Thoughts

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July 4, 1776: What Day One Looked Like


On April 17, 1775 a bunch of colonists from the Massachusetts Colony took exception, not the first time either, to the idea that the British Army had the right to seize guns and powder the colonists stored for future use.  On September 1, 1774 Gen. Gage sent troops to Somerville to confiscate guns and powder stored there.  Colonists heard of their intentions and secreted away their arms.  On December 14, 1774 Gen. Gage did the same at Portsmouth NH with the same results. The stage was actually set on February 26, 1775 when similar orders were given by Gage to collect ammunitions stored at Salem.  This time, however, Gage’s soldiers were met head-on by colonists.  The colonists offered just enough resistance by denying the British soldiers access to a draw-bridge across the river they faced that the commander of the British troops deemed it too late in the day for him to be effective and therefore withdrew back to Boston.

Those expeditions by the British troops were undertaken with relatively small detachments of men, 100 to 200 men.  But on April 18, 1775, American spies in Boston got word of a large movement of troops which were to be sent to Concord.  The seriousness of the situation was not lost on the colonist hence the actions of Paul Revere and his accomplices.  We all know that the spy in Boston signaled to Revere that the troops would travel via sea, which was actually little more than boarding ships in Boston Harbor and debarking on the shores of the Charles River.  Those troops numbered 500.  What they had not accounted for was the dispatching of an additional 400 troops attached the British artillery who would travel via land.  In those days Boston sat on a peninsula as shown below.  The land route meant going south over the “neck” of Boston to what is Dorchester today and then via Watertown westward to Concord.  Those 900 regulars outnumbered the entire population of Lexington and Concord by 2 to 3 times.  As John Hancock sat in a tavern in Lexington near to where the first skirmish took place he was fully aware that from that day forward he and his allies would be branded as traitors to the crown and subject to death if captured.  It was truly a very fearful time for these rebels.

boston - concord 1775

In September of that year the First Continental Congress was assembled in Philadelphia to discuss their situation and what to do about it.  Washington begged for financial support that he desperately needed to keep his troops not just fed and clothed, by loyal to the cause.  Unpaid soldiers were prone to desertion, something that plagued Washington throughout the Revolution.  Representatives from each of the colonies argued over how many troops they should send and how much financial support the should and could give.  Unfortunately little was accomplished.  Massachusetts, under John Adams, supplied the lion’s share of troops and supplies to the cause, something which did not sit well with Adams since being passed over for the job of General of the Army which he had coveted at the outbreak of hostilities.

But sometimes lost in this is one other document which affected all Americans at that time, “Common Sense.”  This was a pamphlet, written by Thomas Paine, an English expatriate, who set out in print how hostilities between the King and the colonists came to fruition and why such actions had to be taken by the colonists.  The pamphlet sold in excess of 120,000 copies during the first three months of 1776.  It helped set the tone for the yet to be written declaration.

In 1776 the Revolution was not going well for the Americans.  Some viewed it as a civil war over opposing ideas where one side would win and the government as they had known it would continue in some similar fashion when hostilities ended depending up who prevailed.  But from the very beginning, both the Massachusetts and Virginia colonial leadership knew full well that a return to life as it was would be impossible.  Thomas Jefferson had started writing treatises to that effect in 1774 and when he appeared as a congressional delegate in 1775 he was a natural to write a declaration of independence.  On June 11, 1776 a “Committee of Five,” as it was known, was selected to write the declaration.  Its members were Thomas Jefferson, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Roger Livingstone of New York, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, John Adams of Massachusetts.  Jefferson wrote the majority of the document and presented it to the “Committee of the Whole,” Congress, on June 28. The famous picture below depicts this.

1280px-Declaration_independence

A debate ensued on how to adopt it which was settled on July 1.  Franklin insisted on a couple of changes which were granted and the signing began.  John Hancock was the first to sign.  His signature is by far the largest as well.  When queried as to why he had done this he responded that he wanted to insure that the King could see it.  At the end there were 56 signers, that was July 3.

On July 4 the Committee of Five, after rendering the document fit for printing, delivered it to John Dunlap, the broadside printer.  It was officially presented to the public on July 5 and sent via courier to King George III.  Fifty-six men had sealed their fate: lose the war and lose their lives in the process.

Prior to April 19, 1775, the inhabitants of the 13 colonies all considered themselves loyal subjects of the King.  They were Englishmen first and Americans second.  They had enjoyed great prosperity under English rule so their taking up arms against their own government in England was not taken on lightly but with great trepidation.  To wit, during that first year there was much discussion over who was a “patriot” and who was a “tory.”  Who could be trusted and who could not was discussed at great length and the matter was not settled until March 17, 1776 when the siege of Boston ended and British troops and loyalist left on an armada of ships for Nova Scotia.  Among them were here-to-fore respected and admired colonists of position and rank, judges, doctors and even one general in the militia.  There was even one colonial governor and son of a signer of the Declaration of Independence, William Franklin, governor of New Jersey and son of Benjamin Franklin.  The two never spoke again.

Upon reading the Declaration you find the beginnings of our Constitution, in particular the Bill of Rights.  This document not only set forth the grievances of the colonists to its former government, but a delineation of the direction they would be taking. It is sobering to consider that up to that point the new American army had won just one battle, that being Lexington and Concord.  Only two month after Lexington and Concord the colonists suffered a withering defeat at Bunker Hill.  Later, Gen. Washington suffered numerous defeats on Long Island and then New York City before retreating to the woods of Pennsylvania.  Only July 4, 1776 there was little reason for optimism even with the newly presented Declaration of Independence.  It was an extremely fearful time for all involved and still they had declared themselves “all in.”  On July 4th 1776 there was good reason to believe the colonists would not be successful and little reason to be on victory save that of their absolute dedication to the cause.  And in the end, that is exactly what won the day.

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Brady’s Footballs: What Really Happened


Since January, the NFL has had its focus entirely on what happened to 12 New England footballs during the AFC Championship game.  After over 100 days of investigation and millions of dollars spent, the best they could come up with was “more likely than not.”  This is an extremely ambiguous statement.  What does it mean?  How do you quantify such a statement?  And how do you justify making such a statement where a person’s career is involved?

