Mon Musings

Can it really have been since March 17...my last post, that is?  Wow!  Where does time go?
Sun's op-ed pages in the Oak Press were, as they say in the commercial, "priceless."  First, a letter-to-the-editor included this:  "Your editorials are normally boring and not woth reading, but when you do finally write about an issue of substance, you get it all wrong."  Boy, isn't that letter right on the money?

And two other op-ed pieces were noteworthy.  Walter Williams has been on fire lately, the last month or so.  His column this week had some relevant and realistic points, ones that are not always pleasant to confront.  He notes a number of things, including one of my favorite bogeymen, "fairness." He calls it "pain" or "harm," but it is the same thing.  To prevent harm to one person likely causes harm to another.  Rarely is there a "win-win situation."  A smoker who is prevented from "harming" a nonsmoker is, in fact, "harmed" himself.  Williams asks who is harmed more, a homeowner with a beautiful view out of his front window or a potential homeowner who wants to build a home across the street which would block the view and either builds or is prevented from doing so.  Here's one I've written about, in one context or another, many times.  "If it will save just one human life...."  That, to me, as Williams also points out, is like the concept of "fairness."  "If" what "will save just one human life?"  Of course, one of the most common targets are guns.  OK, but if saving "just one human life" is a goal, what about reducing the speed limit on expressways to 55?  That will save lives, more than banning guns will.  And, even without legislation, can't the "just one humann life" people voluntarily drive 55 mph?  What about, as Williams notes, banning airplane travel?  Lives again will be saved.  As usual, it's whose ox is being gored.  Are the lives not saved by lowering the speed limit not worth as much as the lives lost by shootings?  And, Williams also brings up the old "FDR's New Deal brought us out of the Depression."  He knows the New Deal likely lengthened and deepened the Depression, causing a great deal more anguish and poverty.  But our arrogant elitist media and hisorians perpetuate the myth that the New Deal and FDR were saviours.  That leads far too many people to demand of government, "Do something!"  No!  As the Wall Street Journal said of government a few years ago in the face of all this federal bailout and intervention business, "Don't do something.  Just stand there."  You can check out recent Grand Slams by Williams at his Web site.

And then, there's EJ Dionne.  I'm glad the Oak Press runs him every once in a while.  It's good to see he's always going to be the same.  This particular column concerns gun control and the NRA opposition to it.  Dionne cites NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg.  "The NRA's leaders...were interested in promoting a culture where people take the law into their own hands and face no consequences for it.  Let's call that by is real name: vigilantism."  Oh, boy!  So, are bar owners then to be assumed to favor drunk driving?  Gee, where was a Dionne column about the NRA and gun control a few months ago when a 9-month old baby was murdered by a stream of 40+ bullets fired into the baby's house?

I'm curious to see tomorrow AM's newspaper.  Will there be photos and stories of the protests at the U of M?  Will students and the "99%ers" be setting up shop aimed at the greed of the U of M?  Somehow I doubt it.  Big Oil, Wall Street, the bankers, and their ilk can be "greedy," but not the U of M.  U of M greed?  Yep...football tickets.  Can you imagine paying $95 to see a college football game?   Well, if you want to see the UM/MSU game next fall, start saving.  The average price for a Big Ten football ticket is now $65!  Gee, isn't that a bit greedy?  Nah, just like the local high school charging kids $1.50 for a bottle of water, when it can get a 24-pack for $3. 
I should mass e-mail this one, esp to those ObamaCare supporters. K and the secretaries now have HAP instead of MESSA, which the teachers still have. HAP is CRAP, as I say. K has been taking meds for migraines for a long time, 20 years or more. Now, some pencil-pusher at HAP said these meds won't be covered; she has to switch to another med. Let's see, the ones she's been taking have worked and worked well. As even HAP said over the phone, it's not known is the new meds will work or, if they do, as well. But, she must at least try them because HAP will only pay for the new ones, not the old ones that worked. So, like ObamaCare, K's medical decisions are not made by her or by her doctor, but by some bureaucrat. And who the heck has time to read the 2700-page ObamaCare law? Yep, I hope the ObamaCare supporters get crap like this thrown at them, and soon.

