Local Brew Contests in August

Two local homebrew contests brighten up the Kansas City calendar in August, and one of them offers you the final voice in the judging process.

75th Street

The first one will be the 2nd Annual 75th Street Homebrew Master's Contest. It features a rare, free-form approach to judging. Rather than rigidly measuring how closely a beer matches up to the style guidelines of the Beer Judge Certification Program, this one tosses the style guidelines out the window in favor of which beer tastes best. From all of the submissions, an expert panel will narrow the field to 5, and then those 5 will be served to and judged by the public on Saturday, August 29.

Homebrewing, like many endeavors, balances science and creativity. The vast majority of homebrew contests favor the scientific side. Beers are submitted under specific subcategories, and they are judged by how closely they fit into the written descriptions of those styles. That causes competition-minded brewers to adhere to traditional recipes instead of creativity. Experimentation, like trying English hops in a German style, is discouraged, not because it would taste bad, but because it is not what the style guidelines call for. I use a computer program in designing my recipes to make certain that the color, bitterness, strength and other measurables fit within the guidelines.

The 75th Street Contest is a radical departure. If you want to try tossing oatmeal into a pilsner, and it comes out tasting great, then you might win. Last year, I won the contest with a beer based loosely on the Belgian tripel style, but bolstered with honey and Mexican sugar to create a beer that serious judges would criticize, but pleased anyone looking for something sweet and strong.

If you want to taste a few interesting, well-crafted homebrews, show up at 75th Street on Saturday, August 29 and help choose from among the finalists. I'll probably be submitting a Dark American Lager, a Hefeweizen, a Robust Porter, a Schwarzbier and a Milk Stout. If I'm one of the finalists, I'll let you know!

KC Irish Fest Stout Brewing Contest

If the 75th Street contest represents freedom, the KC Irish Fest Stout Brewing Contest represents focus. Only stouts need apply.

That said, stouts are a fairly broad group of beers, with 6 recognized subcategories. Dry Stout is probably what you think of when you think of stout - Guinness Draft, Murphy's and Beamish fall within this category. Sweet Stout is often brewed with lactose to give it a more full body and a sweeter taste - try Left Hand Brewery's Milk Stout for a great example of this enjoyable beer. Oatmeal Stout is similar to sweet stout, but it uses oatmeal to increase the body of the beer instead of lactose. Samuel Smith's Oatmeal Stout is a good example of this one, as is Goose Island's Oatmeal Stout. Foreign Extra Stout is actually two varieties - a thick, sweeter Tropical version, or a strong, bitter Export version. Essentially, these are sweet stout or dry stout on steroids. If you've had a Dragon Stout from Jamaica, you've had a great example of the tropical version, and if you've had Coopers Best Extra Stout from Australia, you know what a great dry version tastes like. American Stout is similar to the export version of the foreign extra stout, but typically uses American hops (which often have a citrus flavor) and tend to be more bitter. Rogue's Shakespeare Stout is one of my favorites. Finally, Russian Imperial Stout is a monster of flavor, with 8% alcohol or higher, and deep, rich, complex flavor. Go grab a bottle of Bell’s Expedition Stout or North Coast Old Rasputin Imperial Stout for a visit to stout heaven.

Out of all those subcategories, the KC Irish Fest will identify one as the best homebrewed stout in Kansas City. I'm going to be submitting a Milk Stout that is still fermenting, partially because it is a little bit unusual, and might stand out for the judges (who will be tasting stout after stout), and because I wanted to brew a batch for my buddy Ancillary Adams to enjoy. Because, ultimately, while it's nice to win contests and I eventually want to have a wall full of blue ribbons, my favorite prize in homebrewing is when somebody takes a sip, gets a bit of a surprised look on his or her face, and says, "Hey, this is really great! You brewed this?".

The Case Against Pete Rose

Over on Facebook, a friend has started a discussion of whether Pete Rose should be allowed into the Baseball Hall of Fame. In this age of chemically-enhanced, steroid-juiced heroes, the simple act of placing bets in favor of your own team seems simple and understandable. Why should Pete Rose be singled out for making a phone call to a bookie while other major leaguers were shooting up?

So far, I'm the only vote against Pete Rose in my friend's informal survey.

Let me be clear. There can't be any legitimate argument about whether Pete Rose's baseball playing deserves the honor. It does. His hitting, his longevity, his versatility and, most of all, his hustle made him a true great. His play at the plate in the 1973 All Star game remains one of my favorite baseball illustrations of toughness and determination.

But he bet on the Reds. Strikes one, two, and three. He's out.

I've only been in a couple MLB clubhouses. Besides benches and lockers, there's one other thing always in them, though, and I would find it in every single clubhouse in Major League Baseball. Rule 21. "Any player, umpire, or club or league official or employee, who shall bet any sum whatsoever upon any baseball game in connection with which the bettor has a duty to perform shall be declared permanently ineligible."

Pete Rose has admitted that he violated that rule. He lied about it for years, denying it at every turn, but I'm not here to judge the moral worth of the guy - only whether he has a legitimate claim that he should reside in the Hall of Fame after he violated the most prominent, crystal clear rule of the sport.

