Meanwhile, Down at Floyd's Barber Shop

Continuing along with the Andy Griffith Appreciation theme...

Floyd's Barber Shop in Mayberry was like any barber shop in America.  Friends gathered to shoot the breeze while waiting for their turn with the clippers in the chair.  Andy, Barney, Goober, and maybe even Howard jawing about the latest doings in town.  Whose house was getting a new paint job?  Whose mother just whipped a new recipe for boysenberry pie?  Who got a new tie for the big town dance?

And, while we never really saw this on television, barber shops are also the place to take the temperature of the country.  Here's where you can discount the polls offered by USA Today/Gallup, the New York Times, and CNN.  You want to know what the nation is really thinking?  Go get your hair done.

And, so it was for me two weeks ago.  And I unexpectedly got an earful.

I've been seeing the same great hair stylist for most of my time in Los Angeles.  I have followed her to a variety of venues and her latest gig is in a pretty high end salon in West Hollywood.  There's always good and funny dialogue there on any given Saturday between her and the other folks that toil around her station.  From cut to ultimate blow dry, it's always an engaging ninety or so minutes for me.

Now, please keep in mind that the conversation never really gets that heavy.  And almost never gravitates to politics.  Even if it did, I would likely keep my mouth shut.  This is Los Angeles and the world of show business.  Unless you have an extreme and radical liberal viewpoint, your thoughts are almost always and immediately dismissed.

But, two Saturdays ago, I walked into a discussion that was already at its midpoint.  And, as I sat down in my chair, I was alerted by my hair stylist.

"We're talking politics."

Umm, okay.  I'll be quiet.  Since I hate both sides usually.

Except this was a crowd that was up in arms.  All women.  A variety of ages.  And almost all of them had voted for Barack Obama in 2008.

But I quickly learned that those ballot checkmarks might have been a one-time-only event.  These folks were angry.

Annoyed by a health care plan that they all seemed to know was going to hit them in their pocketbook.

Exhausted by all the talk of class warfare. 

"What's so bad about people trying to make a million dollars?  Isn't that how our country was built?"

No longer buying into the notion that Barack and Michelle Obama were the idyllic benchmarks to emulate.

"I don't buy her act.  She hasn't seen the inside of a kitchen in twenty years."

"Who cares what George Clooney thinks?"

One client in the other chair had just finished Edward Klein's Obama-focused expose, "The Amateur," a book that I myself was reading at the same time.  She couldn't stop talking about the contents of that tome.  Plans were made to pass it around like a joint.

Knowing that this was not a combat zone for equal-hating-both-sides me, I chimed in a bit.  I brought up my long-standing notion that all Presidential candidates must take an extensive American History test and then a complete psychiatric work-up.  High fives were exchanged at the very mention.

"I don't know what's so bad about Mitt Romney.  At least, he's run a business." 

When the "Amateur-reading" client mentioned that the book reports about a major falling-out between Oprah Winfrey and the Obamas, that was the last straw.  If Oprah was no longer lock step in formation with the First Family, how could they be?

I listened to all this and surveyed the demographics.  A wide range of ages on the female side of the ledger.  They had mostly all voted for Barack in 2008.  And were no longer standing behind him.

I thought about what was happening around me.  This was West Hollywood.  The belly of the liberal beast.  If the President was no longer delivering this crowd, perhaps the upcoming election won't be as close as it seems.  Just maybe the anger and disillusionment will show up at the polling places come November.  Granted this is California and a lost cause in the electoral college anyway.  But, still....

This was Obama's crowd and he has lost them.  Hmmmmm......

Gee, I wonder what Andy and Barney are thinking.

Dinner last night:  Roast beef sandwich from Clementine's.