Bernie's Blog

Ireland by Rail

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, September 25, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

Compared to the United States, Ireland is not a terribly advanced country. Parts of it are. Major cities, notably Dublin, have excellent roads and striking (but not very tall) modern buildings and sports venues that compare with the best we have. This alongside churches and castles that go back centuries, and at least one bar where the Vikings used to enjoy a taste.
 
Out in the country, however, there are places where you are back in the 1800s, with lanes so narrow that cars cannot pass without one pulling off the hard surface. But then those areas do not have that many cars either. But in one respect, even in rural areas, Ireland sets an example that should be followed in the U.S. Its public transportation is outstanding. Most of the people attending the Notre Dame-Navy game in September arrived on a rapid transit system that compares with the best in this country. You can’t get to the former Joe Robbie Stadium like that.
 
But what really is impressive is the intercity train system. It connects Dublin with the major cities in all directions, and is a model of what Florida should have, and might someday when the plans for a Miami-Orlando train become reality, and when Tri-Rail eventually switches service to the Florida East Coast tracks. The Irish trains are sleek, comfortable and run on time. They look like the bullet trains of Europe and Asia. But they run on tracks that go back to the earliest days of railroads – not the tremendously expensive systems that bullet trains require.
 
Our first ride was from Dublin north to Belfast, where there is a connection at the same station to a train to Derry, but the last leg of that journey was out of service as the track is being modernized. After a few days in Donegal, the land of the family ancestors, we headed to Galway. This trip was by bus, for Donegal is lightly populated, and does not warrant a train. From Galway it was back to Dublin.
 
These trains are fast by U.S. standards. Except for the Northeast Corridor, our trains are limited to 79 miles per hour.  In Ireland we clocked on an iPhone speeds over 90 miles an hour, and consistently in the 70s. And even with stops every 15 miles or so, the trips were quick. The railroads, though dating back to the 1800s, have few grade crossings, and hardly any in urban areas. The 106-mile ride from Dublin to Belfast (with a dozen stops) took a bit over two hours, and the scenery was so spectacular you almost wished it were longer. From Galway to Dublin, 129 miles, it was two hours and a half. And that was with eight stops along the way. 
 
Who needs to go any faster than that for short distances? For comparison, an Irish-style train from Fort Lauderdale to Palm Beach, with stops in Boca and Delray Beach, would take about 45 minutes. Some days you can spend that much time just getting to I-95 and back to the downtowns.  And this is without the enormous cost of building a new system. It would be necessary to eliminate some grade crossings, especially in our cities along the route, but that cost is minimal compared to constructing a new system to accommodate bullet trains.
 
When it comes to getting from town to town, the New World has much to learn from the Old.
Dressing For Success

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, September 18, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

Many were pleased by the Miami Dolphins' impressive 35-13 victory over the Oakland Raiders Sunday. What pleased us even more was that the two teams were dressed virtually identical to what they would have worn 40 years ago, when the Dolphins became the only undefeated team in NFL history. This is called tradition, and it counts. If it does not count, why are the Dolphins making such a fuss about the anniversary of that memorable team?
 
Back to the present. The Dolphins came out in all white. One could see Griese, Zonk, Mercury and – a personal favorite – Dr. Doug Swift, suited up in uniforms that only a real uniform freak (who notices socks) could distinguish from the suits of 1972. The Dolphins wear all white about as elegantly as any team. God only knows why in recent years they have often been wearing green pants. Those pants give the opposition seven points right out of the locker room.
 
As for the Raiders, with their basic silver hats and pants and unadorned black jerseys, they could have been the team that Ken Stabler led in some memorable games of that era. The setting reeked of nostalgia. And the Dolphins played like they thought they were the 1972 team.
 
