#472 – Dick Bernard: Penn State/Joe Paterno/Relationships between Vulnerable Children and Authority Figures

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There is no need to recite the volumes already, or to be, written about the story at Penn State. (I write, when they are on the field against Nebraska, at this moment, behind 10-0. Entering the game they were the 12th ranking football team in the nation, their opponent the 19th ranking team).
Of course, all that is totally irrelevant. As one commentator said a few minutes ago, it is as if the quarterback, Paterno, fumbled the ball on the goal line at the edge of the greatest victory in history….
I have another perspective that may add a bit to the necessary conversation.
Being human, with a fair amount of seniority amongst my cohorts in today’s population, I know a little bit about human nature.
Being Catholic, I know how stupidity plays out among power people who think that they can contain and control incidents of sexual abuse within the confines of their church authority (that began to unravel in the 1990s, a long time ago, and continues to this day.) It didn’t and doesn’t work. But some in authority still don’t quite get it.
But I have another insight, born of representing public school teachers in a teachers union from 1972-2000 and seeing the statutory transition from, initially, restrictions on corporal punishment (spanking), to mandatory reporting of even a suspicion of abuse of a child by an adult. The transition was complete long before my staff career ended. What astonishes me in the current situation is that this bunch at Penn State could have been so utterly clueless.
There have been, are, and will continue to be incidents of abuse in public education and elsewhere. We are humans, after all.
But in my particular venue, public education, the incidence was very, very tiny, but when uncovered very, very visible. (In the United States today there are perhaps nearly 50,000,000 children in schools; and perhaps 6,000,000 school employees including substitute teachers, aides, bus drivers, cooks, and on and on and on. With such an immense cohort, in school for an average of 171 days a year in Minnesota, there is no end of possibilities for problems, but amazingly few problems occur.)
In Minnesota, the relevant statute has existed since 1975, and can be viewed in its entirety here. It has been amended frequent times, and doubtless Penn State will cause it to be revisited once again.
I remember the general evolution of this law.
It began pretty simply, probably in 1975, essentially prohibiting spanking of, in anatomy terms, the gluteus maximus (to we lay people, the “rear end”). I don’t recall the genesis of the Law, but probably it was from some excess by someone, somewhere. It was a difficult adjustment for the enforcer in a school, often the shop teacher, more often the principal. The paddle had to go. To this day, there are some who advocate the paddle….
As years went on, the Law evolved.
I wish I could remember the year, but I think it was sometime in the 1980s, when the mandatory reporting provision was first enacted. This came to be called the ‘no touch’ rule in my public education jurisdiction.
The reaction was in the direction of zero tolerance of adult-child touch, in any of its manifestations.
I remember the most dramatic aberration (response): kindergarten teachers, virtually all female, became fearful of doing such innocuous things as helping a kid tie his or her shoelaces.
As time went on, the system and the individuals found more equilibrium, but the point remains, as it relates to Penn State, that the business of adult-vulnerable child relationships has been an active part of legal policy discussion since at least 1975 – 36 years.
There is an entire additional discussion, in this case, of the role of football as a symbol of power and authority in our society. Joe Paterno was an institution because he “brought home the bacon” for Penn State in prestige and money.
But, as I say, that is an entire other discussion.
UPDATES (Notice also comment included with this post):
Comment from Bonnie, Minneapolis: Well said, Dick. Hard to understand their cluelessness. Thanks for continuing your good work.
Comment from Bob, suburban St. Paul, Nov. 12:The only moral response by Penn State would have been to forfeit the remainder of their season to emphasize the significance of this horrendous criminal behavior. The students and fans who want to deify their coach and gloss over this criminality need a strong message from the university that this behavior is to be abhorred and treated as a criminal matter.
