Re: Dad, who are you voting for for mayor?

I haven’t written any posts since April 9th because of a realization that became apparent during the gun control debate which caused me to become very dispirited. I did write an article for this blog explaining how and why I became so dispirited but I have not posted it yet. I wanted to share this email correspondence with my daughter Jessica first.

She wrote to me asking who was I voting for for Mayor, then wrote the following:

I like de Blasio, and it's not just 'cause he's Italian, or 'cause he changed his last name to his MOM's last name, or 'cause he went to SIPA! or 'cause he's married to a black woman, or 'cause they send their kids to public schools. it's because he seems the most progressive.

To which I responded:

I like you, Jess. Does Bill not capitalize the 'de' in his name? Did you know that Weiner is thinking about single-payer med insurance for NYC? That would be wonderful, it would mean that your mother would not have to work forever before she's eligible for Medicare. If Bill 'of' Blasius (Blasio being a derivative of the Latin blaesus [stammering] which was used as a byname for someone with some defect, either of speech or gait. Gotta love those pejorative Italian surnames.) is also for single-payer then I guess I would have to base my vote on the other factors concerning these two candidates.
Do I go with the ethnic-pandering, ivy-league/ivory-tower one world government elitist, color-barrier crossing, practice what he preach, politically correct guinea dago wop?
Or do I go with the social media and sexting pioneer, Anthony Weiner?
Seems like a no-brainer to me.

Oh, by the way, Weiner is a surname originating in the German language (wein meaning wine) which was adopted by German Jews of Ashkenazic descent for reflecting the prominence of wine in the Jewish Scriptures and Jewish ceremonies. Interestingly,in English, it is also a slang expression that is used as a euphemism for a word that I am not comfortable using in an email to my daughter and for which I can find no other suitable euphemism other than the word 'weiner.'