Bloated Idiots

In the Dashiell Hammet classic The Maltese Falcon, Casper Gutman discovers that the black bird he has been chasing for nearly two decades is nothing more than a crude fake.

Joel Cairo, unable to contain his disappointment cries:

"You imbecile. You bloated idiot. You and your stupid attempts to buy it!"

Yes. Yes. Crude attempts at gaining what you covet intensely very often result in disappointment. Today, the devotees of Daily Kos and Democratic Underground are consumed by two separate and conflicting desires.

The first is retribution.

George W. Bush trashed our Constitution, lied us into war and authorized an illegal and useless torture program for no other reason than, well, he's bad guy--a stupid guy--who did dumb things and enjoyed inflicting pain.

Today's rabble won't be satisfied until the former president is burned at the stake, paraded to the guillotine in an oxcart or left in a cell with a pistol and a cyanide capsule.

Through all of this, our esteemed Speaker, Lady Robespierre, has been playing a very perilous game, i.e. fanning the flames of wingnut revenge just enough to keep the embers glowing but not so much that they singe her pubic hairs.

It has been a delicate and dangerous dance indeed and she has proven not to be particularly adept at this version of the two-step.

To hear our current national leadership speak, you would think that they had spent the last eight years in a sensory-deprivation chamber.

Silly me, I thought that members of the Intelligence Committee attended briefings on intelligence.

It seems they were as attentive as were members of the Banking Committee and the Financial Services Committee, or so they say.

Funny thing, though, about the goings on in government.

The people who run these fandangos like to keep very detailed records and they keep them for a very long time.

This is a common trait among bureaucrats.

Records of the Nazi Holocaust list names, dates and precise hours of the day for every atrocity they committed in pursuit of a more perfect world. But I digress. Written, contemporaneous accounts of each and every briefing indicate that unless our leaders in Washington were all suffering from somnambulism, they had to have some knowledge of enhanced interrogation methods.

In fact, records indicate that when informed of the details of waterboarding, the Speaker-to-Be asked:

"Are you sure that's enough?"

So now Pelosi, Murtha, et.al. are being waterboarded by their own words and they don't like it one little bit.

To add to the irony, Frau Facelift's former patron and mentor, current CIA Director Leon Panetta, issued a scathing memo excoriating those who would cast doubt upon his department and its brave men and women.

Et tu, Leon.

So if Curious George deserves the guillotine, doesn't Nancy at least merit a little nip and tuck with a chain saw?

Which brings us to that other all-consuming craving of the left, i.e. implementing every hare-brained scheme cooked up by Ivy League eggheads and Saul Alinksy acolytes over the last fifty years.

Alas, the distraction of "What Did Nancy Know and When Did She Know It" threatens to divert political energy from more important Democratic Party objectives, such as eroding our freedoms, confiscating our wealth and dismantling free enterprise.

It won't be long now. As their dreams of a Euro-socialist Utopia quickly fade the witless parasites, misfits, and malcontents of the left will soon turn on their own heroes, screaming...

You imbeciles. You bloated idiots!

Migliore fortuna la volta prossima.

Intellectual Misuserisms

During a conversation on politics with an old friend I offered the hope that all his faith in our new president:

"Ain't been in vain fer nuthin'."

With that he reared up and replied to my comment by saying:

"You always ridicule with clever solipsisms."

Far be it from me to be solipsistic, so I pointed out that he probably meant solecism.

Mistake 1: Never quote Lina Lamont at a New York City cocktail party. They won't know what you're talking about.

Mistake 2: Never attempt to correct the tortured misuse of the English language by New York intellectuals who pride themselves on their rhetorical skills. Especially New York intellectuals who took such great glee in equating our former president's acyrologia-laden speech with a simian level of intelligence.

Far be it from me to defend George W. Bush's tortured misuse of English. I confess that I still hold the bigoted view that fuzzy syntax indicates fuzzy thinking.

Then, just last week, during an interview with Wolf Blitzer Senator Dianne Feinstein of San Francisco took a shot at political opponents who would rather keep suicide bombers locked up in Guantanamo instead of halfway houses in Ashtabula.

"And, so, this shibboleth, which is largely used by Republicans, to say, oh, the Democrats want terrorists in your -- in your neighborhood, in your community, that is a lot of baloney. That is not true. And that's the message that is being pushed, because it frightens people."

Far be it from me to to lecture Sen. Feinstein on the Old Testament.

