I want to think my friend, Steve, for recommending me for a carpentry job to one of his friends. Not because I got the job, but it gave me something to think about while I was doing some tedious painting.
This fellow wanted me to install a new exterior door from his porch to his kitchen. The existing door was in good shape, but it was one of those doors that has a glass insert panel on the top half. He was concerned that someone could break the glass, reach in and unlock the single cylinder dead bolt, and thus break into the house. He wanted me to install a solid door without a window. The kitchen was pretty shaded and dark, and the solid door would have made it even darker, but, to me, the darkness that permeated the house was not from the lack of windows.
His was the personal darkness of fear that made him willing to shut out the light. He had lived in that same house with the same door for over 30 years, but suddenly he was fearful of a break-in. It's not a bad neighborhood, middle-class, not wealthy, but not Detroit or Chicago. I looked for some statistics on home break-ins and found a Bureau of Justice Statistics report from 2003 to 2007. Here's the link: http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/ascii/vdhb.txt. It turns out that the number of break-ins seems quite high; about 3.7 million/year, or one for every 33 households. But, 65% of those break-ins are committed by intruders known to the homeowners. About 7% (259,000) of break-ins result in assaults, but only about 90,000 of these assaults are by strangers. That makes the risk of being assaulted by a stranger in your own home about 1 in 3000. In all of the break-ins, there are only 430 homicides per year, so the risk of being killed in your own home during a break-in is about 1 in 700,000. According to the report, these risks diminish some what if you are white, married, and live in a single family home. And, I assume, that the part of the country you live in, your economic status, and other variables can increase or decrease your risk, but the report does not differentiate.
I won't call the man's fear irrational, after all, there is a small but real risk of being assaulted or even killed in you own home. But, you are 15 times more likely to die by falling in your own home, 10 times more likely to accidentally poison yourself, 7 times more likely to die in a home fire, twice as likely to die by choking to death, and almost twice as likely to die by drowning. There's even a higher risk of being shot and killed by a law enforcement officer.
This man's fear is an anecdotal example of our societal belief that danger seems to lurk at every corner. We are constantly reminded by the media that murder and mayhem exists. We are told by the NRA that we need guns to protect our homes. We are told by our Republican candidate for president that immigrants and and minorities are taking our jobs, cheating us of our tax dollars, spreading terrorism, and even threatening our religions. Some of our preachers allege that Christianity is under assault and that God will punish us for allowing abortions, or for tolerating LGBT people.
I'll admit that I'm cautiously fearful of certain things. I'm very fearful of some big picture items such as climate change or threats to our democracy, that might effect my child or grandchild, or our country, or even the world. I would bolt the door to protect future generations.
But here's the thing: I know that I, like everyone else is going to die, hopefully not tomorrow or next week, but someday. But until then, I am going to choose to live in the light.
Saturday, August 20, 2016
Sunday, February 14, 2016
Tape this to your refrigerator and check off the blocks.
I suspect Antonin Scalia was a decent man whose ideology prevented him from seeing the forest for the trees. I sorry for his death, but glad he's gone from the court.
So, whats going to happen now? Within hours of Scalia's death, Mitch McConnell announced that the Senate would not confirm a new justice under the current president, even though that will throw our legal system into chaos for at least a year. Here's how it will play out.
1. President Obama will know that picking a liberal will poke a stick in the Republican eye. He may try it once, just to win some political points.
2. He will soft ball over the plate a moderate middle of the road judge with good credentials but without a big track record.
3. The Republican political assassination team will immediately knock the nominee right out of the park with a combination of, character assassination, innuendo, right wing punditry, litmus tests, religious views, accusations of left handedness, or anything else that will postpone an actual vote.
4. Under constant personal assault, the nominee will likely decline or withdraw his nomination before a vote can be cast.
5. Wash rinse and repeat, probably three of four times.
6. Even though the American public will, by this time be clambering for resolution, by selecting, a balanced nominee, and if he actually receives a vote in the Senate, he will lose. King Solomon could not be confirmed under the current conditions in the Senate, with the current President. It won't even be close. Adding to the slim majority the lockstep Republicans hold in the Senate there will be a number of Democratic Senators in swing states that will not risk their political future on a reasonable appointment.
Mitch McConnell as well as a number of Senators and congressmen have, over and over again, shown themselves to be traitors to the American Constitution, and the American public. This will be just one more in a long line of seditious acts.
So, whats going to happen now? Within hours of Scalia's death, Mitch McConnell announced that the Senate would not confirm a new justice under the current president, even though that will throw our legal system into chaos for at least a year. Here's how it will play out.
1. President Obama will know that picking a liberal will poke a stick in the Republican eye. He may try it once, just to win some political points.
2. He will soft ball over the plate a moderate middle of the road judge with good credentials but without a big track record.
3. The Republican political assassination team will immediately knock the nominee right out of the park with a combination of, character assassination, innuendo, right wing punditry, litmus tests, religious views, accusations of left handedness, or anything else that will postpone an actual vote.
4. Under constant personal assault, the nominee will likely decline or withdraw his nomination before a vote can be cast.
