The importance of getting young writers off to a good start

Getting young (or any age, really) writers to start strong in their journalism or essays is one of the toughest tasks for any instructor, but one way to help them find successful strategies is to share good examples from the professionals.

Here is a lead (or lede) from a Washington Post news story today: 

SEARCHLIGHT, Nevada — From the highway, Spirit Mountain — a 5,642 foot-high peak — appears gray. But at times, it glows a majestic pink. For the Fort Mojave and 11 other tribes, these mystical rocks are the site from which their ancestors emerged.

“There’s a spiritual connection that makes us Mojave people,” said Tim Williams, chair of the tribal council. “If it’s not protected, our generation will not have done our job.”

Two decades ago, Congress preserved the mountain — called Avi Kwa Ame (ah-VEE-kwah-may) in Mojave — and 33,000 acres around it as wilderness. Now the Biden administration is readying a proclamation that could put roughly 450,000 acres — spanning almost the entire triangle at the bottom of the Nevada map — off limits to development under the 1906 Antiquities Act.

President Biden will commit on Wednesday at the White House Tribal Nations Summit to protecting the area, according to a senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the decision was not yet public.

A young writer might point out that the actual "news" here is not revealed until the fourth graf, but the instructor's job is to help writers analyze how such a choice can work well.

The first graf is descriptive, but also gets at the "why" of the story (the importance of the area to a large number of tribes). The second graf is a direct quote from an informed source that supports that opening graf's thesis.

Then comes graf 3, which provides needed context for readers while hinting at the next graf's specific announcement.

Finally, readers get the news: the official announcement will come later today.

No matter the structure journalists choose for any particular story, they have to include as many of the answers to the classic 5 Ws and H questions as they can. Sometimes deadlines preclude getting solid answers to one or more of those questions, of course, but the "who, what, where, when, why and how" questions always must be addressed at some point.

The answers to those questions can be complex. For instance, in this case there are really two WHO answers -- President Biden plus the tribal council. We have already touched on the WHY, and the WHERE and WHEN and WHERE are all there. The HOW is not crystal clear, but readers likely assume that the protection will come through some administrative action, since the Congress is not mentioned.

Early in a semester, it would be wise to set aside time most class days to do this sort of analysis of the structure of leads. 

That focus will pay off for the rest of the term. 

Bonus: I rarely see mediocre or poor stories that begin with a strong lead. Leads are the engine that drives the writing.

And now, we wait

It's the calm before the storm, so to speak, in terms of the college semester, with lots of major papers due Sunday night from my CSU courses. That it comes as a surprise (to the students and to me) of sorts is shocking, but with only a week following fall break between relaxing and panicking to get that final document in good shape, the surprise is understandable.

Once most universities made the switch from having two weeks FOLLOWING Christmas break as the final weeks of the fall semester, the proximity of Thanksgiving to Christmas made things very tight. 

I recall those days of coming back after two weeks away and THEN panicking to get those final papers written and cram weeks of reading into days. They were not great days, but on the plus side we didn't start the semester until after Labor Day...

Scheduling ourselves into problems and challenges is quite common, of course, and we mostly have ourselves to blame. 

I am this week under some stress because of a readers theater holiday show that I wrote and am directing. Due to last week being Thanksgiving, the entire process -- from auditions last night to the performances on Saturday -- wraps up in six total days. 

The auditions brought out 50 people who wanted to be part of this relatively low-stress event, which is gratifying but also a potential problem. After all, the show was written to accommodate about two dozen players. 

So, there I was, on-the-spot, calling an audible to double cast the show and present it twice Saturday evening rather than once. I had not seriously considered that as a possibility until I saw all those faces eager to take on a role. 

So I scheduled myself into a full day today of splitting the cast into two groups of 24 (two people dropped out) and both shows will be fine. Of course, the split means that there will be TWO initial read throughs Wednesday night, so rehearsals will be back-to-back at 6 and 7:30 p.m. THAT means everyone needed to know today which cast they were in so they could do their own personal scheduling.

It is now done, and thank goodness I didn't have the pile of papers coming in TODAY that I expect next Monday morning. 

I have high hopes that both shows will be good, and someone is organizing cookies after the second show, so there's that.

There are no cookies for my online students, unfortunately. 

But they probably wouldn't have time for such silliness anyway.

Americans accept all sorts of avoidable deaths, sadly

The pandemic is over and all is well, at least that is how Americans are living their lives. But about 300 people are dying each day in this country from Covid, and 90 percent(!) are 65 or older.

So this has become a plague among the elderly... and that includes me. The good news for me and other old-timers like me is that I don't have multiple chronic conditions that put me at the highest risk. 

So I have been vaccinated and double boosted and then boosted one more time for the latest variants... and am feeling quite safe. Kathleen and I still wear masks in airports and on flights but that's about it in terms of taking extra precautions. Perhaps we are naive.

Beyond my personal situation, which may put me among the lucky ones (having ducked getting the virus for nearly two years), the national issue is that the country has made a general trade-off that 300 per day senior citizens dying of the virus is "acceptable losses." 

It's a sort of ageism, I suppose. After all, those old-timers have had their day and it's time for them to leave the stage... perhaps permanently. The problem is that most folks my age aren't actually doing badly and aren't yearning to leave this "vale of tears."

