Parts to Wholes: the Socionomic Systems Nexus

On Sept. 11, 2001 the world changed course for most of us, though you could argue it was "just" a rude awakening. But cast your mind back to that day if you can and try and recover the shock and dismay as all the rock-solid beliefs that we all shared were ground to dust and rubble. If you have trouble going back you might let Alan Jackson set the stage - in fact to make my point please do: Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning? It's not clear we're entirely back on our feet even yet but we've made a lot of progress. But on Sept. 28, 2008 there was a bigger change in the world when Lehman collapsed and almost took the entire world economy with it. Why do we say that? Because the world we thought we lived in was a world where not everybody was going to be a millionaire, indeed far from it. But it was a world where we all thought the rock-solid bedrock of America was that everybody would have a chance to better themselves and build a better life for their children. That world got blown up that day. More correctly we all found out that what we thought was bedrock was actually sand, actually quicksand, and we'd been slowly sinking into it for almost three decades. That shock was the earthquake that told us that our most fundamental assumptions about America needed re-examination.

PBS recently covered the history and long-term implications in an interview with The Atlantic reporter who did an excellent story on the future of the middle class, and it's not good on current course and speed. That was the day it was made clear that the "world had stopped turning" for everybody, and the last two years have driven it home. But this time it wasn't a single act of violence but recognition of a fundamental breech in the American Social Contract, the glue that holds us all together.

The Degradation of the Social Contract

What do we mean by that? Well we've talked several times about the long-term outlook for the economy, how weak the recovery will be and what it means for employment and how long it'll take to get back to anything like where we were at. What we haven't really talked about it is what it means for society, nor how far and deep the roots of the problem run back. To see what we mean take a look at this chart - it may appear to be dry statistics and charts but if you can translate it into its human dimension it's a measure of the quicksand.

You may have heard that the average household income is about $46K/year? Well it's not as if we're evenly distributed around that average - just the opposite as a matter of fact. Income distribution has a very long tail but 98% of us make less than $250K/year. From about 1944 to about 1984, or so, income grew for all the different groups evenly, like a picket fence. But beginning about that time it became harder and harder for anybody but the special few (remember that long, thin tail) to keep with the Riches. Instead, along with the rest of the Jones they watched their incomes sink. In fact beginning around the early 80s and continuing, even accelerating, to this day the proportion of income going to the upper 0.1% has increased at an accelrating rate to the point where it's doubled. And it's not entirely inherited wealth either. A lot of it has to do with advantages of job, education, class and position.

Think super-stars, athletes, executives and hedge fund managers. But in fact a lot of that increase has gone to folks who were in a position to exploit the explosion in financial engineering or positions of corporate influence to disproportionately reward themselves. Almost 40 years ago Peter Drucker pointed out that when the average CEO made 80X what the average worker did we were headed for trouble. Now (to the best of my faulty memory) that figure is more like 300X. It's not clear that so much extra value has been created to justify that astounding gap in rewards. In fact given how well the economy has performed, it turns out, and how fairly the proceeds have been shared it would appear that little new value was created and what there was went to a minority.

The Stratified Society: the Real 911 Wakeup Call

When we say stratified does that mean anything to you? One of the basic American values, at least IOHO, is that every person is the equal of any other. Different people have different roles, responsibilities and contributions for which they should be fairly and appropriately rewarded. And given the respect due their role and contributions. But not treated as something special. That's an inheritance from the Scots-Irish who were such an influential part of our history. The Clan Chieftain was accorded all due respect but he HAD to earn it by being responsible for the welfare of the Clan, not by taking advantage of things to further his own advantage. Beyond that every clansman expected to be treated with respect and with due acknowledgment of his rights.

In a stratified society your position determines your outlook and you accorded the forced respect accorded the aristocracy. Think it could never happen here? Well go back and listen very carefully to that PBS interview, or more importantly, skim the excerpt in the readings. Better yet, read the whole article. That's the direction we've been headed in for almost three decades and over the next decade the pressures are likely to continue and worsen with the aftershocks of the economic crisis. It will take a lot to dig ourselves back out of that problem. And think again - in a way it's already happened thru the "Laws of Unintended Consequences". Take a look at this graphic and think about the permanent underclass we may have already created in our inner cities. Thru a combination of well-meaning but very poorly thought thru policy choices on wage controls, rent controls, drug laws, etc. etc. we drove productive business away from our older cities and very likely created a permanent underclass, particularly among Black Americans. So much so that endemic gang warfare is now a gimme given on most TV shows.

Circle back to the long-term analysis of income distribution and think back on the PBS interview as well as multiple postings we've put up on the state of the economy, the long-term outlook and the long-term history of the economy. On a macro-scale what we're really looking at is the Unintended Consequences of believing you can get something for nothing, ignoring major challenges in Healthcare, Education, Energy and Innovation. And in general pursuing debt-fueled immediate gratification at the expense of savings, investment and productivity. We may be headed for migrating much of the middle class into a stagnant backwater similar to what we've managed to do in our inner cities. Worse yet we've done it to ourselves AND we've been enabled by partisan political warfare where ideologies have been substituted for analysis.

Time to Listen to the Real Wake-Up Call?

There may actually be some good news in all this. If the problems have been slowly accumulating for decades, if possible solutions have been discussed and if all that's been ignored it's been because of the classic set of problems. Not my job, let somebody else handle or we'll worry about when it gets here. Well it's not quite here. In fact we could probably muddle thru for another ten years by being clever and adroit but then things would start sliding over the edge of the abyss. The two keys to whether or not we do something will be, first, whether or not we're finally willing to face the truth (why does Col. Nicolson's face flash in front of my eyes). But most importantly whether or not we decide to pull together or degenerate separately (apologies to Ben).

It's not an accident that we woke up to headlines about an irate member of the increasingly disadvantaged classes having shot two Pentagon policemen, nor that a few weeks ago a software entrepreneur and rock guitarist flew his private plane into a Texas IRS building, or that the Tea Party has exploded across the national political scene with populist outrage. This has happened before and, after creating a lot of sturm und drang, it blows over. What's really sad is the way a lot of this anger is being exploited for partisan political advantage, often and usually by the same folks who's ideology, political shibboleths and narrow choices contributed to and accelerated the problems they are angry about.

A few weeks ago PBS had a segment on a great Black poet who wrote some of the most touching reflections on 911 we've ever heard. Yet when she spoke of 911 she spoke to deeper truths.

Tuesday, 9/11:

Thunder and lightning and our world is another place.

No day will ever be the same, no blood untouched.

They know this storm in otherwheres, Israel, Ireland, Palestine, but God has blessed America, we sing.

And God has blessed America to learn that no one is exempt.

The world is one.

All fear is one, all life, all death all one.

 Now do we listen? More importantly do we hear?

Continue reading "The Sand Beneath Us - 911 Was Small But the Tea Party Has a Point!" »

Posted by dblwyo at 06:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last two posts have been about as wonkish and abstract as we can get, though the discussion of the Deficit and Debt outlook seems to have gotten a lot of attention. At the center of them though, aside from technical issues and policy challenges, lies the question of do we have the will to address the problems. Our feeling is that in fact it does lie in us, if we choose. For its own sake and because there is no better sublime and stunning example of how far humankind can push itself when it desires we're going to devote this Sunday morning celebration to the Olympics.

Contrary to popular whining NBC is actually providing the most extensive coverage ever, not just entirely on TV, but on it's web site. And it's not just news coverage per se but complete standings and results as well as a huge collection of video clips. One way or another you can find about everything you could ask from stories, to expert summaries, to medal ceremonies, background stories, discussions of the sports science to expert commentary to selected clips, full programs/games and shorter ones. Go to the results section and select an event/sport and then look for the video links. Or go the video section, see what comes up as highlights and recaps or search on a sport. If you want to watch the final skates of the pairs for just the final three it's there. Or anything else. After the break we present a selected set of clips.

If you'll click on thru the picture you'll get a clip of the greatest moments of the first week from the Opening Ceremonies to key events. BtW the full opening is online and it's one of the best programs we've ever seen - quiet, restrained, moving and brilliant - along with some outstanding music. You'll find the links to both after the break. But the picture raises the question what is the Olympics and to whom? And what does it take to get there? A lot of pieces make up this puzzle but at the end of the day we think this athlete's expression captures it all - it's about pushing to the limits of human capability, endurance and mental capacities to reach a sublime moment of touching the best that is in us. Can we even say, reaching to touch the Divine by giving our all?

Continue reading "Faster, Higher, Stronger: Reaching for the Limits of Human Excellence" »

Posted by dblwyo at 07:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It being Sunday we're going to combine a little moral philosophy with our political economy and try to draw your attention to the Charter for Compassion. Almost two years Karen Armstrong, the religious scholar by accident, was made a TED fellow and her wish was that we restore Compassion to its central place in the world. And take it out from under the accumulated detritus of dogma, orthodoxies and self-serving distortions that have so long distorted it and religions. But let's start and set the table by looking back a bit at Haiti (Strays, Disasters, & Wars to Davos: Governance, Civility and Pragmatics) by starting with the 25th Anniversary of "We Are the World". In our explorations here of pragmatic compassion we're going to mostly tell the story thru video clips which at ~18min/clip plus two short ones means we're asking for about 90 mins of your time. Other than intrinsic merits though we think the clips are well worth your time for your own sake.

Now we love this song and wholeheartedly admire and agree with the sentiments but there has to be more than mere sentiment here. After you've hopefully re-listened to this new version we'll remind you that the results of the original were some money but no lasting change. And it may be entirely revealing that the Compassion that's so central to the heart of the song, a compassion that ask you to see the Other as an I and then a Thou is sadly a little short-shrifted by the performers who keep checking out their appearances on camera or considering the amount of time the credits take. No matter, let's talk substance - the heart of I and Thou! (Frontline Lessons Brought Home: Others, Selfs and Manners).

The Task of Our Time: Restoring Compassion

The adjacent clip is Karen's recent short speech to the TED audience thanking them but more importantly discussing the role and importance of compassion. Why it's so important to restore the central tenet of every single major religion AND make it active and constructive in the world. Restoring it from the dustbin as it were.

It is rather short but telling but it might be interesting and more important to listen to her original TED Prize Wish speech in which she discusses the nature and role of compassion and why she thinks it's so important. Her's a women who's ended up as one of the most respected thinkers on Religion in the modern world who got there by accident. She was a Catholic nun but left the church to become a literature professor. After some trials and troubles she got involved with the BBC and stumbled into reporting on religion and in the process learned more about Judaism and Islam than she ever had before, either as nun or professor. And found that, at their hearts, the all had similar, almost identical, tenets. There's a certain great irony here wouldn't you say? A women of great faith but a faith of orthodoxy and dogmatic practice leaving and then slowly re-discovering the real roots  that lay behind all the facades.

Continue reading "Are We The World? - Golden Rules, Edgeworth Box & God's Hand" »

Posted by dblwyo at 09:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last several weeks continue to be eventful with Haiti continuing to occupy front page space and the nightly news & nightmares, the segue from the SOTU to the 2011 Budget to the conclusions of the WEF's Davos2010 conference who's theme this year was "rethink, redesign and rebuild". There were several central themes that reverberated which we need to dig into and revisit when we get back to looking at international affairs but a central one was a need to regain trust in government, business and leadership by improving performance and governance, and so rebuild trust. Here, here. This being Sunday we're going to focus on that issue because it threads across every session, the problems in Haiti and the problems we're having at home. You've all probably seen more than your share of images but CNN did this marvelous 360' short vidclip where you can pan the view. A word of caution - thes images are too tame because they're largely of a tent city not the devastation and injured. But even as the garden spot they're still terrible.

The Parable of the Stray

In some ways what brings such events home even more than terrible images is heartfelt words and here we look to the words of Haitian ex-pat poet Michele Voltaire Marcelin who's lament for the lost children of Haiti will bring it home. Equally she laments the deep fissures and breakdowns in Haitian society and governance, the legacy of centuries of malfeasance, and applauds the resilience and spirit of the Haitian people.

Were you ever walking down the street when a stray dog came up to you wagging their tail? Hoping for a handout but really looking for a friendly pat on the head and some sense of security and future. How many times did you reach down in pity and sadness to do the feelgood thing? 50%, 75%, 90%, all the time? One of our great epiphanies was the realization that the after petting the dog we'd have to chase them away. In fact the only person in this exchange who'd end up feeling good was ourselves, not the dog. Unless we were prepared to take them home, take care of them and nurture them for a long time. Instead most of us had our "moment" and walked on. Stop and think about that for moment or three. Our hearts may be moved to pity, we may write a check or we may text a contribution but are we really prepared to do for Haiti what needs to be done? In the long run?

Continue reading "Strays, Disasters, & Wars to Davos: Governance, Civility and Pragmatics" »

Posted by dblwyo at 03:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just in case you hadn't noticed we're facing a raft of challenges that will be barriers to prosperity for the next decade, and perhaps on into the next. Included among those are an economy that will have to make major structural changes, the need to wrestle with major issues in Healthcare, Education and Energy and a world that's evolving rapidly. At this point we're almost tempted to re-use Andrew Shephard's speech from the American President but figure you've probably heard it enough. The good news is that there are none of these problems that aren't solvable, in fact there are none of them that aren't being addressed. On the whole, about as well as they could be. The better news, in its own perverse way, is that the challenges are "minor" compared to the ones that we faced at previous cusp points historically; whether that was the GD and WW2, the Industrialization of America, the Civil War or the Revolution and the creation of the Republic.

There are two bad pieces of news however. The first is that our biggest challenge, common to all the big problems, is that we need to re-think and re-engineer our institutional framework. The second is that this will required patience, understanding and support from the population at large, in addition to leadership. Changing our institutions will be hard because it calls for re-invention of organizations that have grown up over a century since they were first created and they have accumulated lots of "plaque" and interests. Changing ourselves will be harder. The composite Gallop Poll pretty well captures the disenchantment of the American people. Of course there weren't polls to look at in 1860, 1880 or 1930 so what did we do for guidance then?

Continue reading "Renwing America 4: Time for Some Changes" »

Posted by dblwyo at 01:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Let me start by wishing, well and sincerely, all my readers the best wishes and sentiments of the season. It's a season for celebrating many things but at it's heart it is the Solstice - the Season of Re-birth and Renewal. And has been recognized and celebrated by humankind for as long as we know about. Beyond mere sentiments, however well-meant, let us also try to add some reflections on the deeper aspects of the Season.

Seeing Thing For Themselves

Let us start with the great Zen Sage Dogen, in a verse taken from Steve Heine's wonderful translation, "Verses from the Mountain of Eternal Peace". In one of six poems on snow Dogen says:

All my life perplexed by truth and falsity, right and wrong;

Now amusing myself in the moonlight,

Laughing at the wind,

Listening to the songs of birds -

So many years spent idly contemplating

The immense white layer on the mountains;

This winter, all of a sudden,

I see it for the first time as a snow-mountain.

How many times have you looked at a mountain and see something that wasn't there but was constructed out of your own mind? Instead of seeing things for themselves, as they are and without distortion. Personally we find that our views of the world are often distorted like a fun house mirror by the lack of clarity of our thinking, the turbulence of our emotions and the disturbances of our body. We are, in other words, ruled by what has accumulated in our back brain, or as James calls it, the apperceptive mass. The first step forward is often seeing the Mountain.

Reflections While Driving

The Two Big Ahas

 

Forgive me if these aren't as well written as they might be, or as powerful as they seemed to me when the lights went off.

 

1. Faith is Beyond Reason: attempting to work one's way to Faith by logic fails because logic doesn't reach that far. At the end of the day you have to make the leap across the chasm, no choice, one way or another.

 

2. Committing to the Rules you live by is the breakthru to living a conscious life: we all live our lives and make decisions on the rules we've accumulated in our subconscious, the apperceptive mass. Mostly these are never considered. Reaching a point where you decide and then commit on the deepest level to adopt chosen rules is life's biggest challenge. (this one in particular is not yet well-formed but, in its own way, was the biggest realization).

