The Cologne Collector
Smells like Rick Perry is up to his old tricks again. In late October, the Republican governor of Texas once again used the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) to stick it to small businesses and cities not only across the Lone Star State but also in other states.
Gov. Perry Gives Away Tax Money To Big Insurer
SAN ANTONIO, Texas — Smells like Rick Perry is up to his old tricks again.
In late October, the Republican governor of Texas once again used the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF) to stick it to small businesses and cities not only across the Lone Star State but also in other states.
This time, he threw $2.5 million at Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company as an “incentive” “to expand corporate operations in San Antonio.”
Perry promised that the “investment” will create $94.8 million in capital and 750 “high paying jobs” in Texas, though San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro said the company would create 838 jobs for San Antonians.
Moreover, the San Antonio Express-News quoted unnamed “economic development leaders” as saying that San Antonio “could have lost the Nationwide jobs already here.”
Nationwide has 932 existing employees here, and their jobs could have supposedly gone to another city on its list: Raleigh, N.C.; Tulsa, Okla.; or Little Rock, Ark.
But why is losing these jobs such a big deal? And what does Nationwide do exactly?
According to the press release from the governor’s office, the company “offers a full range of insurance and financial services.”
“The bulk of the initial job growth will be in sales and services positions. These positions will support an existing book of business and generate new growth for the company,” the press release said.
And that $90 million in capital investment will go toward the company’s third regional corporate headquarters slated for completion by December 2011, according to the Express-News. (The other two headquarters are in Columbus, Ohio, and Des Moines, Iowa.)
And that doesn’t include another $29 million in equipment for the new pad.
So Perry gave a suitcase of cash to “one of the largest insurance and financial services companies in the world” to build a building for people to push papers?
But, of course, Nationwide couldn’t have used any of its $21.832 billion in revenues last year to build its 300,000-square foot piece of office space over 25 acres of almost-never freezing land.
How much of that cash is going to go to coffers of the state and local municipalities?
Said Gov. Perry. “Companies like Nationwide will continue to create jobs in Texas because of our state’s low taxes, regulatory environment and educated and diverse workforce.”
Note the “low taxes” part of Perry’s equation; that’s Perry-speak for “nothing.”
Actually, truth be told, Nationwide got a whole lot more free money out of the deal than from the Texas Enterprise Fund.
San Antonio City Hall and Bexar County collectively gave away $1,000,000 in taxpayer dollars to Nationwide, plus 10-year, 100 percent property tax abatements.
“The city’s 10-year tax abatement is valued at $3.7 million,” the Express-News reported.
That’s over $7.2 million just to keep a non-Texas business from pulling its operations out of San Antonio.
But that’s not all!
“The site also will be nominated for a state enterprise designation, which will allow the company to obtain state sales tax refunds for construction and equipment purchases,” San Antonio’s newspaper reported.
In other words, more free money!
But such is the idea behind the way we do business here in Texas.
Gov. Perry likes to tout the fact that the Texas Legislature created the TEF for him in 2003 and has re-appropriated funding in 2005, 2007, and 2009.
His press release also spelled out that projects proposed for TEF giveaways must be approved by the governor, lieutenant governor, and speaker of the House.
What his office doesn’t tell you, though, is that giving tax breaks and incentives to corporations doesn’t always work toward its goal of retaining jobs in state.
Prior to the Nationwide giveaway, The Houston Chronicle’s business columnist Loren Steffy noted such was the case for Winston-Salem, N.C..
Five years ago, the Southern city had lured the Round Rock-based Dell Corporation to open a plant there to the tune of $240 million in tax breaks over 15 years in exchange for up to 8,000 jobs.
However, Dell admitted last month that it wouldn’t be needing all that time since it planned to shutter this factory by January 2010.
Bernard Weinstein, an economist at Southern Methodist University, could have told Winston-Salem that no company can predict its long-term growth.
He could have also pointed to quite a few studies that show tax abatement programs are economically stupid.
“In most instances a company does not make a locational decision based on the level of local taxes,” Weinstein told Steffy.
