MRR Column for no 357 (Mykel does election day)

 

You're Wrong

An Irregular Column

by Mykel Board

Mykel's Column for MRR # 357 (January)

"Democracy today is just a polite term for highly developed totalitarianism,” --Laibach

       ELECTION DAY 2012: One of the many things I love about toilet stalls is that you can close the door and be in your own world. You can experience the joy of release... sometimes the double joy. I now stand stall-pissing. Ridding myself of the morning coffee, with a touch of last night's beer. My whole body relaxes as the yellowtude pours out of me. Gas rumbles through my intestines. It too demands release. Yes! That's the double joy... a standing pissing fart. The morning's flatulence out with the morning's liquid. The gas bubble nudges downwards as the yellow stream slows to a trickle. I tense my abdomin... give it a final push... I'm already late for class... I gotta hurry.

Uhhh, uhhh, ugggg, whoops! It's not just gas that passes from my anal sphincter. A turdball... grape-sized... escapes and rolls down into my boxers... down the back of my leg... inside my knee... to my calf... to my ankle where it lays trapped by my pantsleg stuck into my army boots.

Damn! I wish I were a girl. Then, when I pissed, I'd be in the right position to aim those turdballs directly into the toilet. Now I'm stuck. No time to undo my boots and fish it out... and who knows what an extra mess that'd make? I'll have to let it rest until after class. Then, I can sit down and get rid of it... It's probably left a trail that'll need cleaning up... Delightful!

Ah well, it's back to class. I just hope I don't accidentally squash the turdball against my ankle. Besides slopping up, it'll stink. The Japanese, that means all my students, are extremely sensitive to smells. They don't even like GOOD smells. They want NO smell. (There are exceptions, but that's another column.)

Shit, it's not even 2PM and today's been hell. I tried to vote this morning... waited on line (IN line, as they say in America) for an hour... got to the front: “You're on the wrong line.... You're in the wrong building...”

Fuck, I'll have to come back during a break. I have to get to class....

When I do get to school, I complain about being kicked out of the poling area.

“Hey,” says a fellow-teacher.. a rabid Democrat, “that's not allowed. Governor Cuomo issued an executive order. Anybody can vote anywhere... It's on account of the hurricane.”

“Nobody told the guys where I vote... didn't vote,” I say, now even MORE pissed off.

She shrugs.

So here I am... in class... private... one-on-one... a turdball resting at the top of my boot, against my ankle.

My student is Takashi, an attractive young man from Osaka. His business casual clothes limp what would be an oriental-induced erection. Good, I don't need another pants problem.

Like my other students, Takashi is fascinated by today's election. He doesn't understand it, but it looks like fun.

“Are you a Republican or a Democrat?” asks the young man.

“I'm neither,” I tell him. “I hate 'em both.”

He looks puzzled.

“Then you're not going to vote?” he asks. “I thought all Americans vote. It's like football. Everybody has a team, right?”

“It IS like football,” I tell him. “I hate football.”

[Aside: Do they play THE RAMONES at football games? I honestly don't know. I hope not.]

“Okay,” he says, “then it's like baseball. You've got a team to support.”

“I support the Green Party,” I tell him. “I'm going to vote for Jill Stein.”

“Who?”

I repeat the name of my candidate of choice.

“Is that your mother?” he asks.

After class, I run back to vote again-- still with the turd in my pantsleg. This time the line is shorter, but it moves slower than the singer in a junkie band.

I finally get my paper ballot: a long confusing list of names. I fill in the little circle next to JILL STEIN. Then I fill in the rest of the WORKING FAMILIES PARTY choices. I'm not much for WORKING anything, but they have good taste in politics and-- except for supporting Obama-- are the best of the bunch.

But wait a minute... one of the working families guys is running for the SAME OFFICE (Senator) as the Green Party guy. I marked 'em both... screwed up the ballot... have to get a replacement. How the hell is some uneducated shlub gonna do this? I've got a fuckin' Master's Degree and I can't do it!

I bring the spoiled ballot back to the desk.

“Can I have another one?” I ask, handing over my mistake. “I fu... er... made a mistake on this one.”

The pimply adolescent whiteboy behind the table makes a tsk tsk sound as he takes the paper. He looks at it, tsk tsks again, (isn't that unconstitutional?) gets a folder, marks something on the ballot, hands me another, and says, “This is your last chance.”

I walk to the metal marking booths, open for the world-- at least for the TV cameras which are EVERYWHERE-- to see. I carefully mark my choices and bring it to the vote-counting scanner where a big Aunt Jemima blocks my way.

“I'll take that,” she says, “the machines aren't working right. I have to feed in the ballots very slowly.”

She takes my ballot and looks at it. She does not tsk tsk, but carefully inserts it into the machine, looks at me, smiles, and says “Thank you citizen.”

I immediately like her.

No time to chat. It's back to school for two more classes, then home.

