Eisenhower, the sage

By Don Klein

The United States is a debtor nation, yet it sustains the most portentous and feared military force in human history. Oddly this phenomenon exists when it is not challenged by any enemy of comparable awesome power – not by a long shot (pardon the pun). Further there is no nation anywhere threatening it or on bad terms with the US. Not the Russians, not the Chinese, none at all.

To add to the absurdity of the scenario, the US is broke and owes hundreds of billions of dollars to other nations. It also suffers the burden of a crushing deficit which must be reduced.

Is there something in this package of facts that makes sense?

How can such an economically bereft nation maintain such a military monster for virtually no reason at all? Strangely enough President Dwight D. Eisenhower spelled out the reason more than a half century ago. The United States is afflicted with what may be a fatal malady. Ike warned us about it in his farewell speech. He described it as "the military-industrial complex."

Eisenhower was not a great president, but he was an honest man who knew all about war. During World War II he was the commanding general of millions of Allied forces in the European Theater. He might not have known much about social issues or other civilian matters, but he was an incontrovertible expert on the military.

This dichotomy reminded me of the fact that my whole life has been spent under the cloud of war. I was barely 10 years old when wars broke out in Asia and Europe and I was happy after WWII that there was no one left to fight. I was wrong.

There was the Korean War soon afterward, in which I served, then the tense near war over the Cuba missile threat, then Vietnam and Cambodia campaigns, the aborted war with Iran over the hostage situation, and the Reagan invasion of Grenada, the Lebanese Marine barracks debacle, the air attack on Libya, the Iran-Contra affair and deploying defensive missiles to Europe, followed by the Bosnian war and now for more than a decade, the Iraq and Afghan wars.

Almost every post-WWII president during the last six decades sent US forces into harms way on questionable missions. They seemed to act on the premise that we are the superpower, and have to demonstrate it by flexing our might.

I don't believe there has been a similar period of history that has had more wars affecting a single nation. War is an awful waste of humanity, of resources, of industrial clout, of intellectual potential. It is interesting how history seems to write its story despite all else.

Suddenly, after all these decades, Eisenhower, a bourgeois military man, comes away appearing to be a farsighted political sage. This country's future has already been derailed by the false belief that overwhelming military superiority will keep us safe from attack. Remember, it didn’t stop 9/11?

There is no major military power threatening us, yet we spend more on arms and military operations than all other nations combined. And if anyone suggests we slowdown we get the usual fear-peddling nonsense about being soft on security. The nation's gullible voters buy it hook, line and sinker and we continue casting ourself as the most well-armed pauper in the world.

In all fairness the US was not the only nation afflicted by wars. There were dozens of hostilities in Africa, Asia, Central and South America during what became the bloodiest century of all time. And that’s not even counting the two most lethal European conflicts – World War I and World War II.

In too many of these wars the US has played a part – if only as a materiel supporter of one side or another and, in others, like Iraq, WWI and WWII, as the principal adversary.

But with the decline of the Soviet Union in the last decade of the 20th century there is no substantial military power facing the country, and none are on the horizon. So why do we maintain such an awesome, and expensive, military force?

Eisenhower warned about it. Big industry makes tons of profits selling arms and other military supplies. The arms makers influence Congress with donations and high ranking professional warriors parrot fearful consequences to keep up the spending for wars that are not at all likely. Members of Congress in turn sell their warlike programs employing large doses of frightful dire consequences to the public and tamp down all political opposition by branding them "soft on security."

So the carousel keeps twirling with the US screwing itself into the ground. The thought of reducing the immense military drain on the budget to ease the economic crisis now facing the country is hardly ever mentioned, and when it is it is, it is couched in modest terms.

At the current rate we will be nation no different than a larger version of many third world countries which have a well-financed military supported by an undernourished, unskilled populace controlled by a puppet government owned by the biggest of all industrial claques, whose top executives live in pure luxury.

What we need to do is break the cycle. The first fiscal cuts should come out of an over-bloated military budget, cutting it back to the size a little bit larger than the tradition peacetime force maintained for centuries by the US. Cuts in other programs affecting civilians can follow once we correct the military-industrial imbalance.

Sex and the old man

By Don Klein

They were back at KFC-Taco Bell, the winter haunt of retired men at seaside. Sam munching on the usual chicken breast, original recipe, and Mario enjoying his bean burritos with the enthusiasm of an epicurean dining at a Waldorf feast prepared for gourmands.

"What would you think of an 84-year-old, twice divorced, guy who is marrying a shapely 24-year-old blonde saying, 'This is it. This is a very, very special one. I expect to spend the rest of my life with her’?" Sam asked.

"I’d say the rest of his life is not going to be very long," Mario snapped back, adding after a pause, "Is this a hypothetical question or are you talking about someone you know?"

