The Big Apple--core of self-centered snobbery

Perhaps nothing more perfectly illustrates the difference between the residents of upstate New York and those of New York City than the recent headlines with the Big Apple residents pooh-poohing the idea that Irene was a big-bad hurricane.  While Gothamites braved the ravages of the weakest parts of the storm their fellow New Yorkers in Greene County, a mere two hours away, suffered floods of unprecedented proportion.

All in all, this might not be that big of a story, but it so happens that the area where all the problems occurred is where I went to high school. The main culprit in the story is the Schoharie Creek, which ran through a stretch of my backyard and was a great trout fishing hatchery where I lived in the river’s headwaters. The Schoharie crested 15-feet above flood stage, which if it happened in the lowlands, like the James does now and then, it would not be a problem. But the Schoharie Creek in those areas runs through the mountains. A 15-foot surge is enormous.

People are being evacuated in areas where all the bridges have been wiped out. Many of the towns are in big trouble, and Windham, NY’s, Main Street looked more like a great lake than it does a highway.

And yet, the people of NYC sneered at the storm as if it were nothing. Nothing to them, anyway. But upstate New York, where the Big Apple gets most of its water, the people have been slammed. In some instances, people have lost homes, livelihood, and possibly their lives. But not in New York City, that bastion of self-centeredness.

I guess when you are the be all and end all of the Empire State it’s easy to overlook those slobby bottom-feeders living in the mountains outside the city.  After all, they aren’t important. They aren’t what makes New York NEW YORK, right? So, I guess the city can go ahead and snicker, because by God that storm Irene didn’t slow them down.

Meanwhile, back at my ranch here in Virginia, we struggled through the storm and ensuing 48-hours without electricity. And, I can tell you, I for one am happy that the outage was only two-days. I have friends who still don’t have power and may not be getting it anytime soon. I’ve offered up my generator in order to help them out while Dominion is working its tail off to get power extended throughout the region.

But you won’t catch me laughing and saying anything derogatory about Irene now that I have power at my home.  I’ve been through plenty o’ hurricanes in my life. Covered several down in Florida, while I was in college and can tell stories about the damage they have caused. I know the difference between a Cat 1 and a Cat 3, and by proxy a Cat 4 from dealing with the destruction wreaked in Louisiana when Katrina struck just a few years ago.

It’s not a time to be snooty and run a Bronx cheer at Mother Nature. All the time the residents of New York City are trash talking how bad they were against the storm, they seem to have overlooked the devastation in Greene County, and I am certain they are totally oblivious to what happened in Vermont. But Vermont isn’t even a state, right?

But then, that doesn’t really matter now does it? I mean, New York is all about City, right?

Buddy, I can't spare a dime!

I can’t say how it is for you, but as far as I am concerned putting an end to the street pan handling has been a long time coming.

Other than the city’s feral cat problem, I would rank street pan handling at the top of my pet peeves.  It’s not so much what they are about as it is the fact that driving in my car is nearly the only time I have peace and quiet and don’t have to worry about someone or something nipping at my heels, knocking on my door, or calling/texting me for a donation or a better this or better that service.

Yes, you read that right, texting. How I keep getting text message ads on my phone I can’t begin to understand.  And yet, it happens. The best thing is I can simply delete them, but why am I getting them at all? I mean, after all I am on the Federal No Call list.  At least City Council is taking a step to reduce, if not eliminate, the practice.

The new ordinance addresses handing out handbills, leaflets and other forms of local propaganda, but it also includes people begging for change. I suppose in some way we have only ourselves to blame. For years, a number of organizations would hit those high-traffic intersections (can you say Temple and Conduit?) and solicit donations for good causes.  But most of the more reputable concerns have taken to moving to even better areas, such as outside WalMart, Sam’s Club, and Target. At least there the traffic flow is people and not automobiles.

Now, in all likelihood, many of those who are begging at the intersections would not be allowed to beg at the store fronts. After all, some of the bigger stores have even stopped the Girl Scouts from selling their cookies there. And, as we all know, the Girl Scout program is scorned throughout the US. No one likes their cookies anyway, except for the thin mints.

