Shannon Zimmerman won his recent assembly race, and the lines had been drawn on the dozens of different flyers, laying out in plastic and paper, or maybe sand if not stone, the muddled and mired Republican stance used to defeat Alison Page — and not turn the page.

These are positions that appeared to resonate in this often plush and red Wisconsin district. (In the 30th state assembly, Zimmerman won 20,308 to 17,116). Some musings on this, little tidbits, lie below. They are not a complete assessment of the victor, or the vanquished.

But do Zimmerman’s supporters know that aside from a voting percentage that quite easily placed him back in office, where he’s been since 2017, there’s another stat where he’s seen by at least some as at the 51 percent level.

— Candidate LuAnn, and I’ll call her by her first name, looks like everyone’s grandma. Who can vote against that? Don’t diss (grand)ma. But people did and she lost legislatively down in and around Milwaukee. Going against big money.

Still, she was painted as a somewhat transient flower-power liberal. Such as one you might find in ol’ town San Francisco, and she has been said to be better suited for there. But she is striving for cleaner drinking water, and should that be a super controversial issue? It is promoted on her behalf by the group Wisconsin Conservation (not conservative) Voters IEC.

Granted, she has district hopped, all across southeastern Wisconsin, at least as far as her status of residence and from where she was running, but still the message … It’s not just in San Fran.

By the way, her last name is Bird, like an old friend of mine by that name, who died way too soon. So the message simply resounds. And in her district is another Bird by the name of Shelly, a hairdresser not a rich person, so apropo. —

Back beyond the Bird, here (as an example?), is one voter’s own assembly story.

It’s approaching the weekend at Buffalo Wild Wings, a local haunt where families often gather after youth sporting events, in the late afternoon, and three people are seated at the far end. One then cast a vote not for a favorite sauce, but on touting her fave assembly pick.

The woman said, “yeah I didn’t know who they are, so I just voted for her.” Referring to Zimmerman.

She was quickly informed by the others that Shannon is a he, not a she, and then was chastised about being part of an ill-informed electorate. And how in this race super-hyped with flyers with photos of them, (and unfemale-like receding hairline), in your mailbox or inbox, could someone not know? As I’ve often said, this is like someone not having heard of the Beatles.

Unless the woman with the wings knows something we don’t. Maybe Shannon is transgender??

Based on that, granted very isolated, instance of voter apathy, in whom we elect, is it any wonder that this country is in this kind of shape? For whom the bell tolls? (Page it seems, it was for thee. Now like same-name guitarist Jimmy of Led Zeppelin, you are basically retired, for now at least from politics.)

A resident of my building even got a get-to-the-polls-postcard from Oakland, California, urging her to vote Republican with a brief notation that’s handwritten, and info typed on a sticker. Uhm, the sponsoring agency, based on its domain name, is from Wisconsin.

Zimmeran is pictured, (Shannon is shown), on an early flyer making a point to, or taking up the time of, a St. Croix County deputy, with a squad car behind them and his arms flailing beside. He did vote for a resolution to send state resources to provide help at the southern border — and not of the Badger State — that include the Wisconsin National Guard, but I don’t think it’s more such troops that are the workers needed there.

Then, the following photo dissected, is unlike most you see in political ads, this time for Page, also from college town River Falls. It shows a mom in the middle and four kids gathered around a stone monolith of sorts, although flat, that simply says “Imagine.” I think John Lennon would approve, with not props positioned but those people around a circular, (Perfect Circle?), emblem or you could call it an insignia.

Zimmerman gets kudos from me, if his typically-outside-the-GOP claim is true, that he is fighting against policies that would increase rising energy bills. But does that gut green energy, in the process? I’m not sure. Utility companies are notorious for their frequent price hikes — like you might say rental properties, which becomes a double-whammy — and when was the last time you heard the requests of one of these companies turned down by a regulatory agency? To which, who are the people who appoint its also often well-heeled members??   

But he has voted against middle class tax cuts, so if you’re in a Modern Family you will save money on your utility bill, but it’s likely cancelled out by the need to fund the tax monies that are not paid by the rich. Like the handing over of $1.5 trillion in tax breaks that reportedly would be given to big corporations and billionaires, via Trump’s plans. And Trump would likely try to end overtime pay, another hit taken by the working class, as the ultra-rich don’t need that extra money — so do triage in your touting of Trump? — again largely cancelling out his proposal that tips such as those gained by servers not be taxed. So think twice about pulling a double to gain any possible time-and-a-half.

Back to Zimmerman, he blocked paid family leave. As with many Republican candidate stances, I can see fiscal reasons for taking that side. But he mixed grievances and alleged that such a plan supports people “who don’t really want to work.” Hey, do so from home?

Page has worked in a hospital setting — good experience for a rare change if you’re going to be a government official and oversee such situations — although she’s coy about it being for the most part as a CEO. But hello Hovde, that’s business experience brought to the table, which is what the GOP is prizing.

An anti-Zimmerman ad points out that the abortion ban law enacted in 1849 and upheld is very outdated, as it was before women could legally own property or vote, and it likely would be decades before there even was any type of humane or reliable pregnancy test. Another flyer unscored the point, to say that back in 1849 it was the time of the Gold Rush, most doctors recommend opioids like heroin to combat diarrhea and cough, and cocaine was used to relieve toothaches.

So Page says, I’m through with Zimmerman, now that he’s elected, apologies to alt rock lyrics of Jane’s Addiction. She is not asking for a recount. Not GOP-type money to fund it, for starters.

There is the silver screen, also, and those referenced below had used that path, among many others. But they also had both silver tongues and fingers. Which can mean that more silver coins, even if just a few, are kept more handily in other people’s pockets.

Even in their death. And giving back can encompass people who are Black. We’ll start there, then spread.

So this post follows a recent theme here of remembrance.

