Stevie Joe and Public Service

Things are just a mess.  Take a look at politics today.  Who'd be fool enough to run for public office?  Here in the Holler, we got ol' Mayor Barney as our local chief executive because nobody else in town wanted the job.  There aren't any perks (well, not any that an honest man can come by).  Yet, the mayor gets those phone calls from Mrs. Frenchak complaining that the streetlight outside her parlor window is too bright or that Junior's dog, Junior Junior, is peeing on her rose bushes.  Nobody, not even Mayor Barney, has the heart to tell her that the odds are even that it's actually Junior himself.

On the national level, consider the race for President.  This is some rough business.  So rough, in fact, that I think it's having a detrimental effect on the whole country.  

Take a look at the Dumbocrats latest efforts to lose yet another election.  Hillary Clinton is shocked, just shocked, that Nancy Pelosi had the audacity to suggest that the nomination should go to the candidate with the most votes. 

Let's put aside for the moment the fact that leaders of both national parties have now casually discarded the notion that our leaders should be selected by popular election.  Apparently, the will of the voters is no longer all that relevant.

What is interesting about the Pelosi incident is the response from the Clinton campaign.  They rounded up their biggest financial contributors and had them write a letter to Ms. Pelosi.  In this letter, they suggested that she re-think her position or else they may stop all financial contributions to the Democratic Party congressional campaign.  That's right.  Hillary Clinton is blackmailing her own party.  Things better go her way, or she'll help the Republicans regain control of Congress.

Talk about scorched-earth strategy!  This is the state of politics in the US today.  Do you think that this is good for our nation?  Me neither.

"Nice party you got there - it'd be a shame if anything were to happen to it,"

Stevie Joe Parker

Stevie Joe, Eliot Spitzer, and the Mortgage Crisis

Everyone knows about Governor Eliot Spitzer's dramatic fall from grace, but there was another story buried beneath all the headlines.  That story was Spitzer's Washington Post commentary explaining how the Bush administration willingly aided banks in their predatory lending practices.  Some have even alleged that the timing of Governor Spitzer's scandal was orchestrated to minimize the effect of this commentary.  

Well, ol' Stevie Joe doesn't know about that, but it is an interesting column nonetheless.  Check it out here.

Denying that I have a client number,

Stevie Joe Parker

Stevie Joe's Easter Message

Here to hoping you all have a great Easter. Be sure to listen to Jesus Christ Superstar (the original 1970 album, not the later soundtrack) like the Good Lord intended.

Peace,
Stevie Joe Parker

Stevie Joe and the Cost of War

Stevie Joe's Holler Update

Stevie Joe is just getting over the flu, and, boy, did it kick my behind! My body was so sore that I couldn't sleep. Of course, Mrs. Stevie Joe thought I was making it all up as an excuse to lay in bed and get outta doing chores. So, this morning, I licked her toast when she wasn't looking.

In other news, Juanita and Jimmy are fighting again. Lord knows what it's all about this time. They are both so hard-headed. To get Jimmy's goat, Juanita has been hanging around Junior. Everyone knows that Junior is sweet on Juanita. Jimmy has responded by hanging out with Dickie Jensen. As a result, the Great Ambulance Feud of 2008 gains two new combatants.

Now, Juanita and Jimmy are both holding their noses on this one. Hardly anyone except me can stand Junior, and nobody at all can put up with Dickie for any length of time. But as they say, strange bedfellows and all . . .

Toast lickin' for the truth,
Stevie Joe Parker

Stevie Joe's Breakfast Woes

The Holler is sinking its way on out of winter.  Snow has given way to mud.  The county roads are all busted up from the frost heaves and thaws.  There is just a touch of that organic smell of spring in the air.  Not quite winter yet not quite spring.  Instead, tension has settled in town.

You can cut it with a Stihl chainsaw.  See, there is a feud brewing between Junior and Dickie Jensen, and it has made the morning gossip sessions at the Junebug Cafe and Internet Lounge downright uncomfortable.  When Junior called the ambulance to get Dickie Jensen's nekkid behind out of his bed, he didn't realize that he was going to be charged for the service.

If the EMTs had simply removed Dickie, that would have been bad enough.  However, they went and took him to the hospital where the docs looked him over.  How they could have examined Dickie Jensen and decided he was good to go is beyond me, but home is where they sent him.  Maybe, they just wanted to get rid of him.  I know the feeling.

Of course, Dickie had tried to refuse transport and treatment, which is his right.  The problem was that the EMTs have to be assured that a patient is competent to make such a refusal.  In Dickie's case, such a judgement is questionable on a good day.  A nekkid Dickie just ain't gonna convince anyone.

So, there is a $650 bill to be reckoned with.  Of course, Junior and Dickie disagree about who should pay.  And then there is the matter of who could pay a $650 bill.  Meanwhile, the rest of us have to put up with all this nonsense, and it's making my breakfasts a bit less enjoyable than usual.

Always something interesting going on here,

Stevie Joe Parker

Stevie Joe and the Ambulance

It had to happen sooner or later. Frankly, I'm surprised that it took this long. Last night, an ambulance came roaring up to Junior's house next door. Knowing Junior as I do, I was expecting the worst. When I ran out to see what was going on, however, there was Junior jumping around the yard and screaming his head off. It appeared that the problem was not Junior (at least not the major problem) but Dickie Jensen.

Earlier in the day, Dickie was seen running nekkid through town yelling, "Fuck! . . . Shit! . . . Fuck!" and so on. For Dickie, this in itself was not unusual behavior. Unfortunately for Junior, however, Dickie was heading his way. Apparently, Dickie ran right into Junior's house and jumped butt-nekkid onto Junior's bed.

Now, if Junior had been drunk, this would have been no problem. He just would have passed out on the floor, in the yard, or on my davenport. However, this was one of the rare occasions when Junior was stone sober, and the sight of a nekkid Dickie Jensen in his bed was more than he could take.

Dickie had slipped into some sort of catatonic state and failed to respond to any of Junior's yelling. Junior, at about 120 pounds and with the muscle tone of Jello, would have been unable to remove Dickie even if he wasn't afraid to touch a nekkid man. Not knowing what else to do, he called 911.

So, what was the cause of Dickie's behavior? My guess is the presidential election. Dickie had been in quite the foul mood lately. This began as it became apparent that Ron Paul was not going to win the Republican nomination. It worsened as the conventional conservatives dropped out of the race. When Ralph Nader announced his candidacy, Dickie went on a three-day bender during which he set himself a new personal record for obscenity. Finally, when Mike Huckabee dropped out after Tuesday's primaries, Dickie could take no more. With the well-known liberal John McCain left to defend the Republicans against Hillary and Obama, Dickie had nothing left to hope for.

Why he chose Junior's bed to be the spot where he lost the will to live, I don't know. I'm just glad it wasn't my davenport. No amount of cleaning could ever make that safe to sit on again.

Wonderin' how much the ambulance charges for moving a nekkid man,
Stevie Joe Parker