A week from today…

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…the polls will be closing across the United States and we’ll be deciding what fork in the road this country is deciding to take.

It has been a nasty season.

General-in-chief Trump has now ordered troops to the Mexican border to “protect” us from a few thousand mostly women and children, some of whom may reach the border area perhaps a month from now.

A few weeks ago, Oct. 3, when they were testing the telephone Emergency Alert warning system – I was in a restaurant when all the phones in the restaurant went off simultaneously – I was wondering what the first crisis under the latest version of this system would be.

Well, this is it.  The phones weren’t necessary because General Trump has been threatening it on his campaign stops which are amply covered by the media.

As Trump likes to say, “very sad”.  Huge amount of national resources, financial and otherwise, wasted on a fake crisis.

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Back on October 22, 1962 – it was a Monday – I was an Army Private at Ft. Carson CO, and President Kennedy was addressing the nation.  I was 21.  It was a crucial point in the Cuban Missile Crisis.  We watched the President on Mess Sergeants Stubbs 9″ black and white TV.  It is one of those memories which has never left me.

Thirteen days in October, 1962, was a time of real danger.

The photo (above) and Cuba002 is what we read in our barracks the following day.  We were stationed just a few miles from a major target of those missiles, the NORAD facility on Cheyenne Mountain – a mountain we saw most every day.

The day we heard President Kennedy speak was the end of the 7th day of the crisis.  The crisis ended Sunday October 22.  We never had to leave our base, though we were prepared to do so.

We had experienced a legitimate crisis.

*

Now we’re engaged in a fake crisis with an immense public cost in money and national reputation – all to buy votes based on fear and hatred.

The man with the microphone threatens to attempt to amend the Constitution on his own, declaring children born on our soil to non-citizens to be unwelcome here.  It is not the childs fault to have been born here, and, of course, the child is defenseless.

We are a nation of immigrants.  There likely have been millions of first children of immigrants who were not citizens here when their child was born.

Everyone of my family ancestors came from elsewhere to North America.  That is the story for most of us.

Next week is a referendum on our values as a nation.

Don’t waste your opportunity to cast a ballot for your and our future as a nation, and the future of everyone who comes after us.

Ft. Carson Colorado 1962, my barracks a couple of blocks from this end of the base; Cheyenne Mountain and Pike’s Peak area in background.

POSTNOTE:  Squirrel Hill, overnight.

POSTNOTE TWO: Back in October, 1962, I had only recently turned 22 and was a little older than many of my colleague GIs.  We knew nothing about the Cuban Missile Crisis until President Kennedy went on television.  Before that, the efforts to deescalate had all been diplomatic.  The rest of the week was a little busier than usual in our companies, but not all that much.  We never went anywhere.

My fellow citizens from that era are all in their 70s or older now.  It seems that it is our generation that is most prone to fear and resentment of immigrants…for no good reason at all.

POSTNOTE THREE Nov, 2, 2018: Bad Always Getting Worse, Just Above Sunset, overnight.

 

The World Is My Country

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PRE-NOTE:  The inspirational film (below) is non-partisan and WWII era documentary history. At the same time, Nov. 6 is an important election in this country.  Reminder: in 2016, 66 million voted Clinton; 63 million voted Trump; about 100 million didn’t vote at all.  If you’re a U.S. Citizen and voting age in 2016, you know which category you were in.  VOTE WELL INFORMED ON NOV. 6.

Until Monday, October 29, you can watch, free, and on-line, the marvelous film, “The World Is My Country”.

The details are below.  The producers only ask that you evaluate the product, and make a contribution to help complete this film, to help make it accessible to everyone everywhere permanently.

“Access the film here. Code/Password  cgs2018  (NOTE:  The code/password is all lower case and gets entered on both pages.)  Please share the link and let us know how you felt about the film here.”

*

The World Is My Country is a very well known project to me.

I first learned of this project in 2011, and in 2012 asked the producer if I might show the first rough draft of the film to a group of high school students in St. Paul.  I wondered how kids would relate to a 90 year old man telling a story of what he accomplished when he was in his 20s, right after World War II.  The producer and the school were okay with the idea.

I described for the kids what they were about to see, and asked them to rate the film on a scale of ten before they saw it.

Their collective assessment “4” of “10”.  It was, after all, a movie during the school day! (I was a school teacher long ago.  I know.)

The 90 minute film over, I asked again: This time “9”, one evaluation about average, most 10.  The high evaluation was not a surprise.  I had noted that the kids had been paying attention.

Do watch the film, and do provide an evaluation.

