The War to End All Wars (and didn't) passes into American history

Frank Buckles, the Last American Doughboy, died yesterday at his West Virginia home.

With his passing, World War I becomes strictly a matter of history for Americans. It is no longer an event within "living memory." (Wikipedia says there are two confirmed World War I veterans yet living; both served in the British armed forces, though Claude Choules moved to Australia after the Great War and served under that nation's colors in World War II.) Oh, there are yet some who were alive during the War to End All Wars, but all living memory of going "Over There," the trenches, the mud, the rats, the gas, the thunder of the guns -- all of this is gone now.

When I was a boy, there were lots of World War I veterans. They were the granddads. When Charles Schultz drew Snoopy as a World War I flying ace, there were a good many newspaper readers who had thrilled to the first accounts of the battles between those Knights of the Air. Some of the real air aces were still around to chuckle at Snoopy's misfortunes right along with the rest of us.

But no more.

The other night Youngest Son had computer issues: It crashed just after he'd completed a paper and would not restart. My wife volunteered me to get up and sit with him as he called across the world for assistance in bringing the machine back to life. It was the wee small hours of the morning, of course; that's when high school seniors tend to write papers that are due immediately after sunrise. Youngest Son was on hold forever and I flipped on the TV to stay awake. There was a silent comedy on TCM; it was about two doughboys who escape from a German prison camp. It occurred to me that Youngest Son wouldn't have seen German uniforms from World War I; come to think of it, I couldn't remember the last time I had seen any either -- certainly not outside of some program on the History Channel. World War I had once dominated the popular imagination. Then the horrors of World War II crowded World War I from the collective consciousness.

And now World War I becomes a matter for historical study only.

The veterans of the Second World War were the dads of my youth. They are dwindling fast now; the last of these will be go someday, too, like Mr. Buckles, honored and celebrated and revered as the last of his kind.

The last World War II survivor will probably have been a kid who lied about his age to get into uniform, just like Mr. Buckles did. It will probably be that way for the last Korean War veteran, too, or the last veteran of Vietnam.

All the debates over strategy and tactics are glossed over, simplified, or even forgotten, as the generals fade away. The historians decide who was right and who was wrong (and change their minds every generation or so). The last living memories of any war aren't the grand schemes of planners and staff officers, but the vivid impressions made on a teenager's mind, far from home and kin.

Police and fire not among the most hazardous professions?

Last October, I ran a serious post, Solve the budget crisis: End (most) public pensions. Like most of my serious posts, it landed with a dull and largely unheard thud in the Greater Blogosphere. To summarize, I suggested that (a) current public pensions be honored for people who have already earned them and (b) public pension contributions be stopped immediately for everyone else except police officers and fire fighters.

The private sector largely did away with pensions a generation ago. My wife, a Catholic school teacher, was one of the last people in the private sector that I knew with a pension -- but it was terminated three or four years ago. (My wife didn't teach full time until about 10 years ago. Her guaranteed pension, as of the date it was terminated, was something like $17 a month. I can hardly wait!)

Anyway, I suggested that its mostly people without pensions who are paying, by their taxes, the salaries and benefits of public sector employees. Why should public sector employees (who already have unions, civil service and Shakman protections) also have pensions their neighbors no longer have?

My suggested exemption for police officers and fire fighters was based on the notion that these individuals put their lives on the line on every shift.

Until the other day, only Dave left a comment on that post. But now a second comment has appeared which I reproduce here in full:

Why make pension exemptions to police and fire? You mention risk, "putting their lives on the line" but these public union jobs [don't] even make the top ten hazardous occupations list.
Besides, public safety pensions make up over 70% of municipal pension obligations, so if you're going to make a cut, it makes sense to start with the greatest abusers of pension entitlements, police and fire.

You're the reason real pension reform [won't] occur when you whore out your preferences to fire fighters and such.

[B]ecause, when you state that governments are bankrupt, [don't] have the money, but then go ahead and make exceptions, no one takes you seriously.

My first thought was to reply that the most dangerous occupation must be this guy's food taster -- but it occurred to me that that would be just stooping to the commenter's level.

If police officer and fire fighter are not among the 10 most hazardous occupations, what are the 10 most dangerous occupations?

According to this August 28, 2010 post on Yahoo! Finance (by Les Christie of CNNMoney.com) the 10 most dangerous occupations in America are:

1. Fisherman,
2. Logger,
3. Airplane Pilots,
4. Farmers and Ranchers,
5. Roofers,
6. Ironworkers,
7. Sanitation Worker,
8. Industrial Machinist,
9. Truckers and Drivers/Sales Workers, and
10. Construction Laborer.

The last of these 10 most dangerous occupations, construction laborer, supposedly has a fatality rate of 18.3 per 100,000 workers. If I am reading this statistic correctly, on an annual basis, we can expect 18.3 deaths for every 100,000 persons engaged in the occupation of construction worker. This is the same death rate as expected for hazardous occupation no. 9, "Truckers and Drivers/Sales Workers." The death rate for Industrial Machinists is given at 18.5 per 100,000 persons. The death rate for Sanitation Workers is given at 25.2 per 100,000.

This last one shocked me. I've heard of guys employed by Streets and San being found in automobile trunks from time to time, but these unsolved mysteries were never assumed to have been caused by picking up garbage. I have lived in Chicago a long time, and I've never heard of a line of duty death involving a worker on a garbage truck.

But I have heard of Chicago police officers dying in the line of duty -- several this past year. So I inquired further and discovered this December 28, 2010 article by Patrik Jonsson on the Christian Science Monitor website. In the article, Jonsson writes that there were 160 deaths among American law enforcement officers in 2010. He adds that there are "about 800,000 active local, state, and federal law-enforcement officers in the US." Doing the math, I come up with a fatality rate for police officers in 2010 of 20 per 100,000 -- above three of the 10 allegedly most dangerous occupations.

But still below "Sanitation Workers."

I could not find comparable figures for firefighter line of duty deaths. The United States Fire Administration, a division of FEMA, reported "there were 85 onduty firefighter fatalities in the United States as a result of incidents that occurred in 2010, a 6 percent decrease from the 90 fatalities reported for 2009. The 85 fatalities were spread across 31 states. Illinois experienced the highest number of fatalities (9)." There were 90 firefighter fatalities in 2009. But that doesn't give me a total number of firefighters or even define the term. However, it apparently includes professional urban departments, like the Chicago Fire Department, as well as rural volunteer companies and even smoke jumpers -- the guys who jump in the middle of forest fires.

Therein lies the problem with these statistics. I can't believe that police officers or firefighters have a lesser risk of on-the-job fatality than the guy who picks up the trash. My experience tells me it ain't so. Some inside-the-numbers and inside-the-definitions exploration is clearly warranted in order to figure this out -- but this is, of course, impossible from the linked articles alone.

And then there was the contention raised by my anonymous friend that "public safety pensions make up over 70% of municipal pension obligations." Sadly, he did not provide a source for that claim either. While police and fire make up a sizable chunk of any city budget, I wonder if 70% isn't high. I would guess that the number can't take into account teacher pensions (in Illinois these are paid from a different fund and school boards are separate taxing entities). But I just don't know.

To use my new friend's colorful phrase, I wanted to 'whore around' some more and investigate this claim, but I flat ran out of time today. Perhaps I can come back to the topic again. Or someone may provide some additional facts in a comment?

More troubles for Rep. David Wu

Let's be fair. When he donned this costume, maybe the seven-term Oregon Democrat was just trying to attract one of those Chinese tiger mothers who has been so much in the news of late:


Rep. Wu's is apparently a sad story of mental decline (for background, read this) and I don't mean to pile on.

