I've got nothing to add

Peruvian surfer Domingo Pianezzi rides a wave with his alpaca Pisco at San Bartolo beach in Lima, March 16, 2010.   Credit: REUTERS/Pilar Olivares

The best  investment of six minutes you'll make all week

Planxty

Okay, I can't let the day pass unacknowledged. Here's Planxty, a short-lived Irish supergroup. If you've never heard them, you've never heard anything like them. There are other groups with good musical talent, there are others who have a genuine love for the form. There's never been anyone else who ever could blend the talent with the joie de vivre. Liam O'Flynn's work on the uilleann pipes in this song is beyond joy and mastery.

There's not an Irish musician who doesn't pause and look at his feet at the mention of Planxty. They are at once exhilarating and inspiring and absolutely humbling. Their like will not be seen again.

Give a listen.

A diller, a dollar, a dithering

I haven't had a clear view yet of the president's plan to reform education. Perhaps it's brilliant, or perhaps it's another case of a person thinking that, because he's eaten in a restaurant, he's qualified to be a chef.

In anticipation, then, here are some things that nobody with the power to make things happen will bear in mind but that might make a difference in our educational system:

1. Cohort testing. I was at a gathering in Strong, Maine, at a blue-ribbon school, with the faculty and Senator Susan Collins, and this was raised as a major factor in testing. You can't judge this year's fourth grade against last year's fourth grade. It's not fair and it doesn't tell you what you need to know. You need to follow each group as they move through the system. How did this group do in fourth grade, compared to the progress they made in third grade the year before? Collins said she, and her fellow-senator Olympia Snowe, were aware of this issue and wanted it to be part of the re-authorization. Okay, time to step up.

2. An end to hazing of new teachers. This is not a problem everywhere, but it's certainly an issue at a lot of schools, and it has an impact on educational attainment. To begin with, we lose some potentially good teachers because they are hazed instead of mentored. They are deprived of classroom space, they are shuttled to the least desireable assignments, they are given the worst schedules, because they are lowest on the totem pole. That's wrong.

But more to the point, the problem of seniority is that too often, the hardest kids are left to the least experienced teachers. You can't show "adequate yearly progress" when the kids who drag down the school's average are being taught by novices. It is natural enough that more senior teachers would rather not have to deal with the unteachables. But that's what experience is for, and it's not right, it's not fair and it's not good sense to leave the hardest assignments to the faculty members with the least experience. Share the burden, my brothers and sisters.

3. Teach kids stuff they want to know. One common element of other nations' educational systems is that they recognize a difference between engineers and poets. The Big Lie told in American circles is that this system "locks kids in" before they are old enough to know what they really want out of life.

It is not just a lie, but a damned lie, because it is a lie that hurts kids and hurts our educational system. About two years ago, I met with a group of some two dozen exchange students, from at least three continents and a variety of nations that ranged from Serbia to Venezuela to Turkey to Vietnam, and I asked them about the tracking systems in their education. If you were in an engineering program and you decided you wanted a liberal arts education instead, what would happen? They shrugged and said that you would talk to your guidance counselor and you would switch. One of them (one of the two Turks, I think) laughed and said that, if you kept switching back and forth, there might be a problem, and they all laughed at that. But they were flummoxed by the idea that you couldn't change your mind. Of course you could change your mind. You're a kid, after all.

4. College for all is a bogus misdirection. On one hand, it is nonsense to prescribe "college for all" because not everybody needs to know much about Shakespeare. On the other hand, "college" has come to mean any large building with desks and a whiteboard. We need to get clear on what we mean by a K-16 educational system.

To begin with, if it takes 17 years to build an educational portfolio that will get you a job, then we need to make it equitable. All kids, regardless of family fortune, must be able to reach the bottom rung of the ladder, and if that is Grade 16, then let's support that much education. When it only took a "grade school" (i.e, 8th grade) education, we paid for that much, as an investment. And when a high school diploma became the lowest common denominator, we paid for that, too.

The process whereby people get that necessary BA, without which you cannot get an interview,  and end up with thousands of dollars of debt is completely immoral. If it is the base requirement, then we, as a society, have an obligation to invest in our future and make that the hallmark. When college was a frill, it was up to the student to pay for it. But if we are going to dictate college as the base requirement, then we have to pony up and invest in our future.