Those kids to whom I showed the film are now in their mid-20s, and they are living in their own future.  All of them can vote this year.   I wonder how many will.

I have seen this film many times since, in assorted contexts, including its World Premiere at the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Film Festival in 2017.

It is a winner.  But to date only a few can be inspired by it.

Support its efforts to cross the finish line to public release.

You can watch it free through Sunday.

POSTNOTE:  There have been some powerful comments at Descent Into Darkness, my post from a day or two ago.  See them here.

 

Descent Into Darkness

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Today is the 73rd birthday of the founding of the United Nations.  There will be a program this evening which I plan to attend: UN Day Program Oct 24 2018.  Till October 29 there is a free on-line viewing available of a wonderful historical film, The World Is My Country003.

Meanwhile, “nationalism” rears its ugly head, officially.  Much more about that for those interested here and here.

Directly related Post here.

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Lies have become so routine and so outrageous in the American political discourse, that I wonder how many of us realize the potential consequences to ourselves and our very society, if we are not very careful in assessing who or what to believe.

We can learn from history.  It’s another question if we have learned anything at all….

Back in the old days of 2003 when we were beginning to bomb the hell out of Iraq, a quotation came to my computer screen that was so unbelievable that I took the considerable time necessary to actually search out and read the entirety of the book in which the quote supposedly first appeared, in 1947.  I finally found the book in the dusty stacks of the University of Minnesota Library.  Here is the quote.

from Nuremberg Diary by Gustave Gilbert, 1947

The person quoted is Reichmarshall Hermann Goering, as recounted by Allied Psychiatrist Gustave Gilbert.  This is found on page 278 of Nuremberg Diary, Farrar Straus and Co c1947.  A pdf of this same page is Hermann Goering 1946001

I especially call attention to the last paragraph.

It took a long time for the Germans to recover from the lies far too many of them believed.

We Americans are no better, and our future is no brighter than the disaster Germany woke up to in 1945.

Ultimately, Hermann Goering committed suicide, before a death sentence could be carried out.

Be very, very wary of slick salespeople, selling lies.

Is our country, the United States, on a “Descent into Darkness”?  We voters and citizens have a lot to say about that in a few days.

POSTNOTE: It was the U.S. and others, through the Marshall Plan, which had a great deal to do with the recovery of Germany and the establishment of permanent alliances to establish the peace after World War II.  Who would want to come to our aid, if our time of disaster comes?

 

COMMENTS:

from Judy B: Excellent column, Dick. Things are so scary now!

from Florence: Trump’s call to Nationalism and calling himself a Nationalist rang really loud and clear today! And over 40% of Americans support him!  I am afraid …

from Judy M: Dick, please know how much your wise and attentive articles are.  You are right on!

from SAK:

Many thanks Mr Bernard although the message is very alarming indeed.

As you say it’s getting more & more difficult to disentangle truth from lies & propaganda.

In a book from 1998, Serendipities – Language and Lunacy, Umberto Eco writes:

“The truly genuine problem thus does not consist of proving something false but in proving that the authentic object is authentic”.

People are so confused that they are becoming cynical & skeptical to such an extent that it will be hard to convince them of anything!

They will laugh & remind you of Chicken Little & “the Sky is Falling, the Sky is Falling.

Avoiding plastic is all the rage – save the planet one straw at a time. Meanwhile yachts with very few on board are burning tonnes of oil every minute. Something from a London restaurant’s menu:

If you would like a straw please ask your waiter, they are biodegradable J.

But seriously, while people are fiddling about transgender toilets, the right pronoun or who will pay for that wall global warming is threatening the whole planet.

The Financial Times (no leftist rag this one).

The Financial Times writes here: Martin Wolf: Inaction over climate change is shameful  23 Oct 2018.  

“. . . if this limit is ignored: life will survive, but not life as we know it”.

“The natural tendencies are either to do nothing, while insisting there is no problem, or to agree there is a problem, while merely pretending to act. It is not clear which form of obfuscation is worse”.

“This is a scale of challenge human beings have historically only met in times of war, and then only against one another. The chances of co-operative action seem near zero in today’s nationalistic world”.

Darrin Nightingale:

‘Inaction over climate change is more than shameful, it’s suicidal. But shaming those who can do something about global warming will not work. They have no shame. Because they cannot see the wrong in what they do. I agree with Mr Wolf that “we need to shift the world on to a different investment and growth path right now”. I agree rich countries who caused the problem need to pay. The redistribution of wealth to “countries that matter for the solution” needs to happen. But I don’t think it will.