Still, I couldn't help but think that Mr. Wu's increasingly well-documented problems weren't entirely new. There was something about him that triggered my increasingly feeble memory.

Then, today, I remembered this March 2007 post about a Finnish parliamentarian who had gone to the trouble of translating his campaign web site into Klingon.

In putting that post together, I came across a YouTube video of an American Congressman complaining of American policy in Iraq and warning of "Klingons in the White House." That video is no longer available. But this one was, at least as of this lunch hour:


Yep. That's Rep. David Wu.

Now, whether I agree or disagree with the point Congressman Wu was trying to make is immaterial. His little speech here makes reference to both Vulcans and Klingons. That's weird... but not really crazy. The crazy part is that his argument can be understood only by old geeks like me who've watched Star Trek lo these many decades. I kind of doubt there's that many of us... are there?

Don't let anyone tell you the economy is improving

This is the big lie circulating these days, mainly, I suppose, because the media have tired of reporting on the Great Recession. Not that they did a particularly good job of it....

There may be signs of hope... sprigs of green pushing out of the late winter snows... stock prices have rebounded... the big banks have paid off most of the TARP money... GM reported its first annual profit since 2004 (there were quarterly profits in 2010 and 2007)....

But however healthy things seem at the top of the economy (thanks all too often to the massive and timely infusions of taxpayer money), for the rest of us, those deemed small enough to fail, things don't seem to be getting better at all.

I had a client declare bankruptcy recently. If I did bankruptcy work, that might be a good thing for me... but I don't. What that client owes me won't drive me into bankruptcy by itself... but I am teetering on the brink, too.

Somebody asked me recently whether my business is trending up or down. "I think it's more a swirling motion," I responded. The February rent is not yet paid. March starts next week.

And, while I hope my own situation will improve soon, for the economy as a whole, it seems likely to get worse before it gets better: Governments at all levels are broke. Yet, in many states, such as Illinois, there is no incentive to stand up to the public employee unions that have such a large say in who attains elective office. So taxes must go up instead. (Tea Party pipe dreams notwithstanding, even a stiff dose of fiscal courage would probably include some sort of tax increases at almost all levels anyway. The shame of it is that there is no 'rightsizing' -- a hated private sector euphemism for layoffs -- likely in the public sector. Thus, however much taxes go up, we're really only postponing a day of reckoning.)

Although Illinois may have found one silver lining in all this: We had Democratic members of the Wisconsin State Senate hiding out in Rockford and Harvard and even Chicago, trying to prevent a vote on measures proposed by Wisconsin's Republican Governor, Scott Walker, that would require public sector employees to contribute more to their own health care and pension costs, limit their right to strike, limit their union's rights to bargain to wages only and not working conditions, and limit the extent of raises that may be granted. Meanwhile, Democratic legislators fleeing Indianapolis (where a right to work vote was set for the Indiana legislature) took refuge in places like downstate Champaign.

Finally a growth industry in Illinois! Playing host to legislators shirking their duties in other states. As long as they don't thereafter shirk their bills here....

An Unscientific Survey: The eyes have it, or, rather, have had it....

It was not quite four years ago that I asked here about whether I should switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs at the Curmudgeon home.

Well, I did switch. As incandescent bulbs failed, they were replaced by CFL's. I still have a few left, but they're in fixtures that don't seem to support CFL's -- and there are few of these -- the light over the kitchen sink and a decorative bathroom fixture are the only ones that come to mind right now.

I'm wondering how long I have before I have to replace those fixtures. You don't see incandescent bulbs on the store shelves much anymore, do you?

I miss incandescent lights.

I sit under harsh fluorescent lights here in the Undisclosed Location. My desk lamp, which used to provide a warm, comforting incandescent glow in the midst of the cold fluorescent harshness, has long since been replaced by a CFL, too.

And my eyes hurt.

Granted, I'm four years older, since I began switching to CFL's, and eyestrain should become an increasing issue over time. But an association is forming, in my imagination at least, between incandescent light and my eyes not hurting so much.

So I put the issue to all and sundry who might happen upon this post: Have you noticed any increased eyestrain since switching to fluorescent lighting at home and away? Is there scientific evidence that backs up or refutes the association that I've made between increased eyestrain and constant fluorescent lighting?

At least I didn't get past the lobby....

Have you ever had a snake-bit case?

I realize that most of the people who might happen upon this blog aren't lawyers, so that's probably a dumb question.

But have you ever had a task, a project, an assignment where absolutely nothing is done right the first time?

I have a matter now pending in the Appellate Court that fits this description. The very pendency of this matter in the Appellate Court is a dead giveaway. But a case doesn't become snake-bit just because a judge makes a decision that I disagree with.

In thinking about this piece, I thought about detailing all the stupid, nonsensiscal, just-plain-dumb mistakes I've made on this one case -- mild stuff, like sending out a bill without including all of the expenses (which means I ate them) -- to more fundamental, tactical decisions (I should have filed two suits, not one, and let the defendants argue they should be consolidated). In this case, the Circuit Court Clerk failed to call me when the appellate record was assembled so that I was unable to verify that stuff that should have been included in the record was included. It wasn't. (This problem was correctable, and was corrected.)

I thought about listing all of the many things that had gone wrong on this matter but it occurred to me that such a litany would and could identify only this case and my cherished anonymity would be out the window. (And I might have wound up breaching the attorney client privilege in the bargain. In this case, that would almost be a dead-cinch certainty.)

Suffice it to say, then, that if the copier had a misfeed, it was printing something for this case. If the printer jammed when making envelopes, it was stuck on the service list in this case. If I got a paper cut, from one piece of paper in all the mounds of paper that weigh down this Undisclosed Location, it would be from a paper I'd forgot to file in this case. (And then, when I'd staunched the flow of blood, I'd be unable to find the offending paper to put it where it belonged.)

Yesterday I had a motion to file in the Appellate Court. In this case, of course. It was a housekeeping motion, about something that should never have had to be done in the first place, but that's been the nature of this beast.

The Appellate Court is close by my Undisclosed Location and yesterday felt like the first day of Spring. The Groundhog's Day Blizzard is shriveling away. Of course, the first day of Spring in Chicago does not involve a lot of green. The predominant covers are brown or black as the dirt and pollution and the mud remain behind as the once-pristine white snow melts to an ugly gray.

Anyway, yesterday's motion was for leave to file something. I had the something on my desk. I prepared the motion without incident. I got through Security at the Appellate Court and started pulling my keys and my phone out of the folder in which I'd brought over the motion and that is when I noticed -- the something to be filed, the subject of the motion, was still sitting on my desk, wondering where I'd gone.

Oh, fiddlesticks! I might have said, but did not.

Of course, a phone call I'd been waiting for came in while I was on this fool's errand. I returned the call -- and while I was chatting away, I thought to make the envelopes to send out the copies of the motion. This was accomplished without incident. I thought to put the thing to be filed into my folder. And then I thought to put the stamps on the envelopes. So I took the motions out for just a moment so I could weigh one with the envelope and apply the proper postage.

Out I went again.

I got through Security again and fished out my keys and my phone from the folder and I smiled when I noticed that the thing to be filed was in the folder just where I'd put it -- and my smile faded just as quickly that the motion was no longer there.

Oh tarnation! I might have said, but didn't.

Now, the third time was the charm. I got the motion and the thing to be filed over to the court clerk at the same time.

Now, if this happened to me in every case, you'd say (and I'd agree) that I need a keeper. But it only happens in cases like this one. Cases that are well and truly snake-bit.

But, at least, on these two futile outings, I never got past the building lobby....

Curmudgeon blue about modern blue jeans

I wrote a few years back about how I broke down and got my first pair of blue jeans in at least 20 years.

