The Greatest Show On Earth

And now onto an event more thrilling and breathtaking than the Beijing Olympics, the American election race and Miami's win against the Patriots combined: The 63rd Session of the United Nations General Assembly General Debate. You may be asking, What is that? But the real question is why doesn't the media show this exciting and exhilarating activity on network television? You would think that the TV stations would be scrambling at the opportunity, but instead they are playing The Price is Right, a game show which has been around for more than 50 years, including a cast of makeup monsters the same age. But that's another subject for another time.

But the 63rd Session of the United Nations General Assembly General Debate (6SUNGAGD for short) is very entertaining. More entertaining, I would say, than a nuclear bomb exploding or a WWF Royal Rumble or an emu running or Obama talking about change, all of which are very exciting to watch.

The 6SUNGAGD party is the who's who of world leaders all getting together and getting their turn to give speeches where they unanimously put down America (read the Great Satan) - who just happens to be the hospitable host nation for the event - while peppering the remainder of their monologue with words such as "peace" and "God" and "unity" and "death to America." Somehow I don't think these words fit together, but then again I'm not the leader of a terrorist sponsoring nation.

Which brings me to my next point: Why doesn't America play along? You get my drift? Every other nation under the sun, including Belize and Monaco, have a lambasting session against the United States, the lone superpower in the world (for now, until Mexico overruns our southern border and takes over all the difficult jobs at the Pentagon, such as cleaning nuclear silos and refueling aircraft carriers, therefore giving them sole power over our military).

And what do our politicians say in response? "My distinguished friends, the United States of America is doing everything within our incredible and mind-boggling power to eradicate terrorism from the face of the Earth, share the peaceful fruits of democracy and disseminate obesity. Join us, my friends, in this mission for mankind's good so we may reap the bountiful harvest of baseball." I am convinced that isn't going anywhere in getting the likes of Chavez and Ahmadinejad to put aside our differences and share breakfast cereals.

I recommend another response: "My idiotic enemies, the United States of America is 250 times more powerful than you. Our great and proud nation challenges anyone who belittles us to a cage fight with one of our ten million Midwestern farm boys who, dare I say, can drive tractors without running into people and lift entire cows with one hand. If you happen to survive that encounter, we will send you to your home country which, by the time you arrive, will be flying the Old Glory atop your presidential palaces, oil refineries and grass huts. We will teach your people to speak English and eat beef. If you feel you have been wronged, we will challenge your strongest men to an American football game, during which our players will rip out your players' kidneys at every down. Did I mention we won't share our breakfast cereals with you?" I believe this would have a much more effective effect on America's enemies. And that would also be the makings of The Greatest Show on Earth.

Of Pigs and Pecuniary Pride

Today we are going to talk about economics. Not because I want to. No - I hate economics. It was my worst subject in school. Here's why.

Economics should be one of the simplest subjects at school (along with P.E. and lunch), but it isn't because it's peppered with impossible-to-comprehend terms which obviously were invented by economists: wild-eyed and fuzzy-haired number-crunchers who couldn't get a job as an accountant or auditor, and therefore - in their angry-at-all-the-world rage - invented their own language to create the impression that they were smart and confuse us humble bread-winners into unanimous awe at their supposed incredible wisdom.

Seriously. Which one of you knows what X-inefficiency means? Or Countercyclical Fiscal Policy? Or Pareto Optimal Policy? Or what is the Law of Diminishing Marginal Rate of Substitution? Do you really care? Or are you an economist? I didn't think so. (For all those curious readers and Trivial Pursuit fans, I will display the definitions at the bottom of this article.)

But let's stop harping on the economists. We all know that they do a great job trying to lie to us about how great the economy is doing on Nightly News with Brian Williams and Good Morning America when we all know we can feel the fiscal fire and brimstone descending upon us. But I suppose they do convince a minority of the population that everything is hunky-dory: mainly politicians and CEO's of major corporations, which hire them to convince them that spending more money is the key to creating wealth (more on this later).

Anyway, let's talk about the economy. It's junk. Okay, I'm glad I got that out of the way. Now onto something else - something infinitely more important - let's talk about why the economy is junk.

I am an American, and therefore I will be speaking from an American perspective. But I venture to say, reading reports from economists (yea, they're helpful for some things, such as reminding us what we already know), this is a global economic disaster just waiting for permission to play harder. But I'm going to pick on America because, frankly, we're the idiots who started the whole downward spiral. I'll tell you why.

