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The thought of Rick Santorum as the Republican nominee elicits all sorts of powerful, negative emotions within me. As a social conservative/fiscal liberal, Santorum represents everything wrong with the political Party I love. Even so, I recognize that reckless attacks on Santorum and his supporters will resolve nothing. We share a common goal, to see Barack Obama ousted from Office, and in order to accomplish that, we must be willing to work together.

While I don’t consider him to be the “perfect candidate,” I support Mitt Romney. On this blog, I have defended Romney from his religion, laid out a clear presentation of the Republican world view and broken down conservatism to its most basic elements, all in an attempt to dispel the most common misconceptions regarding the (still) frontrunner and to lay the groundwork for constructing a narrative in which Romeny defeats Barack Obama on November 6, 2012.

I’ve said it before a million times, but it’s worth repeating. Roughly one-third of this nation identifies as Republican, one-third identifies as Democrat, and another third identifies as politically independent. Although in recent polls Republicans have seen their numbers slip, while independents have seen their numbers rise–slightly.

Ostensibly, a national general election comes down to the candidate who can win more independent voters than your opponent .

How do you accomplish this?

It begins with an understanding that regardless of your own personal beliefs and convictions, politics is the art of compromise. This does not mean selling out to your political opponent, but rather buying into the democratic system. If a candidate cannot sell that they are willing to live by this maxim, they will have a hard time winning over political independents.

Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama all ran campaigns based, at least in part, on their proven history to “work across the aisles.” Ronald Reagan won big in ’84 by championing his history of working directly with the Democratic Speaker of the House, Tipp O’Neil.

Obviously it takes more than a willingness to work with the opposition. Bob Dole and John McCain both fashioned campaigns on their bi-partisan successes, yet both lost by considerable margins.

It could be said they lacked that certain je ne sais quoi needed to connect with and to energize the electorate. In this way, Presidential Elections are not too different from the student council elections of our youth, where the most popular, not necessarily the most qualified, end up winning office.

Probably more so than any other Presidential candidate in history, Barack Obama possesses this rock-star quality. He’s young (relatively speaking), hip and handsome. He gives inspirational speeches and, as we recently learned, even sings a little Al Green to his wife.

Regardless of how you feel about the President’s politics, you have to admit he is cooler than you and Americans want their President to be cooler than them.

There is not a politician alive today that can compete with the cult of personality that surrounds Barack Obama, but some are perceived as more relevant than others.

Somewhere below Obama and Reagan, and above Dole and Kerry, you will find Mitt Romney on the personality scale. If President Obama is Bob Dylan, then Mitt Romney would be Tom Petty, a rock star, but maybe not a cultural icon.

Romney presents himself as a very affable character capable of connecting with independent voters, especially in key swing states like Ohio and Florida. A majority of Americans realize this country is heading in the wrong direction and they would gladly vote for a challenger, provided that candidate possess the right temperament and cogent policy positions.

In short, Mitt Romeny can beat Barack Obama.

Rick Santorum, on the other hand, may play well at CPAC, but how would he do at Coachella?

He comes off as the paternal figure who yells at you for playing your music too loud and demands that you get a hair cut–a sharp, domineering, abrasive figure–more concerned with legislating his morals than fixing our economy. Sure, Obama favors a paternalistic form of government as well, but at least he’s the cool daddy government type–Matthew 25 type of stuff–Santorum just comes off as mean-spirited.

Santorum does not come off as the type of politician who would be willing to work with the opposition to solve this nation’s problems.  In fact, he comes off as an infantile obstructionist who would prefer plugging his ears and stopping his feet, to working with Democrats to creative compromises to get our economy moving again.

I’ve questioned many Santorum supporters about his winning narrative–how he would beat Barack Obama–and not a single one has given me a response. Instead, they simply list off the reasons they like him, which begin and and end with social issues.

Take for example this response from a Santorum supporter, after I asked her to sell Santorum to a pro-choice, pro-marriage equality, fiscal conservative:

How do they plan on selling Santorum to political independents or moderate Democrats if they can’t sell him to a fellow Republican?

So, I’ll issue this challenge to any and all Rick Santorum supporters, construct a narrative outlining how your candidate will beat Barack Obama in a general election if given the opportunity. I respect the 1st Amendment here, all comments are welcome, so open up and let ‘er rip.

Continue reading »]]> I recently stumbled across some YouTube video posted by an old friend. The following clips comprise a movie he wrote (and directed) for a Spanish class when were in high school. I believe this was shot when we were sophomores, so it would be the 1994-1995 school year. I did not take Spanish; I took French instead (real helpful in Texas), but I do have a part in the film. My car, a black Pontiac Grand Prix, steals the show.

Obviously, we were all huge fans of Cool Hand Luke and this was my friends’ attempt to bring it to a Spanish language audience and get an “A” in their Spanish class at the same time. After Cool Hand Lupe, we would all go on to film Thunder in Bivins, an attempted remake of the Hulk Hogan classic, Thunder in Paradise. Sadly, no known footage of Thunder in Bivins remains.

Without further delay, I present, in its entirety, Cool Hand Lupe. Enjoy!

