Category: Uncategorized

US Constitution, First Amendment 

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Inalienable Right

It is a building block of personal freedom. The check and balance on government. A unique feature of the American system. All of these terms are used to describe the First Amendment.  There are over 150 nations in the world that guarantee “free speech”.  But there is no other country that does it the “American Way”.  The First Amendment doesn’t grant a freedom. That freedom is “assumed” as part of the “inalienable rights” of the Declaration of Independence. 

Instead the First Amendment places a stricture on the government:  “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech or of the press”.  And, since all of the powers of the government envisioned by the Founding Fathers emanate from the Congress; that means that the US Government in total cannot “abridge”.  

What is speech?  The Founding Fathers saw it as the ability to critique (and criticize) the government.  They believed in a right of “Englishmen” that went all the way back to the Magna Carta in 1215. That right was taken away from them by King George III.  It was a founding cause of the Revolution.  So it made sense that those same Englishmen, now Americans, would restrict the government (like King George) rather than grant a right they knew already existed.

Unitary Executive

We are in a very different era from the Founding Fathers.  In our era, much of American power has devolved to the Presidency.  It’s been a game of “pass the buck”.  Congress is so politically divided that it can hardly fulfill its most basic duties. They can’t  choose a Speaker, or pass a budget, or determine who may or may not enter the United States. But the President is a single power, where only one mind needs to be “made up”.  That single power is now in the saddle, emboldened by the “Unitary Executive” theory in vogue in American conservative circles.

And the concept of government power is very different as well.  Take the Federal Communications Commission, the FCC.  It is an arm of the Executive Branch, essentially granting the President the right to reach out to control the public “airwaves”.  That made sense, back when there was a finite amount of “airwaves” (band width) to use.  Radio and television took up so much, that the “right to use” a particular “channel” in a particular area was rationed.  And, since the government claimed the total width of airwaves, it made sense they would be the one to ration it out.

With rationing came control.  The ability to give or take away a license to operate on a particular airwave, say “channel 2” in Dayton, Ohio, was life or death to a television station. Dayton’s Channel 2 in the early 1970’s was owned by Avco Broadcasting, who operated WLW-D.  My Dad was the station manager, and ultimately responsible for the station keeping their FCC issued license. 

Broadcast License

Dad started an early television talk show that help create a whole new genre of programming.  Phil Donahue took over the late morning show, and interviewed people in the news in a single-guest, hour long format.  Local folks, at that time often stay-at-home Moms, were able to call in and ask questions.  Ultimately the Donahue Show was on 225 stations nationwide, and lasted for almost thirty years, broadcast first from Dayton, then Chicago and finally New York.

In 1970 the Phil Donahue show had radical anti-Vietnam war activist Jerry Rubin on air, and Dad was very concerned.  Jerry Rubin was always and intentionally profane, using it to shock his audience into attention.  Dad knew that Rubin’s profanity could NOT go “over the air”.  His first “F–K” would immediately threaten Avco’s license.  And since President Richard Nixon was the general target of Rubin’s wrath, the FCC would jump on the chance to punish WLW-D for giving him airtime.

Ten Second Delay

It was a “mechanical era” of technical broadcast.  Dad needed a “delay”; time to push the literal “bleep” button to keep Rubin’s profanity off of the air.  And since the broadcast was live, it wasn’t a matter of editing later on.  The bleep had to be as needed, on time.  So the station engineers set up two massive videotape machines, across the room from each other.  The first machine would record the show onto tape. Then the tape was strung across the room to the second machine and would play the tape for broadcast, ten seconds later.  

That gave Dad time to push the literal “bleep” button.  Rubin’s interview went out, and Rubin, true to form, was “bleeped” a lot. Nobody got tangled in the ten-feet of tape. And everyone got what they wanted:  Rubin got his “bully pulpit”, Donahue got the interview, the public got a great show, and Dad got high ratings and managed to keep WLW-D on the air.

Bandwidth

It’s a totally different age today.  Cable and streaming have added amazing amounts of content to entertainment, without using the “public airwaves”.  So the internet isn’t regulated by the FCC in the same way.  We all know this, what comes across our screens (like it or not) is in no way “cleared” for broadcast.

But broadcast over the airwaves stations, still exists.  Two major owners of Broadcast stations are the Nexstar Corporation (265 stations, WCMH here in Columbus) and Sinclair Broadcasting (185 stations, WSYX and WTTE in Columbus), about 40% of the total stations in the US.  Almost all independent stations usually are “affiliated” with a broadcast network, one of the “Big Four”: ABC, CBS, NBC, or Fox.   Other than the network’s “owned and operated” stations, the networks themselves are NOT subject to FCC control.  But all those individual stations are, just like Dad’s station back in 1970.

ABC Did It

So when late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel called out MAGA-world for using conservative influencer Charlie Kirk’s assassination for political gain, the FCC took notice.  And when Nexstar, already in negotiations with the FCC to expand to even more stations nationwide, realized that the Trump appointed Chairman took umbrage to Kimmel’s comedy, the company knew what to do.  Nexstar told it’s ABC affiliated stations NOT to air the Jimmy Kimmel Show.  Sinclair Broadcasting, already known for its strong right-wing bent, followed suit.  

ABC was faced with a choice.  They could continue to air Jimmy Kimmel and face the wrath of the FCC on their own stations, plus all of the other ABC affiliates, or pull him.   They made, what I’m sure to them, is a “logical” business decision.

It’s the same “logic” that caused Paramount (CBS) to cancel “The Colbert Show”.  They needed government permission to merge with Skydance Media, and Colbert is a thorn in Trump’s side.  In both cases, neither the President nor the Federal Government “ordered” the comedians off the air.  But the FCC exercised its “legal” right to license,  and pressured the companies to cancel them.

“Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of the speech or of the press”.  But the President, through his Federal Communications Commission, can threaten the economic well-being of hundreds of broadcast stations.  And he can do it because he didn’t “like” what was said, or how he was characterized, or who made “fun” of him.  If it looks like abridging, walks like abridging, talks like abridging, and acts like abridging, it probably is abridging.

What a childish way to lose our founding freedoms.  

United States Constitution, Art I, Sec 8

“The Congress shall have the power…

• To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
• To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
• To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
• To provide and maintain a navy;
• To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
• To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
• To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;”

United States Constitution, Art II, Sec 2 

• “The President shall be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several states, when called into the actual service of the United States…”

Experience

The Founding Fathers spent a lot of time thinking about war.  After all, war was a part of their life experience.  Not only did they survive the American Revolution, but many fought in the French and Indian War before (part of the Seven Years War, the first world-wide war).  In fact, the first shots of that first world war were fired by a twenty-two year-old American officer in Western Pennsylvania on his first assignment, Lieutenant Colonel George Washington.  And there continued to be conflict on the frontier with the independent nations of Native Americans. 

One of the reasons for writing the Constitution in the first place was to more efficiently defend the new nation.  The Articles of Confederation, the prior “organizing document”, didn’t have a provision for a Navy, and more importantly, the capacity to raise the funds to create one.  And while there was a provision for a National Army, there still wasn’t funding.  So the individual states were ultimately responsible for National defense.  

The Constitution put the responsibility for creating and funding both a National Army and Navy on the United States Congress.  It also gave Congress the power to pay for state militias (the National Guard), that could be nationalized, but generally maintained under state command.  But most importantly, the Constitution of the United States gave  the power to declare war to the Congress, not the executive.

The President

The President is the Commander-in-Chief of all of various forms of military:  Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Space Force, and the National Guards of the several states when Federalized.  The Founding Fathers were clear:  Congress creates, Congress declares, the President executes.  George Washington as President, took personal command of the State Militia to put down an insurrection in Western Pennsylvania, the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794.  He was authorized to do so by Congress in the “Militia Act of 1792”.

There was historic tension between the Congress and the President throughout history.  In the Civil War, Lincoln took the actions he thought necessary, with Congress getting pulled along.  The classic example was the Emancipation Proclamation, what today we would call an Executive Order.  Lincoln only freed slaves in those states still in rebellion, because his authority only extended to those areas in insurrection.  The states that remained in the Union but maintained slavery (Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware and the parts of Louisiana and Tennessee under Union control) were not “in” insurrection, and the Order did not apply to them.

Congress

And while Woodrow Wilson staked his Presidency on the treaty ending World War I, guaranteeing American support for the new League of Nations, the United States Senate refused to ratify it.  The United States never participated in the League, perhaps dooming it to failure, and World War II.

After the Civil War, and World War I, Congress moved to reclaim war powers away from the Presidency.  However, the threat and expanse of World War II caused the President to gain greater powers over the military than ever before.

But the real change in the balance of power between Congress and the President came after World War II.  With the advent of nuclear missiles, that could launch a devastating strike within minutes, the process of declaring war seemed cumbersome and probably irrelevant. Instead, Congress gave the executive long-term “use of force” powers.  The last “declared war” was World War II, but there remains a long list of conflicts, still with Congressional approval:  Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, and Kosovo.  And even more actions were justified after the attacks of 9-11; in Iraq and  Syria, and America’s longest war (two decades) in Afghanistan.

Why War?

The term “war” is used a lot today.  We are “at war” with organized narcotics traffickers, now called “narco-terrorists” in order to “fit” under the use of force provisions passed by Congress after 9-11.  The United States is committing arbitrary actions on the high seas, destroying a second presumed narcotics trafficking boat just the other day.  What Congress might have defined as piracy back in 1788, now is an ongoing US policy.  

We are also “at war” with undocumented migrants, using some of the same reasoning and executive authority that allowed for the internment of Americans of Japanese descent during World War II.  There’s a “war on crime”, so much so, that the National Guard is being Federalized to patrol the streets in Los Angeles, Washington DC, and now Memphis. (Even though the Federalized National Guard cannot, by law, do policing actions such as arrests).  And, after the assassination of conservative figure Charlie Kirk by a disturbed individual, the executive branch is ready to “declare war” (a power they do not have) on the vocal opposition to their actions.  

War Department

“War” allows for the President to exercise the nearly unbridled authority of the Commander-in- Chief.  There are only two checks on that power:  Congress “clawing back” their authority, or the Supreme Court restraining Presidential overreach.  And, if past actions are prologue, don’t expect either to happen very soon.

And one final point:  war by definition is violent.  This week we speak constantly of “dialing back” the violence in American life.  But if the Executive is constantly using the language of war and conflict, it’s difficult to conclude that anything other than more violence will be the outcome. 

America has a long way to go, to get beyond our current sad state.  Using “war” as an excuse for action (or the name for a department of government) won’t help.

Lapsed

I don’t practice religion anymore.  As I tell my Catholic friends, I haven’t been “blessed” with faith.  I think it would be nice to have a firm belief in a God, a purpose, a plan greater than what’s seeable and feelable here in earth.  The ability to ask and receive Godly forgiveness in this life would be amazing.  But, I am not so blessed.  It felt hypocritical, even as a teenager, to sit in a church pew, and recite all of the “correct” prayers, participate in all of the “correct” ceremonies, and sing all of the “uplifting” hymns.  I always figured that, if there was a God, they’d know I was faking it.  I surely did.

