#463 – Dick Bernard: Visiting My Minnesota DFL (Democratic Farmer Labor) Party

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One of tents for Founders Day celebration at Minnesota DFL Headquarters October 29, 2011


When I made the decision to create this blog two and a half years ago, I had to decide how to label myself. It was not a difficult choice: “moderate pragmatic Democrat” is what I called myself then, and I’ve not seen any reason to change the label.
Each word, of course, carries its own meaning. As owner of this particular label, “moderate” and “pragmatic” speak a personal truth I learned over many years of advising and representing people. It is great to have ideals, but the reality of our communities and our nation and world is much messier. We are a “booyah”, a stew, of infinite variety. Anyone who seeks to impose his or her views on everyone is in for a very rude awakening, if not in the short term, certainly in the longer term.
As for “Democrat”, I’ve mostly been quiet, but in more recent years more active and visible. The Democrat view I see is more oriented to people at large, rather than to the most powerful, the ones who can control through money and media in particular.
Of course there are infinite points along any ideological line. Some progressive friends would view me as a sellout to the cause; some off to the right wing would view me as a socialist, or worse (I spent most of my career working for a Union – one of the hate words in the right wing lexicon.)
But that’s who I am.
Earlier this evening I drove over to the newly refurbished DFL Headquarters on Plato Avenue in St. Paul. It was a celebratory evening, featuring Guest Speaker Sen. Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont. In the gathering period before the dinner (I did not attend the dinner) was the motley variety of people I have come to expect at DFL events. This is truly a ‘big tent’ organization of people who care about people.

Celebration of DFL Headquarters remodeling, Oct. 29, 2011


Wandering around the attractively remodeled headquarters of the State DFL, I came across a couple of quotes which serve as well as any words I might add to this blog.
I close with these two quotes, engraved on the walls of the headquarters (click on photos to enlarge them).
We would be well advised to follow their sage advice:


Today is slightly over nine years since Paul Wellstone’s death; nearly 48 since the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
We remember.

#459 -Dick Bernard: Heritage. Michif Language and Music; Haitian Family Story and Food. Thoughts of Booyah and Culture, generally.

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An October theme for this writer came to be the topic of Heritage. Previous posts on this topic are here and here and here.
October 18, found me in a classroom with multi-cultural students of French at Macalester College in St. Paul MN. We were listening to Professor of French and French in America scholar Professor Virgil Benoit of the University of North Dakota speak on the Michif culture of the Chippewa Reservation at Turtle Mountain ND. Dr. Benoit is a passionate defender of the French language, one of the major world languages, and one of the most studied languages in the world.

Dr.Virgil Benoit, University of N. Dakota, at Macalester College, St. Paul MN October 18, 2011


Dr. Benoit’s video guests (from a 2005 video interview) were Turtle Mountain Michifs Dorothy and Mike Page (Mike is pictured with the fiddle above). Mr. and Mrs. Page conversed about various aspects of their culture, including use of their native Michif language, a language infrequently used at this point in their history. “Michif” is a culture and a language, usually a combination of French-Canadian and Canadian Cree ethnicity and language and customs. (A number of links related to Michif, including a fascinating conversation spoken solely in Michif, can be found here.)
A few days later, October 21, we attended a most interesting talk presented at a Minneapolis Church by Jacqueline Regis about her experience growing up in the southern peninsula of Haiti (near Les Cayes). Haiti, the second free Republic in North America (independence in 1804) was born from a revolt of African slaves against their French masters. It was viewed as a threat by slave-holding and infant United States with consequences to the Haitians lasting to this day (click on Haiti history timeline link here NOTE. the reference to 1919 should be 1915). The loss of Haiti was a major defeat for the French, however, and a direct consequence of that defeat was the co-incident sale of the huge Louisiana Purchase to the United States in 1803.
Ms Regis, long in the United States, is fluent in English but grew up speaking Kreyol and learning French, now both official national languages of Haiti, though French is the language of government and commerce.
[UPDATE: see note at the end of this post] Here is a Haitian recipe for Haitian Pumpkin Soup, served at the gathering: Haitian Recipe001. Food, along with Fun and Family, are very important parts of all cultures.
As I was listening to the Page’s and Dr. Benoit on Tuesday I began to think of a regional stew often featured at large group gatherings in this area. It is called “Booyah“, sometimes “Booya”, and when I looked it up I found it is likely actually derived from a French word, and possibly was first used as a reference to the stew in Wisconsin.
Booyah, like Americans generally these days, consists of many common elements, but no Booyah is exactly the same.
So also is American culture: very diverse. And the diversity was reflected both in the classroom and the church sanctuary in the Twin Cities this week.
Dr. Benoit, the Page’s, Jacqueline Regis, and everyone who make up the American booyah have good reason to be proud of their heritages, as reflected in the rich tapestry that is the American culture.
UPDATE October 26: an incorrect link is shown in the pdf. A reader provided the correct link for the Pumpkin Soup recipe: see it here. Other recipes here and here

