The Word That Shall Not Be Named

My friend Ken Mcdowell has written often and forthrightly about the loss of civility in our national discussions. While he sees himself as the voice of reason, and often he is, he still sometimes hears the exact same tone as either the soothing sounds of songbirds or the suffering wail of a banshee depending on whether it emanates from the right or the left. In a recent blog post Ken discussed Bill Maher’s use of a certain ugly word to describe Sarah Palin. http://kendrickmacdowell.wordpress.com/ . Some words are too ugly to even partially spell using asterisks to replace vowels. I don’t even want to go that close to this particular word. Let’s just say it rhymes with the thing men are doing when they carry guns into the woods to find dinner.

There are all kinds of terrible words in the world. Some of them are just overwhelmingly ugly and embarrassing when used publicly, but can be appropriately inappropriate, even pointedly precise when used in more closed settings. There are no ugly words among whisky-ed men in smoky rooms. As long as everyone in the room has given permission by their presence in such places, there are no politically incorrect words, just colorful, descriptive adjectives and racist, sexist and filthy jokes. But Maher was doing his “Stand Up” act in heavily Democratic Dallas County. Maher claims he was well received, though no one polled the women in the audience.

Some words are fighting words, some make us cower, embarrassed for humanity to hear one of our own use or misuse it.  However, there are words at the very edge of the flat earth of language beyond which is nothing but the void. A word that rhymes with the smallest weakest puppy in the litter, is one of these.

The word Bill Maher used to describe Sarah Palin is one of the most provocative words I know. I wish I didn’t know it. A friend told me he used it in the last argument that he and his ex-wife had while living under the same roof. I have heard of men who were startled to find a butcher knife up under their ribcage after using this word. I know many perfectly polite women for whom this word triggers the nuclear option. I have seen it used by people who knew full well that once the word crossed their lips, fists would fly and all hell’s fury would break loose. F-bombs get dropped like napalm on the jungles of Vietnam, but one ugly little word rhyming with a football term for a strategic kick that relinquishes possession of the ball, makes Dresden look like a playground.

I once saw a teacher of deaf children take on a stripper in way-too-high heels (that story is rather complicated but exonerates me of any accusation of having been in a so-called gentleman’s club) and grab a beer bottle as a weapon, to emphasize her objection to the use of the word. One can only imagine the row – no, one can’t imagine – if Maher had actually said this insult to Palin’s face. I have no doubt Palin could have and would have been within her rights to kick Maher’s tookus.  

Maher’s use of “the word you never say” is interesting in all kinds of ways. First, it’s like a signal admitting he is less and less often funny, going the way of almost all comics (Robin Williams, George Lopez, Gallagher, Carrot Top) save a few, such as, Bob Hope, a rare, funny Republican of yesteryear.

Apparently, the PC police have now infiltrated the right and are offended by name calling when it is directed at them. This is like the black kettle that has been blackened further after being left over the fire for days while cooking black bean soup, calling the kettle black. For years they scoffed and belittled the “PCers”, starting their racist jokes and their sexist comments with “…well it may not be “politically correct” but…” They always got their little finger workout doing the quote signs in the air for emphasis, and then headed off into something that was sure to offend, unless of course they were in some inner sanctum of male inebriation. You can call the President of the United States the Anti-Christ but if you use a word that rhymes with the professional man who does the dangerous stuff in movies so Tom Cruise stays pretty, you have broken all of the rules.

If you want to be polite there are some perfectly nice church groups, book clubs, and nursing homes that you can visit. However, politics is a tough game and since there is little common decency among the men who play it, there is no reason to expect a special set of rules for the ladies. That said, if I was Bill Maher, I would grunt out an apology and watch my back.

Noting Spring 2011

Spring wells up from the blackland prairie and the post oak savannah of North Texas. The warming ground comforts the seeds. Blankets of wildflowers burst from the ground in the full sun fields between the shadows of the tree canopy. The parade of waving colors swirl through days of wind, each in its own time. First, are the brave little Blue Bells, unafraid of winter turning back for a final assault.  Soon, the anticipation of the Bluebonnet is relieved, followed by Indian blankets and Paint Brushes, all accompanied by other voices of the choir. Some have but a short time, others slowly wither as the heat of summer comes, and wears, on. Days of wind in March and April ruffle and smooth the low painted fields and roadsides. The wild plum, pear and apple blossoms explode in the still brown thickets, awaiting the dogwood. The assurance of Spring is in the dogwood and the Bluebonnet.