5. Wash rinse and repeat, probably three of four times.
6. Even though the American public will, by this time be clambering for resolution, by selecting, a balanced nominee, and if he actually receives a vote in the Senate, he will lose. King Solomon could not be confirmed under the current conditions in the Senate, with the current President. It won't even be close. Adding to the slim majority the lockstep Republicans hold in the Senate there will be a number of Democratic Senators in swing states that will not risk their political future on a reasonable appointment.
Mitch McConnell as well as a number of Senators and congressmen have, over and over again, shown themselves to be traitors to the American Constitution, and the American public. This will be just one more in a long line of seditious acts.
Sunday, May 3, 2015
Fast Cars and Baltimore
Last month, our men's book club read and discussed Outliers The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell. For those who haven't read this excellent book: Through a series of anecdotal profiles, he defines the reasons that people become successful, and also the the reasons for the lack of success of others. There are two main themes to the success stories. One is the 10,000 hour rule, that is, that it takes at least 10,000 hours of hard work or practice to become proficient in a chosen field. One of the examples he uses is that of the Beatles, who, before bursting onto the scene in 1964, had spent years together playing in clubs in England and Germany. While many of their competitors were three chord wonders, the Beatles had, by the time they appeared on Ed Sullivan, become accomplished musicians. Of course, the 10,000 hour rule is no guarantee of success, but that much work is necessary to reach the peak of proficiency.
The other theme, that he stressed, is that essentially no one becomes successful without help along the way. That, the concept of the "self made man" is bogus. This help that successful people receive can come in many forms, and it is very often a series of intervening helpful circumstances that lift people up in this world. These compounding circumstances can be as simple as being born in October or November so that a person might be 20% or so more mature or coordinated than his peers. In these cases, a teacher or coach might take interest in one's development. It may be the advantage one receives by being born into an upper middle class well educated family that can afford to spend the time and effort needed to guide a child to excel and to learn the interpersonal IQ needed to make one's way in society. It may be some special circumstance, such as being afforded computer time on a mainframe at an early age, or having a truly accomplished musician take interest in your piano studies
So now I come to the point of the title of this post. We are all hearing about the rioting and violence occurring in Baltimore and other cities over the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of the Baltimore police. The cries from the right are redolent with racist remarks about the Baltimore thugs, too lazy to work, and eager to burn and loot their city. And, I admit that that there is a certain amount of thuggery involved, and a short sighted inclination to shit where you sleep. But, there is also the hopelessness of the fact that the vast majority of the poor blacks in Baltimore and every large urban metropolis in this country will never get a single one of the aforementioned breaks or, much less, a combination of these breaks necessary to break out of their situation. They are raised by poor and poorly educated parents and grandparents, unwilling or unable to give them proper guidance. They are warehoused in underfunded and under performing schools, administered by school boards, county commissions, and states that are not willing to take on the roll of surrogate parenthood that these children need. They live in neighborhoods where unemployment is high and the hope of employment is low, and because their experiences of the world outside their boundaries is limited, they are unwilling or unable to leave.
And the fast cars portion of my post title? The song "Fast Car" by Tracy Chapman, which portrays the reality and hopelessness of the inner city better than I can ever express. It's enough to make me cry.
The other theme, that he stressed, is that essentially no one becomes successful without help along the way. That, the concept of the "self made man" is bogus. This help that successful people receive can come in many forms, and it is very often a series of intervening helpful circumstances that lift people up in this world. These compounding circumstances can be as simple as being born in October or November so that a person might be 20% or so more mature or coordinated than his peers. In these cases, a teacher or coach might take interest in one's development. It may be the advantage one receives by being born into an upper middle class well educated family that can afford to spend the time and effort needed to guide a child to excel and to learn the interpersonal IQ needed to make one's way in society. It may be some special circumstance, such as being afforded computer time on a mainframe at an early age, or having a truly accomplished musician take interest in your piano studies
So now I come to the point of the title of this post. We are all hearing about the rioting and violence occurring in Baltimore and other cities over the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of the Baltimore police. The cries from the right are redolent with racist remarks about the Baltimore thugs, too lazy to work, and eager to burn and loot their city. And, I admit that that there is a certain amount of thuggery involved, and a short sighted inclination to shit where you sleep. But, there is also the hopelessness of the fact that the vast majority of the poor blacks in Baltimore and every large urban metropolis in this country will never get a single one of the aforementioned breaks or, much less, a combination of these breaks necessary to break out of their situation. They are raised by poor and poorly educated parents and grandparents, unwilling or unable to give them proper guidance. They are warehoused in underfunded and under performing schools, administered by school boards, county commissions, and states that are not willing to take on the roll of surrogate parenthood that these children need. They live in neighborhoods where unemployment is high and the hope of employment is low, and because their experiences of the world outside their boundaries is limited, they are unwilling or unable to leave.
Saturday, April 25, 2015
If I were a Republican
The definition of conservatism: A general preference for the existing order of society, and an opposition to efforts to bring about sharp change. With that definition in mind, let me pretend to be a member of the Republican party. Not your typical ill informed Republican, constantly being bombarded with right wing propaganda in order to be convinced to vote against his own best interest, but instead, a member of the elite, wealthy, powerful inner circle of Republicans working to guide national policy to achieve their own very narrow goals.
