1.18.2021 – measure of success

measure of success
unselfish spirit exists
purpose, dignity

It was Bill Clinton who famously said, “It’s the economy, STUPID!”

So call me stupid, but what is the economy and how do we measure it so we can understand if things are good or if things are bad.

The one economic rule of thumb that really made sense to me was that when other people had no money, it was a recession.

When I had no money, it was a depression.

The reporters and commentators on economic news of late seem to feel that the economy is doing okay, even good considering the covid and all.

Maybe even the impact of covid with have good long term economic imact.

Then the reporters and commentators start throwing out the economic textbook alphabet code words like GNI, PPP, OECD, GDP, Nominal GDP and REAL GDP.

By the time the reporters and commentators are done, I have tuned out and I listen for one word.

Good.

Bad.

After all, it’s the economy STUPID.

Then, feeling stupid, I ask good for who and bad for who?

A long time ago, Robert Kennedy questioned the use of economic factors as a measure for a success of a Country.

In one of the first speeches in his 1967 Presidential Campaign, speaking at the University of Kansas and speaking, according to legend, without notes Mr. Kennedy talked about GDP.

(First, a reminder that GDP measures those activities for which money changes hands or for which a monetary value can be attached. Paid childcare is included, but unpaid childcare by family members or friends isn’t.)

Mr. Kennedy said:

” . . .the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play.

It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials.

It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.“

BOY HOWDY!

I mean gee whiz just off the bat I love this just for the way Mr. Kennedy said it.

Then I love what he said.

Then what he said just, well, makes me sad.

Mournful, you know what I mean.

So much has happened lately that can tell us so much about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.

Will Rodgers would imitate President Calvin Coolidge giving a speech (a bit of humor that President Coolidge did not appreciate) and would deliver a text like:

“The County as a hole is prosperous. I did not say the whole Country is prosperous but the Country as a hole. Usually, a hole is NOT prosperous. And this Country is in a hole.”

We are in a hole.

A hole that we dug.

As Mr. Kennedy said, “no one – neither industry, nor labor, nor government – has cared enough to help.”

I wonder if we can get out.

So much has is gone and still as Mr. Kennedy said, ” … there is another greater task, it is to confront the poverty of satisfaction – purpose and dignity – that afflicts us all.”

But Bobby also said, “I think we here in this country, with the unselfish spirit that exists in the United States of America, I think we can do better here also.”

Can we get back there?

Can we go forward to get there?

Make America Great with an unselfish spirit.

For that answer I have to return to Mr. Kennedy’s GDP speech again and to Mr. Kennedy’s quote from George Bernard Shaw.

“Some people see things as they are and say, ‘why?’ I dream things that never were and say, ‘why not?’“

1.8.2021 – all fools in town on

all fools in town on
our side, ain’t that big enough
a majority?

From the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.

In the scene, the grifters, the King and Duke are arguing about overstaying their welcome too long with a family they have convinced they are long lost relatives.

Not only have they talked their way into the family but into the will of the recently dead, Peter Wilks, and they stand to walk away with the bulk of the dead man’s fortune.

But the Duke second thoughts about they whole deal and has to be convinced again.

Mr. Twain writes “the king he talked him blind; so at last he give in, and said all right, but said he believed it was blamed foolishness to stay.”

This leads the King to say, “What do we k’yer? Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? And ain’t that a big enough majority in any town?”

I feel that somehow I know just how Mr. Twain felt when he thought up these lines.

I also feel like I know someone who could be described as Mr. Twain described the Undertaker about whom was written, “He was the softest, glidingest, stealthiest man I ever see; and there warn’t no more smile to him than there is to a ham.”

1.7.2021- How it all started

How it all started
Well, that was some weird shit … now
the fat lady sings

“Well, that was some weird …”

So commented someone in attendance at the Trump Inaugural 4 years ago.

