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Ask Dr. Babooner

34 Comments

Dear Dr. Babooner,

I just want to make it clear at the outset that I love my country.

I love it so much I want to make all of its decisions for it. But to be able to make those decisions, I have to win a major, major contest against the person who’s running it now.

I say “running it now” but in fact he’s not running it. No one person can run an entire country – especially this one. It’s too big and varied.

But anyway, I really, really want to win. So I go around pretending he’s running the country poorly and messing it up. And I also pretend that I can somehow do a better job. We both know this is nonsense, but we both continue to act like fixing an economy is no big deal, and that we both know exactly how it’s done.

Every now and then a bunch of numbers come out that indicate how the country is faring. When the numbers are bad, I look better. When the numbers are better, I look bad.

Dr. Babooner, I really need my country to have some bad numbers right now. I find myself dreaming of massive unemployment increases and a misery index that is off-the-charts awful.

But I only want to see this calamity deepen so I can get a chance to make things right! The agony of other people creates opportunity for me, and when I get a the right opportunity, I’m pretty sure I can make things better for everyone! That might be another hallucination but there’s only one way to find out!

Does that make me a bad person?

Seamus Roofrack, Esq.

I told Mr. Roofrack that yes, in fact, this does make him a bad person. No question. Wishing misery on strangers so one can get an opportunity to reduce their misery is as radical a self-glorification fantasy as one is likely to have. It’s like Lassie hoping Timmy falls in the well so she can charge to his rescue. This is a fanciful story, though, because a canine would never be so selfish or deluded.

But that’s just one opinion. What do YOU think, Dr. Babooner?

34 thoughts on “Ask Dr. Babooner”

  1. Romney went out on stage at the first presidential debate and lied himself blue in the face. That was to be expected. President Obama seemed utterly flummoxed….
    +++++
    No, Obama wasn’t flummoxed. He was “Gish Galloped”, named after creationist Duane Gish, is the debating technique of drowning the opponent in such a torrent of half-truths, lies, and straw-man arguments that the opponent cannot possibly answer every falsehood in real time.

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    1. Gish Galloping is a clever (NOT Cleaver) and diabolical debating trick. So terrible that Seamus inflicted it on our prez. I haven’t seen the whole debate from last week and I think it would be a good idea to keep avoiding it.
      I was VERY discouraged to hear that the debate wiped out Obama’s lead. I hope that Joe and debate #2 can somehow get it back.

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      1. My advice to you: continue avoiding it! It was just plain sickening to observe a man who has accomplished so much for our country be subjected to 90 minutes of shock & awe.

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  2. odds are that having thoughts of ill will didnt make you a bad person , you already were a bad person. otherwise these thoughts would never have come to you in the first place. the problem with the race today is that you have the guys in the white hats who are there to help people and trying in earnest to do whatever they can to make the world a better place, hoping against hope that if they phrase the question correctly that the opposition will allow them to do good, and then you have the opposition who sees the piles of money available to be moved over to their side of the table and away form all the grubby little mitts of the needy and the ill prepared. they have plans and methodologies in a vault that will allow them to take over the world and shut the have nots out. a friend in the banking business has an idea on how to make his business more profitable and a friend in the oil business more profitable, a friend in the business of servicing the world at war has an idea on how to spend more in one year than has been spent in the history of time and wed better do it quick before someone catches on. if the guys in the white hats are in power the only way to stop them is to muck up every thing they do and wait for the opportunity to get back in power through the use of fear and anger as ways to manipulate the poor schmucks who want to keep america from going to hell in a handbasket. if the idea of making life painful so that the guy trying to help looks like he failed when in reality the only thing he failed at was believing that the best interests of his country would be put ahead of personal gain by the guys in the black hats then we have an obvious choice.

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  3. When we consider some of the bad things being done when the better people are in power and the even more awful things that are sure to happen if the less good get in power, we are caught in a bad place. It is time for a revolt. Only give the better guys enough support to keep them in power. Put more effort into forcing them to do the right thing and have a plan to eventually, better sooner than later, get people in power who will really do the right thing. Roofrack you don’t deserve anyones support and I hope somehow your efforts to manipulate people to get in power back fires on you.