Continue reading "Reflections for the Season: Faith, Hope and Renewal" »

Posted by dblwyo at 01:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This post continues to build on the theme of change being hard, on life being unavoidably stressful and the real challenge being how we manage to deal with stress and change. Whether or not it's constructive or destructive - ultimately the choice is up to us. On the other hand that's not a road we have to walk alone, or even can. We started with the "Change is Hard" theme by looking at our public struggles to address three decades of deep and profound neglect of the public policy questions facing us. And then took what might appear to be a sidebar trip in talking about Veterans Day, the Fall of the Berlin Wall and Ft. Hood. But they are all tied together and here we'd like to draw the discussion to an endpoint on the personal level while deferring to a future post a bookend on public decisions.

The Doorway to Freedom: Having the Ground Cut Out from Under You

We aren't particularly good at telling stories so we're going to look to Ani Pema Chodrun to start us off by talking about what happens when the ground is swept from beneath. What results when all the hidden or implicit assumption we made about how the world works are destroyed, and facing the facts of things. We won't anticipate her too much but will say she knows whereof she speaks, having lived thru it, and has a real talent for putting it directly and bluntly. Hopefully you'll take the few minutes required to listen to this brief introduction to a central Buddhist concept of the groundless world, which is actually common to all the major spiritual and religious traditions. There is a longer interview with Ani Chodrun on Bill Moyers special on Faith and Reason, both of which we highly recommend. BtW - after the break you'll find some selected readings and video clips on related topics along with a brief introductory discussion.

Continue reading "Change is Hard: Finding Good Ground in a Turbulent World" »

Posted by dblwyo at 07:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The reactions to the tragedy at Ft. Hood is covering a wide range, none of which seems to be speaking quite to the hearts of the matters involved. Nor are the lessons we'd hope to see, and have been trying to draw, getting the attention they deserve. On the one hand Maj. Hasan's breakdown and reprehensible behavior is being excused as PTSD on the other certain pundits are calling for his head. And yet a third group is calling for his head, preferably after cruel and unusual punishment. There's also the search for the guilty whose heads must roll in punishment - which will just create another bad set of outcomes for which we are indirectly responsible. So we thought we'd take a third pass and try and close the loop with the lesson we'd hope to see drawn.

We'll start by remind everyone that Nov. 11 was our Veterans Day but we're not the only country to suffer in Afghanistan and Iraq, not the only ones to remember great sacrifices in the past and present. There's a wonderful poem called In Flanders Fields that the Canadians like and here's BNN's brief tribute, set to an arrangement. You can find another lovely arrangement on YouTube as well, with the words  visible. The opening line goes "In Flanders fields the poppies blow" and Canadians and Brits wear a poppy on their Remembrance Day as a result. But the last several lines go:

In Flanders fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Now the real question is, in these cases who is the foe? And, more importantly, what does keeping the faith require?

We'll argue that it doesn't include not facing the realities of what's going on, nor does it include punishing the innocent in a blind and rage-filled search for "justice". It also does not include not taking responsibility for the aftermath of war. But, as we've argued before, nor does it include living our lives in such a way that we do NOT honor the sacrifices of the veterans, living and dead, who bought our opportunities and privileges at such cost. Sad as we are to suggest perhaps it could and should be said that most of the reactions dishonor their memories, as much as failing to learn and apply their lessons does.

Continued ....

Continue reading "In Flanders Field...and Here At Home" »

Posted by dblwyo at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last post on veterans, values, stress and consequences might have ended up being a little abstract for most, including ourselves. If you'll consider this a large-scale addendum we'd like to take a shot at giving it some emotional weight. As last week's events at Ft. Hood show, perverse as they are, there's plenty to go around. And, achingly sad, done in shades of red.

If you haven't been under severe and sustained stress it's hard to explain that emotion. Combat is the most severe stress there is and impossible to explain to those who haven't been there. My dad flew C-47s in SWOPA in '42 and '43 when the other major aircraft in the sky was Japanese. He came home with a couple of Air Medals and a DFC, not standard gongware for transport pilots. And things he mostly refused to talk about. A good buddy flew F-105's out of Thailand during 'Nam and in all the years we knew each other he only started talking about the telephone poles coming up to get him once, for about 90 sec. before he cut himself off. But not only wouldn't either talk they absolutely refused to watch war movies or TV. Hollywood may do its best but unless you've been there...and if you have you don't need to be told nor want to be reminded.

Nonetheless we're going to take another shot at it by using Hollywood to illustrate the stress. 

Continue reading "In the Heart of the Beast: War, Stress and Pressure" »

Posted by dblwyo at 05:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tomorrow, Nov. 11th, is Veterans Day when we recognize and celebrate the lives and contributions of those who have served the country at such great cost. A cost the tragedies at Ft. Hood remind us is greater than we're willing to acknowledge or do something about. There are going to be all sorts of emotional tributes, and we've made our share because this is a debt that can only be recognized not repaid. If we ever manage to get to that point we also ought to recognize that the ones who come back pay their own high costs, often for years to come.

In talking about Memorial Day and the Anniversary of D-Day this last summer though we were led to consider what payback might look like. Inadequate perhaps but its bedrock is "pay it forward". We honor the sacrifices of our veterans by how we choose to live our lives, the contribution we make and the world we jointly create. (Frontline Lessons Brought Home: Others, Selfs and Manners) An opportunity they only made the initial down payment on. It's all to easy to see something like these cartoons have a weepy moment or three and move on back to our daily existences. Yet we're also learning that back in the "World" that the stresses and strains and strengths of combat have their analogs as well.

The Prices That Keep Being Paid

 Bill Moyers last Fri. took a small step in reminding us of the larger and on-going price that many veterans pay for their service with his special on "The Good Soldier". In it he portrays the experiences and lives of veterans from WW2, Korea and Iraq. And, like we said, the recent incident at Ft. Hood certainly brings home in an ugly and terrible way. The Media feeding frenzies that are going on may serve some good though by finally getting people to recognize what a small minority of our fellow citizens our paying for our lives. The photo is taken from the film clip and tells us part of the price paid in war, and a terrible one. But to know the real price listen carefully to the veterans or, better yet, watch their faces. Go ahead it's a short clip. Then tell us these aren't men who've experienced the stress of combat and are still experiencing it years later. And continuing to pay a price.

Continue reading "Veterans, the Wall & Magic: Fear, Stress & Loathing on the Reform Road" »

Posted by dblwyo at 01:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Is this a teachable moment, for us and the country? Out of what seemed to be nowhere a brushfire of protest over the President's opening day speech to American school children was being billed as communist propaganda. It's worth while to read the text and more so to listen to the speech. It sounds to us more as if it could have come from 'ol Abe than from Uncle Joe. Tomorrow night the President will address Congress on the subject of Healthcare Reform, which is a lot more complicated, difficult and shot full of special interests than "work hard, do your homework, find something you're passionate about and learn from your mistakes because you'll surely make a few".

Now there have been angry and mis-informed voices raised on both sides of every issue, always and forever. And bitter political partisanship thruout our history (Jefferson paid a propagandist to attack Adams) but we've sure heard high decibel outrage, appeals to the hindbrain and little constructive criticism in the last eight months. In fact what we think we've seen is a continuous attempt to label every single initiative that comes out of the Administration with the worst possible description and oppose every one of them on ideological grounds. We're all for passion and opposition but shouldn't it be grounded in some basis in fact?

Reality Checks

The labeling started with calling the stimulus, rescue and budget plans as "Socialism" and went on from there. So before we go on with the values and philosophy let's segue to a bit of a reality check. The rescue of Detroit was eventually acknowledged by hard-headed industry and business observers as doing for Detroit what it should have been able to do for itself anytime in the last three decades. The heavily critisized Bank Stress Tests managed to restore confidence in the Financial system at a moment when it appeared like the markets were going to collapse. The continuing support of Financial bailouts, hated, complex and mis-understood as they are, was a major contributor. (Which is not to say we're thrilled about how Wall St. manipulated a public emergency they created to their own advantage; if ever there was prima facie evidence of opportunistic special interests calling for regulatory reform Wall St. is the poster child.). And the much maligned stimulus bill literally saved the economy, along with Fed monetary intervention, from a Great Depression 2.0. Responsible estimates are that at least 4% was added to Q2 GDP and without instead of a -1% we'd have had a -5% or worse downturn. Even the job markets are repairing themselves. We've been discussing economic policy for a long time and the readings have a small collection that might be worth your while. The chart shows OMB's long-term outlook thru 2019 which tells us the worst is likely over but we've got a ways to go and face a severely hobbled future.

Continued ...

Continue reading "A Teachable Momenet? - Fear, Loathing, Renewal and Futures" »

Posted by dblwyo at 02:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Right now we're in the midst of an ugly, pejorative and distortionate debate on Healthcare Reform that's dominated by our lizard, or hind-, brains. The outcome of this debate is important, in many ways the most important of this administration and not just for its own sake but because it will define the context of the rest of this term. It will also tell us a lot about whether the American people are willing to face the hard decisions we've deferred for three decades in pursuit of debt-fueled hedonism. Or whether we're willing to be told the truth about the way things really are, facing the "brutal realities" as Jim Stockdale taught Jim Collins or whether we want to continue to be lied to. It will also tell us a lot about whether or not the political class will put staying in office/power ahead of some attempt to do what's right for the country. Now we don't expect all politicians all the time to pursue the pure public interest, we expect and hope for them to strike a workable balance. We also expect them to learn something about the issues, to engage in reasonable debate, to treat each other with some civility and respect for the other and to conduct themselves with Civitas (the pursuit of the public good). We particularly expect them to be constructively critical, which means presenting their own proposals for fixing the mammoth problems we face. Most especially, importantly and critically we do NOT expect them to pursue pure and purely obstructive opposition by appealing strictly to the worst nature of the voters. While the Democrats have their Dimowackic factions on the whole they're passing these test and have passed them with respect to all the other major pieces of legislation proposed or passed since Jan.20. On the other hand the Republicans appear to be letting the darker angels of the Ripudiacan fringe dicate policy, strategy and tactics.

Fear, Shock, History and Change vs. the Lizard-brain

 The US has its historical roots in a set of peoples and cultures that had good reason to distrust authority (Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America by James Webb), which has been a strength and a weakness. These bedrock tendencies got super-charged at the end of the 19C when the sudden industrialization of the country made us a true continental nation-state of huge size and complexity dominated by large institutions in business, government and public service. (The Search for Order, 1877-1920 by Robert H. Wiebe) But with size and complexity comes a fundamental necessity for large mechanisms to keep the wheels on the track. It was the (real) Progressives invention over three or more decades of the modern administrative apparatus that allowed us to govern this country and grow to our present state of prosperity (take that how you like). In the process though the distance between the citizen and the centers of power went from village scale to national scale and people, rightly, felt themselves the fungible victims of forces beyond their control. The turmoils of the '60s and the failures of large-scale social engineering iced that cake but what really turned it sour, IOHO, was the confirmation of all the worst conspiracy theories by the Enron/WCOM scandels and the malfeasant and self-serving behaviors of the Finance Industry and outright criminal behaviors in this last go-around.

Continue reading "Lizard-brains vs the Public Good: Time to Embrace the Suck" »

Posted by dblwyo at 12:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Welcome to "Reset World" where we're having to face up to the last thirty nears of grasshopperian neglect of vital issues and public policy. This is a post we've been holding in the pending file for too long because it's just been one damn thing after another. The bad news is the delay and, perhaps, the amount of reading materials in the excerpts section. The good news is that there's a bunch of stuff to point too. The worse news is that we're going to be trying to weave together a bunch of different threads into a coherent fabric. The possible news is that if we do this bear dance you may get something out of it. Just remember though the miracle of the Dancing Bear is that it dances at all,not how well it dances.

Serendipitously this was the 40th Anniversary of Woodstock, you know the celebration of peace and love that set the tone for the next 40 years ! Yeah, right. Just not quite the way it was intended. That clip was Woodstock then, for Woodstock now try this vidclip of the old surviving hippies who are now tour guides, and the museum, all selling the vision. As David Clayton Thomas of Blood, Sweet and Tears reminds us in this BNN interview it wasn't quite like that. For one thing Kent State had just happened and people were angry, for another none of the headliners got paid so they aren't memorialized in the historical videos. For another there was sure a lot of violence in other places and a lot of folks who didn't buy into the "it's all different now" message. In fact the Greatest Generation who had survived the GD, fought WW2 and built modern America that Woodstock was so against were just in their forties.Woodstock is now twice as far behind us as their adventures were behind them.

BUT...and this is the point...the decisions and divisions we created then have been reverberating every since. Have we done any better ? That's not an easy answer btw - the Boomers fought the Cold War, 'Nam, dealt with the biggest social changes in our history and changes in our society and economy that were phenomenal, to say the least. How we wrestle with the consequences of those legacies going forward is going to define America for the next forty years. How will we deal with our mental imps - rationally with a sense of decency, commonality and public interest ? Or pursuing private agendas that put partisan advantage ahead of the public good ?

One final clip, audio, this time from the historical archives of "This, I Believe":  Our Noble, Essential Decency. Scifi Master Robert A. Heinlein.

Continued...

Continue reading "Sausage Eating Lizards: Sonia, Spooks, Death Panels and the Pope" »

Posted by dblwyo at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Robert McNamara died at home in his sleep this last week, prompting widespread commentary and reflections. Perhaps the most thoughtful was on PBS's Newshour, at least IOHO. After the break you'll find some reflections and ruminations from a wide spectrum of observers, commentators and participants. Reading them and reflecting on the lessons ourselves we were, and are, struck by several things. First everyone sees things thru their own prism, naturally, but fails to some extent to broaden that prism to include the entire context. Second, McNamara's Legacy is widely held to be a failed strategy that led to a failed war; and beyond that, a legacy of distrust with government and divisions in society that persisted for years. It can be argued that in fact they persist until recently and we are only now beginning to move beyond them. Of course Mr. McNamara wasn't alone in making the decisions that so shaped and warped our public discourse, attitudes and culture for the last 30+ years but he was and is a bit of a lightening rod. History will reach its own conclusions in the fullness of time but the damage created and the difficulties in re-bounding seem to be clear. Nor is Vietnam the sole legacy of the '60s from legislation to civil changes, many of which suffered similar fates for similar reasons; and for which we are only now beginning to come to terms with and respond adequately to !

So what are those legacies ? We'll work thru that but we'll suggest (assert) three major ones for you to think about. 1) It is fundamentally necessary to understand how things work in context and not impose simple models on a complex universe. 2) It is equally necessary to adapt your understanding to new learnings and change your strategies and actions accordingly. 3) The core requirement of a public servant is to have the moral courage to admit when things aren't working and take responsibility for finding alternatives. In other words see the world as it is, not as you fantasy it and then adapt yourself to reality to achieve your goals. And have the courage, discipline, persistence and old fashioned gumption to stick with it long enough to reach a conclusion.

Ugly Americans, Real Lessons of 'Nam and Responses

The majority of the commentators (though not the PBS guests who were biographers) failed to assess McNamara and American policy in the context of the times. Retrospective criticisms are all well and good as well as fun and entertaining but they can't be taken seriously. Decision-makers have to act with situations as they are, with the tools they have and the information available, not operate in some ideal and theoretical world where infinite time and resources are available. So before we judge Caesar let us properly bury him by making the real record clearer. In the readings we've collected a reading list on Vietnam per se and on the history and context, e.g. John Lewis Gaddis' short history of the Cold, which underpins this section. We've also collected a set of Rose interviews on 'Nam, Somalia/Balkans and Iraq that trace the arc of American institutional response to these sorts of crisis and challenges.

Continued...

Continue reading "McNamara's Legacies and Lessons: Beyond Simple Answers" »

Posted by dblwyo at 11:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This is another post that's taken, even required, some thought and our focus is on the fundamental question we left on the table at the end of the last post (Reflections & Remembrances: Memorial Day, D-Day, Today). What lessons can we take from the sacrifices of the veterans and how can we bring it into our lives, private and public ? People join the service for many reasons but a major one is in service of our core ideals: government of, by and for the people. Without exception that we know of veterans endure what they endure for the sake of their brothers, and now, sisters. Major Dick Winter, the real life hero of Band of Brothers, tells the story that he wasn't a hero himself but he served with a company of them. They all say the real heroes are the ones left behind. A Hero is someone who sacrifices themselves, in whatever form, for the betterment of us all. Ultimately they are motivated by COMPASSION, the ability to see the other as themselves. We argued that for those of us not there the best we can imagine is from movies and TV but in some ways an even better source are the works of the artists who were there, as this drawing from the Navy's Combat Art Collection shows. If that's not the most profound love of one's fellow man on the faces of these Marines, watching their fallen comrade to see if the plasma will save him, we have no clue as to human nature.

