TWENTY-FOURTEEN –-MAKE IT YOUR YEAR!

By Edwin Cooney

Since all of us in one way or another consider time an important factor in our lives, every January 1st can be “a new beginning!”  Although our well-being or fate is never entirely in our personal control, we do invariably have the power to set the right course every day of our lives.  Each January 1st, we all recognize, sometimes with grudging resistance, that this would be a good time to take stock of the past and present for the sake of our immediate future.  In that spirit, I offer a few historical/political New Year’s perspectives for your consideration and entertainment.

By Monday, January 1st, 1759, 26-year-old George Washington had decided to take two risks.  The first was a career change.  He’d already resigned his commission in the British army even though Britain and the colonists were in the midst of war with France for territorial supremacy and colonial security against the French and their marauding Indian allies. The previous July, he’d been elected as one of two Frederick County delegates to the House of Burgesses.  Five days later, he would take another huge step by marrying 27-year-old Martha Dandridge Custis, the richest widow in all Virginia.  Would politics and marriage be good choices for young George?  He couldn’t know; he could only guess.  He would just have to work at it with sufficient tenacity to maximize the distance his choices might take him!

The first of January occurred on a Tuesday in 1850. Vice President Millard Fillmore was nearly as high and dry politically as any previous vice president had ever been.  His old friend, New York Senator William H. Seward, who was politically ambitious and perhaps a little envious of Fillmore’s vice presidential prominence, had gone from friendly to cool.  President Taylor wasn’t in the least consulting him.  Nor were his other old abolitionist friends paying him much heed.  What he couldn’t know was that his time was coming.  On July 10^th of that year, on the death of President Taylor, he would inherit the presidential mantle but fall short of the opportunity for success it offered.  Against the advice of his wife Abigail, he would exchange morality for political expediency by signing the Compromise of 1850 which included the infamous fugitive slave law.  The year of 1850 would make him president, but it would fall short of making him great!

One can hardly write of New Year’s personal political potential without citing three January firsts in the life of Richard Nixon.  On Thursday, January 1st 1953, Nixon, who was just 39-years-old, would turn forty in eight more days.  Yet he was about to take the oath of office as the second highest officer in the land under one of the most revered men of his time, President-elect Dwight David Eisenhower.  His youthful success was arranged by others on the basis of his political appeal and potential usefulness to his party and his country.  He was to be one of the youngest vice presidents in American history, second only to 37-year-old John C. Breckenridge of Tennessee, James Buchanan’s vice president between 1857 and 1861. 

Ten years later, by Tuesday, January 1st, 1963 -- largely due to too many scotches on a losing election night in California -- 49-year-old Richard Nixon had declared his political career over at his “...last press conference.”  Even more, due to circumstances beyond Nixon’s control, Jack Kennedy, so opposite to Nixon in so many ways, was the president and appeared to be a cinch for re-election in 1964.  Just two months before, as Nixon sought to become governor of California (a position he was only strategically interested in for political advantage), JFK had, in the public mind, bested Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev during the Cuban missile crisis.  Kennedy was youthful.  Nixon was stiff and formal.  Kennedy was vigorous. Nixon was generally emotionally restrained.  Kennedy was relaxed and funny where Nixon was often piously self-conscious.  Then came November 22nd, 1963 and JFK’s fortune was forever fixed.  Nixon’s future was hardly secure, but it was his for the taking.

As for Monday, January 1st, 1973, Richard Nixon appeared to be at the pinnacle of his political career, this time due to circumstances over which he had total control. Elected overwhelmingly to a second presidential term, Nixon’s downfall was almost inevitable.  Nixon, who prided himself on his ability to handle America’s toughest totalitarian opponents, couldn’t effectively master his own political resentments whether justifiable or otherwise, so he largely destroyed himself.

Only you and I can make 2014 a good year.  We can be sure that many things that will happen will not only be beyond our control, but on occasion outrageously so.  Occasionally events will be within our grasp but our timing or judgment will prevent them from coming to fruition.  Hopefully, many more times, we’ll be farsighted, able, and lucky enough to attain our goals and desires beyond our wildest expectations.

Of course, every new day and every new year is in many important ways a clean slate.  If the past is prologue, as many will insist, the future beckons you and me to make it better than anyone dreamed it could ever be.

Happy New Year!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL NONSENSE!

By Edwin Cooney

I know, you’re too sophisticated to believe in Santa Claus, but not me!  For that dab of naiveté I’ve always been grateful to Professor Clement Clarke Moore.