Everything else you or I can say about the situation is simply argument over details. Pete Rose supporters can point to his performance as a player, and his detractors can point to his decades of lying about his betting, and his time in jail for tax evasion (ironically, in the hometown of the catcher he demolished at the plate). Neither is relevant. We can argue about whether the penalty for betting on your own games is too harsh, but it is what it is (and, in my opinion, what it should be).

I appreciate the way that "Charlie Hustle" played baseball. He was one of the greatest. But he violated the rule posted on every clubhouse door. He should not be allowed to reside in the Hall of Fame.

Sophia Jumps from Comments to Her Own Blog

One of my favorite commentators on this blog has been Sophia. We don't always agree; we don't always disagree. She's calm, insightful, informed and logical.

Finally, she's started her own blog, League of Extraordinary Nobodies. I'm expecting great things.

Sunday Poetry: America, by Allen Ginsberg

America

America I've given you all and now I'm nothing.
America two dollars and twenty-seven cents January 17, 1956.
I can't stand my own mind.
America when will we end the human war?
Go fuck yourself with your atom bomb
I don't feel good don't bother me.
I won't write my poem till I'm in my right mind.
America when will you be angelic?
When will you take off your clothes?
When will you look at yourself through the grave?
When will you be worthy of your million Trotskyites?
America why are your libraries full of tears?
America when will you send your eggs to India?
I'm sick of your insane demands.
When can I go into the supermarket and buy what I need with my good looks?
America after all it is you and I who are perfect not the next world.
Your machinery is too much for me.
You made me want to be a saint.
There must be some other way to settle this argument.
Burroughs is in Tangiers I don't think he'll come back it's sinister.
Are you being sinister or is this some form of practical joke?
I'm trying to come to the point.
I refuse to give up my obsession.
America stop pushing I know what I'm doing.
America the plum blossoms are falling.
I haven't read the newspapers for months, everyday somebody goes on trial for
murder.
America I feel sentimental about the Wobblies.
America I used to be a communist when I was a kid and I'm not sorry.
I smoke marijuana every chance I get.
I sit in my house for days on end and stare at the roses in the closet.
When I go to Chinatown I get drunk and never get laid.
My mind is made up there's going to be trouble.
You should have seen me reading Marx.
My psychoanalyst thinks I'm perfectly right.
I won't say the Lord's Prayer.
I have mystical visions and cosmic vibrations.
America I still haven't told you what you did to Uncle Max after he came over
from Russia.

I'm addressing you.
Are you going to let our emotional life be run by Time Magazine?
I'm obsessed by Time Magazine.
I read it every week.
Its cover stares at me every time I slink past the corner candystore.
I read it in the basement of the Berkeley Public Library.
It's always telling me about responsibility. Businessmen are serious. Movie
producers are serious. Everybody's serious but me.
It occurs to me that I am America.
I am talking to myself again.

Asia is rising against me.
I haven't got a chinaman's chance.
I'd better consider my national resources.
My national resources consist of two joints of marijuana millions of genitals
an unpublishable private literature that goes 1400 miles and hour and
twentyfivethousand mental institutions.
I say nothing about my prisons nor the millions of underpriviliged who live in
my flowerpots under the light of five hundred suns.
I have abolished the whorehouses of France, Tangiers is the next to go.
My ambition is to be President despite the fact that I'm a Catholic.

America how can I write a holy litany in your silly mood?
I will continue like Henry Ford my strophes are as individual as his
automobiles more so they're all different sexes
America I will sell you strophes $2500 apiece $500 down on your old strophe
America free Tom Mooney
America save the Spanish Loyalists
America Sacco & Vanzetti must not die
America I am the Scottsboro boys.
America when I was seven momma took me to Communist Cell meetings they
sold us garbanzos a handful per ticket a ticket costs a nickel and the
speeches were free everybody was angelic and sentimental about the
workers it was all so sincere you have no idea what a good thing the party
was in 1835 Scott Nearing was a grand old man a real mensch Mother
Bloor made me cry I once saw Israel Amter plain. Everybody must have
been a spy.
America you don're really want to go to war.
America it's them bad Russians.
Them Russians them Russians and them Chinamen. And them Russians.
The Russia wants to eat us alive. The Russia's power mad. She wants to take
our cars from out our garages.
Her wants to grab Chicago. Her needs a Red Reader's Digest. her wants our
auto plants in Siberia. Him big bureaucracy running our fillingstations.
That no good. Ugh. Him makes Indians learn read. Him need big black niggers.
Hah. Her make us all work sixteen hours a day. Help.
America this is quite serious.
America this is the impression I get from looking in the television set.
America is this correct?
I'd better get right down to the job.
It's true I don't want to join the Army or turn lathes in precision parts
factories, I'm nearsighted and psychopathic anyway.
America I'm putting my queer shoulder to the wheel.

- by Allen Ginsberg
____________________________________________________________

For a guy who eschews the traditional forms I love, Ginsberg manages to create real poetry in the grandest sense.

While I tend to talk about rhythm, rhyme, sonnets and villanelles, poetry can also be as simple as the absolute correct word in the correct place. Alexander Pope talked about poetry being "what oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed," and that looser definition has unleashed barrels of undisciplined ink, scrawled by emotional basket-cases thumbing through thesauri. But, even without the discipline of metrical forms, Ginsberg stands out as someone who creates real, lasting poetry with little more than breathtaking word choice.

