Real Religious Beliefs vs. Self-Centeredness

Change is not always easy to accept, unless we see some obvious benefit (or I suppose, some perceived benefit) in that change for ourselves. Regular readers know that I most often write about politics, more precisely, about economic politics, as that is a passion I have. I want to see an economically fairer country. Unfortunately, in the last three decades we have seen America become less and less fair economically, and that isn't just by Randy's standards, but even by many more conservative public figures like Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, and George W. Bush. Where Bernanke will fit in is still to be seen, but the others, while publicly stating how income inequality had grown, left the situation at that, a statement about the facts, but with no proposals, and seemingly no desire to do anything about it.

What puzzles me is, with the rise of the Religious Right, beginning in the 1970s, you would think that America would have made tremendous strides toward an even fairer society, including some form of health care for ALL Americans. Why? Because most religions seem to advocate some form of shared responsibility towards their fellow human beings. Instead, we've seen the growth of selfishness and a "get the money, get the money" mentality, the likes of which I've never seen in my "fair number of decades" on this Earth. (Hey, you didn't think I was going to tell you HOW MANY decades, did you?) Many of those who were already wealthy benefited the most. This "mo' money" philosophy has culminated in an economic downturn that continues to this very minute, with virtually all prominent economists saying that it will likely take years to get out of this mess. It will be interesting to see how we assess the "benefits" of this era we've come through.

My question to you is this, if YOU have strong religious beliefs, would YOU turn away someone in need of help? Would the particular deity/deities of YOUR religion want YOU to turn inward, and deny proper medical treatment to YOUR fellow human beings? To me, attending religious services or quoting religious verses does NOT a religious person make. I'm so often stunned by some who claim religion, but whose true beliefs seem to be more about themselves, rather than others. I'm not saying that upholding religious beliefs is an easy thing, as our natural inclination is to be for ourselves. There aren't many Mother Theresa-types in the world, although I'm sure there are more than we actually hear about. The thing is, do YOU tout religious beliefs, but then really not make an effort to live by those beliefs?

Word History:
Shoe-This word is only in the Germanic languages, as no other Indo European languages have it. Old Germanic had "skokaz," which some/many linguists feel goes back to the Indo European root "skeu," which meant "cover." The Old Germanic form passed into the developing Germanic dialects as: "scoh" in Old English (Anglo-Saxon), which seems to have been pronounced similar to modern "show"), "skor" in Old Norse, "skoch," in Old Frisian, "skoh" in Old Saxon (this is the Saxon that remained on the Continent), "scuoh" in Old High German. In more modern times, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish have "sko," Dutch has "schoen," and German has "Schuh," which is pronounced pretty much like the English word. Interestingly, one of the plural forms, besides "shoes," in English, was "shoon" (German has "Schuhe" for the plural) and this form lasted well into the 1500s! The verb form in Old English was "scogan/scogean," and was used like in "to shoe a horse."

Is The Crisis Easing?

Recently there have been some economic statistics that have given a bit of hope that, ever so gradually, the crisis is beginning to ease. Let's hope, but to be quite honest, we have a long way to go. At times during the Great Depression conditions seemed to be improving, only to have the economy tumble even further. Currently, some parts of the economy do seem to at least be stabilizing, so I'm not saying things are going to get a lot worse, but there are still very troubling matters that could send the economy into another tailspin.

First, a high number of job losses are already in the pipeline. When we've heard or read that Company XYZ is cutting 5000 jobs, seldom does that mean that those 5000 jobs were eliminated that very same day, but rather those jobs will be eliminated over a given period of time, usually measured in months. So unemployment is going to get worse, at least in the next few months. Hopefully the job losses will begin to come down, but don't expect employers to come knocking at your door to fill vacant positions any time soon.

Then we have the banking situation. Right now it does seem to be stabilizing, and I hope that is truly the case, but there is an escalating crisis in commercial real estate, as many office buildings and shopping malls have high vacancy rates, or tenants behind on rent, and these properties are having increasing difficulty meeting their payments, aka, mortgages. Home foreclosures are still rising (up 24% in the first three months of this year compared to the same period last year), and with so many job losses, I can't imagine the numbers are suddenly going to start getting a lot better. As if this isn't enough, credit card and auto loan defaults and late payments have significantly increased. Again, it doesn't take Einstein to figure out that with more unemployment, there will be even higher default rates. The question is, with many of the banks doing a bit better, can they take the hit of more credit losses?

