The greatest loss in being laid off by the newspaper, besides the loss of income, was the loss of opportunity to review local theater productions. With a little academic background, a love of theater and, most importantly, a willingness to do it, I became the default reviewer for local productions by The Playhouse and Barton College. Over nearly 30 years, I saw a lot of great performances and only a handful of miscues. I spent many a late night laboring over a review that would appear in the next day's paper. I can honestly say that only one or two of the dozens of productions I saw were not very good.
I don't know that my reviews did a lot for theater in Wilson, but they did give each production an extra boost of attention from the newspaper, and I think, occasionally at least, might have led some audience to the theater. Paul Crouch, the retired director of the drama program at Barton, told me after he retired that he had always told his students and cast to pay no attention to the reviews in the newspaper because "None of them know what they're talking about." Fair enough.
Saturday night, I went to see "Member of the Wedding," one of two plays on this year's Theater of the American South playbill. I went without a notepad and pen and without a complimentary ticket. If I were reviewing this production, I'd say it was an outstanding staging of a powerful story by Carson McCullers with an honest depiction of interracial relationships in the Jim Crow South and the deep anxieties of a 12-year-old girl.
What was most impressive about the play were the performances of the two main characters, 13-year-old Maddie Taylor of Chapel Hill as Frankie Addams and Yolanda Rabun as Berenice, the family cook, who is also a surrogate mother for Frankie. Taylor, who has numerous film and television credits despite her young age, lived up to her highly acclaimed reputation. She had a stage presence that was gripping and endearing. Rabun captured her role beautifully with all the nuance of a life that is central to white society but outside of it. Rabun's combination of loving care and demanding discipline was perfectly on target, and her singing voice in three brief stagings was spine-tingling. Adam Twiss of Barton College directs a moving production with a more than adequate supporting cast. But it is Taylor and Rabun, who are onstage nearly the entire play, who carry the story and make the drama real.
How far has Theater of the American South, Gary Cole's bold planting of a major theater festival in sleepy Wilson, come? "Member of the Wedding" competes well with "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" from the first year of TOTAS. It was good to see some local performers in the cast, albeit in minor roles, in a festival that has relied primarily on professional actors. The Wilson community remains enthusiastic about the festival, which also attracts patrons from many miles away for its plays, cooking demonstrations, lectures and other events.
With "Member of the Wedding," Theater of the American South is alive and well once again this year as it wraps up its 2010 season tonight.
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Unions ally with public employees
Labor unions have seen their future, and it is in the public sector. While union membership has plummeted, along with manufacturing jobs, union visionaries have realized the opportunity that lies before them: organizing government workers. Public sector unionizing is the only growth industry organized labor has seen in the past quarter-century.
Now, the Service Employees International Union, a political powerhouse, wants Congress to require state and local governments to negotiate with unions representing government workers. Such a law would overturn laws in several states, including North Carolina, which specifically prohibits bargaining with or strikes by public sector employees. If passed, the federal legislation would be a payoff for the SEIU's support of a number of powerful Democrats, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
The problem with collective bargaining with public sector employees is the imbalance of power at the negotiating table. SEIU and its North Carolina affiliate, the State Employees Association of North Carolina, have shown their willingness punish any legislator who opposes their agenda and to threaten all others. "Management," in this case, is at a disadvantage because members of the board of directors (i.e., legislators and other elected officials) are in the pocket of the union that helped to get them elected. There can be no balanced negotiation when labor can influence management behind the scenes through campaign contributions and vote delivery.
Unlike private-sector negotiators, government officials have little incentive to oppose union demands. A corporation has to watch its bottom line and faces market forces that prevent raising prices to pay for too-generous labor costs. A city manager, however, has fewer limits in a labor negotiation. City services are almost always monopolies, so raising prices is no problem. And if more money is needed for higher salaries and better benefits, the city can always raise taxes. It is down this road that states such as California and countries such as Greece discovered the limits of their generosity. If North Carolina, which has prohibited bargaining with public employees for half a century, is forced by federal law recognize and negotiate with labor unions, taxes will inevitably rise.
There should be no right to strike against the public interest. Imagine the chaos — and the anger — if firefighters, police, emergency medical personnel and others went on strike. Even if strikes are prohibited (at first) union members could make their point by, for example, having Highway Patrol troopers ticket every driver doing 56 in a 55 mph zone. Or suppose the entire fire department got sick on the same day. Even with some moderate restrictions, collective bargaining with public employees could lead to chaotic consequences.