Let me pull out a few of the lines that make this poem shine for me:
"America when will you be angelic?
When will you take off your clothes?"

"America why are your libraries full of tears?"

"You made me want to be a saint."

"America I feel sentimental about the Wobblies."

"Are you going to let our emotional life be run by Time Magazine?
I'm obsessed by Time Magazine.
I read it every week."

"It's always telling me about responsibility. Businessmen are serious. Movie
producers are serious. Everybody's serious but me.
It occurs to me that I am America.
I am talking to myself again."

"America I'm putting my queer shoulder to the wheel."

You may have chosen other lines. That's the beauty of the poem - it is a vast complaint of alienation, a lamentation that America is too straight and narrow to accept the oddball marvelousness of someone like Ginsberg, or the angelic communists he knew as a child.

The final line, "America I'm putting my queer shoulder to the wheel," redefines the entire poem for me. It's not a defeated whine, it is a strident insistence that he is a part of America, and that he is participating, like it or not, in building this country. When he resurrects the names of people who were persecuted for being different, he insists that he is part of a vital history of dissent, and courage.

When it was published, many thought of this poem as horribly anti-American. And, in fact, it may be anti-"Lee Greenwood's America", but it is the sort of poem that makes me proudest of the America we live in.

Thank God that Allen Ginsberg, back in 1956, put his queer shoulder to the wheel, and thank God for the other oddballs, outcasts and free-thinkers that continue to pound out their strange beats in rhythms that are not iambic.

Terse Fun

The Writer's Almanac recently mentioned the legend that Hemingway was asked to write a 6 word short story. His creation: "For sale: baby shoes, never worn."

Wired Magazine challenged others to the same task, and got some fun entries:

Machine. Unexpectedly, I’d invented a time
- Alan Moore

Epitaph: He shouldn't have fed it.
- Brian Herbert

Nevertheless, he tried a third time.
- James P. Blaylock

He read his obituary with confusion.
- Steven Meretzky

Here are a couple of my own efforts:

"Let's try," he said, engine revving.

She should have checked her safety.

The amputee blamed me for everything.

Next morning, his nickname was "Pee-wee".

Try your own hand at it in the comments!

99 Bottles of Beer on the Blog - Amarcord's La Tabachera

Having recently taken the Beer Judge Certification Program examination, I'm up to speed on traditional beer styles, and the way things are supposed to be. On Saturday, though, I picked up a beer that marches to the beat of its own drummer, and it's an anarchic blast of malt and alcohol that reminds serious students of beer that the point is, really, whether it tastes good.

Amarcord is an Italian brewery. Most Italian beers you find here in the United States are fizzy euro-lagers, without distinction. A developing craft beer movement has enlivened Italian pubs, though, and Amarcord is a newish brewery in San Marino, blending obsessions with Fellini and fermentation.

La Tabachera is listed on the brewery's website as a "double brown ale". It smelled more like a bock when it poured - this is a fragrant, malty beer. Sniff early when you pour it, because the head is fizzy and dissipates rapidly. It churns up the aromas of malt, fig, malt, malt, brown sugar, and malt.

If you're expecting anything remotely like any brown ale you've ever tasted, you're in for a surprise. It's nothing like Newcastle or Moose Drool or any of the other wonderful brown ales out there fitting within the regular style guidelines. It's not even very brown - it's more of an amber ale in terms of color.

The flavor of the beer delivers on the malt promise made by the scent. It tastes like a wonderful Oktoberfest boiled down to a syrup. It has a nice amount of hop bitterness to keep it from being overly sweet, but I could detect almost no hop flavor, beyond a peppery note that could come from German noble hops.

For all the flavor contained in this swing-top bottle, you'd expect it to be thick and viscous, but the mouthfeel is yet another surprise. It's almost on the thin side, even after the carbonation fled the glass. Perhaps the thinness comes from the fact that 10% of the fluid is alcohol - this is a deceptively drinkable strong beer.

Italians have given us great food, great wine, and now they have brought us some great beer. It's not what you'd expect, but it's a surprising and enjoyable beer. I'll be looking forward to seeing what else the Italian craft beer movement will produce.

Walter Cronkite, Union Station, and Change

My kids were cute, that much was obvious. And they had a diverse pack of friends. So when the people supporting the Bistate Tax to renovate Union Station wanted a video-genic pack of little kids to cluster around Walter Cronkite as he called for the renovation of the KC icon, the match was made.

We showed up at a decrepit, dark, filthy building, and they let us in a side door. We used flashlights - the windows were too dirty to allow much light in. The floor was strewn with fallen plaster from the ceiling, and pigeons flapped inside. We all wore hardhats - even the smallest sizes drooped over the ears of some of the children. A small place was cleared, with a bench and professional lighting - and Walter Cronkite sat there.

To the pack of kids, he was just another old man. We told them he did the news, but it didn't mean much to them. But they were drawn to the grandfatherly man with the gentle, deep voice, and the director had an easy time of it. The kids were precious on film, and Cronkite delivered his lines with ease and grace. As I recall, it was over in minutes, though the group of parents gathered offstage half-wished it would take a few hours, so we could observe the icon that brought us back to our own childhood living rooms.

Walter Cronkite is now dead, but Union Station is polished and bright. The children are all in their 20s now. I didn't even ask my kids if they remembered their connection to him when they heard that he had passed away. Even if they did, I imagine it was a vague memory at best.

