Intellectual Ore

Michael Frerichs, Illinois state senator from the 52nd district, has written a letter to the Daily Illini to garner support for a new $25-billion construction initiative, “Illinois Works”. The proposal will allocate over $180 million to new projects at the University of Illinois. The state plans to earmark 70% of the revenues from several new casinos, including proposed projects in Danville and Chicago, to fund the project.

Expanding casinos to pay for state construction projects is bad business. When the state doesn’t have money in its coffers, the responsible thing to do is either (a) raise taxes, or (b) not do the project. Our politicians are trying to avoid the politically unpopular consequences of such overt wealth redistribution by earmarking revenues from new casinos. Such behavior benefits nobody; who’s better off, when a new business is burdened with a 70% tax load from the beginning? No sensible entrepreneur would start a business with such a heavy tax burden, meaning that scarcely any jobs will be created, and the surrounding communities will no doubt have social problems.

I have no problem with Danville and Chicago opening casinos, but the final decision should rest with their respective municipal governments. If Danville and/or Chicago want casinos, they should be considered as independent projects, not as a source of revenue for Illinois Works.

Michael Madigan, speaker of the Illinois House, is holding hearings on the project’s source of funding. Hopefully, cooler heads will prevail.

The bill passed through the Senate after much compromise between both parties, said state Sen. Michael Frerichs, D-Gifford, but is now facing some resistance from House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago.

Among other statewide projects, the bill would provide funds for local infrastructure improvements, renovations to Lincoln Hall and the construction of two new campus buildings. Madigan plans to hold hearings in Springfield and Chicago to discuss with citizens the source of money for the spending: a statewide expansion of gambling.

“The speaker wants to hear from people around the state as to whether or not they think that’s a good idea, whether that’s what they want Illinois and Chicago known as, a gambling mecca, second only to Las Vegas,” Madigan spokesman Steve Brown said.

Frerichs said he believes the bill has a “very slim chance” of passing in the House.

Two quotes:

Einmal ist keinmal, says Tomas to himself. What happens but once, says the German adage, might as well not have happened at all. If we have only one life to live, we might as well not have lived at all.

- Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor.

- Henry David Thoreau, quoted in Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Toward the end of the summer, I began reading Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being. The book tells the story of a man’s meeting a woman in a very ponderous, yet conversational style. One of the central questions Kundera raises involves the inevitability of everyday life. While traveling on business, Tomas meets Tereza when she is assigned to wait on him at his hotel. Their chance encounter leads Tereza to pursue Tomas later in the book, and to eventual cohabitation. At several critical points in the book, Tomas assures himself that the consequences of his decisions are inevitable - “Es muss sein” - and absolves himself of responsibility for his decisions, in the belief that certain things are fundamentally out of his control.

Stephen Covey’s “Seven Habits” outlays a ladder-like progression to “effectiveness”. Through a series of imaginative exercises, he attempts to lead the individual on a process of personal discovery, in hope of uncovering what matters most, and going after it on a day-to-day basis. The book gives a nod to “efficiency”, but drives home a crucial point made to me at a young age by my father: “Don’t confuse action with accomplishment”, meaning that simply being busy is not of itself virtuous. Climbing a ladder quickly does little good if the ladder is laid against the wrong side of the house.

But to identify our highest priorities, we must believe that we are in control of our own lives, which is central to Dr. Covey’s first habit, “Be Proactive”.

I can’t put aside the reality that an enormous number of my life’s defining moments have happened as products of chance. The idea that “we might as well not have lived at all” is a bit extreme, but I’m starting to see how exceedingly silly it is to treat life as a protracted high-school physics lab. Applying the scientific method to a life is patently outrageous: identifying cause and effect is intractable, and we can never reproduce our results. There are no mulligans in everyday life. Sorry Dr. Covey, I love your book and the idea that I can be “proactive” and control the course that my life takes, but I’m still don’t believe that it’s either that it’s (a) possible, or (b) desirable. Which isn’t to say that I won’t follow the advice in the book, because it’s excellent, but there is an element of truth to the phrase Einmal ist Keinmal.

I finally got all my recommendation letters for graduate study submitted today - what a battle. Thanks to everyone who wrote me recommendation letters and guided me along the way. Maybe I could have done things differently, if I’d have known then what I know now, but that’s not how things worked out and I’ve accepted that.

Let’s see if I’m admitted.

Tomas often thought of Tereza’s remark about his friend Z. and came to the conclusion that the love story of his life exemplified not “Es muss sein!” (It must be so), but rather, “Es könnte auch anders sein” (It could just as well be otherwise).