Book Review: The Three Cs That Made America Great by Mike Huckabee, Part 1

Preface

Several weeks ago my Dad went to Sam's Club and bought us large bags of almonds, pecans, walnuts, and a big jar of cashews. We love nuts of all sorts at our house. The man-spouse frequently drops by the store on the way home to pick up a bag of pistachios or can of cashews to munch on, and I use almonds and pecans in salads and cashews in my sautéed spinach recipe. So this was a welcome gift. When we had consumed them all, I asked him if we could get some more. Sunday night he messaged me saying that he had been to Sam's and could I come over and get these nuts. When I got there he had a paper grocery bag with the three bags and one jar of nuts, four oranges...

... and a book by Mike Huckabee. "I'd like you to read this book," Dad said.

I shuddered and shook my head. "You don't want to read it?" he asked. I shuddered and shook my head. "He's drunk the Kool-Aid," he said to my mom.

The phrase "to drink the Kool-Aid" is a reference to the Jonestown massacre, a 1978 event in Guyana in which a charismatic cult leader convinced his followers that the government was coming to get them, and that the only way to save themselves was to commit "revolutionary suicide" by drinking grape flavored Flavor Aid laced with Valium, chloral hydrate, Phenergan, and cyanide. In Foxworld, use of that phrase does not refer to a cult leader type president convincing people that the "socialists" are out to get them and the only way to save themselves is to vote for people who want to take away their health care during a pandemic. It instead refers to people who have a different point of view, one which they supposedly came to because the "lying liberal media" fed them "fake news" in order to enslave them by convincing them to vote for "socialists" who want to "take away our freedoms."

My real reason for not wanting to read the book had little to do with Mr. Huckabee himself, even though I knew I was going to disagree with much of what he would have to say. Nor was it because the forward was written by fascist and professional fabulist Sean Hannity.  No, it was because I knew that this was going to turn into an involved research project that would occupy my brain, and I wanted to be able to sleep. It will take up ALL of my time, and I've got things to do. Plus, I know he's hoping it will influence my vote, but I voted in September.

The conversation turned to the fact that I'm back at work, and how much I am enjoying not being on the overnight shift anymore, and then I stepped into the other room to look for a DVD I wanted (but didn't find.) While there I thought, Oh, why not. I came back to the kitchen, put a set of DVDs that I had decided to take home into the bag. I grabbed the book and put it in too.
   "Oh, you're going to read it?" Dad asked. 
   "I guess," I said.
   "Have Gaby read it too. It's all about the Constitution, and I think he'll find it informative." Gaby has read two books in his entire life. This isn't going to be the third.

  I had to work on Monday, so there was no way I was going to get into the book before I had to go to bed, so Sunday night it sat untouched on the coffee table. I had three days off, so my plan was to start it on Tuesday morning in the hopes that I could mentally leave it behind as the day wore on. I did peek Monday evening. I thought it might be fun to be able to say, "Well, the first sentence was a lie." But it wasn't. I looked at one more sentence on a random page, and got reminded of why this could turn out to be difficult. 

A few years ago I read a book with the rather misleading title The Republican Brain.  It was, in fact, a look at what the differences are between the way the conservative mind thinks vs the liberal mind. Its conclusion, basically was that if you want to convince a liberal of something, you get out the spreadsheets and show them the data. If you want to convince a conservative of something, you have to appeal to their values. (My conservative Facebook friends have convinced me that if you want to convince a conservative of something, you fill them up with bogus information and scare the crap out of them, but that's another post.) For the liberal, their values are informed by their beliefs, and for the conservative, their beliefs are informed by their values. They have different paradigms, and that makes it hard to see the other's point of view.

   The word paradigm means model, and in this case I'm using it to mean the model a person has for his understanding of the way the world works. People with different paradigms have difficulty communicating with each other, usually because they use the same words to describe entirely different things. (My brother did a video about this, primarily about evolution. He could do the same with socialism.) But the understanding of language is more than just the words. There is subtext and nuance and a whole variety of things that influence your usage of the words that out of your mouth. It's like you have your own language. And for someone to understand you, they have to understand your language. That's why it's so hard to argue with strangers on the internet.