Quincy Jones was a force in American music, across just about every genre, more behind the scenes then a lead guitarist but still prominent. He used to look much like a ’70s disco star, but also had his fingers in so much else: Austin Powers, (more than one movie, and that should be news to my server friend who is a dead ringer for Tia Carrera in Wayne’s World). The Color Purple, (loved first by just a few friends having a certain manner of life, then more broadly with its bountiful message). Bob Dylan, (ditto on that, and I refer to a phone call from Arizona by a potential protege just gained). Likewise-not-an-actor, mostly, Steven Spielberg and many others making more movies, (and ET and kid captivated me like few others, all the way through.) Then to TV, Will Smith’s Fresh Prince when it was Bel-Aire. Maybe moving heavier, The documentary The Distortion of Sound. SNL. Much sax with Bill Clinton. Stevie Wonder, (and loved both playing and singing Superstition, maybe with associate Obama making it a trio?) Even floated was the idea that he would be this country’s first minister of culture, as the US is rare amongst the nations without one. And We Are The World, think what you like of it, raised money and crops for millions of famished people. Spectacular things from a man with the commonly found name of Jones. Then …

Kris Kristofferson. He was a juggernaut in all kinds of endeavors, making him a true Renaissance Man. Those in the arts tend to have talents across its realms, but this man parlayed it further. I loved his actor turn with female leads, such as in A Star Is Born, and thus even another connection via Barbra Streisand and her very red role in The Way We Were, alongside said to be ailing Robert Redford, one of my most sentimental favorite movies. And with other juggernauts that included Jennings in the country-based, go-hit-the-road super-group The Highmen, and at long last drew my attention to them, a firefighter, boxer, decorated U.S. pilot, lover jointly of Janis Joplin and her often same style of tunes, and even a Rhodes scholar. More than a lyricist.

John Amos. This is not Amos and Andy. I used to watch his patriarch pulling-it-all-together Good Times comedic but also serious TV show, often and with unusual interest, and had many thoughts. He on-screen continually celebrated the continuing matriarchal beauty of his beau, even though she now cast — how to say it, a more mature and busty and full-figured and bountiful — figure. Kudos to both of them, and other GOOD men like them, for their shared insightfulness and kindness and adaptiveness. Then there was son Jimmy, a yes caricature who dominated the set comedically, but I’ve known other young black men who embodied its very-broad generalizations by providing a grain of truth.

With that and ditto, NBA legend Mutumbo, the first NBA seven-plus footer who caught my sports fan attention and then did so much for charity and humanitarian causes, especially in his native Africa.

Then a man who has not died, but is still kicking even after celebrating a birthday that is I believe his 100th, yes another Jimmy, as in Carter. This is a former peanut farmer who rose way beyond peanuts, thinking people know.

So locally is not the only loss we have felt, although the list of such people remembered on the Agave Kitchen marquee grows longer with each passing month. And to its owner Paul, my suggestion on that note passed through to you the other night was about a possible ad on these pages, not of a eulogy to my dad on yours, although the topic(s) keep evolving, (and could be confusing.) See some of the posts below. And an addition, now, to this one.

Other people, who stuck more to just tunes, have gone to face the music, and I’m sure they will pass muster. Even St. Peter himself may have plucked with a pick, much as a pied piper, on peppered ground? (And yes, one named below was in a flick, too.)

Flea is dead. Or is he. It depends on which Flea, and which band.

Word had gotten out that the beyond par bassist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers had passed on. But it actually was the bass player for a related band, by the name of Judge. Where there is one Flea, there will be more than one. The Flea with local connections, who married a River Falls woman before they went goin’ to California, and who just happened to have been a supermodel, lives on. But you had to go rather deep online, at least at first, to be told of the distinction.

Other local deejays, more creative than usual in their song selections and combinations, have not been so incognito, even in death. First, there was DJ Kurt who was a staple at the Wild Badger in New Richmond, and T-shirts in his honor are still sometimes sported by the staff there, saying Rave In Paradise to honor his theme shows, then followed to the grave by DJ J Strong, the weekend fixture at Dick’s Bar and Grill for years running. Strong especially, was known for playing stuff that’s beyond the run of the mill, complete with shoutouts enticing people to dance. It just could have been that his trademark, workout caffeine was way too strong.

Then the other day I ran into someone for the first time in years, at a haunt atypical for me, and she passed this word on. “Ralfie,” as well a musician and longtime area attendee, also had died.

And oh, one of the first publishers with whom I’d had acquaintence, even if just in interviewing (basically I got that far in the process) for a straight outta college job for editing one of his quaint, across-state mini-magazines. Roy Reiman was also known to my mum, sorta. In the berg she became transplanted to upon retirement, he built-up and/or funded like half his earlier-on burgeoning “Green” town, in name and even in bird habitat, as his form of giving back while paying it and playing it forward.

Hopefully that rounds out this short list, get longer, too long, of those who have gone to that great big concert in the sky.

When I was walking down the street yesterday, I spied a sticker pasted to the ground that said “I voted,” and gave its former owner a slap on the red, white and blue back, but alas it was now laid out, to rest, on the sidewalk ready to be stomped on.

As I looked up, two older members of the local Rotary Clubs, I don’t know which version, decked out in yellow worker vests to protect themselves from traffic, were uprooting flags of such colors from their precarious poled positions up and down the blocks of Hudson’s downtown business district. They had been placed there prior to this three-day-weekend, such as it was, standing firmly in place to honor values that were again thrown asunder on Nov. 5.

On the other side of the coin, after my mom had placed a call to the Purple Heart people to make a clothing donation, some veterans were at her doorstep to collect it pronto, before 8 a.m. the morning after that solemn Monday.

Such were the sights on and after Veteran’s Day locally. But no sounds right now, as for the moment there would be no 21 gun salute. Only the hinted possibility in a speech of patriots and partisans and politicians, much less criminal immigrants, being ordered to face a firing squad, even if just in metaphor.