Continue reading »]]> I’m normally not big on Internet quizzes, but found this one rather interesting. Over the past three years, I’ve had several arguments with my left-leaning friends regarding some of my rhetoric of President Obama’s policies. One of my harshest critics, my best-friend from high school suggested I break out of my “cultural bubble” and socialize with people outside my own socio-economic circle. I don’t claim to be most diverse person in the world–I do live in a part of Dallas known as “The Bubble”–but I am very different from my neighbors. I’m rather proud of my score, proves I’m not monolithic after all.
How about you? How did you score?

How Thick Is Your Bubble?

In other words, even if you’re part of the new upper class, you’ve had a lot of exposure to the rest of America.

Continue reading »]]> Yesterday, the Dallas Mavericks raised their first championship banner and I had the privilege of being in attendance. As a lifelong Mavs fan, I honestly thought I would never see the day my franchise was on top of the Association. For those of you who have waited patiently, but were unable to attend yesterday, I shot the following video of the pre-game festivities.

Continue reading »]]> I have to give the Occupy movement credit. They remained civil and culturally relevant much longer than I originally anticipated. However, it appears those days are now over.

From the beginning, this group has claimed to represent “the 99%”–a nebulous term, apparently meant to refer to anyone who doesn’t work in finance, but almost every image that comes out of the Occupy camps looks more like a Phish concert than Main Street America. Not to say the Occupiers aren’t welcome on Main Street, just that those living on Main Street might not feel too welcome among the Occupy crowd.

Certainly the movement raises some good points. If you look at the events that led to our current financial crisis, there are four main culprits–financial institutions, investors, unqualified borrowers and the government.

In order to correct the mess we’re in, and to ensure that it doesn’t happen again, each of these four entities must change the way they do business. It does no good for the government to crack down on financial institutions, if they’re not willing to change the way they do business. While the list of grievances committed by each entity differs greatly from the next, they do share a common denominator; they all bet on money they didn’t have. It stands to reason then that we should be demanding financial responsibility and accountability from these entities.

The Occupiers have the demanding accountability from the financial institutions and investors down to an art. Demanding accountability from borrowers and the government? Not so much.

Responsibility? The word is not in their vocabulary.

Examine the group’s actions and rhetoric and you begin to see why some labeled this a “Romper Room Revolution” from the start. Indeed, the Occupiers’ constant defiance of authority seems more like the product of disaffected young adults than a the courageous stand of a principled adult.

Some of the movement’s more rational minds seem to understand this and have sought to remind protesters appearances matter. Consider this tweet from Sean Hubbard, a fringe Democratic candidate for Senate:

You “appeal to the conscience of our nation” by observing the rule of law and outlining the abuses by some in the financial sector.

You “appeal to the conscience of our nation” by exposing our government’s addiction to the spending and the disastrous effect it has on our economy.

You “appeal to the conscience of our nation” by educating American consumers, especially those in lower income brackets, on how to manage their personal finances.

In short, you “appeal to the conscience of America” through dialogue and debate, not camping, chanting and drum circles.

The problem is–and the reaction of the evicted Zuccotti Park protesters proves this–that a good chunk of the protesters object to the idea of capitalism. Free markets and private property infuriate them. They seek not to fix our current problem, but to radically overthrow and transform our nation and way of life.

Until the Occupy movement distances itself from these radicals, it will be impossible for them to “appeal to the conscience of our nation.”

Continue reading »]]> Interesting piece on NPR yesterday from an African-American listener in New Hampshire. She talked of the racism she has experienced as a life-long New Englander, a region virtually void of “people of color.”

Reminds me of the stories my friend Quimby would tell of his times in Minnesota. Like me, Quimby was a native East Texan, an area heavily populated by African-Americans, yet synonymous with racism (see Jasper, Texas). Unlike me, Quimby is African-American, so I think he would be qualified to speak of an areas acceptance to African-Americans.

In the great white north of Minnesota, he said the racism was completely different than the racism down South. Up North, he was viewed as a novelty item (e.g. “the black guy” ) and this particular sugar-coated racism was more widespread.

In East Texas, he said, the racism, while definitely more intense, was isolated. You see, where we come from, you’re constantly surrounded by “people of color.” We went to school in some of the most well integrated school districts in the country and grew up in integrated neighborhoods. I just assumed it was like that everywhere, until I got to college.

Some of my suburban friends in college began looking through my high school yearbook and couldn’t believe how many black people went to my school. This puzzled me because I never thought anything of the ethnic make-up of my school (approximately 50% white/50 % African-American), I considered it normal.

A few years later, I traveled to Kansas City with a group of high school friends to visit one of our other high school friends (an African-American), who now lived in an affluent KC suburb. We went out to eat at a casual dining restaurant (4 white boys & 1 African-American) and received stares throughout the entire meal. This sugar-coated racism would never happen in East Texas (or anywhere else I’ve ever lived).

I slowly began to realize that most of the country is either void of a minority presence or, even worse, suffering de facto segregation. Yet places like East Texas continue to get dogged in the media for being behind the times in terms of race relations.