The wealthiest individuals, in the wealthiest economies, are like the character Sydney Stanton, the hobbled billionaire in 1950’s sci-fi film “When Worlds Collide”. He thinks his wealth buys him a seat on the ark. It does not. It only buys the opportunity to build it.’  Video here.

‘Think about this for a moment. The 1000 richest people in the United Kingdom increased their wealth by 184 per cent in the ten years that have accompanied austerity. They accrued £468 billion on top of the £256 billion they already had, while the rest of the population experienced the worst decline in living standards in a generation. They no doubt accumulated this wealth by working hard, making shrewd investments, and leading successful businesses. They also managed to convince successive neoliberal governments to decrease their tax liability. £468 billion could do a lot of good. Why isn’t it? Because trying to shame the Stanton’s of the world into changing their ways is like eating glass. The only person with a lacerated tongue is you. “You did it to yourself.” Shaming them will not work. They still think they can buy a seat on the ark, and a way out of the apocalypse.’

from Mark: An interesting quote. History has often revealed that what started out as reform or initially packaged as positive change or “needed” government assistance has descended into murderous evil.

Who are the Gorings of today? That is the great question of our times. I submit that there is more to fear from those who promote a candy shell of universal common good to hide the ecoli within.

Response to Mark: You ask an interesting question, meriting a much longer conversation sometime.  The Third Reich is a forbidden topic these days, and it shouldn’t be.  I was once told by an expert on the holocaust that Germany had about 70,000,000 people and a half million Jews at the time the Reich was building up steam.  We have about 330 million people, more or less.  In that population there are plenty of Goerings.  I spent my 60th birthday at Auschwitz, May 4, 2000.  Auschwitz was for the Polish political prisoners who were tried, sentenced and shot there; we walked to Birkenau, where the Jews were incinerated.  I will never forget that tour.

More to your point, I’d ask you to go to my May 1 blog: here.  At the blog go down near the end and click on World Law Day 2018, and go to pp 4-5, comments of Benjamin Ferencz.  Ferencz, who is still alive, was the Prosecutor at Nuremberg, a young Jewish lawyer.    You may be surprised by his comments.
It’s unlikely Nazi Germany can happen here, but the Germans in impoverished 1920s Germany probably didn’t think 1933 and beyond would happen either.
Let’s talk more, sometime.  Thanks for responding.

PS:

Walking into Birkenau, May 4, 2000.  Photo Dick Bernard.

Walking from Auschwitz towards Birkenau Death Camp May 4, 2000. Photo by Dick Bernard

I had requested of our group leaders that we seek permission to walk from Auschwitz to Birkenau.  At that time, I think it was an unusual request.  But it was granted, and it was an extremely powerful couple of miles.  In front of me is Fr. Michael O’Connell, then Pastor of Basilica.  We were with a group of Catholics and Jews, primarily Basilica and Temple Israel.
War is always very good for business, as you know….
from Joyce, a column by Charles Pierce: ‘He couldn’t say “bombs.” Worse, he couldn’t even say any names. He couldn’t say, “Barack and Michelle Obama,” or “Bill and Hillary Clinton,” or “Maxine Waters,” or “John Brennan,” or even “CNN.” But he found room later in his speech to use some of their names to draw adoring applause and angry chants from the mindless drones who turn out to watch him stroke himself, and all of them, until the ragegasm rises and sends them spiraling upwards into orgiastic glee in the misfortune of others…

…on Friday, within the larger context of a nationwide attempted political murder spree, the president*’s remarks centered primarily on his own greatness, and on how unfair it is that his greatness is not universally acknowledged and applauded…

But all of that pales next to the fact that he came to the stage Friday night apparently utterly unaffected by the events that took place in the country of which he is the president*—or, at least, utterly unaffected by anything beyond how it affected him, his public image, and the possible utility of the events to his cheap political ends. That is an ongoing news story, and it’s terrifying.

His administration* is like him now. In 1992, I covered the trial of Jeffrey Dahmer in Milwaukee. I sat through the entire thing. The frightening thing about the defendant was how there wasn’t an ounce of light in him. He was a blank. He was there, but you’d be hard-pressed to confirm that an actual human being was sitting at the defense table. That is this administration*—dead-eyed, almost reptilian in its cold-blooded ability to exist outside the context of what’s going on with the citizens of the country that it was elected to serve. It is as blank-staring as an abandoned casino on the Atlantic City strip…

Now there’s another guy who rode that tide into a synagogue in Pittsburgh, wherein he drowned in actual blood an actual ceremony of innocence. The president* stood in the rain at Andrews Air Force Base Saturday and called for guns in places of worship and a wonderful, sleek, streamlined new death penalty. I had no interest in the president*’s remarks on the subject, because there would not be any life in them.’