I believe mandatory reporting started in about 1970 in Minnesota for a host of professionals such as medical personnel, social workers, all mental health professionals, and education staff. Defining abuse to include corporal punishment by teachers must have come later or in 1975. Prior to the mandatory reporting law it was very hard for doctors and others to report abuse for fear of being sued by the parent for violating confidentiality. In 1969 or so I attended a conference at the U of Denver where a Dr Kemp had identified the “battered child syndrome”. I was with a contingent from Ramsey County including the local juvenile court judge, the head of psychiatry at the old St. Paul Ramsey, a county attorney, a police officer and others. When we came back we developed the Ramsey County Child Abuse Team to facilitate coordinated action by the various entities that intervene in abuse cases. Mandatory reporting has been on the books in Pennsylvania for many years. The Penn State staff had to know about their legal obligation to report. It is the same old story of those in power believing that their sacred institution (Church or Football Program) has priority over civil law.
My dates or years are a bit fuzzy but I believe roughly correct without doing in-depth research.
Note from Dick: whatever the actual dates, awareness about abuse, and the laws on reporting, have a very long history.
From Jeff, south suburbs, Nov. 13: The parties involved need to be punished severely… that means the offender
Sandusky, and if any coaches or university officials condoned or did not
report the crime then they also should be prosecuted if they broke the law
in PA.
Obviously Penn State will pay a very heavy price in lawsuits and settlements
in regard to this matter. These civil actions will help Penn State and
other institutions understand that protecting innocent children is paramount
and institutional protection of football or a university’s name is nothing
compared to this. Just think of how Penn State would have been held up as a
correct role model had they handled the situation the way it should have …
morally and legally.
As to the matter of football games. I personally differ on this. if the NCAA
or the State of PA wants to punish the football program at Penn State in the
future that is fine. The games that are set up are contracts that are
certainly not inviolate, and Penn State could forfeit them of course. I
think it would have been difficult last week. My feeling is however that
the players in the program today, and the students at the University today
should not be punished for things they had no involvement in. if the
program is punished in the future in some way , and both criminal and civil
sanctions and punishments are metered out as they are justly deserved I
think that is enough for now.
I do have sensitivity to the fact that sports or a sports program should not
supersede the criminality and heinous nature of the offenses ; but I also
think that punishing students and student athletes today for things that
happened 10 years ago and for which they had no control would be wrong in my
eyes.
Another followup comment from Bob in suburban St. Paul: Dick, I just attempted some research on the origins of our law in MN without much success. I did learn that in 1962 the medical profession began bringing the subject to our attention. In 1974 the federal government passed legislation providing funding to for state programs to address the issue. I do know we were in Denver in 1969 learning about how to develop a multi-disciplinary team at the local level. Just when MN outlawed child abuse remains question for me. Until states passed laws to make child abuse illegal it was dealt with under laws prohibiting cruelty to animals. What is stunning about the subject is the fact that it took us so long to define child abuse as criminal. Until then children were considered chattel. A doctor called me one time when I managed Child Welfare Intake for Ramsey County. He was trying to tell me through the use of obscure language that this young teen-age girl was a victim of incest. He could not be explicit or give me facts to go on because the law did not mandate reporting and he was going out on a limb legally. When I asked him for facts or how he knew these things, he said I just had to trust his medical acumen. It was obvious that this doctor was very nervous about telling me anything but wanted to tip us off. After the law was passed he was required to report and was protected legally. Thankfully we have advanced somewhat, but obviously not at Penn State. Bob
And yet another, from Bob, on Nov. 13: Dick, Try as I may the earliest mandetory reporting law I can find for Minnesota dates to 1974. This seems at odds with my memory of Judge Archie Gingold and others pushing for such a law as early as I969, and our child protection interventions prior to 1974. Perhaps we used other other child protection laws and the mandatory reporting law came along later in 1974, which also provided legal protection for the reporter and really changed everything. My memory is obviously flawed. Bob

