Yesterday we buried my grandparents at a small graveyard in Canton, South Dakota. They now lie near generations of their forebearers atop a small, windswept hill surrounded by farm fields. Two people who lived and worked in some of the remotest and far flung corners of the globe have returned to rest beneath the blue sky and broad vistas of the prairie. It fits perfectly.
I love the prairie. It is harvest time and the fields are golden and tan. Traveling beneath a bright cobalt sky dotted by swiftly rolling clouds conveys a sense of timelessness. I find it hard to feel sad as I think of my grandparents lying quietly year after year as the seasons march over top. Maybe I would feel different if I stood atop the hill in the dead of winter but yesterday it was golden and it felt inevitable and right.
The prairie always feels inevitable. It can be easy to forget just how vast this country is when you live in a city. The prairie and its open horizons are a necessary correction. After 9/11 I remember scanning the horizon thinking about a hijacked plane flying toward the building I was standing in. Those fears drained away a few weeks later as I was driving west. These plains are too large. No act of terrorism or war endangers them. They cannot be destroyed by anything short of a global catastrophe. That recognition brings me peace. My grandparents will lie undisturbed for all time.
Peace is acceptance. I have struggled to accept the loss of my grandparents. While they were by no means young, the loss of each seemed premature when the time came. Despite that longing, I felt peace yesterday. Not because I have come to terms with their departure but because the land has welcomed them home. They have come full circle back to the endless horizons that watched the beginning of a great journey and now watch over a well-earned rest. I believe they are at peace. I am.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Friday, October 7, 2011
My Idea For the 99 Percent
Over the past week the Occupy Wall Street movement has started to gain some real momentum. Commentators are talking about it spreading like the Tea Party movement did a few years ago. Today, Occupy Wall Street came to Minneapolis.
It is too early to tell if this is the start of a broader social movement. I certainly hope it is. America's most recent gilded age gave rise to the Tea Party which energized the Republican party. Somehow, people who were angry about government spending on behalf of banks threw their support behind a party that believes the rich should be paying less and not more. Meanwhile, government programs that support those too poor to benefit from tax cuts are being starved of funding.
My hope is that Occupy Wall Street is the start of a populist movement that will serve as a needed corrective. Sites like the We Are the 99 Percent make me believe that it can be.
As the Occupy Wall Street movement has grown much of the criticism from commentators centers around the fact that there is no central demand that the movement has put forward. Rather, it is a loose collection of demands. Most of these demands center around anger at the economic fortunes of the elite (symbolized by Wall Street bankers) and frustration over the economic pain being inflicted on the rest of the population. The problem for the Occupy Wall Street movement is that there is no consensus around a solution - whether that be taxes on the rich, economic assistance for the poor, nationalization of the banks and so on. As such, it is easy for the media to latch on to the further fringes of the anger and portray the movement as purposeless.
This messaging problem has led some to offer their own proposals as to what Occupy Wall Street should be demanding. On Sunday, Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times offered his proposal. Thus, I have decided to offer my own proposal. Of course, no one will actually read my proposal but I am convinced it is superior.
I believe Occupy Wall Street should be demanding that Congress and the states pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting any contributions, direct or indirect, to any politician from anyone who is not a registered voter. I believe the constitutional amendment should restrict the amount of money that any one individual can contribute. Finally, the constitutional amendment should make it clear that, for purposes of contributions to politicians, corporations are not citizens and do not have rights under the First Amendment.
So why is this the one demand that Occupy Wall Street should have? Because I believe if it was written properly it would pull much of the corrupting influence of money out of elected politics. More importantly, it would break the cycle of the political system serving the few at the expense of the many. Politicians should be responsive to voters not to corporations. By limiting contributions and prohibiting groups like corporations and unions from contributing to campaigns, politicians would be far more attuned to the needs of individual voters.
Such an amendment would undo the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United and would amount to a mutual disarmament of the political parties. The political parties could be restricted from running ads that supported candidates and, more importantly, could be restricted from raising funds from corporations and unions. This would, in turn, make the politicians and the parties less beholden to the agendas of the financiers.