Hero's Virtues and Ordinary Lives

One of my favorite artists is Norman Rockwell, even if it's customary to sneer at him more often than not these days, because of the bedrock virtues of ordinary life. A favorite Rockwell painting (to the best of my recollection) is the umpire glowering down at the tiny batter arguing with him about a call, "You're OUT ! Now PLAY BALL !!". Unfortunately we couldn't find that one and have substituted another that still speaks to the same message. I'm sure we've all been there, done that or seen it. But, especially when Rockwell drew them the chances that the umps had in fact been veterans of one sort or another were pretty good, in fact so good as to be likely. My dad flew C-47s in combat, my math teacher P-51s and the science teacher was a ball turret gunner on a B-17 while both another teacher and a family friend had lost arms as infantrymen. Some of the prices were daily reminders for us then. Yet here is the man, who may have been to hell and back, arguing - if not calmly then civilly - about a call according the book of rules everybody had agreed to play by. Rami Khouri, the editor of the Beirut Daily Star lived in this country and become a baseball nut. He tells the story during a Rose interview about one of the reasons he loves the game. It's because it didn't matter who you were, the rules were the rules and no matter who your father was you were out if the ump said so. That respect for playing by the rules of the game and the voluntary support of a civil society is at the root of our society. In fact we argue, and have argued (Peace, Stability and Prosperity: the Nature of Good Government), that it is the root of the long-term stability and success of all prosperous societies.

Welcome to Notre Dame

Which brings us to our core question - how do we take the willingness to serve others into our normal lives and especially the public sphere ? Slighly over a month ago Pres. Obama gave the commencement address at Notre Dame. The invitation and actual event provoked outrage, debate and critiscism among a wide range of commentators. We can applaud his courage for stepping into the lion's den, but then that's his job just as on another day it was the job of the Rangers to go up the cliffs of Pont du Hoc. Better that we applaud the courage of Notre Dame for inviting him, even though they clearly had disagreements. Most of the commentariat recognized a (typical ?) great speech but didn't pay much attention to the substance of the arguments. As for the demonstrators and objectors, well....we suspect they are so trapped in their own viewpoints that the issue didn't even come up. Shall we consider what he actually said ?

Every one of you should be proud of what you have achieved at this institution. One hundred and sixty three classes of Notre Dame graduates have sat where you are today. Some were here during years that simply rolled into the next without much notice or fanfare - periods of relative peace and prosperity that required little by way of sacrifice or struggle. You, however, are not getting off that easy. Your class has come of age at a moment of great consequence for our nation and the world - a rare inflection point in history where the size and scope of the challenges before us require that we remake our world to renew its promise; that we align our deepest values and commitments to the demands of a new age. It is a privilege and a responsibility afforded to few generations - and a task that you are now called to fulfill.This is the generation that must find a path back to prosperity and decide how we respond to a global economy that left millions behind even before this crisis hit - an economy where greed and short-term thinking were too often rewarded at the expense of fairness, and diligence, and an honest day's work.... we must find a way to reconcile our ever-shrinking world with its ever-growing diversity - diversity of thought, of culture, and of belief. In short, we must find a way to live together as one human family.

Unfortunately, finding that common ground - recognizing that our fates are tied up, as Dr. King said, in a "single garment of destiny" - is not easy. Part of the problem, of course, lies in the imperfections of man - our selfishness, our pride, our stubbornness, our acquisitiveness, our insecurities, our egos; all the cruelties large and small that those of us in the Christian tradition understand to be rooted in original sin. We too often seek advantage over others. We cling to outworn prejudice and fear those who are unfamiliar. Too many of us view life only through the lens of immediate self-interest and crass materialism; in which the world is necessarily a zero-sum game. The strong too often dominate the weak, and too many of those with wealth and with power find all manner of justification for their own privilege in the face of poverty and injustice. And so, for all our technology and scientific advances, we see around the globe violence and want and strife that would seem sadly familiar to those in ancient times.

I said a prayer that night that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. Because when we do that - when we open our hearts and our minds to those who may not think like we do or believe what we do - that's when we discover at least the possibility of common ground. That's when we begin to say, "Maybe we won't agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this is a heart-wrenching decision for any woman to make, with both moral and spiritual dimensions. So let's work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions by reducing unintended pregnancies, and making adoption more available, and providing care and support for women who do carry their child to term. Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women." Understand - I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. No matter how much we may want to fudge it - indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory - the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature. Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words.

Freedom Is Not Free

Two small hopes and a big one though. I hope it's more than a sentiment, or just a sentiment. We're all "moved", or at least give lip service to their sacrifices. I think it's because we all recognize it's for us all and not self-serving. The same way we applaud the righteous who risked their lives to stand for decency and help the Jews during the Holocaust. They act for the best that is in us.
 
My big hope is that we can all learn, in some small way, to learn that sacrifice for the other is not limited just to war but that we each can and do do it in small and large ways in every day of our lives.
 
And contrawise when we act out of narrow interests, hate or anger we do so for the worst of us. Especially when it's not just in the heat of the moment but a sustained or deliberate act of damage.

As We Speak: the Posturing Inquisition

Last fall, literally, Western Civilization almost collapsed. Two men were primarily responsible for saving it - Hank Paulsen and Ben Bernanke. If they had failed to arrest the collapse of the credit markets, restore order and get things moving again our chances of having a Great Depression again were near certainty. Given the scope and magnitudes of the potential breakdowns the downsides were so much worse that the GD might have looked like a walk in the park. Yet despite being under enormous pressures 24 X 7, dealing with unprecendented events that nobody had faced in years, if ever, they managed to right the ship and save us all from disaster. And their rewards have been an almost un-ending stream of critiscisms from all points of the compass.

There behavior in the crisis was truly heroic. There is nothing so difficult as keeping you head in a crisis, especially when everyone around you is loosing theirs. To do it day after day under a drumbeat of one damm thing after another is extraordinary. To do when the answers aren't clear yet you must remain calm, collected and decisive is more extraordinary. As Gen. Peter Pace pointed out in his commencement address to the cadets of VMI it often takes more moral courage to support an unpopular position, let alone carry it, in the meeting room than it does to command in combat. It's all to easy to give in to the common wisdom, even when you know it'll lead to disaster.

To conduct yourself in such a manner subject to so much critiscism is more difficult yet. When that critisicsm is both ignorant and largely motivated by narrow self-interest the challenges are beyond my imagination. Yet day after day during the crisis, and as I write, these guys were civil, calm, intelligent and right.

As the President pointed out at Notre Dame, and many times before and since, we face challenging and difficult times that call for new solutions. They do NOT call for the continued search for partisan advantage. To act in that way, seeking a scapegoat to sacrifice to the political gods, is a violation of everything that we should have learned from the veterans.

In my book we don't deserve such public servants, do everything we can to drive them away, and we can only wonder that they do serve. Truly heroic in every sense of the word IOHO !

Continue reading "Frontline Lessons Brought Home: Others, Selfs and Manners" »

Posted by dblwyo at 07:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Obviously Memorial Day was Memorial Day and we've passed it by without comment but with a lot of thought and reflection. The weekend after was the 65th Anniversary of D-Day in Normandy but we let that one slide as well. Now that was partly due to poor discipline or lack of energy, technical problems (we've been offair for over a week with a fried DSL modem) but mostly it was caused by a pause for reflection. That reflection was a search for something to share and say beyond the obvious or trite - not that our gratitudes shouldn't be expressed and certainly not that they are not beyond well deserved. But others said them last year and again this - as they should for now and forever, amen - and we took our shot at last year as well (). In fact we think this composite set of oped cartoons captures things as well as anything does. BtW - on that last panel and courtesy of our friends at YouTube some of the color film from WW2 and Iwo is now being shared. Here's a vidclip of the Iwo Flag Raising for real and in color.

If you haven't been in combat, and I haven't, it's impossible to truly grasp what it means to have your life at risk that way. Let alone constantly, under strains and pressures all the time and when somebody's not shooting at you to have no sleep, poor or non-existent food, worn out clothes, to live in the mud and rain. The old joke that's not before you volunteer dig a hole in the backyard, fill it with water, go spend a few days and hire tha neighborhood maniac to take a shot at you now and again. Yet these people do it and they do it our name. Interestingly enough perhaps the best efforts to convey the chaos, fear, sudden death and general discomfort some recent Hollywood movies may capture it best (Saving Private Ryan, We Were Soldiers, Band of Brothers, others). The scene on Omaha Beech from Private Ryan is one of the best, along with the D-Day jumps from Band of Brothers. Take a minute and refresh your memory. I've been in situations where my life or well-being was at risk, and multiple times. But never multiple times a minute or over multiple days in a row. If you haven't been there it's almost impossible to imagine. To the extent it can be conveyed by re-telling the story, and remembering that these calm and quiet recountings are in the hell here are some other heroes:

• Corpman G.E. Whalen, MOH, Iwo; Tibor Rubin, concentration camp survivor and Korean infantryman
• Sgt. Hoxie, wounded and crippled Iraq veteran; James Lockhard, civilian engineer and posthumous honoree

Going in Harm's Way 

These veterans pay a terrible price, though as they all point out, not as high as the real heroes they left behind. Why do they do it ? Well for some it's an escape, for others an adenture or a chance to make something of themselves. Sometimes it's even from boredom...at least at the start. But that's really two questions - both of them deep and profound but very different. The first one is why do they sign up. And once they are in the game why do they fight ? And for whom ? Every combat veteran we've ever heard doesn't talk about love of country, high ideals or principles or anything like that. They talk about their brothers, their family in and of arms.

We Were Soldiers is about a battalion of the 7th Calvary (yes, that 7th Calvary) that made the first helicopter assault in history and was cut off, surrounded and attacked by almost two divisions of North Vietnamese regulars in the Ia Drang Valley in 1965. When the landing zone got to hot Hal Moore, the CO, closed it with the obvious risk that his battalion would suffer Custer's fate as well. What saved them was the pilots of the helicopter company who returned, under fire and in the darkness to keep bringing in food, ammo, water and take out the wounded. More specifically it was Bruce (Snake) Crandall and Ed (Too Tall) Freeman. Both of whom were, years later, eventually awarded the MOH for going far beyond and beyond the call of duty. But let's let Snake and Too Tall tell - again in the laconic, laid-back fashion of the veteran. If you want to know what it was "really" like go watch the movie.

They went, prepared to sacrifice their lives, to save their family. Greater love hath no man than a mother cat prepared to die to protect her kittens. Greater love hath no man...

And if you want a little YT on how some folks think about it...Gary Owen: the 7th at Ia Drang or the 7th: Frontier to Baghdad.

Signing Up

Like we said, there's being there and going there. Why do they go ? You can list the reasons as we've done and be as cynical as you like. And thruout history being a soldier has often been a cynical thing to be for many reasons. But still...and especially in our system people don't fight for loot or because the king said so or to ransack a city. They fight because they see it as part of their duty to the nation. Time filmed the crew of the Lincoln repeating the greatest words ever said about the purposes of the nation.

When we fought the Civil War the survival of the US was at stake but so to was the entire notion of democracy. That a government of the people, by the people and for the people could survive, work and eventually prosper.[If the Time server is malfunctioning you can either search for USS Lincoln or try this URL].

When the crew of the Lincoln goes to see the are putting themselves in harms' way for the same principles that their forefathers spent three of the bloodiest days in American history fighting for, with the issue in doubt. The Republic almost died in those three days and is a tribute to the courage, tenacity and dedication of all our veterans that we can watch our Memorial Day picnics. If you haven't read Lincoln's Gettysburg Address recently we urge you to; years ago we gave the Memorial Day recital in a role as CO of the local NJROTC unit (since Dad was a decorated veteran himself he set it up thru the Legion). One of my great regrets in life is that then I didn't know what I was saying.

I and Thou: Love of the Other

One of the side-benefits of stopping to reflect on the real meaning of our veterans sacrifices was a chance to re-review Joseph Campbell's "Power of Myth". He makes the startling, but on contemplation, proundly true observation that when a soldier sacrifices his life for his brothers and for his country he does it because it reflects his deepest commitment to the welfare of the Other. They see the Other as Themselves, as a Thou. Bill Moyer's offers a great observation when he ads the story of an acquaintence who talks about taking the subway to work every morning and dying a little bit every day.

It's not just soldiers in war touching the deepest and most profound wellsprings of humanity. It's every one who ever acted, in small or large ways, for the betterment of someone else.  When my neighbors go out of their way to host their annual Christmas party, at serious expense and an enormous amount of work, they do it to make the neighborhood a better place. When a policeman saves a suicide at risk of his own or those firemen went back into the Towers they did it for the best that's in us.

Each and every one of us can do the same. In ways that are large or small.

It's what makes us human, makes the world a better place and let's us touch that small spark of Divinity that we each carry around with us. A spark that needs nurturing to flame up but is there, potentially, in every one.

Perhaps the best memorial to what our veterans have done for us is to do for our friends, family, neighbors, colleagues and fellow citizens the best we can for them. Not just for ourselves. And to remember what they have done and are doing.

Continue reading "Reflections & Remembrances: Memorial Day, D-Day, Today" »

Posted by dblwyo at 12:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If it's not entirely clear to everyone we're trapped in a concentric and converging set of Perfect Storms on the economic, financial, socio-political and geo-political fronts that we will have to deal with. One way or another, that is consciously and deliberately or inadvertently or accidentally. We got into this mess thru combinations of systemic failure, moral failures (on our part as well as by the powers that be) and systematic leadership failures. Our last post (Welcome to Coach Carter's Gym: Renewal of Duty, Honor and Country)addressed the need for us to suck it up and pull together - to return to fundamental values. Yet what are followers without leaders, just as what our leaders without followers ? We need both ( Following the Spirit: Leaders, Leadership and the "Wise" Course) and both have to perform more then adequately. You might both enjoy William James on the symbiosis between leaders and led:Great Men, Great Thoughts, and the Environment., and profit (greatly) from the explicit analysis of mutual inter-dependence.

So if we do our part what will the folks with their hands on the levers do ? As it happens the Davos conference is underway and the sessions are available online for your viewing pleasure and we recommend them, for lots of reasons, very...very much. Having been watching over the last several days we've culled several that are well worth your time IOHO. And you can find them below along with some short comments (forgive the graphics - it's proven technically impossiel for me to get a good picture but we've left apparently blank spaces to provide "space" to encourage you to pause and watch).

Crisis and Leadership

 This first session we'll point you to is on leadership in a crisis with Bibi Netanyahu, David Cameron, Jaime Dimon and Anna Botin. Their observations and astute insights are both wise and experienced as well as informed by a great deal of practical experience in getting results from the "sausage factories" that make policy, politics and decisions. We were particularly impressed with Bibi and Jaime but feel that the entire session is well worth your time. If the session won't come up by either clicking on the placeholder or the marked hyperlink you can find it on the Davos web site directly for yourselves. If you haven't the time to watch all the sessions or even a complete one go back - we think these are worth listening to repeatedly !

Views From the Next Generation

One other interesting session is this one that has six teenagers selected from several hundred from around the world to come and briefly present their activities and observations and then respond to the moderator's questions. While it'll be our actions and the decisions of the greyheads in power which determine our future course these are, ultimately, the folks who will have to live with the long-term consequences. And their reactions are fascinating, interesting and encouraging. For anyone who thinks that there's no civic spirit in the younger generation this will disabuse you...or should. At the same time they also displayed a natural and justified anger at the moral failures of the people they've trusted, willy-nilly, to build them a better world.

Sad Lessons of Past Generations

Speaking of which the opening graphic is a YouTube vidclip of Dylan's "Times They Are a Changn'" composited by various artists over the years. This song was an anthem it it's day and ever-afterward. Watching it again and the various artists interpretations reminds us of that and, hopefully, causes us to be willing to pick up our burdens. Yet watching this reminded us of a great PBS Special on the "Folk Years" (of which there is a wonderful CD/DVD collection out) that collects many of the great songs of change and youthful effort. When it was broadcast it was fascinating to watch many of the middle-aged and well-off audience singing along from memory. Yet how did they live their lives ? Rather traditionally at the end of the day. They surrendered their Revolution for comfort and complacency and squandered the inheritances received from the Greatest Generation bought at so much cost in blood, sweat and tears.