"This is not a fictional character. We all know him. You know him also." Sam started to chuckle as he considered the prospect. "Who do you know who would marry a gal 60 years his junior?"

"Most of the guys I know these days would consider marrying a woman 60 years of age as robbing the cradle." then challenging his friend, Mario asked, "You are almost as old as that guy you are talking about, would you marry someone that young?"

"I said you knew him, aren’t you interested in who he is?" Sam ignored the question about what he would do.

"Yeah, who is this nut who plans to end his life in the saddle earlier than otherwise?"

"Why none other than your good friend Hugh Hefner, the founder and recipient of the Playboy fortune."

"Hef’s no friend of mine."

"Sure he is. I guess you were a Playboy devotee in your wayward younger years, slobbering over those buxom young playmates month after month. We all were." Sam claimed.

"I’ll admit I read a few copies of the magazine, but I didn’t pay much attention to the Playmates in it. I spent my time in reality. I preferred real live women and will admit I was a bit of a ladies’ man in my day." Mario confessed.

"Yeah, you told me you were a bit on the wild side before you settled down with your wife for good. I suppose you didn’t have time for Playboy. Now it was different with me. I'm old fashion, I'm a one woman guy and have been married for over 50 years. But I was a regular Playboy reader for a couple of years."

"So Hef is getting married you say. And the bride to be is only 24 years old?" Mario noted.

"That’s correct. I thought Charlie Chaplin was stretching things when he hooked up with Oona O’Neill in 1943," Sam said, "He was 54 and she was only 18 when they were married. And despite the age duifference they had eight children."

"I don’t remember anything about that. I was just a child at the time, but I read somewhere that Oona’s father, Eugene O’Neill, the playwright, was not very happy about the union."

"He certainly was not -- in fact he disowned her and they never spoke to each other again."

"Well who is marrying Hef?" Mario asked.

"Her name is Crystal Harris," Sam said, "There was a picture of the two of them in The New York Times magazine a few weeks ago. He was seated on a throne-like chair in black silk pajamas and a red silk robe looking like an ancient potentate and she was standing next to him like a teen concubine dressed-up to look older, with long blond tresses and a too short skirt." Sam tried to be explicit.

"I thought it was laughable. I am younger than Hef by a few years and have a granddaughter almost as old as Crystal," Sam continued, "In fact Hef has a daughter who is 58 years old. She could be Crystal’s mother."

"Imagine a 58 year-old woman with a 24-year-old stepmother," Mario laughed,
"only in Hollywood."

"It sounds like you think Hef has never grown up and still thinks of himself as a young buck ready to sniff any female that comes by like a dog in heat," Mario suggested.

"Don’t get me wrong I give the guy all the credit. What other octogenarian do we know who can still command the interest of those young birds," Sam said, almost with admiration, "But I am not ready to concede that his appeal to the kitty crowd is sexual. He cannot be much of a partner there, but he pays well. He has to realize they wouldn’t be there if he didn’t. That must be his real allure."

"How do you know that?" Mario asked.

"Well the story said he pays the young things that agree to stay at his luxurious Hollywood mansion keeping him in a sensual Valhalla $1,000 a week and picks up virtually all their expense, like autos, clothes and so on. The mansion costs over $3 million a year to run."

"I sort of feel sorry for the old geezer," Mario became very thoughtful suddenly. "As they say there is a time in life for all things. Time to be born, to grow up, to get married, to raise a family – and a time to enjoy the autumn years relaxing and reviewing the vicissitudes of life."

Then he pondered, "Poor Hef he tries be appear debonair but never grew out of the teenage years. He still hangs out with chics. An old man, who will be 85 in two months, cannot find adult things to do with his life so he pays young women to parade around his bedroom without clothes on and occasionally join him in Viagra-buttressed sex."

"That’s an avocation reserved for young men." he declared wistfully.

"Dammit," they simultaneously agreed.

Too big to manage?

　
By Don Klein
　
In recent discourse we have heard lots about businesses that are too big to
fail. That was why the government charged in with billions of bailout funds
to help foundering enterprises on Wall Street and in Detroit. I am beginning
to wonder if the emphasis is in the wrong direction.

I get the impression there is a much worse problem. Could it be that this
country is too big to manage. It seems that America is too overblown in every
way and too diverse, for any administration to be supervised skillfully.

Take an objective look at the country. It stretches from the Atlantic to the
Pacific over a multitude of miles of mostly fertile land and is the home of 310 million people of diverse backgrounds and ethnicity. Russia has twice the land mass with half the population and a population density of 8.2 per square
kilometer. Canada has slightly more land than the US with merely ten percent
of the population .

The US stands third among land masses on Earth with 9,629,091 square
kilometers and a population density of 31.6 per square kilometer. The
average population density for the entire world is 13.1. And it will worsen as
the US gets bigger, and we will because we have the largest expanding
population among the world’s industrialized countries.