It is not often noted, but the Dolphins have a rare advantage in uniforms that they often do not exploit. Most teams at home wear their color. The Dallas Cowboys are a conspicuous exception. But – and the warm weather explains this – the Dolphins usually wear white at home. That not only feels cooler by reflecting heat, it looks cooler. Of course, that gives the opponents a chance to look good, as the Raiders did, in their intimidating black. But when the Dolphins wear all white, things balance out, and they usually have their guests outdressed. And on the road they can usually wear white, which they sometimes ruin with those stupid green pants.
 
This idea about the importance of uniforms goes back to the days when we used to cut out full-page pictures of stars from SPORT magazine. Our favorite unforms, and it’s all we really liked about the sport, were the hockey outfits, mainly because there was so much to them, and this was before they went to helmets and face shields. It was a sharp contrast with baseball. It was a time when half the baseball teams wore either dark blue or black hats. And everybody wore white at home and gray on excursions. There wasn’t much color in those suits, except for the stockings, and then style practically did away with that charming bit of lower body color.
 
Among the black hats of that era were the Philadelphia Phillies.  A few years later they went to red and blue caps, and then red with pin stripes in their home uniforms, and then occasionally back to red and blue caps and sometimes those junior high colored jerseys.  Most baseball teams wear those jerseys from time to time, and the reason, it seems, is money. Some fans will buy anything their team wears. Thus we see Yankees hats in red and other disgusting examples of monetary policy.
 
To a real fan, uniforms count. Notre Dame courted disaster in pre-season when it displayed novelty helmets, a nauseating gold on one side, dark blue on the other. Not as bad as Boise State, but close. The reaction of Irish fans was immediate. Alumni threatened to burn down the Golden Dome. So far this season the Notre Dame management has listened to reason and stuck to their traditional outfits, which are all business, few stripes. Is is just a coincidence that they are 3-0?
Reflections on 9/11

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, September 11, 2012 2 Comment(s)

I may have been the last person in the world – certainly the last in our office – to realize that two planes running into the Twin Towers was a terrorist act. I recall thinking that it was an amazing coincidence that on a clear day two planes could strike the towers within minutes. It was not obvious immediately that these planes were commercial airliners, and I wondered if air controllers had gone crazy.

 

 
There is a reason for this, and nobody else watching the office TV that day would know it. And that reason is that I was the only one old enough to remember the morning in 1945 when a B-25 bomber crashed in a fog into the Empire State Building. It seemed an impossible event at the time, and that is what jumped into mind at the sight of the towers spewing smoke. It wasn’t until – and this came very quickly – that the attack on the Pentagon was announced that it became clear this was no freak accident.
 
Reflecting 10 years later, the events of 9/11 have had consequences far beyond the immediate tragedy, and even the continuing pain of people coming down with disease as a result to the exposure to dust that fateful day. It also led to two conflicts, in Iraq and Afghanistan, which have taken many lives, and continue to do so as we write. In the context of a political campaign, these wars are being linked to the economic troubles of the recent decade, and the Bush administration is being blamed for wrecking the economy and in the process creating civil strife in the Middle East that seems to have no end.
 
In a way, that criticism, coming mostly from Democrats, seems as unfair as the Republicans blaming President Obama for not magically curing the ills that he clearly did not create, and which his attempts to remedy have been blocked by political opponents at every turn. What one tends to forget is that when the Bush administration went to war, there was not only a sense of urgency among most of us to strike back at whoever attacked us, but also seemingly credible information that Iraq had something to do with it.
 
After all, Saddam Hussein had already attacked a neighbor and thrown the Middle East into turmoil. And if our leadership thought the man had weapons of mass destruction, it is well to remember he had already used such weapons against people in his own country. Furthermore, that dictator did a pretty good job of acting as if it possessed such weapons. Recall the protracted efforts by inspectors to gain access to sites where we thought such weapons could be found. It certainly seemed at the time that Iraq had something to hide, and the U.S. certainly was under self-imposed pressure to hit somebody, and hit hard.
 
