Coaxing you back with some happy thoughts

This blog post will reveal the "schizophrenic" nature of my blog posts of late. It's that kind of period of time. Hard to look at all that's going on in the world--war and rumors of war, as well as economic bad news at every turn. What's the choice for us?

Maybe, as Bruce Cockburn once sang, we should just "kick the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight." Then again, he also sang of rocket launchers. Actually, once again, I think he was speaking about the duality of living, in this case, the two sides of anger.

Ok, so now I share a positive thought with you, courtesy of Lisa, from her HR Thoughts blog. BTW, did you know that the HR world is a source of some fantastic and informative blogging? Like Laurie's Punk Rock HR blog, for instance. Check out her blogroll.

Did you know. . .

"The happiest people have vibrant social networks. In several studies of individuals with self-reported high well-being, the number one strategy used to raise mood and combat depression was 'social affiliation.' People also report feeling happier when they are around others."

--Caroline Adams Miller and Michael B. Frisch, PhD, in Creating Your Best Life (Sterling) as published in Oprah Managazine, January 2009 issue

Time for me to throw a few logs in the fire and head off to bed (it's -20 in my corner of the universe, which is cold, no matter how you slice it!).

Having the correct views on Israel

Saree Makdisi, author of Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation, spoke on C-Span2's BookTV this weekend. I happened to tape it, and watched it this morning while doing a spin on the Lifecycle.

I haven't been able to watch any of the MSM's coverage of the Israeli invasion of Gaza, because it's so lacking in context as to be a joke--the only problem, the Twittering masses don't know that--they're too braindead to care about anything other than updating their Facebook page, or LinkedIn profile (not that there's anything wrong with that).

The Jewish lobby (read AIPAC) controls most of the dialogue about the invasion, and limits viewpoints on Israel, and its treatment of Palestinians. Any "alternative" views are restricted to the margins.

In doing a bit of research on Mr. Makdisi, who also writes for the LA Times, I found this, about an appearance he was to make at a well-known bookstore with liberal leanings, Politics and Prose, in DC, which ended up being cancelled, censoring Makdisi's views on the Israel/Palestinian conflict. (he made reference to this in his Book TV talk)

I'm planning on getting my hands on Makdisi's book, as I prefer to make up my own mind on issues, not looking for news that plays to my own preconcieved notions, which is now the American way.

For a bit more on Mr. Makdisi and his views, there this article from 2007, in Al-Ahram.

History Maker Mondays-01

[Thus begins a new weekly feature here at Words Matter. Each Monday, for the next year, you’ll be greeted by History Maker Mondays. We’ll start with the letter A, and cycle through the alphabet once, and make another pass through before the end of 2009.--JB]


History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. History is who we are and why we are the way we are.
--David McCullough

Adler, Felix (1851-1933)

Adler was born in Alzey, Germany. His father Samuel, a rabbi, brought the family to the U.S. in 1857, where a rabbinate at Temple Emanu-El, in New York City awaited him.

Adler would attend Columbia University and graduate in 1870. He went back to Germany where he received his doctorate from Heidelberg University. Returning to the states, he began a professorship in 1874, at Cornell, in Oriental Languages and Hebrew. Two years later, he was asked to leave for what was considered his “dangerous attitude.”

In 1876, Adler would found the Society for Ethical Culture, in New York. The aim of his new religious movement was the advancement of social justice for all. He suggested that the movement should further the principles of ethics among adults and children through education and that members of the Society should express their religious consciences in moral and humane actions. Adler’s founding ideas remain the cornerstones of the philosophy of the New York Society for Ethical Culture, which was incorporated on February 21, 1877.

For Adler, on of the keys to his nascent movement was his observation that too often disputes over religious or philosophical doctrines have distracted people from actually living ethically and doing good. Consequently, "Deed before creed" has remained a motto of the movement.

Adler was passionate about education and developed schools centered around a progressive pedagogy that combined liberal arts education with specialized vocational training programs for students who opted for them. In fact, his model was an early incarnation of what has become our own vocational training/CTE model today.

While his blueprint was never fully realized in his various Ethical Culture Schools, it was picked up later by the New York City public schools in the creation of schools Bronx High School of Science, and similarly by what are now called “magnet” schools.

