The View from Right Field

Interruptions

Back in January I quoted from a homily by Rev. Phil Blackwell of the Chicago Temple on the subject of vocation (here).  He recently said another thing that I wanted to mention because I thought it was really good.  I don’t have a copy of what he said, and my memory may be a little off, but his point was something along these lines (to the extent this comes out right, it is to his credit; to the extent it does not, it is my faulty memory):

“You need to think of interruptions or inconveniences in your life as an opportunity to serve.”

Every Romance Needs a Soundtrack

I read a comment recently that “[e]very romance needs a soundtrack.”  If I had to choose, I would go with “Hey Hey, Holy Mackerel, No Doubt About It,” with a little “You’re My Cubs” and “All the Way” (by Eddie Vedder) thrown in on the side.

"In praise of the real bounty" – Joan Beck's Last Thanksgiving Column

For I-don’t-know-how-many-years Joan Beck, a columnist for the Chicago Tribune, wrote a special Thanksgiving Day column. Ms. Beck’s column was always a highlight of my Thanksgiving, and I would look forward to reading it every year. Ms. Beck died in December of 1998. In memory of Ms. Beck and her wonderful columns, here is her last Thanksgiving Day column, from the Chicago Tribune of November 26, 1998:

"As we gather together to count the Lord’s blessings, 377 years after the first Thanksgiving Day, we are grateful, Dear God, for the Israeli-Palestinian accord if it lasts and the bull market if it’s back, and the budget if there’s a surplus and the pullback in Iraq if it works, for John Glenn and Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire, for latte and laptops and love, for diversity and dialysis and dishwashers, for Amazon.com and answered prayers and amazing grace.

O God, our help in ages past, our hope for years to come, we thank you this day for violins and Viagra and virtual reality, for daughters and databanks and doughnuts and down, for magic and Magi and miracles, for browsers and brooks and brown paper packages tied up with string, for tech-support hotlines when they help and low mortgage rates when they’re available, for carryout and carry-ons and carry-overs, for caregivers and caretakers and caramels.

Grandparents and granola and grants and grand slams and Grand Tetons we count as blessings this Thanksgiving, God of grace and God of glory. So, too, carousels and caucuses and crocuses, oboes and oysters and oceans and Oz, blue jeans and teens and jelly beans, docks, and doctors and docents and doctoral dissertations, ducks and documentaries and dogs, pasta and pesto and pro bono and the ancient promise, that ‘while the Earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest and cold and heat and summer and winter and day and night shall not cease.’

Eternal Father, strong to save, whose arm hath bound the restless wave, we are grateful today for e-mail without spam and elections without attack ads, for limericks and luminaria and lime, for angels and onions and e pluribus unum, for cooks and courage and cousins and cougars, for sun and sons and soup and soap and soul, for modems and mothers and brothers and significant others.

For teachers and preachers and all creatures great and small, we thank you, Lord God who made them all, and for fathers and founding fathers and forefathers and foster fathers and father figures, for fajitas and farms and faith, for fireflies and fireworks and firefighters and fireplaces, for gingerbread houses and jumping ropes, for Grisham and Gershwin and Grieg, for hymns and hugs and hamburgers, for eagles and beagles and bagels and lox.

O Lord our God, when we in awesome wonder consider all the world thy hands have made, give thee thanks for ‘Swan Lake’ and ‘Nutcracker’ and ‘Silent Night’ and the ‘Grinch Who Stole Christmas,’ for Madeline and madeleines and madrigals and magazines and magnets, for nurses and newspapers and newborns, for readers and referees and Christopher Reeve’s ‘Rear Window.’

For ‘Your baby’s just perfect,’ and ‘Your lab report is normal’ and ‘You’re hired’ and ‘You’re covered’ and ‘It’s benign’ and ‘You’re admitted to the class of 2002,’ and ‘For better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health.’ And ‘they lived happily ever afterward,’ and ‘Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil,’ we thank you, Immortal Invisible, God only wise. So, too, for volunteers and vouchers and voters and votive candles, for authors and aspic and autumn and auld lang syne.