I realize that no one has been checking in each day in breathless expectation of an update, but the topic is on my mind.

Add blue jeans to the list of things that aren't as good as they used to be.

When I was a kid, blue jeans were blue. Dark blue. Navy blue. And they were stiff.

Oh, they could be folded. One could, with some effort, stand or sit while wearing new blue jeans. But it was a workout.

Everyone at school knew when you had new blue jeans. It was not, as I seem to recall, entirely favorable notice. Of course, when you're an adolescent, unless you've just scored the winning basket at the big basketball game, almost any notice is unwelcome, at least initially. Coming to school in a new pair of blue jeans was nothing like winning the big game.

Everyone else, in their more faded, softer blue jeans was far more comfortable.

There was an element of risk the first time a new pair of blue jeans were washed, too. My mother always wanted them soaked in a vinegar solution to hold the color.

That was just like parents: Darker jeans were definitely less cool than faded jeans; therefore parents instinctively favored darker jeans. Whether vinegar was used or not, however, anything washed with the new blue jeans was apt to turn at least a robin's egg blue.

Faded blue jeans were celebrated in songs during the 1960s for a reason: By the time a pair of blue jeans were properly faded, they'd been lived in. Your favorite blue jeans were privy to your habits, good and bad, and even your secrets, if you had any. When the knees went, applying a patch was much more than garment repair; it was first aid for a friend.

The modern blue jean is neither particularly blue nor particularly stiff. Today the garment is marketed to us Baby Boomers as 'relaxed fit' and 'stone washed.'

It turns out that relaxed fit doesn't just mean that six of your high school selves could occupy those pants. And it turns out that "stone washed" is literally true.

On one of those "How Its Made" programs aired on the Science Channel I learned that new blue jeans are pre-washed in what amounts to giant washing machines. Instead of fabric softener sheets, actual stones -- small boulders, even -- are washed with the jeans to 'break them in' before they're foisted on a lazy public.

Either the modern jeans consumer is too sensitive about the reaction obtained when wearing new jeans or too lazy to break them in as we did in the 1960s and 70s. Blue jeans fade now after being laundered only a few times -- and why not? They've already gone through extraordinary wear (and even tear) before getting put on the shelves.

And every parent knows that pre-torn jeans are more expensive.

When a patch is required, as it will be all too soon on the modern blue jean, the item is not an old friend; it's hardly even a casual acquaintance.

If anyone knows where old-style, sturdy denim jeans may be obtained, please leave a comment. Of course, the jeans would have to come in aircraft-carrier sizes....

Valentines birthday salutes!

One of my all time favorite entertainers, Benjamin Kubelsky, was born right here in Chicago on this day in 1894. You may remember him as Jack Benny, the Pride of Waukegan.

So do I.

I was reading Fred Allen's Treadmill to Oblivion again recently. Toward the end of the book he pays a wonderful tribute to his supposed enemy: "He is my favorite comedian and I hope to be his friend until he's forty. That will be forever."

And speaking of people who don't yet admit to 40, here's a birthday shoutout to Skeezix Wallet. He looks pretty good for 90, don't you think?

(Only in the comics.)

Also celebrating a birthday today is Ken Levine, one of my all-time favorite bloggers, even if I am insanely jealous of the career he's had: Comedy writer (M*A*S*H, Cheers, and many others), director, and baseball broadcaster. (He'll be doing some work for the Seattle Mariners this year.) Levine's blog posts are consistently funny, except when he writes eulogies. In contrast, I may be at my funniest when I try to do a serious political post. Dag nab it. (Levine once passed up the chance to see the Beatles in concert and saw Jack Benny in Vegas instead. "I made the right choice," Levine wrote. "That night at Sahara's [Benny] was sensational. No one who went to the Beatles concert could hear a note.")

And there is yet one more birthday shoutout to make this morning, this one to my Older Daughter. She doesn't read, or even know about, this blog. If she saw this, she'd be upset by my continued association of her birthday with Jack Benny's. I'm upset by the fact that she's 27 today.

Twenty seven? How is anyone supposed to believe I'm still 23? Even when I explain how it works according to the New Math I learned in the 60s? I may have to move my admitted age up to 39 as well.

What does Yahoo! think I am -- a Republican congressman?

I have a couple of different Yahoo! mail accounts; there's one linked to the Sidebar on this blog.

All of them recently developed the same problem.

Every time I go in to check my mail, a pop-up box will appear on the lower right-hand portion of my screen. Here's one:

You may not believe this, but I don't know anyone named "Wett.heartz590." I certainly did not ask Mr. or Ms. Heartz (you will note the indistinct gender identification in the solicitation) to add me to his or her contacts list. The same goes for Mr. or Ms. "Warm.potion" something-or-other that also popped up.

And, frankly, I'm kind of ticked off about the fact that Yahoo! is letting this kind of stuff through. I mean, who do they think I am? Former Republican Congressman Chris Lee?

First of all, the last time I appeared in public without a shirt, Captain Ahab tried to harpoon me.

Anyway, this has happened now 12 or 15 times and I was moved this morning to try and write to Yahoo! to complain.

I clicked around for some time, finding menu upon menu of 'frequently asked questions' but nothing about these unwanted messenger pop-ups. Apparently not too many are asking about Mr. or Ms. Heartz or Potion yet. Or maybe Yahoo! customers are flattered by the solicitations and accept the invitations. Personally, I think these solicitations are invitations to contract a virus -- computer or otherwise.

I'm still trying to figure out how any question becomes "frequently asked" because I could find no address where I could ask anything at all.

Has this happened to any of you?

Anyway, I'm putting my complaint out here in the Greater Blogosphere in the hopes that some Yahoo! spider will see its exclamation points bandied about in this fashion and put an end to the unwelcome solicitations of Mr. or Ms. Heartz and Potion. Or, possibly, introduce them.

Picture Day at the Undisclosed Location

I run photos here at Second Effort, some of which I've actually taken myself. Most of them, of course, are 'lifted' from other corners of the Internet.

Of course, I don't think pictures are entirely necessary -- even if it doesn't really work out this way, I'd rather have you coming here for my words rather than someone else's pictures. Still, the occasional illustration breaks up the solid gray page....

It took awhile to figure out how to insert a picture. Checking this morning, I think the first illustrations I put in this blog came in August 2006 -- nine months after I'd started this blog. And this was my second blog (hence the name).

At home, I'm the guy who downloads photos my wife takes and stores them in various subfolders of the "My Pictures" directory. I can do minimal editing and everything!

(Long Suffering Spouse has to take pictures at school. For the yearbook. For the parish bulletin. And she takes whatever family souvenirs we have because, she says, my pictures are usually out of focus. I can't argue with her because she's right. And this with an automatic digital camera! Yes, I have talent. And, if we're outside in the daylight, I can't see the stupid screen on the back of the device to save my life.)

Anyway, having demonstrated so much ability in the capture and manipulation of images, you might think that a simple request for a photo would not throw the old Curmudgeon into a tizzy.

You might think that -- but if it were so, this would be even a more boring post than it has been so far.

I'm filling out a questionnaire for one of the bar associations that is reviewing my latest judicial application. Some of the questions are easy: No, I don't use recreational drugs. Yes, my license is current. No, I haven't been sued. Yet.

But this questionnaire requests that I provide a photo. Of myself.

Most of the pictures I've been in lately are group shots: Older Daughter's wedding, Oldest Son's wedding. Events associated therewith. And even in these pictures there is a problem. Some techno-sharpie is Photoshopping me out of all of these photos and substituting some overweight, balding old man where I should be. I have been vigilant. I have paid careful attention. I still can't figure out how it's been done. And even if someone else weren't standing in the group where I should be, I doubt that a group shot is what the bar association has in mind.

