Must See Movies

It recently came to my attention that some of my younger colleagues do not know who Cary Grant is. Quelle horreur! This is practically beyond my comprehension. Have they just been playing video games their whole lives!?

So to attempt to rectify - here are 2 lists of loosely defined 'classic' films that I urge 'young' people to explore at their most earliest convenience!

Of course there will be plenty of evolved males and females who can cross over this arbitrary line. Plus I hope those with partners will enjoy these together. Per my personal prejudice, I limited the war movie/violence selection.

These films are shown on Turner Classic Movies (cable). And almost all can be found on Apple tv.

Enjoy.

My Awesome Dutch Ancestors

I have just finished an amazing book called The Island at the Center of the World by Russell Shorto.

Even if you don't have Dutch ancestors, it's worth reading to get a more accurate, complete view of the early influences of this country; plus it reads like a page turner novel.

Not only does it include several of my ancestors - discovered by the meticulous 20 year research by my incredible sister - it features some prominently. He calls the couple Catalyntje Trico and Joris Rapalje who arrived in 1624 - the "Adam and Eve of Manhattan" (New Netherlands). How cool is that? 

Several of my ancestors made up one of the first bodies of representative government in the country; 12 people who tried without success to stop Stuyvesant's predecessor, Willem Kieft, from starting a disastrous 1643 war with the previously friendly and generous Indians.  

Plus other ancestors assisted in preventing Stuyvesant from a suicidal retaliation against the English (when they - unprovoked - attacked Manhattan). Bad Puritan Pilgrims! If, instead of acquiescing to the English' generous terms, they had 'fought to the last man', I, and a whole bunch of other descendants would not be here. Thank you Nicasius, Joris, et al!

It helps to explain my interest in politics, strong support for tolerance, love of literature, easy going child rearing, even my taste for cole slaw - it's in my Dutch DNA. In addition to places: Lang Eylant, Breuckelen, Haarlem, Staten Eylan; we have the Dutch to thank for: District Attorneys, the boss, St. a Claus and St Nicholas stockings, cookies, and lots and lots of bars! New Amsterdam was rough, just as the city is today and we acknowledge - that's a large part of its charm.  

Not only is it exciting to learn about history in such a personal way, to know that you come from distinguished stock is kind of emboldening. Now we fight against the powers that be in corporations. Compared to what they did, crossing the Atlantic to an unknown land that didn't even yet have a wooden shack - let alone a Radisson - for them to sleep in? How hard can it be to put up with our modern day disappointments? 

What would my ancestors think of Manhattan today? Despite their vision that it would indeed become a multicultural booming metropolis based on the bustling trade port it was then, I'm sure they would be completely blown away by the skyscrapers poised on top of what used to be their farmland. 

I wish they could see what our lives are like - that I can order any kind of food to be delivered at my door at any hour - that I have this device called an iPhone that lets me make phone calls, access a web of knowledge and watch videos and listen to music - all at the tip of my thumb.  I can cross the Atlantic in a matter of hours instead of at least 4 months. It makes me appreciate those things even more. 

I am so proud of this city that never lost its melting pot roots that go back to the Netherlands homeland. Early Manhattan was welcoming of all the people who came here, and we still are. 

It's good that some things have not changed. 

IDEAS can be dangerous

Although it's too soon to leap to any conclusions about motives in Boston bombing, one thing we've heard via the boys' mother, was the conspiracy theory that the U.S. planned the 9.11 attacks in order to turn the world against Islam. 

Whether it's 'Obamacare will kill grandma', 'my God is the one true God', 'your sex is weaker', 'my race is superior to others', or 'those people are evil'; ideas can kill...big time. Battles for hearts and minds too quickly turn into clashes on battlefields.

When we hear ideas like this, we can't ignore them. We need to argue against them, point out how irrational the idea is (while striking a balance of sympathy for the individuals espousing them). 

The notion that a government that some people don't trust, particularly a government that can't pass common sense legislation, or can't hide some of it's most embarrassing secrets, could be capable of pulling off some of the massive conspiracies people attribute to it is ridiculous and should be exposed as such at every opportunity. 

Sensible people must put themselves on the line to try to nip things in the bud, expose those who hate and spread lies on the internet, demonstrate against those who picket funerals, and vote out those representatives who encourage ignorance and misinformation to achieve their personal ambitions.  

We can spread ideas of our own, those based on fact and logic and good will. 

In the clash of ideas those should win out, because most sensible people want a world where people get along with each other, and advance civilization, not set it back. It's a war we have to win, and we should all consider ourselves in the battle.

If you hear something, say something.