Time will tell whether they will be a new Great Generation or not but the earlier signs are encouraging. They're acting not just talking, rioting, partying or dancing to the music. They appear to know that good intentions are no substitute for good actions. But listen to the lyrics, at least the opening lines. The times are indeed changing - whether it's for the better or not is to be determined. Which in turn depends on whether these Crisis or just Risks....or Opportunities as well !

Bad Lessons of the Current Generation

Speaking further of which after the break you'll find the counter-examples in point. These are recent news stories on the awarding of $Bs in bonuses last year by the Finance Industry. Talk about a total lack of leadership, morals or values ! We knew that the Industry was self-serving and not to be trusted without adult supervision and would sell our collective interests down the river for another bottle of wine. Now we're learning they have no sense of the broader interest at all. Our guess would be that at the end the adults supervisors will be armed and authorized to use deadly force, so-to-speak. And will be roundly applauded when they do. There's a fundamental lesson of Civitas here - no one is an island and we all prosper in conjunction with the ecologies we live in. When you damage that ecology by poisoning it in pursuit of your narrow self-interest you're citizenship rights are likely to be justifiably amended.

Values, Attitudes and Coping

Our favorite Davos session is this one with Benjamin Zander. If you watch no other watch this one. Zander is an orchestra conductor who lectures on how to conduct your life well by rising to challenge thru seeing them as opportunities. A 1-sentence summary that does nearly complete injustice to the power, depth and force of his "lecture". Which is not really a lecture. He starts though by telling the story of his Jewish father who lost everything fleeing the Nazis yet found the strength of will, moral purpose and principles to build a new life.

At the end of the day whether or not we and our leaders pull ourselves thru these messes boils down to that. Can we find it within ourselves to rise above this and re-discover fundamental values ?

Continue reading "Crisis, Leadership, Leaders and Values" »

Posted by dblwyo at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now that we've had some time (can you believe it's basically just a week since the Inaugural Speech - it seems like months ago !) let's stop and consider it. The general quick take of the punditocracy seems to be that it was a good, even very good, speech without flights of soaring rhetoric but with a sober, realistic and grounded call to arms. We sort of agree but think they missed a lot of it being too narrow in their interpretations, for one thing, and not able to step back and listen to what they really heard. In fact our take differs somewhat from theirs on several levels, both rhetorical and substantive. On the latter the speech deserves to be parsed out and analyzed line by line - which we intend to do at a future date. There was a huge amount of substance but it was entirely consistent with our prior takes on the Grant Park speech, the nomination acceptance speech and what came out of the debates. Perhaps one of the most substantive we've ever heard. On the rhetorical front the standards of comparison were JFK, FDR and Lincoln, particularly the latter's second Inaugural. Quite a standard, yet in each case they were ill-received at the time. In fact so was the Gettysburg Address. Our opinion is that there were plenty of rhetorical and policy points that worked well together.

Call for Responsibility

By this time you've probably heard the old story, true to our knowledge, that the Chinese ideogram for Crisis is the composite of the ones for Crisis and Opportunity. Which seems to perfectly capture the times and the speech. As Rhammie puts it, "never waste a good crisis...do what you've been putting off and couldn't get support for it." That pretty well captures a central message. Woven thruout the entire speech in fact was the charge/argument/what have you that we all bear and bore responsibility for these multiple crisis, not just a few fat cats. A point we've argued several (many ?) time before and one which stands up to severe scrutiny. Any time you bought a new giant TV using your house as an ATM machine or lived on 0% savings you were part and parcel of this whole shebang. We all rode this gravey train for at least the last 30 years and put off facing the hard decisions (  Party on Grasshopper: Digging Deeper....into the Policy Agendi, Inside the Sausage Factory: the 4P's of Political Reality). Instead of posting the speech itself though we're going to let someone else put it in a nutshell - Samuel L. Jackson speaking/acting as the real life Coach Carter.(IF there are some technical problems with the pop-up the highlighted section takes you hopefully to the trailer - which speaks amazingly well to our basic points. Otherwise search YouTube for "Coach Carter").

Listen to it and you'll hear in a lot blunter language what the President told us. We can work our way out of these messes. It's not going to be easy and it's not going to be quick and it will take hard work, discipline, sacrifices and, MOST ESPECIALLY, working for someone besides our own selves. We are a team in other words or we're going to be road kill. Or, as one the Founding Fathers put, "Gentlemen, we must all work together or we will surely all hang separately !" We're all big people now and need to take responsiblity for our own decisions and the consequences.

Values for the Future

One of the best moments for us, among many, was where the President challenged us to rest our efforts on fundamental values, built on the historic values that made this country great. This is what he said:

For as much as government can do, and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends -- honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism -- these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history.

What is demanded, then, is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility -- a recognition on the part of every American that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

At heart this is, as Coach Carter has it, a call to suck it up. We've chatted before on the fundamental requirements for peace and prosperity of a grounded and workable set of values. The accompanying graphic is taken from that post (  Stories We Tell Ourselves: Values, Culture and Change,  From Griffindor to Tatoonie: Searching for Good Ground in a Groundless World) so we won't repeat our discussion. But at the end of the day the central question here is what ground do you stand on ? One way or another we are, "each and every one", going to find out ! For sure, for sure.

One final observation or look back if you would, the prior post (From Misconception to Collective Affirmation: the Inaugural Renewal) was looking forward to the speech but also looked back before to the values, risks and actions that made this country. In our book the Inaugural answered the mail, completely, thoroughly and on every point. It was indeed a call for renewal ! After the break you'll find a three-part readings collection: some lead-ins that set the expectations, some selections from some pundits who got it better than most IOHO, and the most important section. A set of key readings on the new Civil Society we need to build the world we'd like to live. Those are the ones I particularly think you ought to read.

Back in the day, so-to-speak, someone who had full legal rights as a Roman Citizen was said to be part of the CIVITAS. But Civitas implied much more than privileges and rights...it also implied and implies duty and obligation. Most especially it implied that a good citizen would act to properly balance their own narrow interests with a proper concern for the well-being of the city and the state. For all one's fellow citizens...Barry is asking us to renew our Civitas in a modern age.

Continue reading "Welcome to Coach Carter's Gym: Renewal of Duty, Honor and Country" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In her weekly column in last weekend's WSJ Peggy Noonan talks about the Inaugural and what it means to her, starting with tearing up as she flies in and sees the great monuments to our historic past. She continues by dissecting things a little bit, admitting that there's going to be a lot of hoopla, maneuverings, posturing and politics. Even, perhaps, some cynical manipulations, or three, in the days to come by various parties. She closes with the appeal that "we suspend our disbelief". That is we don't just watch a series of public ceremonies, a swearing in and a multi-hour parade by everybody from the Old Guard to high-school bands selected more for who they are than how good they are, but we suspend our modern cynicisms, our disbeliefs. While taking her point, even understanding it and agreeing with the surface logic, it bothered me enormously. Suspend our disbelief ?

NO, absolutely not. While we don't always agree with Noonan we've always found her insights and humanity to be worthy. In this case, though, we must vehemently disagree with her fundamental premise. If we've learned anything in this last election cycle it is that we are all children of our deepest, unconscious emotions. Our lizard-brains, as it were. Yet we also know that our lizard-brains are both trainable and disciplinable. We also know that our most fervent beliefs and values reside not in our higher rational processes but in our deepest and oldest human characteristics.

Instead of suspending disbelief we should instead be affirming our beliefs. No matter how hokey, maudlin or manipulative these Inaugural events and celebrations might seem they are recognition of some of the best that is in us. And of some of our highest ideals and greatest achievements. If you don't think so then we urge you to listen to HBO's broadcast of Sunday's Inaugural Celebration.For which we thank them for broadcasting, online and now making available (in case it disppears you can find some YouTube clips from which this picture is taken).

The Miracle That Was and Is

Now the analyst in us suggests that the carefully, artfully and well-crafted Celebration be parsed out a bit. And if you listen carefully, over and above enjoying the music, the peformances, and the speeches you'll find several recurrent themes. Reinforced by the musical choices. If you want to know the tone this administration intends to set, what it's major philosophies will be you'll hear all you need to know. All of which we agree with from "we can face our challenges" to "we are one" to the emphasis on the dignity and value of work, the need for people to be self-responsible and for government to help finding opportunity and lifting the burdens that prevent them from achieving these goals. While also asking each and every one of us to bear our share.

But no matter our problems they continue to pale in comparison to what we've faced historically. Serendipitously the HBO mini-series "John Adams" is now out on DVD and in my local rental shop. Renting it this last weekend couldn't have been better timed. It's a very real, gritty, accurate and honest portrait of the people, times, challenges and events. But it also showcases how our Founding Fathers (& Mothers) were motivated by their ideals, governed by their values and dedicated themselves to making this a better world. Beyond that we all take too much of this for granted. When they started their deaths by hanging were more likely - they were after all 13 small colonies taking on the mightiest and most powerful Empire in the world. More than that they were creating a Republic from scratch by their own decision. Something never before done in human history.

Re-read that last line. As we stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before us we forget what leaps of faith and imagination and courage were required for their achievements. The man who first made the "shoulders" comparison was Issac Newton who's own work on the Principles of Gravity required a conceptual leap, that action at a distance without a physical connection, was possible and what organized the Universe. That was an act of insight, intellect and Faith for which there was no logical or rational basis at the time.

The act of deciding that we would be governed by ourselves, in a form we crafted, that we would be dedicated to the enabling the "pursuit of inalienable rights" for all was an even bigger act of Faith.

So don't supsend you disblief this week - affirm your Faith.

After the break we provide a YouTube playlist of the Adams series but if you listen to nothing else listen to the clip that is embedded in the accompanying picture. John Adams gives the most pointed statement of that fundamental faith that we've ever heard. And take his message - the Faith that created, not just moved, a nation and pay it forward.

Continue reading "From Misconception to Collective Affirmation: the Inaugural Renewal" »

Posted by dblwyo at 04:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was of several minds about whether or not to tackle this and put it off but in my mind real respect for the victims of 911 is to do something about it. Not have another maudlin remembrance and go back and re-create the disaster all over again for the same reasons. So in that spirit we're going to start with 911 and re-treat it as the wake-up call it was and then point out that much of the substance of he 911 commission report has yet to be enacted, let alone implemented. But it's not just the changes in security, defense and foreign policy that the Commission called for that are in dire straits as the result of the same fundamental flaws. And are coming home to roost (look up ROC on Wikipedia for how big these birds are going to be). So in addition to talking a bit about continuing failures related to 911 we're going to tackle, briefly, two other major breakdowns that result from the same policy-making dysfunctions. One of the things I like about political cartoons is that whether you agree or disagree they're a good indicator of the feelings, attitudes and spread of same. The opening cartoon is sadly funny but not right on in my book. In fact it's got a couple of major flaws.

Were you ever in a small town, neighborhood, city what have you that had a "Deadman's Corner" ? You know the place where the preponderance of accidents seemed to happen. Now there was always some reasonable explanation for each accident: drugged out teenagers, bad storm, road repairs, whatever. But somehow that one corner always got 60+% of the serious accidents. And nobody bothered to ask why - that is what design flaw was causing the accidents to happen in the same spot. That's called a "systemic risk" - that is there's a flaw in the fundamental operation of the whole system - after all drunks, teenagers, storms and repairs are part of life. And there wasn't a rash of accidents all up and down the rest of the highway - just CRASH CORNER ! Well we're in the process of re-creating and re-experience a slew of crashes in several different areas and all due to the same systemic flaws. Which to my mind is perfectly captured by the next political cartoon - the only one I've found that is truly respectful of the 911 dead because it doesn't deny the source of the problem. Our own unwillingness to face reality.

2nd Failure Source: Institutional Breakdown 

Now after the break we back up that assertion with a series of readings excerpts on National Security, the collapse of the Frannie twins (btw - in case you don't follow the news last weekend the two biggest financial institutions were taken over by the government. And this weekend Lehman Brothers is headed for bankruptcy, Merrill has been bought by Bank of America, Washington Mutual and AIG insurance aren't in much better shape), and on energy policy. In each case we find the second major systemic flaw - and the same one. Now in each of the readings sections we've not only listed some key excerpts in these areas but also the pointer to a prior post of ours that provides background context. So for 911 and Security policy there's a prior collection, for the Frannie breakdown a couple of our economic/market posts from this weekend that may be a little technogeeky but.... and our post on a national energy policy for that. Now if you click on the Twin Towers picture where you actually go is a 2004 panel discussion at the Kennedy School on the aftermath of 911 and it's not a pretty picture. Just in case that doesn't work the pointer is repeated below along with an easy to use, read and understand version of the 911 report in graphics form by Slate. Which is unfortunately no longer free online - you have to buy a copy.

Some Teaser Points

Notice we didn't characterize the second major fundamental breakdown. Rather we're hoping you'll reach a similar conclusion to ours in your own words and thoughts by watching the KSG vidclip (the whole thing is 90 min but the first 30 min are the panel). The first two pointers after the break btw are to two earlier posts of ours laying out all the machinery in detail that will give you a very complete and thorough diagnostic toolkit. As well as some approaches to fixing it. But let me see if we can get your dandruff up with a few summary points.

1. 911 was the result of a sustained period of ignoring the world as it is and treating terrorism as a police problem instead of a security problem but has it's real roots in the self-righteous emasculation of the intelligence agencies by the Church Commission in the '70s. In other words we created terrible long-term problems for ourselves by making short-term feel good decisions that had terrible long-term consequences. Wow, deja vu' all over again Pogo. By the way, in passing, the two Senators who took the lead on breaking some of the post-'04 legislative logjams were named Liebermann and McCain.

2. Our problems with the insolvency of Frannie aren't like nobody wasn't trying to fix the problem. In fact, as you'll read, George Bush, Alan Greenspan and a host of others tried to start a major re-structuring of the Bloated Twins but were stopped dead by their lobbying clout with Congress. Guess who the four largest recipients of their political contributions was....read it for yourself. 

3. Energy policy is a great irony. Was just chatting with my neighbor and telling him that back in my days as a resource economist every single proposal on the table right now was on the table then. And btw we actually have, believe it or not, a National Energy Policy and it's a pretty good one. Just not implemented. Guess what - it too was one of the earliest policy initiatives of President Bush and couldn't make it thru the Congressional barriers and special interests lobbying (that's another hint btw). Here's another with an example: Having Fun, Doing Good, Making Sausage: Goodtime Charlie's War

Now we're not holding up a brief for any party or politician here. At the end of the Clinton Administration Larry Summers took a serious pass at the Frannie Twins too. And got as far as Uncle Alan and George W. And for the same reasons. Like we pointed out in the last post policy makers and politicians often have a much better idea of what needs to be done than we know, or give them credit for. They just can't sell it no matter how hard they try.Oil and Other System Shocks: Beyond Iraq & Georgia

At least until the dire consequences that you've been warned about are so serious and painful that you're willing to do the hard stuff. You see the third major barrier is us - we're the ones that refuse to buy in and instead go with the snake oil salesmen. As the record proves over and over again.

So if you're truly interested in change don't buy the snake oil - take the real medicine, eat right, loose weight and exercise. Or face the penalities. 

Continue reading "911 Memorial: Fix the Problem Don't Repeat the Crash" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Consider this part of our "stories" series of posts - a never-ending story perhaps ? We promise not to stretch it to far but the metaphor is doing some good. Stories we tell ourselves are the values, beliefs, rules and guidelines we rely on to navigate this challenging world. Whether they're conscious or not, whether you learned them the hard way, absorbed them in childhood everybody has a set of guidelines they follow for good or bad. Simply by living you must decide and by deciding you reveal your values. Now this is a thesis we've pursued here abstractly and concretely, at the level of society and at the level of the individual. 

Values and the Candidates 

Earlier we'd pointed to the Q&A at Saddleback Church (Welcome to Saddleback: the Candidates, Pastor Rick and Some Real Answers) as being interesting, informative and a valuable public service. Certainly learned more about both candidates than I'd known before, especially Johnboy. And the questions were thoughtful and insightful - the ones on leadership and personal values in particular. Only two commentators though really got to the true heart of the importance. One was an observation that the values a leader brings to the table are critically important. The other, by Dan Henninger of the WSJ, was an astute observation on why Pastor Rick started with those questions. And why it was probably unthinkable for something similar to have been done to Truman, Eisenhower....Reagan and even the first Bush. His argument was that we had a commons shared sense of core values and precepts that were so widely shared that it was unnecessary to explore them. In that I think he was correct.