— That said, everything in the political world and beyond is unstable, and the only thing that has remained frozen in place are recent gas prices. At Kwik Trip yesterday we filled up at a mere $2.73.99 a gallon. (That 273 figure has for years reminded me of Ellsworth, see phone prefixes, adding more numerical stability.) As far as the other turmoils, I will analyze them in depth as things like the Trump cabinet cadre play out, slowly or more likely quickly. It could be described as Cemetery Gaetz. And more music musings, too. —

It was just another day at the national cemetery, chock full of remembrances, at least presidential, with it being Biden this time doing some stumping in a way, noting that he had signed into law during his four years more than 30 bipartisan bills designed to provide better care in so many different ways to our veterans, now outed?

Jeez, I hope, maybe not happening on this year’s holiday that is Veteran’s Day, but it seems likely that there will be another equally outrageous Arlington encounter before it all ends. Or because of his politically tinged actions early in the summer, is Trump banned for life from that cemetery?

Unlikely, as it’s proving even harder to contain or restrain him, and another Memorial Day will eventually, like a tank, come rolling around again, with a culprit actually back in the oval office, not just striving for it.

But I must say, is it really that unsacred to use such a cemetery as a campaign backdrop? Does it being deemed such a prized location make it an added place of honor? Is Arlington really so untouchable that it is treated like the royals just because of what it is, and represents? Federally and in its finality speaking?

Yes, these — and all other war heroes — should never be disposable, but by comparison look how badly some of our Vietnam War vets have been treated. This was drummed home by some of the stumping, and a recent documentary on this and other facets of the life of Bruce Springsteen, with a backdrop being his landmark and misunderstood song Born In The USA.

On the eve of the day of remembrance, I was watching a football game at the sports bar, and there were almost a dozen, often grainy photos displayed, apparently of soldiers who had died. I wondered, how did they choose which heroes to highlight, and where they would cut off the number as far as how many displayed?

A thousand, or million, points of light are not enough.

Dad was not one you’d bounce a joke off of, but he could take ill-thrown, bounced balls to the chest while pretending to be a catcher for my curveballs, partially a family joke.

So he was many things. And sometimes none at all. Like most of our fathers. Mine recently died, shortly after his 91st birthday.

In my last night’s dream, mid-summer passed, it was about lending an hours-long and late-given but I hope helping hand to my late dad, this time an ala carte assignment. In it, as he was called to the fore like so often, as in actual life on this earth. Work seemed around every corner for him.

— The next day, mom got a phone call/email from the long-term care facility that was returning some unspent funds. The check was made out to dad, who now of course is dead. And he never had great penmanship for endorsing such anyway. So try to open the pertinent attachment; it was even met with a loud screech from the printer, like someone dying. Since the phone service, she found out later, had cut out for a time. —

In the dream, I briefly felt a calling too, and bolted for a bit and loved the time with friends after walking to a downtown music club, this time being situated in River Falls, the south end, but soon felt an urge to get back. And give back.

I would hold the torch, actually a flashlight, sort of, on some Saturdays, without being given any kind of instructions, while dad worked away below, like in a small and dark crawl space. So I never really learned much about what he was doing, and never carried that torch on when reaching adulthood. But as a youth, I was cool with cleaning ends of copper pipes, just the last inch, (in the interim?)

Later in life, when he finally got into the union and did long gigs on big paper-mill shutdown jobs, he was a savant if allowed to look for just a minute or two at the amalgamation of pipes, and could tell better than calculus, or abacus, just which piece of a steel should go where.

There was late in my schooling years in Merrill, that one Christmas Eve where he literally risked life and limb to drive his truck home alone in a blizzard, from near Northern Michigan.

Then in the opposite time of year, there were those evenings on the basketball court, which was really an average-size slab of concrete with at hoop at the end right in front of the garage. Dad and my brother did the laborous task, such as it was, of shooting around to pose for my “practicing” photos I would take, as was practice for my studies of newspaper reporting at UW-Eau Claire. Tom laughed as our dad struck inadvertently funny poses while making like a star defender, for photojournalism.

Also funny was what Tom told as a eulogy, when dad tried to race us past the pine trees he’d planted in the front yard, to show that he was still as fast as that young man who used to always win the game of “deer,” an early version of tag on the old country schoolyard. He ended up, in those final yards, pulling up lame in the home stretch, gaining a huge black broken blood vessel up and down his whole hamstring, as still shown days later, although he never quit doing any type of work because of it..

Not as funny, with the practice throwing I did incessantly, was when dad would try to scoop up my wayward in-the-dirt curve balls at the mound I’d built in back. He would only grumble a little when on occasion taking one in the chest, but was more gruff when one bounced weird and broke his eyeglasses, right near the nose guard — although that would be referencing football, not flinging lackluster fastballs.

There were more, and really bad, jokes at the funeral, as we’d rather laugh than cry. As mom and I pulled into the church parking lot, it was mentioned, again, that she should have renewed dad’s handicapped parking sticker, but the last few days had been quite busy. To which I said, you coulda now just propped him up in that back seat, driven through the DMV drive-through lane, then pointed to the rear and say, for legitimacies sake, it’s him! Hey, say, Chevy Chase would do that, with planting grandma on top of the station wagon roof, like getting ready for a funeral pyre.

I was going to tell that to lighten the mood with the usher who greeted us by the door, and add that we still were there very early to my “late” dad’s funeral, but things kept serious for the moment, before he made a lighthearted quip. The moment was past. (I felt that the eyes of Jesus pictured on the wall were staring right at me, as if I was weighed and found wanting.)

As were the people at a nearby funeral home who a full eight days after my dad had passed away, sent a flyer to my mom advertising burial services they offer. So they missed by a figure of eight; they were really behind the eight ball, as I don’t think there was another resurrection in the offing. We were both still able to laugh at that.

Since this starts as a music website, I must divulge that faith-filled dad did diss the lyrics of Danzig and his song Twist Of Cain, saying on a night right before Christmas that I should not give much stock to his opinions on religion and just who sired who, although well-researched.

He had not even heard of Ozzy, who had slaved away in at least one slaughterhouse in his blue-collar time, splicing beef instead of piecing together pipes. And not having the vocal kind, although he did sing bass in the church choir for a while.

