Saturday, November 22, 2003
THE OTHER SHOE
There have been several interesting forecasts of “things to come” in the news of late:
As anticipated, most of the features b y which the media which marked the 40th Anniversary of the death of President John F. Kennedy, hinged on attempts of some sort to accent the concept of an unidentified conspiracy. On TV promotions well in advance of the showing were loaded with teaser elements which suggested that we were going to hear, for the very first time, who actually killed John F, Kennedy that day in Dallas, Texas.
It seems this vague “others were involved” theory is going to be a regular part of all events of the future marking of death of J.F.K.
Another portent of complications in future news came to light this week when the New York “Times”, and others, took a stand regarding the Social Security bill currently being considered in Washington. They indicated obvious “holes” in the proposed legislation which will not work to the advantage of the Medicare recipients seeking some relief from increasing medical costs. Criticism of the A.R.R.P. has surfaced revealing how the outfit ostensibly protecting old folks has been raking in millions of dollars while servings as little more than a glorified mail drop for insurance companies who pay the organization A.R.R.P. commissions on all insurance policies sold to their members.
Another set of prominently used letters may also be in the upcoming news for re-evaluation of intended and actual activities during the forthcoming election year ... the N.E.A. ...during the political election we face.
Brace yourself for more news coverage of Michael Jackson. It is sure to be a saturation situation and there is very little one can do to avoid it. That seems to be set up now as the keystone of our immediate future. Not a pleasant prospect at all, is it?
There are also news events out there waiting to happen about which we know absolutely nothing. Let's hope some of them will be pleasant.
A.L.M. November 21, 2003 [c394wds]
Friday, November 21, 2003
CROSSINGS
We, as a nation, owe more than we realize to a man named Emanuel Luetze.
To begin with the man's name is pronounced LOIT-suh, and now that we have met him he is be remembered as an artist born in 1816 in Germany who came to America as a child – to Philadelphia – with his parents. He grew up in that area, and in 1859 moved to New York City to live.
He painted a picture which has loomed large our national growth. It stands twelve feet high and twenty-one feet in length.
Today, we can learn from studying this patriotic representation “Washington Crossing the Delaware”. We can examine it, today, and see ourselves both as we once were and as we are.
Almost any attempt to paint picture if an historical event invites a clutter of criticism. Some just grounds for criticism may come from the very complexity of the situation being shown and the involved personalities of the persons depicted as well.
In this case we find the artist set out to paint a picture which would express the basic feelings of patriotism and freedom which inspired the people at that to take action.
The artist painted realty as he saw it . Notice that no two men in the boat are wearing uniform clothing. It was a ragtag army, poorly equipped and inadequately supplied, who were facing up to the Hessians and British Redcoats across the cold. ice-packed river waters against rushing winds. Look at this picture when you have a chanbcetodo so,m and check to see if the criticisms we hear today concerning our national leaders is valid or the results of artistic license taken by the critics.
We see General Washington in uniform as the artist saw him depicted in a museum image; that's James Monroe holding the wind-swirled flag, just behind Washington. Both men are doing something that could have been fatal to the mission - standing an an small boat which could be easily overturned. The flag Monroe is holding the is that designed by Betsy Ross some ten years later. The lone, black patriot on the group is a man known as Prince Whipple who lived in Baltimore at the time of the Crossing.
One can find fault with the painting endlessly, it seems, but it still teaches a fine lesson in patriotism. The focal point of it all is on the stalwart figure of Washington eagerly facing the dangers of an unknown future. He also depicts vividly the rugged character of the colonial people. Leave the nitpicking to those nerds who delight in seeking such slight slivers of departure from exact photographic detail of historical events.
A.L.M. November 20, 2003 [c455wds]
Thursday, November 20, 2003
TOURIST TRAPS
New Yorkers have a long-established tradition of con men selling the Brooklyn Bridge to gullible visitors. Other areas have kindred tales about local folks outsmarting visitors from elsewhere. There was a time when it was a local sport, but no more. Tourism is big business and the major occupation of large groups of people spread afar though the local community. It is no longer a penny-ante game bringing paying visitors in who will never be coming that way again.