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  4. i love the name seamus roofrack. its hard to believe we would think about making a man the leader of our country who would have no more insight than to put his dog on the roofrack of his suv and not realize he was putting his dog in peril, its hard to believe that a man who would say that he is not going to worry about trying to about all those people who need the government funded programs to make life work would be considered for a leadership position. the fact that seamus roofrack came out on top of the heap from the primary where the stumblebums and misfits went rolling off the cliff and imploding before our very eyes has to make you wonder what kind of idiots they take us for. can we be fooled into thinking the candidate they put up will have any say whatsoever as to how his party will allow him to respond? balderdash. this is not a supreme court justice who is placed in a position of power for life and may turn out to be a surprise in the long run, this is a talking head for the party who will ask when it is time to go to the bathroom. he is not a leader he is the figurehead of the party of the money and fear who asks what he is to say next and tries to remember what they tell him. the scary part of seamus is that if the powers that be told him to strap the country to the roof of his car he would, there is just not a lot going on up there for old seamus. he may be fine for a job as a doorman or a hotel clerk but as the leader of the band he is a buffoon. havent we had enough of the buffoons out of those guys? is this the best theyve got? or is it that when you take the man out of the equation and all you have left is a suit with a set of prepared statements to recite in response to whatever comes up and instructions to say them authoritatively, the odds of finding a person of substance goes down dramatically. seamus i hope you lose and i hope yo go somewhere where you can have your dog on the roof and the consequences are that the dog has a bad time not the world at large. i dont wish ill on your dog , i wish good on the rest of the world.

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    1. “he is not a leader he is the figurehead” yup. rumsfield and his think tank powerbrokers are still their with their plans for us

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  5. Dear Mr. Roofrack,
    In order to reach for the lofty goal you are reaching for it seems that having an ego the size of Texas (or possibly larger) is required. An ego like that is bound to blind you to pesky details like how many lives your ill thoughts and actions would affect. Yours is a party that thrives on fear of change and an overweening need for order (never mind your whacked-out economic ideas). Perhaps you could think on that for a bit. If your constituents truly have a fear of change and a strong need for order, then perhaps the best thing is to let the other guy win: there would not be drastic changes and undoing of the order that has been slowly building over the last few years, and all of the other men and women that work with the person in the position you aspire to would also work with a known quantity (again with the lack of change and less chaos during a potential transition). And if that doesn’t work, maybe we could find someone to box your ears and ask, “what on earth are you thinking????”

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  6. OT: I’m planning a cabin trip this weekend. It could be souful, looking at the last of the leaves while a soft rain patters on the flat roof of my queer cabin. Guests are welcome, and you can ride up with me IN the car, not tied to the roof rack.

    I just finished Clyde’s book, thanks to the generosity of Bill in Mpls who printed it and loaned it to me. I thoroughly enjoyed Clyde’s unique vision. I’d be delighted to share the printed book with anyone who is interested

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    3. Thank you for the compliment, Steve. And from you, whose skills I so respect.
      I hope the trip works out for you.
      I won’t be on the Trail much for the next few days, distracting medical issue.

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  7. Dear Mitt, I mean Seamus Roofrack,

    I am sure you are a fine husband, father, businessman, and Mormon. However, your relationship to your own principles seem a bit weak. Your relationship to the truth seems even weaker. I think you are a rotten politician. I will leave the judgement of your personhood to your Higher Power.

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    1. Apparently Seamus know how to make a lot of money, but I don’t think we can say that he is a fine businessman. As we learn more about the kind business he was in, it seems his work there resembles his work as a politician.

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  9. Morning all – just caught up on the trail. Love everyone’s stories.

    Today’s letter writer just brings me back around to my favorite political theory. Anyone who wants to be president is automatically disqualified by that desire!

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    2. That’s a good theory, VS. Unfortunately we will be stuck with one of those people as president and I wouldn’t like to see it go the least of the two. I think you know which one I have in mind. He’s the one who thought his dog, Seamus, might like to ride on the top of his car.

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      1. No, no.. there is a second part to my theory. That we should find someone who we think would be a good president, but who doesn’t want to run. Then we force that person to do the job — and tell them that if they don’t do a good job, we’ll make them serve another term!

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        1. Right. We should do that. Let me know if there is some way we can do that and I will help.

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  10. Dear Mr. Roofrack,
    I’d like to say that I hope your dog bites you, but that would be juvenile and petty. If you really love your country so much, perhaps you could stand back and take a good hard look at it and ask yourself if you really have the tools to make it better. If you really care, you’ll be more concerned with what is best for the country and the majority of its people than you are with your own avarice. You could begin by considering well the words of a famous President who led our country some 50 years ago, “And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.” I don’t think you’re close to being qualified to run the country if you have not given full consideration to this philosophy.
    Sincerely,
    Dr. Babooner

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  11. Nice post, Dale. I admire the baboons who have responded today. I think the small numbers of reposnses is a function of speechlessness that I know I have when I think about this election and the issues that are at stake. My ancient computer at home has gone irreparably kerflooey, so i may not be on the trail much until I get it replaced in the next week or two.

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  12. Folks, I have my 4th and 5th grade choirs sing Heaven Help Us All every 2 years. I posted Stevie Wonder singing this not too long ago. I can’t think of another song to post for today. Perhaps you can think of one. Here is Ray Charles.

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  13. I wish I could go to sleep and wake up on election day—just in time to vote. I listened to the debate from another room, could not bear to watch. Mitty sounded as if he was on coke or speed, didn’t he have to breathe? I guess he has the votes of those who hate Obama and those on the far right so he is going to try to say anything to convince the undecided that he is not what he is. gives me a headache.

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