Don't forget to wipe your feet!

"It has never been proven that air toxins are hazardous to people."

Tom DeLay

As a kid, I spent much of my summer vacations on my sister and brother-in-law's farm. I

have a lot of fond memories of those days. My nephew, about my age, and I would work out in the fields of other farms, harvesting crops like beans, berries, and squash.

When between crop harvests, we would help out on the family farm. One of my least favorite parts of that was working in the pastures of the sheep and cows they kept.

Fortunately, there was a boot scraper on the back porch. It was used to remove the extra pounds of moist mud and manure from each foot. And you didn't dare enter my sister's farmhouse before removing all the crap gathered on your boots from those fields.

Well, every so often I am reminded of those summer days long gone by guests some news channels choose to interview as "experts" in their fields. Like oil company $cientists expounding on the "myth" of global warming.

This past week, that flashback occurred again when I spotted former republican house majority leader Tom DeLay on CNN. Apparently, he's making the rounds to promote his new book of memoirs. Suddenly, my feet again felt the weight of pastures past.

I think it's great DeLay has a venue to hawk his book. But for a guy forced to resign his job in the wake of his corruption scandals to face criminal charges, I found it laughable he labeled president Clinton as being "slimy."

But I wouldn't assign too much credibility to what DeLay opines regarding the state of D.C. government today in light of his reputation. In fact, I was a little upset CNN would assign value, let alone creedence, to anything DeLay had to say.

Just as back during all my days on the farm, I never found a sage in a pile of shit. No, that was something we wiped from our feet before we entered the House.