MARK TWAIN TALKS - NOTES ON THE DAMNED HUMAN RACE

REMEMBRANCE

2011-09-09T10:21:00.001-04:00

We seem to have developed a very bad habit of thinking "close is good enough". All our major holidays have become "seasons". Now, apparently, one of our worst tragedies can be rembered whenever it fits into the schedule.

I, too, lost friends on 9/11/2001. This morning the financial markets in NY and Chicago have observed three separate "moments of silence" in remembrance. I know it is inconvenient to remember the anniversary on Sunday, but had anyone noticed that today is 9/9/2011? This Sunday is the day on which I will take some time to contemplate the tragedy of ten years ago.

Where the Money Is

2011-03-10T08:44:00.000-05:00

Willy Sutton was a prolific bank robber. Between the late 1920's and 1952 he stole more than $2 million dollars. He is famously reported as saying, when asked why he robbed banks, “Because that's where the money is”. He denied ever saying it, but he explained that he might have said it if asked -

“The credit belongs to some enterprising reporter who apparently felt a need to fill out his copy...
"If anybody had asked me, I'd have probably said it. That's what almost anybody would say...it couldn't be more obvious.
"Go where the money is...and go there often."

Which is exactly why we need to start taxing the obscenely rich people in this country. We often hear that rich, powerful people will just stop working if we return to the tax rates of even 15 years ago. This is absurd. After a certain point they are not working for the money anyway, but for the power. The money is just a way of keeping score. Even Warren Buffett agrees that he doesn't pay enough tax.

I have a new mantra - “If you can't live on half a million dollars a year, f*** you.”

War and Time

2011-02-15T08:07:00.000-05:00

“how do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?”.......... John Kerry 1971

     What happened to John Kerry? What happens to a man as he grows older and is no longer directly involved in the fighting of wars, but only supporting them through funding them?

     Kerry is six years older than me, but I remember the passion of the Vietnam Veterans against the War. I remember how angry we all were that the United States was involved in a war of aggression against people half a world away. I remember the shame that, because of inequity of the draft laws, mostly disadvantaged youth were being sacrificed so that our country would not “lose face”.

     We are now engaged in two “wars” half a world a way which Kerry supports. We no longer have a military draft so there is far less anger about the lives lost. Still, we send the National Guard to these wars while the professional standing army “trains” at Fort Bragg, Fort Hood, et.al.

     Our journalists are now “embedded” with the troops, so we don't get the kind of brave reporting we got from Vietnam, where it was those brave enough to show us the true face of the war who were largely responsible for ending it.

     I used to be angry, now I'm just sad.

FILM AT ELEVEN

2011-02-11T10:18:00.000-05:00

“The church is always trying to get other people to reform – it might not be a bad idea to reform itself a little by way of example.” Mark Twain, A Tramp Abroad

The same could be said for The United States. We are losing our moral authority and influence (other than military) in the world. We have stopped trying to convince others that our system of representative democracy is the best available form of government. Instead we have adopted a policy of demanding that others do as we say, not as we do.

Take Egypt............please. We supported Mubarak, knowing his was a corrupt government. We pretended that it was founded on democratic principles – right up to the time when the people took to the streets. As soon as a mob appeared we sided with them and demanded a change in government without regard to the rule of law, which we insist is the most important principle in this country. If mobs appeared in the streets of Detroit or Newark or Los Angeles would our government head resign? History says no.

If we wish to be a guiding light in the world, we need to let other countries resolve their own problems, bring our troops home, and work on the many problems we have here in this country.

“The pitifulest thing out is a mob.” Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Class(less) Action Suits

2009-11-02T09:43:00.002-05:00

When not performing I've made my living since 1984 as an investor. If you have ever traded stock, you probably know that there is a subset of the legal profession which specializes in suing companies for poor stock performance if they think they can make any money at it. Generally, in order to participate in any class-action "settlement" of these cases, you must prove that you bought the stock between dates A and B and agree to be part of the "class" and not sue the company separately. The settlement amount usually is not enough to merit the trouble of filling out the paperwork. Only the lawyers make money.