I think Ted Wells is likely to most disingenuous person I have ever heard of around pro-sports.  If I, or any other researcher, had published such a report, those people who employed me should be looking for their money back because I certainly had done a questionable job at best.  And certainly not a job worth multiple millions of dollars.  Wells chose to publish only those points that support a finding of fault on Brady’s and the Patriots organization.  Worse, he made claims of lack of cooperation which have since been shown to be at least partly if not fully false.  You cannot publish a report which makes false statements.

Strangely, Wells’ statement is probably true that Brady was generally aware of what was happening with the footballs!  But he has failed to connect Brady to anything.  Had he been a real researcher he would have known better than to limit the scope of his investigation to that single game, or for that matter, the previous games that New England played this past season.  A thorough investigation would have shed light on Brady’s likely involvement. Here’s why.

Back in 2006, Tom Brady and Peyton Manning got the NFL to agree to a rule change.  This rule change allowed them to get the footballs a quarterback is going to use in any particular game into the shape they want.  That does not, however, allow for any deviation from the football inflation constraints.  But it did empower all NFL quarterbacks.  And so as the years passed, Brady, Manning, Farve, Rivers, Rogers, and all other quarterbacks of their caliber got to fool around with the footballs.  No one took much notice, not even the referees.  By 2014 they had all made their preference known to those team personnel who prepared the footballs for game day.  Brady likes his footballs at the bottom end of allowable.  I suggest that Brady probably off-handedly, and more than once, said to these personnel that he preferred his footballs below the allowable pressure.  But, he likely never instructed them to do so.  Just as Aaron Rogers likely never instructed those people on his team to over-inflate his footballs.

The attitude of game officials at the AFC Championship game of 2014 shows us exactly how important this was to them, zero.  Even though Walt Anderson had been advised prior to the game of possible issues, I suspect he went about his business just as he had in all his previous 19 years of games, he looked the balls over for obvious violations and finding none he allowed them into the game.  I think it likely he checked a couple of balls for pressure and finding now problems, or fixing those he found, he allowed the rest into the game.  I think it likely all game officials having been acting in like manner since the NFL had previously not made it a priority.  Scott Zolak suggested that such complacency has always existed in the NFL.

What further backs this up is the record of McNally carrying the 12 footballs from the preparation room where the game officials sit to the sidelines unaccompanied.  That is contrary to the rules and yet it was allowed to happen.  The question is, how commonplace are such acts around the league?  I suspect it was very common.  Officials heretofore had never thought it all that important and therefore never enforced the rule.

What Wells needed to do, and did not do, was poll other referees around the NFL about how they treated the game day footballs allowing them anonymity in relating their sense of what has happened with them.  He also should have anonymously polled the other 31 team equipment managers about their actions.  Team and NFL lack of vigilance on properly inflated footballs more probably than not would have shown the general feeling that how a quarterback wants his football is how he gets it, even if it does mean a rule is violated.

What comes of a proper investigation in this case is that the NFL itself had not created a standard operation procedure for the handling of footballs prior to the beginning of the game.  Any organization that finds rules it creates to be crucial to its image makes certain there is a comprehensive paper trail coupled with exacting directions.

Tom Brady certainly made it known to his equipment manager, Jastremski, exactly how he liked his footballs.  It is unlikely he said anything on the day of the AFC Championship game, or even in the days immediately prior to the game, because it was already well established what he wanted.  He likely suspected the footballs were underinflated but chose not to say anything lest that be changed.

Similarly, Walt Anderson knew the rules of how footballs are to be delivered to the sidelines but when he noticed McNally taking them by himself it was just something he had observed 100 times before with every team in the NFL and it did not occur to him that it was anything out of the usual or even an infraction.

Brady needs to own his part in this, Goodell his failures, Wells his failures, etc.  This is an institutional failure more than it is the failing of any one individual.  Goodell desperately needs to vacate the Wells report, all punishment levied, and announce that the NFL has failed the fans and show the changes that are put in place to insure that things like this never happen again.

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Brady Innocent, NFL Guilty!


I have done a fair amount of research during my life, one paper being published in a scientific journal (http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2003-379).  In writing that report room for error was tight, that is, a reasonable person reading the report and have knowledge of the conditions discussed, would agree with my/our findings.  Ted Wells is an attorney who is well versed in evidence.  The phrase “a preponderance of evidence” is key in any courtroom as an offer of proof.  But what does he say in his report?  “More likely than not.”  Can you imagine him saying that in a courtroom?  He would be laughed out!  His “evidence” would be dismissed, absolutely!  At 51% you reach the “more likely” category but what meaning does that hold.  I suspect he was thinking along the lines of 60% likelihood but even so, that cannot by any standard be taken as guilt.

The bottom line here is, if you cannot prove something “beyond a reasonable doubt,” something else Wells is very familiar with, you have nothing!

But I hold Goodell more to blame for all this than anyone else.  I wrote immediately following this incident that Goodell’s move was to inform the Patriots of what he had been told and said to them, “we will be checking and you better no be doing anything!”  Had he done that, and the balls found underinflated still, then he would really have had something.  Now he has bupkis!  Nada!  Nothing!

Now everyone is discussing what punishment needs to be levied.  They point to Gordon, Hardy, and Rice and say how they were severely fined.  True, but in each case there was incontrovertible proof of their wrong doing.  Here they only have the suggestion of proof and nothing more.  To fine Brady anything at all would be wrong in every sense of the word.  The NFL’s best course is to fine the organization, a large fine to quell the critics, and move on.

If they do punish Brady I cannot imagine anything more than a fine.  The first game of the season is prime-time Pittsburgh versus New England with Ben Rothlisburger going up against……..Jimmy Garropolo?  I don’t think so!

What this report shows more than anything how poorly the NFL conducts its business.  Had the inflation level of the footballs been as important prior to that fateful game, there would have been a foolproof system of tracking the balls and insuring the integrity of the game, but there were not and are not.  This is just another case of the NFL, and Goodell in particular, remaining reactive and not proactive as would be the intelligent way to do business.

