We offer our kudos and congrats to former senator Linc Chafee, one of the finest gentleman of the political arena that we have known, for finally cutting the cord to the Republican Party. 
 
When Linc was castigated for criticizing President Dubya, his delusional and deadly administration, and the GOP Neanderthals in the US Congress, Chafee pointed out that his opposition to Republican positions and those of its drugstore cowboy leader came because the party had left him.
 
Now it is official, with his having registered as unaffiliated, which has always been P+J’s designation of choice. Anyone who continues to pull (or ink) a straight ticket ballot for either major party probably thinks the voting boot should also include a commode, and is baffled by its absence.
 
Never mind being associated with a political organization here in the Biggest Little that is associated with the likes of the frothing “author,” Steve “Laugh At Me” Laffey, and which is headed by the doyenne of the Vo Dilun GOP, the derringer-packing Eileen “Jurassic Spice” Slocum.
 
So a grateful tip of the hat, and our ongoing respect and admiration to that old horseshoeing wallah, Linc.
 
It is evident to P&J that Chafee stayed at the GOP party as long as he did in deference and allegiance to his father, a giant among men and someone would be aghast at many of Dubya the Dumb’s machinations to weaken our country at home and around the world.
 
Linc Chafee served us very well for many years, and his decision reveals the intelligence, thoughtfulness, and courage that he brought to his various elected roles. We hope he will remain in the public arena, so that Rhode Island will continue to benefit from his special type of leadership.

Birdland by the beach
Jon Campbell, a Casa Diablo regular and accomplished Celtic and what-have-you music star-cum-pyrotechnic genius — he wrote the famous Vo Dilun theme song, “Winnebacome, Winne¬bago” — tells us of a tale of woe recently experienced with his lady at Moonstone Beach. It is in lyric form, of course, “just a mildly exaggerated account” of his travails by the seashore.

Running A (Fowl) of the Law

Now I like September when the tourists are gone
You can head to the beach and be mostly alone
’Twas a grand view of the Is¬land from Moonstone that day
As the cares of the world like the sands blew away

Now she and I went in the surf for a while
And beachcombed the strand for about half a mile
A chance at the end of the day to unwind
On colorful towels we talked and reclined

Now up comes a Clam Cop badge Five Hundred and Six
And he’s showing a trainee all his Park Ranger tricks
Says he it seems while we searched for some unsullied sand
That we’d plunked ourselves down on some federal land

Now all of a sudden our quite pleasant time
Had been quickly transformed into a federal crime
It appeared Fish and Wildlife was hot on the case
To see that no wildlife was there taking place

With his hand on his side¬arm he grilled us at length
And probed all our answers for weakness and strength

It seems Piping Plovers against natural reason
Now linger on Moonstone for the whole Shoulder Season

We produced our ID and stood in the lurch
(I could see she was fearing a cavity search)
And I knew that the efforts to maintain Plover Purity
Had landed us in the hands of Seagull Security

I’ll admit we weren’t handcuffed or cracked on our melons
A check on the computer showed we neither were felons
We both had to stand there partially dressed
While the tickets were written and the whole fine assessed

It passeth all understanding why he was so overzealous
Perhaps my bikini-clad blonde made him torturously jealous
As we were escorted from the beach this thought was emergent
Towel-wearing must equal Iraqi insurgent

The upshot of this was a $125 ticket for Jon and his sweetie, a pretty heavy fee for disturbing the local fowl population. While recognizing the little plovers are indeed worth protecting — although Campbell says they taste like chicken — he notes how the signs at the water’s low tide line, indicating that the spot is a closed, federally protected area, should be readable from the beach side, rather than that of the water.
 
At any rate, Jon finishes by saying, “I'll admit that this lyric is no ‘Alice’s Restaurant,’ but the circumstances felt a lot the same. I do assume that for my $125 I have all rights and privileges to include this as a track on my next CD.”
 
We’ll be waiting for it.