And that we did, and now we see the consequences, which include a national division and political parties which routinely accuse each other of deceit. Sept. 11 was a terrible thing, and it unified a nation. Unfortunately, not for long.

 

Playing for the Jersey

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, September 04, 2012 No Comment(s)

CARRIGART, COUNTY DONEGAL, IRELAND – Many thought that the mysterious University of Notre Dame was located in a remote part of Indiana. However, just last weekend researchers found that the school is actually located in a section of Dublin, Ireland, known as Temple Bar. There were 35,000 Americans in Dublin last weekend, the vast majority of whom were from or associated with Notre Dame, and the vast majority of them were waking up to headaches after spending the pre-game celebration in a neighborhood that has a bar every 50 feet. In fairness, Navy fans were also seen: a guess is about five ND for every Navy person. It is said to be the largest group of Yanks to come over for a weekend event since World War II.

Notre Dame played Navy Saturday and, praised be to the saints, destroyed the Middies, 50-10. More important in this economy, it is estimated that this event generated 100 million euros for the Irish economy. Few of the fans came over for game day. Almost all turned it into an Ireland tour. Anthony Travel, a company that does travel for Notre Dame, brought 2,000 people when the Irish first played Navy here in 1996. This time they brought 10,000. As a result, people wearing Irish hats, shirts, jackets and Joe Montana’s No. 3 jersey have infested the entire country – the victors are everywhere, in Galway, in Cork, in Killarney, even here in dear old Donegal. We thought we had finally shaken them in Belfast, but today in the McNutt tweed shop we ran into Joe Dougherty, whose Philadelphia accent could be identified at 10 paces. At least by a fellow Yank. The native Irish can always spot an American accent, but most can’t tell Texas from Brooklyn.

The game, although not close, was a memorable spectacle. The entire brigade of Midshipmen marched in, as in the Army-Navy game ceremony, and the famous Notre Dame band, only at half strength because it only brought upperclassmen, put in a splendid halftime show. The local Irish, some of who were in the audience, were impressed. Yanks were vocally proud of their kinsmen on both sides.

An Irish cab driver pointed out that the Gaelic football finals were on the same weekend, but he knew something unusual was happening because he had been driving people wearing Notre Dame colors for several days. He said the Gaelic footballers were all amateurs; they had jobs and just played for local pride.

“They play for the jersey,” he said. He asked if the American lads got paid. We explained that they got scholarships, but they weren’t paid, depending on what dirty program they worked for, but they used the publicity to get professional contracts. But on the college level, most of them also played for the jersey.

“And isn’t that just fair,” he said.

 

We said surely it was indeed and took off, mostly by train, to show Mark McCormick, an ND alum, a bit of the country from which most of his ancestors left years back. The first at sea was Hugh McNeales in 1835. Where we write may be within walking distance of his birth place. That is if you are willing to walk a few days, which is what most did in that era. If you walk, you have time to figure out the road signs, which are both in English, a language familiar to many Americans, and the old Gaelic, which few in Ireland can speak. The reason for this, we learned, is that a labor union called Erin Lispach dun ballystuffing mischt giblets con sinaghe, 42, Aidan MacSuibhne, schante boyo (translation: Irish Sign Painters and Typesetters Union 42, Aidan Sweeney, president) insisted on keeping Gaelic signs alive because it gives twice as much work to the lads. Gaelic, like German, is about three times as long as English. Which is why the only kind thing the English ever did for the Irish was coax them, sometimes at the point of a bayonet, out of their language.

Most of the people we met from Notre Dame had not been to Ireland before. The game presented the perfect opportunity to fill that void and watch their team at the same time. The Irish are on to something. They have also declared 2013 the year of the gathering of the clans.They won’t have a football game as a draw, but maybe they can have a battle as of old. And enjoy the old tongue.

Garda O’Gallehobbair dice bruscar baile nu tacsaithe con coras iampair et lady gaga un gibberish Gaelic a dheanamh Nahcht Domino pizza.

