Month: May 2024

Not to Play

We learned a new “phrase” in the 2016 election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.  The Republican Party spent decades making Clinton look bad (including seven million of taxpayer dollars on the multiple “Benghazi” hearings in the House of Representatives).  And Donald Trump was the candidate of division from the moment he came down the “Golden Escalator” in Trump Tower.  Both of their “negative” ratings were underwater (over 50%), and yet they were the two candidates we had to choose from.  It was a “binary choice”.  To take a phrase from the early 1980’s Matthew Broderick movie, War Games, the only other choice was “Not to play”.  

We all know the outcome of that election.  

Covid

Joe Biden was a failed Presidential candidate in 2008, but the perfect match to a relatively young and inexperienced Senator Barack Obama.  After eight years as Vice President, 2016 should have been Biden’s “turn”.  The ultimate tragedy, the death of Biden’s oldest son in 2015, made it emotionally impossible for the Vice President to run for the top office.   With Hillary’s loss, it looked like both Clinton’s and Biden’s political careers were over.

But America had never experienced a President like Donald Trump.  In 2020 to many; especially after the disaster of Covid response; Trump represented an existential threat to the American Democracy.  For the same reasons that Biden was the perfect choice for Obama’s Vice President; experience, stability, foreign policy expertise; Biden was the now the perfect choice against the “bull in a China shop” Trump.  It was, again, a binary choice.  And as the results show (the largest election vote ever), few chose “Not to play”.  

It’s now 2024 (so fast, is this what happens when you get old??).  There is a collective hole in America’s memory, a hole we label simply as Covid.  We don’t remember what we did, what we missed, what we lost.  There are folks that just disappeared.  Even today, I hear, “What happened to old so and so”.  We have little memory of their passing.  When I look back, it’s hard to remember the “toilet paper” lines, the literal battles in the grocery store for the last can of “something” (even here in Pataskala), the cheap gas because there was nowhere to go.  Are we better today than we were four years ago?  Of course – IF – we really remember what we were doing four years ago.

Spring Chickens

No one, really, no one, wants two octogenarians running for the Presidency of the United States.  On energy, blood pressure, slurred words and stumbled stairs alone; Americans are rightly concerned.  We thought Reagan was old, elected President at seventy.   Looking back, he still wasn’t a “spring chicken”, but definitely not a “stewing hen” either (until the Alzheimer’s crept in). 

But it is what it is.  We have a binary choice, again.  To vote against “old”, you either have to throw your vote away on a seventy-year-old, worm-eaten (his words, not mine) Bobby Kennedy, or choose “not to play”.  But it’s not just a binary choice between two (too?) old men.  It’s also a black and white choice on multiple issues.

Rights

Stop the Steal:  a vote for Trump is a vote in favor of voter suppression.  His Supreme Court is already eviscerating the 1965 Voting Rights Act.  The six conservative Justices, led by the Chief John Roberts, somehow believe that discrimination is “over” in America.  In our increasingly minority-majority nation, the notion of “white power” is real.  Many states (including Ohio) are doing whatever they can to make voting harder, actions which impact lower economic and minority communities more.  The whole point:  maintain power, in the state legislatures and in the National government.   As the Nation approaches the time when whites are no longer the majority (around 2040) the pressure of some to keep power will only grow greater.  And who represents them best:  Donald Trump.

Abortion:  a vote for Trump is a vote for banning abortion nationwide, regardless of the reason.  It’s really that simple.  Trump can say whatever he wants right now, but the seminal “deal” of his political career is his deal with the Christian-right, an agreement based mostly on ending the right of women to make their own choices for their own bodies.  That agreement alone allows “Christians” to accept a morally bankrupt candidate as their “imperfect vessel”. It’s not just three Supreme Court Justices (and young replacements for two if Trump is elected).  It’s all of the other “wedge issues” that come with it; LGBTQ rights and the whole other litany of alphabetical issues:  DEI, CRT to name two.

Foreign Policy

Ukraine:  a vote for Trump is a vote for Russian victory in Ukraine.  It’s not only about Trump’s known affinity for Russia’s dictator Vladimir Putin.  Among other traits, Trump is known for getting “revenge” (“I am your retribution”).  Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy failed to “play ball” with Trump against Biden in 2019; if Trump is elected his “retribution” will result in the Russian conquest of the nation.  And what is the outcome of that?  Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania all are on the block, with Poland right behind.  Putin’s appetite to rebuild the Soviet Union really has no bounds.  

Israel and Palestine:  a vote for Trump is a vote to suppress Palestinians.  And that might sound “OK”, but it also means that Palestinians will use the only remaining outlet available to them, terrorism.  It’s how this all started in the first place, in the 1970’s.  The only solution is to somehow give Palestinians an opportunity to have their own nation, a real nation with real sovereignty (not the occupied West Bank).  But getting Israel to do that will require political change in their government, and Trump is massively allied with the current regime.  It’s not a coincidence that Benjamin Netanyahu is Jared Kushner’s godfather.

Retribution

Democracy:  Maya Angelou said it best, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time”.  Trump, and his notorious advisory staff, have made it clear what they will do on gaining office in 2025.  It’s what they wanted to do in 2017 with the first flurry of executive orders (remember the Muslim Ban?).  They didn’t understand how to get things done then, but they’ve had eight years to get better at it.  Once Bannon’s pardoned, and with Steven Miller back in the saddle, the Justice Department will be the “Department of Retribution”.  

Sure there are lots of good reasons to vote FOR Joe Biden.  But in the end, it’s a binary choice, one that’s even made if you choose “Not to play”.  In fact, that entire quote is:

“A strange game. The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess?”

But, to be clear, not choosing is not a “winning move”.  It simply means abandoning personal responsibility to help govern America.  And, if you don’t care, you deserve what you get.  

Old Glory

Here’s one of my favorite topics!!!  Let’s talk about American History – specifically the history of American flags!!

There are a few historic flags I’d like to “zoom-in” on, flags somewhat obscured by the lens of time, but now back in the “common vernacular” of our discussion.  The first is the actual flag of the United States of America, the Stars and Stripes (all fifty stars for fifty states, thirteen white and red stripes representing the original thirteen states that signed the Constitution).

Stars and Stripes

It’s not quite the “Star Spangled Banner” Flag (fifteen stars, fifteen stripes – designed before the they realized the pin-stripe effect of adding a stripe for each state).  And it’s not the “Iwo Jima” flag either, thirteen stripes but forty-eight stars.  It’s the flag that’s represented the United States since 1960, when Hawaii entered the Union as a state.  And it’s the flag that could still see more stars:  Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia to mention two.

 Star Spangled Banner

“World War II” Flag

Throughout US history, flying the Stars and Stripes upside down was a sign of extreme emergency.  But in our recent history, the upside down flag has been appropriated as a symbol by the extreme MAGA crowd (as opposed to the only “crazy” MAGA crowd?).  The Stars and Stripes upside down (The World Turned Upside Down, played by the British as they surrendered at Yorktown) was outside the Capitol on January 6^th, used to beat the Capitol and DC Police officers.  But it wasn’t the only flag there.

Extreme Distress – US Flag

Of course there were a whole lot of “Trump” flags.  But there also were some other traditional American flags, some specific to the groups that gathered to overturn the election and support the losing President. 

Historic Flags

There was the “Betsy Ross” flag, thirteen stripes with thirteen stars in a circle.  It’s been the traditional flag of the American Revolution, the flag flown over George Washington’s army.  It’s been absconded by the “Three Percenters” (with a Roman Numeral III added) a far-right extremist group.  Five years ago Nike marketed a Betsy Ross Flag sneaker, triggering a whole protest against racism.  I wrote an essay (Flags and Shoes) about it at the time.  Nike didn’t have the stomach for the fight, and the shoes “went away”.  