Americans are similarly making a bargain regarding guns and violence and mass murder. The Gun Violence Center, which has the unhappy goal of tracking mass shootings in America -- defined as at least four people shot, not counting the shooter -- and the home of the free boasted 607 mass shootings as of Nov. 22. That may soon push the 2021 total of 690 mass shootings. 

At least we are keeping our mass shootings to under two per day, on average. So there's the good news.

Americans have learned to shrug at the idea that 110,000 people, mostly over 65, will die of Covid this year, added to the over one million already dead. 

Thus far in 2022, 18,360 Americans of all ages have died from gun violence, along with 21,912 suicides by gun.

Digging a bit deeper, thus far, 291 children up to age 11 have been killed by gun violence, along with another 641 injured. And 1,237 12-18 year-olds have died and another 3,478 injured via the gun.

Thoughts and prayers, of course.

Of course, the eventual death rate for humans is 100 percent, and the U.S. has a population of over 330 million, so the statistical chances of dying from either Covid or gun violence remain quite low. 

I also read today that most first world countries have seen decreasing numbers of deaths among pedestrians and bicyclists over the past few years. But not America -- our rates of non-drivers killed by cars is going up and quite quickly. The article pointed out all sorts of strategies for making those not inside the car more safe, but we just don't care enough to invest in simple safety practices, mechanical improvements and road construction.

Human mortality is unavoidable, but there really are an excessive number of avoidable deaths each day and month and year in America.

Those deaths are the price we pay for... no one really knows.

Giving thanks for some fine writing

Some gems from the latest "For the Love of Sentences" feature shared by Frank Bruni:

Let's begin with a review, partly because a review is the next assignment due in one of my online writing classes, and partly because the plain truth of reviewing is that negative arguments are usually way more entertaining than positive ones. Far be it from me to recommend teaching kids to be snarky, but the reason "bad" reviews are more compelling and fun to write is similar to our often-noted truth that most news = bad news.

From Ron Charles in his Washington Post Book Club newsletter, on the same-day releases of new memoirs by Mike Pence (So Help Me God) and Michelle Obama (The Light We Carry). “It hardly feels like a fair contest,” Charles wrote. “Michelle Obama is one of the most popular and dynamic public figures in the world. Mike Pence once lulled a fly to sleep on his own head.”

For our students, we might point out the use of hyperbole (that last jab at how boring Pence is, even if students may not have seen that weird video of a fly settling on Pence's forehead). It is also a good example of how to "bury" the attribution (Charles wrote.) Our default is to place the attribution at the very start or very end of the quotation, but this tactic (by Bruni, in this case) is more sophisticated. Leaving readers with the neutral verb "said" is not a strong way to wrap up a quote or a paragraph... or at least we can remind young writers that there are options to avoid that effect.

The review finishes with: “Despite protecting the Union from its greatest threat in 160 years, Pence describes that calamity with all the verve and insight of a man telling us how he loads the dishwasher. It’s a peculiar act of historical revisionism — as though the paragraphs have been sprayed with a mixture of fire retardant and Ambien.”

Of course, we might need to quickly refresh student memories about Jan. 6 for them to understand the reference. More importantly for writers: he never plainly states that Pence's prose is boring... but we get it.

Also in The Washington Post, Joel Achenbach explored doomsday scenarios of the cosmological rather than political kind, recounting: “A few days before NASA tried to crash a spacecraft into an asteroid as part of what it called the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, I talked to Lindley Johnson, the agency’s planetary defense officer. I think we can all agree that this sounds like an important job.”

This pairs nicely with the hyperbole of the review, demonstrating the concept of "understatement." 

In The New Yorker, Jelani Cobb surveyed recent history: “In the seven years since Trump took his ride down the gold-colored escalator in Trump Tower to declare his candidacy for president of the United States, the movement that coalesced around him has died a thousand deaths, only to climb out of its shallow grave before the first trowel of dirt hit the casket.”

This metaphor that compares a candidate to one of those impossible-to-kill monsters we have all seen in so many movies does a nice job of avoiding direct criticism of Trump or anyone else. The writer is simply pointing out the resilience of the guy... though we are all free to read into that sentence any political stances we wish.

It's been nearly six decades since a key event in my life

Nov. 22 has been a key date for me for 59 years, as of today, marking the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas. I was in 8th grade in 1963 at Central Junior High, and was sitting in class with history teacher Bud Williams when the announcement came over the P.A.

It must have been early afternoon and school was immediately cancelled for the rest of the day. I can't imagine that happening these days, no matter what, but I must have walked home (about two miles or so, though I'm sure we made it more like three, with all the twists and turns we explored most days). 

I assume it was cold but don't recall any snow or rain that day. JFK was a hero in our house and there were tears from both my mom and dad -- and that was very unusual. I had to look it up, but it was a Friday and everyone spent the entire weekend and most of the following week watching TV coverage, including seeing the accused assassin himself assassinated by Jack Ruby on national TV. I can't imagine how well my young self handled all this chaos, followed soon after by the funeral rites and procession.

