“If Dube had been tempted by a young fraulien, that’s nature, I would have let him live, but to lose the bank plates to a alte Frau“, he laughed”, Herr Maverick that’s incompetence.”
Even with a lifetime’s practice it took effort for the old gambler to chuckle with the General who not only had revealed to him what had been sitting in his casino’s vault for days, but confirmed that while eight decades had taken most of her legendary beauty, Samantha Crawford still retained her wits, nerve, and an uncanny ability to put the men of his family at risk.
The old man eyed the gray parade streaming before him and turned to the youth fighting back tears.
“Herni, let me tell you something”, he said touching the brim of his worn Stetson, “Before winning this house I played hands from Santa Fe to Shanghai & the decades taught me my Uncle Beau was right: ‘No matter how hot cards run, eventually they cool’ The day will come when Germany’s hand cools.”
Resigned, Henri mumbled “Oui monsieur Maverick” then, nearly dropping his tray gasped, as he recognized the smile & twinkle in the ancient gambler’s eyes:
One of the many reasons that Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was my favorite of the several Trek incarnations is the quality of its pilot episode “Emissary.” In it, we first meet Commander Benjamin Sisko, a widower, the father of a young son, Jake, and previously, the first officer of the USS Saratoga which was destroyed in Trek’s infamous Battle of Wolf 359. His wife, Jennifer, has been dead for three years — killed at Wolf 359 — and he has languished at a desk job since that time. In the beginning of the series, he takes command of Space Station Deep Space Nine without much enthusiasm, and contemplates retiring from Starfleet when his task at the station is finished.
Fast forward to the pivotal scene of the pilot: here is Sisko as he teaches the prophets — a group of non-linear alien beings who have abducted him and who use the appearance of persons and scenarios which are familiar to him in order to communicate — about linear existence using his favorite game as a metaphor.
[On a baseball field]
Avery Brooks as Benjamin Sisko
BATSMAN-Alien: Aggressive. Adversarial. SISKO: Competition. For fun. It’s a game that Jake and I play on the holodeck. It’s called baseball. JAKE-Alien: Baseball? What is this? SISKO: I was afraid you’d ask that. I throw this ball to you and this other player stands between us with a bat, a stick, and he, and he tries to hit the ball in between these two white lines. No. The rules aren’t important. What’s important is, it’s linear. Every time I throw this ball, a hundred different things can happen in a game. He might swing and miss, he might hit it. The point is, you never know. You try to anticipate, set a strategy for all the possibilities as best you can, but in the end it comes down to throwing one pitch after another and seeing what happens. With each new consequence, the game begins to take shape. BATSMAN-Alien: And you have no idea what that shape is until it is completed. SISKO: That’s right. In fact, the game wouldn’t be worth playing if we knew what was going to happen. JAKE-Alien: You value your ignorance of what is to come? SISKO: That may be the most important thing to understand about humans. It is the unknown that defines our existence. We are constantly searching, not just for answers to our questions, but for new questions. We are explorers. We explore our lives, day by day, and we explore the galaxy, trying to expand the boundaries of our knowledge. And that is why I am here. Not to conquer you either with weapons or with ideas, but to co-exist and learn.
[Scene switches to the doomed USS Saratoga in Sisko’s quarters as he leans over Jennifer’s dead body.]
TACTICAL-Alien: If all you say is true, why do you exist here?
The prophets force Sisko to face the fact that, by living in the grief and anger produced by Jennifer’s death, he has stopped trying to live up to his own standard.
This is what we all do at various points in our lives. And our task in life isn’t to beat ourselves up for being imperfect in what we say we believe — for failing — but to get back up off of the floor and keep pushing and pressing on, using what we have left.
Sisko still had his son and discovers by the end of the pilot — and by the end of the series — that he has much more than he was able to imagine at the point where we first meet him. This was good TV.
And it demonstrates something essential about the relationship between inner-core beliefs/principles and the fallen nature of humanity: temporarily falling away from the former doesn’t make them any less true or correct …and doesn’t make them any less yours. And the great part about principles which are solid and true is that returning to them will help you dig yourself out of the ditch into which life has deposited you.
Leonard: Okay, fine. Live with cats. Be like my Aunt Nancy. She had dozens of them. And do you know what happened after she died? They ate her.
Sheldon:You don’t have to sell me on cats, Leonard. I’m already a fan.