Betsy Ross  Flag

There was the famous “Don’t Tread on Me” snake flag. officially called the “Gadsen Flag”.  In the first decade of this century, the Tea-Party movement took it as “their” symbol, and it is often used as a “private” symbol of MAGA’ism.  It’s the “insider” information, rather than just put a Trump flag in front of the house.  Now, when you see one you’re an “insider” too!!

Don’t Tread on Me Flag

And, of course, there’s the Confederate Battle Flag (actually the flag of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia).  That flag became the symbol of the Ku Klux Klan, and continues to represent the white extremist movements.  But it also became the symbol of “country-boys”, and can be seen in a lot of Country music songs and videos in the past forty years.  Lynrd Skynrd and Hank Williams Jr (you can buy a Battle Flag with Hank’s face in the middle) are two examples.  Seriously though, in the Civil War a major goal of the Confederacy was to march the Battle Flag through the Capitol.  It didn’t happen in four years of  that war, nor in one hundred and fifty-five years of American history afterwards.  But it did happen on January 6^th, 2021.

Confederate Battle Flag

Insiders Know

This week we have another American flag emerging as an “undercover” representation of the MAGA movement.  This is the “Pine Tree” or “Appeal to Heaven” flag, originally designed for the first Continental ships of war during the Revolution.  It shows a Pine Tree, with the words “Appeal to Heaven” or “Appeal to God” written above it.  But today it is symbolic of Christian Nationalism, a growing extremist movement that erroneously sees the United States as founded as a Christian Nation (it was, in fact, established diametrically opposite, as a secular nation).   It’s another “insider” flag.  Wink-wink, nudge-nudge; only those “in the know” knew.  Now you do too.

      Appeal to Heaven Flag

Of course this is really about that ultimate “insider”, the Justice of the United States Supreme Court Samuel Alito.   He’s been “winking-winking, nudging-nudging” to those “in the know”.  We all knew he was a conservative Justice, but we now know he’s been “signaling” the MAGA-extremists that he’s “one of the boys”.  First it was the “distress flag” flown in front of his house in the week between the Insurrection and the Inauguration.  Now it’s the “Appeal to Heaven” flag flown over his vacation home on the Jersey Shore.  

Of course, the Justice could argue that it was a “naval” flag, and he was just honoring the few, proud, Continental Naval forces.  But he could have done that “honoring” with the official ensign of the early Navy, the “Grand Union Flag”.  Instead he chose the loaded “Appeal to Heaven” flag, with all the baggage of Christian Nationalism that we hope our Judicial System would avoid.  He puts his own extreme political views up front, raised to salute in front of his homes.  

Grand Union Flag

If he’s so anxious to have a “personal” flag – he could put the “Seal” of the Court on a flag and fly it.  That would be a real “insider” flag – without declaring his alliance to insurrection.

Seal of the US Supreme Court

The First

What about the First Amendment?  That’s the first question everyone asks, when they hear about United States Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito.  He is an American citizen. Isn’t he “endowed” with the right to freedom of religion, speech, the press, peaceable assembly and to petition the government for redress of grievances?  That’s the very first “thing” the Founding Fathers added to the Constitution. It was part of the agreement that got the Constitution passed by the states in the first place.

In case you missed it,  here’s the story.  In the days following the January 6^th Insurrection in 2021, the Alito family flew an American flag upside down on the pole in front of their house.  Flying the flag upside down means extreme distress. But at that specific moment it was symbolic of support for those who broke into the Capitol building and disrupted the peaceful transition of power.  According to Alito’s “courageous” statement, “my wife did it”, in response to a “F**K TRUMP” sign down the street.  But it wasn’t just a momentary statement of rage. The flag stayed up, upside down, for several days between the Insurrection itself and the inauguration of Joe Biden on January 20^th.    The Alitos’ were making a point.

Freedom from Responsibility

The First Amendment “freedom of speech” is kind of an odd thing.  First of all, the Amendment doesn’t create an unqualified right to “say what I want”. We always go back to Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes limit: you  can’t shout “fire” in a crowded theater. But there are other, more stringent requirements.  And the entire “right” is simply a protection from the government making political speech “illegal”.  There is no “right” to cuss out your boss, or threaten your neighbor, without repercussions.   Sure, you can tell the “boss” he’s a “$&@!!”. But he can still fire you.  The freedom of speech carries with it the responsibilities that come with exercising that right.

So if Sam Alito was Sam Smith, plumber; then fly the flag upside down: protected speech.  Now if Sam Smith was in the Capitol, battling police, he might get fired from his job.  But the flag thing, probably would be OK.  I’m thinking of the woman who saw President Trump’s limo driving by, and decided to “fly” the universal middle-finger of disrespect.   She was just “expressing” her view , but fired from her job. Fired, because she worked for the government. Essentially she was flipping-off her own boss.  

Jerseys or Hats

But Alito is not Smith, and he’s not a plumber.  He’s a Justice of the Supreme Court.  He is one of the nine top judges in the Nation, sworn to uphold justice without fear or, as importantly, favor.  Sure we know that there are six “conservative” Justices on the Court, and three “liberal” Justices.  That’s how they view “the law”.  But we still expect that they will set aside their personal politics and determine cases in front of them “by law”.   To use a worn analogy, we do not expect Supreme Court Justices to don “Blue” jerseys or “Red” hats.  And we certainly don’t expect them to side with those attempting to stop the ultimate symbol of American democracy, the peaceful transition of power from President to President.

Peaceful Transition

How big a deal is that transition?  Long before we ever thought about Trump or Biden or MAGA or Insurrection, we taught the election of 1800 in school.  Vice President Thomas Jefferson and his running mate, Aaron Burr, were running against then-President John Adams and his running mate, Charles Pinckney.  At the time, each elector in the Electoral College got two votes for President.  Every Jefferson elector, all seventy-three of them, chose Jefferson and Burr.  Every Adams elector, sixty-five, chose Adams and Pinckney.  But the original setup of the Electoral College (later changed by the Twelfth Amendment) did not make a distinction between Presidential and Vice Presidential votes.  So Jefferson and Burr were tied for President.

A tie is broken by the House of Representatives,  then controlled by Adam’s Party, the Federalists.  Only the tied-two were on the ballot, so the Federalists had to choose between which Democratic-Republican they wanted for President.  The “elder-statesman” of the Federalists was Alexander Hamilton, who supported Jefferson over Burr (continuing a long-running rivalry with Burr that would ultimately end four years late on the dueling field in New Jersey – “Everything’s legal in Jersey”). 

After all of that, John Adams did not stand in the way of Jefferson’s inauguration.  He left town for Quincy, Massachusetts, the morning of the ceremony, and Jefferson, his political enemy, was peacefully installed as the new President of the United States.

Without Violence

We taught this as a seminal moment in American history, the first peaceful transition of political and Constitutional power without guns or bombs or violence.  That tradition was maintained, even in the Civil War, even in the Great Depression, even when the electoral tiebreaker failed and a committee chose the President in 1877.  The peaceful transition held even when ballots were messed up in Florida, and the Supreme Court itself weighed in to stop the count and chose George W Bush as President in 2000.

Alito, the ultimate legal arbiter, took a side against the peaceful transition in 2021.  At the minimum, he should recuse himself from decisions about actions on that fateful day.  But he hasn’t, and he won’t.  He sees himself as “above” the normal rules that govern judges, even Supreme Court judges.  And, short of a politically improbable impeachment and conviction, there is nothing to require him to fulfill the rules.

