Obama and the Federal Reserve

The Hobo Philosopher

On Economics

Obama and the Federal Reserve

President Obama has both the Right and the Left in a state of confusion over his economic solutions. Who is correct, the Right, the Left, or president Obama?
The extreme Right basically is advocating what they have always advocated – inaction. Their historical answer in times of economic stress has always been Prayer, Poverty and Providence. Let the banks fail, let Detroit fail, let people lose their homes, let unemployment soar, let charities and soup kitchens take care of the poor and unemployed, let God’s invisible hand inspire and guide the system – Laissez-faire. Despite the general acceptance on the Right that this is a credible answer, history says otherwise and morality and ethics will challenge any movement in that direction.
This conservative notion is a good idea if the goal is to vanquish government and foment a revolution. As the critics of this policy state, “The less we do the worse we will all fair.”
Both the Left and the Right bring up the 1929 Great Depression and the role of the Federal Reserve. Both sides somehow credit the Federal Reserve with wrong doing.
The Right claims that it was the Federal Reserve that caused the 1929 Depression. This is false.
We can argue until the cows come home about what caused the 1929 Depression but the basic arguments are not so complicated.
Some claim that excessive negative competition and overproduction in the marketplace, lead to a negative spiral and thus to the downfall of the general economy. This amounts to a general lack of any controls or regulation on business, labor and production and substantiates the inadequacy of the Lessez-faire policy.
Others claim that the super wealthy fearing a worker revolution pulled their money from industry and investment in an attempt to stifle worker organization and cooperation. This was due to a fear of the spread of the communist and socialist philosophy on the part of the wealthy capitalists. This also negates the Lessez-Faire notion.
Another answer is that this is just the way the capitalist economic system works or that the whole thing was just an accident and couldn’t be helped. This is consistent with the Lessez-faire notion but not consistent with reason, logic history or common sense.
The stock market collapse, most agree, was due to over speculation. A speculative bubble was created. Many contend that this was done by accident in 1929. But other more radical voices of that era claim that the market crashed due to greed and chicanery on the part of the “best, brightest and wealthiest.” When the bubble burst and the smart money pulled out and ran, everything collapsed.
In evaluating today’s stock market crash the radical Right is once again claiming “accident” or at least mass complicity. Others contend that just as in 1929 it was the greed and selfishness of the best, brightest and wealthiest.
The Right goes on to claim that the government is spending too much. This has also been proved wrong by the historical facts and even by their own past evaluations of history.
Both the Right and the Left blame the Federal Reserve in the 1929 fiasco, but what did the Federal Reserve do to warrant this criticism?
Basically it didn’t do anything. It did what the Right is recommending today. Today’s Right blames the Fed for their inaction in 1929 but yet recommends that they do the same today.
Today’s Left agrees that the Fed didn’t do enough in 1929 and that is what they fear is going to happen again today.
The Right says that all of FDR’s social recovery spending was unsuccessful and that it was World War II that cured the Depression.
Well, what happened in World War II that was so influential in curing the Depression?
It was massive government spending for the war effort that made the difference - spending of up to 120 percent of the GDP. So then if there were no World War II what should have been done in 1929?
Obviously FDR should have increased Government social spending instead of cutting spending as was demanded by the Right in 1938 and as is being demanded by the Right in 2009.
After the war Truman, fearing an inevitable post war economic collapse, initiated a continuation of massive war time spending, as preparation for the impending and inevitable war with Russia (cold war) and massive government spending on the Marshall Plan (redistribution of American wealth).
The Korean Conflict then justified more military spending and it has gone on and on – but it is all “government spending.” It could have been medical and health care spending, education spending, infrastructure spending, disease research spending or aid to the impoverished spending.
What is Obama doing? He is recommending massive government spending. This is what was done by FDR in financing World War II. This is what both, the Right and the Left, Galbraith and Milton Friedman, economists past and present and the bulk of historians have analyzed as what should have been done and what was eventually done in the depression years (spending on the war). Only the extreme, radical Right claim that a massive depression is better than government intervention. No Republicans have yet to recommend World War III as a possible solution – but we’ll have to wait and see.
Today many of our Republicans are pushing for depression and a federal government collapse. They are offering the do nothing Rightwing radical response. They would rather have no government than what they term as a socialist government.
By Rightwing standards it is “socialist” if the government money goes to the American people or for social spending but if the government money goes to subsidize or support corporations, big business, banks or war and the pentagon it is “capitalism.” The only big businesses they don’t want to support are those that have labor unions. Money spent to help labor is the equivalent of “social spending” and is therefore socialistic.
They are basically anarchists. But rather than have rule by the aggregate masses, they advocate rule by the aggregate capitalists. In the past it was demanded by rightwing conservatives that anarchists be deported or put in prison.
The less than radical Right wants the government to spend but they want it to spend less and via convoluted methods like tax cuts for the wealthy or even for the middle class, and investments overseas. These policies are what brought us to this present sad state of affairs.
Spending less is not the answer. The answer is creating jobs and employment. Hitler brought Germany out of the Great Depression with no advanced knowledge of economics or the stock market. He simply believed in putting people back to work – 100% employment. He was successful. Once World War II arrived, the U.S. then achieved 100% employment via massive government war spending and our depression ended also.
The answer is spending and creating jobs – any kind of jobs. As far as government jobs versus private sector jobs, it doesn’t matter. One collects taxes off the backs of the masses and the other collects profits off the back of the masses. This is a political argument not an economic argument. It is a political preference as to who saps up the excess. From the “what stimulates the economy” point of view, it is inconsequential. It doesn’t matter - either public sector or private sector jobs will do the trick. The bulk of jobs that saved us from the Great Depression via World War II were public sector jobs – soldiers and military production, procurement, research and development. All the money was coming from the government. Some of it was filtered through private enterprise, but for the most part it was federal taxpayer’s money. And both sectors were loaded with graft, theft, and corruption but not the majority. This is always the case, but it too is inconsequential. The country as a whole would be better off without this human corruptive reality and a more positive and prosperous society would result but it isn’t necessary.
The Right wants anarchism and the Left wants Socialism. Obama is advocating a middle of the road path.
The Left wants a more powerful Federal Reserve. Some want the Federal Reserve to move into hedge funds, insurance companies and credit cards as well as banking. Obama policy is doing this but via a cooperation of responsibility of government and government agencies. Obama is enabling the Federal Reserve but holding back the power for the government and the law makers. This is safer and smarter and much more in tune with American tradition and popular opinion.
The Left wants a take over of banking and financial institutions. Obama is asking for cooperation and voluntary compliance along with new stricter rules and regulations. This is the safe road once again. If it doesn’t work the harsh road of complete takeover is still available.
The left and much of the public want to see some arrests. The administration’s answer to this has been that they must put out the fire before they can go after the arsons. This sounds reasonable unless the arsons continue to light more fires.
Again Obama is taking the middle of the road approach. If this whole problem on the part of banking and finance was just a matter of lax rules or sanctioned misbehavior then it can be corrected by new rules and sanctioned good behavior. If this has been a criminal conspiracy then the fire will continue and some heads will have to roll – jail and no bail for the bad guys and total government control, at least for a limited time.
If Obama goes to the Left he will totally alienate the Right and possibly some of the middle. If he goes to the Right, he will undermine his base and possibly lose the majority. If he continues down the middle, progress may be slower but he will maintain the majority, keep both sides hopeful, though dubious, give the guilty a chance to redeem themselves, and possibly turn the ship in an acceptable direction. All Obama has to do is show a change in direction to be considered successful. He doesn’t have to cure or revamp the entire system.

