I've always liked this day. First, my brother's birthday--and believe me, he's had a lot of them to remind me. Second, a signal to the start of summer. Some even contend May 31 is the true birthday for baseball, since the Philadelphia Athletics were formally founded on this date in 1859 to play a game then called 'town ball'--20 years before Abner Doubleday 'invented' the game. Personally, I can't comment one way or the other. But you could ask my brother--I think he was there.
At any rate, May 31 should also have a special meaning this year. It may even be an historic watershed. Because on May 31, 2007, two seemingly incompatible events did, indeed, occur. Word came from the Associated Press that in the first quarter of the year, our economy almost tanked. In the sense that economic growth, as such, was reported at an almost-invisible 0.6 percent in the United States. Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan says there's a one-in-three chance that we'll actually slide into a recession this year. This is not good.
And on this same morning, the New York Stock Exchange, the Grand Arbiter of all things economic, opened at the highest point in its history.
Think about that--we're about to go under, and everyone is partying on the top deck. Welcome to the Titanic Economy.
Do you think that maybe--just maybe--we've reached the point where the wealthy may have taken a piece of the pie too big for even their swollen jowls?
diderot
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Vive la France
In his book, Paris in the 50's, former Time magazine correspondent Stanley Karnow describes the status of an intellectual class,
"...venerated as authorities on everything from art, literature and music to politics, economics, religion and complex social issues. Their Olympian status mirrored the respect long shared by the French for the power of ideas and for the elite caste that shaped and spread them. Their books and essays...triggered squabbles that, judging from the endless reports in the newspapers, enthralled the public."
Contrast that with a recent column in Fortune magazine:
"...are some American parents actually hostile to education? In my travels I'm seeing evidence that the answer is yes. I was talking some time ago with a group of school superintendents from Maryland. The dominant mood was frustration--a sense that they weren't making the progress with our kids that they wanted. A few...surprised me by saying they had received complaints from parents who were angry because their kids were being made to learn algebra: 'What do they need algebra for? It's hard!' A middle-school vice principal...in Nebraska...reported the same thing: parents angry over kids having to learn algebra. Until recent years you wouldn't...complain to school administrators that your kids were getting too much education. Now parents evidently feel it's safe to do so."
Granted, the comparison is made across an ocean, a cultural divide, and half a century, but I wonder if we Americans will ever come to grips with a cancerous fault on our body politic--the mistrust and (increasingly) outright hostility to fact-based knowledge. Ours is a culture in which what is believed is gaining significant market share over what is known. Ours is a faith-based intelligence.
A very small but telling example is the case of Monica Goodling, an underling at the Justice Department who admitted this week in her Congressional testimony that she 'stepped over the line' in applying tests of political fidelity to the Republican party in judging the merits of what were, by law, supposed to be apolitical civil service appointments. Not included in her testimony, but reported earlier by one of her superiors, was her tearful, near hysterical private reaction upon discovering she would be called on the carpet: "All I ever wanted to do was serve this President!" As if that were a defense. In her mind, apparently honoring what you truly believe trumps what is legally mandated. And this person is a lawyer.
For at least a generation, we have heard the disapprobations: "elitist snobs", "pointy-headed liberals", or for that matter, just plain "liberals". These are people to be mistrusted; they are out of touch; they flaunt their intelligence--their facts. Their ideas are dangerous. Fear them. Fight them.
In truth, speaking of those Paris intellectuals of the 50's, a good case can be made that for all their learning and pretense, they were sometimes not just out of touch, but in fact, wrong. Many of them were so blinded by their fervor for the tenets of the Communist Manifesto that they refused to accept the savagery of Stalin--until they were forced to confront the facts. They were not omnipotent.
But that's not the point. The enduring vision is of a French society where intelligence was and is honored, challenged, debated and observed, all as a matter of course. Opinions matter--but facts do more. Thinking is an assumed part of existence.
Compare that to this place where America has come...where facts are denied...where allegiance to one dogma is the sole path to both power and salvation. In so doing, we can only ponder our nation in terms of the French during World War II.
Do we see ourselves in the role of their valiant patriots, who formed a Resistance to a cult-based occupier?
Or are we to become more like the occupier itself?