Here are my goals as a member of this powerful Royal club. Note that this is truly a club, in that in this very exclusive group, members all know each other, associate with each other, and conspire with each other. Some of these members are household names, like the Koch brothers, or Sheldon Adelson, but for everyone in the group you can name, there are hundreds of other lesser Royals pulling the strings of their own self-interest. As a member of this group, my number one goal is to insure that I can maintain and increase my wealth for my benefit and for the benefit of my heirs. Each of my other goals are simply subordinate to my number one goal. I will attempt to reduce taxes on my wealth and on that of my heirs. I will at all costs attempt to prevent the existence of a voting majority that might threaten my status and my wealth.
My Royal club that is tirelessly working to achieve it's goals, and is supported by a cadre of lesser Royalty, the Dukes and Earls of America, if you will, who benefit from the policies of their superiors and, the soldiers,or knights you might say, who enforce the royal will upon the American serfs. These knights, otherwise known as politicians and pundits are directly or indirectly on the payroll of the lords.
As a member of this American Royal family, let me explain how we achieve our goals. First of all, as I have said previously, we convince a substantial percentage of the voting public to vote against their own best interests. Through our knights, we promote xenophobic ideas regarding race, religion, and poverty. We convince the public that it must have guns to protect itself against potential uprisings of minorities, the poor, and the undocumented immigrants. We convince the public that we are an exclusively Christian nation, and that Christianity is under assault in America. Then we denigrate the poor, claiming that they are all lazy "takers", undeserving of government help, and beneath contempt of "hard working, God fearing Americans". Under the guise of religion we use gay and abortion issues to compromise the will and rights of individuals and to lure the religious zealots to our party.
We have very successfully made the words, socialism and communism, synonymous, and used the cold war fears of totalitarian Russia and China, to convince citizens to despise programs that universally help people, by labeling them socialist. We hate programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and now, the Affordable Care Act, because on the one hand they take money out of our pockets, while on the other hand, these programs make people more independent and less beholden to us.
So far, these moves have helped us achieve most of our goals, except for the two major prizes, a permanent Republican Presidency and a majority court system under our control. We are currently hard at work on policies to overcome the demographic obstacle of a nationally elected president, and have mounted a grass roots approach to co-opting the court system and obtain even wider margins in the house and senate.
The weakening of the nation's campaign finance system now allows us to pour in vast amounts of dark money to not only national campaigns, but also increasing into local elections. As it has been said, "all politics is local", and as we build up a large cadre of Republican county commissioners, judges, and state legislators, we are building the future of the party. Our efforts in these areas have already reaped rewards.
Many states now have majority Republican Legislations working tirelessly to restrict Democratic voter turnout, roll back the political power of unions, thus cutting of important campaign finances to our Democratic opponents, making judicial positions partisan, and in some states, revamping electoral college laws to allow proportional representation where that would be an advantage to us.
Of course the main interest of the wealthy is to become more wealthy, so on that front, we, through our knights, have mounted a battle against the intellectual liberal elite. We simply cannot have people going around saying that air and water pollution is harming us, fossil fuel is driving Carbon Dioxide levels to irreversible highs, or that mankind is causing global warming and sea level rise. Our knights are working to discredit scientific study, reduce research, and actually decree that terms derogatory to the business climate not be used by government employees. When the time comes, we will retreat to higher ground and our knights will protect us.
Each of us looks forward to a time when our Knights obtain insurmountable political power and we can begin to completely unravel the social fabric of our country, and return our Royal families to the Utopian servant economy we so richly deserve.
Here are my goals as a member of this powerful Royal club. Note that this is truly a club, in that in this very exclusive group, members all know each other, associate with each other, and conspire with each other. Some of these members are household names, like the Koch brothers, or Sheldon Adelson, but for everyone in the group you can name, there are hundreds of other lesser Royals pulling the strings of their own self-interest. As a member of this group, my number one goal is to insure that I can maintain and increase my wealth for my benefit and for the benefit of my heirs. Each of my other goals are simply subordinate to my number one goal. I will attempt to reduce taxes on my wealth and on that of my heirs. I will at all costs attempt to prevent the existence of a voting majority that might threaten my status and my wealth.
My Royal club that is tirelessly working to achieve it's goals, and is supported by a cadre of lesser Royalty, the Dukes and Earls of America, if you will, who benefit from the policies of their superiors and, the soldiers,or knights you might say, who enforce the royal will upon the American serfs. These knights, otherwise known as politicians and pundits are directly or indirectly on the payroll of the lords.
As a member of this American Royal family, let me explain how we achieve our goals. First of all, as I have said previously, we convince a substantial percentage of the voting public to vote against their own best interests. Through our knights, we promote xenophobic ideas regarding race, religion, and poverty. We convince the public that it must have guns to protect itself against potential uprisings of minorities, the poor, and the undocumented immigrants. We convince the public that we are an exclusively Christian nation, and that Christianity is under assault in America. Then we denigrate the poor, claiming that they are all lazy "takers", undeserving of government help, and beneath contempt of "hard working, God fearing Americans". Under the guise of religion we use gay and abortion issues to compromise the will and rights of individuals and to lure the religious zealots to our party.
