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.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
No Country for Old Women
William Butler Yeats had it right: there are places and times not for--in his case--old men, but also for old women as well. One of these is a wedding. I'm just back from attending a wedding in Washington state. It was held outdoors in a beautiful setting, the weather was perfect, the bride right out of the pages of a magazine, and everything well organized and happy.
Why then, one might ask, do I say I didn't feel I belonged? Let me answer that by stating my (new) philosophy of weddings. Weddings, I have concluded, are for the young.
Note that I talk of weddings, not of marriages. Marriages are the union of two people. Weddings are the elaborate, expensive celebrations written about in bridal magazines, planned to the last degree often by a new profession called wedding consultant.
Marriages can be held in a judge's offices with at most a corsage for the bride and maybe a carnation for the groom. Weddings are held in romantic locales, require $2000and up dresses plus formals for the groom and his attendants, flower arrangements that carry out a color scheme repeated by the cake, and several thousand dollars' worth of elaborate photography that inevitably includes a picture of a champagne bottle nestled among an invitation and the bride's shoes.
Marriages may be celebrated by a retreat to a local restaurant or someone's back yard. In the UK, it may be a retreat to the local pub. Weddings, on the other hand, require catering and an orchestra.
Finally, marriages cross every age barrier. Weddings, on the other hand, and as I said before are for the young by their very nature. The hours before the ceremony are taken up with false eyelashes, zippers, nylons, and frantic straightening of bows and curls. This is when relatively normal young women turn into bridezillas fully convinced that the least flaw will ruin whatever future life awaits them. I speak in generalities here because, happily, the bride did not make this transformation. She was, indeed, the wonderful young woman she has always been.
But even given the fact I wasn't needed much in the way of curls and nylons and was free to take long walks on the beach, I still felt out of place. The reason was the nature of the exuberance of youth. I had little in common with the young friends of the bride and groom, nor they with me. It didn't help that I beat a hasty retreat when, overtired and overstimulated, the children of the guests expressed their frustrations in the normal way: crying inconsolably at the disruption in their lives.
I now know I am old because I remember my own child doing the same--only way back then I was young myself. I admit it--I have become a Yeatsian old person, and a screaming child makes my ears ring and my heart rate rise. Any illusion I may have had before this wedding, any self-congratulatory estimate of my bearing my age well, dissipated as I made a hasty retreat rather than bend down to console the little one. I have never felt my age quite so much before, nor in some respects my own redundancy.
Yeats talked about the generations teeming and the young in one another's arms as a sort of scary reality. We who are older must recognize they are the future, and we who have had our day must bend before them. I made my contribution to the world--hopefully, I did some good. But it is theirs now, and I yield it gratefully to them.
I hope the world will understand if next time I just send a check.
Why then, one might ask, do I say I didn't feel I belonged? Let me answer that by stating my (new) philosophy of weddings. Weddings, I have concluded, are for the young.
Note that I talk of weddings, not of marriages. Marriages are the union of two people. Weddings are the elaborate, expensive celebrations written about in bridal magazines, planned to the last degree often by a new profession called wedding consultant.
Marriages can be held in a judge's offices with at most a corsage for the bride and maybe a carnation for the groom. Weddings are held in romantic locales, require $2000and up dresses plus formals for the groom and his attendants, flower arrangements that carry out a color scheme repeated by the cake, and several thousand dollars' worth of elaborate photography that inevitably includes a picture of a champagne bottle nestled among an invitation and the bride's shoes.
Marriages may be celebrated by a retreat to a local restaurant or someone's back yard. In the UK, it may be a retreat to the local pub. Weddings, on the other hand, require catering and an orchestra.
Finally, marriages cross every age barrier. Weddings, on the other hand, and as I said before are for the young by their very nature. The hours before the ceremony are taken up with false eyelashes, zippers, nylons, and frantic straightening of bows and curls. This is when relatively normal young women turn into bridezillas fully convinced that the least flaw will ruin whatever future life awaits them. I speak in generalities here because, happily, the bride did not make this transformation. She was, indeed, the wonderful young woman she has always been.
