Don't Call Me Plus Anger Management

I’m not answering my land line telephone anymore unless I can readily identify who the caller is. Despite registering our number on the National Do Not Call list, we are being pestered by solicitations and scam calls, the most recent of the latter being an admonishment to respond or face a Treasury Department enforcement action. The gall of these con artists is that, unlike callers who want to sell you something, they actually leave a message on your answering machine with a call back number. Brazen. 

As I know I don’t owe any back taxes it is easy for me to dismiss these bullying intrusions into our household. I wonder, though, what impact these calls might have on citizens who have a balance due the federal government or those, such as the elderly or uneducated, who are uncertain. Might they think the bogus call is real and rush to send money to clear their accounts? Apparently, many have.  

“This January, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) announced they have received reports of roughly 896,000 contacts since October 2013 and have become aware of over 5,000 victims who have collectively paid over $26.5 million as a result of the scam,” according to a February 2 Internal Revenue Service press release.

Problem is, the IRS is about to unleash private debt collectors on the populous, a provision dumped into the Highway Bill last December. So taxpayers, delinquent or not, may get more calls demanding payments. How to tell the bogus from the real, the wheat from the chaff, will be a task of biblical proportions. Some prayer might be in order.

Anyway, if you do need to reach me, call my cell phone. Or leave a message on my land line. As the saying goes, “Leave your number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

Looking Back and Forward in Anger: Everyone seems to agree the mood of the public can be described as “angry,” an emotion being exploited by politicians who want enough votes to build walls to protect our American way of life, forgetting for a moment there is disagreement about what exactly constitutes our American way of life. 

“One thing that baffles me is that many of the angriest voters are also those associated with communities of faith. By what logic can the devout commit the sin of anger, and resist the call of its antidotes, the virtues of forgiveness and understanding?”

Gosh, I wish I would have authored those lines. I commend to you the full text of an Op-Ed piece by Jennifer Finney Boylan in Thursday’s New York Times. Boylan is a professor of English at Barnard College (http://nyti.ms/20oLuy2).

BBC News asked a New Hampshire resident his thoughts on the primary election and the direction of the country. He responded it was important to get back to the values upon which our nation was founded. Asked to explain, he said one couldn’t do anything on one’s land without getting a permit. In other word, too much regulation.

Sounds simple enough. You’d think a landowner should be permitted to do as he pleases on and with his property. Until you realize that seemingly actions of personal choice, such as not putting a fence around a swimming pool as required in many communities, could have disastrous, often fatal, unintended consequences should a toddler fall into an unattended pool. 

A few years ago a man in a Westchester community used his home to buy, sell and store mercury, a health risk not only to him but also to his neighbors. I could go on and on citing similar examples as to why regulations are necessary for the general good and welfare, but I’ll spare you. 

No doubt there are rules that defy reason. Most regulations, however, were enacted to counter practices that hurt or had the potential to harm the population. We should treasure the intent and the value of such regulations, not dismiss them as as anti-American.

I’m also puzzled by the antipathy toward unions among much of the electorate, especially those who yearn for a return to yesteryear, to simpler times, to a time when income from manufacturing jobs forged a thriving middle class. 

Do these people not realize union membership was a bulwark of those times? Who do they think negotiated better pay? better health care benefits? better retirement benefits? paid vacations? better working conditions? better education benefits? better safeguards against indiscriminate layoffs? Do they really believe employers, out of the goodness of their hearts, would provide workers  with any but the most meager of salaries and benefits? 

Sure, union leaders have at times abused their power. Overall, though, unions have benefitted society. The failure of current workers to recognize the value of unions goes hand in hand with the failure of women, men too, to appreciate the long-term commitment Hillary Clinton has had to equal opportunities, regardless of gender. 

Here’s a contribution I recommend under the provocative title “All the terrible things Hillary Clinton has done — in one big list” (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/all-the-terrible-things-hillary-clinton-has-done-in-one-big-list-2016-02-04).

The Sound of Music

Fifty years ago, two days ago to be precise, the film version of The Sound of Music debuted. It became, arguably, one of the most cherished films worldwide. Heck, even my Jewish high school, the Yeshiva of Flatbush, arranged an outing into Manhattan so we could see the novitiate nun-cum-governess-cum-wife and her once brooding widower-employer-cum-husband outsmart the Nazis by leading the Von Trapp family on a climb over that mountain leading to Switzerland. For many in my class it might have been their first exposure, albeit by celluloid, to the insides of a church and the black clad ladies who toiled within. 

Anyway, it’s merely a coincidence that The Sound of Music is being celebrated this week. I’ve brought it up because of an interview Gilda and I heard Wednesday morning as we drove to Manhattan. The Outlook program on BBC World Service talked with Joanne Milne of Gateshead, England. For the first 39 years of her life, Milne was deaf. Last March, after cochlear implants were inserted into her head, she was able to finally hear (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7LcNUxcQ8Y).