And the fact that a local luminary had asked me, long ago, to sing a tune penned just for me on his “celebrity” CD did not play well with dad, as it was rock music, albeit the light kind.

So my final sendoff to him just had to be some Iron Maiden. I had in mind a song written by bassist Steve Harris, Blood Brothers, in part as a tribute when his father died right as they were going on a world tour. After lots of practice when I could find some alone time, I was able to correctly cue the music, and mercifully the YouTube political ad had been cut out from the streamed version. My singing of the song could have been much better, as although being someone who is seldom nervous when getting onstage, this time around I was shaking in my boots, as my family had not heard my vocals before and I wanted to get it right.

I’d recommend looking up the lyrics, to which I borrowed the first two verses, then added some of my own words, suited to fit my dad. These follow:

“He’s my father/we’re blood brothers/like Our Father/he’s a strong one.

Some men like to live life on the edge/although some do not need that as a hedge.

They are very strong in their faith and resolve/As they know that someday life on this earth will evolve.

And dissolve/around Heaven it revolves.”

I felt he lingered with my spirit in the few days after his death, which led me to wonder aloud if it takes a bit of time for a soul to fully complete the journey to the afterlife …

Good travels dad. Farewell.

Lots of them are displayed here and there for a day or two, but it isn’t often that shown as an RIP, a locally legendary name gets this kind of lengthy billing, for well over a week running now … and it persists … on the high sign on the outside wall of the Agave Kitchen, two stories up.

“A legend rests. Eric Raley.”

— Over at another sorta competitor, as hey when one wins they all win, Hudson Tap, the bartender as advertantly I suspect, greeted a new customer who introduced himself as (also) Eric not Erik, note the difference: Hey bro, if it’s with a “c” not a “k” we’re good. —

I met the deceased back in 1990 when first moving to Hudson. His family and mine built houses, both modest in size, one more than the other, a block apart on Cherry Circle in North Hudson. His kids enjoyed coming over on Halloween and taking in my decked out yard, full of small pieces of grisled gear with me on the roof directing traffic, as in ghosts and goblins and other goonies, on long and thick strings, some years significant enough in number to be said to be assorted, and myself being part of the moving assembled mass.

His first wife, Rhonda, was the first massage therapist I would have, at a stylist shop across the way in the village, with several others to follow, for my severe Tourette Syndrome — and she often worked extra hard on my tight muscles. Knuckles fully engaged, as if of brass. Especially on the far side of my knotted legs.

We would all see each other, from time to time, walking or biking or scooting on the street as it looped back toward Fourth Street.

After this being the pattern for several years, there was a brief hiatus to the interaction, but then I started hobnobbing with various friends after work at Dick’s Bar and Grill. I soon met and counted among them Carol Tucker, one of the managers and someone who would later purchase the establishment, and she would later meet, and then marry, Eric Raley.

This time an existing house was to be not built, but bought, in the Hudson Third Street neighborhood. Again, a stone’s throw from a place much more in common.

First, I recall coming in one night, walking directly over to the back horseshoe part of the bar and shooting the breeze with him about hard-rock music (he’d love Dio and Neon Knights, see the above headline, and Carol and I’d also conversed about System of a Down and Chop Suey lyrics if not slaw) and hard-fought pro football. After a couple of minutes Carol politely interrupted as she had something to show me. There was a great big rock and ring on her finger.

It was made known that my presence was not only requested, more than once in the next week, but required, at the eventual wedding service, reception at the old Garfield’s Valley House, and of course the dollar dance.

Later, over a few years and time — through thick and thin and even as such, a discussion right after 9/11 — we drifted apart and went separate ways, but I’m sure all thought of one another on occasion. Then came this October, well after the first one when we met, and Eric Raley passed away.

At roughly the same time as my own father, now living in Milwaukee, who also had worked in the construction business, various facets but especially plumbing, and made it more years, up to his early 90s. His time of rest had come, as his health had deteriorated in varied ways since age 90, and he had been — plumb stuck — in a nursing home.

So I left for Milwaukee to be with my own family, such as mom and brother, the day prior to services for Eric Raley, so I could not be there. But various people remained in my thoughts; I returned to Hudson a week later.

The night before I traveled southeast across Wisconsin, I had ventured into Dick’s. I saw a friend, who conveyed the sad news, which of course I already knew. He said, see you at the services, at O’Connell’s. I did not have the heart to tell him I would not. But there soon was a sign, small but meaningful, positioned on the front window of Dick’s, with condolescences from his Class of ’87.

Once back, I was thinking about Carol and Old School Hudson when walking to the door at the newer version of Our Town, the newest Kwik Trip. I saw longtime bartender Chad just before I grabbed the knob.

I asked how everyone at Dick’s was. Chad is seldom at a loss for words, and on this occasion he had just two that rung out the most:

It sucks.

Then last night, back at the Old Stomping Grounds, I ran into a not looking too much older but now B-Dayed friend Abby, back at Dick’s, and she said also, have you heard, it’s so sad. And sudden, as is suscinctly and sincerely said by so many.

There will be the possibility of more thoughts on local and otherwise-close-to-me and others life and death, but mostly life, on these pages soon.

On Wednesday, it was almost 5 a.m. in Central Standard Time that I got an email from my editor and friend at Associated Press, out in New York, closing the books in my election day stringer work for them. So it was a long night for all of us.

Including Donald Trump, who was said to look very tired while camping out in Mar-a-Lago, while I’m sure servants were attending to his every need. Get used to it. But One thing is sure: The dictatorship of America has begun.

So now that I’m rested, I’m going to write this one last post on all things political, then give it a rest for a bit and turn my scribeship to another topic or two. But I will return, with the analysis you have come to expect, explaining why some of the key races went the way they did and why the messages touted took root. I will now take a bit of a more favorable turn to the Republicans.

But before we get heavy, let’s have humor. Several silly asides about the names of people who had been running, and thus a play on words …

In Texas, where there is a little ol’ band, there was also a little ol’ candidate by the name of Allred. Who’s as Blue as a Democrat gets. The joke is obvious.

