Note: "It's American Exceptionalism, dude" will be concluded shortly.
Lying in repose on my chaise longue in an attitude befitting a dad on Fathers Day, I pause to reflect. Thankful as I am for the slew of children in my life, I wonder what the future holds for them. The malaise and uncertainty of the zeitgeist affects them all. Many young adults yearn for a second adolescence, another chance to gather rosebuds. The crushing economy has sent them back to their parents' basements or spare bedrooms. They look incredulous when they hear stories of the 60's boom and the jobs to be had. Then their brows furrow and they slowly nod when they hear grayski say that because of the Downturn and his ill-conceived retirement plans that he plans to work till he drops. Grayski is not regarding his job clinging as calcifying the labor pool. Rather, he sees it as a sacrifice he'll make for his kids or some rubbish. Of course, he was just watching his stocks grow in the 90's to care that many entry level jobs were disappearing. Now, many laid off workers are scrambling for the crumbs of what's left.
With this in mind on this Father's Day, I must argue for a strengthening of the patricide laws. Older societies realized that ordinary homicide taboos weren't enough of a deterrent for hard-wired Oedipal crimes. While winning dear old Mom may not be Junior's intent, he or she will soon be agitated beyond a political remedy. They sense things are stacked against them by an entrenched generation which will be around for a long time. Witness what's happening in Italy and Greece. The "youth" live with their parents into middle age as the birth rate plummets since marriage is not economically feasible. Tired of internships and low end jobs, they've frequently rioted in frustration. This scenario is sounding familiar.
Grayski Boomers, hear my appeal. Let's be proactive just this once. AARP is no safe haven. We need direct political action on a generational basis. Partisan politics be damned: Give me a life preserver! Make patricide a torturable and capital offense. Oh, and Happy Fathers'Day.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Friday, June 10, 2011
It's American Exceptionalism, dude
This will not be a rant. There is enough foamy mad dog ranting going on in the "sphere" to poison any chance for actual debate. I'll merely comment on what's either stated or understood in the rhetoric of today's American politicians striving for a message that resonates with an aging electorate. That message: WE ARE EXCEPTIONAL. You will hear Obama allude to this in his understated, professorial way. In his Libya speech he said that " other nations might turn a blind eye" to the impending massacre but " the United States is different." Gingrich puts his view on a DVD all about the "shining city on a hill" myth. Glen Beck, though not a politician, feels strongly that Barack Obama just doesn't get A.E., that he just can't feel it, man.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
My Kind of Succession
On Monday the "City in a Garden" gets a new gardener and he promises to do some weed-pulling. If current treads continue, however, Rahm will also be doing more share-cropping. To deal with the deficit, the transition team must be mulling over what chestnuts can be leased to anonymous international consortiums. Take the Spanish group who runs the Skyway and boosts the toll with alacrity.
But what did we expect? Tapas at the toll booth MacDonald's?
Daley was vehemently cursed for privatizing the sadly run parking meter bureau. Did that ruffle the five term mayor? Maybe in the same way Gaddafi or al-Assad were phased by early protests. But Daley would tell you that he has the city's bond rating to worry about. Everyone
knew that the only efficient parking crew was the Denver boot squad. That high-stakes operation worked like the movements of a Swiss watch. You pay and the boot was off your wheel exactly when they told you it would be. Any parking meter ticket could be blamed in a letter to be mechanical failure, a bag with BROKE on the meter's head, or epoxy in the coin slot, ad nauseum. Nobody checked downtown. They'd just let you slide. That's because election time would be coming around and the parker was usually a potential vote.
Daley, of course, no longer needs your vote. Rahm bought what votes he needed for $30 apiece in an election in which the " City of Big Shoulders" shrugged. The Chicago electorate greeted the first mayoral change in 20 years with the same enthusiasm as a Soviet citizen accepting a shakeup in the Politburo. You ask why, tovarich? Fine, I'll put on Moussorgsky, light the samovar and try to explain.
Chicago doesn't care about democracy. Hence what is preferred is orderly Soviet-style succession. Since the days when Hinky Dink and Bath House John ran the vice-ridden First Ward, cynicism trumps every ballot. Certainly, a leader like Daley can pick a successor, though he may deny it. The commuters who were greeted by Rahm Emmanuel could well have believed it was Vladimir Putin. They take a look at this guy and they don't see cuddly. He offers a handshake and then there's the stub.
The deli accident that lopped off half his middle finger created a weapon. He has poked it into the chest of many a shocked congressman who was reluctant to go along. Any old school Chicagoan eats that up. After all, weren't we " Hog Butcher to the World"? Working men didn't tap keyboards in the stockyards. They handled edged tools the sight of which might keep you up at night. Despite New Trier and the ballet stint, the stub gives Rahm the macho cred to cut it with a lot of voters. Give us someone who's tough enough to stand up to the ADVERSARY and who has connections, fer chrissakes.
Enough voters felt that way and so did nearly every major bank in the country. Oh, excuse me, is the United Bank of Switzerland in the country? I'll save that one for Davos.
But what did we expect? Tapas at the toll booth MacDonald's?
Daley was vehemently cursed for privatizing the sadly run parking meter bureau. Did that ruffle the five term mayor? Maybe in the same way Gaddafi or al-Assad were phased by early protests. But Daley would tell you that he has the city's bond rating to worry about. Everyone
knew that the only efficient parking crew was the Denver boot squad. That high-stakes operation worked like the movements of a Swiss watch. You pay and the boot was off your wheel exactly when they told you it would be. Any parking meter ticket could be blamed in a letter to be mechanical failure, a bag with BROKE on the meter's head, or epoxy in the coin slot, ad nauseum. Nobody checked downtown. They'd just let you slide. That's because election time would be coming around and the parker was usually a potential vote.
Daley, of course, no longer needs your vote. Rahm bought what votes he needed for $30 apiece in an election in which the " City of Big Shoulders" shrugged. The Chicago electorate greeted the first mayoral change in 20 years with the same enthusiasm as a Soviet citizen accepting a shakeup in the Politburo. You ask why, tovarich? Fine, I'll put on Moussorgsky, light the samovar and try to explain.
Chicago doesn't care about democracy. Hence what is preferred is orderly Soviet-style succession. Since the days when Hinky Dink and Bath House John ran the vice-ridden First Ward, cynicism trumps every ballot. Certainly, a leader like Daley can pick a successor, though he may deny it. The commuters who were greeted by Rahm Emmanuel could well have believed it was Vladimir Putin. They take a look at this guy and they don't see cuddly. He offers a handshake and then there's the stub.
The deli accident that lopped off half his middle finger created a weapon. He has poked it into the chest of many a shocked congressman who was reluctant to go along. Any old school Chicagoan eats that up. After all, weren't we " Hog Butcher to the World"? Working men didn't tap keyboards in the stockyards. They handled edged tools the sight of which might keep you up at night. Despite New Trier and the ballet stint, the stub gives Rahm the macho cred to cut it with a lot of voters. Give us someone who's tough enough to stand up to the ADVERSARY and who has connections, fer chrissakes.
Enough voters felt that way and so did nearly every major bank in the country. Oh, excuse me, is the United Bank of Switzerland in the country? I'll save that one for Davos.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Chicago Abandoned!
In a rare moment of clarity Chicago's 2.8 million inhabitants poured out of the city today seeking a more temperate climate. Thousands trudged along the city's main arteries through white-out conditions headed for the former prairies. Clinging to scant possessions, often just some sports memorabilia, the haggard masses pushed south and westward without stopping to glance back. Others, hearing rumors of landing craft waiting, crossed a paralyzed Lake Shore Drive only to plunge like lemmings off piers and retention walls into the icy Lake Michigan. Still other desperate Chicagoans fled through the Deep Tunnel System seeking a route to the Mississippi. Being among the first to leave, city officials were not available for comment.
