#671 – Dick Bernard: New Years Eve, 2012. Reprise on The Fiscal Cliff, the Debt Limit and Other Things

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I wrote about this general issue a few days ago. Here is that post.
A few days ago I predicted to a good friend that by tonight the Congress would figure out some way to come to an agreement on their differences and reach a settlement that could be signed by the President. Such a settlement can be made only by the Congress, with the House of Representatives in the lead, as required by the U.S. Constitution.
I told my friend that I’d often seen “cliff stuff” before – usually in the hot-headed moments near the end of teacher contract negotiations.
Almost always, in those cases, there was a settlement. Rarely did one party or another elect to go over the cliff: reason utimately prevailed. Usually it was one party or the other in such a crisis, perhaps someone in labor, perhaps someone in management, who played the primary role in the end game before walk-out…rarely did both parties tell each other equally to ‘go to hell’…. Sufficient people knew that there were bad consequences for both ‘sides’ if there was a strike and efforts were made to settle.
In labor terms, these days, we are seeing a new variation on this theme: the “lockout” of Minnesota and St. Paul Symphony Orchestras is a current management-option way around collective bargaining, but its effect is no different than a strike. Set your feet in cement, and that cement will ultimately harden. The consequences are unpleasant. You are stuck.
It is best to find a way to settle.
At this writing, in early morning on New Years Eve, perhaps 18 hours away from the end of 2012, it appears that my prediction on the Fiscal Cliff negotiations will be wrong.
We appear to be going over the cliff, whatever that comes to mean.
There’s still time to settle, and I’ve seen stranger things in the last hours before “push comes to shove”, but it’s going to require adult behavior by our elected House of Representative members in particular, and I see little promise of that.
It happens that today, Dec. 31, 2012, my Representative in Congress is still Republican Michele Bachmann. After the New Year it will be Democrat Betty McCollum. The positions of both are worth watching, now and down the line.
(Bachmann continues in office, but in another part of Minnesota, though she still lives in this District. McCollum is also a veteran congresswoman. The configuration of their districts have changed.)
The U.S. House of Representatives remains Republican, though with a smaller majority; the U.S. Senate remains Democrat, with a bigger majority, but not enough to avoid the 60% vote needed to avoid filibuster by the minority. How this change in composition will change the results is uncertain at this point.
What happens today with the Cliff has especially big potential consequences for especially those with the most limited means to survive – the lower middle class and the poor.
The next issue on the horizon is the Debt Limit controversy, essentially, whether the U.S. Treasury can pay debts already incurred by previous Congressional action.
Like the Fiscal Cliff, the Debt Limit is subject to much misinformation. Both topics are abstract and distant and difficult for a layperson to understand.
I took a look at the Wikpedia entry on U.S. Public Debt, which includes a section on the Debt Limit, and I think it gives a reasonable base at least for thinking about the issue.
The Debt Limit has lately become a new political weapon, and it is a dangerous one including for its proponents. Essentially, the Congress, once again, the Congress, will be tempted to say that the United States is not authorized to pay Debt which that same Congress has authorized in the past, a great part of which is to pay for wars, including the current ones.
Basically, this would seem to me a bit like a consumer, myself, voluntarily incurring a huge debt which I cannot pay, which I then simply refuse to pay with the consequence of losing my credit, or my house, or whatever else comes in the wake of my foolishness.
There are big differences between personal debt, and debt for a country like ours, of course. The Wikipedia article above referenced seems to give a pretty good and balanced view of the topic over U.S. history.
This game of chicken is not much different than any other potentially fatal game.
What can you do, as a citizen, today, tomorrow and on? Make your views known to your Representatives.
COMMENTS:
Will, Dec 31: I don’t pretend to understand it and have read a number of pundits and economists who say the fiscal cliff doesn’t even exist and is a political ploy of some kind.
Jeff, Dec 31: I haven’t been following it, we are mostly powerless on this.
My thinking is they will let the fiscal cliff occur, then make some
adjustments in January… with the spending cuts fought over prior to the
debt ceiling vote…
The Farm Bill is not yet done either, another mess.
Bruce, Dec 31: The psychology behind your analysis of the “fiscal cliff” would be correct, if the cliff was a real crisis. It’s a manufactured for political reasons, and that is why they don’t have the urgency to avoid a real catastrophe. They know that, and so does the “mainstream media”, but they choose not to acknowledge it. For the politicians, it’s not acknowledged for win/lose political reasons, and for the media, it’s a sexy story.
Both sides have set up taxes as the bad guy. If we don’t come to a compromise, taxes will go up. Well, really they should go up for everyone. They should be raised until the cost of the two wars we’ve waged for the last ten years have been paid. These were wars fought in our name for, in my opinion, no good reason. The increased taxes should be a reminder that we have a collective responsibility, at very least fiscal, for these terrible wars.
Taxes are the easy part of the “fiscal cliff”. Cuts to the Federal Budget are more difficult. The automatic across the board cuts will show the American people what we need to know, that the Federal Government is a fiscal engine that provides jobs. Jobs directly, but more importantly indirectly. If the Federal government is be responsible for job layoffs, than the unemployment benefits should be raised along with other “safety net” programs until the economy is reconfigured, which would the right time to set up a green economy for the 21st century.
It would be an anxious and exciting time. I wish I was 30 years younger, so I could be part of the rebuilding of America.