Among the first sounds she heard was Imagine, the John Lennon song. Which made me wonder, what music, what song, would I have chosen for that intoxicating, unimaginable moment? I immediately thought of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy, perhaps because it was the alma mater theme of Camp Columbia, the camp, incidentally, I attended when The Sound of Music premiered in 1965. 

If you’re so inclined, let me know what music you would have picked.

Speaking of Sounds: Did anyone else who watched Bibi Netanyahu’s speech to Congress Tuesday notice a loud thud just as the Israeli prime minister completed his first reference to Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons? To his credit, Netanyahu didn’t react. He simply plowed ahead with his dissertation. 

Speaking of Thuds: While writing this blog at my desk Wednesday morning I was startled by a loud thud coming from the window behind me. A large clump of snow had fallen from the roof above to the roof of our extended dining room. It also bent a gutter out of shape. Comparatively speaking, that’s little damage from this winter of non-stop agony. Oh, the joys of being a homeowner!

Where’s the Outrage? In the last few days we’ve been treated to revelations that Hillary Clinton used a private email account while she was secretary of state, leading to a continuous barrage by Republicans that she was undermining the integrity of her office and the country.

At the same time there was nary a word from them about a more troubling disclosure, that former General and ex-CIA director David Petraeus will plead guilty to illegally providing classified secrets to his mistress, that he lied to the FBI and that he left national secrets in his home (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/03/david-petraeus-plea-deal_n_6792344.html). 

Be Ethical and Advocate for Social Justice

I found this quote in a BBC News article on the partial shutdown of the U.S. government rather amusing and disturbing:

“Paul Broun of Georgia, who is currently running for a Senate seat, said he would not vote for legislation that ‘does not fit the Judeo-Christian biblical principles that our country was founded on’.”

Among the 84 votes that the Republican congressman has cast against the wishes of his party’s leadership was a vote last January to deny disaster aid to Hurricane Sandy victims. 

Christian charity!?! Harrumph!!!

I wonder, just which biblical principles do Broun and his fellow travelers agree with? Do they include polygamy? Or slavery? Or perhaps he’s in favor of, according to Jewish law, land redistribution to original owners every 50 years when the jubilee comes around? There are lots more inconsistencies between Broun’s and the Bible’s views on the way one’s life should be conducted, but perhaps the deepest chasm is between the latter’s exhortation to care for the needy and the former’s indifference to the plight of his fellow man, woman and child.

As the fight over Obamacare has shown, the world is living in increasingly doctrinaire times. Dogma for dogma’s sake. Fie on good will and fellowship. Principles and partisanship over peace and probity. 

Even Pope Francis is feeling the heat from those within the Catholic Church who wonder what happened to their ecclesiastical leader. Why is he emphasizing serving the people and not the papacy with its crimson-robed functionaries? 

No religion is immune to internecine bickering, though Islam seems to be more bent on warfare from within than dialogue. How disrespectful of another point of view are the repeated bombings of mosques and funerals by those not sharing the attacker’s version of Islam. Hundreds of years ago Christianity—Catholics, Protestants, Russian Orthodox—fought its share of wars of intolerance. Two thousand years ago Jewish factions killed those who didn’t agree with their visions of Mosaic law. 

With few exceptions, today’s Jews don’t kill one another, even when the debate is over their existence in Israel and the lands conquered in the Six Day War in 1967. There are, however, ongoing battles for the soul of the Jewish state in Israel and for the soul of Jews in the Diaspora. In Israel, the debate has many levels. One is over territory and security. Neither side wants to undermine the security of Israelis, but those who would relinquish total control of the West Bank see nothing secure about continued control of more than a million Palestinians. It would be state suicide to confer citizenship on the Palestinians; it would destroy the Jewish soul to retain the Palestinians in their current stateless condition. 

On another level, the secular foundations of Israel are under assault. Ultra-Orthodox Jews are pressuring for a more rigidly religious state, one that increasingly separates women from men. They haven’t blown anybody up, but they have exhibited behaviors abhorrent to Western sensibilities. 

The soul of the Jewish Diaspora, particularly in America, is in play, as well, as highlighted by this week’s release of a survey of U.S. Jews by the Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project. In a nutshell, the study found fewer American Jews identify with their religion’s rules or religious institutions, though they continue “to feel pride in being Jewish and have a strong sense of belong to the greater Jewish community.” As the Associated Press reported, their connection is based mostly on culture and ancestry. “A large majority said remembering the Holocaust, being ethical and advocating for social justice formed the core of their Jewish identity.”