But even given the fact I wasn't needed much in the way of curls and nylons and was free to take long walks on the beach, I still felt out of place. The reason was the nature of the exuberance of youth. I had little in common with the young friends of the bride and groom, nor they with me. It didn't help that I beat a hasty retreat when, overtired and overstimulated, the children of the guests expressed their frustrations in the normal way: crying inconsolably at the disruption in their lives.
I now know I am old because I remember my own child doing the same--only way back then I was young myself. I admit it--I have become a Yeatsian old person, and a screaming child makes my ears ring and my heart rate rise. Any illusion I may have had before this wedding, any self-congratulatory estimate of my bearing my age well, dissipated as I made a hasty retreat rather than bend down to console the little one. I have never felt my age quite so much before, nor in some respects my own redundancy.
Yeats talked about the generations teeming and the young in one another's arms as a sort of scary reality. We who are older must recognize they are the future, and we who have had our day must bend before them. I made my contribution to the world--hopefully, I did some good. But it is theirs now, and I yield it gratefully to them.
I hope the world will understand if next time I just send a check.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Greater and Lesser Utopias
The world is a crazy place these days. For example, there’s Pope Benedict looking like the ghost of Tiger Woods, going around dressed as the spirit of confessions past. Then there are the Tea Partiers, who held a convention down here in Phoenix (July 2010), revealing once and for all they are the party of whites. No diversity there to distract them from their dreams of Utopia—small government, health care to the deserving, longevity to those who can afford it, and success to those who impose their economic imperatives untrammeled on the world.
Utopia’s an interesting concept. The first one I read, Sir Thomas More’s version of the same name, talked about an ideal world that had never existed and, given human nature, never could. It was a paean to a golden time when human beings might get beyond their greed (gold and precious stones were treated with contempt) and lack of care for one other. In fact, Utopia was an ideal society based on Christian principles—and, gasp, it turned out to be Christian socialism. There’s that dirty word—socialism. Self-proclaimed Christians hate to hear it yet fail to realize it is a logical extension of their own professed beliefs. In America these days, Christianity is all very well as long as it doesn’t interfere with kicking the crap out of illegals, doing away with social security so the elderly poor can starve or freeze because they failed to save enough for their old age, and leaving all social programs up to charities (as long as the half-way houses and shelters aren’t in “respectable” back yards).
The Arizona Statesman reported on the Tea Part rally in today’s paper and commented that most loose organizations of enthusiasts seldom last for very long. I’d love to believe so, but this group, if one may call it that, has revealed an American underpinning of self-delusion and unkindness that may lead to some longevity. For one thing, they have an amazing tolerance for hypocrisy.
They wish government out of people’s lives, yet want legislation to ban abortions: the government it seems should look into other people’s lives just not the Tea Partiers’. They want individual liberty yet want to give long prison sentences for relatively minor failures to conform and God help the Gays who don’t conform to their assumptions about marriage and sex. They want to believe in the perfectability of human beings, rather like the 19th Century idea of the Noble Savage who has been damaged by the polluting laws of civilization and who can rise again to his old glory if only freed of the chains that hold him back. (I wonder if any one of them has read “The Lord of the Flies.”)
They want to pick and choose what they are willing to pay taxes for without understanding that wherever the money is spent it drives the same number of jobs. John Ruskin once commented that complaining about the rich buying luxury goods was senseless because the luxury trade provided livelihoods for just as many people as if the rich had spent their money only on basic necessities. Government spending provides jobs. They don’t consider that many more people will be out of work if they shrink government. Who will pick up the slack? Will corporate America come rushing forward to provide new jobs—we know where they stand on sending jobs abroad. For this, the Partiers have no answer beyond platitudes. Sometimes I think there will be no peace until the country is either on the breadlines or involved in another Civil War.
