Sheep or Shepherd?

 

The trip was almost canceled. My 87-year young Dad called and said they were locking down Southern California. He strongly suggested if we had not already purchased the tickets, not to come and visit. I had already bought the tickets and my wife and I were determined to take that trip as long as we and he were healthy, the airports were open and the planes were flying.

The experts, leaders, and authorities warned the Wuhan virus was ascending. Public officials deemed we were taking our lives into our hands by flying on an airplane just to visit family. We would be endangering older members of our family or those with compromised immune systems by being out in public and potentially carrying the dreaded disease. Only essential workers should fly they said. But who should decide who is essential?

Of course, our military personnel is essential to protect our country. Of course, our police, to protect us from criminals, are essential. Of course, the courts are essential to adjudicating our differences. Of course, medical personnel and their support staff are essential during a pandemic. Yet, none of these essential jobs can function unless the other “essentials” are working. The small businesses that are the very essence of our economy; the restaurants and Mom and Pop stores that are the economic engine that allows for-profit and prosperity for the other essentials to function. They are as essential, if not more so than any government worker or bureaucrat.

My wife and I weighed the risks. After all, we are healthy, feeling good and so were our relatives. We read scientific reports, listened to friends who had experienced the virus first-hand, and with this information we made the decision to live our lives fully rather to live in fear. We understood the threat and the potential situation to our health as being serious. We made our choice. We took the trip.

On the day of our departure, the airports were open. The TSA, the traffic controllers, the pilots, flight attendants, and all airport personnel were working. Airport restaurants were serving food and drinks and gift stores were open. Construction crews were inside the building still working on the Great Hall of the airport, many years behind schedule and millions of dollars over budget. Are these workers any more essential than a Mom and Pop store, a restaurant or any small business?

It reminded me of the problem-solving grid created by Milton Freedman who suggested one should look at public policy issues from the stand point of Who Pays, Who Benefits, Who Decides,
and What’s Fair?

The airport and the plane were mostly empty. Fifty passengers on an aircraft that could hold 170. The flight was smooth, fast, and enjoyable as I read an engaging book. We landed before you knew it. Los Angeles International was under a major construction project. Amazing that these construction jobs were deemed essential and government money seemed to be fueling their pace. We were the only ones on the rental car bus which whisked us to our car. Our first stop was to visit my Dad who lives ninety minutes south of L.A. We made the trip at the height of rush hour traffic in a ridiculously fast time and we were at his front doorstep in an hour and a half. Maybe they did find a solution to LA’s traffic problem; scare the populous into their homes.

The street where my Dad lives was packed with cars in this beachside community. A party was in high gear next door to him with a jazz combo playing swinging music and people enjoying themselves in sequestered Southern California. Was this civil disobedience? Was the local populace through putting up with their hypocritical overseers? It appeared so.

My Dad greeted us with hugs and kisses and told us to remove our masks. We did. He has had very little person to person contact for the last ten months since we were all told, “15 days to flatten the curve.” The populous obeyed and yet the edicts of lockdowns still came in thirty-day increments. As a healthy octogenarian, my Dad is in great physical shape and has a positive mental attitude. The music next door filled the air and was a wonderful background noise for the delicious dinner my Dad prepared of mouth-watering steak, baked potatoes, salad and the several bottles of local wine which may or may not have all been consumed. We laughed, talked, and discussed of our missing each other for almost a year and what was happening in our lives and in the world until we were too tired to continue.

The next day, we helped my Dad clean his place, did yard work, talked, and laughed some more. My Dad needed a new microwave. The store where we purchased the appliance was packed with people rear-end to elbow buying gifts for Christmas. Yet, the local restaurant we wanted to go to was open for take-out or delivery only, with no in-house dining. This is the lunacy of government picking winners and losers. We decided to order dinner from the local sushi restaurant, light the Hanukkah candles, and had a delivery service risk their life by picking up and dropping off the food in a timely manner.