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Sober Thoughts and Sober Thinking


Once again I have used my hand dandy Webster’s to look up a word which in this case is the word “sober.”  Now everyone knows meaning number 1, not drunk.  What about the other meanings?  Here’s one: 3. “Straightforward: serious 4. Plain or subdued, ie sober attire for church. 5. Devoid of frivolity, exaggeration, or speculative imagination <gave a sober assessment of the problem> 6. self-controlled and sane:  reasonable.  I would like to add the idea of a “sobering experience.”  Or, Level heads and sober minds came to a well-reasoned conclusion.

If you are thinking this sounds strangely like something you might here in an A.A. meeting, you are quite correct!  You might indeed but don’t let the fact that I have attended such meetings for the past 16 plus years color your thinking.  Or maybe it should.

I look around me today, particularly which I am forced to consider things of a political nature, or worse, drive on one of our interstate highways.  All around me I see thousands of people who are in desperate need of a 12 step meeting and most are not even alcoholics!  Yes, I am suggesting that the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous need to be exclusive to alcoholics.  Indeed, to just such an end, Overeaters Anonymous uses the “Big Book” of A.A. and its 12 steps as the basis of their program, and it works!

Step 1 — My life is a mess /nuts and I seem to have lost control of my own little universe.

Step 2 — I have decided that since this all this stuff seems too much for any one person, I am going to pray to God for help.

Step 3 – Having identified those things over which I seem to have no control, I’m calling in help, additionally, I am letting go of any idea that I either can figure it all out by myself or that I can do it alone, I CAN’T!  So I’m passing some stuff off to God.

4.  All these resentments I have a wearing me out.  I am going to figure out why I have them and how to get rid of them, permanently.

5.  I can’t do step 4 alone so I am going to enlist a trusted friend to hear my problems and assist me in removing them.

6.  I need to make a list of my short comings, and a plan to rid myself of them.

7.  Well, once again I cannot do the previous step alone so I enlist assistance.

8.  Time to consider all those people I have wrong over the years, institutions too.  And yet again I enlist the trusted advisor to objectively look at my list and edit it.

9.  I make amends!

10.  I have decided that what I have gained thus far is considerable so at this point I will take a daily personal inventory to insure my commitment to continually doing the next right thing.

11.  I have found a little prayer and a lot of thought and mediation keep me in touch both with myself and that which I see as a higher power.

12.  Now I get to show the rest of the world, through my actions, that I have improved myself but I must insure the message is honest and available to them if the desire it.

See there, no mention of alcohol and yet makes all the same points at AA’s 12 steps.  That definition I put all the way back at the top comes back into play here, as does the title.  People who have discovered the advantages of a spiritual life manage sober thoughts and sober thinking without much effort.  They have practiced it for so long that it has become second nature to them.

I think 90% of all American adults, if not more, could benefit from using the 12 Steps of AA.  A strange things to people who practice them religiously, they change.  And that change is both dramatic and wonderful.  They grow up, become responsible, are reliable, good husbands, wives, and children as well as employees.  They understand implicitly that denial is the first step towards failure.

Right now I would love to give the entire American Congress a 12 step program but I fear that cannot be as totally honest such a program requires.

You do not have to be an alcoholic to go to an AA meeting.  I guarantee if you do go, you will absolutely get something out of it.  Consider this:  there is absolutely no down side to never taking another drink; and there is no up side to taking a drink.

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On Easter Sunday, I Give You the Real Jesus


Today is Easter Sunday which for Christians is the most holy day of the year.  But have you ever asked yourself what the word Easter means?  There is no apparent connection to Christian belief.  I had no clue either until a few moments ago when I looked it up in my handy dandy Webster’s.  It says: “word history:  The word Easter . . . had its origins in pagan times.  Eastre or Eostre the Old Germanic English spelling of Easter, was originally the name of a Germanic goddess who was worshiped at a festival at the spring equinox.  Her name is closely related to Latin aurora and Greek eos, both of which mean “dawn.”  Easter is also derived from the same root word as east, the direction of the sunrise.  The Easter Bunny is another story entirely and for another time.

Theologian scholars have provided us with a plethora of information of where modern Christianity formed its holy days.  Christmas is a fabulous example of this as those same scholars seem to universally agree that Jesus was born in the spring and not when we celebrate his birth.  Early Christians, the early Roman Church in particular, were wont to end what they saw as pagan practices, in this case the pagan holiday of Saturnalia.  I make mention of these two well-accepted facts as evidence the early Christian church was extremely interested in co-opting paganism, and thereby killing it off, than historical accuracy.

Conservative Christians of today have the unnerving tendency to use the Bible as their sole source for information about the ancients.  But the truth is, there exists far more than those texts.  For example, there are the Dead Sea Scrolls which refer to daily life and customs at the time of Jesus.  Even though they were discovered in 1946, a complete and accurate description and final translation of them in far from finished.  Still, they provide us with a very different view from that of the New Testament.

And this brings me to the time of Jesus.  Was Jesus the son of God, something He never actually says himself but infers heavily, an angel of God, which would be very much in keeping with ancient Hebrew beliefs, or simply a great prophet?  Maybe He was all three.  But what we know of Jesus seems to fall far short of what we would like to know.  For example, he is born, secreted to Egypt for fear of his life, disappears entirely for 12 years at which time he shows up at a Temple and declared a rabbi.  Then he disappears again entirely for another 18 years for which we know nothing.  And even those final three years of his life the “facts” given are quite thin and many beg for clarification.

As a degreed historian, I can say with authority that such books as the Gospels are to be placed in the category of folk lore.  And this is not to say that folk lore in either unreliable or untrue, but as folk lore exists, it must be, in this case, assigned to stories of faith.  The veracity of such stories must be questioned.  But as with anything of the sort, there is likely truth to them as well.

Many books have been written about the “Historical Jesus.”  I have seen a few and as books go they vary in veracity.  That is, the ability of the author to keep his personal views and his prejudices apart from his writings is not always complete.  Even so, they are attempts to find the real face of Jesus.  In this respect I will add my own perspective which I can guarantee you are entirely prejudiced by my own views and are only my own view of this great and historic man.