But I was raised in the Episcopal Church, and when I return (for weddings and funerals) the warm familiarity of the liturgy takes me back to my youth. It always reminds me of Mom, who had a real faith anchored in Roman Catholicism.  Not only did we attend church on Sunday, but there was often a mid-week “youth group” meeting.  And, back in the early 1960’s, there was even a once-a-week walk from school down to the church for instruction (though, unlike today, there was no fee to participate).  Where we lived in Cincinnati, Clifton; the Episcopal Church was two blocks from the school, and only a block from our house.

And I have studied (and taught) many religions over the years, from variations on Christianity, to the other great religions in the world.  Every time, I gained academic knowledge, but never felt a desire to become a practitioner.  I have not been called to Faith.

Religions 

What did I learn?  That most religions are tolerant, and merciful.  That most religions believe in charitable acts; of an obligation of those who “have” to help those who “have not”.  And that most religions recognize that while “they” think they’re right, others with differing views of faith should be respected.  Muslims call Jews and Christians “people of the book”, acknowledging that they share a common fundamental source. 

So I grew up with a vision of Jesus Christ as merciful and forgiving.  After all, he did wash the feet of his own disciples.  And he “fed the world”, or at least the multitudes, with loaves and fishes.  He even showed compassion for prostitutes AND tax collectors.

Now, to be clear, I don’t believe that the United States is a “Christian” nation.  In fact a reading of American history indicates to me, that the Founding Fathers were intent on keeping religion out of our government.  Sure, Jefferson attributed “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” to a Creator.  But his version of Creator is not the traditional Christian one.  In fact, Jefferson himself envisioned a “wall of separation” between church and state.  

Even here in little Pataskala, we have Christians (of all sorts) and Jews, Muslims and Buddhists, Bahai and Hindus.  Years ago Buddhists bought a local soybean field to build a sanctuary.  The soybeans (sometimes feed corn) are still growing and the priests bless the field every year.  But someday, when the time is “right”, there will be Buddhist sanctuary, to paraphrase The Music Man, “Right here in Pataskala City!!” 

Nationalism

I worry about that.  Many in our Nation are enamored with a form of Christianity that is linked to an almost rabid Nationalism.  They use Christianity as a cudgel to control others, not just their adherents, but everyone else.  “Judge not, lest you be judged” doesn’t seem to be a working tenet of their faith.  Instead, everyone is “judged”; the LGTBQ, the migrants, urban versus suburban and rural. They are judged, convicted, and banished, even without judicial review.

I know we are in a time of great division and polarization.  As an historian, I recognize the echoes of the 1850’s before the Civil War, and the turmoil  of the 1960’s.  That’s bad enough.  That there seems for some to be, a “religious” basis for our current turmoil only makes things worse.   There’s a difference between political views, and religious faith.  We Americans have a long history of debating political views.  But once faith becomes involved, one side believes the other side is “in sin”.  And that changes everything.

Politics no longer is, as Ezra Klein proposed in a recent New York Times opinion, two differing opinions reaching for a common goal of American greatness.  There really isn’t a common goal anymore.  The Christian Nationalist view of America is antithetical to my own view of what our Nation should become.  I guess that puts me, and many Americans, “against” their view of God.  We are the sinners.

How else do we expect their adherents to react?

Awakening

I date my “political awakening” to the spring of 1968.  I was eleven years old and it was the year of assassinations.  Martin Luther King was shot in the beginning of April.  I remember the terrible suddenness of his death. But even more, I remember the frustrated out-pouring of grief that turned into riots in downtown Dayton, Ohio.  Dad ran a television station there, and we lived just south of town in Kettering.  

We sat and watched Dad’s station, the camera crews and reporters braving the violence on the streets to tell us all what was going on. I was worried, for our city, but also for Dad. He spent the night at the station, not far from our home.  I didn’t know what he might have to do.

Bobby

That night in April also cemented my admiration for Senator Robert Kennedy, then running for President.  I was always a “Kennedy man”, but on that night, Bobby landed his campaign plane in Indianapolis, and went, against the advice of the police and advisors, downtown to talk to the assembled mourners.  His speech that night was off the cuff.  In part, this is what he said:

For those of you who are black and are tempted to be filled with hatred and distrust at the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I can only say that I feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling. I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man. But we have to make an effort in the United States, we have to make an effort to understand, to go beyond these rather difficult times.

My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He wrote: “In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.”

What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black.

He not only shared in the pain and frustration of those assembled, but he took that shared emotion and tried to re-direct away from violence, and towards a better country.  I was a “Kennedy man” for sure, from that moment on.

Again

But it only lasted a short, two months.  On June 6^th, one of the last days of school, my radio-alarm clock went off at 7:00 am.  The first words out of the speaker were fateful:  Bobby himself was shot in Los Angeles, soon to die.  At eleven years old, it was difficult to understand such violence.

But it was 1968, and the violence was far from over.  The cities burned in riots during the summer, the anti-Vietnam War movement grew more powerful, and the Democratic Convention in Chicago became known for the “police riots” that tore the Party apart.  Mayor Daley cleared the streets of demonstrators with the full force and violence of his department.  The Democratic Party, and the United States; were splintered, divided, polarized, and violent.  

And Bobby’s speech in Indianapolis became a foundation of my political life.

A Single Bullet

I am now a full-fledged, “card-carrying” Boomer.  For my generation, assassination and violence in politics is no stranger.  The power of a single bullet can alter history; whether it was fired by a “contract killer” like the assassin of Martin Luther King, or a “madman killer” like the assassin of Bobby Kennedy.  

We don’t know what we don’t know about yesterday’s assassination of Charlie Kirk, an incredibly popular young right-wing podcaster and influencer.  He was killed on a Utah college campus.  In our incredibly polarized, social media driven world, the accusations are there:  “They (left-wingers) did it!”  Maybe so, or maybe a calculating madman with a personal grudge, or maybe someone else. 

What we do know is the power of a bullet.  Seldom does a bullet cause the “love and wisdom through the awful grace of God” that Bobby addressed.  Instead, it is just as likely to drive us even farther apart.  It doesn’t help that many of our  hand-held “news sources”, are driven by algorithms designed to heighten the drama.  Most of us, like it or not, saw the actual strike of the bullet, the “Zapruder film” of this generation.   It serves to create even more division. If you don’t think so, check out “X” or “Facebook” or any of the other “news” (not really) sources.

The Divide

Other than his political views, I don’t know much about Charlie Kirk.  I do disagree with almost everything he stood for.  And I do know that his murder will not further my political cause or beliefs.  Creating a martyr to “their cause” never does.  

But, like the 1960’s, the assassination of Kirk, the attempted assassination of Trump, the murders of the Democratic legislators in Minnesota, and the constant drumbeat of school shootings (even yesterday in Evergreen, Colorado); tell us one thing.  Our Nation is so divided, so intensely partisan and hateful, that those on the fringes are likely to “fall off”, and decide they can use that ultimate power to make single-handed change:  the bullet.    

And that division is one we all have some responsibility for.  

Missions

They both wear uniforms.  They both carry guns.  And, they both hold a special and usually honored place in American life.  The local police and the National Guard are a lot alike, but they are NOT the same.  And to quote Robert Frost, “…that makes all the difference.”

It’s all about missions.  Proctologists and Orthopedic surgeons are both doctors.  They’re both trained in medicine.  But I wouldn’t want a Proctologist to repair my shoulder, or an Orthopedic running my next colonoscopy.  Police are trained to prevent and arrest people committing crimes.  As part of their specialized education, they learn the communities where they work.  Policing is more than just “busts”, it’s also listening to the community.  That communication enables better law-enforcement.

Here in Pataskala, my elderly backyard neighbor had a “beef” with me. He didn’t feel like telling me the problem, so instead he called the police.  Now, the police officer could have told him that his concern (some grass clippings encroaching on his back property line) wasn’t a police matter.  But the officer didn’t.  Instead, he served as a messenger, trying to solve a community problem at the lowest level.  I took care of the clippings, (a phone call or a simple knock on the door would solve it).  And, of course, I was annoyed that the police were involved.  But I very much appreciate that the officer solved the issue.

That’s good policing, what you hope for by those with a badge. 

A Well-Regulated Militia

And it’s not anywhere near the job of the National Guard.  The National Guard is the real-life enactment of the Constitutional “state militia”, a localized defense force.  It made perfect sense in the era when the Federal Army was small, far away, and months from “coming to the rescue”.  When there was a hostile attack at the edge of the frontier, it was the militia, now termed the National Guard, who could respond with alacrity.

The National Guard is the state defense force.  They are trained in the art of warfare.  But they have become more than that.  They are also the emergency force sent in after a widespread disaster.  The Guard organizes relief efforts when the tornadoes sweep through, and does search and rescues after the floods.  

And the Guard also has a role in civil unrest.  Those of us who remember the Vietnam War era, remember the ultimate threat against college campus protest:  calling in the National Guard.   

That pitted two different groups of young people against each other:  college students protesting and folks the same age (some also in college) who chose to go into the Guard.  And we saw the fallacy of using troops untrained in crowd control on a college campus.  Kent State, an Ohio campus of 20,000 students, became the rallying cry for protest, as ten students were shot with four killed by the Guard during a protest.  Neil Young called it out:  “Four Dead in Ohio”. 

The National Guard does not have a badge. They are NOT trained in policing.  They are NOT a substitute for effective police work.  While both the Guard and Police wear uniforms, and carry guns, they are not the same.

Urban Crime

There are unacceptable levels of crime in America’s big cities.  This was particularly true right after the Covid era, when crime, like inflation, rose to record levels.  But most cities responded to the crisis, and crime rates (even in Chicago) are close to pre-pandemic levels.  They have found some answers:  more policing in communities, more cops on a “beat” that they come to know, more involvement with the community in a non-law enforcement role.  All of that costs money, and the Federal government, up until January, was helping to fund those increases.

But with the second Trump Administration, much of that police support was cut.  And while crime rates continued to go down, President Trump is using crime as his “niche” issue.  There’s a political reality there:  big cities are almost invariably run by Democrats, and Trump’s base of support is Republican, white and suburban or rural.  Trump is using the fear of the big city as a cudgel to beat Democrats, cutting funding then decrying their still improving crime statistics.

The Smell of Deportations

Then there’s the whole racial issue. Most of the victims of crime in big cities are minorities. But when the National Guard arrived in Washington, DC, they were ordered to patrol the tourist areas, not where minorities live, and where the most serious crimes are committed. The Guard is for “show” there, not to reduce real crime. But, to the MAGA base, Trump sent in The Guard to get control of “them”; the same black and brown people he threatens to imprison through ICE.

Trump wants to prove that HE can do something that the local governments cannot.  So he’s declares a faux emergency to Federalize the state National Guards.  Once they are under Federal command, he can direct them where ever he chooses.  Last week, he declared “war” on Chicago, even displaying himself as a character from the war movie of the 1980’s Apocalypse Now.  Robert Duvall’s line in the movie is, “I love the smell of napalm in the morning.”  Trump altered it to, “I love the smell of deportations in the morning.”  It conflates his aggressive and illegal roundup and deportations of undocumented migrants with crime.  Except, of course, that conflation isn’t true.  

All Show

So it was all for show, when the armored vehicles rolled through the streets of our Nation’s Capital, as if an occupying army arrived.  It had.  But the Guard are not police.  They ended up picking up litter, and painting fences, and laying down mulch, all at the cost to the Nation of a million dollars a day.