I just know that I may not have been named after the president -- after all, I was born just five years after JFK returned home a war hero and a decade before he ran for president. But whether I introduced myself as John or Jack, people always gave me a look. And I still sometimes get a lame comment like, "I thought you were shot in Dallas" from time to time. For many years, it happened every time I produced my ID, and I honestly wish I had a nickel for each occasion. 

My family lost something that day, though, like most Americans, we managed to return to "normal" and returned to jobs and rooting for our favorite teams (Iowa Hawkeyes and Chicago Cubs foremost) and generally "getting on with it."

I was thinking that likely happens all the time, no matter the horror. The five killed in Colorado Springs the other day will likely be mourned for a few days or weeks and then people will need to get back to life and all its challenges. After all, we live in America, the only nation where such slaughters happen with numbing regularity, all in worship of "freedom."

Thanksgiving was the next week, and the district cancelled classes all week, leaving everyone plenty of time to watch TV, mourn, and wonder about the future. I returned to Bud's class ten days later and we may have talked about it all, but I have no memory of that -- and about 17 years later would find myself working at City High, where Bud had become dean of students and cross country coach and a living legend. I mentioned once to him that I had been in his World History class on that fateful day. He just nodded and had nothing to say. It was random coincidence and that was that.

I have watched from afar as other Kennedys came and went in our lives, with the assassination of Bobby Kennedy just after I graduated from high school in 1968 being a rival painful moment. 

The country missed out on the generational leadership that Bobby might have provided had he won that year's presidential election. He was the favorite in the race and he was vastly superior in many ways to his older brother as a leader and thinker. 

I occasionally reflect on "what if" regarding the Kennedy brothers and know I am supposed to be skeptical that one man (or woman) really can make the difference in a giant country and world. But I do retain the perhaps quaint notion that one person in the right place with the right leadership and insight can make things better (or worse) for much larger groups of folks. 

One of the happy surprises in my life was that Barack Obama was NOT assassinated. I have long assumed that the good guys get gunned down. It is America, after all.

Thoughts and prayers, of course.

Billionaires and wackos and murderers... just your basic week of news

The World Cup began yesterday and the U.S. plays its first match today... and most of the news is about how Qatar brought in thousands of workers from poor nations nearby and how hundreds died in construction accidents and many more have not been paid and how all those workers were mistreated. Hooray for sports!

FIFA, the organization that runs international soccer, is a rotting, horrifying gang of wealthy elites who find autocratic nations easier to work with... thus forcing teams to toil for the amusement of dictators and monarchs. More cheers for the beauty of sports!

Billionaires are in the news -- when are they not? -- and it's mostly bad news. Elon Musk is quickly revealing that he is mostly a spoiled rich kid who has manipulated his way to a fortune and who claims genius when really he has stolen great ideas. 

Trump may or may not be a billionaire (he claims he is) but his "return" to politics seemed like a rerun of an old TV show that only attracted a few fans to begin with. Americans have short attention spans and little regard for history, but his shelf-life may be over. Hooray for moving on!

The wacko who snookered thousands into investing in FTX crypto reveals that the company may owe about $3 billion to investors, and the entire crypto market may finally be revealed as the ponzi scheme it always was. Hooray for idiots looking for quick riches!

Just an hour south of here, a clearly deranged psycho who should have been receiving mental health care murdered five and injured dozens more in a shooting at a GLBQA+ dance club. One customer evidently tackled and beat up the guy, thus saving many more lives before police could even arrive. Hooray for personal bravery!

So much to be thankful for.

An easy call: feeding hungry kids is the right thing to do

Pundits predict legislative gridlock starting in January, as the Republicans take over as the majority in the House of Representatives. Few voters purposely chose creating a congressional situation that won't get much done over the next couple years, but some may be delighted at this result. 

Prior to the change in power, however, there is the so-called Lame Duck session that has already begun. The Senate has already advanced a bill to protect gay marriage and interracial marriage in law, and should vote on a final version soon. Democrats hope to save the nation from financial chaos by lifting the debt ceiling. 

And one other thing the lame duck session might do is bring back the Child Tax Credit act that lowered child poverty by 50 percent during the pandemic, but which expired last year.

Fighting poverty and hunger and homelessness among the nation's children has to be a bipartisan issue, though nothing is ever simple in our tribal politics. You would think there might be 10-12 Republican senators who could be persuaded to support the bill, which gives all the power to spend the extra money to families -- a conservative value if there ever was one.

I shouldn't connect everything to Taylor Swift and the Ticketmaster fiasco of the past few days, but a nation that can freak out over concert tickets and is OK with thousands of workers monitoring a ticketing website rather than working can certainly afford to feed its children.

As we head into the holidays and the mix of love and sanctimony and commercialism and family gatherings, bringing American families a modest monthly income boost each month seems like the ultimate gift to our neighbors. 

The rich would foot the bill, mostly, as will happen in Colorado next year with universal free school lunch paid by a small increase in taxes for those making over $400,000 per year. 

A proven strategy to give our children a stronger foundation in life is something all should be able to get behind. 

Or are we just too exhausted? Too divided? Too calculating and cruel?

The next few weeks will tell us a lot.

Monopolies take advantage of consumers... who knew?

