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PS... A Column on Things |
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By Paul E. Schindler Jr. |
Some things are impossible to know, but it is impossible to know these things. |
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I have a day job. So every word of this is my opinion, not that of my employer. This offer IS void in Wisconsin. Except, of course, that some material in this column comes from incoming e-mail; such material is usually reproduced in the Sans Serif type font to distinguish it from the (somewhat) original material.
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September 12, 2005 Vol. 7, No. 36 Table of Contents:
General NewsLack of PanicThe biggest news of the week: I no longer wake up every morning in a cold sweat, filled with dread. I am actually quite relaxed about teaching. Could it be true what they say, that it gets easier as you go along? Part of this stems from the insistence of Mrs. S across the hall that we do joint planning for the first six weeks, a brilliant idea for which I am most grateful. But part of it is honestly a more relaxed attitude. I haven't had to send a single student to the principal's office yet, a record for me. I am yelling and getting angry less too; good for me and for my students.
What I Do NowThere are some things in this world I just don't understand and cannot image. One of them is the widespread fear of public speaking. According to as phobia-fighting web site: A February 2001 Gallup poll found that 40% of adults have a fear of public speaking. Comedian Jerry Seinfeld once said that at a funeral, must people would rather be in the casket than giving the eulogy. I can't send you to the Gallup site; they charge you to see the data. Judging from the headline on the survey, the only thing Americans fear more than public speaking is snakes. I have been a public speaker all my life. I was voluble as a child, worked in radio in high school and college, spent four years on the high school speech team doing debate and radio commentary, did a decade of software reviews on public television, hosted several dozen radio talk shows, and have spoken at numerous conventions and small meetings. I always thought if I could find a way to earn my living just be talking, I'd be in heaven. I am pretty close to heaven .Teaching is 44 minutes of extemporaneous speaking per period (OK, really only 22 minutes; you spend half your time listening to students). So I talk for a living, but I write for love. As I wrote the poem reprinted below under the headline Dream Poetry, I realized that the world is divided into four kinds of people (remember, the world is always divided into either two or four kinds of people): those with something to say who can write, those with something to say who can't write, those with nothing to say who can't write, and those with nothing to say who can write. People who have something to say and can write are the ones who make society move forward: Rachel Carson with Silent Spring, Ralph Nader with Unsafe at any Speed, and a half dozen others. When I was young, I wanted to write just one book like that in my life. Instead, I wrote Aspirin Therapy and two volumes of memoirs I'll be lucky if my daughters ever read. In short, I fall into the last category, those who have nothing to say but can write. I live to write. Always have loved it. When I was 12 I wrote a 160-page novel (now, mercifully, lost). When my previous employer changed me from a reporter to an editor, I started this column in order to fulfill my need to write. By the way, teaching is harder than writing--you're being watched every minute. And what you do matters more when you teach.
Lost Control Of Our DestinyI don't know if you noticed--most American's haven't--but China is the single biggest purchase of the government debt we are issuing to fund Bush's ill-advised tax cuts for the super-rich and his ill-advised war for the rest of us. They buy $1 million a day worth of U.S. Debt. People, especially Democrats, used to say that the National Debt was not a problem because it was money we owed ourselves. Well, guess what, now it is money we owe the Chinese. People say China won't stop propping us up because we are their largest market. This assumes the Chinese are rational players in the world. If you believe that, you don't know Chinese history. Take, for example, Mao's Great Leap Forward which killed his countrymen by the tens of millions. Of course, like our beloved President, Mao stayed the course. China is a totalitarian state. The leadership can do anything it wants. Woe be to us if we attempt to fulfill our treaty obligation to Taiwan to protect it against Chinese invasion. Our nuclear arsenal and vast army and navy will be helpless against the simple Chinese threat to stop funding our debt. Of course, we could escape this by raising taxes on the top 1% of American incomes to what they were 10 years ago, but apparently, Bush would rather hand a veto over American foreign policy to the Chinese then do the right and honorable thing, advocated by Republicans for decades until the Gingrich revolution--pay as you go. The other veto over our foreign policy belongs to Saudi Arabia. If that country ever decides it really wants Israel gone, Israel will be gone. The Saudis can bring our country to its knees in a matter of weeks through the simple expedient of turning off the oil tap. "Cut off their nose to spite their face," you say? Not really. They can last a lot longer without our money than we can without their oil. Are they rational actors? Look at their support for Al Queda (until we noticed) and Wahhabism (their state religion) and tell me they are rational actors in the 21st century. Like every other nation on Earth in all of human history, their self-interest comes first. I know what some of you are thinking: the Chinese and the Saudis would have to be insane to destroy their best customer. Well, buckle up buckie, because every well-informed and intelligent person I know is scared to death of the fact that America has lost control of its destiny to two of the most complete dictatorships that now exist on the planet. Be afraid, be very afraid.