BACKLASH please

This is a list of the so called 'senators' who voted no to (even considering) expanded background checks on guns:

Alexander (R-TN)

Ayotte (R-NH)

Barrasso (R-WY)

Baucus (D-MT)

Begich (D-AK)

Blunt (R-MO)

Boozman (R-AR)

Burr (R-NC)

Chambliss (R-GA)

Coats (R-IN)

Coburn (R-OK)

Cochran (R-MS)

Corker (R-TN)

Cornyn (R-TX)

Crapo (R-ID)

Cruz (R-TX)

Enzi (R-WY)

Fischer (R-NE)

Flake (R-AZ)

Graham (R-SC)

Grassley (R-IA)

Hatch (R-UT)

Heitkamp (D-ND)

Heller (R-NV)

Hoeven (R-ND)

Inhofe (R-OK)

Isakson (R-GA)

Johanns (R-NE)

Johnson (R-WI)

Lee (R-UT)

McConnell (R-KY)

Moran (R-KS)

Murkowski (R-AK)

Paul (R-KY)

Portman (R-OH)

Pryor (D-AR)

Reid (D-NV)

Risch (R-ID)

Roberts (R-KS)

Rubio (R-FL)

Scott (R-SC)

Sessions (R-AL)

Shelby (R-AL)

Thune (R-SD)

Vitter (R-LA)

Wicker (R-MS)

These 'representatives' of the people that pay them to serve their communities, chose NRA money over their duty to keep those people safe. No matter how much they try to delude themselves and their constituents with arguments to justify their behavior, there is simply no excuse for their cowardice. They are selfish and greedy, putting their careers ahead of doing what is clearly right. 

I hope all that NRA money they will continue to get goes directly toward purchasing Ambien so they can try to sleep at night. To those NRA members who, like the 90% of us, do support these measures, please stop sending them checks and swelling their membership numbers. Enough is enough.

I urge the voters in these states to send them back to jobs that will do no harm to our nation in the future:

Alaska

Arizona

Arkansas

Florida

Georgia

Idaho

Indiana

Iowa

Kansas

Kentucky

Louisiana

Mississippi

Missouri

Montana

Nebraska

Nevada

New Hampshire

North Carolina

North Dakota

Oklahoma

South Carolina

South Dakota

Tennessee

Texas

Utah

Wisconsin

Wyoming

Thanks to all you sensible Senators who did support this bill, especially Joe Manchin and Pat Toomey for your hard work. Please don't give up on us.

The Human Family

There are 2 kinds of people _______(fill in the blank). How many times have we said/heard that? There are endless possibilities, so many ways of dividing ourselves:  people who think like us and people who don't, cat people or dog people, famous and obscure, religious and nonreligious, conservatives vs liberal, honest or dishonest, beer drinkers or wine drinkers, party people or couch potatoes, educated and ignorant. Us versus Them.

In this age of excessive partisanship our differences seem to define us. One thing all individuals on the planet have in common is our uniqueness. We want to feel special, and that sometimes is achieved by feeling disdain for others. But the things that divide us are superficial. Fundamentally, in the things that really count, we are all the same.

What we tend to forget is that we are all part of the Family of Man. We all were once a little baby, someone's son or daughter.  We all look pretty much the same in any culture in the world, without our clothes and other trappings. We will all grow old and we will all die someday. If we are lucky in the meantime we will experience love and laughter and friendship and success and comfort. Many of us will be considerably luckier than most.

We all want to be significant, even if it's just to a few loved ones. We want to be respected, especially by those whom we respect. We don't want to disappoint our loved ones. We want what's best for ourselves, our children, other people's children, our neighbors, our country and our world.

We all have aspirations and hope. Not all of us have the resources to achieve our dreams. Some dreams may be incredibly modest. The satisfaction in achieving them is just as profound.

We are all touched by the same things. We cry when we see sadness and tragedy. We are all afraid when we see danger. We get angry when we see injustice. We want to have fun. We all dance to our favorite music. We are all happy when we play with a child.

We all experience excitement, anger, boredom, anxiety, sickness, hunger, beauty, pride, curiosity, compassion and courage. We can understand and forgive. We seek truth, respect fairness, try to set good examples. 

We cannot escape our human condition. We need to embrace it and make the most of it. We need to understand each other and bridge our differences. 

Perhaps each year on our birthday we should all give a moment of thought to how alike we all are and how much better the world would be if we kept that realization uppermost in our minds in our daily interactions and in the decisions we make. 