We have very successfully made the words, socialism and communism, synonymous, and used the cold war fears of totalitarian Russia and China, to convince citizens to despise programs that universally help people, by labeling them socialist. We hate programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and now, the Affordable Care Act, because on the one hand they take money out of our pockets, while on the other hand, these programs make people more independent and less beholden to us.
So far, these moves have helped us achieve most of our goals, except for the two major prizes, a permanent Republican Presidency and a majority court system under our control. We are currently hard at work on policies to overcome the demographic obstacle of a nationally elected president, and have mounted a grass roots approach to co-opting the court system and obtain even wider margins in the house and senate.
The weakening of the nation's campaign finance system now allows us to pour in vast amounts of dark money to not only national campaigns, but also increasing into local elections. As it has been said, "all politics is local", and as we build up a large cadre of Republican county commissioners, judges, and state legislators, we are building the future of the party. Our efforts in these areas have already reaped rewards.
Many states now have majority Republican Legislations working tirelessly to restrict Democratic voter turnout, roll back the political power of unions, thus cutting of important campaign finances to our Democratic opponents, making judicial positions partisan, and in some states, revamping electoral college laws to allow proportional representation where that would be an advantage to us.
Of course the main interest of the wealthy is to become more wealthy, so on that front, we, through our knights, have mounted a battle against the intellectual liberal elite. We simply cannot have people going around saying that air and water pollution is harming us, fossil fuel is driving Carbon Dioxide levels to irreversible highs, or that mankind is causing global warming and sea level rise. Our knights are working to discredit scientific study, reduce research, and actually decree that terms derogatory to the business climate not be used by government employees. When the time comes, we will retreat to higher ground and our knights will protect us.
Each of us looks forward to a time when our Knights obtain insurmountable political power and we can begin to completely unravel the social fabric of our country, and return our Royal families to the Utopian servant economy we so richly deserve.
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Birthday thoughts and wishes
It's a quiet day for the birthday boy. So far I've managed to bake four loaves of bread, and download five Bob Dillon CD's using the DVD/CD Rom player my wife got for me. (A lot of new laptops don't come with one). I also purchased Peter, Paul and Mary's greatest hits. My music purchases reminds me of this old guy (about the age I am now) from Kannapolis that several of us young guys carpooled with to McGuire Nuclear Station back in the early seventies. Each day he would turn on the car radio at 7:00 and listen to the news. Then, as soon as the first song after the news began playing, he would quickly turn off the radio and, like clockwork, say "ain't make any good music in twenty years."
My favorite chair in the den developed a big hole in the leather cushion, which I could have lived with, but coupled with the fact that the chair was quite low and increasingly hard to get out of, I got a new chair for my birthday. You know you're getting old when you get your own recliner. After I retire, I suppose I'll spend the majority of my leisure time with my feet elevated to the same level as my head. I'm developing more and more aches and pains, but I read today there may be hope.
I researcher today announced that head/body transplants may be possible within two years. I'm happily married to what I consider a trophy wife, so now perhaps I can get a trophy body as well. Of course, some might say the body got the short end of the stick. Can you imagine putting the grumpy head of an old man on to a 20 year old body. Talk about being a creepy, lecherous old fool. And, what would the doctor say after a successful surgery: "He's alive, he's alive." I guess when my head wears out, they could then transplant a new head onto my new body. I'd be like George Washington's axe, all original except for replacing the head and handle a few times.
I'm planning to retire in September, or at least mostly retire. I still need to make enough money to fund my hobbies. Actually, Kathy thinks I'm mostly retired now. Bought some new panniers for my bike and have a few trips in mind. I think my friend Tim and I are going to ride down to Greenville, NC in April. Kathy and I are going to do the three day Cycle NC coastal ride on the tandem in April, and maybe do a big 300 mile coastal loop sometime this summer. I just hope my health can hold out at least for a few more years. I've toyed with the idea of riding cross country, probably by myself, maybe next year, but I don't know if that will actually happen. It may be like some of my other dreams in that my reach may exceed my grasp. I probably should not have mentioned this trip, because I expect that Kathy will not be too keen on the idea. I would like to get in one grand adventure before I can't remember my way home. While writing this, the line "the places you'll go the people you'll meet" came into my head, and I became curious as to it's origins. It comes from the book "The Places you'll Go" by Dr. Seuss. Here's a YouTube link to the burning man version of the poem. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahv_1IS7SiE . I know, Burning Man is just a bunch of crazy hippies camping in the desert, but this is worth a watch, because this is about the me that I wish I could be.
My favorite chair in the den developed a big hole in the leather cushion, which I could have lived with, but coupled with the fact that the chair was quite low and increasingly hard to get out of, I got a new chair for my birthday. You know you're getting old when you get your own recliner. After I retire, I suppose I'll spend the majority of my leisure time with my feet elevated to the same level as my head. I'm developing more and more aches and pains, but I read today there may be hope.
I researcher today announced that head/body transplants may be possible within two years. I'm happily married to what I consider a trophy wife, so now perhaps I can get a trophy body as well. Of course, some might say the body got the short end of the stick. Can you imagine putting the grumpy head of an old man on to a 20 year old body. Talk about being a creepy, lecherous old fool. And, what would the doctor say after a successful surgery: "He's alive, he's alive." I guess when my head wears out, they could then transplant a new head onto my new body. I'd be like George Washington's axe, all original except for replacing the head and handle a few times.