Norms

Normal rules – what we define as norms.  They are the “standards of behavior”, not set in stone or in law, but accepted as the “way to get things done”.  The peaceful transition of Presidential power has some legal standing, but is mostly about “norms”.  And the Justices of the Supreme Court are, but for impeachment and conviction, unfettered by rules. But they are subject to higher “norms”, because of their legal invulnerability.  And that’s the point.  When a Supreme Court Justice openly supports insurrection, the disruption of the peaceful transition of power – he’s blown the “norms” right out the window.

What is the “norm” for a Justice of the Supreme Court?  In the case of the ultimate refusal to accept the actions of the current government, Justice John Archibald Campbell set the standard in 1861.  After eight years on the Supreme Court, he resigned his seat to join the Confederacy, ultimately as Assistant Secretary of War.   While you may not agree with his sentiments, at least respect his decision to follow “the norms”. 

Alito can’t even do that.

So this one isn’t about politics.  It’s the championship season in high school track and field.  I’m a literal bystander now, the official calling “make or miss”.  But I see what’s going on, and high school sports are changing, not always for the good.  And there’s a larger story here about education, and the twenty-first century.

Forty Years

I was a public school track coach for forty years.  For many of those years we had big teams, with sixty or more boys vying to get onto the “varsity” squad.  I didn’t “cut” kids from the track team, mostly because I saw the changes that impacted boys from a fourteen year-old freshman to an eighteen year-old senior.  The kid that “didn’t have a prayer” of making varsity as a freshman, might be a State Qualifier three years later.  It was worth the wait.

I did my best as the Head Coach, to get the most qualified assistants I could find.  But my primary criteria for hiring wasn’t necessarily technical knowledge.  The most important factor was how did the candidate work with kids.  Was he or she, a positive role model, the kind of coach that inspired as well as instructed.  I could teach an assistant “technique” but I couldn’t make an assistant inspirational.  As time went on, I found that the great assistants not only learned the “nuts and bolts” of their events, but were able to get their athletes to achieve far beyond what they thought possible.  Many of them are still doing so today.

Negotiations

Athletics has changed in the past couple of decades.  Not to be too cynical, but parents are willing to “buy” improvement for their kids.  I guess it one way they show they care and support their child, by putting their “money where their mouth is”.  So “private club” coaches are more and more a part of high school track and field.   And since parents are paying a lot for their services (as much as $500 a month), that coach has a great deal of influence on what the parents, and the athlete, will do.

The axiom, “You get what you pay for,” still sounds true in the mid-twenty-first century. So, that $500/month coach must know more than that “free coach” at the school, I guess.  As I watch my friends coach teams today, I realize that public school coaching is no longer just going out and “teaching” track.  It’s also a series of negotiations, with the athlete, with the parent, and with the “club coach” – the one that has to justify the parents’ huge expense.  The “my way or the highway” head track coach of my day probably can’t get away with that any more.  The parents, the Administrators of the public school, the kids, won’t go for it.

Championship Season

One close friend has coached state and national contenders.  She’s highly educated in her events, as well as being a former highly skilled collegiate competitor herself.  And, in her own way, she inspires athletes to try new techniques and events that leads to even greater success.  But she’s a woman in a “man’s world” in track and field, the “weight” events, shot-put and discus, (and hammer and javelin).  

In the final weeks of high school track, the best compete in a series of meets to get to the culmination of the season, the State Championship.  Unlike other sports, there aren’t usually fences and security personnel keeping spectators far away from the competitors, especially in the throws.  Parents, teammates, friends and just spectators have the same access to the athlete as coaches do.  And since “club coaches” want to coach “the best” (success breeds success breeds, more kids at $500/month), some see these competitions as recruiting opportunities.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all club coaches.   Many are very ethical, taking kids (and parents) that come to them, and staying out of the way of the school coaches.  There were a couple of years when I had both roles, a school coach and a club coach. I worked hard at  knowing my place, and being an ethical coach.  But there are some that give the whole group a bad name.

Chicken Hawk

They try to “chicken hawk” athletes, right in the middle of competition.  As a kid tries to focus on getting their best effort, listening to the coach “that brung ‘em”, all of a sudden there’s another voice pitching their abilities and making suggestions.  It’s all about sales, and it tells a lot about what kind of coach the “hawk” is.  Maybe they know about the technical event, maybe they took other athletes to higher success.  But the kind of coach I want to hire, the kind that inspires kids as well as technically coaching them – that kind of coach would never interfere in competition, never take that most delicate moment and try to interpose their sales pitch.

And in the throws, a definite “male bastion” of track and field, there is a “hawk”, who has no ethical problem interfering with a highly qualified, highly successful coach who happens to be a woman.  Sure it’s unethical.  It’s also something that wouldn’t go on in other sports.  No one comes out of the stands at the basketball game, or onto the sidelines at the football game, and calls another play.  But in track and field, it happened.  

Preparation

I had the privilege of coaching my team’s pole vaulters for decades.  We developed a whole pole vault “culture” and had tremendous success.  One of the issues we actually had to deal with was other pole vault coaches “kibitzing” in, making suggestions to my athletes in the middle of the competition.   They weren’t trying to steal my kids, or sign them to their “club”.  A lot of  the time, they really just wanted to help, to be a part of the success.  I prepped my kids for it – be polite, nod affirmatively, then walk away.  It wasn’t that “we were right and they were wrong”.  It’s that our “process” included making corrections, and we usually were right.  Other folks didn’t know our “process”, and might literally be fixing the wrong thing.

Of course, my friend has established rapport with her increasingly successful student.  He knows who to listen to in a meet.  But the focus required for maximum athletic performance is fragile, and easily disrupted.  The “chicken hawk” is just one more factor to “prepare” for.  It shouldn’t be.  She shouldn’t have to make that part of her “regional prep”, the last meet before the State Finals.  But in “modern” track and field, it’s just another cost of success.

Background

Tuesday,  I wrote a long piece explaining the controversy and evident corruption involving Ohio’s Governor, Attorney General and the Ohio’s State Teacher Retirement System (STRS) (Crooked Men and Crooked Staffs).  If you aren’t familiar with the situation, it would help to read that essay first.  The summary is  this: STRS controls over $90 Billion of retirement money for teachers.  In the past decades, they failed to increase the investment, in fact, losing money, despite the markets climbing steadily, even including the Covid drop (the Market indexes set record highs just yesterday).  But private equity investment companies, and the professional investment staff of  STRS itself, have made millions.

Both retired and active teachers, frustrated by ongoing cutbacks in retirement benefits, increased teacher retirement costs and longer work-years requirements, moved to change the governing membership of the eleven member retirement board.  Since 2021, the elected members of the Board (five by active teachers, two by retired teachers) were altered.  Currently five of the seven elected members are “reformers” in support of STRS changes.  The other four Board members are appointed by the state government.  One of those, the Governor’s appointee Wade Steen, is also a “reformer”, giving them a six to five majority.

In the 2023 election when a reformer won decisively, the Governor tipped the balance of the Board back to the “old Board” by illegally removing Mr. Steen before his term was completed.  After several months of litigation, Steen regained his seat.  When he took his seat at the April Board Meeting, the Chairman of the Board, Dale Price, (an “old Board” supporter) just walked out, throwing the meeting into the chaos which ultimately ending it.  There was no “legal” motion to adjourn.