I got really upset last week over a newspaper article and a radio show that, both, seemed to blame the state's financial woes on teachers' (that is, my) retirement costs, "legacy costs" they call them. Oh, that grates me. I toyed with rifling off a nasty e-mail to each, but there's no doubt I wouldn't change their minds. First, they don't grouse when schools waste money on unneeded administrators.  Nor do they complain when schools build million-dollar athletic facilities, theaters, etc.--hey, these aren't professional athletes or Broadway stars; they're kids!!!!!! And do they whine about all the computers the schools have bought, most of which most of the time go unused? At any one time, for instance, at any high school, walk past a computer lab, with about 30 computers in each. None of the rooms is ever full and most of the time, 90% of the time!, there are half a dozen students in there.  Think of how many of the computers at the school I worked sat unused most of the time. Second, they didn't complain when their Republican buddies changed the retirement system back in the mid-90s so it wasn't self-sustaining, raiding it for money for their own pet projects. And they didn't gripe when we got little or no raises while private sector jobs where getting them, often hefty ones. We were promised good health insurance (and we got it) and a good retirement (which we have, but is in jeopardy). Third, I love their hypocrisy when it comes to the free market. "Let the free market work!" is their mantra. Well, they never let it work in education. (Of course, there are perhaps two roadblocks, administrators and the unions.) Why didn't they insist that I make more money than the architect down the street? (I use this example because of a three-way conversation about 25 or so years ago. This guy was making, I recall, $85,000 while I was getting about $40,000.  Another teacher said, "But we have great health insurance." Indeed, we did. But, I offered, "I tell you what. I will give him my health insurance and take his if he'll agree to trade salaries with me."  The other teacher wasn't ready to make that deal.  The architect was thinking about it.) Of course, they might argue that "Anyone can be a teacher" or "Not all teachers are good...." The first is blatantly ignorant and the second isn't my fault, but administrators' faults. If they really want "great teachers," then the "free market" would allow great teachers to be paid like lawyers, doctors, etc. (like in Finland, which they always cite as what should be the goal of our schools, but never finish the story on who gets to be teachers). At the least, I should have made more money than the guys they pay to do their taxes! I guess it's like everything else, whose ox is being gored. And, surely the state's financial mess must be tied to the auto plants, right? Sure, they say that, but blame the unions. Wait a minute! Who agreed to give the UAW all the ridiculous things it received? (Remember, the assembly line workers, with overtime, annually made two or three times as much as either of I did. They were given a $7000 bonus to ratify a contract that gave them $100,000 and a pension to retire, etc.) Oh, it was these same auto execs (making, "deserving" of course, their 7- and 8- figure salaries) who sold out the farm. Ah, but it's not their fault--it's ours!

Greed.  Fairness.  Value.  They are all pretty subjective terms, aren't they?

The Greatest Artist?

Does anyone put on a greater light show that Mother Nature? Or produce greater art than She does? It's hard to imagine that, but maybe Michelangelo came close.

Thurs AM, out for a run in the dark as usual, I felt as if I were in a bowl. (This was before the nasty tornadoes that struck 30 miles from here.) Overhead, the sky was starlit, but clouds surrounded the horizon in all four directions. And, behind the heavy clouds--thunderheads they were--pulsating lightning bolts lighted up the sky. It almost appeared as strobe lighting. I had to, several times, catch myself from running off the road as I watch the sky. It was very, very cool!

This, this AM, out there just after sunrise, fog enshrouded everything. Oh, what an eerie phenomenon, but so beautiful. The same scenery, neighborhoods that I see daily looked very different.

This afternoon, while tossing batting practice to Bopper, I asked him to stop and count the clouds in the sky. There were none! It was just, well, sky blue from horizon to horizon. Imagine--mid-70 degree temperatures on St. Patrick's Day! I remember, in my lifetime, two gargantuan snow-storms on this day/date, each dropping nearly 20" of snow. One year K and I were dating. Smitten, I refused to let a little thing like 20" of snow ruin a night out, esp since we were going to an Irish bar! I had to park three blocks from her mom's house, on a main drag that was deserted, plod through the piled snow, to get her. We had a great time!

