A Rude Awakening at an Office Party

I was taken aback! I dare say I was appalled!

Tonight I attended an office Christmas party after work. We gathered at a restaurant and someone had a game for us to play.

Now I need to remind you that having grown up in the Bible-belt and being firmly ensconced in a church setting most of my life - most of my acquaintance with party games were in that "church" setting. I don't really regret that, it's just that most of my experience with party games has been that type that worked more like a practical joke with one person being the "brunt" of the joke.

Therefore I approach party-games with a very healthy sense of caution.

This game was fairly benign. It was one of those ice-breakers that forces you into "safe" conversations. We were to each find people in the room whose life experiences matched the ones described on a paper we were given. It was things like "Never saw a white Christmas" or "Re-gifted a Christmas gift last year".

Somewhere on that page, among those "safe" conversation starters lurked a hideous truth that I was not prepared to face.

It was a small group - less that twenty people. People that I work with every day - people I thought I knew pretty well.

One of the items on the page was the statement: "Has never seen 'It's a Wonderful Life!'"

As we were going over the responses as a group - someone polled the entire group...

Probably over one-third of that group had never seen "It's a Wonderful Life!". I could not believe it! And I couldn't believe they were so freely admitting it in that public forum.

No wonder our country is in the shape it's in when 33%+ of a random sample of fairly intelligent people had never seen the icon of holiday sentimentalism.

When I protested and expressed my disappointment in blustering terms - they just blew off my words as if it were no large concern.

"It's a Wonderful Life!" is - in my opinion - THE best holiday movie ever made. And it is right up there with "Casablanca" as possibly the best movie of all time.

The watching of this movie is almost a sacred rite that is observed with great care in our home each Christmas season.

It is typically the movie that I reserve for the week of Christmas to watch. I like to build up to it. We may start the season with "National Lampoon's: Christmas Vacation" or "A Christmas Story" or some other newer movie of little significance. As the season progresses we move to more solid Christmas fare like "Christmas in Connecticut", "White Christmas" and "Holiday Inn". Cary Grant's "The Bishop's Wife" and even it's less-than-two-decades-old counterpart - "The Preacher's Wife" might follow.

Finally, it is time for the main event. Some years, R. and I have saved it until Christmas Eve.

I do not believe I have missed a viewing of this movie more that two or three Christmases in the past 25 years.

When I first discovered this Frank Capra classic, I would catch bits and pieces of the movie - usually on Christmas Day.

I remember when I was struggling in the field of sales and felt the weight and pressure of poor performance - I could relate to George Bailey as he came home late night after night, trying to bear up under the pressure "Potter" was putting on him.

As I waived good-bye to my teenage years and moved fully into adulthood ... being a hopeless romantic ... I longed for love. I envied George Bailey whose heart was smitten by the faithful and loving Mary.

When I had finally broken free from the bondage of misspent career choices and had moved into the "bliss" of entrepreneurial enterprise - I empathized with George again as it looked like his business and all he had worked for was going away.

This movie has always had something for me.

Jimmy Stewart may not have been that great of an actor - but because of his "everyman" style - he always moves me; and he's my favorite.

Frank Capra, the movies' director, had a life changing experience in which he felt that God had challenged him to really say something worthwhile with his movies. So his movie trademarks are things like humor, large groups of family and friends, patriotism, a love for one's fellow man, and always a hopeful and happy ending.

That's why despite what many will call cheesy sentimentalism, this movie has a message. It's one of redemption, one of hope and an encouragement to those who have held fast to the challenge before them.

It is great wisdom couched in innocence.

You owe it to yourself to really stop for a couple of hours and soak in this movie.

And like George Bailey, you might find yourself looking back over this gift of adventure your life has been so far... and you could walk away thinking that it really has been a wonderful life.

Mr. Smith and Principled Journalism

Having raised the spectre of the superiority of old movies over new ones in my last post, I feel that I must do something to beat it back down. Therefore I offer another article on "Capra's America".

I will begin with a small clip from what may be my favorite Frank Capra movie (running neck and neck with "It's a Wonderful Life!"):




I've always been something of a late bloomer (still hopeful of blooming in some areas). In keeping with that pattern, I finally went back to get my Bachelors degree about 13 years after high school.

Whether those 13 years were wasted or not is a subject for another day, but I will say that I was probably better equipped in motivation and attitude at that point in my life than I was earlier.

Anyway, I learned alot, but two classes significantly marked my little college experience at what was then Kennesaw College: One was attending Newt Gingrich's first "Renewing American Civilization" class. The second was my "Organizational Behavior class.

Newt's class inspired me to continue to learn in countless ways, the Organizational Behavior class was significant because for the mid-term we watched the movie- "Bridge Over River Kwai" and for the final exam, we watched the movie - "The Sting". How great is that?!? We got to watch movies for the examinations! Of course, I was enjoying it so that I barely noticed that we had to answer difficult questions about the managerial and behavioral concepts that were modeled in the movies.

With that in mind, I would like to give a homework assignment to the readers of this blog: to find and watch the movie,"Mr. Smith Goes to Washington". I understand full well that I am "not the boss of you".

I just think this movie is one Americans need to see (my international readers may exempt the movie although it might be valuable to watch the movie and juxtapose it's concepts with the concepts espoused by our current President during his recent international "Apology Tour".

There are some things you need to know about old movies. They appear to be simplistic and "cheesy" to the casual observer, but I think that after several viewings, you will find that there is real depth here.

You may hear grown men - even public officials- using such terms as: "gee whiz!" and "gosh", maybe even one or two "darns". Just mentally replace those terms with your favorite profane terminology if you must, for "realism" sake.

Beneath all of the sentimental stuff is a rich story about a "bumpkin" with true ideals - ideals about what this country is REALLY made of. When this neophyte is selected to fill the unexpired term of an expired Senator - Jimmy Stewart (our hero) brings those ideals to Washington, DC.

There he comes face to face with arrogance and skepticism that is the face of Washington politics even today. He is mistreated by the press, he is mocked by his own staff and "handlers" and is generally taken advantage of.

If you can look past all the stuff that old movies are made of - stuff that I love - you will find a picture of "machine politics".

I believe it can be closely compared with the "Chicago-style, Machine politics" that we have in DC today... only less brutal.

Like most Frank Capra movies, this one has a real message to it. It gets me every time.

Jimmy Stewart says something in the movie about having "printer's ink" in his veins, because his Dad was a crusading newspaper man, losing his very life in a fight with some powerful opponents. "The lost causes are the only ones truly worth fighting for" he says.

With that in mind, let me wax both political and prophetic and make a prediction. Though the newspaper industry in America is basically done for, I believe that there are some journalist who went into that field for truly noble reasons. They truly believe in fighting for the little guy - the lost causes.

As our President sends out his minions to actually attack and demean legitimate news agencies, I believe that some of those very few true journalist will finally have enough.

I believe that they will realize that they have been duped and they will rise up with the mighty pen. They will make the stand even if they do not like the organization they are defending. Because it is a matter of principle - it's a matter of liberty.

I know that it appears that neither principle nor liberty are important any more to the majority of those "guardians of the public trust" - but deep down, when the fight seems all but lost ...

just maybe, someone will rise up.

Lost causes: the only ones truly worth fighting for.

Capra's America: Tea Party Participants - Meet John Doe

Well they did it!

The People took to the streets today in droves in protest of goofy taxation.

I did not attend because I have a job (still) and that is the biggest reason that you don't often see a lot of people protesting things like high taxes and regressive economic policies - because the people that are against those things are too busy working to keep the country going.

But I am proud that it was a true grass roots effort, and I am proud of the people that attended... proud of those that sacrificed a vacation day; proud of the veterans who took a rare opportunity to speak out - when they fought to maintain the freedom for folks to do that; I was proud of the children and the parents that brung them (that misspelling is intentional).

I heard today, that in Springfield, Tennessee, the town held a Tax Day Tea Party and they wouldn't allow politicians to speak... when one tried, he was booed off the stage.

That's rich!

It put me in mind of a Frank Capra movie - Meet John Doe. I am using the occasion of that thought to launch a recurring series on Capra's America. You know, I am of the opinion that if we put the entire nation on a steady diet of Frank Capra pictures for about a month, we would see the whole nation turn around.

Anyway, in Meet John Doe, Barbara Stanwyck plays a street-wise reporter who is fired after a hostile takeover of her newspaper. She submits her last column but makes it all up. It's a story about a "John Doe" who is fed up with all the corruption in politics and the state of the world... he vows to leap off city hall in protest on Christmas Eve.

Well, as the story proceeds, she finds herself in the catbird seat and the newspaper is begging her to come back. She confesses the deception and convinces them to find a guy to be "John Doe" and play the story out.

Gary Cooper, a down-on-his-luck baseball player agrees to play the role of John Doe and using speeches written by Stanwyck about the glory of this experiment that is America - they launch a national campaign of John Doe Clubs. It literally sweeps the nation.

It's a wonderful story about community, loving your neighbor, and the American way.

In one scene John Doe finds himself in a small town courthouse, the people pour in to see him. The leader of the local John Doe Club tells numerous stories of how people began connecting and helping each other. And the mayor who is listening intently, chimes in - "well how come you never invited me to your John Doe Clubs?"... "no offense, Mayor," comes the reply "but we said from the start that we wouldn't allow any politicians to join."

I was reminded today, that that is the beauty of these Tax Day Protests - that they are strictly the people. Even though most of the national media - newspapers and network news outlets - ignored the story the protests went on.

Even though Mr. Obama's Department of Homeland Security released a strategically timed report warning law officials to be wary of "right-wing fanatical types" the Tea Parties continued.

Why? because it was the People that drove them.
And that's the thing that will keep America great - the People.