This Week

This week it was announced that another reformer, Michelle Flanigan, was elected to take Price’s seat in September.  Just before that result was announced, the Governor presented an anonymous letter claiming that his representative, Mr. Steen, and another elected reformer, Rudy Fitchembaum, were “colluding” with a private company to make a “hostile takeover” of the Board, in order to invest $60 Billion with that same private company.  Steen and Fitchembaum deny this, and the 2021 meeting records also refute parts of that claim.  The Governor referred the letter to the State Attorney General for investigation.

All of that got us to Tuesday morning. Tuesday afternoon, the David Yost, Ohio’s Attorney General, conducted his “investigation” in less than a week, and filed a lawsuit demanding the Steen and Fitchembaum be removed from the Board.  Wednesday, the STRS Board met, with the reformers in the majority for the first time.  The Chairman Price was “ousted”, and Mr. Fitchembaum was put in his place. An “old Board” member was also replaced by a reformer as Vice Chairman. 

Today

The Governor continues to rely on the “anonymous letter” (now supposedly authored by a member of the STRS staff legal team).  He and the Attorney General are doing whatever they can to prevent the reformers from exercising control of STRS policy, regardless of the fact that they were legally elected by the constituents of the System.  My best guess:  Yost will seek a temporary injunction to stop the current majority from “acting” until his lawsuit is heard, sometime in the summer of 2025.

He better hurry.  Come September, the Board will have a majority of reformers even without Mr. Steen.  

But the question remains:  why are the state politicians so worried about changes in the STRS?  Why aren’t they worried that STRS requires the highest teacher contribution rate (14% of their annual income) in the country, but doesn’t pay the consistent Cost of Living Allowance that they promised up until 2015? (All of the other state retirement funds have annual COLA increases). Why aren’t they concerned about a multi-million dollar investment staff that has managed to lose money in the biggest market gain in history?

My answer is in the title:  there are crooked men with crooked staffs who have a vested interest in the “old” Board, and the “old” ways.  The “powers”, Governor DeWine and Attorney General Yost, are abusing their authority to protect that interest.

This is a long story – about teachers, power, pensions – and a lot (a lot!!!) of money.

Ohio Mud

In the past few months I’ve written several essays on political corruption in Ohio.   The leaders of the state have been “steeped” in corrupt activity, from Gerrymandering to paying-off private industrial debt with public money.  But somehow, Ohio comes across as politically “clean and pure”. 

 In fact, Ohio’s politics are as ugly as New Jersey, or Texas, or even Illinois.  Our state just doesn’t bother to send folks to jail. (But one – ex-House Speaker Larry Householder, the notable exception to the rule.  He “only” took a $60 Million bribe from power company Direct Energy).

Now, there is a battle over corruption at the Ohio’s State Teacher Retirement System (STRS). It’s been going on for the past several years (What’s the Deal), but this week, it boiled out into the open.

The System

The big picture:  Ohio’s public school teachers have a separate retirement system from the rest of the world. Teachers don’t even pay into social security. They had no choices about how their retirement money was invested.  It was “all in” to STRS, originally for at least thirty years of teaching to get a “full” retirement. (Teachers would get about two-thirds of their best three years).  Teach an additional five years, and get almost equal to their best years as a pension.  

The money; a percentage of the teacher’s salary matched by their school district, was “carefully” invested by the investment staff “wizards” at STRS.  And for decades that system worked, living up to the self-anointed claim to be a “premier” retirement system.  Retired teachers got annual Cost-of-Living-Allowances (COLA) of 3%. And for decades, they even received a “thirteenth” check at the end of the year.  Insurance was cheap, and life was good for retirees.

The Market

But the near back-to-back stock exchange disasters in 2001 (9-11) and 2008 (housing bubble bust) shook the retirement world.  Add that to the number of “Baby-Boomer” teachers reaching retirement age, and the “wizards” were concerned.  Could they keep up with the financial needs of ballooning retirees with fewer “active” teachers paying into the system.  In addition, actives were giving the option of splitting their contributions into a “defined contribution” plan, more like a 401-k.  That money wouldn’t remain in the investment “pot”. 

Meanwhile Ohio’s Republican Governor and state legislature gave the state retirement systems, including STRS, autonomous authority to change the structure of the pension plans, and to invest in private equity firms.  It freed up the almost $90 billion in STRS investments for much more “creative” investing.   It also let the legislators off the hook. They didn’t have to vote to cut retirees.

The Wizards

Retirement contributions increased from 10% to 14% of annual salary, now one of the most expensive in the Nation.  School district contributions also increased to 14%.   Retirement benefits were cut.  The “thirteenth check” disappeared,  insurance costs went up, and the COLA was cut from 3% to 2%. Ultimately it was suspended indefinitely.  

STRS began hiring “private wizards” for the “in-house wizards”.  Twenty percent of the over $90 Billion in investments went into private equity companies; $20 billion privately controlled and invested rather than direct open control by STRS.  And the “in-house wizards” also went into the real estate business. Almost 10% of the Fund was invested in Columbus, New York, Texas, Illinois and California (STRS).  

The nature of the investment fund became murky, as those “private” funds were shrouded in layers of non-disclosure agreements.  Even when the overall portfolio lost billions of dollars in value ($5.3 Billion in 2022 alone), the in-house  “wizards” still paid private equity fees. And they continued to get millions of dollars in “performance bonuses” themselves.

Meanwhile active teachers were paying more into retirement, and retired teachers were losing more and more of their spendable income.  From 2014 to 2023, the “value” of their original pension lost 32% in purchasing power without a cost of living increase.  The cost of health insurance increased, and many retired teachers were forced back into the job market just to make ends meet.

The Board

The Board that “governs” STRS is made up of eleven members.  Four are appointed by the State Government (one each for the Treasurer, Legislature, Department of Education and the Governor).  Two are elected by the retirees, and five are elected by active teachers.  For decades the Board served as a “rubber stamp” for the investment “wizards”, routinely approving bonuses and even allowing the Executive Director control over the Board’s own agenda. 

 The Board didn’t exercise oversight, and didn’t seem to be concerned.  And with the state government controlling four seats, and the major teacher union, the Ohio Education Association, controlling most of the other seven seats, STRS went on it’s “merry” way, despite the growing cries of retirees and the loss of confidence by many active teachers.

In 2021, retirees, dissatisfied with the “premier” pension that left them with lower standards of living, organized to elect a reform slate to the Board.  The Ohio Retired Teachers Association (ORTA) teamed up with the Ohio STRS Members Only Forum (MOF, based on Facebook) and STRS Ohio Watchdogs to change the elected Board members.  The goal:  to get Board members more concerned with the impact of STRS cuts on retirees, and on “future retirees” as well.  

The issue was clear:  if the STRS fund had simply been invested in “passive” funds, indexed to the stock market, over the past twenty years the fund would have doubled.  It didn’t take “wizards” to figure that out.  Even with obvious buffers for market performance, the fund should have grown by billions, and never actually lost money.  And STRS shouldn’t be paying millions in private equity management fees, and millions more in professional staff bonuses, regardless of loss to the fund.

The Money

It’s public money.  It is the “fruit of the labor” of decades of teachers. (And for those who note that half of that money came directly from employing school districts – keep in mind that but for the teacher’s labor, that money wouldn’t be in the pension fund).  It’s “survival” to the teachers and retirees who depend in good faith on the System.  And clearly, it’s been mismanaged, with no one held accountable.  And who benefits from this mismanagement?  

First of all, it’s the “wizards”.  The “wizards” work for STRS, get to set their own performance goals, hire the firms that determine whether those goals are achieved, and then pay themselves handsomely (last year, over $10 million in bonus money on top of six-figure salaries).  Second, it’s the private equity firms, who make millions in management fees, and have non-disclosure contracts preventing public scrutiny of their actions, even by the Board members.  

