The Folly of the Bureaucratic Mind in a Messy World

G'd begat the Bureaucrat and the Bureaucrat begat Rules. And the Rules begat the suffering of the masses.

Now I am sure that phrase came from somewhere in the Bible. Or if it didn't, it should have.

Please don't get me wrong. I am not against there being rules in our world. None of us want rampant anarchy in our streets or crime and mayhem happening everywhere. The only bone I have to pick is that Rules, with a capital "R," seem to take on a life of their own and then the well-meaning folks we appoint to be bureaucrats suddenly become very lazy and believe that they no longer have to use their thinking processes anymore. Everything in the world becomes a black or white issue. Why should they waste their energy assessing situations to see if the Rule actually applies or makes sense in a specific situation? The rules are in place, so all they have to do is to mindlessly enforce the rules, which sometimes seem to make absolutely no sense in a given case.

Years ago, a fellow named Lawrence Peter, wrote a book called The Peter Principle. He touched on this tendency of some people to lose their capacity to look at a situation and use their capacity to think to assess that situation. You would think that teachers, as a group, would stand out as individuals who would be capable of working their way through problem, even if it means occasionally breaking a rule to do it. Take the case of the rule that a teacher could not let students leave a classroom unless the bell rang. There was a teacher whose room was being flooded by a water pipe which burst in the room. However, because the bell had not rung, she had to be ordered by the assistant principal, who happened to be passing by, to evacuate the room.

One of the school districts in the Houston area had a zero-tolerance policy on taking drugs. One pinhead of a bureaucrat at the school, banished a straight-A student with no disciplinary problems to one of the schools alternative schools, for the heinous act of taking an aspirin because she had a headache. Hey, after all, argued the bureaucrat, it was drug. Her parents protested but the school district would not rescind the action. Her parents in short order pulled her from the public school system and put her in a private school.

I am not picking on the educational establishment particularly. These just happen to be the most blatant of examples that came to my mind first. If one looks hard enough in our governmental bureaucracies or in industry or in the finance sector... or maybe doensn't look particularly hard at all, one will find this to be a rampant problem. Or maybe even in our judicial system. Imagine that!! All this makes the intelligent and hard-working administrators throughout our society who actually do a good job look really bad unnecesarily.

Every day, seemingly intelligent people become real slackards when all they have to do is invoke the Rule in the face of a situation that demands judgment on their part. They have covered their behinds and they are off the hook. And some poor individual gets really shafted because another person is unwilling or just plain lazy or, as is very often the case, is afraid to go out on a limb and do the right thing. Too often the person in charge, for whatever the reason, does not ask the right questions: Do the facts justify using the rule against another person? Or not?

What is lost when this very wrong sort of thing happens? First of all, any semblance of fairness or equity in enforcing rules goes out the window. Circumstances should alter decisions about what actions should be taken given the situation. Too often, the facts about a situation seem to have no discernable relationship to the decisions made relating to that situation.

Worse yet, the person who enforces the Rule in a slavish, unthinking sort of way begins to come off as a person who clearly does not want to be confused or bothered with the facts of the situation... ergo, suddenly looks like an abject incomptent yes-man or yes-woman. It is easy to sluff off bad judgment by singing out, "We do it the company way." But that does not make what is happening right or fair.

The rules that we put in place in most situations should be guidelines at most. We need some guidelines as benchmarks which we can use to decide if something is good or bad... if someone should be rewarded or reprimanded... if an action deserves accolades or razzies. But the realities of our human society are often worlds apart from the ideal that we strive to achieve. Sometimes it is just a bit frustrating to see that the best intended Rules create more havoc and unfairness than if the Rules had never been put in place in the first place. At least if there were not rules, in every case, people would first have to look at the facts and figure out where to go from there. But hey, folks, that would actually make sense.

Nah!! That will never happen.