#458 – Dick Bernard: The Vikings Stadium

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If you live in Minnesota or vicinity, and you give even the tiniest bit of attention to news, you will know that THE MINNESOTA VIKINGS NEED A NEW STADIUM (or so they claim). What is more real is that they WANT a Stadium.
MN Gov. Mark Dayton has called for a Special Session of the Legislature before Thanksgiving to decide what obligations will be assumed by Minnesota Taxpayers to build this new facility, wherever it happens to be built. His is a prudent political decision.
Personally, I have no particular interest in the issue. I think the Stadium will be funded, and taxpayers will pay lots of the cost, and I think it will be a very stupid decision, and I will so advise my legislators, but it won’t interfere with my daily life. It’s only a few hundred million, after all. Heckuva deal.
I attended a single Vikings game in my life, back in the early 1970s before sophisticated cameras and large TV screens, and I had arguably the worst seat in the stadium: beyond the end zone, in perhaps the third row up along the third base line at old Met Stadium. I could see the football in the air when it was being passed or kicked. I could discern progress only by cheers, boos and public address system, and by the long sticks showing where on the field the team was.
It was a horrid experience, never to be repeated.
This doesn’t deter the pitchman for the National Football League (NFL) saying yesterday “Great Cities are defined by the great institutions that they support”. This quote was on the front page of yesterday’s Minneapolis Star Tribune, above the fold.
Quite obviously he was talking about taxpayers supporting NFL football.
What a joke.
The Vikings have never won a Super Bowl, and are having a rotten season this year.
Since I don’t follow the game, I only see the aftermath in the morning after coffee crowd who mostly watched the game on television.
These days, there isn’t much animated conversation about The Team. The Vikings have died and gone to hell…quite literally.
Still, when all is said and done, my prediction is that even in these dismal economic times, when everything else is being cut, the State Legislature will find a way to involve ‘we, the people’ in helping along the wealth machine that is the NFL and its teams, including the Vikings GETTING THEIR STADIUM.
So, how much should this matter? Of course, points of view differ.
Real roughly, it seems that perhaps 1 of 1,000 Minnesotans actually attend the home games of the Vikings during the season, and, likely, most of these attend more than one game or are season ticket holders.
Very few care much about what the stadium looks like, or what amenities it has.
Lots of others (not I, thank you) watch the games at home or in other gathering places. But their time is not occupied by seeing how wonderful the corporate boxes are, or how good the obscenely priced drinks or food at the stadium are.
You could play the game in a large warehouse, with a green screen (a la the weatherman’s invisible screen) and sound effects, and nobody would know the difference. There’s a great plenty of authentic crowd pictures and noise already archived.
That would be much more efficient.
But in the end, we’ll cough up several hundred million dollars one way or the other, to preserve a home team which doesn’t perform especially well, and most of us will never see the inside of their stadium. There’ll be another coach, another quarterback, a new tight end…by Super Bowl XC (we’re approaching XLVI in a few months) THE VIKINGS WILL WIN!!! And that new stadium will have to be replaced, again.
What happens between now and the Minnesota Special Session, and after, will be political fodder in 2012. Gov. Dayton knows this; so do the legislators.
The real losers will be the school kids, the small rural cities and country, the poor, the people who suffer loss of revenue or services to help satisfy a greedy industry and its satellite businesses dependent on it.
Sad.

#454 – Dick Bernard: My Contribution to the Peace and Justice Community

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Message to the assorted groups that make up the Peace and Justice community (of which I am a part): this is a time of opportunity to convey your message; but it is long past time to change tactics and strategies. Public attitudes have changed pretty dramatically, but our approach has not. We need to act on this.

