Category: Uncategorized

No Labels

A new “political movement”, stocked with millions of dollars from anonymous donors is contemplating a run for President in 2024.  It’s the “No Labels” party, hoping to find a “middle lane” in the American political spectrum.  Notable leaders of “No Labels”:  Joe Lieberman former Democratic (and Independent) US Senator from Connecticut, and former Maryland Republican Governor Larry Hogan.  

The ”No Labelers” offer three things to American voters.  First, they avoid the extremes of Democratic Progressivism or Republican MAGA-ism.  They are “centrists”.  In the old days we called them moderate-right, where the two political parties used to “intersect”: Rockefeller Republicans and Manchin “Blue Dog” Democrats.  Second, they claim “common sense” solutions, and even take credit for creating the bipartisan “Problem Solver’s Caucus” in the House of Representatives.  And third, they hope to offer an alternative for voters who held their noses to vote in the “Biden v. Trump” dilemma of 2020.  

In short, they hope to claim the “middle ground” of American politics.  And they have enough money to get on the ballot in most of the fifty states. 

The Middle Ground

It’s a seductive idea. America is polarized to the extremes, and has been for over a decade. A “No Labels” party running centrist candidates like John Kasich, Larry Hogan, Liz Cheney, Joe Manchin, or John Hickenlooper might appeal to Americans “in the middle”. Leave Trump his 33% of MAGA crazies, and give Biden his 40%, and that means that – the math doesn’t work. It adds up to 27% of the vote left – not a winning number.

And that’s the assumption we need to think about.  Is there really a “middle-ground” of American thought, or is today’s polarization so extreme that, simply, no one is left in the middle?  Does a “No Labels” ticket offer a way out of our crisis, or would it just assure a minority candidate victory either in the Electoral College or in a House of Representatives tie-breaking vote?

1860

Here’s an imperfect historic example.  The last time the United States was so heavily divided was prior to the Civil War in 1860.  In that election there were actually four national candidates running for President.  One “extreme” was the new Republican Party led by Abraham Lincoln of Illinois.  Lincoln was considered “anti-enslavment”, though he was really against the expansion of enslavement into the new US territories.  The alternative extreme was the break-away Southern Democratic Party led by John Breckenridge of Kentucky.  Breckenridge wanted legal enslavement for the entire United States, North, South and terriories.

In the middle was Stephen Douglas of Illinois, the nominee of the “rest” of the Democratic Party, who favored “popular sovereignty”; allowing individual states and territories to determine the enslavement question by vote.  And finally, there was Constitution Union Party nominee John Bell of Tennessee. Bell took no stand on enslavement, only stating that