"Greatest Show on Earth"

Institutions that surrender control over part of their industry give up direction for all of it.

 The University of Illinois in Champagne underwent a sustained attack against their Native American mascot more than a decade ago. The result was total capitulation from the school. The mascot was retired and the school’s branding no longer includes Indian images, just a big goofy capital “I”. A supposedly socially conscious minority of students assumed (or imagined) the school’s chief mascot was offensive to Indian tribes and must be stopped. As a public university their ability to fight the charge was limited, their funds rely heavily on state and federal grants. Students who sympathized with the mascot, seeing no problem with the Native American mascot and taking no offence were poorly organized.

This situation plays out too often in life and reasonable people don’t take simple stands against it. In most cases a vigorous push back is the last thing needed. A straightforward easily articulated message is the most effective response to campaign of attack. The Chick-fil-A model is textbook for opposing an assault from organized protesters. A few years ago the CEO of the restaurant gave an interview to a magazine where he stated his support for marriage between one man and one woman. The Cathy family support pro-family groups that belief in the biblical definition of marriage. Large cities like Boston and Chicago (in 2012) refused to give the chain approval for zoning because of pressure from outside groups. The outrage against Chick-fil-A was not proportional to the statements made by Cathy and Christians seemed to understand what was happening in the culture. Mike Huckabee started Chick-fil-A appreciation day on August 1 2012 allowing supporters to line up for sandwiches all over the country. The response worked because of the simplicity of the message: a Christian group is under attack for supporting a biblical version of marriage, now go support them with your dollars.

Cities backed down and the restaurant received zoning approval.

Enter Ringling bros. and the attempt by animal groups (not public attitudes) to shut down the elephant portion of the circus, a key draw. The circus without elephants is like a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert without “Freebird”; people still go but the event is a lot less fun. More than a year ago Ringling Bros did away with the elephants. Constant attacks from activists disguised as animal welfare groups started to pay dividends. Excuses like ‘shifting public opinion’ are cited in news stories about Ringling’s decision to eliminate the elephant shows. What determines public opinion better than ticket sales? Polls are rarely cited as evidence of the so-called public disinterest.

When the elephants went away so did the spectators. Ringling Bros and Barnum and Bailey made a rational decision  based on cities like Oakland passing ordinances that restricted live animal shows, a measure meant specifically for circus acts. Once a few cities essentially outlaw your business the only option is to get out of the business. The main attraction was the elephant show.

“The Greatest Show on Earth” didn’t realize it until it was too late.

Would it have mattered anyway? The sharp instruments used to control the animals (called bullhooks) became the symbol of everything wrong with elephant training methods. Never mind that Asian elephants can weigh as much as 6 tons and stand 8 feet at the shoulders. How do critics propose to handle the great behemoths, with conflict resolution? How about positive reinforcement? Opposition to a part becomes hatred of the whole. So it is with groups like PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) that occasionally stumble into a legitimate animal cruelty story.  The entire circus became an object of scorn and ridicule, the training methods supposedly barbaric. But acquiescing to the mob only pushed away the customers, those who came for elephants. The message from the offended parties is clear, change your ways or expect a PR assault.

Cities got pressured into passing laws against using bullhooks. Governor Brown signed SB 1062 restricting traveling shows from using those instruments and effectively putting the elephant performances out of business. The iconic circus owners issued a statement citing ‘changing public opinion’ in the decision to get rid of elephants but no popular vote was taken on the issue. The Rhode Island ban against bullhooks only applied to the traveling shows and circuses. If the device was cruel and unnecessary why only restrict the circuses? Shouldn’t the local zoos also find another way? Ringling Bros, Shriners and others stopped using elephants because of the impossibility of controlling the animals with kind words only. Even for the iconic circuses the future of live animal shows looked murky despite all the ‘shifting public opinion’ nonsense they churned out for press releases.

When institutions and businesses give up control of their livelihood everyone loses. The circuses didn’t stand much chance in the long run; their industry was increasingly controlled by petty outside interests and malcontents. I am no great lover of the circus but I hate the idea that historic and cultural treasures are subjected to a public inquisition by activists claiming to speak for them. The circus may have disappeared as a milestone for kids growing up in America anyway. Going out like this, neutered and shamed, is an unfitting end for the “Greatest Show on Earth”.  Like the University of Illinois it let a small group determine its culture and drive its future. A shorter future than anyone realized.

Tough Times in OK

When the usual means of funding run short local churches become the lifeline with food, medicine and shelter. Oklahoma is in such a state now with its schools. Funding is dangerously short for repairs and maintenance that are normally covered under the yearly budget.