Erecting a barrier between everyone but citizens and the politicians would make politicians reliant on individuals for contributions. A cap on the amount of a contribution would limit a politician's reliance on any one individual. As a consequence, the focus would be shifted from those with the most resources to those with the most support.
To give an example tied to the current financial mess, Goldman Sachs would be prohibited from funneling any of its billions in profits to any politician, either directly or through a lobbying group. Similarly, Goldman could be restricted from running issue ads calling for a bail out of large banks. Goldman could attempt to persuade its shareholders and employees to ask their politicians for a bailout. But the weight of each shareholder or employee would be limited by the contribution cap. Thus, a politician with a district consisting of a large number of shareholders and employees of Goldman may still be persuaded to spend public money for the good of Goldman but only because it was the will of a sizable number of constituents.
Corporations and unions are very good raising money. In fact, corporations were created for the purpose of raising money. Unfortunately, the rise of modern media has so intertwined money with politics that corporations and unions have acquired an over-sized hold on our democratic institutions. For our democracy to survive and flourish that influence must be paired back. To do that, under the present interpretation of the United States Constitution by the Supreme Court, requires a constitutional amendment. There is simply no other way to counter the weight of money that can be brought to bear on a politician.
If Occupy Wall Street were to obtain such a constitutional amendment it would ensure that politicians would listen to the 99% before the 1%. The voice of the people would at least be heard above the din of special interests and their money.
It is too early to tell if this is the start of a broader social movement. I certainly hope it is. America's most recent gilded age gave rise to the Tea Party which energized the Republican party. Somehow, people who were angry about government spending on behalf of banks threw their support behind a party that believes the rich should be paying less and not more. Meanwhile, government programs that support those too poor to benefit from tax cuts are being starved of funding.
My hope is that Occupy Wall Street is the start of a populist movement that will serve as a needed corrective. Sites like the We Are the 99 Percent make me believe that it can be.
As the Occupy Wall Street movement has grown much of the criticism from commentators centers around the fact that there is no central demand that the movement has put forward. Rather, it is a loose collection of demands. Most of these demands center around anger at the economic fortunes of the elite (symbolized by Wall Street bankers) and frustration over the economic pain being inflicted on the rest of the population. The problem for the Occupy Wall Street movement is that there is no consensus around a solution - whether that be taxes on the rich, economic assistance for the poor, nationalization of the banks and so on. As such, it is easy for the media to latch on to the further fringes of the anger and portray the movement as purposeless.
This messaging problem has led some to offer their own proposals as to what Occupy Wall Street should be demanding. On Sunday, Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times offered his proposal. Thus, I have decided to offer my own proposal. Of course, no one will actually read my proposal but I am convinced it is superior.
I believe Occupy Wall Street should be demanding that Congress and the states pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting any contributions, direct or indirect, to any politician from anyone who is not a registered voter. I believe the constitutional amendment should restrict the amount of money that any one individual can contribute. Finally, the constitutional amendment should make it clear that, for purposes of contributions to politicians, corporations are not citizens and do not have rights under the First Amendment.
So why is this the one demand that Occupy Wall Street should have? Because I believe if it was written properly it would pull much of the corrupting influence of money out of elected politics. More importantly, it would break the cycle of the political system serving the few at the expense of the many. Politicians should be responsive to voters not to corporations. By limiting contributions and prohibiting groups like corporations and unions from contributing to campaigns, politicians would be far more attuned to the needs of individual voters.
Such an amendment would undo the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United and would amount to a mutual disarmament of the political parties. The political parties could be restricted from running ads that supported candidates and, more importantly, could be restricted from raising funds from corporations and unions. This would, in turn, make the politicians and the parties less beholden to the agendas of the financiers.