This week he plans on doing it again.  Like California, he will declare a fake “emergency” in Illinois, Federalize the Illinois National Guard, and send them into the streets of Chicago.  It’s a great spectacle, and his supporters will feel more secure if they venture to the Navy Pier or the Miracle Mile.  Other “red” states wil volunteer their Guard to join in (Ohio Guardsmen are still in Washington today).  But the reality is:  the Guard doesn’t fight crime.  And if they try to do so, with loaded weapons of war, it’s likely to become the same disaster that occurred at Kent State.

Want to spend millions of dollars to fight crime? Authorize more police on the streets, pay for more foot patrols in the high-crime neighborhoods that need them, develop alternatives to “gang life” for young people. None of that is achieved by the performance of militarizing the streets of America. That’s just for intimidating political opponents, not the criminals.

Teaching

I spent most of my career teaching social studies.  As I stood in front of a classroom, explaining Gettysburg or World War I (two of my favorite lesson plans), I didn’t expect my students would remember all the details.  While I would (ask my wife) get incredibly detailed about Confederate movements around and up Little Round Top, or vividly create a picture of life in the trenches of Northern France, I was really trying to teach my students something else.  

I wanted them to “feel” the incredible courage of Americans, willing to risk everything for a cause they believed in.  I tried to make them “live” in that moment with a nineteen year-old from Texas, or Maine, or Ohio, as they faced the existential threat of death.  My hope was they would understand that being an American (even an American fighting against the Union) was a cause worth fighting for, and even dying for.  

If there was any “indoctrination” going on, it was that even with all of its flaws, the concept of the American experiment was and is, worth it. It was so important, as the Founding Fathers so eloquently put it, that: “(W)ith a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor” (Declaration of Independence).

Benjamin Franklin put it succinctly:  “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”  It was true outside Independence Hall in 1776, and it is still true today. 

More Perfect

I based my goals for the class on this “hanging together”; and one other phrase, this by James Madison.  “We the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union…” (Preamble, US Constitution).  It’s that odd phrasing, “more perfect”.  We’d spend just a little time dealing with the grammatical issue created by “more perfect”.  Clearly if something is perfect, there is no more “perfecting”, nor making it “perfect-er”.  But it wasn’t a Madisonian grammar error, it was an intentional understanding.  

America was not perfect.  It was a Nation with enslavement and economic inequity, and huge regional diversity.  But instead of saying the negative, a “flawed” America (is that “woke”?), Madison instead recognized that the Constitutional Republic was a form of government so much better, that it simply need be allowed to “grow”.  The growth is the “more perfecting”, and we could see it in the Constitution itself.  The inclusion of an Amending process (Article V) allowed the Constitution to “grow”, from the Bill of Rights on.

The American experiment in democracy was literally based in change, in becoming “more perfect”.  {This is exact opposite of the legal argument of the Supreme Court “Originalists”.  Their opinion is that the Constitution was set in stone, like a tablet down from Mount Sinai.  Their idea is that anything other than amending, leaves the Constitution static and unchanged.  That doesn’t fit with Madison’s model at all}.

Learning Outcome

My goal for my students was to see America as a place where regardless of our ethnic, regional, racial, religious, gender or political differences; we could all still “hang together”. And that, together, even in a Nation full of flaws, we could continue the process of making it, and our lives, “more perfect”.  That was a goal worth living for, and if need be, dying for; despite the imperfections that America has.  And that was what teaching social studies in America was all about.

Today, all of those “vaunted ideals” are being erased.  The current America is becoming, in my view, “less perfect” at an alarming rate.  Patrick Henry in his famous “Liberty or Death” speech said:  “…The next gale that sweeps from the North will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms.” Today, you might say the next news update “shall bring to our ears” the sound of American democracy failing, on piece at a time.

Prudence

It would be easy to “go small”.  The “prudent” move might be to hide.  The shield of white, suburban America, of old age, of stable pension and mortgage; all seductively call out; “Lay low. Let the gale pass by”.  But what about those young Americans who drove into a hail of minié balls at Gettysburg with nothing but the bayonets on their rifles?   What about the heroes who held the trenches at Second Battle of the Marne?  What about my parents, who placed their lives on the line to stop Fascism in World War II?  They stood up to the tempest, regardless of the risk.  Those “ordinary” heroes (how can a hero be ordinary?) might not have articulated the Founding Fathers’ reasoning, but they were defending the American experiment.  

If not us, who will stand up for Jefferson’s and Franklin’s and Madison’s ideals?

And, what do I owe those thousands of students who watched the battle lines of Gettysburg move across the chalk-board, or imagined the stench of mud, feces and human rot in the trenches of my class?

American Answer

It must be more than being small; more than prudence in my actions.  There are many ways to stand for “more perfect” today, but hiding is not one of them.  So I too must call out a government that is acting Un-American, from secret police round-ups to blowing up ships on the high seas.  The Founding Fathers would have understood the need to leave their homes and act, as soldiers or legislators or statesmen, or even as authors.  Thomas Paine, the “conscience of the American revolution”, said it.  

“Whatever is my right as a man is also the right of another; and it becomes my duty to guarantee as well as to possess. Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigues of supporting it.”

He also wrote:

“THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.” 

It is no time to be a summer soldier or a sunshine patriot.  Our souls are being tried, but the clear duty to our Nation remains.  We must stand by it now:  for our families and our ancestors, and for students past and future.  

Because those future students will ask, in a freer America; “what did you do?”  

We must provide the answer to that question; one that makes America more perfect again.

Political Process

OK, I know what a lot of you already think:  all politics are dumb, and ruin the lives of everyone it touches. From local elections here in Licking County, to the “Raw Milk” folks in the state legislature, to the daily shenanigans in Washington, DC: it’s hard to argue that much “good” is coming from politics.  

So, I’m not trying to describe the entire political world, just one particular political move by the Trump administration.  It’s dumb. And that’s unusual; like them, or NOT, the folks around Trump are usually pretty good at the “game” of give and take.  But they are blowing this one.  From a “political process” side, they need to be called out.

The Survivors

There was a dramatic media “conference” on the steps of the Capitol Wednesday morning.  Some of the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse openly called for the release of all of the information the government has about him, THE EPSTEIN FILES.  They spoke in compelling terms: they were tragically damaged as young adolescents for the adult sexual pleasures of Epstein, Maxwell and their friends.  The survivors spoke with direct knowledge about what was done to them and who did it. And now, more than twenty years later, they have not recovered.  Some of those victims never did recover:  suicide is a constant concern.

Games are being played:  the Department of Justice released over 30,000 pages of “information” to the House Oversight Committee.  But, almost all of those pages already were available to the public, and the remainder are so highly redacted as to be useless.  Many thousands of pages remain under-wraps.  The survivors are calling on the Administration, and particularly on Donald Trump, to release them all.

The Trump “conspiracy”

And in response, Trump called them a “Democrat conspiracy”, and the demands like “information about the Kennedy assassination”.  He might even have arranged for an Air Force flyover to disrupt their conference.  So let’s breakdown what actually is going on here.  

THE EPSTEIN FILES were a major campaign point FOR Trump.  His folks demanded, and he agreed, that ALL the files be released as soon as he got elected. I don’t think it was a pivotal issue: no one voter for Trump and full FILE release, instead of Harris. But it was one that drove his already convinced voters to the polls, helping his turnout.  The EPSTEIN FILES were a major part of the whole “Deep State” Government concept, the “swamp” that Trump promised to drain.

While swamp mitigation wasn’t really on the Trump agenda, what his followers hoped for was at least a list of mostly Democratic names.  Some were already floated: Bill Clinton, Bill Richardson, George Mitchell, Alan Dershowitz, Prince Andrew of the United Kingdom, and of course Columbus’s own Lex Wexner, of Limited Brands.  Trump essentially threatened to “out” them all as sexual predators, by revealing the EPSTEIN FILES.

Frankly, most Democrats think the whole “swamp” thing was stupid (still do).  And most of us assumed that Clinton probably was involved. It fits his well-known proclivities.  So release the EPSTEIN FILES or not, it wasn’t really a big deal for Democrats.

But it sure was for Trump’s MAGA disciples.

The FILES Go On 

So we’ve been dealing with the EPSTEIN FILES for a couple of months. Here’s two essays I wrote about the subject already: It’s Not the Crime, It’s the Coverup, and  Tale of Two Deals.  But, somehow, the Trump Administration has put itself on the side of the coverup, when they ran for office on the side of “transparency”.  It just seems like a politically stupid place to be.  

Trump, and a sympathetic Melania should be meeting with the survivors.  Trump should be pressing the Congress to reveal all the EPSTEIN FILES. He should order Attorney General Pam Bondi to put them all online, with some redactions to protect “the innocent”.  But instead, The President is telling Republican Congressmen that they will be “hostile to the Administration” if they vote for making all the EPSTEIN FILES transparent.

It’s just a dumb political move.  He’s on the wrong side of HIS OWN VOTERS.  And while Trump (probably) won’t run for the Presidency again, he still needs the MAGA-faithful to exert his personal influence over the rest of the MAGA-Republican office-holders.  Why are Republicans Congressmen so afraid of Trump?  Because of his power and sway over the Republican primary voters.

All of which leads to the question:  why?  Why the reversal, why the sudden turn-around, why blame the Democrats for the issue Trump himself started?  For all the political “downsides” to his action, there seems to be only one, singular, solitary, answer.

Trump himself must have so much to hide, that he’s taking the heat and this damage to his own base, rather than have it revealed. 

 What other reason could there be?????

Pasteur

We know the great French scientist of the 19^th Century, Louis Pasteur, as one of the fathers of “germ theory”.   He created the rabies vaccine, preventing certain death from the bites of rabid animals.  And, he was a practical man.  He developed vaccinations for not just rabies, but also anthrax and cholera.  

When I was a child, I read the “Landmark Book” of Louis Pasteur. He occasionally bent the rules of “science”.  It was only after brief experimentation (fifty dogs) that Pasteur applied his rabies vaccination to a human. He used it on nine-year old Joseph Meister, badly mauled by a rabid dog.  In fact, Pasteur didn’t have a medical license, and so he supervised the process as the actual injections were made by a doctor.  

While it was really a no-lose situation – if the boy developed rabies it would surely kill him – it certainly wasn’t up to scientific standards even then.  But the boy survived, and rabies vaccinations today are improved from the original, incredibly painful, seventeen shot series  (one per day) in the stomach.  It’s now  four or five shots in the arm, similar in pain to tetanus shots.

Germ Theory

Pasteur applied his germ theory to prevention of disease.  So, he invented the process named after him, pasteurization.  It raised the temperature of a product, such as milk (and since he was French, wine of course) to kill bacteria.  This allowed for not only safer products, but also increased the shelf life.  Diseases such as tuberculosis, brucellosis, diphtheria, scarlet fever, and Q fever were prevented, as well as food poisoning from salmonella, listeria,  and Escherichia coli (Michigan).  That was in the 1860’s.

So, unless you grew up on a dairy farm and took a “straight shot” after milking,  all the milk we consume is pasteurized.   And looking at the disease list above, it’s a good thing.

Liberty

This week, some Republicans in the Ohio State Legislature are proposing to legalize raw milk production for human consumption.  One of the co-sponsors of the legislation, Kellie Deeter of Norwalk, says the quiet part out-loud:

“I’m personally not a raw milk advocate; I’m a liberty advocate,” Deeter said. “As long as people understand what they’re consuming,” (Newark Advocate).

