Travel Blogging II

Kralendijk, Bonaire: This cruise we visit only A an B of the ABC islands (Aruba, Bonaire, and Curaçao). Yesterday was Aruba, today Bonaire. They were a former Dutch colony that still maintains close ties with the Netherlands, Bonaire more so than Aruba.

Tomorrow we are on to Grenada, site of a minor U.S. invasion some decades ago. Today Grenada is mostly known for hosting a medical school for would-be doctors who can’t get into the extremely selective med schools in the States. Hitting the books when hitting the beaches is nearby has to be hard.

We flew south from Pittsburgh to Ft. Lauderdale a few days ago, and have been cruising the Caribbean Sea since. The contrast between late autumn Pennsylvania and the same period in the Caribbean is dramatic.

That contrast is much greater than we’d experience going from northern CA to HI at the same time, nearly as much as the contrast at this time between WY and HI. Understanding the area’s draw on chilled northeasterners is a no-brainer – it's thawing out.

Having seen Aruba not long ago, we stayed aboard the ship when most folks went ashore. It is like having this large ship to ourselves, our own giant “yacht.” Actually, I like the “sea days” better than the “port days.”

We were on this ship two months ago for a Baltic Sea cruise plus trans-Atlantic crossing and in that two months the “feel” of the ship has changed substantially, for the worse. Same ship, different “feel” – go figure. Many of the personnel have turned over, gone home on leave or gone to other ships in the fleet. Of course it’s a different passenger “consist” too.

Travel Blogging I

It has been snowing lightly in Pittsburgh the last couple of days. Tomorrow we'll leave the cold and snow and fly to Fort Lauderdale where the weather will be warm and moist. I can hardly wait.

A fascinating thing about the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, it still runs the Mary Worth and Rex Morgan, M.D. soap opera comic strips. I would have guessed they no longer existed. I'd have been wrong - they do.

Makes me wonder if Terry and the Pirates or Smoky Stover still persist somewhere? How about Major Hoople?

The Great Fly-Over has a different culture than the coasts, friendlier and less distant. I begin to see why some people have moved here, in spite of the weather.

Gender Gap Revisited

Connie Cass, writing for Associated Press and sourced from the San Francisco Chronicle, talks about men being the swing voters, and swinging away from the Democrats. What I find fascinating about her column is that the gender gap between parties persists not just among whites, but also among blacks and Hispanics. In other words, it is a true gender gap irrespective of ethnicity.

Remember the campaign ad Team Obama ran called The Life of Julia, wherein the government helped a woman throughout her life? Perhaps the gender gap is women wanting government to provide what men once provided, and men not wanting to be supplanted by government programs.

It makes a sort of sense.

Terror in Poland

Not all terrorists are jihadists, some are just very angry members of the society they target. Think Timothy McVeigh in Oklahoma City, or Anders Behring Breivik in Norway.

Now it is Poland's turn to catch an angry Pole who was ready to try to destroy the Polish government with explosives. See the article in The National Interest, hat tip to RealClearWorld for the link.

With the U.S. population over 300 million evenly split politically, and some very angry partisans on both sides, it's a wonder we haven't had more domestic terrorists here.

Spain's Turn

The zeitgeist is one of countries breaking apart, ethnic groups wanting to go their own ways. Think Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and the Soviet Union for examples. Belgium and Canada are 'pending.'

Now it is the turn of Spain, where the Catalans and Basques are very near creating space between themselves and the Spanish body politic. See the article in The Independent (U.K.).

Makes one wonder who or what split is next.

Missing GOP Voters

Scott Johnson and John Hinderaker of the well-known Power Line blog write about  missing GOP voters\. That is, people who were expected to turn out and vote for Romney but didn't.

Their view is that the culture has turned these people against capitalism, the underlying economic philosophy of Republicans. If true, that is a very difficult barrier to leap over.

Unlike these authors, I wonder if Romney's association with Bain - a private equity firm - wasn't too exotic for these missing voters to understand. In other words, perhaps the role of private equity in cleaning up the "garbage" of free enterprise is too distasteful. See what you think.

A Cathedral of Learning

I've spent a lifetime in academia, and pretty much thought I knew a lot about it. However, on the campus of the University of Pittsburgh there is a building with a 40 story tower that looks like a Gothic cathedral, but isn't. I'd never heard of it.

The building is the Cathedral of Learning - Gothic architecture applied to a university building. It's the only Gothic building I've ever been in that was warm - the heater was running. The C of L contains classrooms, offices, and study areas on stone floors in vast, soaring spaces.

The Cathedral looks and feels like Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, from the Harry Potter series of books and films. I kept expecting to see a poster recruiting members for the Gobstones Club or the Quiddich team, or alternatively a monk in robe and sandals.

