A Deeply Flawed Vessel

When Richard Nixon ran for president in 1968, many Americans were suspicious of him.  Watergate was still in the future, but the idea that one would not want to buy a used car from him has an article of liberal faith.  With his five o’clock shadow and communist hunting past, he could surely not be trusted.

Nonetheless, despite an ignominious loss in running for California’s governor, we would soon have Tricky Dick to kick around again.  Years of war and racial tension made him the candidate of law and order—which a great many voters found appealing.

Similarly, when Ronald Reagan ran for president in 1980, many Americans were suspicious of him.  He was a cowboy actor who would shoot up the world because he was too dim to understand the consequences.  All that conservative rhetoric was unambiguous evidence of mental incapacity.

And yet Reagan would win his election.  This time voters were tired of a raging inflation and humiliation at the hands of Iranian fanatics.  They too wanted a return to law and order.  Reagan might be an unknown quantity, but he espoused traditional values.

Now we have Donald Trump running for president.  The electorate likewise suspects him of serious flaws.  Indeed I am one of them.  Trump is a fulminating narcissist with a limited grasp of international politics or domestic policy.  Moreover, compared with his predecessors, he is vulgar and shallow.

But can he make a decent president?  This is a question we must soon answer.

Richard Nixon was an expert on foreign policy.  He put this capability to the test by ending the Viet Nam War and opening diplomatic relations with China.  While he might not be likable, on this level, he knew what he was doing.

Meanwhile Ronald Reagan was conversant with conservative economic and political thinking.  His critics believed him an empty suit, but he actually wrote many of his most important speeches.  Hence when the time came, he knew the policies he wanted and had the courage to implement them.

Although Nixon was driven from office, both he and Reagan accomplished much of their agendas.  Now Trump presents himself as the candidate of law and order.  With the world aflame and our streets awash with distrust and division, this is, in fact, an attractive platform.

But can he deliver?  His enthusiasts believe he is a practical man.  They insist that he is a doer who will learn on the job.  In their eyes, he is not a loose cannon, but a fearless opponent of political correctness.  He will thus identify our enemies for what they are.

Yet is this enough?  Will a man who insisted on running his own political campaign listen to advisors more experienced than himself?  Trump asserts that he can.  His choice of Mike Pence as a running mate suggests this is possible.

After all, Chester Arthur, when he succeeded to the office of president after the assassination of James Garfield, was regarded as a political hack.  Until this point, he had been little more than a bagman for the New York State political bosses.  Even so, he grew in office.

Might the same be true of Donald Trump?  Would the responsibilities incumbent upon him have a sobering effect?  We cannot be sure.  Trump is undoubtedly a flawed vessel.  He does not possess the virtues of a Nixon or Reagan.  But does he possess compensatory qualities?

At this point, I do not know.  He was never my choice for chief executive.  However the alternative is Hillary Clinton.  She is not only a fatally flawed candidate, but a much more thoroughly vetted one.  Her limitations are not only known, they are deeply entrenched.

So the issue is this: Shall it be the devil we know or the devil we don’t know?  Is the possibility of Trumpean law and order sufficient to cancel out the possibility of Trumpean chaos?  Neither Nixon nor Reagan blew the world up.  Would Trump?

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University

Innocents Abroad

Samuel Clemens might have been a Missouri boy, but he was also a world traveler.  One of his first assignments as Mark Twain was to accompany a group of American pilgrims to the Holy Land and to report back on their progress.  His account was eventually published as “Innocents Abroad.”

My wife and I have also ventured across the Atlantic.  We recently returned from a cruise around the Baltic.  Aside from encountering cold and rainy weather the whole way, we also had our innocence tested.  No doubt we were less naïve than Twains companions, but we too were in for surprises.

First, on the airline trip over, we had a discussion with a Dutch national who had lived many years in the U.S.  When I explained how uncomfortable I had been during a bicycle trip through the Netherlands a half century ago, he empathized.  Yes, he agreed, Holland was windy and the bike paths had been paved with brutal cobblestones.

But those days, he continued, were long gone.  The Dutch remained fond of their bicycles, yet those paths had been smoothed over.  These vehicles were, as we soon discovered, still very much in use—with Dutch households owning an average of three.

