FREEDOM OF SPEECH January 23, 2009

About twenty five years ago I was in a rapidly declining partnership with one of my brothers. We had a piano and organ store that was falling victim to the rise of video games, computers and video tape players. The business had been purchased by my brother about five years earlier and I had joined him in it after he had completed the first year. It initially showed some promise but never really grew to the point where two families could be sustained with any degree of comfort. So during the years we had the store, actually a couple of stores for a time, we both had other jobs. At the time when the business was going downhill my brother was in the Air Force Reserve and was gone a great deal of the time. My extra job was managing a movie theater.

The last theater I managed was a little neighborhood place right next door to the music store. The theater business at that time was also in a serious slump. The video rental business was new and exciting and was seriously affecting how often folks went out to a picture show. So the big company that owned the theater was trying all sorts of gimmicks to bring in the customers. We had dollar nights, prize drawings, triple features and specials on popcorn and soda. But things weren’t going so well even with all of the promotional efforts.

One evening I was visited by the regional manager who told me that we were going to try a change of programming to go after a different audience. Some neighborhood, legitimate movie houses were running x-rated films and having some success. The old theater in the downtown area had even tried a couple of famous features and done well. Respectable upper income couples had filled the place up for a while. But the adult shows were only sporadic offerings and merely a novelty at that theater. The company executive said that on the next change date we would be running a double feature. There would be some newspaper advertising about the new format and we could have some extra help on hand to take care of the anticipated increase in business. All of my employees were under the age of eighteen so I had to fire them all and very quickly hire and train some replacements.

The days passed and I received phone calls from the local newspapers asking questions about the upcoming change. I also received some calls threatening the theater with protests by a couple of local religious groups who were strongly against pornography. Two days before we were to start with the new type of movies I got a call from the home office telling me I had to go to the State Police offices and get photos and fingerprinting done for the “adult entertainment” license that would be required. It was then that I became a little concerned about where this was all heading.

Now I was no stranger to adult films. When I started as a manager for the group that owned the theater I had run a drive-in out in the country a ways. That particular venue had been running dirty movies for several years. It was a pretty busy little place patronized by every type of person you might think of. I had two older ladies running the concession area and another selling the tickets. Security was tight and we had a couple of guys walking the perimeter making sure that kids didn’t sneak up to the fence for a peek. Several times a week the State Police would send a car in to drive around and check for any problems. Usually the cop would sit in the back row and watch the movie for while before he moved on. I didn’t particularly like the stuff we showed but I needed a job so that I could put food on the table and it was the only thing I could find. But I was glad when I was transferred to the theater up in town that was showing family movies. And since it was closer to the music store it was a lot more economical.

But now I was being told to switch over to an x-rated place once again. The day before the change over I received another phone call from the home office. This time it was the vice president of the company and he wanted to tell me that the District Attorney from our city had called to say that several complaints had been received about the company plans. He said that police would be in attendance and that it was remotely possible that the theater could be forced to close. This was all taking place during a time when court cases about showing x-rated movies and selling Playboy and other men’s magazines were a regular feature in the news. So the vice president wanted me to know that an attorney from the company would be present and that the ACLU was also going to be interested in the reaction by government officials to our new presentation. Free speech was the issue, he said, and we had the Constitution protecting us.

I’ve always been a strong believer in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Freedom of speech is one of the most important of our freedoms and should be protected. We may not like what is being said, written or shown as entertainment but the choice of listening or watching is up to the individual and the government should not making those choices for us. But I was still feeling a little uncomfortable about this whole chain of events.

