Today's gospel is the "as long as you did it to the least of my brethren, you did it to me" gospel. It is connected to the shepherd analogy in the Old Testament where the good shepherd says he looks after the flock, the injured and lost of the flock but "the sleek and strong I will destroy."
This run of parables, the virgins, the "unprofitable servant" and the talents ends here and the next section of the bible takes up the reaction in Jerusalem which leads to Christ's death. The Catholic Church ends the liturgical year at this point and restarts the year next week in Advent and the beginning of the birth of Christ.
These parables are very hard because the judgment in them is hard. Why will the shepherd destroy the sleek and the strong? Are the foolish virgins really to be punished because they are not wise? Where is evil in all this unprofitable servant, foolish girls and doomed sleek and strong? It appears to all come together in this parable, where all are judged by their behavior to the weak, the hungry, the thirsty and the imprisoned. Despite our modern preoccupation with evil, it is negligence that is the failure here. The predator, the savage and the pirate in our lives is an outlier; we can try to protect ourselves from him but he does not determine our code, our principles of living. Our principles of living are the two great commandments. If they are not foremost in our lives we will drift. And these must be in our lives, not in our institutions. The Pharisees gave money to the poor but did it as an institutional requirement, not because it was part of their lives. (Curiously, this charitable view of the world is the single most distinctive aspect I have seen in Muslim youth.)
In the old Rheims Vulgate version, those who had made this behavior part of their being were called "the just."
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Cab Thoughts 11/19/11
I expect that the Penn State nightmare will be front and center in the news and the courts indefinitely and that some people will be judged. Yet the perpetrators of the mortgage disaster remain untouched and are avidly watching the ticking clock of the statute of limitations. Why is that?
Politicians and nations are more symbolic than poets. China is upset that the United States is putting soldiers in Australia. How many? 2,500. China's area: 9,596,961 sq. mi. Population: 1,336,718,015. There are 300 people with AIDS in China for every soldier that will be in Australia.
Natural gas provides 17% of Pennsylvania's electricity, up from 2% in 2001, a more than 700% increase. Natural gas' gain has been coal's loss. Coal provides 46% of Pennsylvania's electricity and has declined from 57% in 2001. The carbon emission with gas is 50% of coal and this is clearly environmental progress. I don't doubt that regulation has been a factor here but the main factor has been the gas drilling, particularly shale. All the political posturing in the world cannot match the aggressive development of a cheaper alternative.
in 2007 there were 18,000 homicides in the United States. There were 37,000 suicides. That is astonishing.
12% of American Armed Forces veterans are unemployed and 100,000 are without homes today.
Americans between the ages of 26 and 64, 19.9% are without health insurance at any one time. In my experience this is usually a choice of one bill over the other.
If a state university is a creation and responsibility of the state, is the state responsible for school liabilities?
Are there female pedophiles?
I have a new plan. I want to start a virtual country. I think many would consider it avaunt guard and up to date. We could sell passports, flags, apply for admission to the U.N. (they hate borders anyway), get an embassy in some country which doesn't read their mail well or has a sense of humor. We could have parties, write a constitution, form religions. Maybe even a history. We could make a fortune with college students.
"Pure battery electric cars will most likely remain a niche for some time to come," said Bill Reinert, Toyota's U.S. national manager for advanced technology. "The market for these products is nearly all regulatory push, not market pull." Interestingly, they have a very high rate of pedestrian accidents because the pedestrian can't hear them coming.
Interesting article on paid informers said they are paid only if the target goes to jail and many always wear wires, constantly trolling the streets listening for a suspicious phrase or conversation.
Politicians and nations are more symbolic than poets. China is upset that the United States is putting soldiers in Australia. How many? 2,500. China's area: 9,596,961 sq. mi. Population: 1,336,718,015. There are 300 people with AIDS in China for every soldier that will be in Australia.
Natural gas provides 17% of Pennsylvania's electricity, up from 2% in 2001, a more than 700% increase. Natural gas' gain has been coal's loss. Coal provides 46% of Pennsylvania's electricity and has declined from 57% in 2001. The carbon emission with gas is 50% of coal and this is clearly environmental progress. I don't doubt that regulation has been a factor here but the main factor has been the gas drilling, particularly shale. All the political posturing in the world cannot match the aggressive development of a cheaper alternative.
in 2007 there were 18,000 homicides in the United States. There were 37,000 suicides. That is astonishing.
12% of American Armed Forces veterans are unemployed and 100,000 are without homes today.