Which brings us to what I've heard so far: The President wants all students to end up at a point where they are ready for college.

To which I say, okay. But those who call the tune must pay the piper, and it's not fair to call a tune and then charge the dancers for trying to keep up.

Bulgaria Has Talent

Wretches with knotted knickers

I don't want to spoil this by detailing my own response. However, I cannot resist observing that the comments at the end of this outraged blog post seem pretty much divided between the ink-stained wretches and those who are, instead, stained by hair spray.

What's your reaction?

Okay, so it's a commercial.

First of all, I want to apologize to my fellow orcas, my trainers and all the people at Sea World who have been so supportive through all this. I realize that I cannot undo the damage that I have done to all the great things they have worked for so many years to achieve, and I am very sorry.

I also want to apologize to Dawn and to her family and friends. We had worked together for several years and I had no intention of doing anything to harm her or the relationship we had built. She was very special to me and will be impossible to ever replace, although I understand there are applications in the back of the room.

And I'd like to thank the ownership of Sea World for being so understanding throughout this ordeal and for supporting me at a very difficult time. They have gone out of their way to help me to do everything I can to make amends for this tragic event by filling the seats of Shamu Stadium as often as I possibly can in the weeks, months and, I hope, years to come.

However, before I resume my work here, I need to take some time to reassess my responses to certain stimuli and to undergo some impulse control therapy, and I hope that my fans will understand if it is a week or two before I am able to perform for them again.

Finally, I'd like to thank my wives and 14 children for standing by me. I want to apologize to them for the hurt that I have caused them through my own thoughtless actions, and I'd like to ask the press to please respect the privacy of my family throughout this difficult process, except when they are performing, at which time I hope you will take many photographs that can be licensed for promotional uses.

Thank you all for coming and, again, I am very sorry for everything that has happened and very eager to put this behind me and get back to work making Sea World the most exciting display of captive marine mammals anywhere in the world. Don't forget to stop in the gift shop on your way out.

And now, this message ...

Okay, it's a commercial. But it's a pretty interesting commercial from a guy who, until a couple of years ago, never did interviews or talked about his work. I know this because I did a series of interviews with cartoonists who were carried in the paper where I was then working, and he was the only one who turned me down, though he did so very politely.

Which means that I look at things like this and think, "If I'd only done that series about three years later, I'd have had the complete set of artists ..."

In any case, it's a commercial for something my handful of readers might actually want.

Moderate schools of Islam face pressure

It's worth remembering that not all of Islam is militant. In fact, most Muslims are not. In this report, students at a Sufi school in Yemen talk about their studies, and about the pressure their schools face under the eye of a critical Western world that sees the growth of al Qaeda in the area and does not understand or differentiate between types of Islam.

Here's a graphic I did just after 9/11 as part of my educational work at the Post-Star in Glens Falls, NY. We offered it to other papers and several published it in the days following that disaster. I don't know if it will blow up enough in a new window to be legible, but, if you click on it, you'll at least have a better chance of reading it.

 Your Time Will Come

Johnny Clegg and Savuka (1993)

WAQAMB' AMANGA MUS' UKUQAMB' AMANGA

[you were lying, do not tell lies]

WANGI QAMBELA AMANGA UFUNA UKUNGILAHLISA

ITHEMBA LAMI WEMAME!

[You told lies, trying to mislead me,

so that I would give up my faith and hope.]

WASHO NJALO! WATHI IKUSASA LETHU

SELIMNYAMA HAWU WASI QAMBELA AMANGA

[that is what you said -- you said that our future is hopeless,

our tomorrow is bleak, you were lying,

trying to mislead us]

NGEKE SIVUMA -- NGEKE SILAHLA ITEMBA

[No can do! we will never relinquish our faith]

Chorus:

KUZULONGA UKUTHI NINI? ASAZI!