I remember an anecdote from author Mark Steyn about a woman at a political rally who asked the president if he was going to fix their school. It was an old school after all and hadn’t had repairs in years. The windows rattled when the train went by, the paint was peeling off the walls and the computers were out of date. The student desks broke down practically every day and the plumbing needed attention.  The woman demonstrated perfect exasperation and hopelessness at the situation. The president promised to do what he could and used the occasion to bloviate about ‘kids’ and ‘destiny’, the usual boilerplate politician stuff. The whole notion that the president should concern himself with one schoolhouse in one rural district of one state is truly a measure of how far from citizen/state relations we are. When did residents of a town, a district, a parish forget how to paint walls and fix plumbing on their own?

 States and districts and counties and townships should see to their own welfare and not expect taxpayers to repair schoolhouses across the country. It doesn’t matter how genuine the question was. It reflects ignorance about the relationship of citizens and state. This ignorance is tough to undue. The woman at the rally could have been a plant designed to make the president seem caring, good hearted. It may have likely been someone who thought by getting the ear of the 'organizer in chief', by calling attention to the plight of this school it might force the community to pay attention. Who knows, maybe the president arranged for some contractors to clean up the place but I doubt it.
  

That Americans thought the question to the President was acceptable tells me we aren’t helping our communities in need. These are opportunities for churches to raise money and volunteers to begin rebuilding and renewing schools. I wonder how much of these state budget problems can be fixed by taking some of the burden of retrofits and upkeep off the sagging shoulders of local governments. Americans are used to civil society being run like a business with invoices and payrolls, credits and debits. Money from sales and property taxes funds schools and libraries; when revenues are low for long stretches we scarcely know what to do short of blaming the Republicans (or is it the Democrats). Both parties end up managing a sinking ship but using different bailing techniques. The problem is simple. When revenues are down projects get cut, so do employees like teachers. That kind of math is something both parties hate and voters have to deal with.

Churches help by feeding the poor and arranging for counseling and drug rehab programs for the destitute. Some of the larger churches have ‘in-house’ programs for single mothers, ex-cons and scholarship funding for talented kids. Here in Oklahoma the problem of funding for schools is acute. Districts have cut funding for teacher pay and custodial work and even sports programs and office supplies. A lot of Tulsa area schools need more than just regular levels of spending; they need to rebuild large chunks of the infrastructure. We have trouble just keeping the lights on right now.  Oklahoma needs a drive for school renewal projects. Americans have a long history of pitching in and helping with building projects through churches and community led volunteer efforts.

I don’t mean to pick on the woman who asked the President for help. Too many crumbling buildings get ignored budget after budget since the money isn’t available; how frustrating it must be. Churches have the people and can raise the resources to cover the gaps for schools when funds are short. Local church volunteer projects are the collective response by citizens to tough times. Taking care of school buildings doesn’t have to mean a federal role for a federal purse, it just takes local citizens and local volunteers.

Maybe than we can get back to a reasonable understanding of federal roles and local responsibility.  

Crime and Punishment: Death Penalty

Opposition to the death penalty comes in two forms. The first is the what-if-they-are-actually-innocent argument that Northwestern University in Chicago has based much of their research. The second is a philosophical and ‘principled’ stand holding that states shouldn’t have the power to take life even for horrific crimes.

The debate over capital punishment today is mostly a debate over the legality of the procedure or procedures.  Some high profile cases always pop up showing how ineffective (and occasionally biased) the system can be. How many prisoners have been wrongly convicted by a bent jury and weak defense? Famously Northwestern University reviewed a handful of cases and managed to get many guilty verdicts overturned on an appeal. Many contained forced confessions, some hinged on inconsistent eye witness testimony or had false forensic evidence. Every time a case gets overturned and a convicted man or woman released I feel a pang of sadness that such an injustice occurred. I also get a sense that something fundamental needs to change in the court system.

 First Principles doesn’t pretend to know how to fix every situation but understand the tendency to get offenders off the street and put future victims at risk.

 If your argument is we can’t execute because they might be innocent, you aren’t arguing against having a death penalty just applying it in questionable cases. I believe in capital punishment because life is sacred. That might sound odd so let me phrase it like this: Protecting the innocent trumps saving the guilty. Societies that value life have a moral obligation to uphold justice for innocents killed. An element of “Let the punishment fit the crime” exists in some form; this tit for tat motto is about proportionality. Its purpose is justice and doesn’t consider reform or deterrence. Punishment is rooted in paying back what was taken, squaring the debt to society in accordance with principles of proportionality (retributive justice). Men who refuse to pay child support often have wages garnished. Thieves spend time in prison and speeders pay fines, both punishments are proportional to the crime. We wouldn’t put someone with outstanding parking fees in jail for 20 years.