In fact, taxes are barely even on the list of reasons corporations use to relocate operations.
So why giveaway the taxpayer money in the first place?
Weinstein says it’s pure politics.
“Politicians want to be seen as delivering jobs to their communities,” he said.
Moreover, how are Texans benefitting from the payola to Washington Mutual, for example?
The TEF mafia handed out two disbursements to Washington Mutual, $10 million in 2005 and $5 million in 2007. But now Washington Mutual is owned by Chase Bank after the near-fatal economic meltdown last fall.
Steffy wrote that though the Fund does have“claw-back” clauses across the board as a general rule, “it’s unclear whether the state will actually collect” in any situation where a company fails to live up to its part of the TEF bargain.
According to Weinstein’s logic, it’s a better policy to just stop local and state tax breaks cold turkey because if the municipalities get hoodwinked, who is going to hold the bag but the federal government.
Wrote Steffy, “Local and state tax breaks actually increase the federal tax liability for businesses by lowering their deduction for local taxes. So blocking local tax abatements would reduce federal tax revenue.”
But ending this policy of tax breaks will be tough since it is so “institutionalized,” as Weinstein put it.
There’s a whole industry in place that hustles cities and municipalities for free money with which to relocate corporations.
So far, over $383 million has been distributed from the Perry’s pet fund.
And there’s no signs of slowage.
Uranium Mining In Indian Country Equals Hate Crime
Indigenous peoples from the Western Hemisphere collectively announced here that mining for uranium on their lands is a hate crime.
ACOMA PUEBLO, New Mexico — Indigenous peoples from the Western Hemisphere collectively announced here that mining for uranium on their lands is a hate crime.
“Leave it in the ground,” said the participants at the 7th Southwest Indigenous Uranium Forum.
The Forum noted that up to 10 uranium mining companies have their eyes on prime uranium land on Mount Taylor, the site designated a Traditional Cultural Property by the state of New Mexico in 2009.
Uranium is used to after a costly refining process to create nuclear energy; its price has increased dramatically over the past five years.
The companies include Rio Grande Resources Corp., Strathmore Minerals Corporation, Urex Energy Corporation, Laramide, Ltd., Neutron Energy, Inc., Max Resources Corporation, Western Energy Development Corporation, Uranium Resources, Inc., Uranium Company of New Mexico, Energy Metals Corporation, and Quincy Energy Corporation.
The Forum was host to over 250 representatives of Pueblos, Navajos, and other indigenous peoples gathered at the Indigenous Uranium Forum Oct. 22–24.
Some 80,000 viewers reportedly saw the Forum through a live stream video broadcast.
The Forum gave the Native American representatives a chance to tell the stories of their family members who died from cancer, respiratory diseases, and brain tumors as a result of uranium mining on their native lands.
U.S. Experienced ‘Electronic Pearl Harbor’ Last Year
The United States has experienced an “electronic Pearl Harbor” in 2007, according to a report from CBS’s 60 Minutes.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The United States has experienced an “electronic Pearl Harbor” in 2007, according to a report from CBS’s 60 Minutes.
This attack happened by “some unknown foreign power,” said Jim Lewis, the director of the Technology and Public Policy Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
“[H]onestly, we don’t know who it is, broke into the Department of Defense, to the Department of State, the Department of Commerce, probably the Department of Energy, probably NASA. They broke into all of the high tech agencies, all of the military agencies, and downloaded terabytes of information,” he said.
As a point of reference, 12 terabytes is what it takes to digitally store the entire Library Of Congress.
The CBS show reported “less than a decade ago” on the potential of such an attack on the Pentagon or a major city, which would result in the crippling of critical infrastructure.
But such an attack happened last November on the CENTCOM network which is comprised of “the people who are fighting all of our wars,”. Lewis said.
The hackers acted “like they were part of military command,” he noted.
The Bush administration, however, failed to acknowledge that this historical breach of security happened on its watch, though the Pentagon admitted it happened.
Coroner Links Suicide Rate To Recession
An Indiana coroner has evidence that the suicide rate is rising according to the prolonged economic recession.
