Schorr Leave

It was with real regret that I learned of veteran reporter Daniel Schorr's passing today at age 93.

Yes, 93 is a ripe old age and not many people knew who Mr. Schorr was anymore, but I am still saddened by his death. After all, he was a prominent figure in the Watergate drama and its aftermath - arguably the biggest political upheaval of my lifetime.

For those of you too young to remember, or too old to remember for that matter, here's a brief recap: Daniel Schorr was a correspondent for CBS, covering the White House, and subsequently the Watergate Break-In. At one point in the unfolding drama, he came into possession of Nixon's 'Enemies List', which Mr. Schorr read on-air. When he got to number 17 on the list, there was his name.

Whether or not Daniel Schorr posed any real threat to Richard M. Nixon's presidency, the inclusion of his name on that list made him a reportorial superstar, almost as anointed as Woodward and Bernstein.

Sadly, the Schorr reality never quite lived up to that superstardom. Although he was an extremely experienced reporter, especially on foreign affairs, he could never again recover his Watergate limelight. But that didn't make him any different than Woodward and Bernstein, both of whom have done other things of note that I can't for the life of me remember. The same is true of many of the congressional standouts in Watergate - if remembered by general posterity at all they will always be remembered for those hearings, and not much else. So Mr. Schorr was in good company.

If Daniel Schorr's movement into relative PBS and NPR obscurity was inexorable, so was his impact on televised journalism. He remained one of the most admirable yet inscrutable, and somewhat insufferable, reporters of the televised era. A pattern exaggerated with some of today's cable news figures.

Personally, I always stopped what I was doing and listened when he was on, even while disagreeing increasingly with what he said, and understanding increasingly less of it. Come to think of it, that's also a pattern exaggerated with some of today's cable news figures.

One thing's for sure, he was talented and unique (unlike today's cable news figures), and therefore will be missed.

Inertial Misguidance

Did we really expect miracles?

Barack Obama began his Presidency with the two major pluses of making history and providing a nice counterpoint to George W. Bush. His momentum was huge. The inertia represented by that momentum looked hard to counter, especially by the Republicans, seemingly powerless in their defeat and humiliation.

All this was good news to those of us who consider ourselves Democrats. Who have waited for some true progression towards a more equitable society. One where the rich don't ride through wretched mobs in blacked-out limousines, or retreat in lofty boardrooms or behind securely gated communities.

After all, the formula is an old one, tried and true: Democrats favor wage workers who do the vast majority of the jobs needing done, but individually are powerless; Republicans favor those who have the power and the money. Of course, it's historically not been such a clear distinction - except during Shrub Bush's reign, when the extremes became polarized.

During GWB's time in office, the rich did very well indeed, and the rest just kept on keeping on. The jobless recovery of the 2000-2001 recession never gave the working class what they needed - enough good paying jobs (read: union jobs). Lucky for them the housing boom gave them paper wealth that made life seem equitable. Let the rich get richer, the house is worth three times what I paid for it, so I don't care. But by the end of Bush's second term those houses had begun to shrink in value catastrophically, and the discrepancy that had grown between the rich and connected and the now-jobless workers was painfully clear.

Into that gap stepped Mr. Obama. Educated, erudite, and - we all hoped - fervently Democratic. He spoke inspiringly about ending damaging and wasteful wars, closing Guantanamo, fixing the banking system and health care, and addressing the Big Recession by boosting spending on public infrastructure projects. Relief was in sight.

One and a half years later though, and where are we? Guantanamo is still there. The 9/11 planners whose trials the President and his Attorney General can't find a place for, are there. Conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are on-going, and look unlikely to end for years, maybe decades. There is no peace in the Middle East - not even the remotest restarting of the Clinton era negotiations ignored by Bush during his years in office.

And the Recession looks more like a Depression all the time.

Yes, we do have a health care bill, but it's horribly flawed, weak, and no positive effect will be seen from it by most Americans for years, if ever. And it's still in the process of legal challenges that may eviscerate it further.

George Bush mangled the relief efforts for Hurricane Katrina, to the country's everlasting shame. But Barack Obama has hardly faired better with the BP Oil Spill.

We keep looking to see evidence of his intelligence and leadership, but it's just not materializing.

But maybe it can't, and never could. Perhaps the mechanisms of national politics and bureaucracy are too complex and entrenched for anyone to change. Or, maybe the system breeds leaders who support the system and don't really desire it to change.