Today, I attended the demonstration marking the 10th anniversary of the bombing of Afghanistan in October, 2001. A small contingent of demonstrators on diverse issues got an enthusiastic response from motorists on the very busy Lake Street near the light rail station at Hiawatha. The speakers were the usual. I passed on joining the short walk to South High School for the rally [UPDATE Oct 18: Here’s a three minute segment from the rally at South High].
I was glad I went to the demo. (click on photos to enlarge)
(Attendance at this demonstration might have been smaller than expected due to another Occupy Wall Street demonstration in downtown Minneapolis perhaps four miles away.)

Lake Street, Minneapolis MN October 15, 2011



Today’s demo reminded me of the first demonstration I participated in after 9-11. Quite likely it was on October 15, 2001, one week after we commenced the bombing of Afghanistan, with overwhelming support of the American people Afghanistan Oct 7 2001001. As the article shows, 94% of us were quite okay with this violent response, though within that 94% were many varying attitudes about the how’s or why’s of that bombing.
I was in the 6%.
I simply could not see any long term benefit arising from the bombing. It was a lonely spot to be in at the time. But only one of 20 Americans agreed with me.
Ten years ago I wasn’t directly involved in the peace and justice movement in any way. That October day in 2001 I heard about an early evening vigil on the steps of the Minnesota Capitol and wandered over there. The crowd was roughly the same size as today’s. I don’t recall seeing or hearing anyone I knew. Nor do I remember any of the messages, except for the raucous gaggle across the street who were bomb-the-hell-out-of-’em-get-revenge-now-bunch, brandishing flags like weapons, trying to shout out the speakers on the steps. Their ranks included young children. I was to see a lot of those angry-as-hell folks the next few years.
I came home and got actively involved in the Peace and Justice movement.
These days I’m more involved than ever, but chances are many of those activists across the street from where I took today’s photos think I’m a deserter.
Hardly.
These are insane times. Our worship of war and the war economy, along with greed, is killing us. We desperately need to retool: exactly the opposite of going from a peace to war economy in WWII, but with the same positive results: jobs, jobs, jobs; but fewer of the negative: deaths, deaths, deaths. But we don’t seem to be paying attention. Change is very hard….

But I’m not sure that demonstrations like today’s are a good use of valuable resources in bringing about change: our resources are much better spent in engaging with the public.
Today there were no anti, anti-war folks along that Minneapolis street. There were lots of honking cars.
Any survey worthy of the title today will support the idea that Americans are very tired of war. The October, 2001, attitude is long gone. The worry is about survival in this mean economy.
Standing nearby me today was Barry Riesch, Vietnam vet 1969, and a man I greatly admire. He has made Memorial Day and Armistice (Veterans) Day very special for many years. At the demonstration, I matched his sign with my Veterans for Peace cap – I’m a member of Vets for Peace. The cap which goes with me everywhere in my car.

Barry Riesch, Minneapolis, October 15, 2011


Barry and I know each other, though not well, and he had recently been to demonstrations in Washington DC on the issue of war. He’s been a guest columnist on this blog.
I sensed that he generally agrees with me that the Peace and Justice movements need to get much more involved in true dialogue with those who are searching for ways to become engaged, but are either tired or or not ready to go stand on street corners.
This is a time to personally engage with these uncertain folks who don’t like the status quo but are not ready to get rid of the military or whatever else idealists would want to have happen.
Earlier this summer I attended another demonstration in the rotunda of the state capitol in St. Paul, and made some observations about that group which I feel directly apply to all of us. The blog post is here. The specific comment is this: “I am of the belief that the only effective way for ordinary people – people like myself – to have an impact is one person, one contact at a time. We are so overwhelmed with “information” that there is little left to learn. If we’re going to survive as a society, we need to talk with, even debate, each other, and really listen to other points of view. It isn’t easy – those people standing in a circle yesterday, to have effect, need to turn around and act outwards towards people outside the Capitol rotunda. The only way to do this is to practice honing the skill, be it letters to the editor, standing up in a small or large meeting, giving a presentation, etc….”
As the group marched west on Lake Street yesterday (below photo), I would hope that they are marching into more direct public engagement and true dialogue.
Without such public engagement, there is little hope.

