By Edwin Cooney
A couple of weeks ago, a dear friend of mine sent me a most interesting article from the New York Times under his own subject, “A Telling Observation.”
The “telling observation” was a commentary by Brown University Professor John Edgar Wideman who teaches Africana Studies and Literary Arts twice a week at Rhode Island’s most prestigious venue of learning. A resident of “the Big Apple,” Professor Wideman travels to and from his job via Acela train. His route takes him through, as he expresses it, “one of the most educated, affluent, sophisticated and enlightened” areas of population in the northeast.
Over the last two years, he’s made something of a sociological study in which he is both the subject and the observer. A “man of color,” he’s noticed that the seat next to him inevitably remains empty unless the train fills to its capacity. What he didn’t say was whether the empty seat next to him is always the last seat to be occupied when the train fills up. That, it seems to me, would be more convincing than the information he offers us in his October 7th, 2010 commentary.
Nevertheless, Professor Wideman seems to be convinced that his color is why he enjoys the delights and conveniences of extra space along with the occasional pang of loneliness which appears to this observer as the force of energy behind his commentary.
Notably, Professor Wideman points out he suffers not from such maladies as “body odor,” “bad breath,” or, interestingly enough, a deformity of any kind. Hopefully, one would have had to choose the seat right next to the learned gentleman to notice those first two maladies, but “deformity”? Does the good professor really consider physical “deformity” legitimate grounds for social isolation?
My guess is that if one were to put this question directly to Professor Wideman, he would respond “of course not,” yet in this most erudite sociological commentary he uses the very absence of deformity in defense of his own acceptability!
Still, it’s very possible that color is a factor in his twice a week high speed combination of convenience and abandonment.
Many years ago, when I would ride the Greyhound or Trailways buses of upstate New York, I frequently hoped that an attractive lady would choose the seat next to me. After all, despite my disability (which is most notable because I carry a cane and wear dark glasses on the darkest day and in the darkest bus), I was sure that I looked sufficiently handsome and sophisticated in my trench coat, sport coat and newly purchased briar pipe to draw the attention of a most sophisticated, attractive, and sensitive lady. (Yes, indeed, back in the 1960’s, one could even smoke a pipe on long distance bus trips).
Gone today from almost every social situation is the lure of any briar or smoking pipe. I’m still comfortable in a sport coat and, during cold weather, an overcoat. No longer do I particularly care about attractive or sophisticated ladies occupying the seat to my immediate right or left. Still, like most people, when I get on a conveyance of transportation, I have only one primary thing in mind besides my safe and timely arrival.
What Professor Wideman seems to have let get by his notice is the realization that the first thing he and his fellow passengers insist on is their own personal comfort. Such comfort generally requires maximum space, a window seat and, above all, privacy.
A quick glance up and down the aisle of a sparsely occupied train, bus or even a plane will demonstrate that most people prefer the window seat. Furthermore, many people need the time, especially during an hour or two hour commute, to prepare for the day ahead, analyze the day just concluded, or to read or reflect on matters affecting their lives.
It’s my experience that few people commute, even on public transportation, to socialize. Thus, their private sense of well-being inevitably (and I assert legitimately so) has priority.
As for Professor Wideman’s assessment of his twice weekly social status, he is, of course, more than welcome to his private conclusions. Nevertheless, had he taken into consideration the power and the legitimacy of purely private and personal comfort, his conclusion that he’s being isolated because of his color might be, at the very least, altered.
Unless someone’s actions affects another person’s rights or well-being, that individual’s right to privacy ought always to prevail.
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
Monday, October 25, 2010
Monday, October 18, 2010
THE MISSION THAT COULD HAVE MATTERED
BY EDWIN COONEY
As one observes with foreboding the conflict in the Middle East, it’s only natural to wonder sometimes if this current “sorry pass” might have been averted with a little diplomatic ingenuity. It’s probable that historians (one of which I am not!) will disagree with me, but I believe that it nearly was.
It is Saturday night, February 10th, 1945. Winston Churchill, the cherubic “English bulldog” with his dramatic elocution and ever-present cigar, is hosting a dinner at Vorontsov Palace in the Russian Crimea Peninsula for his two world leader colleagues, Joseph Stalin and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Everyone knows that World War II will soon be over in Europe and they believe that it will probably take another year and a half to defeat Japan.
Big decisions have been made during the last seven days by the “Big Three” powers. They include such weighty matters as: a reluctant Russia’s membership in the United Nations; the granting of world power status to China and France; the governance of a defeated Germany; the disposition of property and geography in China (although minus the consent of the Chinese government); the issue of free elections in Poland (which President Roosevelt knows full well is not enforceable although he hopes for Stalin’s good faith); and, finally, participation in the war against Japan by the Soviet Union.
All these issues have been debated and concluded. Some of these decisions are secret. Some of these decisions, when made public, will be seen as weak and even deceitful by many. But they have been made and each leader believes that although the price has been very high, he has attained the best outcome he could possibly hope for.