The next day we drove back up to Los Angeles to visit more family from afar or in close proximity depending on their comfort level or medical situation. It was a great visit and we all survived. No one caught the Communist Chinese Party Virus. The best part of this trip besides visiting family was the airports and roads were mostly empty. Travel was a breeze. The reason for sharing this story is simply this. You can be an obedient sheep corralled in the “safety” of your home, waiting for the day when your overlords tell you it is OK to live your life. Or, you can be the shepherd of your life and live it in the full knowledge there are consequences to one’s choices living in freedom and taking responsibility for those decisions. We called my Dad when we arrived back in Denver to let him know we were home. He wanted us to turn around and come back already. Every life is indeed essential, so live it like it is.

https://kimmonson.com/featured_articles/sheep-or-shepherd/

Monsters – Real or Imagined

 Have you ever caught a glimpse of something you thought was one thing and your mind interpreted it as another?  The other day I was shaving in my bathroom and out of the corner of my eye I saw what appeared to be a pair of eyes staring at me.  It was a momentary flash.  As I turned, I realized my wife had placed a decorative jar with a variety of soaps in it on the ledge around the bathtub. The placement of two similar packaged soaps looked like a pair of eyes and the oval bar below was the mouth, wide-open as if saying “Oh”.  It was a weird occurrence. Then my wife walked by and I said to her, “We have a monster in our bathroom”.  Unsure, she said, “Where?”  I slowly pointed to the corner of the bathtub.  “You have a highly imaginative mind” was her response.

Our minds see monsters all over the place especially when we have just viewed or read something disturbing and our subconscious plays it back in the form of a bad dream.  There are a lot of imagined monsters from the Saturday morning reruns of my childhood, like the classic 1930s and 1940s horror movies of Dracula played by Bella Lugosi, Frankenstein played by Boris Karloff or The Wolfman played by Lon Chaney, Jr.

There are many imagined monsters that lurk in our local, state, and national government, service organizations, schools, and businesses that are being molded into golems. The small town I live in reacted to the heinous killing of a black man in Minneapolis at the hands of a police officer by conducting the obligatory march and rally against racial injustice to show unity with victims of police violence.  Perhaps the reported thousand participants of the twenty-eight thousand residents or 3.5 percent of the population thought it was the right thing to do. The problem they were rallying against and the unity they thought they were creating are actually divisive and delusive.

My town is made up of 91.67% Caucasians, 5.25% Asian, 2.47% two or more races, and 0.21% African American or Black.  I could not find any current information from the FBI or from local sources of any so-called “Hate Crime” in my town.  In fact, our community has been acknowledged as “A Safe Community,” “Best Places to Live” and “Best Places to Raise a Family”. It is a welcoming town.  In my neighborhood, we have people of all races, creeds, and religious backgrounds.

Yet monsters lurk in my town. The social justice warriors, aka trustees, decided the community needed a conversation to talk about the issues of the day, “systemic racism,” “white privilege”, “critical race theory” and other constructs some imagine are the problem and are wanting to “enlighten” and “educate” the dense country bumkins in our town.  We were told we need to understand about the victims of the past.  We need to understand other people’s pain.

OK, I am open-minded, so I listened to a scheduled zoom meeting entitled, “How to Be Inclusive Forum – A Community Training & Facilitated Conversation for the Town of Erie” introduced by the Mayor, Jennifer Carrol, and conducted by LaTonya Pegus, a nice, well-spoken, professional woman who is highly credentialed.  For an hour I listened to the definition of inclusion, bias, and words which would be considered micro-aggressions.  I was told how not to perpetuate a worldview of “white supremacy”. There were some useful pieces of information on communication styles and listening which I appreciated.  Yet, after listening to this indoctrination for sixty minutes, all I could think of was, is this the proper role of local government?  Is it the community’s job to be promoting a premise that because I am white, I am hateful, privileged and I just don’t understand, therefore the town is going to help me understand my unintended bias?  They are correct. I don’t get it. The packaging of this sort of reeducation is Maoist, and once again in the guise of helping, government divides more than unifies.  Conversations, discussions, lectures, books, movies, cultural experiences of people of different backgrounds and cultures, and ethnicities are wonderful opportunities to learn and interact. Yet when this sort of presentation is conducted by your local town it becomes dystopian.  I wonder when this sort of education to the community will be required by our town.  It already has become doctrine in the public schools, community groups, and in some businesses.

Since January, I have been enrolled in a ten-month course on the history of slavery with a focus on American slavery. I have read and studied what wrong ideas can produce. As an example, John C. Calhoun, the American statesman, and political theorist was a complex individual. Calhoun became known for his “cast-iron man” politics and for his defiant defense of Southern beliefs and practices.  As a Senator from South Carolina on February 6, 1837, Calhoun asserted that slavery was a “positive good”.  He twisted and contorted his defense of white supremacy in a way that today his views are rightly seen as racist.  Conversely, a case can be made that the Black Lives Matter organization with its Marxist founders touting its radical anti-western agenda and its Alinsky style tactics make it the John C. Calhoun of today.

