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The Big Apple

Posted: June 20, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

For the first time in about a decade, I visited New York City. It’s a mess!

Although the city still has many sterling attractions, including museums, music, and sporting events, the Big Apple has hit hard times.

It reminds me of the 1990s when crime soared, racial tensions affected daily life, and the subways became a haven for crime and chaos.

Just before I arrived in town last weekend, a 34-year-old man was murdered on a subway near Union Square. That’s where I used to teach in the 1990s. Just after I left, a man slashed the legs of people on an East Side subway. I had difficulty sleeping because of the constant peel of police sirens, even in a relatively quiet neighborhood.

I spent about a dozen years in New York living and working on the West Side, which is generally considered a bit hipper and younger than the stolid East Side, where I stayed this past week to meet an old friend near the United Nations.

What surprised me on the East Side, which is generally considered older and wealthier, is how many restaurants had died from COVID. Many eateries closed, including McNally’s, a hangout for fans of the Mets and Buffalo Bills. Ironically, the locale is being turned into a healthcare facility.

Homeless people slept in the middle of the day on sidewalks across from the United Nations. I don’t remember the homeless situation being that bad when I lived in the city. However, a recent Wall Street Journal analysis found that homelessness had soared in recent months because of massive increases in rent throughout the country during COVID.

What really surprised me was the amount of dog poop on the sidewalks. Back in the day, I remember loud arguments if people left poop behind.

New York was never particularly friendly, but it seems even less friendly now than I recall. Almost no one makes eye contact or offers a hello or good morning. In a diner where my friend and I had breakfast, the waiter wore a face mask and seemed more interested in our finishing our food to seat another party than serving us.

When Rudy Giuliani became mayor in 1994, he faced many of the same problems that exist today in the city. He focused much of his time on the “broken window” theory of fighting crime. This theory states that visible signs of crime, anti-social behavior, and civil disorder create an urban environment that encourages further crime and disorder, including serious crimes. The theory suggests that policing methods target minor offenses such as vandalism, loitering, public drinking, jaywalking, and subway fare evasion help to create an atmosphere of order and lawfulness. Giuliani’s adoption of the strategy made New York a better and safer place to live.

It may be too late for such an approach.

I realize many New Yorkers will find this post offensive, but I now understand why thousands of people have left the city to find kinder and quieter climates.

The forest vs. the trees

Posted: June 13, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

It didn’t take long for the “experts” to proclaim that climate change had caused the Canadian forest fires that rained down smoke on the United States.

It took me only a few hours of reporting to get some truth about the Canadian fires. A combination of too few firefighters, lousy forest management, and Mother Nature had much more to do with the fires than climate change.

As philosopher Marshall McLuhan put it: “A point of view can be a dangerous luxury when substituted for insight and understanding.”

In a 2020 journal article in Progress in Disaster Science, the authors found that various problems existed in managing Canadian forests.

“Wildfire management agencies in Canada are at a tipping point. Presuppression and suppression costs are increasing, but program budgets are not,” the analysis stated. “To co-exist with wildfire, agencies in Canada must also strengthen and adjust their wildfire management capacity and capability. This necessitates stronger horizontal collaboration, enhanced resource sharing, investments to develop innovative decision support tools, and an increased focus on prevention and mitigation.”

Most firefighting is handled on the provincial level, so no national strategy for battling the blazes exists. Moreover, most provinces have had to cut budgets to prevent fires before they start. Also, the budget cuts have meant that few areas have enough full-time fighters and hire untrained people when fire season comes around.

While there is no shortage of young people ready to take up a hose, shovel, and hard hat for the summer, there have been countrywide problems hanging on to senior-level firefighters with the training and experience needed to fight against the flames.

The government owns most Canadian forest land, which it leases only a tiny percentage to forestry companies. These companies must use practices to prevent fires by keeping the ground clean and seeding and planting saplings after a harvest. Such an approach works far better and is less costly than fighting a blaze.

Seth Kursman, an executive for the Montreal-based Resolute Forest Products, told the Toronto Star: “As public policy has gotten more restrictive and more land has been set aside for preservation, there is less harvesting of mature trees and less cleaning of the forest floor. Trees in unmanaged boreal forests usually die of disease, insect infestations, or fire. When lightning strikes where there is a lot of dry tinder, the fire is worse.”

Greater use of Canadian woodlands by forestry companies could reduce the risk of catastrophe. “About two-tenths of 1% of the boreal forest is harvested annually, while more than 25 times that amount of forest is impacted by fire, insects, and disease,” Kursman said.

