There is a widely circulating video on the internet, titled demographic_problem.wmv, which shows the dire probability of Muslims taking over Europe and North America in a few decades on the basis of population expansion relative to the indigenous Europeans and North Americans.
Demographics is a subject I know something about so I will make this essay as concise and informative as I can. I have written on the subject before in the last third of my blog essay titled Energy (there is a link between population and energy requirements) so you may want to look at that; also one of the best sources around, as I noted in my essay, is the 2004 book Fewer by Ben J. Wattenberg who is recognized as a demographics expert and who has been following and analyzing population trends for the last 40 years or so.
That video is alarmist and extreme and illustrates how selected facts can be used to draw unrealistic, false, and even outrageous conclusions. The video says that action must be taken before it is too late (presumably too late to prevent a takeover of the world by Muslims), but what is the action that is recommended? It is not specified. The video is correct in stating that the replacement rate is 2.1 children per woman; anything less leads to population decline and of course anything more will cause population growth.
Before I start refuting the ominous conclusions of this video I will denote what some of the real concerns are for the coming worldwide and individual country population declines as anyone who is paying attention knows. Just as our Social Security system is now predicted to be in the red in 2010 because fewer and fewer workers are paying into the system and more and more retirees are collecting benefits, the Europeans have greater economic problems because of their even more severely aging population and concomitant falling total fertility rates (TFR). There may well be massive societal dislocations and reordering of priorities and possibly lowering of economic well being, in spite of technology advances, in the coming decades. As I noted in my essay, quoting Wattenberg, the world population will rise from approx. 6 3/4 billion in 2010 to 8 to 9 billion in 2050 and then may drop to between 2 and 3 billion by 2300!
Now let’s discuss the supposed Islamization of Europe and North America in the coming years. The figures for the TFR for several European countries given in the video are as follows with the figures given by Wattenberg in parentheses: Germany 1.3 (1.35); France 1.8 (1.89); Italy 1.2 (1.23); Great Britain 1.6 (1.6); Spain 1.1 (1.15); Greece 1.3 (1.27); and the average of 31 countries in the European Union 1.38 (1.38). As you can see these figures are practically the same so there is no dispute for these data. The claim in the video for an 8.1 TFR for the Muslims in France is highly suspect given the TFR for various Muslim and Arab countries in North Africa (where most of the Muslim emigrants to Europe come from) and in the Middle East as given by Wattenberg: North Africa as a whole 40 years ago had a TFR of 7.1 and now is 3.2 and sinking like a stone and Tunisia is now 2.0. In 40 years Syria went from a TFR of 7.6 to 3.3; Jordan 8.0 to 3.6; Iraq 7.2 to 4.8; Saudi Arabia 7.3 to 4.5; Iran 7.0 to 2.3; and Egypt, the most populous Arab/Muslim country in the world, went from a TFR of 7.1 in 1960-65 to 3.3 in 2004.
The total population of all of the Arab nations in the world is approximately the same as the USA with the world Muslim population being circa 1/6 of the total world population. The non-Arab country with the largest Muslim population in the world is Indonesia at about 230 million and is the fourth most populous nation after China, India, and the USA. The TFR of Indonesia went from 5.7 in 1960-65 to 2.35 in 2001. In addition to Indonesia, the TFR in Turkey, Bangladesh, and Pakistan are falling rapidly although the TFR is Pakistan was one of the world’s highest at 5.08; however it fell one full point from 1990.to 2000.
The oft expressed fear that the Palestinians would overwhelm the Jewish population in numbers is not materializing. The TFR for the Jewish population in Israel was 2.6 in 2002; the Arab women in the Occupied Territories went from 8.0 in 1970 to 7.0 in 1985 and 5.6 in 2002. The trend is favorable to the Jews.
A few years ago lawyer Alan Dershowitz and columnist Richard Cohen were lamenting that 1/3 and an increasing ratio of young Jews in the United States were marrying outside their religion. They were concerned that Jewish people in the USA were losing their culture and something needed to be done about it. Wattenberg’s comment was “Yah, and good luck with that.” In democracies, people, especially young people, are going to do what they want to do.
To quote Wattenberg: “The Catholic Rule is broken and so too is the Muslim rule. It would be remarkable if it were not so as it has happened everywhere else. Joseph Chamie, Director of the UN Population Division (UNPD) puts it this way: “There was the Industrial Revolution. There was the Information Age. Now there is the Demographic Revolution.” In his PhD dissertation in 1976 and his 1981 book, Religion and Fertility Chamie clearly predicted just what has happened.” This was in stark contrast to the inchoate and chimerical, ipse dixit, population predictions made by Paul Ehrlich in his 1968 book, The Population Bomb (see my blog essay Fools, Frauds, and Fakes).
Again quoting Wattenberg: “People are people; sooner or later Catholics behave like Protestants; and Muslims like Christians.” Some people react emotionally to what they perceive as alarming situations. As for me, I prefer to act rationally and be guided by what the data reveal.
Friday, April 9, 2010
Sunday, February 7, 2010
THE USA MILITARY-55
This essay is not an anti USA military screed; rather it is an analytical and dispassionate conspectus of the current USA military encompassing its philosophy, budget, and the worldwide distribution of its personnel. The truly anti-military far left loons may agree with what I am initially espousing, but wait – they will violently (as only they can) oppugn my wrap-up. You may not accept my thesis completely; that is your prerogative. Still, I shall endeavor to make my case as logically and persuasively as I am capable of.
My premise is simple: I believe the United States of America should not be the world’s policeman and yet that is what we essentially are. There may have been justification in some people’s minds, although not in mine, that the USA needed to fill that role during the Cold War. During this War on Terrorism we should certainly co-operate with other willing nations to oppose and thwart the Islamic fanatics who want to kill us. On the other hand, I don’t think the United States would be abrogating any moral imperative by not shouldering the burden of large scale military action against the client states of the terrorists as we are now doing in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The nominal USA military budget is $664 billion of which $534 billion is the base budget. This represents 40% of all of military spending in the world. Total military spending for fiscal year 2010 will be between $880 billion and $1.03 trillion. In 2005 the military budget was 4.06% of GDP; the low in recent years was 1999-2001 where the figure was 3.0% of GDP. The high occurred during WWII in 1944 at 37.8% and during the Vietnam War in 1968 it was 9.4%.
There are 1,454,000 active duty people in the USA military and 848,000 in the military reserve. Only China has a larger standing active military, but their military expenditures are 1/9 of ours. That represents considerably lower pay and more modest benefits for their soldiers as well as a mere fraction of the complex military hardware developed and manufactured by the United States.
There are 820 USA military installations in 135 countries around the world. These vary from small scale observer sites manned by a couple dozen or fewer people to huge military army, navy, or air force bases with tens of thousands of soldiers, sailors, or air force personnel. The USA has 142,000 soldiers in Iraq; 56,000 in Germany; 40,000+ and increasing in Afghanistan; 33,000 in Japan; 28,500 in South Korea; 9700 in Italy and Great Britain. By geographic area these figures breakdown as follows: 85,000 in Europe; 78,500 in North Africa, the Near East, & South Asia; 70,000 in East Asia & the Pacific; and 2000 in the Western Hemisphere (excluding the USA).
A partial list of the countries that the United States has military personnel in is as follows: Aruba, Australia, Bahamas, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, Djibouti, Ecuador, Egypt, Ghana, Greenland, Hong Kong, Iceland (one can never tell when hostilities are going to break out in Iceland requiring intervention by USA troops), Kyrgyzstan, Norway, Oman, Qatar, Saint Helena, Senegal, Singapore, Uganda, UAE, US Virgin Islands. How on earth can the citizens of the countries, possessions, or principalities other than the 135 the USA protects, sleep peacefully at night?
Never in the history of the world, not during the time of Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, the reign of the Mongols, the Mayans, or the Ottoman Empire has one entity spread its military might to more places on earth as the USA has currently done. It is not for conquest or subjugation of other peoples that the USA has done this. It was done with the best intentions. However, never let us forget what the “Road to Hell” is paved with. It is time, nay it is past time, the USA, however well meaning, solely occupies and protects its own land. Few other countries merit or, in fact, even desire we do this for them.
If we are to greatly curtail our overseas military, then how are we to protect ourselves? Here is what we should not do: give captured terrorists the same rights USA citizens get in civilian courts; so restrict our intelligence community that they can not monitor our ubiquitous enemies; impede communications between our domestic and foreign intelligence agencies.
What we should do is spend enough money and attract sufficient talent to ensure that we are in the forefront of nuclear weapon and delivery technology so that potential enemies such as Iran, North Korea, possibly Pakistan, and whomever are sufficiently deterred from even thinking of attacking us without the fear of themselves being completely destroyed by our retaliatory might. Let the nations who would appease the terrorists go down the path of nuclear disarmament. The modern “Better Red than Dead” crowd would be horrified and appalled by my assertion in this paragraph – so be it. I am for protecting this country from all enemies, foreign and domestic.
To accomplish this transformation of pulling in and reducing our military from around the world would take time, even a decade or longer, as a matter of simple logistics, treaty agreements, and so not to unnecessarily disrupt our economic equilibrium. What is the chance that this will be done? Likely in this decade, as the cliché goes, slim to none. Yet, done it must be, if only for economic reasons. As a people we are economically impelled to put Social Security and Medicare /Medicaid on a sound financial footing else the country will sink under unsustainable debt. There are several ways to do it: cut benefits, increase the fees for both the beneficiaries and working contributors, and increase medical services efficiencies by instituting tort reform and allowing interstate health insurance coverage. Likewise our military expense must share the cost reductions of Social Security and our health service. The voting public will insist upon it.
My premise is simple: I believe the United States of America should not be the world’s policeman and yet that is what we essentially are. There may have been justification in some people’s minds, although not in mine, that the USA needed to fill that role during the Cold War. During this War on Terrorism we should certainly co-operate with other willing nations to oppose and thwart the Islamic fanatics who want to kill us. On the other hand, I don’t think the United States would be abrogating any moral imperative by not shouldering the burden of large scale military action against the client states of the terrorists as we are now doing in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The nominal USA military budget is $664 billion of which $534 billion is the base budget. This represents 40% of all of military spending in the world. Total military spending for fiscal year 2010 will be between $880 billion and $1.03 trillion. In 2005 the military budget was 4.06% of GDP; the low in recent years was 1999-2001 where the figure was 3.0% of GDP. The high occurred during WWII in 1944 at 37.8% and during the Vietnam War in 1968 it was 9.4%.
There are 1,454,000 active duty people in the USA military and 848,000 in the military reserve. Only China has a larger standing active military, but their military expenditures are 1/9 of ours. That represents considerably lower pay and more modest benefits for their soldiers as well as a mere fraction of the complex military hardware developed and manufactured by the United States.
There are 820 USA military installations in 135 countries around the world. These vary from small scale observer sites manned by a couple dozen or fewer people to huge military army, navy, or air force bases with tens of thousands of soldiers, sailors, or air force personnel. The USA has 142,000 soldiers in Iraq; 56,000 in Germany; 40,000+ and increasing in Afghanistan; 33,000 in Japan; 28,500 in South Korea; 9700 in Italy and Great Britain. By geographic area these figures breakdown as follows: 85,000 in Europe; 78,500 in North Africa, the Near East, & South Asia; 70,000 in East Asia & the Pacific; and 2000 in the Western Hemisphere (excluding the USA).
A partial list of the countries that the United States has military personnel in is as follows: Aruba, Australia, Bahamas, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, Djibouti, Ecuador, Egypt, Ghana, Greenland, Hong Kong, Iceland (one can never tell when hostilities are going to break out in Iceland requiring intervention by USA troops), Kyrgyzstan, Norway, Oman, Qatar, Saint Helena, Senegal, Singapore, Uganda, UAE, US Virgin Islands. How on earth can the citizens of the countries, possessions, or principalities other than the 135 the USA protects, sleep peacefully at night?
Never in the history of the world, not during the time of Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, the reign of the Mongols, the Mayans, or the Ottoman Empire has one entity spread its military might to more places on earth as the USA has currently done. It is not for conquest or subjugation of other peoples that the USA has done this. It was done with the best intentions. However, never let us forget what the “Road to Hell” is paved with. It is time, nay it is past time, the USA, however well meaning, solely occupies and protects its own land. Few other countries merit or, in fact, even desire we do this for them.
If we are to greatly curtail our overseas military, then how are we to protect ourselves? Here is what we should not do: give captured terrorists the same rights USA citizens get in civilian courts; so restrict our intelligence community that they can not monitor our ubiquitous enemies; impede communications between our domestic and foreign intelligence agencies.
What we should do is spend enough money and attract sufficient talent to ensure that we are in the forefront of nuclear weapon and delivery technology so that potential enemies such as Iran, North Korea, possibly Pakistan, and whomever are sufficiently deterred from even thinking of attacking us without the fear of themselves being completely destroyed by our retaliatory might. Let the nations who would appease the terrorists go down the path of nuclear disarmament. The modern “Better Red than Dead” crowd would be horrified and appalled by my assertion in this paragraph – so be it. I am for protecting this country from all enemies, foreign and domestic.
