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For the past five years I have been writing a history column for BOSS magazine.  And I have yet to run out of history.  In fact, here is my latest column-on The Spanish-American War:

http://issuu.com/dixonvalve/docs/1354198938bosswinter2012/28

Spain made a perfect enemy.  The government was repressive and vile, the country was weak, and it had something worth stealing.  Really, the Philippines, Cuba and Puerto Rico were too tempting not to conquer.  We were even an improvement over the Spanish.

Yes, we could also have extorted the Virgin Islands from Denmark, but even the Hearst Newspapers would have had a difficult time conjuring stories about Danish atrocities.  “Defenseless Natives Expected to Eat Herring.”  “Children Taught to Spell Kierkegaard.”  No, we saved ourselves the embarrassment and just bought the damn islands.

In the course of a correspondence, a journalist told me that I was loquacious and bemusing.  Only half of her Ivy League education was wasted; she does know the meaning of “loquacious.”  Of course, I was too polite (or craven) to correct her; besides, in ten years or so, she may yet be right about bemusing.  But in the meantime….

What is the definition of “bemuse”:

a.  To confuse or baffle

b.  To  reflect on the humor of a situation

c.  To inspire Rimsky-Korsakov to compose the music for “The Green Hornet”

For the last three hundred years, the dictionary has insisted that the answer is “a”.  However, in the next edition the answer is likely to be “b.”  Language is inherently democratic.  If the majority of people misuses a word, the error becomes the correct definition.  Did you “voice” in the last election?  No, you voted–because a 15th century clerk confused the Latin words “vox” (voice) and “votium (vow), and the mistake proved popular.

And now bemuse is evolving into a synonym for amuse.  It is an effortless error.  Just by appearance, the word looks like “be amused.”  And, ironically, when correctly used, bemuse is still easy to mistake.  In today’s New York Times, a story described a midwesterner as “bemused by the situation in Washington.”  So Washington is baffling, the baffling can be ridiculous, and the ridiculous can be funny.  Ma and Pa Kettle are rarely confused with Noel Coward, yet we just transmuted a puzzled bumpkin into a wry cynic.

It is all quite bemusing.

And when we demean meaning, are we making it kinder?

When the Old Hollywood tampered with the classics, it was to simplify and cheer them up.  Hamlet and Ophelia lived happily ever after!  Now, however, literature can’t be complicated enough for films.  Perhaps you could show the cold, hungry servants in “Pride and Prejudice.”  That would be historically accurate–but that  is an insufficient challenge to the director.  No, how about recreating “Pride and Prejudice” as if Emily Bronte had written it. You could have a bedraggled, blowzy Elizabeth Bennet showing her disapproval of burly Mr. Darcy by beating to death a cow.  If you think that I am joking, then you must have missed the 2005 film with Keira Knightley.  (The bovinicide may be my slight exaggeration.)

The idea of swapping authors turned out to be trend–or at least a contractual demand by Ms. Knightley.  She is now starring as “Anna Karenina”–at least the version that Anton Chekhov and Samuel Beckett would have written.  In this version, the Revolution is imminent and the story is set on a stage.  And here is a scene…

Anna:  Shall we make passionate love or just stare at the samovar?

Vronsky:  I wonder who will kill us first: the peasants or the audience.

Boris Pasternak:  This actually is how I wrote “Doctor Zhivago.”

Anna:  Yes, the movie was more interesting than your book.

Boris:  I could say the same about the first five versions of “Anna Karenina”.

Vronsky:  But not this one!

Boris:  But not this one….

Anna:  Let’s stare at the samovar.

Now we have to worry about the next transauthor interpretation.  How about John Le Carre’s “Wind in the Willows”?  Who is the Mole in MI6?  Since this is LeCarre, it probably is everyone but Mr. Mole.  (No, we can still trust Mr. Toad; he never learned anything at Cambridge.)  But there is not really a good role here for Ms. Knightley, although she certainly could pass herself off as one of the willows.

However, I can see her as one of the repressed daughters in an Edwardian family, eager to partake of the sensuous delights allowed her rakehell brother.  In fact, we are overdue for the D.H. Lawrence version of “Peter Rabbit”.

I donated blood today.  When asked if I had syphilis or gonorrhea, I was actually flattered.  I am at that stage of life when all my appendages may be a bit arthritic.  Then there were the demographic questions.  I was asked my race.  I identified myself as “Caucasian unless you are really, really Anti-Semitic.”  Mel Gibson says we are “sorta Asiatic.”  You can imagine Genghis Cohen ransacking the dim sums of China.

My irreverence did not seem to disqualify me as a donor.  However, I may have been deliberately consigned to the clumsiest member of Life Source,  My leech must have been a graduate of the Mengele School of Acupuncture.  Perhaps I was lucky that she could find my left arm.  While I am not familiar with the rules of Mumbly Peg, I apparently was the board. I don’t know what St. Sebastian said during his blood donation, but I was disappointingly trite.  At the point where I could no longer ignore the excavation in my arm, I exclaimed, “Ouch.”

There goes my reputation for wit.  “Ouch” was the best I could offer?  Not, “You may be rushing the autopsy” or “I am ready to sign the confession” or “Let me know when you reach China”  or “Is this the third act of Julius Caesar?”  I didn’t even think of a traditional American response of swearing and punching her out.  No, I betrayed my image, profession and country with a tediously polite “Ouch.”

Fortunately, I am not Japanese; so this is not a suicide note.  I will endure my disgrace by wolfing down what is left of the Halloween candy.

And let’s remember the historic significance of this day:

Veterans Day

Florida election officials concede that there may have some degree of error in disqualifying all the state’s Afro-American voters.  A spokesman for the Governor agreed that all three million people probably weren’t convicted felons, and that having an overdue book from the library is rarely a felony.  There was further doubt that all three million Afro-Americans would simultaneously have taken out a copy of “Gone With the Wind.”  The governor office’s will look into the problem.

There also were electoral problems for the state’s Hispanic community.  Although the ballots were bilingual, the second language turned out to be Middle English.  When asked if the Governor’s office had confused Chaucer with Cervantes, the official response was “As if a real American would care?”  Hispanic-Americans were further confronted with onerous I.D. requirements.  As proof of residency, prospective voters were asked to show land grants from Charles V.

Once again, voters in Miami Beach had problems with the design of the ballots.  Election officials had no idea why this year’s ballots were shaped like swastikas.  “Maybe we were trying to save on paper.  You’d think those people would appreciate being stingy.”

Governor Romney is predicted to receive 200 percent of Florida’s vote.

Meanwhile in Ohio, in accordance with the Secretary of State’s most recent ruling, certain voters may be required to prove their identity by singing “Camptown Races”.

Hello, I’m Bob Schieffer and I welcome you to the third and last of our presidential debates.  Tonight our topic is Foreign Policy.  My first question for the candidates is this:  “What is America’s role in the world?”

We will start with Governor Romney.

Romney:  I want to agree with the accomplishments of this administration because they were all my ideas in the first place.  Killing Osama, the Marshall Plan, I am glad that I could help.  But now let’s talk about the President’s failures.  I have met bellhops around the world… Anne kids me about slumming, but it really makes them feel better especially after she has slapped them…And I have been seriously alarmed by the worldwide contempt for our current tax policies.  I remember a  maid in Paris–the George V, of course–just sobbing, ‘How can America be so ungrateful and cruel to its job creators?”  I am pretty sure that was what she was saying in French.  And I have heard the same heartfelt sentiment in Chinese, Indian and Swiss.

At the same time in these last four years, we have seen the rise of Islam in the Middle East.  Egypt and Iran are now Moslem countries.  How could you have let this happen, Mr. President.  I can promise you that when I am President, I will show my support for Israel by naming a new aircraft carrier for Bea Arthur.

We also have to stand up to China, and we can start–my fellow Americans–by boycotting P.F. Chang’s or at least not leaving tips.

Iran is our greatest threat, so I intend to acquire the country in a leveraged buyout and drive it into bankruptcy.  Bain Capital can do the same thing as Alexander the Great, and without the homosexual stuff.

Obama:  I would list the successes of this administration but apparently I was plagiarizing Governor Romney.  So let me tell you the foreign policy of our second term.  I will be doing an apology tour  for everything that he just said.

Announcing the solution to questionable electoral counts, Diebold Corporation will produce “pre-voted” ballots for every citizen. Corporate spokesman Eugene Finerman explained the advantages of the new system. “First, the convenience is obvious. You won’t have to go to the polls because Diebold has done it for you. Furthermore, each ballot is custom-designed to anticipate exactly how you would vote. Working with Comcast and AT&T, we know your political tendencies from your monitored phone calls and internet visits. For example, none of my YouTube selections is less than 40 years old and I only download heterosexual pornography, so Diebold has cast my vote for Mitt Romney.”

Voters will have a chance to read how they voted by going to Diebold’s website. It should be up within a week of the election. If a person is dissatisfied with his specific ballot, he can call customer service.

What made me a Jeopardy champion?  Was I an extraterrestrial or a mutant with super powers? Washington University–or at least its Psychology Department–wanted to know.  So I was invited to an all-expense paid interrogation to St. Louis.   Once I was assured that the tests would not require any surgery or involuntary breeding programs, I agreed to be a guinea pig.  Being the center of attention, how could a devout megalomaniac refuse.

My flight from Chicago was undramatic.  Despite being American Airlines, there were no unscheduled fires and the plane landed with no missing engines or passengers.  Awaiting me at the airport was a Hollywood moment.  You know the scene where a chauffeur is holding up a sign with the name of his passenger?  It happens to Richard Gere’s characters all the time, but now it was happening to me.  Let the pampering begin!   Of course, the Psych Department was also being practical.  It did not want me lost and wandering around the airport, accosting strangers with unsolicited lectures on the actual St. Louis.  “You know he actually was King Louis IX, and his sanctity far surpassed his competence....”  A chauffeur would still be cheaper than bail. 

My savior and chauffeur was a charming young staff member of the department.  (I should add that everyone was young compared to me.)   Of course, she was delighted to meet me.  Under most circumstances, I am an appealing alternate to grading freshmen’s papers or feeding lab rats.  I was driven to the campus, where I found the buildings to be a directory of Missouri philanthropists.  Danforth here, Olin there, and–need I add–Busch this and that.  I was staying at a guest center named for a publishing magnate. 

But I wouldn’t be eating there.  Reservations had already been made at some of St. Louis’ finest restaurants.  The grad students were eager to take me to lunch and dinner.  Was it my inordinate charm and the remnants of good looks?  No, the department was picking up the tabs, and my “hosts” could enjoy quail and wine instead of their usual post-grad diet of ramen noodles and Mountain Dew.  Being a conscientious guinea pig, I refrained from any alcohol.  To be honest, I am the type who would rather have two desserts than two cocktails.  And wine lists intimidate me; the sommelier hates my request for a wine most like soda pop.

So I probably was quite a dull guest.  My Saturday night hosts must have thought so.  The itinerary of these two lads took us past a number of St. Louis casinos and clubs.  Of course, they would never suggest that we venture into such dens of debauchery; but if I had suggested it, my hosts would have been too polite to refuse.  However disappointed, my guides did comply with my deviation:  to make a pilgrimage to Ted Drews, the legendary frozen custard stand of St. Louis.

Of course, you want to know about the tests.  Alas, because of research confidentiality I cannot tell you.  If it is any consolation, you are not missing much.   I don’t know if I helped advance mankind’s understanding of “cognitive functions”, and I certainly disabused them of the hope that I was a X-Man.  (Really, what would my Super Power be:  the ability to turn any situation into a drawing room comedy.)   But I certainly enjoyed being a guinea pig. If Washington U is willing to subsidize further audiences with me, it might want to test me for Asperger’s Syndrome.   Jeopardy champs could have it.

October 9, 1003: Leif Erikson Lands in North America and Earns a Holiday in Minnesota

The Vikings are notorious for their vices, but they apparently possessed one fatal virtue: hygiene. Whether it was their fondness for saunas or the antiseptic cold of Greenland, the Vikings’ cleanliness ruined their chance to colonize North America. Starting with Leif Erikson in 1003, the Norse attempted to settle “Vinland.” Of course, the original inhabitants objected but the Vikings were never shy about other people’s property. Beyond their extrovert personalities, the Norse also had the tactical advantages of iron and steel armaments. The native American arsenal was still in the stone age. Nonetheless, the sheer number of the natives (Skraeling was the Viking name for them) made the prospect of slaughtering them rather demoralizing. And the Vikings’ damn hygiene eliminated the most effective weapon for depopulation: disease.

The Norse had nothing to infect their opponents.  Even their livestock was healthy. The “Skraelings” would have had no resistance to European germs; measles would have been a fatal plague. The Vikings then could have had Vinland to themselves. Just imagine how history would have changed: North America could have been one vast Minnesota. But the Vikings were too clean to succeed.

The Skraelings had a 500-year reprieve before they were introduced to the Spanish, French, English and small pox.

According to the Jewish calendar, the world just had its birthday and is a sprightly 5773 years old.  Yes, God is lying about His age.  Of course, He might want to look younger than Sheldon Adelson.  But it is more than just vanity.  God hates admitting mistakes: His first attempts at Chosen People. 

The Trilobites proved to be such a disappointment; two hundred million years of just swimming.  The dinosaurs at least were entertaining–for the first 150 million years; but mutating into canaries was rather anticlimatic.  As for the Neanderthals, they just weren’t bright enough for 600 dietary laws–constantly mixing milk and mastodon. 

Finally, some 5700 years ago, God posted Himself on J-Date:  “Deity, with undeniable quirks, interested in monogamous relationship.  Can’t promise you Heaven but how about some sand dunes on the Eastern Mediterranean?”

And we have been going steady ever since.