-diderot
"...venerated as authorities on everything from art, literature and music to politics, economics, religion and complex social issues. Their Olympian status mirrored the respect long shared by the French for the power of ideas and for the elite caste that shaped and spread them. Their books and essays...triggered squabbles that, judging from the endless reports in the newspapers, enthralled the public."
Contrast that with a recent column in Fortune magazine:
"...are some American parents actually hostile to education? In my travels I'm seeing evidence that the answer is yes. I was talking some time ago with a group of school superintendents from Maryland. The dominant mood was frustration--a sense that they weren't making the progress with our kids that they wanted. A few...surprised me by saying they had received complaints from parents who were angry because their kids were being made to learn algebra: 'What do they need algebra for? It's hard!' A middle-school vice principal...in Nebraska...reported the same thing: parents angry over kids having to learn algebra. Until recent years you wouldn't...complain to school administrators that your kids were getting too much education. Now parents evidently feel it's safe to do so."
Granted, the comparison is made across an ocean, a cultural divide, and half a century, but I wonder if we Americans will ever come to grips with a cancerous fault on our body politic--the mistrust and (increasingly) outright hostility to fact-based knowledge. Ours is a culture in which what is believed is gaining significant market share over what is known. Ours is a faith-based intelligence.
A very small but telling example is the case of Monica Goodling, an underling at the Justice Department who admitted this week in her Congressional testimony that she 'stepped over the line' in applying tests of political fidelity to the Republican party in judging the merits of what were, by law, supposed to be apolitical civil service appointments. Not included in her testimony, but reported earlier by one of her superiors, was her tearful, near hysterical private reaction upon discovering she would be called on the carpet: "All I ever wanted to do was serve this President!" As if that were a defense. In her mind, apparently honoring what you truly believe trumps what is legally mandated. And this person is a lawyer.
For at least a generation, we have heard the disapprobations: "elitist snobs", "pointy-headed liberals", or for that matter, just plain "liberals". These are people to be mistrusted; they are out of touch; they flaunt their intelligence--their facts. Their ideas are dangerous. Fear them. Fight them.
In truth, speaking of those Paris intellectuals of the 50's, a good case can be made that for all their learning and pretense, they were sometimes not just out of touch, but in fact, wrong. Many of them were so blinded by their fervor for the tenets of the Communist Manifesto that they refused to accept the savagery of Stalin--until they were forced to confront the facts. They were not omnipotent.
But that's not the point. The enduring vision is of a French society where intelligence was and is honored, challenged, debated and observed, all as a matter of course. Opinions matter--but facts do more. Thinking is an assumed part of existence.
Compare that to this place where America has come...where facts are denied...where allegiance to one dogma is the sole path to both power and salvation. In so doing, we can only ponder our nation in terms of the French during World War II.
Do we see ourselves in the role of their valiant patriots, who formed a Resistance to a cult-based occupier?
Or are we to become more like the occupier itself?
-diderot
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Dads
I've never really figured out exactly how I feel about Joe Morgan, the Hall of Fame second baseman and now national ESPN announcer. But I do feel he is has hit on something fundamental in this quote:
"I hear a lot of people talk about their Dads being their best friends. In fact just the other day I heard Tiger Woods in an interview talking about his Dad being his best friend. Well, my Dad wasn't my best friend. He was my Dad. My Dad taught me responsibility and he taught me how to be a man. My friends are my friends, and my Dad was my Dad. I understand that a lot of people think that way about their father, but I never did. He had a responsibility to me and I had one to him, and I don't always find that with friendships. I always had the belief that he was above my friends. And he was."
diderot
"I hear a lot of people talk about their Dads being their best friends. In fact just the other day I heard Tiger Woods in an interview talking about his Dad being his best friend. Well, my Dad wasn't my best friend. He was my Dad. My Dad taught me responsibility and he taught me how to be a man. My friends are my friends, and my Dad was my Dad. I understand that a lot of people think that way about their father, but I never did. He had a responsibility to me and I had one to him, and I don't always find that with friendships. I always had the belief that he was above my friends. And he was."
diderot
Overwhelming...
