This may be my last post until January 1st. I've been thinking about it, and I believe I want to take things in a new direction here. I want the blog to have one theme---and not politics. I'm too burnt out and cynical to much care about who sits in the White House right now; maybe I'll care again after a year or so.
If I can't come up with something of interest between now and January, I'm not sure what will happen.
Since the first cruise missile hit a target in Iraq in late 2001, American and European media outlets have been critical of every facet of the War on Terror. Evidently, the search for facts has been perverted into a search for controversy or for items that can be used in "gotcha" moments.
But take heart: this is nothing new. While researching an upcoming episode of the podcast, I came upon this little gem:
Never has American prestige in Europe been lower. People never tire of telling you of the ignorance and rowdy-ism of American troops, of out misunderstanding of European conditions. They say that the theft and sale of Army supplies by our troops is the basis of their black market. They blame us for the corruption and disorganization of UNRRA. They blame us for the fumbling timidity of our negotiations with the Soviet Union. They tell us that our mechanical de-nazification policy in Germany is producing results opposite to those we planned. “Have you no statesmen in America?” they ask.
This was written in January, 1946, barely eight months after the end of the war in Europe. It seems those who root for the worst outcome for this nation have been around for a long, long time.
Four Pleasure Ridge Park High School students are dead, killed in a car crash. Two of the dead were twins; the third was their younger brother and the fourth was a friend. There was a fifth teen driving---he survived and has been charged with four counts of murder. The car in which they rode had been stolen by the driver.
I did a large number of incredibly stupid things in high school and after. The fact that my mother prays the Rosary every morning is probably the only thing that saved me from an early grave. Later on, mom had help since my best friend Peter's mom was praying for us all the time. Maybe it was just dumb luck the I lived. Either way, I could easily have ended up dead on the side of the road, a short life lived fast. Many of you could tell the same story.
The Lovely Kelli teaches high school English/Literature, so she is around teenagers all day. Although our culture has changed, the kids really haven't. They still think they're invincible and more knowledgeable than any idiot adult. Even though it probably wouldn't help, I would love to sit these kids down and tell them only three things:
-A good education will make your life easier. Yes, high school dropouts become millionaires, but the road is much, much harder and for every undereducated genius, there are a thousand bitter men and women working for eight bucks an hour.
-You can die. Believe it.
-Sex can wait. This is a hard one for hormone-raging teens, but I don't think anyone looks back and thinks he should have started having sex earlier. You will probably have a spouse one day, so think about explaining yourself to her one day. If it seems embarrassing, you shouldn't be doing it.
I'm not the first person to come up with these points. That doesn't mean we don't need to beat them over the head with common sense.
Much has been made in the last 24 hours of the journalist who threw one of his loafers at President Bush. This morning on NPR, the breathless, politically-correct, too-gentle-for-anger, socialist commentator made me aware of the fact that throwing a shoe at someone is considered deeply disrespectful by Iraqis, as if to let us know how much more we should think of the ass clown doing the throwing. The "arab street" is cheering, but no one should be surprised---these are some of the same worthless ingrates who cheered 9/11.
Our cherished domestic blogosphere found the entire event funny and President Bush deserving. I should write off Daily Kos posters and the fever swamp leftists who have hated Bush since before September 11, 2001, but the hate they exhibit towards the President is obsessive, so much so that it has become a religion of sorts.
While there are many things with which I disagree with President, it's worthwhile to remember what he has done:
1. Freed 40 to 50 million human beings. If the shoe thrower had thrown a shoe at Saddam Hussein, he would be hanging on a meat hook right now, waiting to be strangled with piano wire. 100,000 Iraqis per YEAR disappeared each year of Hussein's rule. Compare that to civilian deaths since 2003.
2. Spent more on treating AIDS in Africa than any President, ever.
3. Prevented another terrorist attack after 9/11. No, you've never heard about them and you never will. You and I live under a blanket of safety because terrible things are done in our name. Trust me, people have been tortured, maimed and killed to make sure your kids didn't die from some horrible biological or nuclear weapon. It's a harsh reality, but a fact: there are millions of people out there who want to kill YOU because you are an American, a Jew, a Christian or a moderate Muslim. President Bush helped to keep you safe.
So even if you didn't vote for President Bush and you despise him, keep some perspective, just like I will with President Obama. I will pray for him daily and wish the best for him, his family and for our nation. What other real choice is there? Be like the pricks at Daily Kos? No way.
The UAW is attacking southern Senators who voted against the auto bailout. I agree with the Senators when they attribute some of the Big Three's troubles on bloated union guarantees and increasingly expensive contract demands. As per usual, the UAW is acting as if automakers want their employees to work for slave wages.
Let's face an unpopular truth: if you are making over $20 an hour to work on an assembly line, you are overpaid. It is not a trade or hard-to-learn skill, but a repetitive motion that a machine could do. Sorry, but that's the reality of it. Yes, autoworkers should receive a fair wage, but the UAW has blown wages so far out of proportion that most workers make more than people with actual marketable skills.
No politician will say what I just wrote. But until wage and benefits costs are brought under control, the Big Three will always be on the edge of a financial abyss.