To the surprise of no one, Ticketmaster's monopoly on online ticket sales for many events produced chaos and ugliness and incredibly inflated prices for Taylor Swift's first in-person tour in over four years.

People waited in online queues for hours, and often still couldn't buy tickets. Websites crashed and families were likely damaged due the stress. There are reports of seats going for $12,000 or more, and the fact that there are likely some people willing to part with that much for a few hours with their idol is sobering. But I guess "freedom" means we can do whatever wacky things we want to do with our money. 

I will not be engaging in such weirdness, thank you. But Taylor Swift means something special to a large chunk of Millennials and that pent up demand to experience her talent live connects directly with all sorts of inflationary forces in today's economy.

After a couple years not traveling to see relatives at the holidays, Americans are definitely going this year, whatever the cost. Airline prices are up over 40 percent but airports are expecting record passengers passing through next week.

Our national (and international) return to normal means trouble for overextended online platforms, which invested in hiring and expansion at huge costs when everyone was stuck in the virtual world. It turns out that humans prefer in-person to virtual, which is bad news for Zuckerberg and Meta and those wacky headsets they want to foist on us. 

Twitter is in a death spiral, which is supremely entertaining for those of us who enjoy a bit of schadenfreude over rich people screwing up. Cryptocurrency is being exposed as the pyramid scheme it is. Facebook and Amazon are shedding workers, and what a nice pre-holiday surprise that must be for thousands of skilled workers. 

I assume those fired workers will end up just fine in the end. Skilled talent always does, though that is easy to say for an old guy not employed by one of our nation's "masters." 

I admit that I would be inconvenienced by Amazon decreasing its services and efficiencies, but I can and do live without Twitter. If Facebook vanished, I would just shrug. 

I'm sure there are some frantic parents who have promised children those golden tickets to see Taylor Swift and who now have to break the news that they simply can't obtain those treasures. There will be tears. 

And then we can get back to agonizing over a disgraced man running for president again, over our continuing suffering due to returning to standard time, and over how clunky the Disney app is on Xfinity.

Now that last item has really been bugging me.

Teachers can build writing competence a sentence at a time

If I were dropped back into a high school English classroom tomorrow (the horror!) I would find ways to focus student attention at the start of class by projecting a sentence or two on the screen and invite the students to analyze what was said and HOW it was said.

I know I would likely need to provide context and answer various questions, but we don't need to turn to the Classics for examples of fun with language. And we don't need to read entire essays or novels to explore the rhetorical choices we all can make.

From a recent "For the love of sentences" feature, by Frank Bruni:

In The Philadelphia Inquirer, the sports columnist Mike Sielski weighed in on the playoffs and World Series performance of the outfielder Kyle Schwarber, invoking the memory of the band Led Zeppelin: “It’s not enough to call him the Phillies’ tone-setter. He’s not so much setting a tone as he is crashing through the front door, grabbing the first pair of drumsticks he sees, and going full John Bonham as his teammates reach for their guitars.”

I have no problem with sports writers reaching for comparisons from non-sports events and figures -- after all, sports stories are really just STORIES with sports as context -- but this sentence refers to a drummer who died in 1980. I wouldn't say there are NO readers under age 60 who would immediately grasp this reference, but this sentence might stand as Exhibit A when we talk about how old newspaper readers are.

A more contemporary reference came from Nick Welsh, the executive editor of The Santa Barbara Independent, who reflected on the attack on Paul Pelosi and the misinformation that both preceded and followed it, observing that “our national political discourse has grown indistinguishable from zombie apocalypse TV shows” and wondering “whether we are what we watch or watch what we are.” 

One of the narratives about the midterms, where many voters seem to have set the floor for what sorts of craziness they will tolerate, is that "we have reached our limit" in terms of dealing with constant terror and conspiracies. Our students may or may not connect with THAT idea, but they may find a discussion on how much our actions reflect TV shows vs. how much TV shows are designed to reflect reality.

 

In The Washington Post, David Von Drehle described the lure of the Powerball lottery: “In the infinitesimal space between zero chance and the tiniest of chances, a lot of dreams can gather.”

A standard motivational phrase for students is "you can do anything you put your mind to." That is obviously an exaggeration, and may end up creating endless disappointment. But everyone likes to daydream a bit about "what if," as in "what if I suddenly had a billion dollars."

Poking fun at clichés, sportswriting and the intensifying American fascination with an oddly named game, Caira Conner wrote in The Atlantic: “Watch the highlight reel of the 2022 U.S. Open Pickleball Championships and your jaw … might stay right where it is.”

Pickleball is enjoying a moment right now, but high school P.E. classes have been playing it for decades now. It doesn't take up that much space, the rules are simple, and the equipment needed minimal. But it's hard to argue with flipping the "jaw dropping" cliche when it comes to describing actual matches.

Also in The Atlantic, Elaine Godfrey described a rally that Barack Obama attended in Pennsylvania: “When the 44th president came onstage, the crowd greeted him like a long-lost friend — or a favorite teacher who’d returned after a series of varyingly unimpressive substitutes.” 

That final reference should connect with almost any reader, as everyone has had frustrations with substitute teachers in their own schooling. Students want their teacher... the one who will ultimately determine their grade and the one who they can count on for a period of time.

