Two items: forgotten films and invented greetings. Thanks to my granddaughter (she who visited Paris with us this past summer) there is a new greeting in the family. In fact, our holiday dinner yesterday started with lunch and by request - matzoh ball soup, and by tradition – potato latkes. It is a tradition because they are fried in oil, and it was the miracle of the oil that burned for eight days that underlies a lot of the Chanukah celebration, and is expressed by the eight candelabra Menorah. Evening meal was turkey with cranberry sauce, dressing, pumpkin pie and wine. So much for the amalgamation of Christmas and Chanukah.
Now to the entertainment portion of this epistle The afternoon was passed combing through our son’s prodigious collection (two walls!) of DVDs. Watched one of the most beautiful movies no one ever seems to have heard of. Maybe I missed the fuss over it when it opened nearly ten years ago, if indeed there was any “fuss,” but I had never heard of “Tortilla Soup” before Christmas Day. It is a sweet and startling, sometimes sad, sometimes funny examination of the relationships in a Mexican-American family living in L.A. Three different and delightful daughters, and a superb performance by their father, a master chef played by Hector Elizando. The critics didn’t rave about it when it came out in 2001 and the audiences apparently stayed away. (Not that critical acclaim makes a movie work. Some of every weekend’s top grossing movies get one star panning.)
If you are the father of daughters, you will be delighted.
Almost upstaging the actors is the food presentation. It is a must movie for “foodies.” The dishes are astonishing and the photography is perfect, done by, I am sure, the best food stylists in the business.
What occurred to me more though, was that some movies simply are avoided or ignored. “Tortilla Soup” did not deserve to be. But there are dozens of stories like this. I remember having a conversation with Jeff Daniels about “The Butcher’s Wife.” It was a weird story and co-starred Demi Moore as the clairvoyant daughter of an elderly butcher. I told him I had so enjoyed the movie but asked why did it get so little play? He told me that there was a big management shuffle at Paramount just as the movie was to open and it was “orphaned.” It got no big advertising. No big promotion.
There are other “relationship” movies that seem not to have prospered. By the way, I have no problem with films that are labeled “chick flicks.” Like “Beaches” which was, at least for me, a startling examination of the relationship between women who are best friends. In the film they are Barbara Hershey and Bette Midler. Maybe it did better than I suspected having a “gross” of more than $50 million.
I remember “Where’s Poppa” a very funny, very dark comedy with Ruth Gordon, George Segal, Ron Liebman, and Trish Vandervere (who was then married to George C. Scott.) I laughed so hard I went back two days later and laughed even harder – in anticipation of what was to come. At week’s end it disappeared. Gone. Forgotten.
A few years later I interviewed its author and director, the incomparable Carl Reiner. I asked him why the movie disappeared. He told me it was coming back as a cult movie.
Maybe it did. But it’s another one that if you have never seen is worth visiting. There is a peculiar change in the editing between the theatrical version and the one released on videotape. I presume the first was the studio edit and the other was the director’s edit. The one which I suspect was the director’s edit, had an extra scene that turns the entire story around. It is better ending but the studio honchos must have considered it too daring,
Maybe I should put some of this on Facebook so my “friends” and curious trouble-seekers can tell me what movies they loved that the public ignored. Maybe some of you blog readers will join the quest for more of "the best movies people never saw."
Meanwhile - Happy Christmakah.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
ALL HAIL THE THINKING VOTER - ER - TAXPAYER
Even after so many years away, people still ask me: “Would you go back into Talk Radio?” It is only then that, realizing I have no interest in returning to the scene that made me a household word so many years ago, I wonder. Is it because I am too old? Burned out? Bored? None of the above. It is because, when given a forum to air views, compare opinions and – most of all – perhaps actually learn from what is said – nothing changes. Every time I returned to the mike there were the same callers saying the same angry and empty things. They weren't the same people of course, but you get the point.
I made several returns to radio, mostly because nothing else was happening in my “career” and there were still broadcast executives who thought I would be good for the ratings. What appalled me was that twenty, thirty, forty years after the mind-numbing calls from people who wanted to talk about crosswalks while the world was in turmoil – nothing had changed. The final reminder of futility came today.
I’m at my computer at early morning to check local and international media for news, and editorial opinion. One of my stops is the Toronto Star. Not because I love the Star, but because it is local and expresses a local point of view. (I could say the same about the Sun, but that would be stooped.) This morning I went to the “comment” section to read what Torontonians were saying about Mayor Ford. A column had been written saying that he had already pushed through three of his campaign promises. Those, in my opinion, were a slam dunk, and like the writer of the article, I warned that he was about to come up against some of the really big stuff. (Even though he promised he would stop the "gravy train," he announced that he had staff working to find elements of that gravy train.) What colossal gall! What I found among the hundreds of responses to the article on Rob Ford’s future, was a replay of the same kind of comments I heard more than forty years ago!
