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Lightning Rod Gets The Zot
The Poet's Eye ^ | Lightning Rod

Posted on 10/23/2010 5:17:52 PM PDT by Lrod

A character like Christine O'Donnell presents a unique problem for a humorist. Few elaborations are called for since the caricature is self-embodied. All that is needed is a dead-pan Jack Benny look. You know, the one where he just stares blankly at the audience without saying a word and eventually someone titters and before you know it the whole place is in hysterics? Her very existence as a major party candidate for US Senate is the kind of comedy which arrives ready-written and would only be spoiled by embellishment. I mean, what can you add to rabidantimasturbationtarianism, rats with fully-functioning human brains and her famous Witches of Eastwick campaign ad that looks like it was produced by Tim Burton? I had fully intended to leave Ms. O'Donnell to the other comedians and the pundits who were wearing her out on cable TV. But then came the most recent revelation that she has claimed that her father was Bozo the Clown. Here I had to break my silence, not in the name of humor, but in the cause of veracity. This is a subject I happen to know something about.

Long ago, for one magic season, I was related by marriage to Bozo the Clown. I'm not making this up. My father was a semi-notorious lothario in the television and advertising business. Sometime after he turned 50, he married the 17 year-old daughter of one of his professional colleagues, Larry Harmon, the guy who owned the franchise to Bozo, the Most Famous Clown in the World. He was Bozo Primero, not one of the many FauxZos who were franchised in every major media market. I was much closer to the power center of the Bozo world than Ms. O'Donnell ever dreamed of being. It gave me an intimate glimpse into the backstage life of clowns. I knew little of the inside workings of the clown business in those days. Like a naive child, I had assumed that, you know, Bozo was Bozo. It never occurred to me that there was a school, like a Bozo boot-camp, where imposters went to learn how to walk like a Bozo and talk like a Bozo and draw the red rictus of a smile on their faces with greasepaint. It was like learning a dirty family secret and it was a big disappointment. When you go to see Bozo, you want it to really be Bozo, not some guy dressed up in a Bozo costume.

I hadn't thought about my brief inclusion in greasepaint royalty for years until Ms. O'D surfaced with her claims of actually being a blood relative of Bozo the Clown. The marriage between my father and Princess Bozo, which was chronologically challenged to begin with, barely outlasted the honeymoon. They had about as much in common as Christine would have in common with the 99 other US Senators. Suddenly the whole subject bubbled from my subconscious and made me wonder about franchises and politicians and the authenticity of clowns.

Since John Quincy Adams carried forth his father's political legacy, American politicians have campaigned on the richness of their family's past public service. Roosevelt and Kennedy and Bush all represent minor dynasties and it is entirely in keeping with this tradition for Ms. O'D to claim descent from Bozo. Clowning is as present in the current of American politics as populism, liberalism or conservatism. But in light of Ms. O'D's penchant for resume enhancement, she fibbed about her college career and has downplayed her wiccan studies, her claims to clownly ancestry are also suspect. While she seems like a natural and can certainly get a laugh and works well in the side-shows, one has to wonder if she is really ready for the Big Top, the center ring.

The US Senate is the Big League of Buffoonery. Even pros like Colbert have trouble hanging there. It's a tough room. Notice that Al Franken, even with all his years of practical comic experience, has been keeping mum in deference to the mime-masters of the Senate. These clowns can juggle, ride unicycles, do pratfalls and get shot from cannons, all with the perfect dead-pan of their painted-on media faces. They are consummate clowns adept with all the tricks, the seltzer bottle, the pie-in-the-face, the filibuster. I don't want to get all Stephen King on you but these aren't nice clowns. Ms. O'D should think twice before she alienates her witch constituency, she may need some strong juju to avoid the dunking stool. They'll make her the senator-punk-clown. Every troupe of clowns has one, the smallest clown, bottom of the pecking order, the one who all the other clowns slap and when there is no smaller clown for her to slap, she turns to the audience with her out-turned palms and pitiful Emmett Kelly frown and says, "I am you."

Two of the greatest Senatorial Clowns, Lloyd Bentson and Dan Quayle, in their famous vice-presidential debate in 1988 demonstrated the type of cut-throat comedy these jokers are capable of. When Quayle set the joke up by comparing his inexperience to the inexperience of Jack Kennedy, Bentson spiked it with this punch-line, "Senator," he said, "I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy."

The Poet's Eye would like to say to Christine O'Donnell in this same spirit, "Ms. O'Donnell, you say your father is Bozo. Well, I knew Bozo. Bozo was briefly my step-grand-father-in-law. Christine, your father was no Bozo."

Yes I’m stuck in the middle with you, and I’m wondering what it is I should do. It’s so hard to keep this smile from my face. Losing control yeah I'm all over the place.

Clowns to the left of me! Jokers to the right! Here I am stuck in the middle with you. ---Joe Egan and Gerry Rafferty

Visit The Poet's Eye


TOPICS: Government; Humor; Politics; Society
KEYWORDS: bozot; christineodonnell; clownzot; hater; humor; kittychow; molassesmiasma; odonnell; ozone; penguinhumor; satire; sionnsar; thepoetseye; troll; vikingkitties; vikingkitty; zot
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To: Dead Corpse

I love you, DC. Der Prinz refuses to eat leftovers, even if he originally made the meal. Combine that with his quantity-estimation problems, and it leaves me and the kids eating some meat glop two meals a day for a week. “Come on, just eat a little, and then you can have a cookie!”