Our Father who art in heaven, we thank you this special day for mentors and memories and melting pot, for salad and salmon and salsa and salvation, for beaches and bleaches and bleachers, and peaches and for soccer and succor and success and for physicians and musicians and electricians and magicians, and for pick-your-own-apples and sing along Messiahs and chose-your-own Christmas tree in the woods.

The discovery of suchomimus tenerensis with its dreadful jaws, and astonishing size gives us thoughtful pause this day, O God from whom all blessings flow, as so SUVs and RVs and MRIs and AP courses and ESOPs and Roth IRAs and BLTs and TGIF. We count as blessings, too, 911 and 1-800 and 98.6 and 20/20 and 120/80 and 1999, the 55th chapter of Isaiah and the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians and the 103rd Psalm, the 1st Amendment and the 9th Symphony and ‘we hold these truths to be self-evident’ and ‘government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish from the Earth.’

For second harvests that salvage surplus food for the hungry, we praise you this Thanksgiving Day, God, who is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. So, too, for smokers who quit and kids who just say no, for homes and homecomings and homemakers and homers, Homer and home rule and holidays and holy days, thesauruses and tyrannosaures, sleeping bags and sleeping babies and all the wonder your hands have made.

Our father’s God to thee, author of liberty, we offer thanks today for Lincoln and licorice and libraries and lilacs, for commissions and remissions and non-polluting emissions, for chocolate and churches and chowder, for Christmas and carols and choirs and coral reefs, for sales and sails and ponytails, for vacations and vocations and vaccinations, for dreams that aren’t deferred and hopes that come true.

Dear Lord and Father of Mankind, we thank you, once again, for dawn after dark, for rest after work, for healing after hurt and life after life, for a bridge over trouble and a shelter from the storm, for love that will not let us go and an eternal home and always ‘that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present, nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God.’"

"Don't Tax You, Don't Tax Me"

Senator Russell Long of Louisiana once said that "[t]ax reform means, 'Don't tax you, don't tax me. Tax that fellow behind the tree.’" I thought of Senator Long when I read about a new Associated Press poll on how we should pay for the changes President Obama and Democrats in Congress want to make to our healthcare system.

According to the poll, 48% of the people opposed new taxes on insurance companies (versus 42% who supported them), and 51% opposed raising taxes on drug and medical device manufacturers (compared to 41% who approved of them). In both cases, I would imagine the people who opposed the tax increases were concerned, inter alia, that the insurance companies and manufacturers would just pass the increased taxes onto consumers and patients; i.e., them. (It can’t be because people like insurance companies.)

On the other hand, when people were asked if they would support a tax increase on those who earn above $250,000 per year, 57% said yes and 36% said no. In other words, "Don't tax you, don't tax me. Tax that fellow behind the tree".

There are, of course, at least, two problems with this approach. First, saying "let’s do something and let’s you pay for it" has a bad feel to it. If you are into the politics of envy or class warfare, it might be okay. But the general principle of thinking government ought to do something and you shouldn’t have to pay for it seems a little wrong to me. If you really believe in something, then you ought to be willing to pay at least a small amount for it yourself. After all, when it’s free, anything is fine.

The other problem is that it won’t work. The rich are not dumb. You generally don’t get rich by being stupid. If laws are passed to increase taxes on the rich, the rich are going to find ways to avoid as many of those increased taxes as possible. Loopholes; foreign trusts; all kinds of things. The tax consulting business will recover from the recession, assuming it ever had a recession, with a bang. Which means the increased taxes will not raise as much money as was expected.  And that means taxes will eventually have to go up on a large number of those people who originally thought that only the rich were going to have to pay.

Former President Clinton Volunteers to Help Out

Last week the United States Preventive Services Task Force changed its recommendations on when women should get annual mammograms to check for breast cancer. The old recommendation was that all women over 40 should get annual screenings. The Task Force now says that women between 40 and 50 and those over 75 do not need annual screenings unless they have special risk factors.

Needless to say, this caused a lot of controversy, but former President Bill Clinton has stepped in to help. President Clinton said that if any woman between the ages of 40 and 50 needs a breast exam and cannot get one, he will personally exam her himself.

The former President did say, however, that somebody else would have to take care of those over 75.