Many Christians like to quote the Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt not kill” as a biblical rebuke to capital punishment. But the text isn’t referring to judicial or governing bodies, only individuals. The word “kill” isn’t about a punishment only a crime. No one complains when a deadbeat dad is sued and the court orders he pay money owed from future wages. In other words no one says when the court takes the man’s money “Though shalt not steal” although ‘stealing’ is exactly what taking earned wages means.  Most people understand the courts exist to seek justice and taking wages fits the crime. Some courts even award punitive damages on top of the amount being requested. Talk about stealing huh? The state (expressed through the courts) exists as a mechanism for applying law, punishing the guilty and seeking justice for victims.

Capital punishment as a tool of the state is under assault from drug makers.

 Manufacturers have started refusing to sell the 3 execution drugs involved in lethal injections on principle. Just this last week Arkansas tried to move up the execution schedule since the drugs used to execute will expire at the end of the month. The pharmaceutical company responsible (Pfizer) for the selling the drugs to Arkansas managed to get a federal judge to suspend the executions on the basis they were purchased under false pretenses. The company is probably responding to public pressure more than anything. This is still worrying because of the shift in attitudes among the public on lethal injection, if there really is a shift.

  

The point here is that anti-capital punishment advocates are finding clever ways to stop executions going forward. Pressuring pharmaceutical companies to stop selling the deadly mixes and using courts to issue injunctions are some of the latest tactics. Their adherence to principle is admirable but consider the philosophical ramifications of not putting murderous criminals to death when most every part of the law hinges on the ‘eye for an eye’ principle. Life gets devalued.

The rights of the guilty overtake justice for the innocent.

Life in prison is not an acceptable alternative to death. It doesn’t matter if the life in prison comes with hard labor and difficult circumstances. The toughness or ease of the sentence is beside the point. Societies should value life and the inherent blessing it represents. Taking one means losing another.

Whatever problems exist in the courts the death penalty needs to remain a viable method of punishment for murderers. Justice is often slow and fraught with error and imperfection but if we throw out capital punishment we lose the ability to correctly apply the law as it was established for the worst offenders.

  

ESPN and Sportishness

The stakes aren’t very high in sports so give my little rant here the attention it deserves by not taking it too serious.

 I miss the days when ESPN used to record the hour long Sportscenter coverage of the previous day’s scores and highlights. If you caught the first half and missed the second it would repeat every hour from 6 a.m. till noon. It gave viewers memorable sound bites and clipped highlights in a tidy package. It told America what happened in a clever and fun way; they introduced witty anchors and memorable lines, like the late Stewart Scott’s “Cooler than the other side of the Pillow.” Now we have what? I don’t even know what to call it, sportishness?

The network’s main course is still sports but now includes a mixed helping of politics, star power and talk show antics.

I should probably explain that I am not talking about the live sports they cover, the Monday Night Football segment and all the basketball games are great. Kirk Herbstreit on college football is superb, as are Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas for basketball.  Daily ESPN is like network soaps and talk shows, colorful characters and opinionated talking heads. One of their morning shows, First Take, encourages 3 guys to argue over a given topic. Each gets a short segment of time and occasionally uses it to blast another’s point of view. It’s more ‘talk friendly’ and works with the overall transition to hot take scripts that nearly every program before the 6 o’clock news follows. SportsNation, another hot take show, uses mic’d up audience feedback heavy on the “WOOAHs!” and “OOOOHs!” that Talk Soup made popular decades ago. These aren’t terrible shows and when you realize sports is entertainment the move toward personalities and gimmicks makes sense.

They just resemble the rest of the daytime television landscape instead of rising above it.

I don’t fault the executives at ESPN for wanting to change direction. Few companies have the boldness and intuition to cast aside a winning formula and head into the digital unknown. ESPN is avant garde in this way. Sportscenter went from a recorded morning news roundup to a live one in 2008. That was huge because it meant they needed to create new content for 6 hours every day. That was the beginning of this shift away from sensible today-in-sports broadcasting to a hodgepodge of Twitter posts, gossipy did-you-see-what-So and So (insert star name) wore trolling. Again, this is sports so the level of outrage is tempered by its entertainment nature.

Today’s version is heavy on opinion and light on reporting.

