the tribe has spoken


Today another 4 soldiers were killed in Iraq. That statistic falls on our ears like the adjusted rate of inflation, or housing starts, or the cost of living, or the median price of a single family home. Numbers, not unlike voters, are suprememly malleable, elastic, manipulated. The numbers of wounded soldiers in Iraq and other places we simply do not want to know: what the blind man cannot see and the deaf man cannot hear does not exist in the mind of the typical voter. The mantra of the new millennium is "what we do not know cannot harm us" and if there is anxiety, fear, concern, we are told to repeat until feelings of relative normalcy return.

Just as this prescription began to lose its efficacy the terror alert status leapt to fiery orange; after a few months of intermittent hot-to-less-hot readiness, this too began to wane. But salvation, in the form of Mother Nature arrived and the ruling classes began beating the drums of economic disaster - bluish-red hurricane surviving Gulf coasters pitted against red brush fired midwesterners against blue mudsliding West Coasters. 'There cannot possibly be enough to go around in the face of so many catastrophic events' they say, wringing their hands. 'We have to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps, tighten the belt, help one another out.'

That our belts have been retrofitted with the awl of recession for at least three consecutive decades is of no concern to the autocrats. That the "greatest generation" is the wealthiest for the first time in the history of this country is of no consequence, and at the direct expense of their own children and grandchildren is unimportant. The electorate now firmly buys the pap that Congress has been peddling since Ronald Reagan decided to trickle down on the rest of us: "I got mine, honey -- you go find a way and get your own!"

A generation of families with no living wage has begun to take its toll - more diabetes, more obesity, more stress related illnesses, more suicide among young people, the statistics go on and on, and if you are a normal American you have stopped reading this somewhere in the second paragraph. The rest of you may or may not decide to stick with me.

Joe Six-Pack is now faced with a peculiar dillemma: open said eyes (not to mention mind), take the cotton out of his collective ears and pay attention to what is happening in our country. Surrepticious wiretapping of US citizens has been de riguer since the fall of 2001. The president has declared war without declaring war and claims all of the priviledges while accepting none of the responsibilities. Our Vice President moonlights for Halliburton and gets yearly bonuses and the IRS and Congress find nothing unusual about this particularly odious form of war profiteering. Corporations default on pension funds while giving executives record salaries and bonuses. The standard of living for the average American household is a fraction of what it was a mere 40 years ago. Why are none of these things cause for outrage?

It is a foregone conclusion that most of the red states and a fair amount of the blue states support the war in Iraq based soley on the NIMBY proposition (not In My Back Yard) that iot is better to have a relative and or friend die at the hands of a growing number of terrorists than live with the uncertainty that a much smaller body of terrorists may succeed again in harming a fraction of the US public, on American soil. If you attempt to apply reason to this anxiety about hijacked planes or trains or buses and remind fellow citizens that many many more die as a result of gunshot wounds, for example, or traffic accidents, they refuse to deal with the threat from a small band of ideaologues rationally.

This peculiar brand of groupthink extends back to the panthesim of our past, when sacrifices to elemental beings could assuage the bloodthirst 0f men. Tribal sacrifice is considered a barbaric custom that lives in the remote outbacks and savannahs of our planet where civilised men have not yet extended the much vaunted capitalistic model. And yet people who could and should know better agree with the dim witted idea that "better to bring the battle to the enemy rather than sacrifice civillians." That our troops are young and idealistic if not technically virginal and thrown into a savage desert rather than a fiery volcano -- these facts do not change the basic template of the age old model at all.

That our brave soldiers remain very much part of the fabric of American life, and despite the fact that the deaths, maimings and traumas to each of them rip holes in the fabric of our communities, our United Sates and our President continue to insist that we are safer for invading a sovereign nation under false pretenses. We are shown mass graves where thousands were butchered - and those who care enough to remain informed knew of these things at least a decade ago; we are cautioned that the old Iraqi government was corrupt - a laughable justification for war, as our own Congress is rife with scandal andf abuse. Worst of all, the idea that the government of Iraqw so corrupt, the treatment of Iraqis so abhorrent it had to stop is an insult to the victims of genocide in Rwanda, Darfur and other nations, an insult to the countries who have entered into treaties with the US only to have the current administration declare them void, a slap to the abject poor within our own country with no running water, no shelter and no food - many of them vctims of natural disaster, far too many more permanent underclasses.

The legacy of the last thirty some years of GOP rule has been the elimination of our civilization and an embrace of a draconian contest among the populace. Where once a person born with a profound handicap was considered a ward of the public and provided with the means for a dignified life, now the mentally ill and the indigent are literally thrown to the gutters and dependent upon the mercy of passerby to survive at all. Where once libraries and a meaningful education were a right of each citizen, now they are luxuries many communities cannot afford. Where once corprations and businesses were held accountable for the way they disributed profits among the owners, executives and workers, there now exists a free-for-all where a bankrupt company still pays outrageous sums to the very people who were in charge of running the company into the ground. Pollution controls, cafe standards, meat and dairy inspections, Head Start and infancy programs, block grants... these things are now a part of our memory and not in our future.