And that’s a problem.  “In Florida, 21 people — including six children younger than 10 — have suffered infections since January after drinking raw milk from a dairy farm.”(Newark Advocate).

It’s the new MAGA-Republican “mantra”; freedom over science.  So what if non-pasteurized milk can cause all of the diseases.   It’s all about the “liberty” to make dangerous choices for themselves, their children and even unborn children.

Raw, unpasteurized milk has a cult-like following in some health food circles.  It’s one of the recommendations from Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert Kennedy Jr as part of his “MAHA” (Make America Healthy Again) program. Raw milk advocates even have a slick website put together, the Raw Milk Institute, extolling the virtues of raw milk, and displaying pictures of cute children pouring glasses of it. They claim it’s “just like human breast milk”.  But it’s not.

Science

Science proves it.  Pasteur fixed it, 165 years ago.  But today, science doesn’t “count” anymore.  After all, there’s a website, and there’s folks with letters after their names (MD, DVM, PhD, MS) that say raw milk’s great!! So who needs to listen to science?  Like pharmaceuticals, they claim it’s “Big Dairy” that’s keeping the “wonder” of raw milk from American consumers; forcing us to drink cheap, unsanitary, long-shelf-life “CAFO” milk (CAFO – Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, a “dirty word” for big dairy farms). 

It’s the so-called mystery of our time, the “specter” of big business, keeping health away from us regular folks in order to sustain their profits And while there may be a kernel of truth in that, there’s also a reality:  a product that has known dangers shouldn’t be marketed as a “wonder food”.  Remember, cigarettes in the 1930’s were “physician tested and approved!” (Healio).  Even more, good public health should do whatever it can to mitigate risks.  That’s not just common sense, but financially sound.  Treating folks who get sick costs all of us in one way or another.  If public health can prevent those expenses, it makes all health care a little bit cheaper.

What we shouldn’t do is allow already known dangers to be legal in the name of “FREEDOM”.

Childhood Vaccination

It’s an underlying theme of America today:  “freedom” versus “the public good”.  The most obvious example is in our ongoing public health crisis about gun death.  One side correctly points out the Second Amendment. It states:  “…the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”  They want to end the conversation right there.  (Of course, there’s the “magic …”, the horizontal ellipsis, implying that the amendment said more.  And it does. “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…”, implies that regulation and militia somehow temper “the right of the people”.)  

But this is not an argument about guns today.  It’s about an even more important public health issue, childhood vaccination.

Iron Lung

When I was a kid, back in the “dark old days” of the 1950’s and 60’s, we all ran the gauntlet of childhood diseases.  I had the mumps, measles, and scarlet fever.  Somehow I missed chicken pox, but that caught up with me in my early thirties.  There were no vaccines for those diseases then, and for most kids, it was a blip in a normal life.  But for some it was life altering, even life ending.  We all read about Helen Keller, blinded and deafened by childhood disease.  So while we “knew” we were likely to get sick, we (and our parents) could only hope we would be okay.

The great threat to us was polio, the “summer-time” disease. Some recovered from it, some were paralyzed or placed in “iron lungs”, and some died.  Our family’s luck was right down the street from our home in Cincinnati. Albert Sabin, who developed the oral vaccine, lived a couple of blocks away.  So while some of my sisters friends risked polio just a few years earlier, by the time I was at risk, I simply had to drink a cherry syrup, and be protected.

Eradication

And, since we travelled back to England to visit Mom’s family, we were also required to get smallpox vaccinations.  I still have the dime-sized scar on my left arm, the mark of “protection”.  Smallpox vaccinations were so successful that the disease was eradicated worldwide in 1980.   The scrouge of mankind for centuries, killing and scarring hundreds of millions without regard to status or financial standing, was wiped out, and no longer a risk.

Smallpox spread from one human to another.  It took a worldwide program of vaccination to disrupt the cycle of transmission. Once everyone was vaccinated (literally everyone) then there were no “transmitters” left, and the disease ended.

Weighing the Risks

It might sound hyperbolic, but getting a smallpox vaccination wasn’t just protecting yourself, it was protecting the entire human race.  And it worked so well, that kids today don’t even know what the “scar” looks like, or what it was for.

Today smallpox is “just” history.  And my generations gauntlet; measles, chicken pox, mumps, scarlet fever, rubella, whooping cough and the rest, are generally avoidable.  There are vaccines that can provide wide protection from all of those, and more.  In being vaccinated, children get personally protected. But they also protect other children whose conditions do not allow them to receive the medications.   If no one in a class gets measles, then, no one in the class risks measles.

The Public Good

There are risks in any medical procedure.  And it’s easy today for parents to get “scared away” from vaccination.  In our online world, it takes only a few keystrokes to find horror stories of measles (actually MMR) vaccine reaction.  Oddly, it difficult to find a reputable “scientific” site warning of those reactions. Instead, it’s someone’s blog, or opinion on Reddit, or some other personal account. Oh, and the law firms who will take your case of “for free” to sue if there is a vaccine reaction. (Free really means contingency fee based on collecting a settlement).

What does the “public good” require?  It requires that many assume the tiny risk of vaccine reaction, in order to protect all from the much greater risks of the diseases themselves.   It is the public duty, that our internet “informed” society is struggling to uphold.  And, it doesn’t help that the worm-damaged brain of the Secretary of Health and Human Services feeds the disinformation.

It took a vaccine to get our Nation back to work from the Covid pandemic.  That vaccination, and the, infamous “mask mandates”, helped us avoid the worst of Covid. In fact, it’s estimated that if everyone had followed the mandates, instead of taking “political stands” against them, another 220,000 Americans would have survived (NIH).  Their position was based on “Freedom”, but without regard for the public good.

To put it bluntly, some Americans were not only foolish, but selfish.  And they are now the ones running our public health systems today.  

America’s Problem

I resisted writing this essay.   With all of the craziness going on in American politics, for the Nation to actually come to grips with a “real” problem seems hopeless.  But the absolutely irony of what happened in Minneapolis this week is too great to ignore.

This is a far too familiar story, one unique to American life.  Children massed together, in school, at a church service.  A young, white person determines they are good “targets” for venting rage for whatever reason.   Shots fired:  children dead.

We struggle with the unfathomable grief of the parents and friends of the dead children.  We marvel at the stories:  the ten year-old whose best friend jumped on top of him to “take the hit”.  The fourteen year-old who marshaled his friends to safety under the pews.  The unlikely heroes who saved lives out of the strongest bond; the childhood duty of friendship.

Then, just like every other time for over a quarter of a century; we wring our hands, send out heartfelt thoughts and prayers, and go on about our lives.  This is an accepted part of our society, one that our Nation must condone.  How can that be?

Acceptance

Sure, you’re saying “It’s not accepted!  How dare I suggest such a thing?”  But if mass killing is not accepted, why aren’t we doing something about it?  Drunk driving, something that used to be “accepted” to the point that officers gave the offenders a ride home, now is seen as a heinous offense.  Need an example:  remember the Mayor of Columbus, Ohio, picked up “inspecting the city”?  That attitude changed, because a single group, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, made the loss of their loved ones to “accidents” unacceptable. Our national perception of the drunk behind the wheel went from a friendly ride, to opprobrium and jail.  

Marijuana use was “unacceptable”.  We arrested, jailed, and condemned the use of the drug for decades, ruining the users lives: “Reefer Madness”.  But now, twenty-four states have completely legalized its use, including here in Ohio.  What was a covert purchase in the shadows, now is a walk into an airy shop with different varieties of dope displayed on the shelves.  We changed our national perception of getting “high”.

And all of those “woke” things that MAGA-world rails against:  LGBTQ and DEI and the rest, were discriminated against and persecuted for generations.  In this same quarter century, we recognized that a free society should stop judging individual differences.  That’s up for question right now, as the current crowd tries to roll back those hard-won freedoms.  But, either way, we changed our perception of what individuals “can” be.

So, we can change.

Our Rights

The ultimate irony:  America sends its “Thoughts and Prayers” to those who were attacked while praying.  And when some made the suggestion that prayer wasn’t enough, the right wing media tried to make that the story:  “Minnesota bishop fires back after Mayor Frey knocks prayer…” (Fox News).  Of course, that’s just one more excuse, along with, “it’s too soon”, “we need to mourn the dead”, and “we HAVE OUR RIGHTS!!!”.

America has always been about balancing rights.  Justice Holmes made the point about the First Amendment; “The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic” (Supreme Justia).  Justice Goldberg declared, “…for, while the Constitution protects against invasions of individual rights, it is not a suicide pact” (Supreme Justia).  So where does my “right” to own a high powered, multi-shot rifle get “tempered” by the blood of  8-year-old Fletcher Merkel and 10-year-old Harper Moyski, killed in prayer?

Oh, I know, this is a two-sided conversation.  Of course the shooter was mentally deranged.  This is the definition of derangement:  shooting through the stain-glassed window of a Catholic Church at children.  How we handle mental illness is one side of the “acceptance” argument.  Because it’s easier to get “physical ailments”, from broken bones to cancerous organs, diagnosed and treated, then it is to access mental health care.  That is part of the problem.

Their Blood

But the other part is simpler:  those guns are designed to kill humans.  Somehow, in our national psyche, they have become synonymous with “FREEDOM”, wrapped up with some Jeffersonian quote:  “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants” (Monticello.org).  These guns aren’t for hunting, or protection; they are symbolic of FREEDOM.

So those kids in Minneapolis, were they patriots or tyrants?  Because they paid the price of the so-called “liberty” for us to own the weapons.  Their blood watered “the tree” of gun FREEDOM.  And since we won’t do anything about either side of the “coin”, I guess we then must accept and condone the outrage.  We’ve done it over and over and over and over again.  When will it be enough?  

Essays on Mass Shootings

• Guns and Sadness    10/3/17
• A Teacher with a Gun   2/23/18
• Don’t Change the Subject    3/25/18
• Again    4/15/18
• Staying Small    5/3/19
• Saving Lives Is Not Politics   8/4/19
• The Pain Becomes too Great 8/5/19
• Who’s Your Daddy    8/21/19
• A Good Guy With a Gun   9/1/19
• Rights and Guns  5/17/20
• Pittsburgh  6/17/20
• Our Choice   12/1/21
• Toxic Mix    5/16/22
• Apple Pie    5/25/22
• Prairie Dogs   6/9/22
• The Will to Do It   7/6/22
• Hanging Together  8/12/22
• Swatted    9/23/22
• They Aren’t Pro-Life   9/23/22
• Motive, Means, Opportunity 1/25/23
• Accepted Losses  2/14/23
• German Rights   3/28/23
• Fear Itself   3/30/23
• The Gravel Pit    4/16/23
• Butcher’s Bill     5/8/23
• Right to Live        10/26/23
• On the List      9/5/24

Interstate Driving

Reverend Al Sharpton said it all on MSNBC this morning:   “They’re worried about the logo, when there’s nothing healthy on the menu”.  Yesterday I wrote about the month of August, “silly season” in the media world.  There’s not much silly in our current news, but here’s one.  It’s about a restaurant chain called “Cracker Barrel”.