In any event, President Obama now finds himself with inertia of a different kind. Rather than the inertia of unstoppable momentum, his now is the kind of the resting object that tends to remain in place. There's no more 'Big Mo', and it's 'All Stop' with seemingly no where to go. The administration's announcement today that it's likely the Republicans will re-take the House in the midterm elections, was a tacit acknowledgment their time as thought leaders was up. They'll be running a defensive strategy from now on. Get re-elected for a second term, no matter what it takes. Not unlike Bill Clinton did after his health care disaster and Democrat losses in the midterm elections of his era.

In the end all we can hope for is that at least a few of the promises our leaders make to us are kept, and that some good comes of them. Whether those leaders are Republicans or Democrats, or some other party.

What did we expect, miracles?

Contemplating Competence

Does cynicism increase with wisdom, or just with experience? I'd say it's with experience, and that even geniuses can be horribly gullible, but then I'm just being cynical.

Of course, cynicism is easy to come by these days, no matter your experience or IQ. All you need do is read the news in print or on the net, listen to it on the radio, or watch it on TV. Almost nothing you will come across will inspire pride, faith, trust, or any other positive emotion in those who govern us, or in those who report their governing.

We seem to be a nation run by incompetents, chronicled by idiots.

Ask yourself, when was the last time anything was done by our government that turned out well, and had lasting positive results? Hard exercise, isn't it?

The best I can come up with seem to be results that can't easily be tied to discrete actions, but are the results of long-term policy. Like the ending of the Soviet Union and the reunification of Germany. Many feel that result could be linked to Ronald Reagan's aggressive spending on defense, but I'm not so sure that was the only factor, and maybe not even the critical one. And even this desirable event may have a few negative results in tow to spoil the glow. Like the vulnerability of the former USSR's nuclear stockpile.

And the fall of Lenin's Lads was a long time ago now, with most college kids barely toddlers or not yet born. What competent act has happened since then?

Don't say 'The First Gulf War', because I won't accept that answer. Daddy Bush may have orchestrated a successful military campaign, and showed admirable (if ultimately unwise) restraint in not pushing into Baghdad, but he and his advisors completely missed the point that leaving foreign (read, 'Western') troops permanently stationed on hallowed Muslim soil would have decidedly non-positive consequences. Like giving Bin Laden all the motivating PR he needed to recruit his suicidal terrorists.

And don't say the 90's economic boom. At best that was a collection of events that resulted in a flood of money that floated a lot of boats, but not all boats. And there's really no one person or administration to credit for that boom, certainly not Bill Clinton, nor either bracketing Bush.

And what has happened in the new millennium that is unabashedly positive and can be traced to enlightened or intelligent leadership? Well, the new era didn't have long to develop before 9/11 came along and left us with a table run of demoralizing failures.

Many of us hoped the tide would turn with the obviously intelligent, erudite, Barack Obama taking our lead, but that doesn't seem to be happening. You can't always judge a book by it's cover, sometimes competence may be only superficial.

So what are we good at? We can't run the country, report the news, or manufacture anything. We can't get an oil company to plug it's leaking well. We can't build levees that won't fail.

I guess we are good at comedy, and satire, and just plain laughing at everyone and everything. Jon Stewart, Colbert, that's what we do well.

Or maybe I'm just not being cynical enough, expecting competence to manifest in success. Maybe competence doesn't guarantee success, and it's all down to dumb luck.

In which case all of our past leaders may have actually been competent, but unlucky.

Not the press, though, they are still idiots.

Lovely Weather

It's not nice to kick people when they are down and suffering, but when it comes to the weather woes of my east coast brothers and sisters, I can't help myself.

For the great majority of my life, transpiring as it has after a strategic relocation to the West Coast, east coasters (especially bitter relatives) have constantly bragged to me about their 'Four Seasons'. They can barely restrain themselves with glee when my region is battered by drought and wilting under dry, hot, winds. When it's 80 degrees in LA on Christmas, they are condescendingly sympathetic.

Now, thanks to crazy meteorological swings, perhaps traceable (or perhaps not) to global warming, it's my turn to gloat.

Morning fog, burning off by noon(ish) to reveal a pleasant sunny day in the 70s, while the east coast sweats and simmers under triple digits and hellish humidity.

Lovely Weather ...

Big Planes, Big Plans

The 4th of July has always meant a get-together with family and friends. For the past 5 years or so, this has meant our family has joined a larger gathering at a friend's well-situated hilltop house. Good food, conversation, beer and wine (to aid the conversation), and a front row seat to distant official fireworks, and a grand view of the local unofficial pyrotechnics that light up the neighborhood. Good fun, with only the slightest hint of law-flaunting rebellion to remind us what Independence Day is all about.

This year, due to a confluence of events things were quite different: our children, both firmly into their teenage years, vanished to spend the 4th with their friends, and our friend decided that hosting the 4th was too much this year, the energy budget being largely expended on other events (the financial budget a bit weakened too).