Today I got a postcard which I believe tops anything I have ever received before. It states -

"If you are a current or former T-Mobile customer who never sent a text message, but received, were charged for, and paid for text messages, while not on a rate plan or value bundle plan that included text messages, during the period October 1, 2003 to September 4, 2009, you may be a member of the settlement class."

I have no idea how many possible claimants that might be, but unless you've kept a lot of billing statements you probably can't prove your claim. But it doesn't matter, because the card goes on to say -

"If you are a class memberyou have several options: you may remain a member of the class (in which case you will give up the right to seek damages and receive no monetary relief), object to the terms of the settlement, or request exclusion from the settlement class. The parties estimate that that the average potential recovery for a class member who won at trial would range from approximately $0.17 to $1.17."

So if you decide to sue T-Moble yourself and manage to win you might collect a buck, but if you remain a member of the class you get nothing. Counsel for the Settlement Class is Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, and they will get all of the settlement. And, of course, they only brough this suit to help the poor little person who was overcharged by T-Mobile.

WE NEEED TORT REFORM!

The long Year-and-a-half

2009-11-02T09:37:00.002-05:00

Shortly after my last post my wife and I bought a small cottage in Wareham, MA. It needed a lot of work and we spent the summer of 2008 re-habbing it. We moved in September of 2008, just as the financial melt-down began. The last year has been spent working on the house, getting our financial heads above water, and generally neglecting everything else. I'm happy to say everything is now under control and "Mark Twain Talks" is getting back into the swing of things, with several new bookings in the works.

A NEW TWIST

2008-03-17T10:15:00.002-04:00

According to The Boston Globe this morning, the Republicans, under the urging of Rush Limbaugh, have discovered an interesting campaign strategy. Since their primaries are over and their candidate selected, they are requesting that registered Republicans vote for Hillary Clinton in the democratic primaries in those states where cross-over voting is allowed. Apparently 12% of the votes for winner Clinton in Mississippi came from registered Republicans. The idea is to keep Obama and Clinton tearing each other apart so McCain doesn’t have to.

At the same time, Nancy Pelosi has said that it would be a bad thing if the "super delegates" were to decide the eventual Democratic candidate. I disagree. The Democratic nominee should be selected by members of the party, and at least the "super delegates" are that. It is a subversion of the process for the nomination to be affected in any way by those outside the party ranks, including independents.

I think a case can be made for the fact that McCain was, in fact, selected by independents voting in Republican primaries. This is why the conservative wing of the party was not thrilled by that outcome.

The entire process by which the United States "selects" candidates to run for the presidency has become a too-long, and too-expensive, farce. Maybe it’s time to follow the rest of the civilized world and let anyone run during a limited period before the election, with preferential voting or run-offs if necessary.

Lying our way to the Presidency

2008-03-12T08:55:00.001-04:00

I don’t suppose I’m any more opposed to lying than the next person, but I do think we ought to be more honest about it. In my younger days as an actor in New York I would tell some very tall tales to people I met, but I was scrupulous about admitting they were all lies - if asked that question. I seldom was asked.

We currently have 3 United States Senators running for the presidency. Each has told us some of the grandiose plans they have for improving our country once they are elected. My question to them would be - "Do you really believe you can accomplish theses things, or are you lying?"

And if their answer was "Yes, I believe this can be done.", I would suggest that they go back to their elected positions in the United States Senate and try to do it - now.

OVERCROWDING

2008-02-07T11:44:00.000-05:00

"Often it does seem such a pity that Noah and his party did not miss the boat.".... Mark Twain

I don’t believe there is a single problem facing the human race that couldn’t be solved by having a lot fewer humans on this planet. Certainly the other species would be happier, except maybe the rats, who seem to rely on our profligacy for their entire existence.

Fewer people would mean less garbage, less pollution, less waste of resources, and much more freedom for most of us, because Governments would have less interest in controlling our behavior. Take health Insurance – please.

Despite the fact that every other civilized nation on Earth has figured out a way to provide health care for all its citizens, the United States maintains that this is impossible except by mandating that every citizen buy it through what is generally recognized as a corrupt and inefficient system of private insurance. This not only flies in the face of all logic, but ignores the fact that the Federal Government already runs the largest Health Insurance network through Medicare/Medicaid and the program for Federal Employees. Do you think President Bush has to show his proof of insurance when he goes to Walter Reed to get a checkup?

