Are Americans Welcome on Mars? A Dream?

NASA Photo

A DELEGATION OF MARTIANS ARRIVES ON EARTH. THEY LAND IN WASHINGTON, D.C. They have heard rumors about Americans wishing to move to Mars. The Martian delegation wants to figure out if Americans are qualified to be accepted on Mars. They find a few American citizens and a dialog ensues as follows. 

Martians: What kind of people you Americans are? 

Americans: We are a good people. 

Martians: What does that mean? 

Americans: We are committed to truth telling. We don't lie. 

Martians: Huh. So you elect a leader to represent you among nations of your Earth and in the galaxy who doesn't know what truth telling is. Right? What else? 

Americans: We respect each other, especially women among us. 

Martians: Huh. So you elect a leader to represent you among nations of your Earth and in the galaxy who has been convicted for abusing women. Right? What else? 

Americans: We are fair minded people. We are not consumed by revenge and retribution. 

Martians: Huh. So you elect a leader to repesent you among nations of your Earth and in the galaxy who is consumed by revenge and retribution. Right? What else? 

Americans: We are a decent people. 

Martians: Huh. So you elect a leader to represent you among nations of your Earth and in the galaxy whose language is often laced with obscneity and vulgarity. Right? What else? 

Americans: We are ...... 

Martians: Don't have to say more. We understand that you value lies, misogyny, revenge, and obscenity, among other human frailties we may not know about. Right? 

Americans: But not all of us are like that.

Martians: Maybe not. But the majority of you chose the leader whose qualities of character you admired. Right?

Americans: Perhaps you have a point here. 

Martians: Of course, we have a point here. The point is that we Martians do not want to be corrupted by you Americans. So just stay off our planet Mars. Don't pollute us.

Americans: But may be we will change in four years. 

Martians: We will keep our fingers crossed. Until then stay bound to your Earth. Mars is not for you.

The Martians then turn around, board their saucer and are gone in a jiffy. 

It is then that we wake up! Or do we?

Neck Collar or Breast Harness? Do Dogs have a Choice?

Wikipedia Image

I WAS SHOPPING IN A LOCAL STORE WHEN I NOTICED ANOTHER shopper with a service dog. The dog looked nice and calm as service dogs ususally do. I noticed that the dog had both a breast harness and a neck collar. The shopper had the rope attached to the neck collar and not to the breast harness. I wondered why. I wanted to askl the shopper why she didn't prefer the breast harness over the neck collar to restrain the dog. But I didn't, thinking that she might be offended.

For long I have been bothered by dogs being pulled around and restrained by a neck collar. I don't know how dogs feel about that, but I suspect they wouldn't be comfortable. A breast harness would be a much less painful way of being restrained. I notice around me that the use of breast harness is increeasing, but very little. Most dogs continue being restrained and pulled away with neck collars. I wish we could ask dogs how they feel.

I can't shake off the photo of one of our army pesonnel, paid byour tax dollars, dragging an Iraqi person by a rope around his neck in Abu Ghraib prison during our invasion of Iraq based on a false premise. And I wonder whether that particular action, subsidized by our tax dollars, was not a reflection of the neck collar around a dog's neck, letting the prisoner know that he was no better than a dog. Did the puller get that idea from the dog he had pulled or seen being pulled that way?

Yes, President George Bush did apologize on our behalf for that conduct, and for worse conduct, both in English and Arabic. He could have prevented the need for an apology to begin with.

Cruelty to animals is not a trivial matter.

There was a ray of hope that as a people we do have a feeling against creulty to animals. South Dakota governor Kristi Noem quickly lost her expected elevation to potential vice-president position when she revealed that she had shot her dog dead because she could not train the animal. But furor against her has not lasted long. She is now the incoming president's nominee as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.

So much for symapthy for innocent animals.

We have about 90 million dogs in this country, most kept as pets in human households. I am sure that most of them are treated well. Yet, according to the American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animanls, 50,00 animals (dogs and others) have beenn transported to shelters in the last ten years.

To conclude, I say to the dogs of the world: stand your ground if you are pulled by a neck collar.

Seriously, I think neck collars should be banned in favor of breast harnesses when retaining is required by law or common sense.

 

POST-MORTEM: Are We doing it the Right Way?

SPEAKING ELECTION-WISE THIS IS THE SEASON OF HANDWRINGING OVER THE RESULTS. Those who had expected a different results are perplexed at what happened. The pundits are engaged in a post-mortem of the results. That is normal.

