The glass broke.

At first, while listening to this TED Talk, I wasn’t sure that it was relevant, though I wanted it to be. It’s a subject I’ve given a lot of thought to.

Lera Boroditsky: How language shapes the way we think.

The speaker hit on the example of “the vase broke” vs “he broke the vase,” and the implications of these two different KIND of observations implicit in our language constructs (different in kind, not in degree), and my thoughts went immediately to my own home, as recently as two nights ago.

I had opened the cabinet in the kitchen to retrieve a glass, a very particular one I had just recently bought, and it was cracked. I asked Phoenix – my other half – about it. “It broke.” This didn’t satisfy my English-language-fueled blame-lust, so I pressed on, saying something like, “Oh, I guess it just decided to break itself.”

Phoenix has lived in the U.S. a long time, but he was not born here, and English was not his first language. His was Tagalog, heavily influenced by Spanish.

So perhaps his way of describing such events does not show an unwillingness to take responsibility, as I have would have had it. Perhaps instead it shows an acknowledgement of the actual change that has resulted in the physical make-up of the world, to be weighed in its own merit.

I’d like everyone to watch this Talk, and identify ways in which their own thinking or behavior might be swayed by the ways we tend to describe things.

In truth, yes: “the glass broke.” I think I can learn to be ok with that.

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Will we need a universal basic income in the future?

I was drawn into a conversation recently of whether we will need a universal basic income at some time in the not-so-distant future. This is something that I’ve been thinking about perhaps since I graduated from college, and I’m now a few years away from retirement. So it’s something I’ve thought of from time to time, over the years.

I’d like to share with you a couple of TED Talks on the subject that I came upon just within the last week or two. First, one by Martin Ford, called “How we’ll earn money in a future without jobs,” and another, by Rutger Bregman, “Poverty isn’t a lack of character; it’s a lack of cash.”

There are others as well. But these two I found particularly key; the point drawn out of the first one is that even though this is a familiar tune we’ve heard numerous times before – the robots are going to put us out of work – the technology has shifted, not just in degree, but in kind, in ways that make it perhaps more of a realistic possibility now than at other times in the past. And the second illustrates the difference in peoples’ responses to everyday occurrences, decisions they have to make, life choices, etc., when comparing their financially-secure state with their financially-at-risk state. It makes the case for a guaranteed minimum income for reasons of what I’ll call social pragmatism, where the first one does so for reasons of technological encroachment on human employability.

It seems clear to me that the idea of “running the country like a business,” as some still say they want us to do today, is an idea whose time has simply passed. With more and more business processes being executed by machines, computers, systems, etc., what does running a business have to do with solving human problems?

I think the time has come, rather, to run the country like a junior high school concert band, or soccer team. Here, the coach/conductor is rightly more focused on building character, helping the team members to find their strengths, than on winning competitions. With a sufficient safety net such as our modern society ought to be able to provide, people can be led to find their own truths, their own best skills, and quite probably make the greatest contributions to society at large. In eliminating the survivalist “do unto others before they do unto you” kind of thinking, we can create an entirely different national dialog and identity.

A guaranteed minimum income can provide the means to that end. And it may well have to.

A visit, away.

I was very happy to have been able to spend some time with the two people I met last night. One was a young man who was something like a freelance orderly and home care attendant, who visited multiple people every day, generally traveling by bike but sometimes catching a ride with a friend who drove a delivery van, or the bus, as was the case when we met.

The other, also met on the bus, was a woman who was an African spirit-healer for severely handicapped children nearing the end of their time with us – something like a doula, she explained, but for those exiting the world rather than entering it – and their families.

“Many a time have I sat with the hand of the child and the hand of the parent, each in my own hands, when the child crossed over to freedom,” she said.

We walked together for a while after leaving the bus, which was when she told us this. It was night now, so we had spent several hours together. We were in a sort of gas station or taxi repair, under an urban overpass; each was on their way somewhere. A couple in a white van asked a couple of times (it was a bit noisy) if any of us had a [something] coin; I started to reach into my pocket and they looked surprised, as I was the one who seemed the most out of place here. One of them asked again, “a taika-coin?” and I said, “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t hear that part.” It was a sort of token that grew out of the barter economy, used in this place and other small businesses for things like car vacuums, as this couple wanted, and sometimes for newspapers, candy, etc. I didn’t have one.

The “doula” recited a bit of a bidding prayer in verse, and at the end said, “Let’s finish together,” and the young man and she – and me trying to fumble and follow along – sang what seemed a standard recitation of the names of some African ancestors, surprisingly (to me) starting with Abraham, but I don’t remember the other four or five names. This was used as a sort of “Amen” at the end of her prayer, and seemed common practice.

I was sorry to have to take leave of you all so suddenly. You probably wonder what happened to me: a coughing fit jolted me awake. It saddens me that I was therefore not able to spend more time with both of you. But I am happy to have met you, and to have been able to bring this small glimpse of your lives back into this realm with me.

Do Republicans have trouble with math and memory?

I keep hearing Republican members of Congress and other GOP talking heads saying that politically they need to deliver on health care reform and/or tax reform. Something. Anything. Because they made that promise to the people, and the people don’t like it when you promise something and don’t deliver.

Some of that is true. People don’t like it when you promise something and don’t deliver. That much is true. However, who are the people? Who was the promise made to? What percentage of them were on board with that promise, thought it was a good thing, from the get-go?

Well, let’s look at some numbers. Vagaries of the electoral process aside, when you’re talking about people, and how the people voted, it seems to me that you’re explicitly not talking about how the election districts voted or how the Electoral College voted. You’re talking about how the people voted.