It's the Food, Stupid!

Lawrence - My Hometown

“It’s the food, stupid”

By Richard E. Noble
It was a cold December night. A bunch of us had bundled up in a booth up at the Tally-ho. The Tally-ho was on Swan St. It had become a great place to hangout for the post high school and young adult crowd. Older folks came in too but they used the back entrance. They had a section of their own – away from the younger noisy bunch.
The Tally-ho was a sports bar before there was such a thing as a sports bar. There were TVs stationed appropriately in all the dining rooms and several at the bar. If anything was happening with Boston sports, it would be on the TVs at the Tally-ho. It was a great place to go to watch a Red Sox, Celtic or a Bruins game - lots of enthusiastic chums to cheer with. Paul Margraff was the owner/manager/bartender/waiter/sandwich maker etc. during my era.
We were playing forty-fives at our booth. Forty-fives was a card game indigenous to Lawrence and the greater Merrimac Valley. Anyone I met in my travels who knew how to play the game of forty-fives had roots in the old neighborhood.
On this particular occasion an old buddy came walking through the door. We all looked up from our card game and recognized our old grammar school chum. In typical Lawrence fashion someone said, “Hey Billy, long time no see.”
“Yeah, about 15 years.”
“Has it been that long?”
“You’ve been gone 15 years? I didn’t even know you had left town,” offered another astute Lawrence observer at the table.
“Oh yeah, a little over 15 years now.”
“Where have you been?”
“Well, all over but I settled in California for the last 10 years or so.”
“What are you home for Christmas to see the relatives?”
“No I’m back for good.”
“You’re back for good! What are you crazy? You finally get out of this town and you actually come back here to live? What are you nuts?”
Billy laughed. “Yeah, I suppose I am.”
“No seriously, you were settled out there in beautiful California. You were there for 10 years, you say, and you come back to Lawrence? There has got to be something wrong. Somebody in the family must be sick or something?”
Billy laughed again. “No, not really. Everybody is doing fine. Just got a little homesick I guess.”
Each of us at the card table dropped our hand and we all looked up at our old buddy.”
Homesick was not a term that many of us used in reference to Lawrence.
“You got homesick? What the heck could get anybody homesick for Lawrence? I know many people who said that their home in Lawrence made them sick but I never heard anybody say that they were homesick for Lawrence. What could you possibly miss about Lawrence?”
“Well, guys like you for one thing. I kind of missed having four different seasons too. But I guess what I missed most of all about Lawrence was the food.”
“The food! They don’t have food in California?”
“They have food but nothing like the food that we have here in Lawrence. No Tally-ho chicken bar-b-que, no Lawton’s by the Sea deep-fried hotdogs, no Bea’s cutlets, no Bishops, no Ceder Crest, no Bungalow, no Pappy’s bakery, no anchovy or pepperoni crispellies. They never even heard of lemon slush or a Black Moon ice cream on a stick for cryin’ out loud. Why, the homemade bread alone is worth the trip to Lawrence.
“There is a bakery on every corner around here. You want fresh baked Polish bread, you go down to Sunkist Bakery on Exchange St. You want Italian bread, you go down to Jackson or Common Streets. They have four bakeries at one intersection - one on each corner down there. You want French bread, you’ve got it. You have home baked Syrian bread everywhere. You have German restaurants, French restaurants, Syrian restaurants, Italian restaurants, and Chinese Restaurants. Even the diners around here are great - the Broadway Diner, Ritzie’s, Jubert’s, Falon’s, the Post Office Diner with Rudy, Ernie’s Diner and Mushy’s famous baked beans.
“I have been dreaming about a homemade pastry square for years. Where else can you get fresh backed fig squares, raisin squares, lemon tarts and Napoleons? I bought an Italian meat pie up on Broadway the other day. You can’t find a meat pie like that anywhere in America but Lawrence. Fould’s French pork pies, hot or cold - a little ketchup and you’re in business. I’ve never seen a pie like that any place but here. Kibbie and shish kabob sandwiches, Tripoli and Christie’s home-style Italian pizza, Essem hotdogs and Polish kielbasa, Barrett’s tomato sausage - you guys are all used to it. You take it all for granted. But let me tell you, they don’t have food like this in other places.”
So you will put up with ten feet of snow and a million people huddled in tenement houses for a homemade cruller or jelly donut? You’re easy.”
“Yeah, that’s what the girls always said. Hey, I was raised in a tenement house. There are worse places to live than a tenement house. Tenement houses don’t make slums – people do. When I was coming up around here we had no central heat or air-conditioning. We didn’t even have hot water. If you wanted a bath you had to heat the kettles up on the stove. Now all these tenements got heat, air, hot water - what the hell?”
Mr. Danny Tardugno, a little gray haired fellow who worked behind the bar at the Tally-ho for years, called out Billy’s sandwich order.
“You better go get those sandwiches, Billy, before the Tally-ho stops making burgers.”
“Yeah, like that’s ever goin’ to happen. Take care guys. I’ll see ya the next time I get hungry.”
“Good enough pal.”