#471 – Dick Bernard: Armistice (Veterans) Day 2011

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UPDATE: A reader sends along this Eyewitness to History link from the actual day/place in 1918.
Today is a unique date: 11-11-11 (November 11, 2011).
It is also Armistice Day, commemorating the end of World War I, when at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918, a moment was taken to recognize the hope that the end of the Great War, was also the beginning of Peace (hope always springs eternal.)
My mother, Esther, then 9 years old, remembered the day vividly: “The hired girl and I were out in the snow chasing chickens into the coop so they wouldn’t freeze when there was a great long train whistle from the Grand Rapids [ND] railroad track [about 4-5 miles away, as the crow flies]. In the house there was a long, long telephone ringing to signify the end of World War I.” (page 122 of Pioneers: The Busch and Berning Family of LaMoure County ND).
WWI was very deadly and confusing: my grandparents and most of the neighbors in their home (Wisconsin) and settlement (ND) communities were German ancestry, first generation American, and spoke German. One of my grandfather Busch’s hired men was killed in the war, and Grandpa wanted to enlist. Mom’s younger sister Mary, born 1913, remembered “there was a lot of prejudice against Germany at that time so the language was kept quiet. Being called a “kraut” wasn’t the nicest thing to hear. Most of the neighbors had German ancestors. Most of them came to the U.S. to avoid compulsory military training.” (p.136)
Esther and Mary’s Great-Uncle Heinrich Busch in Dubuque, a successful businessman who with his parents and brother had migrated from Germany in the early 1870s, wrote a passionate letter, in German, home to his German relatives Nov. 5, 1923, saying in part “The American millionaires and the government had loaned the Allies so many millions that against the will of the common folk, [P]resident Wilson was pulled into the War. England had nine million for newspaper propaganda [for war] in American newspapers about the brutal German and that the German-Americans had come to suffer under it, they were held [arrested] for [being] unpatriotic and were required to come before the court for little things as if they were pro-German. The damned war was a revenge and a millionaire’s war and the common people had to bleed in this bloody gladiator battle…..” (page 271) He went on in the same letter to predict the rise of a regime like the then-unknown Hitler and Nazis because of Germany’s humiliation and economic suffering in defeat.
War was not a sound-bite. History did not begin with Pearl Harbor and WWII….
Armistice Day is still celebrated in Europe, especially.
In the United States, in 1954, the day was re-named Veteran’s Day.
Whether intentional or not, the original intention of Armistice Day has come to be diluted or eroded: rather than recognize Peace; the effort is to recognize Veterans of War.
I’m a Military Veteran myself, so I certainly have no quarrel with recognizing Veterans.
But today I’ll be at the First Shot Memorial on the Minnesota Capitol Grounds, recognizing Armistice Day with other Veterans for Peace. Part of the ceremony will be ringing a common bell, eleven times.
A block or so away the Veterans Day contingent will be gathering at the Vietnam War Memorial.
The same kinds of people; a differing emphasis….
Ten years ago today, November 11, 2001, we were waiting to board our plane from London, England, to Minneapolis.
At precisely 11 AM…well, here’s how I described it in an e-mail March 20, 2003: “One of the most powerful minutes of my life was at Gatwick airport in suburban London on November 11, 2001, when the entire airport became dead silent for one minute to commemorate Armistice Day, which is a far bigger deal in England than it is here. The announcer came on the PA, and asked for reflective silence. I have never “heard” anything so powerful. I didn’t think it was possible. Babies didn’t even cry.”
A year later at the Armistice Day observance of Veterans for Peace at Ft. Snelling Cemetery I related this story again for the assembled veterans.
Today, whether you’re observing Veterans Day, or Armistice Day, remember the original intent of the day.
Peace in our world.
UPDATE – Noon November 11, 2011
Some photos from the Armistice and Veterans Day commemorations on the State Capitol grounds. The ceremonies were about one block apart. I spent time at each. Factoring out the band and other official personnel at the Veterans Day observance, the number in attendance seemed about the same. At the Armistice Day observance, eleven peace doves were released after a bell was rung eleven times. At the Veterans Day observance there was the traditional 21 gun salute. (click to enlarge the photos)

Bell Ringing Ceremony


Some of the eleven doves of peace released at the ceremony.


At the Veterans Day observance at the Vietnam Memorial, Capitol Ground


Statue between the Armistice and Veterans Day observances today, at St. Paul MN

#470 – Dick Bernard: Public Schools, and the kids in them, matter

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Sometimes seemingly random events have a real element of synchronicity to them: they seem to have no relationship, but in every meaningful way, they are directly related. I recently experienced two such synchronous events.
Wednesday, November 2, I was invited to a house party in south Minneapolis. The event was to recognize the first ten years in the history of a truly remarkable independent and non-partisan organization: Parents United for Public Schools (“PUPS”). The groups website (click here) says it all far better than I ever could.
I was invited to the gathering because in the first few months during which PUPS was evolving from idea into reality I participated in the early organizational meetings of the group. We were something of a ‘rag-tag’ bunch then – simply parents, grandparents and taxpayers who really cared about public schools. Back then, in 2002, there was no organization, no dues, no staff, and thus no guarantee of a future. After a few meetings, a bunch of us sat around in a circle at a library in the west suburbs and had our say. At my turn, I simply urged the group to stay in existence so that it would still exist at the beginning of a second year.
The organizers slogged on (such efforts are never easy), and here they are, still independent ten years later, a recognized and highly credible voice for Minnesota’s children.
At the gathering, Minnesota Education Commissioner Dr. Brenda Casselius stopped by to share a few words about her passion for kids and public education. (click on photo to enlarge it)

