PERSON OF THE YEAR

By now former presidential candidate Dr. Carl Perrin is used to being snubbed by Time magazine. Once again the magazine overlooked him when they named Ben Bernanke Person of the Year. Perrin wasn’t even among the also-rans, which included General McChrystal, “The Chinese Worker,” Nancy Pelosi, and some runner guy from Jamaica.

The online version of Time listed a bunch of “People Who Mattered” in 2009. The list included Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, and Joe (You Lie) Wilson. Evidently it doesn’t matter whether you tell the truth or not as long as what you say is outrageous enough. Olympia Snowe was on the list. We have to admit, she is one of the few semi-sane Republican members of Congress.

Jon and Kate Gosselin made the list. What did they do? Have a bunch of kids and then get divorced. Hey, Perrin says, Been there, did that. Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart of “Twilight” were chosen. Perrin was writing vampire stories before they were even born. That clean-cut American athlete, Tiger Woods was on the list.

Dr Carl Perrin was a candidate for the presidency in 2007 and 2008. Has that been forgotten already? Time magazine can go to hell. Perrin has his own little media empire. He publishes the monthly journal, Leisure Times. He maintains the web site, The Leisure Village Voice, and he has his blog, Grammaticus. Through this media empire, he reaches a lot of people. Perhaps Time magazine won’t find it so easy to ignore him next year when they pick the Person of the Year.

LOOKING FOR A SPOKESMAN?

What do AT&T, Gillette, Tag Heuer, Gatorade, Nike, and Accenture have in common? They are all—or until recently--were sponsors of Tiger Woods. In fact Woods makes—or until recently--made over $100 million a year as a spokesman for various products. Since word of Woods’ extra-marital activities have come out, many of these companies are cutting back on commercials with him or entirely ending their relationship with him. As Accenture said, he is "no longer the right representative" of the company's values.

As these companies drop the famous golfer, they must be in need of a public figure to represent them, someone who is highly respected and good looking. Who could fit that description better than former presidential candidate Dr. Carl Perrin? When people know that Perrin uses these products, they will know that they must be good. There may be an ethical problem in sponsoring Gillette shavers. Perrin uses an electric razor. (If the makers of that razor want Perrin to mention it in his blog, they can contact him.)

You can see pictures of two of the products at the top of this page. This plug is free, but if Gillette and Tag Heuer want him to continue publicizing their products, they know how to get in touch with him.

P. S. Perrin is notoriously cheap. You wouldn’t have to pay him $100 million to endorse a bunch of stuff.

ANOTHER COVER-UP

ANOTHER COVER-UP

People in Leisure Village are still talking about events that occurred on a recent Saturday night when former presidential candidate Dr. Carl Perrin crashed his three wheeler into a fire hydrant and a tree. Perrin refused to talk to police, insisting that he had broken no laws. He also refused medical assistance, saying the only thing he hurt was his dignity when he fell off the three wheeler.

His wife, the beautiful red-haired Janet, appeared with a golf club, which she used to move a tree branch from where it had landed on Perrin’s leg. No one is sure where the golf club came from, since neither Carl nor Janet plays golf.

Unfortunately, Perrin’s reticence has created speculation about why he was riding around Leisure Village on his three wheeler at 8:00 in the evening. Some have speculated that he was headed for the convenience store just outside the village where he planned to get a chocolate bar—even though he is supposed to cut down on sweets.

Since the event Dr. Perrin has not come out of his condo. He still refuses to talk to the police or the press. He has even withdrawn from the spring production of the village’s Bare Bone Theatre, in which he starred in last year in the title role of “The Burglar Returns.”

Perrin’s publicist, Aristotle Mongoose, asks that the public and the press respect Dr. Perrin’s privacy.

UNINVITED GUESTS

Former presidential candidate Dr. Carl Perrin understands how Tareq and Michaele Salahi feel. They are the couple who tried to wrangle an invitation to a formal White House dinner. When they didn’t get the invitation, they went anyway. Michaele bullshitted the Secret Service people by looking through her purse and saying she must have left the invitation in the car.

Perrin understands how they feel because he didn’t get any invitation to the dinner either. In fact he has never received an invitation to anything at the White House. This is despite the fact that he dropped out of the presidential race and urged his followers to vote for Barack Obama. He hoped that a grateful Obama would appoint him to some cushy post in his administration. But, no. No cushy post and no invitation to dinner. Not even an invitation to have a beer with the president.

If he had thought of it, Perrin might have tried to bullshit the Secret Service to get into the dinner. After all, he is no mean bullshitter himself. It’s too late now, of course. The Secret Service won’t fall for that trick again.

Dr. Perrin insists he is not bitter about being snubbed by the White House, but he points out there will be another election in three years. If he isn’t happy with the way things are going, he might run again. He will have learned from mistakes in the last campaign. That will make him a really formidable candidate.