They have to fill up time somehow though. A cable channel that needs to get new material out for 12 hours a day every day should get a break on a few of the shows. They can’t all be Emmy winners right? Whatever the quality, a certain progressive political fiber runs like a thread through nearly every studio show. Not that every personality or journalist thinks like an editor of Mother Jones but the presentation of events suggests the network has Leftist sympathies. During the Missouri football team so-called strike last year the journalists’ covered the team like they were civil rights pioneers. Some of the players didn’t like the way the university president was handling complaints of racist incidents. The tone was very what-does-this-mean-for-athletes-in-America and unfairly portrayed a tolerant school into a place where bigots find refuge. ESPN didn’t say this of course but the reporting on it as a serious issue of our time was too much for me.

I don’t like the athlete profiles they do either. The productions are better than magazine covers for promoting star image. Uglier parts of their life get airbrushed or ignored. Not that stars should be criticized or dragged through the mud but neither should they be presented in an unflinchingly positive light. Journalists should always worry about their closeness with people, places and things they are covering.

For all my criticism of the new daily format ESPN trains their on air talent well. They had a formula for news and reporting that everyone seemed to like though. Go back to the recorded morning schedule and get back to sports news. 

Get rid of the sportishness.   

Notes on Bryson

I’m reading Bill Bryson’s latest travel book about his adopted home, the U.K. 

Mostly he travels to small towns in England and Wales to inform the reader on the history and current state of affairs. We get a little bit of the writer’s personal life as he relates his past travels through the country. The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain takes a fresh look at English pubs, tea, country towns and cell phone etiquette in this hilarious travel diary.

It is one part journalism and two parts satire. Satire and observation make up the humorous (sellable) part of the book. Most towns have backstories explaining the name or historical figure associated with it. Too often the story or legend is dull and anything beyond a paragraph is too much for me. Much of the small town hopping is excessive; he seems determined to check as many towns off the list as possible. It doesn't ruin the story but does seem to pad it. The insight and wit Bryson displays make the slower parts less so.

Raised in Iowa, he gets the differences between America and Britain on food culture and customer service intuitively. Here, he sprinkles the chapters with personal stories from hotels in New York to B&Bs in West Wales. His take on pop culture and what has been lost in modern Britain is hilarious. He can’t help the ‘back-in-my-day’ approach to travel and what has changed since his famous Notes on a Small Island days, the book established him as a travel humorist (travelumorist?). I confess I haven’t read it but Bill references it so often this feels a bit like a sequel. Like most sequels it probably lacks the creativity of the first however. 

He spends a little time on the green zone debate in London. If you aren’t familiar it is similar to other urban planning concerns in major cities. Historical society types and do-gooders who think it is their business to take valuable land out of production have a massive green belt around London. Bryson loves the green space and although I don’t understand his enthusiasm for the green belt, his support of it really strengthens the conservationist tone of the book. He takes a few shots at the green belt Economist for wanting to sell off the unused space.

 The author does his history research throughout the book but doesn’t pummel the reader with useless hagiographies of every earl of this and count of that. He keeps it light and funny with delicious bits of anecdotes in every helping. He might of trimmed the fat on this project some. It isn’t a long book but feels slow in the middle and drags--a little like walking through the countryside.

The humor of the writer shines through brilliantly and the country that inspired him to enjoy nature walks gets another close up from the master cynic.

"Not My Precedent"

The Obamacare precedent is that the government SHOULD be responsible for the medical coverage of all Americans.

Not knowing a ton of information about health care industry I’m reluctant to wade into this topic. But here it goes…

 I don’t like the idea of government sponsored health care or health insurance because it uses public money for private business. This distorts the market because public money is an endless buffet of ‘promises’ never completely delivered. As a society we can carry some debt on interstates and bridges or disaster relief and war but not private health insurance. Hospital visits will get more frequent and medical plans will cover more ailments as long as taxpayers are funding the bill. Medicare runs out of funding consistently.

I can’t imagine the Republican plan to overhaul the ACA (Affordalbe Care Act) will be much cleaner than the original Democrat plan. They don’t do minutia and shouldn’t be asked to. We wouldn’t ask long haul truckers to race their rigs in the Indy 500. They weren’t designed for it. This is a job for markets. Congress can help by removing restrictions on levels of coverage or by allowing some interstate commerce to increase competition among insurers.

Officials don’t help us buy food or gas, why do we need them for health care?

 Obamacare puts taxpayers on the hook for individuals’ health care, or at least the price of it.

It might sound mild but it is a significant change of course for Americans who think and act in market based terms for most goods and services. I get that the market is decidedly less free than it used to be. New homes, cars, food and energy are all frequently subsidized through direct payments and rebates. Both the ‘Cash for Clunkers’ program and the new home tax credits were forms of subsidies. A subsidy is just money from the government to help with the cost of a good or service. Often we come out ahead, like I did on the housing credit, occasionally we lose out.

 How well did used car dealers do under Cash for Clunkers?