By no means does Walter Cronkite deserve credit for the renovation of Union Station. But his support may have swung a few votes, and made the whole deal seem a little more safe and predictable, like the man himself. And he did his part. He did not need to be there in that dark, filthy building, chatting with kids who were not his relatives or responsibility. But he did it, because he thought it was a good thing.

Now, in a very real sense, Union Station is a tiny corner of the world that Walter Cronkite helped brighten. That's a legacy many of us like to think we may achieve - some corner of the world is better off because we passed that way. I doubt Cronkite remembered that afternoon or thought of it as anything special, but today I could walk you to the exact spot where they filmed the ad. It's entirely different now.

There are plenty of spots like Union Station was. Areas of our city, our world, our lives that are dark, hopeless, and even a little dangerous. Walter Cronkite walked into the place with calm dignity and did what he could to fix it, and he did so quite literally with children surrounding and inspiring him.

I hope my children remember him. For me, the mental image of Walter Cronkite and the children brightly lit in the midst of the wreckage of Union Station is something I will carry to the grave. And I'll be reminded of it whenever I see somebody with calm dignity doing something small to counter despair.

Sunday Poetry: Annabel Lee, by Edgar Allan Poe

Annabel Lee

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that was more than love -
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her high-born kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me -
Yes! that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud one night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we -
Of many far wiser than we -
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling -my darling -my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea -
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

- by Edgar Allan Poe

_______________________________________________

It's glorious summer, and time for evenings outdoors, with a fire or just the moon to light the evening. And those evenings have been enhanced since the dawn of language by fantastical tales told in spooky voices to send shivers down your spine, and glances over your shoulder at the darkness.

Those campfires, years ago, were the birth of poetry. Stories set to rhyme are easier to remember, and the rhythm of language draws in the audience. A great story-teller can enthrall an audience with a strange tale set to verse, and the original poets were bards who wandered the country-side, entertaining and enthralling people gathered together around a hearth or a campfire.

Can you imagine having Edgar Allan Poe around your campfire, telling his macabre stories while the dark pressed in upon you?

"Annabel Lee" is a masterpiece of obsession. The repeated phrases and passionate tale lead you to a creepy image of the narrator lying alongside a tomb, yearning for his departed love.

Read this poem aloud. Roll along with the rhythms and rhymes, and practice it in a somber voice. You'll have something to share on an evening outdoors - something that will stick in the minds of those who hear it. And you will be part of the tradition of bards, stretching back to campfires that have long been extinguished.

Yes, We Have No Bananas - Hefe-Weizen on the Way

I know what I want to brew. It's pale yellow and cloudy, with a billowing, long-lasting head. It smells of bread and cloves and bananas. It tastes kind of tart, with the banana and clove flavors brought into balance by the fuller, grainy flavor of malted wheat. It's a summer beer enlivened by bright carbonation and refreshingly acidic fruit flavors, and made richer by the hazy protein of the wheat and vitamin-rich yeast.

That's what I'll be shooting for tomorrow morning when I fire up the mash tun and brew kettle. Whether I will hit the mark remains to be seen.

First off, I should mention that there are no bananas, cloves or other secret ingredients in a hefe-weizen. The uniqueness of a great weissbier doesn't come from sleight of hand by the brewer, or complicated formulas. It's just malt, water, a touch of hops, and the yeast - especially the yeast.

Such a complex beer comes from a simple grain bill. 10 pounds of German pils malt and 10 pounds of german malted wheat. No roasted grains, no caramel malts, no honey or sugars.

And the hops are simple, too - I'll be using two ounces of Hallertau Mittelfruh hops, tossed in at the 45 minute mark, just to add a touch of bitterness without adding much flavor at all.

Even my mashing schedule will be simple - soak all the malt for an hour at around 152 degrees, allowing the amino acids in the malt kernels to do their work of breaking down the carbohydrates in the grain into fermentable sugars. Then drain the water and rinse the grains, gathering the resulting "beer juice" into a kettle for boiling.

After it's boiled, I cool it down to around 70 degrees (I would like it to get a bit cooler, but that's tough to do in KC during the summer), and add the yeast. The yeast is a special variety bred for this kind of beer - I'll be using Wyeast Lab's Weihenstephan Weizen™ strain, which ought to produce all those flavors I described earlier while they go about their business eating sugar and converting it into CO2 and alcohol.

So much simplicity for such a complex beer. People can't even agree on what to call it. Some call it a weissbier. Some call it weizen. When the yeast is not filtered out, it is known as a hefe-weizen. Some call it simply a Bavarian Wheat Beer. Some people toss a slice of orange into it, some people call for lemon, and some people want to enjoy the beer's complexity without the added fruit.

I know what I want to brew, and I have a good recipe. From here on, it's up to my skill as a brewer and a bit of luck.

All-Star Game - Good Clean Summer Fun

I tend to be a grumpy purist when it comes to baseball. I loathe the designated hitter, and resent the overuse of relief pitchers. Cupped bats seem kind of new-fangled, and whenever people talk about aluminum bats in MLB, my voiced concern about safety is a mask for my true objection, which is aesthetic.