Opening night arrived and I got to the theater quite early. I had to set up the projectors and make sure everything was ready for the anticipated crowd. We were scheduled to start our show at seven but I was set to go an hour earlier. My new snack bar people had just arrived and were getting their area set up. It was then that the regional manager and the company attorney arrived. They hung around the lobby, saying little and acting kind of nervous. Then there was another knock on the door and two uniformed city policemen were there along with a guy in a suit who turned out to be the District Attorney. I let them in. The two lawyer types went off to a corner and had a very civil discussion. Meanwhile it was time to open the doors. I could see a small crowd of people across the parking lot with signs of an anti-porn nature. That wasn’t really a surprise since a Lutheran church was only about five hundred feet from the little strip center that contained our theater. And there were some people from the staff of the elementary school a couple blocks away.

The potential ticket buyers were not upper middle class couples. They were all men who looked vaguely uncomfortable at all the attention they were getting from the protesters. When a TV station news van drove into the parking lot several of the men in line very quickly disappeared. It was at this point that I went to the DA and asked him what would happen when I started the movie. He said that the movie would be observed for a few moments until it could be established that it was allegedly pornographic. Then a warrant that was in his pocket would be served. The theater would be shut down and the film would be seized as evidence. I would be arrested and brought in for booking and arraignment. When I called the regional manager over and asked him why he wouldn’t be the person arrested he said that I was the one on the license since I was a resident of the state. I then told him that I was not going to show the movie and if he wanted to fire me it was okay with me. And I also told him that changing the theater to an x-rated venue was a very stupid thing to do considering the neighborhood we were operating in. If community standards are part of the criteria for deciding the court cases about pornography then the company didn’t have much hope of winning. To further reduce the chance of having a job the next day I told him that his attorney wasn’t too bright if he had been advising the company to go ahead with their plan. The attorney said it was a matter of free speech and all my legal fees and fines would be paid for, as well as any bail that might be required. But I still refused to start the show. The guys lined up to buy tickets left. The police and the DA left. The protesters went home. And finally the regional manager and his lawyer went away with a warning that I hadn’t heard the last of this.

The next morning I got a call from the president of the theater company. He said that we were going to run older popular action movies at a low admission price until things either got better or until we had to close up. So that night we ran the first Star Wars movie which we had played a couple of years earlier. And we followed that type of format for a few more months. Then the theater went dark.

Now I’m not trying to give the impression that I stood up against the evils of dirty movies. And I’m not saying that if we were trying to show a movie about the virtues of communism that I would have given in if the government tried to shut us down. It would be a lot easier to stand up for the right to show a politically incorrect film than an adult epic. And I probably shouldn’t have been a coward on that night. But of the several things that influenced my action, or lack of action, the most important was that the community surrounding the little theater was against the showing of those adult movies. And I was part of that community. Staying out of jail also was a factor because the value of an adult film was less than the value of my reputation in the community and the loss of that reputation if I did get arrested.

Within a few months I was out of the music store business and out of the theater business. My next couple of jobs got a little better and it wasn’t too long before I was in the business I stayed in until I retired. Every once in a while I think back to those troublesome times. Some would say that I was involved in a sinful and evil thing when I worked at the drive-in. And they are probably right. Others might even say that all movies are sinful and the work of the devil. And they may be right as well. I’ll certainly defend their right to say all those things. And I hope they would offer me that same freedom of speech.

Have a fine day.

PUBLIC WORKS AND INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS January 13, 2009

Today I went for my daily walk at a place I haven’t been for some time. It’s a narrow paved road, which the State has labeled a trail, along a tributary of the river that winds its way through the area. One side of the pathway is a pleasant view of a stream, some marshy fields and a pond and, at a few spots, a view of the river. On the other side of the walk are on and off ramps of a major highway and the air base. So you have Nature on one side and the Military Industrial Complex on the other. America is a great place.