And even if I had a picture to provide... well, when's the last time you went to the drugstore to pick up prints? Everything's digital now... and nothing ever gets printed except for the stuff my wife frames. Despite my vehement protests, my wife has even had group shots framed that include that overweight, balding old man where I should be.

But I need a picture and I need it now. So -- I thought -- I'll pull a profile picture off Facebook. There's a picture there that I've used as a profile picture that was taken at another family wedding this summer. The guy in this picture is also balding and overweight... but it's taken at such an angle, and in such dim lighting conditions, that these conditions are hardly noticeable.

Facebook is interesting. I can lift anyone's picture that I have access to, apparently, except my own. At least that's what I discovered this morning.

So, I fell back on a head-shot that was taken for me by a professional photographer some, um, seven years ago. My wife and I were coordinating a photo directory for our parish's 100th anniversary. One of us had to be with the photographer pretty much all the time when the parish families trooped in for their portrait appointments. It was during a lull following our own family portrait that I asked for the head-shot.

"What do you intend to use it for?" the photographer asked.

"For my business publicity," I told him, truthfully. That photo used to run with the column I wrote for the local legal newspaper. But neither the photographer nor I imagined, at the time, that I'd still be using it seven years later.

I printed a copy on plain paper on my inkjet this morning and it didn't smear too much. In fact, the smears probably improved the image.

And, no, I won't be running that photo with this post.

The court paradox -- which only works if you appear pro se

Yet another reason to always hire a lawyer to handle legal problems. Think about it:




From the webcomic Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal.

I was wondering whether author of the strip, Zach Weiner, may have worked in his own lawyer joke into the cartoon. The student, Euathlus, turns out to be "a genus of the family Theraphosidae containing four species of tarantulas."

Hmmmm.

However, if you check out the Wikipedia article on the Paradox of the Court, you will find that the student of Protagoras is called both Eulathus and Euathlus. This may mean that Wikipedia is in on the joke. It certainly means that the Wikipedia article is in need of proofreading.

Still here after the blizzard....

Everyone in Chicago seems to have been thrown a tad off kilter by last week's blizzard. Youngest Son has a whole mess of tests this week (this week's and last week's) and Long Suffering Spouse reports she's giving a bunch of tests starting today. "The good news," she said, "is that I had them ready to go before the blizzard."

Courts were closed here last week. The Federal courts were closed last Wednesday; the Circuit Court of Cook County was closed Wednesday and Thursday. I can't remember that ever happening. It may have been a good thing, though. I saw that the chief judge of the courts in Dallas insisted they'd hold court despite a snow and ice storm (that greatly complicated matters for that scrimmage they played Sunday in the Jerry Jones Dome) -- and then broke his leg, falling on ice on the way to court.

I had an appellate brief to write. It's due today. It will be filed today.

So I took stuff home Tuesday night, hoping that I'd be able to work on it Wednesday.

Two feet of snow later, I actually got to the brief on Thursday. Afternoon.

But it's done now.

I think.

Instead of writing the story I wanted to write this morning, I think I'll actually read the brief I wrote... just to be sure.

And another unanticipated crisis landed on my desk last night.

And it's snowing again.

February has the fewest days, but it can be the longest month....

Curmudgeon says something nice about government

That thudding sound you just heard is my blogfriend Dave hitting the floor somewhere in metropolitan Atlanta....

Yes, admittedly, I grumble a lot about all levels of government. If you paid your own withholding, like I do, you'd be wary of government too.

But if government is evil, it can protect us from other, greater evils, and that leads us directly to into this morning's discussion.

The evil in question is not the Red Chinese. The Chinese may be our rivals in trade, our most likely adversary in war, and the nation likely to supplant the United States as the world's hegemon as we gracefully decline into a really big Portugal, but they also own the biggest portion of our national debt. So, I don't mean to bite the hand that props us up. No, I refer to a menace far worse than the Chinese.

I refer to the Telephone Company.

I have complained about telephone service in other posts on this blog. Early on, I griped about troubles with the "Texans", a reference to the Baby Bell that later grew up to swallow its corporate progenitor. For the classically trained, you can critique my interpretation of Greek mythology at the post linked in this sentence. In that post, I called the telephone monopoly BP&P; in this 2009 post, I referred to the Telephone Company as AT&TT.

Whatever it may be called, my latest dust-up with the Telephone Company came when I fell behind on my bill.

I know I may be shattering some of your dearly held illusions about the great wealth of lawyers and I'm sorry that I haven't been able to live up to the standard, but when people don't pay me I find it well-nigh impossible to pay my bills.

I let the office telephone bill go for one month, then two, waiting for the dreaded Red Notice all the while trying to plug up other, larger holes in the dike.

The dreaded Red Notice came shortly after the regular bill arrived showing that my business account was two months in arrears.

But here was the problem: The amount demanded on the regular bill was some $36 or $38 less than the amount demanded on the Red Notice.

No, I didn't let things deteriorate to actual disconnection -- so I didn't actually incur a restoration charge. The two bills just demanded different amounts.

Guess which amount I eventually paid?

Wouldn't you?

But the Telephone Company, having decided it was owed more, kept showing this phantom $36 or $38 charge on subsequent bills.

On receipt of each bill, for two consecutive months, I wrote to the Telephone Company at the address designated on the bill for the sending of complaints. I asked for an explanation about this phantom charge. Where had it come from? I explained how I'd paid the amounts demanded on the bills.

I imagine a giant shredder must be at that location: Letters complaining about this or that are apparently fed, unopened, into the maw of this giant machine. At least this would explain the total lack of response that I received from the Telephone Company to my inquiries.

In month three, therefore, I decided to try a different course. I did a little research and ascertained that telephone service in this state is regulated by the Illinois Commerce Commission. I did a little more Googling around the web and found a site maintained by the aforementioned Illinois Commerce Commission on which I could tell the Sovereign State of Illinois all about my trials and tribulations with the Telephone Company. It was a fill-in-the-blanks type form. I filled in the blanks. I pressed enter.

By the next morning -- the next morning! -- I had two voice mail messages from different corporate units of the Telephone Company both promising that a thorough investigation was underway and that I could rest assured that every effort would be made to resolve my problem. Several more calls followed.

This would be a better story if I didn't have to pay the $36 or $38 -- but, alas, this proved not to be the case. It turns out that, several months ago, the Telephone Company mysteriously applied a credit of roughly that size to my bill, lowering my monthly payment for one whole month. I thought nothing of it at the time -- credits like this pop up every so often as the Telephone Company is forced to settle a class action suit or is otherwise caught overcharging its customers. This time, however, the Telephone Company insisted that the credit was applied erroneously. The error was not picked up until the dreaded Red Notice was put together.

How could I argue otherwise? So I paid the #$@%! charge.

Late last week, I received a letter from the Illinois Commerce Commission advising me that the Telephone Company had advised it that my problem was solved and inquiring if I thought so too.

My thank you letter went in the mail last night.

Not all government regulation is bad. Sometimes it is necessary to keep evil corporations more or less honest.

Post No. 1400: There's a snowstorm coming?

(Click to enlarge or clarify)

Anybody hoping for a perceptive distillation of all the wisdom I've gained in putting 1,400 posts up here on Second Effort hasn't been here very often.

Today I actually had hoped to be less shallow than usual; however, circumstances dictate otherwise and, like Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady, I am going to try and stick to the weather or my health as topics of conversation.

Here in Chicago, we are supposedly in the crosshairs of a Major Winter Storm. I've not seen the TV or radio announcers' scripts, mind you, but I can hear them capitalizing "Major Winter Storm" every time they say it.

We're supposed to get anywhere from a dusting of snow to three inches today. The real excitement is supposed to begin tomorrow afternoon and continue into Wednesday.

