The Hard Sell

 

I got a call today

Someone selling gold bullion

By the troy ounce.

The usual scare tactics,

The dept is exploding

The country is imploding

We’re becoming socialists, no, communists

We’re the next Greece, no, Portugal.

 

Rich white people selling gold

Dug up by poor black people

To other rich white people.

Capitalism at work.

Glenn Beck would be proud.

 

Eight Is Not Enough

Eight Is Not Enough

 

 

Eight years is not enough

We need another Texan

To finish the job.

 

So close to another war

So close to bankrupting the country

So close to destroying the unions.

What this country needs

Is a good tax cut for the rich.

 

Vote for the Texas televangelist

And vote for God.

 

 

Pardon Me!

 

 

 

Ah … Scooter, the Scootster, Scooty

The office prankster

One of the good ole’ boys

Friend of Dick, loyal soldier

Willing to take the truth

To his grave.

 

I beg your …

I never promised you a pardon

But W gave the best he could.

Slick, that W, so slick

Saved the Scooter from jail

Where no Yalie belongs.

Put one over on all of us

But that taste, that smell

It’s everywhere

And we can’ get it out of our mouths.

Oxymoron

 

 

Famous poet.

Military intelligence.

President Rick Perry.

Compassionate conservative.

 

How To Succeed

 

I once worked with this guy

Baby faced, fat

Around the middle,

Never really worked

A day in his life

And didn’t know a

Thing about

What he was doing, but

He could talk

And he had friends

So despite his screw ups

He climbed the

Corporate ladder

Reaching the upper rung

Where he could kick

Everyone below.

Sort of like

W. Bush, but

Not as dumb.

 

 

 

A Little Reminder

 

 

In the small woods in my subdivision

The builders forgot to flatten

The trees are filled

With lawn chairs,

Plastic tables

And other suburban accessories

Katrina took from our back yards

And left like ornaments

In the southern pine and Mississippi magnolia.

Just a little reminder

What we take from nature

Nature can take back in spades.

 

Ashcroft Covers The Breasts Of The Spirit Of Justice

Ashcroft Covers The Breasts Of The Spirit Of Justice

 

 

Justice may be blind

But just to be sure

Big John covered the breasts

Of The Spirit of Justice.

 

Who knowS what

Seeing those luscious stone

Tits would do

To the minds of his

Obsequious lawyers.

 

Better to keep their minds occupied

With Morning Prayer meetings

And ways to arrest people

Without evidence

And torture them

Without conscience.

 

Reagan’s Funeral

 

 

 

Pomp and circumstance

Heartfelt tears

Glowing accolades

Clichés upon clichés

What a great man, leader, husband, father

Etc., etc.

 

They seem to have

Left out the part

About the woman

With schizophrenia

Thrown out of the mental hospital

Into the streets

So the man with everything

Could have one thing more.

 

The Big Gypper

The Big Gypper

 

We have so much to thank you for.

The firing of those pesky patco controllers

Leading the way

For the annihilation of unions.

You made the rich richer

And the poor poorer.

You convinced us we had it made

With the crumbs from your table.

You were the great communicator

Declaring greed is good.

You showed those welfare queens

Who was king.

 

 

 

Tempest in a Tea Party

 

Tempest in a Tea Party

 

 

Ready to boil over

Ready to bolt.

If the tea is too tepid

The crazy get elected.

 

GUNS

Guns

 

Rat a tat tat

Playing with plastic guns

Running with rubber knives

Growing up to go to war

Domestic or foreign

Just like that.

A Thousand Points of Fright

 

 

You could see it in his shiftless eyes.

His Dad had tried

To keep him from his demons

But in the end

The demons won

And we lost.

 

Does Karl Rove Come From France?

Does Karl Rove Come From France?

 

It’s hard to say. He does have

A cone head. And I can imagine

Him downing a six pack without

Removing the cans from their plastic sleeve.

 

Fox News Asks The Tough Questions

 

Is he a socialist

Or a communist?

A fascist

Or a Marxist?

Is he the antichrist

Or an anarchist?

Is he Hitler in blackface?

A white black racist

Or a black white racist?

I bet he pals around with terrorists.

 

They are carrying signs

Advancing on the capital

Laying siege to D.C.

The great screaming Santelli

Is having a kanipshin fit

On live TV.

 

An uprising of Fox followers

Wait for Glenn Beck

To give them their marching orders.

Rupert

 

I sing the praises of Rupert

That grand old Aussie

 Rupe’s the man

He can buy and sell anyone.

He’s the media mogul

Who owns politicians outright

And pulls the strings

Of the puppets on Fox News.

I sing the praises of Rupert

Watching my News stock soar

He knows which side the bread is buttered

And where the bodies are buried.

 

 

 

Souvenirs

 

In El Salvador the Generals kept

The lopped off ears of their enemies

Dried and pressed like leaves

A keepsake for old age.

 

The pearl handled pistol

Of Saddam is mounted on the wall

Of the white house

A keepsake

For Bush’s revenge.

Soak The Poor

 

 

Why are the poor so rich? They take so much

And give so little in return. Why are the rich so poor?

They give so much

And get so little in return.