SARAH ENVY

Dr. Carl Perrin admits that he is envious of Sarah Palin. With the help of a professional writer, she managed to grind out her book, Going Rogue, in four months. She received a seven-figure advance for the work, which was a best seller before it even came out in the bookstores. Right now she is on a book tour, where fans line up to see her and get an autographed copy of her book.

Going Rogue gets even with everyone who did her dirt during her vice presidential campaign: Katie Couric, John McCain’s staff, and the liberal media. There is widespread talk about Palin as the Republican candidate for president in the next election. Democrats are hoping that she will be the candidate. Despite her enthusiastic followers, most of the electorate consider her a poor choice for the presidency.

Dr. Perrin feels that all this is very well and good, but it seems unfair that Ms. Palin can dash off a book so easily, get such a big advance, and have the book become a best seller. Perrin’s book, My Run for the White House, has not even found a publisher yet. His book, which is made up from excerpts from this blog, is sure to be a best seller too, if any publisher had sense enough to take it. The next time you go to a bookstore, you might ask if they have My Run for the White House. If enough people ask, some publisher is sure to pick it up.

On a final note, this week’s Newsweek has a picture of Sarah wearing running shorts on its cover. She pretends to be upset by this, claiming that the picture is sexist. Be that as it may, the picture above left shows that the former governor of Alaska is not the only one who looks good in shorts.

MEA CULPA

Last week Democratic Governor Jon Corzine was defeated in his bid for reelection by Republican Chris Christy. According to NY Times columnist Gail Collins, this shows that Democratic President Barack Obama is losing his touch with independent voters, and this bodes ill for the Democratic Party and its agenda.

Former Presidential candidate Dr. Carl Perrin somewhat sheepishly admits that he is to blame for the Democratic loss. “I could have been in the race,” he admits, suggesting that he would have had a good chance of winning the prize. “I know all the people in Leisure Village would have voted for me. They all know me.”

The retired English professor says he was a little bitter about losing the presidential election. “I know, it’s been a year since the presidential election, and I should have got over the hurt of losing.”

Perrin says he has learned his lesson. In a couple of years there will be another election, and he will be ready to run again.

NUDE MODELS

Levi Johnston is going to pose in the nude for Playgirl magazine. Johntson, you will remember, is the father of Sarah Palin’s grandchild. He is training at an Anchorage gym to get his body in shape for the photo shoot.

Former Democratic candidate Dr. Carl Perrin asked himself, “If the Republicans can do it, what can’t I?” Perrin is offering to pose in the nude for Playgirl or any other magazine if they pay him enough money. “I’m not going to send my grandson or some young kid to pose for me. I’ll do it myself.” Perrin says he doesn’t need to go to a gym to prepare because he’s already in great shape.

We were going to put a nude picture of the retired professor with this post, but Perrin decided to wait. “They’re not going to get a nude picture of me until they pay me for it,” he said.

DINNER WITH SARAH

Sarah Palin is auctioning off a dinner date with herself and her husband Todd. The bids on eBay start at $25,000, but the winner does not necessarily get dinner with Sarah and Todd. “Governor Palin reserves the right to refuse dinner with a winning bidder if, in her sole discretion, the winning bidder is not a suitable bidder based on her subjective standards of suitability, professionalism, background and other factors.” In other words, if she doesn’t like your politics, you don’t get the date, even though you have paid at least $25,000. If you are rejected, your money will be refunded, and the next highest bidder will get the invitation. And the background check.

Retired English professor and presidential candidate Dr. Carl Perrin thinks this is one of the best ideas Sarah has had yet. He’s going to try the same thing. The opening bid for dinner with Perrin will be just $100. You can’t go wrong. Dinner will be at any pizza joint in Ocean County, NJ, as long as it serves beer.

The money raised from dinner with Sarah is going to a charity, Ride 2 Recovery. Any money raised from the dinner with Perrin auction, on the other hand, will go toward buying cheap beer for Perrin.

Sarah is screening bidders so she won’t have to eat with a liberal. Perrin is placing no such restriction on his auction. If the high bidder starts yakking away like a right wing nutcase, Perrin will just shut off his hearing aid.

PRESIDENT TO TALK TO STUDENTS

OMG, on September 8 the President is going to talk to American students about the importance of education and the importance of staying in school! Help! Help! The sky is falling!

Even though George H. W. Bush and Ronald Reagan gave speeches that were broadcast over public television to a number of school districts, some Republicans believe that Barack Obama’s speech is an obvious attempt to brainwash America’s school children. According to this view, if President Obama speaks to school children, it must be some kind of liberal plot. A spokeswoman for the Florida Republican Party says the President should not be telling children what to do. Evidently that means he shouldn’t be telling them to stay in school. Why doesn’t Obama take a cue from George W. Bush, who was in school listening to children read on 9/11? After he was told about the attack on the twin towers, Bush stayed in the class for another half hour. Perhaps he just wanted to know how the story ended.

