The OCD Diaries

January 4, 2013June 1, 2015

Defending Joe Biden (Updated June 1, 2015)

Updated June 1, 2015: The Vice President, who has suffered a lot of loss in his life, has more character and depth beneath his outward image of buffoonery than most people know. With news that his son Beau has died of brain cancer, I’m remembering the post below, originally written in 2013. I also recommend this column from Ezra Klein on Biden’s grief perspective.

I’ll surely get a boatload of criticism for what I’m about to do: defend Vice President Joseph Biden.

As you know, the man who’s a heartbeat away from the presidency tends to run his mouth a lot and get into trouble. During the signing ceremony for Obamacare in 2010, the mics were on as he told President Obama that “This is a big fucking deal.” During the 2012 presidential campaign, Biden told a Virginia audience that “we won North Carolina in 2008 and we can win it again.” That was the same event where he told everyone that the Republicans “want to put you back in chains.”

The vice president also has a habit of violating the personal space of those he’s talking to. Yesterday, as he swore in new senators, he embraced the wife of Maine Sen. Angus King a bit long for the comfort of some. He also told the husband of North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp to “spread your legs, you’re going to be frisked.” Biden said this after the photographer asked them to drop their hands for the photo. “You say that to somebody in North Dakota they think it’s a frisk,” Biden joked. “They think you’re in trouble, right?” (The Atlantic Wire has more on these incidents.)

People like to call him Uncle Joe, and not in a good way. One of my friends compared him to the crazy, creepy uncle everyone tries to stay away from during family gatherings. If you’re a Democrat, he’s just a lovable old-timer who has no verbal filter. If you’re a Republican, he’s an idiot and borderline sexual predator.

I agree the guy runs his mouth too much and gets in a bit too close to people. President Lyndon Johnson used to do the same thing. It’s famously known as The Johnson Treatment.

But I also think people make a bigger deal out of Biden’s antics than what’s deserved. A lot of politicians get in close during hugs and handshakes, especially the older folks. He’s also not the first politician to forget which town he’s in during a speech. When you travel all the time, that’s going to happen.

But here’s the main reason I’m going to defend the man: He’s been through a lot in his life and has worked his ass off despite it all. Whether you agree with his politics or not, take a look at his history, and you’ll have to admit he’s done some inspirational things in his life:

In 1972, a few weeks after he was first elected to the Senate, Biden’s wife and one-year-old daughter were killed in a car wreck while Christmas shopping. Biden’s two sons, Beau and Hunter, were critically injured in the accident but made full recoveries.
To keep close to his kids, he commuted from Delaware to DC every day by train — 90 minutes each way. He did that his entire 35 years as a senator.
In 1988, the same year he first ran for president, Biden suffered a series of aneurysms and at one point was given last rites. He recovered and continued to work tirelessly as a senator in the years that followed.
As senator he led the fight to pass the Violence Against Women Act of 1994. That law had several measures and provided billions of dollars to help women suffering from domestic violence and other gender-based crimes.
He was also among the first to call for action when a genocide was unfolding in the Balkans. Specifically, he fought to get Bosnian Muslims weapons and training to defend themselves against the mass slaughter taking place. Those policies eventually helped end the Bosnian war.

Having been through plenty of adversity myself, I have a soft spot for people who overcome devastating personal setbacks to make a positive mark on the world.

Call him Crazy Uncle Joe if it makes you feel better. In my opinion, his good points far outweigh his lack of filter.

Joe-Biden1-e1344976178397

January 3, 2013

Partisan Politics Is a Mental Health Threat

Like everyone else, I’ve watched the debate over the so-called fiscal cliff with a combination of disgust and anxiety. I can’t remember a time when the nation’s economic health was so threatened by political partisanship.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:309o3PJag8FugLJTRTZa77]

It threatens our jobs and our ability to feed our families. And it’s a threat to our mental health.