Just look at what is happening now, when public sector employees are prohibited from collective bargaining. Public employee "associations" (they're not officially unions in this state) directly lobby legislators for raises and better benefits. They protest loudly against any reductions in force or furloughs. In the past two years, as tens of thousands of private-sector employees have been laid off, the loudest outcry you heard was from state employees over wage freezes, furloughs and very limited layoffs. Public employees in this state enjoy extraordinary benefits, including a defined-benefit pension, which is extremely rare in the private sector now. Public sector pay, which has been safeguarded while recessions reduced private-sector compensation, is at least as good as in the private sector.
Giving public employees the heavy artillery of bargaining to go with their small-arms of political pressure would put government firmly in the hands of public employees, whose primary goal — as has been shown many times — is to look out for themselves. Instead of good government we'd have good-for-me government, and the "me" would be union members, not taxpayers.
Now, the Service Employees International Union, a political powerhouse, wants Congress to require state and local governments to negotiate with unions representing government workers. Such a law would overturn laws in several states, including North Carolina, which specifically prohibits bargaining with or strikes by public sector employees. If passed, the federal legislation would be a payoff for the SEIU's support of a number of powerful Democrats, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
The problem with collective bargaining with public sector employees is the imbalance of power at the negotiating table. SEIU and its North Carolina affiliate, the State Employees Association of North Carolina, have shown their willingness punish any legislator who opposes their agenda and to threaten all others. "Management," in this case, is at a disadvantage because members of the board of directors (i.e., legislators and other elected officials) are in the pocket of the union that helped to get them elected. There can be no balanced negotiation when labor can influence management behind the scenes through campaign contributions and vote delivery.
Unlike private-sector negotiators, government officials have little incentive to oppose union demands. A corporation has to watch its bottom line and faces market forces that prevent raising prices to pay for too-generous labor costs. A city manager, however, has fewer limits in a labor negotiation. City services are almost always monopolies, so raising prices is no problem. And if more money is needed for higher salaries and better benefits, the city can always raise taxes. It is down this road that states such as California and countries such as Greece discovered the limits of their generosity. If North Carolina, which has prohibited bargaining with public employees for half a century, is forced by federal law recognize and negotiate with labor unions, taxes will inevitably rise.
There should be no right to strike against the public interest. Imagine the chaos — and the anger — if firefighters, police, emergency medical personnel and others went on strike. Even if strikes are prohibited (at first) union members could make their point by, for example, having Highway Patrol troopers ticket every driver doing 56 in a 55 mph zone. Or suppose the entire fire department got sick on the same day. Even with some moderate restrictions, collective bargaining with public employees could lead to chaotic consequences.
Just look at what is happening now, when public sector employees are prohibited from collective bargaining. Public employee "associations" (they're not officially unions in this state) directly lobby legislators for raises and better benefits. They protest loudly against any reductions in force or furloughs. In the past two years, as tens of thousands of private-sector employees have been laid off, the loudest outcry you heard was from state employees over wage freezes, furloughs and very limited layoffs. Public employees in this state enjoy extraordinary benefits, including a defined-benefit pension, which is extremely rare in the private sector now. Public sector pay, which has been safeguarded while recessions reduced private-sector compensation, is at least as good as in the private sector.
Giving public employees the heavy artillery of bargaining to go with their small-arms of political pressure would put government firmly in the hands of public employees, whose primary goal — as has been shown many times — is to look out for themselves. Instead of good government we'd have good-for-me government, and the "me" would be union members, not taxpayers.
Monday, May 24, 2010
When an 'act of war' doesn't end in war
A hostile foreign power sinks a warship, killing scores of crew members. What will be the result?
This is not a backgrounder on the USS Maine, which sunk in Havana Harbor in 1898. In that case, the result, despite a lack of evidence that Spain had anything to do with the U.S. battleship's sinking, was "a splendid little war," which the United States won handily. No, this case involves two nations with the same last name — Korea — and two very different economic and political systems. On March 26, the South Korean Navy ship Cheonan was struck by an underwater explosion, killing 46 sailors and sending the ship to the bottom of the ocean. Two months later, investigators have announced that the ship was sunk by a torpedo that had originated in North Korea. Despite the carefully reconstructed evidence, North Korea denies having any responsibility for the sinking, which occurred in waters near the two countries' international boundary.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak has officially blamed North Korea and has announced a series of economic measures and restrictions that fall far short of a declaration of war, which would seem to be warranted after this classic "act of war." For its part, North Korea warns that any sanctions against the secretive, closed Stalinist regime would mean "all-out war."
