When it comes to big pop culture events like the Casey Anthony trial, I always come to the party late and over-dressed. I only really became aware of the thing and how huge it was while listening to the verdict being read on my car radio coming back from the beach. Basically I knew the outline of the story but none of the details. I never watched one minute of the trial on television. What I knew was that this batty party girl single Mom was accused of killing her adorably doe-eyed daughter. I also knew that pictures of Ms. Anthony had surfaced showing her partying like it was 1999 at the same time that her child was listed as missing. Although these facts prove conclusively that Casey Anthony is a loathsome human being, they do not necessarily add up to a murder conviction.
The reaction to the innocent verdict in this case has been reminiscent of the anger that poured forth out of the nation after the O.J. Simpson trial. It is seemingly unanimously believed that a gross injustice has been done here. The jurors in this case have been subjected to bitter condemnations from all quarters. The talking heads of the media have been apoplectic in their outrage. Cable news legal analysts who were all so outrageously and spectacularly wrong were reduced to sputtering incoherent gibberish and ass-covering. Nobody enjoys watching the media being made fools of more than me, but I did sense that justice had been denied. The overwhelming and sometimes ridiculous reaction of so many to the verdict did spark curiosity on my part to at least investigate the story and see what all the fuss was about. After doing so I have come to the conclusion that A. Casey Anthony was guilty of murder and therefore got away with it, and B. the jury made the right decision to acquit her of the charge. Let me explain.
In our system of justice the scales are and should be tilted towards the accused. We have a presumption of innocence. The state has a harder job than the defense. A defense attorney only has to convince one juror that there is reasonable doubt to free his client. The prosecutor has to convince all 12 jurors. In this case in particular where the case against Anthony was circumstantial the job is even harder. As I researched this case I learned that there was no murder weapon, no forensic evidence, not even an agreed upon cause of death or even time of death. What there was , was a despicable woman and a dysfunctional family and an adorable innocent child. But the jurors were not charged with making moral judgments about the defendants’ character, they were charged with coming to a unanimous conclusion concerning the facts and evidence of the case and they did so. The prosecution could not argue the facts of the case so they portrayed Anthony as a slut and unfit mother. The defense did its job of proving reasonable doubt by pointing out the lack of actual evidence. This case had bushel baskets of reasonable doubt! When the state places the fate of a human being in the hands of a jury of her peers one hopes that that jury listens carefully to the facts, follows the charge given to it by the presiding judge, and makes their decision accordingly.
Did Casey Anthony kill that little girl? I’m 99% sure. But in our system it has to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. In such a system, sometimes guilty people are set free. When that happens it isn’t pretty. However, I prefer to live under a system of justice that occasionally sets guilty people free than one that routinely convicts the innocent. God bless America.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
My 4th of July
Just got back from 4 days in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina where I celebrated the 4th with my wife, my sister and her husband, and the 50,000 others who decided to do the same thing. Heretofore I have always spent the 4th either in the back yard of my parents’ house or at Nags Head. So nothing I have ever experienced in the past prepared me for the throngs of people as far as the eye could see on the wide beaches of the Grand Strand. Each day we would drive from our palatial condo on the hill 4 blocks away down to the public access parking lot where we would battle for a space, deposit the money into the collection station,( $1.50 per hour ), and then grab our considerable gear and trudge through the hot sand to do battle for a spit of land to call our own. Once our beachhead had been established we would sit in our rickety chairs with one eye on the books we had brought to read and one wary eye on the very large reptilian woman in the chair 18 inches to our right who smelled oddly of Old Spice. Then there were the several women and men who served as excellent examples for any teenagers who cared to look, of the consequences of poor decision making and youthful indiscretion in the area of body art. Yes, that super cool starburst fruit chew design that seemed so right that Saturday night years ago after that Grateful Dead concert in Hoboken doesn’t hold up to the ravages of time and the inexorable pull of gravity.
As I took a walk down to the Apache pier zigzagging through the teeming masses I was treated to the Super Bowl of people watching. It was a moving feast for the eye. Every kind of body type of our species was on display in every possible stage of development. There were the skinny, the fat, the tiny daintily featured , the big-boned. There were the fair skinned wearing large floppy hats hiding under canopies, then there were the grotesquely seared ones whose skin looked as if it had been prepared for use in the manufacture of leather wing-back chairs, the kind you see in the lobbies of law firms who specialize in personal injury cases. Then there were the ladies who had managed to pour themselves and their ample bosoms into bikinis designed for 14 year old girls. Oddly these particular ladies seemed fond of beach games that required rapid movement and quite a lot of lunging, like beach volleyball and corn hole. More often than not their bodies were also adorned with ill-conceived tattoos whose futures were not good. One in particular sported a brightly colored butterfly right across her belly...which if she ever gives birth will soon resemble an axe-murderer with a handlebar mustache.
As I walked and watched this slice of Americana it seemed that most of the people my age were fabulously unhappy. We looked hot and annoyed at the presence of so many other Americans. But there was one group that seemed totally unfazed by the universal hassle of human beings too close to other human beings. The toddlers. Those adorable kids experiencing the beach for the first time. The bright eyes, the look of wonder when they see their toes disappear in the sand after a receding wave washes over them on its way back out to sea. The fearlessness of the two year old who sees his Grandpa out in the water and runs headlong into a crashing wave with his little arms out and face turned up in joy. It’s the sort of thing that you can’t help but watch with a certain lump in your throat. That kid was you 50 years ago, and that kid was your own kid just last week, it seems.
All was not lost because of the overcrowding. I read two books, took some killer naps, shot 81 at Pine Lakes. And ate some truly wonderful food. I missed my kids though. Hope they missed me.