Kids know economics because they have piggy banks. Piggy banks are one of the most incredible learning tools in the world and - in my humble opinion - should replace graphs as the most displayed prop in economic classes. This is because when a kid doesn't have money in the piggy bank, he stops spending. Take little Johny for instance. He sits back and thinks and perhaps gets a bit perturbed and cries about how life is so unfair, but he doesn't spend money, because he doesn't have it. Then he goes to dad or mom and asks if he can work so he can have some more change in the piggy bank. So he works, gets paid, puts the money in the piggy bank, thinks about what he wants to buy, and purchases it. The cycle continues.

Let's jump ahead 30 years. Little Johny is now Big John, and consequently spends about 80% of his yearly income on his wife's jewelry and kitchen appliances, while she spends the other 95% on clothing and shoes. Wait a second! That doesn't add up! And you're absolutely right, but we do it anyway! Us humans are known for doing things that don't make any logical sense whatsoever.

Enter debt, which is a word we learned when we bought our first car back in high school. We couldn't afford our dream car, so we got into debt over it. Same with college, the wedding, the honeymoon, the house, the vacations, the boat, the swimming pool, etc. You get the idea. What happened to the piggy bank? It became obsolete along with Gunsmoke, MC Hammer and the 49er's.

But us little normal people peons aren't the only ones living outside our means. A conversation about debt cannot honestly be spoken without bringing up the United States government. What is it now? Close to $10 trillion and counting with the war against terror, failed investment banking bailouts, and White House dinners raking up. But that doesn't matter, because according to economics (at least what I learned in class), the stronger economy is the one which spends the most. Wow! Eye opening and amazing! That's what I should be doing to be in a better state financially. What a bunch of ludicrousy!

So now we are getting to the crux of the matter. This is really why I hate economics. The word has simply become an excuse for trying to make the numbers work when we know they don't - when we are spending more than we are bringing in - when we are living like a prince and only making the pauper's income. And don't get me wrong: the average American is quite wealthy. But even wealthy has its limits. Even the most affluent kings and businessmen and governments throughout history have dug themselves into financial pits in the name of extravagance and unchecked spending.

Which brings me to another point while I'm on the subject of ranting about economics: budget surplus. Americans will remember the days under the Clinton administration when the budget surplus was flouted as an amazing thing. Wow! We finally as a national government started raking in more dough than we dished out! And that is a step in the right direction. But while we were celebrating about how great our economy was, we almost forgot about the few trillion dollar debt still over our heads. It's still there, people. We can't just ignore it and hope it passes away like summer.

And this leads me to my final rant: People, stop blaming the economists and government. Government, stop blaming the people. Everyone, stop blaming the system. What's all this talk about the system anyway? It's like we're in the Matrix or something. Get real, people! The only system there really is is your habitual system of living outside your means!

So if you happen to be an economist, a government treasury worker, a CEO of a major corporation, or just a normal person, consider this: get a piggy bank. For a change start paying off the debt you have racked up. Take responsibility for your fiscal mismanagement. Get back to the days of pigs and pecuniary pride.

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Answers to pop quiz economic questions in article above:

- X-inefficiency - The underperformance of a firm that has a monopoly position.

- Countercyclical Fiscal Policy -Fiscal policy in which the government offsets any change in aggregate expenditures that would create a business.

- Pareto Optimal Policy - Policy that benefits some people and hurts no one.

- Law of Diminishing Marginal Rate of Substitution - As you get more and more of a good, if some of that good is taken away, then the marginal addition of another good you need to keep you on your indifference curve gets less and less.

War Against the Underground Bees Part III

This is Part III of an entertaining, true-story, 3-part series about two young boys and their war against the underground bees. (And, yes, one of the boys was me.) If you're breaking into the middle of the story, feel free to read Part I and Part II below. _________________________________________

The next morning, as the sun peeked its bright pink head over the trees on the horizon, I began my trek back to the rivals' fort. Corey quickly came to meet me. “I have an awesome idea!” he loudly whispered with the barely-contained excitement of a calculating megalomaniac about to conquer the world. My friend then moved his sinister eyes and starred at the water hose. It didn’t take long for me to get the hint.

“Of course, that is it! This is the way to gain victory against the bees. Just flood them out.” I could hardly contain myself. Could it really be that easy? Was the war really a hair’s breadth from being over, and in our favor?

I snatched the end of the hose and lodged it into the entrance of the bee’s underground lair. Then, wearing his famous Cheshire cat grin, Corey turned the water on full blast. Like water bursting through a damaged dam, a torrent of watery death spewed out of the nozzle and into the bee colony megalopolis.

Bees began to rapidly assemble around the entryway in total disarray. And we, being much more keen and farsighted than we had been in our previous attack, stood a safe distance from the deluge. The bees were absolutely helpless. They could do nothing in response to our upping the ante. If we couldn’t defeat our foes in combat, we would resort to a much crueler method of warfare—genocidal terrorism. We would eradicate every vestige of civilization that they had—flood their city, exterminate much of their population, assassinate their beloved queen. It would soon be over for the insects’ empire in my friend’s backyard.