The responsibility of a citizen is not an easy one: to remain informed and to hold those who govern accountable. A republic is not a tribe - we do not have the luxury of blind obedience or mob rule. Instead we are each commissioned with the duty to make known the truth when ignorance is accepted as fact. We are charged with the work of educating ourselves rather than following blindly down what seems the easier, softer road. We elect representatives, not elders who dictate what we will know and when we will know it and just in case - just in case such a circumstance as we find ourselves in today should befall us as a nation - we have the ability to impeach, to censure, to demand answers and to self governance.

While it may be easier to allow the witch doctor or shaman all the power and responsibility, we are each the guardian of the sacred spirit of democracy. We can revert to a red-state mentality where what was good 100 years ago is good today, but as a society we are fooling ourselves. The world and the rules that govern it are not sepia toned and inviolate. The challenges of life a hundred years ago were in many ways much less desperate than those of the modern United States. Homelessness and hunger were certainly no worse. Floods, hurricanes and fires devastated communities and the US government did not demand private donors pick up the pieces. The free market was an important element of the economy, but so was the employer, the congress, the church.

There is hope in all of these sobering statistics: those who can comrehend their importance have a near-omniscient grasp on American and World economics and politics. These brighter minds may yet demand accountability from their representatives, and a return to agovernment that serves even the weakest members of its society. Until then, I will use my sage and sweetgrass, my amber and patchouli, my snowflake obsidian and jet to keep at bay the greed and the avarice that has overtaken my local goverment all the way to the federal courts, the executive and the legislative branches of government, the national media. I will keep faith in the Constitution and pray it be restored from the perversion it has become, and I will trust that our republic will become a better place for my children and my grandchildren.

Perhaps we have gone past the place and time where a simple vote will cleanse the electorate. Maybe a shape-shifting shaman is what America needs. If so, bring it on, gods of smoke and water. Cleanse the soul of this people and make their blind eyes see the truth - that whatever happens to the least of us affects us all. Ho! And may tomorrow begin with a prayer of thanks for what we have an a plea for the lives of those who come after. Amen!

AULD LANG SYNE, version 2006.2

The world is neither flat -despite Thomas Freidman's excellent arguments in his tome to the contrary - nor round, but rather an icy grey. In other words, January has come to New York.

In the spirit of the ninth day of Christmas, as the ladies dance across our collective psyche, I raise a glass to the old and resolve to embrace the new.

Farewll To....

...Constitutional freedoms, which seem to have gone the way of the Dodo thanks to W's ship of state infesting our island of democracy with rats released by the Patriot Act. Congress may loose the mongoose of Patrick Sullivan's prosecution, or try to have Chertoff herd his cats at the FBI ATF INS CIA etc to try and restore balance to things, but this is only because W and his pals don't have any idea what mongooses, cats and rats have to do with Dodo birds. Hence, my adieu to liberty in my lifetime. Apparently we are all going to have a crash course in history, repeating what our leaders seem incapable of learning.

...The gaucho pant or "skort" which seem to be the eeevil genius of fashion designers who embrace neither the female aesthetic or the necessisty of clothing to function in the most basic of ways. Unfortunately, capri pants and other ludicrous styles of clothiung will still be embraced by my sisters still incapable of demanding comfort, style and affordability from an industry that spends at least 30% of its costs on self congratulatory expenses. Micheal Kors rejoice! There are still seven women left in New York who are willing to wear your shoddy crap. Praise Jesus.

....Speaking of the King of Kings (no, NOT Budweiser, you apes) a long lavender look back on the xenophobes who ignited the anti-Holiday rants this Holiday Season. If you were looking to increase attendance in church by appealing to the most biased, hypercritical and stupid amongst us, I think your plan MIGHT have back-fired. The Messiah must have been proud to see so many screaming, red-faced, sweatpant-wearing emissaries of His word attempting to encourage others through the myriad uses of bull to embrace Him as their personal savior. The bull-horn, the bull-y pulpit, bull-ying and of course bull in its purest and most scatological form. Merry Christmas, knuckle draggers, and so long.

...That scratching sound you hear is the major labels reusing all of the free 60 hours of AOL! CDs sent to households over the last two years. Due to the enormous costs associated with repackaging the same seven songs into however many covers performed by various artists and bands, the entire world could care less about music. That clapping sound you hear is Frank Zappa applauding the death of the suit wearing, soul sucking automatons who up until now enjoyed control over the supposedly free airwaves on the radio and television dials. XM and Sirius are a serious threat to the livlihoods of these useless hacks, and good riddance! Indie radio has been the realm of punks and metalheads too stoned to venture to the clubs, but true folkies and indie artists who create pleasant, lyrical music had no venue or platform that was accessible to any label. No more - satellite radio offers the most innovative sounds for the least money, and without the pay-for-play stickups at the points of distribution and airplay. With Britteny and Ashlee and Mariah as the only choices on the dial, who wouldn't prefer Stern?A concept whose time has come, the free markets of satellite will make the garage band in Massachusets as accessible as Howard Stern, and perhaps aid a generation of listeners into refining their palettes.

...A Ta-Ta to ignorance and greed this year. What was once considered a necessary evil is now just gauche. Excess of every kind will be in bad taste in the coming months, beginning with the Abramoff investigation and ending with the Lay acquittal (though he will be a pariah, an outcome I once thought beyond the ken of the American public.) Moderation and recycling will be in vogue, beginning with recycled tech gadgets in the hurricane zones of the South. CIO, CFO and CEO pay rates may be capped by Congressional mandate if not public pressure. Jack Welch, beware: a gravy train near you may be ready to run off its tracks.