ELKHART, Ind. — An Indiana coroner has evidence that the suicide rate is rising according to the prolonged economic recession.
Coroner John White of Elkhart told MSNBC last week that of the 24 people who committed suicide this year in Northern Indiana, a quarter of them had faced a job loss or financial problems.
According to the Associated Press, Elkhart is the center of a high stress zone in comparison to other counties with a population its size, over 25,000 residents,
The Huffington Post called out an incident in which a woman whose house was about to be foreclosed.
A day after her car was reprossessed, she shot her self in the head.
Said her daughter, “This was a vivacious, very strong woman, and she was taken to her knees because of money.”
BBC Poll: World Dislikes Free-Market Capitalism
According to a new BBC World Service poll, the world dislikes free market capitalism.
LONDON, England — According to a new BBC World Service poll, the world dislikes free market capitalism.
Of those questioned, only 11 percent of those questioned across 27 countries expressed the belief that capitalism was working well.
The poll’s results were released on 20 years to the day of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Since 1989, it has been a popular notion that after the Eastern Communist block fell, capitalism won.
However, such has not been the case a year after the worst financial meltdown since the Great Depression.
The most negative reviews of capitalism came from France (43 percent).
The most positive reviews came from the United States and Pakistan, where one of five supported the economic system.
The majority of 29,000 people across the 27 nations questioned supported a more even redistribution of wealth.
Turkey has the only majority of respondents that supported less government regulation.
Most of Europe supported the fall of the Soviet Union while those outside the West said the collapse was a negative.
American Medical Assn. Calls For ‘Pot’ Review
The American Medical Association adopted a new policy on marijuana last week.
HOUSTON, Texas — The American Medical Association adopted a new policy on marijuana last week.
The AMA’s House of Delegates is now calling for “marijuana’s status as a federal Schedule I controlled substance be reviewed with the goal of facilitating the conduct of clinical research and development of cannabinoid-based medicines, and alternate delivery methods.”
In layman’s terms, that means the AMA wants the Feds to see about making marijuana redesignated as having a “medical benefit.”
However, this change of policy does not mean the organization supports marijuana legailzation.
The federal government still places marijuana in the same drug category as heroin and LSD with no medical benefits.
However, cocaine and methamphetamines are designated as having some clinical benefits in certain instances.
Aaron Houston, director of government relations for the Marijuana Policy Project, referred to the AMA’s new policy as “historic.”
The AMA is considered to be a “conservative major medical organization,” he said.
The American College of Physicians, the country’s second-largest medical group, has already proposed a review of marijuana’s status.
Justice Department Orders Indymedia To Disclose Reader Visits
An independent online news source was ordered to provide the readers of its website to federal authorities last week.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — An independent online news source was ordered to provide the readers of its website to federal authorities last week.
The Justice Department also slapped a gag order on the administrator of the Indymedia.us website.
However, CBS News also reported that the subpoena was not carried through the proper channels at the Department.
“I wouldn’t be surprised to see an internal investigation by the Office of Professional Responsibility; my source would not confirm or deny that,” reported correspondent Declan McCullagh.
The subpoena delivered to news media must be delivered with the authorization of the attorney general, Eric Holder.
However, Holder was not notified of the subpoena’s existence prior to its delivery, according to CBS News.
Moreover, the gag order has no legal grounds since Indymedia is a news organization.
The subpoena called for Indymedia to provide information for just one day, June 25, 2008
The information requested includes email addresses, physical addresses, registered accounts, and Indymedia readers’ Social Security Numbers, bank account numbers, credit card numbers, etc.
Indymedia’s administrator, Kristina Clair, said she contacted the Electronic Frontier Foundation for legal representation.
U.S. Attorney Tim Morrison issued the subpoena, though later withdrew it, according to the report.
Americans Stand Against Afghanistan War Escalation: Poll
A new poll shows that Americans are against the build up of troops in Afghanistan.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A new poll shows that Americans are against the build up of troops in Afghanistan.
Of the 1,018 adult participants, 56 percent said they opposed the escalation, according to the CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey.
Also 58 percent opposed the conflict, the polling data showed.