In a mere 40 years the United States Census Bureau projects the country’s
population will be 440 million, or a 46 percent increase over today. It appears
to be impossible to run the country today, how are we going to handle 130
million more residents?

A growing population in a finite land area puts all kinds of strains on
government. People need water, food and space to live comfortably. We
already use a larger space footprint per person than any country in 2010, what
can we expect in another few decades?

Another problem, if you can call it that, is the tradition of freedom that exists
in America. The population may be derived from different backgrounds but
the ultimate goal of most people is doing what they want, where they want to do it and when they want to do it. How is that going to be possible when we will be falling all over each other in the not too distant future?

Twenty-five years ago I was in China departing a Hangchow to Shanghai
passenger train and stepped onto the platform of the busy station. All I could
see was an endless mass of Orientals streaming to the exits. I was with a
small group of Americans heading for our chartered bus and had to walk
against the flow of human traffic to get to our awaiting vehicle.

It is impossible to describe the feeling of smallness in that situation. The
crowd was hardly belligerent, just curious at the sight of us, as they
maneuvered by. The impact of the shear multitude in such a small area made
me feel intimidated. It was a dreamlike vision, even frightening to share such
a small space with so many others.

The thought of that as the future of the United States, even on a smaller scale,
is enough to provoke nightmares. But that seems to be where the country is heading.

We don’t have enough roads, nor enough bridges and tunnels to traverse our waterways, there are times we don’t have enough water for all our needs, and who knows how long our food supplies will keep us all fat and happy.

There are forest fires that burn down homes, floods that wash away our
towns, hurricanes that damage our cities, tornadoes that level our villages. All
have a human element. The forest fires are often caused by careless campers,
floods are caused by the lack of trees cut down to make room for expanding
home sites and hurricanes and tornadoes wreak much of their damage
because population density results in the inability of people to escape their paths.

But the failure to manage the country lies in the inability to get things done in
Washington. It has become not a question of governance, but the challenge to govern at all. Gridlock in Washington is monstrous as the minority party
votes as one against anything the majority party sponsors.

Recent examples: The unemployed lose of extended benefits, the ailments of
first responders to 9/11 attacks go untreated. But there are worse signs of
mismanagement. Reportedly about 6,000 graves at Arlington National
Cemetery are misplaced, the Department of Defense routinely cannot find
billions of dollars of its budgeted funds, and there are times the government
cannot even deliver a letter in reasonable time and without great expense.

We heard about wounded veterans not getting proper treatment at Walter
Reed Hospital, the icon of American military medical facilities, and we learn
that suicides among fighting forces are higher than ever and specialists in the
field blame the military for not recognizing the problem early enough and
treating the people in need.

Then there is the two worst aspects of US government. One is the outlandish
corruption of officials. Every year there is another series of scandals
involving present and former congressmen and senators. Then we also have
the endless problem of protecting the country from illegal aliens entering
across our borders. We don’t seem to have the gumption to do anything about
it.

They say they can save billions of dollars if they rid Medicare of its
inefficiency. The same is true of every government function. The military
wastes more money than any other agency because it gets more. There is
Social Security fraud and mismanagement, and other entitlements that could
be trimmed without reducing benefits, and education funds go astray, but
government thrives on waste and incompetence.
　
Is there another country with all these problems ? I don’t know , but I doubt
it. The problem is size and wealth. America is simply too big and getting
bigger every year, and too wealthy, even though it is a debtor nation.

They used to say New York city was too big the manage. That’s peanuts
compared to the nation. Places with the largest population are the hardest to run. Think of California’s money problems. Maybe we should not worry about that and just amble along in our incompetence.

I was fortunate to live through the Golden Years of America – from World
War II through the end of the 20th century. I am glad I will not be around to
see what’s in store for the people the next half century.

Waiting for the next blizzard

By Don Klein

Being stuck at home because of a snow storm is great for kids. There is sledding and snowball fights and for those with skill, ice skating. There is also a healthy resurgence of family comity in at-home activities. Most of all it means no school for them. I never realized until recently that being snowbound is good for grandparents as well.

In my younger days I always liked the concept of snow. It was God’s way of purifying the land with a pristine coat of cool, soothing, white fluff, much as intensive rain sweeps away all the muck of everyday life. Snow just covers it. But just below the line of consciousness in those days I secretly dreaded snow when it pounced onto my life in substantial quantities.

To me it meant shoveling what seems to be tons of the white stuff from the driveway and front walk. It meant power failures and the breakdown in normal public services and cancellations of many civic activities plus horrendous trips to and from my job. Snow storms are eclectic, a balance of fun, frenzy and frustration.

Not anymore. In retirement without little ones under foot, being snowbound is a cherished period of relief. I noticed that for the first time last weekend.
In the days when we had young children at home my wife, Joyce, would bake loads of chocolate chip cookies and make what always appeared to be gallons of hot cocoa. Once the walk was shoveled many of the neighborhood kids would come tapping on the front door for handouts. They knew where the freshly baked cookies were concentrated.

