There is nobody this side of a lunatic asylum that could have a kind word or thought about Bernard Madoff. He has indiscriminately destroyed the remainder of many people’s lives, made wastes of the earlier parts of their lives wherein they worked and saved for a financially secure old age that will now never happen, and ruined many of the proud unique hallmarks of our American civilization: our communal efforts to help the lives of others by supporting and sustaining vast numbers of organized charities. To be fair, he has also hurt people who sacrificed caution on the altar of their own greed. Bill Clinton said, “If something looks too good to be true, it usually is.”

          Newspapers have run headlines like, “Burn in Hell” and people publically compete with each other to suggest punishments, each one more barbarous than the other.

          Presently, Madoff is confined to a small cell under conditions that compared to those the terrorists imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay enjoy should make them think that they have arrived at the Pearly Gates, or wherever it is they believe to be their last deserved resting place. Madoff is even denied the right to read, and since this presumably includes the Bible, denies him the right to religious conversion – a state of grace for which my fellow co-religionists and I wish would occur as soon as possible.

          It is easy, in a society founded on the Judeo-Christian principles of compassion, redemption and forgiveness to extend these virtues to socially acceptable and attractive individuals. It is much harder to do so with parasitic lice like the Madoffs of the world. To hold out a hand to a hungry child is commendable, self-satisfying and comfortable. However, to treat Madoff not with mercy, but in a way that allows him to undermine the better angels of our nature, does more to harm us as human beings than he could ever do, and in the last analysis, makes him and others like him, the winners.        

 

 By Jackie Mason & Raoul Felder

          Like senior citizens stampeding into a restaurant for the Early Bird Special, commentators are falling all over each other in trying to declare that the Obama speech on race was the best speech since the Gettysburg Address, or at least since their Bar Mitzvah speeches, usually begun, “Today I am a fountain pen …” or perhaps now it should read “computer.”   

          The speech, however, was brilliant for a different reason.  He gave a speech about race when race was not the issue.  It would be like President Bush addressing Congress and making a speech about crabgrass.            

         The issue was Obama’s nitwit pastor.  His sermons – inconveniently for him (and Obama) videotaped – ran the spectrum from hateful “Goddam the United States” to the ridiculous – America caused the AIDS epidemic, to declaring that the Government was the cause of 9/11.  Although Obama claimed he never actually heard the preacher say these disgusting words, it was rapidly becoming absurd for him to continue in that position, given the fact the pastor was his spiritual advisor, married him, baptized his children, counseled with him, and made these remarks to many thousands of people in his audience.  The conservative press (as few as they may be), and conservative commentators were closing in.  It was only a question of time before people would turn up who were sitting in the audience with him while the pastor was spewing his idiosyncrasies.  He arrived at a brilliant solution – make a speech about something else before the rug is pulled out from under him and he would have to do a Spitzer. 
 

           The problem is that today race is not really a problem in America.  The President of the largest entertainment conglomerate in America – Time Warner – is an African American, so is America’s leading talk show host.  The highest non-elective post in America, Secretary of State, is filled by an African American who, incidentally, replaced another African American. All of this is not to mention that Obama himself has astounding popularity and has a lead in being his party’s nominee for President.   

            Obama has successfully, by his speech, deflected attention from a potentially lethal blow which reflects on a real issue – his judgment.          

            Obama seems to make a keystone issue that the major difference between he and Hillary is that he was opposed to the Iraq War from the start.  So what!  So was our brother-in-law.  And neither he nor Obama was in the Senate at the time to vote for or against the War, and who knows what they would have done if they had all the information available to them as Senators.

            Hillary says she is the candidate of experience because of her time in the White House.  Experience doing what?  Arranging flowers (as her recently released records revealed)?  Experience being one step ahead of the Sheriff?  Her just released records revealed that she was upstairs in the White House, while her husband was getting “Lewinskied” downstairs.   Some person might ask the uncharitable question: How is she going to figure out what’s going on in the rest of the world, when she could not figure out what was going on downstairs in her own house? 

          The real question is: In a country that has so many talented people of all races and religions, in varying sizes, from giants to midgets, how did we end up with these two duds?

Jackie Mason and Raoul Lionel Felder

           In all of the thousands of photographs of Hillary on the campaign trail she always appears wearing trousers – not even one photograph with her wearing a skirt.  Not a peep on the subject from any commentator or member of the media.  Yet, if on a particularly steamy day campaigning in Florida or Georgia, Senator McCain wore a skirt, it would be the major story on every media outlet.  Is this fair?