Erecting a barrier between everyone but citizens and the politicians would make politicians reliant on individuals for contributions. A cap on the amount of a contribution would limit a politician's reliance on any one individual. As a consequence, the focus would be shifted from those with the most resources to those with the most support.
To give an example tied to the current financial mess, Goldman Sachs would be prohibited from funneling any of its billions in profits to any politician, either directly or through a lobbying group. Similarly, Goldman could be restricted from running issue ads calling for a bail out of large banks. Goldman could attempt to persuade its shareholders and employees to ask their politicians for a bailout. But the weight of each shareholder or employee would be limited by the contribution cap. Thus, a politician with a district consisting of a large number of shareholders and employees of Goldman may still be persuaded to spend public money for the good of Goldman but only because it was the will of a sizable number of constituents.
Corporations and unions are very good raising money. In fact, corporations were created for the purpose of raising money. Unfortunately, the rise of modern media has so intertwined money with politics that corporations and unions have acquired an over-sized hold on our democratic institutions. For our democracy to survive and flourish that influence must be paired back. To do that, under the present interpretation of the United States Constitution by the Supreme Court, requires a constitutional amendment. There is simply no other way to counter the weight of money that can be brought to bear on a politician.
If Occupy Wall Street were to obtain such a constitutional amendment it would ensure that politicians would listen to the 99% before the 1%. The voice of the people would at least be heard above the din of special interests and their money.
Monday, September 26, 2011
I Need a Hero . . .
I recently finished a biography of George C. Marshall. Principal architect of the United States war effort in the Second World War and distinguished Secretary of State, Marshall's resume is the stuff of a national hero. What struck me about his biography most was his dogged determination to play the role of dutiful public servant. Marshall worked diligently to avoid becoming entangled in politics and strove to be an honest broker.
Such larger-than-life heroes seem to be missing from our current national crisis. No great leader has stepped forward to lead America out of the tangled mess of a post-9/11 world and the wreckage of the 2008 financial crisis. George Packer, writing in the New Yorker, wrote a longer piece entitled Coming Apart. I largely agreed with his piece, much of which dealt with the apparent collapse of the American political system. One of his principal points, and the one that lead me back to think about George C. Marshall, was that our political leaders have failed us. They have not been the leaders we have needed in a time of national crisis.
I would personally like to believe that President Obama has the necessary capacity for leadership. However, I have come to the conclusion that however great Obama may be at understanding the need for leadership, he is out of step with the times. While that may sound like a criticism of Obama it is not. Rather, it is criticism of the rest of our political system. While our system did produce and elevate an erudite and eloquent leader it left him without a counterpoint. There is no principled opponent with which to bridge the nation's divide. There is no honest broker willing to put country before partisanship. Thus, a great compromiser, who is willing to reach across the political divide in service of a broader faith in the United States of America, is left with no one to compromise with.
Without this counterpoint or counterpoints, Obama is left trying to single-handily move the wheels of governance by himself. In a system that was designed to preclude the concentration of absolute power in the hands of one man, Obama is left with the impossible task of carrying the whole of the burden himself.
There appears to be no George C. Marshall waiting in the wings to selflessly guide America back to an even keel. There is no principled opponent ready to push Obama to take on his party much less deliver the opposition in support of a grand bargain. Rather, in a time when America expected its leaders to leave parochial and partisan interests at the water's edge, America instead sees its leaders standing upon the shores casting stones at those brave enough to enter the water.
Surely this is a recipe for decline. While I am loathe to join the crowd bemoaning America's partisan rancor and predicting the rise of our soon-to-be Chinese overlords, I can not help but look around and wonder where we went off track. The shape of the Republican presidential primary gives me little cause for optimism.
Where is our hero? I fear we will be waiting along time for an answer.
Such larger-than-life heroes seem to be missing from our current national crisis. No great leader has stepped forward to lead America out of the tangled mess of a post-9/11 world and the wreckage of the 2008 financial crisis. George Packer, writing in the New Yorker, wrote a longer piece entitled Coming Apart. I largely agreed with his piece, much of which dealt with the apparent collapse of the American political system. One of his principal points, and the one that lead me back to think about George C. Marshall, was that our political leaders have failed us. They have not been the leaders we have needed in a time of national crisis.
