Karl Klockars

It was a couple hours ago that the news crossed the wires:  Levi Johnston is out of a job. It’s a pure-d bitch, ain’t it?  This Gosh-durn Bush economy strikes another intelligent, hardworking, qualified laborer and leaving him -

Wait, what?  You mean the “qualified” part might not be entirely accurate?  Well, damnation.  You’re kidding.  He doesn’t have the high school diploma that is required to be an apprentice as an electrical apprentice?  Well, sheeee-oot.  Poor kid.  There must have been some mitigating circumstances that prevented him from graduating from high school, right?

It’s probably the same old story, played out again on a national stage instead of in the oil-change joints or tattoo parlors of that “Real America” his mom-in-law was always talking about.  I’m sure he dropped out to pursue employment to take care of his new bouncing baby spawn, Tripp.  (I will bet a shiny nickel that says he had nothing to do with the naming of his first-born.  A whole shiny nickel.)

I’m not terribly interested in the whole school/no-school part of the story.  I’m also not interested in the he said – she said part where the kid’s mother-in-law might have gotten him the job, then might have gotten him fired for saying something about how he’d dropped out of school. No biggie.  Stupid things happen all the time.

I’m also not going to discuss the fact that you’ve gotta some sort of damn fool if you can’t get your GED after three years of High School.  Everyone knows that senior year is for screwing around with girls and gearing up for community college – nobody actually learns anything, and all the work is done by the time you’re a junior.

Friends of mine dropped out of high school twice and earned their GED – and ironically enough, that was what helped get them a job as an electrician.  The universe laughs, ho-ho.  Can’t pass the GED test by at most, second semester Senior year?  Then you just don’t want to.  (Also:  could it be that he expected to get a cushy gig in the Department of the Interior in January?  Levi Johnston, Forest Ranger! Sounds good, right?)

But it was not to be, was it?  It was a quick scramble to employ the “f-ing redneck” that knocked up sweet little Bristol, and ship him up to some oil field in God Knows Where, Alaska so that everything can get back to normal.  And now even that has gone pear-shaped.  It’s like no one up there can catch a break.  And all Levi really did was not pull out.

You’ve gotta really feel bad for the kid.  He’s just a teenage boy that wanted to get a little locally-famous-daughter tail.  If I was 17 or 18 years old and shoved onto the national stage in the country’s biggest shotgun wedding that ever was, I’d want to go hide in the tundra as well.  But he showed up to that big party in September for his girl’s mom and got all dressed up for it and everything.  I’m sure he’s a nice enough guy once you get past the meathead hockey frat-boy facade.  He probably could be a perfectly decent human being by the time he turns 40.

I just want to help out.  But I’m having trouble thinking of things that the guy can do aside from basic manual labor, but surely someone knows someone that enrolls people in the Laborers Local 341 in Anchorage? Or perhaps someone on the Alaska craigslist jobs page could lend a hand?  There’s no shame in having your soon-to-be-wife support you for a while as she works for Merry Maids, is there?  Someone’s gotta do it, and I’m sure the tough-as-nails do-it-yourself frontier-princess attitude of her family isn’t doing much to take care of y’all, right?  That whole hyper-conservative mindset doesn’t really make a lot of room for handouts, I’m sure.  Just suuuuuure.

See?  Now hiring!  I used to date a girl that worked for Merry Maids for a while.  If your baby-mama is as bat-shit crazy as the Merry Maid used to be, I would suggest you hold off on the wedding plans…but she kept a clean apartment, so there’s that.  And if nothing else, you can keep yourself fed and learn how to cook eggs to order in Wasilla.  It looks like they need some help at…I don’t know – the VFW Hall, maybe?  You can take control!  Make them have Taco night on Tuesday!  The power could be yours, Levi!

A quarterly bonus and everything!  I’ll go double or nothing on that aforementioned (it’s a college-level word, Levi, don’t worry about it) shiny nickel that you don’t need a GED to get behind that flattop griddle and sling some hash.  A guy’s gotta take care of his family somehow.

Keep searching, kiddo.  The options are almost endless. Well, if you consider 90 options endless (as of 1/6/09) then you’re still okay.  And some of ‘em might hire you just for the pure spectacle of it.  “Hey, Marv – guess who just applied to work here!  Yeah, that kid right there knocked up that Palin girl!  Yeehaw, boy – pull up a bucket and tell us all about it!”

Maybe Levi needs to become the change he’s been waiting for.  Or perhaps there’s hope for him in the Alaska government.  Hard to imagine they’re very picky up there.