Sam and Emma: A Love Story in Emails - 15 - Sam Tells Emma She Has to Fight Back and that Changes will Have to Start with Her

From: Sam T

To; Emma Landuer

February 19, 2006

My Dearest Emma,

You don't have to worry that I will stop writing you. I will keep the promises I have made to you.

I reread my last email to you. I got the sense that I wasn't the best friend I could be to you. After you told me about your work situation, I responded in a very emotional way. It maybe made you feel better, but it probably didn't help you very much to figure out how to deal with your new situation.

So after giving this a considerable amount of thought, I have this to say. Ultimately, it does not matter what other people say to you or do to you. What matters is how you choose to deal with what they are saying or doing to you. You spend all your time, dodging and weaving... trying to duck the blows that are coming in to hit you. You don't say anything in your own defense. You don't fight back. You don't make those who would hurt you or try to control you pay a price for what they are trying to do to you.

I know that when you set your mind to accomplish something, you find strength inside you to sort things out and to do what it takes to get what you want. I guess it follows that you need to know what you want also, but that is for another email. Unless you start fighting back and start reclaiming your life as your own, some people will continue to manipulate you and to control what you do. It starts with you, not with them. They are not going to change, but you can. But that is something you are going to have to do for yourself. I cannot do that for you. Nor can your parents or your friends. Only you.

Please think about what I have said here. Maybe something that I said will make some difference in the outcome.

I worry about you. Take care of yourself, kiddo.

Much love,

Sam

To be continued...

Sam and Emma: A Love Story in Emails - 14 - Emma Remains Overwhelmed by Events

From: Emma Landauer

To: Sam T.

February 16, 2006

My Dear Sam,

I am sorry that I have not written to you sooner. By the time I get home every night I am exhausted. And then the next morning I start the whole crazy routine all over again. I need to read your last emails again. I just skimmed through them.

Work is not much better. A new person has just started working at the clinic and so she is the current person who tops the shit list my boss uses to find her most recent victim. However, I am still very near the top of the list and I catch a lot of hell still, just not as much.

Am not going to the gym anymore. It is very difficult to escape the demands being made on me. I do so very miss going to the gym, as it gave me a way to work off my tensions.

Sam, the reason that we had a place to go where it felt a lot better than the rest of our day was that we had each other. Here I am alone and you are one of the few people in my life who didn't expect me to be someone other than I am. I don't very much like who I am. But you always liked being with me. You have always loved me just as I am, and I know that sometimes I can be a very difficult person. Sam, my precious Sam, you are one of a kind.

Please keep writing me. It keeps me going on really bad days.

Love and Kisses,

Emma

To be continued...

Postscript: What's Really Important, We Take For Granted

As you may recall, I told you that I had injured my knee a few days ago. What I have discovered is that even a relatively minor injury to my knee has forced me to have to remember how to walk in a normal way . When the injury first occurred, I became afraid to put any pressure on my left leg, fearing that my leg would not support my weight. I started using the zombie stiff-legged walk that little children use when they first learn to walk.

Little by little, I regained enough confidence to be able to put one foot in front of the other and take short careful steps. It seemed like a great victory when I realized that I wasn't going to fall flat on my face if I did that. Then, I was willing to bend my left knee back a little each time I walked and take slightly longer steps. My gait began to look a little more normal with each step. My supervisor at work kindly lent me a cane he wasn't using at this time and it has made my recovery so much easier. Tonight I was even able to take my Yorkie out for his walk.

To most of you, for me to have been able to reach this point in the mending process probably doesn't seem like much of an accomplishment. But for me, these are giant strides. I am able to take back my life. I am not confined to a small apartment... to moving from the bed to the bathroom and back... to moving with difficulty to the kitchen to make a meal and back to the couch or the bed so that I can get off my leg. For a day or two, I couldn't even put on my own socks. Little by little, now, I am able to start living again.