It has always been my understanding that government’s job is not to protect our guilty bastions of self-interest but, like wiser parents, to prevent us from killing one another—plenty of which has happened in the past, and not just in the incessant wars that government involves us in. Now there’s my gripe—where you have a government, can war be far behind? This is a government of the people, not of Churches, not of corporations, and not of special interests, no matter how flattering these interests may be to who we think we are or could be.
Sir Thomas made neither the error of mistaking self-righteousness for morality nor believing that Utopias could ever be reality. A Christian life is a communal life, he said. Wow. This coming from someone who gave his life for his religion—executed because he would not put his king above his conscience. Let’s see some of these Tea Partiers give up something of theirs for their beliefs instead of just hitting the rest of us over the head with them. If this is indeed a nation under God, just where is all the other, inconvenient stuff such as loving others instead of promoting calculated self-interest as the way of the world?
Utopia’s an interesting concept. The first one I read, Sir Thomas More’s version of the same name, talked about an ideal world that had never existed and, given human nature, never could. It was a paean to a golden time when human beings might get beyond their greed (gold and precious stones were treated with contempt) and lack of care for one other. In fact, Utopia was an ideal society based on Christian principles—and, gasp, it turned out to be Christian socialism. There’s that dirty word—socialism. Self-proclaimed Christians hate to hear it yet fail to realize it is a logical extension of their own professed beliefs. In America these days, Christianity is all very well as long as it doesn’t interfere with kicking the crap out of illegals, doing away with social security so the elderly poor can starve or freeze because they failed to save enough for their old age, and leaving all social programs up to charities (as long as the half-way houses and shelters aren’t in “respectable” back yards).
The Arizona Statesman reported on the Tea Part rally in today’s paper and commented that most loose organizations of enthusiasts seldom last for very long. I’d love to believe so, but this group, if one may call it that, has revealed an American underpinning of self-delusion and unkindness that may lead to some longevity. For one thing, they have an amazing tolerance for hypocrisy.
They wish government out of people’s lives, yet want legislation to ban abortions: the government it seems should look into other people’s lives just not the Tea Partiers’. They want individual liberty yet want to give long prison sentences for relatively minor failures to conform and God help the Gays who don’t conform to their assumptions about marriage and sex. They want to believe in the perfectability of human beings, rather like the 19th Century idea of the Noble Savage who has been damaged by the polluting laws of civilization and who can rise again to his old glory if only freed of the chains that hold him back. (I wonder if any one of them has read “The Lord of the Flies.”)
They want to pick and choose what they are willing to pay taxes for without understanding that wherever the money is spent it drives the same number of jobs. John Ruskin once commented that complaining about the rich buying luxury goods was senseless because the luxury trade provided livelihoods for just as many people as if the rich had spent their money only on basic necessities. Government spending provides jobs. They don’t consider that many more people will be out of work if they shrink government. Who will pick up the slack? Will corporate America come rushing forward to provide new jobs—we know where they stand on sending jobs abroad. For this, the Partiers have no answer beyond platitudes. Sometimes I think there will be no peace until the country is either on the breadlines or involved in another Civil War.
It has always been my understanding that government’s job is not to protect our guilty bastions of self-interest but, like wiser parents, to prevent us from killing one another—plenty of which has happened in the past, and not just in the incessant wars that government involves us in. Now there’s my gripe—where you have a government, can war be far behind? This is a government of the people, not of Churches, not of corporations, and not of special interests, no matter how flattering these interests may be to who we think we are or could be.
Sir Thomas made neither the error of mistaking self-righteousness for morality nor believing that Utopias could ever be reality. A Christian life is a communal life, he said. Wow. This coming from someone who gave his life for his religion—executed because he would not put his king above his conscience. Let’s see some of these Tea Partiers give up something of theirs for their beliefs instead of just hitting the rest of us over the head with them. If this is indeed a nation under God, just where is all the other, inconvenient stuff such as loving others instead of promoting calculated self-interest as the way of the world?