But he stopped short of exploring the other side of the coin. Those core values developed as the result of shared experiences and were massively challenged in the '60s and early '70s when they were no longer as apparently valid in helping us cope with a changing world. Yet in revolting against the Establishment the babies got thrown out with the dirty bathwater and as a result we provoked a backlash from folks looking for old verities. And nothing much has replace them - instead we've had a multi-decade struggle with one thing after another being put forward, tested and generally rejected. So where do we go from here ?

We just finished putting up posts on the speeches at each of the two conventions, using our own set of mainly policy and substance filters, so our evaluations are fairly clear at this point. One thing we will point back to in McCain's speech was the heartfelt and deep-seated transformation from good-timin fighter jock to grounded, serious and spiritual man that his stay in the Hanoi Hilton made him. He was actually more complete and candid on that stage than during the interview. HIs values, their sources and prices are pretty clear and tested. Barry's appear to be more subtle and complex.

There are clearly vast differences between the two candidates in some of their values, though we think that their goals and standards are similar and, as we've argued at length with chapter and verse, they're a lot closer to seeing the same problems and wanting to proceed to the same solutions than any headline will tell you. In fact, and this is a very important sidebar, the substances of their proposals are so close IOHO that they are the smallest set of differences we've seen in four decades. Literally. Which is yet another way of coming full circle back to the values question because if they want to proceed in similar directions then how we get there becomes an important differentiator. As somebody astutely commented (Noonan ?) Johnboy is almost a throwback to the values of the Greatest Generation and IMHO we need more of that. At the same time, as we said at the beginning, this is more complex and nuanced world with escalating challenges to the left of us, to the right and in front and us with no choice but to ride on.

Values and the World 

Let me quote from an enormously wiser person than myself...William James in the Preface to "The Will To Believe":

"If religious hypothesis about the universe be in order all, then the active faiths of individuals in them, freely expressing themselves in life, are the experimental tests by which they are verified, and the only means by which their truth or falsehood can be wrought out.

Religious history proves that one hypothesis after another has worked ill, has crumbled at contact with a widening knowledge of the world and has lapsed from the minds of men. Some articles of faith, however, have maintained themselves through every vicissitude, and possess even more vitality to-day than ever before....Meanwhile the freest competition of the various faiths with one another, and their open application to life by their several champions, are the most favorable conditions under which the survival of the fittest can proceed.

Religious fermentation is always a symptom of the intellectual vigor of a society; and it is only when they forget that they are hypothesis and put on rationalistic and authoritative pretensions that our faiths do harm. The most interesting and valuable things about a man are his ideals and over-beliefs. The same is true of nations and historic epochs; and the excesses of which the particular individuals and epochs are guilty are compensated in the total, and become profitable to mankind in the long run".

You may have to read that over a time or two...James takes little adjusting too. But he cuts right at the heart of things with brilliant but warm and human insights that are also practical and workable. His optimism that we'd resolve the questions he wrestled has been badly disappointed. If anything the wrestling is more vigorous, widespread and discombobulated than ever. Yet perhaps not. And James is not the first person in history to wrestle in that arena nor the last. In fact in the rest of this post we want to take voyage with several spiritual guides who provide their own learnings and suggestions.

From Griffindor to Tatoonie and Beyond 

We start in the Griffindor common room with J.K. Rowling's Harvard commencement address, one of the best we've ever heard and Jamesian in being based on hard and difficult experience, if not in language. We stay at Harvard but move cross campus and back in time to hear Billy Graham talk about moral principles and ethical values in the modern world. We could have returned to Pastor Rick, who also spoke at Harvard and had very similar things to say but we pointed you at his works in our Saddleback post. Then we move forward in time and travel to NYC in location but spiritually to a remote location in Nova Scotia to partake of Bill Moyers interview of Pema Chodrun, a Buddhist Nun. Our final voyage is millenia into the uncertain future to listen as Charlie Rose interviews George Lucas on his art, his motives, his observations on life and the importance of myth and culture and why it's missing in modern life so far. We conclude with some pointers to very ancient wisdom.

As we take these various trips to different sources of values we hope you'll find that despite many surface differences all of these folks are wrestling with the same quandries that James raises, providing their own "hypothesis" as to answers and offerring up their own lives and experiences as the testbed for the results and consequences. 

Continue reading "From Griffindor to Tatoonie: Searching for Good Ground in a Groundless World" »

Posted by dblwyo at 09:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In case you didn't happen to notice Randy Pausch, the compsci professor from Carnegie who's literal last lecture became a worldwide phenomenon, finally succumbed to his pancreatic cancer. A sad thing ? Well, yes. In many ways. But Randy lived a full and fruitful life and even without the fame and the impact of his lecture made contributions that few of us are given to make. Also this last week plus Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the Russian novelist who impacted the lives of millions, also passed on. A long time ago watching the film of Ivan Denisovitch with my college classmates in S.Cal. they were immensely puzzled by the squeaking noises made when the prisoners walked on the snow. You see when it's very cold and very dry snow squeaks. But you have to have lived there, or someplace similar, to know how cold that really means it was and feel it in your bones. Yet Solzhenitsyn's stories helped tell the story of the Gulags, first to the Russian people - which brought him exile, and then to the world. Both of these gentlemen told us stories in the best sense - myths that cut to the heart of things and helped us understand the world, how it worked and our places in it. Things that we need to know even when they're ugly, sometimes ugly beyond my experience or grasping. Randy's words of wisdom helped many people and to hear them again here's a little YouTube playlist: Randy Pausch  Playlist. There's quite a few but his Carnegie lecture is short and to the point while the ABC Memorial Special is the one I'd recommend really listening thru. Hopefully they're all in order.

But with all due respect to Randy the mad Russian poet changed the lives of millions who suffered, as he did, thru one of the most evil tyrannies in human history. Literally - look up the casualty estimates on Wikipedia. Or think about the fact that never before in human history had a government distorted and destroyed the most fundamental human relationships between family, friends, colleagues and fellow citizens. Stalin destroyed the most fundamental glue that holds us in a society, makes us human and is rooted in our fundamental biology and evolutionary history. But he wasn't able to eliminate it or keep it from coming back. I rather like the political cartoonist's tributes to Solzhenitsyn.

The Storyteller

 Unfortunately Stalin's inventiveness didn't go unoticed around the world and many clever and imitative people were able to add to our Medieval legacies, natural biological tendencies and combine it with Stalin's lessons to create their own solutions. Yet just as Czesław Miłosz was able to find the poetry and stories to help Eastern Europe rise above those degradations others are doing the same today. Let me introduce you to Chris Abani, courtsey of the TED Talks (an unparlleled resource for exploring all sorts of things). the Nigerian author, activist, UCSC professor and torture survivor.

This is what TED had to say about his first talk:

"In this deeply personal talk, Nigerian writer Chris Abani says that “what we know about how to be who we are” comes from stories. He searches for the heart of Africa through its poems and narrative, including his own."

But the one you should really listen to is his second. If the first makes the point we're shooting for here, that stories (myths, values, beliefs) are what make us truly human this second tells you what the struggle to be human in a nightmare is like. Take a moment (actually about 20 mins to watch Chris). Maybe longer if you really listen to his story. We'll still be here. The thing, once it truly sinks in about what you're hearing, is how he takes us beyond to the best we can be. The Roman Stoic philosopher was an advisor to Emporer's, a great man, rich and influential and one of the great thinkers of Classical times. What lends special credability to his wors, for me, is that his last and greatest work was written in prison just before he was executed. Chris speaks to us from the "Heart of Darkness" and finds a path to humanity out of it. Based on the stories we tell and the redemptive powers of human nature.

Values, Culture and Stories

Not to get all abstract on you, especially after getting down in the "mud, blood and beer" with the real realities nonetheless I do want to come to a larger point, or return to it, in a sense. And pardon the graphic but it gets back to something we think is central. The ground we stand on, our values and culture, is what makes our lives livable, worthwhile and survivable even. And it is the glue that holds our society together. At the end of the day each individual must find the stories the wrestle with each of these dimensions that help them find their ground. And society must achieve the same goals collectively. Or not with the penalties we now know all too well. We've previously dove into the role of religion and believes and their historical evolution and that can be some interesting background if you like: Faith, Hope and Enchantment: Why Religion Matters...More.

The questions might be put this way, but feel free to put them whatever best suites you.

1. How do we cope and manage with violence ? Modern man forgets that violence is the foundation of our society and endemic in our history. And only in modern times and in the West has there been anything like a brief interlude, preceeded by the most horrific and destructive wars and governments in human history.

2. How do we reconcile Faith and Knowledge, or Science and Religion ? This is a newer question that is the fruits really of the Rennaissance and has led to a continous 500-year struggle. One that strangely enough seems to be more vituperatie with intellectual denials recently than organized religion's denials. A large topic but one that is essential for our future and we've extensively discussed (Science vs or plus Religion: From Disingenuous to New Frontiers).

3. How do we find and express the best that is in us ? Another large question but the arts serve a dual purpose of entertainment to help relieve the stresses of the day. And make no mistake - one only has to watch the Kennedy Honors to understand that entertainment can require everything a gifted performer has. But "High Art" at it's best holds up a mirror to help us see what we've not seen - truthful, ugly, beautifully. At its' better than best it helps us find deeper truths and experience things beyond mere words.

4. How do we train our minds and our selves to truly use our knowledge, mental capabilities, etc. to think about the world ? What is the best way to think ? To learn to think and apply it ? And how do we move from being animals who's minds are rationalizing engines to enable our more primitive selfs to pursue the game and instead elevate our decision-making processes ?

One way or another you and your society answer those questions. Often accumulatively and unconsciously over a period of time, at least until the ground shifts and shows how unstable it is. But it is stories that helped you find your ground in the first place. And may help you find new ground when you need to.

Continue reading "Stories We Tell Ourselves: Values, Culture and Change" »

Posted by dblwyo at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Did you ever stop to wonder why we won the Cold War ? And how hard, difficult, costly and unlikely it was ? Not to mention a big element of luck and good fortune ! Well there are big answers and little answers. Beyond some of the theoretical abstractions were people like "Goodtime Charlie" Wilson. A hard-drinking, hard-partying Democractic Congressman from Texas who engineered the largest and, arguably, the most effective covert war in US history. If you click on the graphic it starts up the movie trailer which captures a lot of the gist of the movie - much better than almost any other trailer I've seen. And what a movie - just as movie. First off it was put together by Tom Hanks as the lead producer - in other words he wanted to make this movie and went out of his way to "make it so". He also played the lead along with Julia Roberts and Phillip Seymour Hoffman - three Academay Award winners is a lot of horsepower. They all must've seen something in it as well. It was directed by Mike Nicholas, one of America's greatest modern directors (The Graduate, Catch 22, Silkwood,...), and written by Aaron Sorkin of West Wing fame. That means to start with it was not only extraordinarily well acted and written but on the surface it's very funny, very clever and very insightful. BtW - it's almost the only recent gig that Sorkin fought hard to get - another telling indicator. You see it's also a true story. And offers up several lessons we think tell us a lot about manuvering inside the Sausage Factory (Inside the Sausage Factory: the 4P's of Political Reality) to get things done for the good of us all. Hard as that might be to believe. The Wikipedia synopsis is pretty decent though a tad limp-wristed trying to be even-handed.

You see we won the Cold war partly thru inherent dysfunctions of the Soviet system which made it unable to adapt and grow. Partly thru the military and economic pressures Reagan put on the Soviet system, including a secret economic war which has yet to make it beyond hints in various thrillers - if you can ever find it it's worthwhile tracking down Cap the Knife Weinberger's review of Tom Clancy's novel "Cardinal of the Kremlin" - written as the sitting Sec. of Defense and published as the main editorial in the WSJ of all places. Talk about a broad hint. Another reason was the growing restiveness of Eastern Europe, particularly the Poles, encouraged and motivated by Pope John Paul II. But did you ever wonder why the Red Army didn't put down the Poles like they had earlier put down the Czechs and the Hungarians ? Because they weren't allowed to after the debacle of Afghanistan where they sufferred horrendous casualties, demonstrated a barbarism toward the population more reminiscent of the Mongols, had (as Charlie Wilson points out) their hearts broken and destroyed their credability with the Politboro. Gorbachev wasn't just being civilized when he wouldn't support their plans to suppress Eastern Europe - he didn't believe they could do it. It's worth your time to watch this interview on Charlie Rose with Goodtime Charlie in which the supposed buffoon has a lot to say about politics, partisanship, and partying. And this much earlier one with George Crile - the 60 Minutes producer who first got Charlier interview and later wrote the book that brought all this to light for us. Who basically back up the fact that a rogue Congressman who set out to do the right thing was the primary mover on one of our greatest foreign policy successes. An amazing story from the real world, better than fiction.

In fact the movie's tag line captures it exactly - "base on a true story...you think we could make this up ?" 

And some of the lessons are pretty sad indeed, and revealing and salutory. But if we want the sausage factory to make better sausage we'd better figure out how to learn them, apply them and repeat them. After the break we'll dig into several of them - though perhaps we did't catch them all and you'll have to watch the DVD and get back with some comments. In the meantime this quote captures the nature of the challenge:

CIA Award Presenter: The defeat and break up of the Soviet empire, culminating in the crumbing of the Berlin wall, is one of the great events of world history. There were many heros in this battle, but to Charlie Wilson must go this special recognition. Just thirteen years ago the Soviet army appeared to be invincible. But Charlie, undeterred, engineered a lethal body blow that weakened the communist empire. Without Charlie, history would be hugely, and sadly different. And so for the first time a civilian is being given our highest recognition; that of honored colleague. Ladies and gentlemen of the clandestine services, congressman Charles Wilson.

One final question, maybe two:

1. What would it have cost us in the '90s to turn Afghanistan into a viable state - $30-40 million a year ? (Wilson's estimate). What did it cost us on 911 ? What's it costing us now ?
2. What 4P lessons do we take away here for Energy, Education, the Economy and National Security that a) we've known what to do about for decades ?

Continue reading "Having Fun, Doing Good, Making Sausage: Goodtime Charlie's War" »

Posted by dblwyo at 11:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Our friends the Brits celebrate Remembrance Day Nov. 11th, the day of the armistice. Otherwise known as poppy day and you'll see VFW,et.al. memebers wearing poppies. Obviously our big remembrance day was Memorial Day which has always meant a lot, and has come to mean more, to me. So putting up a post on the exact weekend seemed like to easy. Better instead to wait, do a little thinking and collect things up. Now we could have started off with a political cartoon on Memorial Day and what it really means but Daryll Cagle's web site has a superb collection. Many of which share the common theme of too much picnicing, sports, beer and general carrying on.Which we sympathize with but only partly.  

Now part of the reason Memorial Day has been important to me is my dad flew C-47s during WW2 and not milk runs moving cargo in safe area. He was part of a Troop Carrier Wing and was involved in moving cargo and people in and near active combat zones. Including some darn serious paratroop drops. Over the years Dad didn't talk much, sharing maybe  1 1/2 to 3 stories. Another reason is that as a student many of my teachers were ex-vets and had served hard time: p-51 fighter pilot, B-17 ball turrent gunner, infrantryman....it wasn't at all unusual - then. One Memorial Day my dad arranged for me, as the CO of the local NRROTC unit and member of the speech team, to give the Gettysburg Address at the American Legion's Ceremony. I wish then I understood what has come so slowly but deeply over the years. So as a reflection of that experience but more importantly my own small reflections on the meaning of the Day let me offer up this "multi-media presentation". Oftertimes movies and other media, even when it's not done by vets, creates a deeper and more compelling grasp of things because of the talents of the communicators.

One other thing - my dad would never watch Combat with me as a kid. It was then and remains now a pretty darn good depiction of platoom level combat in Europe, somewhat sanitized of course. But those who were there didn't need to see it to know it was there and the rest of us, well... But I don't think those vets, my dad or my teachers would have objected to hot dogs, cokes, corn, pie and a game. That after all is what they were fighting for.