I feel fortunate that this shit is happening now. Up until a few years ago, this type of thing would have left me lying in a fetal position on the couch, with so much anxiety and fear over economic calamity that I’d be unable to function. I’d eventually get up from the couch and go to work, but my brain would continue spinning and I’d carry on like a zombie.

I’ve made enough progress on my mental health in recent years that I can put my worries on the shelf and carry on with life. I enjoyed the holiday break with my family instead of brooding in a corner the whole time. I’m grateful for that.

But I won’t bullshit you: I checked the various news sites online a lot more obsessively than I have in a long time. I worried about this a little bit more than other recent political battles, including the 2011 debt ceiling fiasco.

When there’s this much drama and suspense in Washington, it can’t help but fuck with your psyche after a while.

I can still get on with life, but I have no doubt there are plenty of people out there who can’t. They feel like their very lives will depend on what happens in Washington. I remember that feeling all too well.

I feel for those people, and I pray for them.

But more than anything else, right now, I feel anger. And I suspect that most other Americans do, too.

Unfortunately, I don’t have an answer as to what we can do about this national threat to mental health. One easy answer would be to throw all the bums out, but we keep re-electing the people who cause the problems. Another easy answer would be to crack down on the special interest groups that corrupt politicians with money, but where do you start?

The best way to deal with it is to control what we can control in our daily lives. I got help for my addictions and mental defects, and that at least gets me through these storms.

I truly think that’s about all you can do.

November 20, 2012October 7, 2015

Politics, Facebook Friends and the Damage Done

After all my blogging this past election season about how friends and family shouldn’t become enemies over politics and how we all need to knock off the conspiracy theories and name-calling, I’m reviewing my Facebook friends list in search of damage. Here’s my final analysis.

It turns out one person unfriended me. I considered her a solid Facebook friend. We went to high school together and shared many musical tastes. We both post a lot about our families and love and care for our children. But last week she cut me loose without explanation. I think I know why.

She has always been the type to complain a lot on Facebook, such as fights with her husband and hatred of her job. She held nothing back. That’s her right. It is her Facebook account, after all. The day after the election, she melted down, suggesting that things would never be OK again and that we were all doomed. I mentioned her comment in my day-after-the-election post, though I didn’t mention her by name. My goal was to cheer up her and others crushed by Romney’s defeat by offering some “life goes on” perspective. But she apparently wasn’t up for it.

No hard feelings. I don’t regret what I did, and I did keep her comment anonymous.

Meanwhile, I unfriended four people, including a husband and wife, last week. I didn’t do so because these people were liberal or conservative. I did it because I felt they were going over the top and painting everyone who disagreed with them as tyrants.

One former and very liberal friend finally gave me more than I could take when he posted a meme trivializing the power of prayer compared to science. He had been posting stuff like that all along and pinning all the world’s folly on Republicans. Believing as I do that both parties are equally to blame for our current economic and political troubles and in the power of prayer, I decided I didn’t need to see his bullshit anymore.

I hated unfriending the husband and wife. I particularly liked the husband, given our common musical tastes and the paths we both crossed back in the day, even if we didn’t know each other at the time. But they were taking their hatred of President Obama to levels I finally found too toxic for my blood.

If they had simply posted stuff about how Romney was the better choice for America, I’d have been fine with it. But everything became a conspiracy to them. Obama went from being the least capable steward of the economy to someone like Hitler, a guy who happily kills women and children and then covers it up. Their posts intensified after the election, and that’s when I respectfully cut ties.

All in all, I’d say the damage wasn’t too terrible. That’s a small amount of unfriending considering I have 2,334 friends, family and business associates in my network.

I choose to believe most of us got through all the vitriol in one piece. Hopefully, we can enjoy each other’s company a bit more now.

At least until the next election.

November 15, 2012

The Election’s Over. Now What?