The truth is, there are numbers of organizations out there collecting “donations” for this group, or that place, or the other organization.  It’s not so much that I am against pan handling or begging, but at some point a person needs a rest from that.  It’s an everyday occurrence. When I was in Florida on vacation last week there was a guy sitting in the median with a sign, “will work for food.” He was there literally all day. No one offered him a job, but I wonder how many people gave him a dollar or two? Something must have been happening, because he was there every time I drove by.

And it’s not that begging doesn’t pay. I read a story in a magazine a number of years ago about a woman who was working as a legal assistant in New York City. Everyday around three, she would step into the bathroom, don some older clothes and jeans with holes in them, and head out to her favorite begging spot. Turns out, she made more money begging than she did working as a legal assistant. One of the hiring agreements was to allow her time off to pursue her “second job.”

It’s not like this is something new. When I lived in Italy back in the mid-70s, the streets were littered with beggars. Mostly, they were gypsies and it wasn’t unusual to see two or three women with children strategically placed along Via Mazzini, the main shopping street in Verona. They would sit with a small child and set out a box with some coins in it. Occasionally, they would ask for money, and sometimes they would pinch the children to make them cry. That’s not a stretch of my imagination. At the end of the session, they would collect whatever offering appeared in their box and cut through the alleys and move on to another spot.

But even in Italy, the beggars had sense enough to stay out of the streets. If you haven’t been to Italy before, then you probably wouldn’t understand, but it’s very easy to get a foot run over even when you are not in the street.

For the record, I’m not against raising money for a good cause, but I would rather not be approached in the middle of the road when I am trying to get somewhere.  And, ultimately, who’s to say whether that cause is good or not?  Be that as it may, don’t expect any gratuity when you see me barreling through that intersection. A fine of $15 isn’t very much, even with court costs it only jumps to $61.  Probably, it’s enough to keep those people off the street. If not, I suggest raising the fine considerably.

Council will have the last say Sept. 13.

Help! My cell's been hacked!

Really, I don’t know exactly how to go about saying this, so I’ll just blurt it out. Someone hacked my cell phone. Why, I don’t know? Perhaps it was to get at all the sexting messages I have been sending all over the Internet. And then, why not? It seems the easy way to “hook up” and I have been feeling a bit promiscuous anyway.

I don’t know how my spouse would feel about that, but then she’s known me for some time and probably wouldn’t be too surprised. After all, in 24-years, she has probably figured out all of my patterns. But in this case, I want to get it on the table right away.

You know, it’s not so much whether or not I did the sexting thing, it’s more about how the information got leaked. It’s not like I sent it to anyone, it just sort of languished in my drafts folder, there for any hacker to find. And, of course, in my line of business, you know grouching and complaining via the newspaper and blog, I have become a huge security risk to the general public and to the local constabulary as well. It would not surprise me if some of the local officials pooled their resources and hired a hacker just to dig out some evil information on me and thereby weaken my hold over the populace.

It wouldn’t be the first time such a thing has happened to someone, you know. The papers are full of instances of people being hacked, which hails all the way back to the days of Jack the Ripper.  Yes, if truth be known, Jack the Ripper was the world’s first hacker.  He even dates back to a time before we had computers.

But back to my story. It’s not so much that I am worried about those images of me getting out, I mean after all everyone in congress appears to be doing it today so it must be right, right?.  I mean, didn’t they just catch another one the other day?  I had just been out of the loop so long, I never even thought about cellular insecurity.

But getting back to phones and the idea that someone can actually hack into your phone and steal all your digital information, it’s enough to make you wonder why we ever invented such a thing. I, for one, could probably give up my cell phone. I never use it, rarely get a call from anyone, and my kids refuse to do anything but send text messages, “Dad can I borrow some money?”  We have totally lost the idea of civility in borrowing from the parents. There’s no sense of groveling, like asking for the keys to the family car for a night out with the boys or girls, depending. I suppose that was harder, going up to mom or dad, hand out, begging for a few dollars for a movie or a snack or whatever, certainly not gas. Gas was supposed to already be in the car when you borrowed it from your parents.