Afghanistan: The Wait Continues

As President Obama continues his search for a strategy for Afghanistan (I think it took Stanley less time to find Dr. Livingston), the latest delay seems to be the result of President Obama wanting exit strategies for the various options.

Well, here is an exit strategy: Win. It is the exit strategy we used in World War II and World War I and the Civil War and the Revolutionary War. It was, more appropriately, the exit strategy for ending the fighting in Korea. We fought until we accomplished what we needed to accomplish, i.e., until we "won," and then we stopped fighting.

But this doesn’t seem to be what President Obama is looking for. In spite of what he said back in the campaign about how important Afghanistan was, now that he is president, he seems to be looking for a way to get out so he can focus on the things he really cares about – which is a concern.

If you are going to do something like Afghanistan, you have to want to do it. If can’t be something that is a distraction, that you want to hurry up and get done with, so you can do something else. That was the problem that Lyndon Johnson had in Vietnam. In fact, if there is any appropriate comparison between Vietnam and Afghanistan, it is not in the wars themselves, it is in how the president approaches them. Vietnam was a distraction for Lyndon Johnson. It wasn’t what he wanted to do. It wasn’t what he wanted to focus on. And it wound up being a disaster for him.

I get a feeling that this is what Afghanistan is becoming for President Obama. He has to deal with it, but it’s not his priority. He wants to know how he can get out, so he can do what really matters.

If that is so, then it might be better to just get out now. I think we should stay in and devote enough resources to win. I think it would be really bad for us to give up and get out now. But it would be even worse if we don’t devote enough attention and resources to stay in and win. We’ll lose anyway, and it will cost more than if we just get out now. If Afghanistan is not important enough to President Obama that he will make it one of his absolute priorities, then let’s leave now. It will only be worse later.

2012 – A Prediction

I have been saying this for a couple of months, so I might as well write it down. Here is my prediction for the 2012 presidential election: Barack Obama will win unless two things happen. First, Barack Obama is perceived as having failed (or is perceived as failing) during the 2012 election. Second, the Republicans nominate a really good candidate.

Consider the two times in recent history when an incumbent president lost, 1992 and 1980. By the time of the 1992 election, George H.W. Bush was perceived as failing, in spite of our victory in the Gulf War, because the economy was seen as doing bad. (I don’t agree that George H.W. Bush was failing, nor do I think the economy was in that bad of shape by November of 1992; in fact, it was just getting ready to turn around. But the voters thought President Bush was failing.) And the Democrats nominated a really good candidate: Bill Clinton. The result: George H.W. Bush lost.

In 1980, Jimmy Carter was perceived as failing, what with the poor economy, the Iran hostage crisis, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, etc. (In this case I agree with the perception.) And the Republicans had a really good candidate: Ronald Reagan. The result: Jimmy Carter lost.

Consider what may be a counter-example, 2004. There were certainly many people who thought George W. Bush was failing. Whether it was enough for him to lose the election we do not know – because the Democrats nominated John Kerry, who was, most definitely, not a really good candidate.

So, once again, my prediction for 2012: Barack Obama will be re-elected president unless, in the fall of 2012, he is perceived as failing as president and the Republicans nominate a really good candidate.

Connecting Dots

Back in the days after 9/11, a frequent complaint was that the authorities had failed to "connect the dots". The danger was there; the facts were there; but people did not connect the dots.

Which brings me to a couple of recent situations. First, the "flying imams." Back in 2006 six Muslim clerics were taken off of a US Airways flight because their behavior had raised concerns:

"Passengers reported the men had been praying loudly in the terminal, chanting ‘Allah, Allah’ and cursing U.S. policies in Iraq. Once on board, the men took separate seats in the cabin’s front, middle and back. Two imams asked for seat belt extenders, which include a heavy metal buckle that could be used as a weapon, but left them on the floor. The pilot was told that three of the men had one-way tickets."

After a federal judge held that the defendants could be liable for civil damages and that the authorities did not have probable cause to detain the imams, the airline and the airport effectively gave in and paid the imams to settle the lawsuit. Of course, the defendants denied any wrongdoing in the settlement, but one wonders what some flight crew do will, or what some airline will allow some flight crew to do, next time. Which may be, if you’re cynical, exactly what the imams wanted.