As I took a walk down to the Apache pier zigzagging through the teeming masses I was treated to the Super Bowl of people watching. It was a moving feast for the eye. Every kind of body type of our species was on display in every possible stage of development. There were the skinny, the fat, the tiny daintily featured , the big-boned. There were the fair skinned wearing large floppy hats hiding under canopies, then there were the grotesquely seared ones whose skin looked as if it had been prepared for use in the manufacture of leather wing-back chairs, the kind you see in the lobbies of law firms who specialize in personal injury cases. Then there were the ladies who had managed to pour themselves and their ample bosoms into bikinis designed for 14 year old girls. Oddly these particular ladies seemed fond of beach games that required rapid movement and quite a lot of lunging, like beach volleyball and corn hole. More often than not their bodies were also adorned with ill-conceived tattoos whose futures were not good. One in particular sported a brightly colored butterfly right across her belly...which if she ever gives birth will soon resemble an axe-murderer with a handlebar mustache.
As I walked and watched this slice of Americana it seemed that most of the people my age were fabulously unhappy. We looked hot and annoyed at the presence of so many other Americans. But there was one group that seemed totally unfazed by the universal hassle of human beings too close to other human beings. The toddlers. Those adorable kids experiencing the beach for the first time. The bright eyes, the look of wonder when they see their toes disappear in the sand after a receding wave washes over them on its way back out to sea. The fearlessness of the two year old who sees his Grandpa out in the water and runs headlong into a crashing wave with his little arms out and face turned up in joy. It’s the sort of thing that you can’t help but watch with a certain lump in your throat. That kid was you 50 years ago, and that kid was your own kid just last week, it seems.
All was not lost because of the overcrowding. I read two books, took some killer naps, shot 81 at Pine Lakes. And ate some truly wonderful food. I missed my kids though. Hope they missed me.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Our Not So Brave New World
I was a history major in college. I changed my major 4 times at the University of Richmond, so totally aimless and irresolute was I during those 5 years. I settled on history for two reasons. One was that I truly loved it. The other was that I was a gifted enough writer and consequently could bluff my way through essay exams with the barest of actual knowledge in the subject matter. I had not the vaguest clue what one would do with a history degree. I ended up in the investment business, but there on the wall over the leather wingback chair hangs my diploma. What I have learned in the years since is that once a history buff, always a history buff. My knowledge of history informs my thinking about almost everything. Like the author of Ecclesiastes, I know that in fact there is nothing new under the sun. And yet I can’t help wondering if this particular slice of history that we live in is uniquely tenuous and fragile.
We live in an era of unsurpassed technological triumph with the promise of greater advances to come. People are living longer, less stressful lives than at any time in the history of civilization. We talk a lot about stress, I know, but whereas a century ago people stressed about having enough food to eat, today we stress about relationships and where we will go on vacation. Today we communicate instantaneously with anyone, anywhere, at anytime, a feat unimaginable a mere 50 years ago. The gadgets we pay less than a thousand dollars for and hold in the palms of our hands are more powerful and do more things than literally rooms of machines did 50 years ago. But with all of these manifestly beneficial breakthroughs has come no feeling of greater security and no enrichment of the human spirit. With all of our newfound access to knowledge, we seem to have gained no measure of wisdom. With all of our freshly minted communication devices, we seem to say less to each other than ever before. A casual reading of message boards on social websites seems vulgar and vapid laid next to the letters written between John and Abigail Adams 230 years ago, which were teaming with emotion and immediacy even though most were already months old when first read.
Although man has it within his grasp today to protect himself from peril in ways that past generations couldn’t possibly have imagined, I cannot escape the feeling that we are teetering on the edge of something dreadful. The unnatural interconnectedness of world finance and the staggering complexity of its instruments bring with them the nagging suspicion that events in Greece and Ireland ultimately will bring us all down. The masters of the universe who design the systems of this world have no answers except more complexity, in the vain hope that the solutions will be stumbled on by the next generation of geniuses. As a student of history I have concluded that man’s scientific and technological evolution has far outpaced his ability to find joy, to experience beauty, to give and receive grace. In our mad headlong dash to conquer, discover and build, we have ignored our souls and have created civilizations capable of killing each other with blinding efficiency. Even our art isn’t created to inspire but to shock, not to lift the human spirit but to magnify the course and baser regions of our nature.
Perhaps a tragic turn in our destiny will cause us to return to first things. Maybe if the tools of technology bring about our destruction, we will find a way to refashion them into something that serves a higher purpose.
We live in an era of unsurpassed technological triumph with the promise of greater advances to come. People are living longer, less stressful lives than at any time in the history of civilization. We talk a lot about stress, I know, but whereas a century ago people stressed about having enough food to eat, today we stress about relationships and where we will go on vacation. Today we communicate instantaneously with anyone, anywhere, at anytime, a feat unimaginable a mere 50 years ago. The gadgets we pay less than a thousand dollars for and hold in the palms of our hands are more powerful and do more things than literally rooms of machines did 50 years ago. But with all of these manifestly beneficial breakthroughs has come no feeling of greater security and no enrichment of the human spirit. With all of our newfound access to knowledge, we seem to have gained no measure of wisdom. With all of our freshly minted communication devices, we seem to say less to each other than ever before. A casual reading of message boards on social websites seems vulgar and vapid laid next to the letters written between John and Abigail Adams 230 years ago, which were teaming with emotion and immediacy even though most were already months old when first read.
Although man has it within his grasp today to protect himself from peril in ways that past generations couldn’t possibly have imagined, I cannot escape the feeling that we are teetering on the edge of something dreadful. The unnatural interconnectedness of world finance and the staggering complexity of its instruments bring with them the nagging suspicion that events in Greece and Ireland ultimately will bring us all down. The masters of the universe who design the systems of this world have no answers except more complexity, in the vain hope that the solutions will be stumbled on by the next generation of geniuses. As a student of history I have concluded that man’s scientific and technological evolution has far outpaced his ability to find joy, to experience beauty, to give and receive grace. In our mad headlong dash to conquer, discover and build, we have ignored our souls and have created civilizations capable of killing each other with blinding efficiency. Even our art isn’t created to inspire but to shock, not to lift the human spirit but to magnify the course and baser regions of our nature.