 But those are Principles....what about Prices ? Which Buster certainly knew but we may forget - or at least fail to keep at the front of our consciousness.

 Hopefully this little multi-media "essay" is more eloquent than I could have been. Because what we should be celebrating and remembering on Memorial Day is Citizenship. What it is, what it's worth and what it costs. None of which is measured in money but calls for the expenditure of "Our Lives, Our Fortunes and Our Sacred Honor" when the time is right.

Below you'll find some more vidclips and other writings excerpts. The one that I truly recommend for thoughtful reading and contemplation is Teddy Roosevelt's on "Citizenship in a Republic". There is no better discussion in my mind that takes a deep, practical and idealistic look at what is required. Hopefully we'll see more of that in the future...though we've certainly seen plenty in the past ! 

Continue reading "Remembering Remembrance Day(Memorial Day): the Nature and Price of Citizenship" »

Posted by dblwyo at 01:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well it's not only Sunday morning, and therefore, time for our usual effort at something a bit more reflective. It's also Mother's Day which will be widely celebrated for good reason. We'd like to take a bit of a different tack, not surprisingly, and reflect on the prices paid by Mother's Sons that we might enjoy and celebrate the day. Below is a collection of readings, excerpts and pointers to vidclips that make our points for us so it doesn't seem like much more comment is required. What we'd ask of you therefore is to take a bit of time to read and reflect, perhaps watch a vidclip or three. If, like myself, you've never served in the military it's always hard to put yourself in the other's shoes and emphathize with their experiences though we owe it to ourselves to try. It is, perhaps, much easier to sympathize. So just remember that as we celebrate this day that our ability to do so rests ultimately on what Lincoln called "so costly a sacrifice on the alter of Liberty". And on these Mothers raising sons, and now daughters, who are willing to step up and pay the full cost of citizenship.

One final observation - it's often writing and other creative works, non-fiction and fiction, that often best allow us to experience the Other. Taking advantage of technology we conclude with a favorite episode of one of our all-time favorite TV shows, Babylon 5. This one is called GROPOs and, at least by our lights, tells as good a story about the human costs as anything we know of. Plus, to persuade you to watch it, it's as fine a piece of drama as anything IOHO. 

Readings

Bush gives Medal of Honor to Navy SEAL Navy SEAL Michael A. Monsoor had fast thinking to do when a live grenade came out of nowhere to bounce off his chest: Take the clear path to safety that he had but his comrades didn't, try to toss it safely away, or throw himself on top of it. With barely an instant's hesitation on that Iraqi rooftop, Monsoor took the last course, sacrificing his life to save the men around him. For that, President Bush on Tuesday awarded him the Medal of Honor. In an East Room ceremony, Bush presented the nation's highest military honor to Monsoor's still-grieving parents, Sally and George Monsoor. About 250 guests, including his sister and two brothers, fellow SEALS, other Medal winners, many friends and GOP Sen. John McCain and other members of Congress, looked on quietly. "The Medal of Honor is awarded for an act of such courage that no one could rightly be expected to undertake it," Bush said. "Yet those who knew Michael Monsoor were not surprised when he did."

• First hand account of medal of Honor recipient George Wahlen for his service as a medic during the World War II battle of Iwo Jima. (YouTube Vidclip).
• The American Soldier's Journeys  A short look at American fighting men through the history of film. A film montage that tells a story (YouTube Vidclip)
• Disturbing Phone Call - WARNING: Soldier Language. Parents of a soldier in Afghanistan received a disturbing phone call from their son when his cell phone inadvertently called home during battle.

a slide-show essay on Bill Mauldin's one-of-a-kind war cartoons.

Michael Yon's "Moment of Truth in Iraq" Michael Yon is one of those unusual Americans who emerge in wartime to do the jobs that need to be done. The job he is doing is covering combat in Iraq at the gritty, confusing and valiant level of close combat, and doing so with honesty, passion and professional expertise. His new book, "Moment of Truth in Iraq," testifies to that. Yon isn't World War II's Ernie Pyle, he's the Global War on Terror's Michael Yon. This is a different war with a very different media environment. Yon "self-embedded" with U.S. combat units in 2005 -- paying his own way and getting donations through his Website michaelyon-online.com. Given the Internet and digital technology, it isn't really surprising that emails and Web logs (blogs) have been the richest sources of detailed, day-to-day combat reporting. Yon is part of this new media environment. His technique, however, is Pyle's -- be there with the troops, with the Iraqis, in the vehicles, on foot patrols, in the alleys and in the homes, then tell what happened and tell it well. Yon writes: "I prefer to write what I see with my own eyes in the streets and on the battlefield, to paint a picture as intimate and rich in detail as I can, and then ... let the reader come to his own understanding." Twice already I've read out loud the following passage from "Moment of Truth" in its entirety, and both times my small audience asked, "Why don't we hear more stories like this?" Michael Yon Online

BABYLON 5: GROPOs

 Just to repeat myself a bit here's the B5 episode that we're recommending. It starts out kinda fund and just starts raising deeper and deeper questions of what it means to be a Soldier. And what it means to be a friend or family member of a soldier. The denonuement, to use a very fancy word for a very emotional scene without words, comes at the very last few minutes. After a build-up over the whole show. But you be the judge. Total cost...about 45 min. Total benefit... priceless ? Though we may have given it away with the scene we've clipped out, mostly in search of motivation.But, in our humble estimation, when you here the USN Corpsman talk so carefully about his experiences that it's difficult to grasp the raw ugliness this helps wrap a real context around those bare, simple words. If you have trouble with the graphic try this URL: http://video.aol.com/video/video-category/1668166 

Continue reading "Really Re-membering Mother's Day: the Prices of Freedom" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of my favorite TV shows is NUMB3RS which combines crime, science and geekiness to arrive at a rather unique and intriguing, as well as entertaining, mix. And somehow they manage to tackle real issues is a real way - some of their episodes on LA gang warfare are deeply & scarily informative. They also from time-to-time really catch something on a wave. Last year they had a show on religious cults and teenage brides for polygamists which turned out to be very timely. Last night's was on a religious cult poisoned by a con man who didn't believe in medical treatment, at least on the surface. But in reality is was really and exploration of Science Vs Religion....dogma vs dogma. Yet at the end of the day it dove deeper yet and became about Science & Religion....faith working with faith.

Would that it might be. Clicking on the link won't just enlarge but will take you to the on-line show. Just think about all the technology, entertainment, business, skills and resources that have to converge to create that not-so-little miracle. That we take for granted, having lost surprise and thereby our sense of wonder. Speaking of "miracles" and pictures last Su's post had a graphic on the evolution of religion which I forgot to link to an expansion. Sorry as it was a key part of the argument. We've since corrected that and can go back but if you click on it here it takes you to a complete on-line slideshow which is also downloadable if you'd care to have your own copy. The dynamic slide on the historical evolution of religion over 20 millenia bears pretty directly on the issues and provides some perspectives.

What makes the NUMB3RS show so incredibly timely, not just for us, is that Ben Stein has just come out with a new movie attacking Darwin, evolutionary theory, defending Intelligent Design & Creationism and linking Darwinism to the Holocaust. And he had the chutzpah to ask the editors of Scientific American to review it ! Sadly this goes beyond disingenuous to dangerous and deceptive. Worse it's counter-productive, fuels the disagreements into fires and is in fact grossly incorrect on several fronts. Not least of which is the wrong-headed view that theology doesn't accept evolution.

A view I originally got from a friend who's also a world famous biblical scholar and head of a major divinity school but one which you'll find supported in the readings by a former Dominican priest who's also one of the most distinguished and influential evolutionary biologists in the world. An unnecessary conflict that's done untold damage over centuries but particularly in the last which seems to be based on the view that there's only one single domain of knowledge and either Science or Religion will win in a zero-sum game of dominance. Or arrange a treaty to split things out.

 Toward the end of the 19thC that seems to be what was being worked out in general. The armed truce would be that each would take sovereignty in its' own domain and leave the other's alone. With the question open as to whether the two domains were entirely separate or over-lapping though "clearly" disparate. Which unfortunately left the rest of us wondering in the darkness as to which to choose. Worse yet by conceeding the ground religion ended up retreating out of the world and into its' own little nook and cranny while Scientism (NOTE - not Science) pushed an exclusionary agenda of materialism and rationalism. As late as the 1960s Time could run a cover on "God is Dead" and mean it. Yet for all the criticisms of religious intolerance and violence we'd ask you to recall that it was materialist ideologies that brought us the worst wars and organized inhumanity in history. Look up the casualties for WW1 or WW2 sometime, notice how many of them were civilians. Or check out the hundreds of millions killed under Communist regimes. Need we mention the Holocaust ?

There seem to be several parts to the problem. One is the implicit argument on the part of "Science" that everything is knowable and bounded and we'll eventually get to the point where we can resolve our issues and questions. "Unfortunately" Science has been conceding that dogmatic absolutism because it had to. While it works very well i areas where it applies it doesn't in fact address the big questions. Steven Weinberg's famous "we've found no meaning in the Universe" observation leads to the counter-question of so, why do you keep working ? The obvious answer is that he likes his work, thinks he's making a contribution and....wait for it....creating meaning thru his efforts. And we ask you how wonderful and mysterious a world is it where someone can create a great new physics theory ? Or a poem or a symphony or a TV Show ? Or the miracle of miracles a baby. Who will grow up to become a conscious, self-aware person capable of appreciating all these other miracles. Or creating them themselves !

It would appear that what we really have is a world, or Universe if you prefer, where there are many things we cannot in fact resolve but are too important to be left undecided. Ones which we must by both necessity and our natures investigate and act on. As several of the last posts argued values and beliefs are central to both personal happiness and the cohesion and stability of our societies. When we let them go or adopt the wrong ones we end up with Holocausts...or the Khmer Rouge slaughtering their own populations in the name of the People.

There will probably always be a great set of Mysteries which we cannot ignore. There's also a great set of unknowns who's boundaries and frontiers we need to explore and push back. The question is how and with what tools. In the process of turning the Unknown into the Known while also recognizing and accepting the Mysterious Science, Religion and Culture all have major roles to play. And better that they should not just accept each other's existence but move beyond that to active, productive collaboration. Who knows what magic might result from such synergies ? What we do know is that, literally, the fate of Civilization depends on it.

Civilization and civil societies are NOT accidents but the result of serious, disciplined and idealistic effort. Which require all three knowledge areas to make proactive and productive contributions. Sadly this is not a new discovery. One of the excerpts below takes you to Theodore Roosevelt's great speech on Science and Religion in which he, among other things, castigates each for it's narrow-mindedness, dogmatism and parochialism. A great speech by a politician (!) on the most difficult and subtle philosophical problem of the age. Worse and sadder it was made before ideological dogmatism proceeded to bring us a century of war and destruction and inhumanity.

Now, having run history's largest and most expensive field experiments in political economy, we can re-discover and apply things it turns out that we've already known. The other essay we'll particularly point to is "Breaking the Galilean Spell" by one of the most distinguished evolutionary theorists in the world who's goal is to return to a sense of the Sacred from within Science. The first of what we hope are many major signs of the beginnings of the new frontiers.

Continue reading "Science vs or plus Religion: From Disingenuous to New Frontiers" »

Posted by dblwyo at 09:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It being Sunday morning it seemed, again, the appropriate time to step back for some reflections on values. And given some of the news and events of the last couple of weeks even more so. For one thing it was the Jewish Passover celebration and if you've never had a chance to participate in a Seder it's a wonderful experience. And the Pope wrapped up his visit to the US and enjoyed the applause of the Faithful, a lot of bashing from the pundits and shallow coverage from the media who seemed to have missed some incredibly substantive speeches. Perhaps the best discussion of his visit was, again, on Charlie Rose.

Now if you've been following along it may be clear that we consider values and beliefs as fundamental characteristics of any society - and more importantly foundational for the health and future prospects of society. In our opinion we squandered the happy decade of the '90's, took our prosperity and prospects for granted and indulged in a "values" debate on superficial issues. Not the real ones - which we view as what values and beliefs are appropriate and work for the world we face. Answers to which questions determine the long-term resilience and adaptability of society and individual. Now we've poked at the question from an individual basis a couple of times before ( Re-visiting Ramblin Randy: Do the Best You Can with What You've Got ) looking at what lessons we can draw from Randy Pausch's experiences. We've also looked at the role and importance of values in long-term social performance ( Putting the Pieces Together: Framing, Crisis & Linkages). Here we'd like to begin weaving the two together just a little bit.

Now this is an area we've been exploring for some time and you'll find some readings and excerpts below we've found particularly valuable, including excerpts and links for three of the Pope's most important speeches. We think you'll be rather surprised because in addition to what was reported he emphasizes the importance of renewing spirituality in and for the modern world. In earlier works, including an encyclical, he's also emphasize the dual roles and complementarities of Science and Faith. A synergy which unfortunately the "Scientism" community is willing to deny and denigrate. But the real trigger for this post was a column by David Brooks in which he laments the passing of enchantment and a sense of mystery about the world, lost since the Middle Ages, due to the rise and "triumph" of Science. As it happens we think he's capture the symptoms of the problem but mis-diagnosed it. But we'll pursue that inquiry in the future. For now let's focus on why values are important and how they've been wrestled with thru millenia. The charts below BtW come from some slides we put together which are available in a downloadable form. (Value Systems Evolution:20 Millenia of Religious Exploration) 

Why Religion is Important

 The question we think Ramblin Randy really pointed to was what ground do you stand on ? That is what fundamental beliefs do you think should govern your life, guide your choices, explain your role and position in the world and help understand the world and the Universe you must live in ? These are question mankind has wrestled with as long as we've been conscious. The earliest art was related to our views on life, death and happiness. In wrestling with those questions, in standing witness to life and experiencing it, there are different key questions and approaches that must be addressed. Many of which we've lost sight of in the modern world - or failed to cope with particularly well. Perhaps the first is that the world can be an ugly and painful place and our security in it is purchased on a foundation of violence and power. Something many are in denial over. Another question is the relative roles and influences of Faith and Reason. Until the 1500s, and then only in the West, it was wonder at the Great Mysteries that dominated our religious inquiries. In the West we thought we'd discovered a new faith in a materialist Science that would resolve all these questions - a faith that's failed. Another avenue of exploration is High Culture - art, literature, music etc. Which at their best hold up a mirror of the world to us and at their very best help us touch the Divine - that mysterious place beyond words, logic and analysis. The final avenue is Inspiration - the acceptance that words are not the Word and there's a place where logic fails us.

Religious Evolution

 Those are the questions that every faith, religion, philosophy, ideology or value system must wrestle with, one way or another. Including of course denying their value or relevance. Yet while the answers, insights and dogmas have varied thruout the ages much of value has been gained, transformed and transmitted. In the busy little chart here (the slideshow is easier btw) you can see how religions have evolved. While we were wandering bands and tribes the dominant belief systems were a naturalistic animism, Shamanism, which sees the world as a magical though not necessarily safe place. But each system reflects the experiences of the world of the time. As Agriculture became more widespread simple Shamanism gave way to worship of the Mother Goddess based on a deep apprehension of the recurring cycles of the world. Then with the rise of the early Cities and more structured and organized societies as well as early discoveries in Math and Astronomy we came to see the world as a more ordered and orderable place. As Cities grew and the early city-states and empires emerged the hierarchical religions morphed yet again. And with the great disruptions of the Axial Age the belief in order as a given, with the proper propitiations of the gods, was shattered. Out of that turmoil the foundations for all of the world's major modern religions was laid. Yet thru each age the insights of the prior age weren't entirely discarded as many of the characteristics and characters were adopted, adapted and transformed to answer the new challenges. One can for example trace the sustained role of the Mother Goddess thru the early Sumerian's and Egyptians to modern Hindui and Christian beliefs and practices. On that consider if you like the opening sequences of the DaVinci Code. In other words, as we've tried to show, religious insights accumulate and build on one another as well as being created in the pressures of the time. But for millenia there was a "uniform" field - that is religion and beliefs were insuperable from the other parts of society. With the rise of Science in the 1500s an entirely new approach was created that challenged these traditional approaches. Yet in 500 years of exploration, debate and change, more rapid and disruptive than in any previous time, the same questions had to be faced.