I'm planning to retire in September, or at least mostly retire. I still need to make enough money to fund my hobbies. Actually, Kathy thinks I'm mostly retired now. Bought some new panniers for my bike and have a few trips in mind. I think my friend Tim and I are going to ride down to Greenville, NC in April. Kathy and I are going to do the three day Cycle NC coastal ride on the tandem in April, and maybe do a big 300 mile coastal loop sometime this summer. I just hope my health can hold out at least for a few more years. I've toyed with the idea of riding cross country, probably by myself, maybe next year, but I don't know if that will actually happen. It may be like some of my other dreams in that my reach may exceed my grasp. I probably should not have mentioned this trip, because I expect that Kathy will not be too keen on the idea. I would like to get in one grand adventure before I can't remember my way home. While writing this, the line "the places you'll go the people you'll meet" came into my head, and I became curious as to it's origins. It comes from the book "The Places you'll Go" by Dr. Seuss. Here's a YouTube link to the burning man version of the poem. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahv_1IS7SiE . I know, Burning Man is just a bunch of crazy hippies camping in the desert, but this is worth a watch, because this is about the me that I wish I could be.
Sunday, February 15, 2015
Nightmares and Neighbors
My recurring dreams and nightmares have followed a few basic themes. I've dreamed of walking through the woods where at every step there were snakes underfoot. I've dreamed of being in a public place clad only in my tighty whiteys. I've dreamed of flying, or more accurately being able to levitate myself over my surroundings. All of these themes began occurring in childhood, and for the most part occurred less frequently as I got older. I guess all dreams are somehow anchored in reality, although the complete tapestry of each dream is woven of many nonsensical threads. I'm not particularly afraid of snakes, so the snake dream seldom reappears, I have a lot more self-confidence than I had as a child or even as a young adult, and unfortunately the flying dream, which I understand indicates comfort or happiness does not occur as often as it once did.
My most terrifying dream sequence is also the most difficult to explain. It never seems to jolt me awake as it did when I was young, but the reality of this theme often occurs to me. Once, as a writing assignment in high school, I tried to articulate this dream, but I'm afraid my feeble attempt only got me a C or a D, and illustrated to the teacher how screwed up I was. I'm going to give it another shot.
In my dream, I would find myself suffocating under an ever increasing pile of sand being heaped upon me by my parents, one shovel full at a time. Although I would plead with them to stop, each parent was intent upon getting one last shovel of sand onto the pile. That's it, not a complicated dream where one nonsensical thread leads to another and another, just sand, dusty and dense piling up on me. I understand now that my dream was just a reaction to the parents, in my dysfunctional family, engaging in one more escalating argument where neither was willing to back down. My parents resorted to psychological, not physical violence, although at times the one felt as bad as the other. In any case, I survived my childhood, and I doubt that my family was more dysfunctional than many others. It was ,however, my introduction to the escalating argument, a phenomenon I've grown to greatly appreciate and fear.
I've seen, and been a part of these arguments, and the mitigating factor in almost every one I have engaged in or witnessed is that ultimately, one party or both were constrained by the potential loss of something they valued. Be it their freedom, their marriage, their children, their teeth, or their life, there was almost always some limiting factor that stopped the escalation before it lead to violence. But, as I have often joked, the cemeteries and jails are full of people who would not back down. These are the losers in our society, people without valuable constraints.
Couple this mentality with another theme that I have often written and thought about, that is, the psychopath next door. There has been a lot written about the sociopaths around us, including one titled "The Psychopath Next Door". What I have read indicates that about one in one hundred people exhibit some degree if antisocial behavior. Most of these people are not unremorseful killers like Chigurh in "No Country for Old Men", instead most simply have difficulty empathizing with their fellow man.
The danger, thankfully remote, is that you cross paths with an individual with some combination of the lethal traits I've just described. I suspect that this is exactly what happened to the three people of Muslim faith killed by Craig Hicks, their next door neighbor. There is a lot of talk about labeling this as a hate crime, but I think this is putting the cart before the horse. I have no knowledge of Mr. Hicks uttering anti Islam slurs about his neighbors, although I will not be surprised if evidence of this sort is revealed. But, I suspect that had his neighbors been black or red, or to his knowledge, Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses, he would have, by the time of the killings, worked himself into a xenophobic rage against his neighbors. A thoughtful look at the notorious mass killings we have witnessed in past years, reinforces my premise. I think, better that believing this a hate crime, the lesson to be learned is to beware of engaging an enraged psychotic loser.
My most terrifying dream sequence is also the most difficult to explain. It never seems to jolt me awake as it did when I was young, but the reality of this theme often occurs to me. Once, as a writing assignment in high school, I tried to articulate this dream, but I'm afraid my feeble attempt only got me a C or a D, and illustrated to the teacher how screwed up I was. I'm going to give it another shot.