...And a final farewell to "Bubbles" of every stripe. As the world teeters on the precipice of global deflation, environmental degradation and the threat of multiple pandemics in the form of AIDS SARS and H5N1, let us bid a fond farewell to the cheerleaders who pose as journalists and analysts while pimping the stock market, the real estate market, the natural disaster cleanup market and for all we know the herpes zoster/bunion and blister markets. While bubbles are pretty when blown by little children with magic wands on grassy hilltops or even tolerable when a byproduct of the cleansing foam from a bar of soap, bubbles are nothing but the gaseous byproducts of pontification without fact which is bouyed by the listeners desire to be told that they are not idiots for paying 600% more than they can afford to purchase a broom closet with beach accessat a mere 6.5%. That BOOM you hear echoing in the distance is the sound of one world economy falling down around Greenspan's ears as he boards the shuttle for Scottsdale.So long, suckers!

But don't consider the ramifications of these partings to be nothing but doom and gloom. In fact, 2006 looks to be a terrific year for lots of things, so long as you didn't have your heart set on democracy or freedom of the press or economic stability.

Say hello to...

...The return of the Brit-com. The four mega-corporations who control almost every channel on the dial cannot abide an uppity New Englander making the media look bad, so expect a Brit version of Jon Stewart to grace our airwaves by spring, gov'nah! Giving a regurgitated version of a rehashed version of a tamed down Daily Show, expect a pink cross between Tony Blankley and Benny Hill to moderate. Also expect this fare to blow like Shamu the Whale with asthma -- within a month it will fall flatter than Jimmy Kimmel Live.

...Speaking of the bright side, expect solar energy to make a resurgence in scientific circles. With the micronization of technology, solar tech will adapt and shrink battery and panel size to increase utility applications and enable all sorts of solar powered vehicles, homes and other innovations at home and abroad. An I-Pod that runs on sunlight? I remember my dad's old solar powered adding machine, a contraptions whose energy gathering panels were larger than my current claculator.

...Comedy Central becomes a powerhouse. With the demographic dream team of affluent and young viewers, CC will emerge as a source of "fake competition" (sports) and "fake marketing" (evinced by America the Book). Chappelle's Show is back, Carlos Mencia is becoming hotter and we all can be inoculated with a 'syringe of truth' thanks to the ministrations of The Colbert Report's "fact-free zone". (You are laughing right now. I nailed ya.) Comedy Central has rebranded itself to appeal to a wider demographic by courting talent with diverse backgrounds but no overt racial skew. Mencia is an equal-opportunity racist (thin-skinned Eskimoes beware!) while Chappelle careens on the other side of the avenue scoring the zingers that no other comic could successfully score, going deeper into the territory In Living Color skirted at its inception. (Hip-Hop, Wayne Brady, OJ, black bias, etc)

...Self-employment increasing, median incomes may actually go UP for the first time in a generation. With the exodus of manufacturing and now administrative positions, the displaced and disabled workers are now beginning to carve out a niche for themselves, on their own. This group will swell thanks to GM, Delta and a host of other government-protected corporations whose layoffs could be a source of economic devastation, but won't be thanks to the American Spirit. Ray Croc would be rubbing his hands with glee; the rest of us are rubbing our hands to keep warm, but neccessity is the mother of invention.

...The television show of the year will be The I Word, daily on CNN beginning this summer. Expect a rather mundane and dry narrative in the spring leading to the explosive jump-the-shark moment when Congress votes to impeach a sitting member of its own party. (Beyond the level of ignorance, the lapses in judgement will be so glaring that the decision will fall into the realm of him-or-us.) Think arrogant white men in tuxes. Think undisclosed locations. Think neo-con agenda. Still don't know? Neither does Lynne, and that's the true crime here, she seems like such a nice lady, too.

...Terry Pratchett winning the Pulitzer Prize for writing intelligent and hillariously biting social and political commentary. School Boards from Pennsylvania to Oregon will add these fun, ironic novels to required reading lists. Sophomores everywhere will decide to remain in school and a fortuitous decline in dropout rates will result. The political parties will find the increase in graduates will not help their party base, however, as Pratchett's absurdities will inform the newly minted consumers with a strong Libertarian streak.

...I-Net indie reportage and analysis. (ee accompanying article)


Happy Happy. I resolve to write more, talk less and pray about the same amount I did last year. And I resolve to be more cynical about the general and more trusting of the personal. And I want to lose 10 pounds on the raspberry-and-diet-cherry-coke-diet. John Basedow, look out.

the VC

Mailbox, once quiet, now overflowing. I am labeled commie, jerk. Ignorant. They don't sting, they don't make me angry, just profoundly sad. So tired. How can I explain claculus to a mind that cannopt comprehend basic algebra?

While it is difficult for me right now, given my life experiences and personal set of values that seems antithetical to everyone else, even among Democrats apparently, I have tried to be fair and to keep the tone of my remarks gentle, if not civil.

