The Rude Pundit: Of Democratic Candidates and Gay Lovers

Let us say, and why not, that you are a thirty-something openly queer guy, and you are cruising one of your favorite South Carolina gay bars - say, and, indeed, why not, Time Out over on 8th in Myrtle Beach. So you're checkin' out the off-season scene, the regulars, and you notice at the end of the bar a semi-nice-looking guy, who really just seems like another you. He lifts his glass to you, as if saying, "Hello," but you just wave him off. Fuck him. You want something new and exotic.

You scope out the black skinhead dancing with the leatherman, the twink and the bear, the cross-dressing feather fags and the yuppie studs and the club kids. You shoot some tequila for confidence and limb looseness and head out to dance as that awesome Rihanna remix kicks in. The secret truth is, though, that looks are deceiving. For, you see, what you fail to realize is that the one you really want is Mr. Ordinary-Looking at the end of the bar. He's sitting there, toasting away, waiting for someone to sit down next to him so he can order that lucky dude a mixed drink and tell him all the hot shit he's gonna do. But no one notices him. And chances are, Mr. Ordinary's gonna go home alone. It's sad, really, that the thirst for symbolic difference makes us overlook the obvious.

So it was, speaking of obvious, that the winner of last night's Democratic debate was John Edwards, the odd average man out. While Obama and Clinton went at each other in an entertaining slap fight, there was Edwards, calmly speaking for the vast majority of Americans, even if that majority won't ever get to hear him. The only candidate to mention New Orleans during a Martin Luther King Day debate hosted by the Congressional Black Caucus, Edwards articulated again and again the vision of economic justice and empowerment that eluded his rivals. And he had to fuckin' beg for air time while the other two squabbled over who hates Republicans more.

Edwards should have jumped into the pit bull ring more than he did to assert his ideas. That he didn't doesn't take away from the power of them. That the moderators and the media refuse to take his candidacy seriously, however, does leave him, alone, at the end of the bar, waiting for someone to notice.

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That'll put up my bookshelves this weekend and balance my checkbook.

I've learned that the flashy ones, the loud ones, the ones who talk big are usually not what they appear to be. They're just a flash in the pan with little substance.

They drive a Cadillac but have a Chevrolet budget.

A friend of mine once referred to them as the "alligator shoe set." They look good at first glance, but the closer you look, you realize the shoes are just cheap vinyl.

Mr. Ordinary, however, has what it takes to endure, and once you discover that you wonder why it took so long for him to come along.

correctly, the 'i's' are dotted and the 't's' are crossed. They are the adults of the world. I agree, all this flash is shiny and pretty, but come morning, it's all rusty and flaking. I too will take ordinary, adult, intelligence.

I'm supporting Mercer myself.