State of Cape Cod

Don't Stifle Them With Plenty

In an essay for his middle school English class a grand-nephew compared his life with that of his grandmother at the same age. He enumerated all the technological advantages he enjoys in contrast to those with which, in his mind, she suffered in 1948. Flat screen HD color TV instead of a ten inch black and white set. Cell phone rather than party line rotary instrument. The internet as opposed to “snail mail”. He missed at least one far more important difference.

No matter where you lived back then, whether in New Jersey as I did or here on Cape Cod, your neighbors were of similar ethnic and religious background and many were relatives. In or out of the home, parents worked hard and had little time to oversee their children’s every activity. Consequently, youngsters enjoyed a lot more freedom from intrusive adult supervision than kids do today.

The positive influence of that freedom during their developmental years was far more beneficial than contemporary parental micro management and overindulgence. Unlike the ultra dependent “gimme” adolescents of today, many of whom will grow up looking to government to satisfy all their needs, the children of the WWII generation developed into resourceful and self sufficient adults.

Nowadays every childhood activity is organized. Parents are involved in, provide for, and supervise every facet of their youngsters’ lives. To some degree this is necessary in our perilous world. Apparently the bountiful existence and technological progress that children enjoy has encouraged predators as well. On the Cape there is the further potential hazard of water, water everywhere. Little mass transit is available, hence the evolution of parents as recreation directors and Mom as chauffeur.

In the old neighborhoods everyone knew and looked out for all the kids. They were as often taken to task by some other child’s mother as by their own. There were always adults around, but aside from that eternal passive vigilance they were on their own. That wasn’t a bad thing.

They organized their own sports teams. They didn’t have uniforms or much equipment, No manicured regulation field with umpires. No coach. They may not even have had a full team. They simply gathered at the local empty lot, chose up sides, and played. They didn’t know they were deprived. They accepted what they had and made the most of it.

Games weren’t scheduled – they were arranged. “My guys can beat your guys.” “Oh yeah? Be at the field after school.” That afternoon both teams would show up, the ground rules negotiated to accommodate conditions and the number of players available, and the game was played. No parents. No spectators. No officials. No scoreboard. Just a lot of enthusiasm, and, more importantly, independence.

Sports were seasonal, and were often adapted to fit existing conditions. Baseball became stickball if a broom handle and a pink rubber ball were all they had. Soccer was unheard of, but there was “kick the can”. Same objective but no headers. Football could be touch or tackle, depending upon whether there was a grassy field, a rocky field, or only the street in which to play.

Both sexes played hide and seek together. In a team version, one group would hide while their opponents tried to find, catch and tag them. Often played on summer evenings, while parents watched and shouted encouragement from their porch rockers, the game never really ended, usually degenerating into a lot of chasing and shouting around the neighborhood until bedtime.

Boys played box ball, like tennis with sidewalk squares as the court and their hands as racquets; and stoop ball, bouncing the ubiquitous pink ball off the point of the porch steps. Some activities encouraged gambling, even at that tender age. Marbles for keeps. Pitching baseball cards (or pennies) for keeps. Having something at stake helped teach concentration.

There were also individual games for girls, who had little opportunity for organized sports. The schools had few, if any, teams for them. They had to be satisfied with activities like jumping rope. Sound like sissy stuff? Take a look at Double Dutch. They also played games with a ball, like Jacks or some rhyming, bouncing games that were quite intricate. Hopscotch was a big female favorite, demanding coordination and body control.

For many, the corner store was their youth center. It didn’t cost anything, was easy to get to, no one had to be driven, and there was always something to do. A kid was sure to find some of his friends whenever he stopped by. There was no adult supervision at the store except for the proprietor, and none was needed. Whoever got out of line would be banished, and then what would life be like?

Most free time was spent outdoors in games that involved running, jumping, throwing, and other physical tasks. Each group had maybe one overweight member, and he was looked down upon. Obesity was unknown. Fat, yes, but obesity? A fancy word for a serious problem in children? Not to be imagined in those active years.

It cannot be denied that the differences between the young teens of the WWII era and today’s junior high set are profound. Neither progress nor technology can, or should, be blamed. Contemporary young folk expect to be provided with their every want. Rampant unbridled indulgence is the rule and must be reined in. Children should be encouraged to cultivate independence. Society would be well advised to seek a viable way to accomplish this along with the courage to implement it.