I have gained an enormous amount of respect for those folks who cannot walk or who can do so only with great focus and effort... for people for whom normal mobility will never again be a possibility. These folks somehow come to terms with their limitations and simply get on with their lives anyway. In my eyes, this makes them absolutely amazing people who absolutely deserve our awe and respect.

The first group of people who come to mind are the many American soldiers who are returning from the Middle East with severe injuries to their limbs which have permanently altered their lives. These men and women are simply inspirational in that they do what they have to do to recover their mobility with dignity and commitment. They then return to the lives they left behind when they went to war and just move on.

Also, please consider Stephen William Hawking. He is currently considered one of the world's greatest theoretical physicists. He is confined to wheelchair and cannot even talk now, because a debilitating disease has taken even that capacity away from him. He communicates through a dedicated research assistant and also by using a sophisticated computer keyboard attached to his wheelchair. An onboard computer then transforms his input into an artificial voice. With all the physical challenges he has had to face, he has nevertheless managed to make a life for himself under the most difficult of circumstances.

What these amazing people have had to face... what they have had to endure make the minor trauma to my knee begin to seem like pretty small potatoes by comparison. I want you to know that something good has come out of this small mishap of mine. I will never again take my ability to walk or run or dance or do any of the other things I did before with my legs, for granted. I'm a lucky person. My knee will heal and in a couple of weeks my life will essentially be back to normal.

There are some people out there in the world for whom that will never again be the case. That is something that you and I need to always keep in mind.

Trade Your Seldom Used Audio CDs Online

Came across a really interesting news article in ABC news about a new website that enables you to trade the cds that are sitting in your audio collection unused. You can list the cds you want to trade online and look among the cds that you want to trade for online as well.

Here is a link to the ABC article in question.
Got Unwanted CDs? Trade 'Em
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=1860871&page=1

I have already signed on with lala.com. It is a really useful site for anyone who is an audiophile.

Putting It Together, "Piece by Piece"

Each of us is a work in progress, throughout the journey of our life. We evolve and grow over time. We change course many times, never really sure if we are actually taking the right road. The day we die, we are still a work in progress, incomplete and unfinished.

Somehow, this very idea is not an entirely satisfactory notion. We live our entire lives never fully certain of who we are or what we should be doing with our lives. When we are younger, we dream of the wonderful things we will accomplish. Over time our dreams change and our realities may be very far from the one's we saw for ourselves when we were young. We experience many moments which are pleasant and empowering. We also experience in the course of our life not a few disappointments. And during the entire journey, we are never fully certain where we are going to end up, or even when we will get there, wherever that is. With all these uncertainties, how are we to make any sense of all this?

Consider what we do when we solve a jigsaw puzzle. First, we find the pieces with straight sides and the corner pieces. We then proceed to construct the outer border of the puzzle, creating a space which did not exist before we put all the pieces in place. Then we match pieces by color or a line in one piece that merges with a line in one of the pieces already in place. And we find the pieces that fit together. One by one, we build the image in the jigsaw puzzle, the image that the pieces that were separated hid from us. And we continue on, doing this, until we find the last piece remaining and put it into the puzzle.

The only difference between the way a person builds a life and the way we solve a jigsaw puzzle, is that people are never completed. We never live long enough to put in that last piece because there is always a new last piece, every day that we are alive. Our lives are always changing and we are always changing, so there never is a last piece. But otherwise, the two ideas are pretty much alike. In both cases, we are constantly looking for the right piece that fits into the puzzle, at the place and time that we are in the process.

Our lives develop one step at a time, right before our eyes. Even if we don't know what is coming next, we can always look ahead with the hope that good and wonderful things lay ahead for us. Of course, that isn't always the case. But with the coming of each new day, we learn something new, we meet new people who come into our lives and we have new experiences that broaden our understanding of who we are and what our world is all about. Somehow we manage to integrate these ideas, our new acquaintances and new experiences into our lives, figuring out what is a good fit for us and what isn't a good fit. In the process, we change, evolve and grow as a person.

