Cain and sock puppetry

I’ve been busy, too busy to pay too much attention to this Herman Cain story that has gone on for, what, six months now. I see where conservatives are P-O’d that Herman is getting much rougher treatment than Billy Boy Clinton during his series of sexual harassments, assaults and rape.


Well duh, did we expect something different? With Clinton you had real women coming forward with real and specific allegations. With Cain, no one has come forward yet and for the life of me as hard as try to find out, I can’t find one bit of information on what it is he’s supposed to have done.

So yeah, when Paula Jones holds a press conference and accuses the President of the United States of exposing himself to her and demanding oral sex, you’d expect just one story on the nightly news. But when Kathleen Willy accuses the President of the United States of groping her in the oral, oops, Oval Office, then the media get right on it and run a whopping 3 stories in two days. And when Juanita Broaddrick accused the President of the United States of raping her, well that’s when the press really got after it, running another 3 stories over two days.

But hey, really, is there any news there? You have the woman’s name and specific allegation, there’s nothing left. With Herman Cain we have no women and no specific accusations. Now there’s news. It’s a perfect set up for the 24/7 news cycle. Endless guests can be paraded in to speculate on what happened. And now we’re three or four days in and still nobody knows who is alleging what. Yet we have over 50 MSM reports of what might have happened.

My first read was that some woman was complaining of overt gestures, not of a sexual nature, that made her uncomfortable. That could include about anything from scratching an itch to turn the temperature up in the office. And we all know the second you become uncomfortable, that is sexual harassment. Why just the other day, I was being sexually harassed by a strong, damp wind out of the north. Heck yeah it was sexual harassment, after all, it made me uncomfortable.

And then there’s this from the, is anyone surprised, file:

A few years ago, Joe Therrien, a graduate of the NYC Teaching Fellows program, was working as a full-time drama teacher at a public elementary school in New York City. Frustrated by huge class sizes, sparse resources and a disorganized bureaucracy, he set off to the University of Connecticut to get an MFA in his passion—puppetry. Three years and $35,000 in student loans later, he emerged with degree in hand, and because puppeteers aren’t exactly in high demand, he went looking for work at his old school. The intervening years had been brutal to the city’s school budgets—down about 14 percent on average since 2007. A virtual hiring freeze has been in place since 2009 in most subject areas, arts included, and spending on art supplies in elementary schools crashed by 73 percent between 2006 and 2009. So even though Joe’s old principal was excited to have him back, she just couldn’t afford to hire a new full-time teacher. Instead, he’s working at his old school as a full-time “substitute”; he writes his own curriculum, holds regular classes and does everything a normal teacher does. “But sub pay is about 50 percent of a full-time salaried position,” he says, “so I’m working for half as much as I did four years ago, before grad school, and I don’t have health insurance…. It’s the best-paying job I could find.”

That’s it Joe? You’re kidding! YGBSM. 35K down the crapper on a degree in puppetry and full time sub gig is the best you can do? Oh the humanity! Or would it be humanities in this case? If a degree in puppetry means nothing any more, the American dream is truly dead. "The best job" you could find?  Moron! You're lucky to have any job.  Who hires idiots?  Oh yeah, the schools to be teachers.

Hey Joe! Try this. I recall a Cub Scout activity on “Showmanship” when the boys had to make puppets and do a show. It was funny as heck. Not because it was funny like “Seinfeld”, but the things that a boy will say when hiding behind the back of a couch and talking through a sock puppet are really hilarious. They probably learned as much in an afternoon of fun as Joe did in 3 years, and it didn’t cost 35K.