Ding Dong! The witch is dead. Which old witch? The wicked witch! Ding Dong! The wicked witch is dead.

In 1692, the fine citizens of Salem, Massachusetts bound those suspected of practicing witchcraft with rope, then tossed them into water. If the accused sank and drowned, it meant they were innocent. If they floated, they were deemed guilty and subsequently burned at the stake.

Something amazing happened after Barack Obama won last week’s presidential election. Several of the conservative and Republican radio talk show hosts who had attempted to vilify Obama during his campaign with accusations of being a socialist, a Communist, a terrorist, a Black Panther, a Muslim, a savior, a hater of plumbers, and just about everything short of flying on a broomstick, seemed to have a change of heart.

Glenn Beck from 1260 am radio abruptly cut a female caller off and told her she was stupid when she suggested that another inquiry into the validity of the president-elect’s birth certificate should be instigated. Al Rantel of KABC radio complained about the large number of emails and faxes he was receiving daily that stank of racist doctrine or contained the word nigger. He called it shameful and suggested that listeners with those leanings turn off the radio and never listen to him again. Even Bill O’Reilly called for everyone — no matter what political affiliation — to support the president-elect.

This turnaround reminds me of those ghoulish Cossack-attired sentries in The Wizard of Oz who guard the witch’s castle. They have to put up a pro-witch front while she’s still alive, but once Dorothy melts her, the truth comes out that they prefer her gone.

My son is four and a half months old and is as white as typing paper. When he’s finally old enough to question us about things, Barack Obama will be the only President he’ll be able remember. How wonderful will it be when he asks if white people can also be President!

Hope does float. And remember; Wendy, Samantha, and Glinda were all witches, too.

Why did the chicken cross the road?
Because the bridge over it went nowhere.

Did you know that the octopus is supposedly the eighth smartest animal? That puts them just one back from your common Republican. And since octopi are invertebrates, meaning they have no spine or backbone, one wonders if maybe they and Republicans shared the same family tree not too far back. But this blog is not about insulting mollusks.

Liberals have been furious the past week about the lies and misconceptions regarding Barack Obama that have become standard audience shout-outs at McCain and Palin rallies. Republican supporters have blurted insults and racist comments, accusations about Obama being a terrorist, and even death threats aimed at the Illinois senator, and although its true (finally) that Senator McCain has defended his opponent, he didn’t react until some in his own party suggested that maybe it didn’t look so great for he and his running mate to stand idly by while things got out of hand.

I’m not too concerned with these lies. Nobody goes to a Palin rally other than a Palin supporter, and the problem with Palin supporters is that they are too numb with infatuation to realize that she’s not running for president. And McCain? He handed his microphone over to a woman at a rally recently who insisted she wouldn’t vote for Obama because he was an Arab.

These are not smart people.

No Liberal or undecided voter is going to decide that McCain is their man (or Palin their woman) because some halfwit hollers out that Obama’s middle name is Hussein. So be happy, you Democrats and Liberals. The ugliness at McCain and Palin rallies is just the final gasp of a stunted and cowardly party’s stranglehold on this country. The unsteady yammering from the Arizona Senator and that inelegant non-blinking gaze of Alaska’s governor are not long for this world.

Hopefully on November 5th it will be safe to say that the Republicans have left the building.

So, the Republicans stated at their convention this week that they want to renew America and themselves. I’m not sure how one renews America by electing the same people and party that we’ve had for the last eight years, but I have to admit that the Republicans have definitely changed their opinions on certain issues.

One of the GOP’s strong arguments against an Obama presidency is that he has no military experience. Fair enough, but that didn’t seem to be a problem when President Bush (a part-timer in the Air National Guard when he wasn’t AWOL) was attempting reelection against Democrat John Kerry, a candidate who had been awarded the Purple Heart for wounds sustained during battle. And it also didn’t mean much that Bush’s vice president Dick Cheney had never been in the military, nor his political advisor Karl Rove.

The Republicans have also apparently rethought their stance on infidelity. When Bill Clinton had an affair with Monica Lewinski, they spent millions of taxpayers’ dollars dragging him through the impeachment mud, but nobody seems to mind that candidate McCain began a romantic relationship with his present wife Cindy before he was divorced from his first wife, who also happened to be the mother of his three oldest children.

