Top Three Articles of the Recent Past

#1 (Bad Health Care Math)

Several famous persons are credited with the quote: "There are three types of lies. Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics." But the problem lies (sorry) not with statistics but with the ignorant or prejudicial use of those numbers. This example comes from the business pages of the Atlantic, usually the home of reasoned and rational discourse. The chief point of the article is that only 5% of the population make up nearly 50% of annual medical costs. 

These 'big spenders' tend to be over 65 years of age and predominantly white, which in itself is shocking in a country that is predominantly white. But when you look at the meager details offered in the article and parse the language properly, here is what they seem to be concluding - The majority of the health care costs in the United States can be directly attributed to expenses associated with the delivery of services to the people who need medical care.

No really, a big Duh! from the Atlantic. Sick people are getting the most medical care in this country. Who would have thunk it?

I am shocked, shocked I say to hear that healing is going on in this hospital.

#2 (Left, Right, Left)

Here's an interesting idea - ask liberals what conservatives get right and ask conservatives what liberals get correct. Here are two articles that tell you a lot more about those responding to the questions than it does about what they believe the "other side" is up to. Conservatives look at Liberals and The Left comments on the Right. What I find most interesting is that everyone I have sent these articles to find themselves a bit chilled by the words of the analysts they usually agree with. Disagreeing with "the other side" is one thing but listening to the emotionless, dispassionate words of "your guys" can be downright frightening.

By the way, if you are of a liberal lean then I strongly suggest you read some or all of the linked articles in the piece where conservatives talk about liberals. These will really give you some solid insight into the conservative mind and will force you to sharpen your critique of those positions or they might convince you that you really aren't right, I mean correct all of the time.

#3 (Magnes Museum)

Ever had that feeling when you read something in the newspaper and you know more than the reporter is telling. It happens to everyone, mass media smoothes out the story and truncates the facts. I had a big dose of this when reading the NYTimes article about the reopening of the Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at UC Berkeley.

"The Magnes was created in 1962 by Seymour Fromer, a Jewish educator, and Rebecca Camhi Fromer, his wife. Its artifacts were deliberately wide-ranging, including not just Jewish ritual objects but manuscripts, music and ephemera." 

You see Rebecca and Seymour were the parents of one of my very best friends. I not only helped her empty out her father's apartment after his passing but I now live in that very space. When I first saw the apartment it was full of ephemera. Books, objects of art of all kinds plus paperwork, notes and documents the archivist at the Magnes was drooling over. We sorted, shredded, cleaned and cataloged for several months. The bookseller came in and we packed nearly 5,000 tomes for distribution to their appropriate new homes. We called this work "treasure hunting" because mixed in with decades old Visa statements and phone bills we would find a handwritten letter from the director of a museum in Jerusalem with notes on a piece Seymour had brought back from his recent visit.

The archivist eventually took thirty boxes of papers back to the Magnes, which just this week has reopened in a newly remodeled space a few blocks from this now remodeled apartment that once housed the overflow of ephemera and life that has become the Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life.

Top Five Articles of the Recent Past

#1 - (The 1%)

"Of the 1 percenters interviewed for this article, almost all — conservatives and liberals alike — said the wealthy could and should shoulder more of the country’s financial burden, and almost all said they viewed the current system as unfair."

Groups, no matter how we define them, are not homogenous. Here is a very interesting article from NYTimes on who are the real 1% and how do they feel about all the talk and anger directed at them in the recent political conversation. A more nuanced look at the rich, how they got there and how they feel about the rest of us.

#2 - (U.S. Economy)

"For most of U.S. history, most people had a slow and steady wind at their back, a combination of economic forces that didn’t make life easy but gave many of us little pushes forward that allowed us to earn a bit more every year. Over a lifetime, it all added up to a better sort of life than the one we were born into. That wind seems to be dying for a lot of Americans. What the country will be like without it is not quite clear."

From the Atlantic 'Making It in America' a well written fact-based analysis of how the true "middle class" of the U.S. economy has been displaced and what the near and long-term future might look like for those in the declining middle.

#3 - (Obama)

This one is difficult for me. It comes via Newsweek, I seldom like anything in that glossy rag. The piece is written by Andrew Sullivan and I rarely agree with anything he says or thinks. Finally, the article defends Barack Obama and I certainly do not. However . . .

If you are a republican who loathes the president or a democrat who is completely disappointed by him, you need to read this article. Quite simply you must face the half of the article that puts forward the rebuttal of your position. If you can't rewind what Sullivan has to say then you  are simply making noise when you criticize the present administration. Now is not the time for silly slogans and softball positions, there is enough of that in the super PAC presidential olympics running all year on television. If you need some help, here is a conservative response by Joel Pollak, which deserves just as much ridicule as the original article.

This is a really telling test for you to sharpen your critique of the president and if you can't, well then maybe you just ought to vote for him in November. Or stay tuned here for the third side of the debate.

#4 - (Wall Street)
"If there was ever a news story that crystallized the moral dementia of modern Wall Street in one little vignette, this is it."

