Recently I started writing my autobiography. Benvenuto Cellini once said anyone who had achieved anything had the responsibility to do so. What Cellini actually said was more along the lines of every important man (of which number he included himself) needed to do so, but I'll make his comment more inclusive.
I'm finding that writing about my life is far more difficult than I anticipated, not the least because I've needed to confront my demons with honesty and persistence, none of which I expected when I started. I'm finding, like Judy Collins in her song about life and clouds, that life's illusions are seductive side alleys.
Writing about life and living means dealing with parts of life that have been neatly (or maybe not so neatly) locked away in the file cabinets that are our brains. Sometimes we have tried to dump these memories because they are painful, or because they reveal us in ways we would prefer not to show the world. Whatever the reason, if one is to write an autobiography rather than a straight history or a journal, it is necessary to deal with feelings, prejudices, fears, unruly emotions--the things that make us human and also make life difficult. The good stuff in our lives is easy. It's the darker things we learn from--and, as I am learning, we all have them.
I've written many times in this blog about my dismay with religion and politics. Both of these pursuits have been with us since our earliest days as human beings. At least, we assume they have since every time we come across a new cave painting or carving, the first guess we make is that it is ceremonial and has to do with religion. Part of that is extrapolating onto ancient people our own need to find purpose in life and to express the wonder of our own improbable existence. I've been reading a history of the British Isles and have to wonder how my ancestors survived the plundering, warfare, plagues, and natural disasters--why me? why any of us? why didn't our ancestral lines die out? I suppose this is why we pay professional religionists to tell us what to think about these things.
When it comes to religion, I get the human impulse, but at the same time, I doubt the "accepted" answers we are told we have to believe. I cannot accept the idea of some godhead sitting in judgment of the day to day activities of four billion people in the world, and I am offended when someone says that their lucky escape from some disaster was a deity's handiwork when that means that all the others who weren't so lucky were on his s-- list. It doesn't work that way--and herein my problem both with religion and with politics: they are the creation of the human species, born out of our need to feel part of a group, and, even more, to feel superior.
There's a Jewish joke about a town always needing two synagogues: the one you attend and the one you don't. The implication, of course, is that your synagogue (or church, or school, or political opinion) is better than the other. All this is absolute nonsense. Nothing religious can be proved--that's what faith means--yet we are willing to kill each other over it. In politics, I doubt very much that someone asked directly to support a political prejudice (the poor are lazy for example) can produce any data to prove it. It is sufficient only for the speaker to feel good about themselves by judging other people.
If you look back to the last time we were told that the US was going to hell, that freedom as we know it has been lost, and that our children will never know the "real" America, it occurred when Reagan was running for president and he was talking about Medicare (which he promised to oppose). We older folk gratefully accept Medicare these days as undoubtedly we will accept the newest health care reforms in the years ahead. Obamacare may well be one of the cornerstones of our future. Politics is the art of finding people's prejudices and getting out in front of them--all the while hoping that people are too vain to notice.
I think Cellini is right--we all need at some point to sit down to look ourselves in the mirror and ask what the heck we are about. I highly recommend writing an autobiography, finding out why we are so willing to accept the closing of our minds through religion, why we are so willing to give up our individuality in the name of conforming to some political position or other that makes absolutely no sense when looked at in the dispassionate light of day, and why we don't trust our own observations of a universe that deserves so much better from us.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Friday, December 10, 2010
Looking Back Down the Road
These days, we hear endless talk from certain circles about not liking illegals, not liking the national debt, not liking Nancy Pelosi, not much liking the unemployed (but loving the unemployment rate as long as it is going up or down), not liking paying for education, not liking anyone else getting something for nothing all the while greedily accepting whatever pension or public slop comes down the trough. Everyone's unhappy with something; some are unhappy with everything; some just don't want anything but anarchy; some just want change for its own sake.
All this compaining seems to be burned into the human psyche.
I bet when they were building the pyramids, Kufu the stone carver grumbled about all those freeloading illegals come over from Sinai, stealing jobs from the locals and having too many children. And what about the pharaoh, how intelligent is it to run up the national debt just to build a tomb? It has to be the influence of all the homosexual courtiers waving about more than their fans. And what about Ramses, the new wonderboy stone cutter that everyone wants to carve on their tombs? It's all about youth anymore. Now back in the days, life was good: women didn't meddle in politics and children were raised to respect their elders--not playing in the streets but working to help support the family. There was more discpline and more respect for the gods--today we need to burn more incense, slaughter more sheep, and return Egypt to what it once was.
So as Kufu chips and shapes the blocks of masonry, he dreams of returning to this wonderful past. It's a time he hardly remembers except through the haze of years--choosing to forget the violence, illiteracy, and short lifespans that were part of daily life. It was a halcyon time for Kufu because it was familiar and he had a place within it. The fact that it may not be for anyone else escapes him.
Kufu's unfocused nostalgia continues today. It lives on among our conservative brethren who would like to return us to something, although I'm not clear what.
Is it, I wonder, the days of the early Republic when members of Congress fired pistols in the halls and beat one another about the head with canes? When the South based its economy on cotton and slavery? When a woman who didn't conform was burned as a witch? Or is it the early 19th Century with the settlement of the West when graveyards were full of children dead from lack of medical attention and when law was only as good as the fastest draw? Is it the late 19th Century when women and children were the chattel of their husbands and only men of property could vote? Or was it the early 20th Century when the world was consumed in war after war? When my grandfather would have denied me an education because teaching a woman more than housework was a waste? When my grandmother would have been startled by my irreligious attitudes? When my greatgrandparents would have sent me to work in the mills to help pay the rent?
I have to admit that I can do a credible Kufu too. I remember happy times from my childhood in 1950s Britain. People seemed more neighborly. Life seemed less rushed. There wasn't such an emphasis on what Wordsworth called getting and spending. But before I get carried away, I remember my mother and her friends doing a Kufu over the loss of Britain's empire. Having an empire meant prestige for her generation; yet how many among us today would advocate acquiring one? My memories are obviously cherrypicked.
The kids raised today will probably look back on life in the early 21st Century as familiar because it is all they have ever known. Now that is a thought.
All this compaining seems to be burned into the human psyche.
I bet when they were building the pyramids, Kufu the stone carver grumbled about all those freeloading illegals come over from Sinai, stealing jobs from the locals and having too many children. And what about the pharaoh, how intelligent is it to run up the national debt just to build a tomb? It has to be the influence of all the homosexual courtiers waving about more than their fans. And what about Ramses, the new wonderboy stone cutter that everyone wants to carve on their tombs? It's all about youth anymore. Now back in the days, life was good: women didn't meddle in politics and children were raised to respect their elders--not playing in the streets but working to help support the family. There was more discpline and more respect for the gods--today we need to burn more incense, slaughter more sheep, and return Egypt to what it once was.
So as Kufu chips and shapes the blocks of masonry, he dreams of returning to this wonderful past. It's a time he hardly remembers except through the haze of years--choosing to forget the violence, illiteracy, and short lifespans that were part of daily life. It was a halcyon time for Kufu because it was familiar and he had a place within it. The fact that it may not be for anyone else escapes him.
Kufu's unfocused nostalgia continues today. It lives on among our conservative brethren who would like to return us to something, although I'm not clear what.
Is it, I wonder, the days of the early Republic when members of Congress fired pistols in the halls and beat one another about the head with canes? When the South based its economy on cotton and slavery? When a woman who didn't conform was burned as a witch? Or is it the early 19th Century with the settlement of the West when graveyards were full of children dead from lack of medical attention and when law was only as good as the fastest draw? Is it the late 19th Century when women and children were the chattel of their husbands and only men of property could vote? Or was it the early 20th Century when the world was consumed in war after war? When my grandfather would have denied me an education because teaching a woman more than housework was a waste? When my grandmother would have been startled by my irreligious attitudes? When my greatgrandparents would have sent me to work in the mills to help pay the rent?
I have to admit that I can do a credible Kufu too. I remember happy times from my childhood in 1950s Britain. People seemed more neighborly. Life seemed less rushed. There wasn't such an emphasis on what Wordsworth called getting and spending. But before I get carried away, I remember my mother and her friends doing a Kufu over the loss of Britain's empire. Having an empire meant prestige for her generation; yet how many among us today would advocate acquiring one? My memories are obviously cherrypicked.
The kids raised today will probably look back on life in the early 21st Century as familiar because it is all they have ever known. Now that is a thought.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Guest Commentary on the Land of the Rich
What a farce this all is. One person ( Assange ) publishes some info about a criminal and that criminal decides to get him, one way or another by attempted deceitful arraignment on trivial charges in order to get him into the USA. Seems to me that by this procedure, it indicates the info contained was likely genuine. I presume the US has promised Sweden favourable consideration for the next franchise of Kentucky Fried Chicken for this favour.
The Land of the Free and the Home of the Rich
Just when I thought the Republicans couldn't display more hypocrisy, blow me down if they don't go ahead and best their own record. Whatever happed to fiscal conservatism and paying down the national debt--the stuff they hit us all over the head with during the recent elections? Apparently gone with the wind when it comes to tax cuts for the wealthy.
For the wealthy for heaven's sakes. For people making over $250,000 a year. I've never earned anything like that and I consider myself upper-echelon middle class. Even for two people to make that amount means each has a a pretty good salary. But even if one cavils over the exact point where wealth begins, I just can't see giving wonderul tax breaks to billionaires who can't spend the money they already have in their lifetimes and just sit on it or invest it abroad.
I guess I don't get it because I'm not Republican. George Bush once said to an audience of very wealthy donors that some people called them the rich, but he called them his base. I can't think of a clearer statement of what the Republicans represent--the wealthy, the greedy, and the corporate. In the case of the latter, remember those financial sociopaths who said proudly they were stealing "granny's savings."
And we are about to reward them AGAIN?
I can't pretend to understand the ways of politics even though I've worked with politicians but I do know a little bit about dealing with devils. I would have played chicken with the Republicans and I would not have blinked. OK Chums: no tax extension for the middle class, OK none either for the rich--and you be the one with the angry fallout both from your base and the electorate because extending the tax cuts for the rich is widely unpopular. Obama's problem is that he has a heart in a business where that is a liability and appears a weakness.
I rather hope the Dem rebels do filibuster the "compromise." It deserves to be because it rewards greed and self-interest. But then I suppose the Republicans will conveniently gloss over their own inconsistency: the national debt goes by the wayside when it comes to rewarding the people who have bought their toy congressmen.
For the wealthy for heaven's sakes. For people making over $250,000 a year. I've never earned anything like that and I consider myself upper-echelon middle class. Even for two people to make that amount means each has a a pretty good salary. But even if one cavils over the exact point where wealth begins, I just can't see giving wonderul tax breaks to billionaires who can't spend the money they already have in their lifetimes and just sit on it or invest it abroad.
I guess I don't get it because I'm not Republican. George Bush once said to an audience of very wealthy donors that some people called them the rich, but he called them his base. I can't think of a clearer statement of what the Republicans represent--the wealthy, the greedy, and the corporate. In the case of the latter, remember those financial sociopaths who said proudly they were stealing "granny's savings."
And we are about to reward them AGAIN?
I can't pretend to understand the ways of politics even though I've worked with politicians but I do know a little bit about dealing with devils. I would have played chicken with the Republicans and I would not have blinked. OK Chums: no tax extension for the middle class, OK none either for the rich--and you be the one with the angry fallout both from your base and the electorate because extending the tax cuts for the rich is widely unpopular. Obama's problem is that he has a heart in a business where that is a liability and appears a weakness.
I rather hope the Dem rebels do filibuster the "compromise." It deserves to be because it rewards greed and self-interest. But then I suppose the Republicans will conveniently gloss over their own inconsistency: the national debt goes by the wayside when it comes to rewarding the people who have bought their toy congressmen.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Wiki Leaks
Several readers have wondered why I haven't commented on the Wiki Leaks disclosures. I suppose it must seem strange since I've had an opinion on everything else and a demonstrated wilingness to share it with the willing and unwilling. In this case, though, I find it hard to have one because I've always assumed the political and ambassadorial worlds were underhanded and two-faced anyway. When it's your job to deny oil, nuclear power, influence, and power to everyone else, you probably aren't trying for halo of the year.
In this respect, the releases simply confirm my assumptions. Some Muslium leaders drink, other leaders feel entitled to buxom assistants, some flatter people they despise, some feather their nests with the money stupid other leaders think will buy their support, some pay their mistresses on expense accounts--'twas ever so and I'm afraid it is the stuff of yawns. The National Enquirer does better because it's not hampered by any connection to fact. I read the leaks with the same feeling I have when reading that George and Barbara Bush are divorcing, Miachel Douglas is dying even though he is popping up in Disneyland looking hale, and aliens have landed in DC, demanding the key to city of New York. The leaks are all innuendo and gossip--nothing earth shattering like when Israel plans to take out Iran's nuclear capability or when someone is going to plan an assassintation attempt on North Korea's Kim. Now THAT would be interesting. But cocktail party chatter? I've said worse about my boss and the Regents.
What I do find interesting is the reaction to the leaks. Someone told me that he considered the posting of the documents to be treasonous. Well, they can't be treasonous since treason has to be committed by a citizen of the country. Allenge is a citizen of Sweden not the US. I don't even know if it's espionage since I can't see who stands to profit except the military and diplomatic circles who need to do a better job of protecting their files, and I'm sure that's not what Allenge had in mind.
Frankly, I think there needs to be more of this sort of embarassing accountability. I rather enjoy seeing things come full circle and bite the perpetrator in the ass. I'm sure that the security system was put in by one of the big corporations running this country. Instead of Allenge, why not go after Halliburton or whoever put it in. Now that the Supreme Court says that corporations have the same rights as individuals, I'd love to see their asses sued off, just like the rest of us individuals. Oh, baby, you want free speech like the rest of us (supposedly) have? Be prepared to enter the slammer just as we can.
But of course our ham-fisted government is going after those who have exposed the cocktail chatter. God forbid that any of them might be playing guessing games about the future just like the rest of us, that they might admit in an e-mail what most of us have been saying anyway. Common sense reign? Of course not. Trumped up charges of rape, which I am sure are the result of US pressure on Sweden, and shutting down the site--free speech be damned--will be the result.
I say let him release the rest of them. Let's get rid of the idea that we are so infallible that our golden words must be protected against the light of day. Indeed, let's find out whether any of these so-called public servants are worth the money we spend on them.
In this respect, the releases simply confirm my assumptions. Some Muslium leaders drink, other leaders feel entitled to buxom assistants, some flatter people they despise, some feather their nests with the money stupid other leaders think will buy their support, some pay their mistresses on expense accounts--'twas ever so and I'm afraid it is the stuff of yawns. The National Enquirer does better because it's not hampered by any connection to fact. I read the leaks with the same feeling I have when reading that George and Barbara Bush are divorcing, Miachel Douglas is dying even though he is popping up in Disneyland looking hale, and aliens have landed in DC, demanding the key to city of New York. The leaks are all innuendo and gossip--nothing earth shattering like when Israel plans to take out Iran's nuclear capability or when someone is going to plan an assassintation attempt on North Korea's Kim. Now THAT would be interesting. But cocktail party chatter? I've said worse about my boss and the Regents.
What I do find interesting is the reaction to the leaks. Someone told me that he considered the posting of the documents to be treasonous. Well, they can't be treasonous since treason has to be committed by a citizen of the country. Allenge is a citizen of Sweden not the US. I don't even know if it's espionage since I can't see who stands to profit except the military and diplomatic circles who need to do a better job of protecting their files, and I'm sure that's not what Allenge had in mind.
Frankly, I think there needs to be more of this sort of embarassing accountability. I rather enjoy seeing things come full circle and bite the perpetrator in the ass. I'm sure that the security system was put in by one of the big corporations running this country. Instead of Allenge, why not go after Halliburton or whoever put it in. Now that the Supreme Court says that corporations have the same rights as individuals, I'd love to see their asses sued off, just like the rest of us individuals. Oh, baby, you want free speech like the rest of us (supposedly) have? Be prepared to enter the slammer just as we can.
But of course our ham-fisted government is going after those who have exposed the cocktail chatter. God forbid that any of them might be playing guessing games about the future just like the rest of us, that they might admit in an e-mail what most of us have been saying anyway. Common sense reign? Of course not. Trumped up charges of rape, which I am sure are the result of US pressure on Sweden, and shutting down the site--free speech be damned--will be the result.