In my dream, I would find myself suffocating under an ever increasing pile of sand being heaped upon me by my parents, one shovel full at a time. Although I would plead with them to stop, each parent was intent upon getting one last shovel of sand onto the pile. That's it, not a complicated dream where one nonsensical thread leads to another and another, just sand, dusty and dense piling up on me. I understand now that my dream was just a reaction to the parents, in my dysfunctional family, engaging in one more escalating argument where neither was willing to back down. My parents resorted to psychological, not physical violence, although at times the one felt as bad as the other. In any case, I survived my childhood, and I doubt that my family was more dysfunctional than many others. It was ,however, my introduction to the escalating argument, a phenomenon I've grown to greatly appreciate and fear.
I've seen, and been a part of these arguments, and the mitigating factor in almost every one I have engaged in or witnessed is that ultimately, one party or both were constrained by the potential loss of something they valued. Be it their freedom, their marriage, their children, their teeth, or their life, there was almost always some limiting factor that stopped the escalation before it lead to violence. But, as I have often joked, the cemeteries and jails are full of people who would not back down. These are the losers in our society, people without valuable constraints.
Couple this mentality with another theme that I have often written and thought about, that is, the psychopath next door. There has been a lot written about the sociopaths around us, including one titled "The Psychopath Next Door". What I have read indicates that about one in one hundred people exhibit some degree if antisocial behavior. Most of these people are not unremorseful killers like Chigurh in "No Country for Old Men", instead most simply have difficulty empathizing with their fellow man.
The danger, thankfully remote, is that you cross paths with an individual with some combination of the lethal traits I've just described. I suspect that this is exactly what happened to the three people of Muslim faith killed by Craig Hicks, their next door neighbor. There is a lot of talk about labeling this as a hate crime, but I think this is putting the cart before the horse. I have no knowledge of Mr. Hicks uttering anti Islam slurs about his neighbors, although I will not be surprised if evidence of this sort is revealed. But, I suspect that had his neighbors been black or red, or to his knowledge, Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses, he would have, by the time of the killings, worked himself into a xenophobic rage against his neighbors. A thoughtful look at the notorious mass killings we have witnessed in past years, reinforces my premise. I think, better that believing this a hate crime, the lesson to be learned is to beware of engaging an enraged psychotic loser.
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Fist
In 1979 I quit my job with Duke Power and went to work for a specialty piping company as a quality assurance manager for it's Charlotte operation. Not long after I began work, The warehouse workers joined a union and immediately went on strike for better wages. Hoping to break the union, the company began rotating in younger salesmen from the various offices around the country to work in our warehouse. This was an ill conceived plan, as it was pretty costly to fly eight or ten guys in from Philadelphia, Houston, Pittsburgh, and even Anaheim, California for a week at a time, and then send them home and bring in another crew.
The warehouse workers on strike were a pretty tough bunch, and they had been pumped up by watching the movie "Fist" which had just come out. (Here is a wikipedia link about the movie for most of us who did not see it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.I.S.T.) Fist, starring Sylvester Stallone, was a takeoff on the forming of the Teamsters Union, and it used considerable cinemagraphic license in depicting the violence of the union effort. To give you an idea of the character of the warehouse workers on strike (real life, not the movie), one of the strikers, Bubba, whose sole occupation before working at the warehouse was selling drugs, was married to a girl who I don't believe weighed a hundred pounds soaking wet, but was big enough to have stabbed to death Bubba's best friend at a party at their house. Another striker, Bobby was awaiting trial for raping a girl in downtown Charlotte on his way home from visiting his sick wife in the hospital. Of course, in Bobby's defense, he claimed that he only picked up a prostitute, and without paying her, left her naked on the side of Tryon Street. ( I'm not making this up!) There were several motorcycle gang types as well, including David who I will come back to later in this tale. They were on strike outside our gate for about 6 weeks, and each day we had to run the gauntlet to go to work. They discovered that the nails used to nail cardboard to pallets, with one inch square heads and one inch long spikes, did an excellent job of flatting tires as we went in. There were always catcalls and cursing, and I remember Bubba once jumped up on the fence and claimed that he could have me killed for fifty dollars. A threat that I did not take lightly considering his family ties. They shot into the building several times and once shot at a trucker carrying out a load of pipe. After about six weeks, the company offered, and the strikers accepted a contract which allowed everybody to kiss and make up.
A few months later I took over as manager of the warehouse, and Bubba became my foreman. This worked out pretty well. Bubba was no longer in the union, he was a part of management, the workers respected him, he was fairly conscientious, and he was no longer a threat to my life. Things were going pretty smoothly, although I continued to keep a gun in my car. A few months later, Bubba comes into my office and tells me that David is about to get into a fight with a truck driver, there at the plant to pick up a load of pipe. I walked back to rear of the office, and there is David faced off with this driver, and as I am about to try to get things calmed down, (by this time we are all three in a little scrum, just a foot or so apart) the truck driver, who is about a head shorter than David, threatens to "kick David's ass". David whips a big Buck folding knife out of his pocket, puts the tip of it against the driver's breastbone, and says, "I'll kill you". Well, the driver and myself quickly backed up a step to assess David' bluster, and fortunately no blood was shed.