Rather than shibboleth, meaning password in Hebrew, she could have used canard, or misrepresentation, or prevarication or even baloney--which she did use later in her statement. But no, shibboleth has that certain intellectual panache that fuzzy-headed liberals love so dearly.

Never mind that it's incorrect to the point of idiocy.

This week, our Commissar in Chief was asked about his preferences in movies. In addition to calling the White House "my house" he also told of his admiration for the old Star Trek series.

"It turns out we got this nice theater on the ground floor of my house … So Star Trek, we saw this weekend, which I thought was good.

I used to love Star Trek. You know, Star Trek was ahead of its time. There was a whole–the special effects weren’t real good, but the storylines were always evocative, you know, there was a little commentary and a little pop philosophy for a 10-year-old to absorb."

Far be it from me to remind Mr. Obama that he is living in the people's house.

But should I expect the leader of the free world to understand the difference between evocative and provocative? Apparently not. Actually, for a man who had visited all 57 states during his presidential campaign and is now making personnel decisions for the Fortune 500 what's a little misusery now and then.

There I go again. Another clever solipsism.

So now I have had my bigotry reaffirmed. Yes, I do believe that fuzzy usage is an indicator of fuzzy thinking, regardless of how seemingly well-spoken or articulate.

Before Their Time

In the hierarchy of human misfortune, nothing comes close to the tragedy of mothers and fathers attending the funerals of their children. As a Christian I understand that death is the beginning of eternal life in the presence of God, but as much as I try to reconcile faith and fact I still cannot accept a death that occurs out of sequential order. In the past few months I have listened to homilies delivered by sincere, loving and compassionate ministers of God, but still I ache--my heart has a void at its center.

Many years ago in Peru, we would observe the almost daily ritual of funeral processions with grieving fathers holding the tiny coffins of their infant children. And almost daily we would bow our heads and choke back a tear for babies we did not know and parents who should not have to go through this heart-wrenching ordeal. It's a distant land without modern services and they deserve better.

Almost two decades have past, but rarely does a week go by that I don't visualize those solemn processions.

Then a few weeks ago the word came: a young boy from our community who had been battling leukemia for several years finally lost his long fight.

A few days later, the teen-aged son of close friends was killed while engaging in a bizarre ritual that's become all the rage with kids these days.

And last week, the infant daughter of a friend--born prematurely--could not overcome the stresses of her birth. Forever I will retain the image of a young father holding the ashes of his infant daughter in his trembling hands.

During this period I also got word that my oldest friend had been killed in an accident caused by his own recklessness. He was not an infant or a teenager, but his mother and father still had to attend the funeral for their son and, for them, it was a tragedy.

The circumstances surrounding his death are unimportant. What happened was a reflection of the way he lived his life. He never gave the slightest thought for the consequences of his actions, either on himself or others. In his personal life he ran roughshod over the people who loved him. In his professional life he took advantage of our innate desire for deals that are too good to be true. As result, life savings were wiped out and lives were ruined. The victims were all strangers, of course, but it mattered little.

His death, caused by his own reckless disregard, was a final poke in the eye to the people who cared for him.

Four funerals. Eight grieving parents.

In the first three cases the tragedy involves lives cut short, aspirations unfulfilled and talents left untapped.

In the last instance the tragedy was not in how he died or even that he died. No, in this case the tragedy was in how he lived his life and the trail of wreckage he left in his wake.

Into the Fire

A business colleague once told me that rewriting your life story line by line and chapter by chapter is a futile exercise. "If you want a new life," she said, "you have to throw your old life into the fire."

It's not a new idea.

From the legend of the Phoenix to Götterdämmerung to 2001, A Space Odyssey destruction and renewal have been integral to human mythology.

Frustrated by incremental improvements followed by regression, those who seek perfection look to conflagration as the pathway to a better life and a better world. They're probably correct in their thinking.

Evolution takes time, effort and commitment. Destruction provides instant gratification.

On a macro level, we may be living through the final death scene of American freedom and democracy. In 1787 Scottish historian Alexander Tyler observed:

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government.

A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury.

From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship.

The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years,these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

From bondage to spiritual faith;
From spiritual faith to great courage;
From courage to liberty;
From liberty to abundance;
From abundance to complacency;
From complacency to apathy;
From apathy to dependence;
From dependence back into bondage."

