The New York Times begins a three-week series today on the issue of Class in America. I have argued for years that Race is not the issue in America; that it is, in fact, Class that divides us. Today’s series opener by Janny Scott and David Leonhardt says it well right from the headline: Class in America: Shadowy Lines That Still Divide.

(Be sure to check where you fit.)

A few days ago Bill Calahan asked the question: What’s going to be the biggest issue in the 2005 Cleveland Mayor’s race that nobody’s talking about… yet? The answer he got back was: Race. I agree with Bill when he replied a few days later:

You answered: Race. Jobs. Poverty. Regionalism. The lakefront. Too many council members. Who’s got a vision. You think these are “issues that nobody’s talking about”? Hmmmm. People, you gotta get out more.

Yes. We do, Bill. So what does Class mean in Cleveland?

My Soundtrack: Foreign Affairs by Tom Waits.

Americans will vote for cornpone Nazis before they will give up their entitlements to a McHouse and a McCar. And you can quote him on that. So says James Kunstler in an interview with Katharine Mieszkowski for Salon. Kuntlser is talking about the energy emergency, he says, we’re already in, but when I read the quote, I thought about our entitlement society and saw a larger implication.

A few weeks ago, in the course of reviewing a History lesson with one of my students, I read President Franklin Roosevelt’s historic speech to the 77th Congress on 6 January 1941. In that speech Roosevelt said:

In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.

That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation. That kind of world is the very antithesis of the so-called “new order” of tyranny which the dictators seek to create with the crash of a bomb.

While the speech is visionary, one of the things my student and I discussed was how Roosevelts’ Four Freedoms compared to President Thomas Jefferson’s unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. And it was on No. 3, Freedom from Want, that we hit the biggest snag.

Roosevelt said freedom from want meant securing a healthy peacetime life for all the world’s inhabitants. But what does that mean? What is healthy? How high up Maslow’s pyramid do we have to climb to satisfy this freedom?

Over the past 64 years, it seems to me, the definition of what constitutes Freedom from Want has been contiunously ratcheted-up for everyone. From the eight-year-old who wants an iPod to the billionaire developer who wants tax abatement for a business partk, Americans have come to believe that they have a right to what they want, regardless of the consequences for the rest of the nation or the world.

I want a lot of things. Do I have any right to what I want? No.

I’m reminded of a Zen story. A boy wished to study with a Master. Day after day the boy approached the Master, telling him that he wanted to learn from him, and day after day the Master turned him away.

One day the Master took the boy over to a water bucket, and grabbing the boy by the scruff of his neck, forced his head under the water and held it there. The boy kicked and struggled but the Master was too strong for him to break free.

At last, the Master pulled the gasping boy back to his feet and turned him around so that he could look him in the eye. “When you want to learn as much as you wanted to breathe just now. Come back and see me.”

There is a great chasm between Jefferson’s inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness and Roosevelt’s freedom from want. I think we need to have our heads thrust into the bucket for a bit. It couldn’t hurt.

My Soundtrack: The Volta Sound by The Volta Sound, demo EP.

Out in Spokane, Washington, the school board has decided that the schools should teach abstenance-only sex education. The local group fronting the move is Teen-Aid. Fortunately, the group is not without it’s opposition. Given the high degree of lies revealed last year in an examination of the Bush administration’s support of such programs – see Lying To Our Children…, 4 December 04 – you have to feel for these kids.

But at least one in-coming freshman is approaching the school district’s decision with a sense of humor. Tony presented the above bit of photoshoppery to his mother last evening and she liked it enough to post it to her blog. I liked it enough to get permission to repost it here.

It gives me hope that the next generation won’t be dumbed down by ill advised educational decisions that will make it harder for them to compete against their peers in India and China.

My Soundtrack: Images Of Love by various.

In My Backpack… Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir In Books by Azar Nafisi (I’m up to page 109, Bonnie); In My Car… Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison; On My Nightstand… In The Box Called Pleasure by Kim Addonizio; On My Computer… We Collect Gull Feathers by Timothy Young; On My Screen… The Shield: Dominoes Falling (**) directed by Scott Brazil, written by Shawn Ryan.