Some were good, but most were expressions of distaste for the Toronto Star, and expressions of delight that Ford had “swept” to victory. What was missing, and it chronically was on the radio, was a real sense of “knowing.” Did these commenters have anything in their words but personal bile? Did they actually have any information? Neither of those two questions can be answered positively. The responses were simply vacuous rants against imagined enemies. The commenters were the very people Ford spoke to successfully when he elevated (?) them from voters to taxpayers. The latter word having the required emotional pull.
Let me pause here. In my radio years people would ask: “How do you keep listening to all those stupid people?” I would try to respond with something to redeem the medium, and in fact, there were always callers who had their wits about them, who contributed opinions based on information. But information doesn’t matter as long as you can persuade people that they are unhappy and voting for him would be a poultice for that unhappiness.
I had hoped, I guess, to be a small contributor to raising public awareness. Instead I became the receptor for some awful illiteracy. I suppose I still envy the Steve Paikens of this world who can do a profoundly intellectual job of dealing with current affairs. I did have my own moments when I could communicate at a decent level and make some small change. But I was, and still am today, haunted by the declaration: “That’s my opinion and I’m entitled to it.” The most mindless reading of democratic thought. The notion that whatever opinion you have, even though it is not backed by information, but is supported by prejudice, is a worthy opinion.
Do I want to re-visit it? You tell me.
I made several returns to radio, mostly because nothing else was happening in my “career” and there were still broadcast executives who thought I would be good for the ratings. What appalled me was that twenty, thirty, forty years after the mind-numbing calls from people who wanted to talk about crosswalks while the world was in turmoil – nothing had changed. The final reminder of futility came today.
I’m at my computer at early morning to check local and international media for news, and editorial opinion. One of my stops is the Toronto Star. Not because I love the Star, but because it is local and expresses a local point of view. (I could say the same about the Sun, but that would be stooped.) This morning I went to the “comment” section to read what Torontonians were saying about Mayor Ford. A column had been written saying that he had already pushed through three of his campaign promises. Those, in my opinion, were a slam dunk, and like the writer of the article, I warned that he was about to come up against some of the really big stuff. (Even though he promised he would stop the "gravy train," he announced that he had staff working to find elements of that gravy train.) What colossal gall! What I found among the hundreds of responses to the article on Rob Ford’s future, was a replay of the same kind of comments I heard more than forty years ago!
Some were good, but most were expressions of distaste for the Toronto Star, and expressions of delight that Ford had “swept” to victory. What was missing, and it chronically was on the radio, was a real sense of “knowing.” Did these commenters have anything in their words but personal bile? Did they actually have any information? Neither of those two questions can be answered positively. The responses were simply vacuous rants against imagined enemies. The commenters were the very people Ford spoke to successfully when he elevated (?) them from voters to taxpayers. The latter word having the required emotional pull.
Let me pause here. In my radio years people would ask: “How do you keep listening to all those stupid people?” I would try to respond with something to redeem the medium, and in fact, there were always callers who had their wits about them, who contributed opinions based on information. But information doesn’t matter as long as you can persuade people that they are unhappy and voting for him would be a poultice for that unhappiness.
I had hoped, I guess, to be a small contributor to raising public awareness. Instead I became the receptor for some awful illiteracy. I suppose I still envy the Steve Paikens of this world who can do a profoundly intellectual job of dealing with current affairs. I did have my own moments when I could communicate at a decent level and make some small change. But I was, and still am today, haunted by the declaration: “That’s my opinion and I’m entitled to it.” The most mindless reading of democratic thought. The notion that whatever opinion you have, even though it is not backed by information, but is supported by prejudice, is a worthy opinion.
Do I want to re-visit it? You tell me.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
LOOKING AHEAD - AN INSPECTION
I am tired of being cranky about stuff I know nothing about. I am tired of sounding like every other old, out-of-touch dinosaur. I am fed up with my own stubborn sense of superiority. I am tired enough of it all to get aboard and stop griping.
Explanation: you have read my jeremiads against what a whole generation calls “progress.” You know: texting, IPhone browsing, and the biggest target: Facebook.
