A LATE FATHER'S DAY; POLITICS N POKER, POLITICS N POKER, CUT THE DECK, TAKE OUT THE JOKER

Kelso had a bit too much tequila sabado por la noche and was extra raggedy come Sunday morning. All the V-8 juice and Gatorade Kelso could get down, 4 Advils and a couple of Lorazepam and back to sleep. Woke up around 2pm, put Kelso Jr's toy sail-boat together for an afternoon sail on the boat pond and a visit to Kelso Sr & Kelso mere. Kelso, Jr., was thrilled to find out that Kelso, Sr., did indeed play minor-league ball for the Yankees (they were GM, not Rudy's Girls, then). Beautiful day for sailing "The River Rat" or "The Stoonad" or "The Utahraptor"; Kelso Jr. still hasn't settled on a name. A shame family issues prevented Kelso Sr. from joining in on the fun, Kelso Sr. being a Naval Intelligence man during the Korean War.

That's right. Not "conflict". "War." The first one "we" lost. As "we" appear headed toward "our" third loss, Kelso wonders if a few more Kelso Sr's aren't needed back in Washington and a few less Condi Rices.

Jeez, but that Condi Rice scalds Kelso's Nuts. You get all the evil of Henry Kissinger with none of the brains all wrapped up in a tidy little brown package with a wispy moustache. Come back Cyrus Vance and George Shultz. All is forgiven.

What is it that bothers Kelso so much about the endless stream of heartless Blacks, Jews, and Lavenders that this admisitration vomits up? Kelso doesn't know. He believes that everyone makes their own choices and nobody ought to be wedded to one party or other because of other considerations beyond their own views or desires. And at rock bottom, it probably stings the Right more that they've lost the Espicopalians, Presbyterians, Congregationalists and Methodists. All of them. Not just a token handful of the pink-to-olive-to-dark that chase lucre or power or spend too much time obsessing on Israel.

Returning to Kelso, Sr., for a moment. He once told Kelso years ago that in writing fiction he always bore this in mind: in his or her heart EVERYBODY BELIEVES that they are Liberal Democrats and have mankind's best intersts at heart. A fairly keen observation, really, which is why Kelso tends to believe that overt racism was not at the heart of the Katrina disaster, but rather institutional racism. The stuff you can't see or smell but shows up over and over again in the statistics. You know something? Fuck that shit. Kelso hates being fair and he's not going to be fair now. David Brooks, in the Tissue Of Lies, calls this Bush's TVA. In Brooks's dreams. Bush is never going to fund this and if he does it will go to Halliburton, etc., for luxury housing and oil reconstruction ripoffs. Rich Lowry, writing in the New York Post, asks Democrats for a deal: if Bush is willing to commit $200 billion to the reconstruction of the Gulf Coast, then the Democrats have to admit that bad behavior is the cause of poverty and not racism. The Clintons will go along with that maybe. Bad behavior? How repulsive. Pull back the curtain on Mr. Lowry and there's no doubt there's some twisted shit there. Why is Kelso so sure? BECAUSE EVERY SINGLE PERSON HAS ALL SORTS OF TWISTED SHIT. Including the virginal Brooks and the timid Lowry. Why timid? He rejected Al Franken's offer to settle the Democratic wimp thing with a fistfight.

But screw that. Kelso still believes that the door-to-door Civil War is coming. He will endeavor to get to Western Europe or Argentina before it goes down, but if he fucks up, he's going to figure out who the Rap Brown, Stokeley Carmichael, Eldrige Cleaver, Huey Newton, and Bobby Rush of the New Age are and go to them with a proposition. Here's the dough. Protect Kelso's family and teach Kelso how to shoot and fight. Kelso cannot bring himself to fight for the other side.

Kelso sees a couple of possible indicators. Now that college is back in session, there will be a Kent State or Jackson State redux...and then it's time. Or the invasion of Venezuela, a Western Capitalist Democracy. As Richard Pryor famously said: "RUN!" Homeland Security will probably have some kind of international flight lockdown, but who's going to stop a nice White Middle Class family from taking a nice tourist vacation?