My Soundtrack: Steal This Disc, 2 by various.

Do you suppose the Plain Dealer would have run this full-page advertisement for Wal-Mart? I’d like to think not, but we all know how desparate newspapers are getting thsese days. The Washington Post reports this morning in Wal-Mart To Apologize For Ad In Newspaper that the folks at the Arizona Daily Sun didn’t have any problems. Under a picture of a Nazi book burning in 1933 the Wal-Mart-approved text reads:

Should we let government tell us what we can read? Of course not . . . So why should we allow local government to limit where we shop?

The issue, of course, is a pesky Arizona zoning ordinance that would G*A*S*P prevent Wal-Mart from exanding a local store to include a grocery. Sound familiar?

My Soundtrack: Brave Hearts, New Scots Music by various.

Real I.D. is the latest buzz word coming out of Washington. This week Congress approved and sent to President George W. Bush legislation that will require Americans to present four pieces of identification when they renew their driver’s license. This is a bad idea on many levels, not the least of which is that the legislation will have zero effect on its reported purpose: making life more difficult for terrorists.

Can you say forged driver’s license?

Farhad Monjoo in Salon’s Identity Crisis does a good job of laying out the holes in the legislation; not the least of which is the additional nightmare it’s going to make to your regular trips to the Department of Motor Vehicles. What he misses however, is that this is a perfect example of Congressional buck passing.

Since 1789, our State Department has issued passports and those passports have been the gold standard for identifying yourself as a citizen of the United States. If Congress wants every citizen to have positive identification then Congress should pass a law requiring everyone at 18 (or whatever age) to get a passport.

But Congress doesn’t want to do that because it would mean, among other inconveniences, that the Federal government would have to increase the size of its bureaucracy to issue and track all the additional passports. Given the Bush administration’s out-of-control Big Government Conservatism, that might not go over too well. But lay it on the states to take up the slack and the Feds get off free.

No. This is just another example of politicians flailing about and trying to create the illusion that they’re actually doing something. Kind of like the clueless-ones down in Columbus.

My Soundtrack: Sweet And Lowdown by various, movie soundtrack.

In My Backpack… Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir In Books by Azar Nafisi (I’m reading, I’m reading, Bonnie); In My Car… Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison; On My Nightstand… In The Box Called Pleasure by Kim Addonizio; On My Computer… Borrowed Time by David Moreau; On My Screen… The Shield: Dominoes Falling (**) directed by Scott Brazil, written by Shawn Ryan.

My Soundtrack: Songcatcher by various, movie soundtrack.

Randy Martin is another Phoenix regular and yesterday he came through with a copy of his brand-spanking new, hot off-the-presses business management book: They Just Don’t Get It. Martin, along with co-author Leslie Yerkes and illustrator Ben Dewey will be signing their book at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Legacy Village at 7 p.m. on 14 June.

[Update: This just – 1424 on 14 May – in:

Guten Tag,

Erin at Inside-Outside]

One of my favorite activities is visting art galleries. The Art Walks in Tremont and on Murray Hill (why don’t Murray Hill galleries have a group web presnce?) are a chance to see some good Art like the batik on the left by P. Alexandria. And Lee Road is developing it’s own gallery culture with Heights Art, Paradise Gallery, Art & Sol, Mirage Art Gallery and Studio You.

There are more good artists in Cleveland than there is open wall space in galleries. So why would someone want to devote a month’s worth of gallery space to bad art? It beats me too, but that’s apparently what the Inside-Outside Art Gallery is going to do next month.

I found out about the show from Cool Cleveland, which posted:

Call for the worst art. Showcase your cringe-worthy artwork during Inside-Outside Art Gallery’s Worst Art Exhibit in Cleveland.