But I digress. The 800 pound Gorilla of Health Care, of course, is the fact that the more people we have being cured of diseases and living to a ripe (or not so ripe) old age, the more it is going to cost. Generally, the medical profession considers death a "bad outcome", and this is proper. The reality is that every one of us is going to die – it’s only a matter of how and when. Accidental deaths in which the victim dies at the scene are the cheapest, followed by those who are treated at the scene but die before arriving at a hospital. Once a living victim arrives at the hospital, every effort will be made to "save" that person, regardless of expense. The same holds true for those who are chronically ill. Even if it is clear to everyone, even the patient, that the ultimate outcome is death, no expense will be spared to prolong it as long as possible.

The obvious solution is to allow people to die, with dignity, when the time is right. Ah, but who decides that? The patient. If I decide to end my life, does it harm society? No. It may cause grief to my relatives and friends, but that is no business of government. I’d like to see a world in which every human being had a healthy, prosperous, satisfying life as long as that was possible, and then had the good sense and courage to die before they became incapacitated and miserable.

"Unfortunately none of us can see far ahead; prophecy is not for us. Hence the paucity of suicides." ....... Mark Twain

MLK DAY

2008-01-21T10:22:00.000-05:00

I have a dream, too.

I dream of a world in which everyone will have enough, but nobody will have too much.

A world in which it is understood that much is expected from those to whom much has been give. That the pursuit of money and possessions is not the goal.

A world in which governments realize that their only role in the world is to do those things which individuals can not be reasonably expected to do for themselves. Provide for a common defense, build roads, regulate commerce, enforce laws (not enact new ones because the old ones haven’t been enforced), provide universal health care, and care for those who are unable to care for themselves.

A world in which leaders will tell us the truth and only the truth, or not speak at all.

A world in which we stand by our principles and show others that we believe this is the proper way to live, but do not seek to coerce them into believing as we do.

A world in which we consider war a failure, not a victory.

A world where MLK will stand for More Loving Kindness.

Primarily Thinking

2008-01-09T09:31:00.000-05:00

I confess to being a little confused about the current process for selecting a President.

In the old days the candidates of the two parties (for we remain a two-party system despite our best efforts to improve) were chosen, in convention, by delegate representatives of each party. At those conventions, also, things called "platforms" were negotiated expressing the beliefs and ideals of the party and the legislative initiatives they intended to introduce if their candidate was elected. The chosen candidate was then expected to honor that platform. Everything was clear and the only decision we poor independents had to make was which party’s platform seemed less dangerous and vote for their candidate.

Now the candidates of each party are chosen by a primary system of general election which in many states lets independents (unenrolled they call us now) vote in whichever primary they like. This inevitably leads to pandering. Instead of upholding the party ideals and convincing the party faithful to support them, candidates must reach out to the least involved segment of the electorate. The candidates are known before the conventions, their views become the platform, there is no strong feeling that their party will honor their legislative agenda, the conventions are meaningless. And all this is going to happen this year eight or nine months before the election.

My hope is that someone will recognize the stupidity of this process and step into the race around next September, declare that they are willing to work with anyone, regardless of affiliation, to bring this country back to being a beacon of freedom, peace, and justice for the world.

How Much Money Is Enough?

2007-11-20T09:44:00.000-05:00

"A lack of money is the root of all evil." ...... Mark Twain

I think Twain meant this in the sense that poverty drives people to commit crimes. But the co-author of "The Gilded Age" made it clear that the pursuit of riches at all costs was a particularly evil, and predominantly American, disease.
So how much money is enough? I have a strong belief that if you can’t get by on half a million dollars a year there’s something wrong with you. Anything more than that starts to look like greed.

Some people (mostly Republicans) say that if we don’t pay corporate executives ridiculously large salaries they will not be interested in working. This is absurd. Once a person has set away his first one or two million, he starts working for the power, the fame, and the personal prestige. The money is just a way of keeping score. This is even more true of athletes. Whether they make $25,000 a year playing Soccer or $15,000,000 a year playing baseball they play for the love of the sport and the competition.