This episode put me in a bit of a quandary. David had to be disciplined, but valuing my life, I was admittedly reluctant to do what I knew I had to do, which was of course, to fire David. The next day, I called him into my office and did so. He left the building without any bloodshed, and I breathed a sigh of relief.
My relief was short lived, because the warehouse workers took exception to my unfair firing of David over this one little incident, and went on strike to get David's job back. Having already experienced one strike by these guys, I decided to take a different tack on this one. At one point, I had considered hiring refugees from Vietnam who were quite desperate for work, and somewhat accustomed to gunfire as well, but I did not have to resort to that tactic. I got on the phone, and soon found a company willing to bring temporary workers (scabs) through the gates to operate the warehouse. This worked out very well. The strikers were seeing their jobs taken away, and they really weren't that fond of David anyway, so after about a week, they all came back to work.
After the fellows came back to work, I mounted a personal campaign to convince them that the union was doing nothing for them, and that they should decertify themselves from the union at the next opportunity. In reality, the national union they had joined, did not have much of a local presence, and truly was not doing much to support my workers at the warehouse. Sure enough, when the window to vote for decertification came open, they rejected the union as I wished. I was quite proud of my "achievement".
If you know me, or have read my blog posts, you might be surprised by my little union busting story, but here is a different take on the matter.
On the one hand, workers were underpaid, had little benefits, and no say in their work conditions. They took a tack that is often deplored by affected companies and by many nonunion citizens, especially in the south. Their heavy handed and sometimes violent behavior has become the stereotype of union behavior. They did, however, make some gains. Their pay was increased, benefits were extended, and they gained some say in the workplace, however miss placed that might have been. And, these gains carried over even after they left the union. Had they behaved differently, would those gains been realized?
The company, and by extension, myself, did not act exactly saintly in the matter. Fighting the union organizing effort cost untold thousands in lost business and expenses, and in the end, only to avoid what turned out to be modest increases and benefits. It, as nonunion companies always do, fought tooth and nail to avoid affording it's workers a fair shake in the workplace.
This is the only direct union experience I've ever had, so I'm no expert, but I did work for several nonunion companies. The owner of one company, upon my complaining to him that I could not keep good help because of the low wages, said to me: " Mike, I have no respect for a man that cannot support his family on $5.00/ hour". This was in 1986. We had 85 turnovers out of a workforce of twelve. Another employer, after one employee screwing or another, would simply explain, "It's just business". I hope to write a book about that experience one day, but I'll have to change some names.
Today I read that the governor of Illinois, Bruce Rauner, by executive order, blocked public employee unions from collecting fair share dues, and has called for Illinois to become a "right to work" state. If you don't know what fair share dues are, here's a link http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/09/bruce-rauner-unions_n_6648818.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular The Republican right would like to see trade unions completely destroyed in this country, and here's why.
Union membership in this country is down to 7% of the workforce, as opposed to the 35% share it enjoyed in the fifties. In my lifetime, the poorest areas of our country have always also been the least unionized. Even while these areas have be poorly represented by unions, they have benefited by union activity in other parts of the country. The forty hour week, child labor laws, minimum wages, sick leave, vacation, and employer provided health insurance, items which most of us enjoy, and take for granted, were negotiated for by unions, or were granted to forestall union influence. It is no coincidence that as union influence wanes, these benefits are being scaled back, and the inequality gap has exploded. It is also no coincidence that this country has been politically pushed to the right by both the waning influence of unions and by the people that would see us return to a state where the comfort of the rich is truly supported by an abundant supply of the poor. Here's a link to today's column by Robert Reich, (the smartest man in the world) who eloquently covers what I've just said.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/back-to-the-19th-century_b_6648940.html
Let me make myself clear, I believe that every hourly worker in America should belong to a union, and to not belong to a union reduces a worker to servitude. I also believe that with rights come responsibility, and that union workers should bargain in good faith, and work diligently to produce a profit for their employers.
I hope you read my rant and pass it on. I know it will piss off a lot of my friends, but better pissed off than pissed on.
The warehouse workers on strike were a pretty tough bunch, and they had been pumped up by watching the movie "Fist" which had just come out. (Here is a wikipedia link about the movie for most of us who did not see it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.I.S.T.) Fist, starring Sylvester Stallone, was a takeoff on the forming of the Teamsters Union, and it used considerable cinemagraphic license in depicting the violence of the union effort. To give you an idea of the character of the warehouse workers on strike (real life, not the movie), one of the strikers, Bubba, whose sole occupation before working at the warehouse was selling drugs, was married to a girl who I don't believe weighed a hundred pounds soaking wet, but was big enough to have stabbed to death Bubba's best friend at a party at their house. Another striker, Bobby was awaiting trial for raping a girl in downtown Charlotte on his way home from visiting his sick wife in the hospital. Of course, in Bobby's defense, he claimed that he only picked up a prostitute, and without paying her, left her naked on the side of Tryon Street. ( I'm not making this up!) There were several motorcycle gang types as well, including David who I will come back to later in this tale. They were on strike outside our gate for about 6 weeks, and each day we had to run the gauntlet to go to work. They discovered that the nails used to nail cardboard to pallets, with one inch square heads and one inch long spikes, did an excellent job of flatting tires as we went in. There were always catcalls and cursing, and I remember Bubba once jumped up on the fence and claimed that he could have me killed for fifty dollars. A threat that I did not take lightly considering his family ties. They shot into the building several times and once shot at a trucker carrying out a load of pipe. After about six weeks, the company offered, and the strikers accepted a contract which allowed everybody to kiss and make up.