Rolling Blackouts

Sometimes it’s all just too much to watch and listen to, isn’t it? Spring Break came at just the right moment this year. While I did pay attention to what was happening in Japan, I have ignored most everything else this side of Charlie Sheen and the 24 - 7 news cycle for a couple of weeks. While the world didn’t end, I was a little disappointed that no one wrote to say, “Hey, I miss your blog.” Undeterred by a lack of popular acclaim, there are a couple of items to catch up on.

On his radio show on March 18, Glenn Beck said, "If This President Is Re-Elected In 2012, There Is No Way We As A Nation Survive In Any Form That We Understand". The idea that 10 million people a week listen to this nonsense is worrisome enough, the fact that many of them are driving at the same time is absolutely frightening. And they say texting while driving is dangerous.

So it’s now official. Vegas odds-makers say President Obama is the favorite in 2012. This is good news for Beck. What sort of programming could Beck sustain if the Tea Party has completely taken over America? So really Beck is rooting for the President in the same way Rich Little rooted for Nixon. This is called hedging your bet. My own entertainment aside, Beck’s prophesy on the fate of our nation in 2012 is another across the line example of how un-American that whole movement really is. They clearly never understood the responsibility part of the “Rights and Responsibilities” of Democracy, the tenets of majority rule and a loyal opposition. As long as the Republic has lasted, through civil war and civil rights, it is insulting to the American fabric that the re-election of Barrack Obama could be cast as the defining moment of the downfall of the empire. And in 1964, the same people were saying it was the Beatles.

Is there any credibility left anywhere? Wolf Blitzer just dubbed the actions compelled by U.N. Resolution 1973, “Obama’s War”. This made me laugh out loud until a second or two later I realized he might not be kidding. Either my writer’s wit has lost its way or there really are no good metaphors to describe how crazy that statement makes WB sound. The only thing that comes to mind is a small boy being dragged into the women’s apparel department by his mother and then calling it, “Little Barrack’s Shopping Trip”. By all accounts, the President had to be dragged into this Libyan expedition and the handling of it is open for debate on the right and the left. Calling it “Obama’s War” is nothing but the plundering of a theme offered by PBS on their Frontline Series, which focused on “Bush’s War” in Afghanistan and Iraq and then in 2008 “Obama’s War” in Afghanistan (again) as the new administration  took control of and re-branded that ongoing conflict. Two final thoughts, this isn't a war and if it is Obama's, then the guy who sweeps the popcorn out of the theater also directed the movie.

The credibility, and perhaps sanity, disappeared further in the last few weeks when ex-snake handler, Mike Huckabee, once again repeated the Kenya-myth about the President. He later claimed he misspoke. Now, you are free to believe the President was born in Kenya if you want and many of my immediate family members fought in “Reagan’s War” in Grenada to defend your right to believe as you please, but who in God’s money-green America can actually believe Mike Huckabee misspoke “Kenya” when he actually meant Indonesia, er uh, Hawaii. If you believe Huckabee misspoke on the subject of Kenya and the President, then you probably believe Lee Harvey Oswald was just trying to aim high with a few warning shots or that Huckabee is actually from planet earth. Birth Certificate? I want to see the mother ship.

A phrase that is becoming more and more a part of the lexicon is the term, “rolling blackouts.” While these refer to an actual loss of electrical power, there is an irony laced, subtext to this phrase. One can see evidence of rolling blackouts in the coverage of Charlie Sheen or the obsession with Dancing with the Stars. Or, OMG, the President, in a refreshingly light-hearted moment, picked a March Madness bracket and caused hours of broadcast hissing and gnashing of teeth. While rolling electrical blackouts are costly and dangerous, rolling mental blackouts seem to be a serious national problem.