Time to really “Look Ahead” Larry. In the last few days my wife and I have discussed getting into some of the stuff we have scorned. Like people who say “I don’t want to dance” really mean “I don’t know how,” I have stayed away from the screens that flash instantly during intermission at a concert or the theatre, or on the subway train. Time I got with it. Time I got myself at least some kind of interactive telephone, maybe even a Blackberry! Time I climbed aboard. For my wife, this will be traumatic. She is so far behind the times she still does not know how to use a computer. That has become a skill as basic to survival as food, drink, and sleep.
I’ve begun. Finally, I am trying to learn how to use Facebook. Never mind that I am being solicited as a “friend” by people I have never heard of. Never mind that there are people who think that life is all about collecting as many friends as possible as if they were going for a record to have themselves installed in the Guinness Book. I’m prepared to stop carping and start playing the game.
I am still a little unclear of how I use the social network. I am concerned that I have retched (just a little) every time I hear “social network.” But I can’t continue to emulate Canute and hold back the tide.
I do have to promise that I will not abandon what is left of literacy. I am not ready to use the abbreviations and letters-for-words that are a staple of social networking. I might even try to abstain from giving all my friends important “bulletins” about what I ate for breakfast. In fact, even as I write this, I see why so many people seem unable to stray away from examining their phone screens for the latest hot news.
The psychologists, who say it is about loneliness, may be right. Is the urge to cuddle up to an electronic device a sign that we have forgotten how to use the telephone or smile at strangers or insulate ourselves from any real human contact?
All this having been said – here I go. I am launching myself into the 21st century.
P.S. By the way, I have heard by phone from some people who say they no longer receive my postings. I hope this is not a general problem because I have no idea how to remedy it. If your name is on my Google list you should be getting the postings. If not, I’m helpless.
Explanation: you have read my jeremiads against what a whole generation calls “progress.” You know: texting, IPhone browsing, and the biggest target: Facebook.
Time to really “Look Ahead” Larry. In the last few days my wife and I have discussed getting into some of the stuff we have scorned. Like people who say “I don’t want to dance” really mean “I don’t know how,” I have stayed away from the screens that flash instantly during intermission at a concert or the theatre, or on the subway train. Time I got with it. Time I got myself at least some kind of interactive telephone, maybe even a Blackberry! Time I climbed aboard. For my wife, this will be traumatic. She is so far behind the times she still does not know how to use a computer. That has become a skill as basic to survival as food, drink, and sleep.
I’ve begun. Finally, I am trying to learn how to use Facebook. Never mind that I am being solicited as a “friend” by people I have never heard of. Never mind that there are people who think that life is all about collecting as many friends as possible as if they were going for a record to have themselves installed in the Guinness Book. I’m prepared to stop carping and start playing the game.
I am still a little unclear of how I use the social network. I am concerned that I have retched (just a little) every time I hear “social network.” But I can’t continue to emulate Canute and hold back the tide.
I do have to promise that I will not abandon what is left of literacy. I am not ready to use the abbreviations and letters-for-words that are a staple of social networking. I might even try to abstain from giving all my friends important “bulletins” about what I ate for breakfast. In fact, even as I write this, I see why so many people seem unable to stray away from examining their phone screens for the latest hot news.
The psychologists, who say it is about loneliness, may be right. Is the urge to cuddle up to an electronic device a sign that we have forgotten how to use the telephone or smile at strangers or insulate ourselves from any real human contact?
All this having been said – here I go. I am launching myself into the 21st century.
P.S. By the way, I have heard by phone from some people who say they no longer receive my postings. I hope this is not a general problem because I have no idea how to remedy it. If your name is on my Google list you should be getting the postings. If not, I’m helpless.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
YES VIRGINIA, THERE IS A MID-LIFE CRISIS
I am a regular reader of Mark’s Musing, Mark Kolke’s sometimes-navel-gazing that makes good reading – if you like a lot of introspection. I happen to enjoy it. Most men should because Mark reflects what goes on in the minds of many men whose years advance inexorably. We tend perhaps, as we age, to reflect more. The amount of time you spend gazing inwardly depends on your level of narcissism. Except that there has been a lot of great writing coming from this search for an inner self.
Enough philosophizing.
The “mid-life crisis” has been an object of both scorn and interest. My psychologist friends do not believe there is such a thing. Nothing is provable. There is biological change, but does that mean there is a “male menopause.” I think there is.