#670 – Dick Bernard: "The Fiscal Cliff", "the Debt Limit" and the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States

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Today seems to be a good time to transmit that document that is often referred to, often interpreted and seldom read, much less understood, by we, the people: the Constitution of the United States.
Here is that Constitution, including the XXVII (27) Amendments: Constitution of U.S.001. (For those whose fantasy is amending the Constitution for this or that purpose, that 27th Amendment was submitted to the states for ratification in 1789, but was not finally adopted until 1992, 203 years later.)
For those interested in “Fiscal Cliff” and “Debt Limit” questions, a quick reading of Article I, especially Sections 7 and 8, might well be useful: “Section 7. All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.”
It doesn’t take a close read to determine that the question doesn’t end with the House of Representatives solely deciding: rather, it must reach agreement with the Senate, and the resulting agreement must be signed by the President.
The presumption of the Founders was working together to reach a mutually satisfactory agreement. This is how Democracy is supposed to work. Sure there was argument, the objective was agreement between diverse opinions.
Of course, as everyone who follows politics knows, the dance going on in Washington is more street theater than Constitutional law. Here’s a good (though long) summary on the posturing as of today. The posturing is not healthy to our Republic.
Then there’s the gun issue and the Second Amendment, a single sentence about which zillions of words have and will be written and spoken: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
It is said that the National Rifle Association (NRA) has about 4 million members, which is roughly one of every 60 adult Americans. By no means do all of those 4 million members agree with the official NRA stance.
This is another case of the tail appearing to wag the dog. NRA seems invincible only because we allow it to seem invincible. NRA is a classic bully in action.
My own thoughts on the issue, here.
“Persistence pays” is a good piece of advice to those who advocate change in our nation’s policy.
Some time ago I put together a chart of the composition of Senate and House of Representatives for the current Congress – the one which ends shortly. It is here, at least for this moment in history fairly accurate: Congress 1977-2011001
I succumb to the temptation to add my two cents worth to what is happening in Washington at the end of this Congress.
We have accepted a political culture of WINNERS and LOSERS.

The consequence is that we are all losing.
The most troubling fact in all of this is that “we, the people” are in reality the politicians we despise. It is we who made the choices when we voted (or declined to vote), and probably our most important choice of all was for our one local representative in the U.S. Congress (an institution mostly disdained by the people – a strange commentary, since we are the ones who elected them all, position by position.)
Becoming well informed (listening to more than a single point of view, and being on the court rather than simply in the stands) is an important part of becoming responsible supervisors of our elected representatives.
Happy New Year.
NOTE: Some earlier thoughts on the word “Taxes”: here.

#669 – Dick Bernard: Christmas Day 2012 Joyeux Noel

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Recently, on one of my forays through the flotsam and jetsam of paper in my life, I came across some unused Christmas cards from days gone by.
These cards had text in French: “Joyeux Noel. Bonne et Heureuse Annee”, and all were from “Coll. Oratoire Saint-Joseph”, ca 1980s, the most recent 1991. It took little ‘sleuthing’ on my part to figure out this mystery. On my last trip to Montreal, in 1992, I had visited the magnificent Oratory of St. Joseph, and in the gift shop there saw these greeting cards for sale, and bought one of each. Then brought them home, and never used them.
I was going to use one of these cards this card, but then decided to wait until I could scan them for use in this blog. Doubtless they are all copyrighted, but I’m sure Brother Saint Andre Bessette, founder of the Oratory will understand. Here they are: Cards ca 1982002. There are 15 in all.
All Blessings at Christmas. Happy Holidays. All best wishes.
Christmas is a simple yet exceedingly complicated holiday in our western tradition. I happen to come from the Catholic tradition: shortly I’ll be ushering at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis; my roots are French-Canadian and German Catholic. I seem to recall that my Dad, in his only trip to his ancestral Quebec in 1982, visited the Oratory with me. And I went back to the Oratory on subsequent trips.
But Christmas is complex in our society.
This year, to my knowledge, the United States Postal Service marks every stamped piece of mail thus:
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The Postal Service had seven holiday stamps this year, including two Christian and two secular, and Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and Eid…all reflecting different traditions. I tried to get all seven varieties this year, but the last three were not in stock when I wanted to purchase them, probably some function of “supply and demand”.
Today, for youngsters of all ages, “Santa Claus” will dominate, though Santa won’t arrive at everyone’s doorstep.
Christmas is a complex time of year.
So, Merry Christmas, but keep a notion of the ideal we are noting today.
It comes well expressed as an addition to a friends Christmas letter received a couple of weeks ago, from a writing by Jay Cormier, as follows:
CHRISTMAS ROOM
“He is never mentioned in Luke’s story of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem, but he is the linchpin of the whole Christmas story. Were it not for him, Jesus would not have been born in a poor stable but in the Bethlehem Ramada.
He is the innkeeper who presumably refused a room to Joseph and Mary, forcing them to find shelter in a barn. All Luke says is that “there was no room for them in the inn.” Bur every Christmas pageant includes the innkeeper, often portrayed as a gruff old bir who cannot be bothered with a poor carpenter from the sticks and his young bride. Sometimes he is the harried host, overcome with the demands of running a hotel during a busy season. and once in a while, the innkeeper is a compassionate soul who sympathizes with these poor travelers and offers the only hospitality he can.
The innkeeper never realizes who he is turning away. It is a busy time: guests and customers need to be taken care of, and the place is filling up faster than he and his wife can keep up with. (Nothing personal, folks – it’s the busy season.)
We should not be too quick to ridicule: We’re all innkeepers when it comes to this Child. Things need to be taken care of, our lives fill up faster than we can cope. (Nothing personal, Jesus.)
The innkeeper’s plight is the challenge of Christmas: to make room in our homes and hearts for this Child, in the midst of the demanding commerce of our professions and careers, in the quiet desperation of our pain and anguish , at our kitchen table and in our classrooms, in our wallets and checkbooks, in our calendars and day planners; to make room for him both when he is welcome and when his presence is embarrassing and inconvenient.
Take a moment to remember that Christ comes in every guest who comes to your inn in every season of the new year. “
NOTE: My Christmas “card” this year remains here. Especially note the video accessible there.