Recent polls show that Tea Partiers and Republicans now favor the repeal of incest laws to get the government out of our personal business. Further, they are introducing legislation to hang anyone who ever voted in a Democratic primary. Tomorrow or the next day I’ll get around to admitting that I misspoke. What’s the difference? America ceases to exist in any form that we can understand in 2012. With Barrack Obama as President for another four years, Doomsday will have arrived, and Glen Beck will be left to wander through media world muttering, “I can’t understand. I can’t understand.” Now that, will be worth watching.

BP's Comeback

CNN Money and Bloomberg.com carried a little story on Feb. 28 that probably didn’t make your news feed. The first Deepwater drilling permit since the Deepwater Horizon blowout has been issued to Noble Energy Inc. The new well is near the site of the disaster that killed 11 workers. However, CNN Money, Bloomberg and apparently the A.P.,  failed to report that Noble Energy and several other partners own only about half of the well, while our old friend, BP owns 46%.  

This is a hold your nose moment for many people. Somehow, it just doesn’t seem right does it? If you are naughty in elementary school, they at least send you to the end of the line, don’t they? Still, one of the problems is we have failed to plan and invest far enough into the future. Human kind does not yet possess the higher thinking or the courage necessary to attain true sustainability. Our immediate needs, which really have never been needs, but rather excesses, have always driven the energy machine which drives the economic machine. BP is not the devil. To accept that makes me the devil’s keeper. I’m just a guy who likes to drive down to the coffee shop or put up Christmas lights.

I don’t hate BP. Hell, 60% of self-described “vegetarians” in a recent poll admitted to eating meat within the last 72 hours. As much as it is talked about, energy remains like an elephant to a blind man. We feel the parts – dependence, independence, conservation, regulation, alternative, utility bills and price at the pump, but we really can’t grasp how big and complicated this thing is.   

The good news is that deep water drilling will have to proceed more conservatively. (Funny how conservatives want everything to be conservative except when it comes to balancing competing legitimate interests in the making of the almighty dollar and then they want it wheels off, balls to the wall, no regulation, full speed ahead.)  The Obama Administration lifted the moratorium on permits back in October but the pace of permitting has been nil until now. All of the new regulations and requirements stymied a sudden rush back into deep water. The energy industry appears poised to embrace higher safety expectations and the Energy Department expects to permit more deep water wells soon

Companies that show that they can diligently work safely and have a disaster plan with the equipment readily available to implement the plan, will have no trouble getting the permit. It simply comes down to two questions: How will you prevent a blowout? How will you handle a blowout?  That’s what Noble Energy has done and provided a model for other companies to follow. Noble has a partner, Helix Energy Solutions Group that has the technology to contain and recover massive amounts of oil from a spill and to drill relief wells. There is that nagging question about what control BP can have in questions of operation and safety of the well but there at least appears to be resolve in the industry not to have more public relations, not to mention environmental, disasters.

BP ignored Helix’s offer of help for six weeks when Horizon blew out. Helix’s involvement is a good sign.  That and the fact that BP did not pay bonuses to executives responsible for operations in the Gulf of Mexico last year, may signal a new era of “safety first” at BP. In fact, new CEO Bob Dudley, who replaced the inept Tony Hayward, also refused any bonus this year. Early in his tenure, Dudley announced that in the future BP’s incentive payments would be linked to safety performance.

This is good for the economy and jobs and just as short sighted as we have always been about energy. One of these days we really will have to plan like 2111 is just around the corner. Well, because it is.

It's a Wonderful Life

One of my few impersonations is of the great Jimmy Stewart in “It’s a Wonderful Life” when his character, George Bailey, bemoans, “Why do we have to have all these kids?” It’s not a good impersonation, but it is executed with sincerity and empathy. Sometimes I feel exactly like George does at that moment. All parents have the occasional doubt. Of course, these moments are always followed, just like in the movie, by the epiphany of “Zuzu’s petals!” Despite the responsibilities, challenges, and disappointments, my wife Shannon and I stand in awe of the little unexpected miracles of being the parents of our three sons. I am not sure what we were thinking when we went into this parenting thing, so full of joy and trepidation, only to find ourselves at this late juncture in the process, so thoroughly confounded and relatively unscathed. Not that the wheels can’t come off at any moment – and usually have.

