Brindle Media

Archive for the ‘Quality of life’ Category

During the past few months, I’m having this experience more frequently. It’s been happening when I sign into my Linkedin account after being alerted that someone has endorsed me or when I check Facebook to learn which friends are celebrating birthdays.

I’m confronted with the profile of a dead friend.

Has this been happening a lot to you, too? If it has, what do you do about it?

The practical part of me wants to delete the person from my list of friends. But I can’t bring myself to do it. Deleting them from my Linkedin connections list or “unfriending” them on Facebook seems, somehow, disrespectful to their memory. I guess, in some weird way, the uncritical emotional part of my psyche believes, if I keep their profile active, that they somehow remain “alive”.

But, I’m being confronted with this issue more frequently this year. Today, at least three different deceased friends confronted me either on the endorsement pages of Linkedin or on my Facebook birthday list.

Has this been happening to you? If you were me, how would you handle it?

Adeste Fideles! Noel! Feliz Navidad ! Happy Christmas !

Peace on earth. Good will toward men.

And best wishes for a better and happier new year.

Picture: The Homecoming by Norman Rockwell

Our youngest began her college career this Fall but the process started over 10 years ago when we first invested a significant chunk of change in her 529 college fund. Unfortunately, when it was time for her to enter college, rather than multiplying in value that fund was worth about the same as it was when the money was first invested. Of course, that situation impacted her final decision on which college to attend.

Fortunately, she attended a high school which provided terrific guidance in planning for college. Her counselor provided her with a list of 40 schools, including stretch, reach, and safety schools which might be a good fit for her skills and career aspirations. We visited 18 of those campuses over the course of 18 months. Fortunately, most of them are within a 4 hour drive of our home.

During our campus visits, I made sure to have a conversation with the college rep about how a 4 year undergrad degree today is worth about the same as a high school diploma was when I entered college. So, the question was: Does it make any sense in this economy to spend close to a quarter million dollars (tuition plus room & board) on an undergrad degree? Or, would it make more sense to spend the first two years in a much cheaper community college to earn those credits which are the basis for most of a college student’s first two years and then transfer to a four year school to complete the degree?

There’s also a consideration for those teens whose interests and aptitudes might make them less suited for a typical 4 year college degree than to pursue a path which places them in a community college for two years with the goal of joining an organization which will pay for the remaining two years of their education and train them in a thriving industry where their skills, talents, and passions are sorely needed. We’re hearing a lot these days about companies who can’t find the workforce with 21st century skills that they need to compete in today’s economy.

It’s something to consider.

Presented by Degree Jungle “Is College Still Worth It”

I’d also recommend that, along with the U.S. News & World college rankings, you check out the Washington Monthly’s reviews.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/toc_2012.php

Listening to the conversation during the past year about the recent US Presidential elections, I had the distinct impression that many of my fellow citizens equate the belief that the person who holds the office of American president is “the most powerful (person) in the world” with a notion that s/he is omnipotent. It seems like magical thinking. That, somehow, an American president can just declare something   ( wave a magic wand, so to speak) and it will become so. Of course, the world is more complicated than that.

Last April, I attended Bob Woodward’s lecture at Union College and was surprised that Woodward seemed to have a negative attitude toward President Obama. I was recently reminded of that experience while listening to Jon Meacham discuss his new book about Thomas Jefferson and the similarities to our current political situations. According to Meachan, Jefferson explained to his constituents (I’m paraphrasing here) that they should expect to be disappointed in some of his decisions because he had more information about situations than they did. The idealists who voted for Barack Obama in 2008 have been actively critical of some of the President’s actions and decisions during the past four years. In this book, Woodward seems to delight in pointing out contradictions between what Mr. Obama said and what he did. Again, I’m paraphrasing: “The president said: ‘I don’t want to lecture you” and then proceeded to lecture them.”  The guy was a college professor. Is it a surprise that lecturing is his default mode of communication?

This book concerns the negotiations during 2011between the Obama administration and Congressional Republicans regarding the national budget. Woodward’s usual style is to interview as many participants and observers of conversations, both on and off the record, as possible in order to reconstruct those situations. The amount of distrust that Republican political leaders display during these interviews towards President Obama’s attempts to arrive at a bipartisan agreement is disconcerting.  I understand that during negotiations each party positions itself towards the extremes so that they can eventually create a compromise for which each side can save face and claim victory. We don’t get any sense from this book that such was the case during these negotiations. Even when Obama is making clear the administration’s willingness to sacrifice for the sake of negotiation, there’s a sense that the Republican leaders believe there must be some evil intent.