So my wife and I spent the day mostly alone, which once upon a time would have meant together and engaging in activities best done with just the two of us on the premises. Time and circumstance have ways of warping events and best-laid plans, however, so we found ourselves on separate (but spatially collocated) tracks this 4th.

After all, we had the dogs to deal with, one of whom demands more attention than both kids together on Christmas morning. We also had our separate hobbies: my wife a good book and an addiction to iPhone solitaire; me watching motorcycles race halfway around the world (in my defense - there were Americans involved).

Somehow, the self-involvement of the day didn't bother me too much (I can't vouch for the wife who still hasn't really surfaced from the book). After all, I had just returned from most of two weeks spent in Canada. A lovely country with great people but one which nevertheless reminds me how fortunate I am to live in the USA. There's just something about a place that looks so similar but is actually so foreign that will make you reflect on your country and culture. So, relaxing into the day and not trying too hard to celebrate seemed natural enough.

Until the whole house began to shake and vibrate like the 'Big One' was on the way. Shattering our cones of silence, the wife and I merged at the back door in shared concern. A step out and a look up revealed the largest plane I'd seen since, well, since I'd last seen that type of plane at an air show 20 years before. This was a military cargo jet, probably a C-17, one of the largest planes to ever fly (I won't say 'grace the skies', because nothing that large and noisy can ever be said to 'grace' anything).

With the assurance that the 'Big One' (earthquake, that is) was not happening, my wife returned to her recreation. Airplanes are only necessary travel devices to her, and hold no other significance or joy. Loving planes myself, I watched as the 'Big One' (plane, that is) disappeared into the distance, but with my inner smile reflex stifled by reflection on the absurdity of the fly-over:

Why do we always celebrate our independence, which was won by a rebel mob over an organized military superpower, by displaying evidence that we are an organized military superpower?

Do we celebrate the 4th in memory of those ragged recruits who risked everything for a chance at freedom? Or out of fear, and a need for reassurance?

It's my hope the day holds at least an element of remembering our long-ago heroes, and isn't just a thumping of spears against shields.

Maybe next year our friend will be up to hosting the party again. A touch of rebelliousness will be welcome.

Bye Bye Byrdie

One of Jon Stewart's rare miscues came recently when he essentially turned the death of Senator Robert Byrd into a joke.

Sure, Senator Byrd started out his career on rocky footing, campaigning against the Civil Rights Act and for the Vietnam War, but you have to give him props for spending most of the rest of his career making amends.

Unlike Mr. Stewart, I remember distinctly that Senator Byrd was one of a handful in Congress who voted 'No' to allowing George W. Bush the power to initiate war in Iraq. That took courage, when even the most liberal Democrats around had succumbed to Bush scare tactics and were falling over themselves to vote 'Yes', out of fear doing otherwise would make them look 'unpatriotic' or worse yet sympathetic to the terrorists.

That was one of those times when standing up for what you truly believed was fraught with consequences, yet Senator Byrd and a few others (Maxine Waters also comes to mind) had the 'right stuff' to do so.

So Jon Stewart riffs on how the Senator's passing was no surprise, seeing he was '92'. Which may be true, but overlooked how important the man had been to preserving what was left of our liberties under Bush, and how much help, despite his age, he was likely still giving us.

I wonder if there are any conservative rapscallions out there now, who may right their ways and become beacons of honesty and justice, ala Senator Byrd, in some distant future? It looks bleak, but you never know ...

The Canadian Connection

There must be something about the Canadian immigration service, or social service, that makes getting there legally from other countries easier than getting to the United States - or Uruguay, even.

Once ensconced up North, it appears the easiest path to becoming a US naturalized citizen is to assume some deceased Canadian's identity and cross the border. A few years later and - Boom - citizen!

This seems to be the path chosen by those recently unveiled as 'Russian Spies' masquerading as Canadian-cum-Americans.

This is embarrassing on multiple levels: It puts red on our faces since we didn't catch on for a long time. It makes the Russians look bad for spying on their erstwhile allies - Us. And it makes the Canadians look sorely-used and a bit pathetic.

There is a solution, at least in part. Test everyone claiming to be from Canada, and who are seeking US permanent residency or citizenship, on their facility with the French language. Those who score well and claim to hail from anywhere other than Quebec are spies. If they score well and are from Quebec, they are probably spies too. No native French-speaking Quebecois wants to leave Quebec - especially not to become a US citizen.

You might say 'Hold on a minute! This will exclude anyone who speaks French well from immigrating from Canada to the US.'

That may be. C'est la Vie!