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
The Master of the Dung Heap
I was listening the other evening to Our Lady of Wasilla screaming her message to her tea-baggers and found myself reminded of Aristophanes’ definition of a popular politician: “a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.”
Aristophanes, of course, lived roughly 2500 years ago, in politically charged and fractious Greece, the cradle of our political system, so I suppose one can say that politics was ever so, or more pointedly, two thousand years hasn’t seen much change in human beings as they relate to the avenues of power. I think he would recognize us and probably satirize us as he did his contemporaries. He would have much subject matter.
One thing has changed, though, and I have to point to this to us as our unique, modern contribution. We now have the means to broadcast the voice, breeding, and manner over the country and around the world. Not only that, we have created a new form of pundit who fits the definition of popular politician just as well. That idea is both depressing and amusing (in a rather horrible way).
I can picture what Aristophanes would make of Olberman and Limbaugh. He’d probably have recognized the type and written a play about them: Orwell’s barnyard where the animals are equal but the pigs a little more equal, and a raft of other animals, such as the cock of the barnyard, the influential master of the dung heap, try to work around the pigs. The point would be to introduce some levity as well as some perspective into people who take themselves far too seriously.
When I was an instructor in the English Department at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, I remember one of my fellow instructors (we were very junior and slightly mutinous) having a cartoon pasted on her door. It showed a very large shaggy dog with a dialog balloon coming from the depths of the fur on its back. Inside the balloon were the words, “We junior fleas demand a greater voice in the running of this dog.”
Now that Ms. Palin has become a corporate juggernaut (it was reported tonight that she’s earned $12 million this year), she may be seeing herself as a rather large flea these days. I wouldn’t blame her actually. But she needs to keep in mind that a flea is still a flea. Real power is silent and secret. It operates behind the scenes. The powerbrokers are never seen, not even in the backrooms, certainly not out on the Boston commons carrying a placard.
Loud denunciations and easy slogans are not where the real power is. Such efforts are useful to someone, but not to the person using them. Ms Palin will be well rewarded for her efforts—as indeed she has been—but the real power will continue on the way it always has, in dark places where the principals are known only by accident now and then.
This is the way it was 2500 years ago and it is the way, it seems, it will always be as long as we fleas believe we are running the planet.
Aristophanes, of course, lived roughly 2500 years ago, in politically charged and fractious Greece, the cradle of our political system, so I suppose one can say that politics was ever so, or more pointedly, two thousand years hasn’t seen much change in human beings as they relate to the avenues of power. I think he would recognize us and probably satirize us as he did his contemporaries. He would have much subject matter.
One thing has changed, though, and I have to point to this to us as our unique, modern contribution. We now have the means to broadcast the voice, breeding, and manner over the country and around the world. Not only that, we have created a new form of pundit who fits the definition of popular politician just as well. That idea is both depressing and amusing (in a rather horrible way).
I can picture what Aristophanes would make of Olberman and Limbaugh. He’d probably have recognized the type and written a play about them: Orwell’s barnyard where the animals are equal but the pigs a little more equal, and a raft of other animals, such as the cock of the barnyard, the influential master of the dung heap, try to work around the pigs. The point would be to introduce some levity as well as some perspective into people who take themselves far too seriously.
When I was an instructor in the English Department at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, I remember one of my fellow instructors (we were very junior and slightly mutinous) having a cartoon pasted on her door. It showed a very large shaggy dog with a dialog balloon coming from the depths of the fur on its back. Inside the balloon were the words, “We junior fleas demand a greater voice in the running of this dog.”
Now that Ms. Palin has become a corporate juggernaut (it was reported tonight that she’s earned $12 million this year), she may be seeing herself as a rather large flea these days. I wouldn’t blame her actually. But she needs to keep in mind that a flea is still a flea. Real power is silent and secret. It operates behind the scenes. The powerbrokers are never seen, not even in the backrooms, certainly not out on the Boston commons carrying a placard.
