Going After Idealism With A Cheese Grater

I’ve been trying to make the general tone of these entries kind of upbeat. But circumstances at the moment seem to necessitate a bit of, I don’t know, outrage? Maybe disquietedness? Is that a word? (Word says: yes)

I’m just so AAAARRRRRGGGGHH!!!!!!

Here’s the thing: our government appears corroded and corrupted beyond repair. And I’m not really even talking about the people in it (but they definitely deserve some blame). The system itself is so saturated with money; I can’t even deal with it!

I’ve had the misfortune to be taking a class here at the Washington Center laughably titled “Washington Ethics.” And through this class I’ve been reading a whole bunch of articles from the reader (like you do), and in the section on campaign finance reform, I just about macvasinated.*

Politicians (both red and blue) take so much money from wealthy corporations and individuals that they can’t help but be beholden to them. And these articles had all these smug quotes of these empty suit business douches saying things like, “We pay for access.” and “There’s nothing wrong with that.”

So these guys pay the parties hundreds of hundreds of thousands of dollars, and then they get to go to these exclusive parties with the political mucky mucks. And that’s the “access,” having a flirtini with Karl Rove or James Carville and getting to “elbow elbow, nudge nudge” your point of view to the guys making decisions that effect everyone.

And everybody does it, because they all figure that, if they don’t, then they’ll lose because the other guys will. Which is probably true.

So there’s really nothing I, or anyone else, can do about it. Fear of the actions of others will continue to maintain the status quo at the expense of everyone.

Great.

This is a depressing town. I am ashamed to be a person right now.


*mac-vas-in-ate v. 1. Describes the feeling of wanting to gouge out your eyes and stab pencils in your ears in order to escape an unbearably frustrating or morally heartbreaking situation 2. May also be used in excruciatingly boring situations.
When Marsha’s wrist watch alerted her that the politician’s speech was entering its third hour, she began to seriously consider macvasination.

Brainiacs on Display, Press Passes Lead the Way

I remember playing Math Blaster in the elementary school computer lab. I also remember Number Chomper or Chompster or something like that, as well as the ubiquitous Oregon Trail, all on the original “floppy” floppy discs. But the reason I bring up Math Blaster in particualr is because I happened to attend an event the other night that was put on by the Davidson Foundation, which is owned by the husband and wife team the Davidson’s and they were the people who put out Math Blaster all those many years ago. Whew!

In the time since I was a tetherball-hitting, pog-slamming little kid up to now, the Davidson’s have done very well for themselves. They sold their business during the height of the dot com bubble in the late nineties and with their new found wealth, they decided to create a foundation that would give scholarships to gifted children.

Now I know what you’re thinking if you’re at all similar to me, because this is what I thought when I first learned of the information I have just given you. You’re thinking that you remember the stupid GATE classes back in elementary school and that the kids in those classes weren’t all that smart, and in fact most of those kids just had really overbearing parents and many of them were wealthy beyond that and what the hell do they need specific scholarships, much less a whole foundation, devoted to them?!

Yeah, that’s still true, but seriously, the kids I saw at the dinner were, as the Davidson Foundation says “profoundly gifted.”

There was some kid from Idaho who worked for NASA designing computer models that could determine the optimum angle for the Mars rover’s solar panels to be set at so to maximize the amount of sunlight hitting it, while minimizing the build up of Martian durst on the panel itself. Sound confusing? Some girl from New York was (get this, I’m not making this up) synthesizing chemotherapy with a type of genetic (read: stem cell) therapy to create a radical new cancer fighting technique. By the way, he’s sixteen and she’s seventeen.

So there. But anyway, this is what happened:

The folks at Talk Radio News didn’t think that the event for the gifted kids was news, but I went after work anyway. However, because I am not “profoundly gifted,” I didn’t bring any sound equipment. Idiot.

I brought a roommate of mine, at the last minute, to have some company. He wore jeans and a shirt and I was still in my dress shoes and suit pants, but in a polo shirt. These facts come into play later.

We ride the Metro over to the Jefferson Building in the Library of Congress and are immediately stopped by a security guard in front of the building. If you’ve never seen these buildings, you are leading half a life. If medieval Catholics perfected the power of architecture to inspire specific feelings of awe and reverence, then the architects of these buildings took their queue from them. The Library of Congress buildings are enormous, intricately carved, tremendously statue-d testaments to the highest ambitions of the United States. And this security guards thinks he’s going to keep us out? A little flash of the press pass takes care of him and we, slowing spinning with gazes to the walls and ceilings, enter the building.

After press passing our way through yet another line of security guards, these ones with metal detectors, we hear voices echoing down the highly polished marble hallways. We follow the voices past busts of old, important, dead white men and happen across a very formal (ball gowns and tuxedos) swath of people milling around several folding tables. We approach, but are again stopped, and again, the press past thwarts the nefarious intents of suspicious individuals who would keep us from going where we’d like.

The girls in low cut ball gowns behind the folding tables tell my roommate and me that, “This is indeed the dinner for the gifted kids,” but I can tell from her sour expression that she is unimpressed with our choice of personal décor.

I give her a sad story about being a new reporter and about the city being oh so big and terrifying, and she melts like taffy Washington DC humidity. We are unleashed upon the party to dine on the fancy-fancy, classy-classy hours dourves. They even had a weird upscale (and unfortunately rather bland) seven-layer dip with tortilla chips. And being that I am far away from the land of avocados, I partook of quite a bit of it.

All the gifted kids went up on stage and gave little speeches and accepted trophies from the Davidson’s. But the thing was, some of the kids’ speeches were phenomenal. One kid, who was six (6), and a piano virtuoso, centered what he said on the theme of a “Great Society,” and the fact that in his view, art was a necessary and underappreciated part of a “Great Society.” This statement caused me to take a pause and consider what I was doing when I was six; I’ll let you do that now, as well…

Now I know he probably didn’t write his speech. But Meat Loaf doesn’t write his own songs. There’s something to be said for being an excellent deliverer of speeches and this six-year-old Asian boy was definitely that. Plus, Meat Loaf (and meatloaf) is awesome.

Anyway, these kids were outrageous and the food was boring tasting, but the presentation was top notch. Plus, my roommate and I got to the two weird college kids with five o’clock shadows meandering around a super formal party, probably looking like total jackasses.

Those press passes will get you in anywhere.