I say let him release the rest of them. Let's get rid of the idea that we are so infallible that our golden words must be protected against the light of day. Indeed, let's find out whether any of these so-called public servants are worth the money we spend on them.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Give Me a Break--Please
I suppose it was inevitable—tea party members now want to change their image of wild-eyed lunacy into something more like a respectable third party with appeal for thoughtful moderates. I listened to an active tea partier the other day, freshly returned from a rally where I can only assume the leaders told them to evangelize and try to make such a case. He tried, I questioned, he got huffy.
All I can say is that it ain’t gonna happen because wild-eyed lunacy is all the Tea Party ever had. Once the politics of NO is gone, there is no basis for the party’s platform. They have no approach to ruling the country except for not liking the way things are going and slinging slogans.
Now, I am not discounting the rational among them—and there are some, perhaps even many. But they weren’t the ones who got the tea party candidates elected. The ones who walked the streets, attended the rallies, donated the money, and had a wonderful puff of resentment beneath their wings were the angry, and I doubt their sincerity beyond their own self-interest. Given a choice between the personal sacrifice they preach for others and making some of their own, I haven't seen any evidence that any would give up a shred of their personal entitlements. Reduce Social Security checks in order to balance the budget that they say is a primary focus? Not on your life. Not on their backs. They earned their rewards--let the cuts fall somewhere else.
Do I exaggerate?
This year there is no increase in social security benefits because there is no inflation. COLA allowances are tied to inflation. No inflation, no increase. To listen to them as I have to, you would think the government was cheating them of a birth right. “My expenses are going up,” bleated one, “it’s disgraceful that there’s no increase this year.” Considering that most people use up what they contributed to Social Security within ten years or so, the disgrace is seniors who burden the economy and demand that the nation meet their medical needs, all the while denying care to the young because it might reduce their current benefits.
What sense does this make? Tea Partiers, mostly older, mostly male, mostly white, denying care and support to the next generation on whose shoulders the future economic development of this nation rests? This seems to me the world turned upside down: seniors more important than the nation’s future.
Sorry tea partiers. On every level, I just don’t buy you as this nation’s future. I’ve always thought of governing by looking to that future. I can’t get into the idea of governing by looking to the past. Even if you are comfortable there (all right in your corner, Jack), the rest of us thoughtful moderates aren’t. Your creature comforts matter less to me than the corporations who run this country and, increasingly the world; they are doing so without oversight while you guys wave the flag, trot out a Christ who would disapprove of the lot of you, and still cling to the folorn hope that Obama wasn’t born in Hawaii.
The tea party moderate? Give me a break. Please.
All I can say is that it ain’t gonna happen because wild-eyed lunacy is all the Tea Party ever had. Once the politics of NO is gone, there is no basis for the party’s platform. They have no approach to ruling the country except for not liking the way things are going and slinging slogans.
Now, I am not discounting the rational among them—and there are some, perhaps even many. But they weren’t the ones who got the tea party candidates elected. The ones who walked the streets, attended the rallies, donated the money, and had a wonderful puff of resentment beneath their wings were the angry, and I doubt their sincerity beyond their own self-interest. Given a choice between the personal sacrifice they preach for others and making some of their own, I haven't seen any evidence that any would give up a shred of their personal entitlements. Reduce Social Security checks in order to balance the budget that they say is a primary focus? Not on your life. Not on their backs. They earned their rewards--let the cuts fall somewhere else.
Do I exaggerate?
This year there is no increase in social security benefits because there is no inflation. COLA allowances are tied to inflation. No inflation, no increase. To listen to them as I have to, you would think the government was cheating them of a birth right. “My expenses are going up,” bleated one, “it’s disgraceful that there’s no increase this year.” Considering that most people use up what they contributed to Social Security within ten years or so, the disgrace is seniors who burden the economy and demand that the nation meet their medical needs, all the while denying care to the young because it might reduce their current benefits.
What sense does this make? Tea Partiers, mostly older, mostly male, mostly white, denying care and support to the next generation on whose shoulders the future economic development of this nation rests? This seems to me the world turned upside down: seniors more important than the nation’s future.
Sorry tea partiers. On every level, I just don’t buy you as this nation’s future. I’ve always thought of governing by looking to that future. I can’t get into the idea of governing by looking to the past. Even if you are comfortable there (all right in your corner, Jack), the rest of us thoughtful moderates aren’t. Your creature comforts matter less to me than the corporations who run this country and, increasingly the world; they are doing so without oversight while you guys wave the flag, trot out a Christ who would disapprove of the lot of you, and still cling to the folorn hope that Obama wasn’t born in Hawaii.
The tea party moderate? Give me a break. Please.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
After the Ball
Now that it's done and the usual political crowing is clogging the airwaves, I suppose it's time to consider the what next of what the US will be living in the couple of years ahead.
We have just returned into (partial) power the same folks who took us into a unnecessary war on the basis of lies, cost over 4,000 lives and nearly bankrupted us; lifted all regulation on financial markets and therby nearly destoyed our financial system; fought tooth and nail to turn our social security savings over to the same financial markets (Bush says his greatest regret is not privatizing it); and tried to oppose any and all legislation on behalf of the planet that might get in the way of profits. And that's not just the Republicans--some of the Democrats were on board with that agenda too. Every time we get these people in power, they promise fiscal care and prudence. Every time what we get is one group becoming insanely rich while the rest of us get screwed.
I don't get it.
Why would people drawing social security want to end it? Do they have other sources of funds and so don't need it? Why not value it for the precious thing it is? People on medicare want to end medicare? They say they want to get the government out of medical insurance--don't they realize that privatized medical care will drop them first thing? People who have never studied economics think they know how to fix the economy? People who have never been unemployed are experts on unemployment? People whose houses have lost multiple thousands oppose regulation that might prevent the worst mortgage and lender abuses? Just goes to show that ignorance and prejudice must be a sexy sell.
I've been a lukewarm supporter of the Obama White House. I was a Hillary supporter but my bottom line at that time was anything BUT the Republicans and BUT the corporate power brokers. The corporate players were in disarray then because of their own excesses so the Democrats got in. Now, the Corporations have come roaring back along with the Conservatives and their self-satisfied hypocrisy and flat out greed. Of course, they needed complicit ignorance among the electorate.
One thing I have said consistently is that we have changed from a republic into an oligarchy. As my friend Ken says, this country is run by 30 corporations. You can count Halliburton and its craven puppet Dick Cheyney as a good example. Halliburton profits from war--it thrives on it--its stock goes through the roof--its executives get big money and raises. Halliburton needs profits and so we go to war, allowing Halliburton to get no-bid contacts from politicos it has bought and paid for. But add to it the banks, big oil, pharmacueticals, big agriculture, big media, etc. These are the interests that run this country. They buy and sell us daily and we are too besotted with the chaos they deliberately sew among us to see it. Obama at least spent our money on us. We can now look forward to it siphoning back to its corporate masters.
Over time, I suppose I will return to the fray. One can be apathetic only so long and this, after all ,is my planet too. My current home state, Colorado, seems to have taken a thoughtful stance on political reality--bless you my fellow Coloradans for not saddling the world with Tom Tacredo as Governor and Tea Partier Buck as US Senator. I'll cling to the hope that in the next two years we can all get some common sense.
We have just returned into (partial) power the same folks who took us into a unnecessary war on the basis of lies, cost over 4,000 lives and nearly bankrupted us; lifted all regulation on financial markets and therby nearly destoyed our financial system; fought tooth and nail to turn our social security savings over to the same financial markets (Bush says his greatest regret is not privatizing it); and tried to oppose any and all legislation on behalf of the planet that might get in the way of profits. And that's not just the Republicans--some of the Democrats were on board with that agenda too. Every time we get these people in power, they promise fiscal care and prudence. Every time what we get is one group becoming insanely rich while the rest of us get screwed.
I don't get it.
Why would people drawing social security want to end it? Do they have other sources of funds and so don't need it? Why not value it for the precious thing it is? People on medicare want to end medicare? They say they want to get the government out of medical insurance--don't they realize that privatized medical care will drop them first thing? People who have never studied economics think they know how to fix the economy? People who have never been unemployed are experts on unemployment? People whose houses have lost multiple thousands oppose regulation that might prevent the worst mortgage and lender abuses? Just goes to show that ignorance and prejudice must be a sexy sell.
I've been a lukewarm supporter of the Obama White House. I was a Hillary supporter but my bottom line at that time was anything BUT the Republicans and BUT the corporate power brokers. The corporate players were in disarray then because of their own excesses so the Democrats got in. Now, the Corporations have come roaring back along with the Conservatives and their self-satisfied hypocrisy and flat out greed. Of course, they needed complicit ignorance among the electorate.
One thing I have said consistently is that we have changed from a republic into an oligarchy. As my friend Ken says, this country is run by 30 corporations. You can count Halliburton and its craven puppet Dick Cheyney as a good example. Halliburton profits from war--it thrives on it--its stock goes through the roof--its executives get big money and raises. Halliburton needs profits and so we go to war, allowing Halliburton to get no-bid contacts from politicos it has bought and paid for. But add to it the banks, big oil, pharmacueticals, big agriculture, big media, etc. These are the interests that run this country. They buy and sell us daily and we are too besotted with the chaos they deliberately sew among us to see it. Obama at least spent our money on us. We can now look forward to it siphoning back to its corporate masters.
Over time, I suppose I will return to the fray. One can be apathetic only so long and this, after all ,is my planet too. My current home state, Colorado, seems to have taken a thoughtful stance on political reality--bless you my fellow Coloradans for not saddling the world with Tom Tacredo as Governor and Tea Partier Buck as US Senator. I'll cling to the hope that in the next two years we can all get some common sense.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Election Day USA
Here we are--the election is just a few days away and all I can feel is apathy. I have been beaten into the ground by all the yelling, lying, fingerpointing, and just plain hate mongering. I have seen far more of the ugly parts of my fellow human beings than I could ever want to. It has been a bloodbath of ignorance and irrationality and what's worse is that regardless of what happens, nothing is going to change.
If the Tea Party candidates are elected, we will watch the spectacle of the System teaching them just what they don't know --a process I liken to housebreaking. They'll ride in on the wave of changing everything to suit them and find out just how little the system will let them.
If the Democrats win, it will be more years of Republicans fighting tooth and nail to prevent anything useful happening that will move us forward--not because it is always wrong but because it bears the label of Democrat.
If the Republicans win, they will promptly renege on every campaign promise made because the current system is so personally rewarding for them. They will simply get richer while the rest of their followers are caught up in spurious debates over immigration and healthcare reform, which they had proposed in the first place and then suddenly said were socialism. I guess it's socialism when the Democrats propose the same thing.
I suppose we get what we deserve--but the scary part for me is how we are manipulated through our own vanity. That and the populist, alarmist media who pander to the most vociferous among us. There is lunacy in the air. It is palapable and I despair that rational debate will return in my lifetime.
If the Tea Party candidates are elected, we will watch the spectacle of the System teaching them just what they don't know --a process I liken to housebreaking. They'll ride in on the wave of changing everything to suit them and find out just how little the system will let them.
If the Democrats win, it will be more years of Republicans fighting tooth and nail to prevent anything useful happening that will move us forward--not because it is always wrong but because it bears the label of Democrat.
If the Republicans win, they will promptly renege on every campaign promise made because the current system is so personally rewarding for them. They will simply get richer while the rest of their followers are caught up in spurious debates over immigration and healthcare reform, which they had proposed in the first place and then suddenly said were socialism. I guess it's socialism when the Democrats propose the same thing.
I suppose we get what we deserve--but the scary part for me is how we are manipulated through our own vanity. That and the populist, alarmist media who pander to the most vociferous among us. There is lunacy in the air. It is palapable and I despair that rational debate will return in my lifetime.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Mexico and Amigo Care
Poor Mexico—but not just because the US tends to blame its far smaller neighbor for its own problems but because (as with Canada) it fails to recognize the important service Mexico (and Canada) provides. If the US-Mexico border were ever permanently closed, I would argue that the US would be the greater loser.
Some time ago, we visited Algodones, a border town where California and Arizona touch just south west of Yuma, Arizona. The border is quite casual going into Mexico—no documents needed—you know you are in Mexico because of the street hawkers. They’re not offering the usual serapes, ponchos, sombreros, and pottery. Instead, one calls, “Lady, you need dental care? Admit it! You need dental work.” Another calls “Eye glasses? Best price in town. $100 for trifocals and frames.” “Look here! Look here! You need a pharmacy?” Billboards on top of the buildings advertise everything from crowns ($300) to liposuction to face lifts.
Mexico, in other words, has become the cut-rate medical center for US citizens without health insurance. There are no children to be seen, no young adults, no family couples. Instead, the streets are full of US seniors carrying tell-tale purple plastic bags full of prescription drugs (from the Purple Farmacia—the largest in town). The local (very good) restaurants are full of white haired visitors, and stores cater to a more adult taste (no nudes, no skull-and-crossbones t-shirts, and no two-for-one grande margueritas).
Mostly the town is full of medical offices and happy clients: Who wouldn’t be happy when teeth cleaning costs $15? The streets are clean and the buildings in good repair, suggesting not only respectability but prosperity. No one appears to actually live in Algadones, however. There are no food markets or clothing stores. Apparently people live in places like Mexicali and commute to their offices, which occupy a strip that starts at the border and stretches about 100 yards south. The further from the border, the more shabby the offices and the lower the prices. But right at the border, the offices look well furnished, and, if asked, the seniors using their services say they are well satisfied with the care.
Everyone is busy making money and both sides of the border get in the act. Just north of the border are Indian tribal lands, so every car parking pays the tribe $5 for the day. The lot is huge and was packed (the tribe also has a decent hotel-casino where people can stay while having procedures). Coaches from various retirement homes and RV resorts as far north as Colorado come down every three months or so on a schedule to allow residents to make doctor’s appointments and pick up prescriptions. People driving from California to points east plan to stop at this town. Everything is cheerful. The pharmacy clerks call everyone “amigo,” and both sides seem generally delighted with the exchange, although it pays to get references when having something as complicated as a dental transplant.
The only downside is the wait at the border to get back into the US. Last year, it took us over an hour to snake through customs. Still, even that had its amusing side as people compared what they had paid for various things and had a chance to giggle at some of the strange things going home. Every western and northern state and all western Canadian provinces were represented in the line—along with a few stragglers from New York and Maine.
Looked at from the senior point of view, Mexico provides an incalculable benefit to US residents, who gladly avail themselves of its services and have a good meal while they’re at it. I think we can call this Amigo Care.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Tuned in to the US Elections?
The other day one of the readers of this blog reminded me that I have international readers who aren't that into American politics. Make that interested in or involved with. Fair enough. I'm from a smallish island nation (Britain) that was very self-involved, so I think a degree of tunnel vision probably goes with the territory of being human. We all tend to think ourselves the center of the universe and try to make the appropriate arguments ("But because it's so economically huge (substitute whatever measure you wish), the US HAS to be the center"). Ain't necessarily so, as the song goes.
All this leads me to an interesting question: if at this time and place, the rest of the world isn't much interested in US politics, is this a good thing or not?
Right now, the US is undergoing a raging battle for its national soul. Everyone is unhappy in one way or another and, according to a Japanese proverb, when elephants dance, the grass beneath them suffers. This is not to say the rest of us are the grass, but it does imply that the clash of large forces tends to create chaos as it happens.
Chaos is what's happening in the US and no one here can relax until this clash somehow finds resolution. For that reason,I do believe this is something that the rest of the world needs to watch. Let me explain--in my own prejudiced words and views--why I say this.
There are at least three sides to the clashes occurring in this country.
One is a so-called Tea Party that claims a pedigree stretching back to the founding of the country. According to the polls, this is the party of the previously empowered (older white males) who see the emergence of new elements (minorities, non-Christians) and they don't like it. It's a rebellious group that is proving itself rather incompetent in selecting respectable candidates (they're shooting off their mouths in crazy ways). It's hard to be credible when all you want to say is either no or to hell with it. Unfortunately (and take note here, World) these are the kind of people who once in power are likely to send in troops to places with orders to kick butt.
These people are closely linked with corporate interests because the party advocates little to no government (for other people, of course, as they have no intention of giving up their government pensions). Corporations love smaller government as it means less regulation on their ability to make money. For the rest of us, and the rest of the World, it means if the conservative Republicans, of which the tea party is part, get into power, we can be once again at the mercy of these unregulated corporations--as we were before with the global financial meltdown. If the Republican party (and these tea baggers) get back in, we can look forward to more of same. If that happens, I'll be looking for a remote patch of land to live on and grow my own food.