Shannon and I once had to hold my oldest, then three years old, down while a doctor stitched up his hand. The worst was the night he had a honking cough and they had to put him in the plastic tube with his arms straight up to x-ray his chest. I wore a 50 pound lead jacket and stood next to him offering feeble words of comfort. I can still hear the screams from both of those events. There were traumatizing events with the other two boys but, like war memories, they start to fade together. I do remember the broken wrist that buckled my knees and the orbital cellulitus over Y2K holiday, when the Pediatrician chased me out of the office yelling, “Get him to the hospital now. He could go blind!” Though it is true there are more photos of the first son, almost everything else was equal – good, bad, cost per unit. Despite the fact the middle and youngest would claim favoritism toward the first born, the financial receipts do not support this.

In the last few years, Shannon and I have, nearing the top of the parenting hill, encountered the steep part of the slope. The boulder is large, but our resolve is buoyant and steadfast. In just four years our youngest will be college bound. The choices now are so much more important than deciding how much TV is too much and when sugar treats are okay. The boys are not babies anymore but they do require counsel, or at least a maid and a chauffeur. We still live last minute notice to last minute notice. Several days a week are like a “Chinese fire drill”, as my mom used to say. Calendaring for a week is sketchy - a month ahead is like a corporate team building event. Returning to work the next day, we find ourselves a day behind on the work and 47 emails in the inbox.

February in Texas this year was irrelevant. Normally, February can be counted on to stand for something but instead it imitated March. It roared in like a Lion with snow and ice and by the end of the month the lamb of spring had arrived. Spring is not good news around my house. It means the end of any acceptable excuses for cozying up on the couch in front of the fire. My wife morphs into the allergy-zombie and suddenly there is a long list of house and yard chores. If she is going to be miserable she wants me in lock step. Spring brings an explosion of kid related responsibilities that have us scrambling in a thousand different directions.




As I recall, however, sitting in the emergency room at 2 a.m. is not nearly as difficult as the season of UIL, PAC-10’s, FAFSA, SSC, SAT & ACT, AP tests, high school audition, college planning, TAKS, and “the most important (fill in blank e.g. swim meet, water polo tournament, etc.) __________ of my life.” A teenager is like a cross between a toddler and an Alzheimer’s patient. One minute, they are so needy, the next minute they are belligerent because I can’t remember where they put their school backpack.

Also, I love the questions at 9:45 p.m. on a week night. “Where are the poster boards?” This question assumes that we store a ream of these somewhere. “You do remember I told you three weeks ago when we were stuck in that traffic and you were talking to mom on the phone that I have a big project due tomorrow?” There is no sense in arguing, I grab my car keys. At this point in my parenting evolution I can find a poster board in Dallas any time of the night but I can’t remember to teach the whippersnapper to get his own damn poster board. Maybe we are more alike than I thought.

Even though it is Spring these are melancholy moments for a weepy old dad like me. Caleb is off at Pac-10’s this week. His first two years of college as a music major and leader of the Arizona State Sun Devil Men’s (who said he could be a man?) Swimming Team has been full of ups and downs but he has persisted. It would make him mad but I am proud that he has persisted with his swimming, with his life dreams out there strumming a beckoning tune. With everything he has faced, injury, illness, loss of confidence, I would have already quit but that’s not the stuff he is made of. Meanwhile, he still acts as though he could, at any moment, drop out of college and move to New York to become a jazz musician. This sounds like something I would have done, which means it must be a really bad idea. Except he has the talent and passion, so whatever he chooses, his mother and I always support him, even though we miss him terribly.

Then, there is Liam, NHS, A Honor roll, all AP classes, All-State in Swimming, emerging water polo star. This is the child who at about 15 months, felt the pecking order weighted toward his older brother and from his car seat, began kicking the back of my driver seat, emphatically saying, “Me, ME, ME-ME-MEEEE!”, as a protest against being ignored. Living with Liam is like living with a psychologist, a priest, a lawyer and a comedian. He is wise beyond his years and makes us laugh. Liam and I, at this writing, are enjoying four days at Texas A&M University for the USA Swimming Sectional Championships. This time next year, we’ll know where he will attend college and be making graduation plans. So we take every opportunity to just enjoy our time together. I hold every hug a little longer, so he doesn’t get away too quickly.