An impression I take away from Woodward’s book is that Obama senior advisors Valerie Jarrett and Rahm Emmanuel contributed to this perceptions, perhaps without the president’s knowledge.  Especially following the 2008 election, Woodward reports that both Jarrett and Emmanuel responded with arrogant “Tough luck. We won” attitudes to Republicans while President Obama was working to convey his willingness to create bipartisanship.  GOP leaders presumed that Jarrett and Emmanuel were speaking for the president but, given the problems that Obama was having with the left-wing idealists of this Liberal constituency during the first two years of his presidency, that doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense.

There’s one fact I recall from this book which I find to be quite ironic. The Republican leadership’s emphasis was on cutting costs.  Of course, their emphasis was on “entitlements” and they reacted very negatively toward any considerations about to cut the Pentagon’s budget. However, when the Department of Defense was asked how many people they employed, their response was “somewhere between one and nine million”.  When pressed, they couldn’t be more specific.  Republicans are the political party of business. I find it difficult to believe that any company CEO or president would react well if, when asked about the number of people their company employed, HR provided such a stunningly vague response.  If the number of people employed by the Pentagon is “somewhere between 1 and 9 million”, it seems like there much be some fat which could be cut from its budget.

As  I write this in late November 2012, President Obama has won re-election, Republicans are still resistant to returning to Clinton-era rates for those earning more than $250,000, and the “fiscal cliff” looms ahead of us. Let’s hope our leaders have all learned some valuable lessons from the experiences described in Woodward’s book.

Evaluation is a process. 

Judging is a decision which implies approval or disapproval.

As an analytical personality type, it’s been my experience that I’m frequently thought to be “judging” when, in fact, I’m “evaluating”.

When I attempt to explain that I’m simply in the process of information gathering to personality types who are from more of a “shoot-from-the-hip” orientation, they often become dismissive and agitated. They seem convinced that I’m judging them or a decision they’ve made in a negative way.

It can be quite frustrating.

What’s been your experience?

May your blessings outnumber your regrets.

Norman Rockwell’s “Thanksgiving”

Christopher Hitchens could certainly be dismissive, judgmental, and annoyingly sanctimonious, as he showed in his condemnations of Henry Kissinger and Mother Theresa. But he’s also been described as fun-loving and generous by those he allowed to be his friends.

When I saw him speak at Union College in the early 2000’s, the audience’s reaction to his pro-Iraq war position was overwhelmingly negative but his responses weren’t caustic, nasty, or dismissive. He actually seemed to enjoy the conversation.

My sense is that Christopher Hitchens was an intellectual who enjoyed provoking our thoughts by stirring the pot and enjoyed his role as the Baby Boom generation’s designated curmudgeon.

I doubt that he’d want to rest in peace.

PS- On the audio book, the final track is his wife’s recollections of the man. It’s worth the listen.

Sylvia Nasar, the author of “A Beautiful  Mind”, provides insights into the thoughts and actions of historical figures who have shaped our economic history: Charles Dickens, Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, George Bernard Shaw, John Maynard Keynes, Friedrich Hayak, Paul Samuelson, and Milton Freedman are just some of the characters in this story.

Nassar’s book is stuffed with economic theory and detail which doesn’t make it the easiest read. If you’re like me, you’ll find your mind doing the equivalent of your eyes glazing over and you’ll be wondering what the information was that you’d just read.

Nevertheless, Nasar provides some interesting insights. For instance:

-Prior to 1870, Economics was mostly about what one couldn’t do. After      1870, it’s focus became what one could accomplish.

-Less than 150 years ago, most people in the world lived in a state of persistent starvation.

-In 1867, only 7% of English households had an annual income of at least 100 pounds (About $10,000 in 2012 dollars)

-There are disturbing similarities to the days pre-World War I and today.

-John Maynard Keynes as described as having a “gift for synthesis and a diagnostic mind”.

-Between 1921 and 1929, the US economy grew by 21%.

-RCA and AT&T were the Microsoft and Google of the 1920s.

-During the 1920s, most roads between New York and Boston were unpaved, rutted, and potholed.

-During the 1920s, the average lifespan in the US was 58. By 2000, it had increased to 82.

-The average person in China lives today as well if not better than the average Englishman did in 1950.

-The fraction of the world’s population which lives in abject poverty has dwindled by 5/6^ths during the  last 200 years.

-Gains in productivity are the primary drivers of wages and living standards.

-Education and a safety net can reduce poverty without producing economic stagnation.

-The world’s population is 6 times greater than it was in the mid-1800s but is 10 times more affluent.

-The average lifespan of someone living today has increased 2 ½ times that of someone who lived in 1820 and our lifespans continue to increase.