Now, I used to consider myself a conservative, and it wasn't that long ago. Unfortunately, it took a while for me to notice that the word 'conservative" had been co-opted by crazy people. But I think I still understand some of the concepts and lingo, so let's give this a go.

The first thing to do was to find out something about Huckabee the man. Checking Wikipedia, I find that there were a lot of things I knew, and a lot of things I didn't. I knew he had been a pastor, I knew he was the Governor of Arkansas at one time, I knew he ran for president a couple of times.  He's conservative on social issues (no surprise there, as his positions on abortion and gay rights are informed by his faith.) He's kind of all over the place on economics. He's surprisingly liberal on immigration. I found out that he plays electric bass in a band, and that he has a sense of humor. I knew that in one of campaigns he had a completely unworkable tax plan, but I didn't remember what it was. Looking further, I found out it was something he called a Fair Tax wherein income tax was replaced by a consumption (sales) tax. Consumption taxes are inherently regressive, which means that the less money you have, the more you pay in taxes. Under his plan, the poor would be given a subsidy (Socialism!) for their basic living expenses, but taxes would still go up significantly for the middle class, while dropping dramatically for the wealthy. 

I also believed that he was a dominionist. After reading the first chapter, that belief was reinforced. 

Dominionism, also known as Christian Reconstructionism, is the belief that 

• America is meant to be governed by Biblical law
• that the US was founded as a Christian nation, then betrayed by secular humanist liberals who created a myth of separation of church and state in the 20th century, leading the country to immorality and godlessness, and
• that the United States must be taken back by Christians.

Dominionists are sometimes called Christian supremacists because of their belief that their religion comes with the privilege of exemption from obeying certain laws, and Christo-fascists (my preferred term) because they seek to eliminate other people's civil and human rights.  Huckabee is quoted as saying, in January of 2008, 

"I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view." 

 But in the title of the book, he gives equal billing to Christianity and the Constitution, so I'm eager to see how he reconciles this. 

Sitting out on the front porch, I began reading the first chapter, Christian Faith Comes To A New World. Immediately I'm confronted with a question: just how pedantic do I want to get? Like, the Pilgrims did not name their colony Plymouth Rock. John Smith, of Pocahontas fame, had surveyed the area a few years earlier, and named it New Plymouth after a town in England, and the Pilgrims kept the name. Plymouth Rock, however, didn't become a thing until 121 years later. (Plymouth Rock has a pretty interesting history. Check out its Wikipedia page.) But of course, that's not Huckabee's larger point. 

Huckabee writes that during the time of the pilgrims the established church had become corrupt, seeking to please the king, who was using the church as a political tool to control his subjects. For the Pilgrims, being English, that would be the Church of England, and the king would be King James I, who had sponsored an English translation of the Bible just a few years earlier. Without meaning to, Huckabee has made the point iterated by Thomas Payne in his pamphlet The Age of Reason:

"Persecution is not an original feature in any religion, but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law."

I see this as problematic for someone who wants to change the Constitution to line up with the Bible. But this is only page 2, so we'll have to see where it goes. 

Next up is a section about colonial charters. A charter is a letter of permission from the king to a private company allowing them to do business. It's basically a contract that defines the business and its objective. The London Company, for instance, was formed with the purpose of establishing colonial settlements in the Virginia territory as defined by the charter. Shareholders were given interest in the natural resources produced in the colony. It was a feudalistic system in which the company served as the lord and the settlers as the fiefs. Huckabee pulls a portion of a quote from the penultimate paragraph of the second Virginia Charter (1609):

"The principle effect that we can desire or expect of this action is the conversion... of the people in those parts unto the true worship of God and Christian religion." 

