Capitalism

Dear Friends and Followers:

Big Dope made me sit through a political speech recently in which a candidate hinted that, if elected, he would work to eliminate any regulation of the environment. Today I ran across this photo of the public drinking water in Charleston, West Virginia—a result of what you call “unfettered capitalism,” in which those of the libertarian faith so strongly believe.

 

I was confused.

So, I sought out the advice of some of your great thinkers (and some not so great, perhaps). Anyway, a sampling:

“I certainly have some very strong libertarian leanings, yes.” – Clarence Thomas

“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.” – James Madison

“To waste, to destroy our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed.” ―Theodore Roosevelt

"… if the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man." – Albert Einstein

“Capitalism actually encourages morality because capitalism can't function well if people can't trust each other and people aren't honest, if a deal isn't a deal.” - Rick Santorum

“This American system of ours, call it Americanism, call it capitalism, call it what you will, gives each and every one of us a great opportunity if we only seize it with both hands and make the most of it.” – Al Capone

I am more confused than ever. Can someone help?

Your friend,

C.W.

Don't forget to check out Big Dope's book, The Charmed Time.

176. Rain

C.W. was in a rare pensive mood. It was raining and rain makes him homesick I think. He says it rains more or less constantly on his home planet of Falloonia, a fact which supports my belief that his actual “shape” is closer to what we would call an aquatic creature than a human-based form. Today though, he chose the shape of the young student he likes so well. He is the one who can swing between being delightfully inquisitive and a totally pain in the keester, sometimes in the same sentence.

Now, he was turned on the couch with his chin resting on its back. He was staring into the dark morning listening to the rain. Without moving, he said, “How long is it going to rain?”

I looked up from my book, thought, and said, “How the hell should I know?”

“Will it rain for 40 days and 40 nights, do you suppose?”

“I doubt it. Why?”

“Just wondering,” he said. “It did once you know. All over the world. At the same time.”

I said, “According to numerous myths.”

“No, according to your Bible.”

“Have you been studying religion again?”

“It drowned everyone except one family,” he said, ignoring me.

“And one pair of each species,” I said. “Including a pair each of more than 50,000 species of beetles and with tigers and wildebeests bunked side by side for several months.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Kinda neat, huh?”

“Very neat,” I said. I returned to my book.

“But,” he said and I knew it was coming. “All of the precipitation that falls originates as water vapor that has evaporated from the surface of the Earth.”

“Sounds right,” I said, silently hoping for the miracle of peace and quiet since it was an awfully good book I was reading.

No such luck. “So where did all the water come from?”

I said, “In myths, one can make up the pre-existence of water.”

“Did all the little children that didn’t belong to the chosen family drown? That doesn’t seem fair.”

“Myths don’t have to pass any test of moral fairness and they often don’t.”

“Why do you call it a myth?”

I closed my book and said, “Because the story of a world-wide flood appears in many cultures, even Chinese, going back as far as 4,000 years B.C.E.”

“Before the common era,” he said as if explaining something to himself.

“Yes.” I opened my book again.

“Benjy Shanon’s daddy is a preacher and he says his flood really happened and you are going to hell if you don’t agree.”

“I thought Benjy Shanon’s daddy worked on a county road crew.”

“He does, but he preaches too.” He resumed listening to the rain. “Matter can neither be created nor destroyed,” he said.

I said, “That’s interesting. Did you learn that in school?”

He paid no attention to my question, but said, “So where did all the water go after everybody drowned?

Didn't one of your military officers make the comment
during the Vietnam War that "The only way to save that
village was to destroy it? Must be a cultural thing. - C.W.

“It went up Benjy Shanon’s dad’s …” I stopped myself. “I told you it was a myth, a myth designed to establish hierarchies, a myth used to explain things before we had science, a myth designed to keep social groups in line.” I stopped and made myself relax. “So why don’t you read a book or just contemplate nature?”

“May I pray for you?”

“Pray do,” I said. “Just do it silently.”

Outside it continued to rain.

153. Worries

“Your species sure has a lot of things to worry about. I’m compiling a list for the Falloonian Elders. What a mess.”

I couldn’t disagree, although this was coming from the mouth of a comely young lady who appeared to be on the verge of childbirth. That is to say, it was the Alien himself, or herself, in this case, it having joined me on my walk through the park.

“You are right,” I said. It is disturbing if you think about it.”

“Oh, I do,” she said. “I think about it even more now.” She patted her belly.

“One would think so,” I said, playing along with the scenario.

“I’m having a baby, you know.”

“I had guessed as much.”

“I want to have several.”

“Good luck with that.”

“But the news worries me.”

“That seems natural. There are certainly things in our future that should concern us.”

“Oh? What’s bugging you in particular?”

I looked at her. “Well, the planet will start to run out of drinking water during that one’s lifetime.”