Showtime is developing a reality show based on people revealing their homosexuality to a group of people, presumably friends and/or family. I'm surprised this hasn't been tried before, but given a long enough time line I'm sure every conceivable situation will be placed on video for our enjoyment.
I'm not gay, and I am only speaking for myself when I give my opinion on this subject. I have believed for a long time that almost everyone who is homosexual was born that way; there are exceptions, but I believe they are rare. The percentage of homosexuals in the United States is probably about 10%, although there is no way to know this with any certainty. Using the 10% figure, around 30 million Americans are homosexuals. That's a lot of people, but a small minority of the population. Yet, gay culture seems to enter into almost every part of our lives now.
There are several reasons for this, the biggest being the fact that there are a disproportionate number of homosexuals living in New York and Los Angeles, where most ads, television shows and movies are produced. To the average person living in Southern California, a gay man is a common sight. In rural Idaho, you could live your life and never seen anyone living an openly homosexual life. Whether this is good for our society or not is a debate for another day.
If I were gay, shows like the one Showtime is developing and others such as "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" would offend me. Why? First, because most gay men on television and in movies are portrayed as being obviously gay, often flamboyant and what I like to call "flimsy". Second, most gay characters (or real gay people) are often on the show because they are gay and for no other reason. In other words, most homosexuality in movies and on TV is just another form of finger-pointing----look at the gay man, isn't he funny?
If homosexuals in our society really want to foster acceptance, they need to tell their brethren on both coasts to cut out the exhibitionism. We get it.
Liberals (or, ummm, progressives, as they like to call themselves) are already angry over President-elect Obama's selections for his cabinet. While I consider almost all the people he's chosen to be liberals, they evidently are not far enough to the left to suit the Chomskyites in the party of the donkey.
Leftists remind me of Palestinians, eager to have their own nation but incapable of running it once they achieve their goal. Liberals are great at the easy things: name-calling, cynicism, and generally throwing rocks at those in power. However, they know little about how to govern. Maybe, just maybe, Obama knows that. At least I hope he does.
A friend of ours was in town this weekend to oversee the estate sale at his deceased mother's house. I spent Saturday at the house, helping to move, carry and label items as needed. I had a lot of time to look at the old stuff.
I spent many hours in the house during my younger years. We sneaked out of the bedroom windows many times, raced across the front yard to my blue Datsun B210, pushed it down the street and then started it while it coasted. Looking at the windows now, I don't understand how I was able to fit out of such a small opening.
One of the back bedrooms was the place where my friend and I first talked about model rockets, something that was an obsession with us for two years or so. We had never seen a model rocket launch and we envisioned some small version of a Saturn V launch, with the rocket rising slowly from the pad. The reality was much different: the rocket took off almost faster than our eyes could register the launch. But it was still spectacular.
On the New Year's Eve after my friend's father died, we spent the night with his mother, looking at family photos and watching 16mm films. It was not a sad time. It was a celebration of sorts, a recognition of a lived well-lived that ended too soon.
The house will now be sold and it will one day be home to strangers. This is the way of things, but I realize it is a future we must all face. There is a lesson here: be careful what you leave behind---all facets will be analyzed.
O.J. Simpson has been sentenced to 15 years in prison in Nevada on 12 counts of theft, kidnapping and a host of other crimes. Simpson apologized for his crimes, stating that he didn't mean to steal from anyone despite the fact that he and a group of friends raided a hotel room to steal memoribilia that Simpson claimed was taken from him. Big mistake.
I know this trial was not supposed to be about the double murder O.J. committed in 1994 (and if you don't think he killed Ron Goldman and his ex-wife, you need your head examined), but I am very happy he is going away, finally, for his crimes. I had hoped that he would receive a 25-year sentence, almost ensuring that he would die in prison. But I'll take 15. I also thank God that he did not commit this crime in Los Angeles, where he surely would have been let off the hook again.
It sort of makes me believe in cosmic justice again.
This Thursday will mark the 17th anniversary of the last flight of a Pan-Am Airlines aircraft. The name 'Pan-Am' has been sold and re-sold several times since then, but the real Pan-Am has been out of our lives for almost two full decades. I am working on a podcast episode about this, which is how the anniversary came to my attention in the first place.
Pan-Am was the only American airline to fly international routes for nearly a generation. To many people living in the Pacific, Asia, Africa and South America, a Pan-Am Clipper flying boat was a real, living connection to the United States. The top management at Pan-Am knew how important their role in representing this nation was, and they made sure their pilots and crews were world-class professionals.
Pan-Am was not the only American company that represented the dream to people who knew nothing about this country. General Motors and General Electric also served as physical manifestations of capitalism and democracy in many nations. They were enormous companies delivering world-class products that were on the cutting-edge of technology.
Our image of corporate America has changed drastically in the last sixty years. It's a two-way street: we are more cynical and demanding while most large corporations have become nation-less industries with zero loyalty towards anything other than an obscene profit. Those of us who consider ourselves to be on the right-hand side of the aisle believe we have to defend big business from those who would tax the very concept of profit out of existence, and this is something we must continue to do. But we are well beyond the days when our big corporations were a reflection of American society. Once again, we are poorer for that, and not just financially.