And so, today I find myself on the tip of the digital sword so to speak. Someone else actually felt the need to hack into my phone and get the pictures of my wife, kids, cars, puppy dogs. I can understand wanting to get a picture of Grizz, who is actually my son’s dog. He’s pretty cute, and they may be able to market his image to some crazy dog food company that needs a spokes dog.

What kind of a society have we become? The information age, I think they called it back when computers first started to dot living rooms around the US. Now, they are everywhere, they are literally at my fingertips as I type this column. But what’s with these people who think they need the information I keep on my phone. Why don’t they just go rob a bank or something? Do they really expect to make money off the blasé junk on someone’s phone? No, I guess it’s just because they can, like climbing Everest.

Lately, I have read where hackers can get into things like blood sugar meters. Watch out fellow diabetes victims, these guys will either scare you to death or make you think you are living the good health life. It doesn’t make much sense to me either way. I guess I’ll just have to delete all those sexting images from my phone before they end up being posted on some website for silly writers.

A ship with no rudder!

There’s never been a better call to “throw the bums out” of Washington than the sorry state of what exists now.  We elect these people to go and do the public’s work.  We expect honesty, civility, and diligence from them in getting the business of the government moving and keeping it going.  But what do we get? We get infighting, me-ism, chest thumping, and worst of all party lining. And what result? Nothing—nothing at all gets accomplished.

We have some serious problems. We have debt that is way out of line; we have taxes which are also way out of line; and we have a mass of representatives who are so full of themselves they don’t believe they should be held to the same standard that we, the run of the mill Americans, have to deal with every day.

Take a look at the record, it stands for itself. When President Obama was trying to fit people into his grand scheme of a presidency, he had problems time and again finding a likely candidate who would pass muster. Many hadn’t even paid their taxes! God forbid I don’t pay my taxes; I assure the hounds of government would be at my door, skinning knife in hand, demanding their pound of flesh (perhaps this is a new diet plan?).

But for many of these politicians, paying taxes or obeying pretty much any law, is beneath them. Why should they pay taxes? Isn’t that just like taking money out of one pocket only to put it in another?  For most of my adult life I have labored trying to figure out why someone would pay millions of dollars to get elected to a position that only pays a few hundred thousand or so. Where is the economy in that?

When the founding fathers founded this country the idea of career politicians didn’t exist. They felt that serving in a political office was a duty, and not necessarily a way to make a living. Not so today. Today we have politicians who snuggle into their respective hosts like deer ticks on a mangy mutt. They squat, they bloat, and they suckle whatever comes near enough to sate their insatiable appetites.  But it’s okay, because they are Senator so and so, Congressman such and such, Supreme Court appointee so and so, or whatever position they tend to fill in the hierarchy that is the U.S. government.

Really, it’s pretty darn disgusting. The masses struggle to make ends meet, and the fat cats sit back and get caught up in political diatribe and chest thumping that is tantamount to playing chicken with an Amtrak train. Stop it and get on with business.

It’s appalling that the budget hasn’t been worked out. Compromise is supposed to drive democracy, but no one seems willing to let go of their dogma.

The other day I was watching a show about Baidu, a Chinese IT company that basically markets search engine similar to Google.  Robin Li is president of the company, and the interviewer was talking about gross national product. They started talking about how soon it might be before China’s economy would eclipse our economy. Li didn’t know exactly how to respond, so the interviewer prompted him: “What about in 2020?” Li said that the US would still have the leading economy in 2020.

The interviewer then asked about 2030? Li didn’t really answer the question, but his non answer spoke volumes. If China’s economy didn’t surpass the US economy by 2030, it certainly would at some time near that date.

Along another avenue, the interviewer asked why Li thought that China could go about large projects, like the three river dam and get them to come off without a hitch. Li said it had a lot to do with how the Chinese government worked. If the government recognized the need for a project, say the dam, a bridge, or a large roadway, they simply sat down and made up the plans, funded the project, and built the project. Not so in the US, he said, in the US we spend as much time getting it approved at every level from the NIMBYs to the highest authority, that we often lose sight of the need, and we drive up the cost due to the time lag created by getting everyone to agree that it might be a good idea.