So commented someone in attendance at the Trump Inaugural 4 years ago just minutes into the Trump Administration as Trump finished his Inaugural Address to the nation.

Remember that speech?

The one where Trump said, “This American carnage stops right here and stops right now.”

When he finished someone turned to the people nearby and said, “Well, that was some weird shit.”

That someone was George W. Bush.

By some accounts President Bush said it out loud to Hillary Clinton.

Mrs. Clinton herself tells the story that way.

More than anyone knew, President Bush summed up the speech and previewed the next four years.

Four years that are ever so slowly coming to an end.

It was Yogi Berra who famously said “it ain’t over until its over“.

This gets repeated in close athletic contests all the time.

Another phrase that gets used a lot, especially in late game, come from behind unexpected victories , is that “it ain’t over until the fat lady sings.“

The statement is supposed to be a reference to attending opera performances, especially performances of Wagnerian Opera’s that last for a week or more.

The message is you know the opera is over when the fat lady sings.

Another story on the phrase I have in my head is that the fat lady singing was the traditional closing act back in Vaudeville days.

It also seems to me that the last act was bad on purpose as it made the crowd want to go home.

Much like Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson airport is designed to help the crowd appreciate and look forward to their own homes even more.

And for some reason I always thought the fat lady sings was a Yogi Berra saying.

So I was surprised to feed the phrase into the Google and learn that the phrase is of relatively recent origin.

According to Wikipedia, “The first recorded use appeared in the Dallas Morning News on March 10, 1976:
Despite his obvious allegiance to the Red Raiders, Texas Tech sports information director Ralph Carpenter was the picture of professional objectivity when the Aggies rallied for a 72–72 tie late in the SWC tournament finals. “Hey, Ralph,” said Bill Morgan, “this… is going to be a tight one after all.” “Right”, said Ralph, “the opera ain’t over until the fat lady sings.”

1976?

I was sure it went back much further than that but who wants to argue with Wikipedia.

As Mr. Berra said, “If the world were perfect, it wouldn’t be.”

Wikipedia states that: “The phrase is generally understood to be a reference to opera sopranos, who were traditionally overweight. The imagery of Wagner’s opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and its last part, Götterdämmerung, is typically used in depictions accompanying uses of the phrase.”

Wikipedia also lists phrases with similar meanings
“It ain’t over till it’s over“, a phrase popularized by baseball player Yogi Berra.
“Don’t count your chickens before they hatch”, a well-known saying which originated in the 16th century.
“The future isn’t carved in stone“, a phrase meaning that the future can always be changed.
“Nothing is carved in stone” or “It isn’t carved in stone.” a phrase meaning a situation or plans can be changed.

The last one calls to mind when my Father died back in January of 1988.

1988?

Boy, Howdy! But does that seem like a long time ago.

When my Father’s tombstone was delivered we all went out to see it.

The stone cutter had made a mistake common to the month of January and the tombstone displayed the year of death as 1987.

We all looked at the stone and we looked at the date and we looked at each other.

As I remember it my brother Steve looked around and said, “What can we do? It IS carved in stone!”

My Dad would have liked that.

But I digress.

I was struck by the Wikipedia entry about my phrase in question and that it stated it is understood to refer to the Götterdämmerung in Wagner’s opera cycle.

Feed Götterdämmerung into the google and the google says that a Götterdämmerung is a collapse (as of a society or regime) marked by catastrophic violence and disorder.

Well if that doesn’t make you put the coffee down and quote President Bush I don’t know what will.

It is time for the fat lady to sing.

Maybe she has been singing for some time.

I feel like I have wanted to go home and appreciate home for some time.

And the song she is singing is, “Well, that was some weird shit.”

1.4.2021 – you are free to do

you are free to do,
free to say and free to choose
what I tell you to …

Adapted from James Thurber’s Further Fable, “The Bears and the Monkeys.”

Not sure why (oh sure) but it came to mind this morning.

