Our Caligula

I judge you harmful and cruel, selfish and conceited, but I cannot hate you since I believe you’re unhappy.

— Albert Camus, Caligula

Caligula, Rome's emperor from 37 to 41 AD, was so capricious and cruel that his name became synonymous with despot.

Infamous for his misdeeds, Caligula humiliated enemies, butchered allies, plundered the treasury, chased after vanities, and even declared himself a god. While wallowing in vice and luxury, he taunted and tormented those who served him, dressing in weird costumes and staging vast orgies with senators' wives. 

His favorite expression was, "I have the right to do anything to anybody.”

But Caligula discovered he did not have that right. After four years on the throne, he was assassinated by the head of the Praetorian guard. A Roman historian said, "Caligula learned by experience he was not a god.”

We have our own, home-grown Caligula.

In his four years on the throne, he too humiliated enemies, plundered the treasury, dabbled in vanity projects, and tormented the people around him—all the while wallowing in luxury.

So, like a modern-day Praetorian guard, we deposed him.

I've been bellyaching about Donald Trump since January 1, 2017. It's been wearying to have had him around.

 

Like the majority of Americans, I wish now he'd simply vanish from the earth.

Though he's harmful and cruel, selfish and conceited, we cannot hate him, because we know he's unhappy.

But we can hate the sight of him, and the sound of his despotic voice.

Factory Seconds

Serious flaws in manufacturing result in a product that's unusable, but smaller flaws may only represent an inconvenience.

— Fred Decker

When I was a kid, I was fascinated by factory seconds, those flawed products sold at discount.

They represented to me a brute fact of life: namely, that adults would do anything for profit, even if they looked foolish and incompetent.

To err is human, I understood; but to sell errors was—cheesy.

Six decades later, I'm less critical of manufacturers and retailers who monetize boo-boos. After all, caveat emptor.

I also accept another brute fact of life: we're all ourselves factory seconds.

Something went seriously amiss in quality control the day they released each of us into the world.

And when someone neglects or disappoints or crosses me, I try to take a deep breath and remind myself, "he's flawed, yes; but his flaws only represent an inconvenience."

Minding Your Business

 

Wish not so much to live long as to live well.

— ​Poor Richard’s Almanack


Science and medicine can help us live longer, but not necessarily better.


To live well you must mind your business.


The original penny-pincher Ben Franklin understood the importance of minding your business.


When he designed the back of the US' first penny, he included that motto and an ovaloid sundial—a sharp reminder that "time flies." (Coin collectors call Franklin's penny the Fugio, Latin for "to flee.")


Time indeed flies, Franklin wished us to know, and you'll never live well unless you mind—that is, take care of—your business.


But what is your business, when the whole world conspires to call you "retired," the filthiest word in our language?


The answers to that question are many and varied.


Some retired people find second-act professions. 


They reinvent themselves full bore, emerging butterfly-like as entrepreneurs, investors, philanthropists, consultants, writers, publishers, artists, filmmakers, musicians, tutors, teachers, hoteliers, tour operators, historians, farmers, florists, sailors, carpenters, clerics, and chefs.

Others become daycare providers, gardeners, world travelers, or pilgrims; join nonprofit boards; start a "mastermind" networking group; or enroll in the Peace Corps.


Some run for office; some are consumed by a sport or hobby; and some quickly "boomerang," returning to their former jobs.


But many retired people don't mind their business. 


They putter all day, watch TV, surf the web, yak on the phone, read the paper, and take long naps.


How sad!

The world's your oyster. 

Are you minding your business?

Coup

Trump boasted Sunday he tried to overturn the 2020 election.

While our first president to stage a coup, Trump is by no means the first plutocrat to do so.

That dishonor is shared by the leaders of the American Liberty League, a cabal of CEOs that included J.P. Morgan, Jr., Irénée du Pont, Robert Clark, and the then-heads of General Motors, General Foods, and Birds Eye.

The year was 1933. The target was FDR.

Inaugurated in March, FDR had promised a "New Deal" to help lift the nation out of depression. A boon to working men and women, as well as the unemployed, the New Deal incensed the nation's CEOs, who labelled the patrician FDR a "tyrant" and "traitor to his class."

FDR wasn't in office month when the Liberty League sprang into action. 

It plotted to recruit a popular Marine Corps general, Smedley Butler, to lead a half million angry veterans in a march on Washington, with the goal of removing FDR from the White House at the barrel of a gun. 

The League's leaders were ready to spend $30 million to supply the veterans Remington Rifles—the equivalent of $500 million today.

But General Butler, a patriot, would have none of it and exposed the League's plot to the FBI. He also shared before a Congressional committee the details of what the newspapers called the "Wall Street putsch."

The Congressional committee's final report, delivered 11 months after FDR's inauguration, stated that the committee had "received evidence showing that certain persons had made an attempt to establish a fascist organization in this country.

"There is no question that these attempts were discussed, were planned, and might have been placed in execution when and if the financial backers deemed it expedient."

Thirty-four years later, the committee chair, Rep. John McCormack, told a reporter, "We were in the depths of a severe depression, and we had a good man, Roosevelt, in the White House. 

"The plotters definitely hated the New Deal because it was for the people, not for the moneyed interests, and they were willing to spend a lot of their money to dump Mr. Roosevelt. 

"If General Butler had not been the patriot he was, and if they had been able to maintain secrecy, the plot certainly might very well have succeeded."

HAT TIP: Thanks to Ann Ramsey for pointing me to this forgotten bit of history.

Impressed

"I'm impressed."

With snark being our default reaction to everything, perhaps we don't say it often enough.

The verb impress, meaning "to have a strong effect on the mind," entered English in the 14th century.

Its root was the Latin impressus, meaning "stamped," "indented," or "imprinted."

A marvelous event impressed you, stamping its mark on your mind.

A second, less joyous meaning of the verb arose two centuries later.

During wars in the 16th century, when the king needed to fill the ranks of the Royal Navy, he would press seafarers—usually sailors with the merchant fleet—into naval service. 

The king in fact claimed the permanent right to impress sailors any time he chose.

To do so, he would dispatch "press gangs" to roam the coastal towns. The press gangs were little more than bands of brutal thugs, led by ruthless naval officers. Often they'd snatch any man they spotted—regardless of seafaring experience.

To be "impressed"—a fearsome event—meant to be "kidnapped into the service."

The practice of impressing men into the Royal Navy lasted well into the 19th century, when crown service was made voluntary.