". . . mere birdsong in the bushes of things"

They’re looking at the name on a portrait in an old book,  and she wonders to herself, who was he? 

“Who was he, who was he?  Did he labour under the whip of his father, or was he treated with gentleness and respect?  Names, names, all passed away, forgotten, mere birdsong in the bushes of things.”

What an image to characterize the ephemeral existence of a human being - "mere birdsong in the bushes of things."   Such word magic caused me to sit up in bed and wonder in awe - both at the meaning of the image and at the mind of the writer.   

Roseanne McNulty lives in an Irish asylum.  She thinks she may be 100.  Sebastian Barry's The Secret Scripture paints her portrait using peripheral vision,  with shadows and reflections, with the movement of curtains in the wind, with the ripples on the water.   

Barry sees Roseanne and the people around her in ultra slow motion capturing the signals, invisible to most people observing at normal speeds, that, like pieces of bone to archeologists, reveal their souls.  It’s so slow.  So powerful.  So unlike the superficial flash we’re used to. 

Writing, through the eyes of Roseanne, about Dr. Greene, who looks after the patients in the asylum . . .

Then he sat there in his own version of silence for a long while.  He sat so long he was almost an inmate of the room!  As if he lived there himself, as if he had nowhere to go to, nothing to do, no one to attend. 

He sat in the chill light.  The river, drowned in its own water, and drowned a second time in the rains of February, was not in a position to throw its light.  The window-glass was severely itself.  Only the still grass of winter lent it a slight besmirch of green.  His eyes, now much clearer somehow and more distinct without the beard, were looking forwards as if at an object about a yard away, that stare that faces have in portraits.  I sat on the bed and without the slightest embarrassment watched him, because he wasn’t watching me at all.  He was looking into that strange place, the middle distance, the most mysterious, human, and rich of all distances.  And from his eyes came slowly tears, immaculate human tears, before the world touches them.  River, window and eyes.

Wow!  "[T]hat stare that faces have in portraits."  "[T]he most mysterious, human, and rich of all distances."  Barry sees the invisible. How much of life am I missing?

Over and over again he daubs images onto the page and I think, where did that come from and what’s it doing here?  And then he pulls it all together - “River, window and eyes.”

Here's another one. Roseanne reflects about her husband who fished for salmon.

Most of the time, he stood by the lake, watching the dark waters.  If he saw a salmon jumping, he went home.  If you see a salmon, you will never catch one that day.  But the art of not seeing a salmon is very dark too, you must stare and stare at the known sections where salmon are sometimes got, and imagine them down there, feel them there, sense them with some seventh sense.  My husband Tom fished for ten years for salmon in that way.  As a matter of record he never caught a salmon.  So if you saw a salmon it seems you would not catch one, and if you did not see a salmon you would not catch one.  So how would you catch one?  By some third mystery of luck and instinct, that Tom did not have.

Dark waters.  Barry paints with dark waters.  With "some third mystery of luck and instinct."  Where is this going, I’m thinking, and then I read on:

But that was how Dr. Greene struck me today, as he sat in silence in my little quarters, his neat form stretched out on the chair, saying nothing, not exactly watching me with his eyes, but watching me with his luck and instincts, like a fisherman beside dark water. 

Oh, yes, like a salmon I felt, right enough, and stilled myself in the deep water, very conscious of him, and his rod, and his fly, and his hook. 

The patient's view of the doctor!  It’s with these tiny brush strokes that Barry paints his portraits.  I’m not reading a book as much as watching a painter starting with a blank canvas.  He mixes his paints, he draws some lines on the canvas.  Slowly daubs marks here and there.  Slowly, slowly the thin pencil lines gain dark color and richness and the souls of people are revealed. 

This isn’t a book for everybody.  It's too slow.  We aren't use to paying painfully slow attention to amorphous signs.  To looking without looking.  I’d once recommended Yasunari Kawabata’s Snow Country  to a good friend.  He couldn’t finish the short novel.  His verdict, “Nothing happens.”  It’s inside that nothing that everything happens.  The same in The Secret Scriptures.

My Voting Report Card - And Other Political Fliers

We were only gone from Sunday to Friday, but here's what was in our mail when it was delivered Saturday.   Up til now Alaska's never been a critical state.  Our outcomes were generally not close, nor would they impact the balance of the Senate.  It's not that much mail, about two pieces per day. 

Then there was this one.  My voting report card.

What?  Someone's grading my voting?  Well, someone was checking how often I vote.  I knew that campaigns do that, because they particularly target the people who vote all the time.  Do I didn't think too much about it until I saw this post at Immoral Minority that was citing a report at KTUU about letters to people telling them how often their neighbors vote - by name!   That's takes this a step further.  This one comes from America Votes, what appears to be a liberal PAC.   The letter with the neighbors' names and voting records apparently comes from The Opportunity Alliance PAC, conservative group.  At their website - Alaska Votes - you can plug in your address and see how often your neighbors vote.  KTUU cites the letter:

“This year, we’re taking a new approach,” ASVP members wrote. “We’re sending this mailing to you, your friends, your neighbors, your colleagues at work, and your community members to publicize who does and does not vote.”

It's not clear to me how long the organization has existed and thus whether the 'this year' is misleading or not.

The KTUU piece talks about people's outrage over their voting record being circulated like this.  This is public information, though it's tricky for members of the public to get it.  I know parties and candidates pay for lists of people's voting records.  I'm trying to think about reasons why people's voting record (whether they voted, not how they voted) should be kept secret or made public like this.  Would more people vote if this information was readily available?  I'm guessing they would.

But then this led to the backers of Opportunity Alliance PAC - mainly Paul Singer.  Now, he's an interesting person and I'll focus on that in another post soon. 

The Boot

A year ago I wrote about exercises I was doing in hopes of healing my heel and being able to run again.

Since then, despite the exercises, my heel's still a problem.  Most of the time I can walk without any more than a slight pressure that reminds me not to run.  I've substituted biking for running, but it's just not the same.

Once in a while the heel gets inflamed and becomes a serious hassle.  So I finally went back to the podiatrist.

He wasn't encouraging.  I'd done all the physical therapy exercises and it hadn't improved things. They were supposed to strengthen the calf muscles to take pressure off the Achilles tendon.  There's also a bone spur that the exercises weren't going to help and might be irritating the tendon. Well, he says surgery will fix it, probably, but no guarantees.  Naturally, I'm not too excited about that option and reminded him that he'd said a boot was the next step.  He doesn't hold out much hope for the boot, but it could help.  Since it's not urgent and I don't really see a good time in the near future for recovery, and since I need to do more research, I opted to try the boot.  This one is a product of Iceland.  Lots of velcro and the blue ball is a pump to tighten it more with air.

I took it with me to LA in September and did short term tests.  I could walk on it ok, but after a few days my knee hurt.  When you change your gait radically, other parts have to compensate.

So I started my four weeks for real not quite two weeks ago.  I thought I had a month at home to do this.  Did expect this last short trip to see my mom.  It started with six days of a corticosteroid.  I can't find anything online that explains exactly what the med was supposed to do. What I recall the doctor saying was it makes the muscle more pliable.  The boot is supposed to keep my heel from moving and it is pretty snug.  The boot's on all day except for the shower and driving - since it's my right foot.  And I'm not biking during this period.

Two weeks into full time boot and so far so good.  The test period was a good warning to be aware of how I'm compensating and this time there's been no knee problem or other issues.  TSA wasn't happy with my boot. When they rubbed the chemical tester on the boot, it tested positive.  Coming home, I just took it off and put it on the conveyor belt and walked very gently through the scanner.  I must have looked pitiful because the TSA guy asked if I could lift my arms for the scanner.

When I take it off at night, my foot feels good.  And I look at all the people around me who walk around without thinking how amazing it is to be able to walk.  They just take it for granted, as I have all my life.  And that's how it should be.  But it is a blessing that you realize only when you lose it. I wrote a post on that two years ago. 

 And I'm still very appreciative that my problem is relatively minor.  It could be a lot worse.  But I still have lots of research to do before I consent to surgery if this doesn't work. 

The Real Alaska - New Book You Probably Won't See In Your Local Bookstore

Image from email from Thanachart

Unless you live in Thailand.  But maybe we can convince a few Anchorage stores to stock it.


Thanachart (Benz)    Siripatrachai first came to Alaska last December (2013) along with his award winning short documentary The Words I Love.  He's a Thai who was finishing film school
in New York City and he stayed with us a few of the days he was in Anchorage.  Here's my post including a video where he declares his love of Alaska.

Then in April 2014 he sent me a copy of his book New York First Time and a link to a video he'd made to promote the book.  It had, at the time over two million hits!  The book went to the top of the Thai best seller list.

Later he sent me another email saying he was coming back to Alaska because his publisher wanted him to do a book on Alaska, because, he said, there aren't many in Thai.  So he was back in Alaska this summer and we got to see him again for a couple of the days he was here. 

So, now the Alaska book is out.  If it's anything like the New York book, it will have lots of photos, chapter titles and headings in English, and the main text will be in Thai.  It will be humorous and the language will be a little spicy.

He said he'll send me a copy when he gets back to New York from Thailand where he's promoting the book at the National Book Fair in Bangkok.

Image from email from Thanachart

I'm going to try to convince him that some of the books should be on sale in Alaska.  I'm sure some people would buy it, even if they can't read it all.  And there's a sizable Thai-Lao community here who can read it.

This page shows the monk at the Thai Buddhist temple on D St just north of Fireweed.  They have lots of Thai readers and I'm sure this is one of the first books to cover their temple.  The money tree in the picture is covered with donations from many different countries.  (Benz didn't get to the temple last December, but I made sure he got there on his summer trip.)

Below is a picture Benz sent me of him signing his books at the Thai Book Fair.  He's sitting in the center in the dark blue shirt.

Image from email from Thanachart

His video for the New York 1st Time book made him something of a celebrity in Thailand, so I suspect this book on Alaska will get a lot more attention than such a book normally would.  I'm pretty sure the title is tongue-in-cheek, but we may see an uptick in Thai visitors to Alaska.

And none of this would have happened without the Anchorage International Film Festival (which will be Dec. 5-14 this year) which got Benz to Alaska for the first time. 

"They can afford 'em, but they can't drive 'em"

That was the announcement on the ferry loudspeaker system.  There had been a series of loud blasts of the deeeep horn and we'd come to a stop.  Then I looked up to see the cause of the noise and the crew's derision.

The sailboat was no longer in danger of being run over by the ferry.   Is public shaming over the ferry loudspeakers a suitable activity for a public entity like the Bainbridge Ferry?  I suspect not, but I suspect it made the announcer feel a little better.  Will it make the little boat's driver change?  I suspect forcing the ferry to stop was embarrassing enough. 

But we enjoyed the warm sunny crossing into Seattle last Sunday after a family visit on a long layover on the way to LA.  Here's a shot of us approaching the dock in Seattle.

Incumbency Is Not Forever: The Difference Between A 'Nobody' And A Congressman Young Is Just Votes

The way labels affect how people treat each other has always fascinated me.  When I was a doctoral student and teaching my first graduate classes, I tried an experiment that was very revealing, though not completely successful at first.

The Experiment 

I was young and I looked younger.  I came to the first class and sat down just like all the other students.  I had arranged for someone to come in and say the instructor asked that the students divide into groups of four and talk about what they expected from a graduate class.  I went off with one of the groups as though I were an MPA student like everyone else.  Which I had been until just a year earlier.

When we got back into the class, there was a discussion led by the students.  My voice was not given any more deference than anyone else's and a few people vigorously disagreed with what I said.  When I tried to transition from the exercise to getting the class to move on, students resisted.  Finally, I went to the front of the class and declared I was the instructor.  Some people laughed.  Others told me to sit down. Slowly, my identification and status in people's heads changed.  I apologized for the deception, but said I couldn't think of a better way to make an important point.   How we treat people is based on all sorts of labels and social instructions we get.  I pointed out I had been a masters degree student not long ago and that I wasn't much different from any of them and that's how they treated me at the beginning of class.  But now that they learned I was the class instructor, they treated me differently and thought about me differently.  In reality, I was the same person.  But in their heads I was a different person. 

Most of the students got the point and took it in the spirit I intended: it was a learning experience about how we know things and treat people.  But one student, who refused to even give her name when I asked everyone to introduce themselves, went to the dean to complain.  She was sure that I would retaliate against her for things she said when she thought I was a student.  Fortunately, the dean knew me and he convinced her my intent was good and to stick with it.  At the end of the semester she invited the whole class to a party at her house.


I tell you this story because we think of people in special positions - teachers, police officers, doctors, elected officials - as somehow specially anointed.   And in their roles, they do have some special authority in certain areas and we are expected to give them deference consistent with those roles.  And they are expected to fill those roles with an appropriate level of dignity and respect. But the special stuff applies only when they are acting in those roles.  The rest of the time, they are just human beings like the rest of us.

Alaska's Congressional Race Between Don Young and Forrest Dunbar

I say all this because Alaska has a Congress Member who has been in that role since 1974.  He's been the Congressman from Alaska for the lifetime of both my kids.  But, he's just a human being, though it appears that he no longer sees a difference between his official role and his private self.  And he doesn't particularly stick to the level of decorum expected of a Congress Member.  In fact, he's a pretty fallible human being as he most recently demonstrated at Wasilla High School.

Yet despite his bizarre behavior over the years, Alaskans have continued to reelect him.

Partly, because he is a pretty smart guy, who has been able to pull himself together when it counted.  When he debated Ethan Berkowitz in the US House race in 2008, for example, he had facts at his finger tips, he was charming and funny, and he handily took the debate, much to many people's surprise.  He wasn't the bumbling clown some expected.

But I also think that voters are dazzled by the pixie dust that transforms incumbents into a special, superior species.  But they are just normal humans, with more power.

This year Young's opponent, Forrest Dunbar, is an extraordinary, ordinary human being.  But a lot of people looking at him might think, well, ok, but he's nobody. How can he transform into "Congressman?"  That just means they haven't done their homework and found out who he is.  After all, there was a time when Don Young was just as 'nobody.'

In fact, all of the next ten presidents of the United States are now alive and many, if not most, are living their lives as relative 'nobodies.'  You could probably set up lunch dates with most of them.  They are just people.  But at some point they will morph from just people into "The President."

 The 'nobody' who is challenging Don Young this year is just like you and me - some guy from Alaska.  And if he were elected, he'd stay a genuine guy, I'm sure.  He's like me in class as a student, before I became, in their eyes, the instructor.

Here's what the Alaska Public Media said about Dunbar:

He spent his pre-school years in the Yukon River town of Eagle, cutting his teeth on caribou while his father worked as a Fish and Game biologist.  After the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the family moved to Cordova, where Dunbar says they had running water for the first time. . . 

Dunbar spent summers working on a commercial fishing boat and was an exchange student in Japan. A high school teacher, Tim Walters, remembers him as determined.
“Forrest was intense. And he was serious,” Walters says.
He says it was obvious, even then, that Dunbar was going places.

“In a teacher’s career, there’s usually a handful of students that really kind of stand out, that ‘Some day,’ you say to yourself, ‘they’re going to be on the cover of Time magazine.’ And Forrest was one of those kids,” Walters says.

Dunbar went on to an East Coast education:  Undergrad at American University in Washington. Harvard for a Master’s in public policy, Yale for law school. He fought wildfires out of Fairbanks for a summer and served in the Peace Corps in Kazakhstan. He was an intern for then-Sen. Frank Murkowski in Washington. He worked for Guam’s delegate to Congress. He worked in the Alaska Office of Public Advocacy. Last year, he joined the Alaska National Guard, as an officer and an attorney — a JAG.

He's a pretty special 'nobody.'

People vote for Young for all their own special reasons.  But if anyone is thinking, "yeah but the other guy's nobody" well I'm writing this to say

1. Everyone is nobody until they suddenly become somebody - as I was just another student in my class until I became 'the instructor'
2. Don Young was nobody until he got elected
3. One day, a nobody will replace Don Young
4. Forrest Dunbar is one perfect candidate for Alaska's sole US House seat - he was raised in rural and small town Alaska, he was educated in some of the best universities in the US, he's got experience in Washington DC, and he's got international experience.
5. Dunbar is far, far better prepared to be a Congress member than Young was in 1973

Young has criticized Dunbar as immature.  I think he was referring to his being only being 29.  But I'd point out that Alexander the Great was 32 when he died and Jesus was 33.

Don Young's recent arrogance at Wasilla High School should convince people that he really needs to retire.  'But what's the alternative?" 

I'm here to assure folks that we have a very viable replacement who would change our lone Congress Member's office from an embarrassment to the state to one that will bring honor to Alaska.

It's all a matter of people getting their head around the idea of what makes a nobody a somebody.

Incumbency Is Not Forever

And that change can happen.  Here's an example from the LA Weekly Voter Guide:

A year ago, Lee Baca was considered a favorite to win re-election to a fifth term as sheriff. Historically, incumbent sheriffs have needed only to be able to fog up a mirror in order to win. And though Baca was beset by scandals in the county jails, it was an open question whether voters would care. How times change. After 18 sheriff’s officials were indicted last December, Baca was forced to resign.

Parnell Still Doesn't Get It - Response To Sandy Parnell's Commentary

9/5/14 Governor Finally Sack Katkus After National Guard Bureau Office of Complex Investigations (OCI) Report On Sexual And Other Abuse 10/4/14 "Governor Says He Responded To Every allegation but was misled by leaders." 10/9/14 What Did He Know And When Did He Know It? Still The Relevant Questions

I've already written too many posts on Sean Parnell's reaction to the National Guard scandal. 






But when I read Sandy Parnell's commentary in today's ADN, I couldn't help but do one more.

Here are some things she says that beg a response.

"I was with my husband, Sean, when he got the call in February with concrete information that called the Alaska guard command into question."

"concrete information"  -  Anyone with concrete information knows you have to act.  But sexual abuse victims and their advocates rarely walk in with concrete information.  It's the nature of the crime that it's done in secret and without witnesses and without much evidence.

The governor is supposed to be a savvy person who can judge people and situations and then can act appropriately.  The governor, in this case for sure, misjudged people and didn't know what to do.

It's like going to the doctor. A good doctor will diagnose the symptoms, do the necessary tests, and get you cured before you go to stage three.  But when the patient came in to see Sean Parnell, he said, "there's no concrete evidence."  He let the cancer in the Guard fester and grow causing far more pain and anguish than had he treated it right away.  He simply didn't know what tests to perform to get the evidence needed, so he said there was none.

Doctors go through hellishly intense schooling.  Politicians just need enough money and backing to get elected.  Fortunately for politicians, there's usually not much concrete evidence of their bad judgments either.  Nor can they be sued for malpractice.  Unfortunately for Parnell, the evidence of his incompetence has been spelled out pretty clearly.  And an upcoming election is the political version of a malpractice suit.

The point here is that when the Guard came to see Dr. Parnell, the Guard was sent home, and presumably didn't even get an aspirin.

"I am thankful that the bureau’s OCI responded so quickly and so professionally when my husband called for this independent, outside investigation."

Yes, too bad Sean Parnell didn't act that quickly and professionally back in 2010.
 

"The insinuation by some that Sean would not take action is wrong. That is not who my husband is, and that’s not what I have seen him do. He took action, immediately, every time. When he got the facts, he acted. With every specific allegation of assault, he followed up personally.

I believe that Sean and Sandy Parnell believe this.  Unfortunately, the action he took was inadequate and ineffective.  That's why people are upset.  The governor wasn't up to the task and people at the Guard suffered another four years, before real action was taken.  

My husband is committed to protecting the integrity of their mission, and ensuring they can carry out their work for all Alaskans in an atmosphere that is safe, with accountable leadership.

 Again, I believe Sandy believes this.  Again, that's nice, but we need a governor who is as competent as he is committed.  We don't have that.


I realize that it's hard for anyone to admit incompetence.  It's particularly hard for a politician several weeks before an election.  Good intentions aren't enough.  You also need the ability to take timely, decisive, and effective action.

The governor can't blame this on a divided legislature, because it's not divided.  It's full of his fellow Republicans.  And because this was something the governor could have and should have handled all on his own. 

One more comment on that first quote:

"I was with my husband, Sean, when he got the call in February with concrete information that called the Alaska guard command into question."

Allegations of sexual abuse require a high degree of confidentiality.  These aren't things you should share with people not directly responsible for acting, including the First Lady.  Governor Palin was criticized for including Todd in policy issues.   I say this, recognizing that the relationship between a husband and wife is special.  Spouses need counsel from each other.  But if that happens, the spouse's role is to never disclose what he or she knows.  Like in a commentary in the newspaper where she acts as a witness to what her husband learned and when.   

Fresh Keta Salmon

We saw this in the market yesterday here in LA.  I asked the man what Keta Salmon was and where it was from.  All he could say was "USA."   "Is it Alaskan?"  He didn't know.  And it didn't say.

I know a bunch of names for different kinds of salmon, but Keta isn't one of them.

It turns out it's chum or dog salmon.

From Wild Pacific Salmon: (a seafood marketing site)

Wild Alaskan Keta Salmon

Keta (Chum) Salmon

Scientific Name: Oncorhynchus Keta

Market Names: Chum, Keta, Silverbrite

Vernacular Names: Dog Salmon, Calico Salmon, Chub, Keta Salmon

Description: Keta Salmon have greenish-blue backs with silver splashes in the tail. It looks very similar to a Sockeye salmon when ocean fresh. Keta salmon range from 6-17 pounds and are mature at 3-6 years old. The Keta salmon has very light colored flesh and is very mild in flavor.

It's no wonder they don't sell it as dog or chum salmon.  Chum is, as I recall, the least desirable salmon, and that's confirmed by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game:

General Description
Chum salmon, also known as dog salmon, are the most widely distributed of all the Pacific salmon and generally occur throughout Alaska. Like most other Pacific salmon species, chum salmon spend most of their life feeding in saltwater, then return to freshwater when mature to spawn once in the fall then die. Most chum salmon populations do not travel far upstream to spawn; however, some travel up to 2,000 miles upstream to the headwaters of the Yukon River. Although generally regarded as one of the less desirable species of salmon, in Arctic, Northwestern, and Interior Alaska, chum salmon are highly prized as a traditional source of dried winter food. Since the 1980s, commercial chum salmon harvests in Alaska have more than doubled as a result of the Alaska hatchery program and increased foreign sales.

Is this an Alaskan product?  They aren't advertising it as such. 

Exploring The World With Fresh Eyes

We're back in unexpectedly in LA because my mom was having a downspell and we decided we should come back.  Ninety two offers challenges.  Things aren't going to get dramatically better and there is a steady stream of health adventures.  She's doing better though she's weaker than she was a month ago. 

I was able to schedule our trip down to include a long layover in Seattle to see our daughter and granddaughter.  And we got a beautiful warmish fall day.  I got to go to the park with the little one.  She's pushing two now. There are lots of words.  Quizical looks.  Big smiles.  We walked over to the playground,  looked at lots of stuff, rode on the swings, went down the slide, and just explored the world.  Here are some things we saw. 

Here's the mystery fruit.  It was about the size of a ping pong ball, with little spines all over it.  There's a smaller one in the background.  My google search, even a reverse photo search, didn't come up with a name.  Or whether it was edible.  I'm hoping someone out there will know it. 

She can say pine cone now and so she chose this one to examine.  My pocket camera is, it turns out, also a sort of microscope so we could look a little closer. 

(I have to admit, this is not my childhood image of pine cones.  My pine cone is rounder, harder, with sharp tips.)



Then we had to lay all our treasures out on the picnic table in the park.

But it wasn't just biology that interested her.  As we went back home she pointed out some features she wanted me to take pictures of. 

The pipe coming out of the wall.











And then the sewer cover. 

And the drain.

And then we looked a little closer to see the reflection in the water down below.

Getting to spend time with this magical child (I'm not claiming any special magic in my granddaughter, they're all magical, in fact we are all magical, but it's so much easier to see when they're little like this and not hiding it) is a great energy boost on my way to seeing my mom.  And my mom enjoys the pictures I bring her of her great granddaughter. 

Monetizing Ebola

Some people see everything in terms of whether they can turn it into money.  An empty lot, a disaster, older folks who aren't as sharp as they once were, and now Ebola. 

I got this in my emailbox this morning:

	From	Date		Subject	Size
	Ebola Bulletin	Oct 19, 2014		Shocking Revelations from Ebola Expert	27 k

I'd seen an article or post on people exploiting Ebola, but the email above was the first direct contact I'd had.

My first reaction was - how low can you go?   How despicable must you be to use Ebola to victimize others for personal gain?

But I don't think it's quite that simple.  I can think of at least two factors at play here. 

First, there are people who, for whatever reason - no conscience, no empathy for other people, or personal desperation, or whatever else - think nothing of scamming people for their own personal gain.

Second, a society that values money above most everything else.  It doesn't matter how unscrupulously people make money in our society (and much of the world), if it's not illegal or if you don't get caught, the money gives you a veneer of respectability.  Certainly money can buy you all the facades of respectability and it can even buy you a 'get out of jail free card.' But I can envision a society where such bad behavior would so taint the money one gained that far fewer people would be tempted.

Until we find a cure for conscience numbing conditions like  psychopathy  we're going to have people among us without a conscience, thus unconstrained from the kinds of social and moral constraints that keep most people from exploiting others. 

But we can make people accountable for how they made their money.  We can give other factors - decency, less monetizable skills and talents, helpfulness, etc. - more respect and power in our society than we currently do. 

Every time we do something that gives respect to people simply for having money, regardless of how they get it, we support the culture of wealth worship.  Every time we click the teaser links on every monetized website that take us to trivial information, we reward this kind of mentality. 

Unless, of course,  people start using that method to exploit the exploiters.  How about teasers like "The Ten Slimiest Ways the Koch Brothers Make Money" or "Frank Murkowski's Wealth Analyzed, Dollar By Dollar"?  Teasers that lead us to solidly researched information that helps us better understand why some people have more power than it seems they should. 

I'm still thinking about possible legitimate ways to profit from Ebola - drug companies that make legitimate cures, comedians who profit from Ebola jokes (if their joke make people think, it's probably ok), media coverage of Ebola.  But that's tricky, as can be see from this MediaMatters piece entitled  Right-Wing Media Exploit Ebola Outbreak In West Africa To Spread Immigration Fears.

Basically, I think the kinds of people who send out emails like I got - I didn't even open it by the way - are despicable.  I'm just trying to point out though that people aren't despicable in a vacuum.  The more we understand the factors that make them do despicable things, the greater our likelihood of figuring out ways to reduce the number of people doing them.