[Everything will be all right --

It's just when this will be, we cannot know]

KUZOLONGA WENA 'MNGANE WAMI

[Everything will come right, I tell you friend]]

MASUKU LAHLA ITHEMBA LAKHO

[Do not throw away your hope]

MINA NGAPHA WENA NGAPHA SIZOYI BAMBA

[Me holding on one side, you holding on the other side

together we will pull through]

THINA NAWE, THINA NAWE

[you and me, you and me]

UMOYA WAMI ONAKELE

[my spirits are down]

WENA WEMTAKA ANTIE HAWU WANGI SHAYISA UVALO

[I say to you child of my aunt, you have caused me great fear]

WASHO NJALO! WATHI IKUSASA LETHU

SELIMNYAMA HAWU WASI QAMBELA AMANGA

[You told lies, trying to mislead me,

so that I would give up my faith and hope.]

WASHO NJALO! WATHI IKUSASA LETHU

SELIMNYAMA HAWU WASI QAMBELA AMANGA

[that is what you said -- you said that our future is hopeless,

our tomorrow is bleak, you were lying,

trying to mislead us]

NGEKE SIVUMA -- NGEKE SILAHLA ITEMBA

[No can do! we will never relinquish our faith]

Chorus:

KUZULONGA UKUTHI NINI? ASAZI!

[Everything will be all right --

It's just when this will be, we cannot know]

KUZOLONGA WENA 'MNGANE WAMI

[Everything will come right, I tell you friend]

KUZOLONGA 'MNGANE WAMI NGIYAKUTSHELA

[It will be all right my friend, I'm telling you]

WOZA WESIBINDI! UYAPHILISA UYABULALA

[come true courage, for it is you who gives

life and takes it away

MINA NGAPHA -- WENA NGAPHA SIZOYIBAMBA

[me on this side, you on the other,

we will hold it together]

UNGALALLELI LAW' AMANGA 'MNGANE WAMI

[don't listen to the lies of my compatriot]

OH SIZOBAHLULA THINA NAWA

[we will be victorious in the end, just you and me]

OH THINA NAMA

[just you and me]

I saw the Berlin Wall fall

I saw Mandela walk free

I saw a dream whose time has come

Change my history -- so keep on dreaming

Dream on dreamer, dreamer

In the best of times and in the worst of times

gotta keep looking at the skyline

not at a hole in the road

Your time will come, sister, your time will come

nobody's gonna rush history, we have to ease it along

-- just ease it along

http://johnnyclegg.de.vu

http://www.johnnyclegg.com

Soft opening

I'm still tinkering around with this new website, but I'm at the stage where I could use a little feedback before I try to promote it to a larger world.

It's a pretty simple idea -- just put up a strip each day, provide a little entertainment and maybe point two or three people a year to some of the collections that are available out there.

Comic strips, and their creators, are in an odd kind of bind. People like comics. They clip them out and put them on their refrigerators or tape them to their cash registers or pin them on their cubicle walls, but not enough people make the next step and actually support the artists by visiting their web sites or buying their collections.

So how do you try to raise that consciousness? It is a puzzlement. If they pursued comics more rabidly, they would find the collections on their own. But people tend to be passive. They see what is in the paper and they often like what is in the paper. They'll even bombard the editor with complaints if the cartoon is left out of the paper or, lord help us, dropped from the line-up.

But they don't see what is not in the paper, nor do they think much about it. And I don't know that this will help. But it will make me feel like I'm doing something, and, after all, isn't that what it's all about? The appearance of action?

Anyway, come visit www.comicstripoftheday.com and let me know what you think.

(We will now commence a stretch of 10 consecutive days during which there will be no funny or remarkable comic strips at all.)

Remembering a neighbor

Not me. I just got here, and I live about 25 miles too far away anyhow. But plenty of people down the road a bit lost a good neighbor recently.

Here's how they'd help him out.

Here's how they remember him.

Folks around here make good neighbors. And, yes, sometimes good fences come into it, to reference another New Englander. I think even Frost must have known, as Jerry clearly did, that you can always reach over, even climb over, a good fence.

If you throw a tantrum and nobody notices, does it count?

There is a lively and worthwhile discussion going on this week about CBS's decision to accept a Super Bowl advertisement from Focus on the Family that is reputed to carry a strong anti-abortion message. The issue isn't over the actual message of the ad so much as it is that networks have, in the past, rejected advocacy ads for the Super Bowl.