Perhaps a tragic turn in our destiny will cause us to return to first things. Maybe if the tools of technology bring about our destruction, we will find a way to refashion them into something that serves a higher purpose.
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Whats that smell???
Ok..this falls under the category of…”so weird you have to see it and smell it in person to believe it”. A couple of weeks ago our garbage man..er.. “refuge technician” asked us to stop putting large plastic bags of grass clippings in our big garbage cans because they made the thing too heavy to lift into the truck. This says something profoundly disturbing about where we have evolved as a nation when trash collectors start demanding better working conditions but I will save that thought for another time. So today when I finished cutting the grass I took two large 45 gallon plastic bags of grass clippings and two weeks worth of Molly’s bowel movements down to the curb as instructed. I placed them five feet or so in front of my daughter’s boyfriend's car. After a lovely dinner out on the deck I decided to try out my new battery powered weed eater that I had bought earlier in the day but hadn’t used yet because the battery needed 8 hours to charge. When I made it around the corner of the house to the front yard I was met with a bracing stench that I first thought was from the neighbors newly sealed driveway. I ignored it the best I could and instead concentrated on my very cool new weed eater which was doing an awesome job of giving my lawn that finished look. Eventually I made it around to the front curb where I noticed that Jon’s car was gone but oddly, so where the two bags of clippings. At this point the stench became even more foul and overpowering. Suddenly my neighbor Walt pulled up and leaned out the window with his hand over his mouth and said, “Hey Doug. I think you have two bags of grass and dog crap in the middle of Hazeltree Court.” Time stood still as I simultaneously noticed that there was a 6 inch wide slimy green trail leading from the spot where the bags had been, disappearing up Aprilbud Place and then leading around the corner and out of sight. I looked down at Walt with my mouth open, eyes now burning from the toxic mixture of rotting grass and manure. “Yeah, it looks like somebody dragged them or something and they made it all the way to Hazeltree but then the bag busted open so there’s a big pile of dog turds up there. I just followed the trail to you.” Walt felt it necessary to get me fully up to speed on the malodorous affront I had inflicted on the community on this otherwise fine Saturday evening in suburbia. “ I’m really sorry Walt,” I managed to say. “ I cant imagine what happened but I’ll go up right away and clean it up.”
I quickly jumped into the Pacifica and followed the green trail of tears up the street around the corner to the stop sign. There a few small pieces of canine feces that I recognized pointed the way up the hill of Center Ridge drive. When I got to the sweeping left turn on to Hazeltree there it was…two ripped and soggy black bags of shame lay in the middle of the street with large unruly piles of grass in various stages of decay littered around in all directions with small hills of dog crap floating on top like so many brown lily pads on the surface of a dirty pond. An elderly Asian couple out for their nightly constitutional held frilly handkerchiefs over their mouths as they scurried past me trying not to make eye contact. At this point Jon pulled up in his car, looked out the window and won the world championship of stating the obvious with this gem…” I think I might have done that.”
As we worked to clean up the mess I asked him why he didn’t hear something dragging underneath his car as he was driving out of the neighborhood. “We had the radio on I guess”. But my daughter knew something was amiss when she asked the question..”Jon, how come your car smells like a baby’s diaper?”
My abilities as a writer will be sorely tested as I struggle to describe for you the offending fog that has drifted over all of Wythe Trace.
Even now as I bang these words out I can still catch whiffs of it off of my thrice washed hands. The bags were full of two week old dead grass that had been cut wet and then subsequently rained on several times along with large amounts of dog feces. Think of a skunk with a dirty diaper crawling out of a dead skunks behind. Or maybe the smell of a gigantic belch from a biker who just ate a dozen rotten eggs with a side of expired sardines. Maybe its more like 25 bedpans from the diarrhea ward at the old folks home…anyway, you get the picture.
But the problem is more than just the smell because eventually that will fade away. No, long after the smell is but a nauseating memory, there will still be the damning evidence of the long green arrow on the streets of the neighborhood that will point for all to see to 3308 Aprilbud Place as the source of the offence. Like some 21st century scarlet letter, it will remind everyone who was to blame. I had no choice. I mean I like Jon and all but I have to live here. I feel bad about it, but it had to be done. I tacked a brightly painted sign on my mailbox with 4 simple words….”KAITLIN’S BOYFRIEND DID IT”
I quickly jumped into the Pacifica and followed the green trail of tears up the street around the corner to the stop sign. There a few small pieces of canine feces that I recognized pointed the way up the hill of Center Ridge drive. When I got to the sweeping left turn on to Hazeltree there it was…two ripped and soggy black bags of shame lay in the middle of the street with large unruly piles of grass in various stages of decay littered around in all directions with small hills of dog crap floating on top like so many brown lily pads on the surface of a dirty pond. An elderly Asian couple out for their nightly constitutional held frilly handkerchiefs over their mouths as they scurried past me trying not to make eye contact. At this point Jon pulled up in his car, looked out the window and won the world championship of stating the obvious with this gem…” I think I might have done that.”
As we worked to clean up the mess I asked him why he didn’t hear something dragging underneath his car as he was driving out of the neighborhood. “We had the radio on I guess”. But my daughter knew something was amiss when she asked the question..”Jon, how come your car smells like a baby’s diaper?”
My abilities as a writer will be sorely tested as I struggle to describe for you the offending fog that has drifted over all of Wythe Trace.
Even now as I bang these words out I can still catch whiffs of it off of my thrice washed hands. The bags were full of two week old dead grass that had been cut wet and then subsequently rained on several times along with large amounts of dog feces. Think of a skunk with a dirty diaper crawling out of a dead skunks behind. Or maybe the smell of a gigantic belch from a biker who just ate a dozen rotten eggs with a side of expired sardines. Maybe its more like 25 bedpans from the diarrhea ward at the old folks home…anyway, you get the picture.
