[Rhodes22-list] Re-naming Boats, Music, and yes, Politics

[Brad Haslett]

This is just cruel, but funny.  Brad

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Lt. Kerry's Lonely Hearts Club Band
 By Howie Carr  |   Sunday, September 16, 2007  |
http://www.bostonherald.com  |
Columnists<http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/columnists/>

If you thought Scaramouche was a pretentious name for Sen. John Forbes Kerry
to give his 42-foot Nantucket gigolo boat, he's gone and topped himself.

Liveshot has scuttled the name Scaramouche and rechristened it . . . Let It
Be.

That's right, the Beatles song. From Freddie Mercury to John Lennon. I'm
telling you, you cannot make this stuff up.

Why "Let It Be?" My theory is the more appropriate Lennon-McCartney titles
were taken: "Nowhere Man" and "I'm a Loser." Not to mention "Fool on the
Hill."

This momentous nautical event happened last November, but apparently nobody
noticed the official filing with the Coast Guard until now. The question is,
Why change the name? A call to Kerry's Boston office asking if there will be
an answer (a line from the song, see?) was responded to with a brief
e-mail:"I have no idea why he changed the name."

But I do. First, though, we must stipulate the junior senator's
accomplishments. He is without doubt America's most successful gigolo. He
has stalked not one but two heiresses worth hundreds of millions. To *John
Kerry* <http://www.bostonherald.com/search/?topic=John+Kerry> I say with
awe: "Baby You're a Rich Man."

Thanks to your loaded old gold-digging second wife, that is.

"Can't Buy Me Love" indeed. Mama T Heinz Kerry did exactly that. The first
time Sen. Kerry realized how much dough she had, he began humming, "Got to
Get You Into My Life." When he saw her standing there, Kerry wanted to hold
her hand. Or at least her bank book. When she said yes, he was feeling glad
all over.

Soon she was singing, "Baby You Can Drive My Car." Or, more precisely, her
SUVs, all five or six of them, one for every mansion, which are located here
there and everywhere. She gave him a ticket to ride - on her $35 million
Gulfstream jet. She cut Liveshot in on 19 Louisburg Square on Beacon Hill
and presented him with that multimillion-dollar painting to call his own.
And now, with a little help from his (very few) friends, Kerry hangs on to
this do-nothing job in the Senate. One tune he never has to croon to Mrs.
Heinz, er Kerry, er, Heinz-Kerry, is "You Never Give Me Your Money."

The Scaramouche, a Hinckley power boat that gets less than one mile per
gallon of fuel, was just another boytoy toy Mama T bought him in 2002 with
money from her first husband's trust fund. Being John Kerry, he probably
decided on the name Scaramouche without doing any research beyond hearing
the Queen tune on an oldies radio station.

Later on, everybody checked out the real definition of Scaramouche. Here's
one from "Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable": "A stock character in
Italian farce. . . . A braggart and a fool, very valiant in words, but a
poltroon."

>From "Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia": "A braggart soldier."

Well, Liveshot, if the Docksider fits. . .

When the 2004 campaign heated up, the Scaramouche was sent to dry dock, the
Witness Protection Program of boats. Now it's back and John apparently
wanted a lame new name to reflect his latest boring hobby, the acoustic
guitar.

"While My Guitar Gently Weeps?" Not quite. Those weeping are the poor fools
forced to endure a set of John singing those wonderful protest songs of his
'60s youth. "Blowing in the Wind," you know, like a wind turbine in
Nantucket Sound. Where Have All the Young Men Gone? Mostly to the Sun Belt,
to escape the high taxes imposed on them in Massachusetts by the likes of
John Kerry.

But why rename the boat Let It Be? Well, he couldn't take "Yellow
Submarine." That's Ted Kennedy's song.

"When I'm 64?" No way. I mean, that's how old Kerry will be on his next
birthday, Dec. 11.

But don't worry, John. Even 64-year-old gigolos are still needed, at least
as long as they can keep their hands off the younger local talent, if you
know what I mean. If you ever get caught, though, it'll be hello-goodbye,
mostly goodbye. One again, you'll be nothing more than a day tripper on the
long and winding road, just like after you dumped your first heiress wife.
What was her name? Julia?
Article URL:
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1031798