Mr. Churchill has ordered a large rib roast and asked his chef to prepare some Russian delicacies. The champagne, vodka, and other libations are flowing and the toasts are coming thick and fast. FDR is seated in one of his light mobile wheelchairs which fits easily into his automobile. He’s holding a drink and puffing on a cigarette through his long ivory cigarette holder as Joseph Stalin, the short, stubby-fingered mustachioed little man whose power and capacity for cruelty is easily and often masked by his quiet speaking style and demeanor, is bent over the president’s wheelchair. He is inviting FDR to spend a little more time on the Crimea. Roosevelt replies that he’d like to, but he has three kings waiting to see him.
The three kings are King Farouk of Egypt, Haile Selassie of Ethiopia and Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia. It’s about the Palestinian question FDR tells Stalin. Then he tells the Russian dictator: “I am a Zionist,” and he then asks Stalin if he’s a Zionist. Stalin replies that he is one in principle, but that there are difficulties.
On January thirtieth, only eleven days before this dinner, FDR had celebrated his sixty-third birthday. Although he is the youngest of the Big Three in age, he is the oldest in body. Advanced arteriosclerosis has left his polio-ravaged body exhausted. Although he is neither psychotic nor neurotic, he is irritable at times, non-attentive now and then, and occasionally —although not too often—can be observed staring off into space. Lord Moran, Winston Churchill’s physician, has already told the Secretary of State Edward R. Stettinius that the President is obviously suffering from arteriosclerosis of the brain and that he gives him only a few more months to live. Even Stalin has been moved enough to comment that had he known how ill FDR was, he would have agreed to meet somewhere in the Mediterranean. His condition is even obvious to one of the maids assigned to service his bed room at Livadia Palace, the American headquarters at the Crimean conference. At one point she bursts into tears and sobs out: “That sweet, sweet man -- he’s so ill!”
In short, FDR would like to go straight home from the conference of the Big Three, but this most democratic of men must first converse with three royals. The plight of the Jews is on his mind. Some would hope it was on his conscience believing as they do that he was far too slow to recognize the wanton slaughter of Jews by the Nazis throughout the war. Some bitterly resent the fact that he let an old colleague, Breckenridge Long from the Wilson administration, get away with blocking Jewish immigration at a time when their very existence was in mortal peril.
Thus it was that as his plane left Russian soil on the day following the Big Three’s final clinking of glasses, its wheels touched down in Cairo, Egypt, rather than in Washington, D.C. His destination was the U.S.S. Quincy which was anchored on the Indian Ocean side of the Suez Canal. There, on Tuesday, the 13th and Wednesday, the 14th, he would confer with the three monarchs.
Neither Secretary of State Stettinius nor the president’s old and trusted friend Harry “the Hop” Hopkins had any idea what FDR hoped to achieve by meeting this triumvirate of mid-east royalty. Perhaps FDR himself wasn’t sure either. But meet them he did.
His meetings with Farouk and Selassie were anticlimactic at best. Staple cotton and American tourism were the only subjects he discussed with the twenty-five-year-old Farouk whose portliness was very apparent from behind sunglasses and within an admiral’s uniform.
The president’s meeting later that Tuesday with Haile Selassie, the five foot three “Lion of Judah,” was even of less substance. FDR began the conversation by comparing his dark blue Navy Cape with the monarch’s off-white one. Next he thanked Salassie for donating land and buildings for the American Legation in his capital of Addis Ababa. Finally, he expressed the hope for continuing Ethiopian domestic improvements as well as for smooth Ethiopian American diplomatic relations.
His meeting with Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia was more substantial. As exhausted as he was, FDR had enough energy to put on his famous charm. Prior to Ibn Saud’s arrival aboard the Quincy, FDR had given his daughter Anna a choice of remaining in her state room during Saud’s visit or shopping in Cairo. He explained to Anna that as a Moslem King, Saud forbade the presence of women when conducting business. He also told her that his religion required of him that if he saw an attractive young lady while conducting business, he must confiscate her. Anna chose to go shopping in Cairo.
Ibn Saud--who was so physically heavy as well as weakened by arthritis that he had to be lifted aboard the Quincy in a whale boat to the salute of American artillery—was a medieval monarch. He brought along such officials as his privy counselor, leader of the palace prayers, his astrologer and fortune teller, his chamberlain, his purse bearer, his food taster, his ceremonial coffee taster and assistant coffee taster, nine slaves, porters, and scullions—to name only a few.
Diplomatic compliments and oil were first on the agenda. Next came “the Palestinian question”. The president knew that Ibn Saud wasn’t happy about the settlement of Jews in Palestine. He took along a map to demonstrate to the Saudi Arabian King just how small the territory that was being set aside for a Jewish homeland really was. Additionally, he tried to convince King Saud how industrious Jews were and what good neighbors they would make by appealing to the king’s domestic concerns. Wouldn’t the king like to see his deserts bloom? The king responded that he was a warrior—nothing more and nothing less. He had conquered the ten other tribes of Arabia and had some of their ranking members with him. No one was sure whether they were guests or hostages.
