Hopefully, this will be the last day of having to rest the leg...

because I want to walk and I can't.  That's a very frustrating feeling.

This morning, my mind turned to mistakes.  Not the kind we make in everyday life, the kind that happen and become great rarities as a result.

In 1824, whoever was making up the dies to stamp out quarter-dollars got lazy.  So when it came time to make the next die for the front of the coin, rather than engrave a whole new one, he took one from 1822 and altered the last 2 to make it look like a 4.  So it became the 1824/2 (1824 over 1822 date) quarter.  That made it rarer.

In 1943, copper was a critical war material and as a result, pennies were minted from steel.  Not stainless steel either, and many rusted as a result.  But there were a few pennies made in 1943 that weren't of steel as specified, but were made of copper.  They are worth a lot of money today.  In 1944 they went back to copper, and naturally, a few were made out of steel by mistake.  Again, they are worth a lot of  money today.

In 1968, the making of "proof sets", coins made especially for collectors using a different process that gives them  a much shinier, high-relief type finish, was begun again after a three year suspension.  The production was moved to the San Francisco Mint, and their big "S" was stamped on all the proof coins.  Except that someone screwed up and left the S off of a few dimes in these sets.  There are somewhere between 6 and 12 of these sets in existence and one sold in 2006 for almost $50,000.  Because someone made a mistake.

So in all these cases, mistakes turned out to be good for those who discovered them.

A mistake launched one of the biggest careers in Hollywood.  Sylvester Stallone had finally gotten someone to look seriously at his "Rocky" script, even with his requirement that he star in the film.  The producer in the L.A. area who was interested had to send the idea to the head of United Artists in New York, who said he would consider it, but wanted to know more about this Stallone.  So he was sent a copy of "The Lords of Flatbush", in which Stallone had appeared, along with Henry Winkler, Paul Mace and Perry King.  The studio head mistook King, a tall blonde guy for Stallone, liked him and greenlit the film.  He wasn't happy when he learned of his error months later, and when it was too late to back out of the project.  But I'm sure he got over it when he saw the box office and awards that followed.

So don't let a mistake throw you off.  It may turn out to lead to greater success than anticipated.

Is Stifler's Mom in "American Pie" the natural progression of Mrs. Robinson in "The Graduate"?

Did Ellen DeGeneres once rip off a line from a TV show?  Well, there was that episode of "M*A*S*H" where Hawkeye got close to Hotlips and said "Let me be Frank with you", referring to ferret-faced Frank Burns, and not a frank discussion.  Years later, when Kathie Lee Gifford appeared on Ellen's show, in the wake of her husband, Frank Gifford's well-publicized extra-marital indiscretions with a flight attendant, and when Ellen was no longer in the closet, she repeated the Hawkeye line to Kathie Lee.  Theft?  Borrowing?  You be the judge.

Time for a new platform plank for the Centrist Party, and this one has to do with student loans.  We can't afford to just give massive forgiveness of student loans, nor can we just waive interest on them completely.  But we can reduce the interest charged to the best available rate and be more flexible on terms.  At the same time, we're going to change how student loans are given out for post-Bachelor's degree programs.  The biggest problem with student loans is that people take them out to pursue fields of study beyond the Bachelor's degree that don't prepare them for a career where they will earn enough money to repay the loans during their lifetime.  A doctor, a lawyer, even an MBA graduate is much more likely to be able to repay their loans for advanced degrees than someone seeking a Masters or Doctorate in Art History.  That's not to say that Art History isn't as important as a field as medicine or law.  But with the default rate of loans for degrees that don't lead to employment where people can afford their student loans, we have to do something.  My proposal is that we develop a calculation using the average annual earnings for an advanced degree to determine the amount of graduate education loans a person can get that are government subsidized and guaranteed.  If your program fits within the calculation, you get the loans.  If your program doesn't fit, then you have to find a private lender, financial aid, or you'll have to work your way through school.  There is almost a Trillion dollars in outstanding student loans, billions of which will probably never be repaid.  We can't afford not to do something.  I'm open to alternative suggestions, but we need a party plank to somehow address this looming crisis.

One more quick plank, please.  Time to reform the system of pensions run by the Federal government, to imitate the private sector.  No more pensions as such.  The Centrist Party will pass legislation to put Federal employees into a 403(b) type retirement plan.  That's the same type of plan used by non-profit organizations.  Employees have an amount of money contributed by their employer on their behalf.  That doesn't change.  What changes is that the employee directs their retirement contributions from their employer into an investment of their choosing.  No guaranteed pension.  The employee's own contributions to the plan, on a tax-deferred basis, also are managed by the employee.  This is how it's done with 401(k) plans, with non-profits, and it is how it should be with government employees as well.  No future unfunded pension liabilities.  Government contributes during your tenure and how you manage that money will determine your retirement.

Maybe I'll be less preachy if I walk tomorrow?  I hope so.