Senator Cowpie (George Allen, S.R. Sidarth, and Macachismo)

This morning, I was sitting over my breakfast of machaca, a Mexican dish made up of eggs, sausage, and spices, when I turned to my wife and said “Hey Ca Ca head, how you doing this morning?”

For some reason, she got mad at me even though I was clearly joking and didn’t really understand that Ca Ca was slang for “shit” head.

“Do you talk to your boss that way?” she asked,“Or your mother?”

“Don’t believe mom, you remember she told people I held her by her feet over Niagra Falls a few years ago and she wound up taking it back more or less?”

“But that was after you hung that noose on the tree in her front yard and you told her you were worried about losing your job because she wrote about what you did in Niagra Falls.”

“I love my mother and my country deeply dear, that’s all that should matter. Where are you going with this?”

“I’m just worried about the kids. You’re their father. They need to see a Dad who treats his family with respect actually who treats everyone he meets with respect. I know that's sort of old-fashioned, but I like being conservative about some things.”

“Sheez, I was just kidding around, making up names.”I have a few more bites of my breakfast and pat my stomach.

“I have to say Dear, that this Moose Ca Ca stuff is pretty good?”

“It’s “machaca” not “moussaka”. Moussaka is a Greek dish made with eggplant and if you’re going to call me stupid names don’t you think you could cover a little better than that?"

“What do you mean?”

“Well there are any number of other things you could have claimed you were trying to say?

If you were trying explain away calling me “ca ca” by saying “Oh, I was calling you monkey head instead. How lame is that? What’s the friggin difference? You could at least have made like Mel Gibson and said you were drunk.”

“Look, why are you making such a big deal about whatever it is I said, get over it already. That's the trouble with you. You always focus on the negative, never anything constructive.”

After I clean the machaca off of my shirt and pants, I decide to apologize.

“Honey, if it hurt your feelings, I’m really sorry. You see, I was at this rally yesterday and someone came up to the junior senator from Virginia and called him “Cowpie”.

“You don’t call a senator “Cowpie”.

“Well he was wearing cowboy boots and I think the pie part was just being playful. The guy was from Marin or something and I don’t think they call them “cowpies” there.”

“Really?”

“Naw, I think he was just trying to get out of trouble.”

“I thought you said the senator didn’t mind.”

“He didn’t, it was like twelve security guys who roughed him up then escorted him to his car.”

“So you thought if someone could call the senator that, it would be okay to call me “Ca Ca”.
“Look, there’s a difference between kidding around privately and being in public in front of a video camera and calling someone an ethnic slur while you know you’re being taped.”

My wife hands me another shirt.

“True, if you’d call me that on videotape in front of a crowd of people, I’d just figure you were incredibly stupid.”

II

Peace restored, I pick up our morning copy of the National Enquirer.

“How nice, the Enquirer and every other paper in America is writing a giant apology to the Ramsey family, for basically taking a couple who had their six year old daughter murdered and accusing the family of her murder and the mother of really really bad taste.”

“Yes, dear. It’s too bad that Patsy died two months ago. Can I see the story.”

I pick up my copy of the paper again and do a double take. “Whoops, it’s not here. Let me check online.”

After my wife glares at me for bringing my PDA out during breakfast, she reaches for the Enquirer.

“Dear this is a lurid article about the guy who confessed not an apology.”

“You see dear they can’t apologize yet.”

“Why not yet?”

“Well, until he’s tried and convicted, it would be premature to apologize. It’s not premature when you accuse a parent of killing her own kid, but well you know….”

“I wish I were a paper or a tv show, I feel guilty and no one even reads my blog.  I’m sorry Jon Benet Ramsey’s family.  I was wrong  and I’m ashamed for even thinking it.”

III

“Wow dear, this is like apology morning. You say you're sorry for calling me a Ca Ca head and now this.”

“Well, being a real man means learning to say you’re sorry.

“Dear, isn’t it love means never having to say you’re sorry?”

“You might be right, did you know George Allen Junior was the inspiration for….”

“You’re kidding, Love Story? Senator Cowpie?"

“Well actually I was thinking Divine in "Lust in the Dust".

“Oh wow, I can totally see that. They have the same kind of how you say, "macachismo" .”

“Say good night Gracie.”

“Good night George, go crawl back under your rock now.”

IV

I had a most interesting conversation with my daughter this evening. One of the cliques at her high school in way Northern California calls themselves the “Hicks”. As a pride thing, they like applying Confederate Flags on all their personal possessions.

“Dad, they tell everyone they do it because they say they’re proud of the South….but they’re not from the south, never even been there.”

“Do you think that’s why they do it?”

“No, I think they know what it means. They’re just too chicken to admit it. You don’t see anyone who’s really from the South who’s not white running around with a Confederate flag.”

I suppose it’s a typical teenage thing to let the prevailing adult culture (it’s very blue here and poltically correct shade of blue at that) know that you’re going to reject whatever it is they’re telling you to think or do. Somehow the conversation with my daughter, whose way brighter than I am in so many ways, made me think about Senator Cowpie. He knows what he’s doing. He doesn’t have the guts to admit it, but he wants you to vote for him to be in charge of protecting us. In the meantime, he’s so stupid or foolhardy he does it while he knows he’s being videotaped? If he ever apologizes sincerely for what he did to S.R. Sidarth, I hope enquiring minds are there to let us know about it.


note: Re the Ramseys, some doubts have been raised about the reliability of the confession in this case. I'm not sure that changes anything about how "premature" and genuinely cruel this may all have been.

Jim Webb for U.S. Senate

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