Mood:
amorousTopic: "Transparency" (4)
Frodo seems to be thinking a lot about words these days. "Transparency" is one that he must admit he had never considered in its' most recent context. Before, transparency had an application to vision through packaging of some sort, and was therefore not a relevant point of discussion for anyone save some optical techie. Times, however, have indeed changed.
Charles Barkley attended Auburn University on a basketball scholarship, and gained fame as the "Round Mound of Rebound." A full-scale analysis of Frodo's memory bank at that time would respond favorably to the keywords, "overweight," "mutant," "dumb," "jock," "Alabama," and "black." A Google search would today reveal that Barkley went on to the National Basketball Association (that paragon of learned scholars) and became a multi-millionaire retiree who spread his verbosity throughout the land as a broadcaster.
Barkley, to say the very least, has become quite the center of controversy. Known throughout as someone who said exactly what he thought (the refreshing nature of which is dependent upon a certain level of subjective knowledge), Frodo took note of Barkley's willingness to make people angry. His criticism of under-achieving athletes and coaches was not mind-altering, but Barkley did strike a receptive cord when he began to express political opinion.
Charles Barkley announced that he was a Republican, and that he had disdain for those who did not share his belief in the value of hard work. Coming from a multi-millionaire who owed his fortune to a child's game, that was a tad bit more hypocrisy than Frodo could stand. What was really interesting however, were his tittering references to being able to do better than the current leadership in the political realm.
Last week, Barkley announced to Campbell Brown (since nobody watches that show) and the wire services that he was going to return to his home State of Alabama and run for Governor in 2014 (state law requires 5 years of legal residence for eligibility). His timing might have been a little better.
On New Year's Eve the announcements began to accumulate as "Breaking News" on all the cable channels (Frodo is unable to comment on the reporting by Faux News). The Governor-to-be, it seemed, had been arrested and charged with DUI in his current home State of Arizona (home to John McCain, among others). With the latest reports it was disclosed that Barkley had another passenger in his motorcar when arrested (not his wife, it was added). When asked if he had been drinking, he responded as we have come to expect, honestly, forthrightly. When asked why he was driving so erratically, Barkley again responded without equivocation.
It seems that about a week ago Mr. Barkley had had an encounter with that same passenger in his motorcar, and had been given the best (for the record, and reflecting good taste, the terms "oral sex" were substituted by the reporting institutions) he had ever had. He was driving erratically because he was in a hurry to pull off the road and to once again suffer the same experience.
Although he finds the results somewhat amusing, Frodo prefers to return to his prior understanding of "transparency," and to hope that neither Henry Paulson nor Ben Bernanke are performing a similar act upon our collective organs. As for Mr. Barkley, Frodo would pay real money to be an observer of the 2014 gubernatorial contest in Alabama.