To FDR’s surprise, the king was ready for him. Sure, the Jews were transforming desert into farmland, but if the English and French gave Arabs as much money as they gave Jews, “Arabs would do the same.” He complained bitterly to FDR that Palestinian Jews were forming militias, not to fight the Germans but to fight Arabs. When the president appealed to him as a farmer (FDR. always thought of himself as something of a farmer), the king responded that the world needed deserts as much as it did farms and besides—once again--he was a warrior. In short, all of the president’s charm and powers of persuasion couldn’t budge him.
The king said that if the Jews confined themselves to the area FDR had pointed to, perhaps war could be prevented—although he gave no assurances. FDR told the king that he liked Arabs and wouldn’t encourage the Jews to go beyond the current boundaries of Palestine.
As with King Farouk and Emperor Haile Salassie, there were gifts of planes and automobiles—along with mementos of FDR’s recent fourth inauguration. For Ibn Saud, however, there was a special gift. The king admired the lightweight wheelchair the president was using. FDR ordered his spare aluminum wheelchair to be brought and presented to His Majesty. The bulky arthritic old warrior liked it for its maneuverability—it would be most useful to him and the president would have three additional wheelchairs delivered for the king’s pleasure. In parting, FDR told the king that he had learned more about the true situation in the Middle East from the king in five minutes than he had known in an entire lifetime. This assertion stunned Harry “the Hop” because, after all, Roosevelt had only been told what everyone else already knew—that Arabs didn’t want Jews settling in Palestine.
So, that was it and Anna avoided confiscation. As for King Farouk, he would reign for nearly eight more years before being overthrown and executed by his colonels in 1953. Haile Selassie would come to the United States numerous times, but most memorably during President Kennedy’s 1963 funeral when his dignity and manner stood out among international leaders as they paraded down Pennsylvania Avenue.
February 1945, was, of course, near the end for the president. Gone was the righteous leader of the past. He could now sit and listen to the opposition and grant that their position had some merit. Yet, he was still the most powerful individual leader on earth. He, more than anyone else at the meeting of the “Big Three” perhaps, saw the importance of the Palestinian question—if peace were to really and truly last. Stalin was indifferent to it, and as for Churchill, it was strictly a British problem. He couldn’t imagine why Roosevelt even wanted to bother with it.
Perhaps, had the president lived, or at least if he had passed on to Vice President Truman the ideas he might have possessed regarding a more diplomatic way to establish a Jewish homeland, things might have been different. Suppose, for example, the newly established Jewish state had been sufficiently pressured to exist for a period under direct United Nations mandate with Jerusalem also under United Nations mandate as an international city. Perhaps, just perhaps, Arabs might have kept their powder dry. Perhaps, just perhaps, if FDR had made the Palestinian question a part of the Crimean Conference Agenda, Stalin might have joined with Roosevelt in agreeing to withhold armaments from both sides in the foreseen conflict. After all, both the United States and the Soviet Union would be targets for financial pocket-picking by all sides in future international conflicts!
FDR’s instincts for the peace and prosperity of humanity were still present even though his energy for political gamesmanship had waned. As a young man he had been almost as enthusiastic as his distant cousin Teddy Roosevelt for glory on the battlefield. But polio and the needs of the poor and the hungry had made their mark on his soul.
Thus, even as his own life was ending, Franklin Delano Roosevelt knew that the pain of past outrages would ultimately only be soothed by the blessings of those things which nourish both body and soul. He had traveled beyond the conference at Yalta to confer with three kings. Two of them, Farouk and Selassie, he must have sensed were ineffectual. To the most powerful and potentially most dangerous, he appealed as a farmer.
Sadly however, Ibn Saud was a warrior and, what is more, he insisted on being thought of as a warrior. FDR’s mission might have mattered if he could only have convinced the old king that the peace and security of all that he cared for could most assuredly be protected by the most outstanding warriors of them all—farmers, soldiers in the eternal war against hunger!
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
Originally posted October 18, 2006
BY EDWIN COONEY
As one observes with foreboding the conflict in the Middle East, it’s only natural to wonder sometimes if this current “sorry pass” might have been averted with a little diplomatic ingenuity. It’s probable that historians (one of which I am not!) will disagree with me, but I believe that it nearly was.
It is Saturday night, February 10th, 1945. Winston Churchill, the cherubic “English bulldog” with his dramatic elocution and ever-present cigar, is hosting a dinner at Vorontsov Palace in the Russian Crimea Peninsula for his two world leader colleagues, Joseph Stalin and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Everyone knows that World War II will soon be over in Europe and they believe that it will probably take another year and a half to defeat Japan.
