Mark Knows It All

If you are looking for warm and fuzzy…you ain’t gonna find it here. Keep–a-goin’. This is about a phenomenon that is becoming less and less unusual…longevity. I don’t have any statistics, but anecdotally it appears to me that folks are living longer and longer. And that is causing some real problem on all sorts of different levels be it Social Security, Medicaid, long term care. The list goes on and on. My wife and I have had that kind of longevity in both of our families. My mother died three years ago this January at the age of 89. I have an uncle and aunt who are pushing 100. My wife’s mother lived to be 84 and died this past September. The usual response is “isn’t that wonderful he/she/they led such a long life!” Well…maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. If the family is functional long life is a good thing. If it is dysfunctional, that is another story. Both of our mothers were difficult people, and I mean that in the worst possible way. While on the surface things seemed al

I have been writing Mark Knows It All for eight years making this my eighth Christmas Card.   Each year I begin to look for things that could be the topic of my year's favorite essay.   Over the years I have found Christmas in a mad dash for cookies, or in a little girl who was physically challenged going down the steps after a Christmas show, or on a drive to Sharon midst a spectacular full moon and beautiful decorations.    This has been a difficult year.    It has been filled with friends and family passing expectedly or unexpectedly.   There has been family turmoil rising up when we weren't paying attention.    People have been on edge.   Everybody seems to be angry.   Then there was that shooting thing in Connecticut just days before Christmas taking the lives of 28 people, twenty of whom were innocents.   As horrific as the Newtown massacre was, it pales in comparison to the violence on the streets of Chicago and Detroit.        The country is in financial turm

Okay….all of you do-gooders who want to wash yourselves in the Christmas spirit are going to have to wait until next week. This week, I am the Grinch…the Scrooge….the curmudgeon who is ready to take this holiday and shove it up someone’s ho ho ho. Generally I am a good natured person (Alright…who snickered?). But this year I have had it up to my chinny chin chin with people who always have their hand out. How much is enough? The begging for the “needy” is non-stop. From food banks to the local charities to collections in churches to collections in grocery stores to the cashier who asks do you want to donate a dollar to help blankity blank to my Continuing Legal Education seminars where the Ohio Supreme Court says we need to do more pro-bono work. Hell, half the work I do is pro-bono. I don’t need some smug judges who don’t have to pay for their CLE hours because they are “public servants” telling me to do more work for nothing. I am at the end. If things have gotten so bad i

Are you tired of snotty kids? I know I am. No, not the crumb grinding infant set. That’s another story. I’m talking about the sniveling 16 – 26 year olds that don’t have the common sense to come in out of the rain….and yet….they act like they have the wisdom of the ages locked in their puny little brains. In reality, they know jack. Take away their hand held and I doubt if they could add two plus two and come up with four!!! I was channel surfing the other night and came across Reba McIntyre’s new program Malibu something or other. Reba is the hapless parent surrounded by two teen age brats who are endowed with unending wisdom, and her former pot head mother played by Lily Tomlin who knows the answer to life resides somewhere between marijuana and LSD. Never mind that it’s Reba who has to pay the bills and hold everything together. She’s just a schmuck, a poor working schmuck. In many ways this show is emblematic about our society today. Those who are working and trying to m

                               For some light reading these past few weeks, I decided to read a book called The Grey Wolf. For those non-historians among you, and I am sure they are plenty, that was the nick name for Adolf Hitler. The book’s premise it wasn't Hitler who died in that bunker in April of 1945…it was his double. Hitler, Eva Braun, and Blondie the wonder dog escaped to Argentina, a favorite haven for Nazis on the lam.  It explores in detail the relationship between the demise of Nazi Germany and the rise of Juan and Eva Peron (Evita). It's argument is simple. The story goes Eva Braun poisoned herself and Hitler blew his brains out. The bodies were then brought out of the bunker and burned to a crisp. Bones were recovered from the site, but none belonging to Hitler or his wife. So what happened to them? Simon Dunstan and Gerrard Williams do a plausible job in arguing that Martin Bormann, Hitler’s right hand man, planned for Hitler’s escape beginning in 1943 wh

When the train is coming down the track , there is no way to stop it . Get out of the way. And that’s exactly what happened last Tuesday night. To all of my Republican friends, all I can say is I’m sorry . After we retreat into our pensive selves to figure things out, I will guarantee you the sun will come out tomorrow . So now it’s time for the post mortem. I am reviewing the situation , to analyze what happened. As I sit at the bar, there’s a tear in my beer watching out the window at sundown . How could I figure I was winning when I was losing again!!! But all things must pass . Obama did a little sidestep right back into the White House. He had more money , and he knew how to use it.  Those guys from Chicago, Illinois, are tough. There’s always next year, and maybe this time I’ll win. God Bless America.     (There's a Tear in my Beer...really?)