The poll participants were evenly split on how quickly President Barack Obama was taking to decide on the United States’ strategy on Afghanistan.
Moreover, 90 percent of participants doubted the government in Kabul Afghanistan would last another 12 months.
The survey was taken the weekend of Halloween by phone.
Obama is said to be mulling four options; his top commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal wants 40,000 more U.S. troops to deploy.
Tex Tax
As Uncle Hugh used to say, “I don’t know whether death and taxes are both certain. I ain’t died yet.”
Any sensible human being knows that the Tea Party Partisans are slack-jawed morons.
And that Lying Texas Governor Tricky Ricky Perry, the governor Texas didn’t want, would coon-hunt with a shih-tzu if he thought his hair would get on TeeVee for even a second.
But I suspect most of that knowledge is mere supposition.
Like, how much sense could these guys have, since they obviously still use Wildroot Cream-Oil?
But apart from the obvious — like protesting high taxes while standing on an $11 million government seawall to throw fake tea into a bay dredged at a cost of $20 million per annum that provides them with government jobs — there are sound historical reasons why the Tea Heads just ain’t right.
Especially in Texas.
Ballot Realities
Reason one: Let’s talk about the Yankee government briefly. What do we spend most of our money for? Well, more than half, about 54 percent, goes to guns, bullets, soldiers, and interest. Star Wars to Walter Reed. And the banks and insurance companies who lent us the money to make Iraq the garden spot it is today.
And just how many Tea Baggers oppose the wars in the Middle East?
Another 30 percent goes for everything from Social Security to education to Medicare. Let’s see the hands of all those who want to cut any of that stuff? Now, let’s see how many elected officials plan to make cutting any of that stuff part of their next campaigns.
Feel free to hack away at that other 16 percent, like the $20 billion in highways, a billion for GPS and HBO satellites, $2.4 billion for national parks and a couple of bills more for maybe the FBI, CIA, Border patrol, whatever.
Not that there isn’t waste; it’s just that where there’s a dollar, there’s an argument for why somebody needs it.
Texas Our Taxes
Reason two: Absent the federal government, learn some Spanish.
We can’t even stop unarmed civilians sneaking across the border to hang drywall.
How will we make out without the Yankee army against heavily armed, coked-up cartel gorillas?
Not to mention the guerillas.
Currently we spend just 6.2 percent of our $167 billion, or around $10.3 billion on state security, That’s cops and judges.
Want an army? Fort Hood maintenance and improvements alone this year were $13 billion.
But let’s pretend that no one would want to invade Texas.
We spend 44 percent of the state budget on education. That’s $73 billion or so. Add $10 billion that we would no longer get from the feds.
Health and human services makes up 31.6 percent of the budget, or $52.8 billion. Now add to that the loss of Social Security for everybody, young and old, in the state. Then add in Medicare, which most people do NOT want to do without, and the FDA, CDC and all the rest of the alphabet that keeps drug companies from poisoning us all and staves off a cholera comeback.
History Of Broke
For those of us who might have wondered why Texas would have ever joined the union in the first place, the answer is simple.
We were broke.
We owed about $10 million when the average family income was less than $600 per year. We had a population of around 200,000, almost all small farmers, who were using only about 6.8 percent of the land. We were engaged in a war with the Comanche that we had been losing since 1839. Plus, dispossessing Tejanos was expensive, since they tended to take it hard when the government steals from them. No imminent domain protests back then.
We had, even then, our share of something-for-nothing Tea Types.
Taxation was a complex compilation of exemptions and self-valuation that resulted in few taxes paid. Sheriffs, for example, collected the taxes, but only occasionally turned them it. To protest a tax rate, all one had to do was find two local people to say it was too high. Horses and poll tax were exempt for Indian fighters. And who wasn’t an Indian fighter? Horses kept for riding were taxed at $10 per year, but if the animal was ever used with a carriage, it was only a buck a head. Mules and draft animals were 25 cents per year, with an exemption of four head. Slaves were taxed up to $4 per year, but could be taxed at an ad valorem rate of one-fifth of one percent per hundred dollars of valuation. Tariffs were levied on all foreign goods, but only if they were delivered through the port of Galveston. Smuggling up and down the coast was rife, and so was born Corpus Christi.