I would personally like to believe that President Obama has the necessary capacity for leadership. However, I have come to the conclusion that however great Obama may be at understanding the need for leadership, he is out of step with the times. While that may sound like a criticism of Obama it is not. Rather, it is criticism of the rest of our political system. While our system did produce and elevate an erudite and eloquent leader it left him without a counterpoint. There is no principled opponent with which to bridge the nation's divide. There is no honest broker willing to put country before partisanship. Thus, a great compromiser, who is willing to reach across the political divide in service of a broader faith in the United States of America, is left with no one to compromise with.
Without this counterpoint or counterpoints, Obama is left trying to single-handily move the wheels of governance by himself. In a system that was designed to preclude the concentration of absolute power in the hands of one man, Obama is left with the impossible task of carrying the whole of the burden himself.
There appears to be no George C. Marshall waiting in the wings to selflessly guide America back to an even keel. There is no principled opponent ready to push Obama to take on his party much less deliver the opposition in support of a grand bargain. Rather, in a time when America expected its leaders to leave parochial and partisan interests at the water's edge, America instead sees its leaders standing upon the shores casting stones at those brave enough to enter the water.
Surely this is a recipe for decline. While I am loathe to join the crowd bemoaning America's partisan rancor and predicting the rise of our soon-to-be Chinese overlords, I can not help but look around and wonder where we went off track. The shape of the Republican presidential primary gives me little cause for optimism.
Where is our hero? I fear we will be waiting along time for an answer.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
My Grandparents' Things
My grandmother died this week. She was my last grandparent and my last, real link to a life that I am now quite unlikely to live.
My grandmother spent much of her adult life overseas accompanying my grandfather, a disciple of Borlaug in the Green Revolution. While working for USAID and the State Department they lived and worked in exotic locations around the world. Afghanistan, Bolivia, Nigeria, Tanzania, Ecuador, Liberia. The list of places they visited is even more impressive.
To me of course they were grandma and grandpa. They were the grandparents we didn't see as often, at least compared to my paternal grandmother, who was a fixture at holidays. Grandma and grandpa lived on a lake near Nevis, Minnesota. I have vague memories of fishing and learning to shoot with them. In the mid 80's they moved to Palm Coast, Florida and built a home beside a salt-water canal.
We visited them there and, for a number of years while I was in high school and college, they would return to Minnesota to visit. At some point during those high school years I started to develop an appreciation of how different my grandparents were from everyone else. Maybe it was when my grandparents solidly defeated me and a good chunk of my Knowledge Bowl team at Trivial Pursuit. Maybe it was just the slowly dawning realization that the stories they would tell were just a lot more interesting than those of others. Conversations about the Biafran civil war and similar events came out at cocktail hour.
In any event, I also started to pay attention to their home. It didn't look like other people's homes. It was covered in masks and paintings that you didn't see in Wadena, Minnesota. More importantly, the items had stories connected to them. There was the Orisha Oko - a literal god of farming. A devil mask. Bright paintings commissioned from an African artist who worked on doors at the U.N. building. Cowrie shells, dark wood, exaggerated features. They sat on the shelves and hung on the walls of their home. Each had a story.
On their porch sat a bar that my grandfather had built. Embedded on the top of that bar were coins gathered during his work. They were a geography lesson but also a history lesson as well. The bar was covered with coins from places that no longer existed. Tanganyika. British East Africa. I would sit at that bar staring at pieces of history from a world that had vanished before I was born.
I never joined the foreign service. I came close. Very close. Six weeks before my marriage an offer letter came from the State Department for a consular affairs position. A month before we found out we were having our first child I got notice that I had passed the written exam again. I never took the oral round a second time. Grandpa wanted me to I think. He paid for me to travel to Chicago the first time I took the test. He was thrilled I passed it. I think he knew that I wanted to go.
