Safe Man

I had a little problem with my front door lock the other day.  That's when I met Jack.  The key to one of the two locks on my front door would go in, but wouldn't turn.  Time to call a locksmith.  I phoned a recommended source and Jack appeared.
Jack can best be described as a journeyman.  He's a career professional and his career just might be a dying breed.  Everything is going digital and locks and safes are no exception.  But until that day, an old school locksmith like Jack will continue to make a good living.
Jack can get you in.  He can actually diagnose a problem from a fairly accurate description.
"This will take about 20 minutes," Jack said after looking at my problem.  He adjusted a few things and then returned my key.  It seems some small part had broken off on the top lock.  When his repair was complete, in about 15 minutes, Jack went on to explain that the top lock, the deadbolt, was in fine shape and really all one needs.  "That lock is your security," said Jack.
I got off easy only being charged a nominal fee for this home visit.  As Jack was writing out an invoice, we talked, or rather he talked and I listened.  I learned a few important things.  Jack can open just about anything.  "I'm really a safe man," he said.  "There isn't a safe I can't open."

I kept wondering how Jack got these skills and what kind of stories he had that would prove illuminating for fascinating.  But I didn't have much time, so I remained silent.
Jack had a riff about the difference between East coast and West coast doors.  He believes he can tell where a person is originally from just by the number of locks on their front door.  "Easterners have as many as 6 locks," he said.  "As if that really makes any difference.  I don't know, but that's been my experience, something I have noticed."
I don't know either, but now that I think of it, I wonder what it might mean.

Tabloid Culture

When I first heard the term it struck me...this idea really fits.  "Tabloid culture"... we live in a tabloid culture.  All the signs were there.  One had only to hear those two words fall into place.
This was right around the time that reality TV shows were coming into vogue and tabloids, themselves were beginning to appear in grocery stores at the check-out counter.  And appear they did, in numerous forms.  Newspaper and magazine formats took the place of Time and Newsweek.

Of course, television stations were programming the likes of Jerry Springer and Maury Povich.  Who impregnated whom and who done him or her wrong shows were the new ratings toppers.
So what does this say about who we are as a people and how that relates to the current state of the union and those who are in the halls of power?  With all sensitivity to personal tastes and differences, to class, race, and gender...it says that we've come down a few pegs and are, perhaps, in free-fall from our once caring, tasteful, empathetic selves.
That the presidency of Donald J. Trump is both closely related to and profiting from this downturn in morality and decency, there can be no doubt.  The crowds at his rallies (what President has such rallies?) seem exactly like those at the Jerry Springer show.  They cheer at the insults and debasement of their fellow human beings.  This can't bode well.
There is a phrase that we hear with frequency.  It's some offshoot of "I've never seen this before" or "We've never seen anything like this."  It applies to how the values of those in power have sunk to a new low.  Those would be values like bullying and shaming, greed and avarice, violence and vengeance.   The evidence is overwhelming.  The 45th President has seemingly lifted the lid on a vast collective Id so that the laughter and revenge that spills out resembles the eerie sight of a bloodthirsty crowd at a lynching.  They chant, they yuk it up, they smile the ear to ear grin of the self-righteous, just like the folks in those people who have been forever immortalized in a photograph with hanging or smoldering bodies in the background.
If we follow the journalism metaphor to its logical end and ask what does the tabloid culture replace, the answer is obvious.  It replaces what some would call "our better angels" or the best impulses of humanity.  It is about honesty and art because the tabloid is concerned with exaggeration and the sensational. And mostly it is concerned with falsehood.  As the followers of the artificial sport of professional wrestling, the consumers of tabloid culture know deep within that it is all phony.  It is all staged, with members of the screen actors guild "acting" their part.  And like many supporters of the man who would be President, deep inside they know this but they just don't care.
The tabloid  is just too tempting.

Divided House

I've been spending a fair amount of time lately reading Ron Chernow's massive new biography of General Ulysses S. Grant.  At over 900 pages, there is a lot of history here, and much of it quite interesting and thought-provoking.  It is also fascinating to read about this historical era when the country was so divided in a time when the country is so divided again.
Even though it seems like these divisions will never end or be resolved, they somehow dissipate for a time, only to surface decades later in an altered form.  Altered, yes, but not entirely different from their original content and intensity.

We live in a time of tremendous division.  Much of that division concerns the interpretation of what is loosely termed the direction of our country.  We have at the helm, a political newcomer who thrives on pandering to his base and overtly expressing his racism, sexism, and self-righteous indignation.  This is not unlike the world that Grant inhabited when Andrew Johnson was President of the U.S.  True, Johnson was not elected (he was the assassinated Lincoln's VP) but he entered the White House with a set of political beliefs and a moral compass far different from many in the country.  Johnson was impeached, though the Congress failed to oust him from the presidency. At one point Johnson even threatened to send troops to deal with his unruly Congress. Nevertheless, the stage was set for a war of partisan politics that seems to have persevered to this day.  Of course, the labels were not the same.  Lincoln and Grant were in the Republican party and the Democrats were the party of the "solid South."  That evolution is a fascinating story in itself, but best left for another time.
When I see the issues that divide this nation today, I wonder if they aren't another form of those that divided us 150 years ago.  Stripped to their essentials they involve human rights and the struggle between science and blind faith. Today's combatants are also often divided by education level and the ability to empathize with others.
Presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, in promoting her latest book Presidential Leadership in Turbulent Times, speaks about the importance of empathy in a President that can unify the country.   Along with the ability to learn from past mistakes, these are two essential qualities to promote unity.  Grant certainly had those characteristics.  Unfortunately,  the current occupant of the White House has no humility, makes no mistakes.  This does not bode well for our current malaise.
Did they wonder then, as many do now if we aren't wired differently and thus condemned to repeat these struggles?  What are the characteristics of a hard-wired Republican or Democrat? Again, it appears that empathy plays a crucial role.  Perhaps that's why there is no such thing as a moderate or liberal Republican any more. One can only hope that the overt battles of our Civil War will not be repeated.  Anyone who has ever roamed a Civil War battlefield then and now knows the eerie feeling of a house divided against itself and the needless carnage that contributes to its fall.