Modern Challenges

Questions that we're now realizing won't go away and aren't readily answerable by materialist presumptions. It turns out that Science for all it's power and usefulness doesn't deal with the Big Questions. And in fact admits that they can't be resolved. Nor is the alternate answer that they can be neglected very workable either. When you reach an impasses of this sort, where the tools you have at hand no longer work and don't appear to promise to work in the future you need to consider alternatives. And when those questions are too important to be neglected or set aside, on both an individual and collective basis, because they are vital for personal happiness and the health of our civilizations then they are too critical to be left fallow. The fact of the matter is that we will resolve them in one way or another. But some ways are much better than others. And it is in finding those better paths forward that are challenges lie. 

Continue reading "Faith, Hope and Enchantment: Why Religion Matters...More" »

Posted by dblwyo at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A while back we put up post on Randy Pausch and his inspirational Last Lecture (Sunday Morning Reflections: Ramblin Randy's Rules of Life, Living and Love) which we're given to understand wasn't too badly recieved in certain quarters. Since that time his Wiki page has been refreshed, he's had a wonderful interview with Diane Sawyer on ABC's Good Morning America (actually a whole 1-hour special) and his new book has come out (The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and Jeffrey Zaslow). We think those are all worth your time and his discussion with his co-author Jeff Zaslow about his motivations and thought process is a particularly good place to start. But the real place to follow-on is Randy's reprise of his Time Managment Lecture at the Univ. of Virginia. That may seem like an odd place to go from here but if you watch we think you'll find it's not. In his background discussion with Zaslow he puts his whole approach in a nutshell - "you do the best you can with the circumstances as they are". He puts it a little differently of course so listen for yourself.

Now in our last post this was our summary:

But there's one final, almost subliminal lesson that's a big one and Randy doesn't mention nor have any of his commentators. Each of his major career milestones, any of which would be sufficient laurels for a whole career, had some key characteristics that we think are really important and, on reflection, are important at least to us.

1. They were all really...really hard. Both technically and organizationally. by which we mean politically. They crossed discipline and organizational boundaries and were cross-grained to the way the institutions he was in worked. And boy do we mean CROSS.
2. They all reached out to other people and found a way to get them involved, committeed and contributory.
3. And they all had and have larger implications and potential benefits for the well-being of the world. Other people in other words. As the Shakers say, "Hands to Work and Hearts to God".

With all the myriad problems we spend most of our time talking about on this blog and our modest attempts to sort the unsensible into sense and then chart a path forward it's not Randy's obvious lessons that are most important. It's that to address and solve these challenges we need to take his lessons and his example and find ways to work for and with others for the betterment of us all.

The Last Lecture sets out some principles and it has been inspirational for millions, leading them literally to take Randy's example as a trigger to get them to seize control of their lives. But there are two questions, or challenges, that Randy doesn't answer there. Sorta the Big Before and the Big After. The Big After is how do you conduct yourself. Well the Time Management Lecture is a big first step in that direction. The Big Before is how did he find ground to stand on. And it is the fundamental one we all face no matter what our backgrounds, creeds or religions. A partial answer is his parents, upbringing and mentors of course - on which he waxed eloquent. But there's much more to it than that and we certainly don't have any answers. Nor even attempts that would hold up  to the standards that've been set here. At some point we'll try to offer up is a cobbled together approach for finding your ground. But for now let's focus on lessons from Ramblin Randy - because it's about how to live your life...not just "Time Management".

In other words how do you make the most out of the time you've got ? Here's Randy's Rules for translating Principles into Actions... 

Continue reading "Re-visiting Ramblin Randy: Do the Best You Can with What You've Got" »

Posted by dblwyo at 12:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Back last Sept. the WSJ broke a wonderful story about Randy Pausch, a Carnegie-Mellon compsci prof who was giving the Last Lecture. Now in a last lecture the idea is to distill down what you've learned in your career and life and want to pass on to your students and the rest of the world. In other words the most fundamental things you've learned about life, living and how to conduct yourself. There was one small difference, which you may already know. Randy Pausch had/has terminal pancreatic cancer, one of the most incurable, debilitating and painful cancers. His last lecture was in a very real sense truly a Last Lecture. The WSJ vidclip at right will give you a brief taste of an hour-long lecture but the whole thing is much more valuable and interesting. If that doesn't work try the hyperlink instead.

Randy's last lecture was so humorous, brave, entertaining and full of hard-bought practical wisdom that it tore around the internet and then the country like wildfire. The Journal was swamped with comments, ABC interviewed him and named him the person of the week and he eventually had a follow-up interview and reprised lecture on Oprah.

BTW - Randy is still hanging in there with ups and downs and you can follow them on his health update page here. So far so-so but he's far exceeded the limits of the original estimates and his upbeat approach to life and living have to be part of the reason. As he said you have to decide between being Eeyore or Tigger.

Randy's approach is an example for us all. The thing we wonder about though is how many of the thousands of people who watched the clips or his full lecture, who were greatly moved and filled to over-flowing with human sympathy actually turned the lecture to the purposes it was intended for. At least for us because Randy did it for his kids as a memory. 

We figured it was time enough that the intital emotional surge had both died down and passed away. Time in other words to re-visit the good Prof and see who we could bring with us. Because his words need to be though about carefully, mindfully and reflectively. You may not, and probably shouldn't take all his goals and rules exactly as your own. A view we suspect he'd agree with. What we'd suggest though is that a real legacy would be if you listened to this and went and thought thru your own values, goals and habits. And then used Randy's example as a spur to focusing on them.

Because a lot of people face challenges as severe as his, and many of those aren't anywhere near as fortunate in their innate talents, upbringing, or opportunities. Which takes nothing away from the Prof.'s accomplishments or messages. Quite the contrary. Ordinary people face "ordinary" challenges each and very day of living and if this lecture can help them develop ways to better cope, whether or not they're in extremis, that's a real legacy. 

Continue reading "Sunday Morning Reflections: Ramblin Randy's Rules of Life, Living and Love" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Some time ago we made the acquaintence of William James, the powerful, famous and almost unknown and under-appreciated American philosopher. Who we read and re-read and find more relevant to the issues of the day from psychology to religion to philosophy every time. Imagine our delight and surprise to find that Steven Pinker, one of the great modern thinkers in psychology and mind-science, when asked by the WSJ to come up with his five best books on human nature came up with the following list:

Books That Explore Human Nature Five best books on Human Nature. 1. The Principles of Psychology By William James. You'd think that a subject as rich as human nature would inspire a cornucopia of great science writing. But it's easier to find readable masterpieces from fields like mathematics and evolution than it is from scientific psychology. Still, a few works endure that are both intellectually meaty and written with panache. William James's "The Principles of Psychology," for instance, has stood the test of time. In this two-volume work of more than 1,000 pages, he shows how humans are at once governed by habits of mind and emotion but also free to act as they see fit. James is the Mark Twain of psychology, fun to read and a source of zingy quotes for every occasion. "To the broody hen the notion would probably seem monstrous that there should be a creature in the world to whom a nestful of eggs was not the utterly fascinating and precious and never-to-be-too-much-sat-upon object which it is to her." 2. The Strategy of Conflict By Thomas C. Schelling. 3. Yanomamö By Napoleon A. Chagnon. 4. The Nurture Assumption By Judith Rich Harris. 5. Words and Things By Roger Brown

Continue reading "WRFest 9Mar08(Culture): Walking with James thru Human Nature" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There's a great story running around the web which we reproduce below about a parking lot confrontation between an aging WW2 vet and a singing doctor. It's worth a read and a listen all on its' own but afterwards take yourself a step or two back and frame the picture, put it in a bigger context and ask yourself what we learn. I'll pick up that thread more below but here's a hint: troubles schmubles.

Actually (UPDATE) it occurs to me something more than a hint is necessary - this post starts with this great story and video on what the Greatest Generation did, for themselves and us. But is goes on to ask and answer the really hard question: SO WHAT ?

And the answer to that is we take for granted so much that we inherited from these folks but also underestimate what they did for us. And in particular what the whole GG did - for example WW2 was badfor us but incomparably worse for the rest of the world. But most importantly we go on compare what we face today (not much in comparison) and ask the second great question. What happens if we squander this window of opportunity to address our problems now and wait until we get our own chance to be a great generation. Remember..most of the challenges these folks had to deal with could have been avoided or mitigated ! Think about that.Troubles, schmubles indeed.

The elderly parking lot attendant wasn't in a good mood!

Neither was Sam Bierstock. It was around 1 a.m., and Bierstock, a Delray Beach , Fla. , eye doctor, business consultant, corporate speaker and musician, was bone tired after appearing at an event.

He pulled up in his car, and the parking attendant began to speak. "I took two bullets for this country and look what I'm doing," he said bitterly. At first, Bierstock didn't know what to say to the World War II veteran. But he rolled down his window and told the man, "Really, from the bottom of my heart, I want to thank you." Then the old soldier began to cry. "That really got to me," Bierstock says.

Cut to today.

Bierstock, 58, and John Melnick, 54, of Pompano Beach - a member of Bierstock's band, Dr. Sam and the Managed Care Band - have written a song inspired by that old soldier in the airport parking lot. The mournful "Before You Go" does more than salute those who fought in WWII. It encourages people to go out of their way to thank the aging warriors before they die. "If we had lost that particular war, our whole way of life would have been shot," says Bierstock, who plays harmonica. "The WW II soldiers are now dying at the rate of about 2,000 every day. I thought we needed to thank them."

The song is striking a chord. Within four days of Bierstock placing it on the! Web the song and accompanying photo essay have bounced around nine countries, producing tears and heartfelt thanks from veterans, their sons and daughters and grandchildren. "It made me cry," wrote one veteran's son. Another sent an e-mail saying that only after his father consumed several glasses of wine would he discuss " the unspeakable horrors" he and other soldiers had witnessed in places such as Anzio , Iwo Jima, Bataan and Omaha Beach . "I can never thank them enough," the son wrote. "Thank you for thinking about them."

Bierstock and Melnick thought about shipping it off to a professional singer, maybe a Lee Greenwood type, but because time was running out for so many veterans, they decided it was best to release it quickly, for free, on the Web. They've sent the song to Sen. John McCain and others in Washington . Already they have been invited to perform it in Houston for a Veterans Day tribute - this after just a few days on the Web. They hope every veteran in America gets a chance to hear it.

Continue reading "You Think We've Got Troubles: Looking Back to the Greatest Generation" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There were a lot of interesting stories this last week, which led to the 3-part split you've seen today. But a useful aspect is that it allows me to wrap some narrative introduction around each big category and linke them together. If the Int'l Section focused on progress and it's requirements the Domestic Section flipped the coin to ask what kind of government and policies do we want, need and will get. The two are not seperate questions. Nor is this third readfest post which focuses on Culture and Science. But what we're really looking at here is what values, choices & capabilities we choose to have or develop.

So what's your answer ?

Unlike the survey pundits Values have never been a proxy for social policy, e.g. "Right to Life". Values are about the rules that one chooses to live by, or one learns with time and experience. Of course nobody does that in a vacuum - in this case there are two very interesting posts. One on the split in Hollywood over what makes a good movie. Who cares - well in my mind movies reflect and shape our values. They are to us what the shamans, bards and poets were in their day - our repository of stories we tell ourselves about how to prosper in the world. The other side of the house is "High Culture" which has yet again come forth with a screed against all things popular. Not for their own sake but because it's dumbing down America. Not entirely sure I disagree - have you every seen an NFL playbook or game plan. Stupid or uneducated people don't make and use such things. But you decide.

Because if those people focus their talents and energies just on playing a better football game then we do have a problem. We're starting to see some real major initiatives in tackling all the serious issues we face in the world. Where instead of pursuing things in their traditional isolated and parochial silos various disciplines are establishing major efforts designed to work across time and involve all the relevent discipliens. Hallaluah ! I say. About damm time. These are serious times and we need serious...well you know the rest, right ?

At the end of the day what is Faith without Good Works. In other words Vision and Strategy are great things. But the road to Camelot was paved with good intentions and nobody got there. Having squandered our best window of opportunity (which if you still haven't figure it out I'll admit po's me just a tiny bit) we need to turn these values, visions, and discoveries into actions, solutions, products and services.

Let's let the new CEO of Pepsi, both a popular culture and business icon, have the last word here:

The Pepsi challenge CEO Indra Nooyi says the giant can go healthy, but cola wars and corn prices will test her leadership. Nooyi didn't wait to become an elder statesman CEO before making herself heard on the public stage. Her predecessor, Steven Reinemund, calls her a "larger-than-life leader." In a speech to the food industry in January, she pushed the group to tackle obesity. "Do you remember campaigns like 'Keep America beautiful'? What about 'Buckle up'?" she asked. "I believe we need an approach like this to attack obesity. Let's be a good industry that does 100% of what it possibly can - not grudgingly but willingly." At the 2008 World Economic Forum in Davos she told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice it was critically important that "we use corporations as a productive player in addressing some of the big issues facing the world."

Continue reading "WRFest 23Feb08(Culture/Science): How Much for that Fish in the Window ?" »

Posted by dblwyo at 06:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The prior post, while our regular weekly collection of interesting stories and links, had a couple of central themes. One of which is what kind of world do you want to live in ? A question that's with us every day in how we live our lives but is also central to this year's elections. On both a personal, micro level and on a community, national and macro level. In fact it is, at least subliminally, THE central question of the election though not yet at center stage among the punditry. It IS however center stage with voters, especially for the younger folks.

I recently ran across an interesting set of comments on these topics by, of all people, Warren Buffett. The Investment guru of the century and the folksy sage of Omaha. Now as it happens he was supposed to be speaking about security analysis and investments. But he began his time with a focus on the values that make for a happy life. And ended it with comments on the nature of the world and what kind of world we'd like it to be. 

Now I'd recommend watching all ten parts of this vidclip series but the picture at right will take you to Part 1 on individual values, which is as good an argument for living a life of integrity, finding good work that you love and being satisfied with a reasonable lifestyle as any I've ever heard. And a pragmatic and workable one as well. Zen-like in fact when you parse it out.

Part 10 which talks about the nature of the world is, in my view even more interesting. It riffs on Warren's idea of the Ovarian Lottery. That if you're in his audience you've already WON because you're an American, a college student and have the drive, ambition and intelligence to leverage your opportunities.

He's not, emphatically NOT, picking on anybody in particular but putting some real ground truths out there (and bear in mind this speech was circa 1998). Here's a paraphrase on his model Supposed God dropped by and asked your help in re-designing the world ? Here's the catch - once you put  your specifications out there then your name goes back in the lottery bowl and gets re-drawn. Suppose God reaches in and pulls out 100 marbles and your name is on one. In '98 the chances were about 1 in 20 at best that you'd even be an American. Of that one maybe 1 in 3 or 1 in 4 would be a college student. Which is no guarantee of anything. Nontheless with a reasonable level of effort such a person is going to live a life that's healthy, fairly well rewarded, eat good food, drink good wine, see interesting places and have a fair shot at doing rewarding work to make their way. What about the other 19 ? Their chances ain't so good.

Well that makes things pretty darn clear to me - I'd like a world where a larger portion had a better chance. Where that portion grew fairly rapidly and their share of things got better and better.

The thing is that's not just me or idiosynchratic - it's been the goal of most people now and thruout history. But now, more than at any other time in history more people have a shot. And more and more will have a shot if we can keep the wheels on the wagon as it roars down the hill.

Let me put it another way. In fact try these three:

1. Would you rather have a larger slice of a smaller pie or a smaller slice of a much bigger pie ?
2. Odd paradox - I'm better off when we're all better off. And y'all are better off, all things being equal, when I'm better off. Making it really intellectually painful btw that's a fundamental tenet of economics. And the basis for the socio-biology of our evolutionary history as a social species.
3. If we don't build a world where everybody has a better shot at a bigger slice there's always a pretty chance we can end up spending all our time squabbling over who gets which slice of a smaller pie. And in the process dropping the whole thing on the floor and making a mess.

Posted by dblwyo at 08:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Gratitude Campaign is an effort by Seatlite Scott Truitt to find a simple way to let our military folks apprecite what they're doing for. Irrespective of your own politics or how you feel about Iraq or the War on Terror in General they're putting it on the line for us. And doing their duty as they were asked to do their duty.