Grandpa died three years ago. We went down for the funeral. I think it was that visit that I casually remarked on the oven hood over the range in the kitchen. "Oh that. Yes, we replaced the old hood with that. It is copper (or maybe bronze, I have forgotten). It was made from the roof tiles of the old palace in Kabul. I got the dimensions from Sears & Roebuck and went down to the Kabul market and had it made out of the old roof tiles."
If I hadn't asked I am not sure any of us would have known.
I don't know how many stories went with grandma this week. Probably a lot. Most of which I will come nowhere near experiencing myself.
In a few months we are to divide up the contents of the house and sell it off. Grandma made lists I guess. I haven't seen mine. I believe there are some books on African art on it. Grandma had mentioned them to me. They were supposed to have gone to my mother but she had no interest in African art. In fact, most of the art she doesn't want so it will be split among my uncles. I do not know if it is all spoken for. The paintings may remain unclaimed. The fate of the bar is unknown (at least to me). Similarly, the Orisha Okos may be unclaimed - though I assume they will be split between my uncles.
I have found myself wanting it. All of it. For reasons that I have struggled to explain to myself much less articulate. I want the art, the masks, the coins, the oven hood. Not because they are valuable though some of it certainly is. Not even so much because it reminds me of my grandparents though it does. More because it is doorway to a very different world then what I live in here in suburbia.
Maybe I wouldn't covet these trinkets so much if my own life had taken a different path. If I had taken that consular posting. Maybe my walls would be covered with something. Perhaps not masks and paintings from South America and Africa. Maybe something else entirely. But I didn't. Instead, my walls are bare or have pictures from my few vacations and posters of great art work. My dreams of replacing those things with different, more unique things; replacing them with stories of a life lived outside of the average experience is fading. I am not an old man but yet I feel that die is cast.
In a few months, my grandparents' things will be redistributed. A handful of things, apparently mainly the jewelry, will reside with my parents. Much of it will go into my uncles' homes and I will likely not see it again. Perhaps some of it will even come here.
When it goes, that window to a greater world that was my grandparents' home will close. I want desperately to keep that window open long enough to point it out to my children. To say "see, there is more out there than this. You can see it. You can live that life if you want to." I despair of my ability to tell them this story.
There is probably no single piece in my grandparents' house that will tell the story that I am struggling to articulate. No mask or painting that will make my children suddenly look at the world they know and wonder what else is out there. Still, I feel like if I could just hold onto the contents of that house that I could tell that story to them. That I could see their imagination kindle.
If I could just do this I could walk away from all of their things without regrets. I have my memories of my grandparents. They set my imagination alight in that home. I may not have physically escaped my Midwestern orbit but I mentally did. As it is though, I want it all. I want all of those precious things to stay where they are on the shelves and the walls. I want my stories back the way they were. I need those stories. My children need them.
My grandmother spent much of her adult life overseas accompanying my grandfather, a disciple of Borlaug in the Green Revolution. While working for USAID and the State Department they lived and worked in exotic locations around the world. Afghanistan, Bolivia, Nigeria, Tanzania, Ecuador, Liberia. The list of places they visited is even more impressive.
To me of course they were grandma and grandpa. They were the grandparents we didn't see as often, at least compared to my paternal grandmother, who was a fixture at holidays. Grandma and grandpa lived on a lake near Nevis, Minnesota. I have vague memories of fishing and learning to shoot with them. In the mid 80's they moved to Palm Coast, Florida and built a home beside a salt-water canal.
We visited them there and, for a number of years while I was in high school and college, they would return to Minnesota to visit. At some point during those high school years I started to develop an appreciation of how different my grandparents were from everyone else. Maybe it was when my grandparents solidly defeated me and a good chunk of my Knowledge Bowl team at Trivial Pursuit. Maybe it was just the slowly dawning realization that the stories they would tell were just a lot more interesting than those of others. Conversations about the Biafran civil war and similar events came out at cocktail hour.