If the President is allowed to talk to America’s students, the networks ought to allow Sarah or Rush or some other right wing nut to respond. They can tell the Republican point of view: Education ain’t going to do you no good nohow.

We can understand why Republican think that way. If kids get too much education, they won’t fall for right wing bullshit anymore.

COW SHIT

Leave it to New Englanders not to throw away anything that might be put to good use. Central Vermont Public Service has found a way to create electricity from cow manure.

The cow poop is stored in underground tanks and kept at 101 degrees. The process creates methane, which is used as fuel for generating electricity. Methane is more harmful than carbon dioxide in contributing to global warming.

It is definitely a win-win situation. Instead of creating global warming, the methane helps generate electricity. The dairy farmers get paid for the electricity produced by their cows. This provides a steady income for the farmers, which helps offset the fluctuation in milk prices. Furthermore, since pathogens in the manure are killed by the process, the final byproduct can be used for bedding for the cows.

What is needed now is way spread this program nationwide. We need a commissioner of cow shit. Fortunately, we know just the man to serve in that office. Former English professor, Dr. Carl Perrin, grew up on a dairy farm in New Hampshire. If anyone knows cow shit, it is Dr. Perrin.

We know the president is busy with all kinds of stuff, but someone in the administration should bring to the president’s attention the environmental benefits of a cow shit commission and Dr. Perrin’s qualifications to head that commission.

REPUBLICANS ON HEALTH CARE

Rush is screaming that the proposed health care logo looks like a Nazi symbol. What is the point of that? Does it mean that the attempt to spread health care to more Americans is somehow related to the Nazis? Others are yelling that the ideas being put forth by the Democrats are really socialized medicine. So which is it? Are the Democrats supposed to be Nazis or Socialists?

Now the Republicans are sending goons to disrupt meetings where members of Congress are trying to get ideas from the people about health care. That’s really democracy in action: disrupt exchanges of information on one of the most important issues of the day.

And Sarah—God bless her—is charging that the president’s health plan is “downright evil.” She says, "The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care."

Where do these people get their ideas? How could anyone think of her as a plausible candidate for the presidency of the United States?

SARAH RESIGNS

Most people don’t know this, but Sarah Palin is resigning as Governor of Alaska effective later this month. This news is little known because in front of an audience of dozens, the governor announced the resignation on the eve of the Fourth of July weekend when the media were already preoccupied with the death of Michael Jackson. However, the people who read this blog, all 25 of you, will know, and I hope you will spread the word to the rest of the country.

She is resigning because of apathy, not her own but that of the rest of the country. “It would be apathetic to just hunker down and go with the flow,” she said, but she is not going to do that. She is going to leave office before the end of her term and leave the state in the good hands of Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell. Wow, I don’t know why we didn’t think of that before.

Sarah went on to say that she chooses “to work very hard for fruitfulness and productivity.” It goes without saying that she also chooses to fight for truth, justice, and the American way and all that kind of stuff.

Ultimately Sarah is making this sacrifice for the good of the citizens of Alaska. With only a year and a half to go in her term, she is a lame-duck. We all know that lame-ducks cannot accomplish much. She is not going to be like other lame ducks and become a burden to tax payers. “Many,” she said, "just accept that lame-duck status, hit the road, draw the paycheck and milk it.” But not Sarah. “I’m not putting Alaska through that.”

A lot of people used to think that Sarah Palin is an airhead, but the logic of her resignation announcement should put an end to that kind of talk.

REPUBLICAN GOVERNORS

Where is South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford? He is so tired after trying to refuse money from the federal government for education and economic stimulus that he’s just worn out. So he’s hiking along the Appalachian Trial, communing with nature, and renewing himself spiritually. So what if the state police, the lieutenant governor, and his wife don’t know where he is. He just needed to get away.

No! That’s not it at all. He took a quick trip to Argentina, no doubt on some kind of state business.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney denies that Sanford conferred with him about some good undisclosed locations to go to.

Oh no! He was in Argentina, but instead of state business, it was monkey business! It turns out he was having a little fling with someone he met in Argentina a year ago when he went there on an economic development trip. He is resigning as head of the Republican Governors Association. A few months ago some crazies were talking about Sanford as a Republican candidate for the presidency in the next election. I guess that’s all over now.

Meanwhile Alaska Governor Sarah Palin got some “great news for Alaska.” The Supreme Court said it was okay for an Alaskan gold mine to dump waste into nearby Lower Slate Lake, even though the dumping will kill all the fish in the lake.

Palin is calling on other polluters to dump their crap into Alaska’s lakes. She says the Supreme Court’s ruling is "is a green light for responsible resource development."