Big decisions have been made during the last seven days by the “Big Three” powers. They include such weighty matters as: a reluctant Russia’s membership in the United Nations; the granting of world power status to China and France; the governance of a defeated Germany; the disposition of property and geography in China (although minus the consent of the Chinese government); the issue of free elections in Poland (which President Roosevelt knows full well is not enforceable although he hopes for Stalin’s good faith); and, finally, participation in the war against Japan by the Soviet Union.
All these issues have been debated and concluded. Some of these decisions are secret. Some of these decisions, when made public, will be seen as weak and even deceitful by many. But they have been made and each leader believes that although the price has been very high, he has attained the best outcome he could possibly hope for.
Mr. Churchill has ordered a large rib roast and asked his chef to prepare some Russian delicacies. The champagne, vodka, and other libations are flowing and the toasts are coming thick and fast. FDR is seated in one of his light mobile wheelchairs which fits easily into his automobile. He’s holding a drink and puffing on a cigarette through his long ivory cigarette holder as Joseph Stalin, the short, stubby-fingered mustachioed little man whose power and capacity for cruelty is easily and often masked by his quiet speaking style and demeanor, is bent over the president’s wheelchair. He is inviting FDR to spend a little more time on the Crimea. Roosevelt replies that he’d like to, but he has three kings waiting to see him.
The three kings are King Farouk of Egypt, Haile Selassie of Ethiopia and Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia. It’s about the Palestinian question FDR tells Stalin. Then he tells the Russian dictator: “I am a Zionist,” and he then asks Stalin if he’s a Zionist. Stalin replies that he is one in principle, but that there are difficulties.
On January thirtieth, only eleven days before this dinner, FDR had celebrated his sixty-third birthday. Although he is the youngest of the Big Three in age, he is the oldest in body. Advanced arteriosclerosis has left his polio-ravaged body exhausted. Although he is neither psychotic nor neurotic, he is irritable at times, non-attentive now and then, and occasionally —although not too often—can be observed staring off into space. Lord Moran, Winston Churchill’s physician, has already told the Secretary of State Edward R. Stettinius that the President is obviously suffering from arteriosclerosis of the brain and that he gives him only a few more months to live. Even Stalin has been moved enough to comment that had he known how ill FDR was, he would have agreed to meet somewhere in the Mediterranean. His condition is even obvious to one of the maids assigned to service his bed room at Livadia Palace, the American headquarters at the Crimean conference. At one point she bursts into tears and sobs out: “That sweet, sweet man -- he’s so ill!”
In short, FDR would like to go straight home from the conference of the Big Three, but this most democratic of men must first converse with three royals. The plight of the Jews is on his mind. Some would hope it was on his conscience believing as they do that he was far too slow to recognize the wanton slaughter of Jews by the Nazis throughout the war. Some bitterly resent the fact that he let an old colleague, Breckenridge Long from the Wilson administration, get away with blocking Jewish immigration at a time when their very existence was in mortal peril.
Thus it was that as his plane left Russian soil on the day following the Big Three’s final clinking of glasses, its wheels touched down in Cairo, Egypt, rather than in Washington, D.C. His destination was the U.S.S. Quincy which was anchored on the Indian Ocean side of the Suez Canal. There, on Tuesday, the 13th and Wednesday, the 14th, he would confer with the three monarchs.
Neither Secretary of State Stettinius nor the president’s old and trusted friend Harry “the Hop” Hopkins had any idea what FDR hoped to achieve by meeting this triumvirate of mid-east royalty. Perhaps FDR himself wasn’t sure either. But meet them he did.
His meetings with Farouk and Selassie were anticlimactic at best. Staple cotton and American tourism were the only subjects he discussed with the twenty-five-year-old Farouk whose portliness was very apparent from behind sunglasses and within an admiral’s uniform.
The president’s meeting later that Tuesday with Haile Selassie, the five foot three “Lion of Judah,” was even of less substance. FDR began the conversation by comparing his dark blue Navy Cape with the monarch’s off-white one. Next he thanked Salassie for donating land and buildings for the American Legation in his capital of Addis Ababa. Finally, he expressed the hope for continuing Ethiopian domestic improvements as well as for smooth Ethiopian American diplomatic relations.
His meeting with Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia was more substantial. As exhausted as he was, FDR had enough energy to put on his famous charm. Prior to Ibn Saud’s arrival aboard the Quincy, FDR had given his daughter Anna a choice of remaining in her state room during Saud’s visit or shopping in Cairo. He explained to Anna that as a Moslem King, Saud forbade the presence of women when conducting business. He also told her that his religion required of him that if he saw an attractive young lady while conducting business, he must confiscate her. Anna chose to go shopping in Cairo.
Ibn Saud--who was so physically heavy as well as weakened by arthritis that he had to be lifted aboard the Quincy in a whale boat to the salute of American artillery—was a medieval monarch. He brought along such officials as his privy counselor, leader of the palace prayers, his astrologer and fortune teller, his chamberlain, his purse bearer, his food taster, his ceremonial coffee taster and assistant coffee taster, nine slaves, porters, and scullions—to name only a few.