Leftists paint America as a racist country because of this heinous chapter from the past we share. Rather than erasing the evils of slavery or tearing it reminders down, we should be learning from it. Leftists look at history from the wrong end of the looking glass.  America is the greatest story of anti-slavery in human history. In two generations the Americans wiped slavery from our land.  It took England 1000 years and France 900 hundred years. Yet America abolished slavery in about two generations of our founding in 1776.

Here are some things you don’t hear on college campuses or in the dominant media. Today, you can go to several African nations right now and buy another human being.  Today, in America, more Black Africans and Blacks from the Caribbean are successful entrepreneurs and have built flourishing lives and successful businesses where property rights are respected and there is a rule of law.  Today, there is more Black on Black crime than Police on Black crime. Today, the Black American Family has become a one-parent household, where fathers are marginalized, potential lives are aborted, and education is looked down upon because it is “too white” or “western.”

If we are to address the real monsters of today, we need to have clarity on what they are. Unconscious bias and white privilege are not those topics. Unfortunately, there will always be hatred, bias, and racism.  There will always be evil in the world. The best way to deal with these is not to institutionalize them by dividing people into races or giving special privileges to special groups.  As my friend Anders Ingemarson writes in his SEPARATE blog, “statism, with its base in collectivism and focus on an alleged group “rights,” perpetuates racism and prejudice, while capitalism, with its foundation in individualism and recognition of individual rights as the only rights, relegates racism and prejudice to the fringes of society.”

The monsters we imagine are bigger than the ones we encounter.

Link to The Kim Monson Show radio show interview 560KLZ AM: https://kimmonson.com/kim_monson_show/identity-politics-vs-freedom-of-speech/ 

I Have Questions?

 

Why? Three letters that every kid learns when they are beginning to question the world around them.  Why do I have to put on my shoes?  Why do I have to eat spinach? Why do I have to go to bed now? All questions your kids or you have asked, often with the adult reply, “Because I said so”, not really the best answer. The need for asking why is foundational to understanding a cause, a purpose or a reason for something even if we are not ready to hear the answer. Since the dawn of early mankind, I suppose our ancestors asked why?

Like these hominids, I have more questions than answers. To many of these why questions there is no good answer, yet we continue to ask.

There are humorous whys. Why is my hair falling out? Why do my pants not fit me anymore? Why does someone keep misplacing my keys?

There are fun whys. Why don’t we go to the movies? Why not have another cookie? Why shouldn’t we skip to the park? Why not dance all night?

There are parental whys. Why did you not make your bed? Why did you not take out the trash? Why did you leave only a drop of milk in the carton?

There are serious whys. Why did you lie to me? Why are you not following up? Why did you miss the deadline? Why don’t you care?

There are political whys. Why am I paying these taxes? Why should I vote for you? Why aren’t you following the principles you swore to uphold? Why aren’t you protecting my individual rights?

There are hurtful whys. Why aren’t you like so and so? Why don’t you listen to me? Why can’t you follow directions? Why are you such an idiot?

There are helpful whys. Why don’t we learn this together? Why don’t you let me chip in? Why not make this happen so we can both benefit?

There are public policy whys. Why is there so much less extreme poverty today? Why are free markets better for people than socialism? Why do I need to ask the government permission to open a business?  Why do I have to register a firearm if it is my duty to protect myself?

There are philosophical whys. Why am I here? Why is there so much discontent? Why is there hatred? Why can’t we be friends? Why is freedom better than force? Why do we die?

Why is at the core of what it is to be. Why is front and center. Why allows us to understand. Why is simple, yet so complex. Why gets to the heart of the matter.

Out of the cardinal words for asking questions such as who, what, where, and when only why leads to more whys.  I imagine if there was a better word, we would use it. So, why not ask more whys. Perhaps we would all be better off asking it more often. After all, when you were a kid and asked why you couldn’t have the candy in the check-out line for the fifth time your parents either threatened to discipline you, gave in so you would shut up, or the wise parent left you in a hot mess, crying until you found out you were left behind. Sometimes why kicks our butt. Sometimes why gives in and gives us answers.  Sometimes we are just left in a hot mess to cry. Other times there are just no answers.

The foundation for critical thinking is asking questions: Who? What? When? Where? How? and Why? In this introspective Op-Ed, Brad Beck shares a variety of “whys” that he ruminates upon. Brad notes that the need for asking why is foundational to understanding a cause, a purpose or a reason for something even if we are not ready for the answer. Here is the podcast of this conversation. 

https://soundcloud.com/thekimmonsonshow/8-19-20brad-beck-i-have-questions

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

 I love to listen to music. Everything from Bluegrass to the Blues, Classical to Country, Jam Bands to Jazz. Even some old school rap or edgy Punk music can be catchy to my ear. A song by the English punk rock band, The Clash, “Should I Stay or Should I Go” is one of those tunes that has been running through my head lately and I can’t seem to get rid of it. (Sorry, you probably have it in your head now as well).