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Retest If You Must, But Be Fair About It

There was a report on the news the other night about a traffic accident. Someone had struck a child, who subsequently passed away. The driver was a man of about eighty. The reporter, in an account that couldn’t have lasted more than a minute, perhaps a minute and a half, mentioned the word elderly and/or the driver’s age no less than six times, including the very first sentence. That’s once every ten to fifteen seconds.

In the Cape Cod Times of August 5 there was an account of a traffic accident in which a gentleman drove his car into the harbor. The first two words in the headline were ‘elderly driver’. His age was also noted in the brief account. The cause of the mishap? He spilled an ice cream float in his lap. As if age had a bearing on it and no younger person has ever done something similar, or worse.

The same issue of the Times presented an account of a traffic accident in which three people were hospitalized. Nowhere in the story was the age of any of the victims mentioned. Presumably, they weren’t “elderly”. Fair and unbiased? Hardly.

There’s a big disconnect here. If the driver’s age is relevant to one incident involving motor vehicles, then it should be pertinent to all such accounts. If one didn’t know that news reporters, who arrogantly  refer to themselves as journalists, were fair and unbiased, one might suppose that they were engaged in a campaign against drivers of a certain age.

In Massachusetts, from publicity hungry legislators on down to the wannabe journalists (many, if not most, apparently just rewrite wire service stories) and television news readers (really just actors who recite from the teleprompter), there is a continuing effort underway to legislate the retesting of older Americans starting anywhere between ages 65 to 85.

All of which embraces and disseminates the misconception that elderly drivers cause more accidents than any other age group. This is simply not true, and the news media should be, and probably is, aware of it, as this study from Pennsylvania clearly shows. As for our own state, the statistics verify what other states already know, that fewer accidents are caused by elderly drivers than other age group. But those who interpret this fact deliberately skew the findings.

They base their argument by admitting that, while older motorists have fewer accidents, as verified by the U. S. Government Accountability Office, it’s only because they drive less. But, they add, elderly drivers have more accidents per mile driven. So what? It really doesn’t matter to the victim whether he was killed  by someone of an age which has fewer mishaps per mile, than one who has fewer mishaps, period. In fact, no matter how you present it, the odds of getting killed by an eighty year old are far less than of being done in by a twenty year old. Check the section of this article entitled Looking At the Research to find the truth. 

One of my favorite sleight of hand locutions is that elderly motorists cause accidents because they drive too slowly. This, the younger, more aggressive drivers try to convince themselves, makes it necessary to pass them illegally, causing accidents. Evidently they never heard of personal responsibility.  If some fool passes unsafely or illegally for whatever reason, and has an accident, then it’s his fault, not that of the law abiding slower driver he passed. The speed limit is the maximum, not the minimum.

If driving too slowly is the best argument the selfish “Get the Q-Tips Off the Road” crowd can come up with, then refuting it is a cinch. Take the hot topic of the day: what age group engages in the idiotic practice of texting while behind the wheel? While that by itself is enough to make the case for our side, there are many others.

Older people tend to know their limitations and are self regulating for that reason. Many don’t drive at night, let alone in the wee small hours. A lot of them avoid left turns when possible. As a rule, they don’t tailgate. Few drive while intoxicated. You won’t find many oldsters laying down rubber from a red light, or making donuts.

Who do you suppose is more likely to provoke a road rage incident? Not many octogenarians are suicidal enough to flip off a car full of teens. Neither are they likely to be caught with open containers of adult beverages in the vehicle, nor under the influence of controlled substances.

This is not to say that all accidents are the fault of younger people, nor that elderly drivers are paragons of motoring virtue. The truth is that accidents happen to all drivers, with greater or lesser severity, regardless of age. Retesting is not a bad idea, but it ought not be determined by age. A bill that would give doctors more freedom to report people with impairments to the state’s licensing authorities is in the works, and appears to have merit. The bill, as shown under A Call for Stricter Rules, expands on medical-reporting rules already in place in many states, including Massachusetts, and is sponsored by, among others, Safe Roads Now and the AARP. It makes more sense and is cheaper and more extensive than simply testing all the old guys every few years.