Diplomatic compliments and oil were first on the agenda. Next came “the Palestinian question”. The president knew that Ibn Saud wasn’t happy about the settlement of Jews in Palestine. He took along a map to demonstrate to the Saudi Arabian King just how small the territory that was being set aside for a Jewish homeland really was. Additionally, he tried to convince King Saud how industrious Jews were and what good neighbors they would make by appealing to the king’s domestic concerns. Wouldn’t the king like to see his deserts bloom? The king responded that he was a warrior—nothing more and nothing less. He had conquered the ten other tribes of Arabia and had some of their ranking members with him. No one was sure whether they were guests or hostages.
To FDR’s surprise, the king was ready for him. Sure, the Jews were transforming desert into farmland, but if the English and French gave Arabs as much money as they gave Jews, “Arabs would do the same.” He complained bitterly to FDR that Palestinian Jews were forming militias, not to fight the Germans but to fight Arabs. When the president appealed to him as a farmer (FDR. always thought of himself as something of a farmer), the king responded that the world needed deserts as much as it did farms and besides—once again--he was a warrior. In short, all of the president’s charm and powers of persuasion couldn’t budge him.
The king said that if the Jews confined themselves to the area FDR had pointed to, perhaps war could be prevented—although he gave no assurances. FDR told the king that he liked Arabs and wouldn’t encourage the Jews to go beyond the current boundaries of Palestine.
As with King Farouk and Emperor Haile Salassie, there were gifts of planes and automobiles—along with mementos of FDR’s recent fourth inauguration. For Ibn Saud, however, there was a special gift. The king admired the lightweight wheelchair the president was using. FDR ordered his spare aluminum wheelchair to be brought and presented to His Majesty. The bulky arthritic old warrior liked it for its maneuverability—it would be most useful to him and the president would have three additional wheelchairs delivered for the king’s pleasure. In parting, FDR told the king that he had learned more about the true situation in the Middle East from the king in five minutes than he had known in an entire lifetime. This assertion stunned Harry “the Hop” because, after all, Roosevelt had only been told what everyone else already knew—that Arabs didn’t want Jews settling in Palestine.
So, that was it and Anna avoided confiscation. As for King Farouk, he would reign for nearly eight more years before being overthrown and executed by his colonels in 1953. Haile Selassie would come to the United States numerous times, but most memorably during President Kennedy’s 1963 funeral when his dignity and manner stood out among international leaders as they paraded down Pennsylvania Avenue.
February 1945, was, of course, near the end for the president. Gone was the righteous leader of the past. He could now sit and listen to the opposition and grant that their position had some merit. Yet, he was still the most powerful individual leader on earth. He, more than anyone else at the meeting of the “Big Three” perhaps, saw the importance of the Palestinian question—if peace were to really and truly last. Stalin was indifferent to it, and as for Churchill, it was strictly a British problem. He couldn’t imagine why Roosevelt even wanted to bother with it.
Perhaps, had the president lived, or at least if he had passed on to Vice President Truman the ideas he might have possessed regarding a more diplomatic way to establish a Jewish homeland, things might have been different. Suppose, for example, the newly established Jewish state had been sufficiently pressured to exist for a period under direct United Nations mandate with Jerusalem also under United Nations mandate as an international city. Perhaps, just perhaps, Arabs might have kept their powder dry. Perhaps, just perhaps, if FDR had made the Palestinian question a part of the Crimean Conference Agenda, Stalin might have joined with Roosevelt in agreeing to withhold armaments from both sides in the foreseen conflict. After all, both the United States and the Soviet Union would be targets for financial pocket-picking by all sides in future international conflicts!
FDR’s instincts for the peace and prosperity of humanity were still present even though his energy for political gamesmanship had waned. As a young man he had been almost as enthusiastic as his distant cousin Teddy Roosevelt for glory on the battlefield. But polio and the needs of the poor and the hungry had made their mark on his soul.
Thus, even as his own life was ending, Franklin Delano Roosevelt knew that the pain of past outrages would ultimately only be soothed by the blessings of those things which nourish both body and soul. He had traveled beyond the conference at Yalta to confer with three kings. Two of them, Farouk and Selassie, he must have sensed were ineffectual. To the most powerful and potentially most dangerous, he appealed as a farmer.
Sadly however, Ibn Saud was a warrior and, what is more, he insisted on being thought of as a warrior. FDR’s mission might have mattered if he could only have convinced the old king that the peace and security of all that he cared for could most assuredly be protected by the most outstanding warriors of them all—farmers, soldiers in the eternal war against hunger!
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
Originally posted October 18, 2006
Monday, October 11, 2010
THE BELIEVER AND THE TAXPAYER
By Edwin Cooney
I know you’re not going to believe this but one night not long ago, I overheard a conversation between a Believer and a Taxpayer. They both claimed to be men satisfied with their distinct roles of Believer and Taxpayer.
“My most important responsibility is that of safeguarding the fiscal and military security of the United States of America,” asserted the Taxpayer.