For those who did not live through Reagan's presidency or for those who weren't listening, I personally don't know how to color a man who directly circumvented the will of the US Congress through a direct override to his veto. It wasn't okay with me that he did that and it wasn't legal. That he got the capital to fund his scheme by the funnelling of monies through an illegal arms' sale to a puppet regime in MY hemisphere I can't seem to see as anything BUT criminal! I further find it highly insulting to my intelligence as well as to the fundamental role of the fourth estate that this man openly defied a court of law with zero penalty. How many thousands of dollars did my family spend on this... I will say scofflaw and end it at that.
As for the fact that he was afflicted with Alzheimer's, are all Alzheimer victims afforded equal treatment? Do petty criminals and felons of crimes other than treason get a free pass on crimes comitted six years earlier because by the time the state gets around to punishing them they are supposedly senile? If you think that's a statement of fact, you are more naive than I am.

It is easy to condemn Coucesceaux, easy to call Hussein a criminal. But our system only works when everyone is an equal - no political aristocracy, no elite governing class, no exclusions for popularity! The constitution is my frame of reference - literally in my office as well as figuratively in my mindset and remarks.

I assume men and women of decency and intelligence populate this world. It has certainly been proven to me that the values I hold dear are shared by some in America. I apologise if I offend anyone. I can not abide lip service. If you can offer a better answer to my sons, please -- give it to them!! Not excuses, not insistence that popularity equates with worth, give them a tangible example of such saintly rhetoric. I am at my core hoping that someone can offer an alternative view to my own. I am tired and I am saddened and I am afraid my country has not learned a damn thing from such abberant 'statesmen' and will be damned to repeat the same mistakes. Reagan was not just a felionious crook he was a liar. I would not trust his word on anything. He would never ever have bought my loyalty with something so superfiucial as a nod or a wink or a joke, let alone a remembering my name. I would require more than geniality from a treasonous elitist. No tax shelter or reduction in taxes would have bought my loyalty as easily as it did so many of my age. My values were not and are not for sale.

So please, try to accomodate my inferior mindset: I would like to ensure that my children don't die on foreign soil so somebody can drive thier Truck or their SUV getting 7 mpg for a buck a gallon or less. I want them to know an America that doesn't have to remind itself every five minutes that it is in the right, and rather does what is right and stands together against all enemies, foreign or domestic. Anything less and their future is in peril. It is in my power to show them a noble America. I pray it is in their power to realise one.

JH NY

Relentlessly, my television and radio paint Ronald Reagan as a hero, statesman and patriot. My sons, impressionable, open sponges ask why I seem frustrated. The disabilities I deal with every day with a measure of grace are too much for me this weekend.

As a parent, I weight the gravitas of the office and the man, the sheer weight of the omnipresent media speak, my spiritual beiefs to do unto others as I would have done to me. I do not wish to bring pain or anger to those who are hurting.

Then, these young faces, half men, look to me in wonder. Why, if this man was so great, do we not have his biography next to the all too human figures of our American heritage? The lives of Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, even Nixon have thier place in our home; Adams, Stevenson, Kennedy, Roosevelt - both FDR and Teddy - Rosda Parks, Carter, Johnson and others grace our shelves. We speak of these men and their ability to overcome thier personal flaws and predelictions in order to ensure that collectively we embody the principles of our government. We don't shy from the dark sides of these figures, rather we celebrate their ability to do so much good that the shadow they carried touched few. Several were openly hypocritical. A few, so rigid in their beliefs that they seemed destined to secret lives. But Ronald Reagan has not been spoken of, nor his presidency.

The time has come to deal with Reagan, for better or ill. I cannot begin to explain to these children how such an anomaly of Presidential politics could take hold of my dear country. For the eldest at nearly 14, "Veil" and one other tome sit, high on a shelf filled with essays, waiting for his review. For his younger brother, no nuanced answer will clear his confusion.

I pray, for Reagan's family and friends, and for mine. I ask that those he enriched be filled with a desire for more than self-satisfaction and a mandate to contribute fairly to a country that affords them so much luxury for little or nothing in return. I pray for those Reagan wounded, or worse, with his personal strictures and sand-lines drawn with no appreciation for the dissimilar, the grey area, the 'immoral' or worse.

In a way, my mea culpas give me my answer: in passing, more than this man has died. The ability to say one thing and do another has passed with this man.

The union leader who concerns himself only with the profits of producers cannot live in our world anymore. I lived through a house of mirrors where the safety net of welfare was a source of disgust and greed was celebrated; where running a tab you could never pay back was acceptable but being homeless was not; where soldiers were held up while in uniform as penultimate patriots while their pay and health benefits were threadbare and they suffered from even worse deprivation out of uniform.

I lived these things, and suddenly I realize I lived these things at the same age as my eldest son. He is ready, he is byond ready, to decide what kind of person he wants to be, and what sort of world he wants to live in. He can demand a standard for himself and those who govern him, and if he is lucky I wil have taught him that the standards are the same. So, in essence this is what I told them:

"I know that for the next week we will hear much of this man and his legacy and try to remember that some people really need to tell themselves that this is what Reagan accomplished. For a fortunate few, his policies were a boon. But in our home, we have a different way of measuring success. You've heard us remind you that the TV and the radio don't tell the whole story, and this is one case that that is very true.

"It isn't enough that your teacher or someone else says that this man was great. Learn for yourself what it is that you admire. Participate in any activities commemorating this president you like, but remember one thing: we consider a successful man to be a man who can be trusted, whose word is sufficient proof of the truth; a hero a man who does what is right and not what is easy; and it will be an honor to call you our son if we can look at you and know that you have been loyal to those you know, determined to play by the rules and not simply through easy opportunism.