Sometimes the tentacles of audacity, stupidity, manipulation and sheer criminality of Bush Inc. are simply too much to comprehend at one time. Like the giant octopus of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, it comes from every direction and devours everything in its wake.
It seems beyond the imagination of even a Jules Verne that all of these things could be exposing themselves at the same time:
diderot
It seems beyond the imagination of even a Jules Verne that all of these things could be exposing themselves at the same time:
- James Comey, a former deputy to Alberto Gonzalez, testifies that he had to personally intervene in 2004 to prevent Gonzalez and Chief of Staff Andrew Card from coercing a sickbed signature from Gonzalez' predecessor, John Ashcroft. Ashcroft had been in intensive care for several days in a D.C. hospital when someone at the White House dispatched Card and then White House counsel Gonzalez to force him to sign off on continuation of the domestic wiretapping program. Ashcroft, then F.B.I. director Robert Mueller and Comey all threatened to quit if Gonzalez and Card didn't back off. They did, but Bush intervened by ruling that the program could continue even without the consent of his own Attorney General
- Last week, Gonzalez was subpoenaed and ordered by Congress to turn over emails pertaining to any role Karl Rove might have had in the U.S. attorney firings. The deadline was yesterday. Not only did Gonzalez not deliver the goods, he didn't even bother offering an explanation, or responding in any way. The nation's top law enforcement official does not obey the law
- An investigation by the World Bank itself concludes that Paul Wolfowitz, "...did not accept the bank's policy on conflict of interest, so he sought to negotiate for himself a resolution different from that which would be applied to the staff he was selected to head."
- As has been the custom, Bush has chosen a senior lobbyist for the National Association of Manufacturers to lead the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which is responsible for monitoring the deeds of people like the National Association of Manufacturers. As a going away present, the Association gave him a $150,000 bonus. The lobbyist explains that even though ethics guidelines would prevent him from ruling on matters concerning the association itself for two years, it doesn't mean he'll stop involvement with issues pertaining to individual members of the association, or even similar trade groups involving the same companies
- Two years ago, when she was 31, Monica Goodling was given responsibility for screening potential U.S. attorneys. Her requirements consisted of a law degree from Pat Robertson's Regents University (somewhat worse than a mail order medical diploma). In her role, she asked candidates deep legal questions like, "who is your favorite President?", and "have you ever cheated on your spouse?" She kicked out anyone suspected of being a Democrat
- As described in the book Imperial Life in the Emerald City, "...Americans recruited to work for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad were chosen, at times, for their loyalty toward Republicanism rather than expertise on Islamism. The coalition government relied heavily on...a large cadre of eager young neophytes whose brashness often gave offense in a very age- and status-conscious society. One young political appointee (a 24-year-old Ivy League graduate) argued that Iraq should not enshrine judicial review in its constitution because it might lead to the legalization of abortion."
diderot
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Jerry Falwell
Would love to listen in on the conversation at the pearly gates. I wonder what Falwell is saying in response to the question of how his actions really spread the word and deed of his maker here on Earth.
diderot
diderot
Monday, May 14, 2007
Objectivity
Many years ago I was a guest lecturer at a prestigious journalistic think tank in Florida. On one occasion, they invited me to come and share my thoughts on reporting.
I stood up and delivered a lengthy monologue entitled, "The End of Objectivity", or something to that effect. Of course, the title itself set teeth to grinding. After all, if there were a Holy Grail to the reporter's quest, it is the elusive 'objectivity'.
I made two observations. First, even in those pre-Fox News, pre-Limbaugh, pre-Internet days, it was already evident that there was money to be made in partisanship, and thus it was inevitable that media owners would move to that money.
But more important was my attempt to try to draw the distinction between the terms 'objectivity' and 'balance'. Having run newsrooms, I knew the temptation to conflate the two.
Here's a hypothetical example, but one that happened every day. A reporter is sent out to do the classic time or space-filler known then as 'man on the street'. In other words, walk up to random citizens and ask their opinion on a certain hot issue, and record their answers with either your notepad or microphone.
Back then, a typical topic may have been the Equal Rights Amendment for women. Now, as a reporter, you obviously have no control over what people will say. And maybe that day, for whatever reason, 80% of the people you interviewed opposed the Amendment. But you know that if you proportion your story in the paper or on the newscast that way, you're going to be accused of being biased--or, not objective.