But the problem is more than just the smell because eventually that will fade away. No, long after the smell is but a nauseating memory, there will still be the damning evidence of the long green arrow on the streets of the neighborhood that will point for all to see to 3308 Aprilbud Place as the source of the offence. Like some 21st century scarlet letter, it will remind everyone who was to blame. I had no choice. I mean I like Jon and all but I have to live here. I feel bad about it, but it had to be done. I tacked a brightly painted sign on my mailbox with 4 simple words….”KAITLIN’S BOYFRIEND DID IT”
Friday, June 24, 2011
" My Girl"
A couple of days ago my son sent us an email with a recording attached to it. He had written an arrangement of the old classic “My Girl” for a jazz ensemble or something. After he finished with the writing he sat down at his computer and the $300 fancy microphone he had insisted that we get him for Christmas and proceeded to record all 6 parts along with the percussion himself and then somehow mixed everything together. I know virtually nothing about how any of this is actually done but I console myself with the knowledge that all of the technical hardware that it was done with was paid for out of my generosity. When I hit the play button on my computer I was overwhelmed with a torrent of conflicting emotions. I heard my son’s voice doing a spot-on impression of David Ruffin , then his voice filled out all of the crisp harmonies of the other Temptations and all I could do was sit there and smile. The song was a musical feast , so beautiful that if Smokey Robinson heard it he would have picked up the phone to offer his congratulations. When it was over I pressed the play button again and again.
Whenever he sends us some new recording or some new video of a musical creation I am overcome with two competing emotions. On the one hand I am so proud of him and his freakish talent that I instantly want all of my friends to hear it and marvel with me. But then the other emotion rears its ugly head. I think to myself…How is this kid ever going to be happy and fulfilled in this life if he doesn’t end up in the music business? When you’re walking around with this sort of musical creativity bouncing around in your head 24/7, how can you be happy being a high school chorus teacher? Not that there’s anything wrong with that…some of my best friends are high school chorus teachers. But the problem for me as a parent is that I am afraid of the music business. It seems to be a dirty rotten collection of egomaniacs who live a life contrary to what most parents dream of for their children. Unless he is able to find some benign corner of the business unblemished by drug use, broken relationships and rehab, I’ll always be worried about him. But that’s just the way it goes as a parent I suppose.
Whenever he sends us some new recording or some new video of a musical creation I am overcome with two competing emotions. On the one hand I am so proud of him and his freakish talent that I instantly want all of my friends to hear it and marvel with me. But then the other emotion rears its ugly head. I think to myself…How is this kid ever going to be happy and fulfilled in this life if he doesn’t end up in the music business? When you’re walking around with this sort of musical creativity bouncing around in your head 24/7, how can you be happy being a high school chorus teacher? Not that there’s anything wrong with that…some of my best friends are high school chorus teachers. But the problem for me as a parent is that I am afraid of the music business. It seems to be a dirty rotten collection of egomaniacs who live a life contrary to what most parents dream of for their children. Unless he is able to find some benign corner of the business unblemished by drug use, broken relationships and rehab, I’ll always be worried about him. But that’s just the way it goes as a parent I suppose.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
"Let's Make A Deal"...my first Oval Office address
Good evening. This is the first chance I’ve had as your President to address you on live television here from the Oval Office, and I must say, this place is amazing. Much bigger than it looks in the movies. Anyway, back last November when you guys shocked the world by electing me President, I began work on what I was going to call my administration. You know…Teddy Roosevelt had “The Square Deal”, his cousin Franklin Roosevelt had “The New Deal”, and Harry Truman came up with “The Fair Deal”. Well, after weeks of thought I’ve decided to call my Presidency…”Let’s Make A Deal”. And the deal is this…as the representative of the government I promise to get Leviathan off your back and out of your way, balance the books around here, and generally introduce some common sense reforms so that you won’t be embarrassed every time you watch the news. In return, you’ll have to promise to knock it off with all the belly-aching, stop blaming all of your personal failures on somebody else, and get out there and make something of your life. What do ya say?
First, let me explain my end of this bargain. I will not here go into exhaustive detail about every issue facing us as a nation. For one thing, I don’t have all the answers. Heck, half the time I don’t even know the right questions! For example, I know virtually nothing about energy( although I’m pretty sure its none of my business what kind of light bulbs you should be allowed to buy)or housing or agriculture so I’m not going to sit here and pretend that I do. There are some broad themes that I do know a thing or two about and so I will lay out tonight what the goals of my administration will be. Hopefully this won’t take too long because I don’t want you to have to miss the American Idol finale…so here goes.
Foreign policy: effective immediately I am pulling all U.S. forces out of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Europe, Japan, and South Korea and any other place they may happen to be. The first three countries on this list are just a God-awful mess and combined not worth one drop of American blood. The next three are all pretty wealthy places and I figure that they need to take care of their own defense needs. The party’s over guys since we have no money. Henceforth as long as I am President the military will never be asked to be the world’s policeman and the days of the US marines being turned in to community organizers are over. In addition, to help safeguard against the casual commitment of US forces in some ill-conceived mission in the future, I shall make it mandatory that all children of elected officials be required to serve in frontline units of any and all combat divisions of the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
Domestic policy: effective immediately I have ordered an across the board 15% spending cut throughout all agencies of government with no exceptions. Now I know that this will punish all agencies equally and some will argue that some departments should be exempted. But the more I think about it the more that I like the across the board idea…so much easier. If we ever balance the budget, then we’ll talk about restoring some of the cuts. But until we get our financial house in order..a little shared sacrifice, OK? I will also propose a complete overhaul of the tax code with all of its Byzantine contradictions and Rube Goldberg logical leaps and replace it with a flat tax of 17% with NO deductions…for anyone. That’s right, you heard me. No charitable deduction ( if the only reason you give is to catch a break on your taxes, shame on you), no home mortgage interest deduction ( why should we make it more desirable to own than rent? Its none of my business where you live.), no deductions period. Also, everyone will be required to pay their taxes themselves either with a check or online, NO WITHOLDING allowed. That way people will understand exactly how much they are having to pay in taxes. This change will eliminate the need for the IRS and place millions of accountants out of work but on the bright side, it will save everyone else a fortune in fees and lost sleep. Now I know some of you are thinking “I’ll have to pay more under this plan”, or “that rich guy over there he might end up paying less”. Well, get over the class envy people. Our current system has produced a nation where 45% of Americans pay no income taxes at all. That can’t be right can it? Besides, if you eliminate all of the complexities of the system, you will effectively take away all power from politicians, and won’t that be worth it?