Richard E. Noble was raised in Lawrence, Mass and is now a freelance writer. He has published five books. Two of them have Lawrence as their setting, A Summer with Charlie and Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. A Little Something is a book of poetry partly inspired by life in Lawrence. Hobo-ing America, is a workingman’s tour of the U.S.A. The Eastpointer is selected pieces from his award winning column about life in a sleepy fishing village in the Florida Panhandle.

The Eastpointer

Ronald the Redneck and aluminum cans

By Richard E. Noble
Ronald the Redneck looks at life differently from anyone that I ever met. Sometimes he is very difficult to understand, not just for me to understand, but anybody. He says and does things that always leave me wondering.
In any case, there we were sitting on his front porch drinking beer, stomping on the empty cans and tossing them over the railing of the porch and philosophizing, when two strangers wandered into his front yard.
My good friend Ronald the Redneck’s property fronted on to a dirt road. I must admit his front yard did look like a “free range” zone. These two strangers had been walking out along the dirt road and then wandered up off the right-of-way and into Ronald's yard. They were each carrying black garbage bags and with some sort of stick with a duphfenflop on the end, they were picking up aluminum cans and putting them into their black bags.
"What the heck are them dang fools doin'?" asked Ronald.
"Collecting aluminum cans, I would imagine."
"Really!" exclaimed Ronald.
We both watched as these folks wandered all over Ronald's front yard. Finally when they got to within about ten feet of his front porch, Ronald stood up, hiked up his jeans, propped himself up against a porch railing, puffed himself up like a bantam rooster and yelled: "Hey, what you folks think that you're doin'?"
The two good Samaritans looked to one another dubiously. Then the male wandered over towards Ronald in a humble and solicitous manner. "Pardon me?" he asked.
"I said, what do you folks think that you are a doin'?"
"Oh, we're just out getting some exercise and collecting aluminum cans."
"You collecting aluminum cans, you say?"
"That's right."
"And after you collect 'em, what you gonna do with 'em?"
"We're going to take them to the recycle exchange, and cash them in."
"Are you going to take my porch swing and rocking chairs?
You're not going to take my pickup truck too, are ya?"
"Pardon me?"
"Well, I'm just tryin' to figure out what you're up to. Here you are, in my front yard, stealing my aluminum cans; I was just wondering what else you folks had intentions of stealing?"
"Oh we're not stealing."
"You're not?"
"No."
"Well, when you come onto another man's property and start picking up things that belong to him that are worth money, that is what we folks around here call stealing. What do you call it wherever you folks come from?"
"Well, we feel that we are beautifying the neighborhood. We're doing our little part to try and clean up the roadside and make America beautiful. We're not stealing anything."
"You're making America beautiful? Well, you know, you makin' me mighty ugly. Not only are you wandering around my front yard, stealing my cans but now you are accusing me of making America ugly. Next you goin' to be calling me un-American or somethin'."
"No, Sir. We didn't know that you valued these cans. We're terribly sorry. If you want them, we will gladly leave them right here."
"Well why would you think that I wouldn't value them? If they are worth money and here you are out picking them up to sell them? You value them, don't ya?"
"Ah ... well ... we're sorry. Evelyn, dump your cans out over here." They both turned their bags inside out and dumped their cans onto the ground. "We're really sorry," the gentleman said as they started to wander away. "We really didn't think that you wanted these cans scattered all over your yard. We thought that we were doing you a favor."
"Like you're doin' now - dumpin' a hundred, smelly, old beer cans right in front of my front porch? Is that what you call beautifying?"
"Well we picked them all up for you?"
"Did I ask you to pick up my cans? I had 'em all nice and scattered out, so's hardly anyone would notice - just the way that I like them - and here you come along and pile 'em up in front of my door and make my place look like a garbage dump. I liked 'em better the way that I had them. Then, one day, when I feel like some exercise, just like you folks, I wander around the yard and I pick them up - keeps me healthy."
"You mean you want us to scatter these cans all over your yard again?"
"Well, you can say it like that, or you can say that I would like you to put things back the way you found 'em. Would that be askin' too much?"
"You want us to scatter these cans all over your yard once again?”
"Well, if you would do like that I'd consider that right nice of ya."
The couple picked up the cans and put them back into their sack, then wandered about Ronald's yard scattering them around as if they were feeding chickens or planting grass.
By the time they left Ronald's property they had some very strange looks on their faces.
Now, there is a moral to this story somewhere but I don't know what it is.

