Barber breakdown

I think I've just entered a new phase with my barber. Nick's been my barber for the past few years. He's an Italian guy in his early 60s. I discovered him in Hoboken after my previous barber disappeared on me (I think she left to pursue a singing career; she eventually came back, but I stuck with Nick mainly because he shaves the back of my neck--he's even got one of those old timey hot shaving cream machines!). Until today, we had an established routine. He cuts my hair and I feign interest in whatever is showing on the Sci-Fi Channel (harder than you would imagine in my case). On occasion I've made a passing remark about some absurd plot point on Battlestar Galactica, but, for the most part, we don't talk. That's one of the things I've always respected about Nick (that and the fact that his magazine rack is abundantly stacked with smut--not just Playboy, but Penthouse, too! Today I saw a porno dvd out in the open! I almost squinted my eyes out of my head trying to read the title! No luck.). Anyway, Nick kept his mouth shut and I kept mouth my shut and everyone was happy. Today, I'm not even in the chair and he starts in about how worked up he is about the current political climate. Is it possible to cry on the inside? Well, that's what I did. Hoping it was a local thing, I tried to steer things in that direction. We yapped about how ridiculously expensive it is to live in this area for a little while and how people love to complain about poor public services at the same time that they're complaining about high taxes and then we moved on to how Corzine wasn't a total jerk because he inherited a lot of the debt that he's been trying to erase by raising tolls and taxes. And then we got into national politics. I figured I'd let Nick take the lead and chime in occasionally to let him know that I was still listening. He started off complaining about how badly Bush had bungled things in Iraq. So far, so good. Then he started complaining about the current crop of presidential candidates. According to Nick, there's no substance to Obama. He's a smooth talker and nothing else (I mentioned that I had seen Obama speak in Hoboken and agreed that he was indeed a smooth talker). After asking me how old I was, Nick compared Obama's rise to Jimmy Carter's rise after the Watergate mess. He also didn't think much of Obama's withdrawal plans and mocked his claims to track down "his brother, Osama" in Afghanistan. After that bombshell, he asked me why Jimmy Carter was elected? "Because Americans wanted a change," I offered. "No," Nick answered, "because his initials were J. C. Get it? They thought he was the return of Jesus Christ." Wow. I'd never heard that one before! Thinking maybe he was a McCain man, I steered him in that direction. He immediately dismissed him as "too old." So, he's a Hillary man. I wasn't expecting that. I expressed my general repugnance to the Clintons, citing the embarrassment that was Bill Clinton's second term (not because he liked blow jobs, but because he didn't know how to get them without turning it into a public spectacle). And, of course, he brought up the booming economy of the 90s which I attributed more to a happy coincidence than anything Clinton actually did (but, hey, all presidents get the credit if it happens on their watch). By this time, he was sweeping the talcum powdered brush across my face (talk about Old School!) and unsnapping the plastic cape. I hope we can go back to how things used to be, but I get a sense we've entered a new era: The Yapping Era. Another little oasis of sanity lost. What's next? Making chitchat with the people who wait for the bus with me? Ugh.