NIGHT ON THE TOWN

OMG! President Obama took his wife out on a date for dinner and a Broadway play! To hear Republicans react to it, you would think that he started an illegal war, lied to the American people, squandered a financial surplus and left the country with a huge deficit, hired incompetents for various federal agencies, or something like that.

But no! Instead he took his wife out on a date. How much is that date costing the American people? the Republicans fumed. Why couldn’t he take her out on a date in Washington, D.C., where there would not have been the cost of flying the president and his wife to New York?

Why not, indeed? Well, Mr. Big-Bucks Republican, if you promised to take your sweetie pie to see a Broadway show, would you (and she) be willing to settle for dinner at a local diner and a community theatre production? Why should the president deserve anything less? It’s not like he’s taking golfing trips to Scotland paid for by a since-convicted lobbyist (like a former House Republican).

The expense you seem to be object to is evidently the cost of flying to the Big Apple. Would you have the president book a civilian flight to the city and stand in line to board the flight? Maybe you would prefer that he just stay in the White House and watch a video.

Come on, Republicans. Face it, you don’t have a platform. You just want to go back to the good old days of George W. Bush. How pathetic!

HOPPING MAD

Carl Perrin is hopping mad. First of all, he finds out that he is not going to be named U. S. Senator for New Hampshire. Judd Gregg withdrew his nomination, stating that as a conservative Republican, he couldn’t go along with President Obama’s Democratic plans. Which makes one wonder if Obama wasn’t taking bipartisanship a little too far in considering Gregg for a cabinet position.

Of course there is still that job of Commerce Secretary to fill, and unlike many of Obama’s cabinet nominees, Perrin doesn’t have any unpaid income taxes, as far as he knows. Someone did let him borrow a car recently while his was in the shop, but we don’t think there’s any income tax liability there.

Despite his clean record on taxes, Perrin is realistic enough to recognize that with his academic background, he is probably not a good fit in the Commerce Department. However, he was hoping to get a high-level executive job at a bank or some other financial institution that has been helped with the economic bailout. But now he finds out that, even if he can land such a job, the Obama administration will limit his salary to a half a million dollars a year.

That’s outrageous! How can anyone live on $500,000 a year? The first thing Perrin would have done with his new salary would have been to trade in his 13-year-old Honda for a Mercedes. That would have taken a big chunk out of his salary. Then there are taxes and all that other nickel and dime stuff. Before you know it, all he would have left to live on would be about a third of a million. It’s hardly enough to bother with.

PERRIN FOR NH SENATOR

By the time this is posted President Obama will have nominated NH senator Judd Gregg for the post of Commerce Secretary. Gregg will accept the nomination only if Democratic NH governor John Lynch will promise not to name a new senator who will not “change the makeup of the Senate.” Lynch is expected to name Bonnie Newman to the post. Newman at one time served as Gregg’s chief of staff. Part of the understanding here is that she will not run for the Senate seat in the 2010 election.

The NH governor could just as easily name distinguished educator Dr. Carl Perrin to the seat. In a previous posting we noted Perrin’s deep roots in the Granite State. Also they wouldn’t have to worry about his running for the seat in 2010. Perrin will be only 80 years old in 2010. Depending on how things go in Washington in the next two years, the former English professor could be getting ready for another run for the White House.

WILL PERRIN RETURN TO NATIONAL POLITICS?

New Hampshire senator Judd Gregg is being considered for the position of Secretary of Commerce. We think it would be a good move for many reasons. Gregg played a major part in last year’s banking bailout, so he seems a natural for the position in these troubled economic times. Further, it would be a goodwill gesture toward the Republicans because Gregg is a Republican. However the governor of New Hampshire, John Lynch, is a Democrat. Although Lynch is very independent, it seems unlikely that he would not appoint another Democrat to the position. That would leave the Democrats in a stronger position in the Senate, where they have a majority but not enough members to stifle a filibuster.

The situation leaves Governor Lynch is a precarious position. Whom will he choose to replace Gregg if Gregg in fact becomes Commerce Secretary? Obviously he can’t sell the seat. Rod Blagojevich ruined the chance of any other governor to do that. Nor can he pull a Governor Paterson, who hemmed and hawed and finally appointed Kirsten Gillibrand, a Republican who merely pretended to be a Democrat, so she could pick up a few votes from Democrats who don’t read the newspapers.

Fortunately, there is an easy way out for the New Hampshire governor. Retired English professor, Dr. Carl Perrin, a former presidential candidate, has a strong New Hampshire background. He grew up in the state, graduated from high school in Amherst, NH, holds a BA and an M.Ed. degree from New Hampshire schools. He began his teaching career in Hollis, NH. He even once was a member of the New Hampshire National Guard.

Who could be more natural?