The wrath of Clara Harris and Jean Harris

             " Hell hath no fury.... " The story of Clara Harris - accused

    of running over  and killing her unfaithful husband - reminds me of

    another famous case of feminine RAGE : Remember one Jean Harris found

    guilty of murdering  her unfaithful husband, the famous diet doctor,

    Herman Tarnower .Jean's defense : "  the bullet intended for herself

    struck her lover by mistake ". Oh, that's right. He was an unfaithful

    LOVER . Anyway Jean Harris had a good side  and - if I were on the jury-

    I would  have said : " Ten  years - with time off for good behavior ".

              I feel the same way about Clara Harris. FEMALE RAGE can

    explain a lot of domestic horror shows. Jean Harris wrote in her

    biography : " Every person in an American prison should be required....

    wherever possible... to  THINK LOGICALLY, especially about personal

    responsibilities " . ( page 554 , large print edition ) .


                 I oppose the death penalty because modern medicine has

    graphic evidence of brain function unaffected by any mystical FREE WILL.

                  True enough : " The devil made me do it !  "

             Crime prevention is really a matter of raising our emotional IQ.

Arlene scolds Bob Kerr

Good morning, Bob. I very much enjoyed your column making

    fun of RULING CLASS types ( my definition ) who use the word  SUMMER

    as a verb. However, that column was judged " snotty " by WHJJ's

    GENERAL - Arlene Violet.

                I really think Arlene- though I can still respect her -

    is losing it. TALKING too much and -unlike good writers like Bob

    Kerr - THINKING too little.

                  I suspect Arlene socializes with people we use to

    call SNOBS and SOCIAL PARASITES. But  a journalist is just COMMON

    FOLK to them. And nothing shakes them in their self-esteem.

              Oh poor, ungrateful PROLES - who cannot see THEM as our

    true benefactors !

                By the way, I SUMMER myself in Roger Williams Park or

    Oakland Beach bars.

                                          Love your " Queen For A Day "

                                         columns !

- - - - - - - - -
response from Bob Kerr:
  ron:  i summer on the portugese riviera in fall river.  i heard from a few
    people about her little tirade last week.  i've never  thought arlene quite gets
    it.  anyway, thanks for checking in.  bob

Thank God for the rich !

A silly letter to the Christian Science Monitor published

    on February 3  under the heading: " Should the rich keep more of

    what they earn ?  "  . One Sidney Williams begins his letter: " The

    rich provide almost every job in America . No poor person has ever

    provided or created a job.... ".

            Well, well .... THANK GOD FOR THE RICH !  Scientists tell us

    that human beings have inhabited the earth for at least a million years.

    How could they possibly have survived without the benevolence of the RICH

    -who perhaps did not descend from OLD FAMILIES - of monkeys !

                 How does this one percent of the population manage to be

    so much more PRODUCTIVE than the other 99 % ?

                Everywhere the working class would be clueless without them.

    Did not Marx explain to us a long time ago about the secret of capitalist

    profit - the exploitation of the workers ?

                But all that was just crazy commie crap. The capitalists are

    capitalists for the benefit of the working class !

          Oh those stupid, ungrateful proles !

               When did the labor theory of value disappear from the consciousness

    of even left-wing intellectuals ?

McGrief vs. the dark night of the soul

Charles Lindberg - a quintessential American - electrified the

whole world in 1927 when HE DID IT ! - boldly flew across the

formidable Atlantic ocean , landing in Paris to the cheers of a

wild, adoring crowd. Not for nothing he named his famous plane

" The Spirit of St. Louis " . That SPIRIT became the spirit of

NASA, especially in the early days of the space program.

       John F. Kennedy - who oddly reminded people of Charles

Lindberg early in his political career - inspired the titanic,

national project of landing a man on the moon.

        Lindberg -like JFK, like the USA - had a dark side.

    The human soul needs a challenge ,needs to wonder and dream

more than it needs mere comfort and security.

         If I were a complete pauper , I would not begrudge

the NASA space projects. They help keep the Spirit of St. Louis

alive. Nice to know that human beings can arise above the level

of bean counters, that not a few of us do indeed have the right

stuff.

         The seven astronauts of the space shuttle Columbia -

killed Saturday - all had the right stuff.

         The Israeli hero  showed that the human spirit can

rise again even from the ashes of the Holocaust.

          A lot of the grief expressed by public officials

sounds a bit canned to me. I call this phenomenon " McGrief ".

            We like to believe in a personal god. And many of

the astronauts claimed to be devout Christians.   I suspect that

we strain our sanity by believing in God as grand maestro of

the universe.

        Where was the Lord of the O-Rings , I wonder, when

the Challenger exploded ? Reagan was president back then. I

was touched by his speech to nation after that tragedy.

         After the Columbia exploded Saturday -and it was certain

the precious crew was lost - George W tried to imitate the Great

Communicator .  His speech was a flop, canned McGrief.

        Perhaps a great leader at such times might wisely

imitate the silence of God. In long dark night of the soul, we

wait - wait for Godot ?

         Oddly enough you can feel grief for a mere thing. When

I first learned that there was a  serious crack in the Hubble

telescope,   it was like hearing that God Himself lost an eye.

        Our scientists fixed it.