They all took Presidential oaths that required a do-over.
Inaugural verse: poetry and power all the way
I applaud yesterday’s attempt to inject poetry into the inaugural proceedings. But the poem that Elizabeth Alexander composed and read was trite, the sort of thing that helps me understand why many people decide they hate poetry.
When I took a look at the written text of the poem, it appears it’s close to being a prose poem—not that there’s anything especially wrong with that. But these sorts of lines don’t cut it for me as poetry:
We cross dirt roads and highways that mark the will of someone and then others who said, “I need to see what’s on the other side; I know there’s something better down the road.”
Reminds me of nothing other than that old chicken joke.
But perhaps I’m being too harsh towards Ms. Alexander, because in general, inaugural poetry is a very tough gig. Maya Angelou hardly did better in 1993, for example. The tendency is to go all grandiose and portentous. And even the very great poet Robert Frost (although Alexander and Angelou may be wonderful people, very great poets they are not) was somewhat defeated by the assignment back in 1961.
Those of us old enough to remember JFK’s inaugural recall the image of the elderly white-haired poet, faltering in the bright light, and reading (actually, as it turns out, reciting from memory, although we didn’t know that at the time) his poem “The Gift Outright:”
But that was an older poem, not the one composed for the occasion, the draft of which he was unable to see clearly enough to read it. Here is the text of the new poem, called “Dedication,” that he had composed in honor of the day.
I think we can safely say it is not among Frost’s greatest works (I think the same of “The Gift Outright,” by the way—although the latter is at least a good poem and “Dedication” really is not). “Dedication” suffers from the usual problem of being too long to sustain the interest of most people who are listening to it rather than reading it, and it’s almost light verse—Frost in his semi-Ogden Nash mode. The poem’s unabashed message of America being a force of power for good in the world, however, seems both archaic and also somewhat neoconnish.
Here’s the story of how Frost came to be the first poet to read at an inauguration. More than a year and a half before the election of 1960, he was on record as predicting that JFK would win, even though Kennedy had not yet formally declared himself a candidate:
Among the questions asked [of Frost] was one concerning the alleged decline of New England, to which Frost responded: “The next President of the United States will be from Boston. Does that sound as if New England is decaying?” Pressed to name who Frost meant, he replied: “He’s a Puritan named Kennedy. The only Puritans left these days are the Roman Catholics. There. I guess I wear my politics on my sleeve.”
A correspondence sprung up between the two, initiated by JFK. Frost also repeated his prediction many times in subsequent public appearances. Kennedy reciprocated by quoting Frost’s lines from “Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening” (“But I have promises to keep/And miles to go before I sleep”) at the close of some of his speeches. Then after the election, Kennedy invited Frost to read at the inauguration, and even offered the poet some editorial suggestions:
Kennedy asked if Frost planned to recite a new poem. If not, could he recite “The Gift Outright,” a poem Frost has called “a history of the United States in a dozen [i.e., sixteen] lines of blank verse.” Kennedy also requested changing the phrase in the last line to “such as she will become” from “such as she would become.” Frost agreed.
Frost died in January of 1963, so he did not live to see JFK’s assassination, which cut off the President’s life while he should have had miles to go before he slept. But before that, the two men had a few more dealings with each other.
Frost called on Kennedy to present him with a framed copy of “Dedication” and to give him some more advice: “Poetry and power is the formula for another Augustan Age. Don’t be afraid of power.”
Hmmm. And Kennedy responded by adding in his own handwriting, at the foot of a typed thank-you letter he sent to Frost: “It’s poetry and power all the way!”
[NOTE: Speaking of poetry and power, Rudyard Kipling wrote perhaps the best poem composed for a ceremonial occasion of state. His effort, “Recessional” was written not for an inauguration, but rather for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee.
Kipling had cojones; instead of merely praising Victoria and the empire, the poem is a warning about the dangers of power when not tempered by humility, judgment, and genuine religious feeling. It features the haunting and repetitive refrain: “Lest we forget—lest we forget!”]
Michelle Obama’s gauzy gown
Okay, I’m a woman, and I notice these fashiony things. So sue me.
I happen to think Michelle Obama usually dresses beautifully. She’s tall and slender and toned (although hardly model-thin, especially the lower half of her body). If carefully chosen, clothes tend to drape and show well on her.
