Mark Knows It All

Dear Friends, The end of 2006 marks the 1 ½ year anniversary of Mark Knows It All . I want to thank all of you who take time from your busy day to read my opinions and rants. This blog has provided me with not only a creative outlet, but much pleasure. I especially appreciate your posted, emailed, and personal comments, both agreeing and disagreeing with whatever the topic at hand might be. Whether you agree with me or not, I try to provide you with well written commentary. Over the next several months you will see major changes in the format of Mark Knows It All . You have probably already noticed the addition of some basic graphics and pictures, and the addition of a security process to prevent unwanted spam comments. If you scroll down to the end of the archive list, you will see the addition of more links. This week, the Youngstown Vindicator has been added as a link for those of you from this area. The Washington Times is now linked. I have also added Imprimis , which is publish...

I am one of the few people who felt the OJ Simpson "not guilty" verdict was correct. Not because I thought he was innocent, the guy was as guilty as sin, but rather because I truly believe prosecutors should do their job. They have to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt. The planted evidence on the socks in the bedroom, missing blood from a vial taken home instead of to the evidence room, and perjury by the chief investigating officer, all spell reasonable doubt. You see, the chances of OJ coming after me with a knife are non-existent. But an over zealous prosecutor or crooked cops trumping up charges…that is something that should give us all pause and concern. Don’t think it could happen to you? Consider the lacrosse team at Duke University. These chumps hired two minority strippers for a party. One of the strippers claimed she was locked in a bathroom and raped for 30 minutes by several of the team members. As a result, three of the lacrosse team players were arreste...

Peace On Earth Now More Than Ever

I admit it. I like fruitcake. I have always felt that these citron laden confections have been much maligned and battered (get it?) to the point where those of us who are aficionados are embarrassed to admit our secret vice. Those candied cherries and candied little green things that kind of stick out of them are just wonderful. I rank them right up there with dried apricots, also one of my dirty pleasures. There are all sorts of fruitcakes. I got one yesterday in the mail sent by my mother from an outfit called Collin Street Bakery. It was a Texas fruitcake, and everyone knows you don’t mess with Texas. It was also fairly heavy, which seemed appropriate as I was watching the Guns of Navarone on television as I was eating a piece. For a minute, visions of little Nazis danced in my head using those suckers for ammunition in those really big guns. Just kidding. Actually, Collin Street makes a pretty good fruitcake. If someone doesn’t send me one, I usually buy one for myself. There are a...

This year we are having an “Our Lady of Perpetual Christmas” Christmas because there are 5 weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. While the retailers love it, part of me would really like an end to it given that the decorations and television ads started before Halloween. I am a tad "Christmased" out, and there are still 2 weeks to go!!! The result of this overdose of ho-ho was an exhausted case of writer’s block when trying to find a topic for “ This Year’s Christmas Card ” blog. No inspiration, just “when is it going to be spring”. To add to my physical exhaustion, the community chorus in which I sing had its Christmas programs this past weekend. Seraphim is a chorus of 50 people who love to sing, making a joyful noise every Monday night. The chorus does its Christmas program twice, once in Youngstown, the chorus home base, and once in New Castle, PA, at the home church of the director. The New Castle program is physically taxing as it is performed on pull out blea...

This past weekend, after several hours of shopping in Pittsburgh, my wife and I looked for a coffee shop to rest our weary bones and have a cup of coffee. Because we were shopping close to the University of Pittsburgh, there were plenty from which to choose. The first one we entered was so filled with cigarette smoke we could barely breathe. After a hasty exit, we found another shop across the street that had a no smoking sign in the window, so that’s where we went. That is the difference between a conservative and a liberal. I don’t smoke, and I know that smoking is bad. If I go into a place where smoking is allowed, I leave and find a no smoking establishment. Sometimes it means going across the hall, or going across the street, or simply choosing to go home. I don’t need the government to tell me what to do. I am an adult, and I have choices. The same goes for those who choose to work in a smoking environment. They can simply choose to work somewhere else. Ohio’s recent public place...

Some of us are a tad obsessive compulsive, and those of us that suffer from SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), raise OCD to an art form. We will watch the sunrise/sunset times on the weather channel, dread the 4th of July as a holiday as the days begin to be measurably, if not noticeably, shorter. We buy all sorts of lamps to put all over, both inside and outside of our houses. And truly believe whoever discovered Daylight Savings Time ought to be canonized for sainthood. Although I do not have a profound case of SAD, the shorter days do affect me more so than most people. And I have to work at keeping my mood up. I have charted the rising and setting of the sun for the entire year. And my calendar is somewhat different than most peoples. My happiest day of the year is December 21, the day that is the shortest day of the year and hence begins the days getting longer. I ignore June 21, but find the July 4th holiday somewhat depressing. By October, I am positively morose, which gives way...