In search of a progressive voice

I like Thomas Frank. I read Whats The Matter With Kansas, a well-written book about why working class, middle-Americans consistently vote against their own interests, when they chooose Republicans, most notably, neocons, like George Bush.

I knew of Frank pre-WTMWK, from his days, editing The Baffler, a journal devoted to cultural criticism, liberally sprinkled with a progressive political bent. The Baffler is no more, but I recommend Commodify Your Dissent: Salvos from The Baffler, a representative sampling of the publication's best writing.

These days, between working on another book (I imagine), Frank writes The Tilting Yard column for the Wall Street Journal, serving as the pro-market, pro-business publication's token progressive. He's a good choice.

Like today's column. Frank let's readers know that not every pol from Chicago is a Blagojevich (or an Obama). In fact, Frank makes a strong case for Thomas Geoghegan, running to assume Rahm Emanuel's vacated House seat (the one that Blago didn't fuck with), representing the city's North Side. He calls Geoghegan, "an unrepentent New Dealer," something that's rarer than an honest Chicago politician and/or lawyer--Geoghegan happens to be the latter, vying to also be the former. Granted, he practices labor law and advocacy for the poor, which if you know anything about the legal profession, is the bargain basement when it comes to getting rich from the practice of law.

This about Geoghegan, from Frank's column today, recounting how he first became aware of a man that he makes it to Washington, might dispel the cynicism that so many of us feel towards national politics:

I first encountered Mr. Geoghegan in the early 1990s, when he was a frequent guest on a Chicago TV show. And I still remember how shocking it was to hear someone defend organized labor in those days when everyone else was coming to accept the post-industrial order.

Maybe that's just what you're supposed to hear when you turn on the TV in a place like Chicago. To me, though, it was new and astonishing, a sort of revelation. Mr. Geoghegan's 1991 book, "Which Side Are You On?" -- the best book on labor to appear in the past 50 years -- continued my education about the blue-collar world. An "anti-world," Mr. Geoghegan called it, a "secret world." And so it was: the silent, suffering antithesis to the great choir then starting its hymn to omniscient markets and the ever-ascending Dow.

Now that conservative orthodoxy has collapsed in a heap of complex derivatives, I can't help but think what a refreshing dose of plain-spoken Midwestern reality Mr. Geoghegan could bring to the nation as a whole.

According to Frank, Geoghegan is a "big thinker," something that DC and just about every other seat of government is experiencing a dearth of.

Apparently Geoghegan is also a writer, and wrote a book, Which Side Are You On? that Frank says is "the best book on labor book to appear in the past 50 years." (Added to my ever-growing list of books for 2009)

Check out Frank's column, and keep your eyes on the crowded field of candidates vying for Emanuel's vacated seat. I'm hoping that Geoghegan gets the nod and heads to DC.

Getting my (generation) jones on

I feel like a heavy weight’s been lifted off my shoulders—the weight of carrying around the “Boomer” label for one minute more.

From a post at GenerationXpert (copped from Marian Salzman), I gleaned something new about the generational divide that’s all the rage in HR circles, and in various publications germane to work culture. Apparently those of us born in the 1960s, while claimed by Boomers, are actually “Generation Jones.” (the term was coined by Jonathan Pontell)

Apparently those of us born between 1954 and 1965 are in fact “Jonesers,” demographically attached to the baby boom that ended in the early 1960s. However, this has always been my own point of contention (and argument) with being lumped in with Wall Street brokers with pony tails, Al Gore, and Volvo drivers, is that “the events stereotypically associated with generational discussion of Boomers, including protests over civil rights and the Vietnam war and the emergence of rock music took place while the members of Generation Jones were still children or early teenagers.” (from Wikipedia)

Basically, I never identified with the whole Boomer mystique, feeling much more atuned to GenX, and the inherent cynicism attributed to that demographic grouping. In fact, it turns out, according to Salzman that Jonesers like me “value traditional notions of family but see men and women as equals in parenting.” Additionally, we long to go back to older American values like civility, community, responsibility, while at the same time, are comfortable embracing technology and we use the Internet naturally.

My two books, and many of my blog posts hearken back to what I consider a better, and less harried time. The flip of this is the need that I feel (as well as many others, apparently), to stay current on the technology front, even if it probably creates a tension for many of us in this demographic “tweener” category.

Generation Jones is feeling like a well-tailored suit.