Since our last post was pure Bloomberg, today's post is Greatest Hidden Treasures from
the past week of The New York Times.
Constructive criticism to IMPROVE our beloved country and planet -- NOT to tear it down:
I.
Ben Cheever says the following about his famous father
John Cheever [sometimes called "the Chekhov of the Suburbs," and lauded for short stories like "The Swimmer" and novels like The Wapshot Chronicle]:
"He wrote about hypocrisy. The idea was that in every fine home of every
apparently successful [emphasis mine] person, there was living some secret life, that hiding beneath the surface was some terrible passion or infidelity."
["Private Lives of Kennedys, Played Out in Public," NYT, July 15, 2012]
Nobody calls out Mitt -- now Obama & Massachusetts liberal Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren [and probably all politicians, all Americans, if not all Earthlings!] do it too -- for blithely equating "SUCCESS" with making a lot of money at business or other careers.
Mitt accuses Obama of blaming rich people for being "SUCCESSFUL."
And neither Obama, nor the media, nor virtually anyone else, challenges this narrow assumption about the word "SUCCESS."
Is it because the U.S.A. [and now the whole homogenized "civilized world"] is all about materialistic measures? After all, the U.S.A. famously has no history of feudalism or "classes," and therefore perhaps depends on Money as the only yardstick of Superiority?
II.
Here's another current American measure of "Success":
Whatever works to help Me.
Columnist Frank Bruni rips "personal improvement guru Tim Ferris" for promoting -- in Ferris's own Sunday NYT column! -- a breathtaking selfishness:
A. Don't want to lose your checked bag during airplane travel?
"Pack an unloaded starter pistol in it, so that the TSA will flag the piece of luggage, thus diminishing or altogether eliminating the possibility of its loss. It's extra work and fretting for them but, hey,
you get peace of mind. Isn't that what counts?"
B. Also:
"Don't pay for airport parking, if the accrued tickets from leaving your car on the street won't be as expensive. Sure you're unlawfully hogging a space some else might make legal use of; maybe you're thwarting street sweepers, too."
Not your problem. A conscience is for chumps."
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/17/opinion/bruni-individualism-in-overdrive.html
III.
Moderate conservative columnist David Brooks laments Obama's "success" in framing our 2012 Campaign with negativity about business "success," about Capitalism, and about Romney's role in it.
Then, Brooks criticizes Romney for not yet developing a "capitalist vision" around "rigor and productivity."
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/17/opinion/brooks-more-capitalism-please.html
IV.
Oklahoma's Republican senator Tom Coburn [author of The Debt Bomb: A Bold Plan to Stop Washington from Bankrupting America]
makes a mostly convincing case that Democrats exaggerate the power that anti-tax pledger Grover Norquist has over Republican Congressmen.
Coburn insists:
Norquist does NOT have us "in the palm of his hand," as Harry Reid charges.
The GOP does NOT succeed in giving us "marching orders," as Nancy Pelosi claims.
If Democrats succeed in making out Republicans as uncompromising ideologues,
Democrats "can continue refusing to offer detailed plans to reform entitlement programs."
IF THIS IS AN ACCURATE REPUBLICAN CRITICISM OF DEMOCRATS IN CONGRESS, THEN THE LATTER SHOULD IMMEDIATELY TAKE STEPS TO MAKE IT RIGHT.
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