My natural tendency is to dislike the All-Star game. It's a media-hyped, personality-focused baseball carnival interrupting the mid-summer rhythm of streaks, road trips and mounting statistics. It's hardly even real baseball, with managers trotting substitutions in and out of the game, which is itself a mere follow-up to the 10-out abominable freak show which is the Home Run Derby. And it doesn't help that my preferred league is on a decade-plus losing streak.

Grumble, grumble, grumble - the fussy old conservative in me feels the bile rise.

But, gosh darn it, the All-Star Game was a blast last night.

Maybe it's a carnival, but there is something awesome about seeing those lineups packed with the best of the game. Maybe it's a freak show, but I can't help but feel joy at Prince Fielder knocking home runs over the crowd of kids in the outfield. And maybe the American League gets home field advantage on the first game of the World Series every year, but they do it by bringing a roster that always finds a way to win.

I thoroughly enjoyed last night's game, and look forward to Kansas City hosting the game in 2012. I hope Zack Grienke is still a Royal, and that he gets the hometown love that Mr. Pujols got last night. I hope the media descends on our city, and the airwaves are choked with reminiscing '85 Royals and the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum.

I hope I get a seat, and, if I do, I'll be cheering for a night of great baseball, and loving every minute of it.

Albums? My World is on Shuffle . . .

A bunch of my more musically informed friends are compiling lists of their top 50 albums of 2000 - 2009. I'd love to join them . . .

I cannot remember, though, the last time I sat down and listened to an album straight through. These days, when I purchase new music, it goes into my computer, onto my iPod, and gets delivered in song-sized bites, pureed by the shuffle function.

That's gotta stop. Great albums are more than collections of great songs - the sequence of songs and the relationships between them can really deepen the experience of the music. To this day, my mind flips to the "next song" that should be coming up next whenever I hear songs from the classic albums of Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, or Neil Young. "Wish You Were Here" seems kind of lonely if it's not leaning up against "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts VI-IX)". "Even the Losers" sounds more poignant after the triumphant lust of "Here Comes My Girl".

This go-round has been lost to the iPod, but I'll be wiser next time.

"That is So Myspace" - Class Distinctions in Social Media

An alert friend forwarded this article to me, discussing research that suggests Myspace is becoming the ghetto of the social media world, as "white flight" sends white, educated and privileged participants over to Facebook.


"MySpace has become the ghetto of the digital landscape," Ms. Boyd explained to the crowd. And many of us in these social environments, she said, "have gotten into the habit of crossing the street like we always do to avoid the riff-raff."

When I brought up the topic of Facebook and Myspace to a friend, even before I could introduce the class issue, a friend interrupted with the observation, "The only time I ever go into Myspace anymore is for the music." Wow. Is Myspace becoming the seedy jazz joint in the rough part of town?

Sunday Poetry: The Old Stone Cross, by William Butler Yeats

The Old Stone Cross

A statesman is an easy man,
He tells his lies by rote;
A journalist makes up his lies
And takes you by the throat;
So stay at home’ and drink your beer
And let the neighbours’ vote,
Said the man in the golden breastplate
Under the old stone Cross.

Because this age and the next age
Engender in the ditch,
No man can know a happy man
From any passing wretch;
If Folly link with Elegance
No man knows which is which,
Said the man in the golden breastplate
Under the old stone Cross.

But actors lacking music
Do most excite my spleen,
They say it is more human
To shuffle, grunt and groan,
Not knowing what unearthly stuff
Rounds a mighty scene,
Said the man in the golden breastplate
Under the old stone Cross.

- William Butler Yeats

___________________________________________________

After a typical week of struggling with politicians and journalists, followed by my attempt to take a 3 hour written exam this afternoon to become a certified beer judge, the first stanza of this poem struck me as extraordinarily appropriate.

By no means do I think this is one of Yeats' greatest poems - but it is an indication of Yeats' mastery of poetry that when I woke up this morning and thought I ought to post something involving beer as this week's Sunday Poetry, I came across a well-wrought poem penned by Yeats.

I'm off to study the malting process! It's cramming time.

Fred Arbanas - "I've told many, many people that this is my last term."

It seems my post yesterday about Mr. Arbanas caused a bit of a stir. According to the KC Star, they asked him about my suggestion that he plans to not run for reelection, and he "responsed" (sic), "That's a bunch of bunk." The Star elaborated that Mr. "Golf Course" Arbanas says, "he has made clear to numerous eastern Jackson County organizations that he intends to run for re-election."

I wonder if they're the same people he told back in 2004 that he was then in his last term (fast forward to the 4:50 mark). At that time, he stated, on the record and in a meeting, that "I've told many, many people that this is my last term."

Apparently, when nobody filed against him, he decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth and stayed in his seat.

This time around, though, he's going to be almost exactly the same age as John McCain when he's running for office. He hasn't run in a contested race since Salt n Pepa and 'N Sync broke up. But the only way he gets to handpick his successor is if he convinces potential opponents through a gullible press that he still has the fire in the belly.

Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. He hasn't cast a dissenting vote in the past quarter (probably the past few years, but my patience for downloading and reading minutes of legislative meetings has limits). I couldn't even find an instance where he was alert and engaged enough to second a motion.

I'm sticking with my prediction.

Is Arbanas Stepping Down from Jackson County Legislature? Democracy or Backroom Deal?