But I must now go down to the Milwaukee area, where you could see almost in the same yard, signs for candidates not alone, but by both the names of LuAnn and Lucia. Not common ones like Bill and John. LuAnn was said by her opponents to be a little Lunar, but I don’t really think so. More on that later. But the main difference between the two aforementioned names is the presence of an “i.” I’d kept my “eye” on those races. 

Then there was a man by the name of Maxey. Or in the same town it coulda been Maley, who (also) used to be my editor, at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, until I maxed out their stringer money.

And by the surname of Steil. And there was also a Stein running for High Office. That should play well in Milwaukee, I thought. But if you were down south a bit in Sweet ol’ Chicago, it could be Steer. Or looking to the east, in Detroit, Steel.

And one man named Van Orden. Methinks he had to be running on a law and order platform.

The reincarnation, again in Minnesota, of Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Warren Burger? No, actually, the man from the same state by that name’s running for a different office.

No joke, unless made one, there was a man in Washington County, named Scottie Junker by having a recognizable nickname, running under the tagline of “Cutter for Commish.” Running of course for commissioner? Probably not a liberal spender.

Lastly, someone I dealt with Tuesday night, running again for St. Croix County clerk. Christine Hines. Not a Pretender, like the singer Chrissie Hynde.

Bar talk can go beyond basic, and is not just about the Packers, or the crosstown Minneapolis-based Queens that are now Kings, where various people say there may be rioting in the streets tonight, and not because of a bad ref’s call. They pack in a fair amount of political commentary, even if it’s typically more like a monolog.

Usually there is one person at THAT table – this is seemingly the place in the bar where it usually transpires, like the many pollsters at your door being of just one persuasion – who is on a roll and won’t let up and just finish his beer. The rest listen, kinda with just one ear. Turns out they might need a third.

So, on these pages you are seeing a lot of niche political notations, slotted in because this is important. I will try to be balanced and not poke fun only at Trump, but he makes it so easy! And because this being at its start a music column, there’s a whole lotta lyrics fodder for such discourse, even if Disturbed, as in a killer band that foregoes the silence and sounds the alarm.

— Trump has repeatedly gone after Harris about her looks, and a rally speaker said she could be the anti-Christ. (See if you can find the Easter Egg in the metal video Writing on the wall, when the devil tries and badly fails, to ascend.) But wait, I don’t see any devil horns or multiple sixes floating around Harris’ head, (see below), which he says is dizzy. Maybe more plausible to call Trump a fascist. And he does not score points for not the weave in speeches, or the weave that got grazed and flipped and showed his scalp in the back of his head, during that first assassination attempt. —

When the political ad calls come, the spammers spoof in spades, and even the legit (or something like that) ones follow suit. My mom was getting about two spam calls as such per hour on her old land line, and she knew who they were because those four red letters, “SPAM,” kept popping up before those obligatory 10 numerals on Old School caller ID, and not for voting at the polls. Or even on her TV screen, you know, up in the corner. All but one of the spammers took a Sunday off. Not so for fundraiser emails associated with my party of choice (guess which one, based on my writing.)

Do myself, my mom and my niece constitute a bloc of Milwaukee and rest of state voters, even if just a small one?

Better stay in tonight, I told them a few days ago, the eve of more possible death threat charges against Trump, as both candidates were in Milwaukee, Trump at a ritzy suite and Harris at a state fairgrounds. If both they and their posses come my way, tonight, I smirked, I will be reporting, as it is, from the somewhat safety of my apartment window. While on Second Street — which has become the new Eleventh Street Bridge over the freeway — a mere 100 feet from the county GOP Office, there had been debates over which party was performing their posts. One hint: The Dems sported a populist hay bale, I believe, and the GOP if not limos, horribly decked out with flags and such possibly redneck trucks. No big style points on either side, short of Beyonce.

Truth be told, there is no such thing as truth anymore. Trump might as well say, I’m going to blow up the moon, and then when asked how he would do it retort, “I have a concept of a plan.” (Maybe he just wants to just mobilize all that space junk, with the Jedi-like help of Elon, God forbid not Obie.) Just trust me, he says. Someone who tells lies by the hundreds. And his ilk say it is Harris who does not specify what she would do in office. To me, repeating endlessly that she would offer a $25,000 credit to first-time homeowners is a large part of the way there. It specifies both who and how much.

Trump promises the mass deportation of illegal immigrants, the biggest in history, but does not say where he will get all that money. And does he not understand that cheap immigrant labor is one of the backbones of our economy? (I will give him kudos for a proposal to make tips non-taxable, like anyone reports them anyway.) Does he not think that deporting them and restricting their entry will affect the rate of growth that he champions? And the double-whammy or triple-whammy of having the ability to pay for the very construction of that huge wall on the border? (A thought: How about if you have to build a wall, only put it at the areas where there is the biggest crossing crisis. Texas and Texans reign. Granted, many people will eventually catch on and try to cross elsewhere, but in the meantime you have reduced the rate of entry to an acceptable number to all but fervent fascists.)

And as far as Trump saying that in office, he would basically obliterate all his enemies and end his war of choice to specify at the moment, all in his first day. Hey, even God needed seven. Which war would he pick to end, first, On That Day? And I thought the military was going to be really busy hunting down all his political opponents. Maybe, like God, he should give himself a full week.

A mass deportation on Day One? But have to jail them first. The jails are already overcrowded and also the legal system overtaxed. A suggestion. House many of the bad guys at Mar-a-Lago, as there have been many visiting there for a time already, and have Trump oversee them with the fine-toothed comb like he’s used on his rug. And he has criticized Kamala’s looks! She has been said to really rock the look, even moreso, back in the day. She would fit in well on a California beach.

This is not so well. “I got along with Putin,” Trump ranted. Why would someone say that? It’s almost like highlighting, yeah me and Hitler. We’re buds.