            There was, rightfully, outrage when an MSNBC commentator referred to Mrs. Clinton as “pimping” out her daughter.  The comment was disgusting beyond disgusting, but the point attempted to be made, while foul in its expression, might be valid in its underlying concept.  The exploitive use of a particular person in a way where that individual’s personae is connected to a cause when the person’s views or expertise is unilluminating or irrelevant on the issues, is worthy of note, in an appropriate manner (as opposed to what was done on MSNBC).  Chelsea Clinton was paraded about not because of anything she could offer by way of sagacity in foreign or domestic affairs.  Let us be frank: she was on the tour because it pointed out Hillary’s non-robotic side – that she also is a mother – something that hopefully would resonate with other mothers.

            But to be fair: They all do this.  The Edwards campaign exploited Mrs. Edwards’ cancer.  President Bush had his half-Latino Spanish-speaking nephew working his campaign in areas where his speaking Spanish and his ethnicity would help him.  Celebrity endorsements are just another – perhaps more remote – manifestation of this same sort of campaign strategy.

           All of this is fair game for comment IF the commentary is couched in appropriate and non-offensive language.  Worse would be a paralyzing fear that frightens us into silence – even when it involves legitimate observations.

           Obama has run a brilliant campaign, is a mesmerizing speaker, and has captured the yearnings and hopes of millions of people.  He has transcended, in his appeal, race, ethnicity, age and sex.  But the fact is that he is experienced in running no enterprise and yet seeks to run the largest enterprise in the world.  He is virtually inexperienced in government, domestic and certainly foreign policy – all of which should be at the heart of any president’s expertise – and yet the same could really be said of Lincoln, and to some degree Franklin Roosevelt.  But somewhere, somehow, what Churchill referred to as “a little mouse of thought” must be considered: That is, if Obama were white, given his lack of experience, he would not be in the lead for his party’s nomination for President of the United States. 

           Commentators should have the intellectual honesty to note this, as well as the fact that it might be, in effect, a good thing.  His candidacy, with all of his lack of experience stands as a stark contrast and home for those people who are fed up, or, to be charitable, disenchanted with Washington’s business-as-usual, and the usual group of subjects simply playing musical chairs in the running of this country.  Credit must also be given him for not claiming experience when it does not really exist – which is precisely what Hillary Clinton has done.  Her experience basically has been to sleep with the President (hardly a unique claim – at least for females under eighty years of age in the Washington area), become an enabler for the President to carry on with his extra-marital activities and, as all first ladies, arrange for the catering of State dinners – hardly fitting the job description for a President.

           Nobody mentions the fact that senators, of both parties run for president and ask us for our support, money, effort and loyalty.  But yet these same senators do not have enough faith in their own cause to quit their day job and leave the senate.  Putting aside the fact that if they are running for president, they cannot put in full time to do their jobs in the Senate (for which we pay them), why should we have faith in them and give them our money when they hedge their bets?   Would it not make more sense to say to them, “When you show me you believe in yourself and your cause to the extent you give up your other job, then we will support you”?  Is there any business where you can say to your boss, “Keep paying me my full salary for two years while I spend my time looking for another job”?

by Raoul Felder 

Oh, what’s love got to do, got to do with it,What’s love but a second-hand emotion.                   

Tina Turner

           Valentine’s Day is about romantic love:  gushing, vibrant, tender, heartbreaking, heart pounding, pulse quickening, knee weakening, lump-in-your-throat-can’t-eat-or-sleep love.  If you really want to know about love, ask me.  I am a divorce lawyer.

          Putting aside the kind of love that results from a train wreck of crashing hormones (best confined to the backseats of Chevrolets), and the purest of loves – familial, parental or grandparental – the love they sell the cards about, is the product of habit or fear – or both.

          Habit:  Human beings follow Newton’s First Law:Bodies in motion tend to stay in motion, bodies at rest tend to stay at rest. In Sheldon Harnick’s lyric, Tevya asks Goldie:

          Do you love me?

          Goldie:  Do I love you?For twenty-five years I’ve washed your clothes,Cooked your meals, cleaned your house,Given you children, milked the cow…For twenty-five years I’ve lived with him,Fought him, starved with him,Twenty-five years, my bed is his,If that’s not love, what is?

          No less an authority on the subject than I, Jackie Mason points out that the only two questions answered by a number are about marriage or prison sentences (some might arguably make a connection between the two).  He points out that if you ask a man if he liked a steak, or a particular movie, he will not hesitate to answer “Yes” or “No”.  Ask the same man if he is happily married, and the likely answer is a shrug of the shoulders and “25 years.”