Ever wonder what happened to that big chunk of New Mexico stretching all the way to Idaho that appeared on those old Texas maps?
Texas got on the flag and out of debt; the United States got the West.
Trade Up
Back at the turn of the last century, my grandfather’s taxes were levied at three days working on the county road crew. One if you brought a team of mules.
When it rained, he went to town horseback instead of in a wagon. He had a third grade education, a coal oil lamp and an outhouse.
It was a workable system.
Even people who had no money contributed to the general welfare.
Folks knew if you didn’t pay your fair share.
Then he got a car, my mother went to college, he had electric lights and running water.
He got a tax statement higher than a two week’s pay.
And he thought it was one helluva deal.
Fort Perry
Thank you, Fort Hood.
Because of the recent massacre on your grounds, we now see how much Rick Perry hates Washington.
That is, he doesn’t.
When it comes to the U.S. military, the Texas governor nobody wanted is all for it.
When it comes to the health of all Texans, the cheerleader is all pom-poms for the U.S. military.
Oddly, it’s the publicly-subsidized, national armed forces that has “socialized medicine;” everyone from top generals to lowliest of privates go to government-run hospitals for treatment.
The rest of us will probably have to wait three years to see the “public option” fail from its own ill-conceived design.
Even with the so-called ”option,” we’re still at the mercy of the private hospital industry jacking up prices for the basic health essentials.
The rationale for the protection of military personnel’s health is simple; they volunteered for service, so they get free rides from taxpayers.
The rationale for the protection of private health industry is just awful; they hold the monopoly, they negotiate the prices, not the public.
Perry The Secessionist writing in The Washington Post prior to the 220-215 House vote for the public option suggested, “Let states lead the way.”
That would be a great idea if Perry had gotten out of the way for the last 15 years.
All Perry and his ilk have done is protect the dumbest of doctors in Texas, so while more doctors might have come to Texas to find work, who can say that everyday Texans can afford to pay them?
Even to help the neediest of health care consumers, Perry won’t grab federal dollars for Medicaid or Children’s Health Insurance Program. He complained:
“Expanding the Medicaid program in Texas alone to include an additional 2 million people would cost $20 billion to $30 billion over the next 10 years. Regardless of how that cost is shared between the federal and state governments down the road, we believe that level of new mandated spending is grossly unacceptable.”
The talk around the Pentagon has it, though, that another $50 billion is needed for the Iraq and Afghanistan war in 2010.
Granted, Jack Murtha, chairman of the Defense Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, figures that this supplemental spending bill will be around $40 billion.
And that’s just for one year!
So where are the Texas state flags flown at half-mast for those Texans who have died as a result of a lack of healthcare coverage?
Perry and his partner-in-crime, Washington-insider Newt Gingrich, would have you believe that “one-size-fits-all solutions” hurt every American.
Tell that to the servicemen and servicewomen (with and without PTSD) who used the shirts off their own backs and their knowledge of first aid to treat the blood-soaked wounded at Fort Hood.
If those soldiers had set aside “their devotion to central planning,” dare to imagine of how many more Americans would have died that day.
It’s vicious irony that a mentally-unbalanced psychologist could snap and kills his co-workers.
But what is it when your heartless governor looks the other way as his countrymen suffer?
Striaght viciousness.
— Nathan Diebenow
The Heels Who Caused The Recession?
There are many theories about what caused the current recession. Some feel it had to do with sneaky mortgages. Others believe it was the result of greedy Wall Street. And there are those who always look for somebody to blame who believe our financial problems are the result of the Republicans, the Democrats, aliens from outer space, or some secret society that meets every Thursday at the Holiday Inn. All of these people should just look down at their feet. That’s right. I’m suggesting it’s possible that shoes caused the whole financial downturn.
