American columnist and humorist Art Buchwald wrote the best stuff I ever read in a newspaper. His column ran in some New York paper (the Post?) when I was a teenager and I loved its often staccato style: a series of quick thoughts, or bullets, about things anomalous. Its tone and point of view — serious stuff mediated by sardonic perspective — I like to think informs the approach of my blogs.
Although I cannot find a specific reference on the internet, I believe some of his columns were captioned “I’ve Been Thinking.” I have made this phrase one of the categories into which my posts are sorted, and have selected the phrase as the title of this particular post.
Seems that Buchwald won a Pulitzer Prize for doing all of this. No risk of that happening here, but the below gets a whole bunch of confusion and a modicum of anger out of my system as I drift into the Fourth of July, so the exercise works for me. You may not be so lucky.
I’ve been thinking:
*The reason that 57% of US mothers without college degrees are unwed and 94% of US mothers with at least a college degree are in fact married [reference: Harvard alumni magazine] has to do with people opting for choices that give them otherwise unavailable self-esteem.
*That is also the reason poor people buy clothes with conspicuous labels, fancy cell phones and sneakers that cost $100.
*I do not understand why Romney has chosen to make the policy underlying the Health Care Act his key issue as it is his very own policy, and the policy aspect does not change depending on whether it is articulated in a State or Federal program.
*Why do Republicans announce that Health Care is the largest tax hike in American history when it does not even come close, and when we had larger ones as recently as in 1993 and before that even a larger one under Reagan?
*Stock market prices rise and fall wildly these days, depending on each slight perturbation in the European situation, as if clearly minor and temporary developments reflect a final state of affairs; but if some recent negative developments in fact were final, the stocks should not drop two percent but fifty percent.
*Lots of so-called venture capitalists are not willing to venture their capital.
*Small businesses are engines of job growth because they are filled with entrepreneurs and employees fired by large businesses.
*Occupy Wall Street has entered into our national awareness through a slick CD recording of really bad folk-style songs excoriating the one percent, while the Tea Party seems to maintain real influence but lacks its own music CD.
*Boston public transportation was always broke because of lack of riders and, now that ridership has spiked upwards, it is even more broke, suggesting that management is off-track, or worse.
*Gary Loveman thinks he has a lock on a casino at Suffolk Downs, which does not look like a resort destination to me.
*The city of Boston replanted the entire Occupy Boston site, below my office window, with lots of barriers and some pretty big trees, but I think you could still fit a bunch of tents in there if you were so inclined.
*The Supreme Court Health Care decision is a victory for capitalism. Beforehand, our system was pure socialism: you were sick, you went to the hospital or clinic, you had to be treated, you had neither money nor insurance, the cost went into the tax base, and middle class and rich people paid all the expenses for you through their taxes. Marx would have been proud.
*If the US or NATO does not take out the Iranian nuclear program and Israel does it, what happens next?
*In that event, will it matter who wins the election in the US?
*The US is a fundamentally religious society with religious references in our currency, patriotic music and loyalty pledge, and an instinct to refrain from any criticism of any statement couched in terms of religious exercise — in that limited regard, sort of reminds you of some Islamic societies.
*If you applied the statistics of major American politicians and presidents who have had sexual affairs to the population at large, we would be a grossly amoral society. Makes you wonder if we are.
*If electronic or computer-printed postage becomes the norm as the volume of hard copy mail continues to plunge, will collections of rare stamps become more valuable or worthless?
*Does the rise of the internet doom American politics, as people drown in partisan and unreviewed content while losing the ability to study lengthy materials or debate openly and intelligently?
*If we follow the admonition to direct education to developing specific job skills, are we so ignoring the study of government and the social contract as to create the kind of apolitical electorate that will accept dictatorship as the price of order?
*How many Americans believe that it is improper to pass laws defining civil rights, as those rights are inherent even if not embraced by a large majority of voters?
*When is the year that we will have a gay President?
*Instead of legislating in favor of gay marriage, why don’t we pass a law making everyone a party to a civil union for purposes of government policy, and people can privately call themselves married if that is a meaningful personal or religious designation?
*If, as his defense lawyer suggested, Whitey Bulger had immunity from the FBI, why did he bother to hide for 16 years?
I am off for one day of doing nothing. Last reader out, please close the door behind you….