Fear of:      Being alone, dying alone, being able to get the laundry done, bringing up the children, poverty, fear itself.

           There are things worse than being old and alone:  To be old together, filled with hate, or worse, indifference – two sexless lumps, staring across the truce line of a morning breakfast table waiting for the other to die, or having to attend a dribbling, feeble and ruined carcass of a memory.

         The institutionalization of romantic love is, of course, marriage — but marriage in America is a failed institution.  The usual statistic is one out of three marriages end in divorce.  But if you add the married couples who live apart (for which there are no reliable statistics), and those slugging it out in court (who have not yet become statistics), and the really big Number:  People who are simply unhappy, but stay together “for the children” or for economic reasons, “We two shall be lapt together in a five-percent exchequer bond.”  (Eliot), the relevant number – the marriage failure rate – must be in excess of 50%.  There is no product in the world (except perhaps commercial Xerox machines) that have a 50% breakdown rate and are still in business.

          The underlying problem may be that monogamy is a learned societal trout.  Out of 4,000 mammalian species, only a handful are monogamous.  These include beavers and a couple of other rodents – hardly desirable bedmates.

          Valentine’s Day, humbug!  Give me a holiday with real meaning, like Halloween.              

By Jackie Mason and Raoul Felder

           The Kennedys recently endorsed Barack Obama, and Teddy Kennedy drew a parallel with President Kennedy – a vision of a new Camelot rising like a Phoenix from the ashes of the Bush Administration. Either he was addressing the largest group of amnesiacs ever gathered in one place in history or the media and much of America has been eating funny mushrooms and is in the throes of a mass delusion.

           Back to reality: The late President Kennedy bears responsibility for the initiation of one of the bleakest episodes in modern American history – the Vietnamese War. Only because Khrushchev had more common sense than he, did we avoid an enormous catastrophe. After the fall of the Soviet Union, when the Russians’ secret files were opened, we learned (among other bits of knowledge, such as the fact that the Rosenbergs were indeed Russian atomic spies) that there were functioning, deployed, short- and mid-range atomic missiles in Cuba. If we ever, as threatened, tried to land troops directly after the Bay of Pigs debacle on Cuban shores, our troops would have been slaughtered – one missile, thousands of Americans annihilated. This is all not to mention that the fiasco of the Bay of Pigs was authorized by President Kennedy himself, and then he left the Cuban patriots out to dry by withholding promised air support.

          Many of Kennedy’s private and cabinet sessions were secretly recorded; and many years later, one of these recordings from the time of the Bay of Pigs episode reveals Kennedy musing that for a President to go down in history he has to have a war. “Where would Lincoln be without the Civil War?” A cynic might therefore suggest that Kennedy’s trip to the brink of a nuclear holocaust was not the result of his inexperience but, rather, it had a more selfish origin. On the domestic front, he accomplished little, and his promises had to be delivered by President Johnson. He did, however, inaugurate the White House revolving door policy as far as women were concerned, and even in this area it needed a subsequent President (Clinton) to bring it to a point of perfection.

           The other members of the Kennedy bunch are also hardly poster boys for responsible government – or even human beings. The liberals hug Robert Kennedy’s memory, but choose not to remember that he personally authorized the wiretaps on Dr. Martin Luther King. He also carried on the President’s policies; and, as in many families, there were traditions such as passing down clothing from an older to a younger child – only they did this with women. (The most well known of these involved the late Marilyn Monroe.) After the President was through with her, he passed her down to Bobby. Ultimately, as we all know, the poor woman eventually killed herself.

          There are, of course, the gaggle of Kennedy relatives who have been arrested and charged with everything from drunk driving, to rape, and even murder. This, of course, brings us to the present Bloviator-in-Chief, Teddy Kennedy. It would be easy to write him off as another senatorial windbag. But he bears a distinction born by no other Senator: He has killed someone – and not while serving as a member of the armed forces. After a drunken party, he drove off a bridge and left his passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, alone to drown to death, trapped in his car.

          All of this makes us wonder at the judgment of Mr. Obama, or the American public. Camelot, once the fairytale aspect is put aside, is as attractive as a cesspool – and may even smell a lot worse.