While flipping around the television channels the other day, I came upon an old 1946 musical comedy entitled Two Sisters from Boston , starring a very young June Allyson and an even younger Peter Lawford. I kept it on just a few minutes as it was more than a tad cheesy. But in the part that I saw, Peter Lawford wooed his prospective girlfriend by saying “I come from good stock. My great grandfather was the first white man to scalp an Indian”. Did I hear him right? Scalping Indians? How politically incorrect is that? We live in an age where everybody is soooo sensitive. The latest flap over Michael Richards’ (Kramer of Seinfeld fame) off the wall comments, made after being heckled by some African Americans during his comedy act, is a case in point. The video of his racist tirade made the uncensored rounds on the internet, as well as the tamed down version on the television news shows. I don’t condone his racist rant. It was disgusting. Celebrities should know better. On the other hand,...

Does anyone know where I can buy some cool? Has anyone bottled that certain “Je ne sais quoi” that allows some people to own any room that is graced with their presence? As for me, I am totally cool-less, and often consider myself lucky to get through the door let alone into the room. Yesterday I went to Barnes and Noble to buy a book and have a cup of coffee in the café. In the middle of the room was a woman with three screaming kids, totally out of control, yet she sat there and was “cool”, dressed in shabby chic and talking on her cell phone. Totally self absorbed, oblivious to everything around her, she completely ignored her whiny brats simultaneously reading a book and talking on the phone. It must be wonderful to be her. To avoid the lil darlins’, I walked around the corner to Panera Bread hoping to drink my coffee in peace. As I walked in, I spotted a young man sitting in an easy chair facing the door. He looked totally cool, and looked exactly like a younger version of Jim, on...

Time has changed and the days are getting shorter and shorter. I really hate that. But there is good news tonight. In less than 7 weeks, the days will start to get longer again. So to help you through the winter doldrums, here is my recommended winter movie viewing list. My criteria are very simple: a good story, and the movie must take you to a different time or place. Enjoy. 1) Blazing Saddles : Mel Brooks single handedly stunted the growth of political correctness by years in this 1974 comic tour de force. It’s marked with stellar performances by Gene Wilder, the late Cleavon Little, and the late Madeline Kahn in one of her best roles as Lili Von Shtupp, the Teutonic Titwillow. Never again will you hear those immortal words: “The Sheriff is a nig…..” 2) Ghosts of Mississippi: Alec Baldwin and Whoopee Goldberg almost made me turn liberal in this powerful story about the criminal prosecution of Byron De La Beckwith for the murder of Medgar Evers 30 years after the fact. Jam...

From the LONDON TIMES . Right on the money. IRAQ IS JUST A COMMA, NOT A DEATH SENTENCE by: Gerard Baker The remarkable creative strength of America will ensure that its present travails are soon left far behindGEORGE BUSH got in trouble recently for saying the tragedy of Iraq over the last year will come to be seen, in the long narrative of history, as a mere comma. It sounded to his critics a little callous to dismiss the war as one of the commoner punctuation marks. Tens of thousands of casualties, the discrediting of a superpower’s foreign policy, the destabilisation of the world’s already most volatile region? You’d think that might at least merit an exclamation mark. But no. Just another dull comma, the notoriously overused dab of a penstroke separating much larger, substantive thoughts. And yet commas, and their placement, as Lynne Truss has cleverly and lucratively demonstrated, can have large consequences. They can change the entire meaning of sentences. They can, on the one ha...

Bill Clinton helped stoke the fires of extreme control of the parties. When the Republicans took control of both houses of Congress in 1994, Clinton, under the direction of Dick Morris, established a policy better known as triangulation. He would actively encourage both sides of an issue to extreme positions, then stake out the middle ground for himself. It worked for him. Unfortunately, when Clinton left office, the parties had polarized to the point where the vitritude between the Republican right and the Democratic left has reached new heights. Notwithstanding the outcome of the 2006 mid-term election cycle, America faces a daunting task in choosing the next President. Of the two parties, the Republicans are probably in a better position to deal with issues of party doctrine. There is no clear far right front runner. The three most attractive candidates are John McCain, Rudi Giuliani, and Mitt Romney. All three of these individuals are center right, rather than far right. That's...

1960 was the first year that I actually aware that an election was happening. My family was vacationing at Oglebay Park in Wheeling, W.V. It took just one ballot for the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles to nominate John Kennedy for President. The hotel rooms didn't have television sets, and we had to watch the convention in the lobby. It marked the first time in history that primaries played THE definitive role in the nomination process. Kennedy worked the primaries hard, and went into the convention with sufficient pledged delegates to win the nomination. In the Republican Party, the battle was between the Rockefeller Republicans and the Goldwater Republicans. The Republicans were more comfortable with smoke filled room deals. Candidates had to work hard in local parties to gain support and pledged delegates. The political battles reached down as far as fighting for control of college Republican clubs. The burgeoning conservatives began their trek to political power ...

Lots of people are watching the upcoming elections closely for lots of different reasons. It has been fun watching the political pundits on television try to impose their will on the American people. Tim Russert, Chris Matthews, and Wolfe Blitzer have been almost orgasmic in their joy that the GOP might lose control of the House or the Senate or both. The New York Times has been printing stories involving leaked classified documents, which should be treason, and stories based in questionable facts, which is a shame for the only newspaper in the United States which is considered a primary source for those who make their livelihood from researching history. One of the worst offenders is CNN, with Jack Cafferty’s series, Broken America . It is continually flashed across the screen like a political ad, with little or no connection to whether Cafferty is on the screen or not. Talk about your subliminal messages. Many of these reports are abysmal. He should take some pills. The fact of the m...