Go to the other DrC's blog (cruztalkingtwo@blogspot.com) to see photos of this amazing place. The bishop's chairs are elegant, I must have spent at least a half hour sitting in one, wishing I wore my academic robes. I have no priestly ambitions but I can imagine the dons of Oxford or Cambridge using these grand seats.

Various classrooms have been decorated to reflect the ethnic roots of American immigrants from various places in Europe and elsewhere. I particularly liked the ceilings in several of the rooms, like the German and Swedish classrooms - beautiful stuff. Of course, when what you're decorating is a working class or seminar room, the ceiling is the one thing you can be relatively certain the students can't deface so that may be where you put your effort and resources.

We toured the ground floor. Oddly, the rooms included two countries which no longer exist: Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. If you get to Pittsburgh, the University of Pittsburgh's Cathedral of Learning is worth a visit.

Too Broad a Brush

Senator Marco Rubio, speaking of the Obama worldview at the Republican convention, as quoted by Jay Nordlinger in National Review Online (scroll down):

These are tired and old big-government ideas that have failed every time and everywhere they have been tried. These are ideas that people come to America to get away from.

Cubans, si. Other Latin Americans, not so much.

Quote of the Day

Peggy Noonan, writing for The Wall Street Journal, about giving thanks:

Happy Thanksgiving to America—the great and fabled nation that is still this night the hope of the world.

Amen.

Crying for Argentina

For those of you who follow the sad downward spiral of Argentina, Jaime Daremblum has a good article in The Weekly Standard. As regular COTTonLINE readers know, we're observers of the self-destructive politics of that otherwise beautiful land.

President Kirchner's Peronism is a blend of socialism and fascism. Daremblum summarizes the anti-democratic behaviors of the Cristina Kirchner government, and the popular protests against them.

One is compelled to wonder if Argentina is headed for the same sort of middle-class revolution that overthrew leftest Chilean President Salvador Allende. A few years ago when the other DrC and I traveled in Argentina, I remember our decidedly middle-class guide saying he was paid in U.S. dollars, most of which he kept outside the country for safety.

What If China Fails?

Much foreign policy debate focuses on the future role of China as our next opponent in world geopolitics. Instead, try imagining that China could implode much as the Soviet Union did.

This article from The Diplomat, written by an Australian, wonders if China is equal to the challenges it faces in the coming decades. Implicitly, Michael Auslin doesn't think China has demonstrated the ability to adjust to its internal threats. The title is more exciting than the article, but the author raises some good questions about China's ability to cope with the issues it faces.

Coulter Defends Romney

Many in the GOP have been picking on Mitt Romney, saying he was a weak candidate. Not Ann Coulter. She normally does snark on people, but has written a good Townhall column in his defense.

I think most of what she writes in this column is fair and factual. Mitt gave it a heck of a try - deposing incumbent presidents is difficult and rarely successful, a point others have made.

Giving Thanks

Yesterday I sat through one of those friendly interrogations that precedes a major medical procedure, aimed at learning my relevant (and irrelevant) medical history. I presume they got what they needed to hear as the procedure went forward, we hope successfully.

What I got out of that interrogative experience was a realization of all the ills to which flesh falls heir; all the "uglies" I've managed to elude in a relatively long life. I've got a lot for which to be thankful - basically for good health, and for having parents who, in the words of Star Trek's Spock, "lived long and prospered."

Heredity is more important than commonly believed in health and longevity. So ... Thanks for long-lived parents and thanks for relatively healthy habits and a healthy occupation - professors tend to be both long-winded and long-lived. And thanks for a life spent mostly in rural CA, the best of both worlds - CA weather and scenery without the congestion, traffic and pollution.

Most important, thanks for the other DrC, my dear wife of 41+ years. She can do everything I can do except open stuck jar tops and back up a trailer, and she can do many things I cannot, all of them important.

Also thanks to the nice staff at UPMC-Presby (University of Pittsburgh - Presbyterian Hospital). Everyone there was super nice. They even have valet parking - love it.

I'm Baaaaack

As you can see on the other DrC's blog (cruztalkingtwo@blogspot.com), I've been doing things medical in Pittsburgh of all places. It turns out the University of Pittsburgh Medical School/Presbyterian Hospital complex rambles over several blocks and is indeed a big deal.

We were referred here from the west coast as this is the "place to go" for trigeminal neuralgia.  And yes, that is more or less what I look like, when slightly drugged - not my usual condition.

My posts may be somewhat sparse until the anesthesia wears off. Other than groggy, I feel the same as before, which outcome I've been told to expect as my treatment takes weeks-to-months to take full effect. It's a crap-shoot, but one with good odds in my favor. Wish me well (pun intended).

Kotkin Feeling Down

Demographer Joel Kotkin writes a gloomy column for New Geography wherein he predicts that California today models what Obama's nation will look like in relatively few years. Perhaps Joel forgot to take his Prozac or Paxil before sitting down to write.