1,621 posted on 11/22/2010 7:25:46 PM PST by Tax-chick (Six more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: Tax-chick

Hehhe.... Thanks TC. I freeze a lot of stuff in those plastic containers. I have about a weeks worth of lunch on tap.


1,622 posted on 11/22/2010 7:27:59 PM PST by Dead Corpse (III, Alarm and Muster)
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To: Dead Corpse; Anoreth; ColdOne; Monkey Face

1,623 posted on 11/23/2010 4:35:01 AM PST by Tax-chick (Six more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: nicmarlo

I have a “coffee table” book of him and a refrigerator magnet bottle opener car! (It’s all I could afford.)


1,624 posted on 11/23/2010 5:16:45 AM PST by Monkey Face (TSA: A union for molesters.)
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To: Dead Corpse

I have a problem with leftovers. I still cook more than I need, so I not only have leftovers, but I have to give lots of leftovers to the neighbors. And I’m a good cook, too!!

Still, I draw the line at zombie leftovers. ;o]


1,625 posted on 11/23/2010 5:19:45 AM PST by Monkey Face (TSA: A union for molesters.)
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To: Tax-chick

It would be nice to find a kitteh with those powers.


1,626 posted on 11/23/2010 5:20:59 AM PST by Monkey Face (TSA: A union for molesters.)
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To: Monkey Face

My kitteh will beat up your kitteh!

Le sigh ... I’m off to Weight Watchers this morning.


1,627 posted on 11/23/2010 5:49:00 AM PST by Tax-chick (Five more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: nicmarlo; Monkey Face; Tax-chick

It’s slow.

*singing, terribly*
“I came upon a zombie bear,
Who slapped me with his paw!
He slashed my back and bit my leg,
Then on my skull did gnaw!”


1,628 posted on 11/23/2010 7:05:25 AM PST by Darksheare (I shook hands with Sheryl Crow and all I got was Typhus and a single sheet of toilet paper.)
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To: Monkey Face; LibreOuMort
Oh joy. Although more snow is in the forecast, it's also well below freezing. Roads will be treacherous (and the county decided to cut back on snow removal -- but hey, they still have "10% for the arts"!). Snow again on Thursday (so much for making it to Mass) and the rain holds off until Friday.

I'm guessing I'm not getting my work laptop back this week, which makes it two weeks more until I see it again.

I am SO open for new job offers it's not funny.

1,629 posted on 11/23/2010 7:11:58 AM PST by sionnsar (IranAzadi|5yst3m 0wn3d-it's N0t Y0ur5:SONY|Why are TSA exempt from their own searches?)
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To: sionnsar

Monkey Face has been texting me - her computer is down.


1,630 posted on 11/23/2010 8:03:53 AM PST by Tax-chick (Five more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: Tax-chick

It’s -3 here with wind chill.


1,631 posted on 11/23/2010 8:04:10 AM PST by Anoreth (....a fetid behemoth of toxic pustules oozing all over the basement....)
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To: Monkey Face

He’s the best driver, I think.


1,632 posted on 11/23/2010 8:04:13 AM PST by nicmarlo
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To: Darksheare

But, you have a great voice. LOL


1,633 posted on 11/23/2010 8:04:53 AM PST by nicmarlo
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To: Anoreth

Erk. Did you have to evacuate the ship?


1,634 posted on 11/23/2010 8:05:20 AM PST by Tax-chick (Five more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: Tax-chick

No. I had to take trash out. Not fun. It’s a ways down the pier, or whatever, to the tiny dumpster.


1,635 posted on 11/23/2010 8:08:28 AM PST by Anoreth (....a fetid behemoth of toxic pustules oozing all over the basement....)
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To: Anoreth

Glad to hear you all made it! I went to Weight Watchers. There’s a new program starting next week.


1,636 posted on 11/23/2010 8:12:52 AM PST by Tax-chick (Five more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: Tax-chick

Well, they have to make their money somehow.


1,637 posted on 11/23/2010 8:20:05 AM PST by Anoreth (....a fetid behemoth of toxic pustules oozing all over the basement....)
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To: Tax-chick; Monkey Face
Monkey Face has been texting me - her computer is down.

Oh, no!

1,638 posted on 11/23/2010 8:20:54 AM PST by sionnsar (IranAzadi|5yst3m 0wn3d-it's N0t Y0ur5:SONY|Why are TSA exempt from their own searches?)
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To: Anoreth

It always costs the same. But it’s a for-profit business, and they make money in a number of ways.


1,639 posted on 11/23/2010 8:22:29 AM PST by Tax-chick (Five more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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To: sionnsar

It froze up, didn’t want to shut off, and now won’t reboot. I emailed DP to see if he has any ideas.


1,640 posted on 11/23/2010 8:23:33 AM PST by Tax-chick (Five more days to clean your ceiling fan blades. Don't put it off until the last minute!)
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