Common Sense

Common sense ain't common - Will Rogers.

It's a Wonderful Life starring Jimmy Stewart was on TV again last night. Jimmy plays George Bailey, a hopeless dreamer and idealist who takes over as President of the Bailey Home and Loan, after the death of his father. George gives up his personal dreams to insure that the Home and Loan continues to provide mortgages to the working men and women of Bedford Falls.

The time is during the worst of the Depression when banks and savings and loans failed by the dozens. Bank examiners fanned out across the state to insure that financial houses maintained sufficient collateral to survive a run by depositors.

George's Uncle Billy misplaces an $8,000 deposit just as the examiner shows up to look at the books of the Bailey Home and Loan. It looks like financial ruin for George and the end of all his hopes and dreams, and so he contemplates suicide.

Well, if you have watched the movie, then you know that it is a wonderful life after all. George's friends, the working men and women of Bedford Falls whose houses were financed by George Bailey, turn out and make up the short fall.

The point is - banks only made loans to those who worked and provided security for the loans. bank examiners actually examined the books and records of the financial institutions to make sure that there was money behind the cashier window. Whatever happened to this common sense approach to finances?

Securitzed mortgages, loans wrapped up like a hoagie, unregulated fiancial markets, no wonder it all came crashing down.

Strangers

As my experience at Butler Community College demonstrates, America is a rich resource for students from many countries who come seeking to better themselves. These students find that they must contend not only with learning a complicated subjects like physics or mathematics, literature or business, but also English.

In my French class last semester, there were two students from Africa, one from Niger, the other from Cote d'ivore. A friend of theirs from the tiny island of Diego Garcia would occasionally sit in on our class.

Last week, I went to the administrative offices of Butler the other day to get a student id. The student who helped me had an indefinable foreign appearance and was timid. She was tall and black, pleasant, but not chatty. Her age was, to my eye, in the mid to late twenties and her dress was conservative. We had some difficulty understanding each others questions and answers. I therefore jumped to the conclusion  that she was also was African. I hoped she too was from a French speaking country, so I could practice my poor French. I asked her if she was a foreign exchange student, and she said no and I left it at that for the moment.But, as time went by with few words exchanged while she took my picture, I was still struck by the impression that she was not American, either by dress or action. So, throwing caution to the wind, I asked her if she spoke a foreign language. Yes, she said it was Swahili. Always, trying to make a connection, I asked in parting how to say "goodbye" in Swahili. "Kwa heri," she replied.

In my computer class, I sit next to a student from Sri Lanka, the Pearl of the Indian Ocean.He is a computer engineer, studious, but quiet.I try to engage him in conversation, but again, I find that the culture gap, inhibits the simple chatter that makes life bearable.

Our neighbor, who is now a doctor, took a year off to go to school in France. He found himself as many students do here, struggling to comprehend a strange language and a complicated subject. Fortunately, a French student befriended him and helped him with his studies.

Language is but a means of communication. Even with a common language we remain strangers. Each culture is defined by its language, music, history, and art. Language may be the means of communication, but the ideas that bring us together are the social values that we share. President Barack Obama shares the experience of almost a quarter of the population, he has one parent who is foreign born. His father was born in Kenya, his mother in Kansas.

President Obama returned to Indonesia, where he spent four years as a young boy. In Indonesia, he spoke to students at the University of Indonesia in the capital Jakarta. "Assalamu'alaikum. Salam sejahtera," Obama began, an Indonesian salutation meaning 'Peace be upon you, prosperous greetings', which drew a wave of approval. President Obama promised to increase the number of  educational opportunities for Indonesian students in the United States, and remarked that it was equally important for Americans to study abroad in order to increase cultural understanding.

Education is the key to the American experience. Education is what made Barack Obama the intelligent and articulate individual that he is. It is an amazing thought when you think about it, but it is an experience that was and is often repeated. When I think of the girl in the id office at Butler, I can't help but wonder if someday, her child may become president of the United States. Kwa heri.