Craig Roen, PUPS Board President, and MN Department of Education Commissioner Dr. Brenda Casselius, Nov. 2, 2011


For those who lament that its impossible to change a resistant status quo, PUPS is an excellent validation of the timeless quotation of Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” No one in PUPS is under the illusion that they’ve ‘won’; but their winning is in their continuing to advocate for children and for public schools. They’re in this for the long haul. They won’t quit.
The following Wednesday, I was invited to speak to a group of senior citizens in the south suburbs of the Twin Cities. My topic was public education. This group, like myself, had long before seen their children leave K-12 public education. In not too many years, the over 65 cohort will equal the number of students in Minnesota public schools. I call people like us “outside the walls” of public education.
I took on the task of attempting to briefly capsulize 150 years of Minnesota Public Education, as well as the current ‘lay of the land’ in public education. It is up to the group of 15 folks to judge whether or not I succeeded, but as I was preparing what I was going to present I had in mind the meeting the previous week.
Succinctly, at issue in Minnesota Public Education are about 840,000 public school students (one of every six Minnesotans), using about $9,500,000,000, about one-fourth of the total state budget. This seems like an immense number (and it is) but as I pointed out to the group of senior citizens (all of whom know someone who is actually in public school), this amounts to about $66 per day per student – hardly a kings ransom.
But because the enterprise is so immense and complex and far-flung, and because the consumers, the kids, cannot vote and have little say, public education is a fertile field for near warfare between assorted factions who wish to control both inputs and outcomes. Dialogue and seeking consensus can be difficult.
At the end of my talk (which was “peppered” with lots of constructive dialogue) I identified two crucial areas for the future of Minnesota public education:
1) Minnesotans have to commit to work together to help solve the very real problems in what is called the ‘achievement gap’ in the core cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul and elsewhere where poverty is a problem. There is no room for propaganda or punishment on this need. We must work together.
2) Schools have an absolutely critical need to engage with the huge percentage of us who are “outside the walls” of public education (over 60% of households have no one under age 18 living in them; 75-85% of today’s taxpayers have no children of their own in school). We cannot be left as outsiders.
Yesterday was, today is, and tomorrow is at stake.
Thanks PUPS, and to all who care, thanks as well.

#469 – Dick Bernard: Election Day 2012 is exactly one year away.

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Today is an off-year election day. Do vote, and vote well-informed. As I wrote yesterday in this space, here, traditionally very few bother to vote in these important off-year elections. Be one of those who goes to the polls, well informed.
One year from today – the date is November 6, 2012 – is another of those most crucial elections in United States history.
One year ago, November 7, 2010, was another of those elections. A year ago only about 40% of those who were qualified to vote actually went to polls in our country, and a large percentage of those voted strictly out of anger. Paradoxically, perhaps as large a percentage of those who did not bother to vote at all, stayed away because they were angry, and did not bother to vote for exactly the opposite reasons of the other group. (I was an election judge last year: I saw the angry ones coming in, and the low turnout….)
Anger is not a good way to make a decision. That’s how we decided, last year.
Every election day is crucial. The only new difference is that elections are going off the charts in importance as we voters, through often uninformed action, and as often, inaction (not voting at all), are killing our future, and collectively we seem not to care.
It’s not as though we do not have information on which to make informed decision. We have a great plenty of information easily available.
We just don’t care. Or we’ve given up.
Whatever the case, collectively we got exactly what we wanted in 2010, and we will get exactly what we want in 2012. What we wanted a year ago appears to be, at this moment, a Congress with a collective approval rating of 9%. Only one of eleven Americans is satisfied with our closest national representatives. And we are the ones who sent them there, whether we actually voted for them or not. For a year now they’ve been saying that things will get better if only we get rid of President Obama, and doing their best to make sure that he can’t accomplish anything.
Our state governments are not much better. Watch the issues being voted on in this state or that, today. Or what those same governments are squabbling about if there is a Democrat Governor and a Republican House and Senate. We, the people, have tied ourselves in knots by electing this crew.
A few nights ago – it was Monday, October 24, 2011 – I watched Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell say with his usual plastic straight face that the reason for the problems in the Senate is the Senate Democrat majority who have not passed 15 bills sent over by the House of Representatives.
The Democrats are the obstructionists, he said.
This is the same man who has declared from almost the minute of President Obama’s inauguration that his party’s intention was to make Obama a one term President. That is his sole working objective.
The day after McConnell’s performance on television, I wrote a brief note to my local Congresswoman, Michele Bachmann, with a simple question: what are these Bills, by name and file number? I specifically asked for the information in writing.
Surely, this should be a very easy question: very timely; and in the age of the internet, very simple to accomplish.
Here’s the Congresswoman’s answer as of Tuesday, November 8, 2011: not a single word, other than an automated acknowledgement of receipt of the question, about noon on October 25, 2011: Bachmann Oct 25, 2011001. (I think I could make a list of what these issues are, but I won’t: they are a laundry list of wishes that have absolutely no chance of ever becoming law, but can pass the House because of the nature of its essentially anti-government majority.)
To the vaunted 99% who are the victims: there is, indeed, a class war going on, and it is being waged against you. Here is how the 28 years between 1979 and 2007 is portrayed by the Congressional Budget Office.
I hope you cast your vote today, and a year from now, and any and every opportunity in between, and that it is always a well-informed vote.
Watch what happens today, and be well prepared when Tuesday, November 6, 2012, comes around.

