12.20.2020 – basic liberties

basic liberties
extensive, equal for all
greatest benefit

A joke told by either John Cleese or Bill Bryson goes like this (or was it Julian Fellowes?).

If three Englishmen found themselves alone on a desert island the first thing they would do is form a club that would allow them to exclude any other members.

I was thinking about this as the news cycle on Reagonomics is starting to build.

The idea of ‘Trickle-Down’ is now 40 years old and reports and studies are being released that it just didn’t work.

Rich people got richer.

They kept on to their money.

There was no trickle down.

Just recently, according to one source, since the start of the pandemic, just 651 American billionaires have gained $1tn of wealth.

Okay, truth be told, IF I WERE A RICH MAN, would I handle it any better?

Watching Dick Cavett reruns on YouTube there is a clip where Mr. Cavett is having a conversation with Orson Welles.

Mr. Cavett asks Mr. Welles what he would do if he was suddenly given a very large amount of money.

Mr. Welles thundered immediatly like a fast ball off a bat, “Give it all away of course!”

Then he was quiet for a moment.

“Easy to say when it hasn’t happened,” Mr. Welles said in a slow voice.

“Most likely be different if I truly had the money.”

Reading the articles and discussions I came across the writings of John Rawls.

In 1971 Mr. Rawls published his treatise, A Theory of Justice in which he advanced the concept of the “original position”.

Mr. Rawls suggested, if a society gathered to debate the principles of justice in a kind of town hall meeting, but no one knew anything about themselves. “No one knows his place in society,” wrote Rawls, “his class position or social status, nor does anyone know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence, strength, and the like.”

IF this could happen, Mr. Rawls stated, “people would adopt two main principles. First, there should be extensive and equal basic liberties. Second, resulting social and economic inequalities should be managed to “the greatest benefit of the disadvantaged”.

Inequality could only be justified to the extent it provided material benefit to the least well-off.

This template, hoped Rawls, would make intuitive sense to everyone who imagined themselves into the “original position”.

Intuitive sense.

Intuitive sense that economic inequalities should be managed to “the greatest benefit of the disadvantaged”.

Mr. Rawls was embraced by many.

Mr. Rawls and this theory was also debunked.

One critic said that Mr. Rawls’ methodology was problematic.

This critic wrote, “Rawls was too trusting in the US constitution and not aware enough of the dark side of politics and power.”

This was back in 1970.

The dark side of politics and power seems to be doing as well today as economic inequalities.

11.26.2020 – seems fit and proper

seems fit and proper
gratefully, one heart, one voice
in thanksgiving, praise

My wife asked me if any other election in United States History was so contentious as the one we just experienced in 2020.

I would point out the election in 1860 led to one third of the States trying to leave and start their own confederation of States.

But it wasn’t the same type of tension.

Sure there was an election.

An election that somehow Abraham Lincoln learned that he had been elected that night.

No computers or nothing and they had a tally that night.

Go figure.

Also the incumbent President, Mr. James Buchanan, who had a frozen neck and had to stand sideways to look you in the eye, could not wait to get out of office.

But history records that pretty much everyone knew Mr. Lincoln would win the night HE WAS NOMINATED.

The election was pretty much a formality.

Back then Blue State Voters outnumbered Red State Voters 2 to 1.

But half the Blue States were in the South.

When the Democratic Party nominated Stephen Douglas, a known compromiser on the election issue of the day, the Blue Staters in the South bolted the party and formed their own non-compromise party.

The non-compromisers nominated non-comprise candidate, John Breckinridge.

This is were is gets really weird.

Miss Mary Todd dated the young Stephen Douglas.

Miss Mary Todd’s cousin was John Breckinridge.

Miss Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln.

That is just weird, but I digress.

When the Red States nominated Mr. Lincoln as their candidate for President, the math said it was all over.

Sixty percent of the voters were Blue Staters, true.

But thirty percent were for comprimise.

Thirty percent were for non-comprise.