Glenn Miller

The Cranky Old Man is on the road again, this time traveling to Allendale in Worth County, Missouri.The Old Man is searching for the family homestead of Josie Brewer who was Robert Van Huss' grandmother. Josie was the youngest of nine children. From 1865, the date of her birth, until 1880, she lived with her parents and siblings on a farm near Allendale before the family packed up its belongings and moved to homestead near Beaumont, Kansas.

You can find out more about Josie's family tree at the Family Tree Maker posting by Stephen Verden.

Garmins are not infallible. I drove up to Allendale from Kansas City yesterday. I left Kansas city at 5 p.m.. The trip, by Garmin reckoning, should have taken two hours and put me in town at about 7 p.m.. The sun set at about a quarter to 8 and I was still on the road. This is farm country, which means that towns are scarce and hotels more so. I flipped on the Garmin hotel locater and got the bad news that there were no hotels within 20 miles. So, I picked one with a pleasant sounding name, Homestead Inn or something like that and off I went down an old county road. There were two other cars taking the same road, so I felt safe. Soon however, the cars turned off and I was alone with the stars, the dilapidated old farms and a narrow two lane road that hadn't seen any repair work in 20 years.

A half hour later I pulled in to a town that did not advertize its name, drove down a couple of streets that looked deserted and pulled up in front of the Homestead Inn. The Inn was closed and shuttered.At 9:50 I find a Super 8 in Calindo Iowa. It is full. The clerk tells me that he just gave out the last room. But I am in luck, just down the street is the Celebrity Motel where I get a comfortable room at $66 for the night.

Oh, and you are probably wondering what Glenn Miller has to do with this blog. Clarinda, Iowa is the birthplace of Glenn Miller, who was one of the most famous band leaders of the Swing Era of the 30's and 40's. Glenn was born in the house at 601 South Glenn Miller Avenue. Every year during the second week of June, the town celebrates the music of Glenn Miller with a festival.

Glenn must be the namesake for the Celebrity Hotel, although it is doubtful that he ever stayed here. Like the music of the Swing Era, the hotel is nostalgic, a throw back to the time of family run hotels and not the bleak and austere corporate ones like the Super 8. The guests of the Celebrity Hotel today are mainly truck drivers who like the convenience of the hotel to Highways 71 and 2. The truckers are polite and intelligent, traits necessary to their trade since they have to get along on their own for the most part.

And, by the way in 1942, Glenn Miller, at the height of his fame, disbanded his orchestra and joined the army to support the troops with his music. In 1944, he took off from England in a single engine plane to fly to France ahead of his band. The plane with Glenn Miller aboard was never heard from again. The navigation on the plane was not a Garmin, but it goes to show that we are all at the mercy of electronics, the elements, and fate - even a Cranky Old Man.

Pluralism

Pluralism is in its general sense the recognition that life is diverse.

While we might generally agree on politics, economics, and religion, complete unity of belief and action is impossible. Life is simply too complicated to allow for complete agreement on anything.

The value of pluralism is expressed mathematically by John Nash's game theory. Nash observes that an individual's success in making choices depends on the choices of others. Consensus through compromise results in optimal behavior. Compromise results in action. The reverse often produces no action. Legal contract theory implicitly recognizes this value  by noting that a contract is only formed by a willing buyer and seller. Economic and political pluralism tends to create the most efficient means of distributing capital and regulating behavior.



Politics is the process by which groups make collective decisions.  And pluralism is at the heart of modern democracy. A government which permits participation of all its citizens and safeguards the interests of minorities is pluralistic.

The Great Seal of the United States enshrines this concept with the Latin phrase, "E pluribus unum." The idea of  "From many one" is both a recognition of thirteen states forming one union, but also recognition of the diverse religious, ethnic, and political backgrounds of the citizens of this country.James Madison intuitively understood the need for compromise by first noting the need for three equal and balance departments of government. Each department, the legislative, the executive, and the judicial represented a political check on the power of the other two. A further check upon power was created by establishing two houses within the legislative branch. As any first year government student knows laws are not passed without acknowledging the political interests of a majority.