Loud denunciations and easy slogans are not where the real power is. Such efforts are useful to someone, but not to the person using them. Ms Palin will be well rewarded for her efforts—as indeed she has been—but the real power will continue on the way it always has, in dark places where the principals are known only by accident now and then.
This is the way it was 2500 years ago and it is the way, it seems, it will always be as long as we fleas believe we are running the planet.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
All Politics is Local?
I've been told repeatedly that all politics is local. I don't choose to believe this, because if it's true, it's a depressing indictment of the voters and the people who seek political office. Why? Because it means people vote only for their self-interest and those who seek their vote appeal only to the local vanity and greed. Despite much evidence to the contrary, I'm still naive enough to hope for a degree of statesmanship.
In my opinion, only local politics should be local. National and international issues should be conducted on the national and international level. That means in the interests of all of us. Even people in parts of the world we may not like: it's their planet too.
I used to believe that providing elevation in perspective was the job of the US Senate--until, that is, they started behaving like raccoons. For those who aren't familiar with the habits of the juvenile delinquents of the animal world--just ask anyone who has an outdoor fish pond. Raccoons have a nasty habit of pulling fish out of the pond, taking one bite, leaving the fish to die, and then going back for another--sort of killing for the sport of it.
Lest anyone not see the connection I'm making, this is precisely how the Senate has been behaving and by extension, the Republican side of Congress as a whole. It is full of people, comfortably covered by their cadillac health plans, who don't give a rat's ass about other people declaring bankruptcy over medical bills or struggling to care for senile elders at home; they prefer instead to spend public resources on tax cuts for those who don't need them and provide full employment by sending troops to war.
Oh they make noise about caring about people's physical walfare--but primarily for political gain. That's why the Republicans now vociferously oppose the very same plans they proposed when they were in power. It's all a game: what do we need to say to get reelected? Actually do something---pulllease. If this was a Republican-sponsored plan see how fast the concern for socialism would melt away. Right now, the UK, Australia, and Canada--surely not your average socialist states--are wondering what all the fuss is about. They've been taking care of their citizens' healthcare for generations and haven't slid into moral decay.
Which brings me to another thought. How many of these people spouting anti-socialist rhetoric can even define socialism and distinguish it from fascism, oligarchy, nationalism, and communism? I'll be willing to wager that Ms. Palin can't, yet that won't prevent her from trying to get out in front of the herd and lead them somewhere (maybe to Russia since she has telecopic vision and can see it from her house--I tried this summer at Wasilla, but no such luck).
Well, sorry Peter et al, there is already plenty of precedent for what the health plan proposes. The government already mandates our buying auto insurance. Do you really want to go back to the days before it was required? Drivers have to be licensed to assure some modicum of safety. Do you want to take a chance on who's on the road with you?
And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Universities and colleges haven't hesitated to comply with federal requirements if it means money. Businesses comply with federal interstate laws, farmers feed at the public trough by holding back production, medical offices comply with FIRPA--it's all around us. Freedom is a complete illusion until, it seems, it hits the wallet and reminds us we live in an interrelated, interdependent world. How big hypocrites are we? Consider that question when people want the government to protect them from Mad Cow Disease entering our food chain, unsafe drugs appearing on our shelves, and unsafe cars filling our showrooms.
In my opinion again (and I write my own stuff instead of regurgitating other people's ideas), we shouldn't be basing our vote on whether a candidate for office supports moving the state fair from Pueblo to Denver. We're better than that. Or if we're not--then let's stop all the bitching about how the government is not keeping criminals behind bars and preventing drug dealers from fighting turf wars on our streets.
In my opinion, only local politics should be local. National and international issues should be conducted on the national and international level. That means in the interests of all of us. Even people in parts of the world we may not like: it's their planet too.
I used to believe that providing elevation in perspective was the job of the US Senate--until, that is, they started behaving like raccoons. For those who aren't familiar with the habits of the juvenile delinquents of the animal world--just ask anyone who has an outdoor fish pond. Raccoons have a nasty habit of pulling fish out of the pond, taking one bite, leaving the fish to die, and then going back for another--sort of killing for the sport of it.