To accomplish this transformation of pulling in and reducing our military from around the world would take time, even a decade or longer, as a matter of simple logistics, treaty agreements, and so not to unnecessarily disrupt our economic equilibrium. What is the chance that this will be done? Likely in this decade, as the cliché goes, slim to none. Yet, done it must be, if only for economic reasons. As a people we are economically impelled to put Social Security and Medicare /Medicaid on a sound financial footing else the country will sink under unsustainable debt. There are several ways to do it: cut benefits, increase the fees for both the beneficiaries and working contributors, and increase medical services efficiencies by instituting tort reform and allowing interstate health insurance coverage. Likewise our military expense must share the cost reductions of Social Security and our health service. The voting public will insist upon it.
THE COPENHAGEN CONFERENCE – THE SUPREME IRONY-54
Before launching into the crux of this essay, let me settle a small point of pronunciation. Is the capital of Denmark pronounced Copenhāgen, with a long “a” or a short “a” as in Copenhăgen? The answer depends on whether one uses the American pronunciation or the Danish, and actually all of Europe, pronunciation. Columnist Charles Krauthammer brought up a rather picky point by scolding Barack Obama for using the European pronunciation of Copenhăgen when speaking to an American audience. Krauthammer asked if Obama would be telling us that he would be stopping in Paris (pronounced Părē) and Deutschland on the way home.
President Obama had to make a hurried departure from the Global Warming Conference in Copenhagen back to Washington D.C. because of the heavy snowfall which was accurately predicted for much of the Northeastern Coast. On RAI News (the Italian Worldwide TV Network) on 12/20/09, the headlines on the weather segment of the broadcast were: “Il Posto Piu Freddo d’Italia”(The coldest place in Italy); “Gelo Nord & Centro d’Italia”(Icy conditions in Northern & Central Italy”; “Tutta Europa Sotto la Neve” (All of Europe is under snow); “Washington, Nevicata Record” (Record snowfall for Washington D.C.). An added benefit of reading my essays is being given the opportunity of learning esoteric words or, as in this case, foreign phrases.
And of course the cold and snowy weather in Europe did not exempt Denmark. During a snafu for several hundred journalists waiting in a queue to enter the conference hall some conference official was handing out sandwiches and coffee to the waiting journalists. One of the journalists shouted out “I don’t want food, I want heavy socks, I am freezing my a** off!” We all know that during adversity, journalists are far less likely than normal people to suffer in silence.
This two-week Brummagem and paralogistic Global Warming Conference was attended by representatives from 120 or so countries. In order for these people to get to Copenhagen there were 1200 limos and 140 private aeroplanes used. In fact there was insufficient space for all of these aeroplanes in the Copenhagen airports so some pilots had to fly to neighboring countries and wait there until it was time to return to Copenhagen to pick up their passengers. A rather large carbon footprint was left for this event I would say, but then these crapulous G.W. enthusiasts never have worried about their own carbon pollution high jinks.
After all of this expenditure of money, time, energy, and pollution was anything of substance accomplished? The straight up answer is no and for valid and logical reasons. No country, industrialized or becoming so, wants to cripple its economy. China, India, Brazil, the European countries, and the United States, hopefully (although with the current administration I am not so sure), will not commit economic suicide just to appease the G.W. mob. By the way, the majority of the protestors at this conference are the same motley gang of hoodlums who protest at G-8 and G-20 meetings. They are self-avowed Communists and Marxists who are parasites living off the unearned fruits of capitalism. What a revolting and contemptible lot they are.
I have addressed the Global Warming issue in three previous blog essays (Global Warming; Global Cooling or Warming – Which the Heaven or Hell is it?; Beer Consumption & Other Little Ice Age Phenomena) so I will confine myself here to just a few ancillary remarks.
Is global warming occurring and is it anthropoidally caused? The answer to the first part is that it depends upon what time period you mean. From the late 1970’s to the late 1990’s there was perceptible global warming after cooling in the 1960’s to middle to late 1970’s such that the mainstream news media were all atwitter about how there appeared to be another Little Ice Age in the making. In the past 10 years there has not been any worldwide warming. This, by itself, does not prove anything – there could be CO² warming going on which is temporarily being overtaken by certain cooling factors.
The second part of the question is a decided yes. As I have stated previously (somewhere) Pittsburg, PA used to be known as the “Smokey City” due to all of the pollution from steel mills, but not anymore owing to anti-pollution devises and greatly reduced steel making. Los Angles had more pollution 30/40 years ago than now largely from automobile emissions which were greatly reduced over the intervening years. The topography (LA sits in a bowl) and wind patterns made the Los Angles area particularly susceptible to man-made pollution. London had fewer hours of sunshine 100 years ago and more, than now because of all the coal that was burned in factories and homes at that time.
Therefore if anthropoidic activity can influence weather and cause significant pollution locally, then surely more widespread pollution could conceivably affect weather on a broader worldwide scale. Having said that, the question, and a multi-trillion dollar question it is, is what is the evidence that man-made pollution is causing the globe to warm to increasing and dangerous levels to the detriment of the earth’s inhabitants? Given the myriad periods, on long term (1000’s of years), intermediate term (100’s of years), and short term (10’s of years) where mother earth (Gaia) has alternately been hotter and colder long before humans had initiated the industrial age or in fact were even around, what logical reasons are there to definitively assert that any current warming (especially since the end of The Little Ice Age, circa 1850) is caused by perfidious and unkind mankind?
Before committing to an international policy where the industrialized nations of the world cripple their economies, therefore retrograding to past decades the economic wellbeing of their citizens, and transfer 100’s of billions of dollars annually to third world nations, especially the so called kleptocracies, this whole subject of climate change needs to be thoroughly, honestly, and objective discussed and debated. Unfortunately the Global Warming “True Believers” clearly have no desire to engage in an exchange of data and discuss this singularly important question, as the infamously leaked East Anglia e-mails and previous refusal of Global Warming energumen such as Al Gore, Michael Mann, James Hansen, et al to debate the issue show.
President Obama had to make a hurried departure from the Global Warming Conference in Copenhagen back to Washington D.C. because of the heavy snowfall which was accurately predicted for much of the Northeastern Coast. On RAI News (the Italian Worldwide TV Network) on 12/20/09, the headlines on the weather segment of the broadcast were: “Il Posto Piu Freddo d’Italia”(The coldest place in Italy); “Gelo Nord & Centro d’Italia”(Icy conditions in Northern & Central Italy”; “Tutta Europa Sotto la Neve” (All of Europe is under snow); “Washington, Nevicata Record” (Record snowfall for Washington D.C.). An added benefit of reading my essays is being given the opportunity of learning esoteric words or, as in this case, foreign phrases.
And of course the cold and snowy weather in Europe did not exempt Denmark. During a snafu for several hundred journalists waiting in a queue to enter the conference hall some conference official was handing out sandwiches and coffee to the waiting journalists. One of the journalists shouted out “I don’t want food, I want heavy socks, I am freezing my a** off!” We all know that during adversity, journalists are far less likely than normal people to suffer in silence.
This two-week Brummagem and paralogistic Global Warming Conference was attended by representatives from 120 or so countries. In order for these people to get to Copenhagen there were 1200 limos and 140 private aeroplanes used. In fact there was insufficient space for all of these aeroplanes in the Copenhagen airports so some pilots had to fly to neighboring countries and wait there until it was time to return to Copenhagen to pick up their passengers. A rather large carbon footprint was left for this event I would say, but then these crapulous G.W. enthusiasts never have worried about their own carbon pollution high jinks.
After all of this expenditure of money, time, energy, and pollution was anything of substance accomplished? The straight up answer is no and for valid and logical reasons. No country, industrialized or becoming so, wants to cripple its economy. China, India, Brazil, the European countries, and the United States, hopefully (although with the current administration I am not so sure), will not commit economic suicide just to appease the G.W. mob. By the way, the majority of the protestors at this conference are the same motley gang of hoodlums who protest at G-8 and G-20 meetings. They are self-avowed Communists and Marxists who are parasites living off the unearned fruits of capitalism. What a revolting and contemptible lot they are.
I have addressed the Global Warming issue in three previous blog essays (Global Warming; Global Cooling or Warming – Which the Heaven or Hell is it?; Beer Consumption & Other Little Ice Age Phenomena) so I will confine myself here to just a few ancillary remarks.
Is global warming occurring and is it anthropoidally caused? The answer to the first part is that it depends upon what time period you mean. From the late 1970’s to the late 1990’s there was perceptible global warming after cooling in the 1960’s to middle to late 1970’s such that the mainstream news media were all atwitter about how there appeared to be another Little Ice Age in the making. In the past 10 years there has not been any worldwide warming. This, by itself, does not prove anything – there could be CO² warming going on which is temporarily being overtaken by certain cooling factors.
The second part of the question is a decided yes. As I have stated previously (somewhere) Pittsburg, PA used to be known as the “Smokey City” due to all of the pollution from steel mills, but not anymore owing to anti-pollution devises and greatly reduced steel making. Los Angles had more pollution 30/40 years ago than now largely from automobile emissions which were greatly reduced over the intervening years. The topography (LA sits in a bowl) and wind patterns made the Los Angles area particularly susceptible to man-made pollution. London had fewer hours of sunshine 100 years ago and more, than now because of all the coal that was burned in factories and homes at that time.
Therefore if anthropoidic activity can influence weather and cause significant pollution locally, then surely more widespread pollution could conceivably affect weather on a broader worldwide scale. Having said that, the question, and a multi-trillion dollar question it is, is what is the evidence that man-made pollution is causing the globe to warm to increasing and dangerous levels to the detriment of the earth’s inhabitants? Given the myriad periods, on long term (1000’s of years), intermediate term (100’s of years), and short term (10’s of years) where mother earth (Gaia) has alternately been hotter and colder long before humans had initiated the industrial age or in fact were even around, what logical reasons are there to definitively assert that any current warming (especially since the end of The Little Ice Age, circa 1850) is caused by perfidious and unkind mankind?
Before committing to an international policy where the industrialized nations of the world cripple their economies, therefore retrograding to past decades the economic wellbeing of their citizens, and transfer 100’s of billions of dollars annually to third world nations, especially the so called kleptocracies, this whole subject of climate change needs to be thoroughly, honestly, and objective discussed and debated. Unfortunately the Global Warming “True Believers” clearly have no desire to engage in an exchange of data and discuss this singularly important question, as the infamously leaked East Anglia e-mails and previous refusal of Global Warming energumen such as Al Gore, Michael Mann, James Hansen, et al to debate the issue show.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Mid 1950’s Adventures in the Crawfish State-53
Yes, I know the official state name for Louisiana is the Pelican State; however nothing describes Louisiana better than the crawfish. Whether in gumbo or in étouffée, I developed a decided taste for the little critters.
In the summer of 1955 I worked for Shell Oil in Baton Rouge (French for Red Stick), Louisiana while still a student at Michigan Technology University. During this time the Democrat primary for governor was going on with the major opponents being Earl Long and the then mayor of New Orleans. The Democrat primary was tantamount to the general election because the Republicans and independents could put up only token opposition. Long was two years younger than his more famous or notorious, depending upon your viewpoint, brother, Huey (The Kingfish) Long who had been governor, U.S. Senator, and virtual dictator of Louisiana from 1928 to 1935 when he was supposedly killed by a political opponent, 28 year old Dr. Carl A. Weiss. There is uncertainty yet today whether Long was shot by Dr. Weiss or accidentally shot by his own overzealous bodyguards. There were a reputed 61 bullet holes in Dr. Weiss’s body. With that much lead flying about it would not be surprising if Long were hit by one of his bodyguard’s stray bullets. The state of Louisiana and the entire country were arguably better off with the early demise of the demigod, Huey Long, at the age of 42.
Earl Long had a poor formal education, but in his own right was a gifted politician who was a compelling stump speaker and his election record proved it. Long once joked: “Some day the people of Louisiana will get a good governor [i.e., an honest one] and they won’t like it.” His opponent, the mayor of New Orleans, was DeLesseps Story “Chep” Morrison, Sr. Where else but in Louisiana would there be a politician with such heterodox first and middle names and a plebian surname? The Long supporters called Morrison “Ole de la Soups” and Long said of him that “He never before saw a man who could speak out of both sides of his mouth, whistle, and strut at the same time.” According to author and magazine columnist A. J. Liebling, Louisiana politicians used to tell their political opponents and other people they did not like, “You ain’t nothin but a little piss-ant.” The expression apparently comes from the urine-like odor of certain ant’s nesting material of needles and straw from pine trees; especially the two genera of Forelius and Irydomyrmex. Louisiana politicians had an absolute talent for insulting their opponents with colorful metaphors.
In Baton Rouge I met a strange, but dapper and voluble little man (I don’t remember his name) who was an ardent supporter and hanger-on of Morrison and who seemed to be straight from the pages of the novel Guys and Dolls by Damon Runyon which became a musical on Broadway and was made into a 1955 movie of the same name starring Frank Sinatra, Jean Simmons, and Marlon Brando.
He tried to convince me that Morrison would be elected governor of Louisiana. He told me “Don’t you know that Chep Morrison will become the next governor of Louisiana? Don’t you know that this is the end of the corrupt Long regime? Don’t you know that Louisiana will finally get an honest governor?” And on and on. I suspect that part of his reason for telling me this was to practice his political oratory. I was not much interested in Louisiana politics, but I listened because of politeness and he was in fact an interesting speaker. He said that a day or two before he had attended a rally for Morrison. When he started to speak a couple of Morrison’s advisors tried to shut him up. Morrison himself said, “No, let him speak.” My little acquaintance seemed to derive a lot of pleasure in telling me this.