Yet, Thur night Mother Nature reminded us that She's not always nice. How very fortunate nobody was killed in those storms! I haven't seen actual figures, but someone told me winds were in the 135-150 mph range. Wow! Wonder and Awe....

Hypocrisy?

I don't mind opinions that are different from mine. Oh, I don't think I relish them, but like A. Lincoln, I find reading and hearing different opinions to be healthy. Hence the book by Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Reason. But I am not fond of hypocrites. Opinions have to be thoughtful, insightful. I don't always agree with what Leonard Pitts writes in his columns--in fact, sometimes think he is dead wrong--but he always expresses himself, well, thoughtfully and insightfully (is that a word?).

But this recent flap over Limbaugh's comments takes this month's cake for hypocrisy. Anyone who knows me realizes I'm not a fan of his--hardly. He's bombastic, a blowhard, and more--but he's in the entertainment business. I cringe that so many take his word for the right path, particularly when he often cannot defend himself against callers who disagree. Instead, he merely hangs up on them and calls them names, such as "typical lib." I don't listen to him often, but occasionally do just to pass time in the car. So, he's hardly a beacon to me....

So, his comments about this Fluke woman.... What's the big deal? He called her some names. I hear people get called names every day. I was called names, inaccurate names, by people (like Limbaugh?) who, when they couldn't defend their ideas/programs, resorted to name-calling. I would never have, at least not publicly, made comments like this about Fluke. But aren't there more important things the media should attend to--how about the US Senate's failure to pass a budget for more than three years? And, of course, there are other things. (No, the return of Dancing with the Stars isn't one of them!)

There are lots of things I could say, but won't. Hmmmm.... Why would a woman, not accurately portray by the way, endeavor for unlimited access to contraceptives? If I had a daughter, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want her parading before the US House and a national audience as it turned out to advocate for something that encourages unlimited sex. I suppose I'm "out of touch," "behind the times," etc. But promiscuity doesn't seem to me to be a desired attribute. (I really have a tough time accepting that she was advocating for a friend with some illness given then nature of Fluke's history.) And, how would people react if a Jew or Muslim advocated that a school he/she attended be forced to serve pork, you know, against their religious beliefs? Apples and oranges? Maybe; maybe not.

Yet what really irks me isn't that Limbaugh is criticized for being boorish, among many other things. No, that's not it. It's how some people, often the same people, are allowed to get away with the same "boorish" behavior with not a peep said, withouth any consequences. Gee, the Tea Parties are called "racist," "bigoted," etc. Palin and Bachmann were/are called names much worse than those delivered Fluke's way. Hey, Palin's daughter was even attacked verbally. What about Michelle Malkin and other conservative women writers? (Black conservatives, such as Sowell and Williams, are off limits. They don't get criticized, just ignored.) How do the media- and Hollywood-types get away with calling conservatives names, names just as bad and, in most cases, perhaps not as a propos? In fact, instead of calling for boycotts, for sponsors to pull their ads, the "right-thinking people" take contributions from name-callers of the "right side."

And, so this Fluke lady was insulted. OK, I've noted this is boorish behavior, something in which I'd never engage. Limbaugh is correctly castigated. What about the boorish behavior of Bill Clinton? C'mon, wouldn't, say a former state superintendent of Michigan schools, be "boiling" with anger, as he recently wrote of Limbaugh's comments, if Clinton had pulled a "Monica" with "my daughter?" Well, he should be. And wasn't Monica dragged through a lot more, a lot more, than Fluke? Why didn't this former state superintendent--and others who are now so self-righteously offended--speak out against Letterman, Maher, etc.? There are only a couple of logical reasons, neither very flattering.

I don't have time, but I could then go on about the type of people who have led and are leading our schools. (BTW, if really surprised me to see/read the liberal Susan Jacoby in "Unreason" so critical of the schools, what they've become, and how they've so become.)