Opposed to them are the so-called liberals, who traditionally have supported unions and social programs. Corporations are seldom found in this group, for obvious reasons--they are asked to pay for the programs, which cuts into their profits. The liberals are usually called "bleeding hearts" by the conservatives, because they favor universal health care, free public education, and support for the elderly and infirm. Conservatives want all support to come through churches (probably with a good dose of evangelical prosletyzing and judging who's really worthy of help along with the care packages).
Somewhere in the middle, opposing both sides, are what are generally called moderates who try to weave their way through the mess of ideology created by the other two. This moderate group tries to be practical about the nation's future, favoring steady as she goes over (1) an angry, judgmental godhead who wants people to suffer if they don't plan for their futures and (2)a nation committed to "social justice" (hence labeled socialist) for groups that the conservatives don't like (homosexuals, minorities, illegals). All many people know about socialism over here is that they don't like it.
So, yes, rest of World, I'd keep an eye on what happens next election here. It could very well determine US foreign policy. It could also happen in your own country if you have corporations that can buy lobbyists and legislators, as they have in ours.
So, as I say--this is not just a political election, it is an election about what kind of USA there will be in the future and how it will react to the rest of the World. This election, World, I'd stay tuned if I were you.
Ranging ag
All this leads me to an interesting question: if at this time and place, the rest of the world isn't much interested in US politics, is this a good thing or not?
Right now, the US is undergoing a raging battle for its national soul. Everyone is unhappy in one way or another and, according to a Japanese proverb, when elephants dance, the grass beneath them suffers. This is not to say the rest of us are the grass, but it does imply that the clash of large forces tends to create chaos as it happens.
Chaos is what's happening in the US and no one here can relax until this clash somehow finds resolution. For that reason,I do believe this is something that the rest of the world needs to watch. Let me explain--in my own prejudiced words and views--why I say this.
There are at least three sides to the clashes occurring in this country.
One is a so-called Tea Party that claims a pedigree stretching back to the founding of the country. According to the polls, this is the party of the previously empowered (older white males) who see the emergence of new elements (minorities, non-Christians) and they don't like it. It's a rebellious group that is proving itself rather incompetent in selecting respectable candidates (they're shooting off their mouths in crazy ways). It's hard to be credible when all you want to say is either no or to hell with it. Unfortunately (and take note here, World) these are the kind of people who once in power are likely to send in troops to places with orders to kick butt.
These people are closely linked with corporate interests because the party advocates little to no government (for other people, of course, as they have no intention of giving up their government pensions). Corporations love smaller government as it means less regulation on their ability to make money. For the rest of us, and the rest of the World, it means if the conservative Republicans, of which the tea party is part, get into power, we can be once again at the mercy of these unregulated corporations--as we were before with the global financial meltdown. If the Republican party (and these tea baggers) get back in, we can look forward to more of same. If that happens, I'll be looking for a remote patch of land to live on and grow my own food.
Opposed to them are the so-called liberals, who traditionally have supported unions and social programs. Corporations are seldom found in this group, for obvious reasons--they are asked to pay for the programs, which cuts into their profits. The liberals are usually called "bleeding hearts" by the conservatives, because they favor universal health care, free public education, and support for the elderly and infirm. Conservatives want all support to come through churches (probably with a good dose of evangelical prosletyzing and judging who's really worthy of help along with the care packages).
Somewhere in the middle, opposing both sides, are what are generally called moderates who try to weave their way through the mess of ideology created by the other two. This moderate group tries to be practical about the nation's future, favoring steady as she goes over (1) an angry, judgmental godhead who wants people to suffer if they don't plan for their futures and (2)a nation committed to "social justice" (hence labeled socialist) for groups that the conservatives don't like (homosexuals, minorities, illegals). All many people know about socialism over here is that they don't like it.
So, yes, rest of World, I'd keep an eye on what happens next election here. It could very well determine US foreign policy. It could also happen in your own country if you have corporations that can buy lobbyists and legislators, as they have in ours.
So, as I say--this is not just a political election, it is an election about what kind of USA there will be in the future and how it will react to the rest of the World. This election, World, I'd stay tuned if I were you.
Ranging ag
Monday, September 27, 2010
Cellphones Mon Amour
A luddite I am not: I do not go around smashing technology because I am wedded to things as they are. In fact, I think I've been very welcoming of most of our advances.
I owned a PC in the 1980s when they first became generally available (don't even ask what I paid for it. Hint: I had to take a loan and pay it off over time and I used WordStar and Xywrite word processing programs). I've even done fairly well learning to use the television remote, which looks like it could launch a space shuttle and has buttons so small you need a magnifiying glass to read them. The VCR programmer was another matter, but the less said about that the better.
What I want to talk about is my new cell phone.
All I really want in a cell phone is basic stuff, like store a number, dial it, answer a ring, let me know if there's a message, and shut on and off in a reasonable manner. I started ther service when I was widowed and wanted to be able to call AAA if I got a flat. My first phone, which I kept for many, many moons was just that. I learned the features as I needed them and I was happy as a clam until I forgot the thing in Starbucks outside Flagstaff and no one turned it in. It must have been someone less savvy than I because who else would bother with something so ancient?
Well, there I was in Arizona, six hundred miles from home and no phone. I didn't feel like driving home on long, empty roads without one and I didn't like the idea of waiting outside the restroom in some rest stop pleading with someone to make a call for me. Something clearly had to be done. I headed into the local Radio Shack. That's where I encountered a glittering world of the modern cell phone. It was culture shock.
When I was a child, I used to watch the weekly serials down at the local cinema. Kid's matinee it was called. One favorite was Flash Gordon, sort of a space cowboy who went from planet to planet and was always in some dire strait or another. The new cell phones were worthy of him.
"Do you want internet access?" the clerk asked me. He had this sort of doubtful look on his face as if he didn't believe at my age I knew the difference between ROM and RAM. Since those phones made my TV remote look deprived and required monthly IP access charges, I shook my head. He looked at me with pity.
"I have internet access on my home PC," I said with stiff dignity. "I use Skype long distance calling through my laptop. I just need a basic phone."
"Games and built-in camera? Choice of ring tones?" he asked. I shook my head. "Well," he said, "they come basic with all phones so it's a matter of quality and choice."
"Won't need them," I said.
"Blue tooth?" He asked. I had to think. I remembered that my grandson had a blue tooth on his game set. "I prefer to use a headset in the car," I replied. He looked at me sadly. His eyes said it all.
"Well," he said, "here's our most basic phone." I looked at the gleaming monster he handed me. It sat in the palm of my hand and cost almost $200. I looked at the others. This was indeed the cheapest as they were costing upwards of $500 amd looked like little tvs. He saw me looking at them and took one down. He turned it one way and it was a phone; when he turned it around he could type text onto the screen. He did it quickly using his thumbs. With my arthritic thumbs, it would take me hours to tap anything in.
"Cute," I said. That must not have been the right thing to say. "These are mini computers," he corrected me. "You can watch movies on them." I smiled sheepishly, not able to imagine watching something that small for hours. I would see double at the end.
I finally left with my "basic" call phone. It came "free" with renewing my two-year commitment to T-Mobile, which I would have done anyway since the service works for me. He had to show me how to open the darned thing (it slides instead of flips). I have used the camera once, just to see how it worked and promptly forgot how to do it except when I get into it by mistake--then it's tricky to get out of it. After several weeks I've managed to figure out how to set speed dial and how to change the ring tones. I can get my messages and finally set my PIN. It works. That's all I asked.
But, just to remind me whom these phones are meant for: my grandson grabbed the phone when he saw it, played everyone of the games on it, told me that it would connect to the internet if I ever wanted it, and asked why I wasn't downloading the cool tunes for sale as ring tones. When I explained I wouldn't be doing all that, he looked at me with the same pitying eyes as the Radio Shack clerk.
I owned a PC in the 1980s when they first became generally available (don't even ask what I paid for it. Hint: I had to take a loan and pay it off over time and I used WordStar and Xywrite word processing programs). I've even done fairly well learning to use the television remote, which looks like it could launch a space shuttle and has buttons so small you need a magnifiying glass to read them. The VCR programmer was another matter, but the less said about that the better.
What I want to talk about is my new cell phone.
All I really want in a cell phone is basic stuff, like store a number, dial it, answer a ring, let me know if there's a message, and shut on and off in a reasonable manner. I started ther service when I was widowed and wanted to be able to call AAA if I got a flat. My first phone, which I kept for many, many moons was just that. I learned the features as I needed them and I was happy as a clam until I forgot the thing in Starbucks outside Flagstaff and no one turned it in. It must have been someone less savvy than I because who else would bother with something so ancient?
Well, there I was in Arizona, six hundred miles from home and no phone. I didn't feel like driving home on long, empty roads without one and I didn't like the idea of waiting outside the restroom in some rest stop pleading with someone to make a call for me. Something clearly had to be done. I headed into the local Radio Shack. That's where I encountered a glittering world of the modern cell phone. It was culture shock.
When I was a child, I used to watch the weekly serials down at the local cinema. Kid's matinee it was called. One favorite was Flash Gordon, sort of a space cowboy who went from planet to planet and was always in some dire strait or another. The new cell phones were worthy of him.
"Do you want internet access?" the clerk asked me. He had this sort of doubtful look on his face as if he didn't believe at my age I knew the difference between ROM and RAM. Since those phones made my TV remote look deprived and required monthly IP access charges, I shook my head. He looked at me with pity.
"I have internet access on my home PC," I said with stiff dignity. "I use Skype long distance calling through my laptop. I just need a basic phone."
"Games and built-in camera? Choice of ring tones?" he asked. I shook my head. "Well," he said, "they come basic with all phones so it's a matter of quality and choice."
"Won't need them," I said.
"Blue tooth?" He asked. I had to think. I remembered that my grandson had a blue tooth on his game set. "I prefer to use a headset in the car," I replied. He looked at me sadly. His eyes said it all.
"Well," he said, "here's our most basic phone." I looked at the gleaming monster he handed me. It sat in the palm of my hand and cost almost $200. I looked at the others. This was indeed the cheapest as they were costing upwards of $500 amd looked like little tvs. He saw me looking at them and took one down. He turned it one way and it was a phone; when he turned it around he could type text onto the screen. He did it quickly using his thumbs. With my arthritic thumbs, it would take me hours to tap anything in.
"Cute," I said. That must not have been the right thing to say. "These are mini computers," he corrected me. "You can watch movies on them." I smiled sheepishly, not able to imagine watching something that small for hours. I would see double at the end.
I finally left with my "basic" call phone. It came "free" with renewing my two-year commitment to T-Mobile, which I would have done anyway since the service works for me. He had to show me how to open the darned thing (it slides instead of flips). I have used the camera once, just to see how it worked and promptly forgot how to do it except when I get into it by mistake--then it's tricky to get out of it. After several weeks I've managed to figure out how to set speed dial and how to change the ring tones. I can get my messages and finally set my PIN. It works. That's all I asked.
But, just to remind me whom these phones are meant for: my grandson grabbed the phone when he saw it, played everyone of the games on it, told me that it would connect to the internet if I ever wanted it, and asked why I wasn't downloading the cool tunes for sale as ring tones. When I explained I wouldn't be doing all that, he looked at me with the same pitying eyes as the Radio Shack clerk.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
The Time Before Elections
The few weeks leading up to an election have to be one of the most depressing times around. Those who are all right in their corners--thank you very much, Jack--are worked into fever pitch that something they believe is their "right" (no matter whether it is an entitlement from the government) will be taken from them, and those who are not all right in their corner--why isn't the government doing something for me?--all seem to get worked up into a froth of self-interest and hypocrisy wrapped in the mantle of some ill understood ideology that sounds good because it confirms personal prejudices.
I guess it all depends on whose ox is being gored. What I find personally offensive is not the naked self-interest--goes with the territory of being human, I suppose--but the delusional attempts to turn selfishness into something rational (even admirable) by finding some expedient jusitification for it (thank you Ayn Rand and your book on the virtue of selfishness).
For someone who has been reading Aristotle, Plato, and Karl Marx lately(and they're amazing congruent, at least in my viewpoint, which I'll explain later), this whole season is one of the ugliest times around because it exposes much more of my fellow citizens than I really want to know.
To recap a bit: Aristotle said quite objectively that there is a natural conflict between the rich and the poor in a democracy--it's a power struggle as he saw it, the rich wielding money and the poor countering with numbers. The only way to maintain a democracy, he said, was through balance and trust: if you favor the rich, you get revolution; if you favor the poor you get economic reprisals because the rich hoard their money (in our version, banks refuse to give loans). It seems both sides need to be somewhat unhappy for the enterprise to function.
I think the wealthy are more aware of this process than the average citizen but everyone these days seems out for themselves and most political thinkers have historically recognized this.
Plato, for example, decided that balance is all very well but that the poor and undeucated really couldn't be trusted to rule themselves because they are just too--well--poor and uneducated. What was needed was a ruling class of people bred and trained to govern. In other words, he tipped his hat toward the rich and the noble (who else got educated?). Unfortunately, our rich today tend to become civic minded only after they have accumulated more money than God can count. On the way up they are anything but noble. Someone once said that behind every great fortune there is a great crime. That may be a bit too glib for my taste, but it does seem that on the way up they tend to think of the poor as inconvenient in expecting what they consider hand-outs, except, of course, when the poor are useful in some economic way.
Now, Marx went the other way. He agreed with Aristotle that there is inevitable conflict, but he came down on the side of the poor, except he clouded the issue by insisting on calling them the workers and focusing on the means of production to the point that his ideas underpinned an unworkable and destructive system that left out the rich entirely (the only way to wealth was through political corruption), hence destroying Aristotle's thought from the other direction. Jesus Christ, incidentally, falls into this category although he never ventured into economics directly except to castigate the rich and the priests (also rich) for oppressing the poor--see what his thoughts are being used to justify these days: things like using personal wealth as a sign of personal virtue (a good Puritan belief that God rewards those He loves with material benefits). In a fit of his own despondency, Christ once blasted a fig tree because it had no fruit--a metaphor for the rich denying food to the poor; I doubt cutting off unemployment benefits and denying medical care would have appealed much to him either.
I guess the depression I feel is at the gross lack of self-understanding I see around me and, worse, the actual celebration of willful ignorance and disregarding the procession of our past. Our political elections seem designed only to fan the flames of the very qualities that make us less than we can be.
Very few among us even acknowledge the concept of balance as a political goal--I give Obama credit for being one of those few. He's been steering a careful course, trying to restore that balance. But look what he's getting for it. This country has gone overboard for the rich in the past administration, basing such things as tax cuts on the political premise that if the wealthy retain their money and spend, the economy will lift all ships. Well, it hasn't. All it did was unleash the greed and self-interest that Aristotle said it would.
I will vote for any candidate who talks seriously about Balance (and not just of the federal budget, which will inevitably cut programs that serve the poor). But my fears are real and I don't see much beyond mere reacting replacing careful thought. All I know is that if the political pundits are right and we return to the unbalanced emphasis on wealth that set us on our current path, I see trouble ahead.
I guess it all depends on whose ox is being gored. What I find personally offensive is not the naked self-interest--goes with the territory of being human, I suppose--but the delusional attempts to turn selfishness into something rational (even admirable) by finding some expedient jusitification for it (thank you Ayn Rand and your book on the virtue of selfishness).
For someone who has been reading Aristotle, Plato, and Karl Marx lately(and they're amazing congruent, at least in my viewpoint, which I'll explain later), this whole season is one of the ugliest times around because it exposes much more of my fellow citizens than I really want to know.
To recap a bit: Aristotle said quite objectively that there is a natural conflict between the rich and the poor in a democracy--it's a power struggle as he saw it, the rich wielding money and the poor countering with numbers. The only way to maintain a democracy, he said, was through balance and trust: if you favor the rich, you get revolution; if you favor the poor you get economic reprisals because the rich hoard their money (in our version, banks refuse to give loans). It seems both sides need to be somewhat unhappy for the enterprise to function.
I think the wealthy are more aware of this process than the average citizen but everyone these days seems out for themselves and most political thinkers have historically recognized this.
Plato, for example, decided that balance is all very well but that the poor and undeucated really couldn't be trusted to rule themselves because they are just too--well--poor and uneducated. What was needed was a ruling class of people bred and trained to govern. In other words, he tipped his hat toward the rich and the noble (who else got educated?). Unfortunately, our rich today tend to become civic minded only after they have accumulated more money than God can count. On the way up they are anything but noble. Someone once said that behind every great fortune there is a great crime. That may be a bit too glib for my taste, but it does seem that on the way up they tend to think of the poor as inconvenient in expecting what they consider hand-outs, except, of course, when the poor are useful in some economic way.
