THE FLUB-A-DUB AWARD

Let the vetting begin

We’ve already had over seven inches of snow and its been as cold as it’s likely to get and still I hear people talking about how nice its been. Get real. It’s nastier than the day is long. December. Winter. Snow. Cold. Ice. Dead batteries. Frozen bodies. My water fountain already froze solid and busted. I forgot to empty out the water. Chalk one Flub up on me.

Speaking of December Flubs. Bernard Kerik takes the cake. The would-have-been Director of Homeland Security bows out, citing illegal nanny harboring, which is the least of this guy’s problems. Here’s an ex-New York police chief who is worth millions. Even in New York, that’s not a good sign. You can figure he was on the take. Apparently the Bush administration didn’t do their "vetting" very well, which I assume means "checking up on." Bush and Carl Rove have never been ones to worry much about background checks. If they can find some patsy to do their bidding, they’re in. The Flubs are flying in Washington. There’s a lot of poor "vetting" going on.

December is that time of year when my head gets filled with visions of right-winged Christians. I’d prefer sugar-plums. Having just elected their leader to another four years, these folks are as giddy as Elton John meeting Liberace for the first time. These people remind me of the ignorance of the Dark Ages, when people were killed for suggesting that the world was round, or women burned at the stake for having opinions. The moral values espoused by these folks are today limited to abortion and gay sex. You don’t hear them talk much about economic justice, racial equality, gender equality, tolerance, love, or peace through compromise, compassion, and negotiation. In my lifetime, I haven’t seen the Christian faith and practice perverted so badly. I’ve heard this group of Bush Christians called modern Pharisees – the allegedly proud, rigid, legalistic hypocrites John the Baptist called "a generation of vipers." I personally wouldn’t get that carried away. I’d just call them misguided Flubbers.

December’s Flub goes to anyone out there who feels that you are somehow superior to anyone else because of what you believe, or who you are, or how much money you have. You are on a dead-end branch of human evolution. You are the snake in the Creation story. Or to put it in much simpler, less controversial terms, you’re a Flubber who hasn’t had near enough vetting.