#668 – Dick Bernard: Dad's Birthday

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Twenty-five years ago today, December 22, 1987, my Dad celebrated his 80th birthday.
Being Dad, it became a particularly special event, worthy of note this day.
As I recall, my sister, Flo, and I had taken the trip from Minnesota to Dad’s new home at Our Lady of the Snows, overlooking the Mississippi River Valley just above East St. Louis IL. Dad had just moved there from his previous home in San Benito TX, where he’d lived since he and Mom became “winter Texans” in 1976, and not long thereafter purchased a small home at 557 N. Dowling, and became full-time residents of that Rio Grande Valley community.
Mom passed away in August of 1981 and Dad had a decision to make. He decided to live on, staying very actively engaged in the San Benito senior and Catholic and general community. He became an active volunteer at the Berta Cabaza Junior High School across the street from their home, tutoring Hispanic kids whose first language was Spanish, and by all accounts, the volunteer job was a great fit for him. That story, with photos, continues here.
In 1987 his good Valley friends his good friends in San Benito, the Brashers, began talking with him about this Apartment Community called Our Lady of the Snows in their home town of Belleville IL They weren’t Catholic themselves, but they thought the Apartment Community there might be a good fit for Dad, and he decided to try it out with a short visit, then in the summer of 1987 with the help of Flo, and later with my help, he made the long move north to a small apartment in that wonderful Apartment Community.
Our Lady of the Snows became an exceptionally great fit for Dad, and he blended in with everything there. That’s a story in itself.
But this story is about his 80th birthday….
Dad was always a methodical sort of guy, and he’d become acquainted with a physical fitness program through the U.S. government which made suggestions for senior activities, and awarded certificates to those completing their projects.
Eighty days before his 80th birthday he made a decision.
He was going to walk a 15 minute mile once every day, culminating with the 80th mile on his 80th birthday.
I don’t recall him announcing this goal at the outset, but that’s what he did.
He picked his route and his time. He would begin at the stage area of the ampitheatre at Our Lady of the Snows at 7:45 a.m., walk back and forth, row to row, until he reached a mile. (On the general map of the shrine, the area I’m describing is in the lower right hand corner of the developed area.) Somehow he had calculated what was a mile. His goal was to reach the Bells by the time the Angelus rang at 8 a.m.
He’d walked this route the previous 79 days. December 22, 1987, Flo and I were with him.
I recall it as a chilly morning and, worse, a little icy and thus potentially hazardous along Dad’s chosen route.
No matter.
This was Dad, and this was his route, and this was the 80th day, and the day for the 80th 15 minute mile on his 80th birthday. No little thing like ice was going to stop him!
This day he led and we followed, and he was a man on a mission. We did our best to keep up, but it was futile, at least for me.
He arrived at the Bells two minutes before they rang.
There was no drama. He’d made his goal.
He lived on at Our Lady of the Snows till his death November 7, 1997, not quite making 90, basically covering every inch of that remarkable facility on foot, many, many times.
I got into my own habit of walking that day in 1987, and since, I calculate, I’ve walked the circumference of the earth.
Lately a bit of osteo-arthritis in the right hip has crimped my habit of 2 1/2 miles a day, and I’m searching for an alternative.
There are habits and there are habits.
Happy Birthday, Dad!

#667 – Dick Bernard: Today

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Heritage House, Woodbury MN, Noon December 21, 2012


Supposedly today is the end of it all, at least the Mayan calendar ends.
So it’s been good knowin’ yah, until/unless we meet again.
If it isn’t over today, Nostradamus and the Masonic Cross seem to indicate by the end of 2012 it will be all over, so perhaps there are a few days left to make things right….
On the other hand comes the Christmas letter I each year receive from the most overtly Christian person I know, from Bemidji (she’s never said her denomination, but that’s irrelevant. She is never pushy.) The end times have been on her mind, though, and she devoted the last two paragraphs of her always interesting Christmas letter to the topic:
“I’m sure you have been made aware of the December 21, 2012 Mayan calendar date. there have been many TV programs about that date being linked to the end of the world. Do I believe that?? Not at all! I do believe the Lord’s return is close at hand but certainly not on December 21. I have plans for travel in 2013 to Mississippi and Louisiana in February, Greece in April, and New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine in September.
As the verse in the bible so clearly states about the Lord’s return, “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.” (Matthew 24:36). You need to be ready at all times for His return because, “…for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh.” (Matthew 24:44) “Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast that no man take thy crown.” (Revelation 3:11)….”
What I like about her comment is that, regardless of her belief, she acknowledges the unknowability of it all. (Except – she’ll be amused when I point this out to her, I think – that she declares the end of time won’t be today!)
The end comes for all of us: thousands today, unexpectedly, without warning. A traffic accident; heart attack…it is not worth wasting time in worry. A physical or natural catastrophe could easily happen and destroy our notion of the future. So?
Best we can do is to do what we can, every day, to clean up our own abundant messes and do what we can to help leave some kind of a future to those who come after us. (I’m not talking “fiscal cliff” here either, or setting about to accumulate more personal money.)
As individuals we are cause in the matter of the future, however short or far away that might be.
Back in November, a friend sent me a marvelous Louie Schwartzberg video on the topic of Gratitude, based on the theme of Today.
Here it is. It’s only ten minutes of your time, today. Take the time.
It’s also included in my own Christmas message for 2012 which is, if you’re interested, here.
Have a great day. Every day.
(My friends Christmas card is cute: A pleasant snowman with angel halo and wings, a bird sitting on one of its stick arms; the arms holding a string of stars. “All is calm…all is bright” is the caption. I like that.
I recall another friend, at another time, New Years Eve 1999 – the end of the Fall that we call Y2K.
She was flying to Los Angeles from Minneapolis, and planned her flight so as to not be in the air at the stroke of midnight January 1, 2000.
It wasn’t till she was in flight that the thought occurred that, probably, the computer clocks were probably not running on U.S. Central Standard Time….)