Can anyone doubt that we Americans have learned how to vote ourselves goodies from the public treasury? More alarmingly, the evidence is clear that we are now in the apathy/dependence phase of the American death spiral.

On the personal level, the Émile Coué de Châtaigneraie mantra gives millions of adherents daily inspiration and a faint glimmer of hope that tomorrow may be better than yesterday.

In reality, when looking back at the illusion of getting better and better, few can claim that daily incremental improvements have resulted in dramatic lifetime transformations.

For most, every day and in every way we descend more deeply into conformity, boredom and despair.

Bejeebers, this is depressing, pessimistic even nihilist. No it isn't.

Every crossroad provides the pathway to a better more rewarding life.

As a nation, throwing our old ideas about governance and civic responsibility into the fire may lead to a better society if we choose the right path.

For me, eliminating negative influences, tearing off self-imposed shackles and pursuing a new life story--in effect, throwing my past life into the fire--can and will lead to a happier, more productive and far more rewarding life.

Today, I've resolved to begin the next phase of my of life with a renewed sense of enthusiasm and creative energy.

I'm also very confident that generations to come will create a better world out of the ashes of our collective selfishness and profligacy and that I will see that better world in my lifetime.

The Teamwork Trap

Where are the leaders when we need them?

Where is Teddy Roosevelt?

Where is Robert Moses?

Where is Lee Iacocca?

To our great misfortune they are long gone. Some dead, some retired but all long gone. Even Bob Lutz has had enough and announced his retirement from General Motors leaving the future of the American car industry to Harvard Business School imbeciles like Rick Wagoner.

When America's westward growth and emergence as a world power depended on a reliable seaway connecting the east coast with the west coast, Teddy Roosevelt went into action, unilaterally. Rather than let Congress debate the merits of the project he simply went ahead and built it.

"Should I let them debate this issue endlessly or go ahead with it and let them debate Teddy Roosevelt. They can debate me for the next four years and when they get tired of talking the canal will have already been built."

President Roosevelt didn't build consensus. He didn't appoint a commission. He didn't invite the leaders of the House and Senate into the Oval Office for tea or make speeches about bipartisan teamwork. He built the Panama Canal--under budget and ahead of schedule.

When Robert Moses received millions of federal dollars under the WPA he could have easily used it to pay off political cronies.

After all, that's what the power brokers from other states did with the money. Instead, Moses built a state parks system that still endures, providing recreational opportunities and state revenues for nearly eighty years.

Moses also realized that the automobile was the engine that would drive economic expansion and built highways and bridges.

In addition to building them, Robert Moses protected these massive infrastructure projects from the political hacks and parasites who would use the revenues not for the maintenance and expansion of the system, but to create political patronage and fuel corruption on a massive scale.

Of course, since his death this is precisely what has happened. Today, with a round trip on the Verrazano Bridge costing $10 (with $9 going to the MTA) the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is still teetering on the brink of insolvency.

Left to a commission or the state legislature we would still be debating the merits of a two-lane highway between Spring Valley and Albany or an upgrade of ferry service between Brooklyn and Staten Island.

When Lee Iacocca took over a troubled Chrysler Motors he went to Congress with a personal pledge to turn the company around.

He made himself personally accountable and through the power of his leadership and his keen insights into the American car market he succeeded.

It wasn't a management committee that brought Chrysler back from the dead, it was the leadership of Lee Iacocca.

The Chrysler bailout was still a bad idea because it now provides the rationale for every conceivable use of taxpayer money to rescue banks, car companies and securities firms without any reasonable expectation that they can survive past next month.

Can anyone who has witnessed the pathetic spectacle of the auto and financial executives appearing before Congrees honestly say that there's a Lee Iacocca among this gaggle of dimwits?

And what has consensus building, bipartisanship and teamwork gotten us?

For starters there's a stimulus bill with virtually no stimulus. President Obama let Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Bernie Sanders and Harry Reid write the bill and he has signed it into law without even pretending that this has anything to do with reviving the economy. And while our President speaks so eloquently about getting this economy going again immediately, unsurprisingly most of the Porkulus spending goes into effect next year when the best legislators money can buy are all up for reelection.

Coincidence?

So while America's leaders are using our grandchildren's money to pay off today's political debts, the Chinese--yes the Red Chinese--are using their trade surplus to build roads, bridges, nuclear power plants and their own worlwide automobile manufacturing industry.