He says this is an example of the "religious fervor held by the early colonists in America." There may well have been a religious fervor held by the early colonists, but the charters have nothing to do with that. This was a directive from the King of England, who is also the head of the Church of England, who Huckabee said was using the church as a political tool just one page ago. "People in those parts," of course, refers to Native Americans. King James himself had a strong dislike of Native Americans because they had introduced the "filthie novelitie" of smoking into British society. But the king still held the opinion commonly held by English clergy that the Native Americans were ripe for conversion to Christianity -- of a particular flavor, as we will see in a moment. Richard Hakluyt (the younger) wrote, "The people of America crye oute unto us... to come and helpe them, and bring unto them the gladd tidinges of the gospell." In his pamphlet Nova Britannia, Robert Johnson wrote that once in the New World, the English would begin the social and spiritual conversion of the natives "by faire and loving meanes, suiting to our English natures." But while writers back home were insisting that conversion of the natives was a principal purpose of colonization, the men on the scene considered the natives a military problem in which the natives were a real or potential foe. 

Besides, he was very selective about the quote. Here is the rest of it:

And lastely, because the principall effect which wee cann desier or expect of this action is the conversion and reduccion of the people in those partes unto the true worshipp of God and Christian religion, in which respect wee would be lothe that anie person should be permitted to passe that wee suspected to affect the superstitions of the Churche of Rome, wee doe hereby declare that it is oure will and pleasure that none be permitted to passe in anie voiadge from time to time to be made into the saide countrie but such as firste shall have taken the oath of supremacie, for which purpose wee doe by theise presents give full power and aucthoritie to the Tresorer for the time beinge, and anie three of the Counsell, to tender and exhibite the said oath to all such persons as shall at anie time be sent and imploied in the said voiadge.

So the directive from the King of England, Sovereign Head of the Church of England, is to convert the natives and prohibit Catholics, the Catholic Church being the Anglican Church's bitter rival, from entering the colony. 

Meanwhile, back at ranch, the Native Americans did not welcome the new settlers with open arms. They were skeptical of English intentions, and wanted neither Christianity nor encroachment on their lands. John Smith had lied to the Powhatans about their purpose for being there, saying that they had just escaped from a Spanish squadron, and they were taking temporary refuge. Three colonists were killed in a skirmish when the Powhatans found them planting crops. But eventually the English weaponry forced the Powhatans to reluctantly accept the English presence. Captain Smith recorded this conversation in 1609 with Wahunsenacawh, who the English referred to as King or Chief Powhatan: 

"Captain Smith, some doubt I have of your comming hither... for many do informe me, your comming is not for trade, but to invade my people and possesse my country... Having seene the death of all my people thrice... I knowe the difference of peace and warre better than any in my countrie" If he fought the English, Powhatan predicted, he would "be so hunted by you that I can neither rest eat nor sleepe, but my tired men must watch, and if a twig but breake, everie one crie, there comes Captain Smith: then must I flie I know not whether and thus with miserable fear end my miserable life."

The colonists' relations with the natives was complicated. There was a period of hostility between 1610 and 1614, followed by an eight year span of relative peace. Then in 1622, 347 colonists, a third of the population, were massacred by a confederacy of Powhatans. After that it was all out war. 

The history of all that can be read elsewhere, but one of the underlying causes for all the conflict was the English attitude of ethnocentric racism, what would be referred to today as white supremacism, which transformed itself into outright contempt once it arrived in the New World. The Native Americans were viewed as culturally and religiously inferior, and in need of redemption, which involved adopting English customs and fealty to the King. William Strachey wrote, "we shall by degrees chaung their barbarous natures, make them ashamed... of their savadge nakednes, informe them of the true god, and of the waie to their salvation, and fynally teach them obedience to the king's Majestie and to his Governours in those parts." Concern for the native's salvation failed to cover the general disdain the colonists felt for them. John Bonoeil described them as knowing "no industry, no Arts, no culture, nor no good use of this blessed Country heere, but are meere ignorance, sloth, and brutishness, and an unprofitable burthen... [They] are natural borne slaves." The message of his pamphlet fell on receptive ears in a public that perceived the natives as a nuisance to be pushed aside or enslaved. Even the clergy saw no prospects of conversion until "their Priests and Ancients have their throats cut." 

I doubt that any of this is what Huckabee meant when he referred to the "religious fervor held by the early colonists in America." I also doubt that he did any research about it, because it certainly doesn't fit into the narrative he wants to promote.