Dream PoetryI had the strangest dream last night, that either I was a Dutch immigrant to the United States. When asked what I did in the Netherlands, I said I wrote light verse. "Well," said my interrogator, "you Dutch all speak great English, why not do the same thing here?" So I sat down and composed this bit of doggerel, which I revamped a little once I woke up: Here I sit, hat in hand, But I get tin kazoo, Writing this was no fun, Yes, I know the meter is off in the last line by one syllable. Vicki's comment was, "not bad for a dream, but don't quit your day job." I think it is nearly as good as the Prairie Home Companion script that I wrote in my dreams over a period of several years and finally set down on this web site in July 2001.
Gasoline BoycottPhillip Hollsworth, offered this good idea:...Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a gallon of gas is CHEAP at $1.50-$1.75, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control the marketplace ... not sellers. For the rest of this year, DON'T purchase ANY gasoline from the two biggest companies (which now are one), EXXON and MOBIL. If they are not selling any gas, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit. Please hold out until they lower their prices to the $1.30 range and keep them down. This can really work
BushnomicsI love it when one of my friends puts it all together succinctly and then is kind enough to share with me. Richard Dalton, who has been concerned about issues of equity for years, offers this: Remember the tax cuts that were supposed to invigorate the economy and give all citizens a boost? The US Census Bureau's latest figures, released Tuesday, show that real median earnings for men aged 15 and older who worked full-time, year-round declined 2.3 percent between 2003 and 2004, to $40,798. Women with similar work experience saw their earnings decline by one percent, to $31,223. Reflecting the larger decline in earnings for men, the ratio of female-to-male earnings was 77 cents on the dollar, up from 76 cents in 2003. Census figures show that for the first time on record household incomes failed to increase for five straight years. The median pretax income, $44,389, was at its lowest point since 1997, after inflation. Marking the fourth consecutive annual increase, the official poverty rate rose from 12.5 percent (35.9 million) in 2003 to 12.7 percent (37 million) last year. There were 7.9 million families in poverty in 2004, up from 7.6 million in 2003. For a family of four, the poverty level threshold was $19,307; for a family of three, $15,067; for a family of two, $12,334; and for unrelated individuals, $9,645. Thirteen million children under the age of 18 were in poverty last year. The rate, 17.8 percent, and the number were unchanged from 2003. The poverty rate increased for people aged 18 to 64, from 10.8 percent in 2003 to 12.1 percent in 2004. For those 65 and over, the poverty rate declined from 10.2 percent to 9.8 percent. And these figures were all pre-Katrina. However, A new report, "Executive Excess 2005," from the Institute for Policy Studies and United for a Fair Economy, shows that the ratio of average CEO pay (now $11.8 million) to worker pay (now $27,460) increased from 301-to-1 in 2003 to 431-to-1 in 2004. It seems that Bushonomics are working--for somebody. Political NotesIf Bush trips up on New Orleans, it will be like sending Al Capone to federal prison for income tax evasion. You do the math. *** Just to show you there is another side to all this, I am printing, without snarky comment, an e-mail from my friend Mike McNamee: Y'know, I'm still looking for the explanation of why it was the federal government's responsibility to lead the initial response to the hurricane and flooding in New Orleans. In no other natural disaster in my memory has the President of the United States been expected to police the streets, put out the fires, or run the emergency rooms. "Take my city -- please!" is the punchline to a joke, not an actual working attitude on the part of mayors or governors. Basically, you had local authorities who botched the evacuation, created an inadequate shelter-in-place strategy that was quickly overwhelmed, failed to keep a good portion of their police force on the job, and didn't realize that they were in over the heads until it was too late for the feds to move in the heavy stocks of pre-positioned supplies that they had prepared. But none of this would have happened if George had left his ranch a couple of days earlier ... *** In January 2005: Congressman Robert Wexler (D-FL) sent the following letter to President George Bush requesting that he immediately remove Michael Brown from his position as head of the Homeland Security Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Under Secretary Brown's agency disbursed over $30 million in disaster relief money, which was allocated to over 10,000 Miami-Dade claimants after Hurricane Frances, which made landfall more than 100 miles away and there was no more than a heavy rainstorm. In short, Brown was buying votes in Florida. See also:
I need to note in passing that these people are not hysterics. What they are doing is using mainstream media (MSM) coverage--mediated, fact-checked, gate-keepered coverage, to "connect the dots," which, as a former reporter, I know the media are loathe to do, no matter how obvious the connections. Moving on, the right (led by the Wall Street Journal) are saying this isn't Bush's fault or FEMA's fault; it is the mayor and the governor. Really? Check out this Talk Points Memo column describing a Salt Lake City newspaper story--FEMA Wastes Firefighters. Help me figure out how that's the Governor's fault, would you? And how about this:
Is that the fault of the Louisiana governor, or the mayor of New Orleans? I don't think so... And don't just blame it on FEMA, because Bush appointed the head of FEMA, and kept him in place when his incompetence became obvious to everyone in America--except Bush, who apparently likes the way he launders bribes to Florida voters disguised as disaster relief. *** The San Francisco Chronicle deserves its reputation as America's only daily newsprint comic book, although, I am ashamed to admit, it has become more serious since Hearst bought it from the squabbling idiots of the fourth generation of the founders' families. I never thought I'd live to write that sentence, that a newspaper had been improved by Hearst ownership, but maybe it is true; perhaps wonders do never cease. In any case, part of its good reputation stems from its excellent lineup of columnists in Datebook, the "entertainment" section of the newspaper, which has the best writing on cheap paper in America today. By coincidence (they don't see each other's copy) two columnists on Friday had outstanding efforts, relevant to the current crisis:
While we wait for the rest of America's MSM (mainstream media) to grow a spine (which, remarkably, it shows signs of doing), we'll have to make do with great work in the fun and games department of a left-coast newspaper. Briefs
Craig Reynolds' TechnobriefsGoogle hires everyone except Ballmer: in July Kai-Fu Lee jumped ship from Microsoft to Google. Recently released court papers detail how the news drove Steve Ballmer into one of his trademark psychotic episodes: Ballmer vowed to 'kill' Google, Microsoft's Ballmer: chair-tossing potty-mouth, Microsoft alleges exec used inside info. Via the court papers we also learn that even the Chinese Communist bureaucrats make fun of the idiots at Microsoft: 'China has f*cked us' - Bill Gates. It was also announced this week that Google Hires 'Father of the Internet' Vinton Cerf, Google hires Net pioneer Vint Cerf Vint has recently been working on InterPlaNet via Delay Tolerant Networking Research Group. Study says human brain still evolves, Human Brains Are Getting Larger, More Complex, Scientists Say and Human brains enjoy ongoing evolution.The Skype's the limit: this week the talk was about eBay buying Skype. Recently it has been about News Corp. buying Skype or Yahoo! buying Skype, or Microsoft, or Taco Bell... Is VoIP pioneer Skype really worth the $5 billion being bandied about? Businessweek explains Why Skype Can Play Hard to Get.Blizzard mea culpa?: regarding last week's "don't you dare reverse-engineer", after winning a DMCA-based lawsuit, Blizzard now appears to be effectively admitting that their servers are lame (Blizzard to compensate players for World of Warcraft problems) which is what led to the circumvention in the first place. Wikipedia: the Free Encyclopedia to define buzzwords in Technobriefs (like, for example: Wikipedia, the encyclopedia's article about itself). Reuters ran a feature about the Wikipedia phenomena: News junkies find Wikipedia more than encyclopedia. Yahoo 'helped jail China writer' --- from EFF: The Customer Is Always Wrong: A User's Guide to DRM in Online Music --- A 'Weather Nerd' in Indiana Sent a Warning to the Mayor of New Orleans --- PocketMod: The Free Disposable Personal Organizer --- decoding FedEx door tags --- Cringely's new online show: NerdTV.
