Travels With Buddha — 6.0 — Television Library, Lund Drive Studio, North Eugene, Oregon, PCNW, USA — -
“It ain’t me, it ain’t me, I ain’t no senator’s son, son/It ain’t me, it ain’t me, I ain’t no fortunate one, no….”
Before he emigrated from my imagination into the Good Ole USA, Buddha was blissfully apolitical. Sure in 1949 he trundled a steamer trunk of irreplaceable Buddhist artifacts across the Western Himalaya’s following the Dalai Lama to India. THAT was certainly a political act. And since then he has been no big fan of the Chinese Communist Party (I feel him aching to join recent protests in Hong Kong). But generally politics doesn’t interest him much. To Buddha it just seems so futile and transitory. And long ago, he says, he accepted that the US Government would always be run, one way or another, by servants to the International/Imperialist/Capitalist Corporate Insect. It never seemed to matter much whether it was a Republican insect or a Democratic one.
I never did really agree with him on this. To me it always DID matter, but lately even Buddha is expressing political opinions. For instance he says that “The Age of Trump”, should it last more than four short years, is certainly going to mark the downward turning point toward global devastation.
Listen pal, he says, if that flesh-eating dinosaur gets re-elected we are ALL doomed. It could be many many many lifetimes before this sublime little planet of ours is worth the visitation of another re-incarnation. Personally, I will be heading completely out of the solar system for at least five thousand years. And the nearest planet that is even remotely as nice as good old Mother Earth, is 214.5 light-years away. Even at quantum convergence hyper-soul-speed it takes 511 years just to GET there.
Well, as you can imagine, with an attitude like this, Buddha has recently developed a keen interest in who the Democratic presidential candidate will be.
C’mon pal, he says, Let’s watch the Democratic debates.
I just can’t handle it on my own. TV political debates make me nervous. The only other person I know who will suffer with me is our pal JT. So I invite her over for a light dinner, a glass of red wine, pistachio ice crèame and ABC Television live from Houston, Texas. She is a good sport and accepts my invitation. (I think she might still have a soft spot in her heart for Buddha.)
Well, dear reader, by the time you are reading this, days have passed and those debates are basically ancient history. They have been cross-analyzed and punditzied and picked clean by commentary. I just want to tell you that Buddha thinks ALL the candidates are pretty okay (he say’s Joe Biden needs to retire while he is ahead, we don’t need ANOTHER dinosaur president) and that he especially likes the super-smart ones, like Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, and Amy Klobuchar
Those are all women candidates, I say.
Yeah, Buddha replies, I think you are finally getting the idea.
As for JT she likes them all (by comparison to the current orangutang) but is slightly bummed that her favorite Marianne Williamson is not on the podium. The New new Age has not quite made it to main street midwest…
Personally I’ve ALWAYS been a huge fan of Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. Bright, organized, passionate and totally of the correct gender as far as I’m concerned.
Let the games begin. (I will be half-way around the world, please save my country for me if you can…)
