Before President Obama’s speech on jobs before a joint session of Congress Americans got an unlikely opening act – John Boehner and Joe Biden joking around and talking golf.
Speaker Boehner also had something to say about the Vice President’s wife.
For the record, the Vice President’s wife, Dr. Jill Biden, is the one in the red dress. You can decide for yourselves whether or not she’s the “cutest one in the row by far,” or not.
You might be wondering why I’m making a fuss over such a few soundbites that are too mundane to be of any importance. They are just basic human interactions. Well, that is exactly why I’m pointing them out.
We long ago forgot that politicians are, in fact, human beings – much like the rest of us only with better connections. Even on the local level – the level I work round as a camera tech for a small town’s government access television channel – a politician with an opposing point of view is not a fellow town resident with whom you have a difference of opinion. No, they are the enemy and no piece of hyperbolic, incendiary language goes too far in describing them and their kind. These alleged “people” across the political aisle are cruel, inhumane, lying, cheating, unpatriotic, anti-American, etc, etc. Pick your adjective, they are nearly innumerable and if you do run out, take a page from the strategy books of several politicos and make some up. Even the politicians from your end of things seem more like robotic characters – or caricatures, depending on the day and the issue – than flesh and bone human beings. Moments like this briefly point out that is not the case. Neither of these gentlemen is the scheming, devious Disney-style villain we might image them to be and they aren’t. They aren’t androids either, though former Vice President Dick Cheney does come the closest to inorganic life with his mechanical heart. (That’s not an attack, by the way, it’s a fact, so relax.) These two men are merely two guys with big, important jobs who enjoy a joke, a good game of golf, and think that Jill Biden looks particularly fetching.Conversations like these happen in workplaces all across the country and might sound familiar if you swap out a few points. If a comment had been made that “anyone who doesn’t like the Yankees is an asshole,” the conversation could’ve gone like this at the water cooler or in the break room of an office in the real world.
John – Hey, I’m one of those assholes you were talking about.
Joe – Haha, yeah, you’re nuts, man. You don’t know what you’re talking about.We have that meeting today. I hope it doesn’t drag on forever.
John – Yeah. So, did I tell you my in-laws are visiting?
Joe – No, how’s that going?
John – Not too bad if you’re comparing it to, say, a root canal. I swear I have no idea how anyone ever slept in their house. Her father snores so loud you can hear it on the other side of the house! And then this morning I’m woken up by my mother-in-law yelling at her husband through the bathroom door. “Harold, do you have a pair of undershorts in there? You have a pair? Did you say yes? Yes? I can’t hear you! I’m bringing you a pair.” I hope I survive to the end of the week.
John – That’s gonna be the two of you in about twenty years. I’ve been meaning to ask you, did you see that new girl? In HR?
John – Yeah, I saw her. Cutest one in the department. By far.
See? Told you.
Politicians are people, even though they don’t always seem like it and even when they say things that we don’t like. At the start of what is sure to be a vicious presidential election process, I think it’s a good thing to be reminded of. I’m not sure the President’s plan of action for jobs really lived up to all the pomp and circumstance of a joint session of Congress but I think getting all of our elected officials together and talking and so on did get them in a slightly less partisan mood and the country needs that every so often.
Discourse in C# Minor 