HumorBush/Katrina JokesNeal Vitale writes: Two great bits tonight (The Daily Show, September 6)
Lie ClocksA man died and went to heaven. As he stood in front of St. Peter at the Pearly Gates, he saw a huge wall of clocks behind him. He asked, "What are all those clocks?" St. Peter answered, "Those are Lie-Clocks. Everyone on Earth has a Lie-Clock. Every time you lie the hands on your clock will move." "Oh," said the man, "whose clock is that?" "That's Mother Teresa's. The hands have never moved, indicating that she never told a lie." "Incredible," said the man. "And whose clock is that one?" St. Peter responded, "That's Abraham Lincoln's clock. The hands have moved twice, telling us that Abe told only two lies in his entire life." "Where's Bush's clock?" asked the man. "Bush's clock is in Jesus' office. He's using it as a ceiling fan."
MoviesNoneApparently, it is either feast or famine in this department... LettersTo live and ride in LA, A tale from the South, Keillor Column, Dan Grobstein FileGarrison Keillor is good and getting better as a newspaper columnist. Neal Vitale's daughter rides here. He's not so sure it's a status symbol thing.
To Live and Ride in L.A. By MIREYA NAVARRO In the land of freeways, a thoroughbred in the yard feeds into the myth of Western freedom and is a status symbol. A friend in the travel business forwarded this from an organization called Vacations to Go. It tells what is happening in Houston, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The governor of Texas and the mayor of Houston have opened the Astrodome to evacuees from Louisiana. The enormous ground level of the Astrodome has already filled to absolute capacity with thousands of small cots, and every one is taken... For the safety of the untold thousands already here, the fire marshal has closed the Astrodome to new arrivals, but the evacuation is chaotic, and the buses just keep coming... We load tables and supplies into two trucks and walk from the Astrodome to Reliant Arena, where we pass an impromptu medical "clinic" filled with sick and injured evacuees and bleary-eyed doctors, nurses, paramedics and police officers. Within an hour we are ready to serve and the doors are opened. As evacuees enter the building, their identities are recorded, and they proceed immediately to our three serving lines for their first hot meal in days: two waffles, two sausage patties, one pat of butter, one serving of syrup, one box of juice and one big spoonful of grits... [He compliments the food service firm Aramak for good management and not running out of food] I will not soon forget the faces of the people as they came through the line. Many were dazed or grieving, and some still wore the clothes they had on when Katrina struck. Some wore bandages and struggled to hold their plates steady. Others tried to smile, and made a point of expressing their gratitude and shaking our hands in the midst of having lost everything... The Deep South is in trouble, and the need is as wide and as deep as the Mississippi. Dan Grobstein File
New York Times
Op-Ed Columnist: Osama and Katrina By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN If President Bush goes back to his politics as usual, Katrina will have destroyed a city and a presidency. Editorial: Bring Out Your Pork The need of the victims of Hurricane Katrina should inspire members of Congress to become something approaching responsible policy makers. The Come-ons: After the Storm, the Swindlers By TOM ZELLER Jr. Even as millions rally to make donations to the victims of Hurricane Katrina, the Internet is brimming with swindles and come-ons related to the relief effort. The Former First Lady: Barbara Bush Calls Evacuees Better Off By THE NEW YORK TIMES President Bush's mother said that many of the poor people she had seen while touring a Houston relocation site were faring better than before the storm hit. Security Company Closes Baghdad Airport Over Pay By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. The private security company that guards Baghdad International Airport shut down the airport on Friday, saying that it had not been paid for the past six months. Op-Ed Columnist: Neigh to Cronies By MAUREEN DOWD The cronies on the Homeland Security payroll.
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