#468 – Dick Bernard: Election, Tuesday, November 8, 2011

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This is an off-year election, but nonetheless with very important local issues.
It brings to mind the 2009 local election in my town, which I wrote about in this space a year ago. You can read it here.
If you don’t care to read the piece linked above, succinctly: there were ten candidates for four school board seats: “When the votes were tallied, the numbers revealed that only 6% – one of every 16 – eligible voters had even bothered to go to the polls. The candidate receiving the greatest number of votes polled 3% of those same eligible voters. That person sits in office today because one of every 33 local citizens took the time to vote.”
A somewhat similar scenario faces us tomorrow. I will report (by update on this post) after November 8. I don’t expect miracles.
Whether one votes, or not; or casts an informed vote, or not, they are in reality “voting”.
A vote is too precious a thing to waste.
If there’s an election in your town, Tuesday, find out what the issues/candidates are and do your best to not only vote, but vote well-informed.

#467 – Dick Bernard: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. Reform? Cuts?

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A few days ago three of us (photo of the other two at the end of this post) engaged in a brief conversation about the Big Three safety net programs of the U.S. Government: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid.
I am six years into my Medicare years so I know from experience how it works (very efficiently); ditto for Social Security. I have somewhat less knowledge about Medicaid, but neither is that an alien concept to me.
The question was raised: “what are your thoughts?”
I responded that I wasn’t concerned about talk about “reform”. The immediate retort from one of the others was “but the issue is CUTS”.
Good point.
Still, I have a hard time sharing the rage of that old guy (probably younger than me!) in the AARP commercial who threatens the wrath of 50,000,000 members if anybody dares try to cut AARP members earned government benefits (I’ve earned those same benefits, too; I’m also one of those 50,000,000).
But I don’t think it’s quite that simple as simply rejecting CUTS or REFORM.
Here’s why I think we should be a bit more flexible.
These are huge programs with long histories and from time to time careful review and prudent adjustment are very appropriate. Indeed, these programs have been reformed from time to time over their respective histories. It is a natural part of the process.
Sure, there are the nefarious elements who say they would like to eliminate the programs, but even given that possible fact, I’m not sure the near hysteria I see in my e-mail inbox is warranted.
On the one hand – the consumer – the issue is about receiving a particular benefit, say medical care, for a certain cost. Certainly I wouldn’t want mine “cut”. Might some aspects be “reformed”? Of course.
I don’t think anyone expects to get Medicare et al for ‘free’. After six years I know that there is a substantial cost: Medicare premiums paid out of the Social Security check; additional premiums for supplemental insurance which is essential; extra for non-reimbursable deductibles; plus payment (in our case) for what we consider essential Long Term Care insurance to cover the possibility of very expensive nursing home care later.
There is nothing that comes for nothing. Directly or indirectly we paid into these programs for years, and in the case of Medicare, we continue to pay. It isn’t “free”.
On the other side of the transaction, I also am very aware that all of those Medicare, etc., dollars go somewhere, and the most likely somewhere is into the pockets of the companies, doctors, etc., who receive Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements, or the stores and others who derive secondary benefit from those Social Security checks received by so many of us. (I once lived in a fairly large community where it was said that the major income stream for the town was Social Security checks. It was down economic times there, and I think it was right. Get rid of Social Security and that town would have been dead.)
Absent Medicare and Medicaid, many people would not be able to afford even essential care, which would take money out of the pockets of those in hospitals, clinics, etc. Even insurance companies would lose. Procedures now paid by Medicare and Medicaid, eliminated, would HURT the entire health industry, and hurt it badly. Think almost routine procedures (today) like cataract operations.
Very simply, it is in NO ONE’s selfish interest to “cut” anything – including those who are mistrusted on the other side of the conversation. But without reform, the programs are not sustainable long term.
It is, in my opinion, in EVERYONE’s best interest to look at possible reforms to, for instance, attempt to deal with rampant corruption – false billings, etc. – which cost everybody.
It is frightening to even consider the possibility that maybe there are some things that might be done to make a great system even better especially in today’s political climate.
But I think the alternative is even worse, and sooner than later many issues need to be addressed.