Sports reporting demands more than watching from the stands

A newish benefit of my NY Times Kindle subscription is access to "The Athletic," which was acquired by the Times about a year ago and which focuses on sports of all kinds.

I don't spend all that much time there but it's nice to be able to dig into some favorite teams, with reporting by journalists who are close to those teams with lots of access. 

A story that caught my eye today was on what happens during the Cincinnati Bengals pro football team halftime. The total time available is 12 minutes, and I was surprised to learn that this is HALF of what college football teams get. That little stat is startling to me, though I may be one of the last fans on the planet to have been ignorant of the time difference.

Most of the story is made up of short anecdotes from various players and coaches, many focusing on the logistics of coaches getting from the press box to the locker room (and then back again for the second half) and how many are not in all that great shape. All that racing to the elevators and down hallways leads to about three minutes of conversation, sharing of video clips, and planning for the coming half of football.

There are no cameras or even reporters in those halftime locker rooms. I assume that is a rule designed to keep "secret" plans from leaking to the opposition. Or maybe it's nice for even professionals to have a few minutes away from the all-seeing and all-knowing media. 

What drew me to the story in the first place, though, was that the reporting attempted to take me "behind the scenes" and reveal aspects of the sport that have been invisible to me. Those are the sports stories that high school reporters can often bring readers, if they make the effort. Student reporters may even enjoy more access than their professional counterparts.

Fans of high school teams who care likely either attend most games or at least pay close attention to results and trends and stats and rankings. They don't need the basic 5Ws and H all that much, though even when we can watch a sporting event with our own eyes, a lot happens that we can't quite make out.

But those invested fans are the "base" of our sports audience. We might be able to induce some students to check out a sports coverage story if the events are dramatic enough or if we find some universal human interest angles, but we need to pay attention to the die-hard fans if we want to be successful over time.

A nice opportunity exists for high school reporters to gain access to locker rooms during halftime, as long as we can persuade the coach that we can be trusted. We can establish that trust simply by regularly attending practices and listening more than opining. The more reporters become a familiar fixture at practices, the more likely the coaches and players will accept them in the locker room. 

Yes, there are issues with gender and privacy, particularly at the high school level, but reasonable restrictions and expectations can take care of any concerns. Sophomore female reporters will not find themselves surrounded by naked players near the showers... not at halftime. 

I'm not sure some sort of minute-by-minute story on what happens during a particular halftime can produce a true narrative, but hearing and seeing adjustments being discussed, spirits lifted, challenges presented, etc., can produce more insightful coverage.

Athletes know this: more than 80 percent of any player's participation in a sport is NOT on the field or court or in the pool. Success (or failure) can always be traced back to practice and to team meetings... and even halftime planning and recuperation.

It certainly requires some dedication and some investment of time to produce that sort of reporting, but the potential is there for those curious and driven enough to explore that type of sports reporting. 

We aren't there to embarass or spill secrets or play "gotcha" with anyone. I would call it "doing your research," and that works in almost any writing situation.

Today's possibly good news about the future of American politics

According to NBC News exit polling after the midterms, here are the breakdowns on party-line voting by age groups: 

18-29 years of age    Dem 63%    Rep 35%

30-44                        Dem 51%    Rep 47%

45-64                        Dem 44%    Rep 54%

65 or older                Dem 43%    Rep 55%

That is quite a dramatic split and should it continue into the future, the Angry White People Party is looking at needing to find some new strategies if they want to be competitive in future elections... maybe starting very soon, indeed.

Of course, it is also possible that the natural tendency for humans to become more conservative, more "backwards looking," as we age to cut into the potential Democratic advantages. But we know that at least half of Americans in the youngest voting block are NOT white and that nature will be editing (my term for death in this case) that oldest block.

The numbers add even more irony to the fact that President Biden is about to turn 80 and that most Dem leaders in Congress are close to that age. Few can rival Grassley, who should be edited soon, but you can't help but wonder if some excellent leaders are being forced to wait their turn... and perhaps for too long.

If I were a Democratic leader, I would be finding more ways to appeal to voters under 45, from more support for child tax credits, child care initiatives, tuition support, housing initiatives, job retraining, rebuilding manufacturing, etc.).

The oldest group (my age group, to my chagrin) is well taken care of, according to almost every measure, not to mention they are unlikely to swing their support to other parties at this point. That is why, BTW, I am so amazed that ANY Republicans would publicly suggest reductions in Social Security or Medicare. That seems like a sure way to end your relevance as a political force. Few seniors are going to embrace "sacrifice" on behalf of wealthy corporations and inflated defense spending.

In weird political news, Trump plans a big announcement for tomorrow, likely beginning his presidential bid for 2024. His timing could not be worse, but since he is consumed with his own image and pride, he likely can't be bothered to think twice about thrusting himself (and his benighted followers) back into our anxiety-driven lives. 

Oh, well. We had a week or so to enjoy some relative calm.

Marking 104 years of some version of Veterans Day

It's Veterans Day, and I am one... though my service was limited to basic training in Texas, tech school in Denver, two years at RAF Lakenheath, England, and a final eight months in North Dakota. A total of two years, eleven months and 13 days... but enough to earn me 35 months of GI Bill, which was essential to me finishing my BA and my Masters.