His poem, “A Visit from St. Nicholas” (which you and I know as “’Twas the Night Before Christmas”) was written in Manhattan in 1822 and published a year later by the Troy, New York Sentinel.  A professor of Greek and Hebrew Languages as well as of Theological and Biblical Learning at the Protestant Episcopal Church Seminary of Theology in New York, Moore was the father of six children and it was for their wonderment and enjoyment that he composed this wonderful poem on Christmas Eve of 1822.  When it was finally published on Tuesday, December 23^rd, 1823 in Troy, New York -- having been sent to the Sentinel by a friend whom the paper never identified -- “A Visit from St. Nicholas” became the second most famous document published in America in 1823.  More about that later!

The poem, as I see it, has three wonderful aspects – overwhelming audacity of expectation, celebration of the future, and defiance of logic and science.

Clement Moore’s St Nicholas’s audacity (Moore never refers to him as Santa or Santa Claus) can be found in his expectation that he’s welcome in the home of every child in every country in the whole wide world.  Imagine the level of certainty you’d possess, or even more, how insufferable you might be, if you knew you were welcome in only half of the homes on earth.  St. Nick feels perfectly free to enter!  Sure, he’s bringing material gifts to the future doers and deciders of the world, but they’re only the outward symbols of a broader gift – a gift we might call unconditional love.  As everyone knows, unconditional love triumphs over such intellectual demands as states’ rights, civil liberties and balanced government.  St. Nicholas obviously believes in and does what he can do to insure the future happiness and contentment of humankind by his gifts and all that they mean.

Then, there’s the poem’s defiance of aerodynamics and science.  Time is also a victim of Clement Moore’s wonderful nonsense.  After all, aerodynamics, science, logic and time itself are irrelevant to St. Nicholas’s supernatural purpose and mission.

The poem contains both anticipation and fulfillment.  Mrs. Moore in her kerchief (her name was Catharine Elizabeth Taylor Moore) and the good Professor Clement More in his cap have just settled down for a long winter’s nap as nothing is stirring in the house – not even a mouse.  When Santa – whoops, excuse me, St. Nicholas – arrives he’s “lively and quick,” a combination of youth and age with his quickness.  Even more, he’s a miniature as is his sleigh and as are his reindeer.  Magically, by the time his feet touch the living room floor, he’s metamorphosed into the size of a little old man carrying a huge sack of toys.

His “little round belly” that shakes “when he laughs like a bowl full of jelly,” his beard “as white as snow,” “and “the stump of a .pipe held tight in his teeth as the smoke encircles his head like a wreath,” are signs of great age. Ah, Grandpa!

As for his eight tiny reindeer, the first three of their names are action-oriented: Dasher, Dancer, and Prancer.  Comet and Cupid represent the stars and love, while Donder and Blitzen, I’ve read, represent thunder and lightning depending on whether you’re speaking Dutch or German.

The most intriguing reindeer name of the eight is Vixen which can translate as a “bad woman” or even as “an attractive or sexually attractive bad woman.”  It can also be simply an angry woman or as merely a fox from the woods – take your pick!  So, Vixen was foxy.  Professor More, as mentioned above, a professor of Biblical and Theological studies, was also a professor of Oriental and Greek languages.  In short, Clement Clarke Moore was a master of words, thus there may well have been a little mischievous humor in Vixen’s name!

Only reluctantly did Clement Moore “fess up” to having authored “A Visit from St. Nicholas.”  After all, he had a scholarly reputation to live up to, but he finally admitted in 1837 that he’d authored the piece and at the insistence of his children he included it in an anthology of his works in 1844.  Still, there remains some controversy surrounding Moore’s authorship of the poem.  That controversy has, however, been rather successfully countered.  What’s especially intriguing about Henry Livingston, the purported true author of the piece, is that Livingston never claimed authorship of the poem in his lifetime nor is there any version of the poem with his name on it.

Yes indeed, Clement Clarke Moore was a scholar.  His most notable work until the publication of “A Visit from St. Nicholas” was titled “A Compendious Lexicon of the Hebrew Language.”  Magical as was St. Nicholas, you can be sure he never put Moore’s tome in anyone’s stocking!

Wonderful as was Moore’s personhood as reflected in this poem, I was sorry to read that he was a slave owner although he never resided in the South.  Politically, Moore was a Federalist and wrote a commentary questioning Thomas Jefferson’s “false religiosity” when the president stood for re-election in 1804.

Things being as they were, Professor Moore still published, as I see it, the second most important document of 1823.  Secretary of State John Quincy Adams undoubtedly wrote the number one document of that year for his boss President James Monroe’s annual message to Congress issued the very same month.  You know it as “The Monroe Doctrine” in which America guaranteed every country in North and South America its independence from unwanted colonization by any European power.