The Korean peninsula, divided since the end of World War II into a repressive, communist North and a Western-leaning and economically vibrant South, personifies the Cold War maxim of "mutually assured destruction." That doctrine held that neither the United States nor the Soviet Union could risk war because each held sufficient numbers of nuclear weapons to obliterate the other, even in a retaliatory strike after an initial attack. In Korea, nuclear weapons are not the key to the MADness, although North Korea possesses a few nuclear weapons, and U.S. troops stationed in and near South Korea have nuclear capabilities. Even a conventional war between the Koreas would be madness, as the world learned in 1950-53. All-out war would devastate both countries, and although South Korea might ultimately prevail, its economic advancements of the past half-century would be wiped away. U.S. war game exercises conclude that North Korea's defeat might unleash chaos that would envelope the whole reunion and be felt around the globe.
Maybe that's why South Korea, recognizing that it has been attacked by a foreign power whose sinking of a sovereign warship was, indeed, an "act of war," is willing to settle for something less than a retaliatory military strike. President Lee wants an apology and punishment for those responsible. What remains mysterious is why Kim Jong Il's North Korean regime would so foolhardily commit an act of war and thereby risk the obliteration of two nations.
This is not a backgrounder on the USS Maine, which sunk in Havana Harbor in 1898. In that case, the result, despite a lack of evidence that Spain had anything to do with the U.S. battleship's sinking, was "a splendid little war," which the United States won handily. No, this case involves two nations with the same last name — Korea — and two very different economic and political systems. On March 26, the South Korean Navy ship Cheonan was struck by an underwater explosion, killing 46 sailors and sending the ship to the bottom of the ocean. Two months later, investigators have announced that the ship was sunk by a torpedo that had originated in North Korea. Despite the carefully reconstructed evidence, North Korea denies having any responsibility for the sinking, which occurred in waters near the two countries' international boundary.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak has officially blamed North Korea and has announced a series of economic measures and restrictions that fall far short of a declaration of war, which would seem to be warranted after this classic "act of war." For its part, North Korea warns that any sanctions against the secretive, closed Stalinist regime would mean "all-out war."
The Korean peninsula, divided since the end of World War II into a repressive, communist North and a Western-leaning and economically vibrant South, personifies the Cold War maxim of "mutually assured destruction." That doctrine held that neither the United States nor the Soviet Union could risk war because each held sufficient numbers of nuclear weapons to obliterate the other, even in a retaliatory strike after an initial attack. In Korea, nuclear weapons are not the key to the MADness, although North Korea possesses a few nuclear weapons, and U.S. troops stationed in and near South Korea have nuclear capabilities. Even a conventional war between the Koreas would be madness, as the world learned in 1950-53. All-out war would devastate both countries, and although South Korea might ultimately prevail, its economic advancements of the past half-century would be wiped away. U.S. war game exercises conclude that North Korea's defeat might unleash chaos that would envelope the whole reunion and be felt around the globe.
Maybe that's why South Korea, recognizing that it has been attacked by a foreign power whose sinking of a sovereign warship was, indeed, an "act of war," is willing to settle for something less than a retaliatory military strike. President Lee wants an apology and punishment for those responsible. What remains mysterious is why Kim Jong Il's North Korean regime would so foolhardily commit an act of war and thereby risk the obliteration of two nations.
Downtown whirligigs will identify Wilson
Last week's announcement that 32 of Vollis Simpson's giant whirligigs will be moved off his farm near Lucama to downtown Wilson is terrific news for Wilson. Simpson's iconic whirligigs have attracted visitors for decades who marvel at the giant wind sculptures and, unfortunately, make up urban myths about their origins. Simpson has been recognized around the world for his whirligigs, which are considered a high form of folk art.
Some details remain to be worked out about moving the whirligigs. I understand the city does not actually own the two-acre site selected for placement of the whirligigs, for example, and funding has not been announced. But Simpson's whirligigs are so well known and admired (examples stand at the N.C. Museum of Art, the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Collection at Williamsburg, Va., at Olympic Park in Atlanta, Inner Harbor in Baltimore and numerous other locations) that raising money for this venture shouldn't be so hard. With Simpson in his 90s, it's important to nail down this deal now and plan for the repair, refurbishing and maintenance of these whirligigs.
Last week's announcement points to an important fact: Simpson's whirligigs give Wilson a unique identity. Forget about tobacco festivals, barbecue festivals, "bloomin'" festivals, fall festivals, coastal plain festivals, human domino falls, car shows, rubber duck races and all the rest. Scores of cities and towns can replicate those themes, but few, if any, can claim a whirligig as a symbol of local culture. Wilson's annual Whirligig Festival is growing in popularity and guarantees a unique identity for this town. This is the card Wilson has been dealt; it should play it.