So what you put on your newscast are three respondents supporting, and three opposing. Nice, neat, safe, and by definition balanced...but it is not a reflection of the survey you conducted that day, no matter how unscientific it may have been. It does not reflect the objective truth of what happened that day.
The essence of objectivity in journalism is to try to ferret out the truth--not to make people happy or unhappy with your approach. But that's not how it was practiced then--or is now. A classic example is how the mainstream media feels like it has to 'balance' all the 'bad' coverage of the Bush Administration by also showing their 'objectivity' in reporting charges that malign his critics, no matter what the underlying truth of those charges might be.
In fact, the evidence of this misplaced objectivity is still evident every day.
And to finish the story of my enlightening lecture to those reporters those many years ago: I was never invited back.
diderot
I stood up and delivered a lengthy monologue entitled, "The End of Objectivity", or something to that effect. Of course, the title itself set teeth to grinding. After all, if there were a Holy Grail to the reporter's quest, it is the elusive 'objectivity'.
I made two observations. First, even in those pre-Fox News, pre-Limbaugh, pre-Internet days, it was already evident that there was money to be made in partisanship, and thus it was inevitable that media owners would move to that money.
But more important was my attempt to try to draw the distinction between the terms 'objectivity' and 'balance'. Having run newsrooms, I knew the temptation to conflate the two.
Here's a hypothetical example, but one that happened every day. A reporter is sent out to do the classic time or space-filler known then as 'man on the street'. In other words, walk up to random citizens and ask their opinion on a certain hot issue, and record their answers with either your notepad or microphone.
Back then, a typical topic may have been the Equal Rights Amendment for women. Now, as a reporter, you obviously have no control over what people will say. And maybe that day, for whatever reason, 80% of the people you interviewed opposed the Amendment. But you know that if you proportion your story in the paper or on the newscast that way, you're going to be accused of being biased--or, not objective.
So what you put on your newscast are three respondents supporting, and three opposing. Nice, neat, safe, and by definition balanced...but it is not a reflection of the survey you conducted that day, no matter how unscientific it may have been. It does not reflect the objective truth of what happened that day.
The essence of objectivity in journalism is to try to ferret out the truth--not to make people happy or unhappy with your approach. But that's not how it was practiced then--or is now. A classic example is how the mainstream media feels like it has to 'balance' all the 'bad' coverage of the Bush Administration by also showing their 'objectivity' in reporting charges that malign his critics, no matter what the underlying truth of those charges might be.
In fact, the evidence of this misplaced objectivity is still evident every day.
And to finish the story of my enlightening lecture to those reporters those many years ago: I was never invited back.
diderot
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Earth Friendly
Do you want to do your part to fight global warming, and protect the earth? If you're like me, aside from those squiggly light bulbs, it's hard to know exactly where to start.
Someone on the radio the other day had an interesting breakdown. Most Americans consume half of their energy to heat and cool their dwellings. A quarter goes to transportation--everything from filling up the Hummer to that weekend flight to Reno. And the final quarter goes to everything else--from the morning expresso machine to the squiggly light bulbs.
Cut down accordingly.
There, wasn't that easy?
diderot
Someone on the radio the other day had an interesting breakdown. Most Americans consume half of their energy to heat and cool their dwellings. A quarter goes to transportation--everything from filling up the Hummer to that weekend flight to Reno. And the final quarter goes to everything else--from the morning expresso machine to the squiggly light bulbs.
Cut down accordingly.
There, wasn't that easy?
diderot
How Left Is Left?
You know, it's virtually impossible these days to state any coherent definition of 'liberal' and 'conservative'. Why is that? Subject of another post someday.
But here's a test to tell where you might actually stand along the political landscapee.
If you think this is distinctly 'leftist', you're a conservative.
If you agree with it, you're a moderate.
diderot
But here's a test to tell where you might actually stand along the political landscapee.
If you think this is distinctly 'leftist', you're a conservative.
If you agree with it, you're a moderate.
diderot
Mudville
For months, there has been a blight on the grand game of baseball. No, not steroids. No, not the injuries. And not even that evil incarnate (at least to NFL fans), Bud Selig.