We, the taxpayers, have put billions (actually TRILLIONS have been pledged) into propping up banks, insurance companies, and automakers. I know we don't like it, and we shouldn't. BUT we still have to consider the alternative; that is, to have let all of these companies fail. Let me tell you, if you think things are bad now, how bad do you think it would be if all of these companies had gone under? We think the current 8.5% unemployment is bad, but just pick a number for what it might be otherwise: 12%, 15%, 20%??? Believe me, 20% is NOT out of question. Not only would millions of people have lost their jobs from these businesses, but the effect on the overall psyche of the country (and the WORLD) would have been so traumatizing that even 20% unemployment may be a low number.*** If you feel that your job has been shaky now, chances are, you would be another statistic in the unemployment number by now. Again folks, this is what they, the merchants of greed, got us into; virtually a "no win" situation. And don't count the bastards out yet, as I'm absolutely sure they're just waiting to get the price of oil and gasoline back up as soon as possible. Will we let them get away with it? (A word history is below)

*** Remember, the Crash of 1929 and the resulting downturn (including bank failures), scared the living hell out of people, and spending by businesses and consumers plunged by incredible amounts. Roosevelt's New Deal spent what were considered huge amounts for those days, but even those expenditures couldn't pull the economy totally out of the Depression. The truly huge amounts we spent on World War Two finally got the country out of the doldrums.

Word History:
Stark-This goes back to the Indo European root word "ster," which meant "rigid, stiff." The Old Germanic offshoot was "starkaz," which had much the same meaning, but also with the added notion that if something was rigid, it was "strong." In Old English it was "stearc." Close relatives of English, Dutch and German, have "sterk" and "stark," respectively, both meaning "strong." North Germanic also uses the word, as for instance, Norwegian has "sterk," meaning "strong." The notion of "stark=strong" gave rise to its use as an intensifier as "total, complete," by the 1400s in English, and thus to this day we say, "stark naked" ("strongly" naked, if you will; thus, "totally, completely"). This term further gave English the idea of "barren," as in "the stark countryside."

Why Do We Call Them These Names? Part Three

This will be the last part on the Germanic tribes and terms I've chosen to cover. There were many, many more, but these tribes and terms covered in Parts One, Two, and Three are the names most people are familiar with in some context.

Burgundians-These were people from a Germanic tribe that spoke what is classified by linguists as being "East Germanic." I included them because their name gave us the name of the famous red wine, Burgundy, which was derived from the province in France named after the Burgundians. I had some difficulty finding much on the tribal name, but it "seems" that the "burg" part equates with German "Berg," which means "mountain." (Of course, in English, we have "iceberg," a borrowing from German "Eisberg," [pronounced as if ice-bear with a "g" on the end]which literally means "ice mountain.") This would give the notion that this tribe lived in the high country. Old English had "Burgenda." They seem to have lived in southern Scandinavia, in what is now Sweden, and then moved to an island, Bornholm, in the Baltic Sea, before moving into eastern Europe. In Old Norse, the island of Bornholm was called "Burgendarholmr;" that is, "the island of the Burgundians," and the Old Norse form has now been contracted into "Bornholm." The Romans picked up their name and thus Latin had "Burgundiones." The name was given to the wine from "Burgundy" during the 1600s.

Goths-This was another East Germanic speaking tribe. Old English had "Gota" ("Gotan," plural). Some sources feel that the term simply meant "men," as Old Norse had "gotar," which meant "men," but this is not certain. The Romans used the term "Goth" for these people, and the "th" of Latin was later adopted to the English form. During the Middle Ages, the term "Gothic" was used interchangeably with "Germanic," and this in turn brought the use of the term "Gothic" to the art and architecture of northern Europe, and later, to the writings of authors who used these settings for their works.

Frisians-While there are differing dialects for Frisian, many, if not most, linguists say that Frisian is the closest living relative of English, followed by Saxon, the Low German dialect in the north of Germany (see Part One for "Saxon"). In Old English they were "Frisa" (sing.), "Frisan" (plural). Frisian, German (both Low and High), Dutch, and English are all classified as West Germanic. The name seems to come from their hair style (but only their hairdresser knows for sure), as in Old English, "fris" meant "curly" (we still have "frizzle") and Old Frisian had "frisle," "curly hair." The general area they inhabited* (and still inhabit, to some extent) is really something of the ancestral home of English, as this was the same area occupied by the Angles, Saxons and Jutes before their invasion of Britain. Some Frisians also participated in this invasion. I wonder if they had the "frizzies?"

* Stretching from the southern part of modern Denmark, across northern Germany and into northeastern Holland, and all of the offshore islands. The Germans call the area "Friesland," the "land of the Frisians." Interestingly, just as their close English cousins, the Frisians, more especially the East Frisians, are known for their tea!!!