Supply Chain Problem

The real index of civilization is when people are kinder than they need to be.

— Louis de Bernieres

Novelist Louis de Bernieres' marvelous notion of civility as "surplus kindness" arrived in my inbox today thanks to photographer Peter Ralston. 

The word kind, meaning "doing good for another," derives from the Old English word kynn, meaning "family." 

Kynn was borrowed from kunją the ancient German word for "kinfolk." (Kunją survives today in the German words Kind, meaning "child," and Kinder, meaning "children.") 

Just as telling, the word kindness in Old English (kyndnes) also meant "surplus."
 

So "surplus kindness" is a redundancy. 

Except that there's a shortage of kindness in our nation today. 

We need to fix our supply chain problem. 

Quickly.

Inquisitor in Chief

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.

— Monty Python

Governor Ron DeSantis is bucking for Inquisitor in Chief. His target: wokeism.

Labeled an "oppressive mind-virus" by right-wingers, wokeism threatens to infect more Floridians than Omicron, DeSantis believes.

And so he has proposed a new state law, "the strongest legislation of its kind in the nation."

It's called the Stop the Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees (WOKE) Act.

The WOKE Act will let citizens sue schools and companies for promoting critical race theory.

"We won't allow Florida tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country," DeSantis said in a news release.

Eyeing the White House in 2024, DeSantis is clearly exploiting Whites' fears of wokeism, a tactic that put Republican Glenn Youngkin into the governor's seat in Virginia in November.

Were DeSantis of Irish descent, I'd say this is just warmed-over McCarthyism, and no one need worry: it's pure booze-fed Blarney.

But DeSantis is Italian and that's spells big trouble. 

He's a right-wing Catholic without an alcohol problem.

That means, when it comes to purging wokeism, he'll be zealous, ruthless, and cruel.

His closest historical forebear is Tomás de Torquemada, also known as "The Grand Inquisitor," who for Catholicism's sake murdered 2,000 Spaniards in the 15th century.

Torquemada didn't just murder the unorthodox.

He spied on them in their homes; traced them through informants; had them arrested by his secret police; humiliated them; and put them on trial before judges just as fanatical he was. He waterboarded, garroted, and racked those found guilty, before burning them at the stake.

What will DeSantis do to rid America of wokeism?

It's anyone's guess, but I predict it will be brutal.

Nobody ever expects the Spanish Inquisition.

Above: Torquemada, Grand Inquisitor by Jean-Paul Laurens

Pronoun Police

The pronoun is one of the most terrifying masks man has invented.

― John Fowles

Goodly readers on occasion complain that my old-school use of pronouns and impatience with pronouns of choice reveal insensitivity and bias.

Under the hot lights of these pronoun police, I'll admit, I'd probably cop a plea.

But for the moment suffice it to say my one true bias is a bias for brevity.

Brevity speeds communication; and life's too short to stuff a mushroom.

But, incisive as it is, brevity almost always ruffles feathers. 

By fostering favoritism, brevity can't help but trigger the aggrieved.

• Men at work. 
• Boys will be boys. 
• Drama queen.
• All men are created equal.

We could easily enough scrub favoritism from these phrases, but what value would we really add?

• Proletariats laboring up ahead.
• Youths will behave as they frequently do.
• Histrionic person.
• All human beings either are created equal or turn out that way due to randomized instances of syngamy.

I wish I could be as cheery about our current obsession with wokish circumlocution as the linguist John McWhorter, who recently applauded this sentence:

• The boy wants to see a picture of herself.

"There are times when the language firmament shifts under people’s feet," he wrote in The New York Times. "They get through it."

And if they don't, the pronoun police will be there to assist.

My Motto for 2022

People are drawn to the easy and to the easiest side of the easy.

— Rainer Maria Rilke

"Easy does it" is a core principle of the recovery movement. 

It's also my motto for the new year.

It means, according to Alchoholics Anonymous, that whenever you’re flustered, slow down and chill; good ideas will emerge in their own time.

The author of Alcoholics Anonymous borrowed the slogan from the Oxford Group, a Christian fellowship that owed much to Jesus' advice in the Sermon on the Mount: "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will take care of itself."

Jesus' advice was also central to the teachings of Emmet Fox, a Depression-era leader of the New Thought Movement and an AA guru. Fox interpreted Jesus' advice as follows:

"Try not to be tense or hurried. 

"If you try to unlock a door hurriedly, the key is apt to stick, whereas, if you do it slowly, it seldom does. 

"If the key sticks, stop pressing. To push hard with will power can only jam the lock completely.

"So it is with mental working. In quietness and confidence shall be your strength."

In other words, easy does it.

Happy New Year!

You've Got Omicron!

Symptomatic dolts are stampeding Atlanta's hospitals and Covid-19 testing sites, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. 

According to local healthcare workers, 94% are unvaccinated. 

Georgia's governor has called in the National Guard to restore order.

Too bad the Guard can't restore sanity.

These chowderheads have had nine months and more to get their shots, but haven't.

And now they're panicky.

A former HHS employee has told me that to expect all Americans to become vaccinated is unrealistic.

Through the entire history of medicine, at best 85% of the population accepts the need to be vaccinated and complies.

A steady 15% of the population remains vaccine-resistant.

This figure corresponds precisely to the portion of Americans classified as "idiots, imbeciles and morons" by the medical establishment.

Coincidence?

No way. 

So I guess we shouldn't judge the people lining up for tests in Atlanta.

They can't help it.

They're buffoons.