"Even if you are the man of the year, even if I hear a thousand people tell me how great you are, if I cannot look at you and see a man who is honest, decent and moral I will love you but I will not be proud of you. You will have failed in my eyes if you use or discriminate or harm others. You will have failed in my eyes if you cannot manage to be a good and decent person while making your way in the world. Your father works next to the Trump Tower, in Real Estate, and shares nothing with that man. One building is governed by greed, commercialism and the idea that theres only so much to go around while your father lives by the idea that there is plenty for everyone, that until proven otherwise a man is a good man, that if it requires a lie or breaking a law it isn't worth it.

"Despite the cheers of the world, despite the claims of saving this beauracracy or that set of ideals, I do not mourn for who Ronald Reagan was. I mourn for who he could have been, the surface persona that could have deepened, the self-absorption that could have extended beyopnd his small world. I mourn for those who think that a smile and the ability to lie well are measures of greatness, and I mourn for a country whose fourth estate seems consumed by an elite who worship such petty ideals.

"The last time I saw this man, he was smiling in open court while pretending he did not remember how and who defied the rule of our Constitution. I had tried to believe that he had no idea what he was doing, I had heard so much from the TV and the radio that I believed the stories after eight long years. But when I saw him, smirking, lying, about the law, the only thing that makes us different from Iraq or Afghanistan or Russia or any other place, I made up my mind for myself. You have to do the same, with this president, with this time. One day you will see for yourself whether or not this was a man to to mourn for what he was, or for his unrealized potential."

I know that Senator Kerry has removed himself from the campaign for a week. That is why he will make a remarkable President and I would not get elected dogcatcher. I find it difficult to allow others the luxury of their self delusions. For the next week, our TV and radio will remain silent. Perhaps, in the absence of the shrill insistence that Reagan was a saint, I find my way to discover something that was genuinely good about him. Already I owe him the gift of a life lesson to pass on to my sons. For that, I can say with sincerity, thank you.

Jean Harsen
New York

What Did Bush Know on 9/11?

I've been poking around the JFK website and found this wonderful gem. I consider it required viewing for anyone who was NOT watching ABC on the West Coast after 8am PST (11am EST).

Here's the link:

http://www.takebackthemedia.com/true911.html


Thank God I was watching Peter Jennings. He was NOT impressed that the Commander-in-Cheif was unavailable for hour upon hour. This short media presentation goes even further to document the morning of 9/11/2001.

the curmudgeon

Kill the Messenger? Nah. Kill the Stenographer who WRITES the message!

Recently I read an essay by Oscar G. DePineres, Ph.D. outlining "Maslou's triangle" (sic) of human expectations and motivations, and related the outsourcing of jobs to Americans' rising standards for wages and benefits. He states, "corporations are telling the American worker without disclosing this fact is that our high labor cost has become noncompetitive in the present world." He goes on to say that "we are no longer able to produce quality and inexpensive goods at the high wages we have been accustomed to. Remove this layer of comfort we have become accustomed to, and you really have in your hands a cry-foul upraise of American workers. Politicians must face the music and be honest telling the naked truth to the American worker. There is no other way in Maslou’s theory, for corporations to stay competitive in the world and at home than job outsourcing. "

Hmmmm.

Now, I am no PhD. I'm merely a homekeeper and artist who tries to stay fairly well informed with a variety of sources, ranging from the liberal to the conservative. (BBC to WSJ and The Weekly Standard)

I think the Dr. is speaking of Abraham Maslow, whose work I am quite familliar with. I used the theory myself in motivating and keeping productive relatively low-paid workers, while reporting to well to do and up to highly paid owners. I worked with upper middle class portfolio managers while selling high-end apartments as a Resident Manager. I sold leases 20 to 40% over the market rate and stayed at 98% occupancy while my neighbors lost money though they were priced lower and had an 80% occupancy rate. How?

In a word, Maslow. Maslow speaks to how each person is motivated. His "Heirarchy of Need" is a study in human nature and NOT wage or price controls. Yes, his scale is a pyramid, because so many are stuck at a lower level of need. According to his theory, you cannot be motivated by a higher need UNLESS AND UNTIL the lower needs are met FIRST. ANYONE is prone to theft and low productivity if they are not compensated enough to meet what they consider their needs. Hence both blue and white collar crime.

Maslow helped to define why rich people cheat and why some of the most severely underemployed are self actualized people. His Heirarchy of Need explains why Hollywood is filled with fame seekers and why obscure artists can reach incredible levels of fluency and deftness. His scale has more to do with PERCIEVED needs than it does with actual possessions or circumstances.

For the curious or ill informed - one can only hope Dr. DePineres is familliar with the Curmudgeon's work - here is Dr. Abraham Maslow's Heirarchy of Need in a nutshell:

Base level: "basic physiological needs" such as food, shelter and water are the priority to people on this level. These are basic survival needs, and often people on this level are motivated by near desperation. There is a direct connection between income/resources and happiness and fulfillment.

Second level: safety and security are important. A better neighborhood, a decent diet, a dependable source of income are the priorities on this level. These people also experience a direct connection between their circumstances/resources and their happiness and sense of fulfillment.