Americans between the ages of 26 and 64, 19.9% are without health insurance at any one time. In my experience this is usually a choice of one bill over the other.
If a state university is a creation and responsibility of the state, is the state responsible for school liabilities?
Are there female pedophiles?
I have a new plan. I want to start a virtual country. I think many would consider it avaunt guard and up to date. We could sell passports, flags, apply for admission to the U.N. (they hate borders anyway), get an embassy in some country which doesn't read their mail well or has a sense of humor. We could have parties, write a constitution, form religions. Maybe even a history. We could make a fortune with college students.
"Pure battery electric cars will most likely remain a niche for some time to come," said Bill Reinert, Toyota's U.S. national manager for advanced technology. "The market for these products is nearly all regulatory push, not market pull." Interestingly, they have a very high rate of pedestrian accidents because the pedestrian can't hear them coming.
Interesting article on paid informers said they are paid only if the target goes to jail and many always wear wires, constantly trolling the streets listening for a suspicious phrase or conversation.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Money for Nothing
An interesting number came out of a discussion with a friend recently. In the last year Penn State University received 780 million dollars in research grants. $780 million. (This is not going where you think.) The number of private companies spun out of Penn State in the last year: One.
In a culture that has a fetish about small business and capital development this is a surprising number. And Lee Hood's experience with CalTech comes to mind. When he was developing his protein synthesizer at Caltech he approached the president of the university with the prospect of doing a joint venture. The president not only declined, he was miffed. He did not think it proper for the university to sully its hands in so plebeian a thing as a for-profit company.
So the university is an island of reflective purity in this bustling work-a-day world. Aside from the obvious silliness of this conceit, there may be some useful information here. Perhaps the university's distance from the community is doing a disservice to its students, its community and its culture. The students might benefit from a bit of reality when they transition from the student world to the workplace. The university might benefit from a little feedback. And the society should be able to take advantage of all that research money in some tangible way.
Otherwise the culture might start thinking of its educational institutions as separate. As a distinct and self contained entity that has only its own survival and comfort in mind. Like a parasite, for example.
In a culture that has a fetish about small business and capital development this is a surprising number. And Lee Hood's experience with CalTech comes to mind. When he was developing his protein synthesizer at Caltech he approached the president of the university with the prospect of doing a joint venture. The president not only declined, he was miffed. He did not think it proper for the university to sully its hands in so plebeian a thing as a for-profit company.
So the university is an island of reflective purity in this bustling work-a-day world. Aside from the obvious silliness of this conceit, there may be some useful information here. Perhaps the university's distance from the community is doing a disservice to its students, its community and its culture. The students might benefit from a bit of reality when they transition from the student world to the workplace. The university might benefit from a little feedback. And the society should be able to take advantage of all that research money in some tangible way.
Otherwise the culture might start thinking of its educational institutions as separate. As a distinct and self contained entity that has only its own survival and comfort in mind. Like a parasite, for example.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Life and The Worst Possible Outcome (WPO)
"Folks in Nebraska, like folks all across the country, aren't going to say to themselves, 'We're going to take a few thousand jobs if it means our kids are potentially drinking water that would damage their health." So said Mr. Obama in Omaha recently as the government officially put on hold the Keystone XL project, a pipeline program that would send Canadian oil to the United States for refining. The Canadian Prime minister said that, absent the pipeline, the Canadian oil would be sent to Asia.
This is a significant moment in a number of ways. At least 20,00 good, high paying jobs, direct and indirect, hinged on the building of the pipeline. Oil from a friendly nation now goes elsewhere. One wag said this shows the administration is not friendly towards unions but is friendly only towards public sector unions.
But there is a bigger problem here that is consistent throughout our society. It appears in Marcellus shale, smallpox, Gulf of Mexico oil rigs, food production, nuclear power plants--it is the fear of "The Worst Possible Outcome." The WPO. Rather than a challenge to be met, problems to be overcome, difficulties to manage, our culture looks at a possible project and sees the WPO. Unless we can be assured the WPO will not occur, we stop cold.
This, of course, is contrary to all aspects of life except government. Who would get pregnant? Who would build a house or buy one? Who would cross a bridge, fly in a plane, drive through a tunnel? Indeed who would leave their house? If every decision was made through the lens of the WPO no one would do anything. We would live the risk less life of algae.
This is a significant moment in a number of ways. At least 20,00 good, high paying jobs, direct and indirect, hinged on the building of the pipeline. Oil from a friendly nation now goes elsewhere. One wag said this shows the administration is not friendly towards unions but is friendly only towards public sector unions.