Richard E. Noble is a freelance writer who has lived in Franklin County for over thirty years. All of his 5 published books are now available on Amazon.com. If you would like to stock his books in your store or business e-mail me at richardedwardnoble@gtcom.net

The Peppermint Lounge

Lawrence - My Hometown

The Peppermint Lounge

By Richard E. Noble
I was sitting at our cottage on Old Town Way when Tommy Kabildis came banging in the door. “Nobes, you’ve got to help me. Mel threw me out of the Peppermint Lounge.”
“How am I going to help you? I don’t even know Mel.”
“You’re going to be my lawyer.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, Mel threw me out and I told him that I had a friend who was studying to be a lawyer at Harvard and I was going to bring him back with me.”
“You have a friend that goes to Harvard?”
“Yeah you!”
This was all very flattering, I thought. Kibbi not only thought that I could be a lawyer but that I could get into Harvard. Wow! I have a big ego, but Harvard and a lawyer? The only thing I knew about the law was that you should avoid getting caught. But this whole thing sounded interesting to me.
“Okay, I’m your Harvard lawyer. What do you want me to do?”
“I want you to get me back into the Peppermint Lounge.”
Entrance to the Peppermint Lounge was important to certain types of individuals in those days. It was a very busy nightclub at Salisbury Beach. It was rock and roll and blues. I was strictly jazz. I went to the Peppermint Lounge occasionally but not often. I do remember seeing Fats Domino in the parking lot by the entrance one night. He was sitting in a big car just beside the entrance door. He was swigging on a pint of Southern Comfort. There was a crowd of teenagers standing around his car. I had no idea who the fat man was. Somebody said, “That’s Fats Domino.” I said, “Well, you are right there. He sure is.”
The Peppermint Lounge was just down a bit from the Salisbury Police Station and the public restrooms. It had a large dirt parking lot. It was also across the road from the roller coaster. Prior to being called the Peppermint Lounge it was Jenney’s. A fellow named Mack Jenney or Mac Jenney owned it. For my friend Kibbi to be banned from this place this early in the season was a catastrophe. He was desperate. So I agreed to take his case.
As we walked down to the Peppermint Lounge Tom briefed me. I remember that I was wearing a pair of Bermuda shorts. Everybody was wearing Bermuda shorts in those days. In addition I was wearing my multi-colored Hawaiian Eye sport shirt and a pair of sandals. I kept asking myself if a Harvard lawyer would be dressed in this fashion. Why not? Harvard Lawyers must go to Salisbury Beach also.
Mel managed the Lounge. He was a short, fat, semi-bald guy who was always chewing a big cigar. He was an intimidating little fellow - picture Danny DiVito from Taxi and My Cousin Vinnie.
The case: Mel was going into the men’s room as Kibbi was coming out. Upon entering the men’s room Mel noticed that the paper towel dispenser had been ripped from the wall. He turned around immediately; grabbed my buddy, Kibbi, and called one of his bouncers. Kibbi was then escorted to the exit and thrown bodily out onto the sidewalk.
My first question as a lawyer was, “Did you rip the paper towel dispenser from the wall, Tom?”
“Not exactly.”
“Not exactly is not a good answer, Tom. There are only two correct answers to my question - yes I did or no I didn’t.”
“Listen Nobes, the thing was hanging there by one screw. I tried to pull a paper towel out of it and the damn thing falls off the wall. It could have happened to anybody. I just happened to be the wrong guy, in the wrong place, at the wrong time.”
Humm! This was a Henry Fonda movie, wasn’t it?
Man, my first case as a Harvard Lawyer and I have to get an obvious criminal. What would F. Lee Bailey do? I figure, I’ll have to do as real lawyers do - I’ll baffle them with bologney.
I waited on the sidewalk while Kibbi tried to get back inside the club. The bouncer recognized him and wouldn’t let him in. Kibbi demanded that the bouncer go and get Mel to come out and talk to his lawyer.
I figured that this little game was all over. Mel wasn’t going to come out and talk to some guy in Bermuda shorts and sporting a multi-colored Hawaiian Eye shirt - the colors were pastels – pink, yellow, pale blue and turquoise.
But there he was.
I said, “You have accused my client here, Mr. Thomas Kabildis, of engaging in malicious, criminally destructive behavior.”
“I don’t have to talk to you,” Mel said agitatedly while nervously attempting to eat his stubby cigar.
“Well, you can talk to me now, or you can talk to me in a court of law.”
I couldn’t believe it. We actually had Mel scared. Maybe I could really be a Harvard lawyer. It could happen!
Mel continued. “This guy ripped my towel machine off the wall. He has to pay for it.”
“Did you see my client rip the towel machine off the wall?”
“No I didn’t exactly see him, but he was the only one in there and the machine was laying on the bathroom floor.”
“Really? You have nineteen million half drunk teenagers running in and out of your lavatory (note the use of the word lavatory), and just because you see my client leaving the room when you are entering, you accuse him of the crime? You have got to be making a joke.
“Tom, take a good look at this place because when I get done with this guy, it is all going to belong to you. This is deformation of character. This is slander. This is identitae fraud-ulente. People have collected millions on cases like this. This type of case was decided centuries ago. I think the first such case was at Nuremberg in 1346. It is what they call no low expropriente. We got this guy right where we want him. Let’s go. We’ll be seeing you in court, sir.”
“Wait a minute, wait a minute. Listen I don’t know all this Latin stuff and I don’t want no court and legal problems. I’ll let this guy back in this one last time but if I catch him doing anything he’s going to be out of here for good.”
“What do you think, Tom?”
“That’s it? This guy accuses me of all these lies and I don’t get anything? I should get something for being treated like this.”
I looked at Mel. He was fidgeting and his cigar stub was bouncing every which way.
“Five free drinks,” I said to Mel. He stared, pensively.
“One free drink,” Mel countered.
“Three,” I compromised.
“Two free drinks and that’s my last offer.”
“What do you say Kibbi?”
“Okay.”
As Mel and Kibbi went strolling back inside and Kibbi joyfully bellied up to the bar I thought, Wow, I won my first case as a Harvard lawyer. Of course, it was pro-bono but a win is a win.

