Madness on the DT Mall?

Did you know that there’s a mad woman loose on Hookville’s downtown mall? It’s more than an idle rumor. It’s actually The Madwoman of Chaillot by Jean Giradoux, re-imagined by Kay Ferguson and a troupe of veteran players who have been engaged in intense physical training for months as they developed their version of the 1940s play.

The Madwoman of Chaillot is the story of a witty, eccentric woman who rallies a band of artists, workers, and down-and-out characters in a clever plan to disrupt avaricious plans of powerful figures who are bent on sacrificing beauty to obtain profits. As Ms. Ferguson says, the story sounds a lot like “Right Now, USA.”

The first performance is 6:00 PM 6 September 2012, and it’s running all through the month of September. The troupe is using a novel approach to the production, starting with a first act for free on the mall, then parading to The Haven, where they’ll accept donations for the second act, part of which will go to The Haven. Read all about the project, the players, and more.

Talk about dying, please

In some posts here I have reported examples of situations illustrating what I consider to be times when people should be able to hasten their own deaths. I recognize that people have differing views about whether individuals should be able to aid their own death when they are near the end of their own lives. It’s important to me that people have a civil discussion about this matter, not a discussion that is marked by histrionics, name-calling, and illogical argument.

Steve Lopez, who has reported for the Los Angeles Times about cases that evoke compassion about the people involved and with whom I agree about many of these matters, conducted an interview about this subject on 9 August 1012 with two representatives from Compassion & Choices, Judy Epstein and Kathryn Tucker. Admittedly, all three of these folks support the view that people should have options for hastening the end of their lives under certain circumstances. Other people may disagree.

What’s important is that we, the people, need to talk about this. We should do so before the issue becomes critical. We shouldn’t wait until someone we love is dying. I encourage people to watch this discussion about end-of-life options and investigate these issues. Sure, there are legal and legislative matters we can debate, but we also have our own person matters that we need to examine with our own loved ones.

For a primer on earlier posts related to my admiration of Mr. Lopez’s compassionate reporting on this story, simply type his last name into the search box at the top right of the screen and read the entries. Start with the oldest one.

Ms. Clinton on religious freedom

Many people who know me will know that I hold little truck with religion. At best, I consider religions woe-begotten variations on reasoned ways to live one’s life humanely. However, as much as I find religions untenable, I shall defend folks’ right to espouse religious—or anti-religious and especially non-religious—views. Thus I was thrilled to hear the US Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton’s “Remarks at the Release of the 2011 International Religious Freedom Report” in which she delivered one of the most inspiring defenses of religious freedom I can remember hearing.

Whether you might agree or disagree with Ms. Clinton’s political positions, I think most people will agree that the core of her remarks are a spirited defense of foundational principles of human freedom. I hope people everywhere, regardless of political stripe, can watch or read this talk. There are, to be sure, the usual segments of the talk that have to do with thanking contributors to the talk, thanking allies, and calling out miscreants. But there are, as I heard it live while driving home from a meeting yesterday AM, sections of the talk that discuss fundamental human aspirations. Reminders of the ideas of principles on which the US and other democracies were based hundreds of years ago.

Charity for the 1%?

It seems like it’s a good time to remember some history. Do you sometimes forget relatively recent history? G. Santayana was reputed to have said something about (paraphrasing for syntactical fit) those of us who don’t remember the past being condemned to repeating it. Of course, ancient history may be inaccurate (did Nero really fiddle while Rome burned?), and this recent history might be, too. But see for yourself. Check this little bit of history from 2008 about how downtrodden the 1% were back then.

Thanks, This Hour Has 22 Minutes.

Getting More Serious

Barbara Hansen of USA TODAY used GMI Ratings, Standard & Poor’s data, and other USA TODAY research to analyze the pay of chief executive officers of US corporations in 2011. Matt Krantz and Ms. Hansen reported the results of that analysis 28 March 2012. Here is a listing of the top 10 earners for 2011. Ms. Hansen’s table, available with the story they reported, can be sorted in other ways to allow one to see data on 151 companies’ executive’s earnings.