It’s a constant refrain. Should I stay home, or should I go to the market? For the record, I rarely go to the market, my wife does this for us. She says I spend too much. Should I stay home or should I go to a meeting and perhaps risk getting the Wuhan Virus. Should I stay out of the rancor of social media or should I dive in the deep-end by defending a position that may not conform to established social norms?

Like the song, I have the recurring tune of the health crisis running in my head. Even with limiting my exposure to social media, negative conversation, and especially physically distancing myself from the purveyors of propaganda, aka, the news. The phrase, “Tune in, turn on, and drop out” used by Timothy Leary isn’t an option. Abusing drugs or alcohol to escape into an alternate universe that has descended upon us is not the answer for me. So what is?

One of the core tenants of citizenship is the principle of self-reliance;
to be responsible for yourself and finding the path to truth. To live freely one should provide the necessities of life for themselves. This includes knowledge that allows one to attain wisdom.

In 1970, Leonard E. Read, from “I Pencil” fame wrote a book entitled “Talking to Myself “. On pages 19 and 20, in the chapter entitled; “Eduction verses propaganda” Mr. Read wrote, “Eduction, not education, the true antonym of propaganda”. You may often hear, “If we could only educate people on this or that subject.” I find this reprehensible. I do not need to be educated. Why do some people feel they need to tell others they need to be educated? What if we are educated, yet do not agree with their point of view. Then what? What the statist is actually saying is “I will tell you like it is and you will now agree with my point of view”.

“Eduction, is rooted in the Latin “educere” which means “to draw out, elicit, evolve, to educe, or infer from data”. Too often in education today, an instructor will not share all sides of an argument with students or a curious individual for fear that the student or individual will arrive at a reasoned or rational point of view that is in opposition to the instructor. Many would rather indoctrinate through education because it is easier and more controlling.

My solution to all this is not to run from it but embrace the opportunity to read, listen, and study all sides of an argument and understand it so well that you can argue and recite the fallacy of the opposition. Expose it for its weakness and propose a solution that actually makes a persuasive argument. This takes work, study, time, and most of all, persistence. It takes thinking, reflection, and rechecking one’s premise. The alternative I fear is chaos.

“Should I Stay or Should I Go” was released in 1982 as a double A-sided single with
“Straight-to-Hell”. Hm, if we do not practice our persuasion and eduction skills we just may end up in that forsaken place. The next time someone says to you, “If we can just provide those people with education” you’ll know what they mean. Think like them or else. I think I’ll go.

Listen to the companion interview on The Kim Monson Show KLZ560 AM https://kimmonson.com/kim_monson_show/brad-beck-asks-should-i-stay-or-should-i-go/

A Book, a Bourbon, and a Belvedere

When was the last time you won an argument or discussion on social media? The answer. Never.  The days of polite, social intercourse seem to be long gone.  It sometimes feels like all that is left is the other word for intercourse, and I don’t mean friendly.  Too often the default position is, “my way or the highway, you are wrong, and I am right”. You might even start defriending friends, blocking old buddies, axing acquaintances and end up in an echo chamber.  Now you are siloed off in the blissful realm of ignorance. The ignorance of not being exposed to another idea, another opinion, another way of thinking even if you disagree with it.  “Hey Brad, but those idiots are just wrong, those people have an agenda, those people are ruining the country.”  Perhaps, but how will you ever know how strong your position is if you are not open to hearing other ideas, even if they may be wrong?

I am a member of many groups on many platforms in social media.  Often, I am just a voyeur, reading and looking but seldomly engaging on most. I do this to try and determine how others may think, feel or react to the passing scene.  I read other’s ideas and internally ask myself, “Is this written on principle or emotion; Is this a personal experience or a bubbameister.”

(A grandmother’s fable in Yiddish).  If a post, picture or phrase upset me I will read it, reflect on it. Then open a word document and write like a crazy man and then put it away and read it the next day.  If I still feel the same way I may post it, but by then hopefully the “better angels” have spoken and the embarrassment of posting something I’ll regret has passed.