There are many theories about what caused the current recession. Some feel it had to do with sneaky mortgages. Others believe it was the result of greedy Wall Street. And there are those who always look for somebody to blame who believe our financial problems are the result of the Republicans, the Democrats, aliens from outer space, or some secret society that meets every Thursday at the Holiday Inn. All of these people should just look down at their feet. That’s right. I’m suggesting it’s possible that shoes caused the whole financial downturn.
In recent months, many consumers have not been making purchases unless they think the items are absolutely necessary. This has been the case across the board — except when it comes to shoes. All kinds of shoes have been selling very well in the last few months while the rest of the economy continues to struggle.
People almost always buy shoes for themselves. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I’ve ever gotten shoes as a gift. You never hear the slogan, “Say it with shoes.” So some people buy shoes for themselves as a treat. The thinking goes like this: “We can’t afford a new car or to renovate the kitchen, so I’ll buy myself a nice pair of shoes.” If people are feeling low because of their low bank accounts, I guess they feel that shoes will lift their spirits.
I worry that with some of the wealthier consumers, there might be a “let them eat cake” philosophy. Perhaps there are people who think things like, “I don’t get why those people who lost their houses are so upset. Why don’t they just go out and buy some new boots?”
Jennifer Black of the research company Jennifer Black and Associates says, “It’s just fun to shop for shoes. Maybe part of the fun is you don’t feel fat.” I’ve never had fun shopping for anything, but I guess some people do. I understand what Ms. Black is saying: Buying shoes is not as tortuous as shopping for a bathing suit or jeans that you can only put on if a pulley is involved.
Another group of people feel that a new pair of shoes is simply more of a necessity than a new purse or a new tie. Still others buy shoes they feel they need for an inexpensive vacation. Instead of going to a fancy resort, some people are taking advantage of free outdoor activities — activities in which they wear new outdoorsy shoes.
All of these reasons help explain why shoes are selling so well these days. Congress didn’t have to pass a stimulus bill for flip-flops. Shoe sales were $1.5 billion for October, which is the best October shoes have had since 2006.
Because of all of these reasons, I’m suspicious of the shoe industry. For every analyst who’s trying to explain why shoes are selling right now, I’m sure the shoe companies have at least one or two analysts of their own. So they would’ve known ahead of time that during a recession, people would still buy shoes. They would have known that since consumers won’t be buying many other things, people might buy more shoes than they’d purchase during good economic times. So a recession might actually help shoe companies.
That’s why I’m suggesting that the shoe industry may have caused the recession. Call it the Cobblers’ Cabal. Isn’t it just possible that those who are able to convince people to buy incredibly uncomfortable shoes are smart enough to bring about a recession? Countless people who don’t even run to catch a bus buy expensive running shoes. This is the business that, through brilliant marketing, has millions of people walking around in fur-lined boots in the middle of summer.
To you doubters, let me remind you that during the disco era, people actually bought platform shoes with a see-through heel that contained live goldfish swimming around. If the shoe geniuses can convince the American public to wear little aquariums on their feet, surely they could bring about something as simple as a recession. I’m telling you, there’s no business like shoe business.
Lloyd Garver has written for many television shows, ranging from “Sesame Street” to “Family Ties” to “Home Improvement” to “Frasier.” He has also read many books, some of them in hardcover. He can be reached at . Check out his website at and his podcasts on iTunes.
Can The Holiday Season Please Get Longer?
I’ve had it already with Christmas ads and music of the season. Call me a curmudgeon, but do we really need to be inundated continuously with demands to buy, buy, buy — and instructions to be of good cheer — for two months running?
I’ve had it already with Christmas ads and music of the season.
Call me a curmudgeon, but do we really need to be inundated continuously with demands to buy, buy, buy — and instructions to be of good cheer — for two months running?
By the time December 24 rolls around, it’s anticlimactic.
The outside temperature is 70F and I mowed the lawn this week, for gawd’s sake!
We haven’t even bought our Thanksgiving turkey yet, or decided whether to stay home and enjoy the day in peace or trek on up to Chicago (Oy, vay!) to mooch off of relatives.
Actually, while I was growing up we rarely spent Thanksgiving with relatives; rather, we’d go to the home of friends who lived nearby, people with whom we made a conscious choice to associate.