Specifically, CBS turned down an advertisement from the United Church of Christ in 2004 that showed minorities and gay couples being turned away at some churches but being welcomed to services at a UCC church.  According to this article, the reason given was a policy against any advertisement which "touches on and/or takes a position on one side of a current controversial issue."

CBS apparently has admitted to loosening the restrictions in light of the current economy, but still rejected an advertisement for a gay dating site, reportedly because the ad showed a gay couple celebrating a touchdown by kissing.

So the question is, has CBS decided to accept controversial ads, or just the ones somebody in their power structure doesn't consider controversial?

And, to be fair, the other question is, does the Focus on the Family ad say the things its critics claim? I add all the "reportedlys" to this because I happened to be working at an NBC affiliate when Donald Wildmon, a conservative clergyman noted for protesting indecency and blasphemy in the media, launched a campaign against a planned miniseries on the life of Christ, threatening sponsors with a boycott because the story was blasphemous, based on wild and baseless rumors of what the script contained. Today, Zeffirelli's "Jesus of Nazareth" is a staple of Christian broadcasting around Easter.

But let's assume the advertisement is what it is said to be: Florida quarterback Tim Tebow and his mother saying how glad they are that she didn't choose to have an abortion when she was pregnant with him. I don't see how this ad is less controversial than an ad from the UCC saying, "All people are welcome here" or an ad for a dating service that suggests that gay couples kiss when they are happy. No more controversial, but also no less. And thus the question of why CBS is airing the ad deserves to be asked, and the question of fairness answered.

I would go farther and say that I approve of boycotts as a way of expressing displeasure, and, if people want to write to other Super Bowl sponsors and express their anger, individually or collectively, I would encourage them to do so.

However.

The comments section of the above-linked article on HuffPost contains threats by a number of outraged readers to not watch the game. I strongly dislike reading these comments because I kind of like to cherish the notion that  liberals enjoy some intellectual advantage over conservatives. This "that'll show'em" response makes it impossible for me to hold onto an attractive idea which I already knew wasn't true.

Yeah, don't watch their damn Super Bowl. That'll show'em!

But ... that'll show who?

Small gestures matter, even if they are only personal ones. But they have to carry some weight, however light. I carry on my own personal boycott of Arizona Iced Tea and its affiliated products, because they had proposed bringing out "Crazy Horse Malt Liquor" over the protests of his family, who asked them not to use the name, noting the damage alcohol has done to Indians, and, in particular, the staunch temperance views that their famous ancestor had held. The proposal fizzled anyway, but I'm not buying their damned drinks. Now, I don't think that's going to cause any comment in the board room at Arizona Iced Tea because (A) I haven't told them and (B) my dollar a month canned beverage habit isn't going to nudge their P/L by a whole lot one way or t'other. Still, it's money they aren't getting from me and to hell with'em.

That said, how on earth does not watching the Super Bowl show anybody anything? There is, in these outraged statements, a sense that, if we don't watch, their ratings will fall. Now, unless you happen to be a Neilsen family this week and are keeping a ratings diary, the only way this will happen will be if it turns out that television ratings are the result of magical spy satellites that track all our viewing habits.

Let me just say that nobody who believes that is in any position to make jokes about tin foil hats.

If you don't want to watch the game, don't watch. But don't claim you're making a statement, because you are not costing CBS a single ratings point or a single penny of revenue. You are not having an impact on Focus on the Family. You are not advancing the cause of women's right to privacy or to control of their bodies.

You are simply having a very private, very quiet hissy fit that will have no possible effect on anyone except, perhaps, those who have to hear about it at the office. Either do something or do nothing, but don't be silly.

And, finally, for those who wonder where God stands on all this, I submit this Owen Dunne cartoon, which ran in January, 2000, after the Rams won the Super Bowl over the Titans in a squeaker. (Click on it for a more readable size.) Of course, we all know that, if God doesn't give the New Orleans Saints a victory, it means He really did strike down the city as divine punishment for the pro-choice policies of America, just like Pat Robertson said.