And forty percent were for the Red State.

Stephen Douglas knew it was all over.

The guy he had debated and beaten in the 1858 Illinois Senate election would be elected President and the country was going to split in half.

What did Judge Douglas do about it?

He took his campaign and went . . . South.

He traveled around speaking on the dangers of splitting the country.

He pointed out what was going to happen if the Southern Blue States followed through and voted their non-compromise ticket.

He might as well have argued with the stump as stand on it to deliver his speeches.

Mr. Lincoln was elected.

As Mr. Lincoln said four years later, “Both parties deprecated war but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish. And the war came.”

And the war came.

Boy Howdy but that feller Lincoln had a way with words.

And what was the issue of the day?

Again as Mr. Lincoln put it. “One eighth of the whole population were colored slaves not distributed generally over the union but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen perpetuate and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war while the government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it.”

I have to say all the discussion, ink, paper, time and effort that goes into the question, “What caused the Civil War” kind of drives me batty as Mr. Lincoln it explained so very simply.

He said, ” … slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war.”

Helloooooo.

ALL KNEW.

Gee whiz.

Mr. Lincoln noted that, “In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.”

And why did all this happen?

Mr. Lincoln said, “No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. “

Where then?

Mr. Lincoln said, “They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.”

And because of this, Mr. Lincoln said “It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People.”

Mr. Lincoln then said, “I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”

Which leads us to where we are today.

A Day of Thanks.

Mr. Lincoln asked that thanks be given, “. . . with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience.”

Mr. Lincoln closed it all up and said, “fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.”

Restore full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.

Alistair Cooke wrote about Mr. Lincoln, “Lincoln had a gangling gait, a disturbing fondness for rough stories, and a maddening habit of being, in kind of a tooth-sucking way, wiser and sharper than you, (To make matters worse, most of the time, he was.)”

I am thankful for Mr. Lincoln.

I am thankful for so much else as well.

I am perverse and disobedient.

And God forgives.

And for that, you can bet your life, LITERALLY, I am very thankful.

Here is the full text of President Abraham Lincoln’s Thanksgiving Proclamation of 1863.

Washington, D.C.
October 3, 1863

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation.

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the Eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

William H. Seward,
Secretary of State

11.22.2020 – customs, old-fashioned

customs, old-fashioned
propriety remind us
of how things were once

In an article about the Obama Autobiography, David Olusoga writes in the Guardian that:

“After a presidency like no other, after a corrosively acrimonious election and in the midst of a transition still being obstructed by the incumbent, Obama seems almost like a time-travelling visitor from an earlier age, a man whose antiquated customs and old-fashioned sense of propriety remind us of how things were once done and how far we have wandered.

The Obama of 2020 speaks, at times, with a slight tone of controlled exasperation. He has the air of a disappointed parent surveying the damage wreaked by a raucous teenage party that took place while he was out of town.”

Good gosh, what more needs to said?

Let the after party clean up begin.

I am reminded of a time when my brother, beyond all real reason and counsel not too, took the job as ‘Interim High School Principal’ at the school where he taught.

I mean, who and I mean WHO would volunteer for such a job?

While he held the office there was some senior prank and kids got caught in the act.

My brother had to deal with the situation.

Part of the situation he had to deal with was angry parents who were angry that anyone thought that anyone would be angry over what their kids had done.

Come on.

Kids will be kids.

Senior prank.

Just get over it.

No one got hurt.

No one died.

As I remember it the conversations my brother had to endure went on far longer and caused more angst admittedly than any ‘penal process’ could hope to deliver in the way of penance.

But my brother stuck in his guns.

In the end the kids in question were told they would spend a Saturday scraping, sanding and painting the old bleaches that lined the school’s baseball field.

In a show of solidarity and maybe defiance, most of those kids parents came along and worked with their kids to show my brother up.

In the end the bleachers were painted.

The kids lost a Sautrday.

So did the parents.