I can’t remember my Mother preparing a Thanksgiving dinner — ever.
From all I have garnered during my 50+ years, Thanksgiving is not a day that should be spent with those who share one’s bloodline (beyond immediate family). That’s the point of Christmas.
We get to pick our friends, not our relatives, and, since it’s a day of “thanks,” we shouldn’t be shackled to forced commingling with people whom we moved away from years — nay, decades — ago because we really cannot stand them in the first place.
The first Thanksgiving was celebrated by folks who had left extended family and unfulfilling relationships far behind; it’s obvious to understand why they had every reason to be thankful. When did a Thanksgiving gathering of extended family not devolve into a squabble or exercise in volatility?
With only one day off in the middle of a week, especially a week in which one could expect travel to be slowed to a snail’s crawl by some nasty blizzard dumped upon us as if on cue, the last place I’d choose to go is to Grandma’s house.
(Actually, I never knew either of my grandmothers. My parents met at — no kidding — the funeral of my paternal grandmother; we never saw my maternal grandmother, by all accounts a “skank” in today’s vernacular, whom my Father considered disgusting, an embodiment of iniquity to be avoided at all costs.)
The best Thanksgivings I spent with either of my ex-wives were those when we lived beyond reasonable driving distance from northern Illinois. Both of them came from families that insisted upon mandatory attendance on Thanksgiving.
Since I was expected to drive and therefore couldn’t drink, with either family it was at best comparable to daylong root canal work without procaine.
As to the first spousal unit, 12 or more of us would be crammed together into a house far too small to hold more than six people at a time. The “conversation” never varied, childhood reminiscences of the four siblings that left me sitting on my own thumbs.
With the second wife, at least the three siblings didn’t dwell entirely on their formative years. Nevertheless, I was treated as though I were a pariah.
When not being ignored, I was subjected to chastisement from my father-in-law who openly expressed his partiality toward my wife’s first husband, replete with his deep-seeded hegemony that, being of Italian descent, I had no business even living in this country. Such impudence I possessed, having the gall to marry his Anglo daughter!
Anyone who witnessed how ignominiously I was treated by the nieces and nephews would have thought that Rodney Dangerfield was the most respected man on the planet.
Thanks, my ass. Anyone with even a modicum of psychological study — or a logically functional brain — is not surprised that so many at Thanksgiving gatherings end in homicide, and why it is the kick-off for the Holiday Murder Season.
A little family togetherness goes a long way.
At least when observing the holiday on my own terms, rather than being forced to endure callous invectives from maddening relatives and in-laws, I don’t have to tolerate an endless succession of football games that mean less than nothing to me.
Now, thanks to several miracles of modern technology, I can enjoy the Macy’s parade in HiDef splendor while utilizing the DVR to zap past crap like annoying plugs for upcoming television shows, and especially those hackneyed musical numbers extracted from outrageously-priced Broadway shows that most Americans will never get to see — or want to, for that matter.
While I’m at it, what in the devil were the people at Disney thinking, releasing the latest version of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” three weeks before Thanksgiving? Oh, yeah, a market needed to be created for the videogame and other assorted sundry tie-in products. (Actually, we’re heading out to the theatre to see it in newfangled 3-D as soon as I’m finished with this rant.)
Well, enjoy your turkey or ham or tofu, or whatever you indulge in on the fourth Thursday each November, and try to get along with your relations, because there’s still another month till Christmas.
O, c’mon, look at the plus side — with the world coming to an end on Winter Solstice 2012, there will only be three more Thanksgivings after this year’s…
Happy Hanukkah!
Shalom.
(Erstwhile Philosopher and former Educator Jerry Tenuto is a veteran who survived, somewhat emotionally intact, seven years in the U.S. Army. Despite a penchant for late-night revelry, he managed to earn BS and MA Degrees in Communications from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. On advice from a therapist, he continues to bang out his weekly “Out Of The Blue” feature in The Lone Star Iconoclast — providing much-needed catharsis. Jerry is also licensed to perform marriage ceremonies in 45 states.)
