Old vans and European journalists
 | Rob Crowe
Columnist
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Summer is usually reunion time for families and our family is no different than any other in that aspect.
Since my dad was from Kentucky, it is quite a little jaunt to the family reunion so our visits are more or less infrequent. The last time I went was two years ago and for some reason, decided it would be good if I could take my mother down this year to see the relatives. Dad died in 2000 but Mom still likes to visit her in-laws as often as possible.
Our family van, an Aerostar dated 1994 with 165,000 miles, needed a little attention before we left. It runs well but has an annoying habit of leaking power steering fluid all over the place, the exhaust pipe was broken and the left side body panel between the door and rear wheel is a little, well, a lot rusty. After perusing the trusty repair manual and seeing that replacing the rack and pinion would be an all-day repair in the shop, translating to a week repair project on the farm, I decided that even with the high price of oil I’d just keep adding it.
The rust was a different case, since you always want to put your best face on for a reunion, the hole in the fender had to be dealt with and the exhaust definitely needed repair.
I backed the van up to the garage last night, repaired the exhaust and then filled the gaping fender void with some extruded styrofoam blocks and squirted builder’s foam into the open spaces to hold the foam in place. After the foam hardened, I cut the excess off and went on to other things like sleep.
The van got new tires today and after it made it home, I backed it up to the garage again for the cosmetic surgery. I did some grinder work and then started looking for a good place to mix up the Bondo. Being the top Republican in the county has some benefits – an old “Wedel for Senate” sign made a good surface for mixing up the gunk. Since he’s running for county commissioner, he probably won’t need that one.
I mixed up and slapped on several coats of the stuff, running out of my own supply and delving into my son’s supply. I borrowed some of his auto body tools to shape the dried putty, borrowed his air sander to smooth it off, then sprayed some gray primer on the smooth but wavy surface. If you stand about 50 feet away it actually looks pretty good. On to Kentucky!
Bush travels
President Bush has been doing some traveling. As usual, he hasn’t gotten the best reception. He was in Vienna, Austria, having a news conference with the Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel and European Union president Jose Manual Barroso on June 21 when he fielded a rather infantile question from a European journalist.
The question went like this: “Mr. President, you might be aware that in Europe, the image of America is still falling, and dramatically in some areas. Let me give you some numbers. In Austria, in this country, only 14 percent of the people believe that the United States, what they are doing is good for peace, 64 percent think that it is bad. In the United Kingdom, your ally, there are more citizens who believe that the United States policy under your leadership is helping to destabilize the world, than Iran. So my question is, why do you think that you failed so badly to convince Europeans to win their heads and hearts and minds?”
The reporter wasn’t really asking a question, he was just playing the current liberal journalist version of “Gotcha.” Make a statement using some poll numbers detrimental to President Bush then ask a question that is really not a question.
In this case his “question” would be better stated, “We’ve been spewing our hate Bush, hate America message across Europe and it is working, how do you like that?”
There is really no reason to ask this question, the answer is already known.
The president went on to give a classy answer essentially saying his job was to defend the American people, not read polls, but I’m proposing a better one when he encounters imbeciles like this. In honor of one of my favorite Australians, Crocodile Dundee, I’d like to see this reply: “You got _______ (Insert word describing common barnyard substance) for brains?” I’d advocate the version that could be used in a family newspaper. Hopefully the reporter could figure out the putdown, but don’t count on it.
Class is not something that is evident in the current crop of mainstream media journalists. Even in its dilapidated state, my old van exudes far more class than they could ever hope for.
Rob Crowe chairs the Aitkin County Republicans and raises kids and cows on a farm near Hill City.
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