In this life, there are no guarantees for any of us about how things are going to turn out for us. Every day, we have to fit new people, new information and new experiences constantly into our lives, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. This is a really random process. However random it is, though, it still seems to work well enough for most of us. Most of us are able to make the journey without too many serious incidents. The uncertainty factor is just part of the equation. We just have to understand that with each coming day there are going be new puzzle parts that we are going to have to somehow fit into the jigsaw puzzle that is our life. And that pretty much is just the way it is.

Rising to the Occasion

Editors note: Some fellow I met awhile back related to me the essential details of this story. I don't remember the fellow's name anymore, but his experience stuck in my mind. I have taken some artistic license in presenting it to you. Hope you enjoy it.

Let me introduce myself to you. My name is Tom Sullivan. I am a factory rep whose territory covers most of the southeast US, so I do a fair bit of travelling throughout the year. Last year I found myself in Houston, about the end of May. I was staying at the airport Marriott and that night the hotel was hosting the Senior Prom for some local high school. All the guys were decked out in tuxedos and the girls were in their formal gowns and the place was crawling with high school kids.

I was hiding in the darkest corner of the hotel bar to escape the mayhem that was taking place in the lobby. I was nursing my third or fourth glass of Chevis Regal. I was in the middle of some pretty hard-ball negotiations with one of our biggest clients and at the end of the day, my nerves were a bit frazzled. So the presence of all these hormone-driven teenagers wasn't helping my state of mind one bit.

From where I sat, I could look out into the lobby and determine when it was safe to venture out again. After awhile and two scotches later, the lobby looked to be reasonably clear and the prom mob seemed to be thinning out. So I called over the server. She was a good-looking twenty-something with a great figure and a killer smile. "Hey, sweetie. My check please."

"Would you like some coffee before you head out, sir?" she asked me.

"Thanks, but no thanks. Just want to pay my tab," I replied.

She returned with the bill. I added a tip for her, totaled the check signed it. I got up and feeling a lot more mellow, walked out of the bar and made my way across the lobby over to the elevator. I pressed the button for my floor. I waited for awhile but none of the elevators came. I grew impatient and looked for the nearest stairway. Locating it, I opened the door into the stairway and was making my way up to the third floor. Above me, I heard someone crying.

As I made the turn up to get to the next flight of stairs, I saw one of the girls from the prom sitting there. She was a pretty girl in a black shoulderless formal gown. She looked absolutely forlorn and as I approached she put her head in her hands and continued to cry as if her heart were breaking.

I stopped a few steps below her and as soberly as I could, I asked her, "Are you okay, young lady?"

A little apprehensively, she took her head out of her hands and looked up at me. "I'm just fine, thank you. I am just fine." She didn't sound terribly convincing when she said that to me.

I reached the step she was sitting on and I sat down, leaving enough distance between us so I was as unthreatening as possible. "Well, you don't sound like you are okay. You know, people say that I am a very good listener. Do you want to tell me what has brought you to tears?"

She looked at me, uncertain about this slightly drunken fellow sitting next to her. And then she decided that maybe it wouldn't be so bad just to have someone to talk to at that moment.
"What's your name?" she asked me.

"My name is Tom." I answered. "And what is your name?"

"I'm Sarah." she answered and having said that, looked back down at her hands in her lap.

"Nice to meet you, Sarah. So tell me, why is a pretty girl like you sitting in the stairwell of this hotel? You ought to be with your date, having a really good time."

Softly, forlornly, she said, "My boyfriend and I had a fight tonight. We broke up. On the night of our prom." As if that was too much for her, she started crying again.

I leaned against the wall behind me. I was little woozy and I was trying very hard to keep my head clear. "So that's what this is all about. So where is he now, your boyfriend?"