In 1972 I was on the news side at CBC. I was doing features. I decided to do one on men who made radical changes in their lives, often in their middle fifties – changes that included all or some of: changing your spouse, changing your job, abandoning your friends, starting a new career – all dramatic changes. I found dozens of men who fit the bill. Then I went looking for research. There seemed to be none. Then I happened on a book called “The Crisis of Middle Age,” written by a plump little woman from New York. (I am helplessly stuck – I can’t remember her name.) She too had been unable to find any body of research. She came to Toronto to be interviewed as part of my series. What resonated most was what she called “middle-escence.” Like adolescence, except it came as a life-changing episode much later in life. Unlike the intense hormonal changes of adolescence, she could not find anything as dramatic in later years. (We do know that aging happens with biological changes but I’m no scientist so I avoid the discussion.) The evidence is anecdotal. The proof is unscientific. The best demonstration of the crisis, and she quoted it, is represented by the dialogue in Act One of Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite. I read it. It came into sharper focus when during my short return to theatre, I performed (about 250 times) Plaza Suite. If you know the play, Act One is in a suite rented by a woman to surprise her husband on the occasion of their wedding anniversary. What emerges is a troubled man who admits that he is having an affair. I can’t remember the precise dialogue but it went something like: “I returned from the navy. I had everything I wanted. I had a wife and family. I was successful. His wife’s response: “So what’s wrong?” His answer: “I just wanted to do it all over again.”
Eureka! Simon described it perfectly. While the “crisis” may have some biological roots, is defined by restlessness and regret. The good life has happened and now the future lies in wait. You’re not ready. You still feel productive. You want to be productive. You don’t want to let it fade away. That, my friends, is the essence of the mid-life crisis. Restlessness, frustration, a sense of growing irrelevance.
Been there. Done that.
Enough philosophizing.
The “mid-life crisis” has been an object of both scorn and interest. My psychologist friends do not believe there is such a thing. Nothing is provable. There is biological change, but does that mean there is a “male menopause.” I think there is.
In 1972 I was on the news side at CBC. I was doing features. I decided to do one on men who made radical changes in their lives, often in their middle fifties – changes that included all or some of: changing your spouse, changing your job, abandoning your friends, starting a new career – all dramatic changes. I found dozens of men who fit the bill. Then I went looking for research. There seemed to be none. Then I happened on a book called “The Crisis of Middle Age,” written by a plump little woman from New York. (I am helplessly stuck – I can’t remember her name.) She too had been unable to find any body of research. She came to Toronto to be interviewed as part of my series. What resonated most was what she called “middle-escence.” Like adolescence, except it came as a life-changing episode much later in life. Unlike the intense hormonal changes of adolescence, she could not find anything as dramatic in later years. (We do know that aging happens with biological changes but I’m no scientist so I avoid the discussion.) The evidence is anecdotal. The proof is unscientific. The best demonstration of the crisis, and she quoted it, is represented by the dialogue in Act One of Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite. I read it. It came into sharper focus when during my short return to theatre, I performed (about 250 times) Plaza Suite. If you know the play, Act One is in a suite rented by a woman to surprise her husband on the occasion of their wedding anniversary. What emerges is a troubled man who admits that he is having an affair. I can’t remember the precise dialogue but it went something like: “I returned from the navy. I had everything I wanted. I had a wife and family. I was successful. His wife’s response: “So what’s wrong?” His answer: “I just wanted to do it all over again.”
Eureka! Simon described it perfectly. While the “crisis” may have some biological roots, is defined by restlessness and regret. The good life has happened and now the future lies in wait. You’re not ready. You still feel productive. You want to be productive. You don’t want to let it fade away. That, my friends, is the essence of the mid-life crisis. Restlessness, frustration, a sense of growing irrelevance.
Been there. Done that.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
DON CHERRY - POLITICAL NITWIT - OR STALKING HORSE?
I believe that the imbecile remarks made by Don Cherry were not just the famous bigmouth babbling. I believe he was either sent, or like the accidental tourist, just happened to be in the right place at the right time, so he could use language Rob Ford would not use. Ford thinks exactly like Cherry. I would not be surprised to find the guy installed as part of Ford’s inner circle. I hesitate to call it a “think tank.”
His comment about “Socialist bicycle riders” is bang-on Rob Ford. Ford wants to close bike lanes and end the “war on the car.” His “left-wing media” could have been spoken by our mayor who was not a media favourite (with the possible exception of the Sun.) Cherry spoke for Ford thumbing his nose at all the wise-guy (excuse me – pinko) columnists. Even as the criticism continues with writers like John Doyle, Ford is still the winner.
Cherry is the surrogate, the stalking horse, the guy they send to say what they pretend to be too polite to say. Even worse, the new right-wing council seems to laugh it all off, that “what you see is what you get,” when it comes to Cherry. That’s patent nonsense. Ford didn’t have to have Cherry endow him with the chain of office. He didn’t have to have him front and centre. He had to look “surprised” when Cherry anointed him as the best mayor the city has ever had.