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Try A Couple of Fori

In my dotage, circumstances have dictated that a great deal of time be spent at home and none on the golf course. It soon became apparent long hours had been devoted to that fine, if frustrating, game. Those huge blocks of time had to be reassigned so the magnificent iMac was chosen to fill the gap. It didn’t take long to learn that emails, web surfing, household bookkeeping, two blogs, downloading music for the iPod, compiling slide shows of family events, and interminable games of Solitaire weren’t up to the task. So discussion forums (fori?) were elected to take up the slack.

There are more than enough sites available for even the most prolific purveyors of male bovine excrement. Just Google any occupation, area of interest or other topic followed by the word ‘discussion’ and you’ll find a discussion group at or near the head of the list. The Apple support group, for instance, is a must for Mac owners to discuss technical problems and to praise or gripe about some of the new programs and innovations. Comparable sites exist for Windows wonks. For day to day discussion of current events, local or national, nothing is quite as thought provoking as those sponsored by newspapers and magazines everywhere, and Cape Cod is no exception.

Posters come in several personas. There are those who seek to engage in thoughtful discussions about news events and editorial opinions. They are, unfortunately, in the minority. More prevalent are those who want nothing more than to force their views down the throats of everyone else. It is this latter group that detracts from much of the pleasure which more reasonable people derive from the activity.

Particularly galling are posters who, when confronted with disagreement, resort to insults and ridicule. Some of the derogatory comments are not only crude and vulgar but can be downright hurtful. Those who use this tactic fail to see that it merely highlights their inability to mount a cogent argument and emphasizes not only their lack of intellect but a complete absence of courtesy or respect. To put it bluntly, they’re not only dumb but they have no manners.

The sense of security fostered by the anonymity of user names encourages rude and unprincipled behavior. It’s akin to road rage. People feel safe in the confines of their vehicles so they shout epithets and make rude gestures to drivers who annoy them. Posting under a pseudonym provides a similar feeling of invulnerability.

Many believe the sponsor of a forum has a responsibility to see that it is conducted with a modicum of decorum. The fact that disciplinary action is rare leads one to believe that rude behavior is acceptable, if not outright welcome. It could very well be that management encourages controversy in order to liven things up. The problem is that this could very well discourage serious posters and drive them away, leaving only a bunch of ill mannered boors calling each other names.

There is also a deeply rooted suspicion that some sponsors are not above planting a few shills among their posters in order to keep the pot boiling with outrageous and provocative comments. Again, anonymity plays into the hands of the unscrupulous.

Nor are posters blameless. It is well known that some people, perhaps more than we know, adopt different identities, often at the same time. Occasionally their style betrays them, but it’s perfectly possible, even probable, that many lively online arguments have taken place with the same person on both sides, under different names, and no one the wiser.

With all the drawbacks inherent in online fori, why do so many get so involved in them? The easy answer is that they have a great deal of time on their hands. Retirees come to mind, and certainly many posters are in that group. So might people with free time, sanctioned or surreptitious, at work. Students and stay at home moms might participate. All of the above, plus others unknown, might be spending hours in conversation, often adversarial, sometimes rude, occasionally belligerent, with a gang of strangers. What attracts them, and keeps them coming back?

If you are among the large population of forumites on the Cape, and your presence on this site would indicate that you very well could be, then you already know the answer. If you haven’t visited one, you certainly should at least take a look at this latter day phenomenon. You may find it’s not for you. Or, like so many, you may become addicted and endure great pains and some insults in order to contribute your two cents about events here on Cape Cod and throughout the world.

Cape Cod Today is a good place to begin. Register, if you haven’t already done so. Leave some comments. Start a little fuss - but be polite. Cape Cod Talk has fewer participants but you may find it’s just what you’re looking for. Of course, there’s Cape Cod Online, the oracle of the Cape Cod Times and perhaps the largest and most controversial of local sites. There are others, but try these first. You may swear off fori for life. Or you may become a forum junkie.

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As the Song Goes, Don't Blame Me

“The federal indictment of former Massachusetts House Speaker Sal DiMasi — the latest, if convicted, in a long line of elected servants who have violated the public trust — is an indictment of every one of us…”

So began the lead editorial in the Saturday, June 13, 2009 issue of the Cape Cod Times. Well, Times, if you want to accept a share of the blame for the alleged misdeeds of Mr. DiMasi, or any other politician, then beat your breast all you like. Most of the rest of us will plead not guilty, thank you.