Then there are the shootings last week at Fort Hood. Some of the statements and actions of the gunman, Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, were quite disturbing. Wednesday’s Washington Post reported on a talk Major Hasan gave in June of 2007 to a group of fellow Army doctors

"Under the ‘Conclusions’ page, Hasan wrote that ‘Fighting to establish an Islamic State to please God, even by force, is condoned by the Islam," and that "Muslim Soldiers should not serve in any capacity that renders them at risk to hurting/killing believers unjustly -- will vary!’

The final page, labeled ‘Recommendation,’ contained only one suggestion:

‘Department of Defense should allow Muslims [sic] Soldiers the option of being released as "Conscientious objectors" to increase troop morale and decrease adverse events.’"

At about the same time, U.S. intelligence agencies picked up Major Hasan’s e-mails to a radical Islamic cleric in Yemen, who was apparently detained by Yemeni authorities from 2006 to 2007 at the U.S.’s request, but they never told the Army about them. Some people have identified the reason as political correctness. But Daniel Henninger in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal suggests another possibility:

"The problem is confusion. The combatants at each end of the spectrum in the war over the war on terror know exactly what they think about surveilling suspected terrorists. But if you are an intel officer or FBI agent tasked with providing the protection, what are you supposed to make of all this bitter public argument? What you make of it is that when you get a judgment call, like Maj. Hasan, you hesitate. You blink.

Now everyone thinks the call was obvious. But it wasn't so obvious before the tragedy. Not if for years you have watched a country and its political class in rancorous confusion about the enemy, the legal standing of the enemy, or the legal status and scope of the methods it wants to use to fight the enemy."

So, what do we have? The flying imams collect money in Minnesota from an airline scared that it would lose a lawsuit and have to pay megabucks in damages because some its employees were just trying to do their job. Major Hasan makes statements that are totally off the wall, while at the same time he is contacting a radical imam in Yemen, but nobody does anything, whether for fear of being called a racist and a bigot or getting accused of breaking the rules on surveillance of potential terrorists by whoever wins the next election.

Connect the dots.

The Theme Song of the Obama Administration

I am a little late on this, but apparently the President made it to Berlin after all – sort of. Instead of actually showing up, and having all the hassle of standing in the rain and having to wait his turn to talk and all that, President Obama made a video address to those at the Brandenburg Gate on Monday. What struck me about his talk was this part:

"Few would have foreseen ... that a united Germany would be led by a woman from Brandenburg or that their American ally would be led by a man of African descent. But human destiny is what human beings make of it."

I was fascinated by the way the President was able to bring himself into even a talk about the opening of the Berlin Wall.

George Will noted the same thing in connection with the President’s speech in Copenhagen back in October in support of Chicago’s bid for the 2016 Olympics:

"The President and First Lady went to Copenhagen and gave little speeches about themselves. She, Mrs. Obama, used the first-person singular pronoun in some form or another, ‘I’ or ‘me’, sixteen, 34 times in sixteen paragraphs. He used it 23 times in thirteen paragraphs. It was all about them, and the danger is an adjective sooner or later attaches to presidents. Honest Abe, Tricky Dick Nixon. All kinds of adjectives. The danger to the President is that Vain is going to attach to him."

Which brings me to the theme song of the Obama administration – or at least President Obama: Carly Simon – "You’re So Vain":

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Note: I can’t take full credit for this idea. James Taranto at "Best of the Web Today" pointed me to the excerpt from President Obama’s video address in Berlin. Tom Maguire at "JustOneMinute" pointed me to the George Will quote and to the title "You're So Vain." I will take credit, however, for putting the thought together with Carly Simon’s song.

Update (11/12/09 7:30 a.m.):  Corrected the title of the Tom Maguire post.

1989: The Fall of the Berlin Wall - and More

For my post on the fall of the Berlin Wall and the other events that made 1989 such a great year, scroll down to October 31, 2009. For a report on the trips my wife and I took to East Germany in 1979 and 1982, see here .  See other "1989" posts by scrolling down.