Maryland And Slot Machines - The Secret Room

There is a secret conference room. It is not in Annapolis, as you might think, and probably not in Baltimore.

The room might be somewhere in Maryland, the way Camp David is in Maryland. You’ve heard of it, but you can never go there or even find it on a map. Important people know about it, but not its exact location.

The secret room has a door but no windows. Inside the room there is an oval conference table made of solid teak. The other furnishings are comfortable and in good taste, the lighting is soft and indirect, the temperature and humidity are precisely controlled.

On the table there is money, a great pile of money.

Hundred-dollar bills, 100 to a bundle, banded by a simple ribbon of brown paper. The money is stacked on the table the way a bricklayer stacks bricks, alternating this way and that way, so that the pile of bricks is rock solid.

The hundred-dollar bills start in layers near the edge of the table. The bundles stack higher and deeper, rising like a hill to the center. Viewed from a certain angle, the hill looks like Sugarloaf Mountain. How high is this mountain of money? I do not know because I have never seen it. The bundles of hundred-dollar bills certainly do not reach the ceiling. But if you and I sat on opposite sides of the table, we would not be able to see each other. Even if we were standing up, we might not be able to see over the mountain of money.

There is enough money on the table to make a few corporations obscenely profitable, enough money on the table to make a few individuals filthy rich. There is enough money on the table to finance dozens of campaigns for public office. There is so much money on the table that important and powerful people cannot agree on how to divide it all.

There are enough bundles of hundred-dollar bills on the table to buy the state of Maryland, sell it for a profit, and buy it back again.

This is the secret room that has mesmerized Maryland for a decade. This is the secret room that rivets the attention of the gambling industry, like a hunting leopard tensed to attack. This is the secret room that paralyzes the government of Maryland like a deer in the headlights.

There is so much money piled on the table that you and I might think it is enough for everyone. We would be wrong. There is never enough money for everyone. The wealthy absorb money like a warehouse fire consumes oxygen.

This is what it’s all about. This table piled high with money is what the coming battle over slot machine is all about.

The running of the Preakness at Pimlico was the official start of the final campaign to legalize slot machines in Maryland. You will hear of little else from now until the November referendum. Voters will be hounded on all sides by the screeching of people made mad by the lust for money.

The money is on the table.

Enough money to ruin thousands of families in the chase for corporate profit and private greed. And enough money left over to corrupt Maryland politics for generations to come. — Bernie Hayden

Spring In Maryland - The Last Word (Maybe)

Mid-May and the thermo-meter is stuck in the 50s. The cold, rainy 50s! “Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head.” Never fear, “the sun will come out tomorrow.” No, probably not tomorrow. Tuesday or Wednesday, maybe. Regardless, “I’ll never stop the rain by complaining.”

This is probably the last time I will point out (this year) that we don’t go straight from winter to summer in Maryland. Spring is a real season here (one of our four best seasons). And a fickle and gradual season it has been! One balmy day forward and two rainy days back. Take heart. This rainy Sunday is the perfect time to predict that the sun-burning days of June are just around the proverbial corner.

The 50’s in May! Reminds me that I used to spend May evenings in Ocean City huddled in front of a fireplace on 5th Street, wishing for central heating. That first cold May, my employer’s wife graciously provided me with an electric blanket. Remember electric blankets? I think they were outlawed along with electric chairs.

Spring warmth comes even more gradually to Ocean City than to Central Maryland, because Ocean City is right next to an ocean full of winter water. The beach is uncrowded and open for sunbathing. Pick a spot, any spot, stretch out and scatter your beach gear over as much sand as you like. Your nearest sunbathing neighbor might be 200 feet away. And you don’t have to worry about burning the soles of your feet on the hot sand in May. But ocean water is not for the faint-hearted at this time of year. That’s why the local surfers wear wetsuits.

On this Sunday in May, I am a blogger “Lost in the 50s Tonight” (and the 60s and 70s). Not the temperature, the decade. And tomorrow is just another rainy Monday in a strange century. – Bernie Hayden

Fear in Maryland, Terror in Mexico

How thin is the veneer of civilization? How fragile the social contract?

Every day brings more talk of common violence in Maryland. Schools in Baltimore and D.C. struggle not to teach, but simply to contain disorder. Children attack each other, girls as well as boys. Teachers are cursed and threatened daily; physical assaults are an occupational hazard. Students demand respect, or else. Teachers get mostly disrespect, from students, parents, administrators.

Fear rides the bus in Baltimore and D.C. Passengers dread certain routes; drivers are in the same situation as teachers.

