By Patrick F. Cannon
I started writing this before I knew the results of the presidential election. Depending on who you voted for, you may be feeling just a bit apprehensive today. In any event, the next four years should be interesting.
As I’m writing this, in the background I hear one of Mozart’s 27 piano concertos. I own all of them, in versions played by Danial Barenboim and the English Chamber Orchestra. With a couple of exceptions, they are full of light and joy. Mozart died in 1791, aged only 35. But he managed to compose nearly 800 works in his short life. Many people know Mozart only through the 1984 Milos Foreman-directed movie, Amadeus, based on Peter Shaffer’s play. It’s quite entertaining, but mostly fictional.
Think about it. 35 years. 800 works. Although he got minor church and court appointments, he mostly had to work for a living. He had a wife and six children to support. And we’re told he liked a bit of luxury, and a fun time. So, the grindstone was always waiting. He must have often been exhausted from his labor, but nevertheless he never lost the joy that his music expressed. He died young, but not from overwork, but from infections that could easily be treated today.
When he died, he left the joy he felt in his music to us. Although there are other great German composers – Bach before and Beethoven after – none were able consistently to express the joy that Mozart did. When the sad state of our politics begins to get you down, turn to Mozart. His music is available in ways now that would have astonished him.
Listening to the overture to the “Magic Flute” isn’t going to change the results of the election. But it might remind us that we can still find joy amongst the ruins. And that this country, as imperfect as it has sometimes been, has slowly but steadily made life better for most of its citizens (and millions of immigrants too). And that no matter who won, your neighbor is still your neighbor and deserves your understanding and respect.
Of course, if you want to put America first, you can substitute George Gershwin for Wolfgang. He also died young, age 38. In addition to about 500 popular songs, he became America’s finest classical music composer. Most people have heard his “Rhapsody in Blue,” even if they didn’t know what it was. He did many others later in his short life, most notably the opera “Porgy and Bess.”
While you’re listening to their music – or the Rolling Stones if they suit you better – you might want to accept that Joe Biden was a mediocre president, who should have never run for a second term; and that whoever ran in his place would have had to carry his record around their neck. It also didn’t help that the new candidate was chosen without proper competition.
Political parties need to understand their constituents, not force them to go places they don’t want to go. Frankly, we need a new centrist party. Since that’s not likely to happen any time soon, the Democratic Party needs to clean the wax out of its ears.
Copyright 2024, Patrick F. Cannon
cannonnadedotcom 
Music soothes the savage breast (or is it beast?).
I often turn to Mozart for joy, or Haydn for wit and certainly Bach, if I seek something spiritual. A drive or walk through the surrounding woods also clears the head and brings a sense of calm and perspective.
There is actually quite a bit of joy in Mudville. The stock market jumped 1500 points. We don’t have to listen to Kamala’s whiny platitudes. The sad spectacle of Joe Biden will hang around for a few more weeks. But there is optimism in the air (Maybe not in Chicago, winter is coming).
I haven’t thought much about what the Democrats will do now with their party in shambles. There will be much finger-pointing. Someone must take the blame! Joe Biden is a convenient scapegoat, but he, after all, is only a product of an arrogant culture that put him in office. Pelosi bites back. Bernie Sanders is claiming high moral ground with “I told you so’s.” My suggestion is they look at Obama for a culprit. They won’t.
A centrist party is devoutly to be wished. But how? Democrat power centers in California, Illinois and New York. The politics of these states has little to offer the country. Their residents are leaving for better places. I don’t see innovation among the Dems, wax or no wax.
Republicans, like it or not, are the party of Trump now. Vestiges of the old GOP — Romney, Christie, Bush, Cheney, McConnell — are fading away.
More promising is the younger generation of bright people like Musk, Ramaswamy, De Santis, and Vance, who are nominally affiliated with Trump but assert independence, potential candidates who didn’t rely on Ivy League credentials for achievement.
I suppose we should give some credit to Trump for at least disrupting the status quo. Only in America. In Europe, it takes a revolution, a dictator or a war to change things.
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Folks are inclined to blame everyone except themselves. We’ve both lived long enough to remember when a working man would rather die than vote Republican.
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Ah yes, nothing like a hot steaming pile of scorn and derision heaped upon the heads of those who voted differently. After all, in spite of my generally centrist beliefs, I am apparently part of the “enemy within” because I believe in social justice and equal rights for all, and in having government programs that protect our citizens and help those who are less fortunate. At least, that’s how I understand what Jesus calls us to do. Maybe that’s because I follow Jesus 1.0, not the wildly distorted MAGA version of Jesus.
The Germans who elected Hitler cheered over his victory. Alas, they too ended up dead or sitting on piles of rubble, homeless and starving.
The fruits of Project 2025 and other Trump proposals will end up on all of our plates and we will all suffer to varying degrees. Unless, that is, Trump rounds up and jails or deports every non-white non-heterosexual non-MAGA person in the country, citizen or not. I would not be shocked if he tried. If only his groupies are left, perhaps he’ll gaze fondly upon them and shower them with resources and opportunities. Or perhaps not.
The guy is in such serious cognitive and physical decline that he probably won’t last 4 years. (He never exhibited a moral decline because he was already at the bottom from the beginning.) But hey – you’re right; you still have:
What a bench! It is one truly befitting a guy who has the emotional intelligence and impulse control of a 3-year-old, and a black hole where his soul should be.
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Pat, true about the working man. How in the world did the Dems become the party of the educated elite, Big Tech and corporate America? And how did the Republicans come to represent the lower class (Fishtown) side of America in Charles Murray’s Coming Apart?
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Parties have been evolving and radically changing positions throughout the history of our country. There was a shameful time when it was the Democrats who supported slavery and the Republicans, led by Lincoln, abolished it. Now it’s the the MAGAs who seem to hate everyone of color.
I agree with you on this: We need a far bigger centrist segment in both parties, or one new and far larger centrist party. Those centrists need to be reasonable people who understand the necessity of compromise. We need to get dark money and powerful lobbyists out of politics. Far too many politicians are bought by rich people or companies who then dictate what they should support and vote for. Most importantly, we need far more politicians who actually care about our Constitution, our country, and its people. Far too many of them take office, get drunk on power, gorge at the trough of public money, and then do only that which will keep them in office.
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Chicago had its first election for a new elected school board. The teacher’s union spent millions of their members dues to elect friendly members — but then so did the opposition. Then both complain we don’t spend enough on the schools!
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A prime example of exactly what we’re talking about! All that money going to political wars instead of to actually improving the schools!! What a pathetic waste of resources! Kids and our larger society are the ones who suffer from this kind of crap.
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