As I was walking I noticed that new distance markers had been placed along the path. The markers were metal signs with a little hiking guy and a number indicating how many tenths of a mile the hiker had hiked. So at the beginning of the trail was the first sign marked .0, and then, in succession, .1, .2 and so on. I walked to the 1.2 sign and then turned around and subtracted myself back down to 0. Another improvement on the path was the placement of several heavy metal park benches. Oddly the benches were positioned not facing the natural beauty of the river and marsh but facing the pathway and the highway. And at several points along the way signs announcing that this was indeed the “Isaac Branch of the St. Jones River Greenway” were placed at roughly eye level so that a hiker can be sure he has not strayed into some uncharted territory. At each access point to the trail additional signs had been placed describing the handicapped accessibility features, and I’m not making this up, the degree of steepness of the hills, the width of the walkway in feet and meters and the materials used in construction of the walkway itself. Finally at about the .6 marker is a lovely little seating area with a large three sided sign showing how this area was developed, the wildlife living there and a big photographic type map with one of those “You are here” arrows. The bench in this area also faces the path even though it is positioned at the highest point on the trail and overlooks a nice pond full of wild geese, ducks and even a great blue heron.

I’m not one to look the proverbial gift horse in its mouth but all these “improvements” piqued my curiosity. (Two clichés in one sentence, not bad) I began to question the cost of this project and the source of funds used in its completion. So I made a couple of phone calls and some surprisingly accommodating public servants filled me in on some of the details of the costs and how they were met. First the entire project is a County enterprise funded by a combination of monies from a federal grant, State tax revenues and contributions from the county government and private and corporate donations. Of course the federal, state and county portions are all taxpayer provided. Secondly the roughly four mile section known as the Isaac Branch Greenway first and second phase is costing in excess of 5 million dollars. About 3.75 million is being provided by federal grants. I’m not a road building expert but I bet I could build a six foot wide asphalt path a little cheaper than that. Each one of the seven foot long 4x4 posts of pressure treated wood with an 8x6 metal sign costs just over 300 dollars. That doesn’t include the cost of labor and machinery involved in placing the signs in the ground. The benches facing the highway, mounted on an asphalt pad, run about 3000 bucks each. It sure adds up fast.

So here you have a public works project which did give work to a lot of people for quite some time. In fact the project has several more phases planned for the future. But the economic cost of these things is so out of proportion to the benefit that it seems difficult to justify their implementation. If our economic recovery from the current “crisis” is dependent on projects like this, but on a far larger scale, then I think we’re in for some real problems down the road. Putting the responsibility for recovery into the hands of politicians is like giving a three year old a chainsaw and firing it up. Damage will be far reaching and very costly.

My grandfather, my mother’s dad, liked to discuss politics. And every discussion would turn to the long lasting and unbelievably costly damage that he felt was done by the FDR administration in its efforts to bring the US out of the depression of the thirties. Grandpa would rant and roar about Roosevelt raising taxes on people who were working and driving more people into relying on the government. He would say that all those make work projects could have been done better and cheaper if the G.D. politicians would just stay out of the way. And don’t get him started about how FDR sold us down the river to the communists. Maybe the old guy was a little extreme in his assessment but some historians are looking at those times in the same way now. If our new president was smart he too would look back at those times and perhaps learn something.

I really like walking along the well groomed, beautifully paved, excessively signed path through one of Nature’s treasures. But I could just as well do it on a two foot wide dirt path, figuring out how far I walked by the amount of time spent doing it. It might even be a nicer walk, at a fraction of the cost. By the way, I was the sole walker on that path between 8 and 9 this morning.

Have a fine day.

MAINTAINING OPTIMISM January 30, 2009

Every morning we face a moment that will set how we feel about the day ahead. Essentially we decide whether we will have a good, optimistic, positive outlook or a negative and pessimistic attitude. If your first act is to turn on CNN or some other news channel or read the front page of the morning paper there’s a good chance your day may suck. If you have an argument with your child or spouse then that also will give you some negativism to overcome as you start your day. It’s not easy to maintain optimism in the face of public and private difficulties.