Third level: belonging and social needs are what motivates people on this level. Praise, comeraderie, emotional connectivity and personal recognition are vital to these people. Interpersonal conflict, lack of teamwork and rigidity or dismissal of personal needs (i.e. sickness, family, etc) frustrates these people. Employers who can develop a sense of connection to their workers and who deal effectively with diffusing conflicts have happy, fulfilled workers at this level. It is difficult to quantify this need, it is far less able to be quantified than the first two and yet it is vital to meet this level and feel fulfilled in this area or you cannot reach the next level.

Fourth level: esteem and status motivate people on the fourth level. These people crave memberships to exclusive clubs, parties or receptions at places that enhance social status, awards, celebrity, fame, recognition in the papers - all these things can fill the desires of these people for external esteem and status.

Fifth level: self actualization. These people need no external cues to determine their worth or to meet their needs for happiness and fulfillment. They are able to find fulfillment from within.


An important caveat to remember: a person who has no external esteem extended to them at all cannot -by definition- be self actualized. People at the highest levels (four and five) have their needs for connection, safety and survival met coherently enough to focus on loftier goals.

To suggest that Maslow's work be used to convince Americans that their standard of living is too high is a major co-option of his work. Further, America is the ONLY industrialized nation that allows the gap between the executives and wage earners to be a difference of 500% or more!!

When a corporation outsources 30,000 jobs the same year it metes out bonuses to executives equal to 500,000 wage earners' jobs (or more!!) the problem has NOTHING to do with Maslow and America's standard of living and wages. It has more to do with the greed of our boardrooms than it does the avarice of our populace.

Respectfully, I cannot follow Dr. DePineres' logic. Maslow's Heirarchy is clear: the needs progress, not only from the physical to increasingly cerebral and emotional needs, but in less desperate, less instinctual ways. To demand that American workers go against their nature and embrace corporate shenanigans that embody displaced ethics and unbalanced rewards sytsems is silly. There are uncommon people I have met who manage to give 150% despite their working conditions, and [I]all [/I] of these people are American workers.

When these workers see that they will never be compensated fairly, they leave their employer, as any sensible person would. To encourage US workers to turn a blind eye to the lopsided values of Enron, et al, is to encourage a kind of psychic and economic schizophrenia.

the curmudgeon

Endorsement of the Week

Last night a true epiphany occurred while I was watching "Countdown with Keith Obermann" last night (8 and 12 pm EST on MsNBC). One of the stories he followed was the response of John McCain to the idea -- a suggestion floated right here several weeks ago -- that he accept a hypothetical request from John Kerry to run as the Democratic Vice Presidential candidate.

Now, John McCain is a fellow that puts the candid in candidate. He is a maverick, a passionate advocate for changing what he sees as a corrupt system of Government. He is also -unlike John F. Kerry- a Republican Senator from Arizona.

The repercussions of McCain's endorsement of Kerry and his tacit repudiation of Bush (running on the other party's ticket?) can only feed the growing movement to delve deeper into the W. Presidency. From questioning the Administration's stance on the 9/11 commission, the Energy meetings, Halliburton's Iraqi contract and growing overcharges, the oil interests role in the middle East, the House of Saud's influence, and Bin Laden's continued freedom as well as a host of ethical lapses from misrepresentation and spying in the UN and US Senate, the continued rental of the Lincoln bedroom and the unseemly cronyism between Ken Lay, Antonyn Scalia and Dick Cheney, the blush is off the W. rose. McCain's interview only strengthened those concerns.

In addition, John McCain is a hero in every sense of the word to most Americans. His appeal crosses party lines, and McCain knows it. He has demonstrated that he is capable of calling out Bush and Cheney on their hypocrisy in the past, but his announcement that, "although he found the idea improbable" he would be thrilled to serve with Kerry was a revelation to most independents.

Independents cast a vote based on the individual and not the party. McCain has the chops of a statesman, standing up to his party when he feeless it necessary. He defended Jim Jeffords; he ensured that McCain-Feingold passed; the way he deports himself in general on nearly every subject is a virtual primer on ethics and accountability in government service.

Now, many Democrats are ranting and raving about the idea of a Republican on the ticket, and understandably so. The current climate of gotcha politics is sickening, and the double standard applied to the last two presidents is obvious and wrong. But on the Democratic side there are some truly awful choices for Veep. Among these are the 'yellow dog' Democrats who have dubbed themselves Democrats, criticizing Democratic party ideals, liberalism and parity for wage earners and executives and using state Democratic party workers and monetary support to get themselves re-elected, sucking at the special interest trough alongside GOP insiders and predictably supporting GOP initiatives.

"Democrats" like LeBreaux, who vote in lock-step with the GOP on minimum wage and tax issues are okay because they wear the Democratic "team" label? I would never vote to allow a "yellow dog" to occupy any part of the White House again in this lifetime, though I do tend to favor "hawks" more than "doves" ever since the Scoop Jackson campaign years and years ago.

McCain appeals to me as a person, not as a Republican, I'll admit that. I happen to think that there have been greedy, corrupt individuals on BOTH sides of the aisles in Washington but there are also decent and caring people who truly seek the good of our country and not the personal enrichment of themselves. As a lifelong democrat I am offended at the idea all Republicans are evil. I do not like Joe Lieberman because I think he is too indebted to special interests; I feel the same about Edwards and Gephardt. There are more good than bad in the Democratic party in my estimation and that is why I support them, but I have voted Republican before and will again.