I was drafted after losing my student deferment due to low grades (in 1969), but chose to enlist in the Air Force to perhaps avoid the rice paddies of Vietnam... and sheer luck allowed me to miss southeast Asia. 

I had never been on a plane until I flew from Des Moines to San Antonio for basic training, and had certainly not ever been overseas. So the two years in England soon after Kathleen and I married were a combination foreign office job and extended honeymoon... which ended with a baby and a return to the States.

In almost all respects, my military service was incredibly lucky and the time away from "the world" gave me some time to grow up a bit. Still in that process, but things are looking promising.

Sunday at church there will be tributes to those who served and I will stand with the rest of the Air Force veterans, most of whom will be my age or older. I can't say I am proud of my service time, exactly. I didn't have much choice (other than to choose a four-year enlistment over two years in the Army). 

I will say that my three-year investment in the service, however, repaid me multiple times through that GI Bill support, along with providing an amazing start to our marriage. 

We really only had each other. Even calling home was a chore involving lots of British coins and an old phone box in Lakenheath village. Kathleen received $100 per month as a dependent, and my pay was $300 per month starting in 1972 (thanks, Richard Nixon). That was a nice bump since pay was $100 per month when I started six months prior.

Why we decided to have Lesley at our young age and with almost no financial cushion is a mystery to me at this point. Did we talk it all out? Did we create a clear plan? Or did we just say, "Let's do this"? I would guess the latter, and it certainly worked out for us.

Both of my grandfathers served in WWI, and neither saw any combat. I would guess that might be the story for many veterans such as myself. After all, it takes a multitude to support those infantry soldiers and combat pilots.

The Chancel Choir will sing "America" during the services Sunday and other groups will play service hymns... there will even be a tribute song from the young kids.

Any number of folks may offer a quick, "Thank you for your service," and then we can move past all that and get back to our daily lives. 

I heard an interview on NPR this morning from about a decade ago with Kurt Vonnegut, one of my favorite authors, and he said he preferred the original title for Veterans Day: Armistice Day. WWI ended on November 11, 1918, at 11 p.m. That does have a nice ring: 11/11 at 11. Vonnegut fought in WWII. He is dead now. So it goes.

I am sure my grandfathers did not begrudge expanding the observance to include the wars that came after, though they may also have shaken their heads that there WERE so many wars to follow.

On balance, I am glad to have given something to the country. Perhaps the country needs to explore new ways for its young citizens to contribute time and talent and energy to our culture.

Would it heal anything? Who knows? But it would be worth a try.

There are trends, but mostly local elections just prompt more questions

Colorado voters seem to have passed a state referendum to provide free school lunch for all public school students. The $100 million per year added expense will be covered by limiting some tax deductions for those making over $400,000 per year. The fact that we can keep kids from going hungry and indirectly support low income families, all without most of us paying more in taxes, seems like a no-brainer.

The only surprise was that 45 percent of voters chose "no" to this proposal. Were they thinking they might someday make a fortune each year, and wanted to avoid adding to that future tax bill? Were they just curmudgeons who automatically vote "no" to all ballot propositions? Were they people who believe young kids should suffer, just like they did? 

A separate proposition that provides spouses who lost their husband or wife in combat a reduction in property taxes was passed with nearly 88 percent, but that still leaves a pesky 12 percent in opposition.

I sometimes wonder if voters read the issues carefully, though I suppose someone could say, "Why does this only go to homeowners? I am a renter and not married, but I can imagine losing a spouse to war."

Of course, 65 percent of voters approved lowering the state income tax rate from 4.55 percent to 4.40 percent. If there's one thing we can mostly agree upon, it's that we want our money. Of course, we also want our services and roads and schools and so much more. 

We are just not going to be enthusiastic about paying for anything.

Voters in Douglas County, one of the richest per capita in the country, voted down two proposed tax increases, one for new buildings and maintenance and the other to boost teacher pay. Yes, we have had bitter feuds within the school board and with the firing of a beloved superintendent, and yes, some can argue that they don't trust those in charge. 

But my guess is that DCSD teachers with fewer than ten years experience will be looking to switch to a neighboring district in ever-greater numbers. On average, they can make an additional $20,000 per year, plus the major boosts to their eventual retirement payout (a huge factor from the perspective of a retiree). 

Taking your talents to another district is not good for students, but it's the only possible way for educators to make their point about how cheap Douglas County voters are. We won't see the numbers until March or later, when teachers are signing new contracts, but everyone should be able to see the looming crisis.

The vote was fairly close, probably just close enough to have the measures return in the coming year or two. But voters have made it clear about how much they value their teachers, and it's not much.

Students are paying attention to such disrespect, and how many are quickly shedding any hazy plans to someday teach? 

That would be like aspiring to join the ranks of garbage collectors. Sure, we need them, but who jots down "trash industry" on their vision board?

Now that the midterm election is behind us...

We are back from a quick Vegas trip, and Kathleen and I agreed that we may be "over" Vegas at this point. We saw some fine shows but the construction messes and the rip-off pricing everywhere and the general shabbiness of many properties makes it unlikely we will make a point to return.

