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A June bug is an adult beetle. For some curious reason, the June bug is also known as the May beetle. May is already shot to hell, hence my decision to go with “June bugs” as the title of this piece. See, there is always a singular sense of logic in these columns, even if it is sometimes difficult to locate.
As you have probably guessed, this column is not all about beetles or Beatles (Ringo is not even mentioned once). The word bugs can be used to mean different things. It is a slang for something that might annoy you. Bugs also is a slang word for crazy. If a system has bugs in it, it has flaws. Finally, bugs obviously refers to insects. In this month of June, all four uses came into play.
The word bugs applies to Congressman Anthony Weiner in two of the above ways. Weiner both annoyed me and you could say his behavior was crazy. Weiner resigned last week. It wasn’t only that Weiner threw away a promising political career, he managed to offend a porn star.
Weiner’s resignation is no doubt a relief to many who grew tired of deciphering the various code names for penis used by the media. There is not much a columnist can do when the congressman’s name itself is a code name for, well you know. While Weiner was texting naughty words to porn star Ginger Lee, she was texting him about political matters. Right in the middle of texting her about the various positions spelled out in the Kama Sutra, Ms. Lee was questioning Weiner about the benefits of a single-payer health system. Maybe Lee ought to run for Weiner’s seat …
Citizens of Philadelphia are really bugged, that is, annoyed about the new taxes proposed by City Council to bail out the city’s public school system. I can’t say I blame them. The compromise, which included giving the schools about half of what Dr. Arlene Ackerman requested, doesn’t change the distressing facts. One — the superintendant of public schools still presides over a system with too many high-salaried administrators. Two — a recent audit by the city controller revealed flawed accounting procedures that need to be corrected before doling out more money. Three — she is inexplicably increasing the budget to fund Promise Academies based on sketchy information about whether they truly work.
Forget about whether it is a big deal to tax soda, it isn’t. The way the soda lobby and their handmaidens in council are defending soda, you would think Dr. Oz recommended Coke as a health food. On the flimsy basis of 2,700 students and no test score results, has Dr. Ackerman really made her case for new taxes? Should Ackerman have been required to make alternate decisions before increasing taxes while Philadelphia is in economic crisis? I think you already know the answers …
The first Republican Debate was held last week. Bugs, in this instance, is slang for crazy. You put Rick Santorum, Michelle Bachmann, Herman Cain and Ron Paul together on one stage, and in comparison, Mitt Romney gains the stature of our presidents on Mount Rushmore. Then there is the candidate they call T-Paw, Tim Pawlenty. T-Paw had a deer-in-the- headlights moment. When asked by moderator John King of CNN to repeat his recent charge that ObamaCare and RomneyCare are so similar they can be combined, T-Paw just shriveled away. It’s just as well by me if Pawlenty doesn’t make the grade. I just don’t want to go through four years with headline writers call our president “T-Paw.”
Back in 1972 when Vice-Presidential candidate Thomas Eagleton was taken off the Democratic ticket with McGovern because he had been treated by a psychiatrist. In other words, the party was afraid that voters would be afraid to have an unstable finger on the nuclear button. If they disqualified Republican presidential candidates whose ideas were bugs, there would be nobody to run. After all, when all of them think that it’s a good way to reduce the deficit by giving rich people another tax break, what else can you call it? …
June is a month only an exterminator can truly love, which brings me back to the use of bugs in a generic sense to describe various insects. I am truly frightened. I spray the front and back of my home and I swear the bugs laugh and start spraying me back. At night, they knock on my door and ask for snacks and donations to fund the Roach Motel. One of them sent me a note reminding me to water the plants. I take the trash out and they carry it right back in the yard. Last night, they had a barbecue and a couple of them got drunk on a few drops of beer from a can in a neighbor’s recycle container. My only respite may come next month. The bugs advised me they’re going on vacation and will be staying in a New York Hotel.
The last straw was when one of them asked if I could get them tickets for “The Book of Mormon.” SPR
Contact the South Philly Review at editor@southphillyreview.com.
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