button.

Well, apparently, there are other reasons. Check out this sign in one of the spanking new suburbs in Central New Jersey. "Protect your Rights. Money. Property." (Thanks to K., for sending me the photo.)

Halloween

Jonah is dressing up a Power Knight for Halloween. No, it's not just a knight costume, but a Power Knight costume, which is much more manly. Ian may be squeezed into a lion outfit, but he doesn't like sporting an extra head, so he may just wear a pumpkin sweatshirt.

Tonight all the kids of the town will crunch through orange and brown leaves for the annual Halloween parade. (A previous post about Halloween from me.)

What are you doing for the holiday? Is Halloween the best holiday around?

UPDATE: Read Being Daddy's Top Ten Inappropriate Halloween Costumes.

Safety From Insanity

Terrorism is the top issue amongst voters this year. Not the war. Not the economy. Not health care. But who seems more likely to protect us against dirty nukes in the local mall.

It amazes me that this issue is on the forefront of voter's minds, since I haven't heard that much discussion or debate about the best means to ensure safety from insanity. People aren't choosing between different anti-terrorism proposals, but which candidate appears tougher. But, you know, politics is more about perception than reality.

In an effort to get John Kerry to STOP KILLING THE DUCKS, let's try to get away from perceptions of toughness and closer to a real policy discussion:

Different methods to protect against terror:

1. Add Troops to Sensitive Areas. Kerry has pointed out the weakness of our ports and proposed adding troops there. Sure, I don't think it would hurt, but I have marched right past hundreds of soldiers in the subways and could have easily unleashed amageddon right in front of them.

2. Snoop and Spy or The John Ashcroft method. Stop all dark skinned people in airports and strip search them all. Read e-mails and open letters. Probably effective, but entirely unacceptable.

3. Bomb the Hell Out of Them All. I would say that this is Bush's method, but I'm not sure that stopping terrorism is the reason that we're in Iraq. Could be effective if you get all the smart terrorists, but probably more likely to create hundreds of new terrorists.

4. Close our borders. Read an interesting op-ed by Mike Kelley this weekend, who suggested that this was the best method to ensure our safety. Start funding INS and enable them to boot out all foreigners with lapsed visas. Might be somewhat effective. 14 of the 9/11 terrorists were here illegally. But, as Kelley points out, this proposal is politically distasteful. Politicians don't want to offend Latinos or the farmers who employ migrant laborers.

5. The Asylum Method. Put all the loonies in one or two countries and build a brick wall around them. Shoot anyone who tries to leave. Tempting, but again probably an ethical no-no.

6. The Utopian Model. Start pumping a lot of money into education and capital improvements in third world nations, so that the children of terrorists will have too much to lose to strap a bomb to their chest and step onto a crowded bus.

7. Learn to Live With It. Israel.

Now for the love of God, LEAVE THE DUCKS ALONE!

Smart Boy

The kids are downstairs watching a "Signing Time" video. Ian's speech therapist is trying to get the boy to convert his home grown signs into official ones. This woman seems very tightly wound, but we're going along with it right now. Ian hates her because she won't let him whip through the puzzles, but instead holds each piece by her mouth and makes him look at her mouth. It's good for him, I know, but hearing him howl in frustration while belted into his highchair puts my intestines in knots.

With a sick Jonah in tow, we dropped off Ian at school this morning. In addition to two days a week of speech therapy, I've thrown him into nursery school for two mornings a week. It's a touchy feely coop nursery school, which is just perfect for him. No pressure about circle group and lots of parents in the room.

This was the first morning that I left him alone, and I was rather stressed that Miss Barbara wouldn't be able to decode his language. Jonah and I sat in the parking lot with the cell phone on my lap for 45 minutes before I had the courage to drive away. There was some whining, but nothing catestrophic, Miss Barbara later reported.

Even though the doctor declared that Jonah's throat was raw, it didn't stopped him from wearing me thin with questions on the trip to Ian's preschool. With the seriousness of a Talmudic scholar, Jonah asked, Did you ever wish that you had twenty toes? No, because I have enough trouble with pointy shoes. How do make trains? Steel, wood, coal, and rubberbands. Lots of rubberbands.

Ian just walked in the office to check on me. I said "airplane" And he did the sign. A fist with an outstretched thumb and pinky descending into LaGuardia. Lots of clapping for smart boy.

Links

Just some links today, guys. I'm a rather tired blogger today

Dad sent me a link to this interesting blog. Read her post about being a victim of racial profiling.

Because I always enjoy a good Buffy analogy...

In other words, Season 7 of Buffy always struck me as a fairly explicit critique of Bush's foreign policy (even if dullards on the right missed it), and a foreshadowing of a superior Kerryist alternative. Even Willow's tentative embrace of her own power and overcoming of her own fears about how she might use her power for evil echoes the European (and especially German) struggle with the past; as in Season Four (Adam) and Season Five (Glory), Buffy can only defeat evil when working closely with a self-confident and allied Willow.

This theme runs consistently through the Buffy series: strength comes from teamwork, not from one's own power.