Being ethical and advocating for social justice. Nothing restrictive about those values. Be ethical to all. Advocate for social justice for all. Yes, remember the Holocaust, but also remember that other religions and people have their tragedies to commemorate. That’s also a part of being ethical and advocating for social justice.  

Mel Brooks Strikes Again

Mel Brooks victimized me again.

Not just me, directly, but rather any and all of my namesakes. Anyone with the name Murray.

In the latest homage to the incomparable comedian, this time an interview with the BBC’s Alan Yentob (Mel Brooks Strikes Back, aired for the first time on HBO Monday night), a video clip was shown of Brooks and Carl Reiner performing their 2000 Year Old Man routine before a live audience in the early to mid 1960’s. Reiner asked Brooks, playing the ancient yet dapperly-dressed man, how clapping one’s hands as an expression of applause began. 

“Murray the Coward” was responsible, Brooks responded. It seems back in olden days, people would show their approval by slapping their cheeks with their palms. But Murray the Coward didn’t want to hurt himself so he pulled his face back at the last second, allowing his hands to hit. When everyone else heard the sound and saw Murray was not in pain, they followed suit. Thus, clapping was created.

Now, I take great pride in bearing the name of such an innovator as Murray the Coward, but I find it rather amusing the 2000 Year Old Man had so many friends with the name Murray. Three years ago, in an interview with The NY Times, the 2000 Year Old Man attributed to Murray the invention of thumb twiddling: 

REINER: Who was the first one to twiddle his thumbs?

BROOKS: Murray.

REINER: Murray? 

BROOKS: Murray, the cave man.

REINER: What made him twiddle his thumbs?

BROOKS: He couldn’t go on the hunt. He had hurt his foot very badly the day before, a musk oxen had hurt his foot the day before, so he was in the thumb—he was in the cave, twiddling his thumbs. He was the first one to betray this nervous disorder, thumb twiddling. And when we all came back, we noticed it. We said, “Murray, kung voo roch mush?” We talked in a different language.

REINER: Yes, I see.

BROOKS: Cave talk (for) “Why the hell are you twiddling your thumbs.”

There aren’t too many Murrays roaming the earth these days, so I guess my brethren-in-name and I should be happy Mel Brooks is keeping our moniker alive. 

Of course, sometimes having an uncommon name can prove useful, especially if your wife has an equally distinctive name. To wit—when an acquaintance a few weeks ago was speaking to a professional colleague about our daughter’s singing, and she mentioned our first names, the other woman perked up. From the deep recesses of her mind she remembered a Gilda and Murray from her time living in the New Haven area 38 years ago. Could these be the same couple? Indeed we were. Our mutual acquaintance set up a reunion dinner two weeks ago. 

Murray and Gilda. Gilda and Murray. Vive la différence!

New York in 10 Objects

If you had to pick 10 objects that told the story of New York City, actual items that could fit into a museum, not pictures of them, what would they be?

This exercise is not original to me. It’s an admitted rip-off of a feature from the Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC, the public radio station that is part of the National Public Radio network. In turn, the Lopate show was inspired by a BBC and British Museum series it is in the middle of broadcasting depicting the History of the World in 100 Objects.

Submissions to the Lopate Show had to be in by 5 pm Friday, February 10, so I’ve missed the deadline. Thus I’ve no need to keep my selections secret. Nor do I have to restrict my nominees to 10. To get the public started, Lopate offered three suggestions—an elevator from the Empire State Building, a bagel and a subway token.

Here are my choices for objects peculiarly New York in character with historical and/or social significance (I’ve restricted myself to items available from 1900 going forward, though some may have originated earlier). See if you agree and can cull them down to the 10 most significant. Or you can add your own iconic items. My Top 10 picks are at the bottom:

1. Slice of New York-style pizza
2. Nathan’s hot dog
3. Car from Coney Island’s Cyclone ride
4. Playbill from a Broadway show
5. Bloomingdale’s big b brown shopping bag
6. Interlocking N-Y Yankees logo on a baseball cap
7. Front page of the New York Times
8. Central Park bench
9. Checker taxi cab
10. Steel girder from the World Trade Center
11. Statue of the Wall Street bull
12. Ticker tape
13. The marquee of Harlem’s Apollo Theater
14. Art deco frieze from Radio City Music Hall
15. Sewing machine work station from the garment district
16. Manolo Blahnik shoe from Sex and the City
17. Ralph and Alice Cramden’s main room from The Honeymooners TV show
18. Ellis Island immigration stamp
19. A New Year’s Eve ball dropped at Times Square
20. TKTS theater booth
21. The detectives room from Law & Order TV show
22. Lions in front of the 42nd Street Public Library
23. Inside of a tenement apartment from the Lower East Side
24. A montage of magazine covers including Colliers, Saturday Evening Post, New York, The New Yorker, Time, Life, People, Look
25. Street sign of Madison Avenue
26. Menu from The Four Seasons or some other iconic restaurant
27. The steps in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
28. Part or whole Staten Island ferry
29. A bodega
30. Jackie Robinson’s cleats
31. Willie Mays’ baseball cap
32. Babe Ruth’s bat
33. Neon lights of Broadway
34. Fashion show runway
35. Pushcart
36. Looped showing of Woody Allen’s film “Manhattan”