Our fundamentals are strong. We wake up every day to see that we have not destroyed ourselves. We want to wipe out prejudice and hatred so that everyone is free to enjoy all that life can offer. The current of our history is sweeping us in the direction of individual autonomy and global cooperation. Because of grassroots movements we've managed to make great strides in civil rights for women, people of color and gays - just in my lifetime. (Of course, an official equal rights amendment would be nice, fellas.) There is now no large group of citizens who are officially second class citizens in the developed world. Perhaps in the next generation we will wipe out prejudice, racism and silly sectarian hatred. The Arab Spring continues to expand. Human rights are demanded and recognized in every 'corner' of the globe. As Steven Pinker asserts, we are living in the least violent period of our existence. There will always be those that are short sighted, motivated primarily by greed and self interest. But it doesn't take that many of the rest and best of us to push for the solutions to the problems they cause.  

To see ourselves in a positive light is an intelligent choice. To be an optimist is not always easy, it can take some convincing. But to believe in ourselves is the best way to proceed. We are the species that can deduce black holes and multiple universes and create cures for our diseases. We can overcome our frailties and curtail our destructive impulses. Even though we have the power to destroy our planet, we also have the imagination, technical knowledge and persistence to rescue ourselves from our weapons and our actions. There is always, hope.

This photo is from the book "The Family of Man" by  Edward Streichen, the exhibit that showcased the universal condition of our shared labors, rituals, pastimes, joys and tragedies. 

Every man beareth the whole stamp of the human condition - Montaigne

Myth conceptions

52% of Republicans in Mississippi believe Obama is a Muslim¹.  I suppose it would be meaningless to ask why that would be a big deal.  66% of those likely voters polled don't 'believe' in evolution. 

At least 3% of Americans believe they have been abducted by aliens. If a lot of them live in the south, perhaps that explains some of this bizarre thinking! Silly aliens, what will they have us believing next?

One of those Obama conspiracy theorists is a distant uncle of mine who recently sent me an E-mail purportedly proving that Muslim claim (and other very nasty things) based on erroneous excerpts from Obama's books. 

I have so many questions about people who circulate such things on the web. I have no question about the individuals or organizations that author them in the first place - they are clearly motivated by political ambition. But my uncle and others, why would they send ugly, libelous rants to their friends without taking even a minute to check on their veracity? I would never circulate some made up story abut Mitt Romney, let's say, about being a member of the Ku Klux Klan, unless I absolutely knew it to be true from a very reliable source. It took me just an instant visit to the non partisan site factcheck.org to find out all of the statements were false. I forwarded that info to my uncle, yet I have not seen him issue an apology or correction to his recipient list.

btw, I hope nobody extracts any partial sentences from this blog to forward some horrible rumor around the internet! 

Calling certain media outlets 'liberal' is one way to keep people ignorant; convince them not to read or listen to certain things to keep them from seeing an opposing point of view, or in most cases - what's really going on in the world.

The voters should get real, get smart, get sensible. If Obama really was some sort of Manchurian evildoer, wouldn't he have somehow already done more damage than ensuring that my daughter can get health care for her preexisting condition?

The sad situation is that we can convince some of the people of anything because they are not disciplined in their thinking. Their lives are faith based instead of fact based, so they often put their trust in preachers, politicians and leaders who want very different things than what would help them lead better lives.

Why is it that we tolerate such a huge amount of misinformation and deception? Is it the old 'end justifies the means'? Are these people so totally convinced that Obama is harming this country, that they think any tactic to sway opinions is OK?

It's sad and dangerous when people misconstrue and make up things like death panels, and non existent tax increases. We are living in different realities. 

Clearly we need more fact checking. Perhaps the push for that can come from some of us. More indignation, more pointing out fabrications, more requests for some semblance of truth and oversight in our political advertising (like we have for consumer products). Politifact.com, Fact Check.org, truthfulpolitics.com ... we ought to have them on the top of our browsers. Let's have less 'Pants on Fire' comments, or at least more debunking after the un-fact.

Here are a few facts worth circulating:

Government spending has risen at its slowest rate under Obama than in the past 60 years.² Some of us would consider that a mistake in a sluggish economy.

The average number of private sector jobs created under Democratic administrations is twice the average number created under Republican administrations. ³

Since World War II the average increase in the national debt has been almost twice as much under Republican administrations than under the Democrats, accelerating first during the Reagan administration, and then ballooning under Bush (the charts are truly dramatic). ⁴

Ironic isn't it, that voters who want the same thing - a fiscally responsible administration, are voting for different parties? Facts are often different from the accepted reality.

All lies are not equal, some politicians lie more than others and some lies are bigger than others. Some say one thing but do another. It might be nice if we all just voted for the most honest (factually correct) candidate. At least we would have some trust again.