Maybe it was the line, “By sparing you the burden of electing your leaders, we save you from the dangers of choice. No more secret ballots, everything open and aboveboard.”

The Bears and the Monkeys.

In a deep forest there lived many bears. They spent the winter sleeping, and the summer playing leap-bear and stealing honey and buns from nearby cottages. One day a fast-talking monkey named Glib showed up and told them that their way of life was bad for bears. “You are prisoners of pastime,” he said, “addicted to leap-bear, and slaves of honey and buns.”

The bears were impressed and frightened as Glib went on talking. “Your forebears have done this to you,” he said. Glib was so glib, glibber than the glibbest monkey they had ever seen before, that the bears believed he must know more than they knew, or than anybody else. But when he left, to tell other species what was the matter with them, the bears reverted to their fun and games and their theft of buns and honey.

Their decadence made them bright of eye, light of heart, and quick of paw, and they had a wonderful time, living as bears had always lived, until one day two of Glib’s successors appeared, named Monkey Say and Monkey Do. They were even glibber than Glib, and they brought many presents and smiled all the time. “We have come to liberate you from freedom,” they said. “This is the New Liberation, twice as good as the old, since there are two of us.”

So each bear was made to wear a collar, and the collars were linked together with chains, and Monkey Do put a ring in the lead bear’s nose, and a chain on the lead bear’s ring. “Now you are free to do what I tell you to do,” said Monkey Do.

“Now you are free to say what I want you to say,” said Monkey Say. “By sparing you the burden of electing your leaders, we save you from the dangers of choice. No more secret ballots, everything open and aboveboard.” For a long time the bears submitted to the New Liberation, and chanted the slogan the monkeys had taught them: “Why stand on your own two feet when you can stand on ours?”

Then one day they broke the chains of their new freedom and found their way back to the deep forest and began playing leap-bear again and stealing honey and buns from the nearby cottages. And their laughter and gaiety rang through the forest, and birds that had ceased singing began singing again, and all the sounds of the earth were like music.

MORAL: It is better to have the ring of freedom in your ears than in your nose.

Fables for Our Time and Famous Poems Illustrated by James Thurber, New York, Harpers, 1940.

12.29.2020 – not treachery

not treachery
an infallible instinct for
doing the wrong thing

Is it me or has Government of the people, for the people and by the people hit a rock in the water?

There are not a lot of qualifications for elected office listed in the Constitution of the United States.

Cleary brains, compassion or desire-to-do-the-right thing are not required.

Groucho Marx once said something along the lines of not wanting to join any club that would let people like him in as members.

Groucho once was refused membership in a Hollywood county club as he was Jewish.

Groucho asked that since his children were only half Jewish could they go halfway into the swimming pool?

Right now, anyone who expresses any interest in elected office should be disqualified from running.

Who would want to sign up for such abuse?

I guess such thinking is what got us where we are today.

Ben Franklin saw it coming when he said about George Washington, “The first man put at the helm will be a good one. Nobody knows what sort may come afterwards.”

Dr. Franklin continued, “The executive will be always increasing here, as elsewhere, till it ends in a monarchy.”

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Today’s haiku has its roots in a quote from George Orwell from his essay on Great Britain at the start of World War 2, “The Lion and The Unicorn” first published by Searchlight Books, 19 February 1941.

Mr. Orwell wrote of the British Government at the time that:

What is to be expected of them is not treachery, or physical cowardice, but stupidity, unconscious sabotage, an infallible instinct for doing the wrong thing.

They are not wicked, or not altogether wicked; they are merely unteachable.

An infallible instinct for doing the wrong thing!

BOY! HOWDY!

I ran across the quote in another article which included a chilling coda to this thought.

Where Mr. Orwell wrote that they [Government] were “merely unteachable,” this line was added.

“Back when [they] at least partly understood such criticism.”

I scream and yell at the news images of the actions of Congress over and over.

I have to remember they don’t even understand what I am yelling about let alone care that I am yelling.