But there is a bigger problem here that is consistent throughout our society. It appears in Marcellus shale, smallpox, Gulf of Mexico oil rigs, food production, nuclear power plants--it is the fear of "The Worst Possible Outcome." The WPO. Rather than a challenge to be met, problems to be overcome, difficulties to manage, our culture looks at a possible project and sees the WPO. Unless we can be assured the WPO will not occur, we stop cold.
This, of course, is contrary to all aspects of life except government. Who would get pregnant? Who would build a house or buy one? Who would cross a bridge, fly in a plane, drive through a tunnel? Indeed who would leave their house? If every decision was made through the lens of the WPO no one would do anything. We would live the risk less life of algae.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Hannity and Sebelius: A Pox on both Their Houses
Kathleen Sebelius, the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services--and the woman who taught us all how to sneeze, has written an article in The New York Times on why we need to continue research into smallpox generally and smallpox vaccines in particular. This is a result of another outbreak of a problem stalking the democracy, the politicization of science.
The World Health Organization is having a debate soon on whether to destroy the remaining stores of smallpox currently held in approved microzoos. Since Jenner, humanity has been trying to eradicate smallpox, a savage illness with a high infectivity and mortality. The success we have had is a tribute to human science, innovation, persistence and cooperation. The disease was officially eradicated in 1980 and now these zoos are the last remaining reservoir of the organism. One would think a world holiday would be declared as we finish off the little devils.
But there are other considerations. Vaccinated subjects can sometimes reconstitute the killer organism into a virulent form to infect the subject and spread. There may be viral stores we are unaware of. And, the real worry, there may be homicidal maniacs out there who think the organism is good way to fulfill their goal of death and unhappiness. The DNA of the organism is well known and can be engineered by an experienced biologist. More, the Russians, through their infamous Biopreparat Program developed smallpox as a primary biological weapon and as a secondary carrier for more lethal viruses. (Apparently they were dissatisfied with the traditional 30% mortality and 70% misery with the single organism and developed attachments to Ebola and other such bugs that have a 100% mortality but are so lethal they kill the host before they can spread.)
There is a legitimate argument against the zoos: The group with the vaccine wins. But the notion that there can be a policing of laboratories to guard against such an effort is insane. And the Sebelius article has emerged for a single reason: An American company has developed a retroactive vaccine for smallpox. The vaccine works after the individual has contracted the disease. But because the threat of the illness is not immediate and straightforward, interest and support of the drug has raised the supercilious eyebrows of the Right. Hannity and Bortz have raised questions about its legitimacy as a pursuit. After all, isn't everyone immunized? Are rich people involved in the company? Are some of them Democrates? Is this possibly another Solyandra? We have vaccines, isn't this just overcure? Was undue influence involved? In the war against Obama everything is a weapon.
It is easy to criticize superficial political thinking but, in fairness, it is hard to prove the value of a drug like this. You cannot just give someone smallpox to prove the drug works and a Tom Clancy-like scenario might never develop. But the idea that a smallpox attack would stimulate a successful worldwide immunological campaign is quite naive.
This looks like a very valuable drug for dangerous times. The recent revelation of company influence and that insider trading is the exclusive right of our elected representatives makes everything look suspect.
But sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
(N.B. I own the company in question and when it falls further I intend to buy more.)
The World Health Organization is having a debate soon on whether to destroy the remaining stores of smallpox currently held in approved microzoos. Since Jenner, humanity has been trying to eradicate smallpox, a savage illness with a high infectivity and mortality. The success we have had is a tribute to human science, innovation, persistence and cooperation. The disease was officially eradicated in 1980 and now these zoos are the last remaining reservoir of the organism. One would think a world holiday would be declared as we finish off the little devils.
But there are other considerations. Vaccinated subjects can sometimes reconstitute the killer organism into a virulent form to infect the subject and spread. There may be viral stores we are unaware of. And, the real worry, there may be homicidal maniacs out there who think the organism is good way to fulfill their goal of death and unhappiness. The DNA of the organism is well known and can be engineered by an experienced biologist. More, the Russians, through their infamous Biopreparat Program developed smallpox as a primary biological weapon and as a secondary carrier for more lethal viruses. (Apparently they were dissatisfied with the traditional 30% mortality and 70% misery with the single organism and developed attachments to Ebola and other such bugs that have a 100% mortality but are so lethal they kill the host before they can spread.)