Trump should edit his remarks and not shoot off the cuff, and possibly sleep on it first before he airs them, as to not put his foot in it yet again, feet first. Would that mean less hourly spam calls to my mom’s land line …

Back to the hanging of Harris, would you do anything differently than Joe Biden, an interviewer asked her in a way that seemed to be impromptu. “There’s not a thing that comes to mind” she responded. But just maybe upon further reflection … A mere eight word clip, not given with context.

Wait, there are also third party candidates to poke fun at. Not long after there was the IVF debacle, there was the battle to WIN the ballot and then NIX it for RFK. I’d heard it all, a candidate will SUE for the right to get back OFF the ballot. Sweating it out while seated ahead of the camera like Rich (Nixon) or Rudy (Guiliani.)

Much like the former unceremonious ouster of Mitch, the speaker, of the House, and not of Usher, as we harken back to Halloween. And its replacement of US flags with Halloween haunt ones sized the same, as far as flags, at times flanking the sides of a driveway, which were then re-replaced with Old Glory as election day neared.

Does Tammy Baldwin versus Eric Hovde, a key Wisconsin election race, come down — just as much as abortion rights — to a bag of potato chips or two? Or as I’ll deal with later, an old MTV clip. As the epic “One,” the peerless one and only from Metallica, was the main one that got MTV’s groundbreaking music videos going.

Eaten in a nursing home, feeling chippy rather than chipper, when restricted to a bunch of mush — like my dear friend I have referenced, who is going in to cure her colon, and now has conditions — or maybe mashed potatoes, as we are in the spud state? Even with chips, it all comes down to small potatoes. But this election is anything but …

Baldwin is as Badger Blue as they come — and Harris is back in Madison in the ultimate party zone, you know, the good party, and the southeast part of the state that brought us the ever-popular-there Steve Miller and his band, recently honored in his hometown for longtime achievement. And as has been pointed out blatantly, Hovde is or has been from California and has a mansion there, as well as in Florida, maybe not many miles from Mara-Lago.

The distinction painted is rich vs. liberal. Again we see this theme.

(So, on these pages in the next days you will see a lot of political notations, slotted in because this is important. And because this being at its start a music column, there’s a whole lotta lyrics fodder.)

But back to those chips. In video clips.

Hovde was attacked in full force by Baldwin, and He and His shot back with a recent ad saying that Baldwin was living High off the Hog with her Wall Street girlfriend. The person(s) in the video clip rang out back and forth between Baldwin and her beau, and a female narrator, switching at will. One of the last images shown was of a grocery bag filled high, and at its overflowing top some potato chips, a WalMart signature brand.

It isn’t immediately clear, unless you are watching, who bought these groceries, but on further inspection, it’s the narrator. I thought the splicing to and fro was confusing, and in that way like an old MTV video. The implication was that because of Baldwin, this poor woman was having to buy WalMart brand food. At first glance, I thought it was Baldwin buying Great Value, and I further thought if that’s defined as living high off the hog, so be it. And if such needs to be done by a constituent, too, that’s not so bad. At least the two bags shown are full.

Ads for Hovde have criticized Baldwin for her voting on Fentanyl bans, probably because there was a troublesome rider attached, since she is the one who helped sponsor a bill going after dealers of the drug. (Hovde managed to find one mother whose child had died of an overdose, and only gotten a letter of remorse from Baldwin, and nothing more. All the candidates, on both sides, seem to be great at finding lone wolves, as my family has pointed out.)

It is worthy of note that out in California, Harris had actually gone after drug kingpins and reduced crime, despite Republican claims. You can’t just hold people who are arrested, until you bring sufficient evidence against them, (and there aren’t nearly enough investigators in California to make that quickly doable.) No matter how severe their alleged crimes, violent or not. That’s what Guantanamo Bay is about. So again, we can solve it with more feet on the floor. Even if they are just Legal Beagles. You get what you pay for. Or if taken conversely, don’t pay for.

I think Baldwin and the Democrats are missing an opportunity in their stance on abortion, but that may be by direct choice. I thought that when the court decisions started mounting, and the Republicans became more and more hard line, the Democratic response would be to take a more centrist position and appeal all at once to the vast majority of Americans, not distance themselves as best they could, as far distant as they could.

It is has gone largely unnoticed that even under Biden/Harris current policy, you cannot get an abortion under all but the most extreme medical circumstances after six months, presumably to give a woman ample time to determine that yes, she is pregnant. And they have not done a good job at all to make that distinction known.

I will now reference an earlier ad by Baldwin that shows that even Democrats can resort to tactics that could be seen as vile. It said that Hovde did not want older Americans to be able to vote. What Hovde actually said was that, factually to a large degree, nursing home residents generally don’t live very long — although a half-year is probably a low-ball — so it’s unlikely most of them can find a way to vote.

The fact-back, as confirmed by a couple of volunteers with the League Of Women Voters locally, is that there often are means availed for nursing home residents to be able to cast a ballot, even including polling at their living facilities.

My take on the upshot: Baldwin took liberties with what she had suggested early, but Hovde was wink-and-nod trying to discourage the elderly from voting because they would not be in favor of his policies.

As long as we are on the past …

I was a reporter for the Hudson Star-Observer when Bill Clinton had gotten caught getting laid with Monica Lewinski, then denied it, before eventually fessing up. He was scheduled to address the issue to the American people for the first time, and I decided as an entertainment reporter to take in the common man angle. I went over to what was then Pudge’s Bar, had a seat at the rail, and waited to see what I’d find.

Next to me was a man from all places, Australia. He was working by day for a few weeks with his company to fix the Interstate 94 bridge. But this was evening, so the Aussie thought he’d go quaff an ale.

He was aghast about what transpired on the TV, for a reason you might not expect …

He talked freely during a rather long speech by Clinton, saying that in his home country, if the prime minister had an affair, no one would too much care, but if he lied about doing it, his political career would be toast.

History would not look on him kindly if like Donald, he had his Stormy Daniels. Non-consensual would be even worse for the PM.