Bi-Partisanship is part of the process our Republic's very structure demands. If we cannot work with both sides of the aisle and if we can't show the average voter that gridlock will not be the general rule in a Kerry Administration, we are sunk. That is how Bush defeated Gore in 2000 (well, how he managed to come close enough to steal it), by painting himself as a centrist that would allow for the Congress and the Judiciary to gain some momentum and allow our country to run smoother - in actual terms it allowed poorly devised policy to be slammed through Congress with a ramrod. Terrible government was the result, because Bush is not a centrist, but the swing voters instinctively want to elect someone who is bipartisan.

The way our government works, we either have to have control centered in a single party as it is now - Senate, House, Judiciary and Executive branches all GOP - which will serve the electorate it represents or we have to elect statesmen and women who will work together to draft legislation that reflects the best good of the entire nation based on many voices and perspectives.

Personally, I would love to see former Secretary of State Madeline Albright in the VP slot. She is charismatic, intelligent, a master of foreign policy and has a long and well-documented history of speaking her mind even when it did not dovetail with her superiors. She is also one of the few Secretaries of State not to be indicted, caught in a lie publicly or behaving unethically (Note to Powell lovers everywhere: your guy is OUT). I believe Albright is an outstanding VP choice, but I doubt the Democrats will draft her.

Similarly, Gore Vidal would be wildly popular with independents. Like Kerry after his return from Vietnam Vidal is outspoken, eloquent and most importantly beholden to none. Kerry went on to serve in the Senate while Vidal has made his life's work keeping the media and the American government honest. Vidal is the icon of governmental oversight. His record in the Congress --and since-- speaks for itself, which is why the rank and file Democratic pols will never even allow Vidal near enough to Senator Kerry to discuss his short list.

In a perfect world an eloquent and intelligent man like Congressman Barney Frank would be an amazing choice for V.P, a skilled debater and yet a solid consensus builder. Frank is bright, energetic, has a good political ear and is a staunch advocate for the working poor, civil rights and the rights of women. Think of the good a ticket like that would and could do!!

The REALITY is that Frank and many other choices on the Democratic side are not palatable to the general public due to predjudices, biases and distortions.

It is unlikely indeed that McCain will be Kerry's VP, unless the polls are so close before the GOP election that the Kerry campaign feels it has to somehow reach the people that are staunchly supporting Bush. I've spoken with people who actually voted for him because "Oprah liked Bush's hug and she thought Gore didn't seem to like her". Now, where do you start with someone who votes based on a talk show hosts' bruised ego?!?

However, John McCain is very nearly the Oprah of the Senate right now, with his populist appeal and charisma. McCain has demonstrated over the years that he's an independent thinker, beholden to no party and to no special interests. His recent statements to the press that he would CONSIDER being Kerry's Number Two Man are a deft and thinly veiled endorsement of the Democratic challenger. McCain has once again shown his stature as a statesman by trying to help unseat a corrupt and divisively ideological administration -- and he has displayed considerable political acumen in the process, having endorsed Kerry in a way that cannot be attacked by the GOP rank-and-file.

It's interesting that partisanship has become so divisive. I remember when ideolougues didn't rule the country. Government is not a football game to me, but I also participate in local and regional races, and I tend to look at positions and truly bipartisan action as bellwethers to good government.

Do I support the minimum wage being raised? Do I want the business and environmental rollbacks, the lopsided tax policies (income isn't taxed but now wages are?!?), the disastrous foreign policy gaffes and broken treaties reversed? Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes and yes! That has nothing to do with what the open speculation about a possible McCain run with Kerry has produced.

The point was and is that McCain had the opportunity to state whether or not he would be willing to be Kerry's Democratic running mate against George W. Bush. That he would help defeat Bush sent a message to the more progressive GOP voter that I believe will resonate, far more than labels or insults will.

Partisanship is a wedge that divides our country in half. McCain, and the "Endorsement of the Year" might prove to be the undoing of the "us and them" mentality that has lead to waste and gridlock in our Congress for so long.

The Curmudgeon

Questionable Convictions

Well a lot has happened in week, hasn't it folks? I swing between nausea and frustration with an occasional sense of tragedy and a fleeting sense that the world might yet come out all right.

The weekend began with a nauseating wave of Bushie flag waving (over coffins and smoking ruins, no less) and Martha bashing. The former is no more (in fact far less) than I expected. Bushies will push the only button that looks remotely successful in the voting bloc and that's the fear button. If these ads don't begin to get people sufficiently anxious and scared enough, I am fully prepared for a "terror alert" to postpone the vote itself if Bush's polling numbers aren't close enough to Kerry to engineer a literal win if he can't generate one lawfully.

Oh, you laugh; maybe not, if you've been paying attention. I'm not joking in any way shape or form. Of course I'm a blogger so I obviously have no life, I get all my news from Slate and Drudge and have a porn website on the side (or resell everything I have ever owned on eBay). I know simply writing online relegates my opinion to the scrap heap of the conspiracists and neo-everythings, but I'm just one of the only people who seems to be paying attention, or perhaps the rest of the press just doesn't have the energy or sufficient outrage to try to do something about it, if only expose it for what it is. November is coming, though a lot can happen in 8 months. I shudder to think what chaos a panicked Vice master can generate.