The Parade Ground.

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POSTNOTE: a reader, Jerry, recommends watching this TED talk by Valarie Kaur.

See, at end of this post: “BONUS, The World Is My Country”

San Diego Oct 12, 2018 (explanation in text which follows)

November 6, Election Day, is slightly more than two weeks away.  Many have voted already.  I will probably vote this next week – I need to check on two down ballot candidates for an important office first.   

No one who follows this blog will be surprised: my vote will be Democrat.

My chosen quotation for this election: “We all do better when we all do better”.  (see 8th para of the link). 

At the polar opposite from me is a man, the current President of the United States, whose only allegiance is to himself alone; and the Republicans have embraced and amplified his views: divide and conquer.  

*

U.S. Politics: A Personal View.

The difference between the above poles matters a great deal to our future as a society; which fork in the national road will we choose?

In the last seven days I witnessed two illustrations of principles which I believe apply to all of us and to our country and its future.

Oct. 12, I was privileged to be in the audience as grandson Spencer and colleagues became full-fledged U. S. Marines at San Diego.  (below photo.  His was one of four platoons who were graduating.)

Oct. 17, we attended our first 2017-18 performance of the magnificent Minnesota Orchestra.

In both cases, a rookie Marine platoon and a world-renown Symphony Orchestra, the same principles apply as must apply to any entity that works.  This includes our country, as part of our world.

To my knowledge (I am a veteran myself, and a long time fan of classical music), there is little room for “me” attitudes in the military, or a symphony.  You are part of, and dependent on, the entire group of which you are a part.  Surely, there are soloists, and guest artists (there were both on Thursday, and an Honor Man for each Platoon the preceding Friday), but an Orchestra, like the military, is a team: all the members, the conductor, the back stage crew, the composers are essential as well as the audience who contributes their money, their time and especially their attention.

You can make your own list of other attributes which mark success, starting with teamwork and discipline.

Contrast the above with our present day political United States of America, where destructive competition is the norm – where for one to win, another has to lose.   Pit one “side” against the other in an orchestra, or a military unit, and see what you get.  Mediocrity in one case, or death in the other.

Simply grade our level of discourse by how we communicate against each other; what kind of arguments “sell” in political advertising; how pervasive dishonest political communication has become; and how and with whom we can even communicate about political issues or candidates.

We have become a nation of losers.

Is the notion of working for a nation, a world, working together naive? Impossible?  Look around you, every day, people who are different manage to live in communities everywhere.  Why should we give up hope for a better world?

As we are now, it is a surprise that our country can even survive.  Being “lone wolves” – “free” – might be an aspiration for those demanding “freedom” – “leave me alone” – but it doesn’t work well in a complex society as is our world.  We are paying a price already.  The cost to almost all of us will only increase.

“We all do better when we all do better”.  A good thought as you go to the polls. 

There is a stark choice Tuesday, Nov. 6.  If you have not already voted, make your choices very carefully.

*

Spencer’s Platoon, Oct 12, 2018

About that empty piece of asphalt – the photo at the beginning of this post: Graduation ceremony over last week, the Platoons were dismissed and allowed to mingle with families and friends.  We were looking to take the shortest route to our destination, on the other side of the flagpole, directly across the asphalt.  But there were Marines stationed to limit our access to almost all of the parade field – the section beyond the slightly shaded portion of the above photo.

I asked Spencer why we couldn’t go across.  His response, as I remember it, was that the Parade Ground was reserved for use by the Marines – probably part of the tradition.  It made a lot of sense: “hallowed ground”, shall I say.  Being a recruit is hard, hard work; much of the the grind is practice, practice, practice, likely on that very ground.

A couple of days before the graduation, my barber, Tom, a Marine vet (who trained at this same training depot, 1965), loaned me his yearbook.  He had been Honor Man in his Platoon (the Marine to the left holding the Platoon flag in the above photo.)  Tom’s platoon was #302, Spencer’s #3271.  A lot of Marines have spent a lot of time learning discipline on this patch of asphalt.

Below is a photo of that same Parade Ground from 1965.

Imagine, for a moment, what that parade ground would look like if every present day American were required to be there, together, for an hour, as those young Marines experienced a short while ago, and before, over and over and over again.  In this time of profound political division in this country, it is hard to even imagine all of us standing together, even for a moment, about most anything….  We are in very dark times in our country.

*

My friend,Tom, saw very heavy duty in Vietnam.  He once told me that talking with customers like me was good therapy for him.  His younger brother enlisted in the Marines three years after him, and is one of those who were killed in Vietnam (1968).

