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This community column is scheduled for Dec. 31, so is it mandatory that I include ”resolutions.”
I have a few intentions I hope to explore further in the New Year, but I do not think of them as resolutions. In fact, I have already embarked on all of them; thus, hanging a new calendar does not include a compulsion to initiate any self-reforms.
Sometimes, I wonder if resolutions came about due to the guilt that people suffer following their own behavior on New Year’s Eve. ”I’ll never do that again,” is a refrain I have heard often enough to think it must be part of the chorus of ”Auld Lang Syne.”
Here is one of my intentions (definitely not a resolution): in late November, when the Tribune Chronicle published Thanksgiving messages from readers, I carefully clipped them and read each one. There were nine pages of more than 350 such letters in the print edition. While each was a wonderful outpouring of humanity and humility, I was most impressed with those from younger writers.
To be sure, students may have been induced to write them: there may have been a promise (or two) of extra credit from a teacher (or two). However, in reading the notes of gratitude from the high school students, I was moved by the sentiments expressed. They stand in vivid contrast to the faulty feeling of a few adults who believe that the younger generation is an ungrateful lot.
Therefore, I hope to visit one of the schools or agencies that promoted these youthful scribes, and I intend (not resolve) to listen to them for other bits of wisdom, which they might impart to a ”geezer” generation member. They might even give me some suggestions for future columns, which would certainly be welcomed by regular readers of my words.
The other two intentions are more political in nature. One of them involves the future of our local libraries. It is possible that Trumbull County libraries soon will be contesting with each other in the courts over the division of funds allocated to them. I recall that this paper endorsed a single countywide library system many years ago.
I am not ready to agree. The problem remains the amount of money that the libraries must share. It is as paltry as the Cratchit Christmas chicken about which the invisible Scrooge muttered, ”It’s such a small bird.” And, the Ghost of Christmas Present retorted, ”It’s all Bob Cratchit can afford.”
Our libraries do not need, nor do they expect, the poulterer’s prize turkey, but the paucity of the fowl they are asked to share is, quite frankly, foul. (Perhaps, I should make resolutions to stop the Dickens’ references on Dec. 25 and avoid puns year-round). Consequently, the issue of inadequate library funding is a concern for many reasons.
The second political issue actually embarrasses me to mention: am I the last person in northeast Ohio to know ALEC? (No, I do not mean Alec Baldwin or Alec Guinness; the latter portrayed Marley’s Ghost years before he was Obi-Wan Kenobi. And, yes, I do realize that I just broke both of my resolutions from above. See how long my resolutions last?)
The ALEC of which I write is the American Legislative Exchange Council. This group was founded in 1973 – more than 40 years ago. It has its own dot-org website, so readers can read about it for themselves in great detail. For further reading, there are also a number of dot-org websites that oppose ALEC, too.
The history link on the ALEC site offers this description of itself as an ”association for conservative state lawmakers who shared a common belief in limited government, free market, federalism, and individual liberty . . . who believed that government closest to the people was fundamentally more effective, more just, and a bettor guarantor of freedom than the distant, bloated federal government in Washington, D.C.”
With a background image of Jefferson, they tout Jeffersonian principles. So why did they hide from public view for 38 years? Who benefits from them locally? I intend (not resolve) to learn all that in 2014.
Happy New Year, everyone.
Williams is a Hubbard resident.