CURRENTS OF THOUGHT

OPEN QUESTIONS

     ARE THE DEBATES WRONG?

     These may not be original musings, but they are relevant.  Anything that gets the candidates thinking and talking in front of a live format is revealing and a lot better than packaged and paid advertising.  But--  I wonder if we didn't cross a Rubicon when JFK and Dick Nixon opened the era of television campaigning and debates.  Charisma became a factor in Presidential Campaigns. Looks, style, manner and "appeal" became "values" by which Americans rate and choose their chief executive. Though it is more sinister than that.

     I know 2 or 3 men, who have played on the national and international stage and who were involved in the presidential sweepstakes who could have made good presidents, but they lacked something- media gloss and sizzle. Probably brighter and deeper thinkers than most of their peers, their intellect and experience got trumped by media appeal.

    Jim Lehrer tried to open a format to allow Obama and Romney to present and counter with some depth, but still the rigidity of debate forces the contestants, and we viewers, into an artificial frame of scoring points by attack,  defense, or presenting a zinger. The goal is to beat the opponent, as if that determines how a man or woman would serve.

     Perhaps the evaluation and revelatory outcome helps us to better understand and to decide, but it all seems like it is spawned from the same mind set of a Super Bowl, or World Series-winner take all.

     The Presidency demands more than presentation or debate skills.  Perhaps helpful in some way, it is still an example of the disconnect between the business, and now industry, of elections and the real job of governance.

    We can count on the media yak hacks to be pumped up

on scoring the next rounds, as though it means something.

     THE SEASON HAS OPENED

   Today delivers the first measurable rain of Central California's "rain season." 

    After an extraordinary year in 2010-2011, last year was under average, so we celebrate each drop.  Though, this is a dicey time of year.  Grape growers and vintners are someplace along in harvest and too much rain at the wrong time is bad news.  Stay tuned for an update from Wine Country where

EVERY DAY IS NOT ROMANTIC

     We may romanticize the life of a winemaker, but do so

at the cost of overlooking how hard is the work.  Case in 

point-during harvest there is an endless list of things to do.

One item is just keeping the equipment clean.  Here we see

premier wine maker John Munch and a colleague doing just that. 

A PARTING THOUGHT

    I had a relative who used the old bromide "There's a place in hell for people like that!"  I don't want to open a theological debate or a discussion about judgement, BUT as I read about the Taliban attack on a teen female who had been an advocate for full educational rights for girls, that old saw came back to mind.  Along with words like, idiots, cowards, ignorant, stone age ass holes and evil.

    Truth is, full equality for women in Islamic nations could do more to remove those evil mullahs and imams and their influence of ignorant fundamentalism than anything else.  Oh, a lake of burning sulfur comes to mind as well!

     Really hard to bring yourself to forgive someone like that isn't it? A struggle!

    See you down the trail.

TEAPOT TEMPESTS AND MORE

PROPORTIONALITY

     The best information to date is the Innocence of Muslims  was a badly made and cheap film that attracted only a handful of viewers at a screening in LA.  It could have died there and never been heard of again. But social media changes all the old rules.

      Clips of the film circulated on YouTube and fanned Muslim anger.  Strains of fundamental Islam take little to work them into a frenzy.  Those who hew to a rigid line of never thinking critically about their own faith, or even thinking in an open minded and rational way are quick to foam and be seized by manic anger.  What apparently is a piece of trash with mysterious origin has now become a pivot point of anger, foment and a genuine foreign policy issue.  For all that is good about a wired world and communication power, an incident like this points to its dark side.

       Ignorance is just that, whether in a film, or in a response to it. Ignorance is rampant in the world, and it wears Muslim, Christian and Jewish garb.  A decentralized, non aggregated, free-for-all communication web can simply add fuel to a fire.  It obviously can also set sparks. When so much ignorance plays in the tinderbox, the world is more dangerous.

       This is the kind of world where the US foreign policy and national security apparatus must operate.  It reminds me of muddy and muck filled rivers populated by crocodiles and snakes.  I was glad to have a veteran at the helm.  Hysterics in this climate can be lethal, but they abound.

ROMNEY'S DANGEROUS MISTAKE

     Now before my Republican, conservative or Romney backing readers have apoplexy, this is not about politics.

Indeed even right leaning or right wing commentators as well as old fashioned mainstream Republicans have criticized the Republican candidate for his opportunistic and political attack on the administration.  He was accused of speaking too early, or looking weak among other non presidential qualities.  The Democrats were more pointed, but since this is not about politics, we leave the comment to his own kind.

     From a center court seat and with an historic perspective, his desperation to score political points reflected a lack of judgement, seasoning, sense of depth and class.  At a time of international crisis, the US speaks with one voice. And Romney's sense of timing was bad, at the very least.  

     When Americans and diplomatic personnel are under attack, politics has no place. When those personnel die, any attempt to score political points is not only repugnant and offensive, it is a stupid miscalculation in a grave moment.  It was a cheap, stupid and tactless thing to do.  Romney and his advisers should be ashamed and are rightly being criticized.

     So there you have it.  Stupid X's 3.  Stupid film, stupid fundamental reaction, stupid politics.  What should have been a tempest in a teapot reveals fatal flaws and fault-lines in a dangerous world.

AND NOW SOMETHING DIFFERENT

A Kitten's First Climb

See you down the trail.