Nancy Adams and Barb Powell Oct 29, 2011

#463 – Dick Bernard: Visiting My Minnesota DFL (Democratic Farmer Labor) Party

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One of tents for Founders Day celebration at Minnesota DFL Headquarters October 29, 2011


When I made the decision to create this blog two and a half years ago, I had to decide how to label myself. It was not a difficult choice: “moderate pragmatic Democrat” is what I called myself then, and I’ve not seen any reason to change the label.
Each word, of course, carries its own meaning. As owner of this particular label, “moderate” and “pragmatic” speak a personal truth I learned over many years of advising and representing people. It is great to have ideals, but the reality of our communities and our nation and world is much messier. We are a “booyah”, a stew, of infinite variety. Anyone who seeks to impose his or her views on everyone is in for a very rude awakening, if not in the short term, certainly in the longer term.
As for “Democrat”, I’ve mostly been quiet, but in more recent years more active and visible. The Democrat view I see is more oriented to people at large, rather than to the most powerful, the ones who can control through money and media in particular.
Of course there are infinite points along any ideological line. Some progressive friends would view me as a sellout to the cause; some off to the right wing would view me as a socialist, or worse (I spent most of my career working for a Union – one of the hate words in the right wing lexicon.)
But that’s who I am.
Earlier this evening I drove over to the newly refurbished DFL Headquarters on Plato Avenue in St. Paul. It was a celebratory evening, featuring Guest Speaker Sen. Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont. In the gathering period before the dinner (I did not attend the dinner) was the motley variety of people I have come to expect at DFL events. This is truly a ‘big tent’ organization of people who care about people.

Celebration of DFL Headquarters remodeling, Oct. 29, 2011


Wandering around the attractively remodeled headquarters of the State DFL, I came across a couple of quotes which serve as well as any words I might add to this blog.
I close with these two quotes, engraved on the walls of the headquarters (click on photos to enlarge them).
We would be well advised to follow their sage advice:


Today is slightly over nine years since Paul Wellstone’s death; nearly 48 since the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
We remember.

