Singleness Of Purpose

Gotta minute, or ten?

I would like to take the time to remark on what a Nice Person you are, and to let a Nice Person and presumed Patriot know:

A.)  If you ever in a tired or angry moment wonder whether anyone REALIZES what all you shoulder without complaining of weight, indeed without it BEING objectionable weight . . . *waves* Over here! I recognize it.

and

B.)  Not Bill Clinton, not Mainstream Media, not Talking Heads, not Barack Obama, but YOU have influenced me to re-visit  the breadth and intensity of my Criticism.

Like Neil Cavuto sez, not ‘cuz YOU’RE right (humor, yes?), but because you are gracious and grateful and nice.  You are willing to confront — bravery, in any book — but you are diplomatic and flexible.

I’d LIKE to take the time but, alas, I don’t HAVE the time.  That is how it always FEELS.  Like a race against Time.  So much Injustice, so much Chicanery, so much MANMADE Misery, in MY country, former Super Hero to the WHOLE world, on MY watch.  Combined with remorse over MISUSING so much of whatever Time I “have,” I am obliged to quote the Bad Guy who FUCKING DERAILED MY LIFE (forgive my language): Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go, People, let’s move, move, move, move.

As an aside, several paragraphs from now, this thought is likely to cross your mind, JIMINY CRIPES, I THOUGHT SHE SAID SHE DIDN’T HAVE ANY TIME. 

In a box somewhere I have stationery imprinted with a quote by French Mathematician and Philosopher Blaise Pascal: I am writing you a long letter because I lack the time to make it short.

See, I thought twice about the Cavuto posts.  Not just your input but your follow-up graciousness make me realize I might better have sent the message by “private” email rather than public forum, as I have done with a few others.

Don’t get me wrong, I was ALSO impressed by his story.  Seriously, you’d hafta have a heart of stone not to be moved by stories like that.

BUT, there are SEVERAL but’s.  I would acquaint you with them as I imagine our forefathers wrote to one another.  How they pulled off Independence without cell phones and laptops, I do. not. know.  But that they DID write letters is a matter of record and good fortune.

I have clocked more than half a century as an American, born into a Middle Class family of the Upwardly Mobile tribe.  Not rich or spoiled by TODAY’S standards but we never wanted for or worried about ANYTHING.  Roof, food, medical/dental care, fresh clothes, new cars, summer vacations, COLLEGE EDUCATIONS PAID BY HARDWORKING DADS, these were common.  Upwardly Mobile = Better ‘n Better.

Among my “possessions” is a quite theatrical imagination.  Being dark and brooding Irish forbidden to drink — like Adam and the apple, THAT is — my imaginings not infrequently trend, well, dark.  Never, never, NEVER did I imagine that my country — AMERICA, fer cryin’ out loud — could be in shambles like this.

What are we doing about it?  Basically, nothing.  Basically, we are riding the train wreck right into a brick wall or over a cliff.  I’m not sure, I can’t make it out through all the bullshit. Not even a PRETENSE of applying brakes anymore.

I go out not far on a limb in guessing that your family of five features three Kids.  Congratulations on that, truly.  But you have GOT to be worried about their futures.  WHAT futures, for starters.  Alleged Grownups are playing Biblical End Games as though their Book Of Choice does not EXPRESSLY say we will not know The Time.   It’s JUST as likely North Korea or Pakistan would launch a nuke as Iran.  Is our future to march around the world enforcing order?  How very . . . Prussian.  Then serve as the Global Medical Center for Walking Wounded?  How very . . . Democratic.

You know the spiel: spending like drunken sailors, wacky welfare, CORPORATE welfare, greed, pork, earmarks, blah blah blah.  Those are SYMPTOMATIC.  The disease is DISHONESTY.  Highly-paid people with fancy pants degrees are LYING AND CHEATING WITH IMPUNITY.

America has Bad Guys in high places.  The Mortgage Meltdown and ensuing Financial CATASTROPHE are manmade.  Made by men.  Most of whom are STILL living the High Life, and some of whom hold Office.

What has any of this to do with Neil Cavuto, you understandably ask?

No matter HOW you cut the blame cake, Mainstream Media gets a hulking slice.