Came the day of the election and Long buried Morrison and the minor candidates so thoroughly that a runoff was not necessary. When I ran into my friend on the street the next day he had a large Earl Long campaign button pinned to his suit jacket lapel! I asked him ”What the hell are you doing?” He replied that one had to do what one has to do to survive in the political jungle that was Louisiana politics or some such nonsense.
Where else but in Louisiana and with the Longs would the situation arise that a sitting governor of a state would be put in a mental institution (perhaps in Illinois?)? During his last term as governor Earl Long was committed to a mental institution by his wife, Blanche Revere Long and her political allies. As governor, Long fired the head of the mental institution he was in and appointed a political ally who released him. Why did his wife conspire to confine him to a loony bin? He was having an affair with a stripper named Blaze Starr and when it became known to the public it caused her no end of embarrassment.
There was a true story making the rounds when I was in Louisiana. While he was governor, Earl Long was drunk in the best hotel in New Orleans, The Roosevelt. Because he was too lazy to find a bathroom or too stewed or crazy or all three, he urinated in a corner of the hotel lobby. It is now thought that Ole Earl was bipolar. That might have explained some of the craziness, but perhaps his wife was right – he may have been just plain nuts. Still think that Louisiana politicians back then even approached normalcy?
I met another interesting fellow during my sojourn in Baton Rouge; a young immigrant from Puerto Rico who worked as a draftsman for the state. He was an archetypical worrywart. He worried that his colleagues at work did not like him; he worried that he would lose his job; and he worried that he would get sick so that he could not work. As far as I could tell he was not only young and healthy, but personable and fun to be around with an increasing number of friends. One thing he did not worry about was the purchase of equities. His favorite was Fruehauf Trailer. He said that when you buy stocks and the prices go up you make money. I asked him what if the price goes down. He replied then he would buy more. Made sense to me.
He had a sister in San Juan, Puerto Rico who he showed me a photo of and tried to entice me to write to her. She looked alright, but I told him that she would not be coming here and I would not be going to Puerto Rico so what was the point.
While in Baton Rouge I lived in a boarding house which was just a couple of blocks from the Shell Oil office. It was a private home where the owner, a city policeman, and his wife took in a few male boarders who slept in the 2nd story of the house. The cost for room and board, with breakfast and dinner provided six days per week (only breakfast on Sunday), was the princely sum of $13/week! Seems like an outright steal doesn’t it? However, my starting salary the next year, after I graduated as a geological engineer, was $400/month ($4800/year), up from $250/month ($3000/year) four years earlier for the same job.
During the last month or so of my summer job I was transferred to Crowley, LA, to the west of Baton Rouge and into Cajun territory. I rented a room in a proper boarding house and was charged $15/week. When I complained at the Shell Oil office about having to pay $2 more per week for board and room than I had paid in Baton Rouge the people at the office laughed and said that it seemed like a good deal to them. They were likely right.
For a couple of months in the summer of 1956 as a permanent employee I worked in the district office of Shell Oil Company in New Orleans (Shell Oil USA was then a wholly owned subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell in the Hague, Netherlands). I lived in a boarding house on St. Charles Avenue and rode the streetcar to work every day. This was the first time that this young man from Michigan was confronted with institutional racism. I was surprised and bemused at what I saw. The street cars had movable boards with pegs on each end that slid into the backs of each row of seats. On these boards was printed “For Colored Only.” The idea was to keep blacks and whites separated, with blacks literally sitting in the back of the streetcars, while making accommodation for economics. As the mix of black and white passengers changed, the boards on the backs of the seats were either moved forward or backward to allow space for either more blacks or more whites yet keeping the cars as full as possible. How do you like that? The philosophy was to maintain segregation while maximizing the economic income of the city through streetcar revenues. Talk about “deals with the devil.” What is even more unbelievable relative to the racial equality and mores of today is that the blacks themselves moved the segregation boards forward or backward.
I saw more of this and other discriminating racial practices in the South at that time than any black person under 40 today has ever experienced. Yet to hear some blacks whine about and accuse whites of racist words and acts one would think that the 1950’s in the United States was still with us. Author and longshoreman, Eric Hoffer, said it best 40 year ago that it is not when people are being oppressed that they make trouble and complain about it most - it is when they are well on the way to respectful and equitable treatment. The recent brouhaha between Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, jr. and the Cambridge police Sgt. James Crowley as well as the addlepated and unjustified insertion of President Obama into the matter is but the latest bogus claim of racial profiling by blacks.
Working out of the Mobil Oil Exploration office in Dallas I made numerous business trips to the Mobil Oil office in New Orleans in the 1970’s and 1980’s. The difference in the treatment of blacks, both officially and personally was like night and day compared to what I witnessed 20 years earlier. And of course there has been further improvement in the status, treatment, and opportunities for blacks in the South as well as the North since then to the extent that discrimination against blacks and other minorities is now less prevalent that favoritism towards blacks and I suspect there is now more, on a percentage basis, racial animosity and resentment against whites by blacks than vice-versa.
Bernard Goldberg, erstwhile CBS Television newsman, current Fox TV commentator, and ten-time Emmy Award winning journalist and author, recently said that race relations in this country is a wound that never heals. C’est une pitié.
In the summer of 1955 I worked for Shell Oil in Baton Rouge (French for Red Stick), Louisiana while still a student at Michigan Technology University. During this time the Democrat primary for governor was going on with the major opponents being Earl Long and the then mayor of New Orleans. The Democrat primary was tantamount to the general election because the Republicans and independents could put up only token opposition. Long was two years younger than his more famous or notorious, depending upon your viewpoint, brother, Huey (The Kingfish) Long who had been governor, U.S. Senator, and virtual dictator of Louisiana from 1928 to 1935 when he was supposedly killed by a political opponent, 28 year old Dr. Carl A. Weiss. There is uncertainty yet today whether Long was shot by Dr. Weiss or accidentally shot by his own overzealous bodyguards. There were a reputed 61 bullet holes in Dr. Weiss’s body. With that much lead flying about it would not be surprising if Long were hit by one of his bodyguard’s stray bullets. The state of Louisiana and the entire country were arguably better off with the early demise of the demigod, Huey Long, at the age of 42.
Earl Long had a poor formal education, but in his own right was a gifted politician who was a compelling stump speaker and his election record proved it. Long once joked: “Some day the people of Louisiana will get a good governor [i.e., an honest one] and they won’t like it.” His opponent, the mayor of New Orleans, was DeLesseps Story “Chep” Morrison, Sr. Where else but in Louisiana would there be a politician with such heterodox first and middle names and a plebian surname? The Long supporters called Morrison “Ole de la Soups” and Long said of him that “He never before saw a man who could speak out of both sides of his mouth, whistle, and strut at the same time.” According to author and magazine columnist A. J. Liebling, Louisiana politicians used to tell their political opponents and other people they did not like, “You ain’t nothin but a little piss-ant.” The expression apparently comes from the urine-like odor of certain ant’s nesting material of needles and straw from pine trees; especially the two genera of Forelius and Irydomyrmex. Louisiana politicians had an absolute talent for insulting their opponents with colorful metaphors.
In Baton Rouge I met a strange, but dapper and voluble little man (I don’t remember his name) who was an ardent supporter and hanger-on of Morrison and who seemed to be straight from the pages of the novel Guys and Dolls by Damon Runyon which became a musical on Broadway and was made into a 1955 movie of the same name starring Frank Sinatra, Jean Simmons, and Marlon Brando.
He tried to convince me that Morrison would be elected governor of Louisiana. He told me “Don’t you know that Chep Morrison will become the next governor of Louisiana? Don’t you know that this is the end of the corrupt Long regime? Don’t you know that Louisiana will finally get an honest governor?” And on and on. I suspect that part of his reason for telling me this was to practice his political oratory. I was not much interested in Louisiana politics, but I listened because of politeness and he was in fact an interesting speaker. He said that a day or two before he had attended a rally for Morrison. When he started to speak a couple of Morrison’s advisors tried to shut him up. Morrison himself said, “No, let him speak.” My little acquaintance seemed to derive a lot of pleasure in telling me this.
Came the day of the election and Long buried Morrison and the minor candidates so thoroughly that a runoff was not necessary. When I ran into my friend on the street the next day he had a large Earl Long campaign button pinned to his suit jacket lapel! I asked him ”What the hell are you doing?” He replied that one had to do what one has to do to survive in the political jungle that was Louisiana politics or some such nonsense.
Where else but in Louisiana and with the Longs would the situation arise that a sitting governor of a state would be put in a mental institution (perhaps in Illinois?)? During his last term as governor Earl Long was committed to a mental institution by his wife, Blanche Revere Long and her political allies. As governor, Long fired the head of the mental institution he was in and appointed a political ally who released him. Why did his wife conspire to confine him to a loony bin? He was having an affair with a stripper named Blaze Starr and when it became known to the public it caused her no end of embarrassment.
There was a true story making the rounds when I was in Louisiana. While he was governor, Earl Long was drunk in the best hotel in New Orleans, The Roosevelt. Because he was too lazy to find a bathroom or too stewed or crazy or all three, he urinated in a corner of the hotel lobby. It is now thought that Ole Earl was bipolar. That might have explained some of the craziness, but perhaps his wife was right – he may have been just plain nuts. Still think that Louisiana politicians back then even approached normalcy?
I met another interesting fellow during my sojourn in Baton Rouge; a young immigrant from Puerto Rico who worked as a draftsman for the state. He was an archetypical worrywart. He worried that his colleagues at work did not like him; he worried that he would lose his job; and he worried that he would get sick so that he could not work. As far as I could tell he was not only young and healthy, but personable and fun to be around with an increasing number of friends. One thing he did not worry about was the purchase of equities. His favorite was Fruehauf Trailer. He said that when you buy stocks and the prices go up you make money. I asked him what if the price goes down. He replied then he would buy more. Made sense to me.
He had a sister in San Juan, Puerto Rico who he showed me a photo of and tried to entice me to write to her. She looked alright, but I told him that she would not be coming here and I would not be going to Puerto Rico so what was the point.
While in Baton Rouge I lived in a boarding house which was just a couple of blocks from the Shell Oil office. It was a private home where the owner, a city policeman, and his wife took in a few male boarders who slept in the 2nd story of the house. The cost for room and board, with breakfast and dinner provided six days per week (only breakfast on Sunday), was the princely sum of $13/week! Seems like an outright steal doesn’t it? However, my starting salary the next year, after I graduated as a geological engineer, was $400/month ($4800/year), up from $250/month ($3000/year) four years earlier for the same job.
During the last month or so of my summer job I was transferred to Crowley, LA, to the west of Baton Rouge and into Cajun territory. I rented a room in a proper boarding house and was charged $15/week. When I complained at the Shell Oil office about having to pay $2 more per week for board and room than I had paid in Baton Rouge the people at the office laughed and said that it seemed like a good deal to them. They were likely right.
For a couple of months in the summer of 1956 as a permanent employee I worked in the district office of Shell Oil Company in New Orleans (Shell Oil USA was then a wholly owned subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell in the Hague, Netherlands). I lived in a boarding house on St. Charles Avenue and rode the streetcar to work every day. This was the first time that this young man from Michigan was confronted with institutional racism. I was surprised and bemused at what I saw. The street cars had movable boards with pegs on each end that slid into the backs of each row of seats. On these boards was printed “For Colored Only.” The idea was to keep blacks and whites separated, with blacks literally sitting in the back of the streetcars, while making accommodation for economics. As the mix of black and white passengers changed, the boards on the backs of the seats were either moved forward or backward to allow space for either more blacks or more whites yet keeping the cars as full as possible. How do you like that? The philosophy was to maintain segregation while maximizing the economic income of the city through streetcar revenues. Talk about “deals with the devil.” What is even more unbelievable relative to the racial equality and mores of today is that the blacks themselves moved the segregation boards forward or backward.
I saw more of this and other discriminating racial practices in the South at that time than any black person under 40 today has ever experienced. Yet to hear some blacks whine about and accuse whites of racist words and acts one would think that the 1950’s in the United States was still with us. Author and longshoreman, Eric Hoffer, said it best 40 year ago that it is not when people are being oppressed that they make trouble and complain about it most - it is when they are well on the way to respectful and equitable treatment. The recent brouhaha between Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, jr. and the Cambridge police Sgt. James Crowley as well as the addlepated and unjustified insertion of President Obama into the matter is but the latest bogus claim of racial profiling by blacks.
Working out of the Mobil Oil Exploration office in Dallas I made numerous business trips to the Mobil Oil office in New Orleans in the 1970’s and 1980’s. The difference in the treatment of blacks, both officially and personally was like night and day compared to what I witnessed 20 years earlier. And of course there has been further improvement in the status, treatment, and opportunities for blacks in the South as well as the North since then to the extent that discrimination against blacks and other minorities is now less prevalent that favoritism towards blacks and I suspect there is now more, on a percentage basis, racial animosity and resentment against whites by blacks than vice-versa.
Bernard Goldberg, erstwhile CBS Television newsman, current Fox TV commentator, and ten-time Emmy Award winning journalist and author, recently said that race relations in this country is a wound that never heals. C’est une pitié.