COMPANY	EXECUTIVE	TOTAL
Viacom	Philippe Dauman	$43,077,942
Honeywell International	David Cote	$35,378,249
Walt Disney	Robert Iger	$31,363,013
Marathon Oil	Clarence Cazalot	$29,911,662
Altera	John Daane	$29,576,725
Motorola Solutions	Gregory Brown(1)	$29,313,864
IBM	Samuel Palmisano	$24,221,865
Johnson & Johnson	William Weldon	$23,362,939
United Technologies	Louis Chenevert	$22,878,306
American Express	Kenneth Chenault	$22,490,401
Qualcomm	Paul Jacobs	$21,722,333
Coca-Cola	Muhtar Kent	$21,161,811
Cooper Industries	Kirk Hachigian	$21,116,678

Now, I don’t begrudge people making money, especially if they work hard, and I presume these men work hard, probably as hard as I do. And it’s not about me and them. But, what does one do with this sort of money. In one year, they’re making more than what a well-paid teacher made (including nice retirement and health benefits) over the past 35 years. Equitable?

Well, if these men gave 1% of their incomes to an endowment for a local school for five years, that would amount to something. Those schools would suddenly have budgets that would allow them to buy curricula that they might not otherwise be able to purchase, given the anti-tax and anti-education mood of many neighbors. And, if these savvy business men said, “You have to buy curricula that have a proven track record of success with the funds from this endowment (and here are the sensible rules for deciding what counts as such a curriculum),” then they might be “giving back to the community,” as their similarly wealthy athletics stars say.

In fact, mayhaps we could just ask that these way-wealthy folks would form coalitions and tackle problems such as this, just as the Buffet, Gates, Broad, and other families have addressed international problems. Mr. Atlanta Falcon Matt Ryan, Atlanta Coca Cola Mr. Muhtar Kent, Mr. Atlanta Hawk Joe Johnson, and Mr. Atlanta Braves Chipper Jones…y’all could do some good works among you, if you formed a team. Just 1-2% of your incomes a year for a three-year run for schools, boys-and-girls clubs, community music programs, shelters for indigent elderly folks…. Do you think you could afford 10%?

Who’s the 99%?

Rev. Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir have an answer to that question. It’s actually pretty obvious, ’cause the 1% (really the one-tenth of one percent) are all those folks you and I see pretty much every day. May Day is just around the corner.

sopa pipa

search sopa & pipa at  free speech (I care about my copyrights, but some things are more important.)

Talk about dying

Have you ever had someone close to you recognize that death is not just inevitable, but that it is likely to come in the nearer, rather than farther, future? I am close with some elderly people who have said to me “getting old is for the birds” and even “sometimes I wish I could just die.” We all know someone who’s a bit elderly. Perhaps it’s a parent or an uncle. Maybe it’s a neighbor who still lives alone independently, and you check on her.

I have several in my life (not counting myself). So, in July of 2011 I was quick to read a column by Steve Lopez of the Los Angeles Times entitled “Waiting in the dark with Dad.” In it he told about his elderly father taking a fall one night and his mother, unable to get the father up, waiting through the night with him until they could get to an emergency room.

For other folks, incurable and advancing disease rather than age may be the primary driver of impending death. Still, many of the end-of-life concerns are similar. What does one do to set things straight? How does one face the prospect of being a burden on others? Will there be pain and suffering? Which trip will be the last and how much fun can one wring out of it? Will that advance medical directive be honored? (My sister suggested she might have “Do Not Resuscitate” tattooed on her chest!)

After examining his own parents’ situation, Mr. Lopez has delved into the topic more broadly. The result has grown into a series of articles discussing divergent views of problems faced by elderly folks. Over the past few months I’ve passed along links to and discussed that first and several other columns by Mr. Lopez about his thoughts on his ailing father’s end-of-life situation. The Times has collected a dozen (as of today) of Mr. Lopez’s related columns and has them displayed together under the headline “Matters of life & death.”

