It's Not Just Putin

I'm not going to defend Putin's actions but rather I'd like to call attention to the fact that the Ukrainian government must share some blame in the unrest in their country.  Putin, ever ready to pounce on an opportunity, is merely doing what comes naturally to a man of his background.

If the Crimean people had been happy living under the Ukrainian flag this referendum would have gone no place.  That too is understandable since so many of them are ethnic Russians.  What they don't understand and I'm not the one to explain why, is that they are likely to be worse off returning to Russian control than they are now with a struggling Ukrainian government.

I also read where Quebec is making noises about independence from Canada again.  This is a constant for them and one day the Canadians may well tell them to take their independence and be done with it, beating them to the punch and thus being the ones to set the terms. In the long run Quebec will be the losers because Canada holds the strong hand.

Venice is considering a referendum to separate themselves from Italy.  How many American states have recently made noises about seceding? It speaks to unrest with all their respective governments.

Only the U.S. has succeeded in melding it's ethnic groups into a homogeneous whole.  It lasted for decades.  People were Americans first.  They learned how to speak English.  They worked hard and built  what is now the fast disappearing American dream.  Yet now we divide ourselves and winnow out the ethnic groups for special favors.  The Hispanics.  The Blacks.  The Middle Easterners.  The Asians.  They all have their enclaves around the country where they are more their former selves than the Americans  they came here to become and we pander to them.  We print signs in a multiplicity of languages.  We teach English as a second language.  We deport or not depending on the need be it workers or a voting block.  This isn't the United States of America - the great melting pot.  This is a back to the future look at all the ingredients that went into that pot before the fire was lit.

Somewhere along the line, the fire went out and we have great clumps that don't blend.  What happens if Canada should want Alaska or the route of the Keystone Pipeline instead of dealing with our feckless government?  What happens if Mexico wants Texas and New Mexico and Arizona?  What if China wants all the ports in California?  No one in their right mind would want the rest of the state.

Could the people in those areas become disillusioned enough with our government to referend themselves out from under U.S. control?  With or without foreign troops massing on our borders?

Never say never.  Putin is the head of a failing state with a failing economy and an army weaker than our own yet he plunges ahead. Don't bet that it couldn't happen here.  People don't always understand the future implications of their actions but they sure do understand what drives them to take them.

A New Dogwalk Strategy ~ Shhhh!

Every day I scour the papers for news with a different slant.  I do the same with the media, the pundits and the politicians.  Then there are the blogs which never change tone because the authors are too wed to an ideology.

Some sites are devoted to conversation.  All they really consist of are conversations among several rather than the opinion of one.  Seldom if ever are solutions offered.  Just like the politicians, the pundits and the media.

You know the world has gone haywire when even the Democrats can't figure out what Obamacare is at this point and the world cannot find a Boeing 777 which is nearly the size of a football field. It seems our capabilities across the board are, at the very least, in a state of flux.

I've long been frustrated by the fact that the media reports only what it wants, politicians don't listen to the people and the administration is living in a parallel universe driven by polls.  Actually they are all driven by polls.

So, my Dogwalk solution for the week is that we all keep our mouths shut.  The pundits don't opine on their shows, the media reports absolutely nothing, we bloggers and Facebook types and Twitterers take a holiday from our keyboards and the pollsters take a hike.

If no one says a word, what would happen?  In my world, we'd have to think for ourselves.  And even better so would the politicians.  If they don't have the polls to tell them what to think they'll have to do it for themselves.  Then we can weigh in.  Just the people.  Not the media who claim to either represent how we think, nor the pundits who try to sway us to their side nor the pollsters who skew their questions to suit whoever has commissioned the poll.

Wouldn't that be something?  To turn on the tube and have nothing but a blank screen. Turn on the computer and find all your favorite sites have no content?  I can hear the gurgling now of a world wide brain drain.