Friday, May 29, 2009
CONGRESSIONAL TERM LIMITS-52
A convincing argument can be made that congressional term limits are necessary for achieving better elective government. Despite the mantra by some people on both the political left and right that there are term limits – they are called elections, there is simply too much of an advantage for the incumbent in a congressional election. The other argument that if there were limited congressional terms then staff people would really be in charge. My response is that both presidential and congressional staffs have become grossly overgrown and should be drastically cut in the number of staff people and cost of the presidential and congressional offices.
When Abraham Lincoln became president he had one private secretary/assistant, John Nicolay. Lincoln soon added another, John Hay, whom he paid out of his own pocket until congress appropriated money for his salary. By the middle of his term Lincoln added a temporary secretary, William Stoddard. Edward Neill succeeded Stoddard when the latter became ill and was in turn succeeded by Charles Philbrick. According to the ten year census of 1860 the population of the United States was 30 ½ million (Lincoln served as president 1861-65). The current population of the country is just over 300 million. Compared to Lincoln, on a population proportional basis, the current president should have at most 50 assistants counting all of Lincoln’s assistants individually. The actual current number runs into the hundreds with a few interns, but with overwhelmingly most as paid permanent employees. Congressional staff, amanuenses, and assorted flunkies are similarly grossly bloated in numbers. And it is not as if there was inactivity during Lincoln’s presidency – America’s bloodiest war, a civil war, essentially occupied Lincoln’s entire tenure as president.
Now that I have logically and rationally presented a solid case that presidential and congressional staffs should be drastically reduced, permit me to tackle the question of term limits. By an amendment to the U.S. Constitution (Amendment XXII, ratified February 27, 1951) the presidency for any single person is limited to 10 years. Why not two terms or eight years you ask? The answer is straightforward and simple. No person can be elected to the presidency for more than two terms; however, for example, if the vice-president should replace the president at any point in the first half of the president’s term then that person would be eligible to run for two more terms. Quad erat demstrandum; that could amount to as much as ten years.
Could congressional term limits be achieved? It won’t be easy and is perhaps impossible, still consider the reform now being debated in Italy. There are 630 members of the Chamber of Deputies (equivalent to our House of Representatives) and 322 senators for a total of 952. Contrast this to our 435 representatives and 100 senators for a total of 535. Italy has a population of circa 60 million to our 300+ million. There is broad agreement on reducing the total number to around 500 or fewer, but Italian politicians have differing opinions of how to accomplish this reduction even as the debate goes forward. A similar reduction in the number of members in the House of Commons in England where there about 200 more than we have is also being debated.
There are at least two excellent reasons to limit terms. One of them is age and another is mendacity as well as moral failings. This next may sound as if I am taking a gratuitous shot at aged people. If so then as one myself I can assure you that it is intentional. Some of our senators and representatives have been in office since the George Washington administration – well perhaps not, although it seems like it. Strum Thurmond (R–SC) was a senator until he was 100 years old – literally! He ran for re-election when he was 94 years old. In his last few years in the senate he clearly had no idea whether he was in Washington D.C. or the Land of OZ. Robert Byrd (D-WV) is 91 years old and was elected to his 9th term as senator in 2006. He has been a senator since 1959 and is now the longest serving U.S. Senator in history. He has become so infirmed that he is barely ambulatory, with help, on the senate floor. Known for his florid and rambling oratory it would not be surprising if he started expostulating in a senate speech about his near fin-de-siécle days in West Virginia. Daniel Inouye (D-HI) is 84 years old and has been a senator since 1963; the third longest serving senator behind Byrd and Ted Kennedy (D-MA) who was elected in 1962. Inouye (in-no-way) was first elected as a U.S. representative from Hawaii in 1959. Surely our Republic would have been better served without these old fossils having hung around for so long.
Among the moral turpitude members of congress were pervert Mark Foley (R-FL), the married Gary Conduit (D-CA) who had an affair with the tragic Chandra Levy, and Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) who was a client of a prostitution ring headed by the “D.C. Madam” despite being married with four children. The irony is that Vitter originally replaced Rep. Bob Livingston (R-LA) who resigned because of an adulterous affair. The pervert and liar Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID) refused to resign after an encounter in a bathroom with an undercover policeman at a Minneapolis airport, but at least did not run for reelection in 2008. Then who can forget Barney Fag, I mean Barney Frank (D-MA) whose intimate friend ran a male prostitution ring out the basement of Frank’s house. Of course Barney said, like Sgt. Schultz in Hogan’s Heroes, “I know nothing” just as Rep. Frank knew nothing of the problems leading to the banking and financial institutions failures.
Worst yet are the risible and infra dignitatem brigands who, taking advantage of their positions as senators or representatives, cheat and steal from the public they are suppose to represent. There are and were many in this category on both sides of the political isle. One of my favorites is William Jefferson (D-LA) who is charged with taking several hundred thousand dollars in bribes and kickbacks. During Hurricane Katrina he was discovered to have had $90,000 in cash in his freezer in his house. After he was indicted, Jefferson won the Democrat primary for his house seat, however he lost the general election in a close race to a Republican Vietnamese-American, Anh Joseph Cao, despite the district being 2/3 black. Because Obama, naturally, carried that district overwhelmingly it is likely Jefferson would have won the general election if both the presidential and congressional elections had occurred simultaneously. Because of Hurricane Gustav the congressional election was held one month following the presidential election. After several delays by Jefferson’s defense team the trial is now scheduled for June 2, 2009.
Another favorite of mine is Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-FL) who in 1981 was charged with corruption and perjury as a federal judge. In 1988 a Democrat controlled House of Representatives voted 413 – 3 to impeach him. A Democrat controlled Senate voted 69 – 26 to convict him and thus he was removed as a federal judge, one of only six federal judges to be removed in U.S. history. In 1992 Hastings ran for the U.S. representative from his district and won! He has won reelection to the House of Representatives ever since. Did I mention that like Jefferson he is black from a predominately black district?
Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-CA) was not as lucky. He resigned as a U.S. Representative after pleading guilty to conspiring to commit bribery, mail fraud, wire fraud, and tax evasion. He was sentenced to eight years in federal prison. That is what we want, honesty in our representatives.
Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) was found guilty on all seven counts of failing to report gifts by a federal jury. One week later he lost in his bid for reelection to the senate. A few weeks later, owing to serious prosecutorial misconduct, he was acquitted of all charges by Attorney General Eric Holder. What a shame. If the acquittal had come before the election then old Ted Stevens (he is 85 years old) might have won reelection. We need people in congress who have been there since the dawn of the Republic and if they are dishonest, so much the better.
A name from the past and a more colorful character you could not find than that of James Traficant (D-OH) - he of the ill fitting wig. In 2002 he was convicted by a federal jury of taking bribes, filing false tax returns, racketeering, and forcing his office staff to work on his farm in Ohio and his houseboat in Washington D.C. After his conviction he was expelled from the House of Representatives and is currently serving an eight year sentence in federal prison. He is due to be released on September 2, 2009.
Remember Tony Coelho (D-CA)? He served six terms in congress and was the Democrat majority whip when he resigned from congress in 1989 owing to stories about him receiving a loan from a savings and loan executive to purchase junk bonds. Although he was never charge with a crime, one would have thought that he would not have resigned from his powerful position in congress if he had done nothing wrong.
And speaking of the Savings and Loan industry don’t forget the “Keating five”: Senators Alan Cranston (D-CA), Dennis Deconcini (D-AZ), Donald Riegle (D-MI), John Glenn (D-OH), and the lone Republican John McCain (R-AZ). After a lengthy investigation, the Senate Ethics Committee determined in 1991 that Cranston, DeConcini, and Riegle had substantially and improperly interfered with the Federal Home Loan Bank Board in its investigation of Lincoln Savings and Charles Keating, with Cranston receiving a formal reprimand. Senators John Glenn and John McCain were cleared of having acted improperly but were criticized for having exercised "poor judgment." Compared to others these were not serious miscreants, nevertheless I don’t believe they should be applauded either.
In my opinion, John Murtha (D-PA) is arguably the most corrupt current member of congress. Murtha has been a member of congress for 35 years and he got off to an early start with his scrofulous behavior. When the Abscam scandal broke in 1980 one U.S. senator, Harrison Williams (D-NJ) and five congressmen (four of them Democrats) were indicted and convicted of receiving bribes and either resigned or were unceremoniously booted out of congress. Larry Pressler (R-SD) refused to take what he thought was a bribe and reported it to the FBI. Walter Cronkite called him “a hero.” Pressler modestly responded, “When was one considered a hero for refusing to take a bribe?” Considering the flagitious nature of congress I believe that Cronkite was more correct than Pressler. The FBI classified John Murtha as an unindicted co-conspirator. They just could not quite get the goods on the slippery Murtha and to ingratiate himself with the FBI, Murtha agreed to testify against two fellow Democrat congressmen.
In 2006 the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) called Murtha one of the 20 most corrupt politicians in congress and in 2008 Esquire magazine, hardly a conservative bastion, called Murtha one of the ten worst congressmen. In March 2009, the Washington Post reported that a Pennsylvania defense research center regularly consulted with two "handlers" close to Murtha while it received nearly $250 million in federal funding via Murtha's earmarks. The center then channeled a significant portion of the funding to companies that were among Murtha's campaign supporters.
Murtha is one of the worst abusers of “earmarks” in congress having directed an estimated $600 million to his district in the last four years and $2 billion so far during his tenure in congress. The John Murtha Airport is a prime example. There are just three flights per day which fly only between Murtha’s home town in Pennsylvania, Johnstown, and Washington D.C. The airport gets large subsidies from the government thanks to Murtha. It is all legal, but a colossal waste of tax payer money.
More recently Murtha is being investigated by the FBI for allegedly using his position in congress to influence government contracts being directed to a company his son is part of. Previously he was accused of doing the same for his brother, Robert. If one to were to postulate that Murtha does not possess an honest bone in his body then it is likely that an anatomical examination would verify it.
What can be said about the San Francisco liberal and non-blinking Democrat Speaker-of-the-House, Nancy Pelosi other than her name in Italian means “hairy?” For one thing she is one of the wealthiest members of congress. She and her husband are worth at least $20 million with investments in real estate, a vineyard, and Apple computer stock. With her recent nervous and addlepated press conference denial of being briefed on “water-boarding” and other “enhanced interrogation” techniques previously by the CIA and accusing the CIA of mendaciously misinforming and misleading her and other members of congress the denouement of her speaker-ship seemed imminent. Enough of the Democrat leadership rallied around to rescue her from that peril, at least temporarily. Perhaps they were motivated by the old saw that you do not wound a king (or queen), you kill him (her) or suffer the same fate yourself. Being less charitable and not political, I say of Nancy, “liar, liar pantsuit on fire.” Only an extreme partisan with blinders firmly in place would believe her word against the evidence and the CIA. Certainly fellow Californian Democrat and director of the CIA, Leon Panetta did not.
It is too facile to say “They are all a bunch of crooks.” They are not. I will not argue that at any given time a majority or even a big majority of congressmen are thieves and knaves who not only make a career of feeding at the public trough, but do so dishonestly. However there are numerous exceptions. I am sure everyone could come up with a list of their own. Here are four examples only out of many others that could be cited. In the name of being “fair and balanced” there are two Democrats and two Republicans. They are politicians yes, but honest and honorable men who all left congress voluntarily before becoming infirmed and senile: J.C. Watts (R-OK) served 8 years in the House of Representatives and left congress at the age of 45; John Kasich (R-OH) served 16 years in the House of Representatives and left at the age of 49; John Breaux (D-LA) served 18 years and left the Senate at age 61; Sam Nunn (D-GA) served 24 years and left the Senate at age 58.
Term limits would certainly reduced the ranks of those old codgers, both men and women, who stay in congress unit they enter their dotage. Would term limits remedy the problem of dishonest and parasitic congressmen? I believe amelioration would be achieved if for no other reason than it usually takes a number of years for congressmen to establish a base with enough power and influence to turn public duty and service into personal graft and corruption. I would personally opt for a maximum of two terms (twelve years total) for a senator and six terms (also 12 years total) for a member of the House of Representatives – no partial additional term allowed as is the case of the president. I would even be open to changing the length of the senatorial and representative terms. With senators perhaps two five year terms would be better and with representatives how about three terms of three years each?
A reduction in the numbers of presidential cabinet offices and other federal agencies would be in order. I will go back to the comparison of the Abraham Lincoln administration. There were seven cabinet officials under Lincoln: Secretaries of State; Treasury; War; Navy; Interior; Postmaster-General; and Attorney General. Currently there are 20 cabinet members and 20 more top level departments such as the FBI, the CIA, NASA, FEMA, the FAA, and the FCC. In addition there are the Secretaries of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and the Pentagon which employs 23,000 military and civilian people and 3000 non-defense support personnel. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) spends $29 billion annually on medical research. The federal government has expanded exponentially in the last few decades. It is not only the industrial-military complex that President Eisenhower warned the country about in his farewell speech on January 17, 1961 that is a problem; there are all the other added and expanded federal agencies which have exploded in number and size. In my opinion it is not sufficient merely to stop the growth of the federal government in its many guises, but to reverse, that is to say to downsize, in a responsible and structured manner, this out of control colossus. In the words of the Bard of Avon, “It is a consummation devoutly to be wished.”
