Comfort in the Ghoulish

Listening to the radio this morning I heard was a piece about how much the spending is up on Halloween merchandise this year. Talking to candy and costume vendors the commentator implied people motivated by a scary economic future are spending a little more on costumes and candy.

Possible rationales were twofold, the first being that giving better candy was a more affordable extravagance that excessive gift giving at this coming Christmas. In other words you can feel like you are being nicer to people by giving a bigger candy bar because it is only nominally more expensive especially than those mini Snickers bites when most people will be getting less from you this holiday season. The second postulated reason for the focus on this fall celebration was that people need a break from all the grim news. Putting on a costume and being somebody else allows us to shed our skins if only for a moment, skins filled with concerns and trepidations about the future.

Me personally, I am not sure of the reason but Halloween does seem to be more intensely celebrated this year than in the past few years. On the bus into work today there were a number of college students in costume. The Joker is a big one in these parts. It was a great movie and the whole live large/die young thing is soooo attractive to early twenty-somethings. Goth is always big around the campuses as are slut and beast. I have seen several parochial school girl gone wrong costumes in the past two days. (All day yesterday ghouls in bright garish costumes floated about the area near city hall.) Creatures of unknown origins with tentacles and suckers and many eyes also abound.

Hey I even went to a Halloween party, something I haven’t done in about a decade and a half. Again I found people really pushing to make the event fun. Some of the costumes were just wonderful and they are posted above. Some are clearly way, way over the top. No matter the reason people seem to want to have some fun right now, right here. All I can say is what’s the harm and “Boo”. If it makes you feel better give out the bigger candy bars, you’ll be a god among the pre-teen set.

Perception versus Reality

I am going to violate a number of copyright laws by publishing this, but so be it. Who would have thought this would have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, that bastion of the belief that the free market will make our city on the hill higher, cleaner and just overall better than everyone else’s city on the hill? Thomas Frank is the author of “What’s the Matter with Kansas”. It is an excellent read on what got us to where we are today.

Joe the Plumber and GOP 'Authenticity'
It's hard to reach out to workers while cracking down on unions.

By THOMAS FRANK

The conservative movement made its name battling moral relativists on campus, bellowing for a "strict construction" of our nation's founding documents, and pandering to people who believe that the Book of Genesis literally records the origins of human existence.

And yet here are the words of Ronald Reagan's pollster, Richard Wirthlin, as recorded in one of the main Reagan strategy documents from 1980: "People act on the basis of their perception of reality; there is, in fact, no political reality beyond what is perceived by the voters."

The context of Wirthlin's reality-denial, according to the historian Kim Phillips-Fein, who unearths his statement in her forthcoming book, "Invisible Hands," was the larger Republican plan to woo blue-collar voters.

The mission was a success. It worked because Republicans wholeheartedly adopted Wirthlin's dictum. Reality is a terrible impediment when you're reaching out to workers while simultaneously cracking down on unions and scheming to privatize Social Security. Leave that reality to the "reality-based community," to use the put-down coined by an aide to George W. Bush.

The "perception of reality," on the other hand, is an amazing political tonic, and with it conservatives have cemented a factproof worldview of lasting power. It is simply this: Conservatives are authentic and liberals are not. The country is divided into a land of the soulful, hard-working producers and a land of the paper-pushing parasites; a plain-spoken heartland and the sinister big cities, where they breed tricky characters like Barack Obama, all "eloquence," as John McCain sneered in last week's presidential debate, but hard to pin down.

"There are Americans and there are liberals," proclaims a bumper sticker that adorns my office. "Liberals hate real Americans that work and accomplish and achieve and believe in God," proclaimed Rep. Robin Hayes (R., N.C.) on Saturday at a rally in North Carolina. Speaking of Mr. Obama on the day before that, Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R., Minn.) expressed deep concern on MSNBC "that he may have anti-American views." And on the day before that, GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin saluted "these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation."

Foursquare fans of perceived reality must have rejoiced when they beheld, on the hard streets of suburban Toledo, Ohio, that most authentic of men, Joe the Plumber: "the average citizen" in the flesh, according to Mr. McCain; "a real person," according to Mrs. Palin, who deftly ruined Mr. Obama's "staged photo op there" -- a subject on which Mrs. Palin can surely count herself an authority.

Joe the Plumber -- along with his just-discovered supporter, Tito the Builder -- has brought to the GOP what Richard Wirthlin went looking for so long ago: blue-collar affirmation. But consider the degree of reality-blindness it takes to kick out the authenticity like Joe does. The rust-belt metro area in which he lives has been in decline for decades. In 2007, the Bureau of Labor Statistics ranked it 335 out of 369 small metropolitan areas for unemployment; for home foreclosures, according to a 2007 article in the Toledo Blade, it is the 30 worst of all cities in the nation. According to Census numbers, median household income in the Toledo area, measured in constant dollars, has actually decreased since the late 1970s.