Marching down Lake Street, October 15, 2011

#452 – Dick Bernard: Heritage is alive and well! (Part 2 of 4)

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Related posts: here and here and here.
Earlier this summer I more or less formally resigned my volunteer position as family historian. Thirty years and several books was enough, I reasoned.
But one just doesn’t “resign” from such a “career”, I’ve learned, and the past week, which began with publication of this October 5 post on Heritage is evidence.
October 6 I was at the ND farm near Berlin where my mother grew up, helping “rescue” (a favorite term of my Dad) scrap iron for my uncle. In the junk behind a shed we recovered two pieces of farm history: the remnants of two single bottom hand plows (ploughs), the oldest of which (at right in photo below) probably turned the first furrows when Grandma and Grandpa began to plow the virgin sod prairie in 1905. This plow would have been pulled by a team of horses, and the accompanying wooden accessories have long since rotted away, but the business end remains, and is now safely stored in my uncle’s shed. A few days later, I saw a similar though larger plow in Ada MN, a monument to the pioneers who broke ground in that area. That is the second photo, below. (Click on photos to enlarge)
Both ploughs were surprisingly light and in surprisingly good condition, most likely having laid outside for as much as 100 years or more. When I picked them up I was symbolically reconnecting with my grandparents and their heritage.

Remnants of two one-bottom plows, October 6, 2011. Oldest at right.


Monument to pioneers, Ada MN October 10, 2011


A few days later, in Park Rapids MN, I had the privilege of helping lead a group of 59 people in a conversation about Heritage. The base of discussion was the list found here. There was a vibrant and rich conversation among the participants about what their heritage was, and what it might mean. Our 90 minutes flew by. Here’s a photo of the participants in the session:

Park Rapids MN Headwaters Center for Lifelong Learning October 11, 2011, meeting in Community Room of Northwoods Bank, Park Rapids MN


The very act of gathering and conversing about shared and diverse elements of heritage became a community building exercise in itself, one said.
Between October 6 and 11 came other examples of how the melting pot heritage of America is very rich.
October 7 and 8, I participated in the Midwest French Festival and Convention in Moorhead and Fargo. The below photos represent the tiniest view of a vibrant Festival. More photos on Facebook, here.
In order of appearance:
1) Timothy and Doree Kent discussed the Voyageur, Native and Metis life of the 17th Century before several hundred students and adults.

Tim and Doree Kent October 7, 2011


2) Several persons explained, in English, French and Norwegian, the statue of the Norwegian Rollo across from the Sons of Norway Lodge in Fargo. (Rollo had much to do with the history of the French province of Normandy.) (The inscription on the statue in Fargo: “Rollon. Born 860 A.D. at More, Norway. Founded the Dukedom of Normandy 911. His line through William the Conqueror became the Royal House of England 1066 and of Norway 1905.”)

Statue of Rollo, edge of downtown Fargo, ND, October 8, 2011


Reading the history of the Rollo statue in English, French and Norwegian, October 7, 2011


3) Parishioners at the rural Wild Rice ND parish of St. Benoit (Benedict) gave a most interesting tour of their Church, center of a community with a rich and long French-Canadian heritage.

A tour of St. Benoit Parish, Wild Rice ND, October 8, 2011


4) Dan Truckey, Director, Beaumier Heritage Center, Northern Michgian University, Marquette and Dave Bezotte, Archivist, Michigan Technological University, Houghton, gave a workshop, and performed French-Canadian music for the group. Both are involved in keeping French-Canadian heritage alive in the Upper Peninsula.

Dave Bezotte and Dan Truckey perform at the conference, October 7, 2011


5) In the evening, the great Quebec group Le Vent Du Nord gave a fabulous concert. Later this month they are among a select group of world musicians performing at a major gathering in Copenhagen, Denmark. Many samples of their music can be found on YouTube, and at their website is the Sep 17, 2011, performance of Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion, on which they were guest artists.

Le Vent du Nord, Fargo ND, October 8, 2011


Group Dance to the Musique of Le Vent du Nord October 8, 2011


There is, literally, no end to the potential for conversations about our heritage, and the conversations are interesting and indeed essential. We are, indeed, who we came from; and we live on in those who descend from us.
October 10, at Itasca Park, at the headwaters of the Mississippi River, we came across a family celebration. We don’t know the persons names: the elders had their first date at the headwaters in 1948. She was 17 from Osakis MN, he 21, from Floodwood MN. They married, lived and are now retired in California, and they were joined by some of their family. Their family, joined with others from many cultures, many countries and many places in the U.S., make up our collective country and world heritage.
Let us celebrate Heritage in the broadest and most positive sense.