What has happened here is that politics have hit a new low, unless you voted for Ford’s quick and easy platitudes about taxpayers and gravy trains, and other bumper sticker slogans.
Nothing, we all hope, will change. Democracy will return. The new mayor does not have a bully pulpit. He has one vote. The only “edge” he has is the appointment of an executive committee. Let him go on all he likes about there never having been a vote on Transit City.
The man lives in a world that we all thought came to a merciful death years ago with Mel Lastman’s comment about being put in a pot of boiling water in Africa. We have just had eight years of a mayor, who, even if you didn’t like him, is a well-educated, articulate man. But it is also possible that more people wanted a guy who was just like them and just like Din Cherry.
It appears to me that, even though Premier McGuinty said earlier that “the people have spoken” he appears to be lukewarm on the idea of letting Ford run amok with contracts and obligations.
There are still cities building subways. Madrid, the last time I looked, still planned an annual subway expansion. How it will do with Spain heading toward economic chaos we’ll soon find out.
Meanwhile, the home of the best subway system in the world, Paris, is building more and more light rail above ground routes in the city. Even they know something about the future. And no one that I know of has accused the French of declaring war on the car.
I still have one question for our mayor: if the streets are made extra friendly to commuters in cars, where, when they get downtown, are they going to park?
Don’t bother him with details.
His comment about “Socialist bicycle riders” is bang-on Rob Ford. Ford wants to close bike lanes and end the “war on the car.” His “left-wing media” could have been spoken by our mayor who was not a media favourite (with the possible exception of the Sun.) Cherry spoke for Ford thumbing his nose at all the wise-guy (excuse me – pinko) columnists. Even as the criticism continues with writers like John Doyle, Ford is still the winner.
Cherry is the surrogate, the stalking horse, the guy they send to say what they pretend to be too polite to say. Even worse, the new right-wing council seems to laugh it all off, that “what you see is what you get,” when it comes to Cherry. That’s patent nonsense. Ford didn’t have to have Cherry endow him with the chain of office. He didn’t have to have him front and centre. He had to look “surprised” when Cherry anointed him as the best mayor the city has ever had.
What has happened here is that politics have hit a new low, unless you voted for Ford’s quick and easy platitudes about taxpayers and gravy trains, and other bumper sticker slogans.
Nothing, we all hope, will change. Democracy will return. The new mayor does not have a bully pulpit. He has one vote. The only “edge” he has is the appointment of an executive committee. Let him go on all he likes about there never having been a vote on Transit City.
The man lives in a world that we all thought came to a merciful death years ago with Mel Lastman’s comment about being put in a pot of boiling water in Africa. We have just had eight years of a mayor, who, even if you didn’t like him, is a well-educated, articulate man. But it is also possible that more people wanted a guy who was just like them and just like Din Cherry.
It appears to me that, even though Premier McGuinty said earlier that “the people have spoken” he appears to be lukewarm on the idea of letting Ford run amok with contracts and obligations.
There are still cities building subways. Madrid, the last time I looked, still planned an annual subway expansion. How it will do with Spain heading toward economic chaos we’ll soon find out.
Meanwhile, the home of the best subway system in the world, Paris, is building more and more light rail above ground routes in the city. Even they know something about the future. And no one that I know of has accused the French of declaring war on the car.
I still have one question for our mayor: if the streets are made extra friendly to commuters in cars, where, when they get downtown, are they going to park?
Don’t bother him with details.
Monday, December 6, 2010
CONFESSIONS OF A WASTREL
I am a lifelong critic of lotteries. They are a terrible way to raise money. They have been called “a tax on the stupid.” And I now number among them. I am, unabashedly, but not without some shame, a “player.” Oh I’m much too grand to stand in line a supermarket service desk to get a ticket because the lottery prize has just risen to 20 million or something. Chances are in the multi-millions to one. I know. I know. I am covered with shame. I have been bitten.
But I am not much too grand to indulge in the deluxe, gold-plated lotteries run by the likes of the Heart and Stroke Foundation. The prices are higher. The chances (and fool that I am I believe) are better, the winnings are huge.
In spite of all the rubbish I have heard like:”I know the odds are against me, but someone has to win. It could be me.” Or: (this is the one I love) for a dollar or two I can have a dream.” Let me hasten to add, in my rightousness, I do not gamble. It is many years since I was patsy to Paul Kligman (the late Canadian actor) during rest periods at recording of radio shows at CBC. We’d go to the piano top and play gin rummy. He made expenses. But I maintain the stalwart pose that I am not a gambling man. I think it is crude and vulgar. I don’t like casinos or horse races. I have never been to a horse race but I confess to having been in a casino a few times.