Translation: Gallagher the cop says they don’t speak Gaelic at Notre Dame.

And that’s no blarney.

My friend, Gaet

by Bernard McCormick Friday, August 31, 2012 1 Comment(s)


It was the fall of 1961, and through a football coach I was covering in Chester, Pa., I connected with an Army Reserve unit. It was just in time. I was one of those six-monthers on active duty in the late ’50s, and I had an eight-year Reserve obligation, which I had largely ignored for a year. But this was a perfect setup, a civil affairs company that was headed by a state senator, loaded with professional types. I figured I was a natural for the company public information guy, but the slot was already taken by Lt. Gaeton Fonzi.

Fonzi seemed like a quiet guy, and I was told he had some kind of journalism background. He worked for a business magazine. I had never heard of it but that changed a month or so later when I saw a reprint of something he had written. If memory serves me right, the lead was “Chester is a city which doesn’t give a damn.” That article not only got my attention; it changed my life. Over the next several years the obscure magazine Fonzi worked for morphed into Philadelphia Magazine, which rocked that city month after month and in effect invented the city- magazine concept, which is now all over the country. Fonzi wrote most of the powerful articles that made that happen.

Among his scores was an exposé on a crooked reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer who used his reputation as the publisher’s hatchet man to shake down numerous businesses, including the city’s largest bank. That article made Time Magazine and many papers, including The New York Times. He followed that up with articles that became a book about the publisher, Walter Annenberg – the most powerful man in Philadelphia. Shortly thereafter, Annenberg sold the Inquirer to Knight Newspapers. Many think Fonzi embarrassed him to the point that he left town.

And it was in Philadelphia that Fonzi first wrote about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The local angle was Arlen Specter, then an assistant district attorney in Philadelphia, later a longtime U.S. senator. Specter was the man who came up with the “single bullet theory,” which was the only way the Warren Commission could conclude that Lee Harvey Oswald alone murdered a president. Fonzi was amazed that Specter could not explain his own theory, and how the physical evidence so blatantly contradicted the lone assassin conclusion. His work was one of the first challenges to the Warren Commission. Important people in Philadelphia read it. More on that a bit later.

Impressed by the magazine’s extraordinary growth, I signed on in 1965. Five years later, when it was obvious regional magazines were catching on everywhere, Fonzi and I formed a company to buy Gold Coast in Fort Lauderdale. He moved down in 1972. After serving as editor of Miami Magazine, which we sold, Fonzi was contacted by Sen. Richard Schweiker of Pennsylvania. Schweiker was reopening an investigation into JFK’s death. He remembered Fonzi’s Philadelphia Magazine work and contacted him to work in South Florida, checking into CIA connections with anti-Castro elements. Schweiker suspected Lee Harvey Oswald was an intelligence operative. Fonzi all but proved it, discovering through a Miami Cuban that a high-ranking CIA man had been seen with Oswald in Dallas before the assassination. This information came despite efforts by known CIA people – Watergate burglar Frank Sturgis was one of them – to waste his time and the government’s money on wild goose chases.

That CIA discovery got Fonzi an extended job in Washington, five years in all, which ended with a House subcommittee report that the murder of JFK was a conspiracy, but left the conspirators vague. Fonzi, who wrote much of that report, did not think it was vague, but wasn’t permitted to say so. He was convinced that if the CIA did not murder Kennedy, it went to great lengths to cover up the true nature of the crime. He wrote in effect a dissenting opinion, which first appeared in this magazine, and 14 years later became a book, The Last Investigation. It has been cited by virtually every serious researcher ever since, and the work is one of the main reasons that most people today do not believe a lone nut killed a president.

In Florida, Fonzi continued to contribute to his legacy as a remarkable investigative reporter and exceptional stylist. He wrote a three-part series on the Ivy-League-developer-turned-drug-runner, Ken Burnstine, who was killed in a mysterious plane crash while scheduled to testify against numerous South Florida people in a federal case. He had turned informant after being arrested. It had been reported that Burnstine had faked his death; Fonzi proved otherwise, but also suggested he may have been murdered to keep him quiet.