But back to those bad photos on political ads:

One banking against border czar Harris does not show her as much of a czar at all, aiming to show that her vice-presidency was costing the average American lots of money out of their wallet. One was shown folded open with no dollar bills, not even ones or fives. But wait a minute, on money: There is a great big fold running down the middle, and three more to hold credit cards, and they all looked like … great big ol’ dollar bills! (At least the main one.) And even if they are indeed credit cards, they provide purchasing power, even if draining your own personal finances held, like the Republicans claim the presidential Democratic administration has done.

Even if some of the claims against Baldwin — saying her spending plans are too extreme, although even like with Trump (and yes I said this) they’d help certain segments of the population and may be good ideas in principle — have a grain of truth, they would not aid a large enough number of people to cost a lot of money to the taxpayer. And by comparison, if all of those who regularly eat out would simply skip a steak or two a month—even if it’s simply sirloin vs. pricey porterhouse — and instead donate that money, it would largely end hunger across the country.

And if that is a concern, what is spent at the grocery store and at the pump, what about this about grain? Funding to Ukraine has been blocked or ended, and this and the parts of Russia impacted too by the war mean that the price of wheat is affected. Hey, that’s where we get bread and ethanol. Yes, that more affordable fuel.

Back to bad choices

A second such ad, for Alison Page and her stance favoring abortion rights, says there are some things as out of place as politicians in your doctor’s office — and it shows three elephants, presumably a mom and dad and baby, out in a clipped green pasture in front of a big ol’ red barn.

It has been a while since the signs trumping Trump were small – you know, common man Democrat not Donald size – like the one or two initially, that I saw basically lost in the middle of a field of cedar shrubs of forest-like proportions.

One of the Dem signs I could not ignore: Vote for Democrats. They vote for us (or US?) If they can arrange a way to semi-accurately impersonate you.

Trump has said he has an IQ of 156, but will not take a test to test out his claim. Now it’s been updated, reportedly, that his IQ is really a (limited) bit little than less than “half” that high. That’s not unlike like having played out your deck of cards only until the whistled two minute warning, and the one at the end of the “half” not the end of the game, and trying to hit the sidelines, (read unregistered voters.)

Which concerning all things happening electorally these days, brings up this point: Should people have to have an IQ of a certain level to vote or be voted for? So we don’t dumb down the electoral process, although IQ granted is not the only measure of intelligence. But after all, such a requirement might create a one-party system. Ha, ha. Mandate the means to legislate. Don’t get me wrong, all types of people should have the right to vote, even if you’ve only been (legally) in the USA country for say a decade, and that’s Trump timing, the time he has been around the political scene.

— Of course we know the electoral college consists of our great-great-great-great grandparents or beyond, “voting” for such back in a day when I think they only had muskets for firearms, and they might not even take out a deer with a direct hit. Bambi would limp around for days without actually croaking like a frog, and you would not be able to harvest the meat because you lost track of her, so go hit up the Indians for turkey. My take on the origins of this country. —

But if you’re not scratching triple digits, IQ again invoked, maybe have the vote be weighed on a sliding scale? This would be a way to avoid the tyranny of the majority, as so many of us have seen what happens when there is a (mostly locally) committee of mere commoners overseeing a body of experts, plundering their more astute jurisdiction and throwing it asunder. The local parks committee may take a great (locally based) additive plan and throw it all to hell — term chosen these days — and maybe based on an agenda for vendetta that may include the personal, screw it, and I have seen this covering area town board meetings. (Or on the dangers of using what is strictly popular, bowing only to what you hear on radio during the populist drive-by popular tunes, not the intellectual value of what’s heard at say, 4 a.m. only.) It might be Megadeth and Holy Wars, in which the would-be pundits ID themselves as such, mockingly, as seeming know-it-alls and despite that travel to foreign lands to “ask the sheep about their beliefs.” I would change the word to quiz, and I think it may be such in some song versions.

Although this is all micro-Musk, in many ways. The quandary of weighing by committee who has what astuteness, and these days I’d at times take the immigrants as far as civics knowledge, would create a whole another bureaucracy, and that’s what the embattled Republicans hate, and beyond doubt the ensuing battle to fund it! (Although there is the border battle — minus beer — boldly brewing in bureaucracy that may be created, and we are not talking WI-MN — more liberal with their taxpayer checkbooks — although Iowa recently weighed in presidentially as far as polls.)

Don’t know the (major) difference between Andrew Johson and Harry Truman? Then ballot tossed out? At what point do you cut off the level of knowledge, including the presidential, if you turn someone away at the polls, possibly bringing more lawsuits by non-populist suits with their ties, much less assorted or orchestrated assaults.

Hell, some of the newfound voters who get only what they know from their personally chosen (like Fox versus CNN) social media and its disinformation don’t even know who Ronald Reagen is and what he stood for, (as is actually most of the populace.)

Would the local very Common Council have to decide how to score two-thirds against three-fourths, on a sliding vote scale? (I ‘ve always wondered about the slim difference, in again, popular rhetoric.) Bring that new bureaucracy to a higher — or lower — level.

Trump has claimed, often, that Harris has a very low IQ. One headline cites it as 110. But if you look at the story, and earlier in this story, that is the lower end of only 1,341-or-so people who thus “voted” and were asked to make a guess (party lines invoked?) Trump himself has been said to be at anywhere between 101 and 145. He guestimates, without offering any justification, that he ranks at 156.

To be presidential, you have to have at least some smarts, as how you respond to your handlers, and even ability to speak well off the cuff will only get you so far. Ulysses S. Grant and Andrew Jackson both are ranked at 110, and the numbers raise fairly quickly from there. So Trump’s claims especially seem unlikely.

I think the IQ of Harris is more like that of someone else by that surname, Steve, the lyricist and bassist of Iron Maiden, which a recent scientifically quantified study found to be one of the most intelligent bands of all, and metal was the most intelligent genre.