I need to call WCSB at 10PM to record an interview. It's the second one in a week. The first was with Blag, yeah that one... from the Dwarves. He wanted to talk to me after the MRR no-column fiasco. He's got an internet radio show called “Radio Like You Want.” I don't even know if the show aired, but I was on it.

Now, I'm talking to... oh no! I forget his name. On Facebook, he's DRICORE. He has the late night show on WCSB in Cleveland. He must be old because this is the second interview he's done with me. The first was in 1997!

“Mykel,” he asks, “have you voted?”

“You bet,” I tell him, “and it wasn't easy.”

“From reading your columns, I guess you voted for Jill Stein,” he says.

That's what I like: a man who does his homework.

“You bet,” I say. “You think she'll win?”

“Is your dick gonna grow another three inches?” he doesn't ask. As a matter of fact he doesn't say anything... at least not then. After a throat clear, the conversation continues.

We talk more about the election. He tries the Obama line about healthcare, jobs, I donno. He wants me to be realistic. Sorry, I'm the wrong guy for that job.

People need employment because we've got a fucked up slave system that says work or die. I hate that system. I can't say it's GOOD to put people to work. Is it better that people work than die? Yeah, it's better that I have a turd in my pantsleg than a mass of red ants... but that turd is still a turd and I don't want it there.

The week before, Blag asked me about my rejection of jail for “abusers.”

“What's the alternative?” he asked. “We just let these violent people go and do nothing?”

What the fuck? I don't know the alternative. If someone says you can cure cancer by nailing your nipple to the wall, should I let people do it because I have no alternative? Because I can't cure cancer myself? I don't know what the answer is, but I know what it ISN'T. Same with jobs, abusers... and Obama.

What it comes down to: Am I happy Obama won? No.

Even a tinge that Romney won't be president for four years? No.

Even a bit... selfishly... that the world will think SLIGHTLY better of Americans because they re-elected a colored president? It will be easier to travel than it was during Bush times. Okay, a TINY BIT... selfishly... but that's it.

See you in Suriname... or hell... whichever comes first

ENDNOTES: [email subscribers (god@mykelboard.com) or blog viewers (mykelsblog.blogspot.com/) will get live links and a chance to post comments on the column. Your zines, Cds/records, and... er... private videos... can and should be sent to me at: Mykel Board, POB 137, Prince Street Station, New York NY 10012]

-->One of my facebook friends sent me a YouTube of a news report about a pizza delivery. A colored mother ordered a Domino's pizza. On the bottom of the receipt was printed: Niggahs don't tip. The woman complained. Domino's fired the driver who wrote the comment. That's as far as the video goes. But that's not far enough for me:

1. How do we know what color the driver was? We don't. Black people are a lot more free in their speech than white people. And they know the difference between Nigger and Niggah. The news made this sound like a racist incident, but was it?
2. Did Domino's settle to avoid a lawsuit? How much?
3. Did the family tip? Do they now?

-->Voter base dept: Ann Coulter said that Obama was campaigning with women's rights activist Sandra Fluke because he "is so desperate to get the base Democratic voter-- stupid single women-- to vote for him"

I ask, is Ann Coulter married? If so, does that mean the Republican voter base is stupid MARRIED women?

-->The Real Entrepreneurs dept: The Progressive reports that the Republican convention used the theme WE BUILT THIS to show how private entrepreneurship trumps government action. The convention itself was held at the Tampa Bay Times Forum, built with 62 percent government funds.

-->So that's why dept: On his radio show, Rush Limbaugh blamed a 10 percent decline in penis size on feminism. Says Rush “it has to be the feminazis, the chickification, and everything else.”

-->I'll tell you when I get to the Middle dept: A study by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting found that of 10,489 election campaign stories, only seventeen talked about poverty. I can't remember hearing ONE. It was Middle Class this and Middle Class that. As the Republicans move to take the vote away from the poor, I bet we're gonna be hearing the word “poverty” even less in times to come.

-->Speaking of poverty dept: The National Federation of the Blind picketed dozens of Goodwill stores demanding equal pay for the company's disabled employees. The group says Goodwill has consistently paid sub-minimum wages to disabled workers, sometimes as low as twenty-two cents an hour. There goes my Chanukah shopping!

At least the workers of Walmart are finally going on strike. It's about fuckin' time! Black Friday too!!

I hope the store doesn't pick up thousands of scabs who need a few bucks and will do ANYTHING in for a job in Obamaland. Looks like Walmart's getting a black eye for this. But you don't care. You'll be shopping there... feeling like shit about it... but doing it anyway, right?

-->World Bully Dept: As Israel is acting like big brother America: invading other countries, mass murdering, destroying everything in a wide path, I frantically look around for some Jews I can be proud of! I found 'em! Rabbis for Palestine! They seem to understand the problem best... and they have the right answers.

On the other hand, Israeli rabbis are shouting “Palestinians to the Ovens!” Oy vey!