And oh yeah, by the way…I’ve decided to decriminalize casual drug use. Over the past 50 years there exists no government initiative that has been a bigger failure than the “War on Drugs”, with the possible exception of the “War on Poverty”. But at least with the war of poverty we don’t imprison those who stay poor. Alcohol use in this country destroys millions of lives and consumes millions more in property and yet its legal and the government collects a fortune in tax revenue from its sale. I see no reason why some kid who smokes a joint should be thrown in jail. And since the majority of violent crimes are drug related, maybe a lot of that violence would disappear and the government would raise some much needed cash. Have you noticed how broke we are? Oh, and one more thing. I will introduce legislation next week to make our congressmen and women part time legislators just like they are in most of the states. Along with the part time status will come an elimination of life time congressional pensions and health benefits. The Founding Fathers never imagined full time career politicians. An added benefit of this plan will be that since there is less time devoted to “law-making”, there will be less of it. Plus, during the off season, the capital building will be available for civic groups to rent out and also for birthdays and bar mitzvahs. We need income, people.
In closing let me mention that since I am President, I have taken the liberty to impose a few changes outside of government..just because I can. First off, for the remainder of my term in office the American League is hereby forbidden to use the designated hitter. I also have taken it upon myself to bring back the chain gang work crew concept in all federal prisons since there is so much work out there that Americans just won’t do. And last but not least, I have declared lite beer to be illegal in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Well, its been a pleasure to speak with you tonight and I see from the clock right above the Thomas Jefferson portrait that its 8:50...made it with ten minutes to spare. I hope in the future to always thus exceed your expectations. God Bless you and God Bless America.
First, let me explain my end of this bargain. I will not here go into exhaustive detail about every issue facing us as a nation. For one thing, I don’t have all the answers. Heck, half the time I don’t even know the right questions! For example, I know virtually nothing about energy( although I’m pretty sure its none of my business what kind of light bulbs you should be allowed to buy)or housing or agriculture so I’m not going to sit here and pretend that I do. There are some broad themes that I do know a thing or two about and so I will lay out tonight what the goals of my administration will be. Hopefully this won’t take too long because I don’t want you to have to miss the American Idol finale…so here goes.
Foreign policy: effective immediately I am pulling all U.S. forces out of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Europe, Japan, and South Korea and any other place they may happen to be. The first three countries on this list are just a God-awful mess and combined not worth one drop of American blood. The next three are all pretty wealthy places and I figure that they need to take care of their own defense needs. The party’s over guys since we have no money. Henceforth as long as I am President the military will never be asked to be the world’s policeman and the days of the US marines being turned in to community organizers are over. In addition, to help safeguard against the casual commitment of US forces in some ill-conceived mission in the future, I shall make it mandatory that all children of elected officials be required to serve in frontline units of any and all combat divisions of the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
Domestic policy: effective immediately I have ordered an across the board 15% spending cut throughout all agencies of government with no exceptions. Now I know that this will punish all agencies equally and some will argue that some departments should be exempted. But the more I think about it the more that I like the across the board idea…so much easier. If we ever balance the budget, then we’ll talk about restoring some of the cuts. But until we get our financial house in order..a little shared sacrifice, OK? I will also propose a complete overhaul of the tax code with all of its Byzantine contradictions and Rube Goldberg logical leaps and replace it with a flat tax of 17% with NO deductions…for anyone. That’s right, you heard me. No charitable deduction ( if the only reason you give is to catch a break on your taxes, shame on you), no home mortgage interest deduction ( why should we make it more desirable to own than rent? Its none of my business where you live.), no deductions period. Also, everyone will be required to pay their taxes themselves either with a check or online, NO WITHOLDING allowed. That way people will understand exactly how much they are having to pay in taxes. This change will eliminate the need for the IRS and place millions of accountants out of work but on the bright side, it will save everyone else a fortune in fees and lost sleep. Now I know some of you are thinking “I’ll have to pay more under this plan”, or “that rich guy over there he might end up paying less”. Well, get over the class envy people. Our current system has produced a nation where 45% of Americans pay no income taxes at all. That can’t be right can it? Besides, if you eliminate all of the complexities of the system, you will effectively take away all power from politicians, and won’t that be worth it?
And oh yeah, by the way…I’ve decided to decriminalize casual drug use. Over the past 50 years there exists no government initiative that has been a bigger failure than the “War on Drugs”, with the possible exception of the “War on Poverty”. But at least with the war of poverty we don’t imprison those who stay poor. Alcohol use in this country destroys millions of lives and consumes millions more in property and yet its legal and the government collects a fortune in tax revenue from its sale. I see no reason why some kid who smokes a joint should be thrown in jail. And since the majority of violent crimes are drug related, maybe a lot of that violence would disappear and the government would raise some much needed cash. Have you noticed how broke we are? Oh, and one more thing. I will introduce legislation next week to make our congressmen and women part time legislators just like they are in most of the states. Along with the part time status will come an elimination of life time congressional pensions and health benefits. The Founding Fathers never imagined full time career politicians. An added benefit of this plan will be that since there is less time devoted to “law-making”, there will be less of it. Plus, during the off season, the capital building will be available for civic groups to rent out and also for birthdays and bar mitzvahs. We need income, people.