To this day, our daughters now mothers themselves, bake chocolate chip cookies when they are shut-in by winter storms. The acorn never falls far from the oak.

With this most recent storm, her culinary juices aroused by the sight of snow pelting at the sides of the house, Joyce asked me "Would you like me to bake brownies?" My lack of responsive enthusiasm was driven by the fact that before the storm I had wisely purchased a fudge cake and a box of chocolate covered doughnuts (don’t mention it to my doctor) for nutritional fortification during the upcoming weather-driven confinement.

Not being deterred by my negative reaction, she said the magical words, "How about I make a pot full of knadels." Ah, knadels. An image from my past. The Passover delicacy my wife learned to make from my mother. Mom made great knadels but Joyce has outdone her, ameliorating her cooking with each passing year.

There are few foods I can think of that I can resist – French onion soup, beef Wellington, grilled Alaskan salmon, Rainbow trout, chicken l’orange, beef tartare – but none more than knadels. It makes me salivate.

For those who are unfamiliar with knadels accept ths definition. It is a fluffy dumpling made of matzoh meal and other magical ingredients folded into the size of a meatball, cooked for 20 minutes in unsalted boiling water which is disposed of before the little darlings are served with steaming homemade chicken soup.

The soup, as we all know, is a cure all for ailments. Homemade chicken soup is miraculous. Legend has it that it makes stutterers speak like Laurence Olivier, transforms klutzes into Fred Astaires, and would do wonders in making chatty Sarah Palin as erudite as Adlai Stevenson if ever she deigned to taste it.

Despite all the positives that exist in chicken soup, it is the knadels, or matzoh balls as some people call it, that deserve all the praise. Just imagine. A cold night, the wind whistling outside, the snow pelting at your front door, and you are presented with a bowl full of steaming homemade chicken soup with a half dozen knadels floating in it. You brain turns celestial. You hear bells.

But that is not the only reason for me to glory in being snowbound. All during the day as Mother Nature unleashed her fury on us, I had the pleasure of finishing a great book, "My Paper Chase" by Harold Evans, all about newspaper work in Britain and the US. Then I picked up once again a novel I had interrupted to read the Evans book, called, "The Russian Concubine" by Kate Furnivall.

This is a beautifully written piece of fiction about western expatriates in China prior to World War II. Then there were the moments spent with eyes closed listening to recordings on my CD player of Mozart, Strauss, Copland and Beethoven. What else does man need? Thankfully there was no place to go, nothing to do since all meetings and scheduled dinners were cancelled.

Fortunately a bunch of young guys with a sister, showed up and shoveled out our driveway so if we had to go somewhere we could, but didn’t because there was no place to park the car once we got there. That meant another day of involuntary detention.

It was great to stay home and do nothing, except read great new books, listen to fabulous old music and to close out the day with a dinner which included the eternal knadels and homemade chicken soup. Ah, Nirvana right here on earth.

I’ll try to slip in days like this again when the weather is less contrary, but I know it won’t work. The pull of life’s routines are irrevocable. I’ll just wait for the next blizzard and hope for the best.

Time to call their bluff

by Don Klein

Years ago when I was new to reporting a sagacious elder told me that politics is the art of compromise. Over the years I remembered that rule and watched how it worked on every level of government. That is the true meaning of bipartisanship.

You give a little. I give a little. And before long we have an agreement and legislation is enacted.

Last week when President Obama went before the Republican meeting in Baltimore in a face-to-face showdown on public policy it gave the appearance of the start of bipartisanship in action, but really it was just an extension of what has been going on for the entire first year of his presidency.

It appeared that Obama was making a serious attempt to bridge some of the issues that separate the executive and Republicans. I am sorry to conclude that I did not see the same serious act of honest conciliation on the part of the Republicans who spoke out.

The most glaring different between the Democratic president and his GOP opponents was contrition. He had it, they didn’t. He acknowledged that he did not do everything he said he would do during the 2008 campaign and promised to do better in the future. They, on the other hand, stood fast and never admitted standing in the way of legislative progress during last year.

Obama shocked them when he said he had read their counter proposals on several issues and incorporated the best ideas into bills at issue and rejected others for reasons of good government. While the Republicans hardly ever budged from their unwillingness to cooperate with the administration on any issue.

In the end, Obama walked away from the meeting a much more admirable figure than any of his sniveling opponents who only seemed to be interested in stymying any program which put a new face on solutions to problems. The GOP clearly wants to follow the same old, dysfunctional policies of the Bush administration which brought on the terrible state of the nation today.

Examples: They want to solve the severe national financial shortfall by more tax cuts when what the government needs is more income, not less. They still want to implore the old, harmful plans to cut entitlements and privatize social security instead of seeking new solutions. They don’t want to be labeled the "party of no" by Democrats while never voting in favor of anything the Obama party proposes.