Again, I’m not naive enough to believe there are no racists in East Texas or throughout the Deep South. Indeed the Confederate flag is still flown proudly by some, BUT the vast majority of folks down here live completely integrated lives without incident. Conversely, based on the NPR piece and my own personal experiences, it appears that a much greater segment of the Northern population participates in at least the more sugar-coated forms of racism. In other words, it would seem that an African-American would be far more likely to become a victim to an act of racism up north, than down South.

Continue reading »]]> Last night, I (half) jokingly tweeted the following:

Since pulling back-to-back choke jobs in the NBA Playoffs in 2006 & 2007, both the local and national media have tried to convince basketball fans that the Dallas Mavericks are the worst NBA team ever, questioning their heart, lampooning their leader, and now, apparently just making up “facts.”

Reading ESPN.Com this morning, I thought I was going to have to question my MFFL credentials. The headline read, “Can Dirk and Mavs make it past the first round for second time in 10 years?” I knew things had been rough the past few seasons, but I do remember making it to the NBA Finals in ’06 and beating Spurs in Round 1 in ’09. Come to think of it, we beat the Rockets in Round 1 of ’05. Oh yeah, and we made it to Western Conference Finals in ’03. Need I continue?

Another example of the questionable journalism employed by ESPN, the so-called, “worldwide leader.” What a fucking joke!

Continue reading »]]> On our way home from dinner this evening, my wife had a break-through moment as she was able to correct my pronunciation. I failed in my attempt to describe a planned “soiree.” I try hard to speak standard English dialect whenever possible, but admit there are certain words, for whatever reason, that trip me up.

Without a doubt, “vulnerable” is my nemesis. I feel very vulnerable when I try to say “vulnerable.” For my wife, it’s “horror,” which always comes out sounding like the world’s oldest occupation title and not a movie genre. I am convinced everyone has words that give them fits. What are some of yours?

Continue reading »]]> As a college student, part of the church careers program  required all participants to serve as “associate pastors” at a small United Methodist Church buried deep in the pine thickets of East Texas–Diaville United Methodist Church. The church building consisted of a small sanctuary, with an even smaller kitchen built on the back to service the frequent pot luck dinners. On a good Sunday, twenty people may have gathered in the small sanctuary to listen to college kids try their best to preach their first sermons.

The good folks at Diaville UMC allowed us to control every aspect of their Sunday morning worship service, from the opening hymn, to the sermon and benediction and everything in between. Often, we would take requests for hymns to be sung during the worship service and the one hymn they continually request was “Church in the Wildwood”–an old time religion favorite.

“There’s a church in the valley by  the wildwood/No lovelier place in the dell/No spot is so dear to my childhood/As the little brown church in the dell.”

After stumbling through the first verse in a perfect key of East Texas flat, the entire church would erupt for the chorus, “oh come, come, come, come to the church in the wildwood.” If nothing else, you knew this song had meaning for the congregation.

Since moving to Dallas, my wife and I have been regular visitors to one of the larger United Methodist Churches in the nation. It sits only yards away from a UMC seminary, boasts a membership roll larger than my hometown, features at least 8 Sunday morning worship services that I am aware of and ministers to some of the most famous people in the city. It’s a great church, full of great pastors, staff and people. Normally, we opt for the contemporary worship service, but have had the opportunity to test out some of the other services as well.

This morning, we attended the baptism of our seven month old niece, a Sacrament performed only at the traditional worship service in the main sanctuary. The sermon was relevant to the liturgical calendar (First Sunday of Advent) and everything within the service built on the themes later preached in the sermon. However, in spite of the service’s efficiency, I found something to be missing.

Nothing bad, mind you. The theology was sound, but something seemed very different.

As I settled in for an afternoon nap, I began to reflect on the service. I then began to reflect on the church services at the church I grew up in, First United Methodist Church–Atlanta, Texas. FUMC-Atlanta is neither Diaville UMC, nor is it the church in Dallas I frequent. Instead, it is somewhere in between. A small town church for sure, with a relatively small membership roll, but blessed (or cursed, depending on how you look at it) to have multi-generational roots among its members. When a new family joined the church, they were welcomed with open arms and encouraged by all members to get involved within the church community. When a baby was baptized, the congregation let it be known that they would abide by the Church’s teachings and ensure that child was raised in the Church family. When the pastor preached, he preached to a congregation he knew on a first name basis.

The more I thought about it, I realized the true meaning of the “Church in the Wildwood” and why that hymn meant so much to the folks at Diaville United Methodist Church. It wasn’t about pastors. Thanks to the church careers program, they had a different pastor every week. It wasn’t about theology. A different pastor every week, meant a different theological prospective every week. It wasn’t about liturgy, music or apathy.

It was about the unique gift God had blessed the church with–the ability to connect and grow as small vibrant family in God. Singing “Church in the Wildwood” every week was their way of thanking God for the unique circumstance.

Ostensibly, there’s nothing wrong with mega-churches. I happen to be very happy with the one we frequent. However, I firmly believe that some of God’s greatest gifts lie in those  all to often forgotten churches in the wildwood.