Meanwhile, it’s great to have palliative care programs such as Hospice (ask your doctors and nurses) and support services via Family Caregiver Alliance (search “end-of-life care”; it’s a US org, but I imagine there are comparable or better orgs in other countries) and Compassion in Dying (also mentioned in one of Mr. Lopez’s columns). This dying stuff is worth discussing. Thanks to Mr. Lopez for talking about it.

I hope you read all the articles, but I recommend you start with the one about Mr. Lopez’s mother waiting in the dark with his father.

Skeptic’s Dictionary for Kids!

Bob Carroll announced that he’s completed his latest project, a Skeptic’s Dictionary for Kids, in his weekly newsletter dated 7 August 2011. In the newsletter he explained why he took on this new complement to his massive and long-standing Skeptic’s Dictionary:

I wrote the SD for Kids to promote science and scientific skepticism among young people. I haven’t seen anything else like it on the Web or in print. I was encouraged to do an SD for kids by one big person who thinks kids deserve an SD of their own and by some little people who are already questioning some of their teacher’s beliefs. My 12-year-old consultant took down from her parents’ bookshelf a copy of The Skeptic’s Dictionary to look up “astrology” after her teacher told her class that she believed the stars and planets affect who we are and what happens to us. My consultant thought my writing was a bit obtuse. OK. She said “hard” and “too long.” My 10-year-old consultant wanted more pictures. He especially wanted to see a picture of Area 51, which was mentioned in some movie he saw. He wanted to know more about aliens and UFOs, too.

Mr. Carroll recommends SD for Kids for children ages nine and older and suggest that they start with the about pages and the introduction to scientific reasoning. It’s all at http://sd4kids.skepdic.com/

Budgeting for the future

Lost in all this flap about the debt ceiling, revenue, spending, and such is an important discussion about who’s going to be doing things 30, 40, or 50 years from now. How well prepared will those people be who are going to be responsible in the future for the economy, environment, government, and so forth? Those are investments that really matter for all of us.

In a column opposite the New York (NY, US) Times editorials 17 July 2011, Nicholas D. Kristof discussed some of these issues. He remembered his own school days fondly, likening his “beloved old high school in Yamhill, Ore. — a plain brick building” to a rocket ship that allowed him and his classmate to rise to positions as columnists or lawyers, and raised questions about the current rounds of financial constraints that are crushing education around the USA. He rightly encouraged citizens to reconsider priorities.

Still, we nation-build in Afghanistan and scrimp at home. How is it that we can afford to double our military budget since 9/11, can afford the carried-interest tax loophole for billionaires, can afford billions of dollars in givebacks to oil and gas companies, yet can’t afford to invest in our kids’ futures?

Without an educated populace, we have very little on which to depend for the future. Education does a lot. An educated populace not only earns more and creates more, it makes smarter decisions about child bearing and rearing, purchasing, and on and on.

The importance of education was a foundational notion for people who conceived of democracy. In a letter to George Wythe of 13 August 1786, Thomas Jefferson wrote that he considered “by far the most important bill in our whole code is that for the diffusion of knowledge among the people” and recommended that Mr. Wythe “Let our countrymen know that the people alone can protect us against these evils [tyranny, oppression, etc.] and that the tax which will be paid for this purpose is not more than the thousandth part of what will be paid to kings, priests and nobles who will rise up among us if we leave the people in ignorance.”

I hope the politicians don’t toss the wheat with the chaff.

Read Mr. Kristoff’s “Our Broken Escalator.” Read more of Mr. Jefferson’s quotations about the importance of education for a democracy.

Sir Charles on gays in the locker room

On 17 May, Washington Post columnist Mike Wise published a report about an interview he conducted with Charles Barkley in which Mr. Wise described Mr. Barkley’s views about the unnecessary focus on sexual orientation in professional team sports. According to Mr. Wise, “Charles Barkley is sick and tired of hearing how the sanctuary of the locker room is not ready for a male athlete in a major team sport to come out to his teammates, how awkward everyone would feel after they heard a teammate say, ‘I’m gay.’”