When Abraham Lincoln became president he had one private secretary/assistant, John Nicolay. Lincoln soon added another, John Hay, whom he paid out of his own pocket until congress appropriated money for his salary. By the middle of his term Lincoln added a temporary secretary, William Stoddard. Edward Neill succeeded Stoddard when the latter became ill and was in turn succeeded by Charles Philbrick. According to the ten year census of 1860 the population of the United States was 30 ½ million (Lincoln served as president 1861-65). The current population of the country is just over 300 million. Compared to Lincoln, on a population proportional basis, the current president should have at most 50 assistants counting all of Lincoln’s assistants individually. The actual current number runs into the hundreds with a few interns, but with overwhelmingly most as paid permanent employees. Congressional staff, amanuenses, and assorted flunkies are similarly grossly bloated in numbers. And it is not as if there was inactivity during Lincoln’s presidency – America’s bloodiest war, a civil war, essentially occupied Lincoln’s entire tenure as president.
Now that I have logically and rationally presented a solid case that presidential and congressional staffs should be drastically reduced, permit me to tackle the question of term limits. By an amendment to the U.S. Constitution (Amendment XXII, ratified February 27, 1951) the presidency for any single person is limited to 10 years. Why not two terms or eight years you ask? The answer is straightforward and simple. No person can be elected to the presidency for more than two terms; however, for example, if the vice-president should replace the president at any point in the first half of the president’s term then that person would be eligible to run for two more terms. Quad erat demstrandum; that could amount to as much as ten years.
Could congressional term limits be achieved? It won’t be easy and is perhaps impossible, still consider the reform now being debated in Italy. There are 630 members of the Chamber of Deputies (equivalent to our House of Representatives) and 322 senators for a total of 952. Contrast this to our 435 representatives and 100 senators for a total of 535. Italy has a population of circa 60 million to our 300+ million. There is broad agreement on reducing the total number to around 500 or fewer, but Italian politicians have differing opinions of how to accomplish this reduction even as the debate goes forward. A similar reduction in the number of members in the House of Commons in England where there about 200 more than we have is also being debated.
There are at least two excellent reasons to limit terms. One of them is age and another is mendacity as well as moral failings. This next may sound as if I am taking a gratuitous shot at aged people. If so then as one myself I can assure you that it is intentional. Some of our senators and representatives have been in office since the George Washington administration – well perhaps not, although it seems like it. Strum Thurmond (R–SC) was a senator until he was 100 years old – literally! He ran for re-election when he was 94 years old. In his last few years in the senate he clearly had no idea whether he was in Washington D.C. or the Land of OZ. Robert Byrd (D-WV) is 91 years old and was elected to his 9th term as senator in 2006. He has been a senator since 1959 and is now the longest serving U.S. Senator in history. He has become so infirmed that he is barely ambulatory, with help, on the senate floor. Known for his florid and rambling oratory it would not be surprising if he started expostulating in a senate speech about his near fin-de-siécle days in West Virginia. Daniel Inouye (D-HI) is 84 years old and has been a senator since 1963; the third longest serving senator behind Byrd and Ted Kennedy (D-MA) who was elected in 1962. Inouye (in-no-way) was first elected as a U.S. representative from Hawaii in 1959. Surely our Republic would have been better served without these old fossils having hung around for so long.
Among the moral turpitude members of congress were pervert Mark Foley (R-FL), the married Gary Conduit (D-CA) who had an affair with the tragic Chandra Levy, and Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) who was a client of a prostitution ring headed by the “D.C. Madam” despite being married with four children. The irony is that Vitter originally replaced Rep. Bob Livingston (R-LA) who resigned because of an adulterous affair. The pervert and liar Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID) refused to resign after an encounter in a bathroom with an undercover policeman at a Minneapolis airport, but at least did not run for reelection in 2008. Then who can forget Barney Fag, I mean Barney Frank (D-MA) whose intimate friend ran a male prostitution ring out the basement of Frank’s house. Of course Barney said, like Sgt. Schultz in Hogan’s Heroes, “I know nothing” just as Rep. Frank knew nothing of the problems leading to the banking and financial institutions failures.
Worst yet are the risible and infra dignitatem brigands who, taking advantage of their positions as senators or representatives, cheat and steal from the public they are suppose to represent. There are and were many in this category on both sides of the political isle. One of my favorites is William Jefferson (D-LA) who is charged with taking several hundred thousand dollars in bribes and kickbacks. During Hurricane Katrina he was discovered to have had $90,000 in cash in his freezer in his house. After he was indicted, Jefferson won the Democrat primary for his house seat, however he lost the general election in a close race to a Republican Vietnamese-American, Anh Joseph Cao, despite the district being 2/3 black. Because Obama, naturally, carried that district overwhelmingly it is likely Jefferson would have won the general election if both the presidential and congressional elections had occurred simultaneously. Because of Hurricane Gustav the congressional election was held one month following the presidential election. After several delays by Jefferson’s defense team the trial is now scheduled for June 2, 2009.
Another favorite of mine is Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-FL) who in 1981 was charged with corruption and perjury as a federal judge. In 1988 a Democrat controlled House of Representatives voted 413 – 3 to impeach him. A Democrat controlled Senate voted 69 – 26 to convict him and thus he was removed as a federal judge, one of only six federal judges to be removed in U.S. history. In 1992 Hastings ran for the U.S. representative from his district and won! He has won reelection to the House of Representatives ever since. Did I mention that like Jefferson he is black from a predominately black district?
Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-CA) was not as lucky. He resigned as a U.S. Representative after pleading guilty to conspiring to commit bribery, mail fraud, wire fraud, and tax evasion. He was sentenced to eight years in federal prison. That is what we want, honesty in our representatives.
Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) was found guilty on all seven counts of failing to report gifts by a federal jury. One week later he lost in his bid for reelection to the senate. A few weeks later, owing to serious prosecutorial misconduct, he was acquitted of all charges by Attorney General Eric Holder. What a shame. If the acquittal had come before the election then old Ted Stevens (he is 85 years old) might have won reelection. We need people in congress who have been there since the dawn of the Republic and if they are dishonest, so much the better.
A name from the past and a more colorful character you could not find than that of James Traficant (D-OH) - he of the ill fitting wig. In 2002 he was convicted by a federal jury of taking bribes, filing false tax returns, racketeering, and forcing his office staff to work on his farm in Ohio and his houseboat in Washington D.C. After his conviction he was expelled from the House of Representatives and is currently serving an eight year sentence in federal prison. He is due to be released on September 2, 2009.
Remember Tony Coelho (D-CA)? He served six terms in congress and was the Democrat majority whip when he resigned from congress in 1989 owing to stories about him receiving a loan from a savings and loan executive to purchase junk bonds. Although he was never charge with a crime, one would have thought that he would not have resigned from his powerful position in congress if he had done nothing wrong.
And speaking of the Savings and Loan industry don’t forget the “Keating five”: Senators Alan Cranston (D-CA), Dennis Deconcini (D-AZ), Donald Riegle (D-MI), John Glenn (D-OH), and the lone Republican John McCain (R-AZ). After a lengthy investigation, the Senate Ethics Committee determined in 1991 that Cranston, DeConcini, and Riegle had substantially and improperly interfered with the Federal Home Loan Bank Board in its investigation of Lincoln Savings and Charles Keating, with Cranston receiving a formal reprimand. Senators John Glenn and John McCain were cleared of having acted improperly but were criticized for having exercised "poor judgment." Compared to others these were not serious miscreants, nevertheless I don’t believe they should be applauded either.
In my opinion, John Murtha (D-PA) is arguably the most corrupt current member of congress. Murtha has been a member of congress for 35 years and he got off to an early start with his scrofulous behavior. When the Abscam scandal broke in 1980 one U.S. senator, Harrison Williams (D-NJ) and five congressmen (four of them Democrats) were indicted and convicted of receiving bribes and either resigned or were unceremoniously booted out of congress. Larry Pressler (R-SD) refused to take what he thought was a bribe and reported it to the FBI. Walter Cronkite called him “a hero.” Pressler modestly responded, “When was one considered a hero for refusing to take a bribe?” Considering the flagitious nature of congress I believe that Cronkite was more correct than Pressler. The FBI classified John Murtha as an unindicted co-conspirator. They just could not quite get the goods on the slippery Murtha and to ingratiate himself with the FBI, Murtha agreed to testify against two fellow Democrat congressmen.
In 2006 the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) called Murtha one of the 20 most corrupt politicians in congress and in 2008 Esquire magazine, hardly a conservative bastion, called Murtha one of the ten worst congressmen. In March 2009, the Washington Post reported that a Pennsylvania defense research center regularly consulted with two "handlers" close to Murtha while it received nearly $250 million in federal funding via Murtha's earmarks. The center then channeled a significant portion of the funding to companies that were among Murtha's campaign supporters.
Murtha is one of the worst abusers of “earmarks” in congress having directed an estimated $600 million to his district in the last four years and $2 billion so far during his tenure in congress. The John Murtha Airport is a prime example. There are just three flights per day which fly only between Murtha’s home town in Pennsylvania, Johnstown, and Washington D.C. The airport gets large subsidies from the government thanks to Murtha. It is all legal, but a colossal waste of tax payer money.
More recently Murtha is being investigated by the FBI for allegedly using his position in congress to influence government contracts being directed to a company his son is part of. Previously he was accused of doing the same for his brother, Robert. If one to were to postulate that Murtha does not possess an honest bone in his body then it is likely that an anatomical examination would verify it.
What can be said about the San Francisco liberal and non-blinking Democrat Speaker-of-the-House, Nancy Pelosi other than her name in Italian means “hairy?” For one thing she is one of the wealthiest members of congress. She and her husband are worth at least $20 million with investments in real estate, a vineyard, and Apple computer stock. With her recent nervous and addlepated press conference denial of being briefed on “water-boarding” and other “enhanced interrogation” techniques previously by the CIA and accusing the CIA of mendaciously misinforming and misleading her and other members of congress the denouement of her speaker-ship seemed imminent. Enough of the Democrat leadership rallied around to rescue her from that peril, at least temporarily. Perhaps they were motivated by the old saw that you do not wound a king (or queen), you kill him (her) or suffer the same fate yourself. Being less charitable and not political, I say of Nancy, “liar, liar pantsuit on fire.” Only an extreme partisan with blinders firmly in place would believe her word against the evidence and the CIA. Certainly fellow Californian Democrat and director of the CIA, Leon Panetta did not.
It is too facile to say “They are all a bunch of crooks.” They are not. I will not argue that at any given time a majority or even a big majority of congressmen are thieves and knaves who not only make a career of feeding at the public trough, but do so dishonestly. However there are numerous exceptions. I am sure everyone could come up with a list of their own. Here are four examples only out of many others that could be cited. In the name of being “fair and balanced” there are two Democrats and two Republicans. They are politicians yes, but honest and honorable men who all left congress voluntarily before becoming infirmed and senile: J.C. Watts (R-OK) served 8 years in the House of Representatives and left congress at the age of 45; John Kasich (R-OH) served 16 years in the House of Representatives and left at the age of 49; John Breaux (D-LA) served 18 years and left the Senate at age 61; Sam Nunn (D-GA) served 24 years and left the Senate at age 58.
Term limits would certainly reduced the ranks of those old codgers, both men and women, who stay in congress unit they enter their dotage. Would term limits remedy the problem of dishonest and parasitic congressmen? I believe amelioration would be achieved if for no other reason than it usually takes a number of years for congressmen to establish a base with enough power and influence to turn public duty and service into personal graft and corruption. I would personally opt for a maximum of two terms (twelve years total) for a senator and six terms (also 12 years total) for a member of the House of Representatives – no partial additional term allowed as is the case of the president. I would even be open to changing the length of the senatorial and representative terms. With senators perhaps two five year terms would be better and with representatives how about three terms of three years each?
A reduction in the numbers of presidential cabinet offices and other federal agencies would be in order. I will go back to the comparison of the Abraham Lincoln administration. There were seven cabinet officials under Lincoln: Secretaries of State; Treasury; War; Navy; Interior; Postmaster-General; and Attorney General. Currently there are 20 cabinet members and 20 more top level departments such as the FBI, the CIA, NASA, FEMA, the FAA, and the FCC. In addition there are the Secretaries of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and the Pentagon which employs 23,000 military and civilian people and 3000 non-defense support personnel. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) spends $29 billion annually on medical research. The federal government has expanded exponentially in the last few decades. It is not only the industrial-military complex that President Eisenhower warned the country about in his farewell speech on January 17, 1961 that is a problem; there are all the other added and expanded federal agencies which have exploded in number and size. In my opinion it is not sufficient merely to stop the growth of the federal government in its many guises, but to reverse, that is to say to downsize, in a responsible and structured manner, this out of control colossus. In the words of the Bard of Avon, “It is a consummation devoutly to be wished.”
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Our Universe-51
There is an interesting philosophical question about the universe we live in. And that question is: Was the universe built just for us? Consider the following facts with which astronomers, astrophysicists, cosmologists, and physicists all seem to generally agree as based on an article in the December 2008 DISCOVER magazine among other sources:
If the force of gravity were just a bit weaker, then there would have been no clustering of matter after the Big Bang and as a consequence no galaxies or stars or planets would have formed and therefore no us.
On the other hand, a beefed-up gravity would have compressed stars more tightly, making them smaller, hotter, and denser. The results would have been that these stars would have burned through their fuel in millions of years instead of billions, thereby not allowing enough time for life to have formed. Again no us.
