Kiner's Korner

This week began with the shocking death of Philip Seymour Hoffman.  He was, of course, one of those folks frequently short-listed for the title "Greatest Actor of His Generation," and we will not soon see his like again.  The week ended, though, with another death, much less shocking and much less generally noticed, but sadder on a personal level: the passing of Ralph Kiner and. with him, of a distinctive part of my youth.

Kiner was a Hall-of-Fame baseball player, primarily with the Pittsburgh Pirates in the late 1940's and early 1950's.  Over a playing career abbreviated by persistent back injuries, Kiner was one of the most fearsome power hitters in the game.  But of course, he played his last game fifteen years before I was born.  So to me, and probably to a majority of baseball fans alive today, Ralph Kiner was not primarily a superstar slugger but was, instead, the television voice of the New York Mets.  From their almost satirical entry into the National League in 1962, through their miraculous 1969 season, and more than 40 more years of triumph and haplessness--OK, mostly haplessness--Ralph Kiner was the somewhat drab but always professional play-by-play man in the broadcast booth--and as such was someone with whom I spent an inordinate amount of time beginning in the mid-1980s.

Back in those days, my metabolism was such that I could polish off a pint of Haagen-Dazs peach ice cream virtually every night of the baseball season--from April to October--and still weigh about 140 pounds soaking wet come Halloween.  And the soundtrack to these ice cream binges, whenever the Mets were on channel nine (WOR Secaucus, NJ), was good ol' Ralph Kiner, ably complemented by the color commentary of Tim McCarver (not yet the official voice of Major League Baseball).  The results of those games were often nowhere near as sweet as the dessert, I'm sad to say.

Rest in peace, Ralph.  The games won't be the same without you.

Citizens of the World, Mourn!

Garry Davis has died.  No, not the lead singer for Deep Purple (I thought so, too).  No, in fact, Davis was an American World War II veteran who in 1948 "entered the American Embassy in Paris, renounced his American citizenship and, as astonished officials looked on, declared himself a citizen of the world."  Davis subsequently became recognized as "the dean of the One World movement, a quest to erase national boundaries that today has nearly a million adherents worldwide."  The idea was that the fundamental causes of war all boil down to territorial or nationalistic disputes between countries; hence, no nations = no wars.  Basically, this is also the premise of "Independence Day," only without the threat of intergalactic annihilation.

Davis established the "World Government of World Citizens" 60 years ago.  He also campaigned for the position of President of the World several times, and, since he ran unopposed, I assume he won.  For the most part, other countries ignored the "World Government," although a handful of countries do recognize passports issued to "World Citizens" as legitimate documents.  If you should happen to be in the market for a "World" passport, you can get one; you just pay a fee: $45 for a three-year passport or $400 for a 15-year passport.  That fundamental "logic" of that fee structure, by the way, clearly establishes the "World Government's" bureaucratic bona fides.

The Solipsist Reads the Paper (So You Don't Have To)

Buried in a report about the Nemocalypse battering the Northeast was this little tidbit: "Maine declared a partial emergency, allowing it to suspend federal transportation rules, extend worker hours and bring in extra crews from Canada to assist with storm damage repair."

Dear Maine, I know you're digging out from snowfalls of biblical proportions, but don't be snowblind to the dangers posed by "well-meaning" Canadians!  Once these subversive maple-suckers gain a toehold in American soil, there's no telling where they'll stop!  This time next year, we could all be sucking on Molsons and acting politely to each other!  I urge all my Maine readers to resist the Canadian surge.  And in case I have no Maine readers, I encourage my followers around the Northeast to form a human microphone (a la Occupy Wall Street) to scream this warning to our for-the-moment compatriots in the Lobster State (or whatever).

Of course, if the Canadians DO manage to infiltrate America, we may just be able to sic a few drones on 'em.  During confirmation hearings for John Brennan as CIA director, the nominee revealed that the Obama administration has discussed the feasibility of creating a special court (along the lines of the FISA court, which currently rules on the admissibility of wiretapping) that would hear arguments about whether an individual--particularly an American citizen--could be targeted for drone-strikes.

Personally, if I were a judge, you could not PAY me to sit on such a court! I would TOTALLY do it for free!  I mean, come on!  "How was your day, Dear?"  "Oh, not bad.  Had a few meetings.  Lunch with Roger.  Authorized death from above."  How cool would that be?

I probably wouldn't last long in the job, though.  I think the administration would grow tired of my compulsion to include on all my orders lines from the movie "300" or pseudo-Schwarzeneggerian sign-offs: "Hasta la vista, terrorists!  You have not a REMOTE chance of avoiding being DRONED und CRATERED!"

Another article profiles the teenager who unwittingly helped ignite the Syrian revolts that have so far left thousands dead and hundreds pf thousands displaced.  The teenager (whom the paper does not name, for obvious reasons) inspired rebellion when he was arrested and tortured for participating in the relatively innocuous "crime" of anti-regime graffiti: "He watched his cousin spray-paint the wall of a school in the city of Dara’a with a short, impish challenge to President Bashar al-Assad, a trained ophthalmologist, about the spreading national revolts.

“'It’s your turn, doctor,' the cousin wrote."

All I can say is, an opthalmologist AND a sadistic dictator?  SOMEBODY had quite the "Tiger Mom."