Then we'd find out if there are any left in the world who can think well enough to keep from going down the drain themselves or if like political lemmings, they are all on a one way path to oblivion.

I don't think there's a plumbers snake in the world large enough to clear the ensuing clog! Talking until we're blue in the face hasn't worked.  Let's try zipping it!

Three Cheers For CPAC - It's Over!

I didn't watch all of it but from what I did watch, the best thing that could have happened to those who would be President on the Republican ticket was to not be invited.  There were a few.

Ah, yes, this soiree is designed to showcase the Conservative candidates, not those establishment types Sarah Palin was so eager to dismiss.  I don't know that she did them much harm though.  She was so cloyingly "cute" I had trouble following her point.  If she even had one other than to get back in the public eye.

I didn't listen to all the speeches either, but from what I heard the only one who said what needed to be said was bad boy Chris Christie as he tried to make the point that in order to govern you have to be in power.  What is so hard to understand here?

Ted Cruz didn't disappoint.  He's still shilling for over turning Obamacare without a hope in the world until 2017 at the earliest.  But by golly, he's standing on principle.  He's not accomplishing anything, but to him and like minded thinkers, that doesn't matter. Now, this is hard to understand.  At least to me.

Rand Paul is an interesting mix of Libertarianism and Conservatism.  I don't think he has quite figured out where he can separate from his Dad yet not lose old Dad's supporters.  I wouldn't worry too much.  Dad never won.  He just formed a strong cult like following for idealism from a different point of view.

Then there were those who don't have much of a chance once the earliest primaries are over but there will be a lot of nail biting waiting to see who of the less Conservative types can survive those fanatical early votes.  Huckabee will survive them but what about Perry?  Oh, to have had a few new faces like Scott Walker. Maybe they could have even offered up some solutions.

The panels weren't particularly inspiring.  The usual defense of the second amendment and Ann Coulter holding court with a giggle so irritating it was hard to concentrate on the subject at hand.  There were a lot of empty seats within camera range and young mothers carrying around their babies.

As is usual for Republicans there was more talk of what they're against than what they're for.  It's time, fellas, to start coming out with some specifics.

I see today that Darrell Issa is going to be challenged for his position as Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Depending on who wins the battle, it could be encouraging.  We need some challenges to a lot of the leadership positions.  Sarah Palin seems to think the leadership thinks the American public are the ones asleep. We may be, but we share the bed with the them.

How else could Palin have slipped in with her version of Green Eggs and Ham, her condescending tone and her willingness to rip her own party from head to tail? It wasn't the stuff from which dreams are made.  Try nightmares!

There Will Always Be Bullies

Russia is a bully.  It always has been and I expect always will be as long as people like Putin can hold on to power.

I've been watching the Ukraine incident unfold with this in mind.  I think back to  West Side Story where the two gangs, the Sharks and the Jets,  go after one another and one lone young man, the hero Tony, tries to bridge the gap.  He ends up dead.  Mostly because he didn't have the tools to quell the gangs.

Today's conflicts aren't much different.  Our Secretary of State can preach to the Russians, or any of our other adversaries, about how they're behaving in an outmoded manner all he wants.  The reason why they thumb their nose at him and our President is because neither has the will nor the tools to have any clout.

One reader seems to think every time I write along these lines I'm advocating war.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I am advocating being able to go to war as a last result if necessary. An ability to show strength that  gives those adversaries pause. With the Defense Department cutting the Pentagon budgets to the extent they are, they're diminishing that deterrent.

In an ideal world negotiating would work.  Everyone would get something and life would go on.  We can't even do that within our own government.  Why should the world follow our rhetoric on an  grander scale knowing we have no will to lead?

Putin doesn't care which decade his behavior is most reminiscent of.  He knows there is no will to stop him nor the ability.  He will continue on until he gets bored, take a rest then get back to it.  Whatever 'it' may suit his fancy.