The exodus is said to have been triggered by the National Geographic Society's downgrade of the inhabitability status of the city. The new designation gives the Chicago area a rank of "Tundra with Permafrost." Normally, such a rank would mean the area is suitable for " herds of migrating beasts with abundant fur" (i.e. Pleistocene Era). Locations around the globe that share this designation include Finnmark, Tierra del Hielo, and the interior of the Kamchatka Peninsula.
Despite the hardship of leaving it all behind, Chicagoans greeted the news with characteristic sangfroid. " It's a wasteland but its our wasteland." insisted Norma Rodriguez, a former community organizer. "I hardly noticed the weather til they buried my apartment" Rodriguez lived in apartment below street grade and was sealed inside for 48 hours by errant truckload of snow. Carlton Sessions, an airline employee, put down his bundle saying "I can deal with it. But they should at least try to save something, like the Bean or maybe part of Wrigley Field"
Despite early claims that wholesale abandonment of a city by its inhabitants is unprecedented,
some historians are in disagreement. They have noted parallel instances with the Mayans in precolumbian Mesoamerica. Mystery shrouds the reason or reasons why perfectly good cities in a WARM climate were abandoned in the Yucatan at the end of the First Millennium. Some weather experts have suggested that, during this period, the Yucatan suffered repeated hurricanes. This may have prompted the priest caste to downgrade the area to "we're better off in the jungle."
The future of Chicago's buildings, houses and streets remains uncertain. Large business conglomerates which already own segments of the city such as the Skyway, have offered to assume full control. They claim that Chicago scenes are still needed by TV series on HBO and elsewhere and that contracts must be honored.
The exodus is said to have been triggered by the National Geographic Society's downgrade of the inhabitability status of the city. The new designation gives the Chicago area a rank of "Tundra with Permafrost." Normally, such a rank would mean the area is suitable for " herds of migrating beasts with abundant fur" (i.e. Pleistocene Era). Locations around the globe that share this designation include Finnmark, Tierra del Hielo, and the interior of the Kamchatka Peninsula.
Despite the hardship of leaving it all behind, Chicagoans greeted the news with characteristic sangfroid. " It's a wasteland but its our wasteland." insisted Norma Rodriguez, a former community organizer. "I hardly noticed the weather til they buried my apartment" Rodriguez lived in apartment below street grade and was sealed inside for 48 hours by errant truckload of snow. Carlton Sessions, an airline employee, put down his bundle saying "I can deal with it. But they should at least try to save something, like the Bean or maybe part of Wrigley Field"
Despite early claims that wholesale abandonment of a city by its inhabitants is unprecedented,
some historians are in disagreement. They have noted parallel instances with the Mayans in precolumbian Mesoamerica. Mystery shrouds the reason or reasons why perfectly good cities in a WARM climate were abandoned in the Yucatan at the end of the First Millennium. Some weather experts have suggested that, during this period, the Yucatan suffered repeated hurricanes. This may have prompted the priest caste to downgrade the area to "we're better off in the jungle."
The future of Chicago's buildings, houses and streets remains uncertain. Large business conglomerates which already own segments of the city such as the Skyway, have offered to assume full control. They claim that Chicago scenes are still needed by TV series on HBO and elsewhere and that contracts must be honored.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Legacy
Last week I picked up my daughter after her improv lesson and took her to lunch. I relied on Yelp to direct us to a much lauded (yet mediocre) sandwich shop. Lily's comedy nerve was primed and she had me grinning with a description of her potty-mouthed instructor. We split a huge sandwich piled with lunchmeat as the owner of the deli kept fishing for compliments. Surrounded by carryout beer we worked up a thirst, so afterwards it was to a little U.K. pseudo-pub next door.
We got comfortable sitting by the fire with our pints. The place had its charm-quiet lighting, old wooden tables and chairs, a well worn bar with a cluster of ale tap handles.
We got there in mid afternoon, but as more arrived on this Friday, I noticed another quaint fact: people were conversing in quiet tones with only the ambient sounds of a public house.
No TV's! No place to park your eyes. Not even some insufferable cricket match.