What is not normal is the lack of focus on the true nature of what happened.

Let's examine the nature of the two campaigns and the messages of the two candidates. Let's grade them on what were obviously the key ingredients of their messages. This is what I heard from the winning side, roughly in the order listed.

Anger, Threats, Falsehood, Ignorance, Obscenity, Vulgarity, Promises, Policies.

Let's face it. The losing side could not compete with this performance. They couldn't, and wouldn't, even try. The plurality of the voting public enjoyed this performance, clapping and cheering with obvious approval. No wonder in the voting booth, they chose the one who epitomized what they clapped and cheered for.

Now one might argue: "I am not like that. I condemn that kind of behavior and approach."

So, what? The end result of an election is not the doing of one individual. It is the voice of the collective. So, while individually we might be fine people, collectively we are the epitome of who won the race. Collectively, as a nation, we are represented among the nations of the world by how they see the winning side.

Perhaps we should not take all this so seriously. However, without accepting what this means and what won the day, we cannot reverse it. How can we take obscenity out of the character of our elections without recognizing the over-sized role obscenity played in winning the election?

It has been an American tradition to teach children to look up to American presidents as paragons of virtue and emulate them for success in their lives. This is a tradition we will have to break.

But, as the English theologian and historian Thomas Fuller is reported to have said 'the darkest hour is just before the dawn'.

This Election America Looked in the Mirror

THIS ELECTION AMERICA LOOKED IN THE MIRROR and liked itself enough to elect one of its own to the highest office in the land. The mirror couldn't tell lies, even if it tried to. 

The mirror showed us who we are, a society degraded into a culture of lying and deceiving smeared with a handful of obscenity for good measure. Words that could not be used in public by even un-cultured folks are now routinely used by "nobles" and parroted on public media with a thin veneer of abbreviations. 

When the mirror showed us who we are, we gladly celebrated and elected one of our own.

You might protest "I am not like that. I am a cultured individual with good character."  

Of course, you are a good individual. But, elections are not won or lost by individuals, regardless of how an individual votes. Elections are won or lost by a collectivity of individuals, representing the values - or the lack thereof - of the collective. 

Somewhere in her well regarded book "The Good Earth", Pear S. Buck has noted (and I paraphrase) that in a democratic society, people elect people like themselves. 

So, speaking as a society, we have elected one of ourselves. To the nations of the world, we declare this is who we are. There is no way of getting around it, however hard we may try to wash our dirty laundry.

So where do we go from here? Your thought?

Defining Our National Identity

THE DECISION HAS BEEN MADE. WE HAVE CAST THE LOT IN FAVOR OF ONE LEADER OVER ANOTHER. Does it matter which one?

Our collective decision is clear. As a nation we value arrogance. We value obscenity. We value lying. Should we go on? This defines our national character, chosen by the clear majority of voting citizens. Individually, we may be fine people, but collectively our national identity is clearly defined by our collective choices.

Some will protest. They will say we voted for lower prices, for example. Okay, if bread costs double the price of years past, we can eat less. If gas cost more, we can drive less. We can survive with less to eat and with less to drive, but less truth and more arrogance and obscenity will not only lower the quality of our life but may even kill us.

For the next four years we will hold arrogance, obscenity and lying as a model for our children to emulate and for nations of the world to aspire to achieve. We will accept that so we can eat more and drive more.

Maybe in 2028, we might reverse course, if we get that opportunity.

Trading Votes for Promises?

GROUPS OF VOTERS GENERALLY OVERRATE THEIR VOTING STRENGTH. They pay too much attention to promises that candidates for office make. They willingly trade their votes for promises. In this trade they pay first and may get nothing for that payment, no fullfilment of promises. The trader (candidate for office) has no care.

Neither political party can be expected to be truly influenced by the transitory impact of who voted for it. What the party leadership will be influenced by is their inner moral and ethical compass, or the absence of it, when the impact of those votes has faded.

So, what is the right strategy in selecting who to vote for? It is not who promises to address any specific community’s concerns. The right strategy is to select the one who has the character that enables humility, decency, truthfulness, a sense of fairness and social justice, and a record of the same.  Candidates with character are more likely to respect fair trade, delivering on the promises for which they have been paid by votes. They are the ones whose character can fortify any promises they make.

So, ignore the promises, pay attention to character in choosing our future leaders.

Let's not trade votes for promises. Trade votes for character. Trading votes for promises, without attention to character, is a bad bargain.