#666 – Dick Bernard: Newtown, to those who'd like to help change the conversation about Guns in America

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If you’re interested in making a difference in this guns-in-America conversation, here are some thoughts:
Yes, it is Christmas time, and preparations take center stage such as each of us prepare for our own family rituals at this season.
Christmas is often a confusing time, desperately depressing for many, far too much ‘noise’ and competing priorities. We each have our own narrative. “Christmas shopping” is a major one.
Today and forward, the funerals continue in Newtown CT.
This morning some adult men were joking about going out to buy guns before they were made illegal; I had just read an excellent commentary in the Minneapolis Star Tribune from someone with Asperger’s Syndrome about sensitivity to those with such ailments. I wondered if the guns-trumping-everything bunch can see themselves as mentally ill….
As we continue to be overwhelmed by the horrific facts of Newtown, it is easy to become paralyzed into inaction, or, equally terrible, to rigidly refuse to consider other points of view. Neither mitigate towards change in the status quo that led to all of the hideous acts, Newtown only the most recent.
This is an opportunity for deep conversation and some change in course in our country, state and community in many areas: guns, mental health (including every single one of us), video games, sanctioned bullying demonstrated by adults in sundry ways… Even in my small corner of the communications universe, my first post on this topic last Saturday brought some comments (added at end of this post); and the same column used in the Woodbury (MN) Patch has ignited some continuing conversation [44 comments as of early Dec. 19].
Here are some other ‘threads’ not commonly seen to consider as this conversation hopefully continues.
1. The Status Quo is Very, Very Powerful
Newtown is not the first gun crisis we have experienced, and it won’t be the last. Those who do not want meaningful change know the simplest tactic is to simply wait out the initial turmoil – and life will go on, unchanged. Relevant, I think, is this handout from a workshop I attended perhaps 40 years ago which demonstrates the dynamics of response to a disaster. I prefer to leave it in its original form. It speaks for itself. This is a flow chart to spend some time contemplating, in my opinion.
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Worksheet from workshop circa 1972


We are the politics we like to criticize and judge, more so than the politicians. Change is possible, but takes lots of work, and persistence.
Ditto to the crisis sequence is the very real problem of instituting real and continued Change. Another old handout I have from the same time years ago showed what we all know is true: change is exceedingly difficult, even if one knows that beyond the resistance to change is a better something Change001. We embrace the status quo (think over-eating, etc) because it is very hard to change behaviors. The initial response to change is reduced efficiency (or pleasure, etc), which is why most of us do not actually change those behaviors we know that we should.
2. We will not Rid Our Nation of Guns. The best we can expect is a much healthier attitude towards them.
The guns the Connecticut Mom apparently kept to protect her from potential hostile others, ended up being the instrument of her own death, and of many others….
I have never owned a gun, and never will. I qualified as expert with the M-1 in the military (WWII vintage, something like a deer rifle with a small ammo clip).
A recurring image is at my 87-year old Uncle’s farm house this Fall. He showed me his guns. He had, if I recall correctly, six of them, including 30.06 and 12-gauge shotgun and some old-timers from his Grandpa’s day. My Uncle is no gun nut, and the guns were not for self-defense. He occasionally hunted for deer or for pheasants on his own property – that was it. He didn’t keep a stash of ammo. If he needed a box of shotgun shells, that’s what he bought – not cases.
He and I didn’t talk about the National Rifle Association (NRA), to which he belonged, off and on. It is pretty clear to me, though, that he has not much time for the present NRA.
3. The NRA and the Gun Industry Needs to be Called to Account.
This, too, will be hard. Our weapons industry provides lots of jobs. Think the problem of change.
The current version of the NRA is not all that old. When I first became teacher union staff in 1972, I can remember the first visits to our national headquarters in Washington DC. Across 16th Street, then, about a mile north of the White House, was an old standard issue office building housing the then-National Rifle Association. That NRA was a very different organization than todays version.
4. Is Change Possible? Yes. Is It Easy? No. Can it be Delegated to Someone Else? No way. It’s in each of our courts.
Some years ago I happened across a wonderful book, “Why We Can’t Wait”, written by Martin Luther King Jr in 1963-64 about 1963 in America. It remains in print and available. I highly recommend it.
MLK was then 34 years old. In his final chapter, “The Days to Come”, he talks a lot about political engagement and political leaders like Eisenhower, Kennedy and LBJ. At page 132-33, commenting on JFK’s assessment of the importance of Bull Connor to the Civil Rights successes, King says this: “It was the people who moved their leaders, not the leaders who moved the people.”
This is the powerful message to anyone who wants to impact change. It is the responsibility of each one of us to make our small bit of difference. It takes more than just signing a petition, or saying something else should do it. It is solely up to each and every one of us.
COMMENTS FROM THE PRECEDING POST ON THIS ISSUE:
From Mary Dec. 15:
I attended a workshop yesterday by Noel Larson who is expert in treating people damaged enough to do these acts….and heard about Connecticut there in a large room filled with people dedicated to providing therapy to heal from abuse and perception of constant danger…ironic – if payment is available they have guarantee of work – very difficult work.
I am very sad.
From Jeff Dec 15: watched Congr. Carolyn McCarthy on MSNBC this morning. She is an RN, lost her husband and her son was terribly injured in a Long Island shooter incident in the early 90’s.
She should be watched, she is plain spoken and like most nurses, direct and doesn’t pull punches.
She and another panelist said we have to admit that gun owning is a right, the Supreme Court has determined that. We need to do something about automatic weapons, multiple bullet clips, closing the gun show loophole and strengthening background checks. Find common ground with responsible gun owners , sportsmen that can overturn the perversity of the extreme NRA views. (our political system is gerrymandered under our house districting system to allow the NRA to bully reps)
Michael Bloomberg is putting his money in the fight to find districts where tipping points can be influenced. That is a good thing.
The other thing Cong. McCarthy said is we need to emulate the campaigns against smoking, for seat belt use….long term changing of a culture and mindset by stigmatizing parts of the gun culture are necessary. So gun responsibility, gun safety should be the buzzwords… not gun control. (I note that both George Lakoff, and Nate Silver wrote about this terminology in the past few days).
Bob reminded me of his post from June 29, 2009, here.
From an elementary school teacher in MN: My principal was in the air force and today he talked about wanting to get a gun permit for conceal and carry in the school to protect everyone (which didn’t go over well at all given that everyone is so emotionally raw right now and does not want anything except stricter gun controls) Oh well……..he thinks he personally would save all of us and all 770 students. A little of his ego is involved here I think. Alot more discussion to follow.
From Carol Dec 15: “This morning, a madman attacked more than 20 children at an elementary school in China. As of this writing, there are no reported fatalities.
A few hours later, a madman attacked an elementary school in Connecticut. As of this writing, 20 of those kids are dead.
The difference? The weapon. The madman in China had a knife. The madman in Connecticut had three semi-automatic guns.”