In closing let me mention that since I am President, I have taken the liberty to impose a few changes outside of government..just because I can. First off, for the remainder of my term in office the American League is hereby forbidden to use the designated hitter. I also have taken it upon myself to bring back the chain gang work crew concept in all federal prisons since there is so much work out there that Americans just won’t do. And last but not least, I have declared lite beer to be illegal in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Well, its been a pleasure to speak with you tonight and I see from the clock right above the Thomas Jefferson portrait that its 8:50...made it with ten minutes to spare. I hope in the future to always thus exceed your expectations. God Bless you and God Bless America.
Friday, June 17, 2011
A Tribute To My Father
I was 13 and very much looking forward to summer. Early May was already hot in the afternoon so I was cutting the grass without a shirt at 10 o’clock in the morning. Just one more month of school and I would be free. As I made the long sweeping turn from the front yard toward the garden I saw him. He was walking across the back yard in a v-neck tee-shirt and overalls and my heart sank at the sight. I knew that the minute I finished the grass he and I would get into an argument over working in the garden. I would object on the grounds that I had already spent 2 hours mowing the yard. He would point out that when he was my age he had already put in 2 hours of work before breakfast and besides he couldn’t do it alone. He needed my help so I had better stop with the crying and get on with it.
My Dad didn’t have my gifts of logic and reason, my skills at debate, or my winning charm but even so I never once won an argument with him. He would look at me with a half-smile and patiently listen to my brilliantly argued and flawlessly reasoned positions and when I was through he would say something like,”Ok, well, pick up that bag of fertilizer and lets get started.”
Although I could tell I was his son, he was much bigger than I would ever be. He was in his late forties and very strong and straight. His big arms hung down to his sides when he was in his suit on Sundays, down practically to his knees. Out of those dark jacket sleeves would emerge two enormous and powerful hands that were calloused from hard work and genetics. Even though Dad was a minister and a man of thought and learning, he never lost his taste for demanding physical labor. He was a man of toil. In the fall and winter it was carpentry work , building junk in our cramped pit and the pendulum basement. He would stay down there for hours sawing and drilling and sanding and emerge covered with sweat and sawdust. In the spring and summer it was the garden. As soon as the ground thawed in March he would get someone to plow it up since we didn’t own a tractor. Then he would crank up the old orange roto-tiller that he bought at Western Auto and stored under the back porch all winter since we had no shed. He would go back and forth over the molded-smelling dirt over and over again for days until the ground was all the same sandy color and fine as rice. I had actually looked forward to my big chance to run the roto-tiller after watching Dad all those years. The thing was loud and I liked the way it ground up weeds and clods with such violence. When my chance finally came when I was 10, the unwieldy beast practically ripped my arms out of their sockets. After I suffered through 3 passes down a single 6o foot row I wrestled the monster into neutral and then made the mistake of holding on to the kill switch too long once it made contact with the spark plug. The shocking jolt knocked me flat on my backside. Dad helped me up and said, “ You’ll get better son”.
It was then that I first became aware of just how strong he was. He stood around 6’2” and weighed 210 or so with broad shoulders , a big head and dark jet-black hair. All the ladies and half of the men in our church accused him of using Grecian formula, but I knew that he didn’t. The only health and beauty aids in his medicine cabinet were a Schick injector system razor, a can of Barbasol and a bottle of Aqua Velva. There never lived a man with less vanity than my father. When he worked in the garden he always wore this ridiculous floppy straw hat with a green eye shade thing built in to the front brim. It was huge and sitting on top of his enormous head towering over 6 feet in the air he looked like a menacing extra in the prison yard from the set of Cool Hand Luke. The odd thing was that he was as gentle as a lamb. The only time he raised his voice in anything approaching anger was when he was in the pulpit holding forth on the dangers of sin. His face was handsome with unruly eyebrows, a prominent nose that I had inherited and kind, tender eyes which I had not.
“OK son,” he began slowly. “ Today we are going to lay down some corn and potatoes and if we’re lucky maybe some pole beans.”
“What’s so lucky about pole beans?” I mumbled under my breath.
“ I know you’d be happier playing ball or riding your bike, but when we finish today you’ll be able to look back proudly on what you’ve accomplished. A job well done need not be done again, my daddy used to say.”
“Then how come I have to cut the grass every week?”
“ Well, almost every job. I think that this year you need to learn to use the push plow”
I could hardly believe what I was hearing. Me? Me, getting to use the push plow?? This was not going to end well. I had been preparing myself for the yearly lesson about the importance, nay, the cosmically crucial to the survival of mankind importance of laying down straight rows. How it was a matter of family pride that rows be perfectly straight, any crook in the line an indication of sloth and inattention at best and darkness or even madness at worst. How it was ok to set a stick in the ground at the end of the row but unsporting and somehow cheating to tie a string to it to guide your work. A virtual encyclopedia of information about a man’s character could be revealed by an inspection of his garden. And now my father wanted me to do the honors, our family reputation in the community riding on my slim teenaged shoulders.
“ Dad, you can’t be serious” I pleaded.
“ I’ll help you every step of the way son. You’re 12 years old boy, its time you learned”
“ I’m 13 Dad!” I was always indignant with him when he would forget my age or what grade I was in. The man could recite entire chapters of the Bible, tell you every detail of the life of every Christian from Martin Luther to Vance Havner but half the time he couldn’t remember my middle name.
“ Well, of course you are. What did I say.. 12? I tell ya son the older I get the more that happens. I’ll be thinking one thing in my head and something else will come flying out of my mouth!”
“ Good thing that doesn’t happen in the pulpit , huh dad?”
“ Don’t be so sure “, he answered with a smile.
We both laughed a little at the joke, which actually was funny unlike most of his jokes, the kind of jokes that he would get out of those dreadful “500 Clean Jokes” paperbacks somebody was always giving him. Stupid church people.
Dad walked down to the end of the garden closest to the road and drove a tomato pole into the ground with a 10 pound ball peen hammer. Three licks and it was stiff and straight.
“ Ok son , keep your eyes right here on this stick and walk slow and steady!”