Some details remain to be worked out about moving the whirligigs. I understand the city does not actually own the two-acre site selected for placement of the whirligigs, for example, and funding has not been announced. But Simpson's whirligigs are so well known and admired (examples stand at the N.C. Museum of Art, the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Collection at Williamsburg, Va., at Olympic Park in Atlanta, Inner Harbor in Baltimore and numerous other locations) that raising money for this venture shouldn't be so hard. With Simpson in his 90s, it's important to nail down this deal now and plan for the repair, refurbishing and maintenance of these whirligigs.
Last week's announcement points to an important fact: Simpson's whirligigs give Wilson a unique identity. Forget about tobacco festivals, barbecue festivals, "bloomin'" festivals, fall festivals, coastal plain festivals, human domino falls, car shows, rubber duck races and all the rest. Scores of cities and towns can replicate those themes, but few, if any, can claim a whirligig as a symbol of local culture. Wilson's annual Whirligig Festival is growing in popularity and guarantees a unique identity for this town. This is the card Wilson has been dealt; it should play it.
Friday, May 21, 2010
This debate is four decades old
The Tea Party folks had only begun celebrating the lop-sided triumph of Rand Paul in the Republican Kentucky Senate primary when the victorious candidate stuck both feet in his mouth. Who would have thought that a 44-year-old congressional debate and 44 years of settled law would become a topic in a 2010 Senate campaign? But that's where Paul, the son of 2008 presidential candidate Ron Paul, has taken us.
Paul follows his father's Libertarian philosophy, and you have to respect the elder Paul's principles. As a member of Congress, he declined overseas trips and largely paid his own way on almost everything. He believes in limited government with a big emphasis on limits. But as his son's conundrum shows, that path leads into some mushy swamps. Soon after his electoral victory, Rand Paul began trying to explain his belief that every business has the right to decide whom it will serve. It's unfair for the federal government to force a business to adopt practices it opposes.
If that argument sounds familiar, you're old enough to remember the debate over the 1964 Civil Rights Act. That law banned discrimination based on race, creed, religion, color, national origin or sex, and opponents of the law made the same argument Paul is making now: Businesses should be allowed to decide with whom they will conduct business. The argument has some measure of sensibility. Barry Goldwater made the argument in voting against the Civil Rights Act. But before you sign onto the notion that businesses should be free to determine their own trade policies, recall what society was like in 1964 and what the Civil Rights Act sought to correct. Statutory racism allowed business owners to refuse to serve African-Americans. It barred African-Americans (and other racial, ethnic or religious groups) from many jobs. It prohibited minorities from use of public facilities, such as bathrooms, water fountains and parks. It prevented African-Americans from eating out in most restaurants. It maintained a morally and economically indefensible dual society in which minorities were barred from contributing fully to the dominant social and economic structure.
Perhaps Paul can make an argument in favor of shopkeepers' freedom to choose their own customers, but he cannot claim that the old society, which he is too young to remember (he is just one year older than the Civil Rights Act, was a better, fairer or more economically efficient place. Sometimes, foggy principles have to step aside for the moral — and economic — good of society.
Paul follows his father's Libertarian philosophy, and you have to respect the elder Paul's principles. As a member of Congress, he declined overseas trips and largely paid his own way on almost everything. He believes in limited government with a big emphasis on limits. But as his son's conundrum shows, that path leads into some mushy swamps. Soon after his electoral victory, Rand Paul began trying to explain his belief that every business has the right to decide whom it will serve. It's unfair for the federal government to force a business to adopt practices it opposes.
If that argument sounds familiar, you're old enough to remember the debate over the 1964 Civil Rights Act. That law banned discrimination based on race, creed, religion, color, national origin or sex, and opponents of the law made the same argument Paul is making now: Businesses should be allowed to decide with whom they will conduct business. The argument has some measure of sensibility. Barry Goldwater made the argument in voting against the Civil Rights Act. But before you sign onto the notion that businesses should be free to determine their own trade policies, recall what society was like in 1964 and what the Civil Rights Act sought to correct. Statutory racism allowed business owners to refuse to serve African-Americans. It barred African-Americans (and other racial, ethnic or religious groups) from many jobs. It prohibited minorities from use of public facilities, such as bathrooms, water fountains and parks. It prevented African-Americans from eating out in most restaurants. It maintained a morally and economically indefensible dual society in which minorities were barred from contributing fully to the dominant social and economic structure.