Several years ago, I started posting an ongoing series of images that intrigued, inspired and informed my connections on what I was reading.  Usually on Sunday afternoon I will perch myself out on my porch, light up a favorite cigar, pour myself a favorite beverage, usually Bourbon, and read a book that interests me.  I am a voracious reader.  There are so many great books to read and learn the timeless wisdom of the ages.  There are current policy books that address an emerging or ongoing public issue, biographies that inform how a person lives, learns, and laughs through life. I also enjoy books on history, philosophy, business, public speaking, communication as well as stories of ideas and people.

I’ll post a photograph of said book, belvedere, and beverage on social media with a quote from the author or I’ll reflect on how the book impacts me or best yet, why I think others might benefit from reading it.  Like a moth to a light, people are often attracted to the image or interested to know what brand of beverage or smoke I am enjoying.  For the most part a conversation ensues or likes, hearts or smiles pop up on my feed.  In the many years of these positive post I have only had one connection attack me because he did not like the title posted.  I asked if he would read the book so we could have a conversation afterward.  More nasty comments ensued so I did what I rarely do, I blocked this individual.

I will not tolerate a person who will not have the common courtesy to engage civilly.  We can disagree respectfully.  We can have feisty and firm disagreements on ideas and subject matter. It is good for people to understand their positions based on their principles.  To be a connection with someone on social media should be considered a privilege and should be done in good faith.  If a person gets upset because of a book I read, or its title, they have many more problems than I want to engage in.  After all, life is short and so am I.  There are too many great books to read and I don’t have the time or the patience to fight or virtue signal.

Now if you don’t mind, it’s time to get out on the porch, with a book, belvedere, and a beverage.

Cheers!

https://kimmonson.com/kim_monson_show/the-importance-of-effective-communication/

From My Front Porch

I live in a community built to resemble a by-gone era.  Most of the homes in my neighborhood are reproductions of Victorian, Federal or Craftsman style homes built with a front pouch.  This is one of the many reasons my wife and I purchased a home in this development because our “purple-painted-lady” has a charming character and a wrap-around front porch.  On most weekend afternoons, after doing yard work or several “honey-dos”, I can be found sitting in a comfortable white wicker chair armed with a book, a beverage and a belvedere.

Neighbors will pass and wave on their walks with their dogs and baby strollers.  Children will ride their bikes or scooters along the sidewalk to the sound of the clicky-clack of each of their wheels passing over the divided portions of concrete.  Off in the distance one can hear the sounds of birds chirping, buzzsaws sawing, or babies singing for their afternoon bottles. This symphony of sounds brings a sense of certainty and serenity.  Often passers-by will stop and say, “Hello” or more familiar folks will ask, “what are you reading this week”.

A front porch allows for interaction in a community to take place.  Most modern homes are built with a back deck, which I have as well for those occasional times when I wish to have privacy in my thoughts or dwell on ideas alone.  Yet a front porch brings one in contact with neighbors and strangers walking by. Children and their parents with all manner of sporting equipment pass by on their way to the local park to play, exercise, smile and skip in the expectation of soon having fun and recreation.  

My front porch has been the scene of countless parties, picnics, private conversations, passionate debates, playful prattling, political gatherings, profitable projects, public prose, and putrid joke-telling. Life has been lived on my front porch. There was a time when Americans used to know their neighbors because everyone lived outside on full display on their front porch, especially in the Spring, Summer, and Fall.  If a neighbor's kid did something in front of your house that they were not supposed to be doing you could yell out to them to “stop it or I’ll let your folks know”. It was a deterrent to mischief. Ask most people, “do you know the names of the people living more than two doors down from you” and their response is likely to be a shrug. I happen to know most of my neighbors simply because I like sitting on my front porch. 

When cars drive down my street people will often slow down and point at my house as they gleefully-gawk at the whimsical woodwork which adorns my home.  When they realize a person is sitting on the porch they wave. I smile and wave back with a homespun “howdy” or “hello”. A homeowner’s pride swells up inside of me but more importantly, a connection is made. Several times those gawkers have found a home in the neighborhood and after moving nearby, they will be out walking and will stop to remind me that I was the friendly fellow who waved and welcomed them to the neighborhood.

Front porches build a sense of belonging and bonding that is sorely needed in our communities today.  Front porches allow for connectivity and community that people are desperately looking for. A front porch is part of the fabric of a neighborhood which encourages building relationships, fosters conversations and allows for people to interact in ways that are no longer common, yet should be.  When looking for a place to call home my suggestion is to find a neighborhood with a front porch you can live life on. And if you're in my neighborhood stop by and sit awhile on my front porch