Naturally, some attractions are going to be more compelling than others. Much depends on the tourist's likes and dislikes; preferences and needs. Seldom are there two exactly the same and most will talk about what they see to show how intelligent they were in seeking out interesting locations.
No doubt, many tourist attractions have been “dressed up” to bringing passing dollars from travelers. If you think back a few years who can remember seeing advertising signs calling attention to some freak display, a modified natural attraction, or an historical site based on rumor, gossip, hearsay or political fabrication.
Several large cities here in the United States have ethnic areas known as “Chinatown”. A favorite feature of many such areas was guided ours of some dof the dope dens. Eager travelers were escorted through ramshackle quarters where victims of opium smoking, and other drugs were seen groveling and twisting in tortured contortions. The rainbow of odors was present and many a visitor went away unaware that he or she had seen a rigged setup. Street people where hired, made up to appear more emaciated than they were, and they augmented a cast which may or may not have included a known drug addict.
I am confident that the tourism is much more honest today, thanks, I think, to television. Visitors to sites today are pretty well aware of what they can expect to see because they have seen much of it before on TV.
A. L. M. November 19, 2003 [c337wds]
Wednesday, November 19, 2003
RISKY
We have had a flood of dare-devil shows in recent months of television attempting to run the reality shows off the air.
This series made the old days of Evil Knievel jumping his motorcycle over cars and canyons, seem like child's play and most of these scary-shows were fitted with parenthetical disclaimers front and end: “Do not try to do these stunts at home.” It was just strong enough to make a lot of people try them anyway. ER statistics will probably show that in a great many places.
Skate board stunt demonstrations are another chiller with men, women and children skating on, near, around,close-to and especially above rinks designed and constructed in convoluted patterns resembling the Black Hills of the Dakotas.
It all brings back memories, of course.
I remember hearing people in the Schuyler, Virginia (Sky'-ler)area talk about one of their own - Luke Snead by name, who,one day long ago did his thing. I think it must have been been 1931-32. Luke was gunning his truck up a steep,raised bridge crossing a railroad track. The bridge was built entirely of wood and Luke hit one rail almost head-on. He was sudden ly in the air at about forty feet over the terrain, realizing that his truck was turning over - doing a net somersault. It turned over completely and landed on all four wheels on the railroad tracks below. Luke fell back into the set as he held firmly to the steering wheel. He got out,cranked the truck and drove off absolutely unharmed.
Now that was near Schuyler,Virginia, remember - in he edge of the Blue Ridge mountains where the Walton family of TV fame lived. Folks in that part of the country just don't make good liars, so I've always accepted the Luke Snead flip-over story as authentic and reliable. Of course, some tellers of the tale insert a speeding train bearing down on Luke as he desperately tried to crank new life into the old truck. That's where I sorta wonder, however, because we stopped cranking our cars and trucks a good ten years before that date.
Now, let's see some of you TV stunt drivers do that little trick. It had a certain flair about it, originality,for us. I've asked around but I have yet to find anyone who knows if Luke Snead every had any ambitions to try it from a higher bridge bridge with several “flip-overs”.
A.L.M. November 19, 2003 [c422wds]
Tuesday, November 18, 2003
OF ALL PLACES...
Many have found that rather strange sentiments often come to us from Hollywood.
I am having some difficulty in accepting a statement made recently by a man who has man who has been successful on both the large screen and on TV.
He is saying that Joseph Stalin was not only one of the world's greatest leaders, and also “the most misunderstood” man of all time.
I see no reason why I should set his name before you. Suffice to say, he was a TV personality many knew and admired.
At this time, however, he is seeking attention he does not deserve.
There is a possibility he feels he is just about ready to go “over the hill” and to keep from being forgotten, he takes public stands which are at odds with ordinary thinking.
The total list of the number of people killed though actions of Joseph Stalin has not yet been complied, if it will ever be. His total far exceeded that of Adolph Hitler, and other who built their regimes on bodies of their enemies and, often, their own people. Stalin's rule of inhumane, cruel and totally insensitive acts last over a far great span of years and affected more groups of people often en masse. The records read as macabre log of maudlin massacre - mass murder - planned and executed without any compassion or concern.