There is a legitimate argument against the zoos: The group with the vaccine wins. But the notion that there can be a policing of laboratories to guard against such an effort is insane. And the Sebelius article has emerged for a single reason: An American company has developed a retroactive vaccine for smallpox. The vaccine works after the individual has contracted the disease. But because the threat of the illness is not immediate and straightforward, interest and support of the drug has raised the supercilious eyebrows of the Right. Hannity and Bortz have raised questions about its legitimacy as a pursuit. After all, isn't everyone immunized? Are rich people involved in the company? Are some of them Democrates? Is this possibly another Solyandra? We have vaccines, isn't this just overcure? Was undue influence involved? In the war against Obama everything is a weapon.
It is easy to criticize superficial political thinking but, in fairness, it is hard to prove the value of a drug like this. You cannot just give someone smallpox to prove the drug works and a Tom Clancy-like scenario might never develop. But the idea that a smallpox attack would stimulate a successful worldwide immunological campaign is quite naive.
This looks like a very valuable drug for dangerous times. The recent revelation of company influence and that insider trading is the exclusive right of our elected representatives makes everything look suspect.
But sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
(N.B. I own the company in question and when it falls further I intend to buy more.)
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
The Conceit of Sports
From the Greeks to the present, sport has been more than play. It is a mirror of the man, a training field for war and life, a blueprint and a crucible for the developing young. Practice, hard work, leadership, teamwork, goal setting, mental toughness, pain tolerance, preparation, health, sportsmanship, delayed gratification, exertion of the will--all these factors come into play in sport and, later, in life. So what did Penn State, about as high a level in college athletics as there is, teach its students/athletes and what does it teach us?
It teaches that at some point sport no longer is developmental, it is an end in itself and no longer teaches anything. The competitors have learned about as much as they are going to; they are now relying on their training not developing it. One might argue that we always learn but, when our formative years are over, learning is an accident, a by-product or a specific project of individual inspiration. As sport progress, the audience follows it for the diversion, the distraction, the fun and the empathy but the true uplifting moment--that character building moment that is the key to tragedy--that moment is rare. (The first and third Ali-Frazier boxing matches come to mind.) It is always hoped for but it is rare.
The problem with the Penn State scandal is that it is viewed as a problem with amateur athletics when in fact it is nothing of the sort. It is the end stage of athletics. It is a business. A product. A thing, an enjoyable thing but a thing nonetheless with all its youth, its nobility and its verisimilitude wrung out of it. Not to say it is not an enjoyable business to watch; it is. But the only time it mimics life is when it tries to pretend it is part of education, part of our growth.
At that moment it is like us: Hypocritical.
It teaches that at some point sport no longer is developmental, it is an end in itself and no longer teaches anything. The competitors have learned about as much as they are going to; they are now relying on their training not developing it. One might argue that we always learn but, when our formative years are over, learning is an accident, a by-product or a specific project of individual inspiration. As sport progress, the audience follows it for the diversion, the distraction, the fun and the empathy but the true uplifting moment--that character building moment that is the key to tragedy--that moment is rare. (The first and third Ali-Frazier boxing matches come to mind.) It is always hoped for but it is rare.
The problem with the Penn State scandal is that it is viewed as a problem with amateur athletics when in fact it is nothing of the sort. It is the end stage of athletics. It is a business. A product. A thing, an enjoyable thing but a thing nonetheless with all its youth, its nobility and its verisimilitude wrung out of it. Not to say it is not an enjoyable business to watch; it is. But the only time it mimics life is when it tries to pretend it is part of education, part of our growth.
At that moment it is like us: Hypocritical.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Joe Frazier
Joe Frazier is being buried today. If I had my way it would be a state funeral.
In my youth I drove to another state to watch him fight Ali the first time. It was Everyman assailing the tower. It was as close to Shakespeare as anything I had ever seen in sports. It was brutal, it was painful but everyone who was there, regardless of his sympathy or his bet, walked out of the fight a better person. Frazier was shorter, lighter and much less athletic than Ali. He went into the fight a buffoon. Ali ridiculed him, taunted him, denigrated him to the glee of the media who loved Ali because of his conscientious objection to the Vietnam War, his good looks, his entertaining glibness and his Muslim thinking. They thought this new Black Muslim notion was interesting and they felt Ali was a better guy. Ali, Kennedy aside, was the first man I can recall whose celebrity eclipsed his achievement--and he was one of the best fighters ever. Ever. But he was cruel.