The Republicans are wracked by their well-deserved negative image and want the president to make them look good again. They almost unanimously praised the idea of the meeting and thanked Obama for taking up their invitation, but most of them behind the scenes thought they should not repeat the meeting.

They realize they took a beating on view for all to see on television.

Frankly, I hope I am wrong but my gut feeling tells me there will be no change in relationship in Washington the coming year. The GOP sees their current obstructive policies paying off by causing a new round of gridlock, which the public despises and takes out on incumbents. So far the victims have all been Democrats. The New Jersey and Virginia governorships went their way and more recently the half-century-old Democratic seat in the Senate from Massachusetts went Republican.

They feel obstructionism works to their favor and although Obama seems destined to make points whenever he faced them in open debate, they seem to win at the voting booth. And since this is an election year for all the seats of the House of Representatives and one-third the Senate, why should they start cooperating for the good of the rest of us now?

I don’t see any improvement in relations on the horizon between the two sides in Washington. More gridlock. More ridiculous, meaningless opposition up and down the line. And more problems for the grass roots where unemployment demands a unified government approach to problems.

The Obama visit to the Republican retreat last week was good public relations for Obama, not the Republicans. They will not repeat it soon, or ever, because it did not serve their purpose. I feel they invited the president in the first place because they expected him to decline the invitation and thereby give the Republicans a political victory without an actual face-off. It didn’t work

Being obstructive only goes so far. It pleases the distant right wing because these lovers of Bush extremism see Obama as an abomination for many incoherent reasons. But the majority of Americans think highly of the president and not so well of the Republicans, according to all polls taken recently. If the Republicans continue to cater to the extremists by blocking legislative action in the Senate they will be surprised in November.

If the Democrats were smart, now that they have dithered away their 60 vote majority -- and I wonder about the Senate leadership -- they should push legislation to one filibuster after another and allow the public to measure which is truly the Party of No. I think the Republicans are bluffing and cannot sustain many filibusters without causing damage to themselves.

Let them kill economic recovery. Let them stop health reform. Let them fight excessive federal spending which they themselves perfected during the Bush years. Let them bring government down to inaction. Then let them go to the polls in November and ask the public to put them into power. It would be ironic and the best thing to happen for the Democrats.

But it takes bold-faced courage, and I don’t know if the Democrats have any.

The Eleventh Commandment

By Don Klein
　
I never thought much of devout people who lecture others on the qualities of his or her faith. To me, when it comes to religion, what you believe in – or don’t believe in – is no one’s business but your own. It is like someone clumsily presupposing they know the path to goodness and morality while the other person does not.

It also presupposes there is only one pathway to virtue. Such propositions are flawed and ignorant. And unseemly.

Many years ago when I was an executive with the Maryland Port Authority on a trade mission in Japan I experienced a haunting example of misplaced religious ardor. Four of us were in a taxi on the way to the airport near Osaka when the head of the delegation somehow turned the usually light travel talk to religion. The others were Christians, I wasn’t.

"Klein, you’ll never have a satisfying life because you do not accept Jesus as your savior," he said. I thought he was jesting and laughed, but he wasn’t.

I wondered what this arrogant muttonhead considered a satisfying life. His wife was an alcoholic who died earlier than she should of sclerosis of the liver. His only daughter left an exclusive college without graduating after three years of costly tuition. He was forced out of his top job before retirement because of his professional ineffectiveness and ended up a lonely widower with few friends.

If that was what the "good life" his religion brought, no thank you. Actually, it wasn’t his religion that made his life good or bad, it was his tactless demeanor, his poor business judgment and his arrogance that provided the downturn of his career and private life.

Brit Hume’s demeaning remarks about Tiger Woods’s need for religious forgiveness brought that memory back to me. "Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world," he lectured on television the Buddhist Woods for his womanizing antics.

Having religious beliefs are fine and often serve good purposes. But to have the nerve to openly suggest what others should do is loathsome, but not unusual. Take the thousands of missionaries who are scattered around the world proselytizing their faith over the beliefs of natives with bribes of food and medicine.

The endearing quality of life in America is the Constitutional protection of religious belief. The government will never indorse a specific religion and will never restrict its citizens in choosing the religion they prefer. In most cases people follow the religion of their parents and family. But if they wish to convert, it is their free choice.

I would hope no one construes what I am saying as opposition to conversion. If people freely decide to change their faith, so be it. Congratulations and good luck. But for an outsider, layman or clergyman, to gratuitously preach conversion is definitely a no-no in my mind. Hands off, friend, this is the land of free choice.

Now to the subject of Brit Hume’s proposal to Tiger Woods – "forgiveness." That’s a beauty in itself. What does that mean? What sins are forgivable and who decides which? Would we forgive a cold-blooded slayer of children? A traitor to his country? A murderous head of state like Hitler or Stalin?