The Big Bang Theory: The Zazzy Substitution 2010
There has been some fun in watching the GOP establishment in sheer Trump induced panic to the point where they supposedly think that Mitt Romney is going to ride in and play savior. That insanity has been the bright side to my disappointment that Trump voters don’t know or remember that my man Ted Cruz has been fighting for all the big causes that Trump has been espousing.
However there is one part about all this nonsense and panic that might not make sense to someone paying attention. Why is the GOP so dead set against Donald Trump? After all he is a dealmaker and it’s highly likely that he will make plenty of deals that favor the party big wigs to get the votes in congress that he wants and who says that the big money donors who finance the various candidates will not see a deal or two thrown their way?
What you have to remember is the difference between how an activist sees the GOP and how the party Establishment does.
To an activist the GOP exists as a vehicle to advance a certain set of principles that matter to them as the best thing to the country for the sake of generations to come.
To a member of the establishment the GOP exists as a vehicle to a comfortable job / office in government and/or party, a source of profitable influence in same, an even more comfortable living post government and entré to all of these things for family friends and children.
To the big money donor it’s an investment in his interests to either guarantee a favor or to ensure a hearing.
For the activist it’s what the office can do for their cause, to the establishment it’s what the office can do for you and other members of the club and for the donor that put them all there.
And that’s why the party wants to stop Trump if they can because they envision a scene much like Tip O’Neill described on page 183 of his autobiography when he and a group of Massachusetts congressmen went to see President Johnson to pitch a friend from Boston in the General Service Administration for the head spot of that agency when it opened up in 1964.
As Tip explains things didn’t go as planned:
When we arrived at the White House, Johnson came in to the room and said, “Boys, I know what you’re here for. You want this Kennedy man to get the GSA job, this guy who looks down his nose at me like I’m shit. Well, you can tell him that he’s not going anywhere. He’s damn lucky to be where he is. Every time I see that elongated son of a bitch with his PT-109 tie pin, flaunting it in my face, I almost go through the roof.”
“Wait a minute—” somebody broke in.
“No, I will NOT wait a minute,” the president replied. “No Kennedy man is going to get that job. I’m giving it to a Johnson man. Now let’s go in and have a drink.”
When people think of jobs in a president’s administration they think of secretary of state, Attorney General or chief of staff, but the reality is there are thousands of positions that carry prestige, pay well and guarantee a well paying position in the private sector later on that an administration fills not just at the start of their term but all during it. (another argument for Glenn Reynolds revolving door surtax)
What happens if those positions go not to a party man, but to a Trump man? What happens when the head of an agency like the GSA doesn’t owe his position to a party or to a donor but owes it to the Donald™ and it time to make a ruling that affects the party or could affect a chance in a big donor’s fortunes? Even worse for the GOP what happens when Donald Trump remembers who treated him fairly and with respect and who did not? There are few men in the this history of the world that can hold a candle to Lyndon Baines Johnson in terms of ego and remembering a slight but I suspect Donald Trump is one of them.
I can see that scene from the LBJ years being repeated over and over again as a President Trump remembers who granted him a favor when he needed it (Like Chris Christie) and who did not.
Cue Captain Picard:
I suspect a variant of this conversation is happening right now with a lot of Republican Establishment types being given the choice between joining the establishment “destroy trump at all costs” forces, waiting till after Florida to make up their mind or jumping on the bandwagon before Super Tuesday, although I suspect the language being used by the Trump people is not as diplomatic as the Captain Picard’s
For myself I’m a Cruz man. I urge all voters to support Ted and will keep doing so as long as he’s in this race.
But if I’m ever in a position where my choice is Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton for president, I won’t have to think twice and if nothing else the man who gets my vote will know it was given honest.
It’s Monday and this weekend was the first time since I lost my job and Stacy McCain lost his Twitter rights that we’ve had a setback in our quest for $61 to make a living back here at the blog. Saturday DaTipJar was completely and utterly silent and as of this writing (Sunday 4 PM) DaTipJar is $49 short for the day and remain with a deficit for the year at 21 days and $1335 dollars.
To those who already have kicked in thank you so much. For those who can’t afford it, don’t worry about it but I do ask you to promote the site.
To those both able and inclined I’d really appreciate it if you’d help us close that gap by hitting DaTipJar.
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