The President’s teeth

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Mount Vernon, Virginia

“A souvenir model of George Washington’s dentures has been withdrawn from sale at his Mount Vernon estate because of evidence that the real version included teeth pulled from the mouths of his slaves.

“According to popular myth, the false teeth worn by America’s founding father were made from wood. In fact, they were made from ivory and human teeth, at least some of which came from enslaved people. Washington’s own accounts reveal that in 1784, he paid six pounds and two shillings for nine teeth taken from “negroes”. This has been known for some time, but has received fresh attention due to the publication of a revisionist biography, which documents Washington’s mistreatment of the slaves at Mount Vernon”.  (The Week, 28 Feb 2020).

When you reflect on the lives of George Washington and Good King George III of England you have to wonder why the colonists chose to rebel.  All King George wanted was a contribution towards the cost, to the British alone, of the war with France that was necessary to defend the colonies.  The colonists wanted this protection totally free!  They seem to have thought this totally reasonable, although it wasn’t to many others. And now you have the future President Washington (very unpopular in that role, incidentally), yanking teeth out of the mouths of his slaves.  This is what the British taxpayer was apparently fighting for the freedom to do.

No one else is going to defend the understandable policies of the Good King , so I have chosen myself to do so, defying slander and contempt!

(Note to those of a serious frame of mind: this is a joke.  Sort of)

The truth about Dutch resistance to the Nazis

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“It is high time our country showed contrition for its failure to protect Jews in the Second World War.

“In a historic apology, Dutch. Prime Minister Mark Rutte finally acknowledged that too many Dutch officials supinely obeyed Nazi orders after their country was occupied. In total, 102,000 of the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust came from the Netherlands; survivors later told “heart-breaking” stories about the distrust and disbelief they experienced on their return home.

“In the years after the War, the Dutch fostered an image of themselves as a “stubborn” people who defied their occupiers by harbouring Jews – most notably the family of Anne Frank, who hid for two years before being sent to their deaths – in concealed rooms. These examples, while “all very good and moving”, present a false image. In reality, the Netherlands was far less heroic. The population was actually “reasonably accommodating” to their Nazi occupiers; most people remained silent, while others even helped the Nazis with their “terrible work”. For years afterwards the Dutch made excuses for themselves (“We didn’t have it easy either”). Rutte’s apology was “courageous” – but it was one his predecessors should have made nearly 75 years earlier”.   (Trouw, Amsterdam)

My comment: This has nothing to do with the Jews, but I once asked my mother what she would have done had the Nazis succeeded in invading Britain. Would she have resisted or cooperated?  She replied,  “I had two, very little, children and your father was away, with the RAF, for most of the six years of the war.  I was alone. What do you think?  Of course, the children came first. I would have done literally anything at all to protect the two of you”.

I always admired my mother’s straightforward honesty.  No heroics for her. But we are so used to movies and books about the selfless resistance  throughout Europe (by everyone!) that the truth is a bit jarring, but very believable – and in this instance understandable. It’s easy to criticize the Dutch at this distance in time.  A bit of imagination would not go amiss.

Failing to face the reality of an ageing society

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You’d never have guessed it from the recent election campaigns, but Britain has a major problem with its pensions.  

It’s this: as the U.K. population ages, the state pensions of ever more retirees are having to be financed by ever fewer people in work. Hence the sensible plans to raise the pensionable age for both sexes to 66 in 2020 and 67 by 2028. Such ongoing reform is crucial, but now we’re no longer enjoying rapid leaps in life expectancy – the average life expectancy has almost stalled at just above 79 for men and just below 83 for women – the political parties seem increasingly disinclined to tackle the huge economic problems thrown up by demographic change.  Surprise, surprise!

During the recent  election, for example, Labour pledged the state pension age would never rise above 66, and also made an unfunded commitment of up to £58bn to “compensate” all those women who’d lost out in the recent equalisation between the sexes of the state pension age. The UK simply can’t afford such largesse. The bottom line is we’re living longer, and the retirement age is still too low. This is a problem that isn’t going away.  (Oliver Kamm,  The Times, Dec 2019).

It is also a problem faced by numerous governments (among economically advanced countries , anyway).  The principle of a state pension is a decent, civilized idea, especially for those who have earned low incomes and have not had enough income to save for retirement.  But in some ways it is over-generous.  For instance, if you are a foreigner and marry an American citizen in mid- life you get social security payments (albeit very modest in size) even if you never had a job in the US.  Surprising things like this suggest the need for a review of the system.

On the other hand, the idea of a state pension is something that offers peace of mind and some reassurance that you will not ( should not) be homeless and poverty- stricken.  It is thus  Epicurean in spirit and to be supported.

 

On the coronavirus

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The Word from Wuhan Wang Xiuying:  a comment from China
“There are endless ‘rumours’ out there to be dispelled. One day we’re told that children are less likely to be infected, the next day that pregnant women and children are more susceptible. One day they say the virus can’t survive outside the body, the next that it can live on hard surfaces for up to five days.
“One day we learn that the virus is capable of aerosol transmission via coughing or sneezing, the next day we’re told that’s not something to worry about. According to one piece of advice – perhaps issued on the basis that people can’t live on bad news alone – the chances of infection may be reduced by the moderate consumption of alcohol.”
Authoritarian regimes try to justify themselves, in part, by claiming that, without the drawback of multiple points of view and messy democracy, they can spring into action in the event of a crisis and deal with it quickly and efficiently. One man’s “superior” judgment trumps that of multiple “experts”, they claim.
We are now seeing how laughable that is.  What we need are prepared and funded experts with viable plans.  Prayer?  Not so much.
I for one a would feel happier, and my peace of mind would remain undisturbed , if I knew that professionals were on the job.

A small step for mankind……

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Jeff Bezos is donating $10bn of his personal wealth to help “save Earth”. The Amazon chief executive said he would fund “any effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world”.  (The Week 21 Feb 2020)

On this blog I have, for what it’s worth, criticized the richest man in the world for doing little or nothing for charity, something most Americans are incredibly generous about.

It is appropriate for followers of Epicurus to be as generous as individually possibly to the poor,  the sick and the disadvantaged.  Protecting the environment qualifies.   It’s nice to note that he has got the message.  Hopefully he won’t stop there.  We need more of his fortune recycled into good causes.