People compare notes on areas they consider to be unsafe or crime-ridden. In Baltimore and D.C.? Yes, of course, but I was thinking of Montgomery County.

People search for an explanation for the violence and disorder. They talk of broken families, social meltdown, dysfunctional institutions.

Can violence spiral out of control? Where is the bottom?

You don’t have to look far. The national police chief of Mexico was assassinated on Thursday in Mexico City, shot nine times. Edgar Eusebio Millan Gomez, 42, in office four months, was Mexico’s general in its war against drug cartels. The drug cartels are winning. Quote of the week, as reported in The Washington Post:

“This could have a snowball effect, even leading to the risk of ungovernability. It indicates terrible things, a level of weakness in our institutions — they can’t even protect themselves.” –Luis Astorga, sociologist and drug expert in Mexico City

The next sentence of the Post story, written by Manuel Roig-Franzia, provides a masterful and frightening summary:

“Mexico’s drug and violence problem now engulfs the entire country, swamping cities along the U.S.-Mexico border and rugged drug cartel redoubts in the western mountains, and piercing into the heart of national power in Mexico City.”

In Maryland and D.C., fear, disorder and disrespect.

In Mexico, a reign of terror.

The common factors are dysfunctional social institutions and uncontrolled violence. – Bernie Hayden

Ocean City In The Spring

I came to Ocean City, Maryland, on the 4th of May, a gray afternoon. My possessions fit inside a Ford Pinto. It was 1972. The town was quiet and empty.

The three-story house at 5th Street and Baltimore Avenue was deserted, and the front door unlocked. It was a summer house sided with white shingles, big and sparely furnished. Electric lights worked; running water, hot and cold.

I had no plans, no skills, no evident talent, no money and hardly any sense. But I considered myself prepared. The room had been rented and a job lined up, after all. Working seven days a week did not faze me.

The cool Ocean City, Md., afternoon turned into a cold night. Not only the house was empty, but the street as well. My Pinto was the only vehicle parked on 5th Street from Baltimore Avenue to the Boardwalk. No television and no telephone. No heat! I settled down to read.

By and by, the landlord appeared, a rough but friendly old man, and practical. He got right to the essentials. It was cold, he observed, and we should burn some wood in the fireplace. He offered me a beer and we pulled two chairs close to the fire. Right away, I knew Ocean City was going to be all right. . . .

The landlord was a retired FBI agent, Paul Ernest, and he preferred to be called Mr. E, or Paul. He and his wife leased the place and ran it as a rooming house for young men. The first floor rented by the week to families. The Ernests and their daughter lived on the second floor. The third-floor rooms they rented to eight or nine college boys, lifeguards and such. The Ernests ran the house as if their roomers were relatives. The only rule: No girls allowed on the third floor.

On the corner across 5th Street was a larger house, four stories, with dark weathered siding, Berkley Hall. It was a rooming house for young women, many of them waitresses at Phillips Crab House. Their uniform: white shirt, white shorts, tanned legs. Berkley Hall had a long list of rules, most prominently: No boys allowed past the lobby.

Mr. and Mrs. E ran a rooming house, not a boarding house. Meals were not part of the bargain. Mrs. E was your idea of a perfect grandmother. She let us keep beer in her refrigerator. She maintained order with a smile and a kind word. It never occurred to anyone to misbehave in her presence.

Roomers on both sides of 5th Street worked long hours and spent precious free time on the beach. I hardly remember where or how we ate. From early May to late September, the only amenity at the the boys’ rooming house was a spacious porch with rocking chairs. The only air conditioning came through screened windows; it must have been hot on the third floor. Evenings were spent rocking on the porch, talking and sipping cold beer, keeping an eye on our neighbors across the way. . . .

To Be Continued . . .

COPYRIGHT BY BERNIE HAYDEN, 2008

Rev. Jeremiah Wright, An American Preacher

Call me perplexed. I cannot quite understand why the Rev. Jeremiah Wright is being subjected to public pillorying. Have we become so intolerant of ideas, of religion, of speech?

I just finished watching one of Rev. Wright’s most controversial sermons on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvMbeVQj6Lw

In this sermon, Rev. Jeremiah Wright reviews a history of slavery and racism, placing most of the blame on past U.S. government laws and actions. Along the way, he raises notes of hope, naming President Abraham Lincoln, President Harry Truman, and President Bill Clinton.

Then Rev. Jeremiah Wright makes his point, “Governments change.” He makes that point about “change” repeatedly. It’s a point of hope. (Come to think of it, Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign used to be about change.)