“A Visit from St. Nicholas” is much more imaginative than Adams’ document, and you can be sure that it has never been the basis of an international crisis!

Ah, maybe, after all, it really is the most important document of 1823!

Here it is!  Read it and absorb its magic and you too may have a very merry Christmas.

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all thro' the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar plums danc'd in their heads,
And Mama in her 'kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's nap —
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters, and threw up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow,
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below;
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny rein-deer,
With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and call'd them by name:
"Now! Dasher, now! Dancer, now! Prancer and Vixen,
"On! Comet, on! Cupid, on! Dunder and Blixem;
"To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall!
"Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!"
As dry leaves before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky;
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of toys — and St. Nicholas too:
And then in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound:
He was dress'd all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnish'd with ashes and soot;
A bundle of toys was flung on his back,
And he look'd like a peddler just opening his pack:
His eyes — how they twinkled! His dimples: how merry,
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry;
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face, and a little round belly
That shook when he laugh'd, like a bowl full of jelly:
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laugh'd when I saw him in spite of myself;
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
and fill'd all the stockings; then turn'd with a jerk,
and laying his finger aside of his nose
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose.
He sprung to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
and away they all flew, like the down of a thistle:
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight —
Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

Troy Sentinel (December 23, 1823)

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

TRUTH -- HISTORY’S MOST FICKLE TRUSTEE

By Edwin Cooney

Perhaps the most precious aspect of human behavior is the capacity any one of us possesses for telling and living with the “truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth!”  The degree to which honesty and truthfulness are valued is reflected in the reality that you and I readily both expect, until proven otherwise, that family, friends and associates value the truth as much as we do. 

A Churchillian anecdote I will relay shortly is the inspiration for the following set of questions and observations.

First -- How much do you suppose truth has to do with human history?  What role does truth ultimately play in determining the fate of humanity? 

Second -- If, as men and women of faith believe, a beneficent force we call God created humanity, is it likely that all truth was revealed to us or is it more likely that God granted us both mind and method to discover truth for ourselves?

Third  -- Moving from the metaphysical and spiritual to the socio/political, did Thomas Jefferson inscribe truth into the Declaration of Independence when he wrote that “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal”?  There are those who will insist that Jefferson knew better than to assert that “all men are created equal” and that he was writing of equal opportunity, not the natural equality of every human being.  Thus the question: was Jefferson’s “truth” real truth or was it a promissory note that truth would be revealed some distant day when it was more convenient?

Fourth -- What role does truth play in our own lives?

Fifth -- Should we always tell and practice the truth?  Must truth be a constant presence in everything we think, say, and do?

Sixth -- Should the absolute truth be withheld on occasion?

Seventh -- Is truth always loving, kind and energizing or can truth destroy a worthy cause or a valuable personal relationship?

Eighth -- Are we wise or foolish to continue supporting friendships and loving family members who often spurn the truth?

Ninth -- Can truth be a weapon of the wicked or is it always the sword of the righteous?

Finally, tenth – Is truth either evil or good?

I’ve often quoted John F. Kennedy’s fascinating observation at Yale University that “...the great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived, and dishonest—but the myth—persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.”

President Kennedy went on to stress that we can more effectively master the realities of our time when we cast aside the myths and stale phrases of the past.  Obviously, President Kennedy saw truth as an invaluable guide to the future to the exact degree that we face it open to its full reality.  Only in the fullness of reality does the truth possess power.

As Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin met at Tehran, Iran in November 1943 to plan the invasion of Western Europe (tentatively scheduled for May of 1944), the most significant truths in Churchill’s official life were changing.  Imperial Britain was dying and, with Soviet Russia clearly surpassing Britain as a world power, Churchill’s friend FDR appeared to favor Stalin. Secrecy rather than idealism was clearly the first order of business if there was to be any chance for the proposed invasion of occupied Europe to be successful.  During a private meeting that Churchill had with Stalin on Tuesday, November 30, 1943 (Churchill’s 69^th birthday), he made the observation to the Soviet leader regarding plans for the upcoming invasion of Europe that “the truth is so precious that she must always be protected by a bodyguard of lies.”

Yes, indeed, according to Paul Reid’s The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill: Defender of the Realm, 1940-1965, that’s what Churchill said.  If the truth is sufficiently precious to be protected by a “bodyguard of lies,” is truth a matter of mere circumstance?  Is truth primarily situational?  I think I trust not, but I find it a compelling observation from an extraordinary mind and human being!

