The Wonderful Life

 

The Wonderful Life     October 24, 2012             

            Remember the movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life” and the tale of two towns it told?  Do you want to Live in Bedford Falls where everyone helps and cares for others, or in Potterville where it’s everyone for him or herself? 

Part of the problem of choosing is the alluring concept of America’s strong, self-reliant, rugged individual who doesn’t need anybody.  We identify with the hero of this idea.  Maybe we believe we’ll never be weak, and only the weak need help, and that government just interferes with people.  As Will Rogers said, “It isn’t what we don’t know that gets us in trouble.  It’s what we know that ain’t so.” Do we forget that government is what we do together that we can’t do separately? 

When you get thrown and you break something necessary, you’ll get fixed where government regulations keep your chances of recovery good.  It may cost more than you can get, and be paid for by a government funded program.  Maybe you guessed wrong about the need to buy health insurance.  So, do you think you’d fare better at a hospital in Bedford Falls, or Potterville?  Do you vote that way? By now you’ve heard of some Pottervilles out there that want to let hospitals turn you away if you don’t have health insurance or the means to pay.  Around here, keeping the Wonderful Life, just like in the movie, means keeping Potterville at bay.  You do that with your vote.

Twenty-seven Lies To Be Wise To

Twenty-seven Lies to be Wise to     October 13, 2012

1. You can trust the news media.
2. This Congress is maximizing employment and improving our well being.
3. This Congress is worth the salary and benefits we pay hard-earned money for.
4. Social Security is going broke.
5. Privatizing Social Security would be best for all.
6. Medicare is going broke.
7. We take good care of our veterans.
8. We’re doing too much for the poor.  We need to cut all entitlements.
9. Redistributing wealth is wrong.
10. A flat income tax is the fairest.
11. We live in a “free-market” economy.
12. We can’t fix the earned income tax problem.
13. The TARP stimulus didn’t work.
14. We need a constitutional mandate to balance the budget.
15. Those “No New Tax” pledges benefit everyone.
16. You can trust everything you hear about the Affordable Health Care Act.
17. A good politician will never mislead you.
18. A good public personality will never mislead you.
19. The two major political parties want only what’s best for our country.
20. Voter ID laws are “Party-neutral” and needed.
21. The Electoral College system is better than one person/one vote.
22. We are the “good guys” in the international community.
23. Economic sanctions unseat despotic regimes and promote compliance.
24. Collateral damage is not inflicted by us on people like us.
25. The War on Terror is not self-perpetuating.
26. It’s not about the oil.
27. The War on Drugs is working.

Aww sing it with me, “Around here, we’re wise to these lies…”

Watering Our Humanity

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Watering our Humanity  9/29/12

            A recent Charlie Rose program included Muhtar Kent, CEO of Coca Cola, and Dean Kamen, founder of DEKA Research & Development Corp.  They have teamed up to help provide clean water to African communities.  Big deal?  Well, yeah, it’s a big deal.  One startling statistic: a child dies every few seconds because of lack of clean water.  Kamen and Kent have come up with a service module based on a standard shipping container (widely available) fitted with a water purification module, and a communications center.  They also plan to deploy these to locations in Asia and parts of India and Latin America.  The purification device is simple.  Stick an input hose into the contaminated water you have.  Pour potable water from the output hose. 

Kent suggests that the big societal issues can only be solved by what he calls “the golden triangle” of government working with business working with civil society.  This raises questions.  What do we think the big issues are?  How can business help?  What should our government be doing?

While inequality and instability are surely 21^st century mega-concerns, the gorilla in the room is unsustainability, and he needs water.  Clean water for everyone takes a step toward equality and stability based on sustainable technology.  Kudos too, to Matt Damon and Gary White, and water.org. for making a difference.      

            Around here, we are BIG fans of Charlie Rose, and we are getting a glimpse of the work of some real live 21^st century heroes.

The Algebra Of Deceit

The Algebra of Deceit  9/25/12

            We hear about the need to reduce the deficit because it unfairly burdens our grandchildren—that we must balance the federal budget.  As with most plausible deceptions, this one contains an element of truth.  We do need to reduce it.  We don’t need to require a balanced federal budget.  Our economy runs quite efficiently with moderate deficits, and the last thing we need is to preclude any federal deficit or surplus, i.e. require a balanced budget.  The fed gov’s economic requirements are not the same as our personal ones, nor are they comparable to state budget needs.  Grapes plus apples do not equal cantaloupes.  The formula goes like this:  g + a ≠ c.