But beginning with election night, when she wore the outfit generally referred to as the Black Widow Spider Dress, her taste in ensembles for ceremonial occasions has gone sadly awry:
But I really thought she’d pull it out for the ball, and that she’d return to the simple and classically elegant look that served her so well during the campaign. Instead, we got this fussy, figure-obscuring, girlish bit of fluffery :
Michelle, Michelle, whatever were you thinking? Where did the Jackie Kennedy influence go? Instead, you seem to be looking for inspiration in all the wrong places, like here:
Or perhaps here:
And then there’s here:
Open thread: the Obama inauguration
For those of you who are near a TV and are planning to watch, here’s a thread where you can talk amongst yourself about the inaugural festivities.
A few liveblogging thoughts:
I find the expressions on the faces of the people while they are inside the Capitol, before they see the crowd and get their special public faces completely arranged, to be informative.
Bill Clinton looked especially grim, and then he bit his lip and started to flash the usual smile as he stepped outside. Obama’s face was a combination of mostly unreadable but serious emotions; he only started to look relaxed and smiley as he went before the crowd, just as Clinton had.
In contrast, Hillary looked happy from the start. Perhaps she actually is; who knows? Laura Bush was her customary gracious and lovely self, with a serenity that was reflected in her simple outfit. Michelle Obama looked pleased, but I have to say her yellow sparkly brocade extravaganza, complete with leather gloves of a hideous green hue, did the usually elegantly-dressed First-Lady-to-be no favors (and speaking of fashion, Aretha Franklin is certainly not given to shy and retiring headgear, although she’s in fine voice).
But the person whose demeanor impressed me most of all was President Bush: it was consistent and unchanging. He looked relieved and happy, both as he walked through the Capitol and when he emerged into the daylight. There is no question in my mind that he is overjoyed to be out of it at last. The man never had a moment of peace during his two terms of office.
Oath of office completed, with a few glitches. Let the wild rumpus start!
How long will it take for Obama to own the economy?
Barack Obama is unfortunate to have inherited the worst financial climate in many decades. But in other ways he’s a very lucky man.
One huge piece of good luck for Obama is that the bad news about the economy was almost perfectly timed to help his campaign and even ensure his election. And although his depressed and depressing economic predictions, coupled with Wall Street’s fears about the possible anti-business climate of a future Obama administration, may have helped the slide in its downward trajectory, not even those who detest Obama can really blame this recession on him.
Not only did the timing of the downturn help him, but most of the American people will give him a pass—for a while. And if things improve fairly soon, Obama will undoubtedly get the credit, whether he deserves it or not. But what if we are in for many more years of this? At what point will it become Obama’s recession rather than Bush’s?
For some people, my guess is that the answer would be “never.” For a certain unknown percentage of the American public it will always be Bush’s fault, along with every other problem the Obama administration faces and fails to master. But what about the rest of us?
Obama himself, as well as his advisers and surrogates, has been hard at work making sure that everyone understands not to expect a recovery any time soon, and that it will be a matter of years rather than months for any turnaround. That way, a quicker reversal would make Obama look even better if it were to happen, and a slow one will not disappoint too much.
Obama benefits not only from his own personal popularity, but from the fact that it is attached to what are perceived to be his inherent qualities (articulate, attractive, youthful, intelligent, black) rather than any particular policy or policies he is expected to implement. In the case of the economy, this lack of precise expectations plus Obama’s own shifting message on what he will actually do—combined with the confusion among “experts” about how best to go about improving the situation—help create increased tolerance for a period of confusion and/or experimentation and a resulting lag in the appearance of positive results.
One event that could ultimately earn Obama the disapproval of much of the American public would be if he were to institute policies that were then followed by a significant worsening of the financial situation, especially if that decline were to persist for any significant amount of time. However, a situation very much resembling that scenario failed to cause the majority of Americans to decide during the 30s that FDR was more responsible for the length and depth of the Great Depression than his predecessor Hoover was. The popular FDR was perceived by most people as acting with good intentions, and he was given a pass by most people on the fact that his policies failed to significantly improve the economy and perhaps even prolonged the Depression.
How long will people sit tight during an Obama presidency, and continue to hope for change rather than angrily demand it? This recent poll indicates that Obama will have a significant time before he is blamed if he fails to revive the economy. People are very optimistic yet very patient, at least for now; two-thirds say they believe it will take at least two years before they can expect improvement in the economy. That’s a pretty long honeymoon.
Tomorrow’s the coronation
At least it feels that way, from the reports I read.
America is more excited about this particular president than any previous one I can recall, and my memory goes back quite a while. Is it merely because of the historic nature of the inauguration, based on Obama’s race? Or is it more? Is this the flip side of the mania that was Bush Derangement Syndrome? And if so, is this hope as irrational as that hatred was?