She seemed on the verge of tears all over again. "I don't know. I don't know where he is. He headed out the front door about an hour ago and I haven't seen him since. And I was so embarrassed that all I could think of doing was going somewhere where no one would see me."

I didn't say anything for a bit. "Well, that probably wasn't great idea. Kiddo, most of the kids have left the hotel and unless we can find your prince charming, that leaves you kind of stranded."

She looked at me with a most unhappy face. "What am I going to do?"

Now at this point, a lot of possibilities went through my mind. You must understand that I am not against arranging for a lovely, warm body to share my bed when I am out of town. And I am usually successful in finding someone who is willing to oblige me. And looking at this pretty young thing, I knew if i played my cards right, I could talk her into my bed. That was the first possibility that I could propose to her.

However, beyond the legal ramifications of doing that, another thought crossed my mind. This kid was hurting. She looked like a pretty good kid to me. She was going through the painful endings of a teenage romance. I have been there myself and I know for a fact that it hurts like hell. As much as the scotch had compromised my judgment, moral and otherwise, I was still sober enough to know I couldn't hurt this kid like that.

After having mulling over what I wanted to say to her, I did say, "Sarah, call your Dad and have him pick you up."

She looked absolutely mortified at the thought of doing that.

"Okay, Sarah, if it will make it easier for you, I will call him for you. Sarah, your dad loves you and the only thing that he wants is that you are okay... that you are safe. Right?"

She nodded her head to indicate "yes".

"First, young lady, let me get a cup of coffee and clear my head. Would you like some coffee, too?"

"Okay," she said.

We walked down the stairs and walked back into the lobby and over to the coffee shop. We sat down at a table and when the waitress came over I placed our order.

A young fellow in a maroon tuxedo jacket walked towards us, definitely concerned. He approached our table. "Sarah, I am so sorry. I didn't mean to leave you here like that. I really am." And then he glanced at me. "Hey, Sarah, who is this guy? Is he bothering you?"

At this point, I looked straight at him. "Son, you really screwed up tonight. Right now, Sarah and I are having some coffee. And when we are through, I am going to call Sarah's dad and find out if he wants to come pick her up or if he wants me to put her in a cab, so she can go home."

He protested, "I am her date and I am going to take her home." He looked genuinely concerned that her dad was being brought into this situation.

I cut him off, before he could say any more. "Sorry, kiddo. You blew it tonight. Take a hike before I call the manager."

Now he looked really alarmed. "Sarah!! Are you going to let him talk to me like that."

All of the sudden, Sarah had a look of fire and resolve that I hadn't seen in her face until he said this. "No, Sam. I am going to talk to you like that. You have been a total jerk to me tonight. How dare you just leave me stranded here like you did! What were you thinking? Did it even occur to you that after you left I had no way to get home. I guess I don't really know you very well at all. I don't think I want to anymore. Now get the hell out of here. I don't want to see you again. Got it?"

The young man was stunned, unable to speak. He stood there for what seemed like an eternity, and then he turned and walked away, clearly shaken and worried about the fallout that was to come for him later.

Sarah turned to me and said, "Tom, thank you for speaking up for me. No one has ever done that for me, except my dad. If it is okay with you, I will call my dad myself."

"Sure, Sarah. I'll stay with you until your dad gets here to make sure you are okay till then."

Sarah smiled for the first time since we had met. "Thank you, Tom. That makes me feel so much better. You are a really nice person." She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek.

I actually think that I blushed a little when she did that.

Anyway, I let her use my cell phone and she called her dad. He told her just to take a cab home, when he found out what had happened and he asked her to give the phone over to me.

"Hi. Who am I talking to please?" her dad asked.

"My name is Tom Sullivan, sir. I found your daughter a little shaken up after her dustup with her boyfriend. I got concerned because I have daughters of my own. I knew that she needed some help to get through this. I didn't want her to get into any situation that she couldn't get out of safely."

"Mr. Sullivan, I cannot tell you how grateful I am that you were there for Sarah. Thank you so very much for being her guardian angel tonight." her dad said.