Then there was the case of three South Florida people who disappeared after having financial contact with a notorious con man. The con man was supposed to be in jail, but Fonzi learned through Fort Lauderdale police sources that the con man was being used in a sting operation by the FBI in Chicago. Fonzi broke the story in Miami Magazine and then took it to Chicago, and later New York. It involved payoffs to big-time politicians for contracts to collect parking tickets. The borough president of Queens committed suicide. Columnist Jimmy Breslin called it one of the biggest scandals in his long career in the Big Apple.

Any one of these stories would make a memorable career for most magazine writers. Gaeton Fonzi wrote all these and many more, some was funny and his serious stuff was serious. His last works were two articles he contributed to a book I am soon to publish on the history of the city/regional magazines. He managed to do this work while suffering from Parkinson’s disease, which finally took him on Thursday. There are a dozen writers featured in the book. All are good. He was the best.

 

 

 

 
Special Report From The BLOW Channel

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, August 28, 2012 No Comment(s)

Good evening, weather watchers. This is a special BLOW Channel report. We have five Miami politicians gathered to tell you that the approaching storm is not coming at us and isn’t very strong anyway. But we all want to warn you to stay tuned to the BLOW Channel so we can let our politicians get some exposure and update you on the storm that isn’t going to hit us. Also this may be their last opportunity to appear on television before they’re indicted.

Meanwhile, here is a report from our new Doper radar. Doper radar is unique to the BLOW Channel in that other radars have a delay of seven minutes. Doper radar is not only showing you what is happening now, it also shows you what is not happening. See on this screen where there are no color bands moving in circles. That’s County Mayo in Ireland and there’s nothing happening there. But if you look over here to my left, actually it’s my right, it’s your left. I think I’m right. Anyway you see the bands circulating. The pink blobs are heavy rain, the green ones are winds blowing palm trees.

Now see this little yellow swirly dot? That’s a palm tree in front of 275 W. 388th St., and it’s being blown by the wind. Oh. ... What? ... Oh, sorry, that’s not a palm tree. That’s a black olive. And it’s... what’s that? ... Oh, sorry, the tree on his 389th St. So you folks up in Hollywood are going to be hit in about 30 seconds by a squall that may have mini squalls in it. See, now it’s 25 seconds, now it’s 20. Do you feel it up there? Did the wind blow your umbrella upside out? Now you people out near 441 should be feeling this in about seven minutes. So make sure you take your umbrellas down.

And now one of our politicians wants to warn you that the storm that’s not coming is not coming, but stay tuned and be sure to vote for him and don’t pay any attention if you see his name connected to the voter fraud that’s been all over the news. The fact that the 6,000 absentee ballots were all in his wife’s name has nothing to do with the storm that’s now missing the Florida Keys and will miss us by more 100 purple blobs and at least 35 green ones.

We just got the 7 o’clock update on the storm that’s not coming. It still isn’t coming, but this storm is very unpredictable and we want you to stay tuned to the BLOW Channel. Now here are the possible tracks the storm may take. You see how big it is. This graph which looks like celery stalks shows the various models and how many places this huge storm may not be coming. What’s that? ... Oh, sorry. ... I’m told those are not celery stalks, they’re rhubarb. Do you think the rain will hurt the rhubarb? Heh. Heh. Couldn’t resist a little levity there.

But this is really serious, because if it isn’t you might turn us off and venture out and try to go surfing before the winds that aren’t coming die down. And we are going to bring in five more politicians. The five who were here just got arrested. You can see this white streaky thing with the blue stripes. That’s the police van taking them to jail. But don’t worry, we’ll have five more here any minute. There’s nothing that brings out the weatherman in a politician like a good storm that isn’t coming.