Richard E. Noble was raised in Lawrence, Mass and is now a freelance writer. He has published five books. Two of them have Lawrence as their setting, A Summer with Charlie and Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. A Little Something is a book of poetry partly inspired by life in Lawrence. Hobo-ing America, is a workingman’s tour of the U.S.A. The Eastpointer is selected pieces from his award winning column about life in a sleepy fishing village in the Florida Panhandle.

Lawrence - My Hometown

Black Horse Ale

By Richard E. Noble
We were back in Fort Lauderdale one Christmas for a break from our Hobo-ing America adventure of working our way around the U.S.A. Our homemade camper now sported an elevated fiberglass top (roof) that we had put on while traveling through Riverside, California. We picked up my brother and his wife at their condo and took them for a hobo-style lunch on Fort Lauderdale beach.
We parked in one of the big, fancy hotel parking lots where we had a nice view of the beach. We opened the back doors to the van and sat at our makeshift dinner table drinking a beer and eating our sandwiches. As we sat there enjoying the view and the cool ocean breezes a party of six came out of the hotel’s lounge. They were all dressed to the nines.
They were very happy as they came strolling by the open back doors of our van camper.
“Here, enjoy a real brew with your lunch,” one of the entourage said hefting a six-pack of beer up onto our table.
“Why thank-you,” I said sliding a bottle out of the six-pack and taking a look at the label.
“This is a good brew,” I said with emphasis. “I’ve drunk a many of them in my day.”
“That’s impossible,” the man said.
“Impossible my butt! I used to drink Holihan’s Black Horse Ale all the time. It was manufactured and brewed right in my hometown. It is made with genuine spring water, you know.”
“That’s right,” the man said. “Where’s your hometown?”
“Lawrence, Massachusetts,” I boasted.
“That’s right again. But this company has been out of business for over a decade.”
“Well, I’m not exactly a teenager,” I said. “I’ve been drinking beer for a long time. In fact I consider myself somewhat of a professional. This Holihan’s Black Hose Ale is one of the best ales ever brewed,” I flattered.
The man seemed to be beside himself with joy. He called his entire party over to the back of our camper. He introduced us to all his friends and then added, “We were impressed with this Holihan’s Black Horse Ale ourselves. In fact, we just closed a deal inside that hotel. We bought the formula and the rights to this ale and we are going to start manufacturing it and distributing it all over America.”
“No kidding! Well good luck to all of you.”
“You guys must be a sign. What are the chances of meeting a group of people from Lawrence, Mass. in a parking lot at Fort Lauderdale beach after just signing a contract to buy the formula for Holihan’s Black Horse Ale?”
“What are the odds on that?” I asked my brother Ernie who fancied himself to be a dog track handicapping expert. My brother moved to Florida because he had outgrown Rockingham Park.
“I don’t think you could get Nick the Greek to give you odds on that one.”
The new Black Horse Ale owners went off laughing, hugging and slapping one another on the back.
The remainder of that afternoon my brother and I spent reminiscing about Lawrence. We stopped when the girls began to doze off.
The Holihan brothers started their brewery in Lawrence in 1856, I discovered. In 1912, the name was changed to Diamond Spring Brewery and it was on Beacon Street. They were closed for the prohibition years but reopened in 1933. The Diamond Spring Brewery finally closed its doors in 1970.
My brother Ernie wasn’t much of a drinker but I filled in for him. I drank plenty of Holihan’s Black Horse Ale. My brother was a basketball “star” at Central Catholic. He played for Central Catholic for five years at the center position. He graduated in 1955. He stayed an extra year at Central Catholic trying to get a sport scholarship. He finally got an offer from Colby College but then opted out of sports and worked his way through Northeastern University in Boston. He played with other Central Catholic stars like - Jimmy Dyer, Leo Trudashard, (Bob, Tom?) Flynn, “Bucky” Butterworth, Don Tremblay, and Charlie Fiorino. He played on some great Central teams.

Richard E. Noble was raised in Lawrence, Mass and is now a freelance writer. He has published five books. Two of them have Lawrence as their setting, A Summer with Charlie and Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. A Little Something is a book of poetry partly inspired by life in Lawrence. Hobo-ing America, is a workingman’s tour of the U.S.A. The Eastpointer is selected pieces from his award winning column about life in a sleepy fishing village in the Florida Panhandle.

Chester Alan Arthur

Chester Alan Arthur

President from 1881-1885

By Richard E. Noble

Chester Arthur is another one of those vice presidents put on to balance the ticket or appease party rivalries - like Harrison's running mate, Tyler, and Lincoln’s second mate, Andrew Johnson, so too Chester A. Arthur, and in our times Lyndon B. Johnson. Maybe there is a lesson for political parties to learn here.
Poor Garfield finally kicks the bucket after a number of months of medical malpractice and in comes "Chesty". Chesty looks like a million bucks. He's a fashion plate. His wife died the year before he got elected vice president, so we can’t blame her for the cost of the remodeling of the White House. Chester refused to move in before everything in the place had been auctioned off, some of it priceless antics. Twenty-four wagon loads of decorations and furniture out the door. He remodeled the mansion in late "Victorian" style. But before we consider Chester frivolous with our money, let it be known that he was responsible for reducing the national debt by some 400,000,000. It seems with all of the corruption going on in those days the government still managed a surplus. The surplus was primarily due to tariffs on imports. Funny, I never hear that fact mentioned when I hear talk of tariffs today. Raising tariffs seems to be in the same category as raising the minimum wage, universal health care, the positive influences of Socialism on our present day government, and beating your wife and children.
Chester was a loyal, faithful administrator in the powerful, Republican, New York political machine. A guy named Conkling was the big mucky-muck. The major political problem of the day was "corruption" and the favoritism of the spoils system. This problem looks to be comparable to our political fund raising reform of today.
If the early days of the Republic could be called the "Age of Idealism" followed then by the "Age of Expansion," I think we might be able to call this period after the death of Lincoln as the "Age of Corruption." Of course, if we name such an Age, we then might have the problem of stating specifically when it ended, or when it began for that matter. But it does seem that the government in both the North and the South during this period is operating in a state of failure and shenanigans. Though Mark Twain thought that Chester did fine and dandy.
Garfield was shot by a “Stalwart” Republican, Charles Guiteau. He claimed he did it to promote Chester Arthur and the Northeast Republican, hardball, rightwing machine. As one might imagine, Guiteau's trial became a major political farce. Guiteau was finally convicted and hung, but it is a wonder that he ever made it to the gallows. He got about as good police protection as Lee Harvey Oswald. Arthur, trying to side step conspiracy theorists and accusations from the opposition, did his best to distance himself from all of his old political buddies. This tactic worked for his present position but didn't do much for his chances in the next go around, which didn't much matter because just one year out of office and he died, anyway.
Discounting Andrew Johnson, the Republicans have now been in power for twenty years or more. The Negroes don't really seem to be doing all that well either. The KKK and the old plantation mentality have everything just about back to normal.