One last hosanna to Kelso, Sr. He is absolutely over the moon about some 3x-non-recourse real estate tax shelters he made in the early 80s. They went tits up with the Bill Bradley-Ronald Reagan Tax "Simplification" Act of 1986, but the old boy hung on and has some nice looking property now. Kelso believes this to be an extension of his buddy(The Movement Conservative)'s dictum: Socialists make the best Capitalists and Reactionaries make the best Stalinists.

Culture has been sorely lacking from this blog as has sports, really, because the last few weeks have been politics, politics, politics. One more political note, though, and then, in his constant effort to shove it up The Tissue's collective ass, Kelso will present a poker story MODESTLY and is hoping that Floppers will rate him more highly on style and substance than they do McManus.

A good friend of Kelso's had an absolutely outstanding opinion on the German election. He thought Schroeder might win and asked Kelso what the prevailing price was. At the time, it was 10p-in-the-pound in the futures market and about the same -- 9/1 -- against in the outright. Kelso doesn't know what his friend did, but he sure hoped the guy at least went long in the futures for 1/2 his stake. How did Kelso miss this? Schroeder had kept Germany out of Iraq, the Euro strong, the economy solid overall if a bit disparate, and was basically a steady, if greedy, hand at the tiller, while Merkel was promising to bring Bush-lite to Germany and using some pretty heavy-handed ethnic politics to do so. Great opinion, dude.

Interesting take on the Roberts situation. Bloomberg against. Tomasky of the American Prospect predicting Hillary "aye", Schumer "nay," with the total around 90-10 aye. Kelso's not ready to go to that number but he'll split the difference. 81-19 aye.

Lawn-jockey update: Reverend Floyd Flake backing Bloomberg and called George W. Bush "my homey". Great stuff. Jeez, Kelso's done some gambling in his time and maybe a little partying, but he hasn't cheated on his taxes and has never personally benefitted from the death of a mistress. Kelso ought to be a Reverend. Flake ought to be wearing stripes (though safe from sexual violence).

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In the 2-5 NL HE game, Kelso was about 4th best of 7 including one of the best pros we have in the city. Latter absolutely reading Kelso like a vicar reads a bible. Two other good players play who play Kelso's style but slightly better. Two locksmiths Kelso didn't worry about and a very bad player Kelso should have worried about. Kelso hung in there through three nickel racks and abandoned a lost cause about two elements the wiser: Kelso stupidly allowed a free card on the turn trying to trap on the river, which, of course allowed his opponent to get the case jack (which is in total violation of Kelso's style) and Kelso completely misread a very, bad, loose opponent and the board, costing an all-in for $400. The guy had a very bad betting tell, trying to steal blinds with $15 bets and would fold on every raise or bet over $25. And Kelso was killing him with this. K caught K-K, bet $25, he called. J-x-x flopped. Kelso bet $60 and he called. He should have known there that he had AT LEAST JACKS UP and checked or bet $60 again on the turn, and gone to plan B, but instead when the turn came x, Kelso pushed all-in and got called w/Jacks up 7s which held up. Guess Kelso was still a little tired. He was a little disgusted with his play and didn't feel like fighting his game all night. So, when the last of the third rack was gone, so was he.

Money irrelevant. Being in with better players not a bad thing as the money IS irrelevant and Kelso treats these games as Hold 'Em School, happy to be a small overall net winner, but still and always mortified and appalled at his own errors. This is part of the "no-ego" school which also isn't a bad thing. Unlike McManus, Kelso often makes mistakes and doesn't actually KNOW everything there is to know about poker. Unlike McManus, Kelso is just another poker player, not the poker player OF RECORD. Fuck the Tissue Of Lies sideways.

Kelso doesn't really DO sex on his blog, but maybe tomorrow a little culture and sports and perhaps even some finance as long as nothing new and hideous comes from any members of the Cheney Administration or from Hillary Clinton.

Kelso's Nuts love you.