Oh, I’m just told that this orange blob that’s moving so fast toward the Palmetto is a young woman whose umbrella did not collapse and took off with her hanging on. That’s why we want you to stay tuned. And here’s a report from up north. A palm frond fell off a tree in Fort Pierce. That shows how big this storm is, and even though it’s not coming, it could still be dangerous. We’ll be back with the latest rhubarb stalks after this commercial.
Fang – For Five Bucks A Gag

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, August 21, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

We only saw Phyllis Diller live on one occasion. It seems not very long ago she worked a bash in Palm Beach. She was very good. That night, and last night when her death was reported, we thought of Gene Perret. Back in the 1960s we had graduated from the sports department to a general column at The Delaware County Daily Times, a suburban Philadelphia newspaper then located in Chester. A reader named Gene Perret called one day and said he found the column amusing, and asked that we check out his standup comedy routine. He was at the time working as a technical writer for General Electric, and comedy was a sideline. He invited us to see him work at a local Polish American Club, or something like that. The young man’s performance that night was intriguing. His material was funny, but the audience reacted only mildly.
 
When he asked what we thought of his routine, we were honest. The material was good, we said, but standup work did not seem to be his calling. We added that we could almost hear somebody like Bob Hope telling the same jokes and destroying the house. He told us that in fact he was trying to break into the big time writing jokes for established comedy figures. He had already done stuff for Phyllis Diller. He said he got five bucks a gag.
 
“That’s my ambition,” he said, “to write for Bob Hope.” He also gave us a short course in gag writing. Gags are different from humorous story telling, the kind of thing Mark Twain, and more recently Dave Barry and Jimmy Breslin specialized in. A gag, he explained, consists of three parts. First there’s a premise, then there’s a setup line, and then you flip the thing and people laugh. It sounded simple, like flipping pancakes, but making it work is more art than science. Most of Phyllis Diller’s and Bob Hope’s jokes were virtually one-liners.
 
Bob Hope came to Chester at about that time. “We had a great flight into Philadelphia,” he said. “I wanted to fly United. But the stewardess wouldn’t go for it.”
 
We left the newspaper for magazine work, and it seemed only a few years later (it was actually 1969) that we heard Gene Perret was working for Bob Hope. It was the beginning of a relationship that continued until Hope retired in his mid-90s. For the last 15 years he was the lead writer on Hope’s staff. And along the way Gene Perret became one of the best behind-the-scenes men in TV comedy, writing and producing stuff to divert us from the trials of life. In addition to Phyllis Diller and Bob Hope, his bio lists many of the most famous comedy shows and performers of our time. "Laugh-In," Bill Cosby, "All in the Family," Carol Burnett. The list is long. He won three Emmys.
 
And he wasn’t always behind the scenes. His success made him a sought-after speaker and we saw him a few times as a guest on the late-night shows. And the man who did not seem terribly funny years before at the Polish American Club made us laugh out loud. He must have gotten a better writer.
Better Late Than Never

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, August 14, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

There was a time when if a reporter wanted to talk to a source at the Florida East Coast Railway, it would take a week or two for a return call, and when it came it was from the president of the railroad. He was a crusty old bastard, likeable through his bluntness. “Nah, Mac, we are a freight line. We don’t want passengers.” The FEC did not even have a PR guy.
 
That changed when the FEC was bought from St. Joe Paper Company, and is now in a third stage of ownership. What also changed was the current company’s attitude toward passenger trains on the tracks that Henry Flagler built to develop Florida.
 
A few years ago Hussein Cumber invited us to take a ride on a Florida East Coast freight train. His purpose was to point out the potential of the route for a passenger line. Cumber was a spokesman for the FEC at the time, and we told him he was preaching to the choir. Gold Coast magazine has been pushing this idea since the 1970s, and we have frequently written that Tri-Rail should switch some of its service to the more eastern tracks which cut through all the downtowns on Florida’s Atlantic coast.
 
