Saturday, August 23, 2008

Meerkat Manor or Joe Biden

The announcement of Senator Joe Biden’s selection as Senator Obama’s running mate came during the season conclusion of Meerkat Manor. Joe or Rocket Dog? Joe or Sophie? Joe or the hawk? Joe or Zorro? Joe or the Commandos? Joe or the volcano? Joe or anyone? Decisions, decisions.

Animal Planet will show Meerkat Manor on an endless loop of reruns. Indeed, I could stay up to 1:30PST to watch the suspense as the scrappy Meerkats tempt fate, but going on the internet could remove any suspense. Will Rocket Dog follow her mother’s lead and succumb to the puff adder’s bite?

Male Lotharios, promiscuous females, sibling rivalry, infanticide, warring clans, leadership struggles, social ostracism – that’s worth watching.

Drama; excitement. No, I must watch it now.

NBC didn’t interrupt the Olympic coverage for Joe. Leave that to CNN, Fox, and MSNBC. Why should Animal Planet or I defy the wisdom of NBC?

Joe will be on an endless cycle tonight for the cable networks. He’ll still be on in the morning.

Even worse! I once sat through Joe as the banquet speaker. His speech was an interminable, endless loop. Leave, take a break, make a phone call, use the facilities, light up a Benson & Hedges, and come back. You won’t miss a thing. Don’t Tivo his speech. No need to pause. Just wind him up and watch him speak, and speak, and speak, and speak as a 20 minutes ran into 90. It seemed longer. Keep the drinks coming! And the amazing thing is that he didn’t say a thing.

No need to watch the Senator. We know his story.

His 1968 campaign for the Presidency floundered on plagiarism. This year’s campaign was a gaffe a moment. His memorable comment about Obama, “The first mainstream African American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice looking guy” was matched by “You cannot go to a 7 Eleven or a Dunkin’ Donut unless you have a slight Indian accent. It’s a point. I’m not joking.” (Senator Allen of Virginia lost reelection two years ago because the media hounded him for using the word “Macaca”

Good material, but it doesn’t match the voracious appetite and prolific breeding of these foot long, pint size mammals.

Obama ran on a mantra of change. Obama has four years in the Senate with no accomplishments. Senator Biden has spent 36 years in the “World’s greatest debating society” with no accomplishments. No change there.

Ah, but for the Meerkats, every minute is an instance of change.

Rocket Dog lives! The show must go on. And now it’s time for Awesome Pawsome

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