The midterm election results continue to be counted, and I feel a mix of relief and regret. It is sad to see that Iowa chose to return Grassley, at age 89, to the Senate for six more years. At this point, even death my not deter those crack Iowa voters to forsake the corpse. 

Colorado moved more solidly into Blue territory, which is a complete about face from when I moved here 20 years ago. Then, the state looked solidly Red and Dems were in the desert, so to speak. The Republicans lost most contested races and may lose a couple House races that remain too close to call.

Unfortunately, Florida turning blood red more than cancels out Colorado's turn to more progressive policies. No reason for Dems to invest much in Florida for a few years, unless they intend to rebuild the party from the ground up. Wisconsin is much the same, with the gerrymandering by R's so extreme that few Democrats can win in their districts. The governor will be a Democrat again, but Johnson looks to have eked out a narrow win, which makes me wonder if Badgers have imbibed the same Kool-Aid as their Iowa neighbors. 

Apparently, American voters chose national stagnation over any agendas, and both parties are to blame. It's true that a giant, diverse country can handle multiple challenges and goals, but as long as the mega-rich remain in power, we are doomed to chaos. 

Donny Osmond was a force to reckoned with last night during his show at Harrah's, and at age 65 he seems razor-sharp, uber-talented, and generally a sign that all is not lost. So there's that.

And now I am back to nudge three online courses to the finish line: it's about a month away. 

Something fishy going on in the mountains

Here's the kind of "unforced error" that has to make local newspaper publishers crazy: For a period of at least ten days, readers of the Swift chain of small community papers serving ski town in Colorado could not find ANY stories about Democratic candidates using the paper's online search functions. 

Bonus: readers COULD find Republican coverage using the same search engines. 

How could anyone not suspect some mischief being afoot? Particularly in these times?

No one seems to have any idea about what happened and the search function has evidently been restored... and only a handful of readers actually used the search function (there are many other ways for them to access their news), but this is a serious failure of trust.

It may be tough to recover that trust, which was already at a low level, if Colorado's ski towns are typical of other communities. After all, if the main local news source can't be trusted to accurately reflect its own coverage (those papers DID have stories on Dem candidates), then what else may be inaccurate?

I use this logic in urging students to spend more time on getting things right in their introductions (or "leads" in newswriting talk). If readers encounter a grammar error or a misspelled name or simple word, their willingness to trust the rest of the essay or article is immediately damaged. The easiest thing for a reader to do is stop reading, after all, and no one really WANTS to read much of anything.

We NEED to find out more, about whatever is on our minds. 

Newspapers and TV stations have a tendency to NOT cover themselves and no one looks forward to revealing weakness in procedures or people, particularly journalists who are trying to maintain at least a veneer of objectivity and openness. 

There have been many articles published recently about the death of local news, and there are even legislative initiatives to promote more local news outlets. Those efforts could use a bit more support, particularly avoiding this sort of story that muddies what happened and why. 

Do we really need more sloppy local news outlets? More slopping thinking in persuasive essays? More tolerance of easy-to-correct mistakes?

The one about the old guy hit with a hammer

Among today's news is the revelation that Paul Pelosi's attacker is a Canadian citizen who is in the U.S. illegally. I'm sure that will be spun multiple ways -- it is election season -- but, honestly, who cares?

Hitting an 80-something guy in the head with a hammer is simply heinous, and the nationality of the attacker could not be less relevant. 

What is relevant is that a vocal few politicians and pundits have found ways to turn the attack into some form of joke or perhaps even a story of retribution for the evils of Nancy Pelosi and all Democrats.

I have read commentaries about THIS being somehow different, about this attack crossing a line, and about how the ugly comments and memes will make a difference in our national debate. Pardon me for wondering if most people have even paid much attention to yet another act of violence in America. 

I have basically given up on the hope of my fellow citizens getting back to anything resembling civilized debates and returning to what I assumed were shared American values. I am hopelessly naive, I suppose, but I always valued moral and ethical judgment for legislators and judges and presidents. 

I know they were and are human and flawed, but the mere expectation that our leaders should be moral and ethical people was enough to rein in the worst excesses, cause shamed politicians to resign, or prompt voters to issue their own sentences for transgressors.

Now it's tough to imagine anything creating enough shame to force a politician out of a race. I often think about how Al Franken was railroaded out of the Senate by his fellow Democrats. It was rushed and unfair, but perhaps that defines the major difference between the leaders of our two political parties: one group retains enough morality to feel shame, and the other has decided morality and ethics are for losers.

I see that Herschel Walker is counting on white Evangelicals to support his "redemption story" and vote for him despite his many past sins and his clear lack of preparation for being a U.S. Senator. That might mean more if the nation were lacking in any other options than an obviously brain-damaged former football player who has abused and even terrorized women in the past. 

A redemption story might do the trick if Walker were the only qualified candidate for a specific job. But that is a ludicrous idea. We could basically pick any white male in Georgia who is a Republican and is willing to endure the indignities of our elections, and he could win. Notice that I specified a male, which is appalling in it own way while being absolutely true.

My head tells me that the midterms will not quite become Armageddon, no matter the results, but my heart tells me to prepare for chaos that no one wants to seriously consider. 

So we don't.

The bad news never seems to truly surprise me anymore

More predictable news stories...