Now, Marx went the other way. He agreed with Aristotle that there is inevitable conflict, but he came down on the side of the poor, except he clouded the issue by insisting on calling them the workers and focusing on the means of production to the point that his ideas underpinned an unworkable and destructive system that left out the rich entirely (the only way to wealth was through political corruption), hence destroying Aristotle's thought from the other direction. Jesus Christ, incidentally, falls into this category although he never ventured into economics directly except to castigate the rich and the priests (also rich) for oppressing the poor--see what his thoughts are being used to justify these days: things like using personal wealth as a sign of personal virtue (a good Puritan belief that God rewards those He loves with material benefits). In a fit of his own despondency, Christ once blasted a fig tree because it had no fruit--a metaphor for the rich denying food to the poor; I doubt cutting off unemployment benefits and denying medical care would have appealed much to him either.
I guess the depression I feel is at the gross lack of self-understanding I see around me and, worse, the actual celebration of willful ignorance and disregarding the procession of our past. Our political elections seem designed only to fan the flames of the very qualities that make us less than we can be.
Very few among us even acknowledge the concept of balance as a political goal--I give Obama credit for being one of those few. He's been steering a careful course, trying to restore that balance. But look what he's getting for it. This country has gone overboard for the rich in the past administration, basing such things as tax cuts on the political premise that if the wealthy retain their money and spend, the economy will lift all ships. Well, it hasn't. All it did was unleash the greed and self-interest that Aristotle said it would.
I will vote for any candidate who talks seriously about Balance (and not just of the federal budget, which will inevitably cut programs that serve the poor). But my fears are real and I don't see much beyond mere reacting replacing careful thought. All I know is that if the political pundits are right and we return to the unbalanced emphasis on wealth that set us on our current path, I see trouble ahead.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
The Senior Season at Yellowstone
There's nothing like the national parks when it comes to bringing out stupidity. I don't know what it is exactly. Maybe it's just excitement that breeds obliviousness, but it seems seeing a bison or an elk reduces otherwise normal people to quivering bowls of jelly.
We're just back from Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks where we encountered all the best that humanity has to offer. It seems, unbeknownst to us that there is a phenomenon called the "senior season." I guess it must be all those seniors (like us) who figure the regular summer season with kids--make that noisy kids who can never walk anywhere--ends with Labor Day thus ushering in a period with fewer cars and available hotel rooms.
Whatever the reasoning, the period between Labor Day and the closing of the park (starts shutting down the end of September to end of October) is now one of the hot times to visit. We couldn't reserve any rooms in the park lodges even a month in advance and paid $140 a night for a Super8 room in Jackson. The Visitor's Bureau told us we were lucky to have found a room at all.
Yellowstone it appears is as popular as the Grand Canyon as a destination, judging by all the tour buses disgorging their Asian visitors and by the two rows of seating packed with spectators that circled around Old Faithful, which faithfully erupted on time. We stayed at West Yellowstone, which is actually fun as far as tourist towns go. All the animals we saw (bison and elk) were along the park road leading to the town, and the bison indeed did walk down the middle of the road. Herein lies some of the stupidity we saw.
For those who care for details, bison (American buffalo) weigh around 500 pounds. They don't see very well and are inclined to lumber along rolling their eyes and looking unimpressed. Each year, one hundred large animals get hit by cars and cause $150,000 in damage, presumably to vehicles. We were stopped on the road to let three rather large bulls walk down between the rows of cars when the very small car in front of us pops the sun roof just as one passes and a woman suddenly pokes her head out to start taking pictures. It startled me so I can't imagine it pleased the bison. The one next to her car started and then veeered away. Good thing it wasn't in a mood to be cranky as the animal was as large as the car and its head was pretty much on a level with hers. Only thing more silly were the occupants of cars up ahead who were running back down the road and trying to get beside the animals for more pictures.
The presence of animals did really strange things to people. Cars stopped in the middle of the road while the occupants got out. Other cars parked under signs that said do not park alongside the road. I saw one SUV parked across three handicapped parking spaces. Maybe you can't get a ticket if you don't park properly?
But it wasn't just animals. The geyser fields were another source of mischief. Apparently, there were those who didn't believe the warnings about unstable ground that can give way into scalding underground cauldrons. One fellow actually lay on his stomach on a slippery boardwalk because he wanted to dip his hand into runoff water to see if it was hot. Since the signs said the water in some locations could range from 160 to 280 degrees, one can only wonder about him. I suspect this is where the Darwin Awards might have originated.
Then there were the drivers--and not just of the trucks and RVs. I discovered in Old Faithful Lodge that power wheelchairs be a powerful extension of personal aggression just like the large trucks, invariably driven by older men possibly trying to recover lost youth and power by driving 25 in a 45 mile zone and refusing to use pullouts.
Ah humanity! Was it worth it? Of course. The national parks always are. But with visits to Yellowstone now at an annual rate of nearly 600,000 a year and all the others equally being loved to death, I would have to think hard about going back. On the other hand--I'd really like to see Yosemite.
We're just back from Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks where we encountered all the best that humanity has to offer. It seems, unbeknownst to us that there is a phenomenon called the "senior season." I guess it must be all those seniors (like us) who figure the regular summer season with kids--make that noisy kids who can never walk anywhere--ends with Labor Day thus ushering in a period with fewer cars and available hotel rooms.
Whatever the reasoning, the period between Labor Day and the closing of the park (starts shutting down the end of September to end of October) is now one of the hot times to visit. We couldn't reserve any rooms in the park lodges even a month in advance and paid $140 a night for a Super8 room in Jackson. The Visitor's Bureau told us we were lucky to have found a room at all.
Yellowstone it appears is as popular as the Grand Canyon as a destination, judging by all the tour buses disgorging their Asian visitors and by the two rows of seating packed with spectators that circled around Old Faithful, which faithfully erupted on time. We stayed at West Yellowstone, which is actually fun as far as tourist towns go. All the animals we saw (bison and elk) were along the park road leading to the town, and the bison indeed did walk down the middle of the road. Herein lies some of the stupidity we saw.
For those who care for details, bison (American buffalo) weigh around 500 pounds. They don't see very well and are inclined to lumber along rolling their eyes and looking unimpressed. Each year, one hundred large animals get hit by cars and cause $150,000 in damage, presumably to vehicles. We were stopped on the road to let three rather large bulls walk down between the rows of cars when the very small car in front of us pops the sun roof just as one passes and a woman suddenly pokes her head out to start taking pictures. It startled me so I can't imagine it pleased the bison. The one next to her car started and then veeered away. Good thing it wasn't in a mood to be cranky as the animal was as large as the car and its head was pretty much on a level with hers. Only thing more silly were the occupants of cars up ahead who were running back down the road and trying to get beside the animals for more pictures.
The presence of animals did really strange things to people. Cars stopped in the middle of the road while the occupants got out. Other cars parked under signs that said do not park alongside the road. I saw one SUV parked across three handicapped parking spaces. Maybe you can't get a ticket if you don't park properly?
But it wasn't just animals. The geyser fields were another source of mischief. Apparently, there were those who didn't believe the warnings about unstable ground that can give way into scalding underground cauldrons. One fellow actually lay on his stomach on a slippery boardwalk because he wanted to dip his hand into runoff water to see if it was hot. Since the signs said the water in some locations could range from 160 to 280 degrees, one can only wonder about him. I suspect this is where the Darwin Awards might have originated.
Then there were the drivers--and not just of the trucks and RVs. I discovered in Old Faithful Lodge that power wheelchairs be a powerful extension of personal aggression just like the large trucks, invariably driven by older men possibly trying to recover lost youth and power by driving 25 in a 45 mile zone and refusing to use pullouts.
Ah humanity! Was it worth it? Of course. The national parks always are. But with visits to Yellowstone now at an annual rate of nearly 600,000 a year and all the others equally being loved to death, I would have to think hard about going back. On the other hand--I'd really like to see Yosemite.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Guest commentary: Stephen Hawking, Religion, and the Bus
I am delighted to include a guest commentary--a welcome relief, I'm sure, to readers of my blogging. Ken is British, a WWII vet, former nuclear engineer, and wise observer and commentator--certainly someone deserving of being called cool-old-tech. Comments are welcome and can be attached below or sent to Ken via me at kepad123@aol.com. Diana
I spend much of my time these days trawling the Internet for items that interest me.
Today I read on several web sites that Stephen Hawking has dropped his latest bomb. He has declared that God had no part in the creation of the universe. Some statement eh? and one that is likely to cause more than the occasion murmur within the walls of The Vatican, as well as in a few other places. Of course this was no great surprise to me because I came to this conclusion many moons ago, and I was not a Cambridge scholar.
The statement has such profound and far reaching significance that it totally upsets the apple cart onto the very basis of religion, to such an extent as identifying all brands of religion as being baseless and by doing so puts at risk the employment of all those in the religious community or should I say industry?
Just think, can we now expect to see Rome and the C of E having closing down sales? Expiry of lease? I wonder: Will Hawking now be asked to return the medal he was recently awarded by Obama ? and will Israel now have to change its tune as will Mecca? and will the US mint have to go into overtime to strike new coins? – Should generate some interesting times .
I was writing to a long-standing friend the other day and was pleasantly surprised to receive a very chatty reply in which he touched on our similar ages and the very cynical attitude he has to religion. In fact we seem to have identical views as atheists /agnostics etc., altho in my case I said that I leave the door open just a crack in the unlikely case of someone offering a reasonable argument against. The crack was merely an extension of my caution as a life long engineer to avoid burning ones bridges and regretting it later.
He and the few remaining colleagues that have have at least one thing in common with me. We all have little or no time for the current way of life. It has been usurped by the kids and they have neither the inclination or experience to run it, so we can only blame ourselves. With the end of WW11 we were so exhausted with 5 years of effort and deprivation, that we sat back, believed that it was all over and everything would be fine from now on. How wrong we were, our lack of care created a vacuum and the kids ( aka baby Boomers ) moved in to occupy the space, and the situation is now beyond recovery. The new deity was as obsessed with the new stately pleasure dome as was Kubla Khan, and there was no shortage of help from such as the Beatles of the 50s right up to the Jacksons of recent times
During the first few months of WW11 Neville Chamberlain said when referring to the stalemate in 1940, “Hitler has missed the bus.“ Well, I can modify that to suit myself and say that when referring to the current and dismal situation that Britain and most of the world is in, that I did not miss my bus because I was on it. I got off, way back now after I decided its destination was no longer of interest to me and have little intention of re-boarding it in this world, and I know of no one of my years who thinks otherwise.
However, now that Hawking has kicked my foot from the door, I must say that I am delighted to find someone of academic substance to give credence to my rebellious views, as I have no doubt many other free thinking persons are when getting support from such a quarter. Good for you Stephen!.
I spend much of my time these days trawling the Internet for items that interest me.
Today I read on several web sites that Stephen Hawking has dropped his latest bomb. He has declared that God had no part in the creation of the universe. Some statement eh? and one that is likely to cause more than the occasion murmur within the walls of The Vatican, as well as in a few other places. Of course this was no great surprise to me because I came to this conclusion many moons ago, and I was not a Cambridge scholar.
The statement has such profound and far reaching significance that it totally upsets the apple cart onto the very basis of religion, to such an extent as identifying all brands of religion as being baseless and by doing so puts at risk the employment of all those in the religious community or should I say industry?
Just think, can we now expect to see Rome and the C of E having closing down sales? Expiry of lease? I wonder: Will Hawking now be asked to return the medal he was recently awarded by Obama ? and will Israel now have to change its tune as will Mecca? and will the US mint have to go into overtime to strike new coins? – Should generate some interesting times .
I was writing to a long-standing friend the other day and was pleasantly surprised to receive a very chatty reply in which he touched on our similar ages and the very cynical attitude he has to religion. In fact we seem to have identical views as atheists /agnostics etc., altho in my case I said that I leave the door open just a crack in the unlikely case of someone offering a reasonable argument against. The crack was merely an extension of my caution as a life long engineer to avoid burning ones bridges and regretting it later.
He and the few remaining colleagues that have have at least one thing in common with me. We all have little or no time for the current way of life. It has been usurped by the kids and they have neither the inclination or experience to run it, so we can only blame ourselves. With the end of WW11 we were so exhausted with 5 years of effort and deprivation, that we sat back, believed that it was all over and everything would be fine from now on. How wrong we were, our lack of care created a vacuum and the kids ( aka baby Boomers ) moved in to occupy the space, and the situation is now beyond recovery. The new deity was as obsessed with the new stately pleasure dome as was Kubla Khan, and there was no shortage of help from such as the Beatles of the 50s right up to the Jacksons of recent times
During the first few months of WW11 Neville Chamberlain said when referring to the stalemate in 1940, “Hitler has missed the bus.“ Well, I can modify that to suit myself and say that when referring to the current and dismal situation that Britain and most of the world is in, that I did not miss my bus because I was on it. I got off, way back now after I decided its destination was no longer of interest to me and have little intention of re-boarding it in this world, and I know of no one of my years who thinks otherwise.
However, now that Hawking has kicked my foot from the door, I must say that I am delighted to find someone of academic substance to give credence to my rebellious views, as I have no doubt many other free thinking persons are when getting support from such a quarter. Good for you Stephen!.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Trust
Aristotle continues to fascinate me as I read further into his study of politics. In his opinion, one of the greatest dangers to demomcracy is running for office because it exacerbates the conflict between rich and poor--the greatest threat in his opinion because it can lead to civil war.
It works like this: The rich believe they should have more say because they have the wealth. The poor think they should have more power because everyone is equal and there are more of them. Both have a point, he says, and both are wrong because whichever one gains the power will govern in their own interest and not for the common good. This, he says, is the flaw of democracy.
I’d add another flaw. It’s quite possible for a group of people to exercise their democratic right and vote in a dictatorship. Hitler was elected to power. But I digress.
Running for office is dangerous to the common good, he says, because candidates for office have every reason to become demagogues and appeal to the naked self-interest of each group. Particularly damaging is what Aristotle calls “the wanton behavior of the popular leaders.” In other words, graft and self-interest, leading to an erosion of trust and the destruction of balance between competing interests. Maintaining a democracy, in other words, requires balance and trust.
How do we compare? Not a lot of balance these days, I’m afraid. It seems that 39% of the nation’s wealth is in the hands of 5% of the population and that 5% has learned it can do without most of the rest of us. Producing wealth doesn’t require a middle class or even much of a blue collar workforce when money is made by manipulating funds across nations.
I’m reminded of what someone once told me about the car rental business. “Hertz isn’t in the rental business anymore. They make more off the insurance they sell. So they’re an insurance company that rents and sells cars on the side.” Same thing can be said for the large corporations. They really aren’t into customer service and producing a product. Their major money comes from creating and spinning off subsidiaries. They manage by crisis. Just ask BP and, for that matter, the Corps of Engineers, the subject of an unflattering documentary called “The Big Uneasy.” But then, who cares? There’s no accountability beyond maintaining stock prices and CEOs are proving to be yet another disposable product.
As for trust—well, the depressing roster of politicos called on the rug—and I’m sure those are just the ones we know about—doesn’t create much of a climate for it. Plus the ravenous media who have turned journalism into pandering create a fertile climate for national paranoia. Those who were screaming about Obama attending the Rev. Wright’s Christian church are now screaming about his being Muslim. The only consistency appears to be that it’s OK to make up facts as long as you don’t like the man.
For those who think I exaggerate on the press, consider the headline (real)” Thirty percent of Americans support the Tea Party.” Impressive? Turn it around: “Fifty-six percent do NOT support the Tea Party.” I don’t about the others who are undecided. I guess they don’t have TV sets.
Aristotle’s point on democracy is that if the friction between rich and poor is allowed to widen and deepen the result is civil war. So he’d say what we need is some balance. Here’s my idea of it:
Tea Party—calm down. You do not have the market on civil rights. In fact, many of your members (male, white, over 50) didn’t support the civil rights movement when it happened; it’s only the most blatant hypocrisy and ignorance that is driving your self-righteousness. You are being funded by corporate interests, which means you are being used.
Media--go back to the days when your profession was honorable and you had some ethics. Mainstream media should not be the same as the paparazzi. Let’s have some Pulitzer Prize winning investigative stories that don’t just confirm everyone’s biases.
Republicans—for heaven’s sake repudiate some of the lunacy. Candidate Maes’ comments that he doesn’t have to pander to the moderates is going to turn off everyone. Remember when you received 1% of the vote with an extreme candidate? If you feel you can’t win without the extremes, it tells me that you have become a party of extremes.