Then there is Jonas, our sweet Jojo. I guess he is the inspiration for this piece. The poor kid was dragged all over the country for swim meets before he was old enough to join swim team. It just about ruined it for him. But, like all of us, he did love the water, and became a great little swimmer, even if the fire to drive himself competitively wasn’t there at a young age. He had to keep reminding me that it was okay to have fun. I knew this at my core but somehow the parent driven competition to have excellence in every aspect of our children occasionally got the better of me. While the older two swam on to dizzying heights, Jonas went to practice when he felt like it, enjoyed summer league swimming, played baseball and marched to the beat of a different drummer. I was exactly the same way, so I don’t know why it was hard to let him find his own journey.

The last few years Jonas has been more serious about everything, trumpet, swimming, school…the light seemed to go on at just the right time. Yesterday, he got his acceptance letter from the Arts Magnet High School where he will get music training in a public high school that we could never afford to give him. Last weekend, he swam in our North Texas championship swim meet and it was obvious from the beginning he was having a break out meet. After three great swims on Saturday, we were getting a bite to eat on the way home. “I never, ever, thought I could be as good as the brothers.” I am a youngest, Shannon is a youngest, we knew what he meant but were still sort of sad. Sometimes the underlying culture of a family is stronger than what you objectively know and believe. I told him I was sorry if we ever caused him to doubt, “Oh its okay Dad, I know I can be now.” “Well, it’s your turn, your time, now.” I told him. The next day he dropped an unheard of 45 seconds off his 1650 (mile) and qualified for our State Age Group Championships which is one of the fastest meets of its kind in the country. We’re so happy for him.

Good boys grow into good men, all in good time. Each is taking his own journey. I watch them grow and I know why we have these kids. I see how they are kind to others, respectful, curious, and passionate about their dreams. Shannon and I have three wonderful guys who want to help the world be a more beautiful and peaceful place. As they follow their natural course, I hope they don’t look back too closely. I wouldn’t want them to catch me crying. Hey Look! Zuzu's petals!

With Hand Over Heart

I don’t mean to understate it, but, generally, I believe the Tea Party is the most misdirected, hypocritical, cynical, manipulative, Chicken Little, sour grapes, intellectually dishonest, political body I have ever encountered. In other words, they are the same as every other political party – including mine - when it is not in power. I am talking about the Party, not the people. The individual parts in American political life far exceed the sum of the whole. The people who make up the Tea Party, just like the people who make up the Republican Party or the Democratic Party, tend to be decent, hard working, patriotic, generous, neighborly, reverent folk. Politics make no difference to me and my neighbors when one of us can’t get the car up the icy driveway or the dogs get out. We all come running to help each other.

When I am not writing, blogging, preparing to re-enter the practice of law, trying to stay healthy and being Mister Mom, I live one of my passions by coaching swimming. No one ever thinks about it, but swim coaching is a paid profession, unlike some youth sports where coaching is a volunteer, though no less noble, position. As the head site coach for a year-round club team, the Dallas Mustangs, and as head coach for 12 summers of the KC Sharks Swim Team, I take great pleasure in the many hundreds and thousands of relationships I have had with swimmers and parents.

I don’t have or play favorites, every parent is a potential volunteer and advocate for the team. But, Rachel Segal is already in my parent hall of fame. She comes from a big, Irish Catholic family in Appleton, Wisconsin and has three, umm, spirited?, children. They are semi-wild kids but with a twinkle in their eye, sweet natured and you can hear them coming before you can see them. It is clear how much love, fun, laughter and chaos there is in the Segal house. Just like my house. Rachel is one of those parents who is always helpful to me as a coach, completely supportive, and never the stereotype pushy swim parent.

