Going Dark

Dear Friends,

We recently experienced an instance where several very popular web sites went dark in protest of proposed legislation that would have impacted a range of popular web sites.  For very different reasons I am going dark for a few months, probably until early autumn.

First and foremost, I have grown weary of my own postings.  They all sound the same to me these days and more negative than positive. 

Second, my involvement as a board member of the Central Virginia L'Arche project is turning into something of an unpaid part time job.  It is my primary priority. 

Finally, I am kicking off a new book project, an attempt to write a spiritual autobiography which answers the question, for me if no one else, how did I morph into what I have become spiritually, how did my religious beliefs come to be what they are?  Obviously my lifelong Catholicism is a backdrop for this endeavor.  This is a different effort than my previous book which told the story of my days as a candidate for the priesthood.

So I wish you all an enjoyable (and early) spring and summer.  I'll be back on the air some time after labor day.

Many thanks for your loyal readership.

Jim

My Battle with E D (Electioneering Dyspepsia)

Before I launch into today's posting I want to point out that I am neither a Democrat nor a Republican and so, where the November elections are concerned, I don't have a dog in the fight.

That said, here, in no particular order, are the top ten reasons why I would like to spend each quadrennial election year alone on a desert island without contact with the outside world:

1. Spectacularly stupid viral email.  This is spam containing "facts" made up by extreme partisans and passed on by others of the same ilk who are willing to believe anything about the opposition.  A recent example, one of many in the "scare the elderly" genre, is an email received recently by Mary Ann warning us that because of "Obamacare" the monthly Medicare Part B premium was going to jump from 2012's approximately $100 per month to $247 in 2014.  The true 2014 number is $117.
2. Mindless Media Frenzy.  Nothing related to a candidate is too insignificant to merit coverage by every talking head on television for at least one news cycle.  Certain Republican candidates seem to get fourscore and seven questions about gay marriage for every question they get about Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, energy independence, employment, the economy, deficit reduction, social security, medicare and health care reform.  I won't be surprised if, before it's over, we don't get 24/7 coverage of the political significance of candidate X's new haircut.
3. Demonization of other.  Apparently it's not enough to say that my opponent and I, or the opposing party and I, differ on issues X, Y and Z and here's why I believe my approach to the issue is in the best interest of our country.  Nope, it's apparently necessary to paint the other side as a combination of Satan, Judas, Benedict Arnold, Karl Marx and Adolph Hitler.......over and over again.
4. Negative TV Ads.  These ads, which every candidate claims to be against but every candidate uses, are a corollary to number 3 above.  These ads are insulting to the voters because they assume that no one does any fact checking.  And maybe no one does any checking because these ads seem to work.
5. Single Issue Voters.  Whether it's gay rights, guns, abortion, taxes or any other issue, there are millions of voters who vote based on their pet cause and that alone.  Where a candidate comes down on all the other issues doesn't seem to matter.
6. Meaningless Campaign Promises.  Remember when candidate Obama committed to close Guantanamo?
7. The Candidates.  It seems that anyone who can raise enough money can run for President.  This year, on the Republican side, we were treated to a couple of candidates who were ignorant of basic Middle School geography.  On the Democratic side, there is only one candidate (as was the case on the Republican side with President Bush in 2004).  Why shouldn't the "in party" have a choice of whether or not to run additional candidates?  (Check item 10 below for a likely answer).
8. Vote Tampering.  As a native of Chicago who is old enough to have lived there during the rise of the first Mayor Daley I find myself wondering who really won Illinois in the 1960 presidential election.  The mantra then was "vote early, vote often."  Voters were paid at the polls.  Dead people voted.  Today, things are a little more sophisticated.  This election cycle we are seeing an all-out effort to use our good old friend the law to keep people from voting by enacting legislation related to voter registration and voter identification requirements that millions of poor people can't satisfy.  And as someone or another pointed out, the extent of participation is the best measure of the strength of a democracy.
9. Values Voters.  This term sounds like a self serving label that a certain group of voters has assigned to itself.  I think the implication is that their values are patriotic and godly and that they and they alone are "values voters."  The fact is that everyone who goes to the polls is a values voter, even if what they value is, for example, greed.
10. "The System."  Our political system has been corrupted by "big money."  It currently costs $1.1 million to get elected to the House and $6.5 million if you are running for the Senate.  But this is chump change compared to a run for the presidency.  Barak Obama spent $750 million in 2008 and projections are that the cost of winning the White House in 2012 will be in the area of one billion dollars.......yes, billion.  You don't raise that kind of money five and ten dollars at a time.  So what we are left with (apologies to Mr. Lincoln) is "government of the people, by special interests, for special interests."

So ends my top ten list. 

If you have a "favorite" election related peeve, or you think any of my top ten are bogus, I'd love to hear from you.  You can either use the comments feature of this blog and do so anonymously, or you can email me at EireForEvr@comcast.net.

Tunnel Vision

"Sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train."  (Lou Holtz).

There was a phenomenon known among World War II fighter pilots as target fixation, the consequences of which can be deadly.  Target fixation is the result of one's brain becoming so focused on an object that one can unintentionally collide with it.  In the case of fighter pilots of another era the danger was flying one's plane into the ground.

I can attest to the validity of this phenomenon as I have recently experienced it.  Hence the reference in my most recent posting to "forgetting to look both ways when crossing the street."  Here's what happened.

There I was, driving along life's super-highway at my customary 5 m.p.h. over the speed limit, my eyes for the most part fixed on my rear view mirror as I happily watched day after day of 2011 recede into the past.  An occasional glance forward revealed the onrush of a new year which I just knew had to be better than the one growing ever smaller as it receded at 75 miles-an-hour.

My trusty GPS told me that there were two toll booths between me and midnight on December 31st: Christmas, our nation's biggest retail holiday, and the arrival from Michigan of my daughter Beth and her family who would be with us between Christmas and New Year's.

The Christmas toll didn't bother me.  I was in all ways ready for it.  I even had exact change.  I was also ready for Beth and family.  And so, other than occasionally looking to my right or left for indications that the toll stops were upon me, I kept on my merry way, often laughing at 2011 as it continued its onrush toward the dustbin of history.

I don't remember much of the rest of the trip.  Christmas came and went as did Beth, Jim, Sarah, Mary and Kevin.  I love it when they come to visit, but as an obsessive creature of habit it was nice to awaken on the morning of the last day of the hated 2011 and realize that Mary Ann and I had the house to ourselves.  My old behavior patterns were reactivated. God was in His heaven, all was right with the world.

It was 6.30 PM when it happened.  There I was, ensconced like Archie Bunker in my favorite chair, ready for the evening news and its ever-so-earnest network anchor. It was then and there that my trip to 2012 ended as abruptly as if I had been hit by an eighteen wheeler.  Truthfully, I didn't know what to think:  "Is there no God?"  "How can I not have seen this coming?"  "How stupid am I?"  "Why wasn't I paying attention?" "Hey God, if you're real and listening, can I have a rerun of 2011.....puhleeeeez!!!?!!!

You see folks, it was then, seconds after 6.30 PM Eastern time on New Year's Eve 2011, my own personal Day of Infamy, that the reality of 2012 as an election year hit me like a left hook from Muhammad Ali.

More later.....