As a writer, I would like to kick President Barack Obama's butt.
Before the guys with the dark suits and cufflink microphones show up at my door to have a conversation about the idiotic notion that the above statement in any way represents a threat, let me explain.
I'm not mad at Obama for the same reasons that most people in my community and on Fox News are mad at him; namely, for the unforgivable sin of not being a Republican.
I'm mad at him because he has stolen a couple of items out of my toolbox.
Back in the 1970's, George Carlin made famous the list of "seven words you can never say on television."
Today, censors now must add two more words to that list.
"Hope" and "change."
I'm a writer. My livelihood depends on my ability to use words. Because of Obama's actions, or inactions, these one-word phrases can no longer be stocked in my professional toolbox.
Back in 2008, he damn near wore those two words out, so they were already about as useful in my trade as a tape measure with the numbers rubbed off, or a socket wrench with the ratchets all stripped.
Since we're currently on the cusp of another presidential campaign season, the two words are now all but banished from the American lexicon.
Don't take my word for it, go straight to the horse's mouth.
When was the last time you heard the president use either word in public? Three years ago, you would have thought that he invented the terms. Today, if someone handed him a baby with a smelly diaper, he would say that the baby needed to be "re-diapered." No way would he use the "c" word, even in that context.
As for the other word, even farmers have taken to uttering "I'm looking forward to the next instance of atmospheric irrigational precipitation" instead of daring to say "hope it rains soon."
I miss "hope." In the etymological armory, there simply isn't an adequate replacement. The word is just so darn...hopeful.
Now, "hope" is the new communism. If I dare to use it in any op-ed piece, I'll be branded a Socialist and Obama sympathizer faster than you can say "Joseph McCarthy." Paroled pedophiles get better treatment than anyone who refers to the "h" word in this day and age.
As for "change," the only time I can almost get away with using the term is if I'm writing about the money I get back after handing over a dollar for my 99-cent McDouble.
Even the plastic change banks sold at dollar stores are now referred to as "money sorters."
I guess I shouldn't carp too much. In exchange for those now-verboten terms, Obama and his detractors have given us some new ones.
For example, I can't turn on a television these days without hearing about "class warfare."
Suggesting something as outrageous as the notion that billionaires should pay the same income tax rate as the guy who scrubs truck stop toilets for a living has been deemed "class warfare." Ditto for hinting that the same guy should get back any of the money he's been giving to the government over the last 40 years when he retires. If you listen to the new way of thinking, that guy should have been studying and investing in the stock market during the previous four decades instead of sponging up errant pee.
Had he done so, I doubt the eggheads and investment bankers have any clue how that excess excretion would have been taken care of over the last two generations, but I'm sure the answer would involve some sort of government-funded research grant.
In his upcoming re-election bid, I'm counting on Obama to come up with some spiffy new words to refill the trough. But he needs to be careful and select terms that aren't too controversial, or too difficult to comprehend or spell.
Otherwise, the words might wind up being debated and dissected in high schools and college campuses all over America.
And as the Republicans keep telling us, the last thing this country needs is class warfare.
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