I wake up most mornings with questions on my mind.
Generally, they’re relatively innocuous or inconsequential things like: Why do I have the theme from Mannix stuck in my head? Do bald men think toupees are fooling anybody? Why do so many people believe in gravity? Why do some Kindle books cost more than the same books in print? If I pay my Social Security taxes, why am I taxed on the money I paid into Social Security when I get it back? If Santa Claus knows if you’ve been bad or good, why did he bring me anything, ever? Who the hell did let the dogs out? If an asp in the grass is a snake, why is a grasp in the ass a goose?
There are days, however, when I wake up with more serious questions on my mind. As an even dozen examples, do you ever wonder what life would be like if we:
- Stopped trying to impose Western thought on Eastern people?
- Stopped expecting jihadists to be rational?
- Stopped trying to impose contemporary narratives on history?
- Stopped imagining people can change the climate of an entire planet?
- Stopped pretending science can be settled?
- Stopped pretending equality can be legislated?
- Stopped believing what’s good for you is good for me?
- Stopped thinking contemporary journalists could define journalism?
- Stopped pretending feeling is the same as thinking?
- Stopped believing all people progress intellectually beyond the level of college freshman?
- Stopped expecting governments to take care of us?
- Started taking care of ourselves and each other?
I recognize those questions put me in the company of incorrigible pragmatists like Don Quixote. But it seems inevitable that someone else might ask them at some time. No? Really? Are we that far gone?
Tangents
I happen to have three other questions on my mind, too: (A) Why is it politically incorrect to fly the flag of the United States of American in the United States of America? That feels like a national out-of-body experience, doesn’t it? If not, why not? (B) Why isn’t antisemitism discussed in DEI training? Wouldn’t we imagine equity and inclusion would pertain to one the most — if not THE most — envied, misunderstood, hated, abused, and murdered cultures in the history of the world? Do we really believe we can make people equal, except Jewish people? (C) What the hell is wrong with us?
But I’ll save those for another time. Maybe if we’re ever able to answer the first 12 questions, the last three will take care of themselves. And what do I know anyway? As has been pointed out to me on occasions numerous enough that I’d be rich if I’d collected a buck for each of them, I’m too logical. And maybe that’s true.
Nevertheless, sometimes I wonder.
Mark —
Lots to impact here.
I wonder why
• it’s against the law to look at your cell phone while driving in New Jersey, but it’s OK for advertisers on Route 95 to use electronic billboards that provide rotating messages
• people take smiling selfies at the 9/11 reflecting pool memorial
Re #4 above, are you saying we should stop trying to address climate change?
Re Tangent B. above, it’s a good question, and it’s related to why individual groups such as Jews, gays, people of color, Indigenous Americans, readers of banned books etc. try to move their boulders separately up Mount Intolerance instead of joining together. Hate is hate. We have a big problem.
Re #3. It’s an inevitable part of writing history. Not going to change.
Re paying taxes on Social Security, I agree, but then why do we keep giving tax breaks to the rich?
Jeff, in response to your questions and comments:
• Probably because outdoor advertisers have a bigger lobby than cell phone users
• For the same reason they take smiling selfies while they’re otherwise trivializing and desecrating Liberty Island.
As for tangent B, we have a big ignorance ➛fear➛hate➛violence problem. And for #4, we can be more responsible citizens of the planet. Beyond that, we’re being had:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjcXcmcUfTE
Whether “the rich” (should) get meaningful tax breaks depends of the side of the coin we’re reading. According to the Pew Research Center, “Average effective tax rates … were highest among taxpayers with AGIs between $2 million and $10 million (nearly 28%). The average effective tax rate for taxpayers with AGIs of $10 million or more was actually a bit lower (25.5%), mainly because they tend to get more of their income from dividends and long-term capital gains, which are taxed at lower rates than wages, salaries and other so-called ‘ordinary income’ … tens of millions of Americans owed little or no federal income tax, especially after factoring in the effects of refundable tax credits, such as the child and earned-income credits. In 2020, the IRS received nearly 5.3 million individual tax returns that showed no AGI and hence no taxable income … Another 60.3 million returns showed AGIs of less than $30,000. The average effective tax rate for those taxpayers was 1.5%, even before refundable tax credits were applied.”
And then there’s Thomas Sowell’s question, “What exactly is your fair share of what someone else has worked for?”
We need to get elected to Congress so we can get this worked out. 😉