“How do you accomplish that?” asked the Believer.
“Well,” responded the Taxpayer, “by controlling the most powerful instrument at my command. In wartime, my gun, rocket launcher, or bomber are my most powerful weapons. During peacetime, in a free society, the most powerful instrument I possess is my money. The only thing too many elected representatives really and truly understand is money. I hate to say this, but after over two centuries of liberty, the coin of the realm is far more precious than a man’s word!”
“Hmmm,” responded the Believer, “as a Believer, my first priority is my accountability to God. The most powerful instrument in my possession is love. I mean love for
Humankind born of my love for my God. Hence, if I love my God and follow His commands, then people’s welfare has to be my top priority,” said the Believer, contemplatively scratching his chin.
“Wait a minute,” said the Taxpayer,” I’m a Believer, too, you know. After all, it says in scripture that every true Believer is required to give no more than ten percent of his wages for the sustenance of the poor and far more than ten percent of my taxes goes to the poor!”
“So,” asked the Believer, “how do you feel about that?”
“I resent it,” said the Taxpayer, a bit of heat creeping into his voice. “It’s a redistribution of wealth. We call it socialism these days, because that’s what it is!”
“So,” asked the Believer, “do you resent giving away more than ten percent of your wages because you’re a Believer, or because you’re a Taxpayer, since you insist that you’re both?”
“Well,” responded the Taxpayer, “now that you ask, I resent it most as a Consumer because the more of my money the government takes, the less powerful I am in either the marketplace or as an individual citizen.”
“Wait a minute,” asked the Believer, “are you more of a Consumer than you are a Taxpayer? At the outset of our conversation, you asserted that you are a Taxpayer and I asserted that I’m a Believer. As a Believer, I haven’t asserted that I’m either a Taxpayer or a Consumer. I’m standing alone as a Believer. Paying taxes or purchasing goods and services are things I must do, but purchasing and paying are not who I am. Now, which are you?”
“Look, if I don’t demand respect as a Taxpayer, I won’t have any influence. Influence is everything. If you don’t have influence, you’re powerless,” said the Taxpayer as he shoved his hands deep into his pockets.
“Well,” replied the Believer, “what influence I have comes from my faith, not from my power. My power isn’t my own. If one demands power unto himself where does he go during times of stress? If, for example, politicians, who -- despite their political ideology ultimately work for the government -- didn’t depend on you for your money, what influence would you have if your taxes were sufficiently low? Do you suppose the politicians who got you the low taxes would ask you for less money during the political season?”
“Good God! I don’t know,” said the Taxpayer, glancing heavenward. All I know is that as a Taxpayer, politicians, real estate magnates, bankers, stockbrokers, and even mighty talk show hosts clamor for my attention. Who clamors for your attention?” asked the Taxpayer, suddenly realizing he was about to be overwhelmed by the answer.
“God,” responded the Believer “Who’s more powerful or merciful than God?” As a Taxpayer, your ultimate power and influence is dependant upon politicians who get themselves elected to government. My faith is dependant upon the Almighty. Your strength depends upon what you do and mine depends first and foremost on what I believe. What I do is what I believe. What you do, it seems to me, is what is required of you.”
“Wait a minute!” shouted the Taxpayer, “Don’t you forget for one moment that it is we the Taxpayers of this country who voted to exempt Believers like you from having to pay taxes on funding your religious activities!”
Suddenly, it was happening again. My lady has sharp elbows and they were in my ribs.
“Look dear,” she said, “because I love you I’m willing to put up with a man who thinks too much even when he’s sleeping, but if this doesn’t let up pretty soon, I’m going home to mama for at least a week so I can get some rest!”
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
I know you’re not going to believe this but one night not long ago, I overheard a conversation between a Believer and a Taxpayer. They both claimed to be men satisfied with their distinct roles of Believer and Taxpayer.
“My most important responsibility is that of safeguarding the fiscal and military security of the United States of America,” asserted the Taxpayer.
“How do you accomplish that?” asked the Believer.
“Well,” responded the Taxpayer, “by controlling the most powerful instrument at my command. In wartime, my gun, rocket launcher, or bomber are my most powerful weapons. During peacetime, in a free society, the most powerful instrument I possess is my money. The only thing too many elected representatives really and truly understand is money. I hate to say this, but after over two centuries of liberty, the coin of the realm is far more precious than a man’s word!”
“Hmmm,” responded the Believer, “as a Believer, my first priority is my accountability to God. The most powerful instrument in my possession is love. I mean love for
Humankind born of my love for my God. Hence, if I love my God and follow His commands, then people’s welfare has to be my top priority,” said the Believer, contemplatively scratching his chin.
“Wait a minute,” said the Taxpayer,” I’m a Believer, too, you know. After all, it says in scripture that every true Believer is required to give no more than ten percent of his wages for the sustenance of the poor and far more than ten percent of my taxes goes to the poor!”
“So,” asked the Believer, “how do you feel about that?”
