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Ben Stein's Diary
The Homecoming
Some deep thoughts upon returning from Sandpoint.
Thursday
Back in L.A. We flew in from Sandpoint yesterday. It is a long trip
and I am tired. Plus, I had an extremely disturbing talk on the
phone with a dear friend of 33 years. He has gotten mixed up in a
terrible mess about borrowing money. Now he’s being prosecuted for
criminal fraud. It looks as if he’s going to prison for years.
This man is the kindest, gentlest soul I have ever known. He obviously made serious mistakes —extremely serious — but they do not seem to me to rise to the level of criminal. The state sees it differently. They have the power and the money and he has nothing now. So, this sweet, touchingly sensitive soul is probably going to be in prison. I am just in shock. It depresses me terribly and frightens me. What does one do when he faces the state?
The imbalance of power between this man — any man — and the state — is terrifying. Reason enough to be a libertarian.
I was so upset that when I stopped to buy gasoline at the Shell station at Federal and Santa Monica, I started to drive off with the gasoline hose attached to my car. Really embarrassing. It only cost me sixty bucks. But I was extremely humiliated. The manageress speaking to me in Spanish and then calling someone about me and laughing hysterically was a nice touch.
I drove out to Malibu. The weather was perfect, cloudless sky, no humidity, light breeze. When darkness fell, the stars glittered mightily in the night firmament. I slept with my Julie Good Girl, then came home very late.
On the way home, I had a lengthy talk with my old pal DeAnne Barkley, who lives in Hawaii. She asked a good question: how could George Romney, Mitt’s pop, have run for President when he was born in Mexico? I guess it’s because his parents were U.S. citizens already. But I am not sure.
DeAnne lives a quiet life on The Big Island but at one time she was the most powerful woman in television. She co-invented the made-for-TV movie. When I first came to Hollywood, she was a pal to me and she has been ever since. I am blessed to have her in my life.
Friday
Up early to be on Fox News with
Jenna Lee. She is a super-smart TV news woman. My absolute fave is
Dagen McDowell, but Jenna Lee is right up there. Fox manages to
find extremely smart and beautiful women for its news.
Everyone is buzzing about the Supreme Court upholding Ms. Obama’s health care plan. It doesn’t surprise me. The Supreme Court can say that black is white and white is black and can just select whatever “precedents” it wishes to make its case. It all comes down to legal realism. Judges just do what they please and then claim that the historical precedents required it. That’s the way people act in media, too. The media powers just say that what they like is the truth and also important and really, it’s just what they feel like saying. Same with financial traders. They just trade for momentary advantage and then say that they do it because of big economic trends.
But as to Obamacare and Chief Justice Roberts, “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows,” said Mr. Dylan and neither did Mr. Roberts.
Then I did Cavuto on Business. Our host, Neil Cavuto, gets funnier every week and I have gotten to just love the whole panel, Charles Payne, Charlie Gasparino, Dagen McDowell, Adam Lashinsky, all of them. But Neil is breathtakingly smart and funny.
Then back home for a nap. But no such luck. Everyone has troubles:
Our housekeeper’s daughter is extremely ill with diabetes and in severe pain. We keep sending her to doctors and nothing works. She is a spectacularly fine young woman and we are in agony over her troubles.
Our messenger, Helen, has some dreadful headaches that no medicine can touch. She cries constantly and it breaks my heart.
Our son has a stomach flu and I feel as if I am getting it, too.
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.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (11) | Leave a comment
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MelvinNC| 7.2.12 @ 6:57AM
Ben.....You can't save everybody. Life sometimes doesn't go the way humans plan. We always look for lifelines when we get ourselves into messes that we need to be extracted from.
But sometimes we just run out of rope Ben......Sometime we just run out of rope.
R Martin| 7.2.12 @ 8:02AM
"Same with financial traders. They just trade for momentary advantage..."
And what, exactly, is wrong with that, Mr. Stein. One might ask what you do for monetary advantage.
"...and then say that they do it because of big economic trends."
That's a gross generalization. You don't know what most financial traders "say" and, anyway, seeking financial gain from big economic trends seems rather sensible. Isn't that what you aim to do, Mr. Stein, when you purchase equities?
Your point is obscure.
Pepe LaPue| 7.2.12 @ 9:06AM
Ben, you make me tired just reading what you write. You used to be interesting!!!!!!
Bill84728| 7.2.12 @ 9:08AM
Apropos of nothing written in your comment, I watched the entire documentary, No Direction Home, about Bob Dylan, from his childhood until his motorcycle accident in 1966.
The documentary reminded how intense it was to be young in those days; I forgotten how that felt. I was exhausted by the time Watergate surfaced. That level of things could not possibly have continued. Thank God it finally ended, despite the superficiality of modern life.
Bob Grant| 7.2.12 @ 9:49AM
I Ben Stein's Diary entry that important (and interesting) to put the entire thing on AmSpec's front page?
gene| 7.2.12 @ 10:17AM
"....Come to think of it, why do people hate us Jews so much? We are just people, only a little more so......."
Why the hatred? Ben Stein and many Jews should just read the New Testament more often. It is all about Jews starting the Church. Gentiles are supporting players who are not even on stage as Christians until well into "ACTS". Jesus even had to send repeated visions to Peter reminding him that His message was for everyone. But for the Jews FIRST because they are God's Chosen People. The Gentiles came later and were "Grafted" on to the Tree of Christianity. The Tree itself is and was Jewish. Why the hatred? A famous Jewish Carpenter explained this very clearly:
John 15:
"[18] If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you.
[19] If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.
[20] Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also."
The hatred will continue because you are God's Chosen People and the "Prince of this World" will always hate Jews and Christians.
C. Vernon Crisler | 7.2.12 @ 11:14AM
Ben, some people hate Jews for petty reasons, mainly because they're different in some way, or maybe appear to be in a lower class, or maybe will ruin or even de-Christianize the neighborhood.
I think Hannah Arendt said somewhere that Jews can deal with this sort of dislike or hatred. What caught Jews by surprise was not this sort of perennial aristocratic snobbery or hate, but rather the more sinister version: scientific racism.
There are so many books out there describing how "scientific" racism developed in the Western world and especially in Germany, it's hard to get one's mind around the bibliography on the subject. Scholars are now beginning to see Ernst Haeckel as one of the main culprits in spreading this evil doctrine.
I suspect that if Arendt was writing today, she would train her laser intellect on Islamic anti-semitism, which is far more dangerous today than the old discredited scientific racism, or the paternalistic racism of faux aristocrats.
Cobalt| 7.2.12 @ 11:26AM
A baby is not born with hate in its heart.
We learn hate, envy, etc. from others in society.
Try asking someone why they hate Jews, or another group of people, and you might find they can't even give you a definitive answer to your question.
KyMouse| 7.2.12 @ 12:05PM
Seth Casteel's amazing photos of dogs retrieving balls in a swimming pool will bring a smile to anyone's face. The photos are many places on the Internet, including http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....ml#photo=1
Hardcard| 7.2.12 @ 5:22PM
Bennie you must be exhausted cleaning up all that dog sh*t and shoveling it our way. Take a nap already.
Rich Rostrom| 7.3.12 @ 4:56AM
The child of a U.S. citizen is born a U.S. citizen, with some limited exceptions.
This issue was raised in the 1800s, when General George Meade, the victor of Gettysburg, was touted as a Presidential candidate. Meade was born in Spain, where his father was then in business as a merchant, and also U.S. claim agent.
Meade's eligibility was questioned, and established. "Natural born citizen" means "citizen by birth", which includes Meade, Obama, Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, John McCain, and President Chester A. Arthur.