Finally, as a further check upon the power of the majority, the framers of the Constitution recognized certain fundamental rights, most of which are enumerated in the Bill of Rights. These rights can not be infringed upon by the Federal government. Later, in recognition of the abuse of citizens' rights by the States, the Constitution was amended. The Fourteenth Amendment then applied these same constitutional guarantees to citizens of states. This constitutional recognition came slowly and piecemeal through the Supreme Court's review of issues in later years.

Political unity is impossible to achieve, but legislative action can be obtained by political compromise. Negotiation is the method through which compromise is reached and compromise is best achieved by the participation of all political groups. The failure to include groups can result in situations such as Afghanistan where the Taliban refuse to participate. Their recourse is armed conflict.

Of course a government can impose its views on its citizens by coercion.And in North Korea a totalitarian ruler imposes his will upon the people, but the result is politically unstable and economically disastrous. There are other many other examples of non-pluralistic governments. Suffice it to say that history has demonstrated that pluralism as applied to political and economic institutions has proven the most successful.

Walt Whitman would have course endorsed pluralism. The celebrated title of his most famous book and its words express the value of the individual, "I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars." Pluralism recognizes that the whole is equal to or exceeded by the sum of its parts.

Nineteenth and twentieth century political action which expanded rights not only to blacks and women, but later the handicapped and then made equal access to political and economic opportunities mandatory demonstrate our continued recognition as a society that diversity of opportunity contributes to our universal well-being.

Hymn of the Pearl

Within the Acts of Thomas is a beautiful poem describing the exile and redemption of the soul. The text is known as the "Hymn of the Pearl".

When I was a little child,
and dwelling in my kingdom of my father's house,
and in the riches and luxuries of my teachers,
I was living at ease.

[Then] from our home in the East,
after they had made preparations,
my parents sent me forth.

...

Then they made with me an agreement,
and they inscribed it in my heart so that it would not be forgotten:
"If [you would go] down into Egypt
and bring the one pearl,
which is in the middle of the sea
surrounded by the hissing serpent,
then you will put on your glorious garment
and your toga which rests over it.
And with your brother, our second in command,
you will be heir in our kingdom."

...

The Hymn of the Pearl.


The Apostle Thomas sings the hymn while in prison.

The hymn tells the story of a boy, "the son of the king of kings", who is sent to Egypt by his family to retrieve a pearl from a serpent. He is promised rich rewards on his return. During the quest, he is seduced by Egyptians and forgets his origin. Later, a letter is sent from the king of kings to remind him of his past. The boy receives the letter, remembers his mission, retrieves the pearl and returns. The boy is everyman, as spoken by Thomas; the "king of kings" is Jesus.

What is our purpose in life and how is it that we stray from that path? When we are young, it only seems that life is much simpler. Our parents guide us and instruct us in the ways of the world. We need not make decisions for ourselves. But as we grow older, we journey on, meet new friends, and make our own decisions.

What choice we make are often wrong, for the path of life is fraught with indecision, betrayal, and confusion.We are tempted by wealth and power. Material comforts become an opiate that distracts us from the true purpose of life. The pearl we seek is not wealth, but wealth as symbolized by our real values, the lessons we were taught as children. And that lesson is to serve others.

Up to the Mountain

It is the best of all possible worlds and couldn't possibly be better.

Voltaire - Candide

I went up to the mountain
Because you asked me to
Up over the clouds
To where the sky was blue
I could see all around me
Everywhere
I could see all around me
Everywhere

...

Some days I look down
Afraid I will fall
And though the sun shines
I see nothing at all
Then I hear your sweet voice, oh
Oh, come and then go, come and then go
Telling me softly
You love me so

Patty Griffin - Up to the Mountains



The Cranky Old Man asked me what Candide's words have to do with the lyrics from Up to the Mountain.