If truth is as precious as the air we breathe and the food we eat, it is also as available to us for our well-being.  It is available to the poor and the rich, the beautiful and the ugly, to the uneducated and the learned, as well as to the foolish and the wise.  Like its fellow attributes freedom and wisdom, though, truth, in its most significant and powerful guise, can be to our hopes and dreams a very, very fickle trustee!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

YOUR MOST NETTLESOME PEEVE –- OUGHT YOU MAKE IT A PET?

By Edwin Cooney

Just the other day, my bride of exactly nine months identified (for either my edification or education  -- take your pick!) one of her “pet peeves,” people who are insensitive to others’ time.  No, we weren’t quarreling and she wasn’t accusing me of anything –- although we both agreed that I’m guilty of her favorite peeve from time to time

My response to her was “what makes a peeve a pet?” I went on to insist that pets are favorite things.  There are, of course, pet dogs, pet cats, and, for a while in the 1970s there were even Pet Rocks.  Hence, if one has a “pet peeve,” isn’t one conceding that there is at least some pleasure and perhaps even some gratification in the frustration, resentment, or even in the anger?

The idea that one finds pleasure or satisfaction (or perhaps even both) in peevishness reminds me of the lyric in a song once recorded by Elvis Presley called “Mean Woman Blues.” Here’s the line:

“Strangest gal I ever had,

Never happy unless she’s mad!”

Now, there is a definite sense of relief or exaltation that’s natural as one vents negative feelings.   The danger, however, to people and especially to nations is chronic peevishness.  On a personal level, a particularly nettlesome peeve may be described as a “pet” peeve, but still there is the lingering unhealthy dynamic of peevish pleasure that can ultimately deaden the intellect or the soul.

Widespread personal peeves invariably become national peeves, the kinds of peeves political leaders are particularly sensitive to and latch onto in pursuit of votes.  It’s a matter of record that from the very beginning of her existence, on some level America has harbored peeves toward most of the major nations of the world. 

For example, during the first 80 years or so of our independence, Americans only sporadically celebrated Christmas, because Christmas was primarily a British holiday.  Not until German merchants introduced it as a profitmaking strategy for American enterprise in the 1850s did the good citizens of New York, Boston and Philadelphia lead the way in donning their “gay apparel” thus enabling them to more easily sell their products to an increasingly materialistic-hungry citizenry. Another way to put it is that Christmas was, as a British holiday, originally repugnant even to God-fearing republican (small r) oriented Americans, but as soon as it became profitable, the celebration of Christmas went from being a nonevent to becoming a “traditional” and, certainly, a sacred option.

Of course, Americans most assuredly nurture pet peeves for their fellow citizens or, more precisely, for fellow inhabitants they devoutly wish weren’t their fellow citizens.  These have historically included Catholics, the poor, labor, Jews, ungrateful foreigners, welfare mothers (“queens”), blacks, native Americans, atheists, public school teachers, bureaucrats (who may be your own kids or even you if you work for the government), bankers, someone else’s lawyer, immigrants (whether legal or illegal if they won’t learn English), the politically correct, and, of course, the other party’s politicians.

The core of the problem, as I see it, is simple.  We’ve become a very smug self-satisfied people.  Most of us, much of the time, have little sense of healthy humility.  Once we identify ourselves as any particular thing, whether it be as a conservative, a liberal, as a realist, as an atheist or a religious person, as a family man or woman, a laborer, a businessman or woman and, most certainly, as a taxpaying American, we’re atop the pyramid of logic, good sense, decency, and morality.  We readily identify the hurts and needs of others as being of their own making even as we view ourselves as victims of others’ ingratitude. 

The question I think millions of us would most benefit from is this one: How cheerfully and consistently do you and I meet our own stated principles?  If you peevishly label others as lazy, greedy, selfish, rude, irreverent, intolerant, impatient, materialistic, parochial, unprincipled or arrogant, what’s the likelihood that you come across to others the same way?

Over the past few years, I’ve strived to reach a high degree of political and social objectivity as opposed to the socio/political certainty I once possessed.  Accordingly, I’ve become increasingly impatient with those who spew forth, with too much certainty, political and moral opinions and principles that I once considered to be near the pinnacle of wisdom and morality.  It just seems to me that having an opinion is easy.  As President Kennedy told the 1962 Yale University graduating class “Too often…we enjoy the comfort of opinion rather than the discomfort of thought!”  Therein, I suppose you have my pet peeve.  Hence, I too must be aware that certainties are of far greater value than I’ve been recently willing to grant them.

Perhaps one of the greatest gifts we ever receive is when someone close and dear to us causes us to wonder and to ponder.  To wonder and ponder is to seek questions rather than answers.  Perhaps the most valuable question is, “How really and truly applicable are most of our peeves – especially when they’re dear enough to us to be labeled “pets?”

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY