Author: wdfyfe

Before WD called himself a writer, he worked at a number of different jobs from stacking lumber to interior design. He studied English at UBC and creative writing at ASU where one of his teachers, Rita Dove, taught him the importance of the tale. He has written for radio, magazines and newspapers, but never television. He’s published both fiction and nonfiction in Great Britain and the US. He reads French passably and speaks enough Spanish to get from A to B and find the toilet. He has interviewed John Cleese, Peter Ustinov, Margaret Drabble, Kenneth Branagh and enough other famous people to make him a hopeless name dropper. His not-so-secret passions are history and trivia, and he has never lost a game of Trivial Pursuit — although he did come 4th one drunken Quiz Night at the Uxbridge in Notting Hill. He lives on the Pacific Ocean, although, not close enough to see, so he spends his days looking at a computer screen. It’s a wonderful life and he has only one regret: he can’t type faster.

Watergate: The Real Legacy

Despite the fact that literally millions of folks are clamoring to get into the Land of Milk and Money, for the most part, the American timeline is seen as a series of bloodthirsty conflicts, driven in part by a predilection for gunslinger economics.  This is all in the abstract, of course, since most of the world’s knowledge of America is produced in Hollywood and consists of shootouts, car chases and ancient reruns of Baywatch.  The fact is, however, that since its inception, the twists of America history have had an influence far beyond its shores.  They run all the way from a bunch of Virginia farmers inventing a workable democracy in the 18th century to the boys from Compton and East Harlem reinventing music in the 21st.

Over the years, American cultural hegemony has become a catch-all for discontent.  Since anti-Americanism is one of the few prejudices left open to ordinary people, they take full advantage of it.  There are actually folks in this world cheerleading the demise of the American empire as if it were an international sporting event.   More than a little of this myopic thinking can be traced to a pivotal moment in American history — forty years ago, yesterday — June 17th, 1972.  In the lingering twilight of a late June evening, President Richard Nixon sent his minions to play mischief with the National Democratic Headquarters and changed the world forever — at a place called Watergate.

More than the Kennedy assassination, the Moon Landing or the Vietnam War, Watergate is what has defined America in the second half of the 20th century.  The incredible conspiracy that didn’t so much reach into the White House as begin there, soured the prestige of politics so thoroughly it remains rancid even today — and not only in America but around the world.  The months and years of the Watergate scandal eventually devoured all the goodwill accumulated by America during World War II and the postwar generosity of the Marshal Plan.  It confirmed what young people were saying about the industrial military complex, inequality and racism: America was a poisoned apple, rotten at its very core.

Richard Nixon is the natural villain in all this.  Regardless of how many presidents before or since have bent and broken the law to suit their purposes — including lying to a Grand Jury and dronebombing American citizens out of season — Nixon’s utter disregard for the rule of law set the standard by which all other scandals have since been judged.    No political wrongdoing since 1972 has escaped being suffix-Gated in the media and in our minds.  And that’s the worst of it: the unexpected consequences of the felonies of a President.

Watergate was the beginning of Gotcha Journalism.  As the scandal escalated, it became obvious that the conspiracy was real.  Proof was the problem; catching all the president’s men in the lies and half-truths they were spinning to cover things up became the way to get at it.  Journalists began setting traps for Nixon’s boys — and catching them.  It was no longer a question of if somebody was lying; it was only a question of when and to whom.  Ironically, even as Woodward and Bernstein were being lauded as crusading folk heroes (enrollment in journalism schools doubled by 1974) their style of investigative journalism was going out of style.  Headlines were constructed out of zingers shouted at press conferences, and videotaped ambushes became the norm on the nightly news.  Then, as with every witch hunt, things started getting out of hand.  Innuendo was considered corroboration, opinion newsworthy and everyone was conjuring up their own private “Deep Throat.”  By 1974, without Richard Nixon to kick around anymore, the media was already turning its klieg lights on any public servant who didn’t keep his head down.  Suddenly, everybody from Ford’s demoralized White House to the Des Moines dog catcher was guilty.  Malfeasance was everywhere, and anybody with a press card was out to expose it.  There were reputations to be made, bestsellers to write and movie deals to sign.  Journalism was no longer staid and Walter Cronkite-jowled; it was Redford and Hoffman cool — and only one scandal away from greatness.  Forty years later, the media is still at it, hunting conspiracies like French pigs after truffles.

Watergate, like Gettysburg or Elvis, was a watershed in American history.  It was a point in time when the past was swept away — and just like Gettysburg and Elvis — it not only changed America but the entire world.  Richard Nixon’s presidency was never really the spawn of Satan that many people claim.  His administration was corrupt, without doubt, but history tells us that many administrations have been corrupt — in Washington and around the world.  No, Richard Nixon’s legacy will forever be that he could not protect the prestige of his office nor his country from the ambitions of his own ego.  As a result, he unleashed a media storm that has lasted nearly a half a century.  Most importantly, though, he destroyed the carte blanche of good will America once enjoyed at home and around the world.

Father’s Day: A Brief History

Contrary to popular belief, Father’s Day was not created by an international tie and socks conspiracy.  I’ll grant you, retail advertising had a lot to do with keeping the day going during the lean years, but it’s still a standalone holiday.  It has all the rights and privileges afforded any other “It’s a holiday, but you can’t take the day off work” day, just like St. Valentine’s or St. Patrick’s.  The only difference is that, because it’s dad, it gets shuffled along to the last minute.  Somewhere around mid-morning on the third Saturday in June, getting creative is no longer an option, so most people just head for the haberdasher.  Dads really don’t mind, though; they figure they’re lucky to have a day at all.

To keep the family metaphor going, Father’s Day has always been the poor cousin of Mother’s Day.  Mother’s Day was founded first, in 1908, and it was an instant hit.  Between the newly-minted Hallmark Cards (Hall Brothers, at that time) and the flower power of the florist industry, Mother’s Day went 20th century viral almost immediately.  In fact, Mother’s Day became so commercially successful that its founder, Anna Jarvis, disowned the holiday she had created and was once even arrested for demonstrating against it.  Father’s Day never had it so good.

There are several claimants to the title “Mother of Father’s Day.”  However, it’s generally accepted that Father’s Day was created in Spokane, Washington, by Sonora Dodd, for her father, William Smart, a single dad who raised six kids.  She wanted to celebrate it on his birthday, June 5th, but due to the church schedule, the first Father’s Day ceremony was held on June 19th, 1910 (the third Sunday in June of that year.)  At first, Father’s Day mucked along with some limited success (in 1916, it was recognized by President Woodrow Wilson) but in those days, dad was kinda the silent partner in the family unit, and the holiday fell into disuse.  It wasn’t until the Great Depression was slappin’ the economic crap out of everybody that we rediscovered Father’s Day.  It was a simple case of two ideas coming together at the same time.  While retailers were grasping at advertising straws to promote sales, the rest of us were more than willing to accept any excuse to brighten up the daily grind (which, by all accounts, was pretty grinding.)  Father’s Day came back into vogue – somewhat.  It still didn’t have the cachet Mother’s Day did, but at least dad could read the newspaper undisturbed one Sunday morning a year — if he so chose.

By the 1950s Father’s Day was fairly well established in North America.  However, in the United States, Congress still didn’t think that the American people needed a day to honour dad.  It wasn’t until Lyndon Johnson issued a presidential proclamation in 1966 that Father’s Day had any official status, at all.  Six years later, in 1972, President Nixon signed Father’s Day into law.  In actually fact, Father’s Day, in the US, is not a national holiday.  It’s something called a “Federal Observance,” which, as I’ve already stated, basically means dad doesn’t get the day off.

These days, Father’s Day is big business, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the other big hitters: Mother’s Day, Valentine’s and St. Paddy’s.  Dad isn’t being ignored anymore — most baseball teams try to get a home game on Father’s Day — but he’s still just dad, the guy you go looking for when it snows.  For example, Father’s Day is head and shoulders above any other day of the year for collect telephone calls.  Besides, we all know, from bitter experience, that most dads are tough to buy for.

This year, however, let me help you out.  Instead of stretching your brain all out of shape and ending up with the World’s Greatest Dad barbeque apron, give it a rest.  Jump in the car or get on your bike, wheel on over and spend some time just hanging with the old man.  It’ll do you both good.

If You Remember the Sixties…

If you’ve got some time to waste and want a few serious grins, invite a bunch of old people over for a wine and cheese.  It might not be all that much fun at first (everybody griping about their various ailments) but invariably those old folks are going to get around to gabbing about the 60s.  It’s unavoidable.  There’s even an unwritten rule somewhere that says whenever you talk to people from the 60s, you have to talk about the 60s.  It’s like dating a vegan: you’re going to hear about it — long before you ever decide to sleep with them.

Old people love to rattle on about back in the day, and with a couple of Pinot Noirs under their belt, there’ll be no stopping them.  In fact, if you don’t set some strict limits, they’ll be hauling out the hookahs in fond remembrance.  The neat thing is, though, you’ll get to hear some of the most outrageous lies ever told west of Paul Bunyan.  Edith Hamilton on her best day couldn’t write them any better.  Plus, old people are cunning.  To cover their ass, in a kind of an all-purpose pre-fabrication, they’ve come up with this amazing disclaimer: “If you remember the 60s, you weren’t there.”  With that adage tie-dyed into the conversation, the sky’s the limit.  The highs become the highest, the sex becomes the sexiest, the music becomes the musiciest, and everybody went to Woodstock — except the ones who were at Glastonbury, Altamont and the Isle of Wight.  (Just for the record, I only got as far as Strawberry Mountain — and that’s only because my sister covered for me.)

I understand these are subjective truths.  When one is young and immortal, everything is bigger, brighter and better.  I have no problem with that; we all do it.  For example, when I was a kid, I heard World War II veterans talk about the woods outside of Bastogne as if it were a Boys Only Christmas Party — with Nazis.  The problem I have is when the love-in gets rolling and people start filling in the details, they go from fanciful to false without missing a beat.  Suddenly, Uncle Fred (who’s been selling mattresses since forever) claims he spent his college years smoking peyote with Don Juan Matus and Janet (the secretary at the Auto Claim Centre) is talking about riding with Sonny Barger to Morningstar Ranch — and beyond.  Most of this stuff just didn’t happen.  Even though I’ve never been known to let the truth get in the way of a good story, I have a serious problem when these old buggers start chopping the tall-tale timber.  Why?  I’m old, bitter and twisted, that’s why.

Here’s the real deal (and I don’t care what these Johnny-Come-Latelys have to say about it.)  Back in the day, the shorthairs outnumbered the longhairs by at least 20 to 1, and they used their vast majority like an exclusive club.  Yeah, yeah, yeah!  We all listened to the music, spouted the anti-war propaganda, and groped around looking for free love, but when push came to shove, way more kids spent their evenings studying for Mr. McLellan’s Biology exam than ever sparked up in the dark and listened to Grace Slick.  The counterculture gap then, was a lot bigger than it is now, and the dividing lines were very clear.  As Ken Kesey once said, “You’re either on the bus or off the bus.”  The truth is most of the people claiming retroactive relevance these days were never on the bus.  Not only that, but at the time, they looked very much askance at anybody who was.  Later on, when the 60s became the darling decade, they rewrote their personal history to mitigate their circumstances and claim part of the cool.

I’ve got nothing against charlatans as such, but I hate like hell seeing the dork who worked on the yearbook claiming to be the king of counterculture when he and his football friends used to think it was hilarious to chase my friends with his dad’s Buick.  Actually, I’m not that bitter.  I’ve long since given up trashing these gasbags, it just irks me that they continue to dine out on a decade they were never part of.