Daylight savings time ends at 2 a.m. this coming Sunday and that is either terrible or great or ???? Sleep researchers tend to favor just sticking with standard time, which is closer to what humans have experienced for millennia. Something about resetting our internal clocks each morning due to special receptors in the eyes or something. Who knows?

Here is one thing I know: we will have at least two days of TV and social media blathering about the "change" and how bad it is... or not. There will be some traffic accidents that will be blamed on drowsy drivers (or maybe overly alert drivers, since most Americans will "gain" an hour overnight into Sunday).

The Federal Reserve is prepping for another .75 percent interest rise quite soon, part of its attempt to rein in inflation and still avoid a recession and generally fit thousands of angels on the head of a pin. At the same time, lots of companies are reporting record profits and are boasting that no matter how high they raise their prices consumers are still buying. 

I am shocked, shocked I say, that companies will soak consumers for every extra penny and give no consideration to their legal theft. I read a story today that wondered how companies will fool consumers in the future into thinking they are getting better value for the increased prices, since companies don't lower their prices based on lower inflation and lower costs. 

Many universities and most community colleges are experiencing dropping enrollment combined with the need to provide remedial courses for entering students, particularly in math. Another shock! So it turns out that nearly two years of a pandemic and online schooling and political violence and economic rollercoasters is having an effect on education? Who could have predicted this?

Oh, and add in soaring college costs that seem designed to produce far fewer college students at the same time the "powers that be" push college as the gateway to success... which likely means we will see a higher percentage of upper middle class and upper class students entering college in the next few years... and even more separation between the educated elites and the riff raff who the elites depend upon to serve them.

Canada announced that it plans to welcome a million new immigrants, mostly based on specific job needs and skills, in the next year or two. About 20 percent of all Canadians are immigrants, a record high. 

America, on the other hand, has no plans regarding immigration at all beyond current practices, while most of the country experiences severe labor shortages and wonders "where did all the workers go?". Let me take a stab at it: Baby Boomers have left the work force and succeeding generations are finding more fulfilling and lucrative jobs than in food service and truck driving and child care and gardening... 

Canada has a government that is creating targeted programs to handle near-future needs. America awaits the "end times," so why worry about climate and worker shortages or even inflation? The Chosen will soon be ascending to heaven to party with other special souls, and everyone else is doomed. Sorry, I must have read one too many Lauren Boebert stories.

Trump's taxes don't have to be released, at least for another week or so, and Lindsey Graham will have to testify to a Georgia grand jury, though he likely will take the Fifth, and the midterms will be messy and won't lead to much of anything other than more chaos and bickering and accusations.

And Trump will announce his candidacy for 2024 before the year ends, which means that will be all anyone can talk about.

But by all means, let's focus on changing the clock.

We need smart people to create new paths toward justice

The recently radicalized U.S. Supreme Court heard cases that challenged affirmative action for university admission yesterday, and no one will be surprised if the court ends up banning any admissions policies that are race-based. That will be another example of how the court is delighted to overturn numerous precedents in order to serve rabid conservative agendas. 

At some point, we just have to face the fact the the court is as biased and political as the other branches of government, which is as big a potential problem as election-deniers and white nationalists (and maybe connected with them). 

But...

It may be possible to be a bit more clever about admission policies, according to all sorts of "experts." And it's worth noting that a slight majority of racial minorities oppose affirmative action based on race, which should get us thinking about alternatives that stretch beyond current political unrest and taking default positions.

One strategy is to grant "automatic" admittance to students who rank near the top of their class, no matter the high school. This has clear positives, allowing schools that are essentially segregated to send their top students, no matter their standardized test scores, etc., to top universities. This is now being done in Texas, for instance. 

The problem for the Ivy League schools (Harvard is a defendant in the Supreme Court case) is that they are not "state" schools. They draw from everywhere and there are too many high schools to make the Texas plan work. But smart people could probably work out some method to better spread the applicants out than the current mix of "legacies," excellent test takers, and high GPAs at traditionally strong schools. A lot of admitted students to the Ivy League schools are "groomed" from early years, attending private prep schools, so they are overrepresented in those student bodies.

My choice would be the second option widely discussed, namely to weigh socio-economic status more heavily in making admission decisions. Currently, research by the economist Raj Chetty found that Harvard has 15 times as many students from the richest one-fifth of the population as the poorest one-fifth. At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, students in the top one-fifth of income are 16 times as plentiful as in the bottom one-fifth.

So the reality is that the true division among students at top universities is (shock!) between rich and poor, like so much in America. The nation would be better served with more diversity in terms of family income and experiences, and a clever admissions department could find ways to work around any Supreme Court affirmative action rulings and still bring in students of color... with the bonus of boosting some of the nation's poorest families and opening doors they now can only dream of.

We have now reached the point where many Americans can't trust the Supreme Court to watch out for the "little guy" anymore (if they ever could), but smart rules and even future legislation can create paths forward. 

My initial reaction to the likely striking down of race-based admissions was that this would cause an immediate radical increase in white and Asian-American students at top schools. And maybe it will. But universities see the benefit of more diversity in their student bodies, and I hope most Americans would agree.

Not the Christian White Nationalists, of course. They are only in it for themselves.