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Ben Stein's Diary
(Page 2 of 3)
Anyway, it’s all very discouraging.
However, although I have been greatly impoverished relatively speaking this year, I am still living in a cozy little bubble of faith in the Lord God Jehovah, Lord of Hosts and God of the High Places. It is sort of like my swimming pool. Very warm even when the outside air is cold.
I wake up and worry about money, worry about how old I have gotten (64) and think about how much longer I might have, and I feel scared.
So, I pray. Thanks to God for my beautiful, saintly wifey, Alex. For my dogs, Brigid and Cleo and Mopsy. For my son, Tommy, and his beautiful fiancée, Kitty.
For my fingers, toes, arms, legs, kidneys. I am grateful all of the time.
If I stop feeling grateful, I go to sleep or eat something until I do feel grateful.
As I think I have said, quoting Joseph Heller, I have something that Bernie Madoff and Marc Dreier could never imagine having: enough. I am so happy with what God has allowed me to have I can hardly describe it or speak. Just so happy I had my fabulous Mom and Pop, my great sister, grew up in America, never had to be in terrible battles in World War I or II or in a gas chamber. I am sooo grateful.
I read last night about Dreier’s yacht and Madoff’s yacht and I thought, I hope those men, who will probably die in prison, were as happy with their yachts as I am lying in bed looking into my Brigid’s eyes.
Thursday
Tonight I am in Indianapolis giving a speech. I gave my speech at the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art, a fantastically good museum, and then went back to my hotel. It was snowing but I wanted Starbucks tea, so I bundled up and went off into the snow. Before I had gone two blocks, the streets were deserted. It was 10:30 at night. An African American man approached me, reeking of booze. “Oh,” he said, “you’re Ben Stein. You’re my hero. I love you. You’re the smartest man on the planet.” And on and on.
I said I wasn’t smart but just played a smart guy on TV. He said, “No, you are the smartest guy in the world.”
Then, with many apologies, he said he wanted to ask me a favor. His wife had just gone into birth labor. He needed to get to her side BUT he had locked his keys in his car. The police would not help. He needed $35 to call a locksmith to get into his car. (The exact sum of 35 dollars was what told me in flashing neon that it was a scam, by the way.) He really, really, really hated to ask, but what could he do.…
I gave him 40 dollars, wished him well, and went on my way. That man was a fantastic actor. He really acted out pain, embarrassment, pride, exasperation. Like Olivier. Or, I thought, like a master politician. Just tell any flattering lie, then get the money--or the votes--and run. Promise change. Promise hope. Promise lower taxes. Promise the moon. But get the vote. Close the deal. What a politician that man would make.
Saturday
Now, the year is drawing to a close. It has really been a terrible year. I lost immensely more than I could afford in the stock market. Way, way, way more. My retirement will probably never happen.
About the Author
Ben Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Beverly Hills and Malibu. He writes "Ben Stein's Diary" for every issue of The American Spectator.
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Michele San Pietro| 2.1.09 @ 1:37PM
I hope Blagojevich will receive the punishment he deserves for his wrongdoings.
Ken Donnelly| 2.1.09 @ 2:01PM
I, too, am grateful to God everyday. It took a long time for the fire of faith to burn in me, but now it does, and everyday I thank God for all He has given me. especially the gift of a son. It was only after receiving the gift of a son, that I began to understand God's gift of His Son for all of us.
Alan Brooks| 3.2.09 @ 4:46PM
without faith the world is a cold, dead, empty place...
getting colder by the decade.
Ray Moran| 3.4.09 @ 2:57PM
Little do people know today that it is a fact that the world will burn and melt (2 Peter 3:10-13) along with the great majority of mankind who have not obeyed the gospel of Christ, and their suffering will be endless (Rev. 14:10-11). Seek God while He may yet be found (Matt. 7:7-9)
acheapmom| 3.10.09 @ 10:01AM
I come from Chicago area where I grew up hearing jokes about "the dead rising to vote". People laughed but didn't seem to care.
I now live in Chicago's eastern neighbor - which shares some political DNA - Lake County, IN where "the dead rose up even earlier - to REGISTER to vote". People (overall) did not seem to care...even when the 2007 death certificate was shown next to the 2008 votor registration form.
We Chicago Metro Area viewers all despised Chicago's corruption around the edges; BUT we all laughed at how Teflon(tm) coated Mayor Daley and other high officials were/are in whatever the current sting, corruption charge, politically related crime was.
Yet - once the votors were ENRAGED by a politician's failure. We suburbanites watched as Chicagoans ROSE UP in the late 1970's to throw out a mayor who had failed...
Not failed morally...
but failed to shovel out a huge snowfall that paralyzed Chicago.
---------Now we all watch as we must shovel thru "Chicago Style" politics as they engulf our nation---at least for the next two years as an almost one party government...wreaks major social and economic changes upon us.
*********************************
Maybe God's judgment will be the mere sitting back and WATCHING the consequences of our poorly researched and definitely AMORAL electoral choices....
Brittany| 5.6.09 @ 4:32PM
I always love to read about someone who acknowledges that God exists in the real world. The same God that knew Moses knows Bernie Madoff and Ben Stein...and all of us.
Richie| 5.25.09 @ 3:40AM
Thank You Ben. I just watched "Expelled" tonight for the first time. It was recommended by my church. They actually had movie night at the church to watch it, with popcorn and everything.
I am grateful everyday that I have a friend in Yahweh. He is my armor in the world.
As far as Madoff, Hitler, and every other EVIL person in the world............Phil. 2:10....That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.
Every knee will eventually bow. And everything will be answered. Everything.
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