“It's still hard for me to have a clear mind thinking on it. But it's the truth even if it didn't happen.” - Ken Kesey

Long ago in a galaxy far, far away, two roommates and I were graduating from college and decided in our grand egalitarian manner to host a celebratory pig roast for our blue collar neighborhood. I had been expanding my knowledge of English literature with a mix of motorcycle mechanics, factory girls and the gainfully unemployed, so I called on one of my neighborhood buddies for counsel.

Blynn Shaw was a serial adulterer, amateur and convincing prize fighter, expert with a chainsaw, and knew a farmer south of town who’d be glad to sell us a pig, so there we went in Eddie’s Ford station wagon. The pig farm was just that and since Eddie considered himself a seasoned entrepreneur he put himself in charge of negotiations with the farmer, while Kevin and I took on capture duty. The farmer’s kid opened a small vertical door in the wood-sided barn and to an inviting who-ee out stormed a hundred or so pigs.

The farmer said take your pick but remember you got to carry ‘er out. My teammate was a scrapper from Chicago and I had been thoroughly trained in urban warfare by the Salesians of Don Bosco in NYC but neither of us had ever seen a live pig let alone catch one. It had started to pour down rain and the thought of entering the mud hole did not reflect well on our investment in higher education though that’s what we did.

Kevin had enough brains to go for a small one and we did manage to tackle it after a few dragged us through the mud and pig you-know-what. The farmer’s kid threw us a rope and we tied up that pig with the fear of the Lord and all things wild in our hearts. We dragged the screaming beast toward the gate hollering for Eddie to back up the wagon. The bib overalled farmer greeted us with tears in his eyes. He said he hadn’t laughed that hard in years and the pig was on him!

I don’t know if you’ve ever driven to a slaughterhouse with a live pig in the back of a station wagon but it proved to be memorable. Eddie kept telling Kevin to hold down the pig while I stopped Kevin from killing Eddie before the swine.

The boys at the slaughterhouse had thought they’d seen everything until a few badly stained and worse smelling college boys pulled up with a live pig. “Where in thunder did you boys find that pig” they hollered. We weren’t in a joking mood but they were laughing too hard to haul the pig so Kevin and I grabbed the poor beastie like a bad drunk from Corby’s Bar and hauled her (or him, we’d never know) up onto the loading dock to its eternal fate.

We didn’t talk much on the ride home and neither Kevin nor I would lift a finger to help Eddie hose out his wagon but we cooked that pig in our front yard a week later to the delight of our beer drinking neighbors and the shock and awe of our university colleagues.

What’s all this go to do with a Vantage Point on current affairs you may be wondering? Well, since we selected Barack Obama to manage the animal farm we call Congress and the variety of pigs and piglets therein, why are we aghast that they’ve soiled his clothes and are dragging him through the mud?

Barack is a smart young fellow and could talk a farmer out of his lunch pail but pigs, they’re a breed apart, and talking to a pig is much like conversing with a dining room table as Congress Frank recently lamented.

Given this far reaching umbrella of understanding and exception for Barack and his first months in office, I humbly offer our good president the following:

Heath Care Reform

Quit having secret meetings with big pharma and the insurance boys. They already have your wallet and they’ll have your eye teeth and kid’s lunch money before you can say public option. Also, try calling the “debate” what it is: not “health care” but corporate profiteering on the suffering of others. The idea of hospital as profit center and medicine as business are destined for Dante’s hell and should be dispatched thereto if there’s any hope for meaningful change.

Economy

Ok, Goldman Sachs financed your election and Tim Geithner looked honest in a befuddled altar boy sort of way, but between Treasury and Fed everything of value that wasn’t bolted down is being looted by the Wall Street vampires. You are not in charge of running America’s economy. Just wake up the SEC, start housing the thieves from Sachs and AIG up in Attica with a few new homeys, put back the laws that curbed the gluttony of the Hamptons pariahs and call it good.

War

Never a good idea though your predecessor squandered every ounce of our country’s good faith to promulgate them. You should know better having read a few books, at least about the futility of conquering Afghanistan. Look over your shoulder. Iraq is now a third world gas station. And by the way, when did we declare war on Pakistan? No pipeline through this apocalyptic landscape is worth the blood and treasure and the endeavor will corrupt what’s left of your and our moral compass.

Last but not least, one subject you ought to be leading on but ARE NOT:

Environment

Stop strip mining Appalachia is a good start but clean coal is a cruel joke and our abuse of natural resources and pollution of the air, earth and seas hasn’t slowed a fraction. Regulating environmental crime is something you can take on that is vital and worthy. If you don’t, the world you leave to your beautiful children will make today’s Iraq and the Horn of Africa seem like tomorrow’s Martha’s Vineyard.

vpdonhynes.blogspot.com/2009/08/obama-and-pigs-for-free-long-ago-in.html