In that regard, it is easy to see that most people in this country did not vote for the Trump Agenda in the first place, and an even smaller number today approve of the Trump Agenda as it is actually unfolding.

There are about 320 million people in the US. This represents all people, whether of voting age or not, whether voting-eligible or not. It’s everybody. Our sons and daughters, our immigrant population. Arguably, everyone who would be affected by the laws of this land. Of those, 63 million people voted for Trump. When you look at these numbers, that means that only about 20% of the actual US population asked for him to be in the White House.

Taking a survey today, you’d find that of those original Trump supporters, only 80% approve of where he’s going and how he’s doing today. Only 60% strongly approve. Even going with the higher 80% number, that means that arguably only 51 million are on board with the Agenda. That’s less than 16% of the total US population.

Think I’m being too harsh? Ok. Let’s look at just the voting-eligible population (VEP) of 231 million instead of total US population. In that case, applying the same calculations, we net out at 22% of the US voting-eligible population who are looking to the Administration to do what it said it was going to do. (The numbers are only slightly different when looking at it as percentage of voting-age population (VAP) – around 21% in that case.)

So by and large, here’s how I see it. The Republicans can continue to say that they have a mandate to do what they promised the American people they would do. But the numbers tell a different story. The numbers say that the vast majority of the American people – at least 80% of us – would be best served by this President not doing what he said he was going to do.

I for one can’t wait for them to stop doing it.

The Gift Horse of the GOP Tax Plan

The GOP tax plan is being sold with statements like “lots of people will be able to file their income tax returns on a post card. There’s no one who’s not gonna like that.”

Oh really? No one?

Here’s one: ME.

Look… When I install Windows 10 on a computer, the first thing it asks is if you want to install with the default settings, “Best for most people,” or to customize. I have studied each of these settings – there are about 15 of them – and in every single case, I reverse the default settings in order to protect our security and to meet my needs. The default settings are clearly best for Microsoft and perhaps other unnamed entities. But not for the user.

Do not for a minute presume that filing your income tax return on a document the size of a post card is going to benefit YOU. It’s going to benefit THEM. Especially if you have any kind of business expenses, or charitable giving, or whatever… you’re going to want to fill out a long form and itemize everything you can.

Especially now, with the GOP strategists and technicians, operating sub rosa to create a framework for further GOP control (via mechanisms including but not limited to gerrymandering and the push for voter registration), it’s necessary to be ultra vigilant in our circumspection.

In other words: Yes. DO look that gift horse in the mouth.

This is the Place – Reflections on the attack at Manchester

I have been avoiding reading about the Manchester attack. I know when I’m too close to the edge to look over, and that’s the way I’ve been feeling since I heard about the tragic event. Today, I looked.

As the saying has it, there are eight million stories in the naked city. Manchester, this time, is that city.

One of those stories belongs to eight-year-old Saffie Rose Roussos, the youngest of the victims. She was caught in the blast after having become momentarily separated from her mother and sister, both of whom suffered shrapnel injuries.

Another one of the stories is that of Sorrell Leczkowski, 14 years old, who was with her mother and grandmother. She died. Mother and grandmother are still in hospital, recovering from their wounds.

Not all of the names have yet been released. But for each name, there are countless stories. None of them explain. They merely convey. Those who will survive this incident will recover, more or less, from their physical wounds. There is no recovery from the emotional wounds.

“A return to a normal state of health, mind, or strength.”
“The action or process of regaining possession or control of something stolen or lost.”

A parent who loses a child to illness, or accident, no matter the age of the child, is a changed parent. There is no returning, though there can be a moving on.

But a parent who loses a child, particularly a young child, to an act of atrocity, and worse – their child was there by their own permission or in fact in their very care – not only cannot return, but can never really regain possession or control. That which was stolen, remains stolen. The fault these parents will naturally assume, whether warranted or not – and here, clearly not – will never let them taste sweetness again without tasting bitterness. All the would-have-been-joyful moments to come will forever be tethered to darkness by the fact of the missing essential element: the child.

There is no justification for what happened. There is no explanation that can complete the puzzle of life for the people who were affected. And we have all been affected. The best we can perhaps hope for is to remember. Remember the path we were on. Remember why we were on it. Remember where we thought we were going. Remember who we were with.

For me, this memory is helped along by “This is the Place,” a poem by Tony Walsh, which he so forcefully read in the aftermath of such loss. I leave you with this thought, in the hope that it helps you to come to a better place, as it did me.

Tony Walsh reciting “This is the Place”

Knowing a little does not equate to knowing a lot

How many of you know about the demolition of the Babri Masjid? It happened in 1992. Do you know why it happened? Do you know where? Do you know what the outcome was? How many things have been held in the the balance during the 25 years intervening? What is happening now?

I raise this as one issue – a single solitary thing that happened somewhere in the world, a thing that had tentacles of consequences extending in every direction – to remind myself, and anyone else who considers it, just how difficult it is to know what is happening in the world, and why it’s happening. To remind us that when we sit here in the US and believe we know, because of our education, our CNN, our NY Times, our Facebook and our Twitter, our tremendous privilege, if you will… to remind us that we are truly looking at the world from 40,000 feet up. The details are obscured, the actors and participants unknown. We don’t know what happened just before this obscure scene unfolded, or the week or month or decade before, and we don’t know who prevailed, or what transpired, because we’re moving. We’re not hovering.

A little humility goes a long way. Don’t presume that you know the best course of action for someone else. Be intentional with yourself. Be respectful and compassionate toward others. Assume that there is more to the story than you can see or discern. Be a help if needed, but but don’t expect always to lead.