She stopped and turned to me with a look of total shock. “Who says so?”

“The world’s scientists,” I said.

She relaxed, “Oh them.”

“Yes them, the ones who also say our planet is in the process of frying.”

“Don’t you worry about them. That’s all just stuff they say to scare us.”

“Who told you that?”

“It’s on the news every night. You just have to watch the right channel.”

I was confused. “I thought you were worried about things.”

“Oh I am,” she said. “But real things, not that sort of stuff.”

“Like what, then?”

“You silly. No wonder everyone calls you ‘Big Dope,’ the way you act.”

“You’re the only one who calls me that,” I said. “Other than my wife. But anyway, what things are bothering you?”

“Well, for one thing, we still don’t know who killed President Kennedy.”

This time it was I who stopped. “Uh, yes we do. It was Lee Harvey Oswald.”

“Well that’s what they want you to think.”

I sighed.

“So what real things do you worry about?” She said. She looked at me with a blank look on her face.

“Well,” I said. “In addition to the ever-increasing likelihood of a nuclear weapon falling into the hands of terrorists, there is the matter of the Amazon rainforest.”

Her look changed to one of suspicion. “What about it?”

“Other than it cools the entire planet by one or two degrees, Celsius, or that one-fifth of the world’s fresh water flows through it, or that it absorbs 300 million tons of carbon dioxide per year?”

“And? What’s your point?”

“It could disappear by the year 2080, according to some estimates,” I said. I gestured toward her protruding stomach.”

“Oh, fol de rah,” she said. “Here’s what’s really got me worried.” She pointed to a newsstand where the daily posted a headline announcing that another state (not ours) had approved same-sex marriages.

“This worries you?”

“Do you think I want my little boy to marry another little boy?”

“Wouldn’t you, if it made him happy?”

“He’ll be happy about things I tell him to be happy about,” she said, snipping her words.

“Well he couldn’t be happy about the possibility that there won’t be any middle class in his America.”

“There you go again, worrying about silly things while there are real concerns.”

Don't you worry about the Amazon Rainforest.
By the time it is gone, I'll be basking in the
tropical sun at my cabin in northern Manitoba. - C.W.

“Such as?”

“Buy me this newspaper and I’ll show you.”

“Show me what?”

“Wanda Sue may have been kicked off American Idol last night.”

152. Selections

“It always amazes me,” C.W. said looking up with a confused look. He likes to assume the shape of an elderly woman in the morning when he reads the news. “Doesn’t it you?”

I was working on the computer and had no clue as to what she was referring.

“I’ve tried to figure it from several angles,” she said. “It never makes sense.”

 

I gave up. “What’s troubling you, my child?” I said. That kind of tone aggravates him when he has assumed this particular shape.

“This,” she said, thrusting a newspaper in front of me and pointing a long slender feeling at a front-page article.

It was a report of a massive storm in the Midwest. A photo featured a family huddled together amidst a field of debris. The caption identified them as among the survivors and quoted one as saying, “Someone was watching over us, for sure. He saw that our home was spared.”

She tapped the photo. “Who was that someone?”

It was not a question that sought information. It was an attempt to start an argument.

“I dunno. One of the ‘American Idol’ judges?”

“You are so cute,” she said. “How many people died in this storm?”

“Several dozen.”

“And how many homes were destroyed?”

“Several hundred.”

“And someone chose this family to be spared?”

“Your words, not mine.”

“So how was the selection process determined?”

“C.W.?”

“Yes.”

“Shut up.”

“Not much of an explanation, young man.”

“It’s the best I can do this early in the morning.”

“So let me get this straight.”

“Pray do.”

She folded the newspaper. “Your species has selected a worship figure that sends storms across a neighborhood, destroying homes and killing men, women, and children.”

“It happens. Weather can be a cruel partner.”

“But in midst of all this,” she said. “This omnipotent deity suddenly picks one family and preserves it among all the carnage?”

“According to the newspaper.”

She sighed. “If you were doing the selecting, would you choose me?”

“For what?”

“As the one to be saved.”

Oh dear friends, you can only imagine the effort with which I bit my tongue.

“I don’t think I would want to be put in that position,” I said.

“So you would allow nature to take its course?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then the survivors couldn’t credit you with saving them.”

Disasters can bring out the best in your species. On some
of the dying planets I visit, the community-at-large,
what you call 'Government,' isn't willing to
help the victims of Nature's fury. - C.W.

“Oh, I suppose they could if they wished.”

“Then the victims’ families could blame you with equal justification?”

“Go to hell,” I explained as I rose to get another cup of coffee.

“I am so fortunate,” she said as she looked wistfully out the window.

“Why?”

“I could have been selected to observe a less fascinating species. What a tragedy that would have been.”