 Economists (good ones) hate market intervention because it distorts the real value or price of an item. If your corner Quicki Mart owner gets a 50 cent rebate from Pepsi for every bottle, he can sell pop cheaper than everyone else. Pepsi made the pop at Quicki Mart cheaper than at both EZ buy and Save More. The real market value of Pepsi is something closer to what EZ buy and Save More sell it at. Pepsi distorted the real value of the pop sold at convenience stores by subsidizing Quicki Mart.

No serious person thinks we need a government subsidy so EZ buy and Save More can sell Pepsi at the same rate as Quicki Mart. Or that either shop couldn’t try to sell it cheaper to compete with Quicki Mart. We do treat health care this way though.

Large insurers with thousands of members offer plans at lower rates than small insurers. The reason is simple; the coverage they offer is broader and comes with rebates on hospital and clinic visits. Big health insurers can afford to sell cheaper than their competitors because of the rebate they get from providers. Governments have no more business regulating this than the price of Pepsi at corner stores.

Yes I understand that health care is much more serious than carbonated drinks, but not recognizing this as something for private industry to handle is what leads to high prices. Laws insisting everyone have coverage puts pressures on employers and insurance companies to cover everyone. The only way it works is because of the rebate the insurer gets from the government for offering a plan they couldn’t afford without it.

This is like insisting everyone buy Pepsi. If you can’t afford it the government will help you pay for it by giving you special coupons for EZ Buy and Save More.

The president wanted to get a massive health care law done before he left office, so bad in fact that the framework was built to fall apart. A federal pyramid with mostly older and sicker Americans at the top collapses of its own weight eventually.

 Obamacare was exactly that kind of precedent, one that made official the belief that governments should be the ultimate judge of life and liberty.  

I don’t think the Republicans will improve things much because we’ve crossed the Rubicon between roles of government and roles of citizens. We now think health care just needs to run better, a massive shop with an efficient manager. Republicans will save money and cut costs, probably. It misses the real point. They have no business selling it or regulating it, beyond some very minor things. Let the hospitals, doctors, drug companies, hospice centers, insurance providers and specialists figure it out. They know how.

This isn’t my precedent.

.  

Commitment breeds Consistency

  

 I tried to learn Chinese a few years ago. 

I breezed through my CD-ROM of Mandarin 1. No doubt most of what I learned in 2005 (in China) I forgot over the last couple of years but I was consistent in studying when I came back. The belief that kept me going was this idea of traveling back to China someday, work or travel. The language study fulfilled some emotional attachment I had, and have, to the middle kingdom. I liked the ‘idea’ of learning Mandarin, more than actually learning Mandarin. 

The long term commitment to learn it just wasn't there. 

Like gym-goers full of energy and dedicated to losing weight we forget our exuberance after a rainy day or a cold morning. By April the passion in the eyes is all but dim, like the last few coal embers on a camp fire. This is human nature though. We ebb and flow on commitments because our feelings get in the way. If we understood how emotional our commitment to exercise and healthy eating was we wouldn’t be surprised when it finally waned.

Emotion clouds commitment as surely as Kool-Aid colors water.

Long term commitment requires a larger reserve of guts to accommodate the crashing waves of emotion along the way. If not guts than something more eternal, a higher purpose. Spouses of loved ones with debilitating diseases spring to mind. I noticed a special recently about a movie director with ALS whose wife takes care of him regularly, he managed to direct a film in his condition. The fact that he directed a film through words typed on to a screen using his eyes to located keys on a keyboard (Stephen Hawking style) is amazing and inspirational. His wife and her upbeat look at life and kids really impressed me though. She takes care of him all the time while raising a handful of kids too.

I imagine she approaches every discipline in life with the same dedication it takes to care for her husband and kids.

 Long term commitment has transferable skills that jump from one successful corner of life to another. For instance, if working out is your thing and you’ve been faithful to it, you understand the discipline it has built in you. The foods you’ve avoided, the parties you left early, the alarms you’ve woken up to have all contributed to a better you. When you take on new tasks you are more likely than others to finish them or continue working on projects that aren’t interesting anymore. Because you understand how to ride waves of commitment when others bail out, sick of trying to stay on the surfboard.

Commitment has to be enough by itself, all by itself. Saying “I’d love to go but I can’t…I made plans to help Todd move” has to be enough. Sticking with something doesn’t have to feel a certain way it just needs to be something consistent you do, something you practice. Emotion can’t have any part of it. Stick with that difficult thing and watch improvement roll in.

 Whether learning a language or giving up Saturdays to help a neighbor move, steadfastness pays off. You will approach other situations in life with the same dedication.

You know what it takes now. You are committed.