If you're not reading Matt Taibbi, you should be. He writes for Rolling Stone but his work appears everywhere on the web. This piece is a tale that clearly summarizes just what went wrong on Wall Street and how that brought us all to the brink of a global depression.

#5 - (Bizarro/Terrorism)

The Waffle House Terrorists from Esquire magazine. I swear if you can read this rather longish article and then tell me who the bad guys are or even who the whackos are; then you are a better reader, a better american and a stranger person than I. Who needs fiction when the federal government is involved?

Today's Read

"Those who think that the cold weather will end the protests should think again. A new generation of leaders is just getting started. The new progressive age has begun."

Yes, today's must read comes from the New York Times, so my conservative readers will know it must be left wing propaganda. But give it a read anyway, you might find as others have that we share a lot more in common these days than ever before in our lifetimes. The article has a historical bent about how we got into economic troubles in the past and how we dug ourselves out.

The article is called The New Progressive Movement

Remember I read all of the articles you send me, so you owe yourself this one.

$15 for the New York Times

The New York Times began offering a paid subscription last month. Basically anyone can read up to 20 articles a month for free. After that you have to pay up or wait for the new month to kick in. I never really kept track but I was fairly sure I hit my limit well before the end of a calendar month. What surprised me was when I signed up (99 cents for the first month, $15 thereafter), when I signed up I did not feel like I had just made a NPR donation or a relief for Japan, Haiti, Kathrina or tornado alley contribution. Fifteen dollars a month is a deal.

I read the NYT often. I hunt around in the archives for research, I get three of their teaser email newsletters and click links often for the full stories or editorials. I nearly religiously read the Sunday Review of Books usually on Thursday when it comes out online. I also read the online version of Atlantic (Monthly) still free, it would be a more difficult decision to pay for it; I really prefer magazines in hard copy, particularly the longer pieces. The Economist also gets a cyber-passthru each week but again a subscription might have to be for the hands-on edition. I read both the Atlantic and the Economist at the Berkeley Public Library, along with several other research oriented periodicals; usually on a very hot or rainy mid-week afternoon.

I also am not sure about magazines on eReaders. Books yes, but there is more to a good magazine than the words. The illustrations and the New Yorker cartoons don't translate so well to the digital screen. 

Ah what literary times of choice and bounty we dwell within.

Insomnia & Philosophy

Today marks the final installment in a three month series of New York Times Op-Ed pieces on insomnia. Back in February the Times launched this series they called All-Nighters:

What do you do when the world's asleep and you're awake? 
All-Nighters is an exploration of an ancient malady and modern fixation -- insomnia. With contributions from writers, scientists, artists and others, it will document the many ways we approach sleeplessness -- as a nuisance, a disease, a curse, and opportunity or even a gift.


There have been twenty-eight articles in all in the All-Nighters series, as someone who has not had a serious bout of insomnia is over thirty years, I found the full set to be a revealing take on the subject. Several of my friends who have frequent episodes of sleeplessness, did not find them as intriguing:

"Been there, done that too often. Reading about it doesn't help."


"I started reading the first few articles late at night when I couldn't sleep; so besides being tired and awake, I was also pissed off and annoyed at the efforts to chronicle insomnia by what were obviously late night dilettantes."


Just a few days ago the editors of The Opinionator section ("Exclusive Online Commentary from the Times") introduced another new feature -- The Stone, as in The Philosopher's Stone. The Stone is proposed to be "a forum for contemporary philosophers on issues both timely and timeless."  The first article in The Stone was entitled: What Is a Philosopher?

While I intend to follow this new venture as it unfolds, I have two early (too early?) comments. First, this appears to be an open-ended discussion not limited as was the insomnia exploration. Giving NYTimes editors and writers free reign with a subject as vast as philosophy seems at least to be overly broad and subject to criminal expansiveness.

More critically, the pieces tend to be short; not blog-short but still depth is often sacrificed to brevity. As in the opening article: What Is a Philosopher? I dare say should you read that 1300 word piece, you will come away with many propositions but nary an answer to the question: what is a philosopher.

Still an interesting attempt by the NYTimes folks. I would point out again, this is online content and at least for now still free.

Gotta a Good Reason?

You know that look. Yep, that look! The good news is we are genetically encoded to recognize it and get the hell out of the way. The bad news is sometimes there is no way out. There are times when we just have to deal without someone who is carrying around a big, bad, nasty attitude. But what if they have a good reason . . .

I am not talking about Mr. Roarke the neighbor, who everyone knows is just an downright cranky bastard. Neither are we excusing Aunt Martha, who is just a walking, talking, nasty, meddling, controlling bitch. These people have some long-held issues and, unless you are getting paid, your life should not be wasted trying to rescue them from the pit they have made of their own existence.

Sometimes circumstances are such that we do have to deal with a boss, co-worker or relative who just seems to want to make today a slog through the muck for everyone. If you know the person and they are acting contrary to their usual manner, well then you can either give them some space or try to help. Being a trained professional, may I strongly recommend the space option. In fact, in the course of modern life, I take it as almost axiomatic that when faced with a myriad of potential courses of action selecting "space" is usually the safest course of inaction.