"Well, sir, it was my pleasure to be of assistance. I will see her to the cab and make sure she gets out of here okay."

"Again, Mr. Sullivan..."

"Please, call me Tom." I laughed. "I am too young to be called Mr. Sullivan."

"Tom, for my wife and myself, we will be forever in your debt."

"Tell you what I''ll do. I will have her call you when the cab gets here, okay?"

Her dad said, "I really appreciate that. Thanks again."

And with that the conversation ended.

Now the truth is that I am about 38 and single and hopefully, I have no daughters of my own anywhere out there in the world. But it sounded good to say that... you know, gave me credibility. Oh, well. Look, even if it wasn't true, nobody got hurt by my saying that. Right?

"Sarah, let's get you home now."

She was much more composed now. We called the waitress over and paid the check.

I walked with Sarah over to the Concierge Desk and asked the gentleman there to call us a cab. While we waited, I listened as Sarah told me about herself. She was a cheerleader and an honor student. She wanted to travel and to see the world. She wanted to go to Princeton and study political science and become a teacher. I was right. She was just a good kid who had simply had a bumpy night.

When the cab arrived, Sarah gave her dad another call.

"Thank you, Mr. Sullivan. You have been so kind to me. I will always remember you." She smiled as she said that and then she got into the cab. She waved goodbye through the window. I watched the cab drive away into the early morning darkness. I turned and walked back into the hotel lobby.

The bar was still open for another half-hour so I headed back in that direction. Maybe I might still be lucky and find some pretty young thing to share my bed tonight.

Now I am known to be a pretty formidable guy to deal with and some have said that it is not a real good idea to mess around with me. Not a good idea at all. But sometimes... occasionally, I can rise to the occasion. I can be a good guy too. Like tonight.

Question of the Day No 2 , June 19, 2006

If you just found out that you had only a week to live, what is the one thing you would do because you had not made time to do it in the past; or the one place to which you would go to visit, because you had not made the time to go there in the past? Why would that be your choice?

Response to Question of the Day , from NZ

My friend in New Zealand, at dukeim00617.blogspot.com, wrote a response to one of the questions I posed in the Question of the Day feature. He wrote an especially thoughtful answer to the question I posed. I wanted to share with you, his thoughts.

His Post:
Today, I was surfing on the NET. I just noticed a question from my friend's blog by chance. It was a little bit interesting and curious thing to me and I would like to say about it now.

If you had to evacuate your home on a minute's notice and could take only one object that was really important and precious to you, what object would you select? And why did you choose that particular object?

If an emergency situation ouccured so when I have to evacuate my home immediately, I might take care of my parents. However, I know it can't be an object and an anwser. If it is so, maybe I'll take my hundreds of letters that I've collected them since I was a young. I think they must be about more than 600 letters. They can be short of letters depending on a situation but it is actually important and precious to me. I guess it is a gift with my friend's best wishes to me. I believe when they were writing a letter to me at that time, they put whole thier mind, thought and sincerity. Besides hundreds of letters involves it from my girlfriend. When I was in the army, she wrote a letter to me at least three times a week for 2 years and 2 months.
When I see them nowadays, they remind me of reminiscence. I think the permanent things are just pictures and letters.

What's Really Important, We Take for Granted

Have you ever considered what a marvelous thing it is to be able to stand up and easily walk across a room? Probably not. We don't give our ability to do that much thought. Tonight, I am much more appreciative of something as seemingly small as being able to do this. You see, tonight I cannot do that.

Yesterday, I joined a few members of my family at a baseball game at Minute Maid Park. The women were at a shower for my daughter, Heather. Us men folk, we were at the ball game. It was a lot of fun to be able to share this time with the guys. We don't get to do this very often. We get busy and so we have to grab these moments when we can. Anyway, I am digressing.