It has been a long campaign. Even for a politically active person like me it has been a campaign way too long. Then again, it has been a long four years. Each election cycle I marvel at the intelligence of the American public, and sometime its ignorance. This year my faith has been restored. It has been a different kind of campaign. Conservative and center right moderates acted on their own motion. For three and half years there was no center to rally around…no standard bearer of leader. Yet Americans by the millions acted on their own sense of what it means to be an American forming Tea Parties and Pacs and ad hoc groups operating independently of each other yet all working towards a common goal: American Restoration. While Obama and the Dems tried to fracture America, pitting poor against rich, black against white, young against old, and Hispanic against “white” Hispanic, men against women, a funny thing happened on the way to those faux pillars. American conservatives came to

I have always been political. I remember seeing John Kennedy when he came to Youngstown. I was ten. His motorcade went through Canfield. He was riding in an open convertible shaking the hands of people who went right up to the car. As he drove by me I grabbed his thumb…and wouldn’t let go. My mother started to scream. I could see the headlines now: Ten Year Old Pulls Candidate Out of Car. My conservative ilk started in 1964 when Barry Goldwater was running against Lyndon Johnson. By then I was 14, having political discussions at holiday dinners with my fascist Italian uncle. But he was a businessman who started with nothing, sold take-out spaghetti dinners door to door for his friend Chef Buardi (Boy-yar-dee) in Cleveland, and over the years became a major importer of Italian Romano cheese. At any rate, I read two books: Conscience of a Liberal by Hubert Humphrey and Conscience of a Conservative by Barry Goldwater.  I concluded Goldwater was right, no pun intended, and was imm

        It’s time for my annual Christmas rant. For several weeks, QVC and Home Shopping Network have been doing their early Christmas thing. I am even getting emails asking me to start celebrating early. Several television networks are already advertising their “Countdown to Christmas” movie fests beginning in November. All of this started the last week of September. Give me a break. I know times are difficult. The retail business has been, let’s say, less than stellar. But Geez Louise, the Halloween stuff has just been put on the shelves. Can’t they wait until after the candy corn pumpkins go on sale? All we need is Kraynak’s to start advertising their Christmas Tree Lane…and my October will be complete!!! And don’t forget somewhere in the mix between Halloween and the Christmas season is Thanksgiving…where we are thankful…for the Macy’s parade and football? The fact of the matter is we continue to degrade the Christmas holiday. In A Charlie Brown Christmas, Lucy tells us

As we go through the 2012 election cycle, the behavior of the press has been disturbing. What we are seeing is the death of journalism and an even stronger alliance among those in the media and the Progressive political movement in the United States. There is continual questionable journalism surrounding hard news stories in an effort to shelter the media's candidate, Barack Obama, from any political fallout. It’s tough for Americans to make decisions about who best to deal with serious issues if the media simply refuses to report what those issues are. Here is what the media is not reporting. On the economic front, which is the least of our worries notwithstanding how bad things are, durable goods orders are down 13.2%, the lowest January, 2009, and previous months’ figures are being revised downward. The economy in China is slowing down. And more importantly, the turmoil in Europe, the largest economy in the world when taken collectively, is pushing it into deep, deep rece

The summer of 2012 has been the summer of my discontent. I don’t take to change well, and there has been lots of change. Some was by choice, but most was life just happening. My mother-in-law passed away a few weeks ago after a rather lengthy illness. Those of you who know me also know we didn’t get along that well, but she was very sick and no one wishes that on another human being. I have been to a lot of funerals this summer. Several of my relatives died unexpectedly in addition to several of my friends and clients….not a good summer. Those who are wiser than me told me it is a function of my age. I am 62 going on 63. I hear people my age referred to on television as “seniors” and “older.” I don’t feel I am either of those except when I go for the 20% Tuesday night discount at the Perkins. Hey…a buck’s a buck!!!! But where I have felt my age is in coping with daily life. The world has changed. I have done my best to change with it. I have succeeded in some things, and fai

I have never watched a nation’s foreign policy implode right before my eyes. America has big problems in the Mideast. Pakistan and Iran are watching the paper tiger burn up front and they will feel emboldened. Israel has to be on the verge of nervous breakdown. War will be here sooner rather than later, and it will be bad…really bad. Once again America is learning that there is evil in the world, and it isn’t us. No matter what our faults, we are the good guys. Appeasement does not now, nor has it ever, worked. Peace is only achieved through strength.  It is much more cost effective in blood and treasure to maintain strength rather than to rebuild it. America has lost all influence in the Mideast. We have turned our back on Israel, our most important ally in the region. We have lost Egypt. Pakistan is next and the most dangerous because of its nuclear weapons. Iran is still on the path to war. Iran is telling us what it is going to do. We have to listen. War is now almost inevit

As the Democratic Party opens its convention in Charlotte, the national debt is passing the $16 trillion mark. Can you comprehend that number? It is beyond me how any responsible government official believes that is okay. The figure is equal to the total GDP of the United States. That makes us Greece. On its face, the national debt is a complicated issue and may or may not be as awful as it seems. Let’s start with the upside. We are not Greece. The main problem facing the debt ridden southern Mediterranean paradise is that the money it is spending isn’t its own…literally. Greece uses the Euro as its currency and therefore is spending the European Union currency rather than its own. It has no control over monetary policy, or how much money is circulated. The United States prints its own currency and has the option of going down to the basement to the printing presses and print a whole bunch of money to pay the debt off. Upside #2 is that most of our debt is owed to our selves