All right, cool off. Tiger has only admitted to having extra-marital affairs. That’s got nothing to do with religion and all to do with his relationship with his wife. They must resolve the problem. There is no need to change his religion. Did not Brit Hume’s mother ever warn him to stay out of other people’s personal lives?

There should be an Eleventh Commandment – Thou shalt not stick thy nose in other people’s private affairs.

When I was growing up in polyglot New York City we would often hear a bigot claim that many of his best friends are Jewish. We laughed at the obvious hypocrisy. But I can claim the reverse with unembarrassed preciseness. Many of my best friends are Christian. If fact most of my friends are Christian and I have no complaints.

The ordinary people I have met in life, which includes a career in journalism and public relations and my wife’s career in public education and later as an accountant, has been sprinkled richly with great people of all religious denominations. Except for a minimal of aberrations, like the one mentioned above, I found people keep their spiritual preferences to themselves, no doubt because they felt their faith is a personal matter.

It is truly a shame that a few unthinking immoderates like Brit Hume besmirch the good intentions of so many others who respect the honest differences in faiths found in a thoroughly mixed and educated society such as ours. The thought that one religion is superior to another is not what this country is about, and should not be in the minds of fair minded person.

Tiger Woods will find his own way out of his current troubles or – he will not. And his religion with have nothing to do with it.

The girls of summer

By Don Klein

"The Boys of Summer" was a chronicle of the victorious Brooklyn Dodgers of 1955. That was the year the perennial losers, known as "Dem Bums," finally won their first World Series after a hopeless 65 year history. Sad to note, the victory was a bit hollow in that a mere two years later the team abandoned their New York roots and moved to Los Angeles transporting their heartsick fans from Brooklyn to berserkland.

The book, written by Roger Kahn, in 1972 reflected on the exploits of many diamond heroes and is a symbol of eternal fan patience and athletic fortitude.
Now, in the era of equal gender rights, we seem to be living through a period which could be dubbed, "The Girls of Summer," although there does not seem to be a victory in sight. Neither of "the girls" who make this summer memorable (Sarah Palin and Katharine Weymouth) are winners. Despite that, they have drawn much public attention and professional scrutiny in their respective fields – politics and journalism.

The first "girl" in trouble this summer is the former vice presidential candidate on the losing McCain ticket and soon to be former governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. Here we have a popular Republican, dear to the hearts of the dwindling hardcore of party faithful, deciding to quit in mid-term from a job she says she loves in a state she loves.

There seems to be no adequate explanation for her move since no clear motive was mentioned by Palin in her rambling and, thankfully, short announcement on July Fourth Eve. That should not be a concern since people a lot more skilled at this business than most of us have been unable to understand Palin since she was picked by Sen. John McCain as his running mate almost a year ago.

We heard her say she wanted to quit to better serve Alaska. Wow, what a confession that was. Could she have meant that Alaska would be better served with her not at the helm?

She associated herself with the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan who she said would not quit, then promptly she quit. She talked about basketball point guards like herself passing the ball off to others on the team, but failed to mention that they do not leave after making the transfer as she plans to do.

Did we hear her say she didn’t want to serve as a lame duck and "milk" the public? That makes no sense since the option to milk the public or not was hers. Besides she knew she was elected to a four year term, meaning if she did not run for re-election she would be a lame duck in a couple of years. How long did it take her to realize this simple fact?

Her malaprop-laden rhetoric leaves many shaking their heads in wonderment. Listening to Sarah Palin is like watching a moose on roller skates "it’s never graceful but always riveting," said Mark McKinnon, a former GOP advisor.

Everyone is speculating why she quit just two and a half years into her first term and there are a number of possibilities. Was there a personal scandal about to break that she could avoid by resigning? The FBI says no. Does she want to be free to roam the lower 48 in pursuit of support for a presidential run in 2012? Who knows? Does she intend to make lots of money by taking advantage of her celebrity on the lecture circuit? Probably. Would she write a book to cash in on her sudden short-lived, but still volatile, fame? Very likely.

And finally, maybe she just lost her taste for national politics and wants to avoid the spotlight. Hopefully.

I doubt it is the latter because in her resignation announcement she said she thought she could provide more effective service out of office than in. I can give her credit for one very important attainment. Her sudden and unexpected announcement on quitting the governorship bumped the up-til-then endless coverage of Michael Jackson’s death on the all-news cable networks for at least a few hours. For that she deserves thanks.

If we can accept the political demise of Palin with hardly a blink of the eye, the second "girl" of summer to misstep is a much sadder story of anguish. Katharine Weymouth, the granddaughter of The Washington Post’s great late publisher, Katharine Graham, was caught in the midst of putting together a dismaying case of influence peddling for a price that any newspaper has been known to try.