Fred Arbanas has served on the County Legislature since it was founded. That sounds like an exaggeration, but it's not - he was elected in the first class of legislators under the Home Rule Charter in 1973, and has served ever since.

Among the County Legislators, however, he is the only one without an active campaign committee on file with the Secretary of State. His prior committee folded in 2003, a few years after the County Government took on the burden of cementing his name recognition and stature by naming a multi-million dollar golf course after him.

Since then, Arbanas has not faced a challenger in either a primary or general election.

The upcoming elections, though, present a vastly different picture. After the botched attempt to dismantle Ethical Home Rule brought shame to the Jackson County Legislature, and in the aftermath of the shot of adrenaline provided to young Jackson County Democrats by the election of President Obama, a lot of people are looking to run in 2010.

Change is in the air for the Jackson County legislature.

And, really, it can't be much fun anymore for Arbanas. It doesn't look like they are going to be naming any other public property after him, and he turned 70 in January. He hasn't done the hard work of campaigning - dialing for dollars, door-to-door handshaking - in years, and I doubt he wants to work that hard. It's tough to run an at-large campaign against spirited and ambitious competition.

The issue, though, is how the transition will be handled. My guess is that Mr. Arbanas has some deserving person (upper class white male would be my speculation) that he wants to hand his seat over to. My guess is that they would prefer to handle this on a backroom, handshake basis - Mr. Arbanas will not signal his intention to step down until moments before the filing deadline, in the hopes that nobody else will file to run against an incumbent golf course. At the last moment, his anointed successor will step into the unopposed election, and the winds of change will whistle past District 3.

But that's all guesswork. My hope is that someone great, with progressive ideas and a willingness to battle the good-old-boy network of the Jackson County Legislature, will pay attention. My hope is that we could get someone else with the energy and intelligence of Theresa Garza Ruiz to make a difference.

Weak Tea Bags

Personally, I think it's great that a hundred or so people chose to spend their Saturday morning on the Fourth of July exercising their right to free speech and assembly. While I disagree with their message, I admire their energy and commitment. Bravo, tea-baggers.

BUT - if Darla Jaye really thinks that this crowd numbers 2500-3000, that's just crazy.

When To Ignore Your Lawyers

Despite their reputations as pit bulls and sharks, lawyers turn into timid mice when advising clients. The only good risk is an avoided risk, and self-preservation is valued more than common sense or human decency. If any hypothetical threat of litigation lies down a given path, legal counsel will advise you to stay at the trailhead.

Diane Stafford's column in last Thursday's KC Star raised the troubling issue of employers refusing to provide references for former employees. It's a common practice for corporate employers to refuse comment on former employees beyond the dates of employment, former job title and, perhaps, whether they are eligible for rehire.

From the risk-loathing view of an over-paid lawyer, this makes perfect sense. There's no direct benefit to the employer from sharing descriptions of the former employee's skills or flaws, and there is an infinitesimal chance that if you say something negative, the employee could (somehow) find out and use it as evidence to support some sort of discrimination claim. Even more hypothetically, if you say nice things about good employees but nothing about bad ones, the bad ones could conceivably (somehow) find out that they aren't getting the same kind of references that the better employees are, and use that fact as evidence to support some sort of discrimination claim.

Whatever.

There's also a chance that flying monkeys might attack your corporate headquarters, so legal counsel advises you to keep the windows closed and locked.

The fact is that we all risk litigation every day, when we drive, when we speak, when we go to the grocery store. The risk of litigation in most things is minuscule for those who are not flaming jerks, and the same goes for corporations. If you treated an employee well during his or her time with you, chances are pretty remote that you're going to get sued, and, if it does happen, the chances are even more remote that a reference setting forth your views are going to be outcome-determinative in a lawsuit.

But as long as that chance exists, dancing somewhere on the head of a pin, corporate counsel will want you to avoid it unless you can articulate a valid reason to face it. And, no, common sense and human decency don't count as valid reasons to corporate counsel.

If you're in a policy-setting role at your company, this is an instance where you should tell your lawyer that you appreciate their advice, but that you're going to provide references on your former employees that are fair, accurate and informative, in the hopes that other employers will similarly help you in your decision-making. It might not be the most conservative legal approach, but it's the right thing to do.

(By the way, this isn't legal advice. This is human being advice. Sometimes they differ.)

Sunday Poetry: Us Two, by A. A. Milne

Us Two

Wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
Whatever I do, he wants to do,
"Where are you going today?" says Pooh:
"Well, that's very odd 'cos I was too.
Let's go together," says Pooh, says he.
"Let's go together," says Pooh.

"What's twice eleven?" I said to Pooh.
("Twice what?" said Pooh to Me.)
"I think it ought to be twenty-two."
"Just what I think myself," said Pooh.
"It wasn't an easy sum to do,
But that's what it is," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what it is," said Pooh.

"Let's look for dragons," I said to Pooh.
"Yes, let's," said Pooh to Me.
We crossed the river and found a few-
"Yes, those are dragons all right," said Pooh.
"As soon as I saw their beaks I knew.
That's what they are," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what they are," said Pooh.

"Let's frighten the dragons," I said to Pooh.
"That's right," said Pooh to Me.
"I'm not afraid," I said to Pooh,
And I held his paw and I shouted "Shoo!
Silly old dragons!"- and off they flew.
"I wasn't afraid," said Pooh, said he,
"I'm never afraid with you."

So wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
"What would I do?" I said to Pooh,
"If it wasn't for you," and Pooh said: "True,
It isn't much fun for One, but Two,
Can stick together, says Pooh, says he.
"That's how it is," says Pooh.

- by A. A. Milne
_________________________________________________

Did anybody read this to you when you were a child? Have you ever read it to a child? Have you sat with the marvelous book, "Now We Are Six" and used the silliness and the rhythms to amuse and enthrall a child?

There's plenty to write about this poem, plenty of allusions, rhymes, meter, etc. to engage the dissective abilities of any tweedy English prof, but that professor's best efforts pale in significance compared to a parent, grandparent, older sibling, aunt, uncle, neighbor or someone with a child on their lap, tracing the words with their finger and reading gentle poetry.

This poem is occasionally read at weddings, and even funerals. That's kind of breathtaking. But it is at its finest being read to a child. If you don't have a copy from your childhood, invest six dollars in the future and get one. Enrich the life of a child by taking the time to read poetry to him or her.

Audacious or Modest? Hopes for Funkhouser's Education Summit

I'm supporting Mayor Funkhouser's Education Summit, but I feel I ought to explain myself. Really, after dozens of blue-ribbon panels, grass-roots movements, concerned citizen gatherings, neighborhood committees, business roundtables, and academic colloquia, what possible good can yet another gathering of people talking accomplish? What new thoughts, what new programs, what new ideas?

Haven't we talked things to death, while flaws in our education system continue to breed crime, dampen economic development, and divide our community? Didn't the KCMSD just hire a new Superintendent to come in and make his own changes? At first blush, it is an insulting and arrogant waste of time for a bunch of well-meaning people to meet in a room somewhere, wring their hands and produce a vision of what "we" (meaning "they", of course) ought to be doing.

At first blush, perhaps, but the state of education in Kansas City ought to provoke more than one blush. We all ought to be blushing.

Simply stated, the hope I have for the Summit is that it could get our community to agree on a few ideals related to education, and foster a dialog across the dividing lines we have built up.

Is that hope too modest? Is it simply a waste of time that our community might gather, at considerable expense, and agree on some ridiculously obvious sentiment like "K-8 education in Kansas City should provide the tools for additional learning" or "High Schools in Kansas City should be free of crime and violence"? (I'm just tossing those out there - I have no idea what a Summit might come up with.)

Or is it too audacious? Can one event really break down the "us vs. them, I've got mine" attitude that seems to permeate our "system" of education here? Each of us raising children comes up with our own solution to the problem of how to get the education we feel is best for our circumstances, and doing so requires decisions and actions we might not otherwise undertake.

And then, we are forced to defend our choices. We become an interest group. Support Charter Schools. Support Catholic Schools. Support Home-Schooling. Move to the suburbs. Raid the savings for Pembroke or St. Paul's. Support Afro-centric schools in the District. Insist on bi-lingual education for children of immigrants. We all love our children, so we decide what is best for them under our circumstances, and we make the best of it.

It's like we're all forced to find our ways through an incredibly complex obstacle course, where we have to make trade-offs based upon our own values and circumstances. We all find our own individual paths through the thicket of options, like a corn maze.

What if we, together, lowered the walls of the maze? What if we could acknowledge that the people who send their kids to Charter schools share values with the people whose children attend private schools, and that those of us whose children went to KCMSD schools are not guilty of intellectual child abuse? What if we focused on some commonalities instead of distinctions? What if we walked away from a day together and understood each other better, and even respected the interests and perspectives of "those people"?

Is that even possible? And, if it is possible, what meaningful good could come from it?

By my support of the Summit, I'm saying that I believe it is possible. I think (I know) that the vast majority of people in each camp are good, sincere people wanting what is best for children. And I believe in my core that good builds upon good, just as bad brings more bad.

How does that translate into meaningful good? I have no idea, other than to reduce hostility between the camps (which, in itself, would be an achievement). But maybe someday homeschoolers gete invited to participate in Lincoln's Science Fair. Or a suburban district supports a bond issue for the KCMSD. Or district kids are welcomed to one of Pembroke's dramatic productions of a play they are studying.

I don't know exactly what good could come from increased ownership and caring about the education being received by others in our community, but I feel certain that some good would come from it - perhaps the beginnings of something transformative.

Ironically, I recently participated in an email exchange with a group of people concerned about education, and one of the participants asserted as a fact that charter schools perform significantly better than traditional public schools. I pointed out that the data are conflicting on that point, and he, in turn, directed me to a summary of about a hundred studies on the issue, with conflicting results that shockingly corresponded to who was paying for the study. The undeniable truth is that Charter school advocates will cherry-pick whatever data will generate more support for Charter schools, and traditional school districts will find data that shows the Charter schools are resource-robbing underachievers.

That right there is the problem. Seeing such bought and paid for spinning leads to cynicism, and a lack of trust. My inherent lack of trust is the currency I use to purchase my absolution from caring or getting involved. If the problem is hopeless, and the data are all unreliable, then I am justified in my refusal to work toward solutions or change.