            Here is another element of truth.  The next time you hear somebody whining about the cost of EPA regulations, ask yourself if eliminating them would not pass a horrendous cost on to your grandchildren.  All the cheap food and energy we now enjoy is being, or will be paid for by someone.  It may be the collateral dead in some far-off country, or it may be the children of your children who will have to pay for the damage done by the mining, fracking, and farm chemical consequences that taint your grandkids’ lives.  That formula is: (cheap food & fuel) + (no regulation) = Your Grandchildren get Screwed !

            Around here, it seems the least we can do is tune up our B.S. meters, think carefully, and waste not.

Truth Hides Better Than Money

Truth Hides Better Than Money  9/22/12

“…we both know the truth is hard to come by…”  Dick Feller, Some Days are Diamonds, 1976

            If as I.F. Stone said, “All governments lie…” and news media repeat whatever the government says as true, then why would intelligent Americans not be skeptical about what the news media report as fact?  For instance, do you really believe thousands of Muslims would destroy life and property over a stupid film clip?  Is our hatred that great?  Really?  Has our dehumanization of the people of the Middle East gone so far that we would believe that load of crap?  Is your lie detector ‘broke’?  Someone here and/or over there is lying.

            Well, but it’s fact!  I heard it on the news!  Hold it!  Let me ask you: When is the last time you heard the word ‘terrorist’ without the word ‘Islamic’ on the news?  When is the last time you heard the word ‘Islamic’ without the word ‘terrorist’ in the news?  What really is the nature of ‘collateral damage’?  Around here, it means innocent people, injured or dead as a side effect of some usually deliberate act.

            Here’s the deal.  It’s war.  It’s nasty, full of blood and consequences.  Why try to hide the murder and maiming like the super-rich hide money from the tax man?  Harry Truman said it, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”  Well, if you can’t stand the war, get out of the war!  Otherwise, go have a cheeseburger!  Go hide some money! 

Burning The Flag Of Hatred

Burning the Flag of Hatred  9/20/12

            Think about the violent Arab-world response blamed on that anti-Muslim hate film.  One source posits, credibly, that a strong religion shakes off insults of this kind.  So we wonder what is really behind the violence.  Wonder if people are not striking out in anger and frustration over other issues, like lack of dignity, lack of hope, and inability to hurt back for all the death and suffering readily available in their world.  This violent response seems like the angry over-reaction encountered when a school-yard bully’s victim has finally had enough.

            But it is more than that.  It is carefully incited by radicals who profit from hatred.  They try to foment violence; promise that it will assuage the problem.  It never does.  The inciters then argue that we need more violence, or that it’s our destiny.  The only sure result is perpetuation of the hatred-violence-hatred continuum.  It is neither warm, nor fuzzy, nor useful to human progress.

            Beware!  Inciters are everywhere, looking for scapegoats.  Whether it is a bully in a film studio in La La Land, or a bigoted back-woods pulpiteer, or an “AK” wielding third-world manipulator with angry mobs to feed, they all traffic in hate.

            Around here, we’ve had enough hate-speech.  We’ve sharpened our hate recognition skills, filtering what we hear.  We don’t need hate-speech from America and we don’t need it from the Middle East.  We don’t require warm, or fuzzy.  But we are fans of things that engender human progress.                               

The Thief of Hearts

The Thief of Hearts      8/23/12                                                                              The March Hare

            Joey Bartolomei (Omaha Royals), Phyllis Diller, Dick Clark, Andy Griffiths, Leon Helm, Earl Scruggs, Whitney Houston, Etta James, Johnny Otis (Harlem Nocturne; Willie and the Hand Jive), Harry Morgan, Andy Rooney.  Every year, about 2 ½ million Americans die.  Some after a long and fulfilling life, and some leave us way too early.

            Cliff Robertson, Jerry Lieber, Annette (Cha Cha) Charles, Bubba Smith, Peter Falk, Clarence Clemons, James Arness, Dana Wynter, Sada Thompson, Phoebe Snow.  And in that same year, our own Kyle Clark.

            This decade has given us many things, including about 2 ½ billion tears.  It’s not the “Roaring Twenties” or “The Nifty Fifties” or “The Greedy Eighties” of the twentieth century.  This second decade of the twenty-first century will bring us many blessings and joys.  Our lives will improve.  We will continue to live with hope and work for a better world.  But for obvious reasons, around here this decade will be known as “The Thief of Hearts.”