Craig's Corner

Want a sure fire task that will amuse and frustrate you all at the same time? Look at your job description. I looked at mine recently and had a broad range of reactions as I was reminded what it covered and what it didn’t cover compared to the reality of day to day working and producing results. One of the things that the Great Recession did was consolidate positions so that many jobs have elasticity so a lot of traditional descriptions don't matter much. There is a huge breadth of deliverables for each role in companies and organizations. Then there’s always the all-encompassing “other duties as assigned” that give employers a wide berth in adjusting the job on the fly. Even in this environment, however there are instances of people just not doing what they’ve been hired to do. It’s infuriating. People who may not have a white collar gig or a formal outline of their role still have expectations of what they're supposed to do for work. I think of how many times I’ve gone...

I moved out of home into the dorms (at the school my Dad taught at) in 10 th grade. I’ve largely lived away from home since then. For over 20 years I’ve lived alone --- not counting furry folks (non-human.) More recently I’ve been happily adjusting to life with a partner, including sharing space (at least the times we’re on the same coast). Being on my own is great, but being with my soul mate is fantastic. It’s a great melding that creates interdependence, not one of us being either independent or dependent totally. It got me to wondering if that’s a model that could work in politics as well? There has been some hyperventilating in social media, the press and indeed the public at large at the idea of a President Donald J. Trump. One town in Canada set up a website encouraging Americans to come to Cape Breton if Trump wins. The site has gotten millions of hits. That’s definitely the “leave home and don’t look back” model. Moving away isn’t always possible. Moving home so...

Andy Warhol said : “in the future everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes.” That was nearly 50 years ago. Is it the future yet? Some have had their moments of fame and then some. Some will never get it. It does seem that many are hankering for it, myself included in my own hybrid way of wanting the benefits of visibility without the hassle of recognition. The quote has morphed so that ‘world-famous’ now equates with celebrity. “ Celebrity is fame and public attention in the media” whereas being famous has more to do with skill and accomplishment. 2016 is not the first election cycle where the issue of celebrity has overtaken the issues themselves. In 1960 John Kennedy and Richard Nixon made history with the first ever televised  debates . Many claim that those who watched the debate on TV thought Kennedy won  because he was tanned, rested and relaxed in front of the camera while Nixon was tired, had no make up on and had not fully recovered from a hospital stay th...

I’m not a prude. There are limits, however, to what I think is an appropriate use of sexual innuendo. Justice Potter Stewart described obscenity most directly: “I’ll know it when I see it.” That’s the great thing about America – the structure of the Constitution and the three branches of government are designed so that one person’s objection doesn’t immediately become the baseline for everybody else. That, however, is being chipped away – especially in California which is leading the way. In 2012 Los Angeles voters approved Measure B which “requires the use of condoms in all vaginal and anal sex scenes in pornography productions filmed in Los Angeles County, California. The measure also requires porn production companies to obtain a health permit prior to production and to post the permit and a notice to performers regarding condom use during production.” The main argument came from AIDS Healthcare Foundation which claimed that “"thousands of performers have been i...

I’m mad as hell. Just like Howard Beale in “Network” who screamed the catch phrase forty years ago – there’s a lot to be mad at. I’m mad as hell that:   The economy isn’t as strong as it could be and millions of people are out of work and underemployed. That the U.S. is now $19 trillion in debt and growing at half-a-trillion per year because government can't spend what it brings in. Medical care is so outrageously expensive. Obamacare is thought of as healthcare rather than an insurance program. Congress can’t find a way of compromising and voters re-elect their representatives at a rate in excess of 95%. Social Security is going to be bankrupt by the time I am eligible. Senators have preemptively declared that no nominee to the Supreme Court from the President will even be considered. Government in Flint, MI poisoned its people in the name of efficiency. Al Jazeera America is going off the air – leaving viewers with no options for unbiased reporting on televi...