Interview with Elfego Baca

(I was updating "Two Years Before the Mast" and needed to find pictures of well-off Mexicans, as the chapter I was editing involved Dana's first impressions of the locals. While poking around, I came across a reference to Elfego Baca (1865-1945), a lawman, gunfighter and attorney who was born in the US, in New Mexico, and thus completely wrong from both a geographic and temporal point of view. But so what? I began to read about him and was led to this interview done by Janet Smith for the WPA Writer's Project in 1936. The gunfight to which he alludes was an occasion when 80 cowboys surrounded a house he was in and poured lead into it for two days, at the end of which someone came and negotiated his surrender. He was unharmed, four of the cowboys were dead. He was an interesting chap, even more interesting than the fictional version of him that Walt Disney created. And if anyone would like to re-create the WPA as part of our economic recovery, I'd happily go out and get some oral histories like this for the next generation to enjoy.)


"I never wanted to kill anybody," Elfego Baca told me, "but if a man had it in his mind to kill me, I made it my business to get him first."

Elfego Baca belongs to the six-shooter epoch of American history. Those were the days when hard-shooting Texas cowboys invaded the territory of New Mexico, driving their herds of longhorns over the sheep ranges of the New Mexicans, for whom they had little liking or respect. Differences were settled quickly, with few words and a gun. Those were the days of Billy the Kid, with whom Elfego, at the age of seventeen, made a tour of the gambling joints in Old Albuquerque. In the words of Kyle Crichton, who wrote Elfego Baca's biography, "the life of Elfego Baca makes Billy the Kid look like a piker." Harvey Ferguson calls him "a knight-errant from the romantic point of view if ever the six-shooter West produced one."

And yet Mr. Baca is not a man who lives in his past.

"I wonder what I can tell you," he said when I asked him for pioneer stories. "I don't remember so much about those things now. Why don't you read the book Mr. Crichton wrote about me?"

He searched about his desk and brought out two newspaper clippings of letters he had written recently to the Albuquerque Journal an local politics. The newspaper had deleted two of the more outspoken paragraphs. Mr. Baca was annoyed.

I tried to draw Mr. Baca away from present day politics to stories of his unusual past, but he does not talk readily about himself, although he seemed anxious to help me. Elfego Baca is a kindly courteous gentleman who is concerned to see that his visitor has the coolest spot in the room.

He brought out books and articles that had been written about him, but he did not seem inclined to reminiscing and answered my questions briefly. "Crichton tells about that in his book" or "Yes, I knew Billy the Kid."

Finally I asked him at random if he knew anything about the famous old Manzano Gang which I had frequently seen mentioned in connection with Torrance County.

He replied that he broke up that gang when he was Sheriff of Socorro County.

"There were ten of them," he said, "and I got nine. The only reason I didn't get the other one was that he got over the border and was shot before I got to him. They used to go to a place near Belen and empty the freight cars of grain and one thing and another. Finally they killed a man at La Jolla. Contreros was his name. A very rich man with lots of money in his house, all gold. I got them for that. They were all convicted and sent to the pen."

Mr. Baca settled back in his chair and made some remark about the late Senator Cutting whose photograph stood on his desk.

I persisted about the Manzano Gang. "I wish you'd tell me more about that gang. How you got them, and the whole story."

"Well," he said, "after that man Contreros was shot, they called me up at my office in Socorro and told me that he was dying. I promised to get the murderers in forty-eight hours. That was my rule. Never any longer than forty-eight hours."

Mr. Baca suspected certain men, but when a telephone call to Albuquerque established the fact that they had been in that city at the time of the killing, his next thought was of the Manzano Gang.

Accompanied by two men, he started out on horseback in the direction of La Jolla.

Just as the sun was rising; they came to the ranch of Lazaro Cordova. They rode into the stable and found Cordova's son-in-law, Prancasio Saiz already busy with his horse.

"Good morning," said Elfego, "what are you doing with your horse so early in the morning?"

Saiz replied that he was merely brushing him down a little.

Mr. Baca walked over and placed his hand on the saddle. It was wet inside. The saddle blanket was steaming. He looked more closely at the horse. At first sight it had appeared to be a pinto, white with brown spots. Mr. Baca thought he remembered that Saiz rode a white horse.

"What happened to that horse?" he asked.

The man replied that the boys had had the horse out the day before and had painted the spots on him with a kind of berry that makes reddish-brown spots. "Just for a joke," he added.