Lest anyone not see the connection I'm making, this is precisely how the Senate has been behaving and by extension, the Republican side of Congress as a whole. It is full of people, comfortably covered by their cadillac health plans, who don't give a rat's ass about other people declaring bankruptcy over medical bills or struggling to care for senile elders at home; they prefer instead to spend public resources on tax cuts for those who don't need them and provide full employment by sending troops to war.
Oh they make noise about caring about people's physical walfare--but primarily for political gain. That's why the Republicans now vociferously oppose the very same plans they proposed when they were in power. It's all a game: what do we need to say to get reelected? Actually do something---pulllease. If this was a Republican-sponsored plan see how fast the concern for socialism would melt away. Right now, the UK, Australia, and Canada--surely not your average socialist states--are wondering what all the fuss is about. They've been taking care of their citizens' healthcare for generations and haven't slid into moral decay.
Which brings me to another thought. How many of these people spouting anti-socialist rhetoric can even define socialism and distinguish it from fascism, oligarchy, nationalism, and communism? I'll be willing to wager that Ms. Palin can't, yet that won't prevent her from trying to get out in front of the herd and lead them somewhere (maybe to Russia since she has telecopic vision and can see it from her house--I tried this summer at Wasilla, but no such luck).
Well, sorry Peter et al, there is already plenty of precedent for what the health plan proposes. The government already mandates our buying auto insurance. Do you really want to go back to the days before it was required? Drivers have to be licensed to assure some modicum of safety. Do you want to take a chance on who's on the road with you?
And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Universities and colleges haven't hesitated to comply with federal requirements if it means money. Businesses comply with federal interstate laws, farmers feed at the public trough by holding back production, medical offices comply with FIRPA--it's all around us. Freedom is a complete illusion until, it seems, it hits the wallet and reminds us we live in an interrelated, interdependent world. How big hypocrites are we? Consider that question when people want the government to protect them from Mad Cow Disease entering our food chain, unsafe drugs appearing on our shelves, and unsafe cars filling our showrooms.
In my opinion again (and I write my own stuff instead of regurgitating other people's ideas), we shouldn't be basing our vote on whether a candidate for office supports moving the state fair from Pueblo to Denver. We're better than that. Or if we're not--then let's stop all the bitching about how the government is not keeping criminals behind bars and preventing drug dealers from fighting turf wars on our streets.
Monday, March 22, 2010
In My Corner, Jack
So they got the first part of health care reform through the house. Good show. But, while it is historic, it is hardly premature. There’s been talk of the need for this for generations, and I even edited the publication of Michael Dukakis’s proposed health reform plan when he was in residence at the University of Hawaii. I left Hawaii in 1993, so that should tell you how long ago that was.
Still, the current plan must be doing something right as no one is pleased. I’m reminded of the song from My Fair Lady where Rex Harrison sings about a quarreling couple: “And rather than do either, they do something else that neither likes at all.” No public option, but loads of good stuff anyway, such as regulating the health insurance industry with its record profits, to whose bleats I can say only that they brought it on themselves just as the financial sectors of this country brought their industry down around their ears.
As far as I am concerned, however, it’s not the health care plan that I am most relieved about. It’s the fact the hate and violence that seem to pass for political discourse on the right did not succeed in derailing the legislation. Had the bill been defeated, we could have looked forward to a generation raised to believe that spitting on legislators, calling them racial slurs, screaming down opponents, and forgetting inconvenient hypocrisy by denying its existence are all acceptable forms of behavior.
As I watched the distorted faces chanting Kill the Bill I was reminded of the disgusting behavior exhibited after the civil rights legislation when whites taunted and menaced black kids entering previously all-white schools. It seemed at the time that the South might go up in flames, yet time passed and the generations after have to be reminded of the struggles leading up to the legislation.
And time does change things. Recently, some of those people back then, whose distorted faces were shown on news television, apologized for their actions. Time has brought clarity. With hindsight and if one wishes to be somewhat charitable, one can say that the sixties were a time of insanity, brought on by uncomfortable social changes.