Anyway, more time later--midterms to grade, chapters to revise, and articles to write. Happy Pi Day today and "Beware the Ides of March" tomorrow!

More "Unreason"

From "The Age of American Unreason," which I am enjoying a great deal and
recommend for reading, even though I don't agree with some of it and am dismayed
at the one-sidedness of the author's use of examples in derogatory manners:

"There cannot be anyone in the country who believes that Bush's brain would
have gotten him anywhere near Yale, Harvard Business School, or the ownership of
a baseball team--much less the presidency--without the family name and
connections," she writes. I'd certainly agree, but there is more I'd add.
First, would she deign to also write, later, the same sentence, but substituting
the words "Obama's" for "Bush's" and "affirmative action" for "family name and
connections?" I highly doubt it. Obama may not be as stupid as Bush, but he's
far from being smart. Second, would she also take aim at the many, many
athletes who are admitted,despite glaring academic deficiencies, to so-called
"prestigious" colleges like the University of Michigan, which likes to portray
itself as "the Harvard of the West;" the University of North Carolina; and many
others?

I'd certainly concur that Americans should consider intelligence when
measuring candidates for President. We usually don't, for reasons that seem
pretty stupid to me. It's as if we have a negative view of intelligent people,
distrusting them as a group. (Of course, that might stem from the arrogant
elitists we constantly view in public affairs, those who claim to know what's
better for us than we do and aren't shy about telling us. That they are often
pretty shallow themselves is apparent, but not to themselves.) But how then to
explain the failed or very mediocre Presidencies of Jimmy Carter and Herbert
Hoover, among others? Bill Clinton is a pretty sharp cookie, very bright, but
he left much to be desired as a President. (And, I think, history will show his
Presidency to be much more harmful than currently recognized--or, as it is, not
recognized. But I likely won't live long enough to say, "I told you so.")

Was Bush elected, not once but twice, because, as the author says, "Americans
would have rather sat down for a beer" with him than either Gore or Kerry?
Maybe; maybe not. Perhaps, though, it is more than that. Maybe Gore and Kerry
were seen as lousy candidates. Perhaps Bush was elected for the same reason I
think Obama will win re-election. He's a lousy President, but consider the
alternatives. (But I think the Republican candidates are better, but still
rotten alternatives. In fact, I've said that I refuse to hold my nose and vote
for one of them because they are the lesser of two evils.)

She also thinks the media have been lacking in this regard, that candidates
for "high public office" should be evaluated by intelligence. Are they "smart
enough" to do the job? I don't think we should consider only Einsteins for
office (see above), but it's certainly something we should consider. Again,
though, the author only picks on Republicans and conservatives, when there are
certainly plenty of Democrats and liberals to share this less-than-desirable
stage. And, I can name quite a few, most very conveniently ignored by the
media.

I guess I'm aware of it and have written of it before, but it's still
disturbing to read about our turn away from, almost a snubbing, something to
avoid, being smart or, at least, knowlegeable. As the author notes, it's as if
Americans have become favorably attached to the slogan, "I'm Ignorant and Proud of
It." Now, wouldn't that make a nice bumper sticker?

But, as I was telling my running buddies yesterday, this is a good book--on
many levels. Even if I don't particularly like the constant partisan/one-sided negative
images used to illustrate the author's points, I am struck by how smart some
people, this author included, are. I could never come up with many of the ideas this author has.
Where and how does she get them? How do some minds do that?

The Age of American Unreason by Susan Jacoby. It's a very, very good
book--one of the best I've read in a long while. I'll bet some folks who know
me, who might also read the book, would be surprised to hear that. People who really know me wouldn't.

American Unreason

I'm reading a book, The Age of American Unreason, which is very, very good. No, it's not a novel. And, remarkably, my guess is the author and I don't share political or economic views. Nevertheless, Susan Jacoby has written a thought-provoking, insightful book. And, in keeping with that, I'm thinking a lot about what she's written.

The examples she uses to further explain her ideas are always the cads of the right, never the cads of the left. But that's a minor matter. It's pretty easy to find substitutes.

