By the time you read this…

Dear Son,

You know how much your mother and I love you, right? And our love for you knows no bounds. For this reason we’ve made the difficult decision to send you away until the mid-term elections are over.

By the time you read this, you will have awoken from a sound sleep, and you’ll be in Grandmom's apartment and she's listening to Benny Goodman and baking cookies for you. You’re undoubtedly asking yourself, “What are mid-term elections, and do they have anything to do with a volcano erupting and spewing hot lava that will destroy our home and our village and melt my Lego sets?”

In short, Son, potentially.


Let me explain. There are people in this great nation who, every other autumn, have the ability to shapeshift. One year they’re normal and neighborly, the kind of people who say “Hi, my name is Joe. May I help you carry your groceries?” Then the next year they become perceptive to things unseen, the kind of people who say, “Hi. I’m Joe. Remember me? I’m just wondering if you realize that the politicians in Washington, D.C., are preparing to insert a tracking device in your neck?”

Then, suddenly, the mid-terms approach and they begin to cover the bumpers of their cars with the sticky, smarmy shorthand of "partisanship."

What is a “part-is-an-ship?"

It’s a funny-looking warship. It either has a hull and no stern or a stern and no hull. It’s really "half a ship." Can you picture that? So, as you can imagine, it’s a ship that sinks fast. And as for its sailors, even as the waterline reaches their waistlines, they make rude gestures and fire perfectly timed exposés in widely read publications and widely watched news programs whose fact checkers have been bound and gagged and stuffed into a broom closet.

These people, Son, view everything through the “prism of politics.” What is a "prism?" It's a freaky little gadget that, in this case, turns everything to black and white. And “pol-i-tics” are similar to deer ticks. You feel the symptoms first before you realize something is burrowing under your skin. You start to feel a little feverish, a little sweaty. Your joints start aching. You start quoting the Founding Fathers and carrying a little pocket-sized copy of the U.S. Constitution.

What are “Founding Fathers?” They are men like me — “Fathers.” And like me, they say incredibly intelligent things all the time. Only in my case, there’s no quill-bearing flunky trailing me around to record all my awesome thoughts. In fact, nobody listens to a damn word I say except for you and sometimes Mommy. Morons! All of them!!! They’ll never learn! Let them all wallow in their own stink! See if I care!!!

Whoops. Sorry Son. I was … eh … just trying to get the dog’s attention. He was eating the armchair. Anyway, Founding Fathers like George Washington used to put their children to bed with beautiful little nursery rhymes, such as: "Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism." Their children would then yawn and roll over and lights out.

Thomas Jefferson was another Founding Father. He loved children so much he had them in various skin shades.

Anyway, you’re going to have a great four weeks with Grandmom. She loves literature and art and board games, and she doesn’t have cable TV and she doesn’t log onto Realclearpolitics.com every 45 minutes to check the latest poll numbers and she still thinks Jimmy Carter is president.

Anyway, the thing is, your mother and I felt you shouldn’t be exposed to what will surely be ugly weeks ahead. It’s our hope that, now you’re 7 and have reached the age of reason, you’ll form your own opinions with regard to how modern Conservatives are lunatics and seek to destroy our nation through the crass-telling of half-truths and the proffering of non-solutions, and how our gullible nation seems to forget that only five years ago the Republicans controlled everything just short of the entire Periodic Table of Elements, and they... they …

What I'm saying is that your mother and I want you to eventually come to your own conclusions with regard to how Newt Gingrich is a fascist and how our neighbor Joe is a werewolf.

OK, let me be honest. Grandmom took you away from us in the middle of the night because she was alarmed by all our bumper stickers — mainly the new ones that cover our windshields. She promises she’ll have you back home on Wednesday, Nov. 3, around lunchtime.

We love you!

Newt Gingrich is more villainous than Green Goblin.

Sean Hannity never washes his socks. Yuck!

— Daddy

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