At Lake Itasca MN, Headwaters of the Mississippi R, October 10 2011

#449 – Dick Bernard: Heritage: The Tin Types

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Related posts here and here.

On my father’s death in 1997, I became custodian of our family photos.
While he came from an ordinary North Dakota family of French-Canadian descent, the family had an inclination to take pictures documenting important events, such as weddings, new births and such.
Within the box of photos was a May 7, 1954 Social Security envelope, and inside the envelope were seven most unusual photographs, very dark, on varied size pieces of tin.
They were of a genre called “tin types“, photography as practiced before photographic film.
The oldest – I can speak with some certainty as to its ID – is a photo of my great grandparents, Octave Collette and Clotilde Blondeau, who married in St. Anthony (later Minneapolis MN) in July 1869. While the photo was, like the others, unlabelled, there is no question, comparing with later photos, that it showed Octave and Clotilde, likely about the time of their marriage. The photo is below.
(click on all photos to enlarge).

The remaining six photos are also unlabelled, but most of them show a young Henry Bernard (born 1872), and were likely taken in the late 1880s and early 1890s, probably in Quebec, most likely as keepsakes for him to take along on his trip west to remember the folks back home. The album with the remaining photos is at the end of this post.
The photos vary in size: the smallest is of Octave and Clotilde (1 7/8″ x 3 1/8″); the largest of the two men (2 5/8″ x 3 1/2″). As can be noted on the above photo, the tin pieces were probably snipped out, rather than of a standard consistent size.
The tintypes obviously endured plenty of wear over the years. It is remarkable that they survived as long as they did, probably stuck in a trunk or dresser or such for as much as over 140 years. But they were meaningful enough to not be thrown out.
Four of the photos appear to have been taken by the same photographer at the same time. The evidence is a slight rosy tint to portions of the photos (note the cheeks), likely hand administered. Until I scanned the photos (at 800 dpi), I wasn’t aware of these rosy cheeks etc. on the four photos.
Precisely the who, where, when and why of the photos will likely remain mysteries except for the certainty that most include my grandfather Henry, and the other is of his future wife’s – my grandmothers – parents.
My best guess: the large group photo, with a young Henry Bernard in front, is probably of his family circle in Quebec, including the Parish Priest. Ditto for the photo of three men and three women. And the others are similarly related, in some ways to his family in Quebec (or so I believe).
The four photos with the rose tint were probably taken at Thetford Mines, Quebec, where young Henry was a miner, where a sister and family lived, and from which place he most likely embarked for then-booming Grafton ND in the early 1890s.
Family history mysteries: they fascinate, and they exasperate.
Consider labeling your present day photos, so that someone down histories road knows who is in the image.

Most likely Henry (Honore) Bernard in front center, his brother Joseph to his left. Perhaps taken in Quebec in late 1880s.


Most likely young Honore (Henry) Bernard





#447 – Dick Bernard: A 1977 visit to the Renaissance Festival

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Today is the last day of the 2011 Renaissance Festival in suburban Minneapolis MN.
Friday’s local news brought a story about a fire at the Festival. Several food vendors shops burned to the ground. The fireman being interviewed said that they were hampered by the fact that they had to truck in water to fight the fire: there are apparently no fire hydrants on the grounds of this seasonal event.
No modern fire control measures on-site: that’s very renaissance, even medieval.
It happened that the Renaissance Festival had come to mind recently, as I had come across an old strip of negatives which were unidentified, and I took them in to get a few prints to hopefully date the strip.
It turned out that the pictures were taken in late summer of 1977, and four of them were taken at the Twin Cities Renaissance Festival that year (remaining photos at the end of this post, click to enlarge.)

Renaissance Festival, likely 1977, rural Shakopee MN. That young lady with the Turkey leg is likely over 40 years old today.


Though I have no “evidence”, I can remember being at the first Renaissance Festival, at the then “new town” of Johnathan MN in 1971. The Festival really expanded when it moved to rural Shakopee some time thereafter, and we usually joined the throng in those early years.
Being the Renaissance Festival, the event was frozen in time. It ends today, and until I saw the news had no particular thought of going out there, but maybe we’ll make the trek across town just cuz of the news combined with those old photos.
As part of the news program, one shop owner whose nook survived the fire, noted that a concrete wall between his and the other establishments probably saved his business. That’s very un-Renaissance.
In the real Renaissance times, indeed, much, much more recently in even recent history, a fire would have meant the end of the entire complex or town.
We’ve moved beyond that, with fire departments, and communities who fund such public services with taxes.
Thankfully for those folks who have businesses at the Festival, fire rigs with water could save most of them.
And how about that little girl in the first photo (above)? She’s likely now over 40. One would bet that the vendor preparing that turkey leg back then, and today as well, is fettered (and helped) by this-or-that governmental regulation to keep everyone’s food safe….