I have observed that weather forecasters in Chicago are always making breathless predictions of impending storms. On the TV news the anchors join right in: "We're on Stormwatch tonight in Chicago...." Then they cut to a live remote manned by the least senior reporter, usually on an expressway overpass or at O'Hare. The reporter gravely intones the precautions being taken by IDOT and Chicago's Streets and San and the Department of Aviation. An interview of a representative of at least one of these organizations is shown during this segment which concludes with the junior reporter scanning the sky anxiously for some hint of the promised storm.

This latest storm may be different: The announcers are talking accumulations of 12 to 20 inches by the time we're done. The Tribune says, "The National Weather Service has issued an unusually dire blizzard watch, calling a storm expected to arrive Tuesday afternoon over much of northern Illinois and Northwest Indiana 'dangerous, multifaceted and potentially life-threatening.'" If they're even half right, this will be a major inconvenience. But half-right won't shut anything down. If we really did get 18 or 20 inches, though... that might be a different story.

My Long Suffering Spouse, like the little girl in the accompanying Sally Forth cartoon, is really, really hoping for a Snow Day. (Yes, kids, sometimes teachers hope for Snow Days just as much as you do!) As you may have gathered, I am skeptical. Nevertheless, instead of distilling wisdom today, I am resolved to move as much paper off my desk as possible... just in case I find it more prudent to work from home for the next couple of days.

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Sally Forth cartoon written by Francesco Marciuliano and drawn by Craig Macintosh. I obtained this image from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, though I read it (in print!) this morning in the Chicago Sun-Times.

Early thoughts on Rahm Emanuel's splendid victory in the Illinois Supreme Court

1. I didn't think I would be -- but I'm glad Justice Burke participated in the case. Burke and Justice Freeman filed a separate, specially concurring opinion agreeing with the majority's decision to put Emanuel back on the Chicago mayoral ballot that gently criticized the 'unfortunate tone' taken by the Supreme Court majority (and the Appellate Court dissent) -- and did so in a civil way;
2. I suspect Justices Freeman and Burke have the right of it when they say there was room for disagreement before the Supreme Court spoke late yesterday afternoon;
3. There is no room for disagreement now, though. For purposes of Section 3.1-10-5(a) of the Illinois Municipal Code, "resided in" means where the prospective candidate is domiciled.
   
4. I don't know that Justices Freeman and Burke are correct when they suggest that yesterday's opinion may have unforeseen consequences for residency issues in other cases (such as Chicago's residency requirement -- which requires police officers and firefighters to live within the City limits or forfeit their employment). I suspect Maksym (that's the name by which the case will be known in the law books) will not be so broadly construed by future courts.
5. Rahm Emanuel will win the mayoral primary with more than 50% of the vote and avoid a runoff. This ballot challenge has provided him with sympathetic exposure that no amount of campaign commercials could equal.

I would not, however, suggest that you put money down on this last prediction. If you bet against every prediction I've ever made in this blog you'd probably have a significant amount of money stashed away. Before yesterday I would have thought that Emanuel really was in trouble because Illinois election cases have usually gone against the challenged candidates. I still think you'd be wise not to believe that the Illinois judiciary is suddenly inclined to decide future election cases in favor of broad ballot access.

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Programming Note: My counter tells me that this is post no. 1399. Surely we must be venturing into some sort of record territory here -- I may be the only blogger with this many posts and without either a tinfoil beanie or a book contract. I admit you have to take my word for it about the beanie....

Anyway, coming next week... Post No. 1400. Sitemeter says over 100 people a day have been coming here lately. Most leave quickly, and presumably disappointed. I am grateful for those who have commented regularly over the years -- but this is a message directed chiefly at any lurkers, if lurkers there be: Say hello. And if there's anything you'd like to see more of -- or less of -- on Second Effort, feel free to say so.

Musing on the pace of progress (?)

Must stop looking at the Illinois Supreme Court's Twitter feed, waiting for its decision on Rahm Emanuel.... I have to get some work done....

And isn't it amazing that the Illinois Supreme Court even has a Twitter feed?

A few years ago, it seems, we were adequately 'with it' as long as the clock on our VCR wasn't always flashing "12:00, 12:00, 12:00...." Now, though, the VCR is about as common a household appliance as a butter churn. And I don't even know what I need to know in order to get back to merely 'with it.'

When I was a kid, only the richest and most powerful people had car phones. Now car phones are "mobile" phones and everyone has at least one. Computers were monstrosities in the early 1960's. They required separate, climate-controlled rooms. In fiction, computers were not just monstrosities, they were likely to become monsters. James T. Kirk did battle with a megalomanical computer every other week. Then, all of a sudden, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs smote the ground, and along came desktops. Every high school kid had access to more computing power than NASA did when it landed men on the Moon. Then came laptops. Now, it seems, desktops and even laptops are increasingly the province of old fogies like me -- my kids do most of the things that I do on my computer on their phones.

On the other hand, IBM has invented Watson, a computer that will do battle with Jeopardy champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter next month. But James T. Kirk has become a lonely old man spouting $#*! on CBS. Leonard Nimoy has officially retired. Will Ken Jennings be able to save humanity without Mr. Spock?

Maybe I don't want to get back 'with it' -- even if I could.

The Chicago Mayor's race: Chico & residency; Emanuel & ballot access

In my fertile imagination, I write this blog for a national and international audience -- and six or seven regular readers in the States and two or three regular readers overseas does constitute a certain amount of success in this ambition. A very small amount.

But, today, I depart from my usual practice and write about stuff that's strictly local. Although some of this stuff may be in the news where you live, too.

It all started when Mayor-for-Life Richard II fooled everyone by saying he would lay down his office this year....

You're looking at a picture of mayoral candidate Gery Chico. Chico was a one-time Chief of Staff for Richard M. Daley and later was president of the Chicago Board of Education. He was a partner at the venerable Chicago firm of Altheimer & Gray... which spiraled into the ground a few years back... and now has his own firm, Chico & Nunes, P.C.

He's been endorsed by the local police and fire unions -- and now he expresses a willingness to end Chicago's residency rule.

Chicago cops and firemen (and all other City employees) are required to live in the City of Chicago as a condition of continued employment. I am not a City employee. Many of my neighbors are. Some -- especially the cops, I've noticed -- express feelings of being 'trapped' in the City and look anxiously toward retirement when they can move away.

But I love the residency rule. I believe it helps support the price of housing in the middle class enclave where I live. Take that rule away... and the only real investment I have left may really tumble in value. You think housing prices have gone down because of the Great Recession? I'm afraid that will be a mere course correction compared to the free fall that may follow if the residency rule is eliminated in Chicago.

Here is another reason why responsible anonymous blogging has a place: This is not a popular opinion. I might be scorned by my City-employed neighbors were these views to be known. Yet it is important that the consequences of the elimination of the residency rule be considered. If housing prices really do fall, moreover, the first cop to move out will be fine -- but his fellow cop neighbors will take a beating if they can't sell as fast. I'd be far more receptive to Local 2 or the FOP negotiating a housing allowance for younger firemen or cops in certain particularly disadvantaged areas of the City. But that's another story.

Is Chico pandering for the votes of cops and firemen? The indispensable Second City Cop blog recognizes Chico's statements as such, but adds, "It's what politicians do."

Chico was running a distant third in the polls before Monday when the Illinois Appellate Court knocked Rahm Emanuel off the ballot. In the surreal world of Chicago politics, however, Chico would probably have become the frontrunner were Emanuel to remain off the ballot.

But Emanuel is back on the ballot, as of this morning, because the Illinois Supreme Court accepted his appeal and ordered a stay of the Appellate Court's decision. Yesterday afternoon the court announced that it was taking the case on the briefs submitted to the Appellate Court and would not hear argument.