Cracker Barrel found a niche in American life.  They were originally an Interstate stop, a restaurant that you’d pull off on a long trip, and depend on the menu and food quality.  And it worked. Their menu is based on what would have been served on Walton’s Mountain. (Remember the long-running TV show, the Walton’s, with John-Boy and Jim-Bob and the rest of the clan?)  Cracker Barrel décor is straight out of post-Depression America:  washboards and long timber saws, old metal signs advertising  tooth powder and Brylcreem, RC Cola and Goody’s Headache powder.

One proviso:  if you’re the driver, you need to be careful at Cracker Barrel.  The food is heavy on carbs; biscuits and gravy, fried chicken and mashed potatoes, country-fried steak and beans.  You might went to hold back a little bit, or find yourself yawning  fifteen miles down the road.  

Local Breakfast

And for locals who go to Cracker Barrel, well, I used to say that Jenn and I lowered the average age whenever we went.  Maybe, at sixty-eight about to be sixty-nine, I don’t do much lowering anymore, but Jenn still does!!!  It’s the Bob Evans crowd, and like that more local chain, both serve a mean breakfast, all day long.  At Bob Evans it’s called the “Homestead”, two eggs, bacon, ham, or sausage, biscuits and gravy, hash browns.  It takes two plates.  The similar meal at Cracker Barrel is called the “Old Timer’s”.  I’ve got both memorized.   If breakfast is your favorite meal, it’s the bomb. 

The final Cracker Barrel touch is the “old country store” in the lobby, and the rocking chairs on the front  porch.  That all works too. You can often find the elderly watching the world go by in the rockers as their biscuits settle.  And if you are looking for brand new versions of old LP records – why it’s at the Cracker Barrel.  And not just Johnny Cash and Loretta Lynn, I found Jimi Hendrix’s “Are You Experienced”, a brand new press, as well.

The Sign

So what’s the news?  Well, Cracker Barrel’s original logo was the words “Cracker Barrel” in what looked like a pumpkin outline, beside a barrel.  And sitting by the barrel was an old guy in a straight-backed chair.  It was like if you came down from Walton’s Mountain to town for supplies.  The problem is the logo’s complicated: from afar, coming down the interstate with only seconds to decide whether to exit or not, you could read the words but the rest of the sign was too hard to decipher.

Last week, Cracker Barrel “corporate” decided to simplify things.  They announced they were going with just the words, and cutting out the old guy, the chair, and the barrel.  And MAGA world went nuts.

Why would corporate mess with what a pretty good thing?  It’s simple:  I made a  “Walton’s” reference at the beginning of this essay.  “The Walton’s” went off the air in 1981.  That’s forty-four years ago.  While the show went into syndication and reruns, you have to be in your fifties to even, maybe, have a memory of the original.  There’s a reason why I probably equal the average age in the restaurant. Management was looking to appeal to a younger generation.

But, MAGA-world saw the removal of the old guy and the barrel as, somehow, “WOKE”.  And WOKE, along with the “secret” initials “DEI”, are the worst possible insults.  Say that the hash browns are soggy, demand that the country-fried steak be more than hamburger, inquire what really is in the sawmill gravy:  but don’t call Cracker Barrel “WOKE”.  Even if the MAGA-world doesn’t really know what “Goody’s Headache Powder” or “RC Cola” was, they demanded the corporate Cracker Barrel rescind the changes.

Dying Off

And they did.  The wrath of MAGA-world is more than their restaurant chain can bear.  So the old guy is back, in the chair, beside the cracker barrel; telling a visual story far too complicated to understand.  And the corporate problem remains:  how to compete with the “cooler” restaurants down the road, from BW’s (wings) to Scramblers (breakfast).   The appeal of Cracker Barrel may still be strong, but their demographic is doing the absolute worst thing for their business – they’re dying.

And, as far as Reverend Al and MSNBC are concerned, they are getting their own “make-over” soon.  Comcast, decided to break off their cable business from their broadcast business.  So NBC remains with Comcast, but MSNBC (and CNBC) will now be in a company called Versant.  For the news side, the “NBC” has to go.  Soon, MSNBC will become MSNOW.  Even the MS (which was an original cooperation between Microsoft and NBC) will be rebranded as “My Source” – for “news, opinion, and the world”.  

But MSNBC is WOKE anyway. So other than a few of us “old” NBC-news fans, who remember Chet and David, John, Tom, Brian and Lester; no one else will care.

Little Dictator

Newspaper’s used to call it the “silly season”.  It’s August:  folks are on vacation, or finishing up Little League season, or getting ready to go back to school.  Congress is on recess (no, they don’t have swings or a giant slide).  The weather is hot, and humid; and as George Gershwin put it, “…the living is easy”.  

It used to be a time when odd stories about UFO’s, or crazy Amish mothers who try to kill their families, or lost French Bulldogs wandering the countryside led the headlines.  But this is the “Age of Trump”, and there’s no “oxygen” left in the room for Amish mothers or “Frenchies” (those are true, sad stories, by the way).  Instead, day after day, the President of the United States puts on his own “show”.  And he fills all the air time; all the time.

David Ignatius, a highly respected foreign affairs columnist for the Washington Post, made the point, after yesterday’s edition of the “Trump Show”.  Trump talked about everything.  He’s sending the National Guard into an unwilling Chicago. He’s criminalized US flag burning. And, Trump thinks he stopped “seven” wars in the last six months (it was six, maybe five, and if you ask the nations involved, maybe none).  Then, Trump hinted of a future visit to North Korea. As Ignatius said, “tune in again tomorrow to see Donald Trump with his friend Kim Jong Un!!”.  It’s not The Apprentice, it’s more like a modernized Little Dictator.  (Oh, yes, he did talk about becoming a dictator as well). 

Sitting on the Dock

It’s overwhelming, and it leaves little time for any other political news in the world. To keep the pressure on, last night Trump claimed to fire a Federal Reserve Governor, one of the board members who helps regulate the economy.  Because he “tweeted it” on Truth Social, why then it must be true, (even if he can’t).  Oh, and there was an executive order to banning cashless bail, another “law” the President doesn’t have the power to enforce.  But it makes a good headline.

It’s a tsunami of information, like drinking from a fire hose.  It’s a beer-boiled brats overflow of junk on a hot stove. And it’s hard to keep track of what happened, what’s going on, what’s real, and what’s coming up next.  We need summer time, “the living is easy”; some  “yacht rock” Christopher Cross Sailing, and a seat on the dock with feet dangling.  Instead we get this.

It’s not a coincidence, or a “happenstance”, that this is all happening right now.  Congress is really on recess, and so is the Supreme Court (and many other Federal judges).  There’s actually no one on “duty” to counter all of the executive action by Trump, clearly orchestrated by the person in the pale blue suit,  the “right hand man” of the President, Stephen Miller.  So, while Chris Cross croons in the background (you should have clicked the link!!), let’s look at what’s really important.

Democratic Cities

The President’s attempt to militarize law enforcement is more than scary.  We know that the National Guard in first Los Angeles, and now Washington, aren’t doing more than “appearing”.  Sure, there are armored vehicles outside of Union Station, and troops wandering Dupont Circle.  But they look more like sailors on shore leave than “police”, and don’t have the legal authority to take action anyway. 

So what are they doing?  The  armed forces on the streets of American cities, even if they can’t do much, is the image that the Trump team wants.  Those “crime-ridden cities”, run by not just Democrats, but invariably Black Democrats, “are out of control”, they say.  Except, they aren’t.  But the presence of Federalized troops in US cities is MAGA’s way of saying, “There will be no ‘Blue Bubbles’ of safety.   We, MAGA, will go anywhere, and do anything (ICE) to achieve our goal.”

Tiananmen Square

If the Democratic state governors and mayors won’t kowtow to Trump, then he will attempt to Federalize their cities.  It’s all highly extra-legal.  In any normal time, Federal judges up through the Supreme Court would stop this on a dime.  But, this is the age of Trump, and, while we can be sure there will be District Judges who will stand up, we cannot depend on the Supreme Court.  Maybe they will, eventually, but it might be two or three years down the road.  The damage will be done.

Maybe it’s time to pull a Tiananmen Square, and lay down in front of a military column moving into Chicago, or Baltimore, or some other city in a Democratic state with a Black mayor.  Direct action seems “right”, but it also is exactly what Mr. Miller wants.  To prove MAGA “manhood”, he’d order the column to roll right over the bodies, just like China in 1989.   

Or maybe it’s time for Governors to refuse nationalization of their Guards, like Wes Moore plans to do in Maryland.  And if Stephen Miller tries to use “Red State” Guards to enforce MAGA rule?  

Gee, what’s the definition of a Civil War??

One of the more forgotten aspects of Second World War history is the internment of foreign nationals and American citizens within the Lone Star State. These internment camps were located in five places: Crystal City, Seagoville, Kenedy, Dodd Field, and Fort Bliss. Through four Japanese American Confinement Sites Program (JACS) grants between 2009 and 2015 the Texas Historical Commission (THC) has worked to preserve the history of all five internment camps  (NPS.Gov).

Pearl Harbor

December 7^th, 1941, was, “…a day that shall live in infamy”.   A Japanese air assault caught the American forces at Pearl Harbor completely by surprise.  Five battleships, the pride of the US Navy, were sunk or severely damaged.  The USS Arizona went down in a huge explosion, with 1177 officers and crew killed.  The USS Oklahoma capsized, with 429 killed. And the USS California, Nevada, and West Virginia, damaged and sunk, were later re-floated to play a part in the Second World War.   Three other Battleships were also damaged.

The destruction of the US Pacific Fleet went far beyond the loss of the Battleships.  Eleven other ships were damaged, 348 aircraft destroyed or damaged, and 2,403 killed in the attack.  The one “saving grace” for Americans;  three aircraft carriers were out at sea at the time. 

Up until the moment of the attack, America was divided over World War II.  The battle in Europe had been going since September of 1939. While the United States gave material aid to Great Britain, generally Americans opposed getting directly involved in the battle.  Japan waged a war of conquest in China since 1937, and with Europe effectively removed from the Pacific front, the United States stood as the only blockade to Japanese expansion.  If they could take the US Navy “off the board”, their conquest of the Pacific could continue unfettered.

War with Japan

The attack on Pearl Harbor changed everything.  As President Franklin Roosevelt correctly pointed out in his address asking for a Declaration of War, “…the American People, in their righteous might, will win through to absolute victory”.   Congress declared war on Japan, and within days, Nazi Germany declared war on the United States.  America was fully “in” World War II.

There was a clear racial component to America’s reaction to war. While German Americans and Italian Americans looked like “everyone else”, Japanese Americans were easily recognized.  The state of California, left vulnerable by the loss of Pearl Harbor as an effective defense, viewed every Japanese-American; man, woman and child, as a threat.  That included those born in Japan, and the Nisei, American born citizens of Japanese descent.  Within months, Roosevelt issued Executive Order #9066. He authorized a forced removal from the West Coast “zone”, to be held in “relocation camps”. It didn’t matter their citizenship status:  Nisei or Japanese; they were rounded up.  Many were held for three years in camps scattered throughout the nation.

One of the early detention camps was located at Fort Bliss, just outside El Paso, Texas.  