I believe that a forum can break down that inherent lack of trust. Yes, we will definitely have intellectually dishonest partisans who will try to skew things to support their predetermined positions. But I share the faith that the VAST majority of parents and citizens are like me - we may have our biases and our cynicism, but we fundamentally want what is best for the children in our community. If we come together and have a frank and honest dialog, we may or may not agree on everything, but we can begin to destroy that inherent lack of trust that absolves us from thinking that the "other side" is working in good faith, and absolves us from working toward solutions.

Experts have had their say. We've had those seminars, colloquia, roundtables and committees. I think Funkhouser's Summit can do something different than what we've done in the past. I might be wrong, but I think it's worth a try.

Has Journalism Reached a Tipping Point?

Something really interesting and perhaps troubling happened last week. A local blog, Tony's Kansas City, made the Kansas City Star tumble into irrelevance regarding a major local story.

It all surrounded the turmoil involving the Citadel and spending city money on a project that has been festering for years. But the merits of that particular project matter less to me than the way it got handled.

In a nutshell, the KC Star was, once again, falling down on the job. While backroom manipulations were going on, the Star remained essentially silent while Tony roared to life. It was Tony, not the Star, that drew public attention to the story. It was Tony, not the Star, that got tongues wagging. I've been watching local politics for decades, and, for the first time I can recall, the backroom shenanigans of the insider aristocracy got stopped in its tracks without the Star's involvement.

Tony derailed a process that the Star was too lazy, incompetent or uncaring to write about.

Sadly, Star reporter Lynn Horsley is stamping her foot and claiming that she didn't drop the ball, rather than acknowledging that Tony did a better job than she did, and promising to be more responsive and courageous in her work.

Will this be the wave of the future? Will smart tipsters, who want to see their information have an impact, eschew the blase' and insider-cozy attitude demonstrated by the Star's fading political coverage?

I think it would be best for all concerned if the Star would show more of Tony's willingness to stick his nose into backroom business and gore a few sacred cows, so Tony could go back to being a joke blog.

How to Know You Have Lost Your Soul

When you think it's a good idea to take pictures of a politician's daughter and her boyfriend grocery shopping.

Is that really who you want to be?

Traffic Cops Jogging? - Why Local Control of the Police is a Bad Idea

When you mix Dave Helling's journalistic judgment and the inability of some council members to think before they speak, you wind up with a KC Star front page that makes it clear why we do not want our City Council involved with decision-making for our Police Department.

Several Council members are shocked, simply shocked, that the Police Department bought cars for the officers to use. Their shock is triggered by the unheard-of concept that the Police Department didn't wait until after they needed the cars to purchase and outfit them for regular use, patrolling our streets and keeping us safe.

I suppose, if you're really, really thoughtless (or really, really stretching for news), you could argue that it looks bad that the Police Department spent $2.1 million over a couple budget years to adequately equip our police force with vehicles, at the same time they were complaining that the City Council preferred to donate $2 million for stadiums rather than invest in public safety. The coincidence of similar numbers, plus the eagerness of some Council members to play politics with our safety, makes for an intoxicating mix.

Sadly, some of the Council members are demonstrating their financial illiteracy by arguing that the money spent on cars should have been spent on keeping some of the cops on the street that they themselves idled. There's a difference between capital expenditures and payroll. The "rob Peter to pay Paul" idiocy espoused by some council members goes a long way toward explaining why politically ambitious City Council members make such terrible decisions for our city when it comes to spending money.

Right now, our Police Department is overseen by an appointed board, and City Council members will agree - off the record - that it is one of the best-run departments in the City. But it bothers them that the only control they have over the Police is in approving the budget. As they demonstrate in today's paper, they thirst for the ability to micro-manage the Police Department and misdirect funds to cover their own mistakes. As they also demonstrate in today's paper, such local control would be an unmitigated catastrophe for the citizens of Kansas City.

It was a blow to our collective safety when City Council members chose to fund stadiums instead of police in the last budget cycle. Perhaps they should direct their attention to micro-managing the Royals instead of taking potshots at the Police Department.

Happy Birthday, Libraries

Ben Franklin started up the first lending library on this date back in 1731. The concept, initially based on subscriptions, caught on, and now we are blessed with an amazing network of knowledge that can bring all kinds of intellectual property to your door.

Most of us just use the library as a quiet place to go browse and pick up a book or CD that we don't feel like purchasing. That's a huge enough service, but if you look around even a typical branch, you'll notice a lot more going on. Computers are waiting to help bridge the digital divide. Meeting rooms are hosting community organizations. Posters are advertising a series of free lectures on all kinds of topics. One local library is a nationally known center for genealogy. You can get audiobooks for your iPod. If you talk to a librarian, you'll see that their profession is obsessed with coming up with new ways to help meet informational needs you never knew you had.

Have you ever tried inter-library loan? It's incredible - if a book exists out there, but it's too obscure to find a home in the local libraries, the library will hunt it down and get it to you, still for free. I recently wanted a couple books on a topic I was researching, and within a couple weeks, they were waiting for me at my neighborhood branch.

When I was a kid, I used to haunt the stacks at the Natural Bridge branch of the St. Louis County Library (which I learned moments ago has relocated). Throughout my life, libraries have always been a welcoming place to hang out, read, study, or just browse. We're all fortunate that Benjamin Franklin, nearly 300 years ago, had a brainstorm about how he and a group of his friends could get access to the books they wanted to settle their arguments.