It’s essential to remember that lightning has caused more than three-quarters of the damage in Canada, with no indication of manmade causes, such as arson or carelessness. That means that manmade climate change has had little to do with igniting forest fires.

Chalk up the latest barrage of climate change “experts” to a misinterpretation of the facts on the ground!

This deadly day in history

Posted: June 6, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

June 6 is the deadliest and arguably the most important date in history.

As Martha Gellhorn puts it, “It was good bombing weather.”

Most Americans know that the invasion of Normandy was launched on June 6, 1944; a total of 4,414 Allied troops were killed on D-Day itself, including 2,501 Americans. More than 5,000 were wounded. In the ensuing Battle of Normandy, 73,000 Allied forces were killed and 153,000 wounded. The battle — and especially Allied bombings of French villages and cities — killed around 20,000 French civilians.

But the carnage of June 6 goes far beyond 1944.

On June 6, 1813, the Battle of Stoney Creek [Ontario] was a turning point in the battle between American and British troops in which an English force of 700 troops defeated a U.S. force twice that size.

On June 6, 1918, the U.S. Marine Corps suffered more than 1,000 dead and wounded in the Battle of Belleau Wood [France] during World War I. Marines finally took the area from the Germans.

On June 6, 1942, the U.S. Navy’s victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy at the Battle of Midway was a turning point in World War II. All four Japanese fleet carriers were sunk—as was a heavy cruiser Mikuma.

On June 6, 1967, Israel captured Egypt’s Gaza Strip on the second day of the Arab-Israeli War. The six-day war resulted in the defeat of the Arab armies and a major reshuffling in Arab government throughout the region.

On June 6, 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon to force the Palestine Liberation Organization to lead the Levant. According to Lebanese sources, between 15,000 and 20,000 people were killed during the conflict, mostly civilians.

On June 6, 2017, the Battle of Raqqa began with an offensive by Syrian democratic forces to capture the city from the Islamic State.

Although the date included a variety of military battles, a few good things happened on June 6.

On June 6, 1978, for example, ABC News launched 20/20, which became a well-watched venue for news and entertainment. I spent nine good years there as an investigative producer. Alas, today’s program limps along with reports about meaningless subjects.

Don’t follow your passion

Posted: May 23, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

Most students and college administrators wouldn’t like my message in a graduation speech.

Don’t follow your passion. Instead, prepare and perspire.

Had I followed my passion, I would have been the lead singer in a rock ‘n’ roll band. I almost certainly would have failed, although I am a member of the South Dakota and Iowa rock halls of fame.

Instead, I planned for three options: an immediate career in journalism, graduate school in journalism, or a doctoral program in English literature.

I planned my future for at least five years out. Fortunately, I chose correctly. Graduate school in journalism led me to contacts at prominent news organizations and provided a credential I needed 25 years later when I joined academia.

In a Forbes article, Julia Korn explains why following your passion is probably the worst advice someone can give a graduating high school or college student.

According to researchers at Stanford University, the “follow your passion” recommendation can be detrimental to an individual’s success due to narrowmindedness and dedication to a single passion. See http://gregorywalton-stanford.weebly.com/uploads/4/9/4/4/49448111/okeefedweckwalton_2018.pdf

Here’s why “follow your passion” is terrible career advice:

–It assumes we will only have one passion in life. People are dynamic and have more than one specific life interest. It can be limiting to select merely one passion, as it leaves no space for other passions yet to be uncovered. 

–It assumes passions don’t change with time. Humans continually evolve in every stage of our lives. What we once loved may now be a fond (or not so fond) memory.

–It assumes we already know what our passion is. Many people cannot confidently state a specific passion and how it can tie to a career. Most people need time, education, and exposure to different jobs and companies before they can concentrate on a passion.

–Just because you are passionate about something doesn’t mean you are good at it. American talent shows are a great example of this concept. If you aren’t good at your chosen passion, you’re unlikely to rise quickly in the professional rankings. In the long run, you may ultimately be hindering yourself.

–It’s a privileged message not afforded to all. Perhaps money is not a necessity for you. However, for most of the working force, money drives what profession you choose until you can establish yourself enough to make alternative decisions.

Korn suggested: “Commit to learning and re-learning what energizes and drains you. By dedicating yourself to what sparks your interests and what doesn’t, you can more easily align with a successful career path that highlights your true talents.” 

I would add another perspective from Thomas Edison: “Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.”

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