Already you’re hearing the excuses: Timothy McVeigh didn’t need guns to kill all those people, the terrorists on 9-11 didn’t need guns to kill all those people, yadda yadda. As though a 20-yr-old living with his mother could have pulled off a massive truck bombing or flown planes into buildings. An unstable 20-yr-old needed guns.
I’m not going down the rabbit hole of Patch comments, etc. again. Nothing changes with these idiots. Somebody by now has probably claimed that if some kindergartener’s mom had only packed heat in their lunchbox, they’d all be safe.
From Barbara Dec. 15: I am totally freaked out about this. It must be because of the little kids. Little kids, for God’s sake. Evil, evil, evil.
I am on a massive personal inventory about my complicity via relative silence, and how to mitigate against that going forward.
For starters, Heather Martens and Protect Minnesota have infrastructure in place (and have had for years) about guns and violence. So in MN, there’s a foundation in place.
From Jeff Dec 15: This thing has made me numb… and I can still not comprehend it.
Something has to be done to question the ethic of violence in our society, from these types of murders, to video games, to movies to our own govts reliance on violence to pursue its foreign policy.
Merry Christmas.
From Will Dec 15: Dear Folks: I just finished writing the President most of you voted for plus my Congresspeople urging them to stand up to the NRA and immediately introduce much stricter controls on those types of weapons that are most frequently used in massacres such as at Newtown CT and the others.
My heart wasn’t in this next part but I suggested if they focus on assault weapons, maybe their constituent voters who murder only animals aka “hunters” will not be vindictive at election time. After all, some of these Congresspeople do some good work even though they’re Democrats and need to be dragged much farther to the left such as The Green Party or Workers International League/SocialistAppeal.org.
When I wrote Mr. Obama, I noticed his list of subjects, like my Sen. Amy Klobuchar (but unlike Sen. Al Franken and Rep. Betty McCollum) did not include guns nor gun control. So, flustered, I hit the Homeland Security button which promptly was refused and I tried a few others (Drone, Rice, Boehner, Bachmann) before finally managing to sneak under the wire with “other.”
From Greg Dec 15: Regarding a comment in the Gail Collins column that if more good people carried guns they could respond when a person starts killing. A number of years ago I read a story that I wish I had saved.
It occurred outside a county court house in a rural Texas county. A man accosted his ex-wife as she was about to enter the court house, I believe for a post divorce hearing.
The man started shooting at her. Nearby an uninvolved man saw what was happening. he drew his gun and began shooting at the first man who then began firing at this second man. Result: the second man, a good Samaritan, was shot and killed.
At Sandy Creek school and at the theater in Aurora the shooter was said to be clad in protective armor. Thus not only must a person be able to draw and fire at the attacker, but must connect with a head shot … virtually impossible in those circumstances.
The proposal for rifle storage and usage [Rabbi Michael Lerner of Tikkun] tracks closely my experience in the 1970s while on U. S. military duty in then West Germany. Gun clubs existed in cities where people could store their weapons under lock and key and go to shoot at targets. Seems like a reasonable approach.
People who think they are protecting themselves by keeping a loaded gun in their homes may wish to reflect on the experience of the Rochester Minnesota minister who accidentally shot his grand daughter after mistaking her for an intruder.
From Jeff Dec 15: People who want to reform the gun madness have to start from the premise that gun owning is in the constitution and the Supreme court has recently upheld individual rights to own guns and been very hesitant to strike down certain limitations or restrictions.
aa) change minds with spending money on the same campaign that reduced smoking and diminished it to nearly pariah status… enlists teachers, doctors, police, military men , actors, hunters, religious, etc. to work on changing the gun culture, and part of that will have to be rewarding positive gun ownership
bb) work on closing the gun show loophole, work on passing the ban on automatic weapons, multiple ammo clips,
cc) strengthen and bring technology to bear on background checks
dd) allow pediatricians to ask parents if they are gun owners and how they store their guns
ee) increase funding for mental health, and remove the stigma attached to mental illness (remember Paul Wellstone)
Find common ground with gun owners and sportsmen…they are parents and grandparents too.
Jeff Dec 16: we need to ask ourselves what would our governments and our fellow citizens be doing now if the Newtown killer’s name was Abu Abdallah? I can only imagine the actions that would follow, the unmitigated demands for investigations , etc. Yet a madman takes his gun owning mothers automatic weapons and kills 28 people and we as a nation wonder what our elected reps might be able to do? The Patriot Act was forced down our throats as a result of 9/11, the HSA is one of the largest departments of the govt ,,,, yet it seems every week we endure shootings like this.
Paul Dec. 16: Here is another strong voice in support of the commitment of teachers to their students. The bravery of the Sandy Hook teachers in the face of an unimaginable nightmare is astounding.
From Judy Dec 16: This is wonderful.
From Flora Dec 17: My heart is heavy from the tragedy at the elementary school in Connecticut.
This Wednesday, Jefferson High School will show a film made by last year’s senior from Edina High School, called “Minnesota Nice”. It is the film on bullying, followed by homeroom discussion. I hope every effort matters in making the schools a better place for everybody.
Wishing for Peace everywhere,
From Norm: Excellent piece Dick.
I singled out the following ready to send around because where ‘serious’ can’t do the trick maybe a little
tongue-in-cheek will work:
A safe society is one where everyone packs heat all the time: wouldn’t it build character for citizens to learn their responsibility early on? There’s no problem finding a firearm for
small hands: if every one of them had had a piece in his desk, and opened up on Lanza from all directions right away, only a few more would be dead now, maybe even fewer, and the survivors would have learned about pride and self-sufficiency instead of fear and surrender. We have fire drills; don’t we care enough about our kids to give them rapid-fire drills? And come to think of it, kindergarten is not too young to learn freedom through armed revolt (see lesson one above): what more oppressive, authoritarian institution is there than a school to its students? K-12 students with suitable weapons could be learning to fight tyranny before the school crushes their spirit and turns them into slaves of big government.
From Greg Dec. 17, to his Church in Minneapolis: Many people are probably like me, we want to do something tangible for the dear people of Newtown Connecticut. I think it was upon the death of Princess Diana that a book of condolences was placed in the Minnesota Capitol rotunda. People were able to come and sign their names as a demonstration of their sorrow and desire to connect with the people of Great Britain. I did.
In the news coverage of events from Newtown I’ve seen a number of images from St Rose of Lima Church and its pastor.
Let’s place a book of condolences on a pedestal at the crossing next Sunday for people to sign. Priests can make an announcement this Sunday so people will be aware of this opportunity to connect with our sisters and brothers in Connecticut.
Thanks.
Greg