Democrats—will you please stay out of things that don’t concern you. And will you please understand that you are never going to get the Republicans to agree with you on anything until they find their voice and their direction. It wouldn’t hurt you to find a clearer voice either.
If democracy matters more than just using a slogan to beat someone on the head, then it has to matter to all of us. Maybe we can learn to trust that our government really has our best interests at heart--once our collective heads stop spinning. Until then, screaming at one another may be cathartic—but how valuable will that be when this country goes up in smoke and we live under martial law?
It works like this: The rich believe they should have more say because they have the wealth. The poor think they should have more power because everyone is equal and there are more of them. Both have a point, he says, and both are wrong because whichever one gains the power will govern in their own interest and not for the common good. This, he says, is the flaw of democracy.
I’d add another flaw. It’s quite possible for a group of people to exercise their democratic right and vote in a dictatorship. Hitler was elected to power. But I digress.
Running for office is dangerous to the common good, he says, because candidates for office have every reason to become demagogues and appeal to the naked self-interest of each group. Particularly damaging is what Aristotle calls “the wanton behavior of the popular leaders.” In other words, graft and self-interest, leading to an erosion of trust and the destruction of balance between competing interests. Maintaining a democracy, in other words, requires balance and trust.
How do we compare? Not a lot of balance these days, I’m afraid. It seems that 39% of the nation’s wealth is in the hands of 5% of the population and that 5% has learned it can do without most of the rest of us. Producing wealth doesn’t require a middle class or even much of a blue collar workforce when money is made by manipulating funds across nations.
I’m reminded of what someone once told me about the car rental business. “Hertz isn’t in the rental business anymore. They make more off the insurance they sell. So they’re an insurance company that rents and sells cars on the side.” Same thing can be said for the large corporations. They really aren’t into customer service and producing a product. Their major money comes from creating and spinning off subsidiaries. They manage by crisis. Just ask BP and, for that matter, the Corps of Engineers, the subject of an unflattering documentary called “The Big Uneasy.” But then, who cares? There’s no accountability beyond maintaining stock prices and CEOs are proving to be yet another disposable product.
As for trust—well, the depressing roster of politicos called on the rug—and I’m sure those are just the ones we know about—doesn’t create much of a climate for it. Plus the ravenous media who have turned journalism into pandering create a fertile climate for national paranoia. Those who were screaming about Obama attending the Rev. Wright’s Christian church are now screaming about his being Muslim. The only consistency appears to be that it’s OK to make up facts as long as you don’t like the man.
For those who think I exaggerate on the press, consider the headline (real)” Thirty percent of Americans support the Tea Party.” Impressive? Turn it around: “Fifty-six percent do NOT support the Tea Party.” I don’t about the others who are undecided. I guess they don’t have TV sets.
Aristotle’s point on democracy is that if the friction between rich and poor is allowed to widen and deepen the result is civil war. So he’d say what we need is some balance. Here’s my idea of it:
Tea Party—calm down. You do not have the market on civil rights. In fact, many of your members (male, white, over 50) didn’t support the civil rights movement when it happened; it’s only the most blatant hypocrisy and ignorance that is driving your self-righteousness. You are being funded by corporate interests, which means you are being used.
Media--go back to the days when your profession was honorable and you had some ethics. Mainstream media should not be the same as the paparazzi. Let’s have some Pulitzer Prize winning investigative stories that don’t just confirm everyone’s biases.
Republicans—for heaven’s sake repudiate some of the lunacy. Candidate Maes’ comments that he doesn’t have to pander to the moderates is going to turn off everyone. Remember when you received 1% of the vote with an extreme candidate? If you feel you can’t win without the extremes, it tells me that you have become a party of extremes.
Democrats—will you please stay out of things that don’t concern you. And will you please understand that you are never going to get the Republicans to agree with you on anything until they find their voice and their direction. It wouldn’t hurt you to find a clearer voice either.
If democracy matters more than just using a slogan to beat someone on the head, then it has to matter to all of us. Maybe we can learn to trust that our government really has our best interests at heart--once our collective heads stop spinning. Until then, screaming at one another may be cathartic—but how valuable will that be when this country goes up in smoke and we live under martial law?
Monday, August 16, 2010
Selling in a Down Market
Well, we finally did it--we put the house on the market. It took months of preparation--downsizing, sorting, and packing things away to unclutter the place, conducting serious negotation over what could go to Goodwill, and removing pictures from the walls that could detract from the archeterctural details of the vaulted ceilings. The windows were professionally washed and all routine maintenance completed in the house(hot tub, sump pump, evaporative cooler, fireplace, windows), the papers duly filled out detailing screened, cedar-lined pation, new roof, new high efficiency furnace, new water heater, and generous concession on the now-aging carpet. The garden was put into perfect shape. Up went the sign--and what happened?
One showing, and that person complained that our appliances weren't stainless steel.
Our real estate agent says no one else will look at the house because we have an industrial grade evaporative cooler rather than central air conditioning (never mind that an evaporative cooler is a good choice for Denver because it puts moisture into the air).
Such, it seems, is the way of selling a house in Denver these days. Apparently, I made the mistake of putting major money into maintenance (I have a binder of everything done to the house and it's thick) rather than glamour.
It's been a number of years since I last sold a house and I must admit I'd forgotten how vulnerable one feels-- and not just because one's furnishinigs are suddenly fair game for comment from people who would never otherwise be inside the house. "Not my style," said the person who wanted stainless steel. I hadn't thought it was about my style, but apparently it is. "It's price wars and a beauty contest," my agent says. Except, I have no idea of what today's buyer considers the criteria for beauty except of course for the stainless stuff.
I suppose this all results from buying a house in a development where there are lots of houses with only a few floor plans to differentiate them. It's like a predator with a school of fish. How do you choose? There they all sit with their standard four to five bedrooms, three to four bathrooms, three-car garages, representing the homeownership we are supposed to mortgage ourselves for and thus declare ourselves having lived the American dream.
Right now, there are approximately thirty houses for sale in our development and those around us. Thirty all roughly the same. I suppose I can't blame the agents and buyers for categorizing the houses in order to get make some sort of order out of chaos. Buyers also have to wonder whether the houses are going to lose value over time. I suppose they want to get as much as they can for as little as possible. It's a given that even with a full price offer, the financial loss on this house will be significant.
I suppose I should look on the loss as the cost of living in the house, which has been comfortable and welcoming. If I'd been renting, the money would have been gone anyway and I'd have nothing to show for it. Perhaps also I should look on the house as a sort of generational endeavor--the people before us did so much (actually they ran it into the ground and unloaded it when it started to give trouble, but no matter), we do so much, and then it's passed on. With this market, untold millions of people are probably trapped in houses they'd love to unload so maybe houses are going to remain in people's hands for longer. If there's a silver lining, maybe the home improvement people will benefit as bored homeowners try to prepare for the next beauty contest.
In the meantime, Sid says he'll check to see if we can change out the fronts on our black appliances to stainless steel.
One showing, and that person complained that our appliances weren't stainless steel.
Our real estate agent says no one else will look at the house because we have an industrial grade evaporative cooler rather than central air conditioning (never mind that an evaporative cooler is a good choice for Denver because it puts moisture into the air).
Such, it seems, is the way of selling a house in Denver these days. Apparently, I made the mistake of putting major money into maintenance (I have a binder of everything done to the house and it's thick) rather than glamour.
It's been a number of years since I last sold a house and I must admit I'd forgotten how vulnerable one feels-- and not just because one's furnishinigs are suddenly fair game for comment from people who would never otherwise be inside the house. "Not my style," said the person who wanted stainless steel. I hadn't thought it was about my style, but apparently it is. "It's price wars and a beauty contest," my agent says. Except, I have no idea of what today's buyer considers the criteria for beauty except of course for the stainless stuff.
I suppose this all results from buying a house in a development where there are lots of houses with only a few floor plans to differentiate them. It's like a predator with a school of fish. How do you choose? There they all sit with their standard four to five bedrooms, three to four bathrooms, three-car garages, representing the homeownership we are supposed to mortgage ourselves for and thus declare ourselves having lived the American dream.
Right now, there are approximately thirty houses for sale in our development and those around us. Thirty all roughly the same. I suppose I can't blame the agents and buyers for categorizing the houses in order to get make some sort of order out of chaos. Buyers also have to wonder whether the houses are going to lose value over time. I suppose they want to get as much as they can for as little as possible. It's a given that even with a full price offer, the financial loss on this house will be significant.
I suppose I should look on the loss as the cost of living in the house, which has been comfortable and welcoming. If I'd been renting, the money would have been gone anyway and I'd have nothing to show for it. Perhaps also I should look on the house as a sort of generational endeavor--the people before us did so much (actually they ran it into the ground and unloaded it when it started to give trouble, but no matter), we do so much, and then it's passed on. With this market, untold millions of people are probably trapped in houses they'd love to unload so maybe houses are going to remain in people's hands for longer. If there's a silver lining, maybe the home improvement people will benefit as bored homeowners try to prepare for the next beauty contest.
In the meantime, Sid says he'll check to see if we can change out the fronts on our black appliances to stainless steel.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Telos
I’ve been rereading Aristotle’s Politics lately, feeling rather glad that our thinking has advanced a bit since he wrote that there are some people who are born to be slaves and that women are naturally inferior. As usual, I had to get beyond those parts and, as usual, once I did, I remembered why I find him worth the time.
Most interesting to me are his concepts of the goal of politics and his concept of telos, roughly translated as meaning purpose or use.
To paraphrase, Aristotle believes that politics exists to train citizens to recognize the good and do noble things. Since contemporary politics seems to exist to aggrandize politicians, enrich corporations, and convince citizens they are being kissed while being screwed, that sounds quite refreshing. Naïve, perhaps—given the enshrined role of greed in every level of our political and social life—but still more attractive than the world of lobbyists and naked self-interest on every level.
The telos of human beings, Aristotle says, is to be happy, which means living what he calls a virtuous life. This, of course, begs the question of what virtue means. Virtue, he says, is doing the right thing because it is right. Note—not expedient and profitable. Someone living without morals and ethics cannot, by definition, be happy no matter how that person feels.
All of which is well and good, you might be saying—but what’s in it for us? I would answer, telos. What, in other words, Aristotle offers us is the challenge to look into the purposes of our own political structures. In this, he invites us to link outcomes to our purposes.
Consider, for example, the former administration’s political purpose in removing all impediments to individual initiative and economic expansion. Who was made happy? Obviously the upper echelons of business and investment in this country. Did it make them virtuous? Hardly, since a bunch of them are in jail. All Bernie Madoff managed to do (beside rob his friends) was demonstrate how unregulated exchange between people leads to economic cannibalism.
If I were someone from outer space suddenly cast into American society (and presuming I could understand the language) what conclusions might I come to about the purposes of the government? Well, for one thing, I might conclude that there is no clear purpose. In fact, there are multiple purposes working to undermine each other. The result of all the tumult being that no one’s better nature is appealed to. Listening to the excuses and posturing offered by those in political power, I would, in fact, have to conclude that the term public service is an oxymoron and the only service provided being what is bought and paid for.
Which brings me back to the question of slavery. We aren’t too hot on the subject of a class of people born to be slaves. Aristotle was talking about physical enslavement, particularly of losers in various wars, so I think there’s another way to consider this. If we define slavery as he does: slaves are people who work and act for other people’s purposes than their own, then I think a case could be made for intellectual slavery. How many times have people spouted unexamined truisms about such things as justice and virtue without ever examining them? War is a dirty business—why is it glorified? Why do some argue that if a majority vote for something then it is all right to tyrannize the minority? Why do we believe that our way of life is the only way? Why do we trot out Jesus Christ to urge him to bless our efforts in some ignoble personal pursuit? Why do we accept some political or philosophical position because our parents did or for some reason of guilty national pride?
It seems to me the way to virtue these days is to look for the rational in every situation, and open up assumptions to the light of day. This requires reason, debate (real debate and not just yelling), and a curiosity to find the truth collaboratively. If we are unable to do this and merely parrot the enthusiasms that clog the world around us, then we are indeed no more than slaves.
Most interesting to me are his concepts of the goal of politics and his concept of telos, roughly translated as meaning purpose or use.
To paraphrase, Aristotle believes that politics exists to train citizens to recognize the good and do noble things. Since contemporary politics seems to exist to aggrandize politicians, enrich corporations, and convince citizens they are being kissed while being screwed, that sounds quite refreshing. Naïve, perhaps—given the enshrined role of greed in every level of our political and social life—but still more attractive than the world of lobbyists and naked self-interest on every level.
The telos of human beings, Aristotle says, is to be happy, which means living what he calls a virtuous life. This, of course, begs the question of what virtue means. Virtue, he says, is doing the right thing because it is right. Note—not expedient and profitable. Someone living without morals and ethics cannot, by definition, be happy no matter how that person feels.
All of which is well and good, you might be saying—but what’s in it for us? I would answer, telos. What, in other words, Aristotle offers us is the challenge to look into the purposes of our own political structures. In this, he invites us to link outcomes to our purposes.
Consider, for example, the former administration’s political purpose in removing all impediments to individual initiative and economic expansion. Who was made happy? Obviously the upper echelons of business and investment in this country. Did it make them virtuous? Hardly, since a bunch of them are in jail. All Bernie Madoff managed to do (beside rob his friends) was demonstrate how unregulated exchange between people leads to economic cannibalism.
If I were someone from outer space suddenly cast into American society (and presuming I could understand the language) what conclusions might I come to about the purposes of the government? Well, for one thing, I might conclude that there is no clear purpose. In fact, there are multiple purposes working to undermine each other. The result of all the tumult being that no one’s better nature is appealed to. Listening to the excuses and posturing offered by those in political power, I would, in fact, have to conclude that the term public service is an oxymoron and the only service provided being what is bought and paid for.
Which brings me back to the question of slavery. We aren’t too hot on the subject of a class of people born to be slaves. Aristotle was talking about physical enslavement, particularly of losers in various wars, so I think there’s another way to consider this. If we define slavery as he does: slaves are people who work and act for other people’s purposes than their own, then I think a case could be made for intellectual slavery. How many times have people spouted unexamined truisms about such things as justice and virtue without ever examining them? War is a dirty business—why is it glorified? Why do some argue that if a majority vote for something then it is all right to tyrannize the minority? Why do we believe that our way of life is the only way? Why do we trot out Jesus Christ to urge him to bless our efforts in some ignoble personal pursuit? Why do we accept some political or philosophical position because our parents did or for some reason of guilty national pride?
It seems to me the way to virtue these days is to look for the rational in every situation, and open up assumptions to the light of day. This requires reason, debate (real debate and not just yelling), and a curiosity to find the truth collaboratively. If we are unable to do this and merely parrot the enthusiasms that clog the world around us, then we are indeed no more than slaves.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Haven't Lost My Touch After All
I can still clear a room all by myself. How did I do that? I met up with an honest to God Birther. I probably shouldn't even give that a capital letter since it justifies the argument that Obama was born in Kenya instead of Hawaii. One of our local Colorado politicians called the people who cling to the theory "dumb-asses." He was asked to apologize, which is a pity, because he is right.
Our local newspaper chided the politician and said the people who believe this crazy theory are "sincere"--HAH. In a pig's eye. They may believe (or hope) sincerely he wasn't born in the US, but the insincerity lies in the reasons why they choose to ignore overwhelming evidence to the contrary--some of it my personal observation since I knew Obama's mother slightly from my undergrad days the University of Hawaii.
The birthers purport to be trying to rectify a great wrong--an ineligible man has been elected president. But it's not that at all. They hate him. Now, if they were sincere indeed they'd look at themselves and be honest about why that is so. There have been many Democrat presidents, many liberal leaders, many others who run in fear from the Republicans, who have not generated the level of personal venom Obama has. What is it that has created such a threat to the nation that thse loons don't attack on the many legitimate grounds for attacking any political party in power? What makes Obama such a target?
Well, it's pretty obvious, isn't it? He's from Hawaii for one thing, the newest state and the one the Mainland US is least able to comprehend. Hawaii's ruling culture is heavily Asian and the folks there don't do things the same way. They don't confront one another; instead, as I like to say, they go one floor down and cut the floor out from around your feet and you never know what hit you. I would guess shrewdly that Obama has made his way in Chicago politics by applying a lot of Hawaii--quiet, scandal and confrontation free, highly effective, and not given to blowing his own horn. Good old Hawaii. If you want drama and conflict and winners and losers, Obama wasn't your man--when you elected him, you said you wanted an end to Washington politics--well, deal with it--maybe you didn't after all.