It was a very emotional moment for Tom last week when he recited something legendary Marine Chesty Puller had said “there are worse things to die for than for your country“.  I looked up Chesty Puller and didn’t find this exact quote, but perhaps Chesty was saying the same thing someone else had said.

At San Diego, Spencer mentioned Chesty Pullers name, so apparently he is still part of the training Marines receive.

Semper Fi.

May there never be an occasion where these Marines, or any military, either have to kill, or be killed….  It is part of our job to keep the peace.

MCRD San Diego 1965, from memory book of Platoon 302, thanks to Tom S.  Our bleachers on Oct 12, 2018, were in front, roughy center, of where the quonsets are seen in the photo.  Those quonsets have been replaced by new barracks.  Just to the right (not in photo) is San Diego airport.

BONUS:  “The World Is My Country”

Starting on Monday October 22 you and any friends will have until midnight October 29 to watch this film free, on-line.
Here’s the link that will go live Monday 9:OOAM Pacific Time.
Code/Password  cgs2018
(NOTE:  The code/password is all lower case and gets entered on both pages.)
There will be a request to contribute to its completion.  Do consider helping.  It is worth it.
I am a strong supporter of this film, and encourage you to watch it.  Open access begins on Monday Oct. 22 and goes for one week.
I have been involved with the project for seven years.

 

 

 

U.S. Election 2018

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You might have heard there is an election coming up.

If you want to review how stark is the American polarization, take a moment to take a look at the October 4, 2018 Pew Research poll, which you can view here.

Monday, a local leader sent around a quote by Harry Truman on the people’s responsibility for the government they get.  I try to validate quotes, and couldn’t find the exact one passed along to me, but I found one very similar, also from Truman, when he was campaigning for Adlai Stevenson for President, October 17, 1952  (Dwight Eisenhower won).  Truman said this: “It is the greatest business in the world, this business of Government.  And the Government is in the hands of the people who vote.  And when they don’t vote, and when they don’t inform themselves, when they don’t exercise their right to vote intelligently and they get bad government, then they have nobody in the world to blame but themselves.”  (p. 295 Public Papers of the Presidents, column two, here.  Also, featured at the Harry Truman Library website are talks he gave in Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana in 1952.  They are fascinating in themselves.  You can read them Here.)

When Truman made the above remarks he was at the end of an over 30 year career in Government, preceded by being a military officer in WWI.  Love him or hate him, it was on his desk that “the buck stops here” was found, and it was he who popularized the saying.

“Denial is more than just a river in Egypt.”

There are many issues in the upcoming election.  For me, a domant one is this: the Republican Party as it currently functions is no longer Eisenhower’s Republican party, rather it is the Trump Party, local, state, national.  Even our local Republican Congresspeople and state representatives and candidates and advertising campaign expenditures for these offices cannot declare independence from Trump.  He is the present day Republican party.

Effectively we are being submerged in a far more sinister and extensive “swamp” than the one that supposedly existed.

People like myself are irrelevant in the desired New Order.

Take climate change, for just a single example.

I first heard the Denial phrase (above) from Al Gore, in person, in St. Paul, in the summer of 2005, 13 years ago.  Gore was introducing the still in production film, An Inconvenient Truth; he attributed the quote to the music group Dire Straits.  I wrote about the issue then: Inconvenient Truth001.  The phrase actually has a longer and most interesting history, including earlier use by Vice-President Gore himself, who used it in reference to climate change in March, 1991, as quoted in the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram.

Mr. Gore was talking about climate change in 1991; we know the history since then, culminating with Mr. Trump pulling the United States out of the global climate accords of 2015; and promoting the denial agenda in favor of fossil fuels and carbon.  History and science erased.

Tuesday’s Minneapolis Star Tribune top page one headline said this:

Denial of reality doesn’t solve problems.  They just get worse.

We’re in a time of denial.

A political realty for Trumps base and the rest of us is simple:  The “base” seems to be about one in four of America’s potential voters.  Trump performance seems to be approved, at least somewhat, by about 40% of the population.  Trump has never been a majority philosophy.  They won, anyway.

Still, those who did not and do not support Trump are labeled as”losers”, and losers are the subject of Trumps contempt.  We are in Trumps Civil War within our own country.

But there-in lies a problem for Trumps loyal base and supporters as well.  Trump has room for only a single winner: himself.  His middle class base will learn this over time if the current political balance of power continues.  I give the process ten years: disabling or dismantling the “social safety nets” like social security and assorted medical assistance initiatives, not to mention things like continued attacks public education.  The tax legislation of 2017 is the primary vehicle for this dismantling, and it is already in place, with its permanent, and temporary, “tax cuts”..