Somehow, though maybe those parents didn’t agree, I felt justice was served.

(When I met Obama he voiced his belief in the ‘possibility of America’. But the reality is distressing by David Olusoga)

11.5.2020 – counting counted counts

counting counted counts
one loser but one winner
no prize for second

I remember a conversation in a newsroom somewhere sometime.

In 20 years of online news I have been in a lot of news rooms on election night.

The point was put forward that election day was not at all like a sporting event or football game.

When you watch a football game, the story emerges as you watch.

Both teams start at zero and try to score points and the game goes on.

While it seems that way when watching election returns, that one candidate the other has successful plays and score touchdowns and adds more points.

But it is not like that.

The scores are all made.

The points are all scored.

The points just have to be totaled up.

For the sports analogy, we are watching a replay of the game.

Nothing can add or subtract from the points already scored.

No one surges ahead like a last minute touchdown drive to win a game.

We do not know what the total is but the game is over.

All over but the counting.

In the paraphrased words of President Bill Clinton in 2000, the people have spoken … now we have to figure out what they said.

But thinking of sports I am reminded of Olympic Gold Medal events.

Events were two teams play each other for Olympic Gold.

Boxing, Basketball, Hockey and other head to head competitions where the field is down to two teams or two athletes and they compete against each other for the Gold.

It’s the only time where the loser gets a medal.

Think about it.

In swimming, track, or other such events, there have been thrilling battles for 2nd place.

The Silver Medal IS an accomplishment.

But for some sports 2nd place, the Silver Medal, IS first loser.

You lost.

You lost the Gold Medal.

You get the Silver.

<p value="<amp-fit-text layout="fixed-height" min-font-size="6" max-font-size="72" height="80">Oh boy!Oh boy!

I remember they used to play a basketball game between the two teams that lost in the first round of the Final Four.

This lasted until, as one coach put it, the NCAA mercifully ended the tradition.

But I digress.

The counting goes on.

We will have a winner.

We will have a loser.

And the loser doesn’t even get a Silver Medal.

11.3.2020 – There is ruin, decay

There is ruin, decay
winds blow bleak, all gone away
nothing more to say

Adapted from The House on the Hill by Edwin Arlington Robinson

They are all gone away,
The House is shut and still,
There is nothing more to say.

Through broken walls and gray
The winds blow bleak and shrill:
They are all gone away.

Nor is there one to-day
To speak them good or ill:
There is nothing more to say.

Why is it then we stray
Around the sunken sill?
They are all gone away,

And our poor fancy-play
For them is wasted skill:
There is nothing more to say.

There is ruin and decay
In the House on the Hill:
They are all gone away,
There is nothing more to say.

I was attracted to this poem for today, election day 2020, as finally, there is nothing more to say.

I have always felt that one of the most forlorn sights is a Halloween Pumpkin on November 1st.

How much more so election signs all across everywhere the day after an election.

All those candidates, they are all gone away.

I looked up the poem to make sure I got the poet’s first name correct and I learned that this poem:

‘The House on the Hill’ by Edward Arlington Robinson is a six stanza villanelle that is divided into sets of three lines, known as tercets, and then one final set of four lines, or quatrain. The lines follow a very simple rhyme scheme of ABA, with the traditional repetition one can expect from a villanelle. The first and third lines of the first stanza is repeated, alternatively, in the next five.

It isn’t just a poem but a a six stanza villanelle!

WOW.

Villanelle.

Never ran across that term before.

Sounds much harder than a haiku but explains why I had trouble getting a seven syllable line out of it when all the lines are six syllables.

The page I learned this on also said, in the way of analysis:

It is meant to be a symbol for the speaker’s past and it’s decay a representative of how he’s losing contact with his own past acquaintances and experiences.

On election day 2020, I hope we aren’t losing contact with our past.

I hope it isn’t all gone away.

Bleak and shrill.

No good or ill.

And I hope it is not ruin and decay.

But we all have to wait.

There is nothing more to say.