I watched MR’s acceptance speech last night, and Mr. Eastwood’s standup  comedy routine too. Why? Because it amuses me.

CE is older than me, frail, and I felt for him. I was afraid he’d fall. I think he was looking at that chair longingly, rather than critically for laughs. He wanted to sit on it so that he could talk about Flags of our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima, but first had to figure out how to make it suitable for RNC ears. Soldiers are heroes of course, but …

MR was more entertaining. I could see the long hours he must have spent with his personal trainer, and at the mirror, rehearsing the “humble look”. Half smile only, cock head to one side, dip it 5 degrees, wrinkle eyes. The rapid cutaways that gave me a chance to read his wife‘s face gave me a lot of subtext. And as for the quantity of intimately friendly hands he shook before coming up to speak, I could read their lips.

“Mitt, you are so AWESOME!”

That, btw, is a most useful noncommittal phrase, “awesome”. It is used when going backstage to greet an actor after the curtain comes down, or if you’re a youngster, responding to your parents’ good advice. The ego of the receiver takes care of the intended context.

I don’t take sides, and I’ve never voted. After my years as a young cadet in the British Merchant Navy, tramping around the world many times on old freighters with an international crew, I came to realize that the human race is tribal. Always was, and always will be, in constant competitive face-offs. History teaches us that the day comes, as it must, when they find equality in their weapons.

Irresistible force meets immovable object! And what will that mean for tomorrow?

Republicans can be very entertaining, even when doing commercials. One of them, a righty talk-show host at KRLA in Glendale (I forget his name), always opens and closes his show reminding us that this is “The Greatest Nation on God’s Green Earth”.

If I meet him, I’m going to ask if he ever heard his opposite number, a host on Qatar’s most stimulating talk radio (I can’t pronounce his name.) He always reminds us that his voice is coming to us from “The Greatest Nation on God’s Brown Earth.” As my Japanese wife points out to make me feel better at times, “PLUS MINUS ZERO”, which simply means, it’s a wash.

Speaking of a wash, I was reminded of the story of King Canute, a Danish King who settled in England just before William the Conqueror.  Legend has it that, enamored of his powers, he set his throne by the seashore and commanded the tide to halt and not wet his feet and robes. Yet “continuing to rise as usual, the tide dashed over his feet and legs without respect to his royal person. Then the king leapt backwards, saying: “Let all men know how empty and worthless is the power of kings, for there is none worthy of the name, but He whom heaven, earth, and sea obey by eternal laws.”

Mitt hears from God, as a respected Mormon active in his church, doesn’t he?

While he was giving his speech, Hurricane Isaac was his tide, just to the left, a stone’s throw from Tampa. Did you get it, Mitt? That wasn’t just a hint!

With that in mind, let’s get serious for a moment.

JOB CREATION

Think about that. What do jobs do?

Jobs create goods and services, that’s what.

And when you’ve got goods and services, you stock your shelves, and then what? Why you SELL them (aided by endless commercials) to buyers, hopefully. Economics 101.

Jobs = Sellers. Buyers = Cash.

But who’s got the money to buy? Not us.

Well, the Chinese do.

How very interesting, and ironic. China, low price manufacturers to the world, happy to accept American jobs from American business leaders, enabled consumers to get fat and enjoy the lifestyle they wanted. And America paid huge sums to China to make the stuff for them. And now the tables are turned. Except that China has its own huge domestic consumer demand.

It was World War 2 that pulled America out of the 1930s recession. And who provided the jobs? The government, that’s who, to make weapons that aided in the killing of around 70 million people.

IMO, I mean IMHO, Obama and Clinton, both Hilary and Bill, can see through this, and aren’t fooled by the rhetoric that will go on until November, and the jingoism of politicians and media people hiding the truth.

One can only hope that he’s reelected. If not, we’re sunk, all of us together at last.