By the time this is noticed, it will be too late.  We will rue the day it passed.

Ultimately, of course, people like Trump meet the same fate as all of us: they die.

But their legacy often lives on, and people wonder why things are so bad, that were once so good.

That is the reality ahead, without a mid-course correction.

Somebody has to do the hard work:  it is we, the voters.

POSTNOTES:

Recent related posts: October 4, 5, 7

Overnight: “Dreary Times”, Just Above Sunset.

 

Dr. Christine Blasey Ford

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Yesterday one of my daughters sent a powerful piece by Trevor Noah about we white male “victims”.  You can watch it here: “Trump Weaponizes Victimhood”.   See Joni’s comment at end of this post.

A friend sent an e-mail this morning: “A new show has been added to my Cable..Jimmy Swaggert. As I am going thru the stations I hear him say “ It is a Sin to not Vote in the upcoming elections” Then he was defining Sin thru the bible readings.”  So, now it is a “sin” to not vote…?  I thought “sin” was only for Catholics.  “Jesus saves” used to be the mantra for the Evangelical side of things.

There have been other pieces of data.  These will suffice for now.

I have written about this specific issue three times: Sep 19, 26 and 28.

Where I stand:

  1. I stand with Dr. Christine Blasey Ford; and all those who stand for equal justice under the law.  It took great courage for Dr. Blasey Ford to come forward.  I commend her.
  2. I stand with the Democrats.  The Republican Party has completely morphed into a Radical Party and now it seems just another of Donald Trump’s properties, and as everyone should know, all Donald Trump cares about is Donald Trump.  All else be damned.

Those who follow my musings will note over time that I have always supported the process to find truth, elusive and uncomfortable as that can be.  This comes from a long career of having to solve problems with often difficult searches for evidence.  In the present, where there is a tendency to rush to judgement, due process has taken a hit.  Unfortunately, all ideological sides have a tendency to “shoot first, and ask questions later”.

In one of my previous posts, I used the words “show trial” to describe what was ahead in the Senate Judicary “hearing” a week or so ago.  This was before the hearing and the sham FBI “investigation” which followed.  The “hearing” and subsequent were, indeed, a “show trial”.

I have thought a great deal about this and other issues over time.

As I have said, I used to represent people, and I know people who were convicted and sentenced without benefit of trial:  the accusation was the trial.  This has happened recently with people I deeply respect: Al Franken and Garrison Keillor: the conviction was the accusation.  This is now happening with Dr. Blasey Ford – she is being punished for the courage to speak up.

Still, I’ve taken to heart one of my Dad’s many utterances over the years: “two wrongs do not make a right“.  I seek solutions, not polarization.  For the pendulum to wildly swing from one pole to the other is not healthy for our society.  Unfortunately, to find a middle ground especially in these polarized times is to be considered weak.  In the Trump world, now tragically ascendant in our country, the goal is to win at any cost:  The loser is everybody but Trump, or, in this case, the radical fringe of the Republican party.  To be losers is the only role available to the rest of us..

As a good friend likes to say”this isn’t going to end well.”

But, we can be the solution, but it will take lots of work.

*

Joni’s comment on Facebook:

I hope you take 10 minutes and watch this. For the record, I do not feel that this is a “scary time” for young men in America. In fact, I think it’s quite the opposite.

Side note…John and I have two boys who are now 16 and 18. We are far from parenting experts, and we have made plenty of mistakes along the way. In spite of this, I believe that we have raised two boys who are “good kids”. However, I also know, accept, and even expect that “good kids” can make very bad choices for which there will be very real consequences. One of the things that I do think we got right as parents is that we have taught our boys that all actions have consequences (positive or negative), and that they must take responsibility and not place blame for the decisions that they make. The messages we’re hearing right now from those in positions of great power and influence contradict this message, and honestly, that scares me more than the thought of any “false accusations” against my sons.

COMMENT: Joni is also a Middle School Principal, and a great one.  I’m very, very proud of her.

I think I’ve told Joni the story about the phone call I received 30 years ago, from a teacher, Sandy, who said she had been denied an equal opportunity for a high school assistant principalship, and the only reason seemed to be her gender.

Those were the days when Principalships, especially secondary, were a man’s preserve, and management, after all, had the right to hire who they wished for such positions.  Women mostly didn’t fit.

Sandy never did get her opportunity as an administrator, but fought the good fight, with the help of a then active organization Women’s Equity Action League (WEAL) and, of course, her teachers union, local, state and national.