"Where's your father-in-law?" asked Mr. Baca.

Saiz said that his father-in-law had gone the day before to a fiesta at La Jolla and had not returned.

"I understand you're a pretty good shot," said Sheriff Baca. "You'd better come along, and help me round up some men I'm after for the killing of Contreros in La Jolla."

Saiz said that he had work to do on the ranch, but at the insistence of Mr. Baca, he saddled his horse and rode out with the three men.

"About as far as from here to the station," went on Mr. Baca, "was a graveyard where the gang was supposed to camp out. I rode over to it and found where they had lunched the day before. There were sardine cans and cracker boxes and one thing and another. Then I found where one of them had had a call to nature. I told one of my men to put it in a can. Saiz didn't know about this, and in a little while he went over behind some mesquite bushes and had a call to nature. After he came back I sent my man over, and by God it was the same stuff -- the same beans and red chili seeds! So I put Saiz under arrest and sent him back to the jail at Socorro with one of my deputies, although he kept saying he couldn't see what I was arresting him for."

Mr. Baca and his other deputy proceeded in the direction of La Jolla. Before long they saw a man on horseback coming toward them.

"He was running that horse like everything. When we met I saw that he was a Texan. Doc Something or other was his name. I can't remember now. But he was a pretty tough man."

"You a Sheriff?" he said to Mr. Baca.

"No," replied Mr. Baca, "no, I'm not a Sheriff. Don't have nothing to do with the law, in fact."

"You're pretty heavily armed," remarked the man suspiciously.

"I generally arm myself this way when I go for a trip in the country," answered Baca, displaying his field glasses. "I think it's safer."

"Well, if you want fresh horses, you can get them at my ranch, a piece down the road," said the Texan.

Mr. Baca figured that this was an attempt to throw him off the trail, so as soon as the Texan was out of sight, he struck out east over the mountains for Manzano. Just as he was entering the village he saw two of the gang coming down the hill afoot leading their horses. He placed them under arrest and sent them back to Socorro with his other deputy.

It was about two o'clock in the morning when Mr. Baca passed the Cordova ranch again on his way back. He roused Lazaro Cordova, who had returned from La Jolla by that time, and told him to dress and come with him to Socorro.

"The old man didn't want to come," said Mr. Baca, "and kept asking 'what you want with me anyhow?' I told him that he was under arrest, and on the way to Socorro I told him that unless he and his son-in-law came across with a complete statement about the whole gang, I would hang both of them, for I had the goods on them and knew all right that they were both in on the killing of Contreros. I put him in the same cell with his son-in-law, and told him it was up to him to bring Saiz around. They came through with the statement. I kept on catching the rest of the gang, until I had them all. All but the one who got himself shot before I caught up with him."

"If you ever go to Socorro you ask Billy Newcomb, the Sheriff down there now to show you the records. You might see the place on the way down where they buried a cowboy I shot. It's a little way off the main road though.

"That was a long time before I was a real Sheriff. In those days I was a self-made deputy. I had a badge I made for myself, and if they didn't believe I was a deputy, they'd better believe it, because I made 'em believe it."

"I had gone to Escondida a little way from Socorro to visit my uncle. A couple of Texas cowboys had been shooting up the town of Socorro. They hadn't hurt anybody that time. Only frightened some girls. That's the way they did in those days -- ride through a town shooting at dogs and cats and if somebody happened to get in the way -- powie! -- too bad for him. The Sheriff came to Escondida after them. By that time they were making a couple of Mexicans dance, shooting up the ground around their feet. The Sheriff said to me 'Baca, if you want to help, come along, but there's going to be shooting.'"

"We rode after them and I shot one of them about three hundred yards away. The other got away --- too many cottonwood trees in the way.

"Somebody asked me what that cowboy's name was. I said I didn't know. He wasn't able to tell me by the time I caught up with him."

I asked what the Sheriff's name was, and when Mr. Baca said it was Pete Simpson, I said, "The one you were electioneering for the time of the Frisco affair when you held off about 80 cowboys for over 36 hours."
This is the one of Mr. Baca's exploits that has been most frequently written about.