We ran inside Corey’s house for a premature victory celebration. The latest battle had been well devised and executed with Napoleon-like genius. I can’t remember exactly how we reveled in our supremacy, but we reveled like young boys would, giddy as ever, full of young pride (and probably Oreo's in hand). We had vanquished a vast colony of bees with the use of one weapon—our nuclear bomb—the water hose. We had no remorse, no second thoughts, no pity. The only thing on our mind was “victory at all costs.” I headed home that afternoon with a smug winner’s smile on my face.

I walked to Corey’s house the next morning to follow up on the news of our victory. I was shocked to find out that he had been grounded because he had forgotten to turn off the water which was used to flood the bees. His sister, who had answered the door, told me about how her dad had walked off of the back porch that morning and stepped onto soggy, wet soil. He was totally speechless when he found out that the water hose had been running throughout the night. Speechless, that is, until he found Corey. Overkill had been achieved on a couple of accounts.

I remember surveying the destruction that we had caused. What once had been a beautiful, active backyard full of various living organisms busily accomplishing their duties and giving back to their natural habitat and ecosystem had now become a drab, dead swampland—wasted and empty. It was no longer bustling with abundance and vibrance. It had actually become quite boring, and for a young boy, boredom is a terrible scourge to be avoided at all costs.

Ironically, it was us heartless and warmongering boys who had created this “new and improved” boring landscape without the “evil” bees. What had they done, after all? Perhaps it was the fact that they were wholeheartedly toiling to make our world a better place to live in—pollinating flowers and creating honey—that led us to our dastardly deed: erasing their existence from the face of the earth. Or maybe it was their harmonious and orderly system that made us jealous of their abundance. Could we have been such ruthless and sadistic humans to simply do it for the pleasure? How dare us!

I began to feel utterly horrible. It felt as if a dark and sinister cloud of guilt was hovering over my head, soon to release a powerful thunderstorm of self-remorse. I continued to review the damage the deluge had created. “Why?” I asked myself. As I laid sight on the remains of the once bustling-with-activity metropolis of the bees, I began to taste the bitterness of this victory. I knew the memory of this day of infamy would remain forever in my mind.

For many more years Corey and I would chum around in his backyard. I always hoped that the bees would return to their now desolate abode. They never did. It seems they had learned their lesson: Never construct a city within the vicinity of young boys. It seems we had also learned our lesson: Never take lightly the horrible power and destructive force of water, and never use it without a noble and righteous cause, such as watering the plants that bees pollinate.

War Against the Underground Bees Part II

This is Part II of an entertaining, true-story, 3-part series about two young boys and their war against the underground bees. (And, yes, one of the boys was me.) If you're breaking into the middle of the story, feel free to read Part I below. _________________________________________

The next morning, about the same time that early birds get their worms, I ran over to what I expected to be a defunct bee colony. Corey was already there, and much to our amazement and chagrin, so were the bees! They had done the impossible. Our staunch foes had dug a completely new hole into their hidden hideout—overnight!

This was too much for the two of us. The bees’ marvel totally humbled us in their presence. They had scored a significant victory in our war. These bumbling, instinctive insects had one-upped us. We could almost hear their hearty laughter as we stood there in dismay. We were not about to leave this gaping hole in our self-pride. In our fierce rage (and witless stupidity), we quickly found some sticks and charged the bees with the enmity of a mother bear ferociously attacking any threat to her cubs. In the heat of our anger, all control and logic was lost. We began to swish and swash our ineffective weapons around in a futile effort to murder every bee within stick length. At first, they didn’t seem to notice. Then, they began to take interest in our obvious, barbarous wrath. They may have been amused by our doltish gallivanting, because they did nothing in response. Finally, however, they took action.

Our impulsive counter-offensive attack resulted in the first casualty of the war on our side. My comrade-in-arms dropped his weapon and screamed with the agony of a man horrifically wounded in combat. He hastily retreated into his house, which left me incredibly outnumbered! It was now only a solitary 10-year-old against all the forces that the winged warriors could muster. Like the final man at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, I put forth a stalwart and gallant effort with my skinny stick to gain revenge for my fallen compatriot. Even the greatest trooper, however, eventually encounters his Achilles’ heel. The wound which the bees inflicted upon me sent me dashing away like a dog with its tail between its legs. The second battle was over, and the bees were yet again victorious.

After the nasty puncture was treated professionally by my mother, I spent the rest of the afternoon and that night recovering from it. The next day would be revenge of the highest degree against my new archenemies, the bees. Sleep was an elusive shadow as I lay awake in bed, eagerly anticipating the day of reckoning.

To Be Continued...