Not that there isn’t plenty of blame to go around, but in the end there is still, or should be, something called personal accountability. So Mr. DiMasi must face his tribulations on his own despite what we may presume are the well intentioned efforts of our local media to mitigate his responsibility. So, while no one else is truly responsible for the misdeeds of another, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that we, the voters of Massachusetts, are guilty of placing them, and keeping them, in temptations orbit.

There are many examples of instances where the legislature, our alleged representatives, were sent clear and distinct messages from the voters, and wilfully ignored them. Here are a few, in no particular order.

There is the overwhelming vote to roll back the state income tax to 5%. If you recall, Mr. Dukakis, noted tank commander, raised it as a temporary measure. Here is a direct quote from devalpatrick.com: “In 2000 the voters of the Commonwealth voted to roll-back the income tax to 5%, the level of taxation prior to Mike Dukakis' "temporary" increase. The legislature has not allowed this to happen. “

Were all, or any one, of those legislators who blocked the will of the voters sent packing at the next election? Not on your life. Or, if a few were replaced, you can rest assured it was by someone who takes orders from the same party leaders.

Of course, the more recent gay marriage fiasco is fresh in our minds. Everyone who circumvented our opportunity to vote on the issue should have been summarily impeached, let alone voted out of office at the next election. And what happened to the death penalty? Did the legislators who voted it down no less than three times in a five year span get voted out? You know better.

Then there are our own local pols, Mr. O’Leary and Mr. Turner, who voted to Keep Evacuation Day and Bunker Hill Day as holidays for a select few, and then offered weak explanations for doing so. Do you think there will be a hue and cry to unseat them when the time comes?

The editorial makes a number of accusations which are supposed to illustrate our culpability for official corruption. This is a palpably naive attempt to prove a point which, while idealistically appealing, has no basis in reality. Discussing each and every one of these blame-boosters would be an exercise in futility: a look at a representative few, however, might be enlightening. Here are those of us who the paper claims are responsible for official corruption, along with some opinions on this conclusion.

“those of us who fail to vote and wonder why there is little accountability.” There are several things wrong with this way of thinking. For one thing, we have the right to vote, not an obligation to vote. For another, by not voting we are, in fact, still expressing an opinion. Abstaining is, in a real sense, a vote. Don't legislators do it all the time? Perhaps neither candidate appeals to us. Why should anyone be forced to choose between two people he dislikes? Maybe some voters genuinely don’t care who wins. Voting just to cast a ballot accomplishes nothing for the country, and could skew the results. Most importantly, there are some people who honestly don’t know much about the candidates and feel unqualified to make an intelligent choice. These people should be praised for not voting.

“Those of us in school departments who hire a friend over a more qualified applicant;” or “Those of us in town government who treat a friend more favorably than another citizen;” Isn’t this what Affirmative Action is all about? Haven’t we been told that this is a good thing? Doesn’t the Cape Cod Times support Affirmative Action? The Supreme Court does.

“The next time you get disgusted about how our government works, and want to find the source of the problem, take a look in the mirror.”  What we ought to do is, next time we get disgusted about how government works, check through back issues of the newspaper in the candidates' districts and see if the official(s) in question were backed by that editor. Then we'd know where a share of the blame really lies.

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It's past time to dress up the old pastime…

Every sport needs serious Spring Cleaning

Let's shove politics, regionalization, taxes, crime, and the like into the background. It's time to deal with something really important.

After near-record snow falls and seemingly endless days of freezing temperatures, we are approaching the heart of yet another baseball season. Here it is, the middle of May, with the new pennant chase in full sway and the Cape Cod League not far behind. Unfortunately, amid the excitement of a new and promising campaign, a few things that seriously detract from the sport of baseball are painfully obvious. In a word, steroid scandals aside, the game itself is often very long and boring, and the officiating stinks.

The outcome of nearly every contest, in every sport, is too often controlled by the officials. In football, for instance, a penalty could be called on every play. There are so many rules and so many players on the field that it's impossible for an official not to see multiple infractions as each play progresses. Usually the doctrine of ‘No Harm, No Foul' prevails and the game is allowed to continue with relatively few interruptions, but there are too many instances where non-calls, wrong calls, or unnecessary calls can ruin games and change outcomes.