I’ve been very much out of it since Tuesday morning, when I woke up to a fever, chills, a blistering headache and exhaustion. It was so bad that I wasn’t able to sit up long enough to email my boss until nearly 1 p.m. Yesterday was better, though I couldn’t do much more than lie on the couch.

I’m trying to get back into my writing groove this morning, but it’s not going well. I have a lot of opinions about things I’ve seen on the news, but I don’t have the energy to construct my arguments with the appropriate rigor.

So I’ll just make a few quick observations and then engage myself in an attempt to get some paying work done.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:2R1HDqY6bSdb7G5mYbcItD]

David Petraeus’ extramarital affair. The headlines are full of this one. The former CIA director and revered general made the mistake many powerful people make when too many people tell them their poop doesn’t stink: He cheated on his wife. I feel badly for his family and hope they can move forward. I hope people don’t forget the good he did in breaking the Iraqi insurgency so that we could end the war. I also hope my more conservative friends stop subscribing to the bullshit notion that the timing of his resignation was meant to scuttle his testimony regarding the September 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. People are trying too hard to find a conspiracy where none exists.
Glenn Beck’s “God really sucks” statement. Conservative commentator Glenn Beck reacted to Obama’s re-election with this incoherent statement:

Man, sometimes God really sucks. I got up yesterday at 3:00 in the morning and I knew. And I couldn’t sleep and I started to say my prayers and I got up and kneeled down by the edge of my bed and I knew that — or I suspected that my mind’s not God’s mind, and the peace and the comfort that he had given me and so many of my friends was not about an election. God’s about a bigger picture than an election or a candidate. God is about the freedom of mankind. God is about the Constitution, which is a divinely inspired.

I agree that God is bigger than an election or a candidate, that He’s about freedom of mankind. But Beck says that after questioning God’s will. I’ve despised his whiny tirades ever since his show on CNN Headline News. I’d be happier if he’d just go away now.
Secession petitions now filed for all 50 states. North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas and Florida each had more than 25,000 signatures for secession from the union, the threshold needed to trigger an official response from the Obama administration. A lot of people are calling this a movement. It’s not. What you’re seeing is a stunt that repeats itself every four to eight years, especially when a lot of people are unhappy with a presidential election result. Move along, now. There’s nothing to see here.

I sometimes imagine the conversations I’d be having with my friend Sean Marley over this stuff had he not passed on 16 years ago.

Chances are that he’d disagree with everything I just wrote here. He always loved a good conspiracy theory, especially those that fit his libertarian ideals. I miss those arguments. Sometimes.

Petraeus Resigns

November 7, 2012

Five Takeaways From Election 2012

It’s no surprise to see my friends’ reactions on Facebook, Twitter and elsewhere. Obama supporters are elated; Romney supporters are bitter.

One person lamented that “things will never be OK again!”

Mood music:

[spotify:track:5Qy0zLjQy3czoj0yZ7DFkk]

I feel for those who wanted a different outcome. This election season was particularly heated among friends and family. I saw a lot of relationships tested and damaged. Some were accused of hate speech, bigotry and conspiracy-spinning. That certainly happened in spots. It always does in an election cycle.

But most people simply have beliefs that permeate their souls. They want the best for those around them and personal experience has molded their beliefs on how to get there. They may be right or wrong, but their hearts are in the right place.

There is nothing cynical about that.

Some suggestions for those hurting from the Election 2012 hangover:

Don’t waste your time spinning conspiracy theories about the election being stolen from your candidate or the winner having some hidden evil scheme to destroy America. Even in the post 9/11 world, a president’s power to do the things that scare you are limited. We have divided government, something the Founding Fathers built into the system to prevent the consolidation of power in one place. Spinning conspiracy theories won’t do you any good, anyway. It’ll just make you sick.
If your candidate won, don’t be an asshole about it. Romney isn’t evil and never was. He just has a different set of beliefs than you do. The shittiest part of this election has been the name-calling. The notion that your friends are subhuman and stupid because they voted differently from you is sad and selfish. When you see the Romney supporters in your life this morning, give them a pat on the back and buy them a cup of coffee. Don’t rub salt in their wound.
If your candidate lost, calling the other side idiots, shitheads and the other names I’ve seen this morning will not make you feel better. You’ll feel worse and look petty and spiteful.
Remember that any meaningful, good change in your life starts with you, not the people that get elected. One of my Facebook friends, David Black, put it best when he said, “Whoever is elected president has little to do with how I live my daily life. We have our families, our friends, and our health. What more do we really need? Be of good cheer; this too will pass.” Amen, brother.
As an extension of that last point, do the things that will help your community more than any national or state election result ever could: Volunteer to mentor students. Help your friends and families earn a living by helping out with some household task or watching their kids when school is canceled. Drive your elderly neighbor around so they can do their errands and get to doctors’ appointments. Those things that are personal and seem so insignificant in the big picture make the difference for people. Of course, most of you already know that and already do these things. Thanks for all you do.

When I was a young, idealistic punk, I didn’t get a lot of these things. Indeed, I still have plenty of room for improvement. But I’m hopefully a bit wiser.

Blessings to you all.

Obama and Romney

November 1, 2012

Election 2012: A Disney Production

There’s a lot of anxiety in the air. Many people are biting their nails over next week’s presidential election. Just as many are freaked out because George Lucas sold his Star Wars franchise to Disney.

Disney taking over Star Wars? Among true sci-fi fans, it’s cause for major depression. As for the election, half the population will be proclaiming the end of the world this time next week.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:7Kho44itYaCQZvZQVV2SLW]

Yet the American and Galactic Republics will go on, no matter what we believe.

All jesting aside, I don’t know many people who seriously care if future Star Wars movies suck or not. My kids are both crazy SW fans and never miss an episode of “The Clone Wars.” On hearing that George Lucas sold the franchise to Disney and that Disney plans more Star Wars movies, Sean’s reaction was fairly balanced: “Fine. As long as they don’t make it all princess-y.”

The presidential election is a far more serious matter. I can’t believe how so many of my perfectly sane friends have gone insane over Obama vs. Romney. Facebook is ready to collapse under the weight of all the conspiracy theories people on the left and right are posting.

Friends are angrily calling each other names when one posts something in support of the candidate they oppose. The right keeps crying about a socialist-Islamic takeover of America if Obama is re-elected. The left keeps wailing over the loss of the safety net, the poor and disadvantaged allowed to fall into the fires of Hell. These feelings are captured in Facebook memes people accept as instant truth without investigating the accuracy of what’s said.

The more centrist among us know neither vision of the future is accurate. The truth is, life will pretty much go on no matter who wins.

The sun will still come up in the morning. People will still have the same blessings and woes they had the day before. The world will continue to spin on its axis.

I’m not trying to belittle anyone. I’m just drawing from personal experience. For me, the fate of the world once seemed to hang on the next election. In 1994, when I was a lot more liberal than I am today, I felt devastated and depressed when the GOP swept both chambers of Congress. Two years before that, when Bill Clinton was elected president, I thought all would be right with the world. A lot of people had the same emotional jolt four years ago when Obama was elected.

But in more recent years, I’ve found that my personal happiness has nothing to do with which way the political winds blow. My happiness or sadness is based completely on my own actions. If I live each day as the man I want to be, I’m happy. If I succumb to my weaknesses, I’m sad.

I’ll end this with a lyric from the Avett Brothers that to me says it all:

When nothing is owed, deserved or expected
And you’re life doesn’t change by the man that’s elected
If your loved by someone you’re never rejected.
Decide what to be and go be it.

Peace, folks.

October 30, 2012

Another ‘Crazy Mike’ Facebook Page? Jerks.

Last year, I found a disgusting Facebook page making fun of someone with a serious mental illness. The site was taken down, but now there’s a new page dedicated to the man locals call Crazy Mike.