The Court's action yesterday signals that a decision is probably imminent, possibly as early as today. Also, to me at least, the Court's action means that whatever the Supreme Court intends to do, there is a clear majority supporting it. Further, it means that the court does not see this as a particularly close case (whichever way it goes) because it sees no need for additional briefing or argument. Finally, it probably means that Justice Anne Burke will be able to recuse herself from the court's determination -- something she probably wants to do inasmuch as her husband, Chicago Ald. Ed Burke, has endorsed Chico.

There are some powerful people who've been fighting to keep Emanuel off the ballot.

Burt Odelson, who is leading the legal team against Emanuel, is a well-respected and very successful lawyer in the very narrow (and, in Cook County, critically important) specialty of election law. After he lost at the Board of Elections and in the Circuit Court, some media outlets here were portraying him as a buffoon. He is not.

Nor is Emanuel's success a foregone conclusion. Put it this way: If Curmudgeon, Esq. had been summoned to President Obama's side, not as Chief of Staff of course, but as (for example) deputy assistant to the deputy assistant White House counsel (something junior enough to match my station in the food chain) and were I to return, after having rented out my house, with ambitions to run for Mayor, I would have been rebuffed by the hearing officer. The full Board of Elections would never have gone my way, and neither would the learned Circuit Court judge who ruled in Mr. Emanuel's favor.

Ballot access is as jealously guarded in Chicago as nowhere, perhaps, but in the old Soviet bloc. A right to run is never presumed. Thus, attacking Mr. Emanuel's candidacy was never a foolish quest, however it turns out.

But I can't help but think of an old adage as we watch this Emanuel ballot drama come to a conclusion: He who would strike the king must aim to kill. Emanuel was wounded -- don't doubt it -- by this week's court action, but if the Supreme Court reinstates him he will be anything but dead. In fact, polls show he might win the election in February, without the need for a runoff.

We live in interesting times in Chicago.

Getting a handle on public budgets: Curmudgeon talks about the State of the Union

The State of the Union address is tonight and President Obama will talk about all the things that he thinks the country needs. The Republicans will counter that we can't afford whatever he proposes. He may talk about the need to raise the ceiling on the national debt. The Republicans will say that the debt is reaching ruinous proportions.

The Red Meat Republicans and the True Blue Democrats will shout at each other across the cultural divide, each hearing only the plaudits of their own partisans.

But both sides have a point. Government services cost money and vital government services must be provided whether or not sufficient money for these services comes from taxes. On the other hand, deficit spending can't go on forever.

So maybe taxes need to go up. But nobody wants to waste money. Until you have a handle on the budget, though, how can anyone be sure that we're not wasting money?

How do we get a handle on the budget without immediately falling into partisan rancor?

If it were up to me, I'd suggest getting a camera. I'd take a picture of the Dirksen Building in downtown Chicago.

I would explain that I know pretty much what goes on in here -- the Seventh Circuit and the District Court for the Northern District both sit here.









But my next slide would be of the Kluczynski Building across the street (that's the one with the Calder stabile in the courtyard):

The Kluczynski Building is in the background here. The Dirksen Building is visible at left. I would put this slide up and ask: Who works at the Kluczynski building? What do they do?

The next slide would be of the Metcalfe Building at 77 W. Jackson. Same question: What goes on in here?

The Federal Reserve has it's own building in Chicago at 230 S. LaSalle; I'd illustrate this point with a picture of same. (Wikipedia says the Fed also has a check processing facility in Chicago as well, near Midway Airport.)







Also, in addition to offices in malls and shopping districts near you, the Social Security Administration has its own giant office building in Chicago, the Harold Washington Social Security Administration Building at 600 W. Madison. That's where you'll find the famous "Batcolumn" sculpture. This would be my next slide.

When talking about the federal budget, everyone goes right to Social Security and Medicare -- and these are two big line items, surely.

But who's in all these other buildings? What are they doing? Is everything that all these people are doing really necessary?

You want to raise my taxes? I'm willing to listen. I think a lot of people would be willing to listen. But the proponent of tax increases will have to start by telling us what everyone in these buildings does and why each program is equally vital. Then we'll go to the federal office buildings in all the other cities.

When we're done sorting out which programs we really need and which we don't, then we can start looking at the cost of administering the programs that we do need. I admit that the danger of partisan bickering exists every time we examine whether there really is a need for a particular program. But at least if we're focusing on the alleged need for continued subsidies for buggy whip manufacturers and a bureaucracy to administer same, we're not talking about cuts in Social Security and Medicare and starving our parents or grandparents.

Figure out the cost of what remains and then tell me whether my taxes need to go up. Think anyone in Washington is interested in addressing this?
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Note: This morning's post was suggested by this post yesterday on Rather Than Working.

Tiger mothering and Youngest Son's doctor visit

Yale Law Professor Amy Chua has been much in the news lately, ever since her January 8 article for the Wall Street Journal, "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior."

I suspect a lot of readers saw red and stopped reading at the opening laundry list of things Professor Chua would not let her kids do. Others threw up their hands when Professor Chua wrote:

If a Chinese child gets a B—which would never happen — there would first be a screaming, hair-tearing explosion. The devastated Chinese mother would then get dozens, maybe hundreds of practice tests and work through them with her child for as long as it takes to get the grade up to an A.

Pick your verb carefully here: Professor Chua criticized, mocked, satirized the typical American parent's concern with their child's self-esteem. But she has a valid -- and, I think, wise -- point when she says:

[A]s a parent, one of the worst things you can do for your child's self-esteem is to let them give up. On the flip side, there's nothing better for building confidence than learning you can do something you thought you couldn't.

Those two sentences should be graven on the hearts of parents and teachers everywhere.

Parenting is a constant struggle, and, as parents we often fluctuate between extremes (keeping with the Oriental theme here) from the yin of being a 'hardass' to the yang of being a pushover.

As parents, we are always guessing how best to respond in any situation: Should we be tough guys when the kid wants to stay out later on Saturday night, or should we acquiesce? Should we blow a fuse when we get a disappointing report card, or should we be sympathetic and understanding?

It's a guessing game. And we really can never know if we got it right.

We can't even tell by how our kids turn out -- for at least three reasons. First, kids are works in progress. They change over time. The kid who seems like a lost cause at 18 may get it together by 30. Or 40. (In my case, I'm hoping to get it together by 55.) Second, parents are not the only influences in their kids' lives. Professor Chua banned TV in her home, but in the modern age programs on MTV, FOX and the CW are available on so many other platforms -- just waiting to undermine all the good lessons we've tried to teach. And even if a kid is never contaminated by toxic TV, the peers with whom our kids interact each day likely have been. Our kids' friends and acquaintances shape our kids, too. And, finally, we can't know how our kids might have turned out differently if we weren't there. There are no identical kids running in a separate control group against whom we may compare.

So all we can do is do our best and hope it's enough.

Which brings us to Youngest Son.

Like everyone else at our house, Youngest Son has been sick off and on since before Christmas. The latest bug started over two weeks ago. He had fever intermittently for a week. The fever was sufficiently serious that we had to hold him out of school for a couple of days; thankfully, part of this time coincided with a weekend. After the fever subsided, the congestion began. He began to have an ugly, wet-sounding cough.

We had the vaporizers going and Long Suffering Spouse was after him to take Mucinex or cough syrup. She was after him to eat more good food and fewer cookies. Sometimes he would grudgingly comply.

Through it all, though, he had to maintain his school work and his baseball training regimen.

Tryouts are in another month and, this year, the varsity is going on a spring training trip to California. Youngest Son figures to make the varsity again, but he wants to contribute. So he's working on his arm strength -- lifting weights and running.