After the game, Ben, Heather's fiance, and I were walking back to my car. We crossed the street and the entrance to the parking lot was blocked by a wire rope draped across the driveway. Ben stepped over the rope and I proceeded to do so. But my right foot got caught on the steel rope and I tripped. I fell hard on my left knee and Ben had to help me to my feet. I felt a little woozy and a bit nautious in my stomach, as it does sometimes when one has a fall like this. I hobbled as far as a chain link fence and had to stop to catch my breath. My knee really hurt and it was a real effort to keep going without my left leg collapsing under me.

Ben asked me if I needed some help getting to our car, which was about thirty yards ahead. I gratefully accepted his help and I also accepted his offer to drive back to my other daughter's house. Once there I got ice on my knee and when I finally felt up to it, I got to my car as best I could and drove home.

That was yesterday. Today I just stayed off my feet and decided not to go into work. I can get around a little better today, but not much better. I have to make sure I have something to hold onto and I can only move very carefully and slowly.

I missed the Fathers Day Brunch that everyone in the family went to this morning. Just getting to the bathroom or going into the kitchen to get something to eat becomes a major effort. Some of the things I needed to do today, I didn't even consider trying to do.

On the bright side, both my daughters called me to wish me Happy Fathers Day and to make sure I was okay. And my good friend, Roland, called to check up on me and to offer to bring me over some food if I needed him to do so. I was reminded once again about another important thing. I am rich in people who love me and who care about what happens to me.

Thankfully, I am on the mend. But in the future I will remember what I am going through right now, after I regain my normal mobility. What I know now is that it is not a small thing in the larger realm of things. But it takes being stopped dead in my tracks and debilitated at least briefly to make me realize this and to properly value the "small" things in my life.

A Question to You Who Visit My Blog....

As I have discovered, Blogs seem to take on a life of their own. My blog has evolved and taken directions I didn't expect it to take. As I developed ideas that I thought would be entertaining and maybe thought-provoking, I added these concepts in as new features to my blog. Some of what you read is going to be my own original writing. Some are going to be great pieces that I want to share with you. Sometimes I will include some items that are pure fluff, but a lot of fun to read. And some items are just there to prompt you to think about a certain idea or topic.

I know that it is possible to try to do too much with what I have here. I need to know if I am striking a balance in the various things I am doing with this blog or if I am reaching the point that I am simply put overwhelming you. I have been known to do that in the past and must be constantly reminded that brevity is the soul of wit.

So now I turn to you for your input. I would very much appreciate it if you would tell me what things I have done so far that work for you as the reader. What features or types of posts have most appealed to you and which ones don't seem to make much difference one way or the other?

I look forward to your comments.

Kindest regards,

Howard Fireman
Houston, Texas

Question of the Day, June 19, 2006

If you could produce and direct a movie about any particular subject, what would be the subject of your movie? Why that subject?

[If any of you would like to share with the rest of us your responses to these questions, you are certainly invited to do so.]

FYI: Cockeyed.Com, A Zany Must-See Web Site

My daughter, Heather, pointed me in the direction of a purely zany website that focuses on a lot of totally irrelevant considerations, such as how many "'76 antenna balls did we fit into a Chevy Trailblazer." In this particular adventure the fellow who created this website attempted to win one of the 8 Trailblazers that a local dealership was offering for those that provided the best answers. He won none of the vehicles, but his adventures in attempting to do so make pretty decent reading.

Go to: Cockeyed.com, subsection How Much is Inside? Adventures
Then go into subsection: A Chevy Trailblazer
Have fun, everyone.

Kindest regards,

Howard Fireman

The Cultural Literacy Challenge No. 1

Over the years, I have watched, with no small amount of dismay, the "Jaywalking" feature of The Tonight Show, hosted by Jay Leno. Mr. Leno goes out on the street and stops people to find out if they can answer some questions about science, politics. history... well you get the idea. Sadly, nine out of ten times, these people can't answer these questions. The thing is that when we watch Mr. Leno and these rather culturally clueless folks, we laugh at them. If you stopped to think about our reaction, you might well ask yourself, why are laughing?