#443 – Dick Bernard: Homeless.

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This morning, as usual, we went downstairs at our church for the usual coffee and donuts. (Our place is the Basilica of St. Mary’s at the near edge of downtown Minneapolis – it is a downtown parish – a place of diverse sorts of people.)
I got my coffee and donut and saw a lady sitting at a table by herself. “Mind if we join you?” I asked. “Fine”, she said. She was well-dressed, looking to be in later middle age, with what appeared to be a nice piece of luggage on one of those portable pull carts.
Making small talk, I said, “it looks like you’re traveling“. It was a somewhat obvious observation. We’re an easy and safe walk to the convention center, and the church gets lots of visitors.
Probably she had been to some conference, and was taking in Mass before catching a cab for the airport….
She didn’t respond to me. She finished her coffee, got up abruptly, and then very angrily said “if it makes any difference, I’m retired and I’m homeless.” Apparently there had been some court case in New York which she had lost. She stormed off to wherever, with no chance for us to say anything, as if she would have wanted us to say anything. There are times when less is best.
Two other people had joined us by then. It was a puzzling happening for all of us.
There is a “profile” of homeless. We see lots of homeless in this social gathering hall after Mass. But they LOOK like homeless are “supposed” to look. Yes, it’s a stereotype, but mostly these folks, mostly men, sometimes a few women, stand out from the usual crowd. This lady didn’t look homeless, not in the least. But apparently she was.
As I write, before noon on this same day, I’m just beginning to process what I just experienced.
In a surface sense, everything in our society, at this moment, looks sort of normal. Even with high unemployment, 91% of us are making a living (85% if you throw in the people who have given up on looking for work.)
It is easy to pretend that there is no underclass, inexorably increasing.
We’re in a family that is experiencing the creeping problem of unemployment within our own family circle. Makes it much harder NOT to notice….
Beyond the rhetoric, somewhere as I type, is this attractive well-dressed older woman pulling her luggage, and carrying a back pack.
It is certain she wasn’t being facetious.
What is her story, I wonder.
Where will she be tonight, this coming week, this winter, next year?
I think I know what I’ll be thinking about on this walk I’m about to take.
What lessons can be learned, and applied to our ever meaner society?

#423 – Dick Bernard: Talking war (and peace)

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Monday was Senior Citizen day at the Minnesota State Fair and I made my way over to fulfill my annual ritual, now stretching back to the mid-1960s when I first arrived in the Twin Cities.
This year found me less engaged than in the past – no particular reason. Maybe next year I won’t be back. But…next year there will be that deep-fried cheese curd gene that will kick in, and I’ll be back for my annual fix. One basket of those critters is a great plenty. Thankfully, they haven’t raised the price, which means they’ve reduced the portion size. At my age I don’t need even a single small basket. But so it goes.
One of my ritual stops is at the Leinie Lodge Band Shell, and when I stopped there on Monday, the 34th Infantry (Red Bull) Division Band was about to conclude its gig before a full house, and they were just about to begin a medley of the anthems of the various branches of military service. The announcer asked that vets of those branches rise to be recognized when their anthem was played. First, a few Marines; then Navy; then Air Force; then Coast Guard; then my branch, the Army. Lots of folks stood up, mostly men, mostly old. It was a rather stirring and emotional time, recognizing the vets, one of which was me. (click on photo to enlarge)