In any event, I also started to pay attention to their home. It didn't look like other people's homes. It was covered in masks and paintings that you didn't see in Wadena, Minnesota. More importantly, the items had stories connected to them. There was the Orisha Oko - a literal god of farming. A devil mask. Bright paintings commissioned from an African artist who worked on doors at the U.N. building. Cowrie shells, dark wood, exaggerated features. They sat on the shelves and hung on the walls of their home. Each had a story.
On their porch sat a bar that my grandfather had built. Embedded on the top of that bar were coins gathered during his work. They were a geography lesson but also a history lesson as well. The bar was covered with coins from places that no longer existed. Tanganyika. British East Africa. I would sit at that bar staring at pieces of history from a world that had vanished before I was born.
I never joined the foreign service. I came close. Very close. Six weeks before my marriage an offer letter came from the State Department for a consular affairs position. A month before we found out we were having our first child I got notice that I had passed the written exam again. I never took the oral round a second time. Grandpa wanted me to I think. He paid for me to travel to Chicago the first time I took the test. He was thrilled I passed it. I think he knew that I wanted to go.
Grandpa died three years ago. We went down for the funeral. I think it was that visit that I casually remarked on the oven hood over the range in the kitchen. "Oh that. Yes, we replaced the old hood with that. It is copper (or maybe bronze, I have forgotten). It was made from the roof tiles of the old palace in Kabul. I got the dimensions from Sears & Roebuck and went down to the Kabul market and had it made out of the old roof tiles."
If I hadn't asked I am not sure any of us would have known.
I don't know how many stories went with grandma this week. Probably a lot. Most of which I will come nowhere near experiencing myself.
In a few months we are to divide up the contents of the house and sell it off. Grandma made lists I guess. I haven't seen mine. I believe there are some books on African art on it. Grandma had mentioned them to me. They were supposed to have gone to my mother but she had no interest in African art. In fact, most of the art she doesn't want so it will be split among my uncles. I do not know if it is all spoken for. The paintings may remain unclaimed. The fate of the bar is unknown (at least to me). Similarly, the Orisha Okos may be unclaimed - though I assume they will be split between my uncles.
I have found myself wanting it. All of it. For reasons that I have struggled to explain to myself much less articulate. I want the art, the masks, the coins, the oven hood. Not because they are valuable though some of it certainly is. Not even so much because it reminds me of my grandparents though it does. More because it is doorway to a very different world then what I live in here in suburbia.
Maybe I wouldn't covet these trinkets so much if my own life had taken a different path. If I had taken that consular posting. Maybe my walls would be covered with something. Perhaps not masks and paintings from South America and Africa. Maybe something else entirely. But I didn't. Instead, my walls are bare or have pictures from my few vacations and posters of great art work. My dreams of replacing those things with different, more unique things; replacing them with stories of a life lived outside of the average experience is fading. I am not an old man but yet I feel that die is cast.
In a few months, my grandparents' things will be redistributed. A handful of things, apparently mainly the jewelry, will reside with my parents. Much of it will go into my uncles' homes and I will likely not see it again. Perhaps some of it will even come here.
When it goes, that window to a greater world that was my grandparents' home will close. I want desperately to keep that window open long enough to point it out to my children. To say "see, there is more out there than this. You can see it. You can live that life if you want to." I despair of my ability to tell them this story.
There is probably no single piece in my grandparents' house that will tell the story that I am struggling to articulate. No mask or painting that will make my children suddenly look at the world they know and wonder what else is out there. Still, I feel like if I could just hold onto the contents of that house that I could tell that story to them. That I could see their imagination kindle.
If I could just do this I could walk away from all of their things without regrets. I have my memories of my grandparents. They set my imagination alight in that home. I may not have physically escaped my Midwestern orbit but I mentally did. As it is though, I want it all. I want all of those precious things to stay where they are on the shelves and the walls. I want my stories back the way they were. I need those stories. My children need them.
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