Reflect for a moment on the countenance of the cougar at the top of this post. No really, take another look. . . Go ahead. . . Is not your first reaction to slowly back away from the screen? See what I mean about genetically encoded. Follow your instincts and avoid the psychic scar tissue.

But what if they have a good reason . . .

What prompted my post today was this quote from the NYTimes. See if you can guess the missing words.

"Let me level with you -- sure, I'm grumpy and miserable and anti-social, but the rest of you are unbearable. I can't listen to you talk about your issues because [BLANK] makes me selfish. Your jealousy issues? Boo-hoo. I haven't [BLANK] in I don't know how many days and all of your yammering sounds like noise. You know when the adults talk to Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang? That's what it's like to listen to you.


I used to be so optimistic. Even now if I try really, really hard, I can see the upside to most things. But I have nothing good to say about being a miserable, [BLANK] lunatic. So if you're waiting for me to impart some delicious morsel of hope -- like how I find inspiration in my [BLANK] because, hey, I do my best writing when I'm angry, for example. Well, sorry -- this doesn't really end well for you or me. Try as I might, I can't think of how to go out on a happy note today."


Did you get it? Spoiler alert in one paragraph down.

Consider for a moment the difference between this person being a co-worker or friend as opposed to just someone you need to interact with, such as a sales clerk, bureaucrat behind the desk, police officer, judge  in your case. If you don't know them and will never see them again, you can either assume this is their normal state of gloom or you might select instead the more empathetic interpretation and assume they are being adversely affected today and just cut them some slack.

The missing words in the quote above are: insomnia, slept, sleep-deprived, restlessness. The author is a chronic insomniac. By the way, if you have such issues the NYTimes is running a whole series of pieces on insomnia this week.

Today's point: Sometimes people are having a bad day for a good reason. Allowing for that interpretation instead of the 'evil bastard' explanation gives both them and you the space to avoid conflict and confrontation. Sometimes people are going to be in a dark place, why volunteer to join them? Give 'em a break. I wish I did more often.

Paranoia Strikes Deep

Paranoia strikes deep

Into your life it will creep

It starts when you're always afraid

-Buffalo Springfield

For What It's Worth is the song by Messrs. Neil Young, Stephen Stills, Richie Furay, Jim Messina and perhaps Dewey Martin and/or Bruce Palmer depending on the version you listen to and who was caught up in the last drug bust.

Just a small digression, when Buffalo Springfield broke up after about two years of revolving bass players and the aforementioned drug busts---Stephen Still hooked up with Graham Nash of the Hollies and David Crosby from the Byrds and formed a little band, they took in Neil Young and played some music. Jim Messina and Richie Furay hooked up to form Poco. Jim Messina eventually teamed up with Kenny Loggins.

Meanwhile back at the topic of this here post: Paranoia Strikes Deep. That was the tagline for a Nov. 9 opinion piece in the NYTimes. The paranoia is either that the Republican Party has or will be taken over by the extremist right wing. Whether this has or hasn't happened yet depends on just how left or right you already are and (here comes the point) how paranoid you are about such a possibility. The article can be summarized with it's last two lines:

"The point is that the takeover of the Republican Party by the irrational right is no laughing matter. Something unprecedented is happening here--and it's very bad for America."

In case you missed it, the lines from Buffalo Springfield are:

Something's happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear. There's a man with a gun over there, telling me I got to beware.

The problem is that you can't tell if the guy with the gun is an extreme conservative, a paranoid libertarian or a fearful liberal who has decided to defend his turf. That it ain't exactly clear is why paranoia strikes deep.

---

photo credit: ethiosun.com

Writin' 'Bout Writin'

One of my favorite things to do is to take a set of facts and use them to imagine how the world might work. In writing about some of these ideas, my aim is not to be correct — how can I be, when the answer isn’t known? — but to be thought-provoking, to ask questions, to make people wonder. - Olivia Judson

That is actually a very recent quote from an opinion piece in the NYTimes by Olivia Judson. I like the way she writes, although recently I have been reading books and articles with styles I do not care for. It seems that like John Cage music there are some disconnected writing modes that really ring some reader's cerebral chimes. I am discovering that reading the discordant makes it oh so much easier to analyze the style if not the attraction. Right now I am plowing through Neil Stephenson's Cryptonomicon with it's over 1100 pages. Back when I was working in the cyber-reality, I enjoyed the darkness of his virtual world in Snow Crash, but his herky-jerky story line in this work is distracting. Yet, I persevere because I am trying to master the craft of reading a work I truly admire without getting lost in the author's world.

I want to see beneath the fiction and discover the structure that allows a reader to fall so deeply into the created world. I have read the Mars Trilogy at least three times trying to follow the seamless character transitions. I strive to some day be able to read Blake and understand how his hallucinations can become mine. Until then I will scribble away at my several nascent books and articles, hoping they will someday emerge into the light of public scrutiny and paint worlds yet unseen for my readers.