Who, What, Where, When, How, THOSE are the essences of Journalism.  Journalism is about sleuthing and dot connecting, crafting sentences jam-packed with INFORMATION and delivering them unto People.  Information is a key ingredient of Knowledge.  Knowledge is a key ingredient of Power.  For MASSES of People to RIGHTLY be more powerful than an Informed Elite, the People must be in command of the same INFORMATION as the Elite.  

Regular People are consumed by the endless Mechanics of Living.  For them NOT be hoodwinked into being bushwhacked by the Clever & Dastardly, WHO ATTEND EVERY PERIOD OF HUMAN HISTORY, People must have the SCOOP.   PRESS must deliver it.  Otherwise, People too busy keeping their noses above water to see yonder shark.

Stipulated, that deep in the bowels of the cloak-and-dagger world of Espionage, Spies, Counter Spies and nudge-nudge-wink-wink Intelligence, also inside certain types ongoing Investigations, there are bits of information to which only a Select Few will be privy.  But I dare say, bona fide National Security interests are a FRACTION of what is being hidden.  National Security interests are entirely separate, OR SHOULD BE, from the secrets held tight beneath labyrinths of Creative Accounting.

That some people BOUGHT Derivatives and some people SOLD Derivatives fairly well clarifies that not everyone had the same Information.  I realize, of course, the Market IS speculation, the MANIFESTATION of risk-taking.  Not everyone places the same bets, that’s what makes horse races, etc.  But these were TOXIC ASSETS, with unethical-if-not-criminal underpinnings.  Some knew.  Some didn’t.  It is safe to say that the PUBLIC was not in the vanguard of this learning curve.

PRESS and BEARING ARMS were pointedly protected in the Constitution for excellent and superlative reason, respectively.  EXPOSURE is the last line of defense before EXPLOSION, y’know what I’m sayin’?  

Beloved Anchors and Glitzy Studios, thy other names are Bells and Whistles.

I will argue that relatively uniform pricing amongst airlines and gasoline stations speaks to Price Fixing.  Read that, Collusion.  A hop, skip and a jetset away from Racketeering.  Yeah, yeah, price of oil, price of oil.  It is but ONE cost, therefore ONE component of price.  Different management, different marketing strategies, different methods of operation, intuitively, you’d see some price discrepancy. Moreover, in a market like this, you’d expect to see some price WARS over fewer Travelers.  But nooo. They all decrease service and hold up the prices.  Which Government is also doing with Housing, by the by.

I’ve been on the road for a year now.  It’s the same situation with the motels.  Parking lots practically EMPTY in many of them, but prices remain almost identical by class AND holding at pre-Crash prices.  INTUITIVELY, we’d see Price Wars.  But nooo.

Lots of Good Hardworking Americans lost HALF of everything.  In some cases, EVERYTHING.  And yet prices are holding in industries dominated by Behemoths, which are dominated by high-flying Players. How very . . . convenient.

Returning to Mainstream Media, how is it possible that day after dispiriting day, all the “Majors” have the exact same stories, albeit with different spins?  With an entire GLOBE of activity from which to report, in blocs of time pre-shrunk by RELENTLESS advertising, how is it that they all report largely the same stuff?  I’ll grant some variety with feel-good Human Interests stories but, for News?  Lockstep.

They turn to the same Sources.  Then, despite an ABUNDANCE of evidence of deception and corruption, they take at face value the words of the people who have greatest motivation to lie.  They rely on and relay OFFICIAL versions of decisions and events when OVERSEEING Officialdom is, in fact, their highest calling.

So, in calling out Neil Cavuto, I am first of all coming from a place of HAD IT UP TO HERE.  It’s been EIGHTEEN MONTHS since Hank the Bank Paulson either TERRORIZED or ENTICED Congress into forking over the TARP funds.  Can you imagine a gang of traditional Bank Robbers successfully on the rampage for so long?  Would not EVERY state and federal resource be brought to bear on their apprehension and prosecution?  But nooo.  Not the White Collar Criminals.  They were all set to make NEW Derivatives outta Cap & Trade.

When DID Cap & Trade, which made a mockery of Green, become Cap & Tax, which makes a mockery of Green AND Enterprise?

I am no more interested in the personal lives of Journalists than I am in the personal lives of Paris/Britney/Lindsay or, indeed, of a supermarket checker or gas station attendant.  Oh, that’s right. We no longer HAVE gas station attendants, that a woman traveling alone might refuel without exiting her car.