Very little, if you take them at face value. Voltaire's Candide is a satiric view of  life, which Voltaire sees as a cruel struggle for survival where hope and love count for nothing. Candide travels throughout the world while one misfortune is heaped on another, all the while expressing the notion that God has preordained everything and it is for the best. Patty Griffin's Up to the Mountain is a tribute to Martin Luther King Jr.'s last speech. In the speech King compares himself to Moses who led his people out of bondage and to the promised land. From the mountaintop Moses viewed the Promised Land, but he was to die before reaching it. The speech was delivered in Memphis, Tennessee on April 3, 1968. The next day King was assassinated. The lyrics are a reaffirmation of the hope that exists in every soul that God's voice does speak to us, telling us softly that he loves us so.

Cranky thinks to himself that if we have to choose, we choose hope over despair.

The very thought of it

Marcel Proust said it best in "The Remembrance of Things:

"When nothing else subsists from the past, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered· the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls· bearing resiliently, on tiny and almost impalpable drops of their essence, the immense edifice of memory."

The ocean, a new book, a cup of coffee, a rose, even the musty smell of a basement - all these smells conjure up for me a memory of some time and place from the past. My first memory that I can recall is standing on a gigantic steamer boat, the S.S. Rose, and looking out over an endless sea. I was no more than three or four at the time and my family was returning from Panama to North Carolina. My father was a career army officer. We had lived for a year in Panama where it had been hot and humid. We lived near the jungles and my mother would later tell me stories of how I was always almost lost in the jungles. But, I don't remember any of that.

It is the boat, standing on the deck and looking out at the immense ocean that I vividly recall. The scent of the ocean’s salty green brine that hits not only your sense of smell but taste with its salty sweetness. At sea decaying fish and seaweed are consumed by ocean dwelling bacteria and produce a sort of fishy tangy smell. The smell is unique. Anyone who been on a boat that has recently been fishing knows this smell can stir up a flock of seagulls in to a ravenous frenzy.Perhaps it is this primeval need for food that stirred in me this memory. The memory is more visual than olfactory, but that is not unusual. Smell is a more subtle sense than sight. It embeds its effect in silent ways and calls out to our need for basic survival, the need to eat.

What I do remember is that it was the instance between dusk and night. When the sun is setting, the sea turns from turquoise to iridescent orange, and then in a moment both night and sea turn purple then black. The rippling of the waves and the wake the boat makes the scene animated as if thousands of hands in a multitude of colors, turquoise, orange, purple and all sorts of shades in between are waving at me at the boat silently glides through the water. In my memory, I am shorter than the railing. At times I have my hands on the thick rail watching the show and smelling the air. At other times I stand there hands at my sides awestruck by the immensity of the boat, ocean, and sky. I was too young then to process this thought, but I have often wondered since whether it was at this moment that I understood what it was to be part of the universe. To describe that moment as spiritual is fitting even though at that age I would not have understood the word. Spiritualism is after all deeply confusing even as we grow older.The one thing that even a child can understand is that we are a part of something larger, and that try as we might we can never understand it all. As Marcel Proust might have said, we are tiny almost imperceptible drops within a cosmic universe. The thought is both humbling and reassuring. Humbling for who are we to think that we can in any way make an impact on the world. Reassuring in that we know that in at least one sense our atoms will continue to form and reform in a myriad of different life forms and continue to be part of this universe until the end of time.

Every return trip to the ocean invariably brings back this memory. But even the smell of fish at a local restaurant like the The Fish Market, here in Wichita can involuntarily trigger this memory. The very smell of it - Halibut, Salmon, Mahi-Mahi, Grouper, Tuna, Haddock, Oyster, Clam, Calamari - will bring back that time, place and smell of long ago. The memory like mementos stored in a cigar box is carefully tucked away, safe and secure.