And, third, and perhaps most importantly, it’s the politicians who receive campaign contributions from those private equity firms.  They are “vested” in making sure the pension fund monies are available for “their guys” to make money on.  The politicians get their “cut”, even if it’s a legal contribution to a political fund.

And where does the Ohio Education Association (OEA), the teacher’s union, my union; stand? (In full disclosure – I am a former OEA local President). They are all-in behind the “wizards”, and refuse to answer why.  It’s only speculation – but is there some tacit agreement between the union and the politicians they normally oppose?  Is there some secret quid-pro-quo?  It’s hard to know.  But what is for sure is that OEA is positive in their support of the “old” board, many of whose members moved onto state-level OEA governance positions.

The Governor

Over the past three years, both “retiree” seats on the board, and three of the “active” teacher seats, were won by “reformers” in legal, audited, fair elections.  (Only retirees can vote for retired seats, only active teachers can vote for active seats).  When the last active seat was won by Pat Davidson, an ORTA and MOF reformer, it looked like real change was at hand.  The Governor’s appointee, Wade Steen, had “seen the light” and come to the reformers’ side.  For the first time, there would be a “reform” majority on the Board.

Governor DeWine stepped in.  He removed Steen from the board, replacing him with – wait for it – a real estate and securities manager and $100,000 DeWine campaign contributor.  Steen sued to serve out the remainder of his term, and after several months the Common Pleas and Appellate Courts agreed with him.  The tens of thousands of dollars of Steen’s legal expenses were paid by ORTA.  Steen regained his seat in April and went to the Board meeting to take his place.  Then the lame-duck active representative and Chairman of the Board, Dale Price, walked out of the meeting without a motion of adjournment. That caused the Board to be unable to do business, and  the meeting just ended.

The Doubt

Last week, Michelle Flannigan, a reform candidate, was elected to fill Price’s seat on the Board.  Now with or without Steen, reformers will have control when her term begins in September.

And DeWine received an “anonymous letter”. It claimed that the reform board members were in the “thrall” and “colluding” with a business that does market indexing, called QED.  In fourteen pages, the letter implies that QED has somehow “rigged” the multiple elections held for Board seats in the past three years.  DeWine, just “doing his duty”, referred the letter to Ohio’s Attorney General Dave Yost, another beneficiary of the private equity campaign money.  Yost promises to “protect” the retirement fund from “undue private influence”. 

So here we are in “clean and pure” Ohio.  If you’re a gambler (or investor), don’t bet on the reform majority actually taking control in September.  Odds are, Yost will do a “speedy” investigation, and somehow disrupt things before there are seven votes to clean things up at STRS.  The winners will be the governing party and, sadly, the Ohio Education Association, I guess. 

 But there’s no guessing about who the losers will be:  the retired teachers of Ohio, and just as importantly, the students of Ohio. Why the Students? Because the “premier” retirement system was a big draw for new teachers, even making up for the reduced salaries. Now those rookie teachers can look forward to joining current retirees in one thing:  a retirement filled with financial doubt.  

This is another in the “Sunday Story” series – it’s a story about school, and substitute teaching, and seniors — always an interesting combination.

It’s Over

It’s spring, and it’s track season, and I really don’t substitute school much this time of year.  But a good friend asked a while ago if I’d sub-in for him in early May.  I didn’t have a meet scheduled, and so I agreed.  Okay, to put it to you straight – I forgot.  May in the high school is no joke.

I forgot that my friend teaches seniors. I forgot: seniors are almost done with school, even in the first week of May.  That fact is proudly displayed on his white board, THREE days left before their high school career is —- OVER!!!!

There’s an American tradition called “senior attitude”.  It’s the same attitude “short-timers” have in the military, or adults who are about to retire.  “Senior Attitude” is simple:  “I’m done, I do what I want, I don’t have to worry about it anymore. Anyway, there’s nothing you can do about it.”   As a high school administrator, I used to wish we could just surprise them one day:  “Yep, it’s April 29^th. You’re done – don’t come back.  There will be a picnic on  May 10^th, an assembly on May 14^th, and Graduation rehearsal in on May 17^th.  If you want to “walk across the stage”, be there.”

Because they were done long before April 29^th anyway.  It’s just the truth.  

Patience

But here I am, a substitute teacher of seniors in class with three days left. Patience is the virtue I require.  I should have gone to bed earlier.  There’s no such thing as control, or even progress.  Just hang on for dear life.  In one class I learned a new game, kind of a cross between lawn darts, cornhole, and the basketball game horse. The seniors used rubber suction cup tipped implements, that stick on desks, walls, whiteboards, refrigerators, and even the big screen TV.  Only when the words “…let’s take this to the hall” came out,  did I make a stand.  I’m just glad they didn’t suction cup me.

I overheard a lot of plans, and a lot of conversations that only short-timers can have.  Stories of “the old days” back in freshman year, or what’s happening at work, or singing the “hippopotamus song”.   And there was lots of looking at  funny videos on phones (the school ban on cell phones doesn’t apply to countdown seniors, I guess).   And, of course, there was a fair amount of snoring going on.  I hope they don’t drool on the desk.  

Now, I know that’s not what a sub is supposed to allow.   I know I should have somehow engaged them in some enlightened conversation about protests over Gaza or the powers of the President or what their post-high school plans might be.  But all of those things requires some buy-in from the students: and their buy-in is all sold out.  They’re seniors, and it’s almost over.

The Bubble

The only kids that care are the ones “on the bubble”.  Either due to low grades, or a huge disciplinary “rap sheet”; they can’t deviate, can’t screw-up, even a little.  They are on “ultimate secret probation” until the last day, the last moment; a diploma on the line.  Back in my day, I even suggested some seniors NOT come to school that last week.  They were more likely to get suspended and miss graduation than learn anything.  Better they stay out of trouble, out of school.

Maybe the few, the proud; those competing for valedictorian or the gilded 4.0 grade point average (not as gilded as it used to be in a world of higher than 4.0 course credits), are still worried about assignments. As for the rest, as Julius Caesar said; “Alea Ecta Est”.  The die is cast; the work is done.  All that’s left is to get “across the stage”, make Mom and Dad proud, hug your friends, and start on a whole new path of life.

Who’s Foolish

There was some conversation of putting up tents in front of school.  But it wasn’t to protest anything, it’s just the rebirth of the old “senior campout”.  I suggested that, here in western Licking County in our current political climate; the community might take a dim view of tents on a campus.  After all, Ohio State just cleared tents from their campus, done in support of Palestinians in Gaza. 

 Drivers down the National Road, (US 40) would be shocked to see students protesting outside of Watkins Memorial High School.  Of course, they wouldn’t be protesting – it’s a senior campout, hanging around a campfire in front of school, swapping stories of middle school love and maybe an illegal beverage (or smoke) or two.  

I recommended that the Administration wouldn’t, couldn’t, let that go.  I got a nod, and the back of the senior’s head.  What did I know.  I’m just a substitute, foolish enough to show up in a senior class in May.  

Congratulations class of 2024!!!  

The Sunday Story Series

• Riding the Dog  – 1/24/21
• Hiking with Jack – 1/31/21
• A Track Story – 2/7/21
• Ritual – 2/14/21
• Voyageur – 2/19/21
• A Dog Story – 2/25/21
• A Watkins Legend – 3/7/21
• Ghosts at Gettysburg – 3/14/21
• Lessons from the State Meet – 3/28/21
• More Lessons from the State – 4/4/21
• Stories from the Road – 4/11/21
• A Bear Wants You – 5/1/21
• My Teachers – 5/9/21
• Old Friends  – 5/23/21
• The Gift – 6/6/21
• Echoes of Mom – 6/20/21
• Stories of the Fourth – 7/3/21
• Running Memories – 7/25/21
• Lost Dog of Eldora – 8/1/21
• Dogs and Medals – 8/8/21
• The New Guy – 9/5/21
• Stories of 9-11 – 9/12/21
• The Interview – 9/26/21
• Night Moves – 10/3/21
• Funeral for a Friend – 10/11/21
• National Security – 10/24/21
• Boots on the Trail – 10/31/21
• Taking Care of Mom and Dad – 11/14./21
• Dogs Found and Lost – 11/21/21
• Watching Brian 12/12/21
• Stories from Shiloh – 12/19/21
• Team Trips – 12/26/21
• Uphill, Both Ways  – 1/9/22
• Old Trophies – 1/30/22
• The Last Time – 2/7/22
• Olympic Miracles – 2/13/22
• Mind Numbing – 2/20/22
• Track Weather – 4/3/22
• What’s Missing – 4/11/22
• A Scouting Story – 4/17/22
• Waterproof Paper – 5/8/22
• Origin Stories – 5/22/22
• Origin Stories – Part Two 5/29/22
• Back at State – 6/5/22
• Out in the Country – 6/19/22
• Pataskala Downs – 7/4/22
• Car Stories I – 7/24/22
• Car Stories II  – 7/31/22
• Old Man Experience – 8/7/22
• Cross Country Camp – 8/14/22
• New to the Pack – 8/21/22
• Car Stories III – The Bus – 8/28/22
• A Day in the Life – 9/4/22
• Stupid Human Tricks – 9/18/22
• Fair or Foul – 2/26/23
• Immigrant Story – 3/12/23
• Busy Season – 5/15/23
• Of Jeeps and Bucks – 5/28/23
• A Pole Vault Story  -6/11/23
• End of an Era – 6/25/23
• Paybacks – 7/2/23
• Graying in Pataskala – 7/17/23
• Being a Goat – 7/23/23
• Toy Truck – 8/20/23
• Medical Terms – 8/27/23
• Missing Margaritaville – 9/3/23
• The McGowan – 9/10/23
• Who’s Watching – 10/22/23
• The Saturday Before – 10/29/23
• A Tale of Turkey, and Dogs – 11/26/23
• Bruno’s Story – 12/3/23
• Out in the Country – 12/10/23
• Christmas Eve – 12/24/23
• Rube Goldberg – 1/12/24
• Our Pataskala Kroger’s – 2/5/24
• A Sad, Sad, Dog – 2/11/24
• Singing in the Tornado – 3/3/24
• Your Safe Spot – 3/17/24
• Easter Dawn – 3/31/24
• Swarms – 4/14/24
• Lowest Common Denominator – 4/28/24

Old Guy

Sometimes I feel like an “old guy”.  Like yesterday, I had to ask a young coach how to take “screenshot” on my IPhone so I could send an image in a text.  He was gracious, but I’m sure felt the same way that I did explaining the TV remote control to my Dad.  The “shot” got sent, (and I didn’t manage to call 9-11 in the process), but, definitely I was an “old guy”.

Back when I was growing up, TV’s went from giant boxes with tiny black and white screens to smaller boxes with colorful screens, and there were three choices in television news.   It was either the Huntley-Brinkley Report on NBC, Walter Cronkite on CBS, or young Peter Jennings on ABC. In my youth, we went the “way” that Dad’s TV station went.  We were mostly a Huntley-Brinkley “house”, but there were a couple years when Dad went with ABC, and we got to meet Peter Jennings.  It’s a little different when you’ve said hello to the man who tells you the state of the nation and world every night.

Sliced Up

I’m sure there are some people still loyal to their “network” news.  I still feel “close” to NBC, now led by Lester Holt.  It’s what Mom and Dad used to watch (an earlier essay – Watching Brian).  The sign of our modern political era is that I don’t see Lester or the network news that often.  I’m still watching, but it’s a derivative of NBC News, MSNBC.  The fact that I haven’t seen Lester Holt in live coverage for years tells everything about what’s happened to American’s consumption of television, and as importantly, social media and cell phone news.

If you think of traditional broadcast media news, you start with a pie sliced into three pieces. (Sure, there was always PBS, but they had a very small piece of the pie, one made without sugar or fattening ingredients).   But the “American Pie” today is now sliced into very narrow pieces, perhaps so thin that, like a real pie, the pieces fall apart before you even get them on the plate.

The three main networks still exist.  But the “television news” business is now sliced up.  There’s MSNBC and CNBC, CNN and CNN International, Fox, and Fox Business, Newsmax and OANN; and there’s also “Cheddar” and News Nation, NBC NOW, and ABC and CBS Live.  And then there’s the “direct” news – on YouTube and Tik Tok and all of the other live sources.  And finally, you can get “your news” directly from individuals, from Mark Levin and Tucker Carlson to Marc Elias and Simon Rosenberg (two of my favorites).  

Alternative Facts

Part of any “discussion” of American politics and events is based on some common agreement.  We have a “history” that we share, events that we mutually reacted to, ideals that we hold important.  But in our fractured world, none of those things are true, anymore.  Even such a basic tenet of American history, that we rebelled against a sovereign king to create a “Democratic/Republic”, is now in question.  The Supreme Court is seriously (seriously?) considering the question of whether the President of the United States is sovereign; immune from criminal prosecution for his/her actions.  

Attorneys arguing for immunity pointed to George Washington and Alexander Hamilton for precedent and support.  There was once a time, not long ago, when we all believed the exact opposite.  Many of us still do, but it is no longer a “common” fact.  Washington and Hamilton must be spinning in their graves.

Where we get our information determines what we believe.  We now all have “separate” sources, based on age, habit, peer pressure, and – the saddest part – what we “want” to hear.  We find what we want to believe, then turn to sources to affirm that “want”; whether it’s true or not.  Kelly Ann Conway, former and future advisor to Donald Trump, said it best in an interview with then NBC’s Meet the Press host Chuck Todd in 2017.  They were discussing President Trump’s inaugural crowd size, clearly exaggerated by Press Secretary Sean Spicer.

Conway told Todd:  “You’re saying it’s a falsehood and Sean Spicer, our press secretary, gave alternative facts to that.”

Todd responded:  “Alternative facts are not facts. They are falsehoods.”

Conway retorted:  “If we’re going to keep referring to the press secretary in those types of terms I think we’re going to have to rethink our relationship here.”

The Worm Turns

Here we are, eight years later.  Conway’s “alternative facts” are now “truth” to  tens-of-millions of Americans.   We now know that “fact” and “falsehood”, here in the 2020’s, are no longer absolute terms.  They are relative, depending on what “piece of the pie” is your source.

So, what is it about third party candidates for President?  Ross Perot had a significant following in 1992, when he dropped out of the race.  He stated his reason as masked men attacking his home and endangering his daughter.  A week later he re-entered the race, but the damage was done.  He never had that level of voter support again.

This week, Bobby Kennedy Jr released that he had a dead worm in his head, one that ate a portion of his brain before it died.  It might be true, but it’s certainly not likely to increase his political support – “Oh, I’m voting for Bobby, even though he’s a worm-eaten former heroin addict who doesn’t take vaccines”.  And yesterday, Donald Trump went on Truth Social to “call out” Kennedy for being a “fake” anti-vaxxer.  The son of my hero, Bobby Kennedy Senior, might be a lot of things (perhaps thanks to the worm; more likely the heroin) but surely his one bona fide is as THE preeminent voice against vaccination.  Just another Trump “alternative fact”, I guess.

Ohio – The Heart of it All

Hey OHIO!!  You’ve heard it time and time again, shouted from the State House steps: “OHIO HAS THE SAFEST VOTING AND ELECTIONS IN THE COUNTRY”.   So is it true?  Well, here’s one measure:  5,974,121 votes were cast in 2020.  Out of that number, 27 were cast illegally and charged with a crime (AP).  For you math “geeks”, that’s .000452%.  Those 27 votes did not impact the outcome of any election in the state.  And this was in the “Pandemic Election”, when Republicans decried  (and are still crying about) the “looseness” of the election process.   

Here’s the deal, Ohio.  When Republicans say elections are “questionable”, they’re lying.  They know that Ohio’s elections are secure.  There’s an old saying, “Don’t fix what ain’t broke”.   So when Republicans in the State House put out a two-hundred and fifty page bill to “secure the elections”, what are they fixing?

Voter Suppression

Here’s another axiom of elections:  the more restrictions on voting, the more difficult voting becomes, the longer it takes to vote, the more hoops there are to register and vote; the more likely Republicans are to win.  Why is that?   It’s simple economics.   Folks with less money tend to have less flexibility in their voting hours.  Hourly workers can’t just “take off” to vote.  And they can’t wait hours in line, the situation in many urban areas of Ohio.  And they can’t afford day-care for their kids while they are voting.  Those voters are overwhelmingly Democratic.

Ohio’s proposed “security enhancements” include electronic comparisons of picture identifications.  This creates added requirements for polling places, leading to “consolidating” precinct polls into larger facilities.  Instead of folks being able to walk to their local precinct, in many cases they are required to find transportation to a “mass poll” farther away.  (This happens in suburban Ohio as well.  Here in Pataskala, there are multiple  precincts that vote in a church only accessible by car).  Don’t have a car – can’t find a ride with someone else – can’t vote.

The same is true with “picture identification”, usually a driver’s license.  What is difficult for suburban voters to understand is that not everyone has a  license.  In fact, only 62% of 18 year-olds, and 90% of 30 to 34 year-olds in Ohio have a license (Cleveland.com). Sure, they can get a State Identification Card, if they can get to the BMV.  But if they don’t need if for “more important” facets of life, things like getting bank accounts for direct deposit, then why should it be required to vote?

How Pure Is It?

The old Cincinnati soap company, Proctor and Gamble, claimed that Ivory Soap was “99+44/100% Pure”.  Elections in Ohio are even better than that, 99.999548% secure.  The Republican Secretary of State brags about how secure our elections are, even with early and mail-in voting.  So why is the MAGA-Republican legislature trying to “fix what ain’t broke”?

Because, if voting in Ohio were easy, more Democrats would vote.  And more Democrats voting is a threat to the Republican hegemony in state government.  Not only does partisan Gerrymandering drastically tilt the scales to the GOP, but they want to make sure that what might be a Democratic majority in the state can never express their will.  And the best way to do that, is keep them from voting.  

Adding more layers to a voting process that “ain’t broke” isn’t “fixing”, it’s “rigging”.  That’s what’s happening right now, in Columbus, at the State House.  Standing on the “purity” of election protection, MAGA-Republican legislators are doing one more thing to maintain their power in the state.  They are making sure it’s harder to vote.

In the Depths

It’s happening all over the country, wherever Republicans are in control.  From Georgia to Arizona, the false cries of MAGA “stolen election” advocates are creating laws to suppress the vote.  Because if you can’t win the election outright, you’ve got to rig it. Just like the “Red-Map” strategy of 2010, it’s working.  And if you’re depending on Ohio’s State Supreme Court to step in and “make it right”, that slippery slope is coated in Ivory Soap.  Look what happened to the gerrymandered districts.  Even when the Supreme Court ruled against them, the legislature ignored them and conducted elections in the districts they wanted.  

Back in the 1890’s, Proctor and Gamble made a mistake with their soap processing.  Air bubbles were trapped in the Ivory Soap bars.  Instead of fixing the process, good old P&G decided to make the air bubbles an asset.  Ivory was, and is, the only soap that floats.  But the State Legislature doesn’t want the election fixes to “float” on the surface, they want to rig them in the depths of legislative committees.  The way to “fix what ain’t broke”, is to do it in obscurity.  Then when the voters realize what happened, it’s too late.  We may already be there, here in Ohio. 

No “Sunday Story” today – just a look at history, repeating, rhyming, dooming or just irrelevant.

Teacher

I was a history teacher.  One of the “classic” reasons that I gave my students for learning history, is the “past is prologue” to the future. For my middle schoolers, the line was simpler:  “Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it” (George Santayana).  It all came down to this:  we’ve had problems before, and if we know how they tried to solve them; good or bad, right or wrong, effective or worthless; we can make better choices THIS time.

My class didn’t memorize dates.  Even when I started teaching forty-six years ago, at the very beginnings of personal computers and before the cell phone, I didn’t need my students to know the “big” American dates (1620, 1776, 1801, 1861, 1929, 1941).  What I did want them to know is the “story” (his-story, now her-story as well; always our-story).   The “story” of how guys like Jefferson lived with contradictions, balancing beliefs and principles against the economics of Southern life.  Or the idea that compromise is as much a foundation of the Nation as is democracy.  Or that, as Congressman James Clyburn likes to say so clearly, “Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good (Voltaire)”.  

Mapping

Past is prologue, but the past is not a “script” that must be repeated.  In fact, it’s like that childhood warning:  “Don’t put your hand on the stove to see if it’s hot.”  America put its proverbial hand on the hot stove of history many times, and got burnt.  We don’t HAVE to do it again.  That’s why we learn history.

History is a guide, a map.  As a former backpacker, I knew how to read the detailed topographic maps that led across the wilderness that still makes up a lot of America (produced by the US Geological Survey, a government agency).  I could find the pathway across the mountains, even without a “GPS” (I used a compass, hand-held GPS didn’t exist when I was hiking).  But I also realized that the map, like history, did not always “represent” the real geography I was trying to cross.  Storms, floods, fires, “progress”; all might alter the landscape, or even make the intended route impassable.  The map represented history, but history doesn’t always define the present.

Nixon?

So with all of that, are we repeating history in 2024?  Is this just a sequel to 1968, a pivotal year in American politics?  Is the stage set, the script written?  The Democrats are going to Chicago, colleges campuses are filled with unrest, even Bobby Kennedy (this one alive and unhinged) is running as a candidate.  Has history already written the outcome, with Joe Biden filling both the Johnson and Humphrey roles, and Donald Trump channeling Richard Nixon?

There certainly are similarities.  There is a direct line from Nixon to Trump.  Trump’s original political mentor was Roy Cohn, advisor to the historic “king of misinformation”, Senator Joe McCarthy of “McCarthyism” fame. Nixon gained national prominence through McCarthyism.  And when Cohn died of aids in 1986, Trump turned to a Nixon “dirty-trickster” as his political advisor, Roger Stone (who literally has Nixon’s face tattooed to his back). Nixon to Stone to Trump – a straight line of political immorality.   And while Trump never used the Nixon 1962 line; “You won’t have Dick Nixon to kick around anymore”; he is a defeated President running for re-election.

Humphrey?

And Biden, is a President still seen as “weak” within his own Party, coming to Chicago with the Nation on the edges of two foreign wars, the Israeli debacle in Gaza, and the defense of Ukraine.   Americans aren’t dying in Vietnam, but Americans can literally watch Palestinians dying in Gaza on their phones.  Is that the “equivalent” of watching Vietnam on the evening news with Cronkite or Huntley/Brinkley?

The Democratic Party is divided between moderates and progressives, just as it was divided between pro-War and anti-War in 1968.  But that’s where the comparison ends.  There is a division over the Israeli actions in Gaza, but it isn’t the schism of 1968.  Most, perhaps all, of the progressives of 2024, recognize that Biden isn’t “perfect”, but is “good”. And he’s definitely better than the Trump alternative.

And while Nixon was always kind of “shady”, he was not charged with crimes going into 1968.  He did not daily face felony charges, and wasn’t the first Presidential candidate ever to look at a real chance of some kind of incarceration.  And all of that means that the deciding “center” of America has a lot more to think about.

Chaos

And finally there is the 1968 “chaos” factor.  I watched the Democratic Party in Chicago unable to find common ground in 1968.  The “establishment” Party of the President, Lyndon Johnson, was using the full force of law enforcement to “put-down” the opposition.  The protestors in the street weren’t just stopped or arrested, they were intentionally beaten.  Mayor Daley made his message clear, “not in my city”.  And it’s that “police riot”, combined with a party split down the middle, that made many Americans turn to a “stable” Republican candidate.

But the “chaos” factor today isn’t the Democrats, it’s the MAGA-Republicans.  The four years of Trump were years of American disarray both at home and abroad.  It culminated in a divisive and contradictory approach to a world pandemic.  Trump was for vaccination, but his followers were opposed.  Trump was for “prevention”, masks and distancing, until he was against it. 

Many Americans have walled off their memories of the Covid years, but with a little prodding, it all comes flooding back.  The Reagan question:  are you better now than you were four years ago, is easily answered.  Four years ago we were in the depths of the Covid epidemic.  Hundreds of thousands were already dead.  For the vast majority, we were NOT better.

Rhymes

Speaking of history, there is an historic controversy over who said the phrase:  “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.”  The quote is attributed to Mark Twain, but there is no written evidence that he actually said it.  But it’s something that Twain could have said, and it sounds like him.  So, we give him credit, whether it’s due or not.

We are a Nation dramatically divided in 2024, just as we were a Nation divided in 1968.  And, conveniently, there is college campus unrest, and the Democrats are meeting in Chicago this summer.  So history “rhymes”.  But the issues of 1968 aren’t the conflicts of 2024. Americans face an even more fundamental choice.  Biden is no Bobby Kennedy (one of his heroes) but he’s not Hubert Humphrey either.  He’s moving the Nation beyond the economic impact of Covid, and made fundamental changes in our infrastructure and in protecting the environment.  More like 2020, when Biden seemed kind of a Democratic after-thought, the Party will likely walk out of the Chicago convention united.

Big Deal

And Trump is no Nixon.  Nixon, as personally corrupted as he turned out to be, was still committed to the American experiment.  When he lost a close election in 1960, he conceded with grace.  And in modern terms, Nixon was far more “moderate” than the current MAGA-Republican world allows.  

Comparing Trump to Nixon isn’t setting a very high bar.  And Trump doesn’t even reach that.  While history may rhyme, there is no good historic analogy to 2024, even going back to the great schism of 1860.  We face a new set of facts, a new set of lyrics to what sounds like a familiar tune.  Some things rhyme, but 2024 presents the kind of crisis that nations’ face once a century,  or maybe once in history.  As Joe Biden (no Mark Twain) said – it’s a “big ‘F-ing’ Deal”. 

Hyperbole

It’s a morning of hyperbole on my “mainstream media” news program of choice, “Morning Joe”.   Joe Scarborough’s a former Congressman from Pensacola, Florida (his seat now held by Matt Gaetz). He hosts, and stands as one of two “former Republicans” on MSNBC (Nicolle Wallace is the other).  Joe’s surrounded by what I would consider “moderate” Democrats.  But it’s definitely Joe’s show, and it definitely has his biases.  Sure he supports Democrats, but also supports what in my younger days I’d call “the establishment”.  

This week colleges struck back against the students protesting against Israel in Gaza by “encamping” on the college grounds.  After weeks of negotiations, as protestors demanded that the universities divest from investments that support Israel: Columbia and UCLA sent in the cops.  

Where does “Morning Joe” stand?  When the NYPD went into Columbia, the next morning the Police Commissioner AND the Mayor (a former NYPD Captain) were on air. They talked about how reluctant they were to go onto the campus, and how they worked hard to avoid violence. And the day after, when the LA police moved on UCLA, it was the same story – New York’s Police Commissioner back on, describing how “careful” officers were in moving the protestors “out”. 

Distinctions

Joe created “new” distinctions: “kids” (or as Joe would say, the “privileged kids”) protesting on the campus, and the dreaded “outside agitators”.  Those are the “shady professionals” of the protest world, with credentials from the Green Movement and Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter.  It’s as if someone who cared about “left wing” ideas, “contaminated” those “tender young minds” at Columbia and UCLA.  

The ” adults” called the students “children”, as if these young adults weren’t really capable of independent thought.  It’s all a repeat, the language used to devalue the ideas of those who protest.  They can’t be “smart” or “mature” enough to understand the real “depth” of problems: as if kids at Ivy League Columbia don’t get it.

I don’t mind that Joe is “establishment”.  I do disagree with the old trope, that “elite kids” go to college, and “working class” kids don’t have the privilege of protesting.  It’s the same old line  the “establishment” used in the Vietnam War.  But there were lots of “working class kids” who didn’t agree with that war, and protested just as much as Joe’s “elites”.  

I do resent the condescension.  A lot of Americans who support Joe Biden, Americans who usually support Israel (and were horrified on October 7^th), Americans who might even be Jewish, are against what’s happening in Gaza today.  And they are represented by students at Columbia and UCLA (and Wisconsin, Ohio State and even at that conservative bastion, Denison University).  They are expressing the same frustrations many Americans, and even the President of the United States himself, is feeling.  

Carte Blanche

October 7^th did NOT give Israel “carte blanche” to do whatever they wanted to the Palestinians in Gaza.  And Netanyahu’s precarious political position doesn’t either.  President Biden knows it. And he’s doing the best he can to “straddle the fence” of supporting Israel without sanctioning potential genocide.  So while I don’t sanction either violence or vandalism on college campuses, I realize those students (and the “professionals”) are simply acting on what most of us already know.    They, like my contemporaries of the 1960’s, are “prematurely right”.  

Being “correct” doesn’t mean “carte blanche” either.  it’s not okay to single out Jewish students as symbols of Zionism.  Not all Jews are Zionists, and not all Zionists are in favor of subjugation of all Palestinians. And it’s not okay to sanction terrorists.   The students at Columbia and UCLA, Ohio State and Denison, are all capable of making that distinction.

Does the campus unrest signal a return to that dreaded year, 1968?  Should we expect riots in Chicago at the Democratic Convention, the seminal event that got Richard Nixon elected President? I don’t think so.  I do think Biden needs to address both the campus unrest, and the larger question of what to do with Netanyahu.  

It’s not Vietnam.  “My” Bobby Kennedy isn’t running for President about to be assassinated.  Martin Luther King wasn’t shot down this month.  The nation isn‘t rocked by that violence.  And, hard to imagine, Donald Trump isn’t a Richard Nixon.  He’s so much worse.  So 2024 isn’t 1968, it’s different.  And all of that doesn’t make those students with the courage of their convictions wrong.  They’re just “prematurely correct”.