We also found that the Dutch had grown taller since my previous visit.  Back in the 1960’s, the Americans and Scandinavians were celebrated for their height.  Today it is the Netherlanders who are the tallest folks in Europe.  Many of their young people tower over visitors from the States.

Given their cardiovascular exercise and a nutritious diet, they evidently shot up, whereas we Americans expanded from side to side.  Clearly a regime of herring and vegetables (which is what we were told they eat) is good for one’s health.

The Dutch have also modernized in ways that suggest a future advocates for a higher minimum wage will not like.  These industrious souls are in the process of automating whatever they can.  This was most apparent on our way home.

At Hartsfield International, when we checked in, a friendly attendant weighed our bags.  We joked with her about how much we were carrying and she confirmed that lifting all that luggage put a strain on her back.

Not so in Amsterdam.  They have a computerized machine that weighs the bags and, at the push of several buttons, prints out the necessary tags.  All we tourists had to do was figure out how the gizmo worked.

The same challenge presented itself after we navigated the check in process.  Although my wife and I looked around for a Dutch food vendor, the best we could manage was a McDonalds. 

The trouble was it too was automated.  Instead of a smiling face taking our order, we fumbled our way around a touch-screen device.  Still, after a few false starts, we succeeded in getting it to accept our credit card.  The only surprise was that it made us pay for our ketchup.

I remember when gas station attendants filled the tank and cleaned the windshield.  Now we take care of these chores for ourselves.  Soon, it appears, we will be doing the same for fast food.  Yet who would have thought the Dutch would get their first.

Nonetheless, those bicycles are not the wave of our future.  They may work in a small town like Amsterdam, but I am not about to make a twenty-mile commute to work on two wheels.  Nor would I relish doing so in the rain the way the Dutch routinely do.

Actually, the roadways around Kennesaw State University boast bicycle lanes.  These were supposed to promote energy sustainability.  Except no one uses them.  A tribute to wishful thinking, they are as useless as the showers KSU installed to allow bikers to clean up.

Progress, it seems, can be unpredictable.  It is hard to tell where it will show up or what form it will take.  Certainly we can learn from Europe, but not all of their practices will—or should—take root here.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University

Traditional Values

When I asked my grandfather what it felt like to be old, he replied that he still felt like teenager on the inside.  Now that I am older than he was at the time, I know exactly what he was talking about.  This includes feeling the same way about what is right and wrong.

Every now and then, I am told that this makes me old-fashioned.   If so, I embrace the label.  Some things do not go out of fashion and morality is—or should be—one of them.   We may need to adjust it occasionally, but we should never throw it out wholesale.

One of the things I like about living in the South is that some of the old ways survive.  Politeness is still considered a virtue and the young continue to be taught to respect the old.  Mind you, southerners are no more moral than folks from other parts of the country.  They are just less likely to celebrate their transgressions.

Decades ago, when I was living in New York, I remember be told that it was silly to reprimand the young for violating the rules.  They weren’t going to listen anyway.  In fact, were they rebuked, they might do wrong simply to annoy their elders.

The idea was that if we tolerated casual sex, pot smoking, and cursing a blue streak, adolescents would eventually tire of being contrary.  Sooner or later they would settle down and support the time-tested truisms.

Well the generation that experienced this permissiveness has now reached maturity and it continues its coarse lifestyle.  Divorce is rationalized, dishonesty is accepted as the norm, and out-of-wedlock parenthood is regarded as a personal choice.

Individual responsibility is treated as a concept that comes straight out of the Dark Ages.  Whenever people do something malicious, it is obviously not their fault.  They are merely reflecting the corruption of the larger society.  It is therefore up to others to be their keepers.

Yet what happens if nobody is willing to be anyone’s keeper?  What if we depend upon the government to prevent nastiness, but it is unable to do so?  Then again, how could it, when those who administer it are as bereft of traditional values as those they govern?

Just look at Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.  Does anyone regard them as paragons of virtue?  Have they lived up to, or are they living up to, the traditional values?  If anyone answers yes to this question, I plan to hold onto my wallet when in their presence.

Donald’s marital history is scarcely exemplary, while Hillary’s husband had a problem with bimbo explosions that his wife blandly covered up.  Neither, of course, is admired for honesty, with both possessing a history of shady business dealings.  Each may, in fact, be guilty of criminal activity.