One final thing; we also know for certain that the Gospels of the New Testament date back, at best, to 60 years after the death of Jesus.  They are also written in Greek, not the native tongue of Jesus which was Aramaic.  This means, just on the face of it, that a translation was made from one language to the other. And regardless of whether it was translated from one written language to the other or, worse, one verbal retelling to the other,  translations from disparate languages speak to the astuteness of the translator to understand what he is translating.  Historically, societies kept people who were customs keeper, story tellers, to insure a record of their being and beliefs was passed forward.  Such existed even to the early parts of the American experience in the 17th and 18th century.  The most valuable, and recognized as likely to be correct, is the first hand eye witness account of events.  But these stories were usually, and at best, second hand.  With regard to the life of Jesus, those original stories are second hand at best.  But people of faith with tell you, rightfully so, that his was a mission of faith and thus the stories of his life must be viewed in the same light.

I find it curious in the presentation of the Gospels the claim that Jesus said he had not come to change the law, the ancient Mosaic Law is what he was referring to.  But soon after when He is questioned as to the “eye for an eye” taken of the Old Testament, he responds with “turn the other cheek.”  It seems to me that is a direct contradiction and changing of the law.  I think the New Testament is replete with inconsistencies in logic, sometime from one verse to the next.  There exist too many mixed messages and incomplete thoughts.  Did Jesus actually expand upon such thoughts at much greater length?  I think it reasonable to say that He most certainly did, and probably many times over.  But such lengthy, and probably more enlightening thoughts, are lost to the ages because they were not transcribed as they were being pronounced.

Jesus was by all accounts a radical of His day.  He struck fear into the established religious leaders of the day.  Why?  He was, contrary to what the Gospels claim, turning old Jewish law on its head and providing His followers with a completely new way of looking at things.  He advocated peace.   He was the first historical figure to suggest the separation of church and state when he said to give to Rome which is Rome’s and to God which is God’s.  He advocated for the poor suggesting in his story of the good Samaritan, that those of means give half of what they own to the poor.  He very pointedly stated that man was by his very nature a sinner and that time best spent was that in bettering himself rather than pointing out the shortcomings of another.  And to that point, Jesus never once condemn anyone to hell, as modern evangelists like to do.  For that matter, he never mentioned the place which would have been in keeping with Jewish tradition which had, and still has, no heaver nor hell.

His actions suggest that He actively sought to modify ancient traditions.  Baptism, as He underwent with John, was nothing new.  It was the symbolic cleansing of the spirit.  It also was not done with children but with adults who were ready to admit their sins and ask to be cleansed.  But if Jesus were God it is impossible that He had sinned so why do it?  Quite simply because he understood extremely well the role of the leader.  He knew that charisma, which He had in spades, was the manna which fed the souls of those who chose to follow His teachings.  I think it entirely possible that Jesus was proposing the ideal of spiritual health over religious dogma.  He did, after all, seek out the dregs of his society and only asked of them that he believe in His teachings.  Not once is he heard to say that a man must attend the temple and must contribute monies to keep His church healthy.  Why do you suppose that was?  Is it possible He believed a church was truly inside a man and not within four walls?

In the time of Jesus, and for most of the centuries which have followed, women were second class citizens relegated to the rear of the temple and denied any say what-so-ever in its conduct.  Unfortunately too much of that exists today.  And so enters the most misunderstood character of the New Testament, Mary Magdalen.  The early Christian Church had absolutely no idea of how to handle her existence in the presence of their messiah but she was mentioned in the Bible so they also could not ignore her.  Certainly, they thought, Jesus looked upon this woman as they did, a woman of low moral character who only came to beg for forgiveness and her penance was to wash His feet with her hair.  The problem with such a telling is that it bears no relationship to the truth.  That truth is theologians have never found a woman of that name or conduct.  But they have found a similar woman, or possibly several women, who can account for that personage.  Likely Mary was a woman of means who had been moved by Jesus’ ministry.  Maybe she was a woman from Samaria, people seen as only slightly better than the brutal Romans and equally hated.  But for her to seek audience with a rabbi, a man of such stature and position was unthinkable at that time and for many centuries to follow.  But Jesus, being who He was, denied no one for any reason.  And I suggest, and I think it likely, she, along with several other women, became one of His Apostles.  Remember, at the end of His crucifixion it was only the women who saw to His removal from the cross, transportation, preparation, and final burial in the tomb.  No man, certainly no apostle, was anywhere to be found.  You ask, if they were truly Apostles why not mention it?  Simple, it was an “inconvenient truth.”

A rather famous atheist, Dr. Isaac Azimov, most well-known for his science fiction writings, but also a professor of bio-chemistry at Boston University, made an interesting observation about the writing of the New Testament.  He noted that the Aramaic language in the day of Jesus had around 5000 words.  Today’s English language, in contrast, has over one million.  He observes that the Aramaic word for virgin is identical for the word for young girl.  Does this suggest the early Christian Church’s aversion to the discussion of sex?  I think it extremely likely.  How would the historical figure of Mary as something other than a virgin square with the telling of the birth of Jesus?  It would have necessarily meant that Mary had engaged in sex with Joseph.  I think it likely the church desired nothing less than something which could be passed off as miraculous.  And a virgin birth suited their interest.  They also do not mention Mary’s age, which could have been as young as 12 and Joseph as a man who could have been well into his 50s.  Not unusual in those days.

But back to Jesus.  To the established high ranking Jews of the day, Jesus appeared a threat to their power.  We know for fact that Rome had absolutely no interest in the crucifixion of Jesus, to the contrary.  The ministry of Jesus had suggested radical changes to long standing beliefs of the Jews but never once challenged the power of Rome.  And the ultra-conservative Jews of the day simply could not stand for that.  I am suggesting that this ancient Jesus was in fact seen as some sort of liberal reformist who was bringing needed change to old conservatism, a conservatism which was contrary to the best interest of the Jewish masses.  But that would have meant the illuminati of the Jewish religion would have had to accept changes.  That is something to this day conservatives find difficult if not impossible.

When Jesus died his Apostles and other disciples were at a loss for what to call themselves and they saw themselves, justifiably or not, as out-casts of accepted Jewish society.  For a long time afterwards they simply referred to their religion as “the way.”  The idea of calling themselves Christians had not yet formulated.  Those early follower quickly moved away from Israel, a place they knew they would be persona non grata, first to Turkey and then to Greece and finally Rome.  But it is also likely that these early leaders of the church were illiterate.  The only formal education of the day existed strictly for the rich and those who devoted themselves to become Rabbis.  Scribes were probably the only exception that, they being drafted into such a career by the ruling class.  The Apostles could neither read nor write but such was not a part of their mission.  None had come from background of what we might see as middle class.  All are shown as being from the most humble of means.  And a few, like Peter, were shown to be fairly rough and tumble.  It is my belief that scribes were at some point enlisted to write down what had been witnessed by the Apostles, and others, as custom dictated.  But the scribed did not write the New Testament!