The case was made and if you look at the composition of education administrators these days, you see a stark difference between now and 1978.

All is not lost.  All of us must continue.

Kavanaugh Oct. 5, 2018

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My personal bottom line: Brett Kavanaugh, if confirmed, will be one of the most disastrous appointments ever made to the U.S. Supreme Court.  This has nothing to do with his intellect, nor even with most of the decisions he may render, but what the appointment process is doing and has already done to tear this nation apart.  This win-or-lose game is a losing game for this country as a whole.

This specific appointment is a crucial part of the longterm objective of the radical right wing in this country, to seek effective control of public policy making and interpretation.  Personally, I trace this back over about 40 years.

Nov. 6, 2018, is another crucial date – election day (see postnote).

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Later this morning begins the end game in the U.S. Senate regarding the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh.  I have no idea what the real end of the end game will be.  A Supreme Court appointment is, after all, for as long as an appointed Justice wants it to be.  It is a lifetime appointment, until the Justice resigns, dies, or does something incredibly outrageous.

Becoming a Supreme Court Justice, or a Judge at any level, is a very big deal for our society.  You don’t know this till personally affected.

I follow this kind of thing pretty carefully.  Not obsessively, but carefully.  I’m just one citizen among many.

This is the third time I’ve written about Kavanaugh (links towards the end of this post).

This week I hand-delivered brief, personal letters to my two U.S. Senators, my Congresswoman, and to the Archbishop of the Catholic Diocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis, as well as to two Catholic Priests who I highly respect.  (The public officials Sens. Klobuchar and Smith, Cong. McCollum; the cleric, Archbishop Bernard Hebda.)

The Congress letters were delivered Monday.  The letter to the Archbishop was delivered yesterday, after I learned that the National Council of Churches came out publicly against the Kavanaugh nomination (the U.S Catholic Church hierarchy is not part of the National Council of Churches).  The Catholic Bishops and Cardinals (there are 472 of them) as of this moment are officially silent.

The essential enclosure to all three letters was a one-page letter I wrote to then-Sen. Joe Lieberman on Sep. 7, 1998, related to the Clinton impeachment then raging.  You can read it here: Clinton Lieberman 1998001.  I will let it be my official position on the matter currently at issue.

I didn’t ask for nor do I expect a reply from any of the lawmakers or Archbishop.  But I wanted to hand it, in person, to someone at their physical offices.

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But this is not the end of the story.

I had no idea, twenty years ago, that my simple letter, open as it is to interpretation, would be highly relevant today.

For me, the theme, then and now, is hypocrisy by the those who think they are high and mighty (para three and five).  It is also about shameless abuse of power.

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For those interested, my first three blogs on this issue were Sep. 19, 26 and 28.  If you wish, access to them is here, here and here.

An excellent summary of the current state of the Kavanaugh matter can be read here.

POSTNOTE:  It is customary for people generally, and politicians specifically, to rail against “politics as usual”.  This includes incumbents and candidates.

“Politics” is every single one of us, regardless of our activity or lack of same.  Ultimately, we get exactly what we deserve.

One year ago I watched the entirety of the Ken Burns series on the disastrous Vietnam War (I and my two brothers are military veterans from that era).  Who was responsible for that disastrous war will be argued forever, of course.  58,000 young Americans died in that war, and millions of others in southeast Asia.

I was most struck in that series by a repetitive theme – every President from Harry Truman through Richard Nixon – was blamed for our getting mired in that war.  Every single President, in one way or another, either directly or via advisors, succumbed to a simple fact: to be seen as against engagement in Vietnam, however stupid it was seen to be, was a political (election) risk to be avoided at all costs.  To be against war, was to risk losing an election.  It made no difference, whether Republican or Democrat.

We, the people, got exactly what we deserved.  We were all casualties.

We are replaying the old script this day, October 5, 2018.

Two Heroes: Joe and Rosa

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Two great friends recently passed on: Rosa Bogar on Sep. 2, and Joe Schwartzberg on Sep. 19.  Rosa was 77; Joe was 90.  My life is richer for having known them both.  Their impact is far more than can be expressed in a few words, so my purpose here is simply to introduce them to you.

Here is Rosa Bogar’s eulogy, the featured death in the Sep. 18, 2018, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Rosa Bogar Mpls STrib001.

Here is Joe Schwartzberg’s obituary, also from the Star Tribune.

Dr. Joseph Schwartzberg

The last photo I took of my friend, Joe, was March 13, 2018, at his home, with photos of part of his collection of personal doodles.