Fort Bliss

El Paso, Texas, is a center of the migration “crisis” on the US Southern border.  While the city itself enjoys a warm and cooperative relationship with Ciudad Juarez across the border in Mexico, the pressures of migration influences both towns.  They are well aware of their location as a major border crossing for Central and South Americans’ trying to enter the US.  And when there is no legal method to cross, those migrants become prey to “coyotes” who send them out into the surrounding desert to “cross the line” illegally.

Nearby Fort Bliss has been used to house some of those migrants in the past.  The first Trump Administration temporarily housed “unaccompanied minors” there, and the Biden Administration used it as an “emergency intake center”.  Today, ICE is building a huge detention facility and bringing in detainees from all over the Nation.  Like Japanese-Americans, many were denied legal due-process, and simply swept off the streets and transported far from their homes.  

In 1944, the US Supreme Court ruled in Korematsu v United States that Executive Order #9066 and the internment process were a “legal exercise” of Presidential authority in time of war.  In fact, it took until 2018, in Trump v Hawaii, for the Supreme Court to repudiate that decision.  Congress took decades to apologize as well, in the Civil Liberties Act of 1988.

The Trump Administration

Donald Trump used the migrant issue as the single basis of his political rise to prominence.  It was the core of his introduction, the speech at the bottom of the “golden escalator” at Trump Tower in 2015.  But, during his first administration he ran into Congress and the Courts, “impeding” his desire to attack migrants here in the United States.  

So when he returned in 2025, Trump successfully (at least, so far) overwhelmed opposition. He declared a “war” on Central and South American “gangs” as a predicate to action. He’s used Executive Orders, a Congress willing to relinquish authority, and an overwhelmed Federal Court system, to drive his program.  Billions of US dollars are going to finance an ICE “Army”, patrolling the streets looking for so-called “illegals”.  Trump’s co-conspirator, Stephen Miller, set a “quota” of 3000 arrests a day (Guardian). They have to go somewhere.

Mark Twain’s saying goes:  “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes”.   Trump is trying to recreate the racial bias of 1941, by ginning up a crisis:  sending the National Guard to American cities, the ICE Army to snatch “brown people”, and now, detention centers.  They are even using some of the same locations. And, for the same reason; the isolation, and the hopelessness.  Fort Bliss isn’t the first, and it isn’t the biggest.  But it is symbolic.  From Nisei to migrants,  the camps are filled and the US Constitution be-damned.

How long will it take America to apologize for this atrocity?

Dirty Laundry

Politicians have to answer questions for the media all the time.  It’s a symbiotic relationship. The media wants to know what politicians think, especially if they say something that will generate headlines.  In the end, the media needs readers or viewers.  Like the “algorithms” that drive social media, the more outrageous the statement, the more the media meets their needs.  It’s a matter of their survival.

Politicians need the media, because, they need votes to stay in power.  There are lots of ways to contact voters, to let them know ideas and views.  But many of those methods are expensive, especially broadcast media.  So if a politician can get “free time”, it has actual cash value.  (Like him or not, Donald Trump is a master for getting “free time”.  He did it from the beginning in 2015, and continues to dominate the media landscape today.  The saying goes, “He takes all of the oxygen out of the room”.  Trump can dominate so effectively, that there is little time left for anyone else).

The Premise

So here’s the “formula”.  The media asks questions to generate headlines.  The politicians want answers that will generate headlines.  The key is, that the politicians want headlines that are beneficial to their efforts, “good” headlines, while the media really doesn’t care.  Their view, as the Don Henley song goes:  “Give us dirty laundry”. 

Somewhere behind a politician is an “operative”, a political strategist who helps him or her advance.  Before every encounter with the media, that “operative” (either apocryphally or physically) whispers in the politicians ear:  “Don’t accept the premise of the question”.   Many media questions are in black and white terms, even on issues that aren’t black and white at all.  The “over-simplification” of the question is designed to elicit a simple, headline generating answer.  

But if the answer is somewhere in the middle, even if the question doesn’t allow it; the politician needs to get “political”.  They need to rephrase the question in a way so that their answer addresses the complexity of the problem.  They can’t accept the premise.

Rahm

Rahm Emanuel is the former Democratic Mayor of Chicago and US Ambassador to Japan.  But before his political career as a candidate, Emanuel was an “operative” himself, leading candidates to success, including serving as Barack Obama’s Chief of Staff in the White House.  He’s now thinking of running for President in the 2028 Democratic Primaries, and is trying to get “his headlines” by appearing on right-wing media. (Other possible candidates, like Gavin Newsom and Pete Buttigieg, are doing the same).  Emanuel is known for his abrasiveness, and also his political acuity.  So when he appeared on Megan Kelly’s show a few weeks ago, it’s not likely that he accidently accepted the premise of this question.

“Can a man become a woman?” Kelly asked Emanuel. 

“Can a man become a woman? Not — no,” the former Chicago mayor and Obama chief of staff replied.

“Thank you,” Kelly responded. (The Hill).

He accepted the premise of the question.  He looked at gender identity, a huge range of possibilities, and saw it only as black and white.  And he did it intentionally, to get the headline, and to put himself “apart” from most of the Democratic field.

The Answer

The answer could have reflected the reality of trans-genderism.  There are different measures of “man” and “woman”, besides just physical equipment.   “Brain identity” can and is more important than visual appearance.  And science recognizes multiple combinations of DNA and pre-birth changes that might have one physical result, but another “brain identity”.   

The answer should have been that a man doesn’t become a woman, but a person who has one set of physical characteristics might have other unseen changes that means they are a different gender.   Rahm could have taken his opportunity to explain all this to the MAGA world, and spoken “truth to power”.  

But he didn’t.  He wanted the headline.  He’s looking for “his place” in a Democratic Primary, the candidate in the center of the political spectrum.  His answer got the “lead”, and a thank you from Megan Kelly, as if Rahm acknowledged a “truth” that only MAGA-world really knows.

The Operative

I’m sure there’s a political operative behind Emanuel who did a “high five” for the answer.  Democrats were “burned” by the MAGA anti-transgendered campaign in 2024.  It certainly took Sherrod Brown down here in Ohio.  And some operatives have made a calculation:  Democrats must step away from “gender issues”, and stop supporting “trans” and other LGBTQ rights.  It’s kind of a, “Let’s ‘pretend’ we don’t support LGBTQ, so we can get back in power,” thing.  Instead of educating, and recognizing the real complexity of human gender and sexuality; some Democrats are “accepting the premise” of MAGA gender identity.  It’s simple and headline generating, even if it’s wrong.

Rahm could have said:  “No a man can’t become a woman – unless she already is”.  That would have gotten him just as many headlines.  

And there’s one more advantage – it would be right.

Beef

There are lots of reasons for rising costs.  And, some of those are completely out of everyone’s control.  For example:  beef prices are going up, because it’s been a “bad year” for cows.  Really, the actual number of beef cows in the United States is the lowest since 1951 (MarketWatch).  Sure, there are global reasons:  climate change, drought and such.  And we can talk about the political ramifications of that.  But the bottom (round) line is this:  there are fewer beef on the market, and the market is way, way bigger than it was seventy-four years ago.  

Supply and demand: that’s the central factor in determining cost.  If the supply is lower, and the demand is higher, then the cost (price) will go up.  There’s less beef, with a much greater demand today. So, Pataskala Kroger’s is charging $19.99 a pound for a ribeye, $6.99 a pound for 80/20 hamburger.   Remember how upset everyone was with the Covid meat price hike.  My goodness, 80/20 hamburger went up to $6.00 a pound.  We’re past that now.

Little Blue Vans

Here in Pataskala, we have a “micro-market” that sets the price for gasoline.  The demand for gas is higher here than in the neighboring communities.  That’s because of an Amazon distribution center (I think there’s seven giant buildings, including the “Fulfillment Center”).  And from one of those buildings, there’s a swarm of little blue vans that go out, every day.  

That’s Amazon fulfilling their bargain, swift product delivery to your door.  And all of those swarming little vans have to fill up at the local gas stations, BP, Kroger, UDF, Sheets, Shell, and the rest.  And because of that increase in “demand”, the cost of gas in Pataskala is often $0.20 higher than nearby Reynoldsburg or even closer Kirkersville.  Want to buy gas at UDF around the corner?  There’s a price to pay for the convenience.

Eating Taxes

And we can look forward to the impact of the Trump Tariff policies.  Like it or not, in the long run most businesses will find a way to distribute the new costs of tariffs (import taxes) to the consumer.  Sure, right now, some are absorbing the tax costs to avoid the political ramifications, but that’s not going to last.

Any business has a primary goal:  to make profit for their owners (usually the shareholders).  That’s what Capitalism is all about.  While in the short term, reducing profits by “eating” the additional taxes may make good business sense, in the final analysis, the “owners” are in it for the money.  The costs will get passed along to the consumer.  Tariffs are just another consumer tax, and, as often is the case, they will have a greater impact on those with lower incomes.

Energy

As for the rising cost of energy, it’s a good time to be an energy company shareholder.  The second quarter of 2025 AEP (American Electric Power) declared a $1.2 Billion profit, almost four times greater than 2024 (ABC).  And, as any AEP Ohio consumer can tell you, the price of electricity is going up.  It’s not just the actual cost of electricity, it’s all of the associated costs:  delivery fees, existing infrastructure upkeep, new infrastructure development.  That does make sense, at least, around here in Columbus, Ohio.  The whole region is expanding, and more and more power is needed to reach out to the developing industries and residences.

And it’s even more than that.  Unlike cows, there’s more energy generation going on in Central Ohio than ever.  But the demand is increasing far beyond the existing supply.  It’s not just the stalled Intel Chip plant a few miles north of here.  Industry is booming all through Central Ohio.  What used to be fields in Pataskala, or Ashville, or Marengo (all twenty plus miles outside of downtown); are now solar panel factories, or an advanced military drone plant, or giant distribution centers.  All of that means more power is needed.

Regulation

Back to supply and demand:  the demand for power is exponentially increasing, and the supply is far behind.  So the cost of electricity by the kilowatt is going to go up.   

Should the power companies “eat” that cost, especially with the incredible profits they’re making?  Maybe; they are publicly regulated monopolies here in Ohio.  While I can buy a different provider for my power, it’s still coming in on AEP’s lines.  The problem, of course, is the Public Utility Commission of Ohio, the “regulator”, is made up of five members all appointed by the energy industry friendly Governor, Mike DeWine. Some have long “experience” in the energy industry.  The foxes are in charge of the chicken coop.

The pressure is on the consumer.   Because if prices go up, either consumers find ways to cut (reduce the demand) or they find more income (increase their personal supply of money).  It’s a balancing act, especially for those with “fixed” incomes.  With all of the other political craziness in our world, this issue is still likely to be the most important factor in determining who gets elected.

So while many of us, including me, think that the Trump Administration represents an existential threat to the American Democracy, it might all still come down to the price of 80/20 hamburger, or kilowatt hours, or the price of eggs. Right now they’re $3.59 a dozen at your friendly, Pataskala Kroger’s.  By the way, Kroger made a 4% increase in profit over last year, $10.57 Billion in the first quarter of 2025.

Sycophant

Up front:  I think Donald Trump, and more importantly, the Heritage Foundation sponsored ideology behind him, is a real attack on the American experiment in Democracy.  If they get what they want, the America of 2030 will have little resemblance to the America we imagined in 2015.  The threat is real; and the outcome is in serious doubt.