Here’s how Inside-Outside is promoting the show:

A Call for Entries!!! Inside-Outside Art Gallery is looking for artists for our june exhibit, The Worst Art Exhibit in Cleveland. Entry fee is $3.00 [er work, all media considered. Any artist may enter provided the work is terrible. One may enter a piece found in a dumpster, thrift store, or something your great-aunt Matilda gave you, as long as its bad. This is a juried exhibition, so if the woork is too good, it won’t be accepted. Photos are accepted for the jurying, or you can just bring the work into the gallery between Saturday May 21st and Saturday May 28th. Rejected works may be picked up by the 1st of June. Opening Reception June 3rd. Show runs through June 30th. No Thomas Kinkaid.

OK. I understand the irony thing. But this seems to me to be counter productive. So, I dropped this note to the folks at the gallery:

Shalom,

Jeff

I think Adam Harvey needs to stop in and talk to these people.

My Soundtrack: The Blues Brothers by various, movie soundtrack.

In My Backpack… Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir In Books by Azar Nafisi; In My Car… Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison; On My Nightstand… In The Box Called Pleasure by Kim Addonizio; On My Computer… The Perfect Day by Alice N. Persons; On My Screen… The Shield: Dominoes Falling (**) directed by Scott Brazil, written by Shawn Ryan.

My Soundtrack: O Brother, Where Art Thou? by vaious, movie soundtrack.

[Update 1: Latha Poonamallee at NEOBEAN and Scholarmama.]
[Update 2: Anthony Parker at Urban Cleveland Magazine.]

Last Saturday in Baker’s Dozens, I concluded my hunt for gender balance in my blogroll and posted my addtions. In that same post I announced my new hunt for the non-European blog voices in the NEOsphere. This one is proving to be tougher. I only had one lead, so far, from my friend Cavana.

He pointed me to Jimi Izrael and one other blogger. I only have an email address for the second blogger and I’ve dropped him a note, but I’ve already added Jimi’s. Be sure to check out his Dealing With Crack.

This morning at Brewed Fresh Daily, in a continuing discussion on Race in Cleveland, George Nemeth answers the question, Are There Any Black Bloggers? with the three links I’ve added to the one for Izrael’s blog.

There has to be more than this. Is this a case, like the FBI’s bogus profiler list, where my European blinders are preventing me from looking in the right place for non-European bloggers? Help me out here.

Jimi Izrael
Liberal Portions
Diary Of A Mad Cleveland Filmaker
Trula Star

My Soundtrack: Symphonic Rock, American Classics by various.

In My Backpack… Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir In Books by Azar Nafisi; In My Car… Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison; On My Nightstand… In The Box Called Pleasure by Kim Addonizio; On My Computer… The Table and the Chair by Edward Lear; On My Screen… The Shield: Dominoes Falling (**) directed by Scott Brazil, written by Shawn Ryan.

My Soundtrack: Chinese Bamboo Flute Music by various.

Everyone I’ve shown this to has asked for the link so that they could pass it along to others. After some deep thought, I decided to post it. It’s marginally PG-13, I suppose, but it’s so creative I think most people will forgive me. I found it first on my friend John Pike’s Pike Speak. Just click on the bunny.

Jon Stewart, with his hilarious understanding of idiocy takes on cable channels CNN and MSNBC for their simpleton approach to taking advantage of this blog thing. As always, Jeff Jarvis at BuzzMachine is on top of the story and has pulled quotes and links to other commentators together in Blogvision. You can watch the segment by clicking the following links for Windows Media Player or Quick Time.

Warning: Do Not Attempt To Watch While Drinking Hot Beverages.

My take on this is that the vast majority of media executives above a certain age are never going to get this because they’re short-timers. They don’t want to do anything that endangers their time on the golf course or in the sack with their mistress du jour.

The central message is that the publisher is no longer in charge. The news and information consumer has way too many choices to be cowed or impressed by gold plate. You can have it your way. Really.

My Soundtrack: Classic Stressbusters by various.

In My Backpack… Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir In Books by Azar Nafisi; In My Car… Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison; On My Nightstand… In The Box Called Pleasure by Kim Addonizio; On My Computer… Snowflakes by Deborah Slicer; On My Screen… The Shield: Dominoes Falling (**) directed by Scott Brazil, written by Shawn Ryan.

My Soundtrack: Just Because I’m A Woman by various.