Adrift on Driftwood

Those of us who were born and bred “Red” have all at some point in our lives had to figure out how to square the values and assumptions we inherited from our parents with the world we grew up in and in which we make our lives. Now that’s an awkward sentence ( I was even tempted to find a way to include the word ‘circle” so I could “square” it), despite the fact that I took some time writing it…but I’ll press on.

During the time when my parents were young, America went through a boom (roaring 20’s) a bust (30’s depression) and a recovery (40’s war and post war). Capitalism itself also went on a similar roller coaster ride. Massive unchecked power in the hands of the “Robber Barons” ultimately led to the inevitable massive collapse which in turn led to a restructuring with new rules (anti-trust, Fed. Deposit insurance, Social Security, trade restrictions, collective bargaining etc.) which then slowly morphed and alternately grew and degenerated in various ways to create our current state of affairs. To be “Red” in America back in those days was like being Green today… though “Green” doesn’t carry with it the stigma or suspicion of treason or sedition.

But that stigma wasn’t in place from the outset. Millions of Americans were active and sympathetic to the struggle for economic and social reform and many millions more were the beneficiaries of improved working and living conditions.

For some, Communism was not much more than a set of principles and ideas that addressed the issues of social equality and economic justice in a way that made sense and promised a better world and future, and regardless of political persuasion or understanding of world history and events it remained (for a time) more utopian intellectual theory than real world reality.

Then real world reality set in. The Russians blew it. Mao blew it. Castro blew it. The Radical Left in America blew it. I guess them's fightin words for some and I confess to a little glibness in the pronouncement, but let's just say for argument's sake that the promises made v. the promises kept were in sufficient imbalance to turn many ardent believers skeptical and turn a great many more into reformed reformers.

And for the children, like me and my sibs, whose parents continued to devote much of their energy and time to keeping the faith and remaining dedicated to causes (many of which over time not only ceased to have relevance, but ceased to even exist) and ideas that no longer applied in a fast changing world--trying to understand our place in it given the values we inherited was no small concern. In fact, for me it was an almost an obsession.

I grew up taught that those with money and power were evil because they were deliberately and conscientiously taking it away from others more deserving—and they were doing it by cleverly exploiting others in order to feather their own nests. All true perhaps after a fashion, but to say that's a simplification is beyond understatement and it took me a while to sort out the gray areas and look beyond what I read in copies of The Daily Worker and Soviet Life that constituted the standard reading matter in our household.

I did learn a few things from I.F. Stone though...and his stuff stood out since he wasn't ideological, but rather was concerned with the day to day machinations related to the real world current events and issues and the dirty political games and players who determined the outcomes.

His book The Trial of Socrates was an eye-opener for me and provided one of those early Eureka moments when you realize that "History" is a slippery subject and is oftentimes more fiction than not.

I’ve seen some of the bad guys in action, and for the most part they’re a bunch of bullies, hustlers, cheats and fear driven pansies. They go where the money is flowing and they jump in with their buckets and try hauling out as much as they can as fast as they can before the well runs dry or someone (or something) gets the jump on them and diverts the flow in another direction. And it always seemed to me that the best ways to resist them and their influence was to simply not play their game--even though their game could end up playing you.

Jerry Garcia said: " We're not trying to change anybody, we're just not joining in."

I’ve met (the nice looking fellow on right was a client) CEO’s of companies that rose high and fell fast —and never blinked even as the day of reckoning arrived and the greater forces of the marketplace determined the inevitable endgame. I saw Kozlowski address an auditorium of employees and tell lie after lie to keep everyone in the dark so he could hang on for as long as possible (and keep the stock from tanking prematurely) . I didn't know he was lying at the time, but like Ken Lay, he seemed so transparently corrupt that it was hard to believe anything he said. But again I mistake my digital dais here for a sudsy soapbox so I'll put the brakes on my lecturing and get back to the random sampling style of found objects that has kept me and my very exclusive entourage of readers so delightfully entertained for (drum roll please) over 200 posts.

As long as I got Jerry started, might as well let him keep going...

“We're like licorice. Not everybody likes licorice, but the people who like licorice really like licorice.”

"I read somewhere that 77 percent of all the mentally ill live in poverty. Actually, I'm more intrigued by the 23 percent who are apparently doing quite well for themselves."

Until the Great Depression, most economists clung to a vision of capitalism as a perfect or nearly perfect system. That vision wasn’t sustainable in the face of mass unemployment, but as memories of the Depression faded, economists fell back in love with the old, idealized vision of an economy in which rational individuals interact in perfect markets. PAUL KRUGMAN, "How Did Economists Get It So Wrong?" New York Times, Sep. 2, 2009

She's Back...

Richard --

I'm sad to say this is probably the last dinner with supporters that Barack and I will be able to host together before the election.

Today's the last day you can chip in to be automatically entered for the chance to join us -- and I hope you will. You can donate all the way up to midnight tonight, when the campaign will randomly select the winners:

https://donate.barackobama.com/Meet-Us-for-Dinner

Thanks for everything you're doing. Every little bit makes a difference.

Hope to see you at dinner,

Michelle

Could this be the last I ever hear from her?

Why do I think not?

Finally took sister Deb's advice and snapped some pix of some of my homegrown woodcraft:

These are the Hiking sticks...