I should add that I think Trump’s sycophantic display towards Russian dictator Vladimir Putin last week was ugly and degrading.  Trump literally invited Putin to the United States. He rolled out the “red carpet”, gave him a military display, invited him for a personal “ride” in the Presidential limousine, and even had a personal “award” created for him.  For all of that recognition, Putin’s “entre” back into world diplomacy, the United States seemed to get absolutely nothing.  

No deal, no agreement to work on a deal, no ceasefire in Ukraine, no bargaining: nothing happened.  Putin demanded that Ukraine give up territory, acknowledge Russian conquests, and be denied any protective alliances.  And when Trump wanted to continue discussions over lunch (and give the “award”), Putin just left.  He went to honor Russian airmen in an American military cemetery on base, paid cash for a refuel, and flew back to “Mother Russia”.  Trump, his aides, and the world was left holding an empty bag.

Back Door Leaders

Monday Trump met with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, and a full delegation of leaders from Europe.  Unlike the “red carpet” for Putin, these world leaders were met at the back door (really, the back door) of the White House by the “chief protocol officer”.   Each of the world leaders, including Zelenskyy, learned the lesson of Zelenskyy’s last White House meeting.  They all began their statements with paragraphs of praise for Trump’s diplomatic “acumen”, and complimented him on his fitness and dress.

And Trump responded in kind, with glowing words for the leaders of Germany, NATO, the European Union, Italy, the United Kingdom and especially Finland (they played golf together earlier this year).  He was a little less generous with Zelenskyy and Emanuel Macron, the President of France, but was at least cordial.  That certainly was an improvement over the “beat-down” Trump and Vice President Vance gave the Ukrainian in the Oval Office last February (The Beat Down).

Article Five

In that spat of “negotiations”, Trump promised US support for Ukraine, including being a part of an “Article Five” style alliance with the embittered nation.  “Article Five” is a section of the NATO treaty agreement (all of the nations at the table are in NATO except for Ukraine), that states simply, “An attack on one nation in the alliance, is an attack on all nations in the alliance”.  It’s been put into effect once, after the terrorist attacks on the United States on 9/11.  

Ukraine may not be admitted to NATO, but it may still get the benefits of NATO membership.  It’s hard to imagine Putin agreeing to any deal with that included.  

Another Beat Down

But one of Trump’s base demands seems to be a “tri-lateral” discussion among Trump, Putin and Zelenskyy. Macron wasn’t having that; it looks too much like the two-on-one Oval Office beat down of the past, with Putin taking Vance’s place. The odds of Zelenskyy actually going to Moscow for that discussion seem quite small. 

In the midst of all of this discussion on Monday, Trump abandoned the world leaders to make a forty-minute phone call to Putin.  From what we learned, it didn’t seem like Putin “gave” anything, but it did show Trump’s priority:  Putin over all.

So here we stand.  Despite Trump’s hopefulness, there doesn’t seem to be much movement, and the death and destruction continues along the stalled battle front, and as the result of the Russian attacks on civilians behind Ukrainian lines.  If Russia won’t move, Trump will be forced to take a stand WITH Ukraine. That’s something he’s been loath to do.  Or worse, Trump will allow Ukraine to “hang”, and just let the killing continue. 

Let Them Fight

As Trump himself said:
“Sometimes you see two young children fighting like crazy. They hate each other, and they’re fighting in a park, and you try and pull them apart. They don’t want to be pulled…Sometimes you’re better off letting them fight for a while and then pulling them apart. And I gave that analogy to Putin yesterday. I said, ‘President, maybe you have to keep fighting and suffering a lot’ because both sides are suffering, before you pull them apart before they’re able to be pulled apart.”

Of course, those young children aren’t probably going to kill themselves, or the other kids on the playground.  

But I will give him this.  If the Trump Administration can find a way a negotiate any kind of settlement that stops the bloodshed, without selling-out the people of Ukraine, they’ve earned a prize.  And if giving Donald Trump “his” Nobel Peace Prize, makes him “equal” to President Obama, then so be it.  

He wins. And so will the world.

DC

Washington DC has more than twenty-two different law enforcement agencies with direct jurisdiction.  Just check out one famous spot in Washington, Dupont Circle.  It’s a “trendy” area on Massachusetts Avenue, where downtown meets Georgetown and Embassy Row.  The DC Metro Police has jurisdiction over the roads:  Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire Avenues (and P Street).  But the actual circle, the monument to Admiral Dupont, is under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service.  

More than seventy embassies and international organizations are festooned along Massachusetts Avenue and the side streets.  They are the “sovereign territory” of the nation that occupies the grounds, a great place for a walk and a game of “name that flag”.   The US Secret Service Uniformed Division is involved in policing those areas, as well as the DC Metro Police.   A simple thing like parking (definitely not so simple in DC) can become an international incident.  Diplomatic license plates confer “diplomatic immunity”.  They park where they want.

Underneath Dupont Circle is the DC Metro, the subway system.  One of its oldest stations is located there.  (Back when I lived in DC in the 1970’s, it was “the end of the line”, where I would catch the Metro for Capitol Hill).  The subway has its own police force, the Metro Transit Police Department.  

The point:  policing in Washington, DC is always complicated.

Federal District

Washington is a Federal District, bordered by Maryland and Virginia.  It’s a “tight fit”, the view from the Lincoln Memorial (in DC) across the Potomac to Arlington National Cemetery (in Virginia) spans the state border.  The White House is in DC, the Pentagon in Virginia.  And the “near suburbs” of Washington; Chevy Chase, Bethesda, and College Park, are all in Maryland. 

Washington DC is a US city with a population of over 700,000, 22^nd largest in the country.  It’s boundaries are absolutely landlocked, because the District of Columbia was defined by the Constitution of the United States as the Federal Capital for the Nation.   Until 1973 it was run by a commissioner appointed by the US Congress, and the laws, regulations, taxes and services were directly controlled by Congress.

Washington is 43% African-American, 39% White (including 3% Hispanic), 8% of multiple races, and 11% other races.  It is a “minority-majority” city.  The citizens of Washington didn’t even get the right to vote for President of the United States until 1961 (23^rd Amendment).  And it wasn’t until 1973 that Congress passed the District Home Rule Law, allowing for the direct election of a city council and mayor.

But, even then, Congress maintained a veto over the local government actions.  Over 37% of the municipal budget comes from the Federal Government.   Part of Home Rule includes the emergency “right” of the President of the United States to “intervene” and take control of law enforcement in the District.  And, unlike the “regular states”, the National Guard of Washington, DC is under command of the President.  As Governor Wes Moore of Maryland made clear last week,  state Governors command their own state’s National Guard.

Inside the Law

All of that means that the Trump Administration was acting “within the law” when they took control of the Metro Police and called out the National Guard.  The only  legally questionable area was the existence of an “emergency”, but, that will be a matter for Federal Courts to determine.  

Folks in the District are reasonably concerned.  Sure, actions that reduce crime are generally a “good thing”.  And perhaps all of the Federal police now concentrated in the “touristy” parts of the city might allow the Metro Police to concentrate on higher crime areas.  But the Federal “takeover” is another step taking away the local control of 700,000 Washingtonians.

The answer for the residents of Washington is to become a state.  That would give them autonomy over their own governance, as well as actual votes in the House and Senate. (Currently, they have a non-voting delegate in the House, and no representation in the Senate at all).  DC statehood has been a “local issue” for decades.  

But it is also a national political issue mired in partisan power.  DC statehood would likely mean another Democratic Congressman and two more Democratic Senators. And how the statehood process would work is just one more complexity in the Federal versus local governing process.  Who would police Dupont Circle then?

Outside the Law

When the Administration threatens to do more, and send in the National Guard or Federalize the police in New York, Chicago, Baltimore or other American cities (except, of course, cities that are in Republican states), there’s a big difference. The Governors of those states might be able to intervene. (Governor Hochul of New York sent the National Guard into the New York City subway). The Federal government doesn’t have that authority.

The ”legalities” haven’t stopped Trump from taking actions.  His “better to ask forgiveness than permission” approach is filling the Federal Courts with cases. All of which take longer to adjudicate then the actions themselves (like Federalizing the California National Guard). But it clearly is a part of the plan. “Normalize” Americans to the sight of armed military in the streets of our cities.  

Which, of course, leads to the question:  why does the President of the United States want Americans to think of troops in the street as normal?  The answer to that question is the real threat to American democracy.

Right Hand Man

Todd Blanche is the second most powerful prosecutor in the United States.  As Deputy Attorney General (DAG) in the Department of Justice, he is the “Chief Operating Officer”.  While Pam Bondi, the Attorney General, is in charge, it is Blanche who makes most of the day-to-day decisions.  Bondi sets the direction, Blanche steers the Department.  It’s a “big job” for whoever gets the role.  

Ask Rod Rosenstein, the DAG in the first Trump Administration.  While the Attorneys General changed, from Sessions, to Whittaker, to Barr; it was Rosenstein who bore the brunt of balancing a Department that was first investigating the newly elected President, then defending him, then investigating the investigators.  Whatever you think of the outcomes, Rosenstein was at the center of the storm.

Most DAG’s rise up through the Justice Department.  Some, like Rosenstein, come in as political appointments from US Attorney’s offices (Rosenstein in Baltimore).  But Mr. Blanche took a different route.  While he did serve as a line prosecutor in the Southern District of New York for nearly a decade, he left the Department to go into private practice.  It was in the course of that private work that he was hired by the client that made his career:  Donald Trump.

Blanche represented Trump in the 34 felony-count criminal indictment for falsifying business records regarding the Stormy Daniels payoff.  Trump was found guilty on all counts (as President-elect the penalties were dismissed).   Despite the loss, Blanche remained as one of Trump’s most trusted aides.  That confidence showed in Blanche’s elevation to the second highest office in the Justice Department.

Room Where it Happened

So when a similar situation from Donald Trump’s private life arose, he sent Blanche in to “put out the fire”.  Jeffrey Epstein, friend of Trump and purveyor of underage children for sexual exploitation by the rich and famous; died mysteriously in a Federal prison cell in New York.  Whatever he knew, went to the grave with him.  But Epstein’s own “chief operating officer”, Ghislaine Maxwell, is serving twenty years in Federal prison.  And when the EPSTEIN FILES!! scandal broke last month, Trump needed to know what she would say.  Who else but Todd Blanche, the DAG, would talk to Maxwell for nine hours in a Tallahassee Federal Courthouse.

We don’t know what was said.  What we do know is one side of the “quid-pro-quo”.  Maxwell was soon moved from a medium security facility near Tallahassee, to a Federal prison “camp” in Bryan, Texas.  Department policy prevents convicted sex offenders from the more relaxed confinement in a “camp” type-facility, but Maxwell is there anyway.   Whatever the “other side” of the quid-pro-quo was, it must be enough to warrant a public exception for the “luxury” child sex-trafficker.

Elmendorf

President Trump met with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week.  Putin is under indictment for war crimes by the World Court, and is waging a war of aggression in Ukraine.   But Trump ignored all that, and invited Putin to the United States; Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage, Alaska. He literally rolled out the “red carpet” for him.  Putin even was given a private ride with Mr. Trump in the Presidential limousine, and an airshow featuring America’s most advance weapons, F-35 fighters and B-2 bombers. 