Perhaps Paul can make an argument in favor of shopkeepers' freedom to choose their own customers, but he cannot claim that the old society, which he is too young to remember (he is just one year older than the Civil Rights Act, was a better, fairer or more economically efficient place. Sometimes, foggy principles have to step aside for the moral — and economic — good of society.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
I'll never sit here again
After nearly a full month of online advertising plus a week of newspaper classified advertising (all for one price), my 16-year-old Honda del Sol was sold today. Considering I received 95 percent of the somewhat aggressive asking price, I should be overjoyed. But as the skies cleared this afternoon after two days of steady rain, I felt myself missing that little car that had given me the most fun I ever had on four wheels. I was ready to take the top off and let the remnants of my hair whip in the breeze. I was ready to stomp the accelerator as I shifted to second and feel the four-cylinder engine oomph the lightweight two-seater up to speed. I was ready to take a corner using 100 degrees of arc instead of 90 and let the rear end glide into place. I wanted to feel all those things, and more, again, but I wouldn't and couldn't.
I sold the car to a young man who was probably in preschool when the car was built. He was young enough to enjoy it and to put up with its shortcomings — a chronically leaky trunk and an air conditioner that labored to keep up with the heat generated by the black sheet metal and black interior. And he won't mind that newer cars have nicer appointments, such as keyless entry, cup holders and ambient lighting. If he takes care of the car, it should give him several more years of driving fun.
Each day I drive my "less old" car (it's not "new") I bought six weeks ago, I like it better. It doesn't do the same things the del Sol did, but it does other things the del Sol never would. After shopping for a car of my dreams, one that would combine the del Sol's fun with a larger vehicle's security and more luxurious appointments, I concluded that such a car didn't exist, at least not in my price range. So I settled on a 2003 Honda Accord coupe with a six-speed transmission and 120,000 miles on the odometer. The six-speed lacks some of the "fun" element of the older car's five-speed, but it is fun to shift and has amazingly economical higher gears. A nice stereo, keyless entry, leather seating, an aesthetic body shape, more than 100 extra horsepower than what I was accustomed to — those are all things I could get used to. And while no car feels very safe to me in interstate highway traffic, the Accord is far heavier and less likely to be whipped about by passing trucks. The wind and road noise that I tolerated in the small car are almost entirely missing in the newer car.
Before I sold the del Sol, I received inquiries from as far away as Georgia and New York. People who are familiar with these cars love them, despite all their shortcomings. Fourteen years ago, when I debated and worried over whether I should plunk down more than I had planned to spend on a two-year-old pop-top two-seater, my wife persuaded me by saying, "If you don't buy it now, next time [you trade cars], you'll be too old." As usual, she was right. I got 14 years of fun (and a few headaches) while I was still young enough to enjoy it.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Palin makes it up as she goes along
Now that she's no longer an elected official but just another rich celebrity, Sarah Palin must think she can say anything and get away with it. The former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential nominee doesn't mind just making things up, apparently.
In a speech in Charlotte before the National Rifle Association, Palin accused President Obama of planning to eliminate private ownership of guns and ammunition. Huh? "If they [Obama and his minions] thought they could get away with it," Palin told the crowd, "they would ban guns and ban ammunition and gut the Second Amendment."
Where does she get this drivel? To my knowledge neither Obama nor any other national-scene politician in recent years has ever proposed an outright ban on guns or ammunition. Gun politics has taken a turn the past few years toward looser laws and broader interpretation of the Second Amendment. Even left-leaning politicians now acknowledge the right to gun ownership by law-abiding Americans. Whatever battle there is over the Second Amendment is over the nuances of the law — just what kinds of "arms" are protected, for example, and what reasonable restrictions might government place on this right?
But Palin was never one to deal in nuances. She might leaven her audacious claims and invented scenarios with folksy charm, but she much prefers to outrageous lie to the complicated fact. It sells, and she's going to keep dishing the red meat to her baying hounds.
In a speech in Charlotte before the National Rifle Association, Palin accused President Obama of planning to eliminate private ownership of guns and ammunition. Huh? "If they [Obama and his minions] thought they could get away with it," Palin told the crowd, "they would ban guns and ban ammunition and gut the Second Amendment."
Where does she get this drivel? To my knowledge neither Obama nor any other national-scene politician in recent years has ever proposed an outright ban on guns or ammunition. Gun politics has taken a turn the past few years toward looser laws and broader interpretation of the Second Amendment. Even left-leaning politicians now acknowledge the right to gun ownership by law-abiding Americans. Whatever battle there is over the Second Amendment is over the nuances of the law — just what kinds of "arms" are protected, for example, and what reasonable restrictions might government place on this right?
But Palin was never one to deal in nuances. She might leaven her audacious claims and invented scenarios with folksy charm, but she much prefers to outrageous lie to the complicated fact. It sells, and she's going to keep dishing the red meat to her baying hounds.
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