Today, I suppose we might say we face uncomfortable economic changes. That’s what this is all about—what’s in it for me? If I don’t have a job, what is the government doing taking care of anyone other than me? I feel angry and frustrated and frightened; therefore, I will listen to irresponsible radio figures who sound just as angry and frustrated and frightened as I am, and I will scream and make assassination threats and then –one day—I will look in the mirror and (perhaps) feel ashamed.
The world is not going to end because people earning over $500,000 a year have to bear a tax burden equivalent to what I carry on my comparably miniscule pension. Nor will it end because 32 million more people have the opportunity to purchase (notice: PAY FOR), insurance denied to them because they once had some illness. Nor will it end because 47,000 poor children in Arizona, one of whom has a brain tumor and can’t afford treatment, will get a chance to regain health coverage.
The British have an expression for narcissism and self-absorption: “I’m all right in my corner, Jack,” they say. I can only hope that when people see what is actually in the bill and understand that someone cared enough to get this thing through Congress they won’t give in to the hysteria we can expect in the months ahead.
Still, the current plan must be doing something right as no one is pleased. I’m reminded of the song from My Fair Lady where Rex Harrison sings about a quarreling couple: “And rather than do either, they do something else that neither likes at all.” No public option, but loads of good stuff anyway, such as regulating the health insurance industry with its record profits, to whose bleats I can say only that they brought it on themselves just as the financial sectors of this country brought their industry down around their ears.
As far as I am concerned, however, it’s not the health care plan that I am most relieved about. It’s the fact the hate and violence that seem to pass for political discourse on the right did not succeed in derailing the legislation. Had the bill been defeated, we could have looked forward to a generation raised to believe that spitting on legislators, calling them racial slurs, screaming down opponents, and forgetting inconvenient hypocrisy by denying its existence are all acceptable forms of behavior.
As I watched the distorted faces chanting Kill the Bill I was reminded of the disgusting behavior exhibited after the civil rights legislation when whites taunted and menaced black kids entering previously all-white schools. It seemed at the time that the South might go up in flames, yet time passed and the generations after have to be reminded of the struggles leading up to the legislation.
And time does change things. Recently, some of those people back then, whose distorted faces were shown on news television, apologized for their actions. Time has brought clarity. With hindsight and if one wishes to be somewhat charitable, one can say that the sixties were a time of insanity, brought on by uncomfortable social changes.
Today, I suppose we might say we face uncomfortable economic changes. That’s what this is all about—what’s in it for me? If I don’t have a job, what is the government doing taking care of anyone other than me? I feel angry and frustrated and frightened; therefore, I will listen to irresponsible radio figures who sound just as angry and frustrated and frightened as I am, and I will scream and make assassination threats and then –one day—I will look in the mirror and (perhaps) feel ashamed.
The world is not going to end because people earning over $500,000 a year have to bear a tax burden equivalent to what I carry on my comparably miniscule pension. Nor will it end because 32 million more people have the opportunity to purchase (notice: PAY FOR), insurance denied to them because they once had some illness. Nor will it end because 47,000 poor children in Arizona, one of whom has a brain tumor and can’t afford treatment, will get a chance to regain health coverage.
The British have an expression for narcissism and self-absorption: “I’m all right in my corner, Jack,” they say. I can only hope that when people see what is actually in the bill and understand that someone cared enough to get this thing through Congress they won’t give in to the hysteria we can expect in the months ahead.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Appeasement
Why am I getting the feeling that the Obama is behaving like Chamberlain when he sought peace in our time from Hitler?
Could it be because Obama is trying to negotiate with fanatics who hate us as much as the Nazi’s did? Who see negotiation as blood in the water? Who believe that the poor and the sick deserve all they get because if they were worth tuppence, God would have rewarded them just like the corporate bosses?
Could it be because I am currently in Palm Springs, the original American version of let them eat cake and if they can’t afford to play here, well, piss on them.