And there was still one more complication: Youngest Son was asked to be a student leader at a four day retreat this week. All the seniors at his Catholic high school are encouraged to go on a Kairos retreat; a few are selected from each group to help out with the next. It is an honor. As with most honors, there is a cost: He had to write a lengthy paper to present on the retreat and subject it to review by his fellow leaders and the faculty advisers -- and, of course, he had to review the others' efforts as well. He'll have to make up the school work he misses for the retreat, too.

Thus there was very little time for rest and recuperation from this latest bout of creeping crud. Last week he'd try and leave the house before 6:00 to get his running in. He would join others on the baseball team for weight lifting (or sometimes more running) after school. And there were Kairos meetings, too. He'd come home, fall asleep on the couch for a couple of hours, then get up and do homework into the wee small hours.

His condition deteriorated through the week. But, despite our increasing insistence, he wouldn't agree to see a doctor. "A doctor will tell me not to go to practice," he said, "and I have to go to practice."

And you'll remember that wet cough I mentioned a few paragraphs above? By this weekend Youngest Son's mother and I could hear a rattle in his lungs. Youngest Son admitted he could hear it too. Not that it stopped him from running a couple of miles in the morning Saturday, you understand, although he admitted he had a coughing fit afterward. Thus, finally, Saturday morning, Youngest Son agreed to let us take him to the doctor.

I took him to the local immediate care center.

He's not quite 18, so I had to go in with him.

His blood pressure was 112 over 54.

"That's disgusting," I said. "I can do twice as much as that."

"No you can't!" said the nurse.

"Oh, yes he can," said Youngest Son. He's seen me when the mortgage company calls.

I'd explained to Youngest Son that talking to a doctor is different than talking to a trainer on the sidelines at the football game. You're not trying to get back on the field for the next series, I explained to him, you're trying to get the doctor to realize that you genuinely need the medicine that only he or she can prescribe. So Youngest Son was pretty thorough in describing the course of his illness. Still, I felt a need to supplement his account.

"Is there any other medical problem you have?" the nurse asked, concluding the history before the doctor came in.

"Well, there are his sideburns," I interjected, "but I suppose, strictly speaking, that's not a medical problem."

"Does he always give you a hard time?" the nurse asked.

"Oh, yes," agreed Youngest Son.

The doctor sent the boy off for an x-ray. She saw something on the lower left lobe of his lungs that she takes for pneumonia. A radiologist will confirm the diagnosis and call the house today. "You ran this morning?" she asked Youngest Son. He nodded. "Well, no running for a week," she said. "You need to rest and get better." She wrote out a couple of prescriptions.

"What did I tell you?" snarled Youngest Son when we got back in the car.

"Good thing you're going on Kairos this week, isn't it?" I said.

It will be anything but a week off: He hardly slept when he went as a participant in November. And leaders have to set up for and clean up after the participants.

But I think he'll get more rest on the retreat than he would have gotten had he stayed home.

I don't know where this rates on the "tiger mother" scale. On the one hand, I've let him set the agenda with the doctor -- which perhaps makes me a pushover -- but I understood his reasoning. On the other hand, we are letting him test his limits -- and always continuing to insist that he keep up his studies, too.

Older Daughter tells people she was our "experimental child" -- that we tried out everything on her and then applied the hard-won fruits of our experience to the raising of her four siblings. But they're all experimental children. And so are we.

Curmudgeon's Laws -- and others

I published a list of Curmudgeon's Laws at the end of December and offered to expand on these from time to time.

Despite the near-total absence of clamor for any follow-up, I add to my list herewith:

It costs more to be poor in America than it does to be rich. I concede that this is counter-intuitive -- on the surface -- but poorer people are the ones who can't pay off their charge card bills each month and so incur high interest rates on their balances. A shirt at a department store may cost a rich man $25. The same shirt costs the poor man $25 plus interest. Miss a payment -- or be late with a payment -- and the already high interest rate goes up, up, up. Meanwhile, not only do wealthier people not incur interest charges, at least one credit card (the American Express Plum Card) offers customers the opportunity for a 1.5% discount if the card balance is paid each month when due. I suspect that things work similarly in other developed nations -- but I'm almost positive that this rule would not apply in hunter-gather societies. Are there any anthropologists out there who think differently?

Expenses do not fall easily when income drops. This is more a corollary of Parkinson's Second Law.

"Parkinson" refers to British scholar C. Northcote Parkinson, whose first law, "Work expands to fill the time allotted for its completion," is probably familiar to you even if the author is not. Parkinson's second law is "expenses rise to meet income," that is, the more you make, the more you (or your spouse) will spend. That house that was perfectly adequate before your last promotion seems tiny and cramped following same. That car that was so reliable and comfortable before, now seems old and worn out. So you buy a new house and a new car. Your expenses go up.

Here is where my law comes into play: If you are laid off, or if -- for example -- you are self-employed and your customers slow down or even stop paying your bills because of the lousy economy, your income will fall but the new house is still there -- with the new car in the driveway. The expenses don't fall -- not easily. They will only eventually fall -- after the foreclosure, perhaps, and after the repo man has come to call.

Looking up Parkinson's Laws this morning (lawyers can't help but research nearly everything -- except consumer purchases, but that's another story) I came across this trove of collected wisdom.

Let me highlight just a few:

The law of scientific equilibrium

If it is settled it is not science.

If it is science it is not settled.

The law of scientific consensus

At times of high scientific controversy, the consensus is always wrong.

The law of targets

A level set as a target maximum becomes the de facto minimum, and vice versa.

Lawyers will recognize this last one as a fundamental principle of settlement negotiations. One never tells the other side that the client will settle for somewhere between $40,000 and $60,000. Even if the conversation is reported verbatim, the client on the other side will hear only $40,000 (if he is the one who is supposed to pay) or $60,000 (if she is the one expecting to receive money in the deal).

And I don't know who this Evans was, but he or she was surely right:

Evans’ law of inadequate paranoia

No matter how bad you think things are, they’re worse.

We're No. 1! In traffic congestion, at least

With the Bears playing the Packers Sunday for the NFC Championship, it's hard to find anything in the Chicago newspapers or on TV or radio except breathless pre-game coverage. Every saloon in Green Bay is being visited by accredited Chicago media; every one of these joints is pronounced "historic."

World War III probably couldn't crowd the Bears game off the front page here -- unless, perhaps, Dallas was vaporized in the initial nuclear exchange. Then, however, the headline would most likely read, "Super Bowl must be relocated; NFL asked to consider Soldier Field as new venue."

But I was able to find reference today to Chicago earning a no. 1 ranking in something other than pro football hype and, unfortunately, it's a dubious distinction: Chicago ranks worst in the nation in traffic congestion.

The story is based off a study issued by the Texas Transportation Institute, the 2010 Urban Mobility Report. If you turn to page 28 of the report, you'll find this table (click to enlarge or clarify):


At page 50, you'd find this table:


What it comes down to is this: Chicagoans who drive to work waste more time behind the wheel going to and from work than just about anyone anywhere. And then we pay a king's ransom for parking.

I'm actually surprised that Chicago fares so poorly in these rankings. Washington D.C. I could understand: Gridlock is the state of nature there, isn't it? I have never actually been in Washington D.C. -- but I was on the Beltway one time, at 3:00am, and traffic was at a standstill. In Chicago, we can get around pretty quickly on the expressways at 3:00am. If only at 3:00am.

And we were recently no. 1 in gasoline prices, too. Whether we still are or not, I don't know. AAA says the current national average price for regular unleaded is $3.115. I paid $3.359 to fill up the family van yesterday (I had court in the suburbs). Most gas stations around my house are selling regular for $3.399; one of the stations right off the Kennedy at Harlem posted a price for regular of $3.459 this morning.