Joe's town may be circling the drain, but Joe's real concern, as the world knows, is that he might have to pay more taxes when his ship finally comes in. For good measure, Joe also declares Social Security "a joke": "I've never believed in it," he told reporters last week. Maybe that's because this realest of men knows that Social Security is just a hippie dream, despite the Census's insistence that 28% of his city's households received income from that source in 2003. Maybe all those people would be better off if we had invested Social Security's trust fund in WaMu and Wachovia -- you know, the real deal.

Here is the key to this whole strange episode: Government is artifice and imposition, a place of sexless bureaucrats and brie-eating liberals whose every touch contaminates God's work. Markets, by contrast, are natural, the arena in which real people prove their mettle. After all, as Mr. McCain said on Monday, small businessmen are just "Joe the Plumbers, writ large." Markets carry a form of organic authenticity that mere reality has no hope of touching.

This is not a good time for market-based authenticity, however. It now seems that those real, natural Americans who make markets go also cook the books, and cheat the shareholders, and hire lobbyists to get their way in Washington. They invent incomprehensible financial instruments and have now sent us into a crisis that none of them has any idea how to solve.

If that's nature, I'm ready for civilization.

Life on Mars, my review-GManitou's cultural moment for the week

On Friday’s I will try and post something that is pop culture oriented. Most likely what I write will be a rant about a movie or television program I like. An occasional diatribe about some incursion into our cultural lives might find its way into this slot, but I will try and keep things positive. However the Friday post will be something specifically not pondering about life, meaning or those evil and diabolical children that carry my surname.

TV is on my radar today. Thursday night TV has long been the bastion of the one hour drama. CSI, Without a Trace, ER, etc, these are the archetypes. ABC has now brought a new tale into the mix. It is called Life on Mars ostensibly named after a David Bowie song. It may actually be a reference to the status of the hero and his location (especially given the recent appearance of a little robot/lander thing in the bushes). The basic plot summary is 2008 cop somehow by means of a traumatic incident finds himself living his life as a 1973 police detective.

The Bowie penned theme song has always been a favorite of mine. Back in the summer of 1974 when I was working at Phil Butcher’s Kurly Kustard on the boardwalk in Ocean City, NJ, Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust were two of the top four cassettes we played. Well, they were the only four cassettes we had. The others were Kris Kristofferson’s The Silver Tongued Devil and I and part of Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits Vol II. Over and over again I listened to songs like Kooks and Changes and Starman. Sitting here right now I can recite the track order on sides A and B of each of these tapes. Ah the smell of ice cream, soft pretzels and Bain de Soliel (on the ever darkening shoulders of those sun tanned Philadelphia princesses).

Moving beyond the show’s theme song, the casting of this particular show is just killer. Jason O’Mara carries himself like Steve McQueen in his Bullet era but with the sly humor of early (less fanatic) Mel Gibson. Harvey Keitel is what he always is, smoldering and intense. No matter what role he takes he is a force on the screen. Gretchen Mol is superb in a low key but dead on performance as a woman in a male centric era. Ms. Mol’s character is so far down the totem pole in the police station where she works she can’t even see the glint of the glass ceiling from where she is looking up. And Michael Imperioli, could he look any more of the era than he does with his Harry Reems' modeled mustache and hair style or that 1970s brown sport jacket?

Then there are the little plot details. Things like the hippie dippy neighbor who brings over cannabis laced lasagna. Oh how seventies. Or the Nixon jokes. Ah how I remember that night in August 1974 when Tricky Dick took the helicopter away from the White House that one last time.

This show has potential. It has good casting, interesting plot nuances and great music. I mean with Mott the Hoople, David Bowie and various funk classic riffs what more could a soundtrack want? Life also avoids something deadly on network TV, hyping the science fiction/fantasy quotient too much. Gretchen Mol was wisely given the task in episode two to tell the hero to back off his theories on how he has gotten back to 1973 or else face the real trouble that their boss will rain down upon his head.

Hey the show may turn to dirt in the next few episodes I have seen that happened many times. But for right now, this is fun. Enjoy it if you get the chance.

Whoa boy....

Weather here of late has been unseasonably warm. Today however the bubble of summer seems to be bursting; a burst is the foreordained end of a bubble is it not? Westerly winds now blow carrying a cold chill mist in our direction. Gray days in October are merely warning shadows of the dark winter that is to come.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not unhappy. Change from sun to clouds is nothing more than a natural transition. I like snow. I like winter. Still, I truly love fall. What I feel during this period of change is akin to what I feel when a good bottle of wine is gone and an evening with close friends is drawing to a conclusion, affection tinged with melancholy.

Today is Election Day in Canada. 21 days from now it will be Election Day here. As I watch the world shaking I keep thinking back to Pete Townsend’s comment that the old boss will be the same as the new boss. Jaded? Yup. However I do believe change must come. The change may not be the change we are thinking about right here, right now.

An article in the New York Times Sunday talked about food policy and what the changing economic/oil/social situations in the world mean relative to that policy. It is interesting reading. I don’t buy all of it but I think the underlying premise is sound; food wars are possible. Food may well become the new oil if we can get our energy use in order.