Vets rising to be recognized at the State Fair August 29, 2011


I walked towards the exit to the encore: John Phillips Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever”.
On the bus back to the east ‘burbs, I struck up a conversation with an old guy who’s an Army vet, WWII. “Pacific or European Theater?”, I asked. “Pacific”, he responded. His unit had spent two weeks in Japan immediately after the Atom bombs had fallen in August, 1945. “Terrible there”, he said, and that was about it. I told him about Uncle Frank and the Arizona at Pearl Harbor, and about a whole family of military veterans, including me.
Today, President Obama was at the national American Legion Convention in Minneapolis. I’m a peace advocate who’s a long-time member of the American Legion. Stubbornness I guess. I also am a strong supporter of President Obama, doing all he can in a dismal political environment.
So it goes in the “land of the free and the home of the brave”. It’s hard to deny that “War is the Force that Gives Us Meaning” as so well articulated by Christopher Hedges in his book of the same name (the link is to a talk he gave at the University of California Santa Barbara a few years ago).
Peace hardly has a place at the table in the national conversation even though it has always been an underground topic of the human conversation. I just completed reading an outstanding book which was not about war and peace, but an amazing amount of conversation in this autobiographical love story* of photographer Alfred Stieglitz and artist Georgia O’Keefe was about feelings about World War I, the war raging when they met. But these were private conversations. The public conversation then was reverencing War and Soldiers and Right and Might in that spectacularly misnamed “war to end all wars”.
Indeed, there is hardly any place for public conversation about the virtues of peace. I have found that peace people, while representing the dominant feeling of people yearning peace, are marginalized and isolated. If your ethic is peace, it is impossible to intellectually engage with someone whose investment is in war.
I am part of a group seeking a monument to Peace in the city of War Monuments, Washington D.C. It is very slow going…though in the end, it will either be Peace or Perpetual War and Death.
Why not Peace? I have a theory.

Recently, as anyone watches the news is aware, there has been an overthrow of the Qadaffi government in Libya. There has not been, to my knowledge, a single American life lost in that war.
There are many pieces of conversation about whether that War is right or wrong, but I have particularly noticed the position, delivered through Sens. Lindsey Graham and John McCain, that the Libya campaign has been a “failure” for President Obama and the United States. No one says this out loud, but I think the reason such a war is deemed to be a failure is that there were no deaths to, in a perverse way, celebrate our fallen American heroes and stir up patriotism.
A foolish theory? I think not. To each their own opinion.
Talk Peace.
* – My Faraway One, edited by Sarah Greenough

#422 – Dick Bernard: Walking Woodbury Days with U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar

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I walked with U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar in the annual Woodbury Days parade yesterday. While I didn’t count, it seemed there were perhaps 30 of us, along with the Senator and her daughter, on the approximately two mile walk. Cathy, my wife, walked as well, as did Amy’s daughter. (click on photos to enlarge)

Woodbury Day parade August 28, 2011


Over the years I’ve walked in a goodly number of community parades, supporting one political candidate or another. It is the very least I can do: to give support.
Whoever you see in a parade is working, no question about that. Amy and her daughter had been at the State Fair before the Woodbury gig, and went back there afterwards. We love to hate our politicians, but when they need to somehow touch base with, in Amy’s case, 5 million constituents, campaigning is also very hard work.
This year, unlike any of the others, I wondered how the folks along the route would respond.
We are, after all, in a time of hostility towards “government”, particularly “Washington” kind of government, even more particularly “Congress”, of which Amy Klobuchar is one of 535 sitting members. I see blood-vessel exploding rants against “them” frequently, as if they aren’t selected by “us”. One does begin to wonder if the community, local or greater, is full of these out-of-sorts flame-throwing folks.
Home afterwards, checking e-mails, was yet another anti-Congress e-mail – this the one which essentially suggests that our country should be run by volunteers who get paid the minimum wage and serve only one term…. Amy Klobuchar is one of “them”, of course.
Another was this, more positive little poem, though (it seemed) pointed at our entire body politic, including the politicians:
“What’s this proclivity
For increased incivility?
Is this what evolution picks?
If so, the genome needs a fix.”
But as we walked our route on a pleasant Woodbury day, yesterday, there was no sign that I saw or heard that suggested that the crowd watching was at all surly; rather it was respectful and, in fact, interested.
We tended to get a bit behind, solely because Senator Klobuchar was doing what good politicians do: engaging with people on both sides of the street.

Amy Klobuchar at Woodbury Days Parade August 28, 2011


I sensed a respectful audience for this public servant doing a necessary ritual for politicians in this country yesterday. Doubtless there were people along that route who don’t like the Senator, perhaps some who went back to their computer, as I have, but to raise one complaint or other about her and/or her colleagues. Governing a deliberately politically polarized country is not easy.
But the America I saw along this one parade route in Woodbury yesterday was a respectful and welcoming one.
It was my privilege to be along in support.

Amy Klobuchar and her daughter at the end of the Woodbury Parade Route August 28, 2011