The Flight 1549 survivors escape to tell the tale
Disasters leaving no survivors are not only tragic and terrifying, they remain mysterious. If no one escapes to tell the tale, we are left to imagine how the unfortunate victims spent their last moments. Was the end quick, or did it involve terrible suffering? Was it chaotic and fear-filled, or cooperative and spiritual?
We are curious because we want to know more about human behavior under extreme conditions. We wonder how we would do in similar circumstances, although we sincerely hope we will never have to face them.
And so still another fascination of the Flight 1549 story is that, unlike the misfortunes of Job, or those of Ishmael in Moby Dick…:
…all escaped together to tell the tale.
And what a tale it is! One cannot help but be impressed not only by the mere logistics of their survival as well as its improbability, but by the near-unanimity of the passengers’ stories of calm and mutual assistance.
For a typical example, here’s a portion of the transcript of a Bill O’Reilly interview with survivor Fred Beretta:
REILLY: Now, at this point was the plane still quiet as you were descending down or were people getting a little scared?
BERETTA: It was still really quiet. I think everyone was just stunned. Sort of the reality of it was ”” people were just assimilating that.
O’REILLY: Do you remember what you were thinking?
BERETTA: I thought ”” I looked out the window and I thought there’s a good chance we’re going to die. And I did think about my family and started praying.
O’REILLY: Are you a religious man?
BERETTA: I am. Try to be.
O’REILLY: Were other people praying aloud?
BERETTA: I didn’t hear any, but I could tell. I just kind of glanced around, and people were either just sort of closing their eyes or, you know, sitting quietly for the most part. People were pretty calm.
Beretta describes an eerily quiet scene, much the opposite of the picture Hollywood usually conveys in the typical disaster movie. The Flight 1549 passengers had gone in an instant from a normal traveling day to an encounter with the high probability of their imminent mortality and, according to Beretta (and he should know), they were adjusting as best they could to the astonishingly rapid turn of events, quietly trying making their peace with whatever power they each believed in.
The Flight 1549 survivors’ stories are remarkably similar, leading to an assumption that they are highly reliable accounts of what actually occurred. Not only do most of these people mention the relative calm as the plane was going down (only a couple of sporadic emotional outbursts were reported on the part of a lone passenger or two), but passengers’ behavior after the touchdown was likewise serene and collected.
Of course, once the plane had “landed,” a sense of relief and a diminishing panic might be expected from the passengers. But the reality (and the passengers were no doubt aware of this) was that their situation at that time was only somewhat less perilous than in the moments before the splashdown. Drowning was a very real possibility, as well as death by hypothermia in the icy waters.
Rapid evacuation was therefore of the utmost importance, and a clawing for position, or even a stampede, would not have been surprising. But no such behavior occurred:
“We’re sitting with our heads down,” [survivor Carlos] described. “I’m there buckled in tight, and you just hear them over and over and over and you’re just praying.”
Carlos said the plane skidded to a stop on the river and he made it out onto a wing with the nearly freezing water rising around him and his fellow passengers.
“It was like one big family on that wing, everyone’s holding each other, this guy’s got that guy and this lady’s got that guy and no one wants to fall off,” Carlos said. “It was amazing, the human spirit, when it comes down to that everyone just got together, and was able to overcome and stay together, and everyone made it.”
And there’s this report from another passenger, a young Australian woman:
“There were no screams, tears, just a strange peace,…
It was a passenger who opened the exit door as “orderly chaos” ensued.
“There were a few women hyperventilating but I was really surprised at how calm everyone was. Normally I’d be the one in tears but honestly it happened too quickly. It was just survival instinct,” she said.
What accounts for the calm and the cooperation? Part of the cause may have been the rapidity of the entire event. From bird strike to touchdown was only three and a half minutes, and some people may have still been making the adjustment from normalcy to crisis and back again with hardly enough time to assimilate what was happening. Passenger Carl Bazarian probably speaks for many passengers (and perhaps even the crew) when he indicates he is still engaged in adjusting:
As Bazarian arrived at Jacksonville International Airport Friday morning, he told Channel 4 he was still “in a surreal world.”…
That sense of unreality will probably last quite a while. Although Bazarian and the others were spared the scenes of agony, mayhem, and death that often haunt survivors of disasters in which others have died or been seriously injured, that doesn’t mean that they were not traumatized and will need some time to readjust. But the lessons they (and we) have learned are profoundly positive ones about the possibilities for human behavior in times of great stress. I’ll leave the last word on the matter to Mr. Bazarian:
Bazarian said going through the experience bonded him with several other passengers.