When people pressed Ben Franklin about what kind of government the Continental Congress agreed to back in the late 1790s, he said, “We have given you a Democratic Republic, if you can keep it.” All forms of government have their good points and their bad points. One of the good points about a democratic republic is that it is: “a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.” But sometimes too many cooks make it difficult to bake a cake.

... and the Pursuit of Happiness

Several years ago, an African-American student in one of my classes complained to me about a classmate who was wearing a Stars and Bars baseball cap. I asked him what the problem was, and he said that the symbolism of the Confederate flag and what he believed it had come to mean made him feel uncomfortable around the other student.

I asked him what it was specifically that bothered him about the emblem.  He said that it stood for racism and hailed back to a time when slavery was the rule of the land. I told him that the other student might argue that he was supporting states’ rights, and how he might not see it as a racist emblem at all.

He quickly attempted to assure me that the Stars and Bars in this particular case was intended as a racist comment, and that it made him and his friends defensive just by its very presence.

I pondered this for a bit. Then I said, so basically his wearing that emblem would identify him as someone to watch out for? To which I got a hasty, “Yes!” So, if I made him stop wearing that hat and had him put it in his locker, that would make you feel somehow safer? Another affirmative answer. And doing that would make that student change his feelings about racism? Well, no, not really. Would it make him harbor an even bigger racial grudge? Well, maybe.

So then I would ask you, would you rather have people walking around with those kinds of beliefs and ideas and you not know it? Or, would you rather they wear an emblem of their beliefs and tell the entire world exactly where they are coming from?

My student thought about that for a bit.  Then he said it was probably better to know what that person thought and be prepared for what might come than it would be to go through life not knowing and to be unaware of a potential attack.

Which, of course, brings us to the current state of matrimonial affairs in New York. New York is my home state, for those of you who don’t know, and its current stance on same-sex marriage gives one such as me pause. I don’t know how I feel exactly about same sex unions, maybe it’s a bit like “don’t ask don’t tell,” but it isn’t so much that it undermines my beliefs. It has little effect on what I believe.

For instance, I don’t believe that same sex unions diminish or tarnish in anyway the relationship that I have had with my wife over the past 24 years. There are plenty of legal reasons why same sex partners might want to be legally hooked up; insurance not the least of these. And, while marriage has seemed to work out for me over the years, I can also attest that for many people it is not what it’s cracked up to be. The divorce rate in the US is astronomic, somewhere around 50 percent, and adding more marriages doesn’t seem to be the right answer to amend that statistic. What I believe will happen is that many of these same sex unions will end up on the same scrap heap along with those of hetero marriages that don’t make it.  That seems more logical than a sudden drop in the divorce rate.

What I think bothers us about same sex marriages is that it undermines our basic religious and philosophical tenets. We are, at some level, so dependent upon those beliefs that anything that seems to run against them creates a bit of uncertainty and insecurity within ourselves. It’s as if so much as one apple is upset, the entire applecart will tip over.

I have yet to see any argument against same sex unions that doesn’t devolve into personal beliefs. Remove emotion from the equation, and it seems a fairly straight forward thing. The Declaration of Independence states that we citizens have inalienable rights and that among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It seems to me that those rights extend to all U.S. Citizens, and not just a selection among them.

For me, my marriage has been exactly that, a pursuit of happiness. While at some level I am uncomfortable with same sex unions, I certainly believe all citizens have a right to be happy. And, if that’s what makes you happy, then so be it.

In some ways, it’s like my student who felt concerned about the Confederate flag symbol. See it, recognize it for what it is, and move on. I don’t see same sex unions as an erosion of my beliefs.

When the Declaration of Independence was first written, it included the statement “all men are created equal.” The founding fathers understood well how that statement clashed with the idea of slavery. They opted not to address the slavery question at that time, since they had bigger fish to fry. Instead, they left the question open for a future generation to deal with. It took 90 years to come about, but that question was finally answered. Can this be so much different?