As IF Times

link Rep. David Wu’s staff confronted him over concerns about his mental health | OregonLive.com.

The bizarre behavior of Mr. Wu has been documented by the local papers and paints a picture of someone who may not have all his wires connected.  What the newspaper fails to say is whether his odd behaviour is something that is normal for him and just became apparent, or if he just only recently went Hollywood star on them.  

Mr. Wu is hardly the first politician to exhibit bizarre behaviour.  The donning of a tiger costume may have been a bit unusual, but hey, it’s all good, he’s just eccentric.   The important thing is that he is of the correct political persuasion, so personal eccentricities can be overlooked.  When you take into account the recent utterances of many of his ideological brethren, wearing a tiger outfit and yelling incoherencies hardly moves the needle on the wacko meter.    According to staffers, he was loud and sometimes angry.  Has anyone ever heard of Alan Grayson, thankfully now the ex congressman from Florida?   The article goes on to state that he recently delivered a “belligerent and rambling 19 minute monologue” to fellow Democrats.  Does the name Keith Olbermann mean anything to anyone?  Finally, staffers testified that  “…Wu became unpredictable and sometimes loopy, saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and often not making sense …”   Boy, should we list some names alphabetically?

I’m not sure exactly how they could discern that Wu was exhibiting anything other than acceptable  normal behavior for that party.  Incoherency, belligerence, anger?  The article goes on to recount how in 2007, he accused the Bush White House of acting like  “fake Klingons”, whatever that means.   The best incident was in 2003, when he appeared to go catatonic before a vote.  Clearly the sane response was to flee to another state and avoid the vote altogether.   I’m not sure what’s happening in the Democratic party, but if they start to weed out people like David Wu, good luck  fielding candidates in the next vote. 

As far as David Wu is concerned, he just had the misfortune to pick the wrong profession.  If he was in the entertainment business, he’d be adored, have his picture all over the gossip rags and his own TV show.  There just happens to be a job opening at CBS now that Charlie Sheen has gone.  That show would have had to be renamed One and Half Men, but didn’t poll well with focus groups.  On the other hand, Charlie has a possible career in politics…or MSNBC.

link Chris Rock disses the tea party – PATRICK GAVIN | POLITICO CLICK.

No matter how much money is spent on education, it only takes the rantings of a handful of ‘entertainers’ to wipe out the benefits.  When Chris Rock declares that the Tea Party is a racist group, it’s hard to know if Mr. Rock is playing to his base, which is likely a younger, self professed cooler audience, or if he actually believes what he spouts.  Chris Rock is a disciple of the Don Rickles school of stand up humor but Rock’s material predominantly and predictably centres on racial themes.  Specifically, the nuances of black/white interactions.  While there will always be an audience for this humor, the one note aspect of it must get old as people mature.  The Three Stooges for example still command an audience despite the fact that the poking eyes with fingers shtick lost its novelty decades ago. 

Of course, everyone is entitled to their opinions, that’s the benefit of freedom.  But some opinions are more valid than others, because they are actually based on fact.  Being educated means you have been exposed to critical thinking, that any conclusions you arrive at are based on a logical process.  If someone like Rock were to pick on redheaded people as the butt of his humor, deride their intelligence, their habits, their views of the world, most rational people would see this as caricature and accept it for what it is, attempts at humor.  Sadly, there will always be that contingent that will absorb some of that humor and subliminally accept it as truth, people who somehow think entertainers are on some higher intellectual plane. 

Luckily it was only Politico that aired his comments so it’s unlikely many people would notice them except for news junkies like yours truly. However, by giving Rock airplay, it clumps him into the usual gaggle of people who view everything through the lens of race.  This makes him look bad.  The irony of this may be lost on Mr. Rock, but what he implies in his recent publicized comments  are both irrational and racist.  Despite what he thinks, black people can be wrong.  They can be guilty of crimes.  They make mistakes. They can do stupid things.  Just ask Michael Vick.  Or Tiger Woods. They can be just as dumb as anyone else.  Speaking of Tiger, his golf game has gone to zero.  There have been negative comments on his swing changes, his demeanor on the golf course.  Is this racist? 

Just because people object to the President’s direction on policies doesn’t make them racist.  Nancy Pelosi is widely considered a force behind the errant Democratic agenda as well.  I have yet to hear anyone call the Tea Party sexist.  If a building owned by a black person is on fire, pointing it out does not make one a racist.  Guys like Rock and notable others, have played the race card so many times, it’s a one card deck.  It’ a pretty loyal audience who listens to jokes to hear the same  punch line.

Mr. Rock has made a career of tapping into the latent paranoia of racism.  There will always be an audience for this stuff, as there is for the slapstick  humor of the Three Stooges.  It gets old though and it’s all funny until someone loses an eye.