The Tiger Champ, designed and engineered in China, will be assembled in Oklahoma for sale in America and throughout the world. No doubt this is just the beginning.

I wonder how home prices are faring in Guangzhou?

The 67% Solution

Update! Update! Update! Update!

With the predictability of a lunar eclipse, the New York Times today features a front-page report headlined:

Stimulus Plan Would Provide Flood of Aid to Education

So now the taxpayers--US--will be coerced into partnership with failed and corrupt banks, failed, corrupt and stupid carmakers, and a failed, corrupt, stupid and arrogant education industry. The Times article is excerpted here.

The proposed emergency expenditures on nearly every realm of education, including school renovation, special education, Head Start and grants to needy college students, would amount to the largest increase in federal aid since Washington began to spend significantly on education after World War II.

Critics and supporters alike said that by its sheer scope, the measure could profoundly change the federal government’s role in education, which has traditionally been the responsibility of state and local government.

In this euphoric run-up to the ascension of The Oba-Messiah, all the usual suspects are lumbering toward the trough in order to slobber up the Fool's Gold now being minted by our leaders in Washington.

Consistently neglected in boom years, INFRASTRUCTURE is now the Golden Calf of the 21st Century New Deal, worshipped by one and all in every level of government.

Who can argue with it? Don't these worthy projects need funding? And aren't these the same public servants that have served us so well in good times and bad?

In recent years here in New York City the tax dollars fueled by Wall Street profits cascaded into the city treasury and--as in boom times past--roads, bridges and transit systems deteriorated.

Did any of our political leaders wail about our crumbling infrastructure?

"Sorry, bridges don't vote" came the reply from the political class as they shoveled money to voting blocs and interest groups for the express purpose of remaining in office so they could shovel more money.

Remember the gas tax? How about the bridge tolls that were supposed to benefit mass transit? Money, money, money with nothing to show. So now that stimulus is our government's most critical responsibility, the Fed is cranking up the printing presses.

Their mission: inflate the money supply to pay workers to dig holes in the ground.

Ten years from now when the next crisis hits we'll be treated to another round of bleating from those who advocate a commitment to infrastructure and we will have all forgotten about the previous roads and bridges scam.

This should come as no surprise.

Wasting money is what governments do and infrastructure is traditionally the way they do it. Nothing new here.

But what of social welfare, healthcare and education? Surely these are noble endeavors worthy of national mobilization and they figure prominently in the new administration's stimulus plans.

Useless infrastructure projects simply produce "Big Digs" and "Bridges to Nowhere" that impoverish our grandchildren. National commitments to worthy social and educational crusades typically result in stunted human development in the here and now. As an added kick in the ass, they prolong and entrench the delusions of the social engineers and educrats so that effective reform becomes impossible.

As an example, let's take issue with a government initiative that is beyond reproach: Project Headstart. Headstart was born in 1965 during America's Great Society frenzy. Its mission and vision, to promote greater school readiness among under served children, was self-evidently noble. Predictably, as the Headstart Medusa spread its reptilian ganglia from city to city, suburb to suburb and state to state, community action groups sprang up, taking proactive steps to keep the federal dollars flowing. Also predictably, advocacy groups such as the National Headstart Association resisted all efforts to provide accountability and financial transparency.

Instead, public money was poured into a black hole while self-serving measurements designed to assess the "SKILLS" promoted by the early education movement showed that these skills developed at a more rapid rate.

In effect, industry studies demonstrated convincingly that two-year-old children who were taught to place "A" blocks next to "B" blocks performed this valuable task better than two year olds who had not been conditioned like trained seals. More than forty years later, the beat goes on without a whisper of protest from those who know better but fear being branded as heartless.

Year after year, independent studies designed to measure long-term educational efficacy consistently demonstrate that when tracked through the four stages of cognitive development, children enrolled in Headstart programs show no greater proficiency in formal operational thinking than children who have started school as late as seven years old.

Jean Piaget, the Swiss biologist, philospher and epistemologist first identified the four stages-- sensory/motor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational--more than seventy years ago.

He also observed that by the end of secondary education about one third of all high school graduates were capable of formal operational thinking. Today, throughout the industrialized world, one third of all high school graduates demonstrate formal operational thinking.

Does this mean that the decline in public education is only an illusion?

I think not. It's true that the proportion of students capable of abstract thinking and symbolic logic has remained constant. However, the academic performance of the remaining 67% of high school graduates has declined precipitously. These are the
students who in past generations achieved a level of functional literacy which has all but disappeared.