It's On Sale

The Eastpointer

It is on Sale!

By Richard E. Noble
We pulled into the parking lot of one of our local area grocery stores. I won't say which one or what part of the County. I know my editor doesn't need the aggravation. The large windows were all plastered with this week's sales. I read the signs and was surprised to find that each and every one of the items on sale was on our grocery list. "How do you like that!" I said to Carol. "All our stuff is on sale this week."
We wandered around picking out our vital necessities - being sure to get all the specials that were advertised on the windows. When the girl at the cash register began ringing up our groceries, we both noticed that she didn’t ring up the sale items at the sale price but at the regular price.
My wife immediately ordered a halt to the operation - which is always very embarrassing. Other people are behind you waiting, some holding one container from the deli - probably on their ten minute lunch break. So who wants to hold things up?
"That item is on sale," my wife squeaked softly.
The girl beeped the item to check her computer prices.
"It doesn't say that here," she explained.
"It might not say it there," I offered. "But it says it on that big six foot poster you have taped to that window over there."
"Oh," she said. "You can't go by those signs. They never remember to take them down after the sale is over. Those sales ended yesterday."
"Really," I said.
"Well, I can help you out there," I said.
I went over to each window and I ripped down each and every sign. Within a moment or two there was a young manager or assistant manager hovering next to me.
"Excuse me sir? Is there something wrong?"
"No, nothing's wrong. Your cashier just told me that all of these sale items that my wife and I diligently collected around this store are not actually on sale this week. She said that these are last week’s sales and you folks just didn't have time to take them down. Since nothing annoys me more than buying things on sale that aren't really on sale, I thought that I would give you guys a helping hand and take all of these old signs down for you."
After I got all the signs torn down and stuffed into an empty shopping cart, I went back over to the cash register and paid our bill. The manager followed delicately behind me.
My wife and I smiled and thanked everybody as we gathered up our groceries and trucked on out of the store.
As we were departing I heard the manager ask the girl behind the register, "Did you tell that man that those sale prices on the window had expired?"
"Yeah," she said.
"They don't expire until tomorrow," he informed her.
"Oh," she said.
Not too long after that embarrassing incident, I saw a special on TV. The program was explaining how department stores and grocery chains are making themselves millions every year by "neglecting" to coordinate their cash register computers with their on floor (or on window) sale prices. It seems that the vast majority of customers never notice. The customer sees that an item is marked on sale and they assume that when they get to the register they will be charged accordingly. Not so.
Now far be it from me to suggest that any of our little groceries stores or even our area department stores would do such a thing intentionally. BUT, whenever my wife and I buy anything that is marked to be on sale, we now put it separately in our shopping cart. We present all sale items to the cashier in one cluster. Almost always, there are discrepancies. Occasionally the cashier will just make the appropriate change herself. But more often than not a price check is required or someone has to be called. I am beginning to think that this may not be an accident. I hate to be such a skeptic.
A hundred years ago when I worked as a stock boy in a busy metropolitan grocery store, it was our responsibility to change the prices on all sale items on our aisle the evening before the sale. We accomplished this with wipe cloths, ink pads, hand stampers and stick on tags. It wasn’t just a matter of going to a central computer and pressing a few buttons. We did it every week – no problem. What’s the excuse today?

Richard Noble is a freelance writer and has been a resident of Eastpoint for 30 years. He has written and published 5 books. All 5 are listed on Amazon.com. If you would like to stock his books in your store or business he can be contacted at richardedwardnoble@gtcom.net.

Pickin' and Starvin'