            In a crazy sort of way, Britney Spears being taken to a mental institution may be the best thing that ever happened to her in terms of her custody case.  It’s one thing to be a rotten, spoiled, willful and immature brat.  These are basic character traits with which the law deals, with difficulty.  But if a person is a drug addict or an alcoholic, or mentally ill person, the courts are experienced with those situations and when a parent is so possessed of such an affliction, usually when they come into court they present proof they have sought treatment and are actually undergoing treatment.  America loves to give people second chances, and in those sad cases, the courts usually condition visitation and/or custody upon continued treatment and policing of that treatment.  If I were Britney’s lawyer, that’s exactly how I would play it:  she has an emotional problem for which she is undergoing treatment, but basically she is a decent person who is ill, and illnesses of this sort today can be, if not cured, at least contained, with the victim being able to function appropriately. 

            Don’t get me wrong.  I would vote for Obama if he was an Albino, Penobscot Indian whose religion was sun-worshipping, or if his sex life included sleeping with a horse (except, as Jackie Mason noted, if it were MY horse).  This would all make no difference to me … IF he was the most qualified person running for President, and I felt that he would be the best person suited to deal with emergencies and the unexpected crises facing the next President that will certainly arise.  Unfortunately, Obama has nothing in his background or foreground that indicates he is that person.  Sure, he is charismatic, but so was Clark Gabel, but I would not have voted for him for President.  Obama’s experience in governance is non-existent.  This is not a place for on-the-job training.  If I wanted to hire somebody to run a supermarket I would want a person who has some experience in running a supermarket.  As for running a country, I would want – at least – a bit more experience.         

            Talking about experience, Hillary Clinton keeps saying she has 35 years of experience.  Her experience, doing what?  Her experience is having been married to the man who was the President.  Since when does sleeping with somebody give you experience?  If I knew a doctor’s wife or girlfriend, does that mean because of sleeping with him she is competent to take out my appendix?  As a matter of fact, if sleeping with Bill Clinton gives Mrs. Clinton the experience to run the country, there must be 100 girls around Washington who could claim even better – or at least more – experience through him. 

           One thing is for sure.  The absolute dumbest way to choose a candidate is what we are doing now.  Utilizing 30 second sound bites, for instance, the result is, newspapers report that the best comment on a recent debate was Huckabee’s, “Jesus would not have run for President” which, aside from shedding no light on a candidate’s ability to be President, is not capable of logical comprehension. 
            Usually you expect the Democrats to field a varied and interesting cast of characters who want to be President.  Instead, we have Hillary Clinton, whose major achievement is being one step ahead of the Sheriff (and one might add, a couple of steps behind her plastic surgeon – I don’t mean to be catty, but in her early photographs of herself before plastic surgery, she doesn’t even look like a member of her own family), and Barack Obama, who is the Paris Hilton of candidates, i.e., like her, he is famous for being famous, and nothing else.

              The Republicans, on the other hand, have a former preacher, a former mayor, an OB/GYN doctor, two legislators, one of whom was a prisoner of war, and an actor who appears to be in various stages of decay.  Added to this debate was Ambassador Keans who seemed as out of place as a Shakespearean actor becoming a member of the Dead End Kids in a 1930’s movie, and made about as much sense.  In a recent debate, the moderator, who at worst looked like an Elsa Koch impersonator, and at best, a power-mad school marm, cut off even the limited debate that occurred on previous occasions.
            The public is entitled to real debates, because there are real differences and, instead of who said what,  40 years ago, we should be worrying about what is going to happen in the future, and which one of these people could rise to the occasion.  A Roman scholar said, “The only thing constant is change itself.”  Similarly, the only thing we know for sure is that every modern President has had to face some unexpected crisis and had to act decisively in response to it.  People have to make their own choice and, surely, the linchpin should be, Who would you have the most faith in to react appropriately to an unexpected crisis?
            God bless President Bush, but the fact is, the cameras caught him, when they told him about 9/11, as looking virtually brain dead or, to be charitable, like a deer caught in headlights.  We can’t take a chance in such a volatile, dangerous world, to let this happen. 
 

            Every time the subject of 9/11 comes up, the sunshine soldiers and summer patriots of the “could’ve, would’ve and should’ve” school of criticism lecture us about all of the mistakes that were made when 9/11 happened and its immediate aftermath.  Back in the real world, 9/11 was the most deadly attack on American citizens – claiming thousands of victims – that has occurred in the long history of this country.  Further, the strike was unexpected and without warning or suspicion of impending doom.  Of course, once it happened, the City could have simply been shut down.  But this would have devastated the economy of New York and in turn, since New York is both the central financial hub of both America and the world, not only would America’s economy have been ruined, but there would have been a worldwide economic collapse.
 