Methinks the electoral college was established by some university, (not college), profs who needed something new to study, so they created the topic. On the often questioned, continued validity of that college itself, mom says, “different time, different place.” (Of course we know the electoral college consists of our great-great-great-great grandparents or beyond, “voting” for such back in a day when I think they only had muskets for firearms, and they might not even take out a deer with a direct hit. Bambi would limp around for days without actually croaking like a frog, and you would not be able to harvest the meat because you lost track of her, so go hit up the Indians for turkey. My take on the origins of this country, where the powers-that-be simply and that word is chosen intentionally, were looking out for the common man — not women yet — in an attempt to even-out the power of big vs. little states. So we grant muster to the likes of California and Texas?) Or how about this, back to the basic knowledge of civics as a qualification for voting: How many people on the street, if you stopped them and I was encouraged not to as they might have a musket or more, could tell you the three branches of government? (Just for the record, info-providing-wise, executive (the extreme main one these days), legislative (weakening), and judicial (on the rise.) I’ll bet the vast majority of those officially declared qualified to cast a ballot could not answer correctly.

So we have so many people backing Trump, saying he is his own man and admiring him for that. But so many stars in their own right, men and women, millionaires all but not by Elon Musk standards, have come forward backing Kamala Harris with even their country content — but no Cash — as the Trump mash-up including Musk remarks becomes more graphic than even Cradle of Filth lyrics, and lots even longer in the (lopsided) tooth.

But being such an outsider does still require some modicum of skill. That’s where I draw a line in the sand when invoking, also, my and their rock star heroes. As Ozzy, even eventually, and Lemmy were able to pen intelligent lyrics and commentary on the current world and political landscape – although I’ll give you that The Ozz Man struggles mightily when composing an interview sentence. (Much more on their fastidious fortitude, functionally specific, for as it is, in a later post.)

— This is a fifth, as in a drink, that’s worthy of buying the previou four. Come High Noon. Or more specifically starting at 11 a.m. on football Sunday Game Day. Going through 11 p.m. It’s at the Smilin’ Moose where you buy four High Noons and get a fifth for free, all for just … $27.50. That ol’ 50 cents. This is a combo of vodka and soda, in various fruity flavors, (I tried one for the first time back at home in Milwaukee), and the photo of the bucket on the marquee shows Summer Sips. Would that make you an Arizona fan? Referencing the marquee was a young woman wearing a QB like cast on her leg, if hit low. Had she been on IR from the bar? —

Meandering for a bit, one does almost feel sorry for Trump and what he has become, and by no means a rock star as if for nothing else, he does not have the hair. But if his IQ truly is around 89, or 98 — he says 156 — I’ll give him credit for being able to make it in the business world, sorta, anyway, even if needing to be bailed out, over and above at the ballot box turnstyles, at most turns, and then being a cheap-turn reality show star. That IQ reading seems too low to have any merit, so one wonders if it is a deep fake. Like one I saw of Melania purportedly jumping in front of her husband and saying she is done with him to a RNC crowd because of affairs and whatnot, and tossing her wedding ring into one of the front rows, like a rock concert frisbee. Or was this post a matter of massive editing, in or out with content. And it’s gotten far worse with the deep fakes, on both sides, many from Russia and its regard, since that was exposed. And many attempt to undermine valid voting, and not from Trump.

One’s mind boggles. Would the most recently attemptedly orchestrated and apparently botched as A-47 incident be blown out of proportion to include allegations that it involved also shooting up his now dead body, Liz Cheney and also fame-media hack potshots aside, in a matter of overkill not (officially) penned by Lemmy and Motorhead, and taking out a whale or two for good measure?

On other vows, Rock the Casbah and we Clash, what about the one where Trump was said to have promised oil sheiks $18 billion for favors? And very much also for elbow grease? That could be parlayed into a lot of savings at the pump – and become more of an election issue — though not much for the pocketbooks of those rich men, as they are used to bribes of much more.

This one, unfortunately, is not nearly so fake, like such a handoff. QB Favre had chastised Swiftie singer Taylor about taking recent political stances, where all-the-while he has done the same style, as sung, saying essentially that this is quite unbecoming for a pop star. This in the land where — and just who can you trust? — there are sign stealers across all starboards and game boards. Inside sometimes otherwise empty helmets.

And whose IQ and PQ are you going to trust more anyway? Yes, quarterbacks have to read defenses like politicians read voters, and come up with playbooks and platforms, and they have to be able to read the crowded defenses like you would a crowd that is suddenly on your back moreso than that of a bad comic, and memorize lots of plays and positions, but …

I myself would take a lyricist first, who pens poetic and has to make it more believable than those backing the tack of a particular political hack. Listen to Springsteen and to my bro, he’s actually quite astute, thus Born In The USA stupid — and hey even mom is conversant about him and I don’t have to drag her in too much — and then also Eminem for intellect? And Swift, although I have teased her, is said to have an IQ of 160 — very much pretty damn good and not just pretty lipstick — and that by the way beats even the best proclaimed by Trump by four points or at least pretty close to fourfold, so be careful who you tout. Maybe Favre should stick to allegedly siphoning stamps, where I believe there is a 200 limit. Maybe less in Mississippi.

And the beau of Taylor, not Trump like you might expect, is expected to have made her expecting, so if you double that in the offspring, by a factor of two since there are a pair of parents, you can concoct an IQ of 320 when adding an apparently smart football tighter end (and brain?) than even Swift. That’s like Einstein dissecting a Cover Two.

And Brittany Kelce, of the coming-in-law clan of Taylor, has also entered into the public political fray with her own, fractured like a knee, viewpoint. Would you like to be a fly on the wall, or at least the dated cranberry sauce, at Thanksgiving dinner? Looks like we yet will not, for sure, know a winner who takes all, at that point. And wanna party with not Perry but Musk while chomping on hoidy toidy turkey and sipping fine champagne? Get in line as his dance card is full. But you are not going to mistake this man, that being Musk, for Bill Gates as he seems to have the intellect of only an Average Joe. So how did this guy make so much money? I first associated his name with high end perfume, you know Musk, but if it smells like a fish, or a rat … It has been suggested we shoot him to the moon, along with Trump, via his company.