My solution? Let them make any salary they like, to keep the scorekeepers happy, but tax the daylights out of any amount over $500,000 net. Of course, as is the case now, the costs of making that half-million should be deductible. In the 1950s there was a 90% marginal tax bracket. Almost nobody was subject to it, but I like the idea. The government needs money, and as Willie Sutton was reported to have said when asked why he robbed banks, "That’s where the money is."

There but for Fortune

2007-10-05T09:38:00.000-04:00

"We are all erring creatures, and mainly idiots, but God made us so ...
and it is dangerous to criticize." Mark Twain

When I was working in a scene shop many years ago I had a boss who was fond of saying, "It’s just as easy to build it right the first time.", which is sensible - except for the fact that there was only one ‘right’ and a whole universe of possible ’wrong’.

I had another boss whose favorite take on morality was, "If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem." He used this phrase mostly when I was questioning his approach to solving a problem. It was very effective, since it immediately put me on the defensive and had the ring of wise counsel to it. After many of these incidents I came up with my rejoinder. If you’re not part of the problem, you ARE the solution.

We live in an era when it is acceptable to not only know your neighbor’s business, but to have an opinion about it. And we are encouraged by the media to express that opinion, whether it be an informed one or not. Our current cult of celebrity leads us to a comfortable "holier than thou" smugness about the foibles of the rich and famous. Let us seek to remember that old phrase "There but for fortune go you and I."

Seawalls and Nature

2007-09-23T10:53:00.000-04:00

"There is no shame in being wrong. The shame is in staying wrong."
This investment advice from an unremembered source has been a guiding light to me for years. It can be applied to almost any decision-making area, including government spending.
In today’s Boston Globe there is an article about eroding beaches, seawalls, and the need for the government to spend a lot of money to repair them. The currently popular argument is that this is not to protect private property but the "infrastructure" of utilities, roads, waterlines, etc.

Some History -

In the coastal town where I live, Marshfield, Massachusetts, I was a member of the inaugural "Beach Concerns Committee". I was appointed to the committee to represent the land trust I live in, which owns 100 yards of beach and dunes at the northernmost edge of Marshfield, where it meets Scituate at Humarock. Our stretch of beach and the adjacent town-owned Rexhame beach have never been built upon. South of this beach there is about 3 miles of seawall. One of the tasks the Committee was asked to address was who actually owned the seawall and what should be done about its deteriorating condition. We discovered that most of the seawall had been erected by homeowners on the beach without any governmental oversight, some had been erected with government funds by the WPA during the Great Depression, and some had, in fact been built to protect a road that ran along the coast. Some of the homeowners were still of the opinion that the seawall was private property (they installed barriers to keep people from walking on top of it and told people that the access stairs to the beach at the end of public roads were private, etc.) - and yet they thought it was the Town’s duty to repair these structures.
It has been my long experience that the best thing to do with Nature is leave it alone. The continuing growth of the Human Race, and everyone’s insistence on being somewhere, has lead us to ignore this dictum in many places, but its truth holds. There are places where people shouldn’t live. The lower parts of New Orleans are a good example. What used to be marsh and swamp was transformed by man into dry land suitable for city expansion by the arrogance of people, with the enthusiastic support and help of the Army Corps of Engineers, who believed that they could bend Nature to their wishes. They have been proven wrong again and again.

Conclusion -

Given the fact that these misguided protections were built and homes behind them are owned by good people with a right to protect their property, what do we do? We let them do it, if that is their choice. At their own expense, with the oversight of Town Engineers and the clear understanding that their efforts are ultimately futile. Or we give them the option of selling their property to the Town, which will then demolish that section of seawall and rebuild a dune system to replace it. Where the seawalls are actually protecting "infrastructure", the solution is less obvious, but probably involves building a dune structure in place of the seawall. It should be noted that at our beach, which has never been touched, the dunes are higher and stronger now than they have been at any time since the 1978 Blizzard.

"Architects can not teach Nature anything."........ Mark Twain