The Eastpointer

Pickin' and Starving

By Richard E. Noble

As oystermen, we had all the oysters that we wanted to eat. We also had plenty of fish caught while out on the bar oystering. We had stone crabs once or twice a month that I received in trade for helping to load/unload a late night truck at the campsite. We caught mullet with Carol's cast nets and we bought shrimp wholesale occasionally from a bay shrimper unloading at the dock. But the bay was also loaded with Blue Crabs and we wanted to try those also. The picked and packaged Blue Crab meat, shredded or lump, was very expensive. Everybody told us to pick up a few crab traps and just toss them overboard on our way out to the oyster beds in the morning.
We stopped in Panacea to check the price on some new crab traps. There was a fellow who made the traps and had stacks of them displayed in front of his shop on highway 98. But new crab traps were out of the question. They were too expensive for us. It is the same with fishing poles – it takes a lot of catfish to pay for one hand wrapped, graphite rod and Penn reel.
We noticed that there were always a few crabs traps buried in the sand that had washed up on the beach after bad weather. They were usually bent, bashed and damaged and the crabbers didn’t want them. We picked up a half dozen and patched them by tying in some old wire here and there. We bought some large Styrofoam bobbers and a little rope and we were in business.
We baited them with chicken necks and fish heads and tossed them overboard as we had been instructed. It took two or three days to accumulate any amount of crabs, but finally there we were back at the “mansion” boiling up a large pot full of Blue Crabs.
We covered the table with newspapers, drained the crabs and dumped them in the middle of the table. We started in grinin’ and pickin’.
About two or three hours later we had exhausted ourselves. We picked our last crab. The crab meat that we had salvaged from the crabs was delicious - sweet and tasty - but we were still starving. It seemed to us that the crab meat that was gained from picking was hardly enough to replace the energy that it took to pick the crabs in the first place.
We wrote it all off to inexperience and tried again a few more times. It was always the same. After an evening of pickin’ and grinin’ we had to fry up some hamburgers or boil up some hot dogs in order to get our bellies full.
We discussed the situation and opted for a new system. When we brought in a batch of crabs we would first eat our supper and then put the crabs to boil. Later in the evening, while we watched the TV with our full bellies we picked the crabs and put all the meat into a Tupperware container. It only took a few pickin’ sessions to have a good serving of crab meat in the refrigerator.
The first time we simply heated the meat, melted some butter, and with the addition of some Saltine crackers and a beer we had a real nice time. After awhile we started experimenting with our own crab cakes, crab cocktails, Crab AuGratin, Crab Imperial with capers, deviled crab and plain old crab salad.
I suppose if we had added up all the time in harvesting, pickin’ and grinin’ it might have been cheaper to buy the crab meat downtown. But with our income that option was not available. Besides, this was a part of the fisherman's way of life and that is what we aspired to be - fishermen. It really wasn't work it was fun - and when it did become work we could quit and find something else to do.
Eventually we did give up the crab pickin’ because we had too many other seafood delights that were easier and more fun to get. And the stored crab meat in our opinion never quite matched up to the sweetness of the fresh picked crab. It was a sort of Catch 22 situation. It was a lose-lose situation.
Today whenever we see a restaurant ad boasting all the blue crab that you can eat, we just smile. We aren't going to fall for that one. A person could literally starve to death attempting to satisfy a hard earned hunger by picking his fill of blue crabs.

The Eastpointer, a selection of columns from the Franklin Chronicle, is Richard Noble latest publication. It is now for sale on Amazon.com. Richard Noble is a freelance writer and has been a resident of Eastpoint for 30 years. If you would like to stock any of his books in your store or business email Richard at richardedwardnoble@gtcom.net.

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860 A.D.)

Philosopher

By Richard E. Noble
Arthur Schopenhauer in my psychoanalytic opinion was suffering from that age old male, physical malady, known to all young and middle aged, healthy males as Spermus Backeruptis.
Come on, this guy needed a good romp between the sheets, with a 'normal' female. My goodness! If this couldn't be arranged for whatever reasons, how about a couple of gallons of Prozac? This was one unhappy camper.
Schoppy's mother was a successful novelist (probably wrote Harlequin Romances) and an out spoken advocate of free love (what ever that is). It is thought that his father committed suicide. It is well known that mother and son couldn't stand one another, and that in one of their fights she tossed him down a flight of stairs. Obviously Schoppy banged his head pretty hard several times on the flight down.
The only reason that I picked up Schoppy is that Albert Einstein said that Schopenhauer was one of his favorite philosophers. I don’t understand why, Albert was always so sensible.
Schopenhauer would go to a restaurant, place a large tip on the table for the waiter or waitress to see. Then after he ate and was served enthusiastically, he would pick up his tip and leave.
If you are one of those people who is presently contemplating suicide, WARNING! Reading Schopenhauer could be hazardous to your health.
Schoppy talks a lot about THE WILL. This seems to be something like The Force in the Star Wars movies. Adolf Hitler liked this WILL business. He was able to use the idea quit well. He WILLED a whole nation into submission. This WILL business encompasses everything from God, to Mother Nature, to Superman, to energy.
The Will is also an evil demon who tries to lure men into the trap of enjoying life and then once enticed, starts whacking him on the head, like Punch does to Judy in the kid’s puppet show....Oh Judy, oh Judy? I love you. Then it’s BAMB, BAMB, BAMB right on the top of the noodle. But in this case it is Judy who is whacking Punch.
Schopenhauer’s most famous work is The World as Will and Representation.
He finally settled in Frankfurt, Germany with his two poodles Atma and Butz. A neighbor lady knowing he had some bucks tricked him into pushing her. Caroline Marquet took him to court and won. He made payments to her for 27 years.
To tell the truth, I think that I am going to skip Schoppy and his philosophy of misery. Truthfully I think that I have already met the man in real life. He was sitting next to me on a stool at Al's Tavern in Lawrence, Mass. I had just broken up with my last girl friend and he was telling me about the true nature of women. The thing that I remember most about my Al's Tavern Schopenhauer was that he never left his stool, not even to pee. He just sat there sobbing in his beer and peeing in his pants. Oh well, as the bumper sticker says, Life is a bitch, and then you die.

The Eastpointer

Why do mullet jump?