 I'm only on page four. This is going to take forever.

A Quick Thought: BLM

 A quick thought.

Black Lives Matter is just the latest chapter in the civil rights movement. We may call it something different today, but it's not much different than the civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s. In fact, it's just a continuation. And with it comes the very same resistance, just wrapped up in new slogans.

https://segregationinamerica.eji.org/report/segregation-forever-leaders.html

Snagged from tumblr: Antifa

 A reminder that antifacism is a thing you DO, not an organisation you JOIN.

Calling a hotel and telling them a KKK chapter rented their ballroom for a meeting is antifa action

Pulling down posters promoting hate groups is antifa action (and if you do, use your keys, not your hands. Some groups put razor blades behind their postings to hurt anyone who takes them down)

Addressing local tensions in your community by participating in food drives and supporting disempowered folks can be antifacist, as facist groups will use community fears to stir up hate and gain power.

Going to an event where a figure whom fascists tend to align with and peacefully protesting is antifa action, whether that speaker thinks they’re fascist or not.

It’s not a club, religion, or organization. You don’t pay dues. Being antifa means actively trying to prevent fascism from being built, usually in local ways that respond to immediate community needs. If you see ANYTHING that talks about officially joining a group or organization, it is SUSPECT.

Snagged from tumblr: Hospital Costs

Costs all vary by hospital, and they’re all massively inflated. They’re part of complex negotiations between the hospital and the insurance company, and they’re a scam.

The hospital puts all these little charges together to “justify” a giant bill. Then they “lower” those costs to what they’ve already agreed on with your insurance company. The insurance company then tells you “look how much we reduced your bill by our negotiating!” and then pays some portion of that bill and passes the rest on to you, depending on your deductibles and so on.

If you have no insurance, you don’t get the benefit of the “negotiated” price - they keep the price that high as part of a deal with insurance companies who are trying to justify why you should pay them so much in premiums every month. If out of pocket patients paid less, nobody would get insurance.

We need price transparency where hospitals have to publish these costs and make them available to everyone. We need to be able to call people out when they charge $20 for a tissue and $30 for a band-aid. We also need to be able to compare prices and choose hospitals that give us the best balance of cost and quality. 

We also need to stop acting like giving everyone health insurance is the solution to our broken healthcare system. The insurance companies are the ones who broke it. 

If you are facing a big bill after a hospital stay, whether for giving birth or for anything else, here are some ways to reduce that bill.

1. If you have insurance, call them and ask for an explanation of what they didn’t cover. The person will probably not have one for you. Say you are not willing to pay a bill if they can’t explain why you owe it. The insurance company will sometimes re-submit the claim and cover more of your cost. 

2. Call the hospital billing department and ask for an itemized bill. This alone may reduce the cost somewhat because they were overcharging you to begin with. 

3. When you get the itemized bill, go through it. Highlight any items that seem exceptionally overpriced or even that don’t apply to your visit (a medication you didn’t receive, a procedure that wasn’t done, etc.)

4. Call the hospital billing department back and go through the itemized bill, asking for clarification on all the items you flagged. They may remove items or reduce the cost.

5. Explain that you are unable to pay your bill in full and ask about a settlement or payment options. Sometimes the hospital will be willing to take a significantly lower amount if you can pay all at once, or you can get a payment plan with no interest that is feasible for you. 

This is based on how my husband has been fighting medical bills for the last couple of years. He has a chronic illness and has frequent appointments, procedures, tests, etc. He frequently gets large bills and then negotiates them down to much smaller ones, or in some cases has gotten bills dismissed completely. 

He says that calling the billing department and the insurance company and simply asking them to explain the charges makes a huge difference every time, because the person on the phone almost never has an explanation for why the bill is so high. 

You ARE being overcharged, and you don’t have to just deal with it. You can fight back!

First Reaction: The Family Defense Edition

Yeah, but you've also complained about compulsory masks, so I'm not sure I believe you.