“I resent it,” said the Taxpayer, a bit of heat creeping into his voice. “It’s a redistribution of wealth. We call it socialism these days, because that’s what it is!”
“So,” asked the Believer, “do you resent giving away more than ten percent of your wages because you’re a Believer, or because you’re a Taxpayer, since you insist that you’re both?”
“Well,” responded the Taxpayer, “now that you ask, I resent it most as a Consumer because the more of my money the government takes, the less powerful I am in either the marketplace or as an individual citizen.”
“Wait a minute,” asked the Believer, “are you more of a Consumer than you are a Taxpayer? At the outset of our conversation, you asserted that you are a Taxpayer and I asserted that I’m a Believer. As a Believer, I haven’t asserted that I’m either a Taxpayer or a Consumer. I’m standing alone as a Believer. Paying taxes or purchasing goods and services are things I must do, but purchasing and paying are not who I am. Now, which are you?”
“Look, if I don’t demand respect as a Taxpayer, I won’t have any influence. Influence is everything. If you don’t have influence, you’re powerless,” said the Taxpayer as he shoved his hands deep into his pockets.
“Well,” replied the Believer, “what influence I have comes from my faith, not from my power. My power isn’t my own. If one demands power unto himself where does he go during times of stress? If, for example, politicians, who -- despite their political ideology ultimately work for the government -- didn’t depend on you for your money, what influence would you have if your taxes were sufficiently low? Do you suppose the politicians who got you the low taxes would ask you for less money during the political season?”
“Good God! I don’t know,” said the Taxpayer, glancing heavenward. All I know is that as a Taxpayer, politicians, real estate magnates, bankers, stockbrokers, and even mighty talk show hosts clamor for my attention. Who clamors for your attention?” asked the Taxpayer, suddenly realizing he was about to be overwhelmed by the answer.
“God,” responded the Believer “Who’s more powerful or merciful than God?” As a Taxpayer, your ultimate power and influence is dependant upon politicians who get themselves elected to government. My faith is dependant upon the Almighty. Your strength depends upon what you do and mine depends first and foremost on what I believe. What I do is what I believe. What you do, it seems to me, is what is required of you.”
“Wait a minute!” shouted the Taxpayer, “Don’t you forget for one moment that it is we the Taxpayers of this country who voted to exempt Believers like you from having to pay taxes on funding your religious activities!”
Suddenly, it was happening again. My lady has sharp elbows and they were in my ribs.
“Look dear,” she said, “because I love you I’m willing to put up with a man who thinks too much even when he’s sleeping, but if this doesn’t let up pretty soon, I’m going home to mama for at least a week so I can get some rest!”
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
Monday, October 4, 2010
MEET LADY PEACE
By Edwin Cooney
Label the following pronouncement any way you must, but I encountered “Peace” last week and she’s very much a lady.
No, I’m not suggesting that women are peaceful and men are warlike. The female of many species, especially when protecting those she loves, can be quite fierce. Taking it a step further, peace has far more to do with one’s values than it has to do with a state of war. Peace is about immeasurable strength, a nurturing strength that’s about
self-assuredness and moral certainty. Peace speaks in many, many ways and through many media.
I’ve probably met peace many times but simply didn’t recognize her. Suddenly, there she was in a place I never suspected. The fall of 1983 was, to say the least, an unsettling time in international politics. Ronald Reagan and Yuri Andropov sat at the apex of the world’s two foremost nuclear forces. The Soviets had recently shot down a Korea bound plane that had strayed over Soviet territory. Now President Reagan was opting to station American nuclear cruise missiles in Europe and I was very, very frightened.
One day, I was visiting a friend in San Francisco and for some reason we took a bus to Ocean Avenue from where we proceeded to the beach. There was a chilly breeze (although not overwhelmingly so) and the waves were up. Standing there as I did for about 15 minutes, I could feel the immense power of “mother nature.” The smell was primitive but by no means unpleasant. It was an environment of wind, water, plants and the very seed of all living things. One could feel, simultaneously, birth and death. The waves were loud but not raucous. Their rhythmic beat spoke of a power greater than nuclear force. As nature overwhelmed my senses, my anxiety dissipated and for the first time in days, perhaps weeks, I felt reassured. I suddenly knew that if the world situation got out of hand, I would bring my little family to the apex of God’s awesomeness where, whatever happened, there would be a sense of eternal belonging.
As I’ve observed on a couple of occasions in these writings, peace (as author Herman Wouk points out at the beginning of “The Winds of War,” one of the best historic novels I’ve ever read) “is not the absence of war. Peace is a state of mind.” Nor, as I see it, is real peace the business of world politics. World peace is allusive because, ultimately, it’s not the statesman’s business, it is our business.
As I define it, peace is a sick child singing. Peace is a little boy showing you his frog. Peace is a man sharing his popcorn. Peace is a newly minted Boy Scout. Peace is a little girl who announces that she wants to become a nurse. Peace is a mother reading to her daughter or a father playing catch with his son. Peace is a lady baking cookies. Peace is a curious little boy or a wondering little girl. Peace is a couple being silly together. Peace is a gentleman who admits that he is in love. Peace is a lady’s tears of joy.