"Greater love hath no man than a mother cat dying to defend her kittens"

Robert A. Heinlein 

I doubt that many of us can appreciate what it's like to be downrange without being there, even if we know someone who's been in the real. But the dedication, hard work, risks and repeated going "In Harm's Way" our service folk are giving all that we can ask of them.

Here's the Web Address URL:

http://www.gratitudecampaign.org/index.php 

So let us all set aside politics to express our appreciation for what our fellow citizens are doing with their citizenship in support of the Republic.

VAYA con DIOS to them all. 

Posted by dblwyo at 12:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What are Leaders without Followers ? No one can be a George Washington without being able to persuade others that the path they want to walk is the right one. In fact the best leadership is that which helps the group (the society) find and express that path and commit to it with energy. Yet at the same time helps to shape it, stimulates the emergence of the best and guides its' development.

In other words there is an interaction with the citizens of a society which shapes the future and the character of the citizenry is as important as that of the leaders. In fact they are co-dependent and co-evolutionary. There are many qualities we could consider but three stand out, in my mind: Respect, Tolerance and Civitas. We explore those qualities more below but before digging in let's look at the principles of conduct, personal and social, enunciated by another great man. Before naming him let us frame the situation by looking to William James:

The mutations of societies, then, from generation to generation, are in the main due directly or indirectly to the acts or the examples of individuals whose genius was so adapted to the receptivities of the moment, or whose accidental position of authority was so critical that they became ferments, initiators of movements, setters of precedent or fashion, centers of corruption, or destroyers of other persons, whose gifts, had they had free play, would have led society in another direction.

Societies of men are just like individuals, in that both at any given moment offer ambiguous potentialities of development. Whether a young man enters business or the ministry may depend on a decision which has to be made before a certain day. He takes the place offered in the counting-house, and is committed. Little by little, the habits, the knowledges, of the other career, which once lay so near, cease to be reckoned even among his possibilities. ... It is no otherwise with nations. They may be committed by kings and ministers to peace or war, by generals to victory or defeat, by prophets to this religion or that, by various geniuses to fame in art, science or industry. Great Men, Great Thoughts, and the Environment

 You may have guessed from the illustration that our next exemplar of a great man is Muhammad, Seal of the Prophets of Islam. Out of respect for some practioners beliefs on representation we show a calligraphic representation of his name and fundamental tenets, "There is No God But Allah and Muhammad is His Prophet". In the 7th C his insights and wisdoms made as profound an impact on the world as any leader ever has. And obviously that impact continues to today !

Despite the headlines and events of the last several years when you dig into the Five Pillars of Islam and its social teachings they present a code of conduct, of citizenship, that one can't help but admire. In fact in reading about them the transformation of my own views was personally startling. They are tenets we would wish all citizens of all societies would adopt and adapt. 

Continue reading "Practicing the Spirit: Respect, Tolerance and Civitas" »

Posted by dblwyo at 08:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Let's keep on with the notion of the broad aspects of Christmas Spirit - previously we asked what is it and what are its' consequences, either by presence or absence. Sometimes, in fact often if not always, we forget what we owe to those who went before us and what contributions they have made to our current peace and prosperities. In some circles this is called Leadership and it calls for Leaders who put the welfare of the public ahead of their own immediate gain. More importantly, it calls for Leaders who have a vision of Moral Leadership and fundamental bedrock values that they will adhere to in pursuit of the general welfare under the most trying of circumstances. The WSJ recently published a historical story about Gen. Washington's resignation of his commission that provides perhaps the best illustration of this I've ever heard of.

Washington's Gift Our revolution could have ended in despotism, like so many others. There is a Christmas story at the birth of this country that very few Americans know. It involves a single act by George Washington -- his refusal to take absolute power -- that affirms our own deepest beliefs about self-government, and still has profound meaning in today's world. To appreciate its significance, however, we must revisit a dark period at the end of America's eight-year struggle for independence. … the previous eight months had been a time of terrible turmoil and anguish for Gen. Washington, outwardly always so composed. His army had been discharged and sent home, unpaid, by a bankrupt Congress -- without a victory parade or even a statement of thanks for their years of sacrifices and sufferings. Even America's best friend in Europe, the Marquis de Lafayette, wondered aloud if the United States was about to collapse. A deeply discouraged Washington admitted he saw "one head turning into thirteen." Was there anyone who could rescue the situation? Many people thought only George Washington could work this miracle. For a long moment, Washington could not say another word. Tears streamed down his cheeks. The words touched a vein of religious faith in his inmost soul, born of battlefield experiences that had convinced him of the existence of a caring God who had protected him and his country again and again during the war. Without this faith he might never have been able to endure the frustrations and rage he had experienced in the previous eight months. This was -- is -- the most important moment in American history. The man who could have dispersed this feckless Congress and obtained for himself and his soldiers rewards worthy of their courage was renouncing absolute power. By this visible, incontrovertible act, Washington did more to affirm America's government of the people than a thousand declarations by legislatures and treatises by philosophers. Thomas Jefferson, author of the greatest of these declarations, witnessed this drama as a delegate from Virginia. Intuitively, he understood its historic dimension. "The moderation. . . . of a single character," he later wrote, "probably prevented this revolution from being closed, as most others have been, by a subversion of that liberty it was intended to establish."

 Do we really need to say much else after reading that excerpt ? Of course we will but take a moment and really stop and think about an act with few if any parallels in history. Consider if you will that Napoleon was a near-contemporary of Washington's, the choices he made and the consequences for history. Or George III's comments that "this made Washington the greatest man in history". Consider  that not only would Washington have been within his "rights" to seize power and protect his soldiers but many thought it would be RIGHT to protect the integrity of the country as well.

Continue reading "Following the Spirit: Leaders, Leadership and the "Wise" Course" »

Posted by dblwyo at 09:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well we're gonna keep up riffs and variations on the Spirit of Christmas for a while. Don't know if you got to the bottom of my "Christmas Card" but it pointed you at the Wikipedia entry for the famous Christmas truce   of 1914. Which should have been more than famous. Yesterday's little reflection on the miracle of Christmas dinner was asking what it takes in the world to make sure that more people have the capability to enjoy such. Now as it happens more people have been brought out of absolute poverty in the last twenty years by economic progress in China and India than at any time in human history. We have the potential to move much of the rest of the population into a more prosperous and human life in the next twenty, but not if there are any more Xmas truces.

Let me quote from Johh Keegan's introduction to his history of the First World War:

It doesn't get any clearer than that, does it ? The first WW1 was unecessary, brutal, wasteful, set the stage for the horrors of the 20thC that followed and destroyed the elan' of Western European civilization. Not sure if anybody recognizes it but there's a great, black irony in that label too - Elan' was French military doctrine where charging with style, grace and ferocity was supposed to overcome any deficiencies in weapons, tactics, strategy or good sense. Here's the thing that occurred to me and keeps on occuring - the futility of trench war was clear and undeniable by Christmas 1914. Whey didn't they just stop ? Right Thinking (Wisdom) is not just a good idea or a Buddhist religious percept (that's not a typo for precept btw). It's survival, prosperity and happiness for millions when we're talking about our national leadership and their grasp on how things work.

It is one thing to read about the horrors of a stupid war and lament the wastages and might-have-beens. It is almost entirely another thing to grasp the emotional impacts and consequences. What it did to the survivors and what it meant for their societies and civilizations. The first time that truly began to sink in for me was R.F. Delderfield's great novel (To Serve Them All My Days ) about a Welsh schoolmaster who's invalided from the front and takes up teaching in an English public school. The book is many things, including the best exploration of what it means to educate the whole person I've ever read (cf. William James, "Talks to Teachers") but it is also about emotional recovery and redemption in the face of life's challenges and tragedies. One of the early scenes is when the lead must console a student who's father, a professional soldier, who's killed in action. Toward the end, the book covers basically 1918-1939/40, that boy is now himself a pro and is killed as part of the rearguard on the retreat to Dunquerque.

A consequence brought on by the fecklessness of the statesman who instead of settling a just and fair resolution at Paris opted instead for a retributive and vengeful, I believe the word is revanchist, strategy. And thereby sowed the seeds of the most destructive war in human history. 

Continue reading "And Peace Unto Men....Practicing Spirit" »

Posted by dblwyo at 01:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well the plan was to dive back into "serious" topics with several more Iraq commentaries already outlined and sourced. Fortunately I can't quite bring myself to do it in light of the season in general and the miracles of yesterday in particular. What miracles are these you ask ? Why the miracles of my Christmas Dinner, says I ! And those would be ?

Miraculous Christmas Dinner Menu

Kir Royale with cheese and pears

Salad with Seasoned Balsamic Dressing

• with Domaine du Pere Caboche Tavel, '07

Marinated and slo-cooked Roast of Pork 

accompanied by Basil Tomato Polentta and Ratatouille

• with Montenevoso Montepulciano D'Abruzzo, '06 

Ghiardelli chocolate with Costa Rican Tarrazu coffee

• finished with Tarrazu, Christian Brothers Brandy VS and CAO Brazilia cigar

At this point what do you think ? Stop for a minute and fix your reactions.

This guy is nuts, that sounds likes a nice little dinner but so what ? Or nice dinner but where's the miracle ? Or even better, other than being Christmas dinner what's all that got to do the Spirit of Christmas ? Particularly with compassion ? And on that line why re-post yesterday's Christmas card ? 

Well my composite card, showing the Annunciation and Manjusri, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom and Compassion, was about wishing the world well. More than that it was about wishing we'd all realize that we could in fact do more than wish each other well but could, in fact, thru Compassion and Wisdom do well for each other. After all what is Faith without Good Works ? 

Well, I'm prepared to argue that there were several miracles in that dinner and, in a certain light, have a lot to do with helping out our fellows. 

Continue reading "Christmas Spirit and Dinner Miracles" »

Posted by dblwyo at 06:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This is Part 3 ( of 3) of a week that saw a lot of interesting postings across the spectrum of our interests. Prior posts focused on Political Economy and the consequences for Politics & Policy. The argument being that economics and economic development is the foundation that underlies all other decisions but the choice of policies and the political processes by which they are developed control the trajectory of the economy. And further that these decisions are reflected in the rules of the game, the Institutions, by which we managed our societies and our relationships between societies. The third leg of that stool however is values – and this week was a huge swath of interesting and valuable readings, albeit some very painful ones, on Values and Culture.

Stop and ask yourself what are your values ? That is, what are the principles by which you and those around you evaluate the world, make choices and judge the state of things ? Everybody has values, reflected in the choices they make, even when those values aren’t explicit, thought out or formal. What do you think they should be ? What role do you think they should play ? What is the value of values ? Now those are important and fundamental questions.

Values help tell use who we are, our place in the world, how we relate to others and what we expect of them. In particular they are the glue that holds are societies together. Let me borrow from Douglas North, Nobel laureate in Economics, who says “The greater the specialization and divisions of labor in a society, the greater the measurement of costs associated with transacting and also the greater the costs of devising effective moral and ethical codes”. He goes on, “Strong moral and ethical codes of a society is the cement of social stability which makes an economic system viable”.

In other words the more complex a society and the larger it is the more difficult it is to get everybody to work together rather than pursue their own advantage only. Put more strongly, without a common set of strong, shared values societies are NOT feasible nor is development possible. We’ve spent the better part of the last 100 years testing a) whether or not that’s true and b) whether human kind was some sort of programmable, socially engineerable robot who could be re-programmed to suit the beliefs of the ideologists. In fact I argue that the 20^th C. was the largest field experiment in political economy in history and that the ideologies of Communism and Fascism failed massively and miserably.

Continue reading "Weekly Reader 23Sep07: III Values & Culture" »

Posted by dblwyo at 03:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We're well into August and by and large it's been a lovely summer for us here in Ct. A bit warm on many days but nothing like in prior years; and it cools down at night so the house can be opened up. Quite a bit of rain from time-to-time but many blue and beautiful days. Not only can't complain but actually should celebrate the Summer. Which brings it's own slate of events and occurences besides somewhat predictable weather. Not least of which is the 4th of July. In my little corner of the world that means fireworks, parades (in my little town it's a few veterans, a band or two, lots of Cub/Brownie Scouts, some firetrucks) and picnics. All in in all nothing special. But it is. When you really stop and think, it's very...very special.

Here's a little exercise for you - next time you're driving around your neighborhood imagine a couple or three things. Let's assume folks are pretty decently off - whatever that means to you - so they have jobs, homes, families. None of that happened by accident nor alone. They had to make some effort to get to where they're at - and renew that effort every day. And nobody makes the doors, windows,shingles, cars, food, etc. etc. etc. in all those houses. In fact that's true for all of us - we're comfortably inter-twined in this crazy-quilt network of mutual dependencies and exchanges. And all better off for it by far. If you ever saw some of those History Channel specials, say Iron Age House for example, you have some small glimmer of the efforts involved in just getting a bucket of water.

Now, just supposed you're driving down the street waving at your neighbors and somebody pops around the side of their house and cuts loose with an AK-47 ? A joke ? Unimaginable? Well, not in many places in the world. The fact that we have a shot at making a decent living, in nice neighborhoods filled with the physical things of a good life and are secure from attack and in our families, possessions and rights is not ordained by the fundamental nature of the Universe.

It is a result of a lot of hard work and sacrifice by a lot of folks for a long time - from your neighbors and your efforts to the folks in the local Firehouse to our servicefolk around the world. And all the folks like them for hundres of years back who kept on keeping on. But is particularly due to the efforts of some folks who made extraordinary efforts and sacrifices in those years. And if you wouldn't mind, I'd like to share some reflections on a few and what we owe them. 

Continue reading "Retroactive Reflections on the 4th:Where Were You.....?" »

Posted by dblwyo at 01:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Dan Henninger of the WSJ has a deeply moving review of an even more deeply moving play (which I haven't and won't be able to see right now...SADLY) which if you get a chance to see it sounds as if you should. The highly respected WSJ theater/arts critic Terry Teachout briefly reviews it on his blog though and we reproduce part of it here: (the show information is Beyond Glory )

TT: Southern fried gothic Today's Wall Street Journal drama column contains the first fruit of my recent travels, a rave review of a rare revival of Tobacco Road by Triad Stage, a company based in Greensboro, N.C. I also review the New York premiere of Stephen Lang's Beyond Glory and a production of Pirates! (an updated version of The Pirates of Penzance) at Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, N.J.:

It took long enough, but "Beyond Glory," Stephen Lang's fire-eating portrayal of eight recipients of the Medal of Honor, has finally opened Off Broadway two years after I saw it at Chicago's Goodman Theatre. "Mr. Lang's one-man play is no simple-minded piece of flag-waving," I wrote in this space in 2005. "It is an unsparingly direct portrait of men at war, pushed into narrow corners and faced with hard choices. It is also one of the richest, most complex pieces of acting I've seen in my theatergoing life." I went back to see it again last week, and I stand by every word of my original review....

Lang's play is based on the book Medal of Honor: Portraits of Valor Beyond the Call of Duty and takes eight of the 24 stories contained in as it's source material. And in that spirit here's Henninger's column reproduced in full. At the bottom the Online WSJ video interview with him is embedded and a couple of the projects that the NEW/NPR have organized are referenced, including Operation Homecoming. The goal of that project was to get great writers to hold workshops for the troops so they could tell their own stories.

Faith and Fiber 

The American people may have "Iraq fatigue," but that doesn't mean they've stopped paying attention. A few days ago, the Gallup/USA Today poll reported that, over the past four weeks, belief that the extra troops in Iraq were "making the situation better" rose to 31% from 22%. The percentage who say the new troops don't matter dropped to 41% from 51%. Somehow people have found their way to reports that Gen. Petraeus's counterinsurgency strategy is toting up gains on the ground. Here in the U.S., any such news a half-world away from the troops in Iraq will be processed immediately into the chopped meat of our politics. Example: If the Iraq commitment turns steadily positive, the Democratic leadership's domestic antiwar strategy may leave the party's candidates on thin ice as they slip and slide toward the primary season. This ensures that the war, the one in the U.S., will be fought with recrimination and accusation. Imagine the surprise, then, when the most cathartic experience I've had recently in matters of war or peace was seeing a stage play about . . . war. The play is "Beyond Glory," written and performed by Stephen Lang at the Roundabout Theater in New York. 

Continue reading "Beyond Glory: a Deep Play About Medal of Honor Winners" »

Posted by dblwyo at 10:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)