Also in an ideal world there would be at least one other player who has the tools to stop him yet chooses not to utilize those tools unless the need is dire.  That role used to be filled by the United States.  I think it really began changing when Bush went into Iraq.  I remain furious with him for that action.  The U.S. doesn't start wars.  It ends them.  Pair that now with a pacifist detachment from all that goes on outside our borders it has done nothing but embolden bullies of all stripes.

The Europeans are of no help because they have done what we're about to do - allow our lust for spending overpower good sense and put the economy at  even more peril than its already at.  They've become beholden to the Russians for life sustaining gas.  They're strong trading partners just as they are with Iran.  With Russia pulling the strings.

We're like Tony now.  We no longer have the tools.  The waffling from the President makes him no one to fear.  The weakness of our allies make them no one to fear.  And the bully rules.

As in other parts of the world, there will be those who will try to step up to the plate.  It will probably be students.  Bored, lack of opportunities, tired of sacrificing for the selfishness and corruption of their leaders. Without the counterweight to the bullies they will not succeed.  Look at Iran.  Look at what had once been feasible in Syria until we dithered it away.  How many others?

Will the pendulum ever swing back?  I don't anticipate it in my lifetime.  The Republicans in our area, which is small town conservative America, can't even get their heads together on what they represent.  The Democrats are facing similar problems.  Those defecting from their ranks are doing so to save their careers, not because a policy is just plain wrong.

Grass roots.  It begins there.  Left unchecked you get what we have today.  The bully that will always be, will continue to win.

Theater As A Repository Of History In Story Form

I've had a notebook on my reference shelf for a very long time.  It contains the step by step procedures used for the capital fund drive for a small theater in western Washington that was used as the theater began expanding along with the area's interest in the arts.  Back in the 1990s!  It's as timely today.

When I read that the new artistic director of our summer theater had spent time expanding his experience at the theater I thought he might like to have the book.  After I gave it to him this morning we talked  over coffee.  And talked.  And talked.

Knowing this was on my agenda got me thinking about how things in life can intertwine. In this case, theater and blogging of all things.  I am on occasion asked why I do what I do.  The answer is borne from my frustration with what I view as the disintegration of what our country used to be.  If people of my generation don't talk about what once was and why, telling the story, it will be lost to the new normal.  To me that would be both tragic and frightening.

And this correlates to theater how?  Because theater does much the same thing. Not movies, mind you, but theater.  In a reflective piece on his Facebook page this young actor wrote about  how he sees himself as one such story teller.  Bringing to life what was written without political revision, but rather as written by the playwrights of the day.  As they saw and recorded life around them.  Before the deception of politics intervened.  I related to that and looked a bit deeper.

In a world filled with instant gratification and communication, the 30 second attention span, the dumbing down of standards, the elimination of expectations, handouts for the sake of it, the denial of exceptionalism - theater is the one venue that is the antithesis.

Though the end is entertainment, gratification, for the viewer, it comes from nothing but hard work from the page to the stage.  It requires a work ethic barely known any more.  There is no aspect of theater that does not require training and ability.  You just can't walk in and state you want to be an actor or a director.  You just can't block a play or build a set or orchestrate a score or even design a costume without training.  You cannot perfect the product without rehearsal.  But when done, when all put together, it can be magnificent and if you're so inclined, inspirational, an intellectual honesty, a tale of morality and quite thought provoking.  This does not come without dedication, ability and commitment to intent.

I'm almost afraid to muse about this for fear that once the seed is planted there will be those who will try to revise these written words.  Of course then it will no longer be as intended.  Bastardized more to the truth.  Desecrated just as if I took a brush to the Mona Lisa to make her more to my liking.

I applaud this young man.  This story teller.  And the passion he has for what he does.  I hope he never loses it.  We need the story tellers as long as the stories they tell are truths.  Changing any aspect of it changes it into an interpretation we have no right to make.  Theater seems to have the upper hand.  May they forever cherish it and be as storytellers, forever beholden to it.