By Richard E. Noble
Mullet has been a staple of life for decades here in Franklin County. Most other places it is considered a bait fish or trash fish and people cringe at the thought of eating one. But Calvin Trillin “the international gourmand of chili dogs and fried pork rinds” wrote that Franklin County, Florida is the best place in America to find smoked mullet. I think you can find this essay in Trillin’s book the Tummy Trilogy.
Most people first notice mullet when they are standing on the shore looking out at the horizon. Suddenly they see some kind of fish jump out of the water and sail through the air. And then the same fish does it again and again and again. I watched one mullet jump five times in a row. Everybody’s first question when discovering mullet is - why do mullet jump?
The obvious answer is because they are trying to escape something that is trying to eat them, like a Bottle Nosed Dolphin. I’ve also read that they might be jumping to get an extra gulp of oxygen. I’m sure that there are many other answers as to why mullet jump but I have always liked Marion Millender’s the best. He said that he thought mullet jumped because they were happy.
Carol and I had our first exposure to mullet not in Franklin County, but in Port Isabel, Texas. We were on our Hobo-ing America adventure when we landed at Padre Island and then went down to Brownsville. There was an old bridge, similar to our Island fishing pier bridge, at Port Isabel that had been turned into a State Park and Carol and I spent some time there fishing and waiting for America to warm up.
We were fishing off the rocks at the foot of this bridge when the water offshore began to churn up. There seemed to be miles of some kind of fish out there and they were coming our way. I didn’t know what they were or what they might bite. On another occasion up in New England when I was fishing off the Black Rocks at Salisbury Beach a school of pollack came through and I caught a mess of them with a Dare Devil lure. I had one in my tackle box at the bridge in Port Isabel so I rigged it up. I threw it out in the middle of the churning water but got no bites. Then I remembered techniques that I had developed snagging Salmon up in Michigan. I started jerking the Dare Devil through this school of whatever and whammo. I had a five gallon pail full in no time.
People came wandering by peeking into my bucket. Most of them whispered and talked among themselves. Finally this one older fellow said, “No sense in saving those, son. Those fish are mullet. They’re a trash fish - no good for eatin’.”
We had heard similar stories about various types of fish but Carol and I were not prone to throwing any variety of fish back into the water. We are “catch and eat” not “catch and release” fishermen. That night we ate fried mullet and we were hooked.
For a time here in Franklin County we could catch all the mullet we wanted. We had two cast nets that Carol had constructed by hand and we had a hundred foot of gill net that Mr. Millender gave us. We would ride around inshore and roll that 100 foot off the cull board of our oyster boat or stand on the bow and sail out our cast nets. We never caught enough to sell by these methods but we had plenty to eat.
Every oyster shack along 98 in Eastpoint had a smoker and a sign advertising fresh smoked mullet in those days. You could buy a whole smoked mullet for a dollar to a dollar-fifty. We loved smoked mullet, but we were too cheap to buy it. We decided to build our own smokehouse out back. We had a pile of old corrugated tin laying around and we stuck it together and built a full sized smokehouse about six foot high and three foot wide and maybe two or three foot deep. We made metal doors in the lower front section for the wood and built some racks higher up for the fish. We put some doors on the upper section also. For awhile we had all the smoked mullet that we could eat. We smoked chicken, hot dogs, beef and pork.
People also like to eat the roe (mullet eggs) which presented a problem as you can imagine.
I’ve since heard that you can catch mullet on a cane pole or by hook. Folks use ground worms, oat meal, chicken feed and dough balls made from wadding up some cheap store-bought white bread. We never tried it.
Mullet are strange; they have a gizzard. They feed on dead plant matter and detritus - no meat. They’re vegetarians. They spawn in the Gulf and live inshore in the bay or up the river. They live in schools and periodically they come leaping out of the water - because they are happy.
I like that answer. Now every time I see a happy mullet leaping out of the water, I smile and find myself a little happier also. Why not?

Ruther-"fraud" B. Hayes

Rutherford B. Hayes (1882-1893)

(President from 1877-1881, 19th)

By Richard E. Noble

Rutherford, called Ruther-"fraud" by his enemies, was a proud Union General who became president amidst a storm of controversy. His opponent, Democrat Samuel Tilden, polled 250,000 more popular votes than Republican Hayes. An electoral committee with only one independent vote, a Justice Joseph Bradley, would decide the new president. Hayes was selected. Even before his election or appointment Hayes had sworn to serve only one term.
The South would agree to his appointment on the condition that he end the occupation and reconstruction. Lincoln and Johnson had pretty much lost the battle for readmitting the rebellious Southern States to the Union without prejudice. The dominant, right-wing, religious, radical Republicans, demanded retribution. They wanted the Confederate States to be nothing more than occupied territory. They wanted military rule and government by, of, and from the Negro population; an ignorant, black ruling populace who would be guided by northern radical-right Republicans, or Yankees. The South had lost the war and their true savior, Abraham Lincoln, had been assassinated by one of their own. And now their biggest fear was coming true. A black slave, majority population was being installed as their rulers.
The Southern white population formed secret organizations designed to counter the Yankee military occupation, the political infiltration of northern, Yankee "carpetbaggers", and black Negro rule. The Klu Klux Klan, a social club, originally organized by six young, Confederate veterans from Tennessee in 1865, and then politicized in 1867 under the elected Grand Wizard, Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest was the largest and most notorious of these organizations. The Klu Klux Klan, and other white groups like the Knights of the White Camellia, countered the reconstruction (Yankee occupation) with violence, murder and terrorism, specifically towards the blacks.
Rutherford is credited with ending the horrid reconstruction injustice by pulling the Yankee troops from the South. But what Rutherford accomplished with this act, countered what he considered to be his life's greatest achievement, ending slavery. By pulling the troops from the South he assured Negro abuse, and persecution for nearly another century. He basically left an unequipped, unprotected Negro population to fend for itself amidst a belligerent, hurt and vengeful population of humiliated and defeated whites. Rutherford had risked his life to protect and free the enslaved Negro, and then he abandoned them. Certainly Andrew Johnson and especially U. S. Grant must also shoulder some burden here in allowing the Klan and terrorism to grow and prosper. The Negro was the baby thrown out with the baptismal water of the Civil War. It does seem that neither Rutherford's greatest achievement, freeing the world of slavery, and Lincoln's greatest goal, preserving the Union, were accomplished. The Civil War had left the Union decimated; the South an unwanted, alienated step child; the North in a political and financial shambles over power, money and control; and the Negro abandoned.
My question is inevitable, has any war ever solved any of the problems and arguments supposedly in question?
Mark Twain took Horace Greeley’s advice to union draftees who didn't want to fight in this confusing dilemma and went West. He seems to have made the wisest personal choice.