Basketball is out of control. Travelling, palming the ball, and hard contact occur constantly while infractions are called selectively, erroneously, or not at all. Isn't it odd that the home team routinely shoots more foul shots than the visitors? Don't visiting players foul out more often than those on the home team?

Expulsion after five fouls (six in the pros) should be eliminated. It isn't fair to the fans nor the teams. If memory serves, in the old ABA, after a player committed his sixth foul he stayed in the game but the team which was fouled retained possession of the ball after the free throws. It made for a better game. After all, if you paid big bucks to see a Paul Pierce or a Kobe Bryant perform, you don't want to watch him sitting on the bench with four or five fouls for most of the game.

Hockey is beyond mentioning. To the great detriment of the game, violence, condoned by the officials and beloved by the fans, has replaced skillful play despite occasional lip service to the contrary. As the saying goes, not without a grain of truth, "I went to the fights and a hockey game broke out."

Baseball has no instant replay and it's the only game in which one rule in particular is willfully ignored. Each umpire has his own strike zone. Everyone, fan and player alike, knows it and accepts it, even though an official strike zone is clearly and precisely spelled out in the rule book:" the strike zone extends from the batter's knees to the letters across the front of his uniform. To be called a strike, the pitcher must throw the baseball across home plate, an area 17 inches wide (0.4318 meters), and between the knees and letters as indicated."

While the height varies with the size of each individual batter, the width of the strike zone never changes. Today's technology could easily determine the position of the ball as it crosses home plate in relation to both the vertical and horizontal parameters of the zone. This would guarantee absolute consistency. Along with instant replay for all questionable play calls, it's high time organized baseball allowed balls and strikes to be determined electronically, at least in the major leagues and the high minors.

Die hard fans, local players, and coaches of my acquaintance won't accept these changes. They cite such nebulous nonsense as tradition, the human element, and the charm of the status quo. If baseball nabobs do nothing else they should implement at least this singular change. Everyone should play every game to the same standard. It would make pitching and batting statistics much more meaningful and each victory and defeat would be achieved under the same conditions. The outcomes would be far less controversial.

There are other, more or less minor, changes which would help make things more interesting. To relieve the boredom of four-hour games, for example, time-outs should be strictly limited. Every other sport does it: why not baseball?

We don't need those tedious conferences at the mound. Imagine a football coach walking out onto the field, talking to his quarterback for a while, then taking the ball from him and waiting until the replacement he summoned gets onto the field. Think of sitting there while that substitute player warmed up before the game could continue. In the same vein, no hitter should be allowed to step out of the batter's box once he enters it. There should also be a clock on the delivery of the ball to the plate by the pitcher.

The showpiece of the improvements would be the conversion to two platoon baseball - a major innovation whose time has come. The defensive team would consist of eight position players. That much is obvious. Except for a few exceptional two-way athletes, they need never come to bat. The offensive squad consists of six batters. Three men could be on base at one time, and three would always be ready to hit.

Since potential steals would add to the excitement of the game, pinch runners could be used at will with the batter for whom they ran remaining in the game. Pitchers, once removed from the game, would not be allowed back, in order to avoid constant righty-lefty pitching changes, which could actually lengthen games.

There it is. A relatively simple formula for taking the former national pastime out of the dark ages and into the Twenty-first Century. The term ‘former' is used advisedly. Baseball, once indisputably number one on the American sports scene, has been eclipsed in popularity by football. If attendance and television viewing statistics are any indication, golf and NASCAR auto racing will soon outdraw baseball as well, if they haven't already. If efficiency and excitement are not sufficient reason for making changes, declining popularity indicates that it's past time to dress the old pastime up a bit.

Keeping admission, refreshment and parking prices affordable for families wouldn't hurt, either, but that's for another time and applies not only to baseball but to all sports on the major league level.Let's shove politics, regionalization, taxes, crime, and the like into the background. It's time to deal with something really important. After near-record snow falls and seemingly endless days of freezing temperatures, we are approaching the heart of yet another baseball season. Here it is, the middle of May, with the new pennant chase in full sway and the Cape Cod League not far behind. Unfortunately, amid the excitement of a new and promising campaign, a few things that seriously detract from the sport of baseball are painfully obvious. In a word, steroid scandals aside, the game itself is often very long and boring, and the officiating stinks.