Since the invasion of Afghanistan, the Republicans have insisted that torture of suspected Islamist terrorists is a necessity and American right, yet Fred Thompson in his speech condemned North Vietnamese treatment of Senator McCain at the Hanoi Hilton. The Republicans have called it cowardly and in direct opposition of the Geneva Convention. I guess this change in Republican thinking will be welcomed by those incarcerated at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay.

The Republicans have always accused Democrats and Liberals of having no backbone and forever changing their minds on the issues, but what I heard this week at the Republican National Convention takes flip-flopping to a new level.

The airlines are in trouble, and I think I can help.

Recently, the airline industry changed its luggage policy and downsized how much each passenger can check in and carry on board before being charged extra. Essentially, it all boils down to a matter of weight. There is even talk of reducing the amount of fuel by loading just enough to get to a destination plus an additional top-off for an extra 45 minutes. Fuel for a flight runs into thousands and thousands of dollars, so this would absolutely make a difference.

But how about implementing a new method for pricing passenger fares?
Does it make sense that a ticket for a ten-year old who weighs seventy pounds is the same price as that for an adult male who tips the scales at two-hundred and eighty pounds? A plane filled with Cub Scouts would burn much less fuel than one loaded with Cleveland Browns, so selling tickets based on just the occupied seat and not weight seems cockeyed. A person’s size doesn’t affect a company’s profit in a movie theatre or a museum, but airplanes are a completely different matter, and it’s illogical to treat it otherwise.

So much in our lives is based on weight and measurement, so why not airline tickets? Most groceries are priced by measuring items out by weight, volume, or amount; one dozen eggs, eight fluid ounces, two pounds.

And travel attire would change. Passengers would opt to go for lightweight clothes, and might even wear only bikinis and bathing trunks as long as the airliners’ cabins were kept warm. Many travelers would treat the departure date as a wrestling or boxing weigh-in. They’d train the week prior to their flight, and probably cut back on food and water intake the last forty-eight hours. We might even see passengers running laps at the airport to make a travel weight-class.

Wouldn’t this lead to a healthier America, or at least for those who can still afford to fly? And with costs rising for everything, especially groceries, eating less would fit nicely into this new economy.

Do I sound preposterous? Maybe I am going a bit too far, but I need to write a few light blogs, you know, get the laughter flowing, or at least coax a smile out of readers. I can’t always be serious. I mean, what do you expect me to say? That we need to begin charging for gas according to the size vehicle someone drives? (Aww…did I say that?)

Let me know your ideas about how we can cope with this rapidly changing economy.

Pregnancy. That’s been my life the past nine months. My wife Heidi gave birth to our son on Sunday, June 22, and let me tell you; she has Big Balls. So does Lisa Schultz, the other half of TheWhole9.

Giving birth is momentous, and even the woman who delivers a baby doped out of her mind to avoid any pain is to be commended. But Heidi and Lisa chose natural childbirth. Not one aspirin, a shot of tequila, or even a bullet to bite on did either of them accept.

Unless you’ve gone through or witnessed labor and childbirth, you can’t even begin to imagine the pain. My wife labored for twelve hours, and starting immediately after her water broke, her contractions were never more than three minutes apart. This means no rest, zero breaks, and no time to come up for air. Towards the end, I would see panic drape her drenched face as the next oncoming contraction seized her. These things were like vultures perched about the room, each waiting for its turn to drop down and twist her as tight as it could. And still she would not buckle and ask for relief.

They say that parents immediately feel a bond for their newborn upon seeing it. I did, but it was not the overpowering, lightning bolt that so many men claim to have experienced. I’m not worried. This baby boy has grown big in me since we’ve had him home, and knowing how and who I am, I’ll be overbearing as he gets older. But what happened to me when my son appeared was that I fell hard all over again for my wife. The feeling that bombarded me, that I’d never felt before, was this new need to protect her, that I was honored to have been part of her labor, and lucky that she had ever agreed to be mine.

I wrestled varsity for Ohio State. Those were tough practices. Afterwards, we’d go over to The Horseshoe, Ohio State’s famed football stadium, and run every aisle of stairs in the place. But a Division I college wrestling practice is beans compared to natural childbirth.

Heidi and Lisa have Huevos Grandes for going through natural childbirth. By choosing this, they gave their children a little head-start. I can’t think of anything more commendable. Can you? If so, let me know.