I am sitting in a resort where the tariff is over $300 a night ($99 last minute on Travelocity). It’s pretty, Italianate, and pricey—the banquet tonight is $110 per person and will undoubtedly be palatable but unspectacular. That’s the careless way it goes when expenses can be deducted. Today at lunch, one of the medical professionals gathering here held forth on how superior the American medical system is (ranked 37th in the world and behind Costa Rica?) and why a public plan (like Medicare, which they are all on and enjoying) would yield substandard care. I replied, “It would be better than nothing, which is what millions of Americans now have.” He looked shocked. I don’t know whether it was because I had the temerity to speak up or whether he simply hadn’t considered the point.
Obama’s problem is that he expects these resort denizens to give up something for the public good. That’s not what it’s about in this modern America of ours. It’s everyone for themselves and those that have despise those who haven’t. This viewpoint curls around the edges of the Republican positions. It’s not even that they oppose something because the Democrats propose it. It’s because they oppose anything threatening the comfortable niches that have carved out.
I really can’t blame them for wanting to keep the privileges they undoubtedly feel they have earned, Palm Springs among them. After all, once the herd moves into town with trailer parks, fast food, and cheap, carnival thrills –there goes the neighborhood. If there is a public option, after all, more of these (usually) minorities might even live longer and what would we do with the surplus population?
As I say, I can understand the self-protection of these individuals, but at the same time, this is not the behavior I expect of my government. The government of this country was designed to be a system of checks and balances. Obama has forgotten that in his Hawaii-based, Asian philosophy. Checks and balances are by nature confrontational. They have to be. He needs to take a stand for what he knows in his heart is right before he squanders any more of the people’s support who put him in the White House.
I, for one, need a clear call to action from him or else I might as well say to hell with it and go have a cocktail at the pool.
Could it be because Obama is trying to negotiate with fanatics who hate us as much as the Nazi’s did? Who see negotiation as blood in the water? Who believe that the poor and the sick deserve all they get because if they were worth tuppence, God would have rewarded them just like the corporate bosses?
Could it be because I am currently in Palm Springs, the original American version of let them eat cake and if they can’t afford to play here, well, piss on them.
I am sitting in a resort where the tariff is over $300 a night ($99 last minute on Travelocity). It’s pretty, Italianate, and pricey—the banquet tonight is $110 per person and will undoubtedly be palatable but unspectacular. That’s the careless way it goes when expenses can be deducted. Today at lunch, one of the medical professionals gathering here held forth on how superior the American medical system is (ranked 37th in the world and behind Costa Rica?) and why a public plan (like Medicare, which they are all on and enjoying) would yield substandard care. I replied, “It would be better than nothing, which is what millions of Americans now have.” He looked shocked. I don’t know whether it was because I had the temerity to speak up or whether he simply hadn’t considered the point.
Obama’s problem is that he expects these resort denizens to give up something for the public good. That’s not what it’s about in this modern America of ours. It’s everyone for themselves and those that have despise those who haven’t. This viewpoint curls around the edges of the Republican positions. It’s not even that they oppose something because the Democrats propose it. It’s because they oppose anything threatening the comfortable niches that have carved out.
I really can’t blame them for wanting to keep the privileges they undoubtedly feel they have earned, Palm Springs among them. After all, once the herd moves into town with trailer parks, fast food, and cheap, carnival thrills –there goes the neighborhood. If there is a public option, after all, more of these (usually) minorities might even live longer and what would we do with the surplus population?
As I say, I can understand the self-protection of these individuals, but at the same time, this is not the behavior I expect of my government. The government of this country was designed to be a system of checks and balances. Obama has forgotten that in his Hawaii-based, Asian philosophy. Checks and balances are by nature confrontational. They have to be. He needs to take a stand for what he knows in his heart is right before he squanders any more of the people’s support who put him in the White House.
I, for one, need a clear call to action from him or else I might as well say to hell with it and go have a cocktail at the pool.
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