As we all know, atoms consist of electrons, neutrons, and protons. Now if these protons were just 0.2% more massive than there are, they would be unstable and would decay into more elementary particles. In that case, atoms would not exist and again neither would we.
Stars produce energy by converting two hydrogen atoms into one helium atom. During that reaction, 0.007% of the mass of the hydrogen atoms is converted into energy as illustrated by the famous e=mc² equation of Albert Einstein. If that energy conversion percentage were as little different as 0.006% or 0.008% then untoward (in respect to us) events would have occurred. The lower number would have resulted in the universe filled only with hydrogen; the higher number would have left the universe with no hydrogen, therefore no water, no stars like our sun, and hence no us.
The early universe was delicately balanced between runaway expansion and terminal collapse. Had the universe contained a great deal more matter, additional gravity would have made it implode. If it had contained considerably less matter, it would have expanded too quickly for galaxies to have formed. In both instances, no us.
If matter in the universe had been more evenly distributed after the Big Bang, it would not have clumped together to form galaxies. Had matter been clumpier, it would have condensed into black holes. Again in either case, no us.
Atomic nuclei are bound together by the so called Strong Nuclear Force. If that force were slightly more powerful then all of the protons would have paired off and there would be no hydrogen which fuels long-lived stars. Water would not exist either, nor would any known form of life, which arguably includes us.
In 1998 two teams of astronomy researchers, observing supernovae, found that the expanding of the university is accelerating. The discovery was baffling in that just about everyone else involved in astronomy expected that the cosmic expansion, which started with the Big Bang, must be gradually slowing down, braked by the collective gravitational pull of all of the galaxies and other matter in space. However, it seems that built into the very fabric of space is some unknown form of energy. Physicists call it simply dark energy that is pushing everything apart. Many cosmologists, astronomers, and astrophysicists were skeptical at first, but follow-up observations with the Hubble Space Telescope along with independent studies of radiation left over from the time of the Big Bang, have powerfully confirmed the reality of dark energy.
What to make of all this. One could claim that God made the universe just for us. That may be satisfactory for some, but then the discussion is closed as there is nothing more to contemplate. What I want to know is how this seemingly unique situation came to pass. Postulating that God created the universe and His method is unknowable by us, however true or not that might be, does not advance the explanation in any way so let us consider a non divine hypothesis.
One theory, quite controversial, called the Multiverse Theory, is that there are many universes, as many as 10 5ºº of which ours is the one suited for carbon based life. That is an extremely large number, larger in fact than the number of dollars the U.S. government is using in the current economic bailout. Let’s see how much larger. The one dollar bill is close to 6 1/8 inches long. If laid end to end it would take approximately 962 billion to reach between earth and the sun (the mean distance of the earth from the sun is about 93 million miles). One billion is 1 followed by nine zeros. To get to 10 5ºº we need 1 followed by 500 zeros.
How many one dollar bills would it take to span the diameter of our Milky Way galaxy? Our galaxy is approximately 100,000 light-years across (a light-year is the distance light travels in one year – circa 5.88 x 10¹² miles in the vacuum of space). So it would take on the order of 6 x 10²¹ one dollar bills laid end to end. Still a bit short of the 10 5ºº number.
What about the number of one dollar bills stretching across the diameter of the known universe? The universe is estimated to be 156 billion light-years across. Therefore it would take on the order of 9.5 x 10 27 one dollar bills to span the known universe. How much of a deficit do we still have from the 10 5ºº number? The answer is approximately 10 5ºº / 10 28 = 10 472. It seems we have not made much of a dent in the 10 5ººnumber. What is the evidence there are 10 5ºº different universes? It is part of the Multiverse Theory, but is not absolutely provable.
The specific term “Multiverse” was coined in 1895 by psychologist William James. In these contexts, parallel universes are also called “alternative universes”, “quantum universes”, “interpenetrating dimensions”, parallel worlds”, “alternate realities”, “alternate timelines”, etc.
As previously stated, different universes within the Multiverse (also called the Meta-Universe) are called Parallel Universes. According to this theory each universe starts with its own Big Bang and acquires its individual physical laws as it cools and traces its own cosmic cycle. Physicists do not like the idea of a Multiverse because it lacks testability and without hard physical evidence is non-falsifiable outside the methodology of scientific investigation to confirm or disprove. Yet there is no other current satisfactory explanation of why our universe is the way it is thereby allowing us to exist.
The concept of other universes has been proposed to explain why our universe seems to be fine-tuned for conscious life as we experience it. If there were a large number (possibly infinite) of different physical laws or fundamental constants in as many universes, some of these would have laws that were suitable for stars, planets, and life to exist. The anthropic (human) principle could then be applied to conclude that we would only consciously exist in those universes which were fine-tuned for our conscious existence. Thus, while the probability might be extremely small that there is life in most of those universes, this scarcity of life-supporting universes does not automatically implies intelligent design as the only explanation of our existence.
Strikingly the temperature of space is everywhere the same, just 2.7 ºC above absolute zero. How could different regions of the universe, separated by such enormous distances, all have the same temperature? In the standard version of the Big Bang theory they couldn’t. Cosmic inflation is the hypothesis that the nascent universe, just after the Big Bang, passed through a phase of exponential expansion in the very early universe. Cosmic inflation answers the classic conundrum of the Big Bang cosmology of why the universe appear flat, homogeneous, isothermal, and isotropic in accordance with the cosmological principle when one would expect, on the basis of the Big Bang, a highly curved, inhomogeneous, and non-isotropic universe.
A counter argument that life simply began and evolved to meet the physical conditions of our universe, galaxy, solar system, and planet is not persuasive in that it seems more than implausible that life could come about without stars and planets, to say nothing of atoms or water molecules.
This is heavy stuff and also involves string theory which is a physically and mathematically complex concept involving up to 11 dimensions. It was co-invented by world famous professor of theoretical physics at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, Michio Kaku. Professor Kaku has appeared on various television programs about science and is a best selling author of such books as Hyperspace, Parallel Worlds, and Physics of the Impossible.
I do not pretend to comprehend these abstruse physics and mathematics principles, yet before one dismisses them as flights of fancy the nagging question of why our universe, perhaps uniquely, is seemingly inexplicably suited for us must be confronted.
If the force of gravity were just a bit weaker, then there would have been no clustering of matter after the Big Bang and as a consequence no galaxies or stars or planets would have formed and therefore no us.
On the other hand, a beefed-up gravity would have compressed stars more tightly, making them smaller, hotter, and denser. The results would have been that these stars would have burned through their fuel in millions of years instead of billions, thereby not allowing enough time for life to have formed. Again no us.
As we all know, atoms consist of electrons, neutrons, and protons. Now if these protons were just 0.2% more massive than there are, they would be unstable and would decay into more elementary particles. In that case, atoms would not exist and again neither would we.
Stars produce energy by converting two hydrogen atoms into one helium atom. During that reaction, 0.007% of the mass of the hydrogen atoms is converted into energy as illustrated by the famous e=mc² equation of Albert Einstein. If that energy conversion percentage were as little different as 0.006% or 0.008% then untoward (in respect to us) events would have occurred. The lower number would have resulted in the universe filled only with hydrogen; the higher number would have left the universe with no hydrogen, therefore no water, no stars like our sun, and hence no us.
The early universe was delicately balanced between runaway expansion and terminal collapse. Had the universe contained a great deal more matter, additional gravity would have made it implode. If it had contained considerably less matter, it would have expanded too quickly for galaxies to have formed. In both instances, no us.
If matter in the universe had been more evenly distributed after the Big Bang, it would not have clumped together to form galaxies. Had matter been clumpier, it would have condensed into black holes. Again in either case, no us.
Atomic nuclei are bound together by the so called Strong Nuclear Force. If that force were slightly more powerful then all of the protons would have paired off and there would be no hydrogen which fuels long-lived stars. Water would not exist either, nor would any known form of life, which arguably includes us.
In 1998 two teams of astronomy researchers, observing supernovae, found that the expanding of the university is accelerating. The discovery was baffling in that just about everyone else involved in astronomy expected that the cosmic expansion, which started with the Big Bang, must be gradually slowing down, braked by the collective gravitational pull of all of the galaxies and other matter in space. However, it seems that built into the very fabric of space is some unknown form of energy. Physicists call it simply dark energy that is pushing everything apart. Many cosmologists, astronomers, and astrophysicists were skeptical at first, but follow-up observations with the Hubble Space Telescope along with independent studies of radiation left over from the time of the Big Bang, have powerfully confirmed the reality of dark energy.
What to make of all this. One could claim that God made the universe just for us. That may be satisfactory for some, but then the discussion is closed as there is nothing more to contemplate. What I want to know is how this seemingly unique situation came to pass. Postulating that God created the universe and His method is unknowable by us, however true or not that might be, does not advance the explanation in any way so let us consider a non divine hypothesis.
One theory, quite controversial, called the Multiverse Theory, is that there are many universes, as many as 10 5ºº of which ours is the one suited for carbon based life. That is an extremely large number, larger in fact than the number of dollars the U.S. government is using in the current economic bailout. Let’s see how much larger. The one dollar bill is close to 6 1/8 inches long. If laid end to end it would take approximately 962 billion to reach between earth and the sun (the mean distance of the earth from the sun is about 93 million miles). One billion is 1 followed by nine zeros. To get to 10 5ºº we need 1 followed by 500 zeros.
How many one dollar bills would it take to span the diameter of our Milky Way galaxy? Our galaxy is approximately 100,000 light-years across (a light-year is the distance light travels in one year – circa 5.88 x 10¹² miles in the vacuum of space). So it would take on the order of 6 x 10²¹ one dollar bills laid end to end. Still a bit short of the 10 5ºº number.
What about the number of one dollar bills stretching across the diameter of the known universe? The universe is estimated to be 156 billion light-years across. Therefore it would take on the order of 9.5 x 10 27 one dollar bills to span the known universe. How much of a deficit do we still have from the 10 5ºº number? The answer is approximately 10 5ºº / 10 28 = 10 472. It seems we have not made much of a dent in the 10 5ººnumber. What is the evidence there are 10 5ºº different universes? It is part of the Multiverse Theory, but is not absolutely provable.
The specific term “Multiverse” was coined in 1895 by psychologist William James. In these contexts, parallel universes are also called “alternative universes”, “quantum universes”, “interpenetrating dimensions”, parallel worlds”, “alternate realities”, “alternate timelines”, etc.
As previously stated, different universes within the Multiverse (also called the Meta-Universe) are called Parallel Universes. According to this theory each universe starts with its own Big Bang and acquires its individual physical laws as it cools and traces its own cosmic cycle. Physicists do not like the idea of a Multiverse because it lacks testability and without hard physical evidence is non-falsifiable outside the methodology of scientific investigation to confirm or disprove. Yet there is no other current satisfactory explanation of why our universe is the way it is thereby allowing us to exist.
The concept of other universes has been proposed to explain why our universe seems to be fine-tuned for conscious life as we experience it. If there were a large number (possibly infinite) of different physical laws or fundamental constants in as many universes, some of these would have laws that were suitable for stars, planets, and life to exist. The anthropic (human) principle could then be applied to conclude that we would only consciously exist in those universes which were fine-tuned for our conscious existence. Thus, while the probability might be extremely small that there is life in most of those universes, this scarcity of life-supporting universes does not automatically implies intelligent design as the only explanation of our existence.
Strikingly the temperature of space is everywhere the same, just 2.7 ºC above absolute zero. How could different regions of the universe, separated by such enormous distances, all have the same temperature? In the standard version of the Big Bang theory they couldn’t. Cosmic inflation is the hypothesis that the nascent universe, just after the Big Bang, passed through a phase of exponential expansion in the very early universe. Cosmic inflation answers the classic conundrum of the Big Bang cosmology of why the universe appear flat, homogeneous, isothermal, and isotropic in accordance with the cosmological principle when one would expect, on the basis of the Big Bang, a highly curved, inhomogeneous, and non-isotropic universe.
A counter argument that life simply began and evolved to meet the physical conditions of our universe, galaxy, solar system, and planet is not persuasive in that it seems more than implausible that life could come about without stars and planets, to say nothing of atoms or water molecules.
This is heavy stuff and also involves string theory which is a physically and mathematically complex concept involving up to 11 dimensions. It was co-invented by world famous professor of theoretical physics at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, Michio Kaku. Professor Kaku has appeared on various television programs about science and is a best selling author of such books as Hyperspace, Parallel Worlds, and Physics of the Impossible.
I do not pretend to comprehend these abstruse physics and mathematics principles, yet before one dismisses them as flights of fancy the nagging question of why our universe, perhaps uniquely, is seemingly inexplicably suited for us must be confronted.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Common Expressions Explained-50
The following expressions, except as where I have indicated I have sourced the definition and etymology from my previous writings, are taken from a little 2007 book I Didn’t Know That by Karlen Evins. I hope you will find them as interesting and illuminating as I did:
A-1
More than a steak sauce, the phase itself connotes the very best, because, by definition, it was the highest rating that could be given a ship ensured by Lloyd’s of London. Lloyd’s registry of ships and shipping was categorized by letter and number (with ships rated by letter and cargo by number). “A” meant the ship itself was perfect and “1” meant the cargo was in perfect condition.