Who is advocating for the great two thirds?

Who will campaign for functional literacy?

Moreover, will anyone have the courage to admit that America's continued prosperity depends on Americans who can operate a CNC lathe at least as much as it depends on Americans who can design a CNC lathe?

In a matter of weeks the Fed will start pouring buckets of depreciating Greenbacks into the feeding trough.

And you can be certain that the Early Education Pimps will be there, cheek-to-jowl with the porcine infrastructurists, their snouts buried deep in the stimulative slop. So take heart. There will be new roads and gleaming bridges and modern transit systems to speed Americans to work in this grand new epoch of 21st Century jobs. But traffic will be much lighter than normal if there aren't enough qualified Americans to fill these dream jobs.

For today, though, the skies are brighter and the air is fresher and a brave new world is just beyond the horizon. God help the 67% who will be left behind.

Orfeo ed Euridice... or... I've Just Gone Through Hell for This Chick and She Still Won't Do What I Tell Her

We went to see Orfeo again last week at the Met. We don't usually attend a performance a second time, especially so soon, but this is a breakthrough production so here goes.

Proving once again that there's nothing new under the Sun, the Metropolitan Opera wound down its 2006/2007 season with a spectacular production of Christoph Willibald Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Orpheus myth, here's a quick synopsis:

Orfeo is mourning the death of his young wife, Euridice. But he sends everyone away because his grief is so overwhelming even their sincere and heartfelt support sinks him deeper into despair.

Then along comes Cupid, yeah Cupid, suspended from a wire no less, who tells him that all he has to do is follow his beloved's spirit into the underworld and bring her back.

But, she orders, he cannot look at her, or tell her why he can't look at her, until they're back home or she will die. And this time, for keepsies.

Yada, yada, yada... he descends into Hell, gets past the Furies, finds his wife and they start home.

"But why won't you look at me?," she asks, "Am I no longer beautiful?"

"Just shut up and follow me." implores Orfeo, but she's relentless.

"Is it because this dress makes me look fat?"

"Have you found someone else? It's that little tart from Thessalonika, isn't it?"

At this point the Missus turned to me and said "What a wimp. Why doesn't he just grab her by the scruff of the neck, tell to STFU and drag her out of there?"

Why not indeed? But this is an opera.

Finally, when he can't take her nagging anymore, he turns and looks her straight in the eyes and she promptly drops dead... again.

At that point poor Orfeo collapses to his knees and wails: "Che faro senza Euridice" (what shall I do without Euridice). Well lets see... for starters I'll play golf, go fishing and drink as much beer as I want anytime I want.

But no.

All Orfeo has to do is threaten suicide and Cupid returns to snatch the dagger from his hand. Touched by his devotion Cupid brings Euridice back to life and she immediately starts nagging him to finish mowing the lawn. What oh what shall I do without Euridice? What oh what shall any of us do?

Well, they live happily every after, have five kids and Orfeo gets a job playing in the house band at Euridice's father's catering hall. They are Greek, after all.

And we can only speculate as to how Orfeo's life would have turned out if he had passed on Cupid's "descend into Hell" offer and just looked around for a younger woman. After a respectable mourning period, of course.

But this is pure fiction. For the happily married among us, thankfully, Orfeo's tragedy is a prospect that few of us (gentlemen) will have to confront. All you have to do is glance at the obituary page or take a walk past your local assisted living center to recognize that we're not going to outlive our wives. It brings back memories of the old Alan King routine, "Survived by his wife." In fact, I'm sure that if we followed the Orpheus legend to its conclusion we'd find Euridice sitting in a beach chair in Boca Raton cashing Orfeo's pension checks from the Amalgamated Greek Lyre Players Union.

Face it, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

So when you're tempted to blurt out, "Why can't you do what I tell for once?", understand that this is a male/female dynamic that's been going on since there have been males and females. Just swallow those words before they jump out and get you into trouble because the odds that she'll do what you say are roughly equivalent to the chances that Alex Rodriguez will hit a bases-loaded homer with two out in the bottom of the ninth of the seventh game of the World Series while still wearing a Yankee uniform.

It ain't happenin'.

Next week: Wotan, the King of the Gods, chides his teenage daughter Brunnhilde for her disobediance. "You're grounded, young lady!", he shouts. Then he places her on a rock surrounded by a ring of fire for all eternity. Would that it were...