About Wendi Thomas & other stuff

I notice that Commercial Appeal columnist Wendi Thomas is departing Memphis around the Ides of March. As Shakespeare’s soothsayer warned: “Beware the Ides of March.” He was warning Julius Caesar that danger was waiting for him in the legislative body where senators stood ready to stab him to death. A curious parallel exists with our Caesar, Mayor Willie Herenton, who is facing a recall effort which could result in striking him down.
Ms. Thomas will find that Baltimore has its troubles, just as does Memphis. Sixty years ago (1943-47) Theodore R. McKeldin was Mayor and a Republican. Wikipedia says “Baltimore saw hard times during this period following the Second World War, with the inner city decaying, ghettos forming, and racial prejudice still present in government policy-making. ‘ McKeldin, the last Republican to win city office, bucked the national GOP and supported integration. But some observers blame him for the festering racial discord that continues in Maryland’s largest city to this day.
It will be interesting to see what she learns about that city as she begins this next stage of her journalistic career. I hope she will study McKeldin’s history carefully and see if it has lessons for us to consider here in the Bluff City.

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Men need some say over whether their children may or should be aborted. This is an issue that would appear to have been resolved some years ago when women were deemed the only ones who would decide whether to abort a child in their womb. Now we have a new twist, with a “Roe vs. Wade Suit for men” in which the National Center for Men says a man should have the consttitutional freedom under the equal protection clause to choose not to be a father. And then there’s this variation: “Should a man have a right to insist on his wife having a child, rather than the abortion which only she favors?” And so it goes.

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And did you read Charles Krauthammer’s column on Polygamy in the March 18 Commercial Appeal? Google Krauthammer and Polygamy to learn more. It’s too sophisticated an argument for me to summarize in a sentence, but is worth your time. Well, in a nutshell it’s: “Polygamy rights is the next civil-rights battle” hitchhiking on the gay-rights issue. He’s the best thinker we have. I think.

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And speaking of polygamy, how does the husband react when one of his wives finds him an inadequate (read: tired) lover? When she has an affair outside the marriage is he glad to have a surrogate taking on the job? And has the pharmaceutical industry done a study yet on how many wives can be serviced by one husband without serious consequences from using one of those erectile disfunction medications?

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Oh, I hope this March Madness wears off. This NCAA Tournament fanaticism is costing the nation nearly $4 billion in lost productivity, according to one of those employment measuring outfits. I’m working out at the Y and see fellow fitness buffs stare transfixed at the TV screen, instead of doing the exercises they came to the Y to accomplish. Employers shrug their shoulders over all the hoops hysteria and say things like “Well, my employees will have a boost in morale if I let them goof off and watch the games instead of doing the work I pay them to do.” Of course, they might as well submit. The fans will sneak it, if the boss doesn’t let them do it anyway.