When eventually these people arrived in Greece, a truly enlightened and literate society, those Greeks who embraced this earliest form of Christianity, ensured the survival of the faith buy putting it into print.  But whoever they were had to immediately been confronted with the problem of the translation from Aramaic to Greek, which is where we derive our present day texts.  If in history there ever was a more meaningful time for the expression “lost in translation,” this was it!  It stands to reason that certain words either translated poorly or not at all from the original Aramaic to Greek.  I can almost hear the conversation of the person from Israel trying to explain the concept, the word, he is expressing to his Greek counterpart, and finally the two agreeing upon a word the more or less expresses the thought.  There is no way to know how much of that happened but it is a certainty that it did.  And furthermore, what if one Gospel, say that of Matthew, had very differing views of events from that of Luke or John?  How would they deal with that.  Could it be that they simple chose the one which showed Jesus in the most favorable light?  Or could it be that they allowed their own prejudices in and chose the one which most suited them.  We will never know but it can help explain how four men who supposedly witness the life of Jesus gave differing versions.  If I were a man on that day and was sitting down to lunch with Jesus, at some point I would certainly ask what he did before he started his ministry.  Such a story would be immensely fascinating.  Was such a story told but the early authors could not see the value of including such references?

But does this also explain the large gaps which exist from one Gospel to the next.  This birth of Jesus is related at length in only one, so why not the others?  Were they simply edited out?  Did one story contradict the other leaving the Greek and Aramaic writers left to choose one telling of the other?  The same thing happens at the death of Jesus.  Also, were there records of Jesus’ ministry that were viewed as uncomplimentary which were left out for that reason?  Remember, Jesus did have a fit of violence when he threw the money men from the temple. Which bring about the question as to why that is the only story from his birth to age 30? Also, did Jesus’ retreat to the desert for reflection really last for 40 days or was that a number of convenience because it squared with other 40 days incidents of the Old Testament, Noah in particular.  And remember, the time from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday is also 40 days.  Forty was a magical number in those days as was the number 13, the 13 generations of the house of David being one.

Modern day Christian fundamentalists have co-opted Jesus to their own selfish beliefs.  They love literal translations and have little problems chastising anyone who suggests anything different.  Today’s compelling argument for them is their anti-gay theme comes from Jesus saying that a man should not sleep with another man.  They have not considered the fact that it was common practice in those days for men who led caravans to take along with them young boys with whom they would have sex and feel they have not violated their marriage vows.  Could this have been what Jesus was speaking of and that He, being God and being fully aware of the gay people of his day, had been referring to pedophilia and not homosexuality?  I think that to be much more likely.

I absolutely believe that Jesus would have a lot of problems with those who use their religious beliefs in the conduct of their political desires, ergo his give unto Rome that which is Rome’s admonition.  I suspect the writers of our Constitution felt the same.  I also believe that Jesus would have serious problems with the top 1% of wealthy today.  He might refer such people to his saying what profit a man who gains a kingdom and loses his soul.  He might ask them if they believe that what they practice is what He taught.  And while I am certain he understood that wealth had its place, he repeatedly spoke of being generous with such wealth.  He spoke of casting the first stone, turning the other cheek, treating others as you would want to be treated, judging as you would want to be judged, and absolute kindness and understanding.

If I were a part of the conservative right in this country, I would fear His saying to me, “you have already received your reward and now you will be judge harshly just as you did the least of my brethren.”

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Making Amends to the Universe


It is a funny thing about words you do not use in most conversations: you think you know the definition and then upon looking the word up in the dictionary you find something quite different.  I used to think that the act of making amends with someone meant apologizing.  Of course I was wrong.  Just this morning I looked the word up in my handy dandy Webster’s and this is what I found: “Amends – Reparation for insult, injury or loss.”  Did not see the phrase “to apologize” anywhere there although one can imply it from the word “reparation.”  I of course immediately looked up the word “reparation” and found this:  “Reparation – 1. The act or process of repairing or the state of being repaired.  2. The act or process of making amends: EXPIATION. 3. Something done or paid as amends: COMPENSATION.”  Since “expiation” is not in my vocabulary I had to look that one up too.  At this point I was hopeful I would not see yet another word which needed clarification.  “Expiation – 2. Means of atonement.”  I did not include definition “1” because it said “the act of expiating.”  Is that not obvious?  Regardless, the dictionary made no direct mention of the act of apologizing.  Quite to the contrary, it seems like that definition was actively avoided.

I was made aware of this process by a group of friends almost 20 years ago.  Of course my first impression was that I needed to apologize for my bad acts and be done with it.  Upon reflection, however, it seems people deserving of an apology may have difficulty in believing the maker of such, me, because recent history makes them believe that I will repeat my bad act yet again.  And I now know, they were probably correct.

But what does all this have to do with the universe?  It is actually rather simple but speaks to my religious upbringing, Roman Catholicism.  The Catholic Church that I grew up in had me constantly looking over my shoulder.  It seemed to me, via their teaching, that each day I would commit a multitude of sins that I needed to apologize for and hope that God would be forgiving.  Catholic priests in those days, much like their conservative Protestant brethren preach a whole lot of fire and brimstone.  They contended if I were not on the right side of God, which was more likely than not, I would one day be condemned to hell.  And so Catholics, at least, love to apologize for everything even though they have somewhere been little and no comprehension of their transgression and what makes it such.  For example, the nuns assured us it was a sin not to go to church on Sunday and holy days and that we needed to confess that sin to the priest.  I always wanted to say, “you mean God is pissed off at me just because I missed mass one Sunday?”  I feel certain had I gotten up the courage to ask such a question, the answer would have been a very hearty “yes.”  It just did not make any sense to me, still doesn’t.