-The recession of 2008-2009 HAS NOT reduced gains in productivity and income.

Here’s how her story is described on the book jacket:  “In Nasar’s dramatic narrative of these discoveries we witness men and women responding to personal crises, world wars, revolutions, economic upheavals, and each other’s ideas to turn back Malthus and transform the dismal science into a triumph over mankind’s hitherto age-old destiny of misery and early death.”

Sound like your kind of book?

In mid-October, 1962 I was a teenager living in the house where I’d spent all my life in Rhode Island. As a New Englander, I was proud that one of our native songs, John F. Kennedy, was president of the United States and pleased that he and his family seemed to be at the forefront of my Baby Boomer generation in leading America forward to a predestined shining and promising future.

In 1962, World War II was still a major factor in the American zeitgeist.  Our parents all had vivid memories of the war years, how they had survived those years, and how their standard of living had improved since the war. The Korean Conflict was not something that was top-of-mind for my friends or me. We were more influenced by being the children of the victors.

Although we didn’t realize, we had been propagandized about American courage, valor, ingenuity, and competence with a deluge of World War II-themed movies. Based on what we knew, American soldiers were unpretentious, sometimes shy, sometimes ingenious, but always fair-minded and brave in the face of the enemy. The message that rang loud and clear was: America always wins.

In 1962, the Cold War between the Soviet Union and USA was at full tilt. Nikita Khrushchev was the delusional, frumpy looking, Russian bad guy who pounded his shoe on the table at the UN and who had threatened that Russia would bury us. It was obvious to us that he was a bully. But the Russians had missiles with nuclear weapons aimed at us as we did at them. In grammar school, we had practiced hiding under our desks in case an atomic bomb were dropped on us. (It didn’t seem silly at the time.) It’s safe to say that most Americans in 1962 lived daily with a subconscious dread of nuclear annihilation similar to the subconscious reactions that Americans had following the 9/11 attacks.  But we didn’t dwell too much on those fears. Instead, we sought diversions.

As a result, in 1962 we had “The Twist” dance craze, America’s introduction to surfing and the California sound of the Beach Boys, and the premiers of TV shows  that Fall like “The Jetsons”, “The Beverly Hillbillies”, “McHale’s Navy”, and Johnny Carson’s debut as Jack Paar’s replacement on “The Tonight Show”.   The movie, “Animal House” is set during the Fall of 1962 and captures many of the values and attitudes of that time.

Of course, there was also more serious news during the first ten months of the year.  We were proud when John Glenn became the first American to orbit the earth, when Jackie Robinson was inducted into Baseball’s Hall of Fame, and when the Telstar communications satellite was launched.  The journalist who was to become “The Most Trusted Man In Television”, Walter Cronkite took over the anchor desk for the CBS Evening News.  In May, Cronkite showed us America’s sex kitten, Marilyn Monroe singing “Happy Birthday, Mr. President” to Jack Kennedy and the shocked us with the news of Marilyn’s apparent suicide in August.  In early October, there was big news about Pope John XXIII and the implications of Vatican II.

I can remember sitting in front of our black & white TV set fifty years this month and watching President Kennedy’s address to the nation about the crisis. As I recall, JFK seemed concerned but not frightened. My attitude was that America always won, that Khruschev was a bully, and that the Russians would back down.  In the 1970s, Richard Benjamin starred in a movie called “The Steagle”, a comedy  about a Long Island college professor who figures that he’s going to die in the inevitable nuclear holocaust which would result from the Cuban Missile Crisis confrontation,  decides abandon his real life, try on personas unlike his own,  and travel across the country to LA.  Watching the movie, I couldn’t understand why anyone would have panicked and reacted this way to the missile crisis. It seemed obvious to me that JFK would control the situation, would face down Russia, and America would be victorious again. Apparently, I was being quite naïve.

In his latest book about Lyndon Johnson, Robert Caro describes how frightened JFK was that the situation would get out of hand, that he wouldn’t be able to stop the Russians, and that we would be forced into a nuclear war. Difficult as it is to believe today, hawks in the Pentagon and in Congress were all for the US making the first strike.  Recordings recently released by the John F. Kennedy Library reveal just how much peril the country was in 50 years ago this week. Fortunately, most of us went blythely along with our lives, oblivious to the danger we were in.

Guess there’s something to be said for ignorance.

In this book, Robert Caro picks up Lyndon Baines Johnson’s where he left off in Master of Senate.  LBJ was nothing if not a complex person. Victim/bully/ champion of human rights/manipulative politician/devoted family man/adulterer.