Among her bogeymen is television/videos. Of course it's a cause of "unreason," despite all of the good intentions, the claims of grandeur, and the promise television once had. There's a reason many of us call it "the boob tube." Television and videos, "restrict their audiences intellectual paramaters not only by providing information in a highly condensed form, but by filling time...that used to be occupied by engagement with the written word." Yes, indeed, these media screen out ideas, subjecting "audiences" to one side or another. Regarding our children, television makes "it unnecessary for young children to entertain themselves, but also discourages them from thinking and fantasizing outside the box...." For all of us, television is deleterious to our own thoughts. "Without memory," [note how you can tune in to any television show and within seconds know precisely what happened before you tuned in] "judgments are made on the unsound basis of the most recent bit of half-digested information."

I must have had a premonition about this book, months before I read it. I continue to be amazed, and not in a flattering way, at people's continued hagiographic depictions of contemporary songwriters as great poets--or poets of any quality for that matter. The one I always think of is Bob Dylan, but we can add Lennon and McCartney, Paul Simon (as Jacoby does), and others. Have we forgotten what real quality poetry is? Do we even know who Keats, Byron, Tennyson, and Frost are? Jacoby notes a speech by Robert Kennedy upon the assassination of Martin Luther King. His source for comfort was Euripides and Jacoby includes relevant excerpts from the moving words. No doubt, she adds, today's politicians (dare we say "statesmen?) would drag out words from Bob Dylan--to avoid sneers of "elitism" and "arrogance." (There's plenty of room to use those terms with our leaders out there; this isn't one of those fitting times.) We can extrapolate that to music as well. OK, I much prefer listening to Aretha or Smokey than Beethoven. But I don't ever equate what they do/sing to what Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, etc. have written. They are two very different matters, sort of like the Dairy Queen League and the Majors.

My math buddies are fond of saying, "If you start with a false premise, you can prove anything." Yep, and Jacoby writes of our current predilection for doing so. She calls it "using logic in a closed-system...cloaking anti-rational premises in the language of philosophy and science." A continuing theme for her in this regard is the use of the term "theory" to defend creationism vs evolution. The everyday definition of "theory" is quite different from the scientific definition of "theory." I saw that last weekend, before I read the book, in an op-ed piece by an ACLU lawyer regarding the flap over ObamaCare, contraceptives, insurance coverage, and Catholics. In her very first paragraph she made a statement that she asserted as fact, when, in fact, it was not so. It was her belief, but certainly not fact. That made the rest of her argument moot, not worth the newsprint it was written on.

Speaking of that flap, Jacoby has some things to say about "Cafeteria Catholics," you know, the ones who claim they are "good Catholics," but pick and choose which Church doctrines to follow. Claiming the Church is "out of touch," "outdated," etc. is not a rationale. Either one believes what the Church teaches about artificial birth control, homosexuality, remarriage after divorce, etc. or one should find a new church. The Church holds that those who don't follow its teachings on these matters have committed mortal sins. "Cafeteria Catholics'" contentions that they aren't mortal sins doesn't make them not.

Speaking of religion, many Americans are, correctly, concerned with the appearance of some Shar'ia law in our courts. Hmmm.... How does this measure up with well over 50% of fundamentalist Christians and Black Protestants believe that the Bible should be the basis of our system of jurisprudence? Toss that one around in your mind for a few minutes.

Can there be personal morality? Or is God the ultimate authority? Of course, that begs the question of "whose God?" Can just government be based on things other than Christianity and/or the Bible?

Is a college education intended to challenge or to reinforce the values that students learned as children? Hmmm....

Jacoby is thought-provoking indeed.

Thur Thoughts

Wow! Can you imagine the tornadoes threatening the Midwest again? The forces of Mother Nature are awesome and, frankly, can't be stopped, can they?