Bronzed John Boehner

Bronzed John Boehner

 

He has the healthy afterglow

Of nicotine and Scotch

And a reason to get up in the morning:

There’s money to be made

For all those millionaires.

 

Oil Spill

Drilling Into Thick Skulls

 

 

Already the oil is lapping

At the shore

And yet they want more of it.

They blame anyone

And everyone.

Jindal is screaming

Drill baby, drill

And cries for someone

To clean up his mess.

We want accountability, they shout.

Except for themselves.

 

Madoff’s Slippers

Madoff’s Slippers

 

Who wants to buy

Bernie’s slippers?

Any takers

Or just those who were taken.

They are monogrammed

Like everything else

With three initials.

Were they pried off

Like Dorothy’s ruby slippers?

All his power gone.

The evil, too.

The End of 2008

 

 

A historic year, if years

Can be historic.

It’s just a number

Like the 44 percent

The stock market has subtracted.

Abstract, unless you have

To live with the abstraction.

George Bush rides his bike

Into the sunset, none

The wiser, a silly

Grin on his face

As he dodges shoe

After shoe. Ignorance is

Bliss after all.

A historic election

Reason for hope

As war breaks out

Around the world.

A final farewell, an outbreak

Of salmonella

The last chapter

In Bush’s legacy.

How will this fatal

Year be remembered?

I hope to forget it

Someday.

 

Press Conference

 

Looking down at his notes

Protruding pancake lips

He looks remarkably like the Grinch

 

The Grinch who stole the country.

He looks up, smiles toward

The back of the room.

It’s an inside joke

Only he and Cheney get.

Who Is He?

 (After  a poem by Robert Pinsky)

 

I never heard of George W Bush

But I wish I had. I wish

I knew as much as he knew,

How he could drink his way to the top.

I admire that in a man.

I wish I’d heard of George W. Bush.

Maybe I would have learned

The secrets of his success,

How someone can turn failure

Into a full time job

Without one ounce of regret.

 

 

 

The Bush Years

 

What Went Wrong

 

 

Bush was throned

Cheney was chosen.

There were a few blackouts

But no snow, at least

That’s what he said.

The past was off limits

And so was the future.

Reporters became courtesans

Bill O settled out of court.

Rush “Painkiller” Limbaugh

Made millions.

The rich got richer

The poor poorer

And that was great for America.

One city went under water

While others died of thirst.

The west went up in flames.

Condi went shopping.

Trent Lott lost his mansion

And became a man of the people.

Larry Craig took a wide stance on the tissues

And became a man’s man.

Science was re-written

By preachers and politicians.

Dennis Miller made a joke of it all

And wasn’t funny.

Mayor Koch wanted a President with balls

But forgot about brains.

Fox News stayed on message

Slap happy liars one and all.

Daddy Bush cried on TV

You guys are so mean to George.

A million little lies

Added up to a million dying.

Scalia scolded us

Get over it!

Mission Accomplished.

Bushie, you did a heck of a job.

 

 

This is a poem I wrote in 2009 during the fight over affordable health care. People (and I use the
term loosely to describe the fox news nuts) were more worried that the insurance companies and their multi-million a year ceo's might have to give up a few shekels than the 40 million people without health insurance.

The Insurance Executives Are Laughing

 

Their asses off. They

Have to be,

Watching this

Great outpouring of

Sympathy for their cause.

People are yelling, carrying

Signs saying

Give more to the companies

We’re worried the CEO’s

Won’t make enough money.

 

And yet, it’s hard

To hear the executives

Laughing over the

Raucous uproar

Of the corporate lobbyists

And their minions,

The Republicans.

 

glenn beck

 

Glenn Beck is channeling God.

The Fox Channel

Is channeling Glenn Beck.

Poem of the day

 

September Eleven

 

Not as important as

The investment bankers

Not heroes like

The firefighters,

They were the janitors

And waitresses, the window cleaners

Shoe shiners and

The rest of

The forgotten third

World workers

Who died on eleven

September, the people

From countries

No longer welcomed.

 

Layover at Ted Stevens International Airport

Layover at Ted Stevens International Airport

 

There is a stuffed polar bear in a glass display cage

Up on its hind legs

Looming over the ticket counter.

Other bears populate

The departure and arrival gates

No longer endangered.

At the Anchorage airport

Ted Stevens’ spirit

Is everywhere

And when the drilling

Finally starts,

As we all know it will,

There are sure to

Be more trophies

And more oil money

n the pockets of politicians.

A Sarah Palin Poem

A Sarah Palin Poem

 

A voice like hers

Was made for silent movies.

Her perfect nails scraping a chalkboard

Raking me over the coals.

There is terror in her voice

And loathing for everything in her sights.

I dream of her at night

And never want to wake up.

Angry Young Republicans

Angry Young Republicans

  

They tax and tax

The tax and tax

Your death, they are

Taxing us to death, they

Affirmative action us

Out of our rightful white birthright.

They are all against us

That’s why we need

Our guns

But they want to

Take those, too

Along with our money

And they won’t let our

Kids pray in school.

Those bastards

Are out to get us –

The rich, the white, the well connected

The oh so disaffected.