"Hell, I wasn't electioneering for him," he said. "I don't know where they got that idea. I couldn't have made a speech to save my life. And I didn't wear a Prince Albert coat either. They didn't have such things in this country in those days."

"Is it true that you ate dinner afterward with French and some other men who had been shooting at you, and talked the affair over," I asked.

"I ate dinner with some men afterward but I don't remember who they were now. I don't think that man French was there at all, although he must have been in the neighborhood, as he seemed to know all about it. But I don't remember him. Jim Cook was one that was shooting at me though. He was a pretty tough man, but he came near getting it."

He showed me a photograph which Jim Cook had sent him recently. The picture showed an old man who still looks as though he could not be easily trifled with. It was inscribed "To Elfego Baca in memory of that day at Frisco."

"Did you see the letter that Englishman wrote to Crichton? He wanted to hang me. 'Why don't you hang that little Mexican so-and-so?' he asked. I said, 'Why don't you be the one to do it?' and pulled my guns, and wooo, he wasn't so eager. You know I surrendered only on condition that I keep my guns. They placed six guards over me, but they rode 25 steps ahead of me all the way to Socorro.

"Those were great old days. Everything is very quiet now, isn't it?" said Mr. Baca looking up. "I think I'll run for something this fall, but I don't know what yet."

 

Abandoning the Creeping Meatball

Having little to risk, and still less to be grateful for at their hands, I recently began the process of transferring my banking from a large, interstate, TARP-gobbling megabank into a small community bank.

When the housing market first began to go into the tank, 18 months or so ago, I happened to be in Farmington, Maine, the same town as a fellow who sits on a national board of bankers that advises the Fed. He was a good source to interview as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac began to fall into chaos, but he really had very little doom-and-gloom to talk about for the local Maine banks. They had not behaved foolishly and had not exposed themselves to extraordinary risks with subprime loans and the like.

"We lend money to people who will be able to pay it back," he said, and it seemed like a good policy to this old business writer.

It was not just his bank that stayed aloof from the more speculative mortgage ventures, but the bulk of small community banks. A year later, when TARP funds were being distributed, I was in New Hampshire and did an article on that. Of four local banks, only one had requested TARP funds and they had apparently done so to make sure they could get them if they needed them; they almost immediately assessed the situation and turned them down as unnecessary. Again, a lack of speculation on their part had left them on relatively solid financial footing.

Of course, we're all subject to the effects of the overall collapse, but I've seen minimal impact on community banks. Is that a reason to transfer your money to them? Not really. We're all protected by FDIC, and you're not anymore likely to lose your life savings at one bank than another.

There is an issue of passing the whiff test and of whom you choose to do business with, however, and after viewing a few documentaries on the financial collapse, I decided I'd rather not be in bed with the people who had not only created the subprime mortgage debacle but whose credit card policies were geared to exploiting the lower middle class.

I like to choose with whom I do business. I also went years without eating table grapes and I stopped drinking Coors before I had developed a more sophisticated taste in beer anyway. My reasons aren't as good as the Rotarian who, during a discussion of foreign automobiles, remarked, "I don't buy Japanese cars. They used to shoot at my airplane." But they're good enough for me.

I will admit, however, that, just as nearly any beer made is better tasting than Coors, there are benefits to dealing with community banks that go beyond the warm glow of having abandoned the creeping meatball of heartless capitalism.

For instance, I maintain two bank accounts at Bangor Savings, more than a year after leaving Maine. Why? A big reason is that I can use a Bangor Savings Bank card in any ATM in the country and never pay a fee. Okay, I sometimes pay the fee. But it is instantly credited back to me by my bank. This negates the disadvantage of working with a community bank -- not having a branch available when you're out of town.

But I do have to deposit checks, and it's a pain to mail them to Maine. So a few days ago, I opened an account at Mascoma Savings Bank here in town. It was a Thursday morning, which I mention because I walked out with the little folder of starter checks, but, the following Tuesday, I received my debit card in the mail. And then my printed checks arrived on Saturday, nine days after I opened the account.

In the same mail was a hand-written note from the customer service rep who had dealt with me when I opened the account, thanking me for my business.

As I see it, I'm making a statement, and, in so doing, I'm also getting to work with efficient, responsive, personal bankers who appreciate my business. Oh, and I'll apparently be able to move money back and forth between New Hampshire and Maine easily because Mascoma Savings offers free online bill paying. The larger banks charge fees for that.