A few months later I took over as manager of the warehouse, and Bubba became my foreman. This worked out pretty well. Bubba was no longer in the union, he was a part of management, the workers respected him, he was fairly conscientious, and he was no longer a threat to my life. Things were going pretty smoothly, although I continued to keep a gun in my car. A few months later, Bubba comes into my office and tells me that David is about to get into a fight with a truck driver, there at the plant to pick up a load of pipe. I walked back to rear of the office, and there is David faced off with this driver, and as I am about to try to get things calmed down, (by this time we are all three in a little scrum, just a foot or so apart) the truck driver, who is about a head shorter than David, threatens to "kick David's ass". David whips a big Buck folding knife out of his pocket, puts the tip of it against the driver's breastbone, and says, "I'll kill you". Well, the driver and myself quickly backed up a step to assess David' bluster, and fortunately no blood was shed.
This episode put me in a bit of a quandary. David had to be disciplined, but valuing my life, I was admittedly reluctant to do what I knew I had to do, which was of course, to fire David. The next day, I called him into my office and did so. He left the building without any bloodshed, and I breathed a sigh of relief.
My relief was short lived, because the warehouse workers took exception to my unfair firing of David over this one little incident, and went on strike to get David's job back. Having already experienced one strike by these guys, I decided to take a different tack on this one. At one point, I had considered hiring refugees from Vietnam who were quite desperate for work, and somewhat accustomed to gunfire as well, but I did not have to resort to that tactic. I got on the phone, and soon found a company willing to bring temporary workers (scabs) through the gates to operate the warehouse. This worked out very well. The strikers were seeing their jobs taken away, and they really weren't that fond of David anyway, so after about a week, they all came back to work.
After the fellows came back to work, I mounted a personal campaign to convince them that the union was doing nothing for them, and that they should decertify themselves from the union at the next opportunity. In reality, the national union they had joined, did not have much of a local presence, and truly was not doing much to support my workers at the warehouse. Sure enough, when the window to vote for decertification came open, they rejected the union as I wished. I was quite proud of my "achievement".
If you know me, or have read my blog posts, you might be surprised by my little union busting story, but here is a different take on the matter.
On the one hand, workers were underpaid, had little benefits, and no say in their work conditions. They took a tack that is often deplored by affected companies and by many nonunion citizens, especially in the south. Their heavy handed and sometimes violent behavior has become the stereotype of union behavior. They did, however, make some gains. Their pay was increased, benefits were extended, and they gained some say in the workplace, however miss placed that might have been. And, these gains carried over even after they left the union. Had they behaved differently, would those gains been realized?
The company, and by extension, myself, did not act exactly saintly in the matter. Fighting the union organizing effort cost untold thousands in lost business and expenses, and in the end, only to avoid what turned out to be modest increases and benefits. It, as nonunion companies always do, fought tooth and nail to avoid affording it's workers a fair shake in the workplace.
This is the only direct union experience I've ever had, so I'm no expert, but I did work for several nonunion companies. The owner of one company, upon my complaining to him that I could not keep good help because of the low wages, said to me: " Mike, I have no respect for a man that cannot support his family on $5.00/ hour". This was in 1986. We had 85 turnovers out of a workforce of twelve. Another employer, after one employee screwing or another, would simply explain, "It's just business". I hope to write a book about that experience one day, but I'll have to change some names.
Today I read that the governor of Illinois, Bruce Rauner, by executive order, blocked public employee unions from collecting fair share dues, and has called for Illinois to become a "right to work" state. If you don't know what fair share dues are, here's a link http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/09/bruce-rauner-unions_n_6648818.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular The Republican right would like to see trade unions completely destroyed in this country, and here's why.
Union membership in this country is down to 7% of the workforce, as opposed to the 35% share it enjoyed in the fifties. In my lifetime, the poorest areas of our country have always also been the least unionized. Even while these areas have be poorly represented by unions, they have benefited by union activity in other parts of the country. The forty hour week, child labor laws, minimum wages, sick leave, vacation, and employer provided health insurance, items which most of us enjoy, and take for granted, were negotiated for by unions, or were granted to forestall union influence. It is no coincidence that as union influence wanes, these benefits are being scaled back, and the inequality gap has exploded. It is also no coincidence that this country has been politically pushed to the right by both the waning influence of unions and by the people that would see us return to a state where the comfort of the rich is truly supported by an abundant supply of the poor. Here's a link to today's column by Robert Reich, (the smartest man in the world) who eloquently covers what I've just said.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/back-to-the-19th-century_b_6648940.html
Let me make myself clear, I believe that every hourly worker in America should belong to a union, and to not belong to a union reduces a worker to servitude. I also believe that with rights come responsibility, and that union workers should bargain in good faith, and work diligently to produce a profit for their employers.
I hope you read my rant and pass it on. I know it will piss off a lot of my friends, but better pissed off than pissed on.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