My Top 10:
4, 6, 8, 10, 11, 13, 19, 23, 24, 30,

A Day Near the Office

Maybe he was traveling. Perhaps he had a luncheon engagement. Or he was just not feeling well. Whatever the reason, Lester didn’t show up for lunch at his usual time. We didn’t have a lunch date. Indeed, Lester had no way of knowing I would be waiting for him today.

I met Lester about three years ago. By coincidence, we shared a table in the atrium of the Citicorp Building after getting food from the hot and cold buffet of Cucina Gourmet. Retirements had whittled down my lunch-buddy list at work, so I’d often find myself eating alone. Until I met Lester, as affable a chap as you would likely meet anywhere.

Lester is in his 80’s, and always seems to be in conversation with whomever he sits with. That fateful day our trays found their respective ways to a common table. He is by no means the male version of a “bag lady.” A former retailer of home furnishings, I found his reflections on the industry entertaining. We also shared an interest in travel, old movies and history. His observations on events he lived through in the 1940s and 1950s were illuminating.

We’d meet once or perhaps twice a week, but since my retirement last June I had not seen Lester. I was in Manhattan today for a visit with my cardiologist (nothing wrong, thank you) and had hoped to stop by my old office but was told the staff was at meetings all day and could not entertain any guests. They weren’t even answering their phones. That troubled me, for the specter of more layoffs hangs over the entire publishing industry. The communications problem persisted throughout the day, but my short term anxiety turned to Lester. Where was he? In my current state of mind the ultimate reason found its way into my consciousness.

I dawdled over lunch. Noon turned into 12:30; 12:30 shifted into 1; 1:30 came and still no Lester. I was about to give up when he showed up, looking no worse for the 11 months since our last meeting. I did not tell him of my anxiety. We talked about retirement (he cautioned I might get bored after a year or so, unless I had hobbies like golf, which I don’t). We talked about a biography of Madame Chiang Kai-Shek he’s reading and the despicable way the Nationalist leaders of China treated their countrymen. We compared notes on the immigration law controversy in Arizona. All in all, a satisfying lunch with stimulating conversation, cut short half an hour after it began by my need to get to my next appointment.


Lunch Time: Since I retired my lunch more often than not is a can of soup. That might explain why I haven’t gained weight, especially when compared to what I normally ate. Today’s buffet lunch was typical of my former eating habits—several small pieces of Teriyaki turkey, a portion of chicken Francese, beets and carrots, and some pasta. And, please don’t tell Gilda, a slice of pound cake (only because I had finished my meal by the time Lester came and I had to have something to eat while he dined. I also was in a mood to celebrate my good blood work report).

I was such a regular at Cucina Gourmet that the cashier recognized me and welcomed me back.

Perhaps they succumbed to the economy, or maybe bad management, or maybe lack of interest, but in the near year that I have been away from the Citicorp food court, two kosher delis closed. On the other hand, two new sandwich shops opened.

I washed my hands in the Citicorp public restroom. That is, I wet my hands there, for despite four soap dispensers not one drop of soap dripped out of any spigot. It’s laughable to see the sign, “Employees must wash their hands before returning to work,” when Citicorp does not provide any soap.


Ink Spots: These days when I read the NY Times it is either on my BlackBerry, my computer or from the newspaper itself lying on the kitchen counter. Today I read it the old fashioned way, on the train into and out of Manhattan and became a victim once more of the Times’ nefarious plot to not only publish “all the news that’s fit to print” but to print it in such a manner that is leaves an almost indelible black mark on your fingers.

There have been periods when I disdained reading the Times because my blackened fingers embarrassed me. I even wrote the Times a letter some 15 years ago. They responded they’re no worse than other papers and they’re trying to resolve the problem. Apparently without success.


Nap Time: Metro North retained its comforting position as a favorite napping environment.

I’m indebted to my friend Kevin Coupe of the retail blog MorningNewsBeat.com for the following update on napping. I could not have expressed these sentiments any better:

"The BBC reports (in April) that a new Harvard Medical School study suggests that if a person naps after learning something, it actually makes it easier to commit to to memory. The study results reveal that while people are asleep, their brains tend to work on making connections and processing links relevant to the information they’ve just learned.

I love this study.

Though, as an inveterate napper, I keep thinking that I should be a lot smarter than I am."