Spreaders

"Being human is not about individual survival or escape. It’s a team sport. Whatever future humans have, it will be together." - Douglas Rushkoff

I've been kind of avoiding Facebook. Not, like, abstaining or anything like that It's just that I've been finding myself getting more and more exasperated by what I'm seeing, and I know that if I get too involved, I'm not going to be able to sleep. These are not the normal disagreements over politics and policy. This is life and death. Frankly, I'm appalled by the half dozen or so friends I have who, through what I can only see as willful ignorance, are arguing for death on a massive scale.

I was explaining this to Gaby last night. He asked me, "Do you really need those friends?" If they're causing me so much frustration, why do I keep them? I reminded him that for me there are only two reasons for unfriending someone: a) they're boring, meaning they never post anything, and b) they're no longer important to me. Both have to be true. So I'll put up with fascism, conspiracy theories, and hyper-partisanship so long as you post frequently and you're someone I care about. 

But I do have opinions. I probably won't tell you what that opinion is (at least directly) unless you ask, especially if I doubt your motives. But if you ask an answerable question, I might give an answer. Or not. I frequently see people ask what they think is supposed to be a rhetorical "gotcha" question, but wind up instead asking a question that actually has an answer. For instance, one post recently questioned why, if masks are so effective, did they release "millions of prisoners instead of just giving them masks?" Skipping over the hyperbolic use of the word "millions" and its other implications, that question actually has an answer: Masks are most effective when used in combinations with other preventive measures, such as social distancing -- which is impossible or improbable in crowded indoor situations such as bars, schools, churches, political rallies, aircraft carriers, and, yes... prisons. Anybody with access to Google -- or, frankly, anyone who has been paying attention --  could have found this out for themselves. I didn't comment on the post because the person who posted it wasn't interested in knowing the answer. She just wanted to look clever.

So... my reason for writing.

One of those friends posted this: 

So much to unpack in this. I didn't respond, partly because I didn't want to get into it, and partly because he has friends who are pro-public health and safety and pro-civil and human rights who are willing to argue with him. But the thing that caught my eye and stuck with me was the "real science" remark. I don't what he means by that. I'm similarly disturbed when I see admonitions to "do your [own] research," which in context usually means "trudge through the same conspiracy theory websites as me so you can gain my secret knowledge." It reminds me of when Mormon

missionaries would come to my door and tell me to investigate their claims, and I would do that (because I just like looking stuff up) but I'd invariably come to different conclusions than the ones they were hoping I'd find. 

I'm no medical professional, and I don't have the time or money to do what could reasonably be called "research" by any measure. But I do know how to look up information if I have a question about something. Frankly, it's just not that hard. And I shouldn't have to do it for you. But we all have those Facebook friends who believe that some rando who works at some hospital somewhere is a voice of authority because her particular hospital is not experiencing the problems of hospitals around the globe, and that this prooooves (emphasis on the ooooves) that the whole thing is a hoax. And this counts as "research."

Yeah, I see this kind of thing a lot. A lot.

Meanwhile, thousands of scientists and medical professionals around the globe are actually studying the virus, studying prevention measures, and looking for a vaccine. In other words, doing actual research:

A study published in June in the journal BMJ Global Health confirmed that the highest risk of transmission of the virus occurs before the subject develops symptoms, but found that the transmission rate was reduced by 79% if the infected person is wearing a mask.

In The Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice, Professor Trisha Greenhalgh writes that if 60% of the public wore masks that were 60% effective, the transmission rate would drop to less than one per person, and the virus would die out. (This is a very informative article, covering a lot of related topics, with links to 88 scientific studies.)

A German study published in the IZA Institute of Labor Economics found a dramatic drop in Covid-19 cases just 10 days after Germany made masks compulsory. Their conclusion was that face masks reduced the daily growth rate of reported infections by 40%.

A study from Texas A&M, published in the journal PNAS,  found that mask usage reduced the transmission rate by 78,000 in Italy and 66,000 in New York City over a one month period, confirming that the air an infected person exhales is the dominant route for the spread of Covid-19, and that masks and social distancing are currently the most effective (and cheapest) method for combating the virus.

Those are just four of hundreds. 