Rachel Segal, is a tea party member. “I used to be liberal. The morning after Alex (her first born) was born, I woke up and I was a Conservative. My sisters and one of my brothers are liberals - communists,” she says, as if the two are synonymous. She laughs her great laugh and I laugh, too. As Rachel tells it, “I’m Tea Party. I was there at the beginning of the Tea Party.” I believe it. My mind immediately pictures Rachel throwing boxes of tea into Boston harbor and yelling, “No taxation without Mel Gibson,” or whatever it is that those Tea Partiers yell. We have known each other several years but we rarely have time or inclination to talk about politics. However, we know where the other stands politically. Rachel clearly is comfortable, as her love for her communist siblings and her Catholic-Jewish marriage reveals, in a world where opposites can happily exist. This may explain her tolerance for the liberal swimming coach to whom she has entrusted her children.

So, one day, Rachel says to me, “Coach, I want to ask you something.” With some parents, who want to know if their child will make the Olympic team by the time they are 12, this is a time when I normally suddenly remember I have to check the pool pump. With Rachel, however, I know her question will be legit, usually something more along the line of, “Give Max a hard workout, ok? He’s been mouthy.” or “Why is Victoria just playing around?” She says all of this with a smile and a laugh. However, this time, she was serious and concerned and I took a step back when she asked, “Why don’t you put your hand over your heart when they play the National Anthem? Is it because, you know, your politics, you’re a liberal.” Then she laughed and I laughed. There was nothing disrespectful in her tone. For my own part, I have, in the past, noted about half the people place their hand over their heart in an over-wrought display of patriotism during the National Anthem. It was irritating to me that they did not know the proper protocol.

So I explained that in the Boy Scouts I had been taught that the Pledge of Allegiance required the hand over the heart while the Star Spangled Banner was not a pledge and did not require the hand over the heart. Though, in my defense, let me say that I always stand at attention and usually sing (as long as no one is within earshot). Rachel said she had been taught hand over the heart, for the Pledge of Allegiance and the National Anthem. I agreed it had become a tradition, especially after 9/11, but I noted that at many of the swim meets we attend, perhaps half of the audience does not place the hand over the heart. I was pretty sure of myself. Rachel didn’t try to argue but she was unconvinced. After practice, it ate at me the whole way home. “I’ll show this tea partier. I was a Boy Scout.” I muttered to myself. I couldn’t wait to get to the computer.

The U.S. Flag Code, albeit seemingly out of date with its reference to a man’s “headdress” says that during the playing of the National Anthem, the right hand should be placed over the heart. Well, I thought, this must have become outdated at some point. My reference would be the Boy Scout Handbook (BSH), a book I cherished long after leaving scouting. I always thought the world would be a far better place if everyone could just follow the tenets of scouting:

The Motto: Be Prepared
The Slogan: Do a Good Turn Daily
The Oath: On my honor, I will do my best, to do my duty, to God and my Country and to obey the Scout Law; to help other people at all times; to keep myself physically strong; mentally awake and morally straight.
The Scout Law: A Scout is, “Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean, and Reverent.

Though I can still recite the above by memory, I sought out the 1967 version of the BSH to find out if I had somehow forgotten the National Anthem protocol. I found one on Amazon. It arrived as promised. This is a version with amazing illustrations, typical of good books of the early and middle part of the last century. The cover is adorned with white boy scouts camping and enjoying nature. The back cover, however, in a nod to the changing times, has a black and Asian Scout standing with some white scouts, enjoying the fellowship of scouting. There on page 67, in the section titled “Our Country’s Flag”, appear the words:

“Whenever you hear it played or sung, stand up, salute if you are in uniform, or place your right hand over your heart if you are in civilian clothes – and think of your own future under that Star Spangled Banner.”

How could I have missed this elemental rule of patriotism? How could so many Americans have missed it? I surely would have done it exactly to protocol had I known. My immediate and distant relations, and yours, who fought in wars in the name of freedom, deserve abiding respect.

I wrote Rachel Segal a thank you note and told her she was absolutely right about the proper etiquette for the National Anthem. I told her I would correct my manners in the future and assured her that my “liberal – communist” politics, as they might be seen to someone more conservative than I am, do not preclude a strong love for country, countrymen, flag, and anthem. As I have always said, I wish we were all just a bit more humble about the opinions we hold and consider the possibility that we could be wrong. There’s nothing wrong with being wrong as long as it is in the journey for truth. So, I learned something from my friend, Rachel Segal, and I appreciate her bringing it to my attention.