The Middle East and Ukraine

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In the Vice-Presidential debate last night, the first question related to the Iranian missiles into Israel, the latest chapter in the latest ongoing crisis in what is usually referred to as the Middle East.

Of course, Ukraine is also very much a part of the political conversation as well,

This is not an analysis or opinion on either crisis.  Rather, I just want to provide a tiny bit of geography perspective, which we seldom see in words or images of the area.  The United States is inextricably tangled in all of the situations, most recently beginning with the catastrophic actions in the area of Gaza one year ago on October 7, 2023.  There is no simple solution.

Here is my original post about the current crisis in Gaza Oct 9, 2023 (scroll down to originating post content).  Feb. 16, 2022, was first mention of Putin’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The archive of these posts shows 86 in which Ukraine is mentioned; 33, Gaza; 101 Israel.  We are part of the world, not apart from it…it is a fate we have chosen over most of our history as a nation.

Here and below are maps of the general areas (the pdf is of the larger region, the jpegs including primarily Lebanon, Israel and Iran: Iran Lebanon Israel area); and the below jpeg of Ukraine and environs.  Ukraine shares borders with seven other countries, most of which are NATO nations.  (The nations: Russia, Moldova, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Belarus).

I have always found the CIA Fact Book useful to get general information about international countries.

In context with the United States, and even Minnesota, Israel and Lebanon are tiny countries.  Here is a sketch map of Israel in context with Minnesota

Israel, including Gaza, 1995

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Ukraine area001 (pdf)

 

Tim, Jimmy, Lyndon et al….

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ELECTION INFORMATION: Minnesota related; and National information.  My position on 2024 election, here.

Today, Tuesday, October 1, is the Vice-Presidential debate.    It is also the 100th birthday of Jimmy Carter, 39th President of the United States.

I am a Tim Walz and Jimmy Carter supporter.   I’ve also lived in Minnesota for 60 years, and my entire life has been in/or closely associated with public education.  A column in Sundays Minnesota Star Tribune is where I’d like to start: Minnesota Star Tribune Walz Sep 29 2024.

The debate will speak for itself.  I want to reflect on my Governor, and Vice-Presidential candidate Tim Walz; and on Jimmy Carter, one of my favorite Presidents…and a bit of history, too.

 

TIM WALZ:  The Vice-Presidency, in all of American history thus far, has been a very consequential position, quite possibly never more so than this year .

I was surprised when Kamala Harris announced Gov. Walz as her running mate a couple of months ago.  I thought she would go with one of the other presumed candidates from a so-called “battleground” state.  My feeling had nothing to do with Mr. Walz’s qualities or potential, which I have always seen as excellent.  He brought to his selection a dozen years in the U.S. Congress representing a “Red” District, and is in his second term as Governor of my state, which tends to liberal, but whose rural areas usually vote conservative (60% of Minnesotans 5.7 million people live in the Twin Cities metropolitan area).

I met Walz in person a single time, at a fund-raiser, during his first campaign in 2006.  Eight times since then he has won election to Congress or Governor.

Minnesota is a state that works, and a lot of that is due to community minded leadership of Governor Walz and a strong and effective Democratic Party (DFL).  The word “community” is my key word.  By no means, does this mean that all is perfect here.  No place is perfect.  But Minnesotans work well together, and there is a very strong sense of community.  We experience this in person every day.

Recently Dane Smith wrote a commentary published in the Minnesota Star Tribune about our state.  You can read it here: Minnesota Star Tribune Dane Smith Sep 2024.  It is a summary of an entire series written by him in 2023, accessible in its entirety here.  Smith, a native of Texas, describes Minnesota well, I feel.

We have tended to elect leaders who bring out the best in us, and Governor Walz is the latest.  I’m proud of him, and I would say most of us share this view – you don’t get elected 8 times without recognized positive qualities.

Recent Vice-Presidents:  President Joe Biden (President 2021- ) served as Vice-President (2009-2017).  Here are some other vice-presidents in my lifetime: Harry Truman (President 1945-53) became Vice-President just months before Franklin Roosevelt died in April, 1945; Richard Nixon (President 1969-74) was Vice-President 1953-61; Lyndon Johnson (President 1963-69) was V.P 1961-63; Hubert Humphrey (V.P. 1965-69); Nelson Rockefeller (V.P 1974-77); Walter Mondale (V.P. 1977-81); George H.W. Bush (President 1989-93) also served as Vice-President (1981-89).

All of these came to office with extensive public service backgrounds.

President Carter elevated the stature of the Vice-Presidency when he was elected President in 1977.  In his personal memoir of his life, “A Full Life” (link below), he devotes two full pages to this important decision (pp. 111-113).  Later, his Vice-President, Walter Mondale, made his own run for President in 1984, and selected Geraldine Ferraro as the first female nominee for Vice-President.

ca 1990, East St. Louis IL.

Gerald Ford (1974-77, then House of Representatives Minority Leader), replaced Spiro Agnew when he resigned as vice-president, and then replaced Richard Nixon when he resigned the presidency.   Other V.P.’s post-Harry Truman: Dan Quayle (1989-93), Al Gore (1993-2001), Dick Cheney (2001-09).

Former vice-presidents have had very substantial records of public service before their election.  Tim Walz’s opponent, J.D. Vance, has less than two years of public service experience as U.S. Senator from Ohio.  Dig a tiny bit deeper and Vance is a very scary guy, especially when coupled with his ideology and his patrons.

Mike Pence? (V.P. 2017-21) has. of course, a particular kind of experience to relate.  He wasn’t asked and/or wouldn’t accept a reprise of  the four years as Vice-President, and is not on the ballot again.

Particularly beginning with Walter Mondale, the vice-presidency has more often been given an important and substantive role, for good reason.  The vice-presidency is important, particularly in this ever more complex world we share.

In her very interesting book “An Unfinished Love Story“, Doris Kearns Goodwin recalls a memorable speech by President Lyndon Johnson to the Nation March 15, 1965.  It was a Civil Rights speech for the ages.  Doris recalled a conversation with her to-be husband, Dick Goodwin, who was one of Johnson’s primary speech writers: “I told Dick that I had read an account that when Johnson was later asked who had written the speech, he pulled out a photo of his twenty-year-old self surrounded by a cluster of Mexican American kids , his former students at Cotulla, Texas.  “They did,” (p. 234)

LBJ had a hard-nose reputation as a government leader, but he genuinely had a soft heart for those less advantaged, and it showed in the landmark legislation passed under his leadership in the 1960s.

Tim Walz is the kind of leader in the most positive mold of those who came before.  When the chips are down, as they are in every administration, he will be equal to the task.

Few of the people listed above came from privilege and entitlement.  All of them experienced what Harry Truman called “The Buck Stops Here” weight of responsibility that comes with governing.  Knowing what I know of Tim Walz, he will be a very worthy member of the vice-presidential club.  If/When the crisis comes, such as Hurricane Helene, you want a steady experienced hand at the wheel.  Tim Walz is ready.

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JIMMY CARTER: Mr. Carter is the first President to reach 100.  In my opinion, he will go down in history as one of the most consequential of Presidents.  I’ve been an unabashed supporter of President Carter and his work since I first learned of him in the mid-1970s.

Enroute to Florida in 1977 I stopped in Plains, Georgia, to at least see the tiny town from which he came.  Plains was then and remains small town America.

Plains GA June, 1977

I recently read Jimmy Carter’s personal memoir, “A Full Life, Reflections at Ninety“.  It is a very readable 238 pages, and as anyone who knows Carter knows, the four years of his presidency are only a tiny part of his life experience and immense contributions to the community that is our planet.

Of course, Carter gets around to things like growing up, and peanut farming, and life as a Naval officer on a nuclear submarine, and the role of the Carter Center et al.  Rosalynn was his partner in all ways during their very long marriage.

Together, Jimmy and Rosalynn gave a huge boost to Habitat for Humanity.

He devotes 61 pages, in his own homespun and very clear way, to “Issues mostly resolved” and “Problems still pending” by the end of his term as President of the U.S.

At page 111, he deals with the issue of Truth in politics when he ran for higher office, in part: “Having served as a legislator and governor, I knew how difficult it was to keep this promise [to tell my audiences the truth]…I decided to make the commitment….”

Even in my own much more limited personal experience representing people, I know that it is impossible, truly inadvisable, to always be completely honest.  At the same time, there are discernible boundaries between acceptable truth and unacceptable lies in a civil society, lines which are constantly and excessively crossed in contemporary political discourse.

It was my privilege to see Jimmy Carter in person in Minneapolis in 2015, in his 90th year.  It was a very special privilege.  I wrote briefly about his participation then, here.  Unfortunately, a link to the video of his talk is no longer available.  The entire conference had an emphasis on human rights.

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POSTNOTES:

There have been two other unrelated posts this past week.  If you wish: here (Moms Demand Action) and here (Conspicuous Consumption – musing about the latest Tesla).

Regarding tonight: my most serious concerns, truly, are the implications of J.D. Vance and Project 2025.  I will write about these a little later.  These are the ‘nuclear bombs’ in our midst – aimed at our republic and our democracy.

from Robert Reich overnight: here

from Heather Cox Richardson, also overnight: here

10:15 p.m. Oct. 1, 2024: I watched the entire debate.  It was well worth the time.  Joyce Vance sent her observations about the same time I wrote my sentence.  You can read her comments here.  (Joyce is no relation to  J.D., to my knowledge).  Note from Larry: Walz did fine tonight.

Personal opinion: the purpose of the debates was more for political usefulness than substantive contributions.  In this age of sophisticated media, the importance is the sound bite or video bit that can be useful in political ads and the like.  We will see the results in the next weeks.

COMMENTS (more at end of post):

from Laura: Thanks very much, Dick. Of course I’ve already voted and I’m certainly working for Harris and  Walz!

from Gary: Dick, thanks for sharing.

from Brian: Thanks so much for the update/info on Walz.   Good to know.  And from your area!

from Carole: Thank you. DC is awash with planned watch parties all across the city.

POSTNOTE Oct 8, 2024:  The Minnesota Star Tribune On October 6 had a full-page commentary entitled “Is Minnesota in trouble?”.  The column appeared to be a counterpoint to the Dane Smith column referred to above.  Because of its length and small and difficult to read font size, I enlarged and cut and pasted the contents into this five-page reprint of the entire column. MN Star Tribune Mn in trouble? 10 6 24.  I present it solely as a different perspective on a state which, in my opinion, clearly works pretty well.

As I say near the beginning of this post a week ago: “Minnesota is a state that works, and a lot of that is due to community minded leadership of Governor Walz and a strong and effective Democratic Party (DFL).  The word “community” is my key word.  By no means, does this mean that all is perfect here.  No place is perfect.  But Minnesotans work well together, and there is a very strong sense of community.  We experience this in person every day.”

 

Conspicuous Consumption (and a taste of the past)

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Three times in the last couple of weeks, I’ve seen  very unique appearing automobile in my city of 83,000.  Twice it has quite obviously been the same car; the third was the same vehicle, but this one an advertisement for some company.

Since each of these encounters have come while I was driving, I couldn’t take a photo.  So, here’s a link Tesla Foundation; and a Review.  If you’ve got a spare $100,000 lying around, you can order one of these limited edition automobiles….

Every now and then things like this appear, and the new owners strut their stuff.

The most recent one I recall in my limited view of the past is the Hummer which had a run at fame during the Iraq War.  I suppose they more or less had the image of the WWII Jeep, though they were not an everyman’s vehicle.  There was an implied status and power image connected with them.

Every once in a. great while, nowadays, I see one of them somewhere, but they were a fad, probably mostly stored in their owners garage today.  Will the new Tesla’s have the same fate?

Conspicuous consumption is not restricted to today’s status seekers.

Over 100 years ago, my grandfather Bernard came into possession of a 1901 Oldsmobile. It was the car my Dad said was his driver education car when he was a youngster; and I actually had an opportunity to drive it back in the late 1990s.

1901 Olds, and family, Grafton ND, ca early 1920s.  My Dad is the tall guy at left.  He was only 14 or so, but already 6’3″. Grandpa Bernard was in the middle of the phot, and Grandma between he and her son….  The barn is in the background.  The visitors had come to town from Winnipeg, according to my Dad.  That’s a 120 mile trip, very significant in those days.

The Olds, with owner Tony Bowker, and my grandkids Spencer and Ted 2006.

I wasn’t around when the Olds came to be part of our family, but over the years I’ve picked up bits and pieces of the story of the car.  (The longer story – 7 pages – is here: 1901 Oldsmobile)

Someone came to Grafton in the early 1900s, and apparently had a few extra dollars to play around with and bought the Oldsmobile and it came by rail to Grafton.

It had utility, but for what!?  It was a curiosity, of course.  There were incidents like frightening horses.  And gasoline stations were unknown, and spare tires, and who’d want to even get in the thing!  Utility beyond purchase was not a given.  Now that I’ve got it, what do I do with it?  And does anybody care?

At some point, the man left town for other parts, and wasn’t inclined to take the car along.  Grandpa Bernard had a small barn, and agreed to store the car there, which is where it sat, protected from the elements, except for infrequent visits to the outdoors.  It helped that Grandpa was mechanically very adept, and knew how to care for machines, and he was a faithful steward.

The car wasn’t his, but years passed and the owner was never heard from again, so it became Grandpa’s property.  He was a fireman in the town, and later the little car was stored in a municipal building, where it stayed for years, occasionally coming out for a parade.  Then it became a display in the Oldsmobile dealer in Grand Forks, where it was later sold to a collector, and sold and resold and resold, as such things go.  I have no idea the name or destination of the original owner.  It is probably lost to history.

Californians Tony and his wife became the owner for a lot of years, and took the little rig to London, England, to drive in the Old Car annual event, London to Brighton, and years later did the New London – New Brighton MN version of the rally.

I had a chance to ride in, ‘drive’ (max speed 18 mph), and even buy the little car, but what would I do with it?  I passed.

Best I know, it’s at some car collector in Pennsylvania….

So, what does this all mean?

What will be the future of the fancy dandy new Tesla’s I’ve been seeing.  Will be the next Model T, or will they be the Edsel of the 2020s.

1900 was about the beginning of what became the automobile, and it was perhaps 20-25 years before autos became common means of transportation.  There were automobiles of one sort or another long before 1900, but not before manufacturing technology improvement and reduction in cost slowed growth, not to mention things like roads, stations, and the like.

The new generation of cars has to evolve similar to the cars we’ve become accustomed to.  A good primer on the past to present that I found on the internet is here, from Car and Driver.

I’ll be watching!

Moms Demand Action….

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This morning, Tuesday, Sep 24, was a perfectly clear weather day.  At 7 a.m. CDT, I was heading east on a local street, and was greeted by a spectacular, albeit blinding sunrise straight ahead.  The Autumn Equinox was almost exactly two days earlier, so what I experienced made sense.  Nature is, as nature is.  Humanity’s only impact over the centuries has been to perfect the timing for those who have an interest.

Of course, life goes on.

Today, President Biden addressed the United Nations in New York.  An excellent summary is from Heather Cox Richardson, here.  The President summarized a very long career involved in global matters.  The world is a messy place.  Nonetheless, he remains optimistic.

This evening I decided to go to a local DFL (Democrat) conversation group I often attend.  I decided to go.

It was an evening very well spent.

The descriptor: “Our topic of the day will be gun safety. For this, Chad Kuyper from Moms Demand Action will be joining us for the evening. Come and join us for a discussion of this always-important topic“.

There were only 9 of us in attendance, including three local legislators, and it was a very stimulating and informative conversation.  Chad Kuyper (at right, four second link here: BE82F638-976A-4D44-A77B-11D207394B41_2_0_a) represents Moms Demand Action.  At left is Sarah Branion, Woodbury/Stillwater co-leader of the group in my area.   Chad and Sarah made a short presentation, followed by a stimulating conversation.  His group website, Moms Demand Action, has a wealth of information.  Take some time to look through it, including the story about the groups history and relationship to other organizations.

I’ve followed the gun issue for years.  97 blogs have mentioned “Guns” since 2009.  No need to revisit that.  If you care about the issue but haven’t gotten active – I hope you do – Moms Demand Action would be a good starting point.

 

Vote 2024

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46 days.  The National portal for all the states: Vote.org

Today is the first day for Minnesotans to vote in the 2024 election.  The website is here,  If you are a Minnesotan, I would recommend that you download and print a copy of your ballot.  The contents vary, of course, dependent on where you live, so I won’t include a copy of my own ballot, which contains (not including write-in) 9 candidates for President/Vice-President; 4 for one U.S. Senator; 2 for Congressional Representative; 2 for State Representative.  Every position is crucial, and its important to know the candidates and the issues.

There is a single proposed amendment to the Minnesota Constitution.

There are 8 candidates for 2 positions on the Woodbury City Council – the people who run our city

Then there are the Judges – 24 of them by my count.  To my knowledge, all are incumbents.  Four of them have an opponent.

Judges and City Council members are non-partisan, and how to assess them is not easy.

A humorous handout at the MN Judicial Branch table at the State Fair in 2024. https://www.mncourts.gov/

For the Council candidates I watched the on-line League of Women Voters introduction.  Two of the candidates who filed did not attend the League event.  Some of the candidates had a website, which I visited.  Otherwise, I simply have to go by feedback from others, since I have generally approved of how my city works.

For the judges, all of those with competition, and their opponents, had websites, which were useful.  One of the contenders did not have a website as of this week…there was a placeholder without content.  The contenders websites were not very revealing.  A retired Supreme Court justice wrote a letter to the editor in today’s paper supporting one of the incumbents.  Absent some other evidence, the safest bet is to vote for the incumbents, who were generally appointed to the bench.  Here‘s what the judicial department says about Minnesota judicial appointments.

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Personally, my electoral choices for 2024 remains the same as articulated earlier.

Kamala Harris/Tim Walz for President/Vice-President, here.

My most important post (personally) is at Sep 2 here.

I maintain that at this moment in history there is no Republican Party.  The party name has been hi-jacked, and until the GOP reconstructs it really doesn’t exist.  We are in very dangerous times with our democracy at serious risk.  At minimum, I urge no favorable vote for any candidate at any level who joined the Election Denial brigade which has plagued us all for the last four years.

Project 2025 is a legitimate threat to democracy; as is disinformation of all kinds.

Joyce Vance has an interesting column today on elections in America.  You can read it here.

See you at the polls.

POSTNOTE:

For those interested, I have three additional posts within the last couple of weeks.

The City Manager

Solzhenitsyn

Cornell West et al

POSTNOTE 2:  The annual Twin Cities Nonviolent begins on September 21 for twelve days.  Do check it out.

About October 1 may be my next post, recalling Jimmy Carter on the occasion of his 100th birthday.  He is in very fragile condition.

POSTNOTE 3:  The first comment to this post came from Joyce, in my town in Minnesota: “[We] voted early this afternoon; there were a lot of people voting, and I hope that’s a good sign.”  Another comment from someone else talked about a controversial decision by our City Council, which is non partisan, but apparently ideologically majority Republican, while electorally our city has been Democrat.

Last night we watched a truly extraordinary film premier, “From Russia with Lev“, about Lev Parnas and the Russian involvement in American politics.  [The film airs again tonight (Sat Sep 21) at 7 p.m. CDT on MSNBC]  The link has more information.  It will certainly be available for viewing again, but I don’t have details.  It is phenomenal, if you have any interest in looking behind the screen at political reality in our country.  Of course, it will be trolled.  So what else is new.  The story is told by Lev and documented heavily.

Then overnight came Heather Cox Richardson’s commentary on the Electoral College, which I’d recommend to everyone.  The temptation is, sometimes, to not vote at all, since it seems that this single grain of sand will make no difference anyway.  I very, very strongly disagree.  If our democracy is to work, it takes all of us, one at a time, to make it so.  There is no alternative.  Do everything you can, and VOTE.

COMMENTS:

from Mary: not surprised to see your ‘first day voting in Minnesota’ commentary!  I do hope for lots of voters.  I still plan to vote in person-I vote with every election and can count on one hand the number of times I have used absentee.  Just a habit and no, I never tell folks who I vote for.  It should be pretty clear who I don’t vote for but I have been known to not do enough homework and make a decision on the way to the polling place based on who has signs in their front yards.  I have a perfect yard for political signage but don’t permit it – not to say that renegade signs have sometimes appeared.

from Lois:  I would like to see someone give facts of just what is “threat to democracy” – specifically what actions will cause us to lose our status of a democracy.   I started to read Wikipedia for a very detailed history of facts and will take time to read the entire article, but would like your words, or from others – either party, on what positions and platform items make the threat.

Thanks for the link to the sample ballot!

from Remi: I find it very strange that in the U.S., judges are either elected or appointed by senators. In my view, this politicization undermines the principle of the separation of powers. Recently, Mexico also decided to elect judges, which many argue signals a serious threat to democracy. I watched “From Russia with Lev“ and loved it.

 

 

Cornell West et al

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I’ve printed out my sample ballot for Nov 5 2024.

At the beginning are listed nine candidates for President/Vice-President of the United States.  I don’t think this is especially unusual.  In addition to the usual Democrat and Republican are the usual others as Libertarian, Green, Socialist and others, including “write in”.

Rarely does some maverick do well outside the traditional two-party dominance.  John Anderson, Ross Perot, George Wallace, Gene McCarthy are some who come to mind who made a significant splash, and a few others.  In our complex country it is impractical at minimum for a minor party or candidate to be much more than a source of votes for the opposing major party.

This year, assorted minor candidates like Cornell West are on the ballot.  I mention Cornell specifically since he was the headline in a recent newspaper article about the topic of the impact of fringe candidates on the ultimate outcome.  You can read it here: 2024 Pres election minor parties.  Personally, I probably would agree with most of West’s general philosophy.  But my guess is Cornell’s vote total will be very small…and not benefit the candidate who likely will be the strongest progressive candidate this election.  Some of the other nine on the Minnesota ballot for President: Jill Stein, Robert Kennedy Jr.  None of the other minor candidates are names I have ever heard.

This seems to be a good time to dust off the most notorious Presidential election in my memory: the Bush/Gore contest in 2000, ultimately won at the U.S. Supreme Court based on approximately 580 votes in Florida.

All I want to do here is to recall the really bare basics of the Fall of 2000.  The link includes my short letter to relatives and friends in late October 2000, and the actual vote totals for Florida and Minnesota in the 2000 elections: Presidential election florida 2000 Nader.

If you’re tempted to go for a minor candidate, think two or three times before justifying a vote for someone who will not win.  You can’t undo a thrown away vote, which includes not voting at all, or voting, as I heard one woman say recently, voting for yourself.

The stakes are too high to throw away a vote November 5.

 

Sohlzenitsyn

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September 5 I footnoted the following suggestion in another post:

Yesterday, came a link to a 1978 commencement speech at Harvard by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn .  I printed out the 16 pages, read them, went to the  “Reflections on Solzhenitsyn’s Harvard Address” from October 26, 2020, and also looked up Solzhenitsyn’s wiki-bio.  This is not light reading.  Respectively, these are 16, 17 and 31 pages.  At the end the 1978 speech is a link to Solzhenitsyn’s own personal reflection on his 1978 speech, written in Fall 1978. Here is the official brief biography of Solzhenitsyn.

Solzhenitsyn, born in 1918, was 59 when he gave the speech at Harvard; and it was in the second year of President Jimmy Carter’s presidency.

I took a special interest in this commentary because in the same 24 hour period the link was forwarded to me from an unlikely source, the Department of Justice made a major announcement relating to Russian disinformation intended to interfere with the United States election and functioning.  The news release is here, and highly publicized in U.S. media including my own local paper, the Minnesota Star Tribune September 4&5: MN StarTribune Sep 4&5 2024.  There was no direct connection indicated within the DOJ communication; but the topics were so directly related that it wasn’t a wild leap to connect the two. (Heather Cox Richardson on the Department of Justice announcement Sep. 6 2024.)

I asked the person who forwarded the Solzhenitsyn link to me, who forwarded it to him?  No answer.

I printed out and read all of the articles, totaling 51 pages, and observed that there was a great deal of content to discuss from all sorts of points of view.

Without arguing the substance of the speech, which was powerful, I just want to give it some context, since it was given at a particular point in history, by a Russian, to an American audience at Harvard, and ultimately worldwide.

As noted above, the speech was given in the spring of 1978, which was the beginning of the second year of President Jimmy Carter’s presidency.

Three years earlier the Vietnam war ended.  A year before, President Nixon had resigned, replaced by Gerald Ford, who in turn had replaced Nixon’s vice-president who himself had resigned in disgrace.  Ford pardoned Nixon.  The 1960s and 1970s were turbulent political times in the U.S.

In Jimmy Carter’s recap of his life, written when he turned 90, he remarks that the beginning of the movement which ultimately became today’s White Christian Nationalist group began to sprout about 1979.  Carter was one of the most active Christians ever to be President, but he kept the wall between church and state.

The other actor at the time was Solzhenitsyn’s Soviet Union, which directly affected him, of course, since that is where he grew up.

I simply looked up the assorted leaders of Russia.  The names will probably ring a bell.  Lenin (1922-24); Stalin (1924-53); Malenkov (six months, 1953); Kruschev (1953-64); Brezhnev (1964-82 – the President of USSR in 1978); Andropov (1982-84); Chernenko (1984-85); Gorbachev (1985-91, in whose time the USSR collapsed); Yeltsin (1991-99); Putin (2002-2008); Medvedev (2008-12); Putin 2012-present,

Solzhenitsyn’s reference points pre-dated 1978.  His unknown “wall”, like our own, was the future beyond 1978.  He died in 2008.  I wonder what his thoughts were in the days after 1978.

In the 2020 commentary on the 1978 speech by Romanian Sergiu Klainerman, Princeton, I took particular interest in his reference to “Woke”, a word I’d not heard until very recent years, and now has a derisive connotation.  You can look up its definition.  What I notice is there is a fence of sorts to keep Woke within specific limits.  For instance excessive wealth and concentration of power within certain elites, and the preeminence of Capitalism, however defined, are not Woke, but it seems to me are no different than diversity, equity and inclusion….

History is complicated.  The speech and additions is well worth reading, reflecting and discussing.

 

The City Manager

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Friday I was at a meeting of the Roseville MN Optimists (Roseville Optimists ).  I’m not a member, but came as a guest, interested because the program was a group of Ukraine students, here for a short visit under the auspices of YouLEAD (Youth Leadership Engagement and Development Program: YouLEAD.

This was a large meeting – over 100 of us in attendance.  We were assigned to tables, and my ‘next door neighbor’ for lunch was somebody I didn’t know.  Mark and I were of the same generation, shall I say.  Two retired guys….

We’ve all been to many meetings like this.  In our brief time together, Mark and I found out the tiniest snippets about each other.  In his case, his career was in city management, part of the time in the small city where my own office was for 10 of my staff years; also my Minnesota “home town”.  We didn’t know each other then – no reason to – but I remarked that a colleague friend had, I thought, a brother who’d been a Minnesota City Manager as well, and I verified that later.  Mark knew of him, but he’d come to Minnesota a bit later.  Small world….

In the same 24 hours, I watched the League of Women Voters televised Q&A of six candidates for two city council positions up for election on Nov. 5.  There are eight candidates on the ballot; the other two didn’t show for whatever reason. All of the six I viewed presented themselves very well, and all seemed to be accomplished people, with track records of community engagement.  I’m pleased with how my city runs, and I didn’t say any of them who I’d consider a liability, so I have a quandary, still,  which two will get my vote.   I’m sure I’m not alone.

Then, of course, came Springfield, Ohio.  I need not say more: front page news, a mayor in the spotlight, doubtless a City Manager working in the background to deal with a community crisis, which has become a national item of news and a political crisis as well.

In the course of about 24 hours – a day – I’d come across the simplicities and the complexities of living in our society.

It’s a bit like driving a late-model car these days.  The driver assumes everything: that the car will run efficiently, and start, of course, and that there will not be a flat tire, or an accident, or anything else interfering with a climate controlled journey from here to there.

In the background, always, of course, is a backup team to try to manage imperfections and disagreements.

In our town, it is a Mayor and City Council who receives flak, probably, about most every grievance.  And because there are over 80,000 of us – larger than Springfield – these problems need to be shunted over to somebody, probably the City Manager, whose job it is to figure who, and how, to resolve whatever the issue might be.

We are a nation full of unsung heroes, and we too often forget this.

Back at the meeting, four of this years visiting students from Ukraine reflected on their five weeks here.  They are the third group I’ve seen in person, starting with the first in 2022 – the year Ukraine was invaded.  They all have represented their country extraordinarily well.  One of them, from Lviv, was at our table.  He said he knew four languages, and his English was very good.

Another at our table was a young woman, an American, involved with YouLEAD.  Awesome young person.

At the beginning of the session, another Ukrainian student, who’d been here for the first gathering in 2022, and who’d sung a song for us at that gathering, sang the Ukrainian National Anthem for our group.

Is there hope for the future?  Absolutely yes.  We were all young once, and among us, then, were leaders like these kids are today.

Thank you.

The Great Peace Race

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See important postnote #2 at the end of this post.

The ‘meat’ of this post is the link in the next line.  But see the postnotes as well.

This link, Peace Race (1) (3), opens to a very interesting 8-page commentary on a very noteworthy citizen initiative through the 1960s calling attention to, and mobilizing citizen action, about the Arms Race.  Author Jim Nelson, an active member of United Nations Association MN for over 50 years (1972 photo below), was and continues to be an outspoken advocate, and bears witness to the virtue of persistence. and the quest for peace in our world.  This article, published in 2024, speaks for itself, and I’m proud to present it here for your reflection, sharing and discussion.  Great work, Jim.

A key character in Peace Race is Hubert Humphrey, former Minneapolis mayor, U.S. Senator and Vice-President of the United States. through the late 1940s through the 1970s.  On Friday evening, Twin Cities Public Television airs a program on Humphrey, live streamed to where you live.  Details are below the photo.  This is a unique opportunity, and Jim’s article is a major contribution to understanding how Humphrey fit in to the politics of peace.

Also below, are links to other activities which highlight that we have a long way still to go towards a peaceful world, but actions like Jim and many others give reason for hope.  As Churchill so famously said:”never give in, never, never, never“.

Jim Nelson, United Nations Association State Fair Booth, 1972

Friday evening Sept 13 at 8 p.m. CDT, TPT Channel 2 in the Twin Cities will air a special on Mayor Humphrey of Minneapolis. This program will be live-streamed https://www.tpt.org/watch-live.  It will air again, though not live-stream, on TPT Life Channel  channel on Sep 19 at 8 p.m.  Here’s the TPT descriptor from their program magazine: Hubert Humphrey on TPT Sep 13 and 19 2024

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POSTNOTES: other programs for anyone interested:

  1. Middle East Peace Now is sponsoring a zoom program about Hamas, Saturday morning Sep 14

Date/Time
Date(s) – Saturday, September 14, 2024
10:00 am – 11:30 am

 

“What Hamas represents politically,
why most Arabs support it,
and how Israel-US should deal with it”
with Rami G. Khouri  

Saturday, September 14, 2024    MEPN Zoom Webinar
10:00am – 11:30am CT

About the Speaker: Rami G. Khouri is a Palestinian-American academic and journalist whose family resides in Beirut, Amman, and Nazareth. During his 50 years as a journalist in the Middle East, he was editor of the Jordan Times and the Daily Star (Beirut) newspapers, and contributed reporting and opinion pieces from the region to the Financial Times, NPR, BBC radio, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and other outlets.

Rami founded and managed the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs (IFI), at the American University of Beirut, where he also taught journalism for a decade. He has been a Harvard Nieman Journalism Fellow and a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, and a Fellow of the Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs in Arab East Jerusalem. He was a visiting scholar at Villanova, Oklahoma, Mt Holyoke, Syracuse, Northeastern, and Tufts universities. Rami is currently a distinguished fellow at IFI, a senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington, DC, and a regular contributor to Aljazeera online. His texts and interviews are available on X @ramikhouri.

Rami Khouri’s latest book, co-edited with Helena Cobban, is entitled Understanding Hamas and Why That Matters and is scheduled for release in early October.

Please direct questions about this event to mepn@mepn.org

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2.  Another upcoming zoom cast relating to Israel/Palestine is sponsored by J-Street on the “Spiraling Situation in the West Bank”.  It’s Thursday 11 a.m. CDT, September 12.  Preregistration is required.  Here is the form.


The program descriptor

Media attention was jerked back to the West Bank Friday following the horrifying news that a 26-year-old American peace advocate had been shot dead by Israeli forces.

The news comes amid ongoing reports of an unprecedented rise in settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, increased IDF military operations and a near-total lack of accountability for soldiers and settlers alike – with over 500 Palestinians killed since October 7, including more than 140 children. Israeli and Palestinian human rights organizations warn that the situation is going from bad to worse, with security experts alarmed that simmering violence risks boiling over into full-scale conflict

Here’s what you can expect:

  • Lior Amihai will take us right into the situation on the ground in the West Bank and unpack the indispensable work Peace Now is doing, the high level of danger posed to Palestinians and peace advocates, and rising Israeli and Palestinian extremism.
  • Michael Sfard will share his analysis of the damning international legal implications of decades of occupation, including this summer’s significant ruling by the International Court of Justice that found Israeli occupation of the West Bank to be illegal.
  • Celine Touboul will offer expert policy analysis and recommendations for defusing the growing crisis in the West Bank, protecting human rights and safety there, and charting a better course.

We will also discuss the role that sanctions on those most responsible for violence and instability in the West Bank can play in holding perpetrators accountable and impacting the reality on the ground.


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3. Twin Cities Nonviolent for several years has sponsored programs related to nonviolence for twelve days, this year beginning on Sept 21 through October 5.  Here is this years Program.

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4.  9-11-01.  Sunday evening CBS’ 60 Minutes gave a full hour reprise of it’s 2022 special honoring the fire fighters of New York for their heroism at the time of 9-11-01.  NYPD lost hundreds of its own in the aftermath of the attack.  The report brought tears to my eyes, as it always does and will.  I had basically finished the draft of this post before watching.

Those who knew me then, and now, know that there are two “me’s” when it comes to 9-11-01.  The first is the early weeks after the disaster itself,.  I was working on a Habitat for Humanity build in Minneapolis the week of, including  9-11, and only heard about it on a radio at the site during the day.  This was before cell phones, and obviously there was no TV either.  We didn’t know the towers collapsed until arriving home late in the afternoon.  The e-mail network which years later became the Outside the Walls blog, thence Thoughts Towards a Better World originated in late September, 2001 – it was sort of a group catharsis venture, which some readers would remember.

In early October my mood changed as the decision was made to bomb Afghanistan in response.  To get al Qaeda.  That and other actions were applauded by the general public.  Often at this space I’ve shown the news article that I kept at that point in time.  It is below.  In my opinion, retribution was not a worthwhile response.  It was a lonely time: I was in the 6%…..  But it was also became the entry point for me into the peace movement, of which I’m still a more informal part.

The debate will go on forever, I suppose, about 9-11-01 and what it means.  I’m not alone.  To remember is important.  To disagree is okay.  Our war on Afghanistan, then on Iraq, then back to Afghanistan, really has not ended, 23 years later.  When will we learn?

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4.   Public television: I am a long-time contributor to TPT, for the last six years $1,000 per year as AMillionCopies.  If you would like to be a co-participant,  send me a check for any amount, made to TPT, post-dated to October 31, 2024, and I will add it to the 2024 contribution.  Every little bit helps.  Interested by don’t have my address?  Just ask.

POSTNOTE #2 3 p.m.: Shortly after I published this post, the breaking news was about the just released Congressional Report on the withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.  That debate can go on with out me.  In the Sep 2 post, I included a recent column from John Rash in the Minnesota Star Tribune interviewing the American ambassador to Kabul, Minnesotan Ross Wilson, at the end of the Trump years, and beginning of Biden years, 2020-21.  He was a direct witness to particularly policy considerations in those difficult months.  You can read it here: John Rash 8 31 24 STrib Afghan.  It is an important addition to this conversation.

Re the “Debate”: I will likely watch it, but that is about all I’ll have to say about it here.

POSTNOTE #3 Sep. 11:  I did watch the entire debate and quite a bit of the post-debate discussion, and I’m glad I did.  Kamala Harris was pitch perfect.  Still won’t make the rest of the campaign any easier.

Winder, Georgia

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25 years ago – it was April 20, 1999, I was returning from a meeting and a bulletin came on the car radio about a school shooting in Littleton, Colorado.  I paid attention: my son and family lived in Littleton.

The day and week unfolded.  The incident was at Columbine High School. I had no idea where Columbine was, but ultimately found that it was little more than a mile from my sons home.  At the time, my granddaughter was Middle School, so there was no direct connection, but the incident was by no means abstract to this commuter 1,000 miles away.

Some time earlier I’d made plane reservations for about a week of hiking with siblings in Utah, and fortuitously had scheduled a stopover to visit my son and family enroute home the next weekend.

So, about May 1, I was with the family as we slowly trudged up “Cross Hill” in the rain, to see the memorial crosses raised to remember the dead.  (‘Cross Hill’ was basically construction residue, and from its summit, Columbine. below. was easily viewed.)  Two of the crosses had been sawed off – the person who put them there, had also put up crosses for the two killers, both students at the school.  Giving them a cross was an outrage, to some family of victims.

It was a dismal, rainy day.  Nearby, Robert Schuller of the then-famed Crystal Cathedral in California, came up the soggy slope, separate from the rest of us, with a crew of assistants.  I gathered he was doing some video for use in his television ministry.

Back home, May 4 – National Teacher Day – I talked to teacher union and administrators in Anoka-Hennepin School District.  An unexpected part of the talk was about my recent experience.   I wore the same clothes I’d worn on Cross Hill.  I still have them hanging in a hall closet….

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Fast forward to yesterday at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia.  Four dead this time, two students, two teachers, nine injured.

Once again, thoughts and prayers.

School shootings have become so routine that I doubt Winder will get much more air time, as Columbine did so many years ago.  There have been hundreds of school shootings in the last 25 years.

Ironically, in my most recent post, September 2, I was remembering when I was 18, in 1958, including this: “There was not even a thought about school shootings.”   This tragedy has a particularly personal dimension: two of my daughters are educators working with 14 year olds and others in schools, today.  Doubtless there are many conversations going on.

Have we learned anything since Columbine?

I think it was in the year after Columbine that Charlton Heston made his famous “cold, dead hands” comment at the Convention of National Rifle Association.  The decision was, in effect, “damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead”.

This is not a time to be silent.

EXTRA CREDIT:

Coincidentally, a couple of items ‘crossed my desk’ which indirectly relate to this conversation.

Yesterday, came a link to a 1978 commencement speech at Harvard by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn .  I printed out the 16 pages, read them, went to the  “Reflections on Solzhenitsyn’s Harvard Address” from October 26, 2020, and also looked up Solzhenitsyn’s wiki-bio.  This is not light reading.  Respectively, these are 16, 17 and 31 pages.  At the end the 1978 speech is a link to Solzhenitsyn’s own personal reflection on his1978 speech, June 7, 2018,

Solzhenitsyn was 59 when he gave the speech; and it was in the second year of President Jimmy Carter’s presidency.

Secondly, also yesterday, came a provocative commentary on Artificial Intelligence and its role in the present and future.  “What Happens when the bots compete for your love?”  by Yuval Noah Harari

The reality is that each and every one of us ultimately make decisions on these things, in large part by who we select to be our leaders.

If there is interest, I’m willing to do a specific post on these writings with contributions from others who actually read each of the articles.  

COMMENTS:

from Laura: Thanks so much, Dick. Please pick up the book The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt. Anyone who cares about the young people of our world must read it! Just tremendous.