Before Holy Mountain

  Originally published as a Facebook Note May 31, 2011. A group of us at Coe are reading and commenting on Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink. Malcolm Gladwell calls is "provocative and fascinating," and so it is. Here's what the first three chapters provoked from me: Pink makes two claims which occur side-by-side in the first part of his book. The first is that traditional material incentives (pay, prizes, grades) are not as effective as conventional wisdom would have it. For many people, intrinsic incentives, such as personal interest and connection with others, are more effective. The second claim is that however individuals happen to be motivated, intrinsic motivation is better than extrinsic motivation at fostering creative problem-solving, productivity and job satisfaction. Employers would do well to hire people who are intrinsically-motivated, and those of us who are more extrinsically-motivated would do well to work on developin...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note March 13, 2011. Scott Walker, Governor of Wisconsin (2011-2019) (In which our author, having spilled an obscene amount of words on other people's sites, decides to mess up his own page instead.) I grew up in the 1960s, in a conservative house in a conservative town in a liberal era. When I was growing up, conservatism stood for small, efficient, clean, government, and a cautious approach to social change. Even so, there was room in the conservative idea for public goods. The civil rights, environmental, consumer protection and campaign finance legislation that passed during the late 1960s and early 1970s passed with conservative input and support. In serving as a counterweight to the era's liberal zeitgeist, conservatism was at its best, and made distinctive contributions to American political and social life. It reflected skepticism about government activity and spending, reminding us constantly that we couldn't regulate or spend e...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note August 17, 2010. It was the basis for this post on Holy Mountain. William of Rubruck (1220-1293) This summer I've been taking a day every week or two to study medieval political thought, because I'm scheduled to give a talk fairly soon on the subject. I find the era fascinating, but under-studied, especially by me, so it's been interesting getting prepared. It has also given me a chance to escape from an unusually seamy political scene, even by the standard of election years. Along the way this summer I met an interesting character named William of Rubruck. He was a Dutch monk who was sent by the French King Louis IX on a mission to the Mongol Empire in 1253. (That puts him ahead of the more famous Eastern explorer Marco Polo by a couple decades, but "William of Rubruck" doesn't sound as good yelled at a beach, particularly when you have to find a third person to yell "of.") The king had heard a rumor that t...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note July 16, 2010. (photo by Robbie) July is Travel Month in the Nesmith household, this year featuring a swing to the Mid-Atlantic states followed by a quick trip to Chicago. Details follow, but in order that the detail not become numbing I have limited the information to some essentials--(1) Where did we go, and how far did we travel? (2) Did I get coffee? (3) What was for dinner?--as well as one highlight for each day. The coffee theme winds up less than perky, if you'll pardon the pun (which I don't mind if you don't, as the phrase is there only to ensure you'll notice). Maybe in some future trip we can be sure to save an hour in the day to spend at a wonderful coffeehouse, instead of grabbing some for the road as turned out to be the case except for Corning. Without further ado, the short of it, without the long: Monday, July 5. To: Cleveland Heights OH (582 miles) Staying With: Bill and Kim Claspy Coffee: (1) BP,...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note March 28, 2010. Dear Senator: I've received two e-mails from you this week, touting your latest initiative, which is to require that members of Congress switch from their current health insurance to the new health care program. I'm disappointed by your effort, not because I believe members of Congress deserve special treatment, but because given the structure of the bill Congress passed this week it makes no sense. As an employee of Coe College, I am covered by the institution's health care package, which is provided by Wellmark. The package of benefits is similar to that which you members of Congress enjoy. As such the health care bill will have little effect on either of us, except that should our employment status change we are assured of retaining coverage. This is true of anyone now receiving coverage. But I suspect you know this already. After all, who more than you knows what your health insurance coverage is? So your initiat...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note February 23, 2010. My church--MY church, which is into love and tolerance, and is practically universalist--having inserted a snide remark about separation of church and state into an otherwise charming children's musical last weekend, I thought I would undertake to defend this bedrock American principle. The words "separation of church and state" do not appear in the Constitution. They encompass the principles of two clauses of the First Amendment, which prevent Congress from making any "law respecting an establishment," and "prohibiting free exercise" of religion. For most of our history, these were fairly innocuous and uncontroversial, largely because Protestants ruled and everyone else put up with it. More recently "establishment clause" jurisprudence got a whole lot more interesting, because (a) beginning in 1947 courts have held states as well as Congress to its standard, and (b) around the same...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note February 7, 2010. Kate McGarrigle died a few weeks ago, of liver cancer. The Canadian singer, who formed a duo with her sister Anna, would have been 64 this weekend. She has long been one of my favorite musical performers, a singer-songwriter with a throaty alto and an enviable way with words. Kimberli Maloy calls me a wordsmith, a talent for which I have to thank hours of listening to their albums. In my youth I spent an inordinate time with rather insubstantial pop music, and the main alternatives among my friends were loud rock and the musical travesty known as disco. Somehow, through all that noise, Kate and Anna McGarrigle kept finding me. I ordered one of those $2 samplers Warner Brothers used to offer, and on it was Kate and Anna's "Walking Song" (written by Kate). It was spare, relying mainly on the vocal and the lyric built around two people going on a walk. And the lyrics were odd, in a way that appealed greatly to my st...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note February 4, 2010. OK, it was over a week ago, but I'm a busy person, OK? (Quotations are from Pres. Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress, available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-state-union-address and a million other sites too) #1 "[F]amilies across the country are tightening their belts and making tough decisions. The federal government should do the same. (Applause.)" BN RATING: HUH? Of course there was applause. Everybody knows this basic fact about life. Except me. There must have been some memo I didn't get. Is the premise that everyone should do the same thing all at once? Or that economic recession calls for no spending by anyone? That sort of thinking made 1931 a hoot and a holler, I've read. If that's where this train is heading, I'd like to get off. #2 "As we take the fight to al Qaeda, we are responsibly leaving Iraq to its people. As a candidate, ...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note September 26, 2009. Kingston Stadium (source: tourismcedarrapids.com)   High school football on Friday night is a hugely popular tradition in much of America, so hugely popular that it gets along fine without me, which is fine with both of us. However, recently Friday night lights in Cedar Rapids have shown on Robbie and the Warriors, a.k.a. the Washington High School Marching Band. So off we trundled on a fair evening last night, with our Japanese visitors in tow: Teppei from Waseda U. and Nuri from Nagoya U. They were in for a dose of American culture, and they got it. "Exciting," said Nuri. Words hardly do justice to their responses, though. Teppei's English is pretty good, but he's most expressive with his face and variety of vocal noises... think someone with the facial plasticity of Susan Young and the emotiveness of Ron Santo... and every bonecrunching tackle or trip to the concessions stands got a volume of expression...