Having grown up in predominantly Irish Catholic Southern New England during the 1960s, I was enamored with President Kennedy.  Unofficially, he was sanctified by the majority of New Englanders that I knew.  So, it’s disappointing to learn how the Kennedys and their colleagues treated Johnson. The Kennedys ridiculed and humiliated the man.

Bobby comes across as mean-spirited, self-centered, and a bit of a jerk.  I hadn’t realized that Bobby had been a staffer for Senator Joe McCarthy.  And there’s a scene where Bobby mocks then-Vice President Johnson at a dinner party by sticking pins in a Johnson voodoo doll. And Johnson, who was insecure in his VP role to begin with, feared that Bobby would thwart his ambitions to be the Democratic party’s presidential candidate in 1964 and 1968.

Early in this book, Caro reveals some behind the scenes details about the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. Being a teenager who grew up in post-World War II America, I presumed that we had the situation under control and that everything would turn out alright. Apparently, we were a  lot closer to nuclear war and annihilation than I thought we were.  Fortunately, we lucked out.

The dominant theme for most of Caro’s book is the frustration that Lyndon Johnson felt during his time as JFK’s vice-president.  Another VP, who was marginalized by FDR’s charisma, John Nance Garner described the office as “not worth a bucket of warm spit”. There’s little doubt that LBJ, who enjoyed using his power as Master of the Senate, agreed with that description of the vice-presidency.

The story in “The Passage Of Power” is far from boring. As the Washington Post’s reviewer writes: “In Caro’s account, LBJ comes across by turns as insecure, canny, bighearted, self-defeating, petty, brilliant, cruel and …domineering.” “Caro infuses his pages with suspense, pathos, bitter rivalry and historic import.”

The book contains interesting behind-the-scenes details about JFK’s selection of Johnson to be his running mate and about RFK’s efforts to thwart that decision. There’s also the story about how, after being denied the presidential candidacy and being offered the VP position, LBJ has staff members research how many presidents had died in office and, doing the math, calculates that the odds are in his favor that he might gain the presidency under those circumstances. Although Caro’s book cites authorities which make it clear that Johnson had no involvement in the JFK assassination, I have little doubt that the revelation of that particular anecdote is sure to fan the flames for conspiracy theorists.

For those of us who live through it, the story of the hours and days immediately following the events of November 22^nd, 1963 are the most riveting part of this book.  Being the personality type who becomes calmer and more focused during times of crisis, I could relate to Johnson’s reactions during those chaotic hours at the hospital immediately following the assassination. Witnesses marvel at how calm and in control he seemed. We also learn the reactions of Bobby and the Kennedy staff who despised Johnson and their unfavorable interpretations of his behavior.  One gets the sense that, even when LBJ was trying his best to be sensitive the Kennedy group’s situation, he just couldn’t win.  And, of course, the fact that the assassination occurred in LBJ’s beloved Texas didn’t help the situation.

In Bill Clinton’s review of Caro’s book, he marvels at LBJ’s political skill and talks about how, after Johnson assumed the presidency, he determined to get JFK’s Civil Rights bill passed by Congress despite the strong opposition of his fellow Southern Democrats. LBJ was advised to avoid squandering the political capital he’d gained as a result of the assassination on a cause that seemed hopeless. But Johnson’s response was: “Well, what the hell’s the presidency for?”

Clinton says that that’s the question that every president has to ask and to answer. To LBJ, during the final weeks of 1963, “presidency was for two things: passing a civil rights bill with teeth…and launching the War on Poverty.”  It’s LBJ’s knowledge, skill and expertise in schmoozing, bullying, and cajoling Congress which gets the legislation passed by the House and the Senate. One gets the sense that, had John Kennedy lived, his administration wouldn’t have been able to achieve those results. It’s an interesting hypothesis and, of course, an answer which we’ll never know.

One thing that struck me while listening to this audio book is the comparison of how different things were back then when a president and congressional majority leader could use their powers to withhold perks and powerful positions in order to control Congress and get legislation passed. Today, when Tea Party candidates aren’t interested in becoming “professional politicians” and are determined to undermine the legislative system, those tactics can no longer work.  So, I’m amused when I hear pundits criticizing our modern day president for not being able to control Congress under these circumstances.  One only has to look at John Boehner’s frustration at trying to control his GOP colleagues in the House to understand the dilemmas of American political leadership in the 21^st century.

“The Passage Of Power” ends  as LBJ is deciding how the USA will proceed with its military efforts in Vietnam. His decisions about that war along with those of his successor, Richard Nixon were factors in creating the divisions between the Babyboomers and their parents’ generation and what Jimmy Carter described as our national “malaise” in the 1970s. As I finished this book, the thought struck me that the erosion of our attitude towards the presidency had its roots in Lyndon Johnson’s administration.