I bring that up because as I entered adulthood and for many years afterward, I was crippled with Catholic guilt and no understanding of how to assuage it.  The nuns would have said, “just don’t do it anymore.”  No explanation, just don’t do it.  Such insufficiencies dogged me for half of my adult life.

One of the first things I learned in dealing with my transgressions and the art of making amends, yes, it is an art, was coming to an understanding of the exact process leading up to that transgression.  This was something I had never before considered, mostly because it never occurred to me but also because it had never before been suggested.  And so here is where the universe, and I mean that literally, comes into play.

Long before life came to exist on the face of the earth, at the moment of the “Big Bang” actually, the laws of the universe were set into motion.  Each and every one of those laws are absolutes, not to be broken, not to be denied, and certainly not to be contested, least of all by we humans.  The universe was set into that motion at that moment and had be moving, inexorably, in a particular direction ever since.  Scientists today are at odds with, and discuss at considerably length, what direction that motion is moving, but they agree that there is a single set of laws controlling that direction.  We humans do not understand that law yet, if ever.

Since humans have roamed the earth they have tried, many times in vain, to understand what was happening to them and why.  The ancients, in their desperate attempt, created gods who reigned over just about everything, the rising of the sun, the motion of the moon, the oceans, the rain, everything.  But in that process, they also started making excuses for negative things which happened to them by laying it off to one of their gods or to other people.  The idea of taking responsibility for your own actions seemed at odds with the teaching of the day.  Unfortunately, such teaching, though modified, have mostly passed down through the ages and exist today.  People today try to figure out why something has gone horribly wrong in their life and look outward for the answer, other people, bad luck, anything that does not require them to look inside themselves.  There are also those situations which creep into everyone’s life where the literal forces of the universe negatively impact their life.  It gets really bad when a person starts thinking it is only raining on them when common sense should win out telling them that the universe is not plotting against them, it is actually raining on everyone around them as well.

The reason for mentioning all these things in the context of amends is that humans seem ill prepared to put things in proper perspective.  We humans have this tendency to be in a reactive mode rather than a much more productive proactive mode.  I like to use the example of a 25 year old who dies from cancer.  People love to say “how unfair” it is.  The problem with the word “unfair” is that it implies some sort of reasoning behind it.  It is as if the cancer looked at that 25 year old and decided to pick on him or her.  Of course that is foolishness.  They do not think the same way when a life-long smoker gets lung cancer or emphysema, so why do so just because the cause is not evident?  They would be far better served by lay off blame, if blame really must be assigned, to the universe and its inexplicable and difficult to avoid actions.

One of the most common places to see otherwise good people behaving badly is our nation’s roads and highways.  There is so much aggressive driving, so much inconsiderate driving, so much feeling of being “an exception to the rule” that driving for me personally is painful.  Just because I get up on the wrong side of the bed, or I am running late, or I do not like the type of car you are driving, it is not alright for me to take out my aggressions, my impatience, my distaste for your taste on you.  But when I do, I immediately need to take notice and make amends.  Now I am not going to then stop you just so I can apologize for my bad actions if for no other reason that it is unreasonable.  But more to the point, is it not what making amends to you means.  I this case what it means is I must find patience, I must not be aggressive.  In changing my ways I am making amends.  And in truth, that is the only way amends can be made.

Here is another example of how I used to be.  If at a checkout of a store the store employee gives me the wrong change and it is in my favor I would not notify them of the fact, even if or particularly if, it were a very small amount.  In doing so I was teaching myself to be dishonest which of course translated to much larger things.  They say the devil is in the details and this particular detail speaks to my honesty or lack of it.  That meant for acts of this sort the amend to be made was to make honesty an absolute.  I changed my way of going through life.

I really and truly dislike cold weather of any sort and this particular winter has been quite rough and doubled by an overabundance of snow.  Many was the morning that I felt myself becoming cranky because of one or both such things coming into play.  In the more distant past, my tact was to take out my crankiness on anyone who had the temerity to cross my path.  They did not deserve it but I did it anyway.  The amend here was simply to acknowledge that I am feeling cranky by I simply needed to work to keep that to myself and visit that crankiness on no one.

Today I look upon amends the same way I look at chocolate.  Well, pretty much anyway.  I invite amends because I have come to realize that it allows me to grow and be at peace with the universe.  Life is constantly throwing me curves but I have become rather good at hitting them out of the park.  But on those occasion that I cannot hit that curve out of the park for a home run, I can do nothing and be absolutely all right.  Amending me has brought so much peace to my life it is something I implore everyone to do.

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NFL, Goodell Botch Deflated Football Investigation


I went on the record here right after this whole mess started by stating I thought the Patriots were “obviously” at fault.  A day later I was not nearly so sure.  And now I am convinced the Patriots are simply the victims of Roger Goodell’s incompetence.  The only thing that has kept this story alive is the NFL’s lack of transparency.  In truth, it is, as the Bard penned, “much ado about nothing.”  The naysayers will have you believe that this is really about the integrity of “them game” and the NFL.  Well, that went right out the window when Goodell decided, for God knows what reason, to be 100% secretive about what they knew.  To make matters worse, there have been leaks from “well-placed sources.”  Goodell’s absolute failure to address any of those leaks shows exactly how incompetent he really is.  And worst of all, this has generated more adverse controversy than the Ray Rice scandal ever did.  And this is all over how much a bunch of footballs were inflated in a game where both teams have stated they could have been playing with a bar of soap and the outcome would have been the same?

First of all there is a rat on the loose.  By that I mean, for this to have gained any momentum at all someone at some team, I am betting on Baltimore, complained to the league offices that he suspected the Patriots of using underinflated balls.  What this coward did not do is bring it up immediately but waited until just before the AFC Championship game.  It is also my bet that this person was not the owner, head coach or other official of the Ravens at that level but someone at a slightly lower level who spoke out of turn, without permission of his boss, but that the statement made, like Pandora’s box, raised the specter of impropriety forcing the NFL to take action.

Roger Goodell is informed and realizes he must do something to maintain the integrity of the game.  Had this been his predecessor, Paul Tagliabue, he would have quickly, and quietly, informed the 32 owners of the suspicion which had been raised and that checks on the condition of the balls would be made.  Had Goodell done that, the actions of a good leader, the only thing we would have talked about over the past 8 or 9 days, would have been the Super Bowl match-ups.  But of course Goodell lacked common sense and allowed the opening of Pandora’s box.