The nature of science is that knowledge increases. We know more today than we did yesterday, but we'll know more tomorrow than we do today. Still, a lot of what we know about the effectiveness of masks is knowledge we've had for years, and the Japanese people have worn them for decades.

I read my friend's post last night before sitting down to watch an episode of The West Wing ( "The Women of Qumar," season 3, episode 9) on Netflix. It was the one about seat belts and mad cow, and I found that a lot of the discussion was pertinent to what was on my mind. Sam argued with several people about the necessity for a national seat belt law, giving the statistic that currently (November, 2001) 68% of people in the country wore their seat belt, and that if that number increased to 90%, 5000 lives could be saved. Later, President Bartlett pointed out to him that cars today, with their seat belts, air bags, and crumple zones, etc. are safer than they've ever been. If someone dies in an a car accident today, it's just because of personal behavior and bad luck.

In a debate about whether it should be announced that a cow in Nebraska was being tested for Mad Cow Disease, CJ made three strong points. She said that the public will not forgive a president that withheld information that would have helped them or save lives (remember, this was about 19 years ago); that in a crisis, people need to feel like soldiers, not victims; and that information breeds confidence while silence breeds fear.

That second point stood out.

Previously, my friend had posted a meme which consisted of two photos. The top one depicted a herd of sheep wearing masks, while the bottom showed lions, maskless, approaching the viewer menacingly. The implication, of course, was that people wear masks because they are afraid, and they're obediently following... i don't know, the "gub'mint"? the liberal media? while the lions (without their masks) are brave, standing up to the authorities that want to take away their freedoms.

But that's wrong.

In a crisis, people need to feel like soldiers, not victims.

And in this crisis, a mask is the soldier's most effective weapon.

An anguished question from a Trump supporter: ‘Why do liberals think Trump supporters are stupid?’

An anguished question from a Trump supporter: ‘Why do liberals think Trump supporters are stupid?’

Peni Delina Bedard · August 31, 2019  

The serious answer: Here’s what we really think about Trump supporters - the rich, the poor, the malignant and the innocently well-meaning, the ones who think and the ones who don’t…

That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought “Fine.”

That when you saw a man who had made it his business practice to stiff his creditors, you said, “Okay.”

That when you heard him proudly brag about his own history of sexual abuse, you said, “No problem.”

That when he made up stories about seeing Muslim-Americans in the thousands cheering the destruction of the World Trade Center, you said, “Not an issue.”

That when you saw him brag that he could shoot a man on Fifth Avenue and you wouldn’t care, you chirped, “He sure knows me.”

That when you heard him illustrate his own character by telling that cute story about the elderly guest bleeding on the floor at his country club, the story about how he turned his back and how it was all an imposition on him, you said, “That’s cool!”

That when you saw him mock the disabled, you thought it was the funniest thing you ever saw.

That when you heard him brag that he doesn’t read books, you said, “Well, who has time?”

That when the Central Park Five were compensated as innocent men convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, and he angrily said that they should still be in prison, you said, “That makes sense.”

That when you heard him tell his supporters to beat up protesters and that he would hire attorneys, you thought, “Yes!”

That when you heard him tell one rally to confiscate a man’s coat before throwing him out into the freezing cold, you said, “What a great guy!”

That you have watched the parade of neo-Nazis and white supremacists with whom he curries favor, while refusing to condemn outright Nazis, and you have said, “Thumbs up!”

That you hear him unable to talk to foreign dignitaries without insulting their countries and demanding that they praise his electoral win, you said, “That’s the way I want my President to be.”

That you have watched him remove expertise from all layers of government in favor of people who make money off of eliminating protections in the industries they’re supposed to be regulating and you have said, “What a genius!”

That you have heard him continue to profit from his businesses, in part by leveraging his position as President, to the point of overcharging the Secret Service for space in the properties he owns, and you have said, “That’s smart!”

That you have heard him say that it was difficult to help Puerto Rico because it was in the middle of water and you have said, “That makes sense.”

That you have seen him start fights with every country from Canada to New Zealand while praising Russia and quote, “falling in love” with the dictator of North Korea, and you have said, “That’s statesmanship!”