Cumber left the FEC for some time with the Department of Transportation in Washington, but has returned to the FEC and was the man quoted in The Miami Herald last week announcing that the FEC, through its real estate division, plans a train from Miami to Orlando, which would not involve public money. Wow. There is hardly a passenger train anywhere which does not take government support. The reason for this historic move is obvious. It is a real estate play. Cumber’s announcement, released so subtly that the Sun-Sentinel did not even pick up the story, included a plan to take a 9-acre tract in downtown Miami (the location of its original passenger terminal) and turn it into a major development.
 
Our guess is that this is just the first move in a grand concept to redevelop the entire FEC line, positioning stations in Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach where the FEC owns land that can be developed into high rise buildings. Cumber said the FEC can make money on this train. Doubtful. Unless you count real estate.
 
And when you count real estate, start thinking New York’s Madison Square Garden, built above the underground tracks of Penn Station, or Penn Center in Philadelphia, blocks of what are a second generation of high-rise offices above an underground station which was once an above-ground terminal of the old Pennsylvania Railroad.
 
And when the FEC says it will fund this privately, it doesn’t take a great cynic to suspect that this service can become so vital to the cities along the tracks that Henry Flagler’s old railroad will eventually be rebuilt to accommodate fast trains. That means eliminating grade crossings, dozens of them between Miami and West Palm Beach alone, by either elevating tracks or building bridges. That will cost money, and if public funds are not eventually involved, then the FEC management is a lot dumber than we think.
 
There is nothing wrong with this. The original railroads were built with much public money, in terms of land grants and tax incentives. It was an investment that has been returned many times over in economic growth. Ask Abraham Lincoln. He got it started while fighting the Civil War. The only thing wrong with the FEC’s plan is that it is 50 years too late.
It Ain't Over Until the Fat Lady Flies

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, August 07, 2012 1 Comment(s)

 

We got to the airport way early, so early that we decided to walk around and see all the new stuff that has been added over the last 50 years. For starters, we got there by commuter train, which comes in practically to the departure gates and gets you to center city in 20 minutes, and can take you 30 miles out in the suburbs in about an hour. Every airport should have one.

 

 
After going through the screening we had more than an hour to kill and we wandered around, up one ramp and down another. They seemed to be sticking out like the spokes of a wheel, and it was in fact a mall. We saw all kinds of shops including some pretty pricey ones and a wine bar where you can get an imported taste for only $12. And so it came to pass that when we figured our flight would be called, we were lost.
 
We thought we came back the way we went out, but somehow that appendage dead ended into the wrong airline. So we walked back and tried another route, with the same result. Ramps seemed to be crossing and recrossing each other, like the streets in Washington, D.C. We were about to break down and ask some English-speaking person for directions, which would look ridiculous, especially for somebody who has used  this airport since the Wright Brothers. We finally recognized a store we had passed on the outbound journey, and we figured they wouldn’t have two stores selling imported crystal in the same airport. To make a long walk short, by the time we found the right gate the plane was already loading.
When we found our assigned seat, it did not exist. At least a good part of it did not. There was a woman in the middle of the row with a backside the size of the Everglades. The arm rests, which fold down and afford a small sense of privacy, were not available for either our side or the poor chap in the aisle seat. But at least he could lean into the aisle for breathing space. Our only option was to get out on the wing. We estimated the width of the seat back in front of us at about 18 inches, and this tub next to us required at least 5 inches more.
 
Squeezing into our half seat, already frustrated by being lost for an hour, we said something to the woman.
 
“You know something, honey? You’re fat.”
 
Actually, we did not say that, but we thought about it for the next 2.5 hours, a good part of which was consumed while waiting in line to take off and the time it took to deplane all these people, including the fat woman. We felt blessed that the flight home was relatively short, and we wondered what it would have been like had we been headed to India. We also thought about the idea recently publicized that people of size ought to pay more for special seats to accommodate them, or at least pay by the pound, and use that surcharge to offer consolation discounts to the people forced to sit next to them.
 