I have often written that from my perspective the United States is one of the best countries in which one can live today. Its greatness derives from the unique form of democracy that forms the basis for our government and the truly extraordinary freedoms that we enjoy. But for this kind of democracy to survive and thrive in the United States over the long haul, the folks here in our country need to have a level of cultural literacy high enough that they can read the paper or listen to the rantings of our politicians and be able to understand/interpret what they are reading or hearing.

Let's define cultural literacy for the record. The idea here is that there has to be a body of knowledge about our culture, our society, our political system, and our cultural heritage that we are all reasonably familiar with. For us to have meaningful discussions about human cloning, abortion, immigration, civil liberties and the role of the arts, we all have to sort of be on the same page, with regard to a basic general level of knowledge about these things. If we aren't, then our discussions are not very meaningful. If we aren't, the decisions we make as a community about our society, the sciences or our politcal issues will turn out to be a bit less than informed.

What kind of knowledge am I talking about? Here are some examples. For instance, if I were to ask you who we call the father of our country, you should be able to answer George Washington. If I were to ask you when the Civil War was fought, you should be able to answer: 1860 to 1864. If I were to ask you what important social movement Martin Luther King was associated with, you should be able to answer: the civil rights movement. When we watch Jaywalking, it becomes painfully clear that too many people lack the sort of cultural literacy about which we are talking.

So what can we do about this situation? We can start with ourselves, by increasing our cultural literacy one fact at a time. Okay, I'll make it easier for you to be proactive about this. With this post, I am inaugerating a new feature called The Cultural Literacy Challenge. Every few days, I will challenge you to identify a person or an event or an issue about which I am giving you important clues. Hope you enjoy this new feature of my blog.

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Cultural Literacy Challenge No. 1

I was born in England. I started out in English vaudeville and then came to the United States. I was cast in some of the Max Sennett silent films. I went on to direct and star in my own silent films and created the famous character, the Little Tramp. Among my most notable films were The Gold Rush, Modern Times and City Lights. I lived out the last years of my life in Switzerland.

Who am I? [The next CLC will contain the answer to this challenge.]

A View of War

There are books which we remember long after we have read that tome. And very often what we remember is the plotline and a character or two. Sometimes the one thing which has been etched indelibly into our brain is a particular passage from that book, one passage which captures an idea or a thought so well that we carry it with us, from day to day, wherever we are.

I watched a dramatic presentation called Child of Our Time, on television many years ago. In those days, television still aspired to achieve a level of excellence in its programs that we seldom see today. The story so captured my interest that I found and purchased the book and it has been in my library ever since. The storyline of Child of Our Time involves what happens to a young boy in WWII France. His father is a fascist and his mother is a communist, and he gets caught up in the turmoil of that war. Through a series of wrong turns, he ends up interned a German concentration camp. An older man named Gunther, a politcal prisoner at the camp, protects the boy, Tanguy.

I have selected a passage from this book, a passage which has stuck in my mind for better than 40 years, to share with you in this post. In this passage, the author, Michel del Castillo, explores why mankind so often stumbles into the misadventure that we call war.

from Child of our Time by Michel del Castillo:

" '... I'm still a child, yet I've grown old. I know too much---' [Tanguy] broke off for a moment, then said, 'Gunther, why are there wars? Why do people want war?' "

" 'But who does want war, Tanguy? The man in the street? Stupid unreasoning people and patriotism goes to their heads because the newspapers know just how to stir up their enthusiasm? No, war is like some contagious disease. We say 'that's war' fatalistically, just as in the Middle Ages they used to shrug their shoulders at the plague. Nobody wants war, but war is there all the same. We are at its mercy. We never discover its horrors except by experience; ane then is is too late.' "