I recently reencountered peace and this time I did recognize her. She’s the best lady I ever knew. I met her for the first time when I was seventeen where, calmly and with incredible poise and dignity, she nurtured a dormitory full of anxious and sometimes rowdy teenage boys. From that venue, she invited me, homeless and sometimes both a little rude and crude, into her family. There she taught me tact (well, okay, what little tact I possess), that heroes are peacemakers, and, most of all, that as long as we allow for it, love can appear in one’s life when one least expects it.
As her wondrous life came to its close a few days ago, though suffering from the infirmities of great age, an aura of serenity surrounded her. Although she suffered from diminished hearing, one nevertheless knew that she was still listening. Not even faltering eyesight and nonfunctioning legs caused her to lose her dignity or made her afraid. Her insight into the future always brought forth only calm.
Just as the power of God’s awesome Pacific Ocean did for me so many years ago, Edith Rachel (Meek) Gassman’s presence soothed even the most nagging or heart-wrenching fears. Her legacy is serenity, the main ingredient of peace. Her way of life demonstrates that peace on earth is a living reality. All we have to do is insist that it must prevail.
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
Edwin Cooney
Label the following pronouncement any way you must, but I encountered “Peace” last week and she’s very much a lady.
No, I’m not suggesting that women are peaceful and men are warlike. The female of many species, especially when protecting those she loves, can be quite fierce. Taking it a step further, peace has far more to do with one’s values than it has to do with a state of war. Peace is about immeasurable strength, a nurturing strength that’s about
self-assuredness and moral certainty. Peace speaks in many, many ways and through many media.
I’ve probably met peace many times but simply didn’t recognize her. Suddenly, there she was in a place I never suspected. The fall of 1983 was, to say the least, an unsettling time in international politics. Ronald Reagan and Yuri Andropov sat at the apex of the world’s two foremost nuclear forces. The Soviets had recently shot down a Korea bound plane that had strayed over Soviet territory. Now President Reagan was opting to station American nuclear cruise missiles in Europe and I was very, very frightened.
One day, I was visiting a friend in San Francisco and for some reason we took a bus to Ocean Avenue from where we proceeded to the beach. There was a chilly breeze (although not overwhelmingly so) and the waves were up. Standing there as I did for about 15 minutes, I could feel the immense power of “mother nature.” The smell was primitive but by no means unpleasant. It was an environment of wind, water, plants and the very seed of all living things. One could feel, simultaneously, birth and death. The waves were loud but not raucous. Their rhythmic beat spoke of a power greater than nuclear force. As nature overwhelmed my senses, my anxiety dissipated and for the first time in days, perhaps weeks, I felt reassured. I suddenly knew that if the world situation got out of hand, I would bring my little family to the apex of God’s awesomeness where, whatever happened, there would be a sense of eternal belonging.
As I’ve observed on a couple of occasions in these writings, peace (as author Herman Wouk points out at the beginning of “The Winds of War,” one of the best historic novels I’ve ever read) “is not the absence of war. Peace is a state of mind.” Nor, as I see it, is real peace the business of world politics. World peace is allusive because, ultimately, it’s not the statesman’s business, it is our business.
As I define it, peace is a sick child singing. Peace is a little boy showing you his frog. Peace is a man sharing his popcorn. Peace is a newly minted Boy Scout. Peace is a little girl who announces that she wants to become a nurse. Peace is a mother reading to her daughter or a father playing catch with his son. Peace is a lady baking cookies. Peace is a curious little boy or a wondering little girl. Peace is a couple being silly together. Peace is a gentleman who admits that he is in love. Peace is a lady’s tears of joy.
I recently reencountered peace and this time I did recognize her. She’s the best lady I ever knew. I met her for the first time when I was seventeen where, calmly and with incredible poise and dignity, she nurtured a dormitory full of anxious and sometimes rowdy teenage boys. From that venue, she invited me, homeless and sometimes both a little rude and crude, into her family. There she taught me tact (well, okay, what little tact I possess), that heroes are peacemakers, and, most of all, that as long as we allow for it, love can appear in one’s life when one least expects it.
As her wondrous life came to its close a few days ago, though suffering from the infirmities of great age, an aura of serenity surrounded her. Although she suffered from diminished hearing, one nevertheless knew that she was still listening. Not even faltering eyesight and nonfunctioning legs caused her to lose her dignity or made her afraid. Her insight into the future always brought forth only calm.
Just as the power of God’s awesome Pacific Ocean did for me so many years ago, Edith Rachel (Meek) Gassman’s presence soothed even the most nagging or heart-wrenching fears. Her legacy is serenity, the main ingredient of peace. Her way of life demonstrates that peace on earth is a living reality. All we have to do is insist that it must prevail.
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
Edwin Cooney
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