Goodell is a lawyer and should be well versed in the concept of total transparency during an investigation.  In most investigations the public’s demand for information is answered in a reasonable way.  The public is generally given enough information from the investigators, and/or, the originators, so they have a fair understanding of what is transpiring.  In this case, however, Goodell has allowed speculation, hyperbole, unsubstantiated leaks, and all sorts of foolishness to grow and fester in the public’s mind.  Journalists, broadcast and print, have fallen into the trap and become proponents of even the flimsiest of statements.  The latest being that the NFL has video of a ballboy doing something.  That of course came from Fox news who, like journalist tend to do, refuse to name their sources.  And that has been the downfall of every journalist to date.  They have allowed all these unsubstantiated reports to take on a life of their own and added to it by introducing their own theories.  It is exactly like the Salem witch trials: a harmless interaction between two girls and their nanny is mixed with fear and sensationalism, and suddenly what should have been attributed to youthful foolishness turns into something ugly and entirely unwarranted.

Goodell blew it a second time when he had the opportunity, Wednesday January 21 at the latest, to tell us what the league knew for fact, not speculation. He could have said something like, “the head linesman checked all 12 Patriots balls and found 11 of them did not meet the minimum requirement.  They were between 1/2 and 1 p.s.I. out of range.  At this moment we do know the reason for this but we have no reason to believe they have been tampered with.  We will, however, continue to investigate this and will report our finding when completed.”  A statement like that which would have been 100% true would likely have made this backburner news for everyone.  It would not have let the Patriots off the hook but simply by saying that they know of no tampering would have put this entire issue in proper light.

For my entire adult working life I worked in jobs which required research.  I have been published in a scientific journal, ( http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2003-379), and submitted scholarly papers at Harvard University.  In all instances it was both expected and required that I name my sources and reference primary sources.  A primary source is an actual witness to an event or scientific proof of an assertion.  Without that my assertions have no merit and can be dismissed as untrue.  It is that principle I call the journalists who have reported on this mess to hold themselves to.  I believe that if they have graduated from any reputable school of journalism, they were taught that this principle reigns supreme.  Otherwise good journalists have allowed themselves to be caught up in this foolishness.  It is foolishness because to date not a single shred of evidence of even this slightest amount of wrongdoing has been demonstrated.  Goodell could have done on Wednesday what Bellichik did on Saturday and that would have been the end of it.  He could have said on Wednesday that he has instructed all 32 teams to be more vigilant with regard to ball pressure during the course of a game.  But when you lack the common sense principles of good leadership, you fail to do these things.

For Roger Goodell this football season has been an unmitigated disaster and he has only himself to blame.  If he has an ounce of integrity, immediately following this inquiry’s finding he will resign for the good of the league.  His consistent bad judgment cannot be tolerated.

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Patriots Football Controversy


It would appear the New England Patriots are guilty of a rule infraction relative to football pressure.  Shame on them!  But shame on the NFL as well.  Non Patriots fans, Patriots haters, have more fodder to throw in the Patriots’ direction.  But this particular problem has been blown so far out of proportion as to defy common sense.  People are calling for the Patriots to forfeit a draft pick for this infraction as well as heavy fines.  But the NFL, and Roger Goodell in particular, are equally as guilty.

This infraction, at its egregious best, is worthy of little more than a slap on the wrist.  Why?  Because such practices came to light well before the Patriots Colts game.  Aaron Rogers is on the record for having said he purposely over-inflates the balls he uses because he can get a better grip on the ball.  Worse, he chided the NFL to catch him which shows his knowledge of his own wrongdoing and daring the NFL to take action.  His statement was not made in the last week but over a month ago.

The Minnesota Vikings were warned prior to a particularly cold game this season that they cannot use sideline heaters to warm up the ball, an infraction noted in the same paragraph as ball inflation.  The NFL has in its possession film which shows the Vikings blatantly disregarded the warn and were in fact warming up the balls during the game.  The NFL took no action.

This leaves the NFL with a serious problem of what to do in the Patriots’ case.  To do nothing other than say “don’t do it again” will enflame many.  But whatever action they take against the Patriots requires they take action against the Packers and Vikings as well.

This is absolutely an infraction for- which New England must be held accountable.  However, it is not very serious, at all, regardless of what Patriot detractors want to say.  The solution is a simple one:  The NFL itself will supply all game balls and will be responsible for their possession and introduction into all games.  That possession will include balls being held on the sideline so when a new ball is introduced into the game, it will come from NFL possession and not team possession.

This issues needs to be over this week and end the distraction from the Super Bowl.

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Getting a Clue


Sometimes when I explain my actions when I was young I will say, “I was young and dumb, with an emphasis on dumb.”   As I have gotten older, I have come to see just how little I knew when I was young, and how good it would have been if I had had a few more clues than I did.  I am going to try, in no particular order, the present what a few of those clues should have been.

Clue One:  Everything will be all right.  When I was just 10 years old my father had his first heart attack. Until that time everything had been all right.  But his heart attack brought into sharp focus how unpredictable life can be.  My mother, a registered nurse, took really good care of him.  But we were told that he might not live.  Fortunately he did, and for another 11 years at that.  But it was at that point I really needed to hear my first “everything will be all right.”  This was not a short-coming of my mother but a societal short-coming.   Parenting was a strictly on-the-job training experience.   And in this case, no one was there to tell my mother that everything will be all right.  My point is:  we really have very little control over what happens in our present and our future.  In reality we can only control our own actions, reactions and thoughts.  After that, we really have only a little control over our kids, our pets, and pretty much everything else.  Kids, pets and everyone else are going to do what they want regardless of how we feel.  But if we take care of ourselves and do our best along with doing the next right thing, for the most part, things will be all right.  Still, we need to hear that reassurance from those closest to us.  And in that respect, we need to choose our friends wisely.