Nothing new here folks—right?  What is new is that one of them is liable to be elected president.  Oh sure, we have had immoral chief executives before.  But have we ever consciously voted for one?

What is radically unprecedented is that so many ordinary people are utterly tolerant of this sort of depravity.  They have been told to be nonjudgmental and have taken this to heart.  Rather than be unkind to anyone, they stand around and allow others to be as cruel as they want to be.

The moment we heard about Hillary’s machinations with a private server, her political aspirations should have been over.  The second that Donald used gutter language to insult an opponent; his campaign should have been history.  That this did not occur is more our fault than theirs.

Morality is never automatic.  The temptation to violate its strictures is universal.  But the traditional values became traditional because we upheld them.  That we no longer do is more than an affront to tradition.  It is proof that our moral benchmarks have eroded.

As for me, I will continue to be old-fashioned.  If those who believe in being non-judgmental find this offensive, I advise them to stop judging me!

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University

Social Change and Our Emotions

To paraphrase Mark Twain, everybody talks about social change, but no one does anything about it.  Both liberals and conservatives routinely tell us that they want change.  They insist that once they are in power, everything will be better.  Then, once they get there, it is business as usual.

Consider Donald Trump.  He says he will make America great again.  In other words, he will make us more of what we once were.  Immigrants will be excluded from our shores, while manufacturing jobs will return.  Nonetheless, this common sense version of America is merely a variation of a long-standing aspiration.

Consider Hillary Clinton.  She is going to make health care and education more affordable.  She will also increase the wages of the poor.  Her objective is to do so by making a bloated federal government even larger.  This will supposedly fill gaps in our national safety net.  In other words, she is a tinkerer, not a revolutionary.

Consider Barack Obama.  He was going to give us hope and change.  He would march into Washington and reconstruct it in his own enlightened image.  But what happened?  Even when he had total control over congress, the best he could muster were a collection of shovel ready jobs and a Gerry-built medical system.

Is this an accident?  Is there a reason why major changes seldom transpire?  In fact, people, for the most part, energetically resist significant transformations.  Although they say they want things to be different, when this ensues they are aghast.  Just as soon as they can, they push back against the unfamiliar.

How many times have we been told that we should think outside the box?  But when you do, don’t expect kudos.  If what you suggest is really different, you will be told that you are wrong.  You say the world is round; well, it is flat! 

For all the talk that we are rational creatures, we are actually quite emotional.  Important decisions are hardly ever made on the basis of facts and logic.  Critical choices derive far more frequently from deep-seated feelings.  Although we may not be aware of our sub-conscious affects, they habitually override analytical calculations.

Nor is this always bad.  If we were too easily swayed by novel arguments, we would routinely get into serious trouble.  We would jump to conclusions that seem to make sense without realizing that they leave out important facts.  With only what is on the surface is considered, subtle factors get ignored.

Think about ObamaCare.  Recall how all those brilliant economists and healthcare experts figured out, to the penny, who would benefit.  Then why did the exchanges that they put in place fail?  Or the deductibles on insurance policies soar?  Or millions of people lose their full time jobs?

Could the whizzes have been mistaken?  Indeed, how often are the experts wrong?  Did Medicare meet its cost projections?  Did the Soviet Union’s five-year plans vault its economy ahead of the rest of the world?  Did Mao Tse-Tung’s great leap forward bring progress?

Our emotions put a check on this sort of arrogance.  They are inherently conservative.  The way they may us feel is based on lessons learned by our communities, our remote ancestors, and us.  Their conclusions are then built into our guts and genes.  They thus incorporate information, only some of which is conscious.

Hence, were these lessons effortlessly disregarded, they could not warn of danger. Consider what would happen if we forgot that fire burns.  Imagine if, despite experiencing terrible pain when, as children, we put our hands in a flame, we years later did not remember how much this hurt.  How long do you think it would be before we burned ourselves to death?

Traditions and emotions matter because they provide essential knowledge—and do so tenaciously.  Yes, this can slow us down.  As a result, they may sometimes prevent us from making changes that we should make.  Nonetheless, they can also block us from walking off cliffs or too hastily embracing socialism.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University