I agree with him that President Obama would surely like to follow the California model. However, I think Kotkin overlooks forces in the opposite direction in places like Texas.

It is easy to get down about the results of the 2012 election. We need to remember that just two years ago we were celebrating the results of the 2010 election, which we won.

Perhaps Woody Allen was thinking about modern California when he said:

We stand today at a crossroads:
One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness.
The other leads to total extinction.
Let us hope we have the wisdom to make the right choice.

Gender Gap Deemphasized

Demographer Kay Hymowitz pokes around in the various groups that recently voted red or blue and asks some interesting questions. One of my favorites is this:

Whether younger voters are only temporary Democrats. If long-term trends continue, the large majority of Millennials will marry eventually. At that point, they may change their political habits and vote the way previous cohorts of married men and married women have. Or they may remain Democrats, representing a permanent generational shift. It’s an open question.

She speculates that gender is less important than other factors like ethnicity, marriage and age. Like many City Journal articles, this one is worth your time.

Hostess R.I.P.

Hostess, maker of Twinkies, Ho Hos, Ding Dongs, and other exemplars of tasty empty calories, is going to be liquidated out of bankruptcy as a result of failed labor relations. See the Associated Press story for more details.

It is probable that some existing firm will buy the right to manufacture and market the firm's signature products. "Probable" yes, but not for sure.

A new owner is likely to resume manufacturing without acquiring the firm's aging bakeries or hiring their laid-off workers, all 18,000 of them. Also affected will be some or all of the firm's retirees, number undisclosed.

That a majority of the members of one of Hostess' unions would vote to destroy the firm and their own jobs during a recession is not unique. It reminds me of the story of a frog and a scorpion who meet on the bank of the Suez Canal.

The scorpion cannot swim and begs a ride to the other side, the frog agrees and in midstream the scorpion stings him. As they both sink, the frog asks "Why did you sting me? Now we'll both die." To which the scorpion replies, "It's who I am."

For a look at the way the union and its workers view this issue, see an article in the Bangor Daily News. Wanna bet they wouldn't have voted to strike without 90 weeks of unemployment insurance waiting once the firm shuts down?

To Cheer You Up

Sean Trende of RealClearPolitics analyzes where the GOP stands today, looking at the House, the Senate, state governorships, and state legislatures. The Republicans control more than half the state governorships, more than half of the state legislatures, and more than half of the U.S. House of Representatives.

To be sure, they do not control the U.S. Senate or the presidency. Still, given all they do control, the present wailing and teeth-gnashing seems excessive, seems premature.

It is entirely too soon to begin writing the obituary of the Grand Old Party, although the MSM would like to do so. This article is worth your time.

Reevaluation

This Slate article about herbivores eating meat, on occasion, caused me to reevaluate an experience I'd had as a much younger person. The author describes offering a bite of grilled steak to a white tail deer at a campground, which offer was accepted with gusto.

My experience was quite different, let me explain. Years ago, when nearly everybody still smoked cigarettes, the DrsC were RVing with friends at Lassen Volcanic National Park in northern CA. 

A mooching deer was hanging around our campsite and one of our companions offered the doe an unlit cigarette. This she ate with gusto and came back for more. Eventually the doe ate up all the cigs we could spare. 

Out of cigs I offered the doe a slice of dry salami. Not only did she turn it down, she fled from our campsite at speed and did not return.

I always assumed she rejected eating meat. Having read the Slate article, I now believe she was driven away by the black pepper and other spices in the salami, not the meat. 

Who knew?

Hispanic Voting Myths

Steven Malanga is a senior editor of City Journal. He writes here on common misunderstandings about Hispanic voting.

First he notes that the large numbers of Hispanic residents do not translate into large numbers of votes:

One-third of adult Hispanics are not U.S. citizens and consequently can’t vote. Even Latinos who are citizens don’t vote as reliably as whites or blacks do, and as a result, their population growth rate doesn’t translate into commensurate voting power. According to U.S. Census data (snip) nearly half of the country’s adult whites participated in the 2010 elections; only 20 percent of adult Latinos did.

I particularly like Malanga's conclusion:

In most cases, income is a far better determinant of voting patterns than race is (blacks are an exception, for historical reasons). The voting of ethnic groups evolves significantly as their incomes change. The ancestors of millions of today’s ethnic voters came to America in the great immigration wave of the early twentieth century and voted reliably Democratic for generations. Over the last 30 years or so, their descendants’ voting allegiances shifted significantly. 

Jews are the other exception to Malanga's "income is a far better determinant of voting patterns" rule.

Perhaps Malanga's ancestors were among the early 1900s immigrants he describes. I recommend his article to you.