“We’ll be close forever. It’s unbelievable. Keeping each other warm, assisting each other,” Bazarian said. “Great, great people. I mean really bonding. It’s incredible.”
The science of love: what fools these mortals be
The NY Times reports on researchers’ attempts to discover the chemical mediators of that complex emotion we call love. Some of this research has been done with prairie voles, who seem to share humans’ ability to be monogamous—although I doubt they share a whole lot more than that:
When a female prairie vole’s brain is artificially infused with oxytocin, a hormone that produces some of the same neural rewards as nicotine and cocaine, she’ll quickly become attached to the nearest male. A related hormone, vasopressin, creates urges for bonding and nesting when it is injected in male voles (or naturally activated by sex).
The Times article quotes scientist Larry Young concerning the possible development of an anti-love vaccine, as well as its opposite, a love-facilitator. The first involves the blocking of oxytocin, the second the administration of the same substance.
My guess is that it will be quite a while (if ever) before either is even remotely effective. But literature and art (popular and otherwise) have dreamed of such things for a long time.
A few random examples from popular music. To start, here’s love as a drug-substitute:
Some get a kick from cocaine.
I’m sure that if I took even one sniff
That would bore me terrific’ly too
Yet I get a kick out of you.
Next, we have the yearning to be free of the burdens of love:
What do you get when you fall in love?
A guy with a pin to burst your bubble
That’s what you get for all your trouble
I’ll never fall in love again
I’ll never fall in love again
What do you get when you kiss a girl
You get enough germs to catch pneumonia
After you do, she’ll never phone you
I’ll never fall in love again
I’ll never fall in love again
Note, however, how even in the above song, the resolve weakens fairly quickly. In the final lines of the final verse, we hear:
So for at least until tomorrow
I’ll never fall in love again.
But the greatest of all ruminations on the subject might just be Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Oddly, although the author of the Times article makes what I consider an oblique reference to the play (“we might reverse-engineer an anti-love potion, a vaccine preventing you from making an infatuated ass of yourself”), he never mentions the work at all.
A little personal note is in order: in my extreme youth, I owned the Classic Comic version of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” I read it again and again, entranced (that’s the proper word, I think).
The wondrous mystery of it all! The magic flower with its juices which, squeezed into the eye of the sleeper, would make him/her fall in love with the first creature that met the eye on awakening. The havoc that was wreaked, including the spectacle of the majestic Queen of the Fairies falling in love with a half-man half-ass, doting on him and weaving garlands of flowers to adorn the bizarre object of her affection.
And then, after maximum messiness had been achieved, the satisfying ending in which each person is made to fall in love with the mate who is exactly right for him/her. In the play, this is accomplished by means very similar to those described in the Times piece: a love antidote is applied to eradicate the misplaced affections of several characters, and then a corrective is applied at prescisely the right time, guaranteeing that the new love object will lead to happily-ever-aftering.
The mischievous Puck, on watching the complications ensuing from his initial applications of the love potion, famously declares, “Lord, what fools these mortals be!” And indeed, love can make a person seem foolish when misplaced, and/or can lead to some of the deepest sorrow and pain we are able to feel. But when it works out (and it sometimes does), there’s hardly anything more wonderful. There are some hefty compensations for being mortal (as Starman discovered when he ate a piece of apple pie, and then again when he fell in love with Karen Allen. But I digress.)
In closing, some more music:
The mother of all Nigerian scams
The following email was forwarded to me by a friend. As Nigerian scams go, it is a thing of beauty, don’t you think? And despite the scammers’ continuing inability to master the English language, the closing sentence is a masterpiece: Making the world a better place.
From: koffi annan
Subject: SCAMMED VICTIM YOUR $900,000 .00 USD COMPENSATION.
To: SCAMMED VICTIM YOUR $900,000 .00 USD COMPENSATION.
REF/PAYMENTS CODE: 02007 $900,000,00.USD.