            On June 22, 1941, when Russia was attacked by Germany, Joseph Stalin was so paralyzed that for days he locked himself in a room in his Dacha, paralyzed into inaction, while the Nazis overran his country, killing and capturing literally hundreds of thousands of soldiers, and destroying the Russian air force – and this was after he was warned by numerous sources that the attacks were about to occur.
 
            This was not what happened here in New York.  The institutions of government were reconstructed on an immediate basis.  If business did not go on as usual, at least there was a reasonable facsimile thereof.  On the West Side Piers there was the astounding spectacle of each of the City agencies up and running in makeshift, but functioning, mode.  Large signs were hung over desks indicating “Corrections Department,” “Sanitation Department,” “Water Department,” “Social Service Department,” etc.  Huge fax machines spewed out hourly updates on the conditions of gas and power lines in the smitten area.  The Mayor gave almost hourly reports to the public, keeping them informed and calm in the knowledge that there was a steady hand at the helm.  An adjacent building was turned into a survivor’s center where missing loved ones could attempt to be contacted through a network of hospitals and aide centers.  While all the searching went on, Chaplains, aide workers, Red Cross workers, etc. were available both to administer to the family’s needs and take care of children at a play center while the adults went about their grim business.  Sadly, there were literally no survivors, but that was the fault of the despicable fanatic Muslims and certainly not the fault of any City official.

            Furthermore, notwithstanding any temporary confusion, the Federal Government immediately recognized who the guilty parties were, the armed forces were mobilized and accomplished devastating strikes against the right people.
 
            With the visual acuity of hindsight, the Emergency Response Center could have been constructed differently and in a different location.  Different precautions could have been taken to protect first and second responders.  But who knew?  If we knew when it was going to rain with any degree of certainty, we would never be caught without an umbrella.  The City acted on the best available information both before and after the event and, incidentally, as far as the Emergency Response Center was concerned, various Federal agencies were located in the same building and in the vicinity, and they, too, were devastated.

            Anybody who witnessed New York and the downtown area immediately after 9/11, at the same time had to be appalled at the degree of devastation and marvel at the correctness of the response of a Mayor who led rather than dither.  He wrote the textbook for the role public officials should assume when catastrophe strikes.  The people coming out of the woodwork now could well fit under the category, to paraphrase Shakespeare, “He jests at scars that never felt a wound.”  Let us, and public officials – including the Mayor – be praised for what we did that was right, and not condemned for what could have been done differently, because we view, and judgment is made through the prism of time and knowledge certainly not available on 9/11.

            The Writers Guild is about to go on strike and the networks shamelessly announced that this would immediately affect the evening talk shows and daytime soap operas by forcing re-runs to be substituted for their usual fare.  There was not a hint of embarrassment in this announcement.  Is it then admitted that we are left with television notables who cannot even carry on quasi-coherent conversation and actors who cannot improvise the subnormal discourse with other actors intended for the IQ challenged viewers addicted to TV’s daily inanities.

            Ghost  writers have become a recognized occupation beginning with  our Presidents down to our comedian (which, in some cases, might be the same).

            The role of  Ghost Writers first became memorialized in our political culture with FDR.  He utilized, among others, the services of Sam Rosenmund, a New York Judge, who Roosevelt brought with him when he moved from Governor to President.  But Roosevelt heavily edited the speeches written for him thereby molding it to his personality.  His “Day of Infamy Speech” – indeed that very phrase – was basically his alone.

            As time passed, the creative role of the President in writing his speeches became less and less, finally arriving at the point where he basically became an announcer.  Not only was it generally acknowledged Peggy Noonan was the author of Reagan’s Pont du Hoc speech but she wrote a book about it, explaining in exquisite detail how she crafted the speech.  Bottom line:  Reagan, the great communicator, was basically an announcer.  Can anyone imagine Lincoln hiring a speech writer to write the Gettysburg Address?  From there it goes downhill. Mere mortals who have a ghost write a book for them, usually have the decency to put “as told to,” or “with” etc. under the author’s name.  But not politicians.  Hillary Clinton’s best seller “It Takes A Village,” did not list any other writer except herself even though it was generally acknowledged that it was ghost written.  And, of course, the joke was that Kennedys’ “Profiles In Courage,”  was the first book written by a ghost writer to win a Pulitzer Prize.

            Now, can anybody imagine George Carlin or Jackie Mason not being able to carry on a conversation without somebody holding up cue cards?
 
            Maybe the strike is a good thing.  At least the public will discover that the Emperor has no clothes.  Lord knows, they might even be forced to buy a book written by its real author.