(via fistful o' euros)

The Tortured Voter

Some people seem to stride through life with complete surity and purpose. They part their hair with precision in the morning. They don't dither over the menu in McDonalds. And they always vote with a party, because they are quite sure that the other side is a)a bunch of Northeast pansies or b)armed, white guys in pickup trucks.

Then there are those who have to dissect every issue finding nuances and contractions. They struggle with decisions such as bar soap or liquid soap, ranch dressing or spicy vinagrette, and at what age do mini-skirts finally become a no-no. These people don't fit neatly into any ideological group or party and this election is driving them bananas.

They might like Bush's foreign policy, but hate his social policy. They might like Kerry's economic policy, but his tax bracket might be a turn off. Oh, there are trade offs, and those who see the world as grey, rather than black and white are having a hard time this election (but they probably always do).

Since I gravitate to the tortured people, here are some posts by bloggers who have endorsed a candidate, with qualifications:

Dan Drezner -- Kerry
Megan McArdle -- Bush
Andrew Sullivan -- Kerry
(more to come)

The Sunday Op Ed Award

Maureen Dowd won the Sunday Op-Ed Award.

In yet another attempt to prove to George W. Bush that he is man enough to run this country, John Kerry made an animal sacrifice to the political gods in a cornfield in eastern Ohio last week.

Four dead geese are not too high a price to pay for a few rural, blue-collar votes in a swing state. As long as Mr. Kerry doesn't slip and ask Teresa to purée the carcasses into foie gras.

Tromping about in a camouflage costume and toting a 12-gauge double-barreled shotgun that shrieked "I am not a merlot-loving, brie-eating, chatelaine-marrying dilettante," the Democratic nominee emerged from his shooting spree with three fellow hunters proclaiming, "Everybody got one, everybody got one," showing off a hand stained with goose blood.

She then goes on to mock Bush's wolf ad. No girly men here.

Democracy on Ice

NBC's Today show has painted a map of the United States on their ice skating rink. And as the results of the election are announced next week, they'll color the state either red or blue. A girl in a little skirt will skate over the red and blue states, as America chooses the leader of the free world. Tim "Happy Cheeks" Russert promises to jump on the ice if Florida goes to Kerry.

I always turn to Katie Couric to learn more about such serious issues as breast enlargement in teens, fun things to do with tortillas, and hot trends in handbags, so I'm delighted that she's doing this ground breaking work on the election as well.

Not to be undone, CBS's Morning show will have a map of the country made up entired of Cocopuffs. It will fill the sheep meadow in Central Park. As results are confirmed, the weather guy will get down on all fours and eat the states that go for Bush.

Diane Sawyer promises no talk about that silly electoral college. Instead, she will tattoo her ass on live TV. The right cheek will list the states that go for Bush, and the left cheek will have the Kerry states.

And speaking of tight elections, Matt, how about those tight pants on John Melloncamp?

Any Team but Boston

Steve and I have got ourselves a babysitter. (Large grin.) On Saturday at 8:00, a shy thirteen year old who twists her hair and watches HBO on our sofa arrived. And we ran out the front door to a local pub.

Davey's has Guinness on tap and grandma at the bar. Jersey girls arrived with their parents, and a bachelor party of construction workers stumbled in. Steve and I sat at the bar gossiping with the bartender and watching the ballgame.

When I was thirteen, my dad started taking us to ballgames, because he thought that dads were supposed to do that. He hated it, but he wanted to be a good dad. Daaaad, it's an inning, not a down.

Thurman Munson was catching. Chris Chambliss on first. Greg Nettles on third. And Reggie was up. Which was great because it was Reggie Day and we were all holding our complimentary Reggie bars. When Reggie blew that ball into the stands in right field, we all lovingly tossed our chocolate bars onto the field. He ran the bases amidst the falling chocolate bars like a Roman lord showered with palms.

What's a Yankee fan to do? There is no fucking way that I can root for the Sox. It just isn't happening. I guess that means I have to cheer on the Cards. I'm not excited about it, but I just can't stand gloating Boston fans.

I think that's what most people feel about this election. They are not excited about Kerry, but they just can't let Bush win. A vote for Kerry is a vote against Bush. Those motives don't exactly drive voters to the booths. It's probably a bad sign for Kerry, that after a while the bartender turned off the World Series last night. Nobody was interested.

Close Call

John Podhoretz is as addicted to the polling data as I am.

LET'S drop the partisan fighting and the ideological battling for a moment to step back, take a look around, and then ask: Has there ever, ever, ever been an election as exciting as this one? The answer, after some consideration, is: No way, not by a long shot.

He credits the blogs for making this election all the more yummy.

Most exciting and most addicting are the blogs — the citizen-journalist news sites. They offer campaign coverage of the highest order, from viewpoints spanning the political spectrum. So when I'm awake in the middle of the night taking care of a baby, I can surf Web sites to see the latest polling — and then do so again five hours later, and again every hour after that.

He mentions a few blogs that specialize in polling data: Realclearpolitics.com, Daly Thoughts, The Hedgehog Report and The Horserace Blog. The Horserace Blog, utiilizing a poll by the Center for Policy and Economic studies, found that Kerry was underperforming among blacks by roughly 14 percent of the vote.

I'm off to check out these blogs.