Trump invited Putin so he could discuss ending the war in Ukraine.  There were elaborate plans for a closed meeting, followed by a luncheon, and then talks between the aides from both sides, in hopes of hammering out an arrangement to end the three year conflict and to bring Russia back into the world economy. 

It didn’t happen.

Room Where it Happened

We don’t know fully what the private conversation between Putin and Trump was about.  In terms of Ukraine, Putin made it clear that he would not withdraw from any of the captured territory, and would only accept a ceasefire-in-place with several conditions that the Ukrainians would clearly reject.  That was a foreseeable result:  it’s clear that Putin is still set on conquering Ukraine and making it a part of Russia (again).  The longer the war lasts, the more to Putin’s advantage.  A ceasefire doesn’t help him.

Trump said that Putin affirmed all of Trump’s biggest domestic assertions:  that Russia didn’t interfere in the 2016 election, and would not dare invade Ukraine if Trump were in office in 2022.  The American President also said that Putin “knew” that the election of 2020 was rigged against him.  (Trump didn’t say that Putin knew Trump’s name wasn’t in the EPSTEIN FILES!!, but that might be next).

Putin walked out of the first meeting, made a statement to the press, and went home:  no lunch, no second meeting, no talks between aides.  Putin got what he wanted:  international acknowledgment as a “leader of a powerful nation”, not an indicted war criminal.  Trump served to legitimize Putin’s authority, even as the Russian dictator launched more attacks against civilians in Ukraine.

That was the “quid”, but there seems to be no “pro quo”.  Todd Blanche managed to silence Maxwell for the moment, but what did Trump get?  In terms of Ukraine, it seems like nothing.  But, was there something else that Putin “gave” Trump in return?  

We don’t know,  No one was in “the room where it happened”.

PS: credit where credit is due: “right hand man” and “in the room where it happens (happened) are from Hamilton, The Musical – which continues to reverberate in our household as we contend with the second Trump Administration. And, of course the “Tale of Two Deals” harkens back to Charles Dickens.

You Did It

We definitely live in the age of “what-about-ism”.  Rather than debate the specifics of an issue, the answer by “the other side” is almost always, “what-about?”  Then there’s the litany of statements about when “your side” did something similar to what the “other side” is doing.  It makes for a frustrating discussion, because it never really gets down to the merits of the issues.

A quick example:  the Trump ICE “gang” is going through American cities, rounding up folks who “look like” they might be undocumented migrants.  The take those folks, deny all due process, confine them, and for some, deport them out of the country.  When opponents raise questions about clear violations of Constitutional rights; instead of arguing the Constitution, the response is usually, “what-about”.  “What-about Obama and Biden, who did the exact same thing?”  Well, the answer is, they didn’t.  

On the Border

Both Democratic Presidents did remove newly arrived undocumented migrants at the border.  They gave them a choice, detention awaiting asylum hearings, or a bus ride back across the border without “prejudice”.  That meant those migrants could still wait in line to enter the United State legally.  It wasn’t the “round-up” in Los Angeles, or Chicago, or Columbus, Ohio; and it didn’t require “detention facilities” to be built throughout the nation.  It was literally a roadside decision for the migrants.  They got picked up, they decided what to do, and they either went to detention or went back across the border.  Regardless of MAGA what-about, it’s not the same thing as the inhumane treatment by ICE today.

What’s happening with migrants today is a serious question, one that strikes directly at the heart of the United States Constitution. (For more on that, see this earlier essay, Black Letter Law).  But there’s another issue, this most recent “what-about”, that is a little less traumatic.

Burn

Democrats, and all folks who find MAGA repugnant, are enjoying the current Administration crisis over the EPSTEIN FILES!!.  It’s not about the atrocious actions of Epstein and Maxwell and their wealthy compatriots. Everyone, at least, that I know, finds child molestation abhorrent.  So when I call out the Trump “gang” on the EPSTEIN FILES!!, instead of getting a reasonable discussion about the facts, my MAGA friends immediately resort to “what-about”.  “Well, Joe Biden’s Department of Justice had the EPSTEIN FILES!!. Why didn’t they reveal them?  What-about that?”  It’s an interesting argument, one with enough truth in it to bring a pause to the discussion. 

So here, just this once, is the answer.  Then I’m done with getting in the mud about Epstein.  To everyone involved in the Epstein bacchanals, to quote Hamilton, the Musical,  “I hope you burn”.

Epstein

Jeffrey Epstein was indicted (for the second time) by the FBI in July of 2019.  That was during the first Trump Administration.  There was a large amount of evidence amassed from searches of Epstein’s homes, both in the United States and overseas.  The case was more than solid, and Epstein was likely to spend the remainder of his life in jail.  But in August, only a month after his arrest, he was found dead in his cell in the Metropolitan Correction Center in New York.  It was ruled a suicide.

All of that was under the “watch” of Trump appointed Attorney General Bill Barr.  

A year later, in July of 2020, Epstein’s co-abuser, procurer, and groomer, Ghislaine Maxwell, was arrested by the FBI.  That too, was under Trump’s Department of Justice.  Her Federal trial began in November of 2021, now under the Biden Justice Department, and she was found guilty of varying sex crimes in December of that year and sentenced to twenty years in prison.  No other criminal charges were brought in the cases around Epstein.  This was, in part, because most of the possible charges occurred almost two decades before, and Federal law carries a five to ten year statute of limitation.

Back to Normal

One of the avowed goals of the Biden Administration was to get “back to normal”.  This was particularly true when it came to the Department of Justice.  There was the huge controversy created by FBI Director James Comey’s “speech” announcing that Hillary Clinton was not going to be indicted. In it, he then blamed Clinton for actions that might have broken the law. That speech and his later letter to Congress, violated all past practice and procedure.  Some, including myself, believe that Comey’s statements were a pivotal reason that Trump won in 2016. 

So getting “back to normal” meant that Justice would either speak through indictments, or not speak at all. Since no one else around Epstein could be indicted, the Merrick Garland Justice Department had nothing more to say.

During the 2024 Presidential campaign, neither President Biden nor Vice President Harris even mentioned the EPSTEIN FILES!!  They wanted “normal”:  the Justice Department couldn’t indict, and that was all there was to say.

But one of the promises of the 2024 Trump Campaign was to “reveal” what was in the EPSTEIN FILES!!  They led many voters to believe that all sorts of “Democrats” were involved in Epstein’s sordid activities.  And they all promised: Trump, Bondi, FBI Director Patel, and most prominently, FBI Assistant Director Dan Borgino, to reveal the EPSTEIN FILES!!

Until they got in power.  Then, even after Bondi said she that the “files” were on her desk, they came back and said there was “nothing there”.   

This isn’t about Epstein or Joe Biden.  This is about lying to your own supporters.  It’s about the lack of integrity in the Trump Administration.  That’s what we should be arguing.

What about that?

(Remember that old song Feelings, by Morris Albert?)

Disruption

I guess, to some, it “felt” like a good idea.  Many Americans, fueled by the “Fake/Faux/Fox News” media onslaught, “felt” like billions of dollars were being “wasted”, or even worse, stolen.  That “feeling” helped get Donald Trump elected President, for a second time, despite thirty-four felony convictions.  Enough Americans felt, I guess, that it was time to put that “fox” in charge of the entire “chicken coop”.  

Elon Musk and his DOGE boys came in, and completely disrupted the government.  Finances were ripped from hundreds of programs that were mandated by Congress.  There were real-world consequences, programs that were life-saving, cut cold.  Real people died.  Almost every agency, from the Internal Revenue Service to the Veterans’ Administration to the National Park Service, was disrupted. And the rest of Americans, even the ones who didn’t share the “feelings” of waste and fraud, shared in that disruption, like it or not.

The end result “felt” kind of sad.  The DOGE boys (including their leader, Musk, and his lieutenant, “Big Balls”) spent a lot of money, ate a lot of pizza, and crunched an enormous amount of data.  But, in real terms (not feelings) they didn’t save much. DOGE claims to have saved $160 Billion, a big number.  But analysis shows they spent $135 Billion to do it (CBS).  $25 Billion is a “big number” too, but not so “big” in the scope of a  $5.35 Trillion annual budget.  

Big Balls’ Nose

Speaking of “Big Balls”; he intervened in a street crime in Washington, DC, and got beat up pretty badly.  The President said he was “near death”; but unless you can die from a broken nose Trump might have exaggerated a bit.  “Big Balls” may be big in the computer world, but in real world DC crime,  as the saying goes, he got his a$$ kicked.  And somehow, it “feels” like that’s generated an entire crisis in Washington.

President Trump was looking for something to do in August, besides talking about the EPSTEIN FILES.  He put massive tariffs on China (but he really didn’t), and he arranged to meet Putin in Alaska, in quest of “his” Nobel Peace Prize.  Hopefully, he doesn’t give away Ukraine, or Alaska, as part of the deal.  But when all of those things didn’t manage to change the subject from Trump’s good, deceased, child molesting friend; he decided to bring in the Federal Government to rescue “Big Balls”.

Retribution

“I am your retribution”.  That’s what Trump told the world would happen if he got elected.  And here he is, getting payback for “Big Balls’” broken nose.  He’s nationalized the police of Washington, DC, taking control from the duly elected local authorities.  Trump claimed that Washington was worse than varying war zones throughout the world, and “only he” could fix what the “Democrat” local government allowed to happen.  Just like  DOGE “fixed” the Federal Government, now Trump would “fix” Washington, DC.

So let’s get a couple of things straight, feelings aside.  Washington DC isn’t Baghdad, or some other war-torn foreign capital.  It isn’t even the “murder capital” of the United States.  That “honor” goes to Memphis, Tennessee, followed by St Louis and Baltimore.  DC is fourth on the list, which surprisingly doesn’t include Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, or any city in Ohio.  I guess “feelings” can be mistaken (USA Facts).   And while Washington’s homicide rate rose 15% in the Covid and post-Covid era, it actually fell 12% in the past year.   So while that doesn’t help “Big Balls’” nose, it is factual, versus anecdotal, evidence.  It’s not about feelings, unless we’re talking about “feeling” like talking about something other than the EPSTEIN FILES.

Real World

But there are real-world consequences.  Now the Federal Government is in-charge of the DC Metro Police, replacing the Mayor and the elected City Council.  DC is a complicated jurisdictional area.  It’s a Federal District, and many segments of the city are regulated by Federal Police anyway, including the Capitol area (the Capitol Police), the National Mall (US Park Police), the White House (US Secret Service), and, of course, ICE (they’re everywhere, everywhere)!

The Metro Police is still in action, but now, trained FBI agents are making arrests for loitering, and the Park Police are patrolling regular neighborhoods, as well as the “regular” cops.  Many will “feel” better.  But those “feelings” aren’t likely to be those of the regular folks who live in DC. More importantly, it’s another DOGE-type solution to the problem, one that disenfranchises hundreds of thousands of Washingtonians.  The Federal forces can go “tear up” in DC for a while, joined by the National Guard and perhaps even the regular military.  But, probably sooner rather than later, Washington will return to “regular order”, and the President’s band-aid solution will be over.  Nothing changes.  

Big Balls may feel vindicated.  And Trump will have his “retribution” on the town that stood up to him on January 6^th.  But the rest of us have to get over feelings, and look at the facts.  This is no solution to the real problems of Washington, DC.  It’s just another distraction.

And that’s too bad, for the real people who live in Washington.