That said, I still want to be a television weatherman. How wrong can they be, so often, and still come on and tell us with their self-asserted correctness what the weather will be? Some guy tonight was comical. K was watching and I was listening from the other room. I came running into the living room and asked, "Did that guy just say we are going to get thunderstorms tomorrow afternoon or evening--or we might not?" Great; just great. And then, from the other room, I wondered, "Why do coaches let their college athletes talk to reporters?" They sound so darn stupid. Is there a cliche they don't use? Do they every really say anything? Of course, why do reporters have them? It must be just to fill time slots; they add nothing to anything. For that matter, why do some TV shows end with sappy music, songs with singers who have terrible voices and words that mean nothing? Is it to evoke some sort of emotion--I suppose other than laughter? And when did comedies become not at all funny? Some folks recommended some of these sit-coms as "really funny." I had seen some of their advertising and found them to be anything but funny--and aren't these teasers supposed to be the funniest parts to attract viewers? Well, I didn't last ten minutes. I have better things to do with my time and felt like I wasted ten minutes.

What took so long for the feds to come to Wayne County and Detroit? After all, for decades rumors have swirled about corruption, "pay to play," etc. And, what's preventing them from tackling Chicago? The rumors about the corruption in the Windy City are older than those in Detroit/Wayne County?

Salmon is pretty good food! I like it. Funny, as a kid, I didn't like fish a whole lot. Oh, there was one restaurant (Brown's) that had great deep-fried whitefish, but it was so expensive we had it once or twice a year. I didn't even like fishsticks, which many claim is a staple for kids, or tuna very much. The salmon we could afford then was the canned stuff, mixed with egg and breadcrumbs, and shaped into patties. Yuck! Now, I did like sardines! I think my first real taste of fish (other than Brown's) that I liked was at Amherst. Some of that stuff was pretty good, esp the scallops, which I never had before.

Speaking of food, imagine eating pemmican, an old Indian "energy bar" made with bear (or other animal lard) so thick the fat stuck to the roof of the mouth (like tallow of a candle!) and had to be scraped off with a knife? Oh, yuck!

I thought Cadillac, the found of Detroit, was the most scurrilous noted fellow in the history of Michigan. But, he has some rivals for that ranking. One is John Jacob Astor, head of the American Fur Company and the supposed first American millionaire. Another is Lewis Cass, a Michigan politician at the high levels and almost elected President.

Despair

The recent shooting death of a 9-month old baby has been devastating to many of us. How has this happened? It's a reminder, not the only one, of a culture that has been created. I'm not sure how we got there, but there we are.

I'm sure there are some simplistic answers out there, such as the violence on television and in video games. There are others as well. But we'd better get to the reasons if we want to have any chance of getting rid of these all-to-common occurrences.

I know, I know.... But I think we've created another rotten culture, one that holds nobody responsible or accountable for their actions. Oh, let me amend that. We are quick to give awards, acclamation, prizes, ribbons, etc. for the slightest of good (note the last time you passed a school that wasn't a "Blue Ribbon School" or "State Exemplary School" or a league that didn't give every kid some sort of trophy or award). But bad things? No, No, No...we never acknowledge the people who may have done things (with good intentions, no doubt) that weren't so hot. It's "Let's move on," "Let's not cast blame," "Let's not point fingers," "Let's get beyond this," etc.

How have we made it acceptable--and it's far too acceptable to far too many people!--to unleash a barrage of bullets on a house because of some disagreement over seating at a baby shower? And how many other silly, stupid things have led to other recent shootings? A 9-month old baby??????

As disheartened as I am (Look at the likely choices we'll have for President in Nov. Out of a population of 307 million, these are the best we can find? If so, heaven help us!), I take solace in the words of W.E.B. DuBois, written 90 years ago. He wrote, "Abraham Lincoln was perhaps the greatest figure of the nineteenth century. Certainly of the five masters, Napoleon, Bismarck, Victoria, Browning and Lincoln, Lincoln is to me the most human and lovable. And I love him not because he was perfect, but because he was not and yet triumphed. The world is full of illegitimate children. The world is full of folk whose taste was educated in the gutter. The world is full of people born hating and despising their fellows. To these I love to say: See this man. He was one of you and yet he became Abraham Lincoln."