Aftermath (From my other sources)
Aftermath is commonly and erroneously used to simply mean the period following an event, usually a disaster such as a fire, hurricane, or tornado: “In the aftermath of the tornado, many people in the neighborhood are still homeless.” Television and newspaper reporters are especially guilty of misusing this word. ‘After’ means second and ‘math’ is a mowing or harvest. So an ‘aftermath’ is a second happening, usually a disaster, following and caused by the first event. The San Francisco fire was an aftermath as it was a disaster following and caused by the earthquake of 1906.
Backseat Driver
Think backseat driver and you think of one who complains or one who thinks he can see better from the rear seat than from the front of a vehicle. But the original backseat drivers weren’t complainers. Matter of fact for what they were watching, they could see better! In the days of the early fire engines there was a job for backseat drivers. Someone needed to watch the ladder as fire engines rushed to the scene. As quick turns and abrupt stops were causes for accidents, a backseat driver was as vital a part of the fire team as the firefighters themselves.
Beyond the Pale
Pale is from the Latin word palus which was a stake or boundary marker that fenced the territory under rule by a certain nation. Paling or pickets were quite common as boundary markers in Roman times. Those believed to be beyond the bounds of social or moral decency were once literally exiled beyond the pale or beyond the confines of civilization as determined by the townspeople.
Blackball
Early social clubs in England had a practice of voting for their initiates by dropping white balls or marbles into a ballot box. Those voting against a particular candidate dropped a blackball, hence the term. While the term was first coined in the late 1700s the custom dates back to ancient Greek and Roman times. Even our word ballot refers to voting by little balls.
Cahoots
Cahoots were quite simply little cabins or kajuetes as they were called in medieval Germany. Often known to be occupied by robbers and bandits, these little cabins became planning centers for attacks. So in reality it was the goings-on inside the cabins that became known for what the cabins themselves were called. Today we use cahoots to refer to any shady partnership or less than upright scheme.
Carte Blanche
Ask for carte blanche in France and you just might receive a white sheet of paper because translated literally that is what the term means. Custom has it that a man would trust his closest subordinates with blank sheets or correspondence cards with only his name at the bottom in order that they might use them for whatever needs they might have in a time of crisis (not much different from a blank check today).
Clean as a Whistle
You might not think of a whistle as being so clean that we would use it as a measure of cleanliness, but if you ever tried to make one from a reed (as they were made originally) then you would understand the phrase. To obtain the pure wind sound derived from a reed whistle the tube must be totally free of debris – clean and dry. So to have a thing clean as a whistle today means to have it as orderly as possible, with nothing blocking the passageways.
Crocodile Tears
Those insincere tears we have come to know as crocodile tears are quite literal in origin. For you see, a crocodile does indeed cry over its meal as it eats. But the crying has nothing to do with a croc’s sense of the situation. Instead, as a crocodile eats, his food is pressed to the top of his mouth, causing pressure against the glands known as the lachrymals. These secrete a tear-like substance that flows from his eyes. From this biological active of the reptile we draw our meaning for crocodile tears.
Curmudgeon (From my other sources)
The coinage of curmudgeon is beyond interesting; it is downright fascinating. Dr. Samuel Johnson decided to write his dictionary of the English language because he thought the language was being ‘corrupted’ (after delving deeply into the subject and being astute and intellectually honest, he rejected his original conviction and came to the conclusion that language is a living, breathing, evolving entity).
As related by Bergen Evans, while Johnson was compiling material for his dictionary he received a letter suggesting that the word curmudgeon was derived from the French coeur (heart) and méchant (evil). Either the letter was unsigned or he lost it and forgot who wrote it. The suggestion, though unsupported, was plausible and in his dictionary (1755) Johnson set it down for what it was worth: “a vitious manner of pronouncing coeur méchant, Fr. an unknown correspondent.” In his New and Complete Dictionary of the English Language (1775), Dr John Ash, cribbing from Johnson, but, unfortunately for him, knowing no French entered it as “from the French coeur unknown, méchant correspondent.” This is one of history’s most amusing and notorious instances of plagiarism. The antics of authors Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns Goodwin were drab and colorless by comparison.
Dead as a Doornail
What is a doornail anyway? Well, I am here to tell you. A doornail is that plate or knob upon which a door’s knocker knocks! As it never moves and is pounded upon repeatedly, we assume it’s dead. Hence the reference (some things are just too easy).
Dessert
It is the French who gave us both the word and the custom of the dessert. By definition their word desservir means to “clear the table,” which originally consisted of clearing both dishes and the tablecloth to make way for the final presentation. Most often that final course was a pastry or ice cream, but in all cases it was something sweet to end the meal. It was believed at that time that the sugar in the sweet was necessary to give a rush of energy in order that all of the foods consumed during the meal could be digested.
Dressed to the Nines
No, this does not mean that on a scale of one to ten, one is dressed almost perfectly. The expression is English in origin and was (when spoken correctly), “dressed to thy’n eyes.” (quite obviously in reference to one spiffed up from head to toe). Leave it to us to make it slang, mispronounce it a bit and make it a popular expression, even though “dressed to the nines” in and of itself makes no sense!
Earmark
[We have heard about earmarks in the past couple of years from corrupt congressmen (Are there any other kind? Yes there are – corrupt congresswomen). So let’s see where this word came from.] Long ago in England farmers found it helpful to mark the ears of their cattle and pigs to prevent thievery. Matter of fact earmarks worked so well that the law decided that one caught taking an earmarked animal or altering one to make it his own should be earmarked himself (literally!) as punishment for the crime. [I guess if it was good enough for a pig……come to think about it how about earmarking (literally!) those congress people who use earmarks as a devise for political patronage to enhance their reelection odds.]
Fiasco
By definition, fiasco is a total, foolish failure, but for its origins you have to go back to the glassblowers of Italy who created beautiful bottles. The story has it that if a bottle was noted to have a flaw it was set aside and reworked into a flask (fiasco in Italian). Not as artsy, but more practical in function was the re-created piece that was salvaged.
Getting One’s Goat
It was a common practice in the early days of horse racing to place a goat in the stall with a high-strung horse to calm him before the race. The two made good roommates, but it was also common practice for an opponent to steal his competitor’s goat in order to upset his horse before the race. Many a good racehorse was ruined by someone getting his goat!
Having a Screw Loose
It’s easy enough to conjure up the image of a machine with a screw loose, but which machine originally gave us the phrase? It was the cotton gin, the advent of which caused cotton mills to multiple at an unbelievable rate in the late 1700’s. So frequent were the breakdowns of the earlier machines that loose screws were nearly always blamed for the problem. As a result the phrase was adapted by most everyone who needed to blame something or someone for just about anything. By the early 1800’s having a screw loose became the catchphrase for something gone amiss.
Influenza
The common flu has a superstitious origin. The phrase was coined in the mid 1700’s when the first outbreak of the virus was recorded in Rome. It was believed at the time that the stars influenced such evil and contagious epidemics and influenza (the Italian word for influence) became the given name for this particular one!
Kick the Bucket
This has nothing to do with a pail being kicked out from under a man being
hanged. The phrase originated in the slaughterhouses of old, where hogs were slashed and hung (by their heels) and strung by a pulley weighted with a wooden block called a bucket. (The name was borrowed from the bucket-in-the-well concept.) Often, in the last efforts of life, the slaughtered hog was known to kick the bucket, just before it gave up the ghost.
Lame Duck
The original lame duck was a member of the British Stock Exchange who couldn’t meet his liabilities on the settlement date, and thus flew off without settling his account. From that we applied the term to our political candidates who, by way of losing an election, can’t return to the flock, even though their own party has been retained. [In recent years this term has applied to presidents serving out their term when either they are not eligible for another term or have been defeated in their bid for a second term. As with his predecessors, George W. Bush has been called a lame duck president, yet with Bush and his administration so involved, for good or ill, in the current financial crisis, he has been described as a lame duck who roared.]
Letting the Cat Out of the Bag
Back in the Middle Ages when the Muslims invaded Southern Europe, suddenly pork was declared unclean and thus became a premium on the open market. Because of strict laws forbidding such, pigs were sold undercover, stashed in bags (or pokes, which some cite to credit the expression “pig in a poke”). On occasion a cat was substituted for the more expensive pig and it wasn’t until the new owner let the cat out of the bag that the scam was revealed.
Lunatic
We get the word lunatic from the same base word that gives us lunar, which, of course, means it pertains to the moon. Lunatic was coined by the early Romans in reference to the mentally insane, as a description of one they thought was moonstruck. For centuries, man has believed that full moons have an effect on behavior. The Romans simply gave it a name and we still use it today.
One Fell Swoop (From my other sources)
At one fell swoop means all at once, as everyone realizes. As pointed out by Bergen Evans, what is not as well understood is that the word “fell” in this phrase is derived not from the past tense of “fall”, but from the noun “felon.”
In Macbeth (Act IV, scene III) when news of the murder of his wife and children by Macbeth is brought to Macduff, he exclaims, “Did you say all? O hell-kite! All? What, all my pretty chickens and their dam at one fell swoop?” A kite is a fierce but ignoble hawk or falcon that preys on small quarry and Macduff sees the tragedy in the metaphor of a hawk striking defenseless prey.
Sour Grapes (From other sources)
The words sour grapes leave a sour taste in my mouth – not literally in a gustatory sense of course, but with the figurative ill-tasting sensation of misconstruing what it means. Inevitably this expression is used to mean someone who whines or complains when they do not receive or achieve something they feel they are entitled to.
The expression comes from one of Aesop’s fables where a fox sees some delicious appearing grapes which are out of his reach and try as he might he can not get them. In frustration and resignation he allows as how they are probably sour. The expression really means that the claimant, unable to achieve his objective, declares that the prize was not worth his time and effort.
Three Sheets to the Wind
True the origin of this one is nautical, but no, the sheets are not sails. The sheets being referred to here are the ropes attached to the corners of the sails, which are used for lowering or extending. When all three sheets (on a vessel with three sails) are loosened, the ship will rock and reel as though without course or purpose, much like a drunk would if walking about while intoxicated.
Turn a Blind Eye (From my other sources)
Admiral Horatio Nelson is credited with having said this when willfully disobeying a signal to withdraw during a naval engagement. Tales of that sort, especially when they are about national heroes like Nelson, tend to be exaggerated or entirely fictitious. That doesn't appear to be the case here though and there's very good evidence to show that Nelson was indeed the source of this phrase.
In the naval battle of Copenhagen in 1801 Nelson led the attack of the British fleet against a joint Danish/Norwegian enemy. The British fleet of the day was commanded by Admiral Sir Hyde Parker. The two men disagreed over tactics and at one point Hyde Parker sent a signal (by the use of flags) for Nelson to disengage. Nelson was convinced he could win if he persisted and that's when he 'turned a blind eye'. In their biography Life of Nelson, published just eight years later, Clarke and M'Arthur printed what they claimed to be Nelson's actual words at the time:(Putting the glass to his blind eye) "You know, Foley, I have only one eye - and I have a right to be blind sometimes... I really do not see the signal."
Verdict
The word describing a jury’s decision at the end of a trial is one that dates back to the Middle Ages. With the introduction of the jury, it was superstitiously believe that twelve men in a group would hold some mystical power in drawing a truthful conclusion. The number twelve was considered holy both in reference to the twelve tribes of Israel and Jesus’ twelve apostles. It was the French who gave this body of twelve the name veir (true) and dit (said). Even in homicide cases today, a verdict cannot be obtained until all twelve on the jury reach an agreement. [The phrase for the examination of prospective jurors by the attorneys and the judge is called voir dire which is French for “too see, to speak.”]
Veto
One powerful little word is veto! With four little letters, the head of state has the power to cancel out laws passed by lower governing bodies. The word comes directly from Latin, its translation is literally “I forbid.” It was used in a political context as far back as the time of the Roman senate and has carried the same meaning both within and without political circles for hundreds of years.
Visa
Short for the Latin phrase carta visa, a visa is that official authorization that permits entry into another country. The original phrase means “papers seen”, which was the stamp of approval by those on border control, monitoring the visitors coming into and out of a foreign country.
Win, Place, or Show
Most folks know that the origin of “win, place, or show” dates back to the earliest racetracks, but most may not know that the phrase was so named because of the way in which the finishes were announced. As small boards were used to record the names of the winners of each horse race, and as these boards were so small that only the first two could be “placed” on the board, the titles “win” and “place” were soon coined. Shortly after, a second board was used to “show” the third winner and “win, “place”, or “show” became synonymous with first, second, and third.
Xmas
While some consider it disrespectful to substitute an X for the Christ part of Christmas, others know that the letter X was in fact the symbol used long ago for Christ. X represents the Greek letter chi, which is the initial letter of the Greek word for Christ. According to first century history, the early Greek Christians used the letter X to stand for Christ, much as they used the fish with the X in the tail to represent Jesus.
Zip Code
We refer to it every day, but how many of us knew [before they read this] that the ZIP stands for “Zone Improvement Program”? Okay, so you may have known that, but do you know what the five-digit code represents? Well, according to our reliable postal people, the first three digits indicate a district, usually a city, while the remaining two digits correspond with a local zone.
