LIMERICKS ©PortWhitmanTimes2006
Cash flows at full tilt
And no coin is spilt
Where arenas of swap
Function non-stop
Thus lucrative empires are built
Floored we were
At what could occur
When out in plain sight
We witnessed a fight
'Tween a sir and a her!
We were shocked at what transpired
When someone we admired
Performed an act
Devised to detract
From an image that till then inspired
Far off conversation
Might bear investigation
If it could affect us
In some way connect us
Requiring confrontation
Keep your eye on the trash
Left after a bash
'Cause what might turn up
They were going to burn up
Could well convert into cash
Henry Francisco, Port Whitman Times
HEROES & IDEAS © Port Whitman Times
It's truly unfortunate that the overwhelming percentage of our "extant" heroes throughout history, i.e., those who were recog-nized as such during their own times, seem to come from the ranks of people of Action as opposed to those of Ideas. Not that people of action shouldn't be lionized, but we tend, with the aid of what media we have had at various times, to deify them, wor-ship them in an orgy of adulation and rhetoric that usually stops right there at the point of their action, even years after it has be-come history, to contemplate with gross magnification far out of proportion to its place in the real world of mankind's progress.
Many times, progress has, in fact, taken place in spite of such heroes. This is certainly true of many monarchs or political ru-lers who have cast their lots into the arena of domination and conquest in order to control destiny as they saw it. However, a large percentage of people of Ideas have become heroic after death more often than not, because of the immortality of their ingenious inventions rather than actions, whether the inventions be concrete, philosophical, political, mechanical or artistic.
Now that the Age of Information is upon us, it would seem that people of ideas will begin to dominate, even though much of the communication today is used to gain its own attention, making itself the hero, instead of the person with the media merely the means by which the idea of heroism is reported. Thus the real hero has become shock or titillation or revelation, and we dupes merely the worshipers of whatever the news bureau decides to program and its concupiscient images.
Fortunately there is a plethora of ideas too, and heroes to accompany them, if you search for them. And conveniently the means to search are also proliferating. It now becomes a matter of knowing how to operate the technology to separate out what are ideas and what is literally trash. Stick close to your channel switcher and your computer, pal. HenryFrancisco
New Camden Times
Were it only true...
"Pen is mightier than sword"
World would be won now.
EDUCATION