I want the creator and those who like the page to know something. By embracing such a page, you are making a much broader statement: either that you don’t understand the suffering a person experiences from mental illness or that you do understand but think it’s perfectly fine to tear down a human being who is seemingly weaker than you are.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:55OkffR8hBBf3QnqJAU2gY]

A couple weeks ago, I got an email from someone calling me a scumbag for defending Mike. He scares women and children and should be off the street, the writer told me. What really disgusted him, though, was the idea that Mike is a Vietnam veteran who is sick because of what he experienced there.

More recently, I heard from someone claiming to me Mike’s brother. I have no reason to disbelieve him, but since I haven’t been able to verify it yet, I’ll keep him anonymous. He actually alerted me to the new Facebook page and verified that Mike is a vet.

“Mike is indeed a Vietnam War Vet, serving as a field medic during his tour,” the man wrote. “He was born in May 1950, putting him squarely in that unfortunate group that was drafted or enlisted during the height of the war.”

Now that I’ve captured two different sides, I’ll say this:

Whatever his past, the fact is that he’s a human being who suffers from severe mental illness. I tend to believe that he was in Vietnam based on information I’ve received over time from multiple sources. But the reason for his illness isn’t what matters to me. It’s that he is sick and suffering and that people find it OK to make fun of him. It’s not OK.
Many people have chimed in about their own run-ins with the man, and I have noticed that some folks feel genuine affection for him. As stupid and sad as it was for people to latch on to a page that simply made fun of Mike (some of the comments on the page are nasty and pathetic), I think most people are decent, have good hearts and mean no harm.
I’m no saint. I’ve made my share of fun of people like this, and in the rearview mirror, looking back at my own struggle with mental illness, it makes me feel ashamed. It makes me the last guy on Earth who would be fit to judge others for poking fun at someone less fortunate.

We can do better than this.

True, to those who don’t know him, it can be disconcerting to walk into a store with Mike hanging around outside the door yelling at people. Sometimes, fear is justified. Part of my motivation for this post is to make more of you aware that he’s harmless.

To those who want to haggle over whether Mike was in Vietnam, I’d suggest you stop getting sidetracked and remember that no matter what makes a person sick, they deserve compassion and help, not this bullshit.

The jackass who created the new Facebook page should shut it down. And the hundreds of people who liked it should feel some shame.

Crazy Mike

This post is an update of an early post, “A Final Word on Crazy Mike.”

October 25, 2012

Political Rants on Facebook Are Annoying, But…

A lot of people have complained about all the ugly political comments and memes coming from their Facebook friends from the left and right. Some days it gets to me, too. But I’m going to take a moment to defend the practice.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:08yfTLT6ei3j15382V1foN]

There are some comments I have no patience for, like when people resort to outright name calling. I unfriended one guy recently for telling another of my friends to “get his head out of his colon” during one political spat. I can’t even remember the topic. What mattered was that the guy was being an asshole. He resorted to all kinds of name calling because my other, more conservative friend dared question a liberal principle.

I unfriended another guy for constant right-wing propaganda. It seemed like he had no other purpose in life than to attack anyone who didn’t share his Republican values.

For those keeping score, no one side or point of gets a free pass.

But extreme cases aside, I don’t think the political posts are such a horrible thing. A vigorous political debate is healthy. It’s American. And it’s more important than ever to discuss the day’s issues. A lot of my conservative friends are annoying my liberal friends by continuing to harp on the terrorist attack in Libya that left one of our ambassadors dead. They have just as much right to question what happened as my liberal friends do to question why Republican candidates keep saying things like rape pregnancies are a gift from God.

Besides, these clashes are a lot more relevant and interesting than a lot of the other posts I see on Facebook every day, such as:

People who seek sympathy by constantly complaining about their jobs.
People who seek attention by constantly making statements that lack the context or detail we need to know what they’re talking about.
People who constantly post pictures of their food.
People who jam up the news feed with hundreds of memes about a zombie apocalypse.
People who slather the news feed with love notes to their significant others, including sexual details none of us really need — or want — to know about.

