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Now, remember that I said I have written this post because the writer who interviewed me insisted adamantly that I should go back to writing on things other than Madoff. Yet writing about Michigan football would hardly be what the interviewer had in mind. As an importantly related matter, the interviewer appeared to be struck by my explanation that the reason I generally put 50 or 60 hours of work into reading, taking notes on and outlining each book whose author I interview on MSL's TV program called Books of Our Time, is that I have a dread of appearing or being incompetent -- a dread which, ironically enough, seven years at Michigan did no little to foster. Putting in the hours of work helps eliminate the possibility of incompetence as an interviewer on the book show. But -- and here is where the interviewer's desires and an article about Michigan football come together -- a dread of being or seeming incompetent does not have widespread purchase in this society. Politicians blow off about anything and everything with almost no knowledge of what they are talking about: Good sound bites, and fluent sounding (Obamaesque) speech, are the desiderata, not competent opinions. Corporations (and their lobbyists) put out obvious bovine defecation to justify obscene profits, even more obscene paychecks, interest rates that are through the roof, etc. Much the same is true in spades of journalists, especially columnists, whose prior views are rarely scrutinized to determine the competence of prior views which they proclaimed or to expose the mistakes they incompetently made one after the other. (Are you listening, New York Times? (There is no chance.)) Universities and colleges have a zillion excuses for why higher education has become so unaffordable (and why university presidents need to be paid a million dollars or more). People do not know and do not care what history teaches and that in effect we are repeating unfortunate history that has occurred time and again since 1898 (and in some ways since Alexander the Great) in middle eastern wars. Many people do not know, and even fewer care, that the people in charge of the economy are those, or among those, who brought us economic disaster in the first place.
One does not hear it said that a fundamental problem with G.W. Bush -- as he had proven time and again as an adult even before he became President, and as he repeatedly proved again as President -- was that he is not competent: we elected as President someone who was not competent, and nobody cared about this. One rarely hears that the question about Obama today -- a question about a guy who speaks brilliantly and (far too) often, is whether he will prove competent in action too or will prove to be the opposite. There is no conception that the country -- just like Michigan, with its elitist braggadocio combined with incompetence at football -- proclaims itself to be the greatest country in the world now or ever -- and woe betide anyone who might publicly question this propaganda -- while in fact it lurches incompetently from military disaster to economic disaster to military disaster to economic disaster.
One does not usually hear in this country, in any field, a refrain of "Has she shown herself to be competent? Nor does one hear its twin in importance, of which I have often written: "Has she shown herself to be honest? These are the two questions which count more than anything else most of the time. Yet, they are the questions least heard.
With regard to Michigan football, there is thus far but little to indicate coaching competence. With regard to the economy and war, there is thus far but little to indicate competence. Rather, there are mainly indications that military and political leaders look to and intend to repeat the incompetent policies and mistakes of the past. In education, we are conditioned to expect more of the past -- with even higher costs but, it seems, even lower quality. Ditto for many things, even most things. And frankly, as with Michigan football, so too with the economy, war, education, and so many other fields: we are going to have big trouble, continuous trouble, unless and until there is a cultural sea change under which the question of competence of views and actions, and the question of honesty, become the questions that are asked in every field.
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