#665 – Dick Bernard: When will we learn? Thoughts immediately after Newtown CT

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Friday morning we took a quick trip over to an area shopping mall to watch our 7th grade grandsons school band do a half hour mall concert. I’m always proud watching kids perform, and watching the teachers work their magic with those kids, and this concert was no exception. This band was a unit, playing a medley of Christmas songs for quite a throng of us, likely heavily sprinkled with parents and grandparents and other family of the students (our grandkid also had his aunt there. His Mom and Dad were at work, his Mom as a Middle School Principal a few miles away.)
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Concert at the Mall December 14, 2012


December 14, 2012


Enroute home we stopped at a store on busy France Avenue to pick up some items, and decided to have lunch in a casual dining place across the drive. Meal over, we walked past one of those ubiquitous flat screen TV’s on the wall, sound off, closed captioning on.
I noted something about a shooting in a school, and the view of the top of a school somewhere provided by a news helicopter. We stopped until the closed caption at least identified where the breaking news was taking place, and saw it was in Connecticut, and drove home.
The rest is history, and as we all know, the massacre at the Newtown CT elementary school became the story of the day, and will now dominate for awhile the public and perhaps even the political conversation – and it is a conversation we all need to be involved in about our American reverence for rights, freedom and guns, regardless of deadly capacity.
We’ve had plenty of warning and even practice in this conversation: Not long ago was the Aurora theatre; followed by the assault on the Sikh Temple; followed by the attack on the business in Minneapolis; the Portland Mall…and on and on. There were similar events before; others still to come. Pretty uniquely American….
Random acts of violence involving guns. We know that such events trigger similar events. Someone, somewhere gets an idea….
The debates again beginning will be predictable, I fear.
After Aurora the on-line Patch newspaper editor in Eagan started a poll/conversation on gun control. I had joined the conversation thread then.
Consistently about 60% of respondents were against any kind of gun control, and were passionate about it; the rest of us were more or less evenly divided in favor of gun control, or of restrictions on guns and ownership.
Aurora passed, and on life went, but the poll remained and I was still on the list to receive comments. After each of the above incidents the comments began again. I just looked (early a.m. on Dec. 15) and there are 684* comments, with the percentages consistent with my above comment.)
I’m guessing that sometime today the poll will return to my inbox, with the predictable passions continuing.
Of course, the 60% against gun control is reflective only of those who take the time to present their point of view in a non-scientific poll. It is just a poll, and is so acknowledged there.
But at least respondents present a point of view, even though it is one I have always disagreed with.
If there is to be a change in gun policy in this country, it is going to have to be from the people, including the many who think they can’t do anything, and complain that it’s up to the politicians.
Not so.
WE are the politicians in this and so many ways.
A wrong position on guns has for far too long been a political death sentence for our political leaders, and if we don’t like that, we’re the ones who will have to be, as Gandhi said, “the change we wish to see”.
Those middle schoolers at the suburban mall went home safely yesterday; 26 people, mostly tiny children, in a Connecticut town didn’t….
POSTNOTE: My favorite blogger has a good summary of yesterdays news about the CT massacre and the politics here. A pull quote from William Saletan included in this post: “This morning, a madman attacked more than 20 children at an elementary school in China. As of this writing, there are no reported fatalities.
A few hours later, a madman attacked an elementary school in Connecticut. As of this writing, 20 of those kids are dead.
The difference? The weapon. The madman in China had a knife. The madman in Connecticut had three semi-automatic guns.”
* UPDATE Dec. 19, 2012: I had wondered when the first comment would be added to the 684. I note that the article itself remains focused on the more recent Minneapolis shooting, but this comment appeared overnight from “Terry the Terrible”: “Bla, bla, bla. They already tried a ten yr experiment banning extra capacity mags, bayonet mounts(??? Musta been afraid of drive by bayonetings) and such and it did absolutly nothing twards reducing crime so we know another ban on (so called) assult weapons would be useless and stupid. Also. All of you folks that think taking all of our guns will solve every little thing need to be educated and taken to the range for a day of learning about and shooti.g yourself. You may even find that it is FUN! O.k., sorry for the rant. Peace… all you wicked and violent sounding gun grabbers. Leave us alone already- one of us might save your lives someday.”