I could go on, but you get the picture. At least with politics, we’re talking about things that matter. Just keep it respectful, folks.

September 3, 2012

Today’s Dumb Politics, Explained In A Star Wars Meme

I’ve spent a lot of time in this blog telling you why I’ve become more politically apathetic with age. Yesterday, someone on Facebook posted a Star Wars meme that captures my sentiments in a nutshell.

It explains the state of today’s political discourse better than I ever could. Still, if you want to delve deeper into my perception of today’s politics, check these out:

Bill Maher: Bomb Thrower from the Left

Ann Coulter and the Politics of Hate

Romney’s Lesson: When You Try To Be Someone Else, People Notice

Obama Killed Andrew Breitbart? You People Are Stupid

A Rebellious Catholic’s Analysis Of Rick Santorum

Never Have I Cared So Little About The N.H. Primary

Gay Haters Or Just Idiots?

Racists AND Idiots

August 16, 2012

Bill Maher: Bomb Thrower from the Left

We hear a lot about conservative pundits and how their rhetoric often crosses the lines of decency and civility. I made an example of Ann Coulter a couple days ago to illustrate the point. But there are also plenty of bomb throwers on the left who paint large segments of the population with the same big brush they use to attack individuals who may deserve it. Take Bill Maher, for example.

Maher is a comedian and political commentator. His stock-in-trade has always been to bait people with over-the-top insults. That’s what Politically Incorrect was all about. As Coulter does against liberals, Maher makes a lot of valid observations about conservative stupidity but ruins it by resorting to hate talk and rhetoric that borders on racist.

Mychal Denzel Smith, a writer, social commentator and mental health advocate, offers an example in an NPR article, “The Root: Bill Maher’s Off-Color Jokes Go Too Far“:

Lately he has come to depend on this style of joke to bring home laughs in a way that distracts from the insightful sociopolitical commentary he has to offer. Moreover, he has forgotten the first rule of comedy: Be funny. It simply wasn’t funny when Maher suggested that he wanted President Obama to act like a “real black president” in his handling of the BP oil spill last summer by flashing a gun in the face of its CEO and asking, “We got a motherf – – – ing problem here?!”

Maher is no racist. But, as I wrote in another post a few months ago, the language you use still says something about the kind of person you are.

That aside, what really burns me up about Maher these days is his attack on religion. I’ve written plenty about the crazies who attach themselves to religion and distort reality for their own gain, usually burying the truthful, illuminating aspects of faith beneath the rubble of hooey dumped on us by a minority of nuts like evangelists Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, both of whom suggested 9/11 was God’s punishment upon society for homosexuality, feminism, paganism and groups like the ACLU.

With comments like that and their constant penchant for blaming everything bad in this world on homosexuals, liberals and judges who don’t share their worldview, Robertson, Falwell and other like-minded souls are legitimate targets for someone like Maher. But it’s not enough for Maher to go after the individuals who give conservatism a bad name. He denounces all religion and everyone who believes in it. In his book, if you have faith, you’re delusional. He made a whole movie on the subject, Religulous.

As someone who practices Catholicism, I find that insulting.

I’m the first to admit there are a lot of buffoons in the Catholic Church, as evidenced by “Screw You, Cardinal Egan” and “A Rebellious Catholic’s Analysis of Rick Santorum.” But as I’ve said many times before, I believe in Jesus Christ and the Sacriments of the Catholic Church. People often lose their faith because they spend too much time getting angry with church officials and not enough time on the main point of their faith. I also reject the idea that God will send you to Hell because you’re gay, liberal or a devotee of some other religion.

Maher’s worldview is that if you have faith, you’re a racist, conservative, homophobic sheep.

I’ve heard that despite their political and religious differences, Maher and Coulter are actually good friends. Given their tactics, I’m not surprised.

Bill Maher