“It’s that Kraynak’s time of year”. Ho, Ho, Ho!!!! The Christmas rush is off and running, and right on schedule at the beginning of October. Midst my Halloween decorations and the opening salvo of family negotiations as to who is going where for Thanksgiving (we are demanding bilateral talks while the rest of the families want 6 party talks), I saw the first Kraynak’s commercial with its sickening jingle on television last week. For those of you not familiar with this area, Kraynaks is a garden center located in Hermitage, PA, just across the border, and is known for its miles of aisles of imported Christmas accoutrements as well as its world famous Santa’s Christmas Land. The “lil’ darlin’s” love it. The season has been rushed to the limit this year. For over a week, both QVC and Home Shopping Network have been pushing the holiday cookware, wrapping paper, lighted poinsettias and Christmas trees. In fact, I saw some of this stuff in August. Gift giving is the battle cry for the rest ...

The air is crisp and the leaves are golden. Fall is here and the football season is in full swing. What a great time of year! We once lived very close to Boardman High School. Starting in August, we could hear the drum beat from the marching band practicing before and after school all through the football season. That was fine for me because I love a good marching band. I am really big fan of school fight songs. The school fight song represents the embodiment of school spirit and loyalty, and will rouse school passions for a lifetime as the opening bars of the song are played in any kind of a surrounding. I am a Boardman High School Spartan graduating in 1968. Michigan State University also called itself the Spartans. So Boardman High adopted their fight song as its own. It is a great fight song.  (Edit 2014:  The Boardman Fight Song was actually The Minnesota Rouser...but it used the Michigan State Fight Song liberally when marching onto the field). Then I went to Ohio ...

Politics is politics, but this year’s campaign has taken a nasty, nasty turn. With the Dems running a full court press to take control of the House of Representatives, the “scum” factor has reached new lows on both sides. I cannot refrain from commenting. Although I am a Republican, I have not been particularly thrilled with George Bush. The three areas that have concerned me are 1) his lack of attention to health care insurance issues; 2) the change in the Medicaid laws, which is lethal to the middle class and not well publicized; and 3) the lack of governmental incentives for the rapid development of alternative fuels to oil. As to the Iraq war and the war on terror, there are no good alternatives. And I have been disappointed in the Democratic Party’s continual sniping without offering any alternatives. That leads me to believe they have none, and for those issues I would rather deal with the devil I know versus the devil I don’t. All of the above are important issues to this countr...

The following is written less to express any opinion on the merits of the Iraq War, but more as a commentary on the role of past Presidents. As our past Presidents are elected earlier and live longer, it is my opinion that they should confine their activities to philathropic activities and leave the running of the country to the current President. It does this country no good at all to have former Presidents cutting at the knees of a current sitting President, or forming shadow governments going about the world independently proposing foreign policy. Both Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, especially this past week on ABC news, have chosen to take that path. It is damaging to the country. The political process of those currently holding office or currently aspiring to office gives more than sufficient space for important and necessary debate. Office of Jimmy Carter The Carter Center One Copenhill Atlanta, GA 30307 RE: Comments on ABC News Dear Mr. Carter: Your criticisms of the current adm...

I am 56 years old, and feel like I am 20 years younger. I keep a full schedule at work, doing things now that years ago I never would have imagined myself doing. Other than some GI distress, I am relatively healthy. I sleep a little more on the weekends, but still want to have fun. Imagine my mental distress when I read on the internet that I am in the “wrong demographic”. How can that be? My wife and I are full blown baby boomers, the largest segment in our society. Our kids are grown and their college is either paid for or pert near paid for. We are at our peak earning years. We have expendable income, and less than expendable time that we are looking to use in a fulfilling manner. Nonetheless, when the cable television networks the WB (A Time Warner subsidiary) and UPN (A CBS Viacom subsidiary) merged last May to form the new CW television network, us boomers were deemed to be the wrong demographic. How did I find out? One of the few television shows my wife and I watch on a regular...

Much is made these days about being a team player. Schools try to instill the values of “the team” by continuously forcing group projects into the curriculum. We watch our sports teams and hope that the team members won’t hog the ball. In a country built by rugged individualism, the media extols the virtues of “community”. Even in raising our families, Hillary Clinton says that “It Takes a Village”. I googled definitions of teamwork, and found a thousand platitudes from Vince Lombardi to Paul McCartney. But hidden in these platitudes was a quote from Susan Gerke, who headed IBM’s Leadership Development: She said: “Conflict is inevitable in a team ... in fact, to achieve synergistic solutions, a variety of ideas and approaches are needed. These are the ingredients for conflict”. Translated, conflict is a necessary part of the process, and therefore has to be accommodated. Let’s take a look at what teamwork is not. Teamwork is not mindlessly following a leader, buying into the argu...