The outcome of nearly every contest, in every sport, is too often controlled by the officials. In football, for instance, a penalty could be called on every play. There are so many rules and so many players on the field that it's impossible for an official not to see multiple infractions as each play progresses. Usually the doctrine of ‘No Harm, No Foul' prevails and the game is allowed to continue with relatively few interruptions, but there are too many instances where non-calls, wrong calls, or unnecessary calls can ruin games and change outcomes.

Basketball is out of control. Travelling, palming the ball, and hard contact occur constantly while infractions are called selectively, erroneously, or not at all. Isn't it odd that the home team routinely shoots more foul shots than the visitors? Don't visiting players foul out more often than those on the home team?

Expulsion after five fouls (six in the pros) should be eliminated. It isn't fair to the fans nor the teams. If memory serves, in the old ABA, after a player committed his sixth foul he stayed in the game but the team which was fouled retained possession of the ball after the free throws. It made for a better game. After all, if you paid big bucks to see a Paul Pierce or a Kobe Bryant perform, you don't want to watch him sitting on the bench with four or five fouls for most of the game.

Hockey is beyond mentioning. To the great detriment of the game, violence, condoned by the officials and beloved by the fans, has replaced skillful play despite occasional lip service to the contrary. As the saying goes, not without a grain of truth, "I went to the fights and a hockey game broke out."

Baseball has no instant replay and it's the only game in which one rule in particular is willfully ignored. Each umpire has his own strike zone. Everyone, fan and player alike, knows it and accepts it, even though an official strike zone is clearly and precisely spelled out in the rule book:" the strike zone extends from the batter's knees to the letters across the front of his uniform. To be called a strike, the pitcher must throw the baseball across home plate, an area 17 inches wide (0.4318 meters), and between the knees and letters as indicated."

While the height varies with the size of each individual batter, the width of the strike zone never changes. Today's technology could easily determine the position of the ball as it crosses home plate in relation to both the vertical and horizontal parameters of the zone. This would guarantee absolute consistency. Along with instant replay for all questionable play calls, it's high time organized baseball allowed balls and strikes to be determined electronically, at least in the major leagues and the high minors.

Die hard fans, local players, and coaches of my acquaintance won't accept these changes. They cite such nebulous nonsense as tradition, the human element, and the charm of the status quo. If baseball nabobs do nothing else they should implement at least this singular change. Everyone should play every game to the same standard. It would make pitching and batting statistics much more meaningful and each victory and defeat would be achieved under the same conditions. The outcomes would be far less controversial.

There are other, more or less minor, changes which would help make things more interesting. To relieve the boredom of four-hour games, for example, time-outs should be strictly limited. Every other sport does it: why not baseball?

We don't need those tedious conferences at the mound. Imagine a football coach walking out onto the field, talking to his quarterback for a while, then taking the ball from him and waiting until the replacement he summoned gets onto the field. Think of sitting there while that substitute player warmed up before the game could continue. In the same vein, no hitter should be allowed to step out of the batter's box once he enters it. There should also be a clock on the delivery of the ball to the plate by the pitcher.

The showpiece of the improvements would be the conversion to two platoon baseball - a major innovation whose time has come. The defensive team would consist of eight position players. That much is obvious. Except for a few exceptional two-way athletes, they need never come to bat. The offensive squad consists of six batters. Three men could be on base at one time, and three would always be ready to hit.

Since potential steals would add to the excitement of the game, pinch runners could be used at will with the batter for whom they ran remaining in the game. Pitchers, once removed from the game, would not be allowed back, in order to avoid constant righty-lefty pitching changes, which could actually lengthen games.

There it is. A relatively simple formula for taking the former national pastime out of the dark ages and into the Twenty-first Century. The term ‘former' is used advisedly. Baseball, once indisputably number one on the American sports scene, has been eclipsed in popularity by football. If attendance and television viewing statistics are any indication, golf and NASCAR auto racing will soon outdraw baseball as well, if they haven't already. If efficiency and excitement are not sufficient reason for making changes, declining popularity indicates that it's past time to dress the old pastime up a bit.

Keeping admission, refreshment and parking prices affordable for families wouldn't hurt, either, but that's for another time and applies not only to baseball but to all sports on the major league level.
_______________________

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