Star-spangled boozing

No word yet that country singer Ingrid Andress has actually checked into an alcohol treatment centre following her drunken performance at baseball’s annual Home Run Derby.

She said she would after rattling tens of thousands of eardrums with a wildly off-key drunken version of the U.S. national anthem. 

“I’m not gonna bullshit y’all, I was drunk last night,” she wrote on her social media accounts. “I’m checking myself into a facility today to get the help I need.”

Fans at the event were stunned; some saying the performance left their ears bleeding.

Much fuss about the revered anthem being blurted out with alcohol-stewed vocal chords. It’s not the first time, however, that the melody has been sent floating on waves of alcohol.

The Star-Spangled Banner music was first composed in the late 1700s and became the tune for a drinking song titled “To Anacreon in Heav’n.” Anacreon was a Greek poet known for his drinking songs and erotic poems. 

The song was the constitutional anthem of the Anacreontic Society, an elite London, England-based amateur music society. I’m assuming the singers were well oiled with alcohol when singing the club song because back then water was not safe to drink. Even children drank beer to avoid the bacteria, parasites and other bad stuff in the water.

Th tune later drifted across the Atlantic to become a popular American drinking song. Then in 1814, as the British-American war raged, someone noticed that after the bombardment of Baltimore “our flag was still there.” 

Words were put to the tune, and the sheet music was printed in the September 20, 1814 edition of the Baltimore Patriot. However, it wasn’t until 1931 that the song officially became the U.S. national anthem after Congress received a five-million signature petition saying the country should have a national anthem.

Other singers have struggled when singing the anthem. Christina Aguilera forgot the words at Super Bowl XLV. Michael Bolton wrote some words to the song on his hand so he wouldn’t forget them.

Music experts say the song originally was meant to be sung by a group. It’s a difficult solo because of the range of its notes, some of which are very high.

So, I guess you really can’t blame Ingrid Andress for climbing into her cups before picking up the mike.                     

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We live in a world in which there is plenty to worry about – in fact too many things to worry about.

It’s a world of cascading crises. There’s climate change and environmental disasters, destructive artificial intelligence, pandemics and nuclear holocaust threats. 

Then there is worry about biodiversity losses in which species of plants and animals become extinct and human life is affected. For instance, when India’s vultures began disappearing in the 1990s, human deaths increased from rotting disease-ridden animal carcasses normally cleaned up by vultures.  

These are serious matters that deserve our attention. But there is one crisis not ge tting the attention it deserves – declining effective leadership. There’s been a startling drop in leadership quality in recent decades. 

DDI, a leadership consulting firm, reported in its 2023 Global Leadership Forecast a “worrying pattern in the quality of leadership around the world.”       

That study showed only 40 percent of leaders reporting their operations had high-quality leaders, the lowest level of quality leadership levels in a decade. More than 50 countries and 24 industries were represented in that study, which analyzed data from 1827 human resources experts and 13,695 leaders.

Lack of quality leadership is easily seen in North American politics. Joe Biden, current United States president, confuses names, forgets what he plans to say and walks like a 100-year-old with a full diaper. Donald Trump, the man who likely will succeed him in November, has the brain power of a worm and a garbage can mouth.

Our Canadian federal leaders are not much better. Justin Trudeau, an arrogant aristocrat, is probably the least qualified person ever to become prime minister. He is a wild spender, having driven federal personnel spending up 68 per cent since he was elected in 2015.

Pierre Poilievre, the Conservative leader expected to defeat Trudeau and his Liberals, never has had a real job outside politics. As a teenager he worked doing telephone collection calls for Telus.

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh was a criminal defence lawyer whose main political goal seems to be keeping his New Democratic Party alive and active by supporting the minority Liberal government.

Decent folks, no doubt, but lacking the combination of street smarts and 21st century skills needed to combat issues much more complex than those of the 20th century.

We need new leaders with new ideas and new skills. Leaders who are visionary and inspirational. Leaders committed to the common good instead of the good of themselves and their political parties. Polarization, political and otherwise, has become a serious disease that ultimately will cripple democracy.

One reason that we don’t have the high-quality, effective leadership that we need is because it is not a priority in our educational systems. Leadership education should be a priority in all educational classes from kindergarten to university.

Leaders are not born; they are made. The earlier we teach our children about leadership, the more high-quality leaders we will have for the future.  

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From Shaman’s Rock

By Jim Poling Sr.

 

Readers of my weekly Minden Times column might notice that it is missing from the physical paper and Facebook this coming week. That’s because I have stopped writing for The Times.

 

I’ve stopped because the paper told me that my J. K. Rowling “column was insensitive to the LGBTQ2SPlus community due to JK Rowlings firm stance on the anti trans community.” The newspaper leadership implied that the column should have said how Rowling has written and spoken out against the trans community.

 

Journalists write every day about newsmakers who have faults or prejudices but we don’t include those in every story we do on them. For instance, when Justin Trudeau announces a new feed-the-poor program we don’t write “Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who was scandalized for wearing blackface some years back, announced today . . . . “

 

Or, “Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who was accused of groping a female reporter, announced today . . . .“

 

We do so when there is a direct connection with the story.

 

My Rowling column was about a well-known, very wealthy author who donates much of her income to charities. She is the UK’s second most important charitable donor, following behind only the singer Elton John.

 

No readers had complained about the column, so the insensitive-to-trans concern came from within the newspaper. That’s disturbing.

 

People who work in newsrooms have opinions and the right to express them. But they should not use their personal opinions and feelings to influence how the news is reported. That is unprofessional.

 

I have been a professional journalist for six-plus decades. I can’t allow myself to be connected to anything unprofessional. That’s why I will no longer write for the Times.

 

I will continue to write the From Shaman’s Rock column occasionally. For anyone interested it can be found at: https://onshamansrock.blogspot.com/