#664 – Anne Dunn: Pe'Sla

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Anne M Dunn lives in northern Minnesota and has two earlier posts at Outside The Walls. You can read them here and here. For those of us not aware, Pe’Sla refers to a portion of what most call the Black Hills of South Dakota.
Heart of the Heart
It seems strange that an Indigenous Nation should be required to buy back a sacred site. But I have been told that we often honor the sacred with lip service while we live in the profane. So money rises above the sacred and the sacred becomes commodity.
The landholders of the sacred Black Hills site, Leonard and Margaret Reynolds, had planned a public auction to sell the 1,942 acre section of high-prairie land diced into 300 acre tracts but the Great Sioux Nation (Oceti Sakowin) quickly protested the sale.
This land plays a key role in creation and tribal members feared how new owners might develop the land which is called Pe’Sla, ‘the heart of the heart’ or ‘the heart of all that is’. The Black Hills (HeSapa) is the heart of Turtle Island (North America) and Pe’Sla is the heart of the heart. The Black Hills is the rolling range of mountains rising out of the badlands of western South Dakota. I have been told that we go to the heart with a hungry spirit and return filled.
As a result of the outcry the public auction was cancelled. The Reynolds invited private parties to bid on the property, including the Rosebud Sioux. Their bid of $9 million was accepted in late August of this year. They paid a deposit of $1.3 million which purchased a seat at the negotiating table.
The Great Sioux Nation once dominated an area that covered what would eventually become 14 states and three Canadian Provinces. But it was fragmented, scattered and exiled when they were pushed to reservations. However, they came from Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Minnesota and Canada to resolve this issue.
In fact, nine indigenous nations on Turtle Island banded together to raise the money to buy the high-elevation prairie located in the Black Hills. International support came from Russia, France, Egypt, Germany, Denmark and Japan as well. The purchase deadline was Friday, Nov. 30.
The land is now in the hands of the Great Sioux Nation. Contracts were signed in Rapid City, South Dakota, where the Rosebud Sioux, the Crow Creek Tribe and the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Tribe community gathered in a historic assembly of United Tribes.
I have been told ‘the people’ were created from the Black Hills and Pe’Sla is where the Morning Star in the form of a meteor fell to Earth, killing a great bird that had murdered seven women. The Morning Star placed the Seven Spirit Sisters in the sky. They are also known as the Pleiades constellation.
The meteor cut a wide open spot deep in the heart of the forested Black Hills. For millennia more than 60 indigenous nations have come to the high prairie to gather medicine and participate in sacred rituals.
The Reynold family held the site for 136 years but always allowed access for ceremony. That’s how I happened to be there in the summer of 1998 with a gathering of indigenous nations from around the globe. I’d traveled to the heart of the heart with Sami artist/activist/friend Gladys Koski Holmes.
One day we joined a small group of adventurers who had decided to climb Flag Mountain, which is one of the highest peaks in South Dakota. We stood on the remains of a Civilian Conservation Corp tower and looked down on Pe’Sla. Before the CCC tower was built the craggy site had been used for ceremony and a sense of the spiritual still lingered on those wind-swept heights.
I have been told that the hills were considered so sacred that no blood was shed there. Even hunters could not go there to kill game.
I found a small gray pearl button in the sacred soil of Pe’Sla, put it in my pocket and brought it home. It had laid in the earth for at least 100 years… probably more.
The Treaty of Fort Laramie in 1868 guaranteed First Nations ownership of the Black Hills but gold was discovered in 1874. So in 1877 the federal government seized the hills illegally. In order to secure the area for exploitation the US government engaged in a war of starvation by destroying the Buffalo Nation. A federal court decision in 1979 declared the government’s seizure of the Black Hills one of the most dishonorable acts in American history.
In 1980 the US Supreme Court ruling awarded more than $105 million to the Great Sioux Nation for the Black Hills. I have been told the interest it has accrued is now in excess of $500 million. But the tribes have never accepted the money because some things are not for sale.

#663 – Dick Bernard: Dr. William Beeman "The Consequences of the U.S. Election on our Relationship with Iran"

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Today at the annual meeting of the Minnesota Alliance of Peacemakers (MAP) about 60 of us heard a fascinating talk by Dr. William Beeman of the University of Minnesota on Iran. He is a man of diverse talents, including academic.
Dr. Beeman is recuperating from a recent surgery but that didn’t deter his presentation. He is an expert in his field, and it showed.
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Dr. William Beeman, December 11, 2012


Near the end of his 45 minute presentation, Dr. Beeman addressed the title of his talk.
In his mind there is no question that this presidential election was one with big consequences for foreign policy in the Middle East. Mitt Romney’s advisers were from the neocon group which gave us Iraq; whilst Mr. Obama has an opportunity to work for a more moderate approach to the region.
But Beeman said this wouldn’t be easy: U.S. policy develops over decades and is driven by powerful people within government who continue from administration to administration. Regardless of who is elected, the ship of state is really much like a large ship – easy to see, hard to turn.
Policies we in the public might not notice can become crucial in one persons hands or in those of someone else.
And whoever is elected is torn.
But elections do make a difference.
Most of Beeman’s talk centered on the dismal history of relations between Iran and the U.S., mostly going back to our CIA’s role in the overthrow of the Mossadegh government in 1952. Since the overthrow of the Shah and the Hostage Crisis of 1979, the U.S. has had no diplomatic relations with Iran. (But Beeman mentioned that tourists can get visas to go to Iran, and he has.)
I gather that much of this history is outlined in Beeman’s book “Great Satan versus the Mad Mullahs“.
The books catchy title matches the speakers engaging style.
When I left the room today, I knew more about Iran than I thought I knew, and I thought I knew a fair amount. Beeman filled in blanks for me on topics I’d never really given much thought, like women’s rights in Iran; our 1970s “Atoms for Peace” program and its very integral role in the Iranian nuclear program, now a fear-monger staple.
He mentioned that since 1990, Iran seems always to have been “two years away” from a nuclear bomb. There seems a pattern.
I’d recommend checking looking up Beeman’s book.