The quality of life in America has declined for many reasons. Some are political. Some are economic. But first and foremost on the list is a complete lack of respect for other members of society. For the most part, Americans have reduced America to the least common denominator. A case in point is an article I read about dress codes and airplane travel. Back in the day…and I lived back in the day…people got “dressed up” when traveling by plane. Today a battle rages as air carriers fight a losing battle to enforce some modicum of a dress code. Looking at other people’s butt cracks or underwear with droopy drawers is not my idea of a pleasant flight. The same goes with too short shorts, too much cleavage, people who haven’t bathed or aren’t wearing underwear so that you can see Poughkeepsie or Poughkeepsette. Breast feeding can be added to the list. Yes, it is perfectly natural, but so are many other things and we don’t allow that. The children of the sixties have done a bang u

Paul Ryan was not my first choice for the Vice Presidential slot. That would be Chris Christie. But then again Mitt Romney was not my first choice for the Presidential nominee. That would be Chris Christie. I am from Youngstown which has often been called little Chicago. Those of us who live here had our lives forged in the steel mills of the mid 20th Century, and our politics are a solid by-product. We don’t play nice here. We are tough. We are aggressive. We are no holds barred. With the debasing of Romney by Democratic propagandists…he is a robber-barron…he is a murderer…he is a felon…he hates gays…he hates women…I thought that the Republicans needed a street fighter to get down in the muck with these guys. Maybe I was wrong. In a single stroke Mitt Romney has upped the ante. He has raised the stakes in this election, elevating it to the serious debate this country needs. Paul Ryan is nothing if not the smartest man in the room in Congress. With a young and attractive fa

As our cities, and particularly Chicago, are collapsing around us, the thug Mayor of Chicago Rahm Emmanuel is worried about chicken sandwiches. If you want to know what is wrong with American politics, you need to look no further than liberal authoritarianism. These are folks who would use the power of government to turn off talk radio, prohibit opposition candidates from running ads criticizing an incumbent 60 days before an election (McCain-Feingold); and threaten businesses in their jurisdictions who oppose them. This is just a sample of the dictatorship of the left, whose opinions they have decreed should be dogma for all Americans. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel and Boston Mayor Menino indicated that they would actively oppose the expansion of Chik-Fil-Lay in their cities because of this privately held company’s CEO’s open opposition to gay marriage, which by the way reflects the openly stated opinion of the current President up until he decided to motivate the left in the upc

The tragedy in Aurora, Colorado, has given this nation pause. Pyramided on top of the school shooting in Chardon, OH, and the Giffords shooting and the Virginia Tech massacre not to mention Columbine, America is once again asking the question what is wrong in our society that this keeps happening. Unfortunately, there is plenty of blame to go around, and none of it is fixable. Sure you are going to get the anti-gun lobby screaming and yelling, and maybe they are right but I don’t think so. The issues are much more profound. We have lost our way in this country. The foundation upon which America was built is crumbling. For over two hundred years we were rooted in the Protestant work ethic and individual initiative. Our moral code was rooted in the church. Our support group was the family. Help and charity came from within, and we were a generous people. Not anymore. Families are no longer important as alternative life styles have risen to the surface. Marriages are delayed…ea

I try to keep the Mark Knows It All blog somewhat a-political concentrating on quality of life issues. From time to time, however, something happens which is so politically offensive that I have to comment. Two such things happened over this past week. Barack Obama, in a candid off the tele-prompter moment, finally said what he believed. Those people who are successful didn’t get that way themselves. They owe their success to the government. Really? He was right about one thing. He said that there are lots of smart, hard working people out there who don’t succeed. That’s true. Most small businesses in the United States fail. But we are all in there trying. I consider myself to be a hard working lawyer, and there are lots of lawyers who are financially more successful than me. So what? I admire them. These guys and gals are the ones I aspire to be even at my age. They make me work harder and smarter. That’s how it’s supposed to be. A friend of mine opened a small business several

My chorus is doing some outreach concerts over the next few weeks. One of them is for the South High School alumni. This is an older group with a lot of veterans from WWII and Korea, and they requested some patriotic music. Our director pulled out the old war horses: God Bless America, Battle Hymn of the Republic, Shenandoah, America, the National Anthem, and God of Our Fathers. These are the songs that stirred America’s soul. But this time, as we practiced them tonight, it didn’t seem the same. Ronald Reagan’s Morning in America has turned into a nightmare. Here is a country where half of working Americans pay no income tax. Here is a country that saw 85,000 people go on Social Security Disability last month, while only creating 80,000 new jobs. Here is a country on the brink of a second recession after never really recovering from the last one. Here is a country where people are all but strip searched before boarding an airplane. Here is a country where government is now tryin