The dirt rolled up and over the plow in soft clumps to my right and I tried my best to straddle the row with my feet trying not to look down too much, keeping my eyes on the stick. The more I stared at the stick the dizzier I became. When I made it to the end of the row I was light headed from the stress and my heart was beating loud in my ears. I was afraid to look back. Dad put his hand on my shoulder as we both inspected my work. After an uncomfortable moment of silence he finally spoke up.
“ Son, that’s about the worst looking first attempt at plowing a row I’ve ever seen. Which means that it can’t get anything but better. Let’s try her again.”
My father was not a parent in the modern sense in that he was incapable of coddling. When I did stupid things he let me know about it. He didn’t buy in to the notion that every kid should get a trophy, that all kids were wonderful. He never seemed to be very concerned with the level of my self esteem, figuring that my self esteem would rise when I learned to do something well. But because he never lied to me about how great I was, I learned that I could believe him. Always. My dad could be depended on to tell me the truth.
Dad ran the roto-tiller over my hideous s-shaped row until all evidence had been erased and then I tried again. This process was repeated 5 more times until finally he was positively beaming.
“ Look at that !!!” he yelled, clapping his big hands together. “ Its beautiful!”
It really was beautiful. With this triumph behind me I warmed to the work. Now it was time to line the furrow with fertilizer, horrible smelling nitrogen fertilizer that came in a big 25 pound burlap bag with a paper lining. I would drag the thing behind me as I dug down and grabbed a handful of the blue crystals and scattered them along the furrow. I never wore gloves so by the end of a day of this my hands would be on fire and all of the hair on my fingers had been burned off. Such were the appalling conditions under which I toiled in clear violation of numerous child labor laws. But by this time I was thoroughly into it and eager for what was next. I would drop the seeds a foot apart then flood the row with water from the garden hose, then cover up the row with the push plow and then rake up the foot prints so it looked perfect. I would spend hours out there with him during the summer, first plowing and planting then hoeing and weeding and finally the harvest would come. We would walk back to the house with a bucket of potatoes or a grocery bag full of string beans and always a half dozen bright red tomatoes. I always felt grown up when bringing those vegetables to the house. There was yellow squash, black-eyed peas, lima beans, English peas,corn…although Dad always had something negative to say about the corn. The stuff never suited him for some reason. It was either too puny or too wormy.
Dad doesn’t keep a garden anymore. He’s 86 now and finally gave it up 6 years ago. I miss those hot miserable days, the stinging flies, the dirt, the smell of the soil. Mostly, I miss seeing my Dad in control of that little piece of ground. I miss hearing him tell stories of when he was 12 years old and was given an entire field by my Grandfather to grow whatever he wanted. He chose tomatoes and made 200 dollars in 1936. I couldn’t even imagine such a thing. He would stand in the shade towards the end of the day, lean on a hoe and tell me how God loved a hard worker. How important it was that a man learn how to provide for himself and how out of God’s rich blessings we could know the unspeakable joy of giving to others.
“ Why is it so hard, Dad?” I asked late one afternoon. “Why is keeping a garden so hard? It’s non stop sweat from March to September.”
“ Because nothing in this life that’s worth anything is easy. Gardening is hard, work of any kind is hard. Preaching is hard. Going to school is hard. Jesus had a pretty hard time up on that cross, don’t ya think? But everything that’s hard produces something wonderful.”
“ I guess so,” I said absently.
“ Besides, gardening might be hard, but it sure is easier than starving”
We smiled at each other and walked back to the house as I admired the calluses on my hands in the dying light of the day.
My Dad didn’t have my gifts of logic and reason, my skills at debate, or my winning charm but even so I never once won an argument with him. He would look at me with a half-smile and patiently listen to my brilliantly argued and flawlessly reasoned positions and when I was through he would say something like,”Ok, well, pick up that bag of fertilizer and lets get started.”
Although I could tell I was his son, he was much bigger than I would ever be. He was in his late forties and very strong and straight. His big arms hung down to his sides when he was in his suit on Sundays, down practically to his knees. Out of those dark jacket sleeves would emerge two enormous and powerful hands that were calloused from hard work and genetics. Even though Dad was a minister and a man of thought and learning, he never lost his taste for demanding physical labor. He was a man of toil. In the fall and winter it was carpentry work , building junk in our cramped pit and the pendulum basement. He would stay down there for hours sawing and drilling and sanding and emerge covered with sweat and sawdust. In the spring and summer it was the garden. As soon as the ground thawed in March he would get someone to plow it up since we didn’t own a tractor. Then he would crank up the old orange roto-tiller that he bought at Western Auto and stored under the back porch all winter since we had no shed. He would go back and forth over the molded-smelling dirt over and over again for days until the ground was all the same sandy color and fine as rice. I had actually looked forward to my big chance to run the roto-tiller after watching Dad all those years. The thing was loud and I liked the way it ground up weeds and clods with such violence. When my chance finally came when I was 10, the unwieldy beast practically ripped my arms out of their sockets. After I suffered through 3 passes down a single 6o foot row I wrestled the monster into neutral and then made the mistake of holding on to the kill switch too long once it made contact with the spark plug. The shocking jolt knocked me flat on my backside. Dad helped me up and said, “ You’ll get better son”.
It was then that I first became aware of just how strong he was. He stood around 6’2” and weighed 210 or so with broad shoulders , a big head and dark jet-black hair. All the ladies and half of the men in our church accused him of using Grecian formula, but I knew that he didn’t. The only health and beauty aids in his medicine cabinet were a Schick injector system razor, a can of Barbasol and a bottle of Aqua Velva. There never lived a man with less vanity than my father. When he worked in the garden he always wore this ridiculous floppy straw hat with a green eye shade thing built in to the front brim. It was huge and sitting on top of his enormous head towering over 6 feet in the air he looked like a menacing extra in the prison yard from the set of Cool Hand Luke. The odd thing was that he was as gentle as a lamb. The only time he raised his voice in anything approaching anger was when he was in the pulpit holding forth on the dangers of sin. His face was handsome with unruly eyebrows, a prominent nose that I had inherited and kind, tender eyes which I had not.