If our Hollywood social and political pundits must seek to development a following, they could do far better than to choose Joseph Stalin as a man to venerate and re-do. Opposed openlyh they prosper, but ignored they fade away - not quick enough it seems atx times, but in time.
We play their game for them if we oppose them with any criticism, but we should be aware of their views and temper them as best we can, until such time - which often happens - they realize their views are unsound, impractical or downright stupid.
So, expect to hear Joe Stalin praised for a time by of these Tinsel Town Truth Tellers, and, difficult as it may be to do so, try to give them the silent treatment. Hollywood lives in a make believe world and it often takes time and patience for a citizen thereof to face real circumstances based on age-old Truths.
A.L.M. November 18, 2003 [c393wds]
Monday, November 17, 2003
REFERERENCES
How often , in your mind, do you consciously make references to the past?
It may be more frequent than you think.
Do you ever dream of yesterday's events while sleeping? You probably do far less of that sort of thing when day-dreaming, but, even then, we tend to sort back to see how we handled a like situation years ago.
I know I have called on this dream pseudo-technique successfully. It's common pattern, I suppose. I have gone to sleep at night consciously aware of the fact that an item I need was lost, which I may have misplaced and I dreamed of its wayward location awakened and found the lost item. No doubt, you too, have had, too, have had such an experience as well.
It can be contended that we would have found the item eventually anyway. We would remember where we had put the item. Even then, you see, to recall the act of mis-placing the item is a reference to a past series of actions.
We must the caution at the same time.
Our past is filled with errors, mistakes, and mis-judgments. of course, or we would not be in the plights of the present period. I fact, that may be the most valuable thing we learn from a study of the past – how we did things the wrong way and can avoid doing some of them, all over again.
We need to study the past. Years ago the subject “History” was?lumped together as a mish-mash shoveled out in robotic regularity. We need
to refer to the past to improve out present and future well-being.
A.L.M. November 17, 2003 [c-285wds]
Sunday, November 16, 2003
FIRST LAP LOSER
It happens.
Just his past week-end four cars were quickly removed from the race before they had completed the final lap. That must be one the worst moments a racing driver can experience.
And, so often, it seems to happen in the general world - just as it did this time on the race track.
I don't know if they inquired into the causes of this particular case, but it made me wonder, even as I watched the usual plethora of instant re-plays which followed. Re-runs were done from at least six different angles, it seemed to me, and in each one showing the instant the crash started to form, it was clearly not the fault of the driver of the first car - although one could contend that he should have known better than to be ahead of the zany behind him.
We cannot pick and choose who is to be in the race beside us. We assume that they known what the are doing, and we also feel sure the authorities who plan and execute the races make sure participants are ready, worthy, able and willing to conduct themselves in a sportsman-like fashion. If we are to continue to classify stock car racing as a “sport”, we are going to have to find some way of instilling such as an attitude in particpants and in their suppprters must be accented. Far too many people view such races as a modern version of the Roman Circus or Spanish Bullfight in which death is a possible outcome. When someone gets killed - the onlookers can have a fine time.
We see the same sort of thing in business right now as perfectly legitimate mutual funds groups find themslves marked, driven from the race, even ruined by the careless act of some other less pricipled firm. The second car tips the rear bumper of the car ahead, and causes it to sweve and possibly spin off toward the outer retaining well. It hits the wall in a crashing blow and slides back across the track toward the in side rail and in the path of other cars which are moving at over one hundred and fifty miles per hour. The fans go crazy with excitement both in the stands and in many land as TV repeats the action again and again.
In the business area, the indiscreet act of one mutual funds group, cause others to suffer loss. This is unfair.
All stock car drivers are not alike and that should be made known by prompot acrtion taken against those who give the activite a bad name by infractions of rules. Either by intention or sheer stupidity, the second driven tips the rear end of the first car and the results are costly. If action is taken against such drivers, the most we can expeect is a small fine or some sort, He lost a great deal, you might say. But, others did as well. Five personal racing dreams were shattered when those five cars crashed and support teams would not have a winner or even an also ran contender in those who they have respect and in whose abilities they take due pride.
The stock car races are going to be greatly enhanced in the next year or two as the move from rural to urban locations.
A.L.M. November 16, 2003 [c520wds]
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