It drives me BONKERS when they reflexively flash 8 x 10 glossy smiles at inappropriate times.

It WOULD make me hate them them when they laugh and joke around, but I am forbidden to hate.  So I criticize them instead.  NOTHING IS FUNNY.  It is BECAUSE well-paid, comfortable, secure people   carry blithely on with makin’ money in the REALLY old-fashioned manner of WHATEVER WORKS FOR ME, that the bullshit continues.  American Rank & File can expect little Correction or even relief until Press, the  Representatives who are meant to watch the Representatives, put principle over paycheck by playing hardball with Robber Barons AND Corrupt Officials.

“We” killed OVER A HUNDRED Afghan Civilians last week.  CIVILIANS.  Nobody bats an eye.  People trumpet SANCTITY OF LIFE while funding SLAUGHTER OF CIVILIANS. It ain’t right.

That HIDEOUS reality contrasts garishly with swanky productions of sanitized newscasts is one aspect of the irritation I felt at Neil Cavuto’s interjection of Personal Backstory.  ”ONE TIME, again.”

But I ALSO object to the content itself.  Inspirational story notwithstanding, it struck me more as UPBRAIDING than uplifting the Despondent.

In my experience, Despondency is a TREAD SUPER LIGHTLY area.  Warning signs all OVER the place, from CURVES AHEAD to DANGER KEEP OUT.  Neil Cavuto seems like a Good Guy.   Maybe I am over-ready to pounce (which is what You have obliged me to re-visit), but his Monologue smacked of defensive challenge: IF I CAN DO IT, YOU CAN DO IT.  BUCK UP.  

You never know what will put a Troubled Person over the edge, and Despondent Folk ARE on edges. With backs against walls.  Wow, if he overcame all THAT, I really AM a piece of shit — off with my head.

It doesn’t matter if a person’s circumstances are not as bad as another’s or not as bad as they think.  It matters how they FEEL.  Otherwise, none us would ever be able to gripe about ANYTHING on account of others having endured the carnage of war or 9/11 or whatever.  Many, many, many are the actions of great consequence, good and bad, that can be traced to FEELINGS rather than FACTS.  Owing to a surplus of lawyers and litigiousness, Wrongful Death suits pop up in the most peculiar places. 

Sometimes Tough Love works, sometimes it backfires.

Can you/he imagine if Neil Cavuto’s sermon, which I sensed had a distinct TELLING OFF quotient, turned out to be one Sad Sack’s camelback breaker?  No indeed, news Celebrities and the DEEPLY pocketed news organizations behind them do NOT want, nor should they HAVE, exposure in the Mental Health arena.  So emotional.  Such a crapshoot.  Who knows WHAT a jury is liable to feel.

THEN, even though you know and I know that Money isn’t everything, the Truth is that Money IS an especially big deal in a Moneyian nation during the worst economy since the Great Depression.  In this respect, Neil Cavuto IS sitting pretty.  People who are sitting pretty lecturing people are down-and-out is always a dicey proposition.

It is vital to keep an eye on the real issue.  The real issue is not whether Neil Cavuto has a “better” Life Philosophy but whether ANOTHER sovereign person has the inherent right to say THIS IS WHERE I GET OFF, and do it with more dignity than is entailed with blowing one’s head off or hurling oneself from a lethal height.

Who didn’t love the actor Brian Keith?  When cancer got to a certain stage, with death a certainty and only dissipation and pain between him and it, he took matters into his own hands.  Who cannot understand that  a Free Person might, at a highly idiosyncratic point, CHOOSE to exit with greater haste and less hassle?

Anyhoo, the handy-dandy Word Counter right in my line of vision tells me this has been anything but brief.  As I expected.  The “shortage” of Time manifests in disorganization, rambling, unclear thoughts, typos, missing words.  In short, all the stuff that COULD result in misunderstanding or offense.  Please accept apology in advance in that is the case, for it is assuredly not the intent.

On the contrary.  Because we are on the same “side,”  what I like to think of as the American side, I wanted to explain why I believe that relentless pressure on what has become the Industrial-Military-Media complex is not only Right but Necessary.  But also to thank you for reminding me that I do NOT have to blurt every thought that pops into my head and that, of those I DO feel obliged to express, there are ways and there are WAYS of saying the same thing.

Peace to a Peace Maker, from a Shit Disturber.