From Poppies to Peyote.....

Friends: From Poppies to Peyote...

"Tonight the bottle let me down..." Elvis Costello and Merle Haggard

April 15 is nasty enough on its own...but this week we have been bludgeoned by weird news. Escape is impossible.

The Bermuda Triangle of West Texas, formed by Waco, Eldorado and Crawford, is home to cults of crazed humanity...from Koresh to the LSD polygamist Jeffs to "W," the Clown of Crawford. Stuff occurs there so strange one can't even make it up. Janet Reno, The Miami Beach Brute, ended the Branch Davidian 51-day siege by gassing the holed-up holy rollers and burning em' out...extreme, but effective.

Black-hooded Texas Rangers, with arms locked in a phalanx of righteousness and in assault vehicles with automatic weapons, ruthlessly raided Jeff's compound. Women, praying and wailing, and young children were rounded up like longhorn cows, prodded into vans and taken away for interrogation and perhaps electrical shock. All this was provoked by a call from a hysterical 16-year-old girl who claimed the compound was filled with sex-crazed 50-year-old men, where floggings and degenerate spiritual rituals were the events du jour... and where "the laying on of hands" took on new meaning.

Nearby on the ranch in Crawford, Emperor George The Absent and Pope Ben XVI crouched, chanting for hours Hail Mary séances over a crystal ball, discussing the dismantling of the Catholic Church by prowling pedophiliac priests. As they peered into the black soul of Vladimir Putin, W was rethinking his original assessment of the Russian’s trustworthiness. Somehow the concept of trust and Putin's soul seem to be incongruous.

Meanwhile, Obama The Hopeful Harvard Elitist, was hanging out in San Francisco with Berkeley nutcases, peering into the psyche of Pennsylvanians---you know, those angry and bitter voters who cling to guns or religion in explanation of their frustrations in life. Dr. Wright and the NRA, while separated by style, are now joined in agenda !

Not to be outdone, Washington and Wall Street combined to further fleece the citizenry by a bailout of greedy speculators while bemoaning the "moral hazard" of it. Somehow, the word "Moral" just doesn't seem to fit in these 2 places, although "Hazard" has a seat at the table.

Over at the Treasury teams of bleary-eyed accountants with small necks and sharp pencils attempt to explain the mysterious evaporation of $12 billion dollars, 363 tons, 720,000 pounds--cold American cash--sent to Iraq for bribes and other indiscretions. That's right...the same money you just paid in on Tuesday!

Closer to home, hordes of hapless homeowners huddled en masse, weeping and clinging to each other on the courthouse steps of Main Street, while foreclosures--some 20,000 per month--continue unabated. Tibetan Supporters even chained themselves to bridges in protest...my, my, the natives have certainly been restless this week!

Friends, we live in treacherous and uncertain times. Who'd blame us for seeking solace in bottles or other sorts of anesthetizations. And if there were ever a time, it's now...where are you, Dr. Leary?

As for me, I prefer wine or a good single malt, either, or perhaps both combined for shock effect. Short of death, it is a suitable but temporary relief. But, hey, that's just me...you probably have your own secret escape routes.

For others, however, Elvis and Merle have pegged it pretty well:

"Tonight the bottle let me down
It let your memory come around
The one true friend I thought I'd found
Tonight the bottle let me down."

From Poppies to Peyote …may our collective hangover be short and mild!
"Here's looking at you, Kid..."


Bud
April 17, 2008