Thank goodness we have the Bears and a mayoral election to keep our minds off of real problems.

The stock market as casino for idiots: Exhibit A

Steve Jobs is as closely identified with Apple as Bill Gates ever was with Microsoft. Whether it was truly the cause or merely coincidental, Jobs' return to Apple and Apple's return to prominence are inextricably linked in the public mind. Now Mr. Jobs advises he must stand down from Apple for a time for reasons of health. His prior serious health problems give investors reason to fear that he may be unable to return to Apple soon -- or ever. It is therefore no surprise that Apple stock took a substantial hit in pre-market trading this morning.

But, says CNN this morning, "Nasdaq-100 (COMP) futures, a proxy for the tech sector, slumped ahead of the opening bell" today because of speculation over Mr. Jobs' health.

The entire tech sector falters because the individual most closely associated with a leading company in that sector has health issues?

That's just goofy.

Now, anyone who takes investment advice from me must be an idiot. I've often claimed that my level of financial sophistication is such that I can't decide between a Christmas Club and passbook savings account as an investment vehicle.

But even I can see that, if the alpha wolf is injured, an opportunity is created for the other wolves in the pack to improve their status. Here is the chance for a technology company heretofore languishing in the shadow of Apple to emerge as the new and innovative leader. Intelligent observers, like naturalists following a pack of wolves, should have already identified the likely competitors for the post of alpha male and should be putting money from Apple on one or more of its competitors. Logically, the sector should not shrink on news of Mr. Jobs' misfortune; if anything, the sector should stay constant or even move up somewhat as smart investors put their money behind the most likely candidates to take advantage of any missteps by Apple during Mr. Jobs' enforced absence.

And maybe some of this is going on quietly and behind the scenes. But that's not what's being reported. And, if the entire sector really falls today, we have further proof, if proof were truly needed, that the stock market, as it currently operates, is not an engine of prosperity, but a casino for idiots. The stock value of a Company A goes up before the company makes any money; the stock value of Company B goes down because Company B failed to make as much money as people outside the company guessed they might make.

And we bailed these people out, ladies and gentlemen, the Wall Street titans and the banks that conspire to lose money with them. I have charge cards issued by banks that are charging 24% or 27% on charge card balances. These same banks are paying one-half of one percent or less on CD's. Isn't that enough of a profit margin? Why are banks also allowed to play in the stock market?

And the supposedly anti-business Obama administration deems all of these enterprises all "too big to fail."

But the rest of us aren't too big at all.

*Sigh*

Curmudgeon gets a plug, learns something new

It's not a book contract; it's not even a paying gig. However, from time to time, Jay Harrison, the proprietor of BoomSpeak sees fit to reprint one of my posts (edited by Mr. Harrison to suit his needs).

In the current edition of his Internet magazine, Mr. Harrison reworks my December 20 piece, "I spent much of last week looking for the electric bill" and distills it down to "Electic Boogaloo." I'm grateful for the plug and the link. And who knows? Maybe one of these days we can drive serious traffic to each other's sites.

Also in the current edition, BoomSpeak features an article by Terry Hamburg, "Inside Gilligan's Island." Hamburg, whose regular blog is boomer to you, reveals who almost got marooned on the island. I won't steal her thunder by revealing the identities of those who were considered for, but did not get, parts in the show. However, Hamburg also reveals that Gilligan's tiny ship was named for a famous Chicagoan.

In this morning's Chicago Sun-Times, Michael Sneed writes that Newton Minow will receive an honorary degree from John Marshall Law School at that school's commencement ceremonies Sunday at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers. Minow is of counsel to Sidley & Austin -- and his daughter Martha is the Dean of Harvard Law School -- but you will probably remember Mr. Minow best for a 1961 speech, soon after his appointment as Chairman of the FCC, in which he called television a "vast wasteland."

According to Hamburg's blog post (originally posted here), Sherwood Schwartz, the creator of Gilligan's Island, named the S.S. Minnow in ironic tribute to Newton Minow. "Sherwood Schwartz," Hamburg writes, "didn’t hold Mr. Minow in high regard."

All this time, I just thought the boat was simply named for the small fish....

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Update: An anonymous commenter writes that the name of the boat on which Gilligan et al. set sail for their ill-fated three hour cruise was actually spelled M-i-n-o-w, not M-i-n-n-o-w as I'd written this morning.

A careful search of the Internet, however, reveals this photograph:

It makes an interesting story either way.

Illinois death penalty dilemma

In the closing hours of its lame duck session this week, the Illinois General Assembly passed a bill ending the death penalty here. Governor Patrick Quinn has not said whether he will sign it. Liberals are rejoicing; prosecutors are outraged. I'm torn.

There are cases where the crimes are so horrible, so heinous, and where the accused's guilt is so clear, so certain (sometimes to the point where the criminal doesn't merely confess, he brags of his crime) that the death penalty seems entirely too lenient.

On the other hand, over drinks in a bar one day, a fellow lawyer made what I think is a tremendous argument against the death penalty. "Have you ever won a case you thought you thought you should have lost?" he asked. "Have you ever lost a case when you should have won?"

Well, sure, I said. Who hasn't? Juries do strange things. Courts make odd rulings. You stand up to speak -- and trip all over your tongue.

"Well, what makes you think that can't happen in a death penalty case?"

Makes you think, doesn't it?

The problem with abolishing the death penalty is finding a suitable alternative. Let me illustrate by referring to the infamous case of Richard Speck. Speck systematically raped and murdered eight student nurses on Chicago's southeast side on July 13, 1966. He was identified by the one young woman he missed, Cora (Corazon) Amurao, who hid under a bed during the carnage.

Speck was tried and sentenced to death. The linked article in Wikipedia explains what happened after (footnotes omitted):

On June 28, 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court (citing their June 3, 1968 decision in Witherspoon v. Illinois) upheld Speck's conviction but reversed his death sentence, because more than 250 potential jurors were unconstitutionally excluded from his jury because of their conscientious or religious scruples against capital punishment. The case was remanded back to the Illinois Supreme Court for re-sentencing.

On June 29, 1972, in Furman v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court declared the death penalty unconstitutional, so the Illinois Supreme Court's only option was to order Speck re-sentenced to prison by the original Cook County court.

On November 21, 1972, in Peoria, Judge Richard Fitzgerald re-sentenced Speck to 400 to 1,200 years in prison (8 consecutive sentences of 50 to 150 years). He was denied parole in seven minutes at his first parole hearing on September 15, 1976, and at six subsequent hearings in 1977, 1978, 1981, 1984, 1987, and 1990.

It's that last sentence on which I'd like to focus your attention.

Each parole hearing was, of course, covered extensively on the Chicago TV news. The images of the increasingly feeble parents of Speck's victims at each successive hearing, forced to relive the horror of their children's deaths, time after time after time, made a powerful impression on me. They'd been punished more severely, I thought, than Speck.

And Speck never had a chance for parole, you may say, and you may be right. His crimes were so outrageous and so highly publicized that no one in authority would risk the public backlash that would follow were he let go.

But what of all the victims' relatives in all the less highly publicized cases? Could they risk boycotting parole hearings, trying to spare themselves the pain of reliving their loved one's death?

If you told me -- if you promised me -- that, for the most horrifying offenses, the offenders would be locked up and never given the opportunity for parole, I could accept that as an alternative to the death penalty. The State might even save money, for a time, by not having to litigate the interminable appeals of Death Row inmates.

But -- I'm afraid -- a new generation of reformers would eventually spring up, crying that life without parole is too harsh a sentence. And the interminable appeals would start up all over again.