But I am infected. Not only did I buy tickets (not the first time) for the Princess Margaret and Sick Kids lotteries, but I am doing all the fantasizing I have always been so critical of.
I am actually planning what I will do with a million dollars. My wife and I have real have arguments. I want to put it away (except for one small purchase) and she wants to distribute a lot of it among family members. We actually argue!! I have already been given permission to buy a 7 foot Fazzioli grand piano, which will just fit in the window of the living room in our apartment. I am actually hearing the first wonderful sounds from this masterpiece of a musical instrument.
Am I hooked? Or have I just given in to the urge that millions have, to have something exciting to look forward to, even though those hopes will be dashed the day the6y make the draws.
I can see it now. Me and Fazzioli, the sounds ringing through the building, Excited neighbours knocking at my door.
I’m infected. Stay clear. Unclean, Unclean.
But I am not much too grand to indulge in the deluxe, gold-plated lotteries run by the likes of the Heart and Stroke Foundation. The prices are higher. The chances (and fool that I am I believe) are better, the winnings are huge.
In spite of all the rubbish I have heard like:”I know the odds are against me, but someone has to win. It could be me.” Or: (this is the one I love) for a dollar or two I can have a dream.” Let me hasten to add, in my rightousness, I do not gamble. It is many years since I was patsy to Paul Kligman (the late Canadian actor) during rest periods at recording of radio shows at CBC. We’d go to the piano top and play gin rummy. He made expenses. But I maintain the stalwart pose that I am not a gambling man. I think it is crude and vulgar. I don’t like casinos or horse races. I have never been to a horse race but I confess to having been in a casino a few times.
But I am infected. Not only did I buy tickets (not the first time) for the Princess Margaret and Sick Kids lotteries, but I am doing all the fantasizing I have always been so critical of.
I am actually planning what I will do with a million dollars. My wife and I have real have arguments. I want to put it away (except for one small purchase) and she wants to distribute a lot of it among family members. We actually argue!! I have already been given permission to buy a 7 foot Fazzioli grand piano, which will just fit in the window of the living room in our apartment. I am actually hearing the first wonderful sounds from this masterpiece of a musical instrument.
Am I hooked? Or have I just given in to the urge that millions have, to have something exciting to look forward to, even though those hopes will be dashed the day the6y make the draws.
I can see it now. Me and Fazzioli, the sounds ringing through the building, Excited neighbours knocking at my door.
I’m infected. Stay clear. Unclean, Unclean.
LOOKING AHEAD - THE VIEW IS BLEAK
Economic orthodoxy will be the death of us yet. I watched, with waning interest, the “interview” with Ben Bernanke on “60 Minutes.” As the interview droned on I felt less and less secure. In the Times this morning this quote: Mr. Bernanke also said that the Fed was prepared to buy even more than $600 billion in Treasury bonds over the next eight months, if necessary, to increase economic growth.”
The key words here are: “increase economic growth.” The Fed, Bernanke claims, is not printing money but spending reserves. (If you’ve come this far, try to stay with me while I blunder through the logic of his statement.)
Buying treasury bills puts pressure on long term interest rates. That means that corporations or banks looking to expand using long term debt will be burdened with lower interest rates. But wait. Don’t we already have the image of major companies fattening their balance sheets by borrowing at rock-bottom rates to decrease their existing debt? The bottom line certainly does look better. But can someone please explain to me why that will increase economic activity. The major corporations and ”investors” (speculators) are raking in millions as the stock market continues to boom and unemployment rates go up and despair rises and the Republicans want the rich to get even richer. I give up!
Applying orthodox economic principles is not working. The fight to keep the deficit low is meaningless. The deficit is a paper tiger. Once again, I believe that only government intervention to put people to work will change the present gloomy outlook. America cannot sit and wait for corporations to start hiring when people are not spending and companies are not going to increase production in a falling market. I don’t blame them. If I ran a corporation I would leave altruism at the door, or out in the hall, or as far away as possible.
There is an ideological stand-off, made worse by the recalcitrant Republicans and the woefully weak President. There is so much to be done in America. (And if it is done in America it will reflect on Canada.) There is so much infrastructure that needs updating. There are public works projects crying for help. Do we believe that major corporations and banks are going to put up the money for these projects? They won’t. They shouldn’t. And with taxes staying low, increased government revenues aren't there to do it either.
Stuck. They are stuck between the rock of orthodox market-place economics and the hard place of falling employment and consumer demand. They’re waiting. For what? The tooth fairy?