With the help of his Muslim advisers, Ali polarized the fight by making it racial. It seems hard to believe now but Ali actually made it a fight between him, a Black Muslim, and Frazier, whom he successfully classified as white. The logic was a bit loose but Ali said Frazier was of a slave mentality, worked like a white man and believed in the America as seen by white men. (Ali actually once spoke at a KKK meeting against miscegenation.) The fight was a battle of human will, expert and savage on both sides. And Frazier heroically won. Ali's camp thought they had won and not without reason. It was close but Frazier won, a remarkable victory of the human spirit. He was hospitalized after the fight for three weeks.
They fought again twice, once an embarrassing clutch and jab fest that Ali "won" and the third, in Manila. Ali kept up his cruelty, introducing a gorilla puppet he called "Joe" and carrying it, or a facsimile, everywhere as he promoted the fight. Frazier, neither facile nor particularly bright, never could respond well and actually attacked Ali in frustration during a television interview. The fight was filled with the usual Ali drama although there was one strange event late at night when Ali showed up with a gun to threaten Frazier at his hotel. The fight was a war, fifteen rounds of toe-to-toe attack and defense. Into the fifteenth, Ali had come back in the thirteenth and fourteenth and the fight was a draw on most cards. The fifteenth would decide it. In the corner Ali told his manager to cut his gloves off, that he wanted to quit. In Frazier's corner the trainer realized that Frazier was blind in one eye (something he had hidden for years) and his good eye was closed. He rightfully threw in the towel against Frazier's wishes. At Frazier's withdrawal, Ali collapsed in his corner and had to be revived. Most think that had Frazier just answered the bell, Ali would have quit.
Strangely, Frazier provided Ali with his finest moments as a fighter and it defined his career. He was a brave and skilled fighter and only Frazier allowed him to show that. (His performance against Ken Norton where he fought for 10 rounds with a broken jaw and won a split decision was another such moment.)
But despite his skill and heroics, he was never the better man.
In my youth I drove to another state to watch him fight Ali the first time. It was Everyman assailing the tower. It was as close to Shakespeare as anything I had ever seen in sports. It was brutal, it was painful but everyone who was there, regardless of his sympathy or his bet, walked out of the fight a better person. Frazier was shorter, lighter and much less athletic than Ali. He went into the fight a buffoon. Ali ridiculed him, taunted him, denigrated him to the glee of the media who loved Ali because of his conscientious objection to the Vietnam War, his good looks, his entertaining glibness and his Muslim thinking. They thought this new Black Muslim notion was interesting and they felt Ali was a better guy. Ali, Kennedy aside, was the first man I can recall whose celebrity eclipsed his achievement--and he was one of the best fighters ever. Ever. But he was cruel.
With the help of his Muslim advisers, Ali polarized the fight by making it racial. It seems hard to believe now but Ali actually made it a fight between him, a Black Muslim, and Frazier, whom he successfully classified as white. The logic was a bit loose but Ali said Frazier was of a slave mentality, worked like a white man and believed in the America as seen by white men. (Ali actually once spoke at a KKK meeting against miscegenation.) The fight was a battle of human will, expert and savage on both sides. And Frazier heroically won. Ali's camp thought they had won and not without reason. It was close but Frazier won, a remarkable victory of the human spirit. He was hospitalized after the fight for three weeks.
They fought again twice, once an embarrassing clutch and jab fest that Ali "won" and the third, in Manila. Ali kept up his cruelty, introducing a gorilla puppet he called "Joe" and carrying it, or a facsimile, everywhere as he promoted the fight. Frazier, neither facile nor particularly bright, never could respond well and actually attacked Ali in frustration during a television interview. The fight was filled with the usual Ali drama although there was one strange event late at night when Ali showed up with a gun to threaten Frazier at his hotel. The fight was a war, fifteen rounds of toe-to-toe attack and defense. Into the fifteenth, Ali had come back in the thirteenth and fourteenth and the fight was a draw on most cards. The fifteenth would decide it. In the corner Ali told his manager to cut his gloves off, that he wanted to quit. In Frazier's corner the trainer realized that Frazier was blind in one eye (something he had hidden for years) and his good eye was closed. He rightfully threw in the towel against Frazier's wishes. At Frazier's withdrawal, Ali collapsed in his corner and had to be revived. Most think that had Frazier just answered the bell, Ali would have quit.
Strangely, Frazier provided Ali with his finest moments as a fighter and it defined his career. He was a brave and skilled fighter and only Frazier allowed him to show that. (His performance against Ken Norton where he fought for 10 rounds with a broken jaw and won a split decision was another such moment.)
But despite his skill and heroics, he was never the better man.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)