Barney Frank on NPR's Morning Edition: Priceless discourse

I have been utterly moved this morning to come out of my blogging seclusion to comment on a recurring piece of sheer entertainment on National Public Radio's Morning Edition (NPR ME). Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) is the current chair for the House Financial Services Committee--an extremely busy and high profile post in current times. As such, he is continually working image control on the 'bailouts' that began with AIG, continued through much of the financial sector, and now are focused on the US auto industry. My comments here are completely a-political, rather my goal is to make sure anyone who reads this takes at least a moment to listen to one of these interviews! As the title uses the word, I reiterate: priceless.

Rep. Frank cannot help himself but to fill every second of each of these interviews with his opinionated and assertive blather; but I cannot help but listen. There is no interviewer necessary. The first such discourse I heard was 'moderated' by ME's Renee Montagne. Frank took the opportunity to deliver a speech regarding the importance of the government's 'investment' into the financial sector. Throughout the interview, he refused to be interrupted by Ms. Montagne in her attempts to guide the discussion, question Frank's arguments, or request clarification. When she finally gained Mr. Frank's attention for such a request, the interview slipped off into oblivion as the representative continued to clarify his point into the next break. The second intervew was similar and Mr. Frank continued to talk as Ms. Montagne proclaimed as loudly as she could that they were out of time.

This morning I nearly spat my coffee onto the dash of the car when I heard that Montagne's co-host Steve Innskeep would interview Frank. Montagne and Innskeep must have formed a gameplan in the wee hours of the morning and decided that Innskeep was the man to carry it out. The interview followed a familiar format, with Innskeep asking a specific question and Frank replying with an encompassing essay with opinionated and conjecturing supporting statements. As you may have already surmised, there are no conclusions in Frank's verbal essays. Toward the end of the interview, Innskeep managed to get Frank to hush up long enough for "one last question, and we only have a few seconds for your response". Frank quickly piped up, before the question had even been posed, "well, you'd better not make it complicated if I only have a few seconds [sic]because I need time to respond to these things...." Innskeep could no longer control himself and burst out into what must have been simmering laughter that was finally brought to a boil after a morning's worth of preparations for this gem of an interview.

You may listen to the most recent interview on NPR's website by clicking the link here: NPR's 11.19.2008 interview with Rep. Barney Frank

This article is not attended as an endorsement of any political ideology, party, or representative. It is, however, intended as an endorsement of NPR's Morning Edition and their continuing interview series with Rep. Frank.

Poor Francis Rags to Riches Best in Show Lowe

In early 2007 PFRRBSL (top left), or Frankie as she is known around the house, was living a tough life under the pseudonym Isabelle (or Izzy) at the Montgomery County Animal Shelter in Christiansburg, VA. Lucky for her, the Friends of the shelter had her best interests in mind for finding her a new home.

In February and March 2007, our tongue-in-cheek comments on getting a second dog turned more serious (as that kind of repetitive joking tends to do). We became convinced that our other beagle, Billie (full name: Billie Jean Is Not My Lover Run for the Roses Lowe) was in severe need of a canine companion--and what better companion for a beagle than another beagle. Natasha began window shopping the area shelter websites for young beagles that may still have the hope to be 'trained' for the lush indoor life that Billie had been enjoying for more than 2 years at that point. Of 'pure-bred' dogs, beagles may be the most common to wind up in shelters (no reference given here, so treat it as conjecture) for various reasons which have perhaps already been discussed in the well-received blog entry here. As we soon found out, if you want a beagle you can probably find one (or more) in your local shelter.

Natasha was still working at Montgomery Regional Hospital at that time and before going to work one weekend asked me to call area shelters about the dogs that they had. I called the Montgomery County shelter and mentioned that I was a beagle owner and was looking for a buddy for our 34lb 2 year old female. The lady with whom I spoke mentioned that she would pass my information immediately on to the local beagle rescue (not sure if this is a formal or informal organization) about our request for a second companion. Later that Saturday night, I had a call from Kim from beagle rescue telling me that she had the dog for us. I told her more details about Billie and she invited Natasha and me to the dog walk on Sunday, even though the shelter was closed that day.

We arrived not long after noon on Sunday, and was greeted by Kim and two of the other Friends of the shelter who introduced us to Frankie. She was a ragged-looking, excited dog who was dwarfed by Billie's 'barrel-chested' physique. There is a wonderful fenced playing area that allowed us to see how Frankie and Billie would tolerate each other.

In their first meeting, Frankie was playful and Billie responded excitedly. They ran several laps around the enclosed area, and then I tested Frankie to see how she responded to commands and people in general. She picked up quickly on the basics and came equipped with sit and her favorite to this day, turn-around. She really knew how to put on a good show for adoption day, which pleasantly surprised Kim, who knew how timid Frankie really is.

We could not possibly say no to taking Frankie home. She had failed at two other adoptions before ours, apparently for barking too much. Our guess is that she was put on a tie-out and left there, where almost no beagle would last too long before driving an owner batty with the barking. We asked Kim to get the paperwork started, and commenced the process of adopting Frankie. We filled out the approximately 10 lines of information and then was asked for the $10 adoption fee. For some reason, we did not have any cash (no surprise to my dad, I am sure); so I told them, hold on Wachovia is 2 miles away, I'll be back. As I walked out to the car another Friend came jogging after me, "There's no reason for you drive to get the money, come on back in and we'll get you fixed up." Kim told me, as I reentered the shelter, "We just want to make sure that folks are willing to make a commitment, and you obviously know how to take care of Billie and are familiar with beagles." We left that day with Frankie and a great deal of gratitude for the Friends. Later that month we made a donation to the shelter to cover her adoption fee and to become Friends ourselves.

To our great fortune, Frankie is a wonderful dog. In addition to sit and turn-around, she came house trained and is still better trained than Billie in those respects. We are most-thankful to have the opportunity to host Frankie in our home, and look forward to spending the years with her.