That Trump separated children from their families and put them in cages, managed to lose track of 1500 kids, has opened a tent city incarceration camp in the desert in Texas - he explains that they’re just “animals” - and you say, “Well, OK then.”

That you have witnessed all the thousand and one other manifestations of corruption and low moral character and outright animalistic rudeness and contempt for you, the working American voter, and you still show up grinning and wearing your MAGA hats and threatening to beat up anybody who says otherwise.

What you don’t get, Trump supporters in 2019, is that succumbing to frustration and thinking of you as stupid may be wrong and unhelpful, but it’s also…hear me…charitable.

Because if you’re NOT stupid, we must turn to other explanations, and most of them are less flattering.

Christmas Eve

It's a quiet Sunday night at the grand old hotel. Most of the guests have already arrived and gone to bed. One arrival remains. I finished my paperwork in the first hour I was here, so I'm at the front door waiting on the last arrival and reading a book about John Steinbeck. As often happens, reading about writers makes me want to write.
Much of the quiet is due to the absence of some of the usual people. Keven, the overnight houseman, has Sundays off. Karen, from Loss Prevention (our pretentious designation for our security department) has decided that she doesn't want to work on Sundays either. I haven't asked her yet how she's managing to maintain her 30 hour per week work requirement to keep her health insurance. Her husband, and my best friend, Ted, called in sick earlier tonight, and his absence makes things particularly quiet. So it's just me, and Jay, and Mike: valet, front desk, and LP.
The kids from Paycom are here this week. They are a group of uncommonly attractive twenty-somethings here for some kind of training. We get a different set of kids each time they stay with us, which is about every three weeks or so. One of our bar waiters commented recently that Paycom must have some pretty shallow hiring standards to have every person in every group to be so attractive. The valet staff doesn't care for them. They don't tip, and often they exhibit a rather privileged attitude, which probably is encouraged by the fact that I bring all their cars around early in the morning. I'm sure they think that I do that because there are so many of them and they all come down at once. Some of them might think it's because they're special. The actual reason is because we don't have universal health care in this country.
To elucidate, all of our morning guys have their kids on their health insurance, which means that they don't get a substantial paycheck. All of their spendable income is from their tips. If the guest doesn't tip, they're basically working for free. I don't have that problem, so I bring around the Paycom cars before the morning guys get here. All the morning guys have to do is hand them their keys.

Mike just walked by and asked if there were any homeless people. I haven't seen any. In fact, I haven't seen homeless Joel in a week. Normally he's camped in the third floor of the heated entrance to the parking garage next door. He frequently stops by to buy candy bars and get coffee . Nobody has seen him since last Monday morning. I'm kind of worried about him.

I'm missing Ted tonight too. I have a book to give him, and I wanted to tell him about how I totally trolled one of my FOXhead friends on Facebook. I was able to do it solely because this guy never ever looks anything up, never does any kind of research or fact-checking. He's perfectly happy in an ignorance that suits his prejudices. He posted a meme that said "Kill one terrorist and the world is outraged. Iran shoots down a commercial airliner and kills 179 civilians, crickets!!!!!" I replied, "Haven't heard much about flight 655 either. 290 people killed on that one." He liked that. Now, is he going to do any research and find out that flight 655 was the Iranian airliner that the Americans accidentally shot down in 1988? Not a chance.

Okay, I'm done gloating.

My Dad and I went to the airport to pick up my brother. Tomorrow is Christmas, because that's the way the Savage family does things. We haven't seen each other in years, and I expected the ride back to be full of conversation, but that wasn't the case. It might have been the group dynamics. Our Dad would have been a captive audience had Scott and I engaged in the usual stuff we talk about when we're on the phone. I've often had the fantasy of talking politics with Scott at the dining room table in front of my parents,but somehow in the car it just seemed wrong, and we, all of us, have never been good at small talk. But we have Monday night and all day Tuesday before I have to go back to a normal schedule.

Now it's lunchtime: 2:30am. Still two and a half hours before I have to start bringing Paycom around. I might get a lot of of this book read before then, unless i get sucked into Netflix. We'll see how I feel.