DEAR BENEFICIARY,
This is to bring to your notice that We have been having a meeting for the passed 7 months which ended 2 days ago with the former secretary to the UNITED NATIONS. On this faithful recommendations, I want you to know that during the last U.N. meetings held at COTONOU, Republic of Benin, it was alarmed so much by the world in the meetings on the lost of funds by various individuals to scams artists operating in syndicates all over the world today. In other to compensate these victims, the U.N Body is now paying 221 victims of this operators $900,000,00.USD
Each in accordance with the U.N recommendations. Due to the corrupt and in-efficient Banking Systems in Federal Republic of BENIN, the payments are to be paid by the U.N REPRESENTATIVE here in BENIN Dr. John Michael as under funding assistance by United Nation body. Benefactor will be cleared and recommended for payment by U.N REPRESENTATIVE. According to the number of applicants at hand, 184 Beneficiaries has been paid, half of the victims are from the United States, we still have more 37 left to be paid the compensations of $900,000,00.USD each. Your particulars was mentioned by one of the Syndicates who was arrested as one of their victims of the operations, you are hereby warned not to communicate or duplicate this message to him for any reason what so ever as the U.S. secret service is already on trace of the other criminals. So keep it secret till they are all apprehended. Other victims who have not been contacted can submit their application as well for scrutiny and possible consideration.
You can receive your compensations payments via, DRAFT/CHEQUE PAYMENTS. You are advised to contact Dr. John Michael U.N REPRESENTATIVE in BENIN, as he is our representative in BENIN, contact him immediately for your Cheque/International Bank Draft of $900,000,00.USD This funds are in a Bank Draft for security purpose, so he will send it to you and you can clear it in any bank of your choice. Therefore, you should send him your full Name and telephone number/your correct mailing address where you want him to send the Draft to you.
Contact Person: Dr. John Michael
Email Address: john_michael@yahoo.cn
Tell: +229-98165794
Thanks and God bless you and your family. Hoping to hear from you as soon as you receive your payment. Making the world a better place.
Regards,
Mr. Koffi Annan
Former Secretary (UNITED NATIONS).
SCAMMED VICTIM/REF/PAYMENTS CODE: 02007 $900,000,00.USD
The man for the hour: Captain Sullenberger
The universally acknowledged hero of yesterday, who made the Flight 1549 story one of a controlled landing rather than a plane crash, is US Air pilot Chesley Sullenberger
No one who knew Sullenberger (known as “Sully”) was the least bit surprised at his ability to guide the wounded plane to an unprecedentedly safe water landing in the Hudson River on a bitterly cold afternoon. If anyone could do it, this man could.
And now he’s got something new to add to his already-lengthy resume (see the second page, as well), a mix of ingredients that made him the perfect man for the hour.
Like many pilots, Sullenberger had a love of flyiing from youth. But it wasn’t just flying that interested him—it was also the psychology of meeting a crisis:
…he is a visiting scholar at the University of California at Berkeley’s Center for Catastrophic Risk Management, which studies safety, infrastructure, and preparedness in accidents and natural disasters.
To top it all off, he was a certified glider pilot, helpful training for a situation in which he had to control a plane with its engines knocked out.
It seems, in retrospect, that Sullenberger’s entire life was a preparation for this crisis, and a reflection of his determination to meet it successfully if and when the time came. Yesterday that time arrived—and the preparation paid off for Sully, his passengers, and the unknown New Yorkers on the ground who might have been dealt death from the sky if Sullenberger had been any less ready.
The Flight 1549 story has all the right stuff
We can’t get enough of this story. It contains the perfect balance of suspense and joyful resolution: harrowing danger combined with rescue from what had looked to be certain and deadly harm.
These ingredients are more ordinarily the stuff of cinema than reality. And yet this was reality, with the photos and eyewitnesses to prove it. How often is disaster averted this dramatically and this satisfyingly?
The ingredients start with an everyday situation with which we can all identify: traveling by airplane. The culprit: neither human error nor human malevolence, nor even weather—but birds, a la Hitchcock/duMaurier. The hero: a pilot with a face and a resume sent to order from central casting, only better. Co-heroes: boat captains and passengers whose ordinary day was interrupted by the extraordinary.
The outcome: perfect. Maximum relief after maximum drama.
And the wonderfulness of the story is not hurt at all by the obvious contrast with another day, when New Yorkers watched another airliner coming in much too low—that time, with nightmare consequences and from a nightmare cause.
Farewell from Bush, farewell to Bush
I watched President Bush’s farewell speech last night. I was struck by his demeanor, which seemed subtly different to me: more relaxed, less smirky, more graceful. Perhaps more indicative of his real self, the one he shows to friends and family? Of two things we can probably all agree—the man feels relief, and has earned a long vacation.
Bush’s words in the speech were devoid of the anger and bitterness one would think almost anyone would feel if in his shoes. I believe he has been treated poorly by press and public, and that history will look on his administration if not with huge approval (although that’s possible too), then certainly more kindly than the first draft of history has judged it.