Now Rev. Wright gets to the religious part. The man is, after all, a pastor. He says, “Governments changed, sometimes for the good, sometimes for the bad.” And he cites the Bible: “God does not change.” Rev. Jeremiah Wright praises God, who always stands for love and justice, never changing.

Building toward a conclusion, Rev. Jeremiah Wright warns that governments also can fail. He cited the Roman Empire, the British Empire, Russia, Japan and Germany. He said the U.S. government had in the past failed Indians, putting them on reservations; failed Japanese-Americans, putting them in internment camps; and failed Africans, keeping them in chains and putting them on the auction block.

He touches contemporary issues — drugs, prisons, “three strikes and you’re out” — so quickly you’d almost think he wanted to avoid them.

Finally, Rev. Jeremiah Wright strongly condemns — in words that many people find offensive — actions of the U.S. government that he, as a pastor, considers to be wrong. He condemns America for killing innocent people and for treating citizens as less than human. The most dramatic sentence:

“God damn America as long as she tries to act like she is God and she is supreme.”

Probably most preachers wouldn’t put it quite that way. Many wouldn’t be as flamboyant or as passionate. But how many preachers in America would disagree with the basic meaning of the sentence? It alludes to two of the core teachings of the Judeo-Christian tradition: Don’t worship false Gods, and avoid the sin of pride.

Any preacher worth his salt speaks truths that are countercultural.

Call me perplexed. To me, Rev. Jeremiah Wright has preached a classic sermon, identifying wrongs and calling a nation to repentance and change. People have a right to take offense to a strongly stated moral pronouncement, if they wish. But don’t we have freedom of speech and freedom of religion in America? Have we become so intolerant of justice and truth? – Bernie Hayden

Spring In Maryland - April Wildflowers

Today is the last day of a rainy and chilly April. Spring in Maryland is into its eighth week, by my calculation. It’s been a fast-changing kaleidoscope of colors, white and pink and yellow and lavender.

I noticed my first buttercups on Monday. Petite yellow buttercups are among the the prettiest of wildflowers. But all varieties of buttercups are said to be poisonous! Go figure. Dandelions are everywhere, both flowering and seeding next year’s crop, and the clover is coming along nicely.

The Cherry Blossoms and forsythia are history, but every week brings new outbursts of blossoming trees. The wind and rain of last weekend sent pink petals flying from the crab-apple trees in my neighborhood. They collected in the most beautiful and unlikely drifts along the curbs in the apartment parking lot. (I must get a digital camera to record such sights.) If you pick up a handful of the pink petals, they are soft beyond description. Softer than the fur on a puppy’s belly or the thin skin on the back of an old woman’s hand.

The early-blooming trees and forsythia have turned green, and almost all the trees that were bare four weeks ago are green. Late-blooming trees, mostly with white blossoms, accent the green.

The high temperature for today, last day of April, is predicted to be about 64 degrees, with a low around 48 degrees. Yesterday’s high at BWI: 61 degrees. So much for going straight from winter to summer.

Coming attractions: May and the Black-Eyed Susan, Maryland’s state flower, which is said to be the most common wildflower in the United States. The flower is two to three inches in diameter, yellow petals surrounding a dark brown center. It blooms from May or June through August and grows two to three feet tall.

The Black-Eyed Susan and other flowers too numerous to count grow wild along Maryland’s interstate highways and country lanes. Blogs are writ by fools like me, but only God can make a flower. – Bernie Hayden

Violence In Maryland

Violence in the schools. Teachers verbally abused and physically assaulted in Baltimore schools. A gun fired at Albert Einstein High School in Montgomery County. Gangs in the schools in nearly every county in central Maryland. Bullying everywhere. Students beating others as friends stand by and film the beatings.

Violence on the bus. Road rage on the beltway. Drugs, gunfire and bloodshed on the streets. Violence in the media. Violence on computer games. And violence in our homes.

School administrators seem intent on pretending the violence doesn’t exist. Turn your head and see no evil. Too many politicians waste their time on distraction issues and trivia. Dysfunctional schools, dysfunctional politics, dysfunctional families.

(Among politicians Martin O’Malley is an exception. He has a clear-eyed understanding of violence and its devastating impact on our schools and neighborhoods. Whether or not you agree with his approach, he at least has faced the problem of violence head-on in election campaigns, and he worked persistently to reduce violence in Baltimore. Of course he had only limited success. In the age of the TV Total Makeover, we have little patience for hard work and slow progress.)

Marc Steiner’s essay “Youth Violence And More” is full of insights. The sentence that hit me hardest:

“We have kept Black America imprisoned and that prison culture has taken over the street and that street is the mirror America must face.”

