"Dog and Beth on the Campaign Trail."

On the campaign trail I saw an ugly thing. An awful crushing of hope, all too symbolically resonant of this recent election over all. Like "Big Jim" Comey I see fit to sit on these things for months and months, deliberating uselessly until it is totally redundant to remark upon it.

Then I remark upon it.

Last summer Dog and Beth Chapman were going out for a meal at famous Craig's in this town. The paparazzi –– incredibly –– followed them as they went in to that restaurant, asking them who they were voting for. You could have predicted the answer, or so you would think.

Dog looked even more exhausted than ever, he was even redder in the face than before, so red he was purple, but he planted himself squarely on the spot in front of the cameras, perhaps guilelessly grateful and proud that TMZ was asking his political opinion. He waved away his nervous PA, who kept trying to delicately drag him off camera like a recalcitrant nonegenarian. He stood firm like Gary Cooper and held out his arms palms downward and half-squatted in place, his preferred posture to make a public statement. Now he gently repeated with obvious good will and earnestness some words of wisdom he "onct hyeard Dolly Parton say," which were:  Never influence your public on who to vote for because you will always disappoint somebody.

Nice sentiment.   (You might well wonder, "Who the fuck takes political advice from Dog the Bounty Hunter?" But then you might also ask, "Who the fuck seeks political advice from that oold fart off Duck Dynasty," whereupon you'd find yourself also answering, "Oh yes, Steve Bannon and behind him all the assembled Red States, infinite their sagacity!")

In a show of supreme naivety Dog said, "But hain't this been a great race, hey boy? Whoo! It's been the very best my bruh! America can still have a great election!" Like it had been the Bicentennial. He then raised his thumbs up and grinned, showing off the new dentures of which he is justly proud, even if they make him look strange and eerie and off-kilter and gone badly wrong in all his earthly works.

Dog might have been the first and only person to on record opine thuswise about the recent election "cycle". CNN is not calling his agent asking if he will sit on a panel across from David Brooks, Katty Kay or that especially attractive blonde. Duane has not been asked to "sit in for" Charlie Rose.

The uncynical moment, these few seconds without bile, this delicate and noble show of political magnanimity and bipartisanship by Dog, seemed to hang in the space/time continuum like a silver crystal raindrop for half a minute. For that trice, that mite of time, the world seemed youthful again. Then Big Beth Chapman came clomping back along the boardwalk to take Dog by the ear and holler hectoringly at the cameras, "Don't be a chump, vote for Trump!"

You could imagine "Dogger" stuttering, in his most henpecked way, "But dear I just told them what Dolly Parton said about––" and her cuffing his bald spot and booting him into the restaurant by the worn seat of his pants.

I do believe and recollect that was the last time I saw Duane Champman alive.