And now for the danger Will Robinson part of our story. As some of you who are internet savvy may know, both my wife and I have pages on Facebook. I personally don’t have much truck with Facebook and view it more as a diversion to dabble in from time to time. For all its immersion into popular culture I don’t find that it is providing any meaningful basis of real discourse. The whole status thing part of your profile in which you detail what you are doing at the moment has proved fodder for lots of yuks for me. I am still savoring the sock monkey responsive comments.

On the other hand Francie’s experience today with the same feature was a bit different. At late morning when she decided to check her Facebook listing she found a number of comments that didn’t jibe with what she had last posted her status to be. The tone of the correspondence was concerned and supportive. Uh what is this all about she mused to herself. At that moment she decided to check what it was these folks were responding to. Here it is….

Status “Francie is lying in her bed, wondering what life would be like if she weren't born.”

Ah now the caring and concerned comments began to make sense. However, the comment was not created by Francie. It was at this point she called me. Concerned about improper access to her site she was a little panicked. Sure enough when I went out to the site there were this tidbit in response:

“It would be a world without Primus and Secundus and all that they are poised to give and it would be a world with a miserable JTT, which would certainly be intolerable.”

As we talked about how someone could get access to her page I started thinking about breakfast. In the dark hour of 6:50 a.m. as I was puttering about putting together the family breakfast my 10 year old was busy doing something at the table. Thinking back on it I had assumed he was checking Mom’s recent play lists because on certain music sources the iphone keeps track of what you are listening to. Given his enthrallment with the Postal Service and the Killers I just assumed it was a musically foray.

But no I was wrong. He was busy updating his Mom’s status so that her coworkers when they checked her page would be ready to form an informal suicide watch. Having figure out what had happened Francie was compelled to respond:

“You know, it would have been deep of me - or at least incredibly morose - if I had, in fact written the above status. In fact, my 10-year old son, Loren, was apparently having great fun with my Facebook Ap this morning while playing with my IPhone at the breakfast table. I think he has a much more interesting inner life than I do.”

Okay so once the yuks are gone I am left with a number of questions. First, what do you do with a child like this? I am a limited being and I don’t think play on the chess board of the next few years that will be life with him is in my favor. Second, what is going inside of that head that he would come up with such a phrase and that he would post it on his Mom’s page knowing the reaction it would get from her friends and coworkers? Oh goodness I am in so much trouble. Have they repealed that Nebraska drop off law yet?

Election Two

One of the things people outside of Michigan may not know is that there are two major elections going on. One is the Obama/McCain slugfest of competing world views. The other is the Harper/Dion/Layton and whoever that odd Green Party Lady is donnybrook. Huh, I hear a number of you say.

Michigan by virtue of our proximity to a thin dotted line is barely separated from Canada, the Great White North. Right now they are about a week away from a national parliamentary election. The polls indicate a fractured electorate and in most likelihood a minority government. Minority government rule is an interesting topic in the poltical science milieu, but if you have an interest in its nuances look it up when you have a moment. I refuse to bore you with such arcane.

Still I like the odds there better than here. In Canada there is only one conservative party (it took them a few years of turmoil to get there) and three liberal parties. Given my leftist leanings Canada with three left leaning parties, one a variant of the left wing our Democratic party, the next an actual good old fashioned socialist party and the last a bunch of really, really far left even beyond the pale of my support wackos, is kind of like nirvana. Thus I follow there politics. Also I own property there and it is free and clear and if our economy implodes at least one economic choice I made will have been a good one.

If you need a break from our weirdness please check out their weirdness. One of my favorite spots is a program called the Hour’s attempts to lure the Prime Minister on for a political discussion with the promise of a free kitten. Here is the link although embedding does not seem to work real well on this blog, http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/blog/2008/10/harper_bait_08.html You may have to cut and paste.

Subtle Sky

Some years ago I was wondering around the art museum there in Chadds Ford and I realized many of the pictures there had been part of my life. There were N.C. Wyeth’s paintings and they reminded me of the Brandywine Room at the Hotel DuPont. There were on display Howard Pyle’s illustrations created for those books filled with romantic and chivalrous ideals I read as of kid. Looking at these beautiful pieces of graphic art was just wonderful. But serendipity stepped in and made the day even better.

Turning a corner and walking down a hall I spied one painting by itself. It was by Maxfield Parrish. You know the one I am talking about, naked girl on rock looking up. Posters of it were on the walls of every self respecting hippy dippy dorm room of the seventies. But this was not a poster, it was the original painting. It was wonderful and nobody was stopping to look at it.

The use of colors by Parrish conveys such a romantic view of the world. It is almost like every one of his paintings is trying to say it is late in the day or late in the season, time is full and everything is ripe, the air is warm and it is moment to savor and enjoy. And here right in front of me was that painting that brought Parrish into my world. Sometimes art just overwhelms you and that is a good thing.

One night recently I went walking. Amidst the suburban landscape the light was growing dim. The sky on the edge of the coming night was a Maxfield Parrish sky. It is why I took the shot. Sometimes art makes you think of the sky in a different way or maybe its give you a language with which to define what you enjoy about the sky. Either way it is a good thing.