I recommend Marc Steiner’s essay as a must-read for anyone concerned about culture, society and civility in Maryland. “Youth Violence And More” can be found on Marc’s blog at the Center for Emerging Media’s new Web page. Click on the Center for Emerging Media link on the blogroll, then click on Blog to see Marc Steiner’s blog. Do it now, before you forget. – Bernie Hayden

William Donald Schaefer, At Home In Retirement

The Maryland politics story of the week, or maybe of the year, is in today’s Baltimore Sun. William Donald Schaefer has moved to a sixth-floor apartment (with a view of the Baltimore skyline) at the Charlestown Retirement Community in Catonsville.

The grand master of Baltimore politics and Maryland politics, Gov. Schaefer lived in West Baltimore during all the years he was a city councilman, president of the City Council, and mayor of Baltimore; he lived in Annapolis when he was governor; in Pasadena when he was comptroller; and for many years he vacationed at a mobile home he owned in Ocean City.

To find out how longtime aide Lainy LeBow-Sachs persuaded Gov. Schaefer to move to Catonsville, in southwest Baltimore County, read Laura Vozzella’s story in today’s Sunpaper or at http://www.Baltimoresun.com

Gov. Schaefer, 86, is undoubtedly the most famous (and possibly the most popular) resident on the sprawling campus of the Charlestown Retirement Community, which used to be a seminary.

The governor is reportedly pleased with his new digs, and his many aides and admirers are delighted and relieved. At Charlestown Retirement Community, Gov. Schaefer is most definitely among friends. – Bernie Hayden

Montgomery County Pols: Not Satisfied With the Biggest Slice of Education Pie

Some high-profile political leaders in Montgomery County are not satisfied with the largest slice of the pie.

Montgomery is set to get $46.3 million for school construction, the most generous slice of school funding in Maryland. Montgomery is the largest and wealthiest of the four large jurisdictions that dominate Maryland politics. The other three, Prince Georges County, Baltimore City, and Baltimore County, each would get $41 million, $5 million less than Montgomery, The Washington Post reported this week.

Leading the chorus of whiners in Montgomery County: Sen. Rona Kramer and Sen. Richard Madaleno.

Yes, Montgomery County needs money for school construction. So do many other Maryland counties. Montgomery already has the best and newest school buildings in Maryland, matched possibly by Howard County. Perhaps Sen. Kramer and Sen. Madaleno are not aware of conditions in Baltimore City schools, or of the fact that The City and the inner suburbs of Baltimore County have the oldest stock of school buildings in Maryland.

A social justice question: Is the life of a child in Montgomery County more important than the life of a child in Baltimore City or Prince Georges County? Does a child who lives in Montgomery County deserve a better education than a child in Baltimore or Prince Georges?

Montgomery has the largest population of any jurisdiction in Maryland, and it is appropriate that Montgomery get the largest slice of the coveted school construction pie. But it is either greedy or uncaring for Montgomery to ask for even more when other counties have equal or greater needs. Schoolchildren in other parts of Maryland have an equal right to a good public education. Or maybe that’s just my opinion.

Sen. Kramer and Sen. Madaleno are giving parochialism a bad name. – Bernie Hayden

How to End the War in Iraq And Settle the Democratic Nomination

In this upside-down world of violence, inequality and injustice, leaders and governments so often seem dysfunctional or corrupt, incapable of acting responsibly and effectively.

Rather than bringing order out of chaos, leaders and governments often seem to create war, injustice, and misery. Cases in point: War in Iraq. Food shortages throughout the world.

Once in a while, I find it soothing to imagine a just and peaceful world, with wise leadership.

This week’s concept: Leadership by a council of wise elders.

The nominations that come to mind are prompted by names in the news. By coincidence, the three are churchmen. My nominations for a council of prophets to decide when and how to end the war in Iraq:

• Pope Benedict XVI
• Rev. Jeremiah Wright
• President Jimmy Carter

Decisions would be by consensus. If consensus fails, decisions could be by 2-1 vote. Pope Benedict, the Rev. Wright and President Carter could convene around my kitchen table. I’ll provide drinks and snacks. If deliberations take a long time, we will order pizza. I request the privilege to take notes and write the story. Movie rights to be negotiated later.

(By this point in the endless campaign, I would also be happy to have the council of elders decide between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. I would accept a 2-1 decision, either way and without question.)

Some will complain that the proposed council of wise elders ignores separation of church and state, and lacks gender and age diversity.  Get over it. It’s my concept, and I won’t allow political correctness to stand in the way of world peace.

— Bernie Hayden