The highly influential and much respected newspaper which broke the Watergate scandal, was about to arrange for a series of dinners at Weymouth’s mansion where invited guests would have the opportunity to meet and discuss the day’s issues with high government representatives and a chosen number of The Post’s top reporters. Private firms would be invited to underwrite these meetings to the tune of $25,000 a shot.

The idea was to help improve the financial status of The Post, which like all newspapers, is facing tough economic times. This question arose: Is this the way to raise money for an ailing industry -- by selling influence? Weymouth blames the whole idea on the newspaper’s marketing staff, but if you believe underlings would have the steel to promote this event without clearance of top company and editorial brass, you are more gullible than Forrest Gump.

When the first flier announcing this numb-brained program appeared, the news staff broke out into apoplexy. Once revealed to the outside world, Weymouth scrapped the idea and tried to restore normal comportment. The idea was faulty from the beginning. A newspaper’s most important timber is its integrity. Weymouth was willing to risk that but more seasoned heads at The Post saved the day.

Weymouth has inherited wealth, was a magna cum laude at Harvard and a Stanford law graduate, has everything going for her except she is running a newspaper without real experience in journalism. That’s a prescription for calamity. There are things that should never be for sale. Hopefully Weymouth has learned an ethical, albeit painful, lesson.

A memorable occasion or not?

By Don Klein

Abortion is an combustible topic. Adherents on both sides of this issue are often too passionate to really illuminate the subject. Few really stop and examine what is really at stake.

When the 1973 landmark Roe vs. Wade ruling of the Supreme Court was issued it did not outlaw anything. It did not force anyone to do anything. Unlike most laws, it is not restrictive. It liberated pregnant women to do what they felt was right in early pregnancy. It left the decision of abortion in the hands of women.

Most significantly it took abortion off the criminal docket. No patient or health provider would be prosecuted for participating in an abortion. It legalized the right to choose. At the same time it did not prohibit those who opposed this right from not seeking abortions. No one was required to have an abortion.

It could, in a most extreme of example, be compared to the right of legal representation when accused of a crime. All citizens have a right to a lawyer even if they cannot afford one, but not all defendants exercise that option. They are free to appear in court without an attorney, although that might not be very wise.

We have many rights that we don’t use and no one gets worked into a frenzy over them. We have the right to travel freely all over the country but many never use it. We have a right to send our children to public schools, but some parents find alternatives. We have a right to vote and don’t always go to the polls. Those are just a few rights we don’t use.

Yet no one goes into a tantrum when others exercise the very rights we might ignore. Not so with abortions. Why is that? Because in the case of abortion we run into religious principle. That brings up the next question. Why should religious belief matter in a country which prides itself in separation of church and state and which in all other matters of religion is extremely tolerant?

That’s a hard question to answer when talking about abortion, but it is based on the fact that opponents of Roe vs. Wade hope to repeal the law by consistent and virulent confrontation at every level possible.

The current Notre Dame controversy over whether to have invited the president of the United States to address university graduates this spring and to offer him an honorary law degree is a case in point. Opponents are taking a misguided political stance to promote their resistance to abortion rights.

Barack Obama believes that the federal government has no place in dictating to women whether to have an abortion or not. That is a personal matter out of reach of government and therefore he leaves the subject to the conscience of individuals to deal with. He would agree to counseling against having abortions, but would not try to ban the procedure.

There are many people who think that stance is balanced and a pretty fair approach to the subject of abortion. Advise against the practice, but avoid prohibition. That to me covers both sides of the extremely volatile issue. However, to those who have an emotional attachment to banning abortions or have religious objections, it does not seem to be enough.

So based on Obama’s stand on abortion, an element of the university’s students, faculty and alumni are audibly opposed to even inviting him to the South Bend commencement ceremony.

In putting this into perspective, we must recall that every president from Dwight D. Eisenhower on has been invited to speak at Notre Dame. Actually, it is a distinct honor to have the president come to any school to deliver an address. Most institutions of higher learning never get such a lofty visitor.

Obama is doing the correct thing. He is holding his peace while others deliberate over the wisdom of the invitation. Notre Dame, a Catholic institution, follows the dictums of the Vatican which is flatly and unambiguously opposed to abortions. It claims it violates church law and is immoral.

It is a single issue objection. There is no other reason given by those in resistance to the president’s visit. It is foolish to think that not receiving an honorary degree from Notre Dame would matter much to Obama, a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School and the one time editor of the distinguished Harvard Law Review – and now US president and the most powerful man in the world.

Actually, there are many who think fighting legal abortions is beating a dead horse. During the eight years of the Bush administration, when the president was an outspoken adherent of the so-called right to life movement, there was no attempt to reverse Roe vs. Wade even when the majority of Supreme Court justices were Catholic. It seems most politicians are not willing to move on this issue for fear of voter recriminations on election day. All they are willing to do is offer lip service to appease the anti-abortion activists.