But friends, I have the solution to your challenge. The solution is not in a bottle, although sometimes that offers temporary relief. And the solution is not in yoga, feng shui, or multiple rounds of calisthenics. The solution may be in religious activity or prayer for those who are so inclined. But we all know that there are many, many heathens out there and they need help just as much as the true believers. So my solution will help non-believer and true believer equally, which is only right in this time of acceptance and diversity. My solution to the lack of optimism in your life will stun you with its simplicity.

On these days when even the President of the United States can’t seem to say anything positive the challenge would seem insurmountable. Day after day we hear how bad things are and how the economy is the worst it’s been in almost eighty years. We hear it from Senators and Congressmen. We hear it from Governors and people in local politics. The mass media is full of the talking points that are being spouted hour by hour. And yet my solution will allow you full access to whatever news sources you choose because this is America and you’re entitled to your own choice of doomsayers.

My solution to the challenge of staying optimistic in spite of all these high level people telling you that there is absolutely no reason for even one scintilla of positive thinking will amaze and astound you. Before I outline the steps to living the optimistic life you need to know the prerequisites that you must accomplish. The initial requirements are just as simple and easy as my solution so don’t get all worked up and nervous. An open mind is the first requirement to understanding and implementing my solution. The second requirement is that you need absolute confidence in yourself as a clear thinking and intelligent human being. And finally, you need to be prepared to accept the consequences of living the optimistic life.

The consequences of living the optimistic life are not all as good as you may think. Optimistic people tend to be viewed as a little bit loony. They may be socially shunned for not taking part in depressing discussions about the horrible state of the world. They may be ostracized for their lack of a hangdog expression. People may mistake a smiling optimist for a follower of the Rev. Sun Yung Moon. But the freedoms gained by being an optimist are numerous. You’ll never have to listen to U2 again. You won’t need to read books by Al Franken. You will have no further need for t-shirts carrying messages endorsed by the DNC or NOW. The list can go on and on.

By now you are ready and anxious to learn the solution that I have taken years to develop. Or you may be content in your depression and angst, and wish to stop reading now. Perhaps you feel it’s easier to just go along with the large number of folks who have no hope, who start every day knowing things will only get worse. If so stop now and turn on MSNBC or CNN. Revel in the misery they so joyously promote. But if you’re ready for a better life, for a life of positive thinking and faith in yourself and your fellow citizens then mosey on down to the next paragraph because the solution is waiting for you there.

Ok you’re here. The solution and key to leading the optimistic life (when I patent this idea I will put that phrase in capital letters) is to…are you ready?...never, ever believe anything any politician ever says without checking the facts of the matter on your own. Once you start doing some fact checking you will learn that lies are the stock in trade of ninety percent or more of all politicians. Pick any pronouncement or speech. Let’s say the new Vice President makes a speech to a bunch of union leaders that the economy hasn’t been this bad in thirty years. Okay, get on the internet and look up some economic statistics. It’s really easy and not at all confusing. Google is amazing in that way. You’ll find that the economy was worse in 1982 and no one was panicking. Or perhaps the President will say this economy is worse than the Great Depression. Once again, the facts are readily available on the internet. For example the unemployment rate was fifteen percent in the mid 1930’s. Unemployment today is about seven or eight percent. Do you see what I mean? Knowing the facts and knowing the truth can allow you to be an optimist. A few minutes a day will make your entire world view better.

Start on Monday morning. When the smiling faces on CNN report that four thousand jobs are being cut by a large American corporation check the facts. You may just find that those jobs are going to be cut over an eighteen month period and that they are being cut by attrition and that the company employs 56,000 people in four different countries.
Wouldn’t knowing the facts make that dismal report about job cuts seem somewhat less depressing? You won’t get the facts from CNN or MSNBC. As a matter of fact immediately after the jobs story you’ll probably see some politician in an interview bewailing the horrible employment statistics, which he or she won’t back up with any real statistics. Believe me you’ll feel better knowing that you have some idea about the truth while that politician is just spouting a mouthful of lies. You’ll go out into the world with a smile on your face and a spring in your step, a real American optimist that the country needs so much.

Have a fine day.