“OK son,” he began slowly. “ Today we are going to lay down some corn and potatoes and if we’re lucky maybe some pole beans.”
“What’s so lucky about pole beans?” I mumbled under my breath.
“ I know you’d be happier playing ball or riding your bike, but when we finish today you’ll be able to look back proudly on what you’ve accomplished. A job well done need not be done again, my daddy used to say.”
“Then how come I have to cut the grass every week?”
“ Well, almost every job. I think that this year you need to learn to use the push plow”
I could hardly believe what I was hearing. Me? Me, getting to use the push plow?? This was not going to end well. I had been preparing myself for the yearly lesson about the importance, nay, the cosmically crucial to the survival of mankind importance of laying down straight rows. How it was a matter of family pride that rows be perfectly straight, any crook in the line an indication of sloth and inattention at best and darkness or even madness at worst. How it was ok to set a stick in the ground at the end of the row but unsporting and somehow cheating to tie a string to it to guide your work. A virtual encyclopedia of information about a man’s character could be revealed by an inspection of his garden. And now my father wanted me to do the honors, our family reputation in the community riding on my slim teenaged shoulders.
“ Dad, you can’t be serious” I pleaded.
“ I’ll help you every step of the way son. You’re 12 years old boy, its time you learned”
“ I’m 13 Dad!” I was always indignant with him when he would forget my age or what grade I was in. The man could recite entire chapters of the Bible, tell you every detail of the life of every Christian from Martin Luther to Vance Havner but half the time he couldn’t remember my middle name.
“ Well, of course you are. What did I say.. 12? I tell ya son the older I get the more that happens. I’ll be thinking one thing in my head and something else will come flying out of my mouth!”
“ Good thing that doesn’t happen in the pulpit , huh dad?”
“ Don’t be so sure “, he answered with a smile.
We both laughed a little at the joke, which actually was funny unlike most of his jokes, the kind of jokes that he would get out of those dreadful “500 Clean Jokes” paperbacks somebody was always giving him. Stupid church people.
Dad walked down to the end of the garden closest to the road and drove a tomato pole into the ground with a 10 pound ball peen hammer. Three licks and it was stiff and straight.
“ Ok son , keep your eyes right here on this stick and walk slow and steady!”
The dirt rolled up and over the plow in soft clumps to my right and I tried my best to straddle the row with my feet trying not to look down too much, keeping my eyes on the stick. The more I stared at the stick the dizzier I became. When I made it to the end of the row I was light headed from the stress and my heart was beating loud in my ears. I was afraid to look back. Dad put his hand on my shoulder as we both inspected my work. After an uncomfortable moment of silence he finally spoke up.
“ Son, that’s about the worst looking first attempt at plowing a row I’ve ever seen. Which means that it can’t get anything but better. Let’s try her again.”
My father was not a parent in the modern sense in that he was incapable of coddling. When I did stupid things he let me know about it. He didn’t buy in to the notion that every kid should get a trophy, that all kids were wonderful. He never seemed to be very concerned with the level of my self esteem, figuring that my self esteem would rise when I learned to do something well. But because he never lied to me about how great I was, I learned that I could believe him. Always. My dad could be depended on to tell me the truth.
Dad ran the roto-tiller over my hideous s-shaped row until all evidence had been erased and then I tried again. This process was repeated 5 more times until finally he was positively beaming.
“ Look at that !!!” he yelled, clapping his big hands together. “ Its beautiful!”
It really was beautiful. With this triumph behind me I warmed to the work. Now it was time to line the furrow with fertilizer, horrible smelling nitrogen fertilizer that came in a big 25 pound burlap bag with a paper lining. I would drag the thing behind me as I dug down and grabbed a handful of the blue crystals and scattered them along the furrow. I never wore gloves so by the end of a day of this my hands would be on fire and all of the hair on my fingers had been burned off. Such were the appalling conditions under which I toiled in clear violation of numerous child labor laws. But by this time I was thoroughly into it and eager for what was next. I would drop the seeds a foot apart then flood the row with water from the garden hose, then cover up the row with the push plow and then rake up the foot prints so it looked perfect. I would spend hours out there with him during the summer, first plowing and planting then hoeing and weeding and finally the harvest would come. We would walk back to the house with a bucket of potatoes or a grocery bag full of string beans and always a half dozen bright red tomatoes. I always felt grown up when bringing those vegetables to the house. There was yellow squash, black-eyed peas, lima beans, English peas,corn…although Dad always had something negative to say about the corn. The stuff never suited him for some reason. It was either too puny or too wormy.
Dad doesn’t keep a garden anymore. He’s 86 now and finally gave it up 6 years ago. I miss those hot miserable days, the stinging flies, the dirt, the smell of the soil. Mostly, I miss seeing my Dad in control of that little piece of ground. I miss hearing him tell stories of when he was 12 years old and was given an entire field by my Grandfather to grow whatever he wanted. He chose tomatoes and made 200 dollars in 1936. I couldn’t even imagine such a thing. He would stand in the shade towards the end of the day, lean on a hoe and tell me how God loved a hard worker. How important it was that a man learn how to provide for himself and how out of God’s rich blessings we could know the unspeakable joy of giving to others.
“ Why is it so hard, Dad?” I asked late one afternoon. “Why is keeping a garden so hard? It’s non stop sweat from March to September.”
“ Because nothing in this life that’s worth anything is easy. Gardening is hard, work of any kind is hard. Preaching is hard. Going to school is hard. Jesus had a pretty hard time up on that cross, don’t ya think? But everything that’s hard produces something wonderful.”
“ I guess so,” I said absently.
“ Besides, gardening might be hard, but it sure is easier than starving”
We smiled at each other and walked back to the house as I admired the calluses on my hands in the dying light of the day.
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