At the MAP meeting December 11, 2012

#662 – Dick Bernard: Pearl Harbor Day one day after.

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Yesterday, December 7, was Pearl Harbor Day. Much of the day I was out-and-about.
Dad’s brother, my uncle Frank, died on the USS Arizona that day, and especially since the 50th anniversary, 1991, it’s been a very significant date for me. I visited the Arizona Memorial in November, 1985, Frank’s burial place literally underneath my feet, in the remains of the battleship that was his home for the last six years of his life. Were he still alive, he’d now be 97. I’ve written about Frank and/or Pearl Harbor often. Most recent is here.
A year ago, December 7, I was at the Veteran’s Service Building in St. Paul to remember the 70th anniversary of the attack. There I met Edgar Wentzlaff, a crewman on the Arizona, who survived. He didn’t remember my Uncle, which wouldn’t be a surprise. What surprised me was that yesterday’s Star Tribune carried a long article about now-95 year old Edgar. Time is running out for the survivors of WWII; tell their stories while they are still alive.
Back home yesterday was an e-mail from my brother, Frank, born Nov 1945, first male child after Frank died, and named for my Uncle Frank. The e-mail included a photo of a man in California, Gary Hanson, who I’ve communicated with, who has made a scale model of the Arizona. Behind me as I type is my own model of the Arizona, made by my friend and colleague Bob Tonra back in the mid 1990s; beside it is a scale model of the USS Woodworth, also by Tonra. Woodworth is the Destroyer on which my mothers brother, Lt. George W. Busch, spent three years in the Pacific, 1943-45.
(click to enlarge).

USS Arizona and DD460, USS Woodworth, models in my home office December 8, 2012. Both models in wood, made by friend and colleague Bob Tonra ca 1996. The "water" with the Arizona is dried Hawaiian foliage from two Hawaiian friends.


Gary Hanson with his Arizona model.


Pearl Harbor and the effects of War (Frank was a peacetime victim, technically) is never far away, a constant reminder of the elusiveness of peace, and the brutality and stupidity of war. It also reminds about how complex and difficult an issue this business of war and peace can be, even among passionate people of seemingly like-interests. War…and Peace…is a family matter.
Pearl Harbor is also a reminder of the need for, and fragility of, enforceable World Law, and the need for a system in which such law has a place at the table.
Working on the issue is no simple task, far beyond absolute 100% right positioning, “standing for something”.
Back home yesterday afternoon I watched again the History Channel program, “The First 24 Hours”, about the first hours after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. I had seen the program before, but events immediately preceding the program made me more mindful of the difficulties we face to prevent the next and likely much worse cataclysm if nations cannot figure out how to get along.
Back then, until the day war was declared, December 8, 1941, the U.S. was a nation divided about whether or not to enter WWII, which had already been raging for several years.
An extremely strong interest group at the time was “America First”, whose motivation was basically as its name suggests. Our isolationism ended only with a disaster that we felt we could only remedy by an extremely long and deadly World War II.
Then, and today, our dilemma is not so much external (like terrorists); rather it is within each and everyone of us, dedicated to our own top and non-negotiable priorities. Thinking, somehow, that we can prevail over our opposition, or win by sneak attacks of small and major scale (that’s why I used my December 7 blog space for the Minnesota Orchestra lockout: in my mind, it was a simple power play now gone awry, with no face-saving way yet found to settle on terms of a contract. Most people don’t care about an Orchestra being locked out, but the effects are felt by those who do.)
Even within the so-called “peace” community, of which I am a part, there is often disagreement, to the detriment of those same advocates for peace.
Yesterday, on Pearl Harbor Day, I saw a copy of the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928, supposedly an everlasting and legally binding pact to end all war, following up on the 1914-1918 “war to end all wars” and the resulting Armistice Day commemoration, which later was changed, in the United States, to be called Veterans Day, losing the essence of the day (in my opinion.) In the United Kingdom it is called Remembrance Day.
Of course, the WWI Treaty of Versailles, intended to end War, only helped to spawn Hitler and WWII. And the ink was hardly dry on Kellogg-Briand when ways to bypass its supposedly iron clad language were found, including by the signatories.
I support people with the passion for Kellogg-Briand, etc. But my friends whose passion is making Kellogg-Briand binding once again, seem not quite as passionate about simple things like promoting Peace Sites, places of peace in our midst; or remarkable movements with results like the 1968 and 1971 Declarations of World Citizenship in Minneapolis and Hennepin County, and then Minnesota.
It can be most frustrating.
And on we go.
Where do you stand?
We live in an increasingly fragile world, and the actions we take, or do not take, and the work we do together, or not, will contribute to the problem…or the solution…one person at a time.

Ruhel Islam, owner of Gandhi Mahal Restaurant in Minneapolis, accepts plaque recognizing his restaurant as an International Peace Site from World Citizen founder Lynn Elling (seated at left) Dec. 7, 2012


NOTE to Twin Citians: Gandhi Mahal is a great restaurant. Check it out.