It will be interesting to see the outcome at Notre Dame. Will the university stand up for academic independence and free expression in a temple of learning or will it succumb to the wishes of those embittered zealots who feel that a president who has a different opinion on this subject should be denied the honor a university of stature has to bestow?

Of course as Americans they are free to disagree with any opinion, including the president’s, but instead of being discordant wouldn’t it be more useful to greet and listen to a honorable man of great personal achievement, of historic accomplishment and perhaps the most eloquent orator of these times. His speech might well be a memorable moment in the lives of those in attendance.

Filthy lucre

By Don Klein

We used to make lots of fun when growing up by suggesting money was the root of all evil. When we were young we often used the phrase "filthy lucre" to describe how money dishonored otherwise nice people. We knew it was wrong to influenced by cold cash but secretly we all hoped to have an opportunity to be so tainted.

As we moved through life we noticed that the concept of filthy lucre was alive and well everywhere we turned. People, try as they may to do the right thing often are swayed by the lure of money. Immature boys would hone their athletic skills at the expense of a good education not because they loved sports but because of the prospect of making big bucks as a pro.

Little girls, some as young as five, are entered into beauty contests with eyes focused on an ultimate career in films so they could dress up in fancy clothes and live an eventual life of luxury as a superstar. The prospect of success and the money that goes with it seems to drive the ambitions of many.

Most of these end up as disappointments, but that doesn’t stop the next wave of youngsters from trying.

You would think politics is different. Many say they went into public service because of a earnest desire to do good. They say they want to improve the lot of the people, but once elected or appointed to powerful office, the filthy lucre syndrome takes hold. Often the influence of money is subtle and almost imperceptible, often it is bold and ugly.

Why would a respectable politician like Tom Daschle need to place his career in jeopardy for the sake of a chauffeur driven car provided by an organization that wants a Congressional connection? Why would a solid, up by his bootstraps John Edwards, need a sordid love affair at the potential height of his political career? Why would Charles Rangel, a senior member of the House of Representatives seek a $10 million gift from AIG to build a school in his honor?

The answer is power. If you got it, you use it, you take advantage of it.

Power was what got Newt Gingrich in trouble in 1997 when he was brought up on ethics charges by the House of Representatives, when he was House Speaker at the time. There were 84 charges filed against him but the most serious was claiming tax-exemption status for college courses he ran for political purposes. He paid a fine for $300,000 and resigned his seat for the 1999 term.

What brought him down? Filthy lucre, again.

Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, a Vietnam veteran who served multiple terms in the House of Representatives admitted taking bribes to the tune of $2.4 million from defense contractors and another $1 million in other bribes. He denied it at first than confessed and eventually was sentenced to prison in California.

And then we have the bizarre case of Rep. William Jefferson of Louisiana. When the FBI raided his home in 2006 suspecting bribery funds extracted from a defense contractor, they found $90,000 in cash in his freezer. Another $10,000 was wrapped in freezer food containers. After a series of trials and appeals, Jefferson finally was defeated for reelection in 2008.

The answer rings in our ears over and over again: Filthy lucre. Filthy lucre. Filthy lucre.

These are just a few of the recent cases, but we keep learning over and over again what motivates many of our trusted lawmakers. It not always is money. There are other ways to satisfy an individual’s need to exercise power. Bill Clinton found it in a satellite office adjacent to the Oval Office. Others found it in writing suggestive letters to Congressional pages.

The most notable – in terms of rank -- of all cases of political greed during last half century was Spiro Agnew, the vice president in the Richard Nixon administration. The full impact of the Agnew scandal never reached absolute momentum because ten months later, Nixon, who himself was neck deep in a personal scandal, was forced to resign or face impeachment in the wake of the Watergate case.

Agnew’s situation had nothing to do with Watergate but was just as surly. He was charged with receiving a $10,000 cash bribe in a plain envelope on White House grounds. The bribe allegedly was a payoff to Agnew who when governor of Maryland had provided lucrative state contracts to a contractor.

On October 10, 1973 the country was treated to the dismaying specter of the vice president of the United States pleading no contest to bribery charges in a Baltimore court. In exchange for his resignation Agnew was sentenced to three years of unsupervised probation and fined $10,000, the exact amount of the bribe.

Filthy lucre at its zenith, but pretty small by today’s standards.

When you have power, your have privileges. That’s the way it should be. Executives, like mayors, governors ad presidents deserve respect, deserve their prerogatives and entitlements. It comes with the job. They have nice offices, usually a home provided by taxpayers, have large staffs working for them, are given personal security and officially provided speedy and comfortable transportation. It’s a tough job and deserves rewards.

But those rewards cannot be monetary and cannot be in exchange for official action because legally no one is said to be above the law, especially elected officials sworn to serve the people.

The enticement of filthy lucre has to be controlled.