The key words here are: “increase economic growth.” The Fed, Bernanke claims, is not printing money but spending reserves. (If you’ve come this far, try to stay with me while I blunder through the logic of his statement.)
Buying treasury bills puts pressure on long term interest rates. That means that corporations or banks looking to expand using long term debt will be burdened with lower interest rates. But wait. Don’t we already have the image of major companies fattening their balance sheets by borrowing at rock-bottom rates to decrease their existing debt? The bottom line certainly does look better. But can someone please explain to me why that will increase economic activity. The major corporations and ”investors” (speculators) are raking in millions as the stock market continues to boom and unemployment rates go up and despair rises and the Republicans want the rich to get even richer. I give up!
Applying orthodox economic principles is not working. The fight to keep the deficit low is meaningless. The deficit is a paper tiger. Once again, I believe that only government intervention to put people to work will change the present gloomy outlook. America cannot sit and wait for corporations to start hiring when people are not spending and companies are not going to increase production in a falling market. I don’t blame them. If I ran a corporation I would leave altruism at the door, or out in the hall, or as far away as possible.
There is an ideological stand-off, made worse by the recalcitrant Republicans and the woefully weak President. There is so much to be done in America. (And if it is done in America it will reflect on Canada.) There is so much infrastructure that needs updating. There are public works projects crying for help. Do we believe that major corporations and banks are going to put up the money for these projects? They won’t. They shouldn’t. And with taxes staying low, increased government revenues aren't there to do it either.
Stuck. They are stuck between the rock of orthodox market-place economics and the hard place of falling employment and consumer demand. They’re waiting. For what? The tooth fairy?
Thursday, December 2, 2010
REMINISCING???
In “Looking Ahead” I don’t reminisce. It is an awful trap. It is seductive and wasteful, sometimes self-gratifying, sometimes self-pitying. You decide.
The 40th anniversary of my ignominious departure from CHUM radio passed a few days ago. I didn’t hear from anyone! Not a soul called to remember the day when the president of CHUM Limited, Allan Waters went on the air to tell the audience that Larry Solway would not be returning. He even said: “If I had been here I would have gone downstairs and taken him off the air.” There had been a small, obviously organized barrage of calls protesting my explicit description of orgasm, a description cribbed directly from the then famous “Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Sex” by Doctor David Rubin.
I stayed around just long enough to watch how things came out. I turned down Chuck Templeton who asked me if I’d like to fill in for Pierre Berton in his crosstalk show on CKEY. I said “The body isn’t even cold in the grave Chuck.” They wanted me because all the publicity had made me a “hot” property. Meanwhile, back at the radio station the switchboard was jammed with angry listeners. There were so many calls that morning, and for several hours after the announcement, that the entire 92- exchange (the old WAlnut) exchange crashed. Anyone with a phone number beginning with 9 was cut off. Businesses, doctor’s offices, restaurants, all were getting calls ranting about my vacating my 10 a.m. spot. I was no more. I went out in a blaze of something – it sure wasn’t glory. But management (of which I was part) remained unmoved. I was gone and would not be returning.
The furor died down of course. For six months Waters lived up to his on-air promise that the spot would not be occupied again by a phone-in show. Then perhaps he thought he’d left a vacuum and that Solway might show up at another station. When I heard Dick Smythe (who hated doing a talk show) come on the air to take phone calls, I wanted to call and tell him not to worry, I wasn’t going back into the Talk Radio business.
A few interesting things happened. I got tired of answering phone calls so the two of us headed south. When I returned in winter I drove up to Ottawa to visit the CRTC. Management had been worried that their license would be lifted because I had, in their view, overstepped the bounds of decency. Harry Boyle, then vice chair of the CRTC greeted me at his office door: “What the hell happened Larry,” he boomed. “The calls here were fifty to one in your favour. we weren’t even thinking of lifting the license.”
(Sidelight: many years later, with my boat moored in the Thousand Islands, I did a regular gig on the CHUM-owned station in Kingston. The company then bought the station in Brockville. I was invited to attend the “festivities” at the transmitter tower site. Marge Waters, the beautiful wife of the president said to me: “You’re not going to talk dirty here are you Larry.” I was how she remembered it.)
For those who remember the series, all about sexual dysfunction (years before Viagra) I at no time used any language that could be remotely labeled as “talking dirty.” Perhaps she thought the word masturbation was a little too heavy for her fragile sensibilities.
