Showing posts with label wisdom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wisdom. Show all posts

Friday, March 17, 2023

Older, Not Necessarily Wiser

A quotable quotes column. 

Image by Brigitte Werner from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids — the Stickies — eventual selves to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.  

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating meltdown.  

Glossary 

Featuring Dana: Hallucination, guest star, and charming literary device 

"Old age isn't so bad when you consider the alternative." -Maurice Chevalier


Dear Stickies and Gentlereaders,

Wisdom is alleged to be a side effect of old age. 

Oscar Wilde said that "With age comes wisdom, but..." (the writer emphasizes but, and then pauses for effect).

{But what?}

The second half of the quote is, but sometimes age comes alone. 

H.L. Mencken said, "The older I grow the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom."

Kurt Vonnegut said, "True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country." 

I'm currently 69 (the new 39) years old and recently discovered that the average age of the members of the U.S. Senate is only 64, which means that many of them weren't even old enough to be freshmenpersons when I was a senior and everyone knows how uncool freshpersons are. 

However, I also discovered that 34 of 'em are older than I am and that a personal favorite of mine, Chuck Grassley, a friend of corn farmers everywhere, is 89 and tied for first place with Danne Feinstein. Ms. Feinstein, as you may have heard, was recently surprised to discover she was retiring. 

The average age of the members of the House is a youthful 57, which means that when I was a senior in high school, the average Congressperson was only in second grade. However, 87 are my age or older, 36 are 75 or older, and 12 range in age from 80 to 86.  
   
{What's your point?}

When I become king, Dana, I'm going to decree that 75 is the mandatory retirement age for congresspersons. If they wish to continue to serve the people they can always get jobs as lobbyists.

As of 2020, the average H. sapien was dead by the age of 73.7. Currently, there are 60 lucky members of the 118th Congress who are beating the odds. As of 1/23, the congressional approval rating stood at 21%. Your question answers itself. 


Sylvia Garcia, 72 (D.-Tx) who represents "much of eastern Houston" according to Wikipedia, has only been a congressperson since 2019 but has been a politician for roughly 40 years. Recently, she was (semi) famous for (almost) 15 minutes. 

Ms. Garcia is a member of the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, details here if, unlike me, you have a life and find following politics and/or current events boring and would like a briefing. 

Bottom line: The Red team says The Fedrl Gummit has been stepping, treading if you will, on the rights of the people it's supposed to serve. The Blue Team says nuh-uh.  

Journalists Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger were called in front of the committee to testify about their role in publishing the details of what appears to have been a, um, unhealthy relationship between Twitter and The Fedrl Gummit (TFG) prior to its purchase by Tony Stark, a.k.a. Elon Musk.  

If you're unfamiliar with that kerfuffle... take care, and I'll catch ya later. It would take a column or two to even begin to adequately explain that particular he said, she said, they said.
    

In the following YouTube clip, Congressperson Garcia is beating up on Messers. Taibbi and Shellenberger for refusing to reveal what she wants to know about the stuff they've published that reveals some shady connections between Twitter and TFG prior to Mr. Musk's purchase.  

While this would seem to prove that getting on the wrong side of TFG can get ya stepped on, Ms. Garcia, at 72, is as focused and relentless as Jack McCoy on Law & Order back in the day.


Until...

At about five minutes in she reveals that she doesn't know who Bari Weiss is. 

Ms. Weiss (apropos of nothing, a fellow former Yinzer) is a journalist who's had important jobs at the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Nowadays, like Mr. Taibbi, she's gone out on her own, via Substack, in order to practice traditional (i.e. real) journalism, with no one to answer to but her readers.

Musk turned to her and Taibbi for that very reason. They have led the charge to get the story, stories (Pl) actually, out into the world. Congressperson Garcia, with a straight face, asks Mr. Shelleberger if he, Taibbi, and Weiss are "...in this as a threesome?"

Cue grins and suppressed laughter. 

Garcia, apparently oblivious, continues her attack as if nothing happened, instantly losing all credibility. The head of the committee, Congressman Jim Jordan, then provides a succinct epilogue to the performance. 
       
                                                The End 

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

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