A-1
More than a steak sauce, the phase itself connotes the very best, because, by definition, it was the highest rating that could be given a ship ensured by Lloyd’s of London. Lloyd’s registry of ships and shipping was categorized by letter and number (with ships rated by letter and cargo by number). “A” meant the ship itself was perfect and “1” meant the cargo was in perfect condition.
Aftermath (From my other sources)
Aftermath is commonly and erroneously used to simply mean the period following an event, usually a disaster such as a fire, hurricane, or tornado: “In the aftermath of the tornado, many people in the neighborhood are still homeless.” Television and newspaper reporters are especially guilty of misusing this word. ‘After’ means second and ‘math’ is a mowing or harvest. So an ‘aftermath’ is a second happening, usually a disaster, following and caused by the first event. The San Francisco fire was an aftermath as it was a disaster following and caused by the earthquake of 1906.
Backseat Driver
Think backseat driver and you think of one who complains or one who thinks he can see better from the rear seat than from the front of a vehicle. But the original backseat drivers weren’t complainers. Matter of fact for what they were watching, they could see better! In the days of the early fire engines there was a job for backseat drivers. Someone needed to watch the ladder as fire engines rushed to the scene. As quick turns and abrupt stops were causes for accidents, a backseat driver was as vital a part of the fire team as the firefighters themselves.
Beyond the Pale
Pale is from the Latin word palus which was a stake or boundary marker that fenced the territory under rule by a certain nation. Paling or pickets were quite common as boundary markers in Roman times. Those believed to be beyond the bounds of social or moral decency were once literally exiled beyond the pale or beyond the confines of civilization as determined by the townspeople.
Blackball
Early social clubs in England had a practice of voting for their initiates by dropping white balls or marbles into a ballot box. Those voting against a particular candidate dropped a blackball, hence the term. While the term was first coined in the late 1700s the custom dates back to ancient Greek and Roman times. Even our word ballot refers to voting by little balls.
Cahoots
Cahoots were quite simply little cabins or kajuetes as they were called in medieval Germany. Often known to be occupied by robbers and bandits, these little cabins became planning centers for attacks. So in reality it was the goings-on inside the cabins that became known for what the cabins themselves were called. Today we use cahoots to refer to any shady partnership or less than upright scheme.
Carte Blanche
Ask for carte blanche in France and you just might receive a white sheet of paper because translated literally that is what the term means. Custom has it that a man would trust his closest subordinates with blank sheets or correspondence cards with only his name at the bottom in order that they might use them for whatever needs they might have in a time of crisis (not much different from a blank check today).
Clean as a Whistle
You might not think of a whistle as being so clean that we would use it as a measure of cleanliness, but if you ever tried to make one from a reed (as they were made originally) then you would understand the phrase. To obtain the pure wind sound derived from a reed whistle the tube must be totally free of debris – clean and dry. So to have a thing clean as a whistle today means to have it as orderly as possible, with nothing blocking the passageways.
Crocodile Tears
Those insincere tears we have come to know as crocodile tears are quite literal in origin. For you see, a crocodile does indeed cry over its meal as it eats. But the crying has nothing to do with a croc’s sense of the situation. Instead, as a crocodile eats, his food is pressed to the top of his mouth, causing pressure against the glands known as the lachrymals. These secrete a tear-like substance that flows from his eyes. From this biological active of the reptile we draw our meaning for crocodile tears.
Curmudgeon (From my other sources)
The coinage of curmudgeon is beyond interesting; it is downright fascinating. Dr. Samuel Johnson decided to write his dictionary of the English language because he thought the language was being ‘corrupted’ (after delving deeply into the subject and being astute and intellectually honest, he rejected his original conviction and came to the conclusion that language is a living, breathing, evolving entity).
As related by Bergen Evans, while Johnson was compiling material for his dictionary he received a letter suggesting that the word curmudgeon was derived from the French coeur (heart) and méchant (evil). Either the letter was unsigned or he lost it and forgot who wrote it. The suggestion, though unsupported, was plausible and in his dictionary (1755) Johnson set it down for what it was worth: “a vitious manner of pronouncing coeur méchant, Fr. an unknown correspondent.” In his New and Complete Dictionary of the English Language (1775), Dr John Ash, cribbing from Johnson, but, unfortunately for him, knowing no French entered it as “from the French coeur unknown, méchant correspondent.” This is one of history’s most amusing and notorious instances of plagiarism. The antics of authors Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns Goodwin were drab and colorless by comparison.
Dead as a Doornail
What is a doornail anyway? Well, I am here to tell you. A doornail is that plate or knob upon which a door’s knocker knocks! As it never moves and is pounded upon repeatedly, we assume it’s dead. Hence the reference (some things are just too easy).
Dessert
It is the French who gave us both the word and the custom of the dessert. By definition their word desservir means to “clear the table,” which originally consisted of clearing both dishes and the tablecloth to make way for the final presentation. Most often that final course was a pastry or ice cream, but in all cases it was something sweet to end the meal. It was believed at that time that the sugar in the sweet was necessary to give a rush of energy in order that all of the foods consumed during the meal could be digested.
Dressed to the Nines
No, this does not mean that on a scale of one to ten, one is dressed almost perfectly. The expression is English in origin and was (when spoken correctly), “dressed to thy’n eyes.” (quite obviously in reference to one spiffed up from head to toe). Leave it to us to make it slang, mispronounce it a bit and make it a popular expression, even though “dressed to the nines” in and of itself makes no sense!
Earmark
[We have heard about earmarks in the past couple of years from corrupt congressmen (Are there any other kind? Yes there are – corrupt congresswomen). So let’s see where this word came from.] Long ago in England farmers found it helpful to mark the ears of their cattle and pigs to prevent thievery. Matter of fact earmarks worked so well that the law decided that one caught taking an earmarked animal or altering one to make it his own should be earmarked himself (literally!) as punishment for the crime. [I guess if it was good enough for a pig……come to think about it how about earmarking (literally!) those congress people who use earmarks as a devise for political patronage to enhance their reelection odds.]
Fiasco
By definition, fiasco is a total, foolish failure, but for its origins you have to go back to the glassblowers of Italy who created beautiful bottles. The story has it that if a bottle was noted to have a flaw it was set aside and reworked into a flask (fiasco in Italian). Not as artsy, but more practical in function was the re-created piece that was salvaged.
Getting One’s Goat
It was a common practice in the early days of horse racing to place a goat in the stall with a high-strung horse to calm him before the race. The two made good roommates, but it was also common practice for an opponent to steal his competitor’s goat in order to upset his horse before the race. Many a good racehorse was ruined by someone getting his goat!
Having a Screw Loose
It’s easy enough to conjure up the image of a machine with a screw loose, but which machine originally gave us the phrase? It was the cotton gin, the advent of which caused cotton mills to multiple at an unbelievable rate in the late 1700’s. So frequent were the breakdowns of the earlier machines that loose screws were nearly always blamed for the problem. As a result the phrase was adapted by most everyone who needed to blame something or someone for just about anything. By the early 1800’s having a screw loose became the catchphrase for something gone amiss.
Influenza
The common flu has a superstitious origin. The phrase was coined in the mid 1700’s when the first outbreak of the virus was recorded in Rome. It was believed at the time that the stars influenced such evil and contagious epidemics and influenza (the Italian word for influence) became the given name for this particular one!
Kick the Bucket
This has nothing to do with a pail being kicked out from under a man being
hanged. The phrase originated in the slaughterhouses of old, where hogs were slashed and hung (by their heels) and strung by a pulley weighted with a wooden block called a bucket. (The name was borrowed from the bucket-in-the-well concept.) Often, in the last efforts of life, the slaughtered hog was known to kick the bucket, just before it gave up the ghost.
Lame Duck
The original lame duck was a member of the British Stock Exchange who couldn’t meet his liabilities on the settlement date, and thus flew off without settling his account. From that we applied the term to our political candidates who, by way of losing an election, can’t return to the flock, even though their own party has been retained. [In recent years this term has applied to presidents serving out their term when either they are not eligible for another term or have been defeated in their bid for a second term. As with his predecessors, George W. Bush has been called a lame duck president, yet with Bush and his administration so involved, for good or ill, in the current financial crisis, he has been described as a lame duck who roared.]
Letting the Cat Out of the Bag
Back in the Middle Ages when the Muslims invaded Southern Europe, suddenly pork was declared unclean and thus became a premium on the open market. Because of strict laws forbidding such, pigs were sold undercover, stashed in bags (or pokes, which some cite to credit the expression “pig in a poke”). On occasion a cat was substituted for the more expensive pig and it wasn’t until the new owner let the cat out of the bag that the scam was revealed.
Lunatic
We get the word lunatic from the same base word that gives us lunar, which, of course, means it pertains to the moon. Lunatic was coined by the early Romans in reference to the mentally insane, as a description of one they thought was moonstruck. For centuries, man has believed that full moons have an effect on behavior. The Romans simply gave it a name and we still use it today.
One Fell Swoop (From my other sources)
At one fell swoop means all at once, as everyone realizes. As pointed out by Bergen Evans, what is not as well understood is that the word “fell” in this phrase is derived not from the past tense of “fall”, but from the noun “felon.”
In Macbeth (Act IV, scene III) when news of the murder of his wife and children by Macbeth is brought to Macduff, he exclaims, “Did you say all? O hell-kite! All? What, all my pretty chickens and their dam at one fell swoop?” A kite is a fierce but ignoble hawk or falcon that preys on small quarry and Macduff sees the tragedy in the metaphor of a hawk striking defenseless prey.
Sour Grapes (From other sources)
The words sour grapes leave a sour taste in my mouth – not literally in a gustatory sense of course, but with the figurative ill-tasting sensation of misconstruing what it means. Inevitably this expression is used to mean someone who whines or complains when they do not receive or achieve something they feel they are entitled to.
The expression comes from one of Aesop’s fables where a fox sees some delicious appearing grapes which are out of his reach and try as he might he can not get them. In frustration and resignation he allows as how they are probably sour. The expression really means that the claimant, unable to achieve his objective, declares that the prize was not worth his time and effort.
Three Sheets to the Wind
True the origin of this one is nautical, but no, the sheets are not sails. The sheets being referred to here are the ropes attached to the corners of the sails, which are used for lowering or extending. When all three sheets (on a vessel with three sails) are loosened, the ship will rock and reel as though without course or purpose, much like a drunk would if walking about while intoxicated.
Turn a Blind Eye (From my other sources)
Admiral Horatio Nelson is credited with having said this when willfully disobeying a signal to withdraw during a naval engagement. Tales of that sort, especially when they are about national heroes like Nelson, tend to be exaggerated or entirely fictitious. That doesn't appear to be the case here though and there's very good evidence to show that Nelson was indeed the source of this phrase.
In the naval battle of Copenhagen in 1801 Nelson led the attack of the British fleet against a joint Danish/Norwegian enemy. The British fleet of the day was commanded by Admiral Sir Hyde Parker. The two men disagreed over tactics and at one point Hyde Parker sent a signal (by the use of flags) for Nelson to disengage. Nelson was convinced he could win if he persisted and that's when he 'turned a blind eye'. In their biography Life of Nelson, published just eight years later, Clarke and M'Arthur printed what they claimed to be Nelson's actual words at the time:(Putting the glass to his blind eye) "You know, Foley, I have only one eye - and I have a right to be blind sometimes... I really do not see the signal."
Verdict
The word describing a jury’s decision at the end of a trial is one that dates back to the Middle Ages. With the introduction of the jury, it was superstitiously believe that twelve men in a group would hold some mystical power in drawing a truthful conclusion. The number twelve was considered holy both in reference to the twelve tribes of Israel and Jesus’ twelve apostles. It was the French who gave this body of twelve the name veir (true) and dit (said). Even in homicide cases today, a verdict cannot be obtained until all twelve on the jury reach an agreement. [The phrase for the examination of prospective jurors by the attorneys and the judge is called voir dire which is French for “too see, to speak.”]
Veto
One powerful little word is veto! With four little letters, the head of state has the power to cancel out laws passed by lower governing bodies. The word comes directly from Latin, its translation is literally “I forbid.” It was used in a political context as far back as the time of the Roman senate and has carried the same meaning both within and without political circles for hundreds of years.
Visa
Short for the Latin phrase carta visa, a visa is that official authorization that permits entry into another country. The original phrase means “papers seen”, which was the stamp of approval by those on border control, monitoring the visitors coming into and out of a foreign country.
Win, Place, or Show
Most folks know that the origin of “win, place, or show” dates back to the earliest racetracks, but most may not know that the phrase was so named because of the way in which the finishes were announced. As small boards were used to record the names of the winners of each horse race, and as these boards were so small that only the first two could be “placed” on the board, the titles “win” and “place” were soon coined. Shortly after, a second board was used to “show” the third winner and “win, “place”, or “show” became synonymous with first, second, and third.
Xmas
While some consider it disrespectful to substitute an X for the Christ part of Christmas, others know that the letter X was in fact the symbol used long ago for Christ. X represents the Greek letter chi, which is the initial letter of the Greek word for Christ. According to first century history, the early Greek Christians used the letter X to stand for Christ, much as they used the fish with the X in the tail to represent Jesus.
Zip Code
We refer to it every day, but how many of us knew [before they read this] that the ZIP stands for “Zone Improvement Program”? Okay, so you may have known that, but do you know what the five-digit code represents? Well, according to our reliable postal people, the first three digits indicate a district, usually a city, while the remaining two digits correspond with a local zone.
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