I was never bitter. Things happen. What is – is. The only sadness I felt was watching that wonderful, inventive, ground-breaking radio station turn into a clone of a dozen other stations by a succession of button-pushing consultants and incompetent staff. (After Allan died there was predictably, an unseemly rush to sell the station, take the millions, relax and buy expensive cars. They did. Sadly, there is virtually no station there anymore. Just my own pioneering (begun when I was vice-president programming) station - CHUM FM. It survives and prospers.
I guess I’ve written this piece of self-indulgence because the past has gone and the future seems to have passed me by. Not just with text messaging, FaceBook and Twitter, but with the new technology that allows businessmen to run brain-dead, hands-free radio stations with about as much imagination as a turnip-peeling competition.
I got on with my life. TV News beckoned. I went. Documentaries followed – I wrote and hosted them. There was “This is the Law,” "Juliette and Friends," my own TV interview show. In the late 70s I returned to the stage, which had been my childhood love.
By the way, I you were not around for the furor of November 1970 it's all in my book “The Day I Invented Sex,” Long out of print there are copies available on Amazon.
Speaking of “Long out of print….”
The 40th anniversary of my ignominious departure from CHUM radio passed a few days ago. I didn’t hear from anyone! Not a soul called to remember the day when the president of CHUM Limited, Allan Waters went on the air to tell the audience that Larry Solway would not be returning. He even said: “If I had been here I would have gone downstairs and taken him off the air.” There had been a small, obviously organized barrage of calls protesting my explicit description of orgasm, a description cribbed directly from the then famous “Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Sex” by Doctor David Rubin.
I stayed around just long enough to watch how things came out. I turned down Chuck Templeton who asked me if I’d like to fill in for Pierre Berton in his crosstalk show on CKEY. I said “The body isn’t even cold in the grave Chuck.” They wanted me because all the publicity had made me a “hot” property. Meanwhile, back at the radio station the switchboard was jammed with angry listeners. There were so many calls that morning, and for several hours after the announcement, that the entire 92- exchange (the old WAlnut) exchange crashed. Anyone with a phone number beginning with 9 was cut off. Businesses, doctor’s offices, restaurants, all were getting calls ranting about my vacating my 10 a.m. spot. I was no more. I went out in a blaze of something – it sure wasn’t glory. But management (of which I was part) remained unmoved. I was gone and would not be returning.
The furor died down of course. For six months Waters lived up to his on-air promise that the spot would not be occupied again by a phone-in show. Then perhaps he thought he’d left a vacuum and that Solway might show up at another station. When I heard Dick Smythe (who hated doing a talk show) come on the air to take phone calls, I wanted to call and tell him not to worry, I wasn’t going back into the Talk Radio business.
A few interesting things happened. I got tired of answering phone calls so the two of us headed south. When I returned in winter I drove up to Ottawa to visit the CRTC. Management had been worried that their license would be lifted because I had, in their view, overstepped the bounds of decency. Harry Boyle, then vice chair of the CRTC greeted me at his office door: “What the hell happened Larry,” he boomed. “The calls here were fifty to one in your favour. we weren’t even thinking of lifting the license.”
(Sidelight: many years later, with my boat moored in the Thousand Islands, I did a regular gig on the CHUM-owned station in Kingston. The company then bought the station in Brockville. I was invited to attend the “festivities” at the transmitter tower site. Marge Waters, the beautiful wife of the president said to me: “You’re not going to talk dirty here are you Larry.” I was how she remembered it.)
For those who remember the series, all about sexual dysfunction (years before Viagra) I at no time used any language that could be remotely labeled as “talking dirty.” Perhaps she thought the word masturbation was a little too heavy for her fragile sensibilities.
I was never bitter. Things happen. What is – is. The only sadness I felt was watching that wonderful, inventive, ground-breaking radio station turn into a clone of a dozen other stations by a succession of button-pushing consultants and incompetent staff. (After Allan died there was predictably, an unseemly rush to sell the station, take the millions, relax and buy expensive cars. They did. Sadly, there is virtually no station there anymore. Just my own pioneering (begun when I was vice-president programming) station - CHUM FM. It survives and prospers.
I guess I’ve written this piece of self-indulgence because the past has gone and the future seems to have passed me by. Not just with text messaging, FaceBook and Twitter, but with the new technology that allows businessmen to run brain-dead, hands-free radio stations with about as much imagination as a turnip-peeling competition.
I got on with my life. TV News beckoned. I went. Documentaries followed – I wrote and hosted them. There was “This is the Law,” "Juliette and Friends," my own TV interview show. In the late 70s I returned to the stage, which had been my childhood love.
By the way, I you were not around for the furor of November 1970 it's all in my book “The Day I Invented Sex,” Long out of print there are copies available on Amazon.
Speaking of “Long out of print….”
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