Clue two:  Learn to study.  I went through 12 years of public school and 7 years of college without ever running into a course on how to study.  For that reason, at the end of my junior year in high school I had to transfer to a prep school, repeat my junior year, and continue on with my education.  Part of my problem was, as my mother use to put it, I was just too smart for my own good.  That is, from grades one through five I existed entirely on my own intelligence and ability to grasp what was put in front of me.  That meant I did not need to study to get an A.  The change started in the fifth grade.  My grades went from all As to Bs, Bs and Cs and in high school Cs and Ds.  As things got more difficult, I had no process for overcoming the challenges before me.  The only thing prep school did was it took away television and mobility from me.  By restricting some of my actions I was, in effect, forced to work harder on my school work.  My grades improved and in my senior year I was doing well enough to get into a very good college.  Once in college, however, I was entirely overwhelmed and it took only a semester for me to drop out.  Over the next decade and a half I struggled to get through college, but finally did.

There is nothing natural about studying.  I think some people, a very few, are self-motivated enough to be single minded about education which carries them through their education.  But for most of us, someone needs to tell us how to successfully study.  It turns out that study is not difficult, but it does require a degree of structure and commitment.  Without that, most of us flail around until we either “get it” or fail.  One of the most effective study techniques is really just asking the teacher/professor questions relative to those things we do not understand.  But this requires our belief system to understand that, regardless of how our questions sound or the other person’s reaction to them, they are necessary and we will be all right.

Clue Three:  Always be honest.  Most people will say they are honest.  And to some degree that will true.  The problem is simple, our perception of what being honest is like.  If you were to ask those same people if it is all right to tell a lie to save someone’s feelings, most would say that it is.  But what that statement really says is that they are willing to compromise with the truth.  If you asked that same group of people if they have ever exaggerated things they have accomplished they would probably say they had.  Again, honesty is compromised.

I believe there are two main reasons people lie, shame and fear.  We do something that we feel ashamed of and when confronted with what we’ve done, the tendency is to deny and effectively lie.  The other thing, when we do not want to say something which may hurt someone’s feelings, is to tell them what we think they want to hear.  But the dishonesty there is that we deny the person the right to deal with their own feelings speculating that our judgment is superior to their ability to handle bad news.  We tell ourselves that we are doing the right thing when in fact we are not.  But since we tend to repeat such actions over and over, in time we convince ourselves that it is the right thing to do.  We have become dishonest with ourselves, a truly fatal flaw.

Clue Four: Take care of yourself.  That phrase, take care of yourself, is rather commonly used when two people are parting ways, another way of saying good-bye.  But my meaning is the literal, take care of yourself.  That means in mind, body and spirit.  Of those three, the spirit is by far the most important.  I look as spirit as that part of ourselves that when things get tough, we find the inner strength to push through, and in the end, expect that everything will be all right.  That can be really tough, particularly when we are facing life altering or even possible life ending things.  But in the mundane, everyday things, our spirit is what tells us that we need to get out and exercise, go to the doctor when we feel sick, and tell someone of our problems, particularly when we are feeling overwhelmed.

Self-care becomes particularly difficult when the thing we are up against is somehow shameful in our mind.  It is at that exact time that we need to confide in someone and unless we have trained ourselves to do that, we will opt for pushing down inside ourselves, totally contrary to the ideal of self-care.

It took me a long time to figure out something which should have been obvious.  If I take care of all the little things in my life, the big things will work out and everything will be all right.  Feeling good about myself and my future is all about taking care of myself today.

Clue Five:  Give a damn!  I think one of the reasons I embraced liberal politics was this inner belief that when reasonable, we need to help other people.  There are times in our lives when we need to be selfless and give of ourselves to another person.  Simply put, it means that when someone needs our help, within reason, we help them.  A friend of mine once told me of an experience he had with his mother.  They were out one day when they came across a homeless man.  His mother gave him twenty dollars and told him to give it to the man.  He objected saying why not ten or five, thinking twenty was too much.  She told him that was God lying there.

But helping is usually much easier than that.  Most of the time it simply means we listen to someone who is troubled, trying to understand them, and help them, where possible, through their trouble.  Because if we do take the time to listen to someone else is means, for us, everything will be all right.

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Could My Childhood Survive in Today’s World?


When I was pretty young, I was rummaging around in our barn and found a pair of old wooden skiis.  I goaded my parents into buying me a pair of ski boots and ski polls and headed for the nearest hill.  It was a hill upon which I also used to go sledding.  In the summer it was a pasture for grazing cows.  Sadly, they are gone today.  Anyway, I pretty much taught myself to ski on that small slope and graduated to a larger hill in a different part of town that had a rope lift on it.  My skiing career was launched.

Behind our house there were several large pine trees which I used to climb and eventually built a tree house and towards the top of the tree another ledge.  I used to climb it all the time and look off into the distance at a nearby city and marveled at how far I could see.  The summer also found me riding my bicycle, going to the swimming pond and fishing at the local lake.  Also, every summer my father had a portion of our field plowed and made it into a vegetable garden.  I loved helping him with it.

One day, right after a winter storm, a boy who lived next door told me we could earn a quarter if we went and shoveled a neighbor lady’s  driveway.  I was astonish because such tasks were always done without compensation at my house.  Such non-compensated duties extended to lawn mowing and leaf raking, both of which I did, and actually enjoyed.  To this day I enjoy such activity.  But as with the snow shoveling, I learned that I could grow a bit of a business around the neighborhood by mowing lawns and raking leaves.

Some years later, I expanded my money making to delivering the local newspaper, a six day a week operation that cost each customer the enormous sum of 42 cents a week.  Most people would give me 50 cents and tell me to keep the change.  It was great!  I never ran out of candy bars or Dairy Queen milk shakes.  There was a Dairy Queen along my route.

Once I entered high school, things changed, though not greatly.  Most Friday and Saturdays nights there was a dance held either at a local community center or the high school.  Of course, this was before CDs so the music came via records.  Everyone went to the high school football games in the fall, basketball games in the winter, and a smaller subset to the baseball games in the spring.

Television was not a big part  of our lives because daytime tv was mostly soap operas and games shows.  We did watch evening tv.  The exception to afternoon tv were the Mickey Mouse Club and American Bandstand.

We boys seemed to know everything about cars including how to fix them.  Many of us got jobs working in service stations when all gas was pumped by the service station attendant.

When I was a kid the big  threat by my parents was being sent to my room. I think today’s threat is being sent outside.