#458 – Dick Bernard: The Vikings Stadium

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If you live in Minnesota or vicinity, and you give even the tiniest bit of attention to news, you will know that THE MINNESOTA VIKINGS NEED A NEW STADIUM (or so they claim). What is more real is that they WANT a Stadium.
MN Gov. Mark Dayton has called for a Special Session of the Legislature before Thanksgiving to decide what obligations will be assumed by Minnesota Taxpayers to build this new facility, wherever it happens to be built. His is a prudent political decision.
Personally, I have no particular interest in the issue. I think the Stadium will be funded, and taxpayers will pay lots of the cost, and I think it will be a very stupid decision, and I will so advise my legislators, but it won’t interfere with my daily life. It’s only a few hundred million, after all. Heckuva deal.
I attended a single Vikings game in my life, back in the early 1970s before sophisticated cameras and large TV screens, and I had arguably the worst seat in the stadium: beyond the end zone, in perhaps the third row up along the third base line at old Met Stadium. I could see the football in the air when it was being passed or kicked. I could discern progress only by cheers, boos and public address system, and by the long sticks showing where on the field the team was.
It was a horrid experience, never to be repeated.
This doesn’t deter the pitchman for the National Football League (NFL) saying yesterday “Great Cities are defined by the great institutions that they support”. This quote was on the front page of yesterday’s Minneapolis Star Tribune, above the fold.
Quite obviously he was talking about taxpayers supporting NFL football.
What a joke.
The Vikings have never won a Super Bowl, and are having a rotten season this year.
Since I don’t follow the game, I only see the aftermath in the morning after coffee crowd who mostly watched the game on television.
These days, there isn’t much animated conversation about The Team. The Vikings have died and gone to hell…quite literally.
Still, when all is said and done, my prediction is that even in these dismal economic times, when everything else is being cut, the State Legislature will find a way to involve ‘we, the people’ in helping along the wealth machine that is the NFL and its teams, including the Vikings GETTING THEIR STADIUM.
So, how much should this matter? Of course, points of view differ.
Real roughly, it seems that perhaps 1 of 1,000 Minnesotans actually attend the home games of the Vikings during the season, and, likely, most of these attend more than one game or are season ticket holders.
Very few care much about what the stadium looks like, or what amenities it has.
Lots of others (not I, thank you) watch the games at home or in other gathering places. But their time is not occupied by seeing how wonderful the corporate boxes are, or how good the obscenely priced drinks or food at the stadium are.
You could play the game in a large warehouse, with a green screen (a la the weatherman’s invisible screen) and sound effects, and nobody would know the difference. There’s a great plenty of authentic crowd pictures and noise already archived.
That would be much more efficient.
But in the end, we’ll cough up several hundred million dollars one way or the other, to preserve a home team which doesn’t perform especially well, and most of us will never see the inside of their stadium. There’ll be another coach, another quarterback, a new tight end…by Super Bowl XC (we’re approaching XLVI in a few months) THE VIKINGS WILL WIN!!! And that new stadium will have to be replaced, again.
What happens between now and the Minnesota Special Session, and after, will be political fodder in 2012. Gov. Dayton knows this; so do the legislators.
The real losers will be the school kids, the small rural cities and country, the poor, the people who suffer loss of revenue or services to help satisfy a greedy industry and its satellite businesses dependent on it.
Sad.

#457 – Dick Bernard: Newly released book "FOOL ME TWICE. FIGHTING the ASSAULT on SCIENCE in AMERICA" by Shawn Lawrence Otto

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Judging by the response last evening, this new book by Shawn Otto – its title describes it well – will not only be worth the read, but will provide a very useful springboard for informed discussion.
And there is a great need for informed discussion.

Acknowledgment: while I have the book, I just purchased it a few hours ago and obviously have not read it myself. I have read random portions. But the accolades the book has already received, including the effusive and lengthy introduction of Mr. Otto by long time Twin Cities media personality Don Shelby this evening, help to move me to pay especially close attention to its contents. This is a serious book about a serious topic recommended by serious people.
There appeared to be well over 100 of us in a packed room at Minneapolis’ Loft Literary Center this evening.
More details on the book are here.
Being that this book encroaches on politics, always a dangerous area these days, there are negative reviews along with the positive at places like Amazon, but they don’t destroy the authors basic premise that science, the source of so much that has been helpful in this society of ours, is now under assault, and if the assault is successful, our society as we know it is in deep trouble. (About those negative reviews: I’ve recently learned that ideologues seek to undermine books that they deem in opposition without even bothering to read the book. This is very simple to do on line. I’m pretty sure this dynamic will be in place in some reviews of this volume.)
Indeed, challenging politicians and the major media to again start seeing Science seems to be a major reason for this book. Science is under attack and despite its long and proud history and increasing relevance, it is derided by politicians or political candidates; or its revelations avoided by them. To embrace even well-settled science these days is politically very risky. Fool Me Twice covers a great deal of ground in what random segments portray as being very readable and easily understood, and I predict it will become a basic text for becoming grounded in the issues and the arguments – on both sides – of this contentious debate.
Waiting for the authors talk to commence I read a segment which he later emphasized in his own presentation: “In late 2007, the League of Conservation Voters analyzed the questions asked of the then candidates for president by five top prime-time TV journalists…By January 25, 2008, these journalists had conducted 171 interviews with the candidates. of the 2,975 questions they asked, how many might one suppose mentioned the words “climate change” or “global warming”? Six. To put that in perspective, three questions mentioned UFOs.”