An increasingly popular app called Snapchat combines the availability of instantaneous chatting provided by Facebook and Twitter with the ephemerality of those dissolving cassettes at the beginning of every episode of "Mission: Impossible."  It seems that people--especially younger folks--are growing weary of having every youthful indiscretion stored indefinitely on the world's servers.  Snapchat messages and pictures automatically self-delete after a set period of time, encouraging people to express themselves more revealingly than they might do on a less transitory platform.  I think this is a great idea, and I am already developing the app that I think will be the logical successor to Snapchat: I call it, "Talking to People."

In New York, the Department of Homeless Services is paying landlords thousands of dollars to rent rooms that would normally go for a few hundred.  I would hereby like to officially offer up my spare bedroom (formerly known as SOS's room) for use by New York's Department of Homeless Services.

Finally, John Karlin, formerly of Bell Labs, has died.  Actually, he died on January 28.  I guess the Times delayed the announcement of Karlin's death to spare his family the crush of paparazzi that would otherwise have surely disrupted his funeral.

Who was John E. Karlin, you ask?  (Don't pretend you know!)  He was a pioneer in the field of industrial psychology, the study of the way that human beings interact on a psychological and emotional level with technology.  The study of the way people interact physically with technology is known as ergonomics--or Japanese pornography.

Anyway, we largely have Karlin to thank for the layout of the touch-tone phone and its many descendants.  Much time was spent deciding, for example, the appropriate size of the buttons, as well as their layout: lower numbers on top vs. lower numbers on bottom, that kind of thing.  All I can say is, I'm glad Karlin's team rejected the proposed "QWERTY" keypad (or, more accurately, "KWERTY"), which would have had the top row go 5-9-3 and placed the "star" key (which even then nobody had a use for) where the seven is today.  Rest in Peace, Mr. Karlin.  To hear a eulogy, please press the pound key or remain on the line.

The Nation Mourns

I joined Facebook in April 2009.  Shortly thereafter, I joined a group called "Writer's Dock Party," thinking my creation and maintenance of this blog qualified me for membership.  Another WDP-er contacted me and asked what kind of stuff I wrote.  I explained that I wasn't really a "writer," per se: just a writing teacher with a blog that I had started as an effort to "practice what I preached."  She asked for the link, I provided it, and, after reading a few of the posts, wrote back with a resounding "Wow."  I think she became my first non-relative follower (FOS doesn't count; he's family).  A friendship was born.  Today, however, came news that Janet Woodard Rollstin ("JWR" to as she signed her comments) has passed away.

It's odd to mourn someone you've never actually met. Such is the nature of friendship, though, in the era of Facebook.  No longer constrained by geography, we can now form relationships over vast distances based on affinity--and appreciation for another's support.  Indeed, when JWR--a fine writer in her own right--told me she liked what I wrote, it came as welcome validation--even if it did nothing to cure my occasionally inflated sense of self-regard.  The sadness one feels at the passing of a virtual friend is a small price to pay for the sense of connection with a kindred spirit.

To Janet's family and friends (both physical and virtual), I extend my condolences.  The flag of Solipsist Nation flies at half-mast for one of our first followers and most faithful readers.  Godspeed, JWR.

He Did Good

Ask a five-year-old who the President is, and, since she has not yet suffered much the indignities of the American educational system, she will most likely answer "Barack Obama."  Moreover, if you ask who will be President next year and the year after and the year after that--and into thescarcely imaginable future--she may well say "Barack Obama."  To this child, the very concept of "President" may always, for better or worse, be "Barack Obama."  Why wouldn't it be?  What other reference point does she have?  And so it was for me and my generation of New Yorkers, for whom the mayor was and would always be Edward I. Koch, who died early this morning at the age of 88.

Obviously, the toughest job in American politics is President, but New York City Mayor must be a close second.  After all, New York's population (approximately eight million) is larger than that of 38 of 50 states.  The city is the financial and cultural capital of the nation (oh, Los Angeles, you wish!), and with its wide-ranging ethnic and socio-economic diversity, the city is a fair microcosm of America as a whole.  Second toughest job?  Heck, New York Mayors deal with the same tsuris as American Presidents, but they get nowhere near the perks: No Secret Service.  No Air Force One. No droit du seigneur with their choice of Nebraska farmgirls.  (Oh, you KNOW it's true!)  You need to be a special kind of crazy to occupy Gracie Mansion.

Koch, with his tradmark greeting of "How'm I doing?," certainly had his idiosyncrasies.  How many New York mayors inspire Broadway musicals?  Okay, two (Koch and Fiorello LaGuardia)--which should give you some idea of how wacky the position really is!  I once flipped through a book of the "wit and wisdom of Ed Koch" (the title of which was not--unlike a similarly titled book about George W. Bush--meant ironically).  Once, during a debate, after his opponent delivered a lengthy opening statement, Koch looked up and said, "Y'know what?  You're right."  A wise man knows how not to waste time.

I admit, my impression of Koch lacks sophistication.  He served as mayor from 1978 through the end of 1989, spanning the bulk of my childhood, most of which was spent in blissful ignorance of matters political.  I'm sure folks like MOS could provide a more nuanced view of Hizzoner's strengths and weaknesses.  His tenure was not without its share of problems and controversies.  Crime, racial unrest, the crack epidemic--all part of the background noise of life in New York City in the late 70's and 80's.  Still, that was my childhood, so forgive me my nostalgia.

In American elections, we hear frequently that voters yearn for candidates who have character.  In New York City, though, the electorate demands a mayor who IS a character.  In that respect, Ed Koch exemplified the position.  He cast a new mold for New York's chief executive.  Everyone since has only tried, with greater or lesser degrees of success, to fill it.



NOTE: This post has been corrected to reflect the correct dates of Koch's mayoralty.  He was NOT, in fact, mayor during the 1820's.