Here's a sad statistic that should concern people from any political persuasion:

for the second year there have been more soldiers committing suicide than were killed in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan⁵. Especially on this Memorial Day weekend we can agree this is a horrible situation that we should try to alleviate, even if it means (gasp) spending some tax dollars.

1 March 10, 2012 Public Policy Poll

2 Nutting May 22, 2012 Market Watch, Wall Street Journal

3 US Bureau of Labor Statistics Series ID CES0500000001

4 Project America "US Federal debt change by President"

5 widely reported including Center for New American Security

Be Nice!

Be Nice! -  they know not what they do.

typically irreverent, sorry.

I am, of course, referring to those rural 'fly over' people. Here in THE city, everyone (almost) reads. Ergo, we are much better informed than those who rely on talk radio, or worse, for their information. We are engaged in politics and world affairs because we know it impacts our lives. As we commute back and forth, the construction workers are clutching the free am paper, the Financial clones are perusing their Wall Street Journal, the literary types are hunched over their tablets. We are (quite literarily - new word!) what we read.
It was no shock to learn that Fox news viewers are worse informed than people who watch no news at all, that's probably deliberate. There are lots of politicians out there who are misleading folks instead of leading them.
BUT that doesn't mean we should deride these un-brights as lazy or not knowing what they're talking about. Quite the opposite. We need to show them compassion and understanding. Less Keith Olbermann, more Elizabeth Warren.
The typical citizen doesn't have time to spend an hour or more boning up on world events (although making it a bit more of a priority might help). They are busy raising children and earning a living. They can't be expected to understand the bond market, or the implications of trade treaties, or this country's shift of focus to the Pacific region, if they don't even know about it.  We should not be condescending in our tone (I'm trying to avoid that, really). It's not their fault that they live in red states, surrounded by influences so different from ours. We should be patient and understanding if we want to have any chance to win their hearts & minds and trust.
I just recently 'got' why so many ordinary people think global warming isn't 'real' or caused by human activity. It puzzled me -  why would they throw their lot in with corporations who don't want to pay to clean up after themselves? Like, who wants more severe weather and coastal flooding? Answer: they associate the global warming 'controversy' (which of course is myth in the serious scientific community) with - Al Gore. They've been indoctrinated not to like him, so that issue became a Republican/Democratic divide.
It seems the 2 parties are polarizing ever more obviously into one party that personifies masculine traits - the strict, authoritative parent; and another with the more feminine attributes of human nature - nurturing and compassionate. Seems like that scientist is right who claims Republicans lack the empathy wiring in the brain. (See: the Republican Brain by Chris Mooney, ex). Some people apparently really don't feel horrified by the suffering of others, and assume that those who express that are being hypocritical or cynical or devious.
When Cheney says he thinks Obama has been an 'unmitigated disaster', I don't know what the heck he means, and it makes me wonder if he really did get a heart transplant. Is he disappointed that O has been in office 3 years without starting any new war? His disappointment couldn't be: saving us from the brink of economic disaster, improving America's image and 'soft' strength around the world, supporting Europe through their debt crisis, using just the right touch with China, bringing home troops from Iraq & Afghanistan, walking that tightrope with Pakistan, supplying health care to our citizens, etc etc.  Obviously Cheney is not reading James Fallows as I am. It's like he's in some alien parallel universe.  (curse you Quantum multiverse!)
One party wants to preserve us in the status quo, like insects in amber, while the other tries to move us forward, dealing with the issues of our modern age.
It would be nice if the Dem leaders would refrain from rhetorical overreach - 'war on women' sounds so harsh, but we all know the value of framing and sound bites. Incidentally, that term: "Republican War on Women" was first applied by Tanya Melich in her book, subtitled "an insider's report from behind the lines", published in 1995.
Every comment that seems even a bit harsh gets reacted to with increased nastiness, like the observation that Romney's wife has never worked a day in her life. You'd think the commentator was calling her a communist. The effort to point out that perhaps Romney should look to more qualified sources for advice about the economy,  was twisted into the implication that being a full time mother isn't hard work. Any time you have 5 million women in a category, you have to go after their votes with all the ammunition you can muster. I myself would prefer the insight of a woman who has to face the pressure of performing in a career, budgeting the paycheck and taking care of a household and raising the children.  Stay at home moms should spend their time studying child psychology and behavior, investigating edutainment software and researching education options, not economic theory.
We have to be better than 'them'. We have to, because that's who we are.
Before you call out someone, imagine them stroking a puppy, before you formulate a response. If that doesn't soften you up, try kittens. Let's call it political puppy love. No wonder they all kiss babies.