  Originally posted as a Facebook note September 10, 2009. I watched Pres. Obama's speech last night in homey Armstrong/Douglas lobby with about two dozen Political Science Club members and friends. We enjoyed sub sandwiches from Milio's, and there was plenty of pop though few people seemed to be imbibing. Thanks to Kevin, Liz and Eliot for procuring the feast. The speech itself was pretty good, though we are far from knowing whether health care reform will be addressed this year, or even this decade. Obama hit most of the notes I thought he needed to: he reminded us of the problems with health care delivery currently, spelled out the key points of the reform measure brewing in Congress, stressed some broad points of agreement across party lines, and made some conciliatory gestures while promising not to let innuendo overwhelm the debate as it appeared to do in August (good luck with that...). The atmosphere in the House chamber was occasionally raucous, but not so circus-li...

  Originally published as a Facebook note September 5, 2009. President Obama has a big speech on health care to a joint session of Congress this week. I think the venue is a mistake... anyone who's ever watched a State of the Union address knows what circuses they are with all the cheering and booing and stuff. I'd prefer an address from the Oval Office, which would provide some gravitas. And someone needs to inject some gravitas into this debate in a hurry. The problems of health care are well known, I think: spending consuming an increasing amount of the national economy, putting pressure on government, business and households; 15-20% of the American population uninsured, and many more underinsured whether they know it or not, leaving them vulnerable to any major health problem; and health indicators that are lower than other developed economies even though they spend less and rely on government more. The answers are not simple. Any technical issue is complex, and this is...