The pox has been Barry Bonds. Now, you may love him or you may hate him, but I just can't stand the idea that he sucks so much attention from what is otherwise the world's best sport. The media that doesn't understand baseball can only talk about Bonds. It's something you can do without any knowledge at all...like commenting on politics for the Fox News Channel.
But today, things got even worse. Roger Clemens is back. That ideal of American sports...the guy who won't agree to go to spring training...won't agree to play with any team until he's ready...won't even travel with his teammates on the road unless he's pitching. He's too important.
Now, Bonds may or may not be a cheater. I vote for cheater.
Clemens may or may not be mentally ill (remember the broken bat javelin throw at Mike Piazza?) But even if he's not clinically nuts, he is the poster child of the truly broken foundation of our society. Clemens is the self appointed Pope of the Unified American Church of It's All About Me.
If baseball can withstand the nauseating coverage of these two morons, I assume it can survive anything.
But there is no joy in Mudville.
diderot
The pox has been Barry Bonds. Now, you may love him or you may hate him, but I just can't stand the idea that he sucks so much attention from what is otherwise the world's best sport. The media that doesn't understand baseball can only talk about Bonds. It's something you can do without any knowledge at all...like commenting on politics for the Fox News Channel.
But today, things got even worse. Roger Clemens is back. That ideal of American sports...the guy who won't agree to go to spring training...won't agree to play with any team until he's ready...won't even travel with his teammates on the road unless he's pitching. He's too important.
Now, Bonds may or may not be a cheater. I vote for cheater.
Clemens may or may not be mentally ill (remember the broken bat javelin throw at Mike Piazza?) But even if he's not clinically nuts, he is the poster child of the truly broken foundation of our society. Clemens is the self appointed Pope of the Unified American Church of It's All About Me.
If baseball can withstand the nauseating coverage of these two morons, I assume it can survive anything.
But there is no joy in Mudville.
diderot
Friday, May 4, 2007
Those GOP Debaters, Part 3
I'm not a big fan of the Democratic consultant Donna Brazille. Way to inside the Beltway (and Beltway conventional wisdom--plus, she shouldn't have caved in for Gore in Florida in 2000). Anyway, she did have a great comment on the Republican debaters: "they decided they're not out to succeed Bush--they're out to succeed Reagan."
The genuflections to St. Ronnie truly were nauseous.
diderot
The genuflections to St. Ronnie truly were nauseous.
diderot
Those GOP Debaters, Part 2
I didn't watch the whole debate last night, but I did see the section where Matthews asked the candidates their thoughts on the prospect of having Bill Clinton living in the White House again. They all laughed.
Nothing could demonstrate how out of touch these clowns are with the American electorate. Perhaps their pollsters didn't have the nerve to inform their candidates of Clinton's incredible lingering popularity among voters. If he could run again, he'd win in a landslide.
Come November of next year, the joke will be on them.
diderot
Nothing could demonstrate how out of touch these clowns are with the American electorate. Perhaps their pollsters didn't have the nerve to inform their candidates of Clinton's incredible lingering popularity among voters. If he could run again, he'd win in a landslide.
Come November of next year, the joke will be on them.
diderot
Those GOP Debaters, Part 1
This sounds like a nasty diatribe, but seriously, they're honest questions.
I coach a soccer team with four girls from Mormon families. Great kids, great players. But when we have games on Sundays, they can't play, because that's a day for family only (and other Mormons).
OK, so if Mitt Romney gets elected, what happens on Sunday? Is he only President of the Mormons? Does he take every Sunday off, no matter who attacks us?
And if not, why not? Where is the line drawn? How does that faith decide who gets to associate with the outside world on Sundays, and who doesn't?
diderot
I coach a soccer team with four girls from Mormon families. Great kids, great players. But when we have games on Sundays, they can't play, because that's a day for family only (and other Mormons).
OK, so if Mitt Romney gets elected, what happens on Sunday? Is he only President of the Mormons? Does he take every Sunday off, no matter who attacks us?
And if not, why not? Where is the line drawn? How does that faith decide who gets to associate with the outside world on Sundays, and who doesn't?
diderot
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