Now to Martha, sweet Martha. The pundits have been picking your carcass cleaner than the turkey the day after Thanksgiving. I don't quite understand the glee that so many are taking in your demise. I think it's likely they are either too stupid to understand the circular logic of your conviction or they are too blinded by the sense of inferiority that your mission to inform the world of all things genteel generated within themselves.

I, for one, embraced your at home finishing school via magazine and then TV. You made vellum paper, balsamic vinegar and heirloom seed cultivation accessible to those of us who may as well have been raised by wolves. You taught me to make a killer buttercream. You turned me on to Victorian paper angels. You showed us how to tat, how to tin pierce, how to refinish old furniture and how to do it "well" - not just as a gradation of execution but a state of being. "Wellness" took on new heights with you, you taught a generation that a single fresh flower in a simple glass vase was certainly preferable to dried potpourri from K-Mart. When we saw the elegant ease of gentility and began to embrace the label maker and the sans serif font in every demographic, you brought your downscaled version of elegance to the quintessentially non-genteel market of the blue light special itself, K-Mart.

It must not be much satisfaction to you to know that the people too stupid to get that you have been railroaded will certainly reap a government that regularly imposes martial law and imprisons people for being rightfully paranoid they will overstep their bounds. The lady was convicted of covering up a crime that the judge said she did not commit. WHAT?!? The only thing remotely reassuring about this charade is that I can work my tail off to unseat this idiot from the bench, being so close to the city. I don't think I could stand this if I wasn't a New Yorker and didn't have a voice in who gets to continue to sentence and mete out...er, was that supposed to be "justice"?

To those of you out there who, like me, are waiting for Rod Serling to walk out of the periphery and "submit for your approval, a woman who..." It aint gonna happen any time soon, baby. Ashcroft, as frighteningly menacing as he is, is as real as the computer you are sitting in front of. This administration is crossing so many lines, I think that even God himself might picket 1700 pretty soon.

The two events articulate perfectly the hypocrisy and the double standards that pervade our culture. Bush drapes himself in a flag and evokes the "courage of the moment" he displayed during 9/11. Yet, the guy was so completely hidden that ABC's news anchor dryly observed the afternoon of 9/11 that the President could "not remain incommunicado forever" and sure enough that evening W. addressed us from an "undisclosed location" via closed circuit.

That the only favorables Bush can generate relate directly to 9/11 bodes ill for either the President or the citizens he pretends to represent. The green light that "terror" elicits for George and Dick may have to turn orange in order to capitalize fully on the dread and fear that Al-Qaida and their ilk handed to the GOP on a silver platter. If the public doesn't think through this (in the same way they cannot seem to think through and see the insanity of the logic of Martha's conviction) then the GOP will probably connect the dots by first inferring that a Kerry administration is a target of Al-Qaida; then leaking that the First Puppet and his President of Vices are personally targets of Al;-Qaida; think of the hand wringing, the references to the "unavoidable confusion" that resulted in 9/11 - as though every incoming administration is as diffident to its citizens safety or as so resolutely nationalist in its approach at the outset that it refused to look beyond its own borders at any foreign policy matters.

This morning GOP operatives are all over the airwaves whining about Move-On and Kerry's overheard statements to folks on the dais that the people he was running against are as crooked and rotten dirty as they come, do you think he was referring to the refusal of Cheney and Bush to cooperate with investigations as important as the terror attacks or Cheney's energy meetings just before the trebling of energy prices in the west ion 2000?

Could the "dirty rotten" ethics be fabricating evidence to the UN and American public about nonexistent weapons and chemical arms factories to justify attacking a nation that posed no threat to anyone but its own citizens? Could the "crooked" antics of Halliburton securing a hefty contract to rebuild Iraq after we destroyed it on purpose, then its blatant overcharges and the administration's refusal to pull the contract or mete out some sort of consequence to borderline war profiteers?

Could the fact that Martha and Ebbers have hit the chopping block but yet Kenny Lay (Bush's #1 contributor in the 2000 election) walks free unindicted while his company and everyone, from retirees to stockholders to employees were defrauded? Yes, wring your hands all you like about Clinton dispensing ONE questionable executive order, but then have your anger raised equilvalent to the level of patronage in W's administration.

Remember the Congressional inquiries over a few travel agent jobs in the White House? Yet this Congress has no compunctions about allowing Supreme Court Justices to rule on cases where they have an evident conflict of interest? The level of corruption self evident in the GOP that extends to the Oval office and Vice Presidential bunker is so egregious it defies logic. Crooked and rotten are gentle criticisms -- I call the Republican ethics of the last decade felonious, hypocritical, cowardly, xenophobic, greedy and pathological in its half truths, outright distortions and its blind insistence that it is morally superior despite all evidence to the contrary. Bush (et al) and their public personae have nothing in common with their actions. Their supposed positions, moral and otherwise are rendered moot by the very absence of any sense of conscience or guiding ethos; in the same way America and Martha Stewart received a sentence but no real justice.

I say it now: if all else fails, an orange alert will appear timed just before the elections. If the resulting sympathy/fear bump isn't enough to give W a full 6 point poll lead then the "O alert' will extend through November postponing elections.

You heard it way back in the stirrings of spring, America. When September brings an evil wind, don't say I didn't warn you.

the Curmudgeon