Joe Schwartzberg March 13, 2018

Joe and Rosa never met, but had their paths crossed, I am sure they would have had a very interesting conversation: he from Brooklyn, she from Orangeburg, he an internationally known and highly respected academician, she with less formal education, but well known in her community, with a passion like Joe’s for justice and community.

My context with Joe was active membership with Citizens for Global Solutions MN, at whose website you can view an interview of him in 2014.   In his final years, his passion was passing along his knowledge and experience with the Workable World Trust.

As Joe’s years dwindled down to months, then days, he endeavored to leave behind a compiled record of his work.  One result is his personal  “kaleidoscopic account” of a long life actively lived: JES Kaleidoscopic Sketch 2018-08-15. 

In his papers was a remarkable draft of a  proposed “World Constitution“, handwritten in 1955 when he was 27 and a student at the Sorbonne in Paris, just beginning his career.

His cover letter to myself and others said “should you choose to study my Constitution, bear in mind that it was written in the early days of the Cold War and at a time when the UN had only 60 members [today, 193].  Matters that one thinks little about today (e.g. decolonization) receive greater attention in my 1955 work than they would if I were writing it in the recent past…When I wrote my Constitution I did so with a view to what I supposed had a reasonable chance of being accepted by the nations of the world in 1955.  I think we should continue to ask ourselves that question in 2018.”

For some reason, Joe sent me and whomever else the following link on August 7, 2018: The Memory Mystery from The Daily Paradox.  I have to think it had some special meaning to him, which he wished to share with whomever was on that particular list.

Over the years, Joe’s “signature” became his Affirmation of Human Oneness, which he had translated into over 40 world languages.  You can see them here.  For years, at events, he would post his hand-made Principles of Global Peace and Global Justice.  One year I took photos of all of them, and if you’re on Facebook you can see them in an online album here.

In the last few months, he invited me to ask for a doodle which I might like to have.  His doodles happened as they do for most of us when we’re sitting in meetings of one kind or another.  His were uncommonly artistic, and diverse in their content, and when pressed he didn’t reveal that he had anything particular in mind when he was drawing them.  (He comments on them in his “Kaleidoscopic Sketch”.)

The doodle I requested, and received, is below, 5″x8″.  As with Rosa’s bottles of water, this doodle will be treasured.

Thank you, Joe.

Both Joe and Rosa left behind not only memories, but good examples.  They were among many teachers I’ve had in my life.

Who were some of yours?

Rosa Bogar

I have a file about Rosa, and its contents reveal that I met her in 2006.  We happened to be seated at the same table at the annual Martin Luther King Day Breakfast earlier that year.  She was retired, and had a most interesting story, and over the years we kept in touch.

The eulogy in the newspaper accurately catches the Rosa that I knew as a true hero, someone whose example I hope I can follow.

The last time I saw her was May 1, at an event we’d invited her to attend, on the topic of Forgiveness.   I took the below photo, which she probably wouldn’t prefer, but as you can tell she and the others were seriously engaged in what the speaker had to say (forgiveness is difficult, as you likely know, especially when you have to do the forgiving….)  By her choice she came to the event by bus, was glad she came, and I gave her a ride home after.  She didn’t reveal anything about her ailment recurring, but apparently she was terminally ill.   Life was apparently winding down for her.

May 26, 2018, she sent me a copy of a letter from the archivist at the Hennepin County Library, accepting Rosa’s “personal papers and photographs for public use at the James K. Hosmer Special Collections.”    A handwritten note with the letter was succinct:  “I’m most proud of my collection.  Check it out!”  I will, and I’ll give the archive my own Rosa Bogar file.

Rosa Bogar (at left) May 1, 2018

Rosa can’t speak for herself, now, but as we visited over the years it seemed to me that her twin passions were recognition for the very real accomplishments of those of African descent in this country.  Her card identified her:  “Rosa Bogar/Founder/Visionary.  Ancestral Wrap.  Honoring African American History and Culture.  Headwraps and rags deeply rooted in the culture: “wrap heads” of this truth.”

She was among those featured in the 1996 book, Heroes Among Us, by columnist and author Jim Klobuchar.

She also sought  reconciliation for injustice: things like the Orangeburg Massacre of 1968, which happened in the community in which she grew up was very important to her.  Back in 2008, she sent me a article about Orangeburg and her recollections of it: Orangeburg 1968002.

When I drove her home on May 1, she gave me a gift, shown in the below photo.  Simply water bottles, which she apparently distributed at the Orangeburg observance she attended in 2018.  They’ll not be discarded.  Thank you, Rosa.

The third bottle is in memory of her deceased brother.