As I listened, I couldn’t help but think of the rather bizarre intersection we Americans have reached in this time in history: at the same time in history that science is positioned to make a huge and positive difference for everyone; there is active advocacy for going back to the dark ages where belief trumps reason. Examples are easy to find.
But the message will be in the heavily footnoted 376 page document. And as Beny Bova, award-winning author and Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, says on the book jacket: “Before you vote in the next election, read Shawn Lawrence Otto’s Fool Me Twice.”
I’ll say no more till I’ve read the book, except to recommend a visit to an important associated website I learned about tonight: ScienceDebate.org . Check it out. It sounds most interesting.
Now to the book….
UPDATE October 25, 2011: Lori Sturdevant of the Minneapolis Star Tribune wrote this commentary on Otto/Fool Me Twice in today’s paper.

#456 – Dick Bernard: Who's Rolling in Dough?

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Recently House of Representatives Whip Eric Cantor admitted that there is a problem with the disequity in wealth in this country. The brief commentary, here, is worth reading.
Probably a more honest assessment of who has, and who deserves, and how they get what, was this letter to the editor in yesterday’s Minneapolis Star Tribune. The letter could be a useful springboard for conversation; far more useful than playing the information game on Rep. Cantor’s court.
Here’s the letter:
“State Rep. Carly Melin, D-Hibbing, said the Occupy Wall Street crowd is bringing a voice back to working people and the middle class. But Wall Street already gave a voice to my father, a Coca-Cola truck driver out of the Eagan plant, and to millions of working people.
In the ’80s, he researched, then invested $10,000 in a junk stock and made a fortune, in his opinion. No broker — he trusted only his own counsel. He then researched and invested in other stocks, both risky and mainstream, and made more money. Over the years, he turned the $10,000 into $4 million. Boy, did he find his voice, nagging everyone he knew to invest in the stock market.
Everyone wants the dishonest bums on Wall Street out, and no one was happier than my father when they caught a crook on Wall Street or in Washington. Melin’s real interest is in vilifying Wall Street itself. You never hear her, or others like U.S. Reps. Keith Ellison or Barney Frank, speak of how many millions of Americans of modest means became middle-class or rich when they took a chance on Wall Street.
My dad said that the way to make money for your family is to get up and go to work five days a week or more, save, and invest in the stock market. No guarantee — but when it comes to ideas that work, I would take the advice of a working man or businessman over the theories of a politician.
MAUREEN HANSEN, SAVAGE”
One expects a high profile politician like Cantor to distort and manipulate by omission or commission. Voluntary sharing of wealth has never worked, ever. There might be an occasional glimmer of guilt: think of those ubiquitous Carnegie libraries which still dot towns and cities nationwide. But by and large, once you get addicted to acquiring of wealth, you are equally addicted to retaining control over it.
Maureen Hansen lays out a more ordinary scenario: her Dad figures out a way to make a fast buck in Wall Street Junk stocks, and did well.
She admits there is no guarantee of riches, but her Dad got very lucky in the casino-for-the-little-guys that is Wall Street. He basically hit the casino jackpot by gambling the American Way.
If it were only that simple.
There is a big untold back story to Ms Hansen’s fascinating letter.
One would guess her Dad is deceased. If not, he certainly will be.
If he’s lucky and his pile continues to grow, and she is an only child, will she inherit this wealth? And, if so, is this wealth she inherits wealth that she “earned”?
By accident of birthright, does she then deserve to be rich? And someone else poor?
There are endless questions in this business of wealth distribution. All that is absolutely certain is that there is a hideous imbalance in wealth in today’s United States and those have more’s have shown little or no inclination to share their bounty with those who can’t imagine such wealth, much less being able to invest in the stock market.
The “lucky duckies” who have nearly cornered the wealth in the United States have got a heckuva deal, and Eric Cantor and his ilk know it.
And they have no interest or inclination to share…. After all, they hope to participate in this largesse of the 1% themselves, someday.