It's a little hard to find the downside to all this.

The Chamber of Commerce Express

The upstairs bathroom in the rented home I'm sharing with my son and his family has wallpaper with a pattern of old advertising posters, several of which I've been able to track down. This is one of them, and, until I got a large version with no overlapping posters, I hadn't seen how many commercial plugs it contains. If you click on it, I think you'll see what I mean.

The Hamilton plant of the Mosler Safe Company, which was headquartered in Cincinnati, can be seen through the window of the dining car, but there are plenty of plugs within the car itself, most of them wildly irrelevant to the theme of travel, unless they are suggesting that people will choose a train not just for the comfortable Pullman cars (a common and sensible thing to promote), but for the fact that it serves Cabinet Whiskey and Peebles Perfectos, both by the Joseph R. Peebles' Sons Company of Cincinnati, though apparently the chap with the Burnside sideburns would prefer to sip an Aurora Export beer from the Crescent Brewing Company of Aurora, Indiana (less than 40 miles from Cincinnati).

And there is more, as you will discover. This 1894 poster is a feast of product-placement, which makes me wonder if the good old Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton Railroad paid anything out of pocket to have it printed.

And you thought it all began in 1982 with that trail of Reese's Pieces.

The story's written. I just need a quote.

Wish I had a link to the video, but Houston Texans' Coach Gary Kubiak's final press conference of the season was live on-line, and live for an undisclosed number of reporters who attended in person. I don't know how many people were in the room because it's pretty bare-bones -- a single camera trained on the podium, with Kubiak taking questions from off-camera writers who don't bother to identify themselves because they cover the team all season and he knows who they are.

What I found funny in today's conference was the way one or two reporters phrased their questions. It was clear that they had already roughed out their season wrap-up and simply wanted the coach to provide a quote that would validate their central thesis. It was something like, "Coach, would you say that the third-and-down run by X___ in the sixth week was the turning point of this season?" or "Coach, did the passing game finally fall into place with the addition of Y-factor?"

I'd love to have the video because I can't remember the actual questions -- they were so precise and convolutedly pointed that they defied off-the-cuff recall. But they were similar to those English exam questions that force you to agree with the instructor's point of view: "In what ways does Turgenev depict Uvar Uvonovich as an out-of-date, irrelevant remnant of Russia's old guard, pre-1848 social order?"

Given that we're talking the sports section, this was pretty funny. In the newsroom, sports is referred to as "the toy department" and given little credibility. Sportswriters work different hours and, at many papers, they don't attend the meetings, briefings and trainings that other reporters come in for. There is a general sense that they aren't really covering "news."

On the other hand, sometimes the comic view is simply a clearer view. A clumsy sportswriter fishing for pre-determined quotes is funny, but, having been on both sides of the interview, much of my laughter comes from experiences that didn't provoke giggles.

I've been interviewed by reporters who already had the story written in their minds and only wanted quotes to flesh it out. The first few times, I was horrified when I saw the story that resulted, but, after awhile, I began to recognize it when it was happening. Unfortunately, even staying relentlessly on message doesn't always thwart a reporter who isn't listening, who is only scribbling down the parts he wants to hear, and use.

This is not an issue of "the mainstream media," a foolish phrase used by conspiracy buffs. But it is something you kind of wish you could leave behind when you climb from small papers and tiny TV stations into the Big Leagues. You would like to think that it all stays in the minor leagues, along with (no joke!) the local TV reporter who, at a murder scene, asked the lead investigator, "How was the perpetrator able to get through all this yellow tape?"

Not so. Watch the next time a more important coach, Coach Obama, has a press conference. Listen for the questions that are based on what the reporter has already decided to write.

(Addendum: They have posted the press conference, though I can't imagine anyone who isn't a Texans fan sitting through it. However, it did allow me to find one of the questions I had in mind: "Gary, if you had to point to one thing with regard to (quarterback) Matt (Schaub), would you say that the way he came back from the shoulder injury in that Jacksonville game propelled this team and showed them what leadership is all about?")

My dad's work -- 1951 

(That's me on the left)