Lily mentioned the bar that had offered her a job was lousy with TV's. Being freshly back in Chicago she's been scrambling around looking for work to support her budding performance career. The place offered her a server job, a time honored way for performers to eat while honing their craft. Though she has experience serving food and drink, this new joint required a more extensive grasp of libations.
Then Lily got out a page of notes with various liquors, wine and beer. It had one column of call drinks and another of premium ones. This was her homework and she needed some tutoring. My dear young daughter wanted to tap my knowledge of booze.
What is Jagermeister? It's a German liqueur with forest herbs. In bars they drink it as a shot but it should be savored.
How about Sambuca? A thick sweet anisette, you know, like licorice. In Italy it's served with three fresh roasted coffee beans that send up tiny brown streamers in the snifter.
It went on this way as the bar got more it's Friday crew. Here I was instilling (!) valuable booze trivia so my daughter might gain some sophistication and hold her own at the new job.
I would have looked laughably overfamiliar with the subject had we discussed the topic earlier in her life. A fine pool shooter would once hear " I know where you spent your youth" as his skill didn't belie years spent at the pool hall. This knowledge I was sharing with Lily was
taken from years on a stool in the laboratory of nightlife.
Most Scotches are blends. Your single malt is not, so it's premium.
What whiskey is in a Manhattan? Usually bourbon these days. They used rye in the Madmen era.
Ages ago I might have shown my young some survival skills like how to make a fishhook from a bone. Maybe I'd pass along an effective snare or point out where there was shelter from danger. Now I just got assurance she would take a cab home when she got off late.
So I drove her home so she could get ready for her last night of training at the bar. A few days later I got a call from her:
Dad, I not taking that job. No? What's gives?
They don't have a computerized service system. And besides, the place is creepy.
Alright honey, You'll find something else.
Yeah, maybe some office work. Sounds good.
We got comfortable sitting by the fire with our pints. The place had its charm-quiet lighting, old wooden tables and chairs, a well worn bar with a cluster of ale tap handles.
We got there in mid afternoon, but as more arrived on this Friday, I noticed another quaint fact: people were conversing in quiet tones with only the ambient sounds of a public house.
No TV's! No place to park your eyes. Not even some insufferable cricket match.
Lily mentioned the bar that had offered her a job was lousy with TV's. Being freshly back in Chicago she's been scrambling around looking for work to support her budding performance career. The place offered her a server job, a time honored way for performers to eat while honing their craft. Though she has experience serving food and drink, this new joint required a more extensive grasp of libations.
Then Lily got out a page of notes with various liquors, wine and beer. It had one column of call drinks and another of premium ones. This was her homework and she needed some tutoring. My dear young daughter wanted to tap my knowledge of booze.
What is Jagermeister? It's a German liqueur with forest herbs. In bars they drink it as a shot but it should be savored.
How about Sambuca? A thick sweet anisette, you know, like licorice. In Italy it's served with three fresh roasted coffee beans that send up tiny brown streamers in the snifter.
It went on this way as the bar got more it's Friday crew. Here I was instilling (!) valuable booze trivia so my daughter might gain some sophistication and hold her own at the new job.
I would have looked laughably overfamiliar with the subject had we discussed the topic earlier in her life. A fine pool shooter would once hear " I know where you spent your youth" as his skill didn't belie years spent at the pool hall. This knowledge I was sharing with Lily was
taken from years on a stool in the laboratory of nightlife.
Most Scotches are blends. Your single malt is not, so it's premium.
What whiskey is in a Manhattan? Usually bourbon these days. They used rye in the Madmen era.
Ages ago I might have shown my young some survival skills like how to make a fishhook from a bone. Maybe I'd pass along an effective snare or point out where there was shelter from danger. Now I just got assurance she would take a cab home when she got off late.
So I drove her home so she could get ready for her last night of training at the bar. A few days later I got a call from her:
Dad, I not taking that job. No? What's gives?
They don't have a computerized service system. And besides, the place is creepy.
Alright honey, You'll find something else.
Yeah, maybe some office work. Sounds good.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)