Then there's the fact of his parentage. It was a heck of a brave thing in Hawaii of the early 1960s to mix African and Caucasian. There weren't many Africans to begin with. Obama's father was the first on the campus. I remember about three others later--all from Nigeria, I think. They were glamorous young men, at least one of whom had studied at the London School of Economics, with self-assurance to the point of swagger. Hawaii was intrigued by them, but the marriage was still unusual. It had been only twenty or so years before that the Massey case hit the headlines (look it up on the internet if you don't know). That's why I remember meeting Obama's mother when she was pregnant with him--she had come with his father to a foreign student gathering where Obama senior was talking. I overheard her friends talking about her, worried that in Africa multiple wives were acceptable. I was horrified for her--that's why I remember so clearly.
So, given this background, where I had lived a tiny bit of Obama's story and knew infinitely more about Hawaii than the birther I was confronted with, I took the bait and pointed out where ignorance was intersecting with foreign-phobia. Birthers can't forgive Obama for having a foreign-sounding name and for having a foreign father and a mother who later lived in Indonesia. It's all just too outside mainstream America. Never mind that John McCain was born in the US Panama Canal Zone--my late husband was too and we had to get a State Department Birth Certificate to prove his citizenship. I'm sure McCain has one too. Would the birthers have pursued McCain on this? Doubtful because they agreed with him (at least until he went a bit off message).
The birther left rather suddenly from the gathering where I met him--I can do that to people. Part of my charm, I guess. But the fact remains--the world is moving on. I quote here (from memory so it may be completely accurate) my favorite poem from the Rubiyat: "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on. Nor all your peity nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all your tears wash out a word of it."
Our local newspaper chided the politician and said the people who believe this crazy theory are "sincere"--HAH. In a pig's eye. They may believe (or hope) sincerely he wasn't born in the US, but the insincerity lies in the reasons why they choose to ignore overwhelming evidence to the contrary--some of it my personal observation since I knew Obama's mother slightly from my undergrad days the University of Hawaii.
The birthers purport to be trying to rectify a great wrong--an ineligible man has been elected president. But it's not that at all. They hate him. Now, if they were sincere indeed they'd look at themselves and be honest about why that is so. There have been many Democrat presidents, many liberal leaders, many others who run in fear from the Republicans, who have not generated the level of personal venom Obama has. What is it that has created such a threat to the nation that thse loons don't attack on the many legitimate grounds for attacking any political party in power? What makes Obama such a target?
Well, it's pretty obvious, isn't it? He's from Hawaii for one thing, the newest state and the one the Mainland US is least able to comprehend. Hawaii's ruling culture is heavily Asian and the folks there don't do things the same way. They don't confront one another; instead, as I like to say, they go one floor down and cut the floor out from around your feet and you never know what hit you. I would guess shrewdly that Obama has made his way in Chicago politics by applying a lot of Hawaii--quiet, scandal and confrontation free, highly effective, and not given to blowing his own horn. Good old Hawaii. If you want drama and conflict and winners and losers, Obama wasn't your man--when you elected him, you said you wanted an end to Washington politics--well, deal with it--maybe you didn't after all.
Then there's the fact of his parentage. It was a heck of a brave thing in Hawaii of the early 1960s to mix African and Caucasian. There weren't many Africans to begin with. Obama's father was the first on the campus. I remember about three others later--all from Nigeria, I think. They were glamorous young men, at least one of whom had studied at the London School of Economics, with self-assurance to the point of swagger. Hawaii was intrigued by them, but the marriage was still unusual. It had been only twenty or so years before that the Massey case hit the headlines (look it up on the internet if you don't know). That's why I remember meeting Obama's mother when she was pregnant with him--she had come with his father to a foreign student gathering where Obama senior was talking. I overheard her friends talking about her, worried that in Africa multiple wives were acceptable. I was horrified for her--that's why I remember so clearly.
So, given this background, where I had lived a tiny bit of Obama's story and knew infinitely more about Hawaii than the birther I was confronted with, I took the bait and pointed out where ignorance was intersecting with foreign-phobia. Birthers can't forgive Obama for having a foreign-sounding name and for having a foreign father and a mother who later lived in Indonesia. It's all just too outside mainstream America. Never mind that John McCain was born in the US Panama Canal Zone--my late husband was too and we had to get a State Department Birth Certificate to prove his citizenship. I'm sure McCain has one too. Would the birthers have pursued McCain on this? Doubtful because they agreed with him (at least until he went a bit off message).
The birther left rather suddenly from the gathering where I met him--I can do that to people. Part of my charm, I guess. But the fact remains--the world is moving on. I quote here (from memory so it may be completely accurate) my favorite poem from the Rubiyat: "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on. Nor all your peity nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all your tears wash out a word of it."
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Bumping It Up
Just because of who I am, I tend to confront problems by seeing what has to be done, putting my head down, and just getting on with it. It's probably the residual British in me--just get on with it and don't make a fuss, as my mum used to say.
I used to believe this grim sense of determination was how I made my way through a doctoral program while teaching full time and keeping up my end of family life. I just kept plodding until I was there. The race, in this case, nopt going to the swift, who may have won the initial prizes, but to the steady and persistent.
From the vantage point now of an approaching birthday, however, things seem more complex and in some ways more poignant. I find myself asking sbout human motivation and how the impact of a single life is to measured.
When I was in the president's office at the University of Hawaii, one of the regents told me to advise my workaholic boss to take more care of himself. "Institutions have no memory and no gratitude," he told me. Many people would agree with him, and it's almsot a truism to repeat the observation that no one on their deathbed wishes they had spent more time at work. Yet I'm not at all sure that my boss would or could have agreed with him.
The reasons why people behave as they do are myriad and complex, which makes me wonder whether the behavioral research really has the universal application with which it is presented to us. I'm not sure my boss would have been happy kicking back at that time of his life. He was in a drive to succeed mode, building a university legacy. He needed to accomplish great things (which he did) and he had the family and staff around him to support him. Whether the university remembered what he did was immaterial. He had an intrinsic drive to achieve that he measured by his own standards. In other words, he was in control empowered by what he needed to do at that time in his life.
It seems to me that we have constantly shifting needs and reward structures throughout our lives. Those who later regret their efforts at work might have confused their need for respect with the trappings of their career. As King Lear was to find out, "a dog's obeyed in office." Once they left the job, there was no basis for their public authority. But that doesn't mean what they did in their career was unimportant; it just means that the validation of their career did not last for a lifetime and they are stuck in a rut.
It reminds me of the old public relations mantra that when faced with a media blowup (frequent in a university president's office), a good response was to "bump it up a level." For example, when faced with a protest march on the president's residence, talk to the media about freedom of speech. Politicians do this all the time, except they also manage to drop in something about this being a great country.
Bumping it up is probably a good idea when it comes to human motivation. The most profitable question is not necessarily "Am I identifying too much with my work?" but "How is the work I do at this moment and the way I do it an important part of my progress as a human being?" Not "How important am I?" but "How important is this experience in my life?"
For some reason, I must have needed to plod my way to that advanced degree, possibly involving some element of competition. It must have fulfilled an intrinsic need because once I had earned the doctorate, only my assistant ever used doctor in front of my name. Whatever part of me was stirred by earning the degree apparently had been satisfied by completing it.
As I read him, John Milton was dealing with the need for self-examination and self-validation when he talked about the need to test our "virtues": "I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat."
Perhaps that's what we are all here for: to place ourselves out there in the race for the immoratal garland, whatever that may be for us.
I used to believe this grim sense of determination was how I made my way through a doctoral program while teaching full time and keeping up my end of family life. I just kept plodding until I was there. The race, in this case, nopt going to the swift, who may have won the initial prizes, but to the steady and persistent.
From the vantage point now of an approaching birthday, however, things seem more complex and in some ways more poignant. I find myself asking sbout human motivation and how the impact of a single life is to measured.
When I was in the president's office at the University of Hawaii, one of the regents told me to advise my workaholic boss to take more care of himself. "Institutions have no memory and no gratitude," he told me. Many people would agree with him, and it's almsot a truism to repeat the observation that no one on their deathbed wishes they had spent more time at work. Yet I'm not at all sure that my boss would or could have agreed with him.
The reasons why people behave as they do are myriad and complex, which makes me wonder whether the behavioral research really has the universal application with which it is presented to us. I'm not sure my boss would have been happy kicking back at that time of his life. He was in a drive to succeed mode, building a university legacy. He needed to accomplish great things (which he did) and he had the family and staff around him to support him. Whether the university remembered what he did was immaterial. He had an intrinsic drive to achieve that he measured by his own standards. In other words, he was in control empowered by what he needed to do at that time in his life.
It seems to me that we have constantly shifting needs and reward structures throughout our lives. Those who later regret their efforts at work might have confused their need for respect with the trappings of their career. As King Lear was to find out, "a dog's obeyed in office." Once they left the job, there was no basis for their public authority. But that doesn't mean what they did in their career was unimportant; it just means that the validation of their career did not last for a lifetime and they are stuck in a rut.
It reminds me of the old public relations mantra that when faced with a media blowup (frequent in a university president's office), a good response was to "bump it up a level." For example, when faced with a protest march on the president's residence, talk to the media about freedom of speech. Politicians do this all the time, except they also manage to drop in something about this being a great country.
Bumping it up is probably a good idea when it comes to human motivation. The most profitable question is not necessarily "Am I identifying too much with my work?" but "How is the work I do at this moment and the way I do it an important part of my progress as a human being?" Not "How important am I?" but "How important is this experience in my life?"
For some reason, I must have needed to plod my way to that advanced degree, possibly involving some element of competition. It must have fulfilled an intrinsic need because once I had earned the doctorate, only my assistant ever used doctor in front of my name. Whatever part of me was stirred by earning the degree apparently had been satisfied by completing it.
As I read him, John Milton was dealing with the need for self-examination and self-validation when he talked about the need to test our "virtues": "I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat."
Perhaps that's what we are all here for: to place ourselves out there in the race for the immoratal garland, whatever that may be for us.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
When the Cuckoo Says Cuckoo
Back in the days when Switzerland had the monopoly on cuckoo clocks, my mother brought back two from a stay in Geneva. Hers was a bit over the top. It had a musical box, which played “Never on Sunday” on the hour and had a set of gaily painted dancing figures that came out with the cuckoo. When I inherited it, my son became famous for hiding the pinecone weight from the chain that controlled the music box. Couldn’t blame him since the clock was on the wall not far from his room.
Mine was more traditional. It had the stag’s head and rack, with carved game down the side of the box, all in a shade of dark brown. It did not have dancing figures, but it did have a full-voiced cuckoo. The bird’s voice was ambiguous, however. It didn’t really sound like the bird—more a two syllable bark that could be interpreted in a number of ways. In fact, it took an act of will to make out “cuckoo.”
Of late, I’ve been involuntarily hearing the bird pronounce the word “trouble.” I suppose it must mean I’m in a rather discouraged mood. We’ve been getting the house ready for sale and discovering that we need to correct things that were never right to begin with—like not done properly by the original builders. There was supposed to be a fixed ladder in the window well, for example. The crawlspace was supposed to have insulation installed. I am left to wonder how these things—now corrected—got by the original inspection. But then, considering that a gas stove had been installed in the house without a required safety vent (that was spotted by my house inspector), I’m surprised that the previous owners didn’t gas themselves. Probably didn’t cook much, I guess.
It doesn’t take much for a latent personal cynicism to creep into my thoughts these days. The announcement by Tom Tancredo is a case in point. I’d previously thought of him as a one-issue person (illegal immigration) until I read the platform of the party he has now joined. My heavens: talk about trying to recreate the past—turn back the voting rights act, repeal the endangered species act, remove protection for women seeking abortions, eliminate the IRS (well, I might be tempted on that one) and the Food and Drug Administration (untested food and drugs anyone?), and that's just to name a few.
I find it hard to believe anyone really wants all that—it strikes me more as a type of protest against what the world is becoming. It reminds me of what I had Bill, one of the characters in my novel “The Way to Dusky Death,” say meditatively: “This isn’t the world I grew up in, and I don’t like it.” The world Bill hungers for is predictable because it is familiar. I suppose that is what lies behind the Tea Party movement as well. The world is changing too quickly and the nation is evolving into something very unfamiliar.
Even given the fact that most of us feel displaced in one way or another—I shudder to think what will happen if those who look backwards get back into power. Admittedly, my house is one small example—but if these flaws got past the original inspectors, what would have happened without any inspection at all? Contractors cut corners for profit—that’s well known. Without the threat of inspection, I imagine they would have cut many more. My house might not even be standing. Yes, I’m pretty cynical and I’d send a house inspector through even a new house.
Actually, right now I’m trying not to think about things I can’t do anything about. I need a rest from the panic our media promote. Trouble is, people want to feel panicked about something, in this case, the future.
The nonsense over Obama’s birth certificate is cuckoo (sorry, couldn’t resist) and anyone reasonable would have laid it to rest long ago. The reason it continues is because the birthers don’t like Obama—he’s the minority future and it’s not familiar. Doubting his birth certificate is an insult to Hawaii (where I am from) because the state has repeatedly said the certificate is genuine, and it was reported in the Honolulu newspapers (as was my marriage—that’s how Hawaii does things) and to have fabricated the birth certificate would have meant changing the newspaper archives, where it has been found). Sorry, birthers, you have to get beyond forging an African birth certificate and address the real reasons you hate him.
One of these days, I hope all this craziness will be done. I suppose it can’t happen until people feel more secure and hence more rational. Until then, I’ll try to hear the word “cuckoo” whenever the bird comes out.
Mine was more traditional. It had the stag’s head and rack, with carved game down the side of the box, all in a shade of dark brown. It did not have dancing figures, but it did have a full-voiced cuckoo. The bird’s voice was ambiguous, however. It didn’t really sound like the bird—more a two syllable bark that could be interpreted in a number of ways. In fact, it took an act of will to make out “cuckoo.”
Of late, I’ve been involuntarily hearing the bird pronounce the word “trouble.” I suppose it must mean I’m in a rather discouraged mood. We’ve been getting the house ready for sale and discovering that we need to correct things that were never right to begin with—like not done properly by the original builders. There was supposed to be a fixed ladder in the window well, for example. The crawlspace was supposed to have insulation installed. I am left to wonder how these things—now corrected—got by the original inspection. But then, considering that a gas stove had been installed in the house without a required safety vent (that was spotted by my house inspector), I’m surprised that the previous owners didn’t gas themselves. Probably didn’t cook much, I guess.
It doesn’t take much for a latent personal cynicism to creep into my thoughts these days. The announcement by Tom Tancredo is a case in point. I’d previously thought of him as a one-issue person (illegal immigration) until I read the platform of the party he has now joined. My heavens: talk about trying to recreate the past—turn back the voting rights act, repeal the endangered species act, remove protection for women seeking abortions, eliminate the IRS (well, I might be tempted on that one) and the Food and Drug Administration (untested food and drugs anyone?), and that's just to name a few.
I find it hard to believe anyone really wants all that—it strikes me more as a type of protest against what the world is becoming. It reminds me of what I had Bill, one of the characters in my novel “The Way to Dusky Death,” say meditatively: “This isn’t the world I grew up in, and I don’t like it.” The world Bill hungers for is predictable because it is familiar. I suppose that is what lies behind the Tea Party movement as well. The world is changing too quickly and the nation is evolving into something very unfamiliar.
Even given the fact that most of us feel displaced in one way or another—I shudder to think what will happen if those who look backwards get back into power. Admittedly, my house is one small example—but if these flaws got past the original inspectors, what would have happened without any inspection at all? Contractors cut corners for profit—that’s well known. Without the threat of inspection, I imagine they would have cut many more. My house might not even be standing. Yes, I’m pretty cynical and I’d send a house inspector through even a new house.
Actually, right now I’m trying not to think about things I can’t do anything about. I need a rest from the panic our media promote. Trouble is, people want to feel panicked about something, in this case, the future.
The nonsense over Obama’s birth certificate is cuckoo (sorry, couldn’t resist) and anyone reasonable would have laid it to rest long ago. The reason it continues is because the birthers don’t like Obama—he’s the minority future and it’s not familiar. Doubting his birth certificate is an insult to Hawaii (where I am from) because the state has repeatedly said the certificate is genuine, and it was reported in the Honolulu newspapers (as was my marriage—that’s how Hawaii does things) and to have fabricated the birth certificate would have meant changing the newspaper archives, where it has been found). Sorry, birthers, you have to get beyond forging an African birth certificate and address the real reasons you hate him.
One of these days, I hope all this craziness will be done. I suppose it can’t happen until people feel more secure and hence more rational. Until then, I’ll try to hear the word “cuckoo” whenever the bird comes out.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Lockerbie and Oil
The news from the gulf is mixed. On the plus side, maybe they've got some of the oil capped. No one is allowing themselves to be too optimistic, but anything that stops the oil flow is a good thing.
On the negative side is BP's possible role in the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
It seems (see how careful I am being) that BP lobbied the UK government for the release to facilitate an oil deal with Libya. Now, I know that politics make for strange bedfellows, but this particular deal (and BP isn't exactly denying it while also not quite admitting it)has a very unpleasant odor--think the stench of dead wildlife along the Gulf.
I suppose in some way I'm not surprised. Corporations, as I have said before numerous times in this blog, have no souls, memories, or regrets (except for being caught). In this respect, corporations are sociopathic or psychopathic (depending on whom you ask)--if one can apply the same standards as one does for human beings. something the Supreme Court recently ruled is appropriate. If corporations have protected free speech, I guess they can also have mental diseases as well.
Until lately, my UK cousins used to chide me about US corporations and how money grubbing and unethical they appear to be. While I'm certainly not happy about the spill--or the role of arch-corner-cutter Halliburton--I'm grimly smug that this was a UK corporation. Corporations are corporations the world over and once they get big enough to affect national politics, they seem to morph into something extraterrestrial where they think their self-interest should be the dominant political reality of wherever they happen to be based. Piss us off too badly, they say, and we will move off shore and then good luck getting your tax base and kiss goodbye to all those jobs we provide.
That the UK released the bomber in return for an oil contract is crass. This is not honorable national policy and I think honor is still, or at least used to be, part of the British heritage. The US might do that sort of thing (although it would have been political suicide given that many US citizens were among those littered around the Scottish countryside)but that the UK government did it convinces me that the land of my birth is no longer what I remember. I suppose my cousins will now claim that the UK sold out to US capitalism. Hell, the US sold out to US capitalism, but so did anyone who ever tried to make money on the stock market. And don't get me started on banks.
We used to say in the president's office that two things were capable of bringing down a university presidency in very short order. One was athletics and the other fraternities. Given what is happening these days, I'm starting to think that corporations are what can bring down a national presidency. All of this wouldn't be so frightening if a large portion of the country hadn't allowed itself to be distracted by specious arguments; there's a reason why the conservative right is leading the charge against financial regulation--they are doing the bidding of their corporate masters without even realizing it. The release of the Lockerbie bomber merely brings the relationship between the corporate world and a national government out into the open. Anyone who thinks this is an isolated instance is just fooling themselves.
On the negative side is BP's possible role in the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
It seems (see how careful I am being) that BP lobbied the UK government for the release to facilitate an oil deal with Libya. Now, I know that politics make for strange bedfellows, but this particular deal (and BP isn't exactly denying it while also not quite admitting it)has a very unpleasant odor--think the stench of dead wildlife along the Gulf.
I suppose in some way I'm not surprised. Corporations, as I have said before numerous times in this blog, have no souls, memories, or regrets (except for being caught). In this respect, corporations are sociopathic or psychopathic (depending on whom you ask)--if one can apply the same standards as one does for human beings. something the Supreme Court recently ruled is appropriate. If corporations have protected free speech, I guess they can also have mental diseases as well.
Until lately, my UK cousins used to chide me about US corporations and how money grubbing and unethical they appear to be. While I'm certainly not happy about the spill--or the role of arch-corner-cutter Halliburton--I'm grimly smug that this was a UK corporation. Corporations are corporations the world over and once they get big enough to affect national politics, they seem to morph into something extraterrestrial where they think their self-interest should be the dominant political reality of wherever they happen to be based. Piss us off too badly, they say, and we will move off shore and then good luck getting your tax base and kiss goodbye to all those jobs we provide.
That the UK released the bomber in return for an oil contract is crass. This is not honorable national policy and I think honor is still, or at least used to be, part of the British heritage. The US might do that sort of thing (although it would have been political suicide given that many US citizens were among those littered around the Scottish countryside)but that the UK government did it convinces me that the land of my birth is no longer what I remember. I suppose my cousins will now claim that the UK sold out to US capitalism. Hell, the US sold out to US capitalism, but so did anyone who ever tried to make money on the stock market. And don't get me started on banks.
We used to say in the president's office that two things were capable of bringing down a university presidency in very short order. One was athletics and the other fraternities. Given what is happening these days, I'm starting to think that corporations are what can bring down a national presidency. All of this wouldn't be so frightening if a large portion of the country hadn't allowed itself to be distracted by specious arguments; there's a reason why the conservative right is leading the charge against financial regulation--they are doing the bidding of their corporate masters without even realizing it. The release of the Lockerbie bomber merely brings the relationship between the corporate world and a national government out into the open. Anyone who thinks this is an isolated instance is just fooling themselves.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
It's Not the Economy After All
These days, we're accustomed to media polls telling us that the primary focus of our lives is the economy. Day after day we are bombarded with information on job creation and the number of jobless claims to the point that we might--or I at least--might assume there is some objective thought being dedicated to understanding how the economy came to be what it is and which approaches show more promise for the future.
Judging from the same media reporting on joblessness, such an assumption would be wrong. Ten percent or so unemployment is a sobering number when put into perspective of the 20 million unable to find jobs. But turned around, that same statistic means that ninety percent do have jobs--whether they like them or not is another matter--and that ninety percent probably doesn't much care about the others. In fact, the ninety percent have proved themselves much more interested in the political/culture wars than in the economy.
Colorado Springs is a case in point. The Springs is a bastion of conservative thought. Focus on the Family is located there, along with myriad retired military whose prescriptive outlook had led to one letter to editor writer describing the residents as misers and scolds. The Springs is also home to various initiatives to cut government spending that have now constrained city government to the point where parks are now closing, street lights are being turned off, and fire and police services curtailed. Rather than being disturbed by the potential impact, wealthier Springs residents have solved the problem by adopting their local park as well as a personal, residential streetlight which they are paying for to be turned on. This, of course, means that the poorer neighborhoods will remain dark and without places for children to play.
This economic survival of the fittest is nothing new. There has always been a streak of moralistic judgment among the conservatives. In its simplest form it goes like this: there is a self-evident tautology: people must be poor because they are lazy; if they were not lazy, they would not be poor. In order to prove this point, Colorado Springs is perfectly willing to deny services to the poor, even if it means decreased fire and police protection for everyone. It would seem the residents of the Springs are willing to see their houses burn down in order to prove they are right.
Being proved right, in fact, is the prime motivation of much political discourse these days. It's much more important than the economy. Conservatives in particular--although they are not the only ones--are willing to distort and deliberately misconstrue facts that do not conform with their preconceived political positions. These positions have most likely been inculcated since childhood, and by adulthood have solidified into a stonework that is oblivious to any type of reason. Unfortunately, these cemented opinions are vulnerable to anyone wishing to manipulate them. In its worst form, people holding these opinions hear only what confirms their own ways of thinking. No growth is ever possible among these people, yet they do not see themselves as the victims of absolute thinking that they are. In fact, they see their mission as making sure they pass on their ways to their children.
Perhaps something positive may come from the experience of the Springs. Perhaps some people may even think for a moment about the lunacy of indiscriminately squeezing government spending. I for one hold out little hope. These same people are agitating to put back into power the same failed economic theories that started with Reagan and have proved again and again that they do not work. The sad thing is that the fact they didn't work is not the issue--the issue is proving who is right.
Judging from the same media reporting on joblessness, such an assumption would be wrong. Ten percent or so unemployment is a sobering number when put into perspective of the 20 million unable to find jobs. But turned around, that same statistic means that ninety percent do have jobs--whether they like them or not is another matter--and that ninety percent probably doesn't much care about the others. In fact, the ninety percent have proved themselves much more interested in the political/culture wars than in the economy.
Colorado Springs is a case in point. The Springs is a bastion of conservative thought. Focus on the Family is located there, along with myriad retired military whose prescriptive outlook had led to one letter to editor writer describing the residents as misers and scolds. The Springs is also home to various initiatives to cut government spending that have now constrained city government to the point where parks are now closing, street lights are being turned off, and fire and police services curtailed. Rather than being disturbed by the potential impact, wealthier Springs residents have solved the problem by adopting their local park as well as a personal, residential streetlight which they are paying for to be turned on. This, of course, means that the poorer neighborhoods will remain dark and without places for children to play.
This economic survival of the fittest is nothing new. There has always been a streak of moralistic judgment among the conservatives. In its simplest form it goes like this: there is a self-evident tautology: people must be poor because they are lazy; if they were not lazy, they would not be poor. In order to prove this point, Colorado Springs is perfectly willing to deny services to the poor, even if it means decreased fire and police protection for everyone. It would seem the residents of the Springs are willing to see their houses burn down in order to prove they are right.
Being proved right, in fact, is the prime motivation of much political discourse these days. It's much more important than the economy. Conservatives in particular--although they are not the only ones--are willing to distort and deliberately misconstrue facts that do not conform with their preconceived political positions. These positions have most likely been inculcated since childhood, and by adulthood have solidified into a stonework that is oblivious to any type of reason. Unfortunately, these cemented opinions are vulnerable to anyone wishing to manipulate them. In its worst form, people holding these opinions hear only what confirms their own ways of thinking. No growth is ever possible among these people, yet they do not see themselves as the victims of absolute thinking that they are. In fact, they see their mission as making sure they pass on their ways to their children.
Perhaps something positive may come from the experience of the Springs. Perhaps some people may even think for a moment about the lunacy of indiscriminately squeezing government spending. I for one hold out little hope. These same people are agitating to put back into power the same failed economic theories that started with Reagan and have proved again and again that they do not work. The sad thing is that the fact they didn't work is not the issue--the issue is proving who is right.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Moving
I remember reading somewhere that a fire is as good as a three moves. At the time I thought that draconian—after all, who could possibly want to lose all one’s possessions, not to mention a house, in a set of indiscriminate flames? After weeks of packing in preparation for putting the house on the market, I have a better appreciation of the sentiment.
Packing is extreme weightlifting for the soul. It’s not just the physical part of finding, packing, and storing boxes that’s the challenge, but the intellectual and emotional workout of deciding just how much of the past is indispensable, how much of the present is worth keeping, and how much the future might have need of anything from the other two.
Of the three, parting with the past is the most fraught because of the emotional baggage that attaches to every little souvenir or memento, particularly if it belonged to departed family members. Getting rid of Mum’s thimble and salt and pepper shaker collection, for example, became akin to rejecting her. She wouldn’t have had any trouble saying 'Oh for heavens sakes get rid of it' if something was worn out, but I struggled with letting go of anything. Once or twice I dumped something and then went and took it back from the trash.
I guess it’s just me. When Mum’s things were delivered to me after her death, I found she’d thrown out my brother’s Hornby train set, something I was never allowed to play with and would have liked to have. Apparently, she didn't have any trouble parting with it where I would have agonized. I was upset because getting rid of his things felt as if she’d shut me out of his brief life yet again. I used my perturbed feelings to finally put the thimbles and salt and pepper sets out for Goodwill, so I guess downsizing can also be a way of settling old scores. I still have plenty of her things, you understand, but my final criteria became keeping the things with happy, mutual memories. It was hard, but I did manage to get beyond keeping things just because they were hers.
Almost as challenging is parting with the present because the memorabilia is connected to lives as they have been lived: family, education, hobbies, marriage, children, career, friendships and everything else. It devolves into “What won’t be missed?” Well—as it turns out--it depends. For us it became three questions: “Is it replaceable? Does it have value?” but most important “Are we willing to pack this and pay for it to be shipped across the country?”
Under this rubric, every object had to prove its own worthiness, even art projects left over from the children’s school years. Of course, certain things had defenders and many times Sid said “It doesn’t eat much,” meaning that it’s something small enough, easy enough to transport, and—dammit he wants it—to slide into some packing box somewhere. In my experience, this part of moving generated the most discussions. We had an ongoing one over a TV table with sixties pointed legs that Sid had had for twenty-five years; our compromise was that it went as long as he was prepared to make the case he would use it in his workshop. Parting with a shabby kitchen storage unit became easier when it was presented as either this or that (that being a favorite kitchen table with a cutting board top).
Which brings me to packing for the future. This part requires clairvoyance. “What kind of life are we going to lead where we are going?” This begs the further questions of who are we? and what are we becoming? The danger here is to assume that moving automatically means we change as people. Probably not. For a time the skiing equipment was in danger, but cooler heads prevailed since we liked the idea of having it regardless of whether we used it as much as we have in Colorado. On the other hand, given my years, I think I can predict safely that I will not be using my ice skates again—white, size 10 ladies, hardly used, anyone need them?) Sid has finally parted with his technical climbing gear in recognition that he and I will probably lowland hike rather than try charging up fourteeners. Similarly, I got rid of a lot of baking pans—cake decorating is not in my future—and a bunch of cookbooks—who am I kidding about how much I plan to entertain?
Yep, moving is fraught. But the difference between it and a fire is vital. I get to choose what we keep. A fire makes the decision without any knowledge of me or what I value. So I’ll take the packing boxes any day although they’ll have to carry me out of wherever we move to—I’m not doing this again anytime soon.
Packing is extreme weightlifting for the soul. It’s not just the physical part of finding, packing, and storing boxes that’s the challenge, but the intellectual and emotional workout of deciding just how much of the past is indispensable, how much of the present is worth keeping, and how much the future might have need of anything from the other two.
Of the three, parting with the past is the most fraught because of the emotional baggage that attaches to every little souvenir or memento, particularly if it belonged to departed family members. Getting rid of Mum’s thimble and salt and pepper shaker collection, for example, became akin to rejecting her. She wouldn’t have had any trouble saying 'Oh for heavens sakes get rid of it' if something was worn out, but I struggled with letting go of anything. Once or twice I dumped something and then went and took it back from the trash.
I guess it’s just me. When Mum’s things were delivered to me after her death, I found she’d thrown out my brother’s Hornby train set, something I was never allowed to play with and would have liked to have. Apparently, she didn't have any trouble parting with it where I would have agonized. I was upset because getting rid of his things felt as if she’d shut me out of his brief life yet again. I used my perturbed feelings to finally put the thimbles and salt and pepper sets out for Goodwill, so I guess downsizing can also be a way of settling old scores. I still have plenty of her things, you understand, but my final criteria became keeping the things with happy, mutual memories. It was hard, but I did manage to get beyond keeping things just because they were hers.
Almost as challenging is parting with the present because the memorabilia is connected to lives as they have been lived: family, education, hobbies, marriage, children, career, friendships and everything else. It devolves into “What won’t be missed?” Well—as it turns out--it depends. For us it became three questions: “Is it replaceable? Does it have value?” but most important “Are we willing to pack this and pay for it to be shipped across the country?”
Under this rubric, every object had to prove its own worthiness, even art projects left over from the children’s school years. Of course, certain things had defenders and many times Sid said “It doesn’t eat much,” meaning that it’s something small enough, easy enough to transport, and—dammit he wants it—to slide into some packing box somewhere. In my experience, this part of moving generated the most discussions. We had an ongoing one over a TV table with sixties pointed legs that Sid had had for twenty-five years; our compromise was that it went as long as he was prepared to make the case he would use it in his workshop. Parting with a shabby kitchen storage unit became easier when it was presented as either this or that (that being a favorite kitchen table with a cutting board top).
Which brings me to packing for the future. This part requires clairvoyance. “What kind of life are we going to lead where we are going?” This begs the further questions of who are we? and what are we becoming? The danger here is to assume that moving automatically means we change as people. Probably not. For a time the skiing equipment was in danger, but cooler heads prevailed since we liked the idea of having it regardless of whether we used it as much as we have in Colorado. On the other hand, given my years, I think I can predict safely that I will not be using my ice skates again—white, size 10 ladies, hardly used, anyone need them?) Sid has finally parted with his technical climbing gear in recognition that he and I will probably lowland hike rather than try charging up fourteeners. Similarly, I got rid of a lot of baking pans—cake decorating is not in my future—and a bunch of cookbooks—who am I kidding about how much I plan to entertain?
Yep, moving is fraught. But the difference between it and a fire is vital. I get to choose what we keep. A fire makes the decision without any knowledge of me or what I value. So I’ll take the packing boxes any day although they’ll have to carry me out of wherever we move to—I’m not doing this again anytime soon.
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Lunacy
Well, the Republicans (or Conservatives, depending on whether they want to distance themselves from the Right by redefining terms to their advantage) have finally gone over to the dark side--the dark side of the moon. Our word lunatic comes from the French word for moon because it was once believed that crazies were under the moon's influence (as in police blotters go nuts during a full moon). It would seem there has been a lot of full moons lately, the largest of them presiding over the apology to BP for making them set up a fund to compensate people who lives and livelihoods have been damaged by the oil spill.
Just in case someone has been lost in the woods somewhere, Representative Joe Barton of Texas apologized to BP before starting a Congressional hearing on the Gulf spill because the US Government forced the company to create an escrow account of $20 billion to compensate the damage they caused by cutting corners on safety in regard to deepwater drilling. The said Rep. Barton, a well-known stooge for the oil industry from which he has received lavish funding, is all the the more dangerous because he has been (there's a move afoot to remove him) the ranking Republican on the house energy committee. In other words, he's supposed to be protecting our national interests while being in the pockets of those he is supposed to be regulating. Apparently he sees no conflict.
The uproar over his lunacy has been ferocious, particularly from those living along the Gulf coast, and the Republican party has forced into damage control by making him aplogize for apologizing, something he did grdugingly, sort-of, and half-heartedly. He's a good little paid-for politician who knows where his bread is buttered.
I once blogged on how corporations are not governments. Corporations are for profit; governments (theoretically) are for people. This is a huge difference and one that the Republican party has long forgotten. Corporations have no memory, are incapable of gratitude or regret, and when faced with accountability are prepared to declare bankruptcy, dissolve themselves, and reform with another name. Look at what happened when the head of BP came to testify to Congress: he said he had no knowledge of anything and once the hearing was over left his job. I am left wondering why--if he knew nothing--he didn't bring someone with him who did. Answer: he was sent to stonewall before the company moved him out of harm's way. New leadership can't be held responsible, don't you know--when appointed, the new CEO can claim the same ignorance. Another definition of inanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome: did anyone really expect to get satisfaction from a corporate CEO who rakes in millions in salary for cutting corners?
As someone born outside the US I have always been fascinated by a certain group within the US (see, George, I didn't say America to mean the US) who loudly proclaim their prejudice against education (except as a route to a good job). Perhaps it's the egalitarian part of democracy that trips them up--I suspect they confuse equal rights with equal talents. These folk deny what they can't understand, and, judging from the ignorant letters to the newspapers, I'm inclined to say there is plenty they don't get or even want to. It's much easier to mouth slogans than think, and if there is a group of likeminded around, well, then prejudices and ignorance become truth.
Recently, Professor Frank Fenner, emeritus professor of microbiology at the Australian National University, and no slouch at science (he worked on eradicating smallpox) predicted that the human race will be extinct within the next 100 years, the result of overpopulation and overconsumption. Outside of adding self-centered stupidity to his causes, I would say we have brought it on ourselves. Unfortunately, when we go, we'll probably take all forms of other life with us. But then, I suppose, the planet can shake of our dust and start again.
Just in case someone has been lost in the woods somewhere, Representative Joe Barton of Texas apologized to BP before starting a Congressional hearing on the Gulf spill because the US Government forced the company to create an escrow account of $20 billion to compensate the damage they caused by cutting corners on safety in regard to deepwater drilling. The said Rep. Barton, a well-known stooge for the oil industry from which he has received lavish funding, is all the the more dangerous because he has been (there's a move afoot to remove him) the ranking Republican on the house energy committee. In other words, he's supposed to be protecting our national interests while being in the pockets of those he is supposed to be regulating. Apparently he sees no conflict.
The uproar over his lunacy has been ferocious, particularly from those living along the Gulf coast, and the Republican party has forced into damage control by making him aplogize for apologizing, something he did grdugingly, sort-of, and half-heartedly. He's a good little paid-for politician who knows where his bread is buttered.
I once blogged on how corporations are not governments. Corporations are for profit; governments (theoretically) are for people. This is a huge difference and one that the Republican party has long forgotten. Corporations have no memory, are incapable of gratitude or regret, and when faced with accountability are prepared to declare bankruptcy, dissolve themselves, and reform with another name. Look at what happened when the head of BP came to testify to Congress: he said he had no knowledge of anything and once the hearing was over left his job. I am left wondering why--if he knew nothing--he didn't bring someone with him who did. Answer: he was sent to stonewall before the company moved him out of harm's way. New leadership can't be held responsible, don't you know--when appointed, the new CEO can claim the same ignorance. Another definition of inanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome: did anyone really expect to get satisfaction from a corporate CEO who rakes in millions in salary for cutting corners?
As someone born outside the US I have always been fascinated by a certain group within the US (see, George, I didn't say America to mean the US) who loudly proclaim their prejudice against education (except as a route to a good job). Perhaps it's the egalitarian part of democracy that trips them up--I suspect they confuse equal rights with equal talents. These folk deny what they can't understand, and, judging from the ignorant letters to the newspapers, I'm inclined to say there is plenty they don't get or even want to. It's much easier to mouth slogans than think, and if there is a group of likeminded around, well, then prejudices and ignorance become truth.
Recently, Professor Frank Fenner, emeritus professor of microbiology at the Australian National University, and no slouch at science (he worked on eradicating smallpox) predicted that the human race will be extinct within the next 100 years, the result of overpopulation and overconsumption. Outside of adding self-centered stupidity to his causes, I would say we have brought it on ourselves. Unfortunately, when we go, we'll probably take all forms of other life with us. But then, I suppose, the planet can shake of our dust and start again.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Helen Thomas and the Big Hypocrisy
When I was younger, the two looming female forces were Bella Abzug and Helen Thomas (Betty Freidan--whom I once met--was much too ladylike to be one of the abrasive forces although she was indisputably influential). Bella and Helen were out "there" in any number of ways--speaking out, confronting, visible. At that time, they were challenging what a paternal society "knew" about women. Not so fast, they were saying, don't underestimate us or we will use it against you. Way to go, ladies.
Bella, of course, was Jewish, while Helen is of Lebanese descent, an interestsing contrapoint that nevertheless shows how much they had in common rather than what separated them. They worked together to form a national association for women.
Bella died in 1998, her dream of a zionist state long realized. Helen kept going, a rambling dinosaur of a woman who could still make a difference at going on 90. Along the way she made numerous enemies, as anyone would with the capacity and opportunity to challenge and embarass presidents--ten of them no less. She asked the same impolite questions of them all and never hid her own preferences or as many would say--prejudices. As she grew more elderly, she let her feelings be more open, as in the way of people who have reached an age where pretense seems a waste of precious time. So in a moment of complete exasperation she said what many felt but were too circumspect to say.
I will admit it. I have felt completely fed up with Israel's hogging the role of victim. While I would never say (or think) anything quite as awful and over the top as wishing anyone back to the holocaust, I have frequently said I would like to bang
Israeli and Arab heads together--a point I have made more delicately in this blog by saying a plague on both their houses because both of them are playing the game of "I'm a bigger victim than you are."
Helen Thomas committed the apparently unforgivable sin of bringing her frustration out into the open--in probably one of the stupidest ways I can imagine. As a result, Hearst newspapers, in a move worthy only of the glorious hypocrisy of William R in his heyday (find me a war or we'll start one of our own), dumped her. Had Hearst been in a better mood, they would have scolded her--which leads me to think there were other reasons (probably a lot) why this was a good time to move her on out.
What sticks particularly in my craw, though, is the subtext to her retirement--the hypocrisy of the journalistic profession in maintaining that they can be absolutely neutral in news reporting. There's no such thing. Just by choosing what to report and including or leaving out particular details, the news is slanted one way or the other. Look at the coverage of the Israeli detention of the Turkish ship. Leaving out or not stressing the fact it was in international waters is an editorial decision, as is reporting on the weapons wielded by those on board: it ranges from armed thugs with weapons to relief workers with slingshots and knives. Details are everything. I used to teach this to my freshman students; I can't believe that journalism profs teach anything different unless they are totally incapable of introspection. All I can say is God help us all if that's the case.
I shall miss Helen Thomas. I shall not miss the sinking feeling I get when I read our newspapers and wonder how reliable they are. In the meantime, I will try to find balance by reading (eat your heart out Sarah Palin) the UK newspapers on line, the Economist, and the Wall Street Journal, and by listening to the BBC as well as keeping an eye on the news headlines from papers around the world. By doing that, the only thing I will miss is who is divorcing whom in Hollywood.
Bella, of course, was Jewish, while Helen is of Lebanese descent, an interestsing contrapoint that nevertheless shows how much they had in common rather than what separated them. They worked together to form a national association for women.
Bella died in 1998, her dream of a zionist state long realized. Helen kept going, a rambling dinosaur of a woman who could still make a difference at going on 90. Along the way she made numerous enemies, as anyone would with the capacity and opportunity to challenge and embarass presidents--ten of them no less. She asked the same impolite questions of them all and never hid her own preferences or as many would say--prejudices. As she grew more elderly, she let her feelings be more open, as in the way of people who have reached an age where pretense seems a waste of precious time. So in a moment of complete exasperation she said what many felt but were too circumspect to say.
I will admit it. I have felt completely fed up with Israel's hogging the role of victim. While I would never say (or think) anything quite as awful and over the top as wishing anyone back to the holocaust, I have frequently said I would like to bang
Israeli and Arab heads together--a point I have made more delicately in this blog by saying a plague on both their houses because both of them are playing the game of "I'm a bigger victim than you are."
Helen Thomas committed the apparently unforgivable sin of bringing her frustration out into the open--in probably one of the stupidest ways I can imagine. As a result, Hearst newspapers, in a move worthy only of the glorious hypocrisy of William R in his heyday (find me a war or we'll start one of our own), dumped her. Had Hearst been in a better mood, they would have scolded her--which leads me to think there were other reasons (probably a lot) why this was a good time to move her on out.
What sticks particularly in my craw, though, is the subtext to her retirement--the hypocrisy of the journalistic profession in maintaining that they can be absolutely neutral in news reporting. There's no such thing. Just by choosing what to report and including or leaving out particular details, the news is slanted one way or the other. Look at the coverage of the Israeli detention of the Turkish ship. Leaving out or not stressing the fact it was in international waters is an editorial decision, as is reporting on the weapons wielded by those on board: it ranges from armed thugs with weapons to relief workers with slingshots and knives. Details are everything. I used to teach this to my freshman students; I can't believe that journalism profs teach anything different unless they are totally incapable of introspection. All I can say is God help us all if that's the case.
I shall miss Helen Thomas. I shall not miss the sinking feeling I get when I read our newspapers and wonder how reliable they are. In the meantime, I will try to find balance by reading (eat your heart out Sarah Palin) the UK newspapers on line, the Economist, and the Wall Street Journal, and by listening to the BBC as well as keeping an eye on the news headlines from papers around the world. By doing that, the only thing I will miss is who is divorcing whom in Hollywood.
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Finally, I'm Mad as Hell
In the wake of the latest corporate hypocrisy--BP asking for "patience" in dealing with the oil spill when they had no patience at all when we asked about possible environmental impacts--I am now as angry as the rest of the country. I want heads to roll, particularly those of the people I hold responsible.
So who do I hold responsible? Whoever argued for no regulations on corporate behavior should hang their heads in shame and go home. Whoever argued for trickle down economics (the money never trickled--it just stuck to the upper echelons), should go home. Whoever pandered to Americans by saying they deserved all the world's oil and were willing to send our troops to ensure its supply should go home. Whoever says "Oil spills happen" should go home--they don't happen, they are caused. Whoever said "Drill, Baby, Drill" should go home and drink an oil cocktail, because that's what the world's wildlife and people will be dinking.
This oil spill is a worldwide tragedy with the capability to end life as we know it. If you think I exaggerate, look at the gulf stream and how it flows into currents around the world.
Whoever said that making money was the American way and the government should get out of the way and go home. We human beings are greedy and we need regulations. Even the Bible has rules for living that basically say hands off your neighbor's property. You can imagine why those rules were needed even thousands of years ago--and there wasn't a government to blame then.
Look, you idiots, look at what your policies have brought us to. Look at the homes that have been lost. Look at the livelihoods gone. Look at the damage to the environment--all in the name of capitalist freedom. Who will you blame when the land is a desert from lack of water, when we are dying from the cancers caused by the chemicals around us, when the seas are dead, when the animals are gone, when wars are fought over food? Will unregulated exploitation of the land and corporate "freedom" seem so admirable then?
And now, you idiots, you have the temerity to want to put back into power those people with the same philosophies that got us into this mess, including a Louisiana congressman who wants to limit BP's libability for the spill. Are you insane? Are you so blinded by your team Tea-Party or Team-Conservative that you can't see the damage and you just want to win so badly that you don't give a damn if we destroy the planet?
Why do you insist on claiming that America is the bastion of self-made people? No one is self-made unless they never attended public school or state universities, never benefited from medical advances made possible by state support, never consulted doctors trained at public institutions, never called on the police for protection, never called the fire department, never demanded the government jail scammers and criminals. All you so-called self-made people are the first to bleat when something goes wrong that you think the government should fix so your miserable lives continue the same.
Well--let me be the first to issue a call for the planet. It's my home. Your idelogy and who is "right" matters not a damn to me. As far as I am concerned all religions and political parties can go over a cliff. If oil is the big problem,let's reinstate gas rationing. None of us has a god-given right to fly when we feel like it or to drive large cars across town. But doing so will mean that we--we who complain when the price of gas goes up over $4 when the rest of the world pays that for a litre--we will have to admit we serve the world and not the other way round.
I am not a conservative. I am not a liberal. I am not a member of either or any political party. I couldn't care less. I am a pragmatist and a realist. But I will say this: I will vote for anyone who has a shred of decency, is practical, and has the intelligence to look far ahead. I, for one, am not prepared to commit environmental suicide so some one can have gas to drive to the beach.
So who do I hold responsible? Whoever argued for no regulations on corporate behavior should hang their heads in shame and go home. Whoever argued for trickle down economics (the money never trickled--it just stuck to the upper echelons), should go home. Whoever pandered to Americans by saying they deserved all the world's oil and were willing to send our troops to ensure its supply should go home. Whoever says "Oil spills happen" should go home--they don't happen, they are caused. Whoever said "Drill, Baby, Drill" should go home and drink an oil cocktail, because that's what the world's wildlife and people will be dinking.
This oil spill is a worldwide tragedy with the capability to end life as we know it. If you think I exaggerate, look at the gulf stream and how it flows into currents around the world.
Whoever said that making money was the American way and the government should get out of the way and go home. We human beings are greedy and we need regulations. Even the Bible has rules for living that basically say hands off your neighbor's property. You can imagine why those rules were needed even thousands of years ago--and there wasn't a government to blame then.
Look, you idiots, look at what your policies have brought us to. Look at the homes that have been lost. Look at the livelihoods gone. Look at the damage to the environment--all in the name of capitalist freedom. Who will you blame when the land is a desert from lack of water, when we are dying from the cancers caused by the chemicals around us, when the seas are dead, when the animals are gone, when wars are fought over food? Will unregulated exploitation of the land and corporate "freedom" seem so admirable then?
And now, you idiots, you have the temerity to want to put back into power those people with the same philosophies that got us into this mess, including a Louisiana congressman who wants to limit BP's libability for the spill. Are you insane? Are you so blinded by your team Tea-Party or Team-Conservative that you can't see the damage and you just want to win so badly that you don't give a damn if we destroy the planet?
Why do you insist on claiming that America is the bastion of self-made people? No one is self-made unless they never attended public school or state universities, never benefited from medical advances made possible by state support, never consulted doctors trained at public institutions, never called on the police for protection, never called the fire department, never demanded the government jail scammers and criminals. All you so-called self-made people are the first to bleat when something goes wrong that you think the government should fix so your miserable lives continue the same.
Well--let me be the first to issue a call for the planet. It's my home. Your idelogy and who is "right" matters not a damn to me. As far as I am concerned all religions and political parties can go over a cliff. If oil is the big problem,let's reinstate gas rationing. None of us has a god-given right to fly when we feel like it or to drive large cars across town. But doing so will mean that we--we who complain when the price of gas goes up over $4 when the rest of the world pays that for a litre--we will have to admit we serve the world and not the other way round.
I am not a conservative. I am not a liberal. I am not a member of either or any political party. I couldn't care less. I am a pragmatist and a realist. But I will say this: I will vote for anyone who has a shred of decency, is practical, and has the intelligence to look far ahead. I, for one, am not prepared to commit environmental suicide so some one can have gas to drive to the beach.
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