When you think about it, everything else that is shipped is paid for by size and weight. Why should people be different? And a big package shipped by air doesn’t even offend a smaller parcel by getting in its space and forcing it to sit on the wings. Of course, the argument will be that offensively large bodies should not be discriminated against, even when they offend those of us with beautiful taut figures.
 
Of course, in this era of GPS there ought to be a discreet way of telling over a computer or telephone if a person has special needs, such as room to spread out, and automatically provide a seat built to size and shape, and charge accordingly without the necessity to say, “know something, honey…”
Making The Bad News Good

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, July 31, 2012 No Comment(s)

The big bad news story today is the Postal Service is in danger of being shut down. We have an emotional attachment to this issue, having once labored for the Postal Service. That is, if you count the days when college kids used to pick up handy change by working to back up the pros for the Christmas rush. The trick was to try to stay on the clock for 24 hours straight. That was possible, but rarely achieved because there was always some full-time party pooper who would find us sleeping in the basement around 4 in the morning. He would wake everybody up and make us clock off, but about an hour later the trucks would roll in with bags and bags of new mail, and shortly we would be out on the street with the first delivery.

That usually took a few hours, and each time you worked the same route it got a little faster. Then, if you chose well, which meant a route in your own neighborhood, you could walk home and catch a few hours sleep before you had to check the designated box and start out on the day's afternoon delivery. That took a few hours, and by the time you got back to the office, trucks were lined up bringing the next day's mail for sorting. If you had the right connections, and we did (Dad knew Mr. Loyons, the postmaster) then you could stay on the clock and help with the sorting. That lasted well into the night and was educational. You learned to use modern miracles such as a machine that wrapped string around bundles of mail. When that job was completed, you went into hiding, in the basement, with maybe a dozen other savvy guys – until the party pooper caught you and insisted on clocking everybody off. But 22 out of 24 hours wasn't bad. Especially when you knew what you were doing was important to people.

Alas, today's mail seems not so important. The combination of package delivery services, and the Internet have cut severely into Postal Service revenues, so much so that we face a question of whether this great institution can service, or should? Our vote is that it should, and a possible salvation combines two concepts we have covered in the past. The answer is one word. Trains. And specifically commuter trains. They are making a comeback, all over the country. You can now get from New York to Philadelphia in a little more than an hour. With that speed, the Postal Service could enjoy a new birth, with same-day delivery. That would not compete with the Internet, but it sure would compete with the package delivery companies, and we all know that is a big part of mail today. As state after state, including Florida, began to recognize the value of trains for short- and mid-range trips (say Fort Lauderdale to Orlando) it will be possible to make those trips in a few hours. Going back to the old system of sorting on trains, made infinitely faster by the lights of technology, it should be possible to off load delivery vehicles at various stations (perhaps 20 miles apart), which can reach the destinations before the sun sets.

There is clearly a market for fast delivery. Anybody in business knows that speed counts. Sales people have the urge to get things out immediately, and not worry about the cost. The package delivery services, offering next-day delivery, have proved it for years. Which is why commuter, and the growing number of mid-range trains, connecting cities within a few hundred miles, offer such opportunity. Not only could same-day delivery produce the revenues to make such trains less of money losers, and possibly even profitable in high-traffic markets, they are positioned to serve the areas where most packages and high-priority mail is headed.

This idea of meshing two needed services, fast passenger rail and fast package delivery, is not unrecognized. A proposed inter-city service in the Midwest has factored the idea into its proposed operating plan. And not long ago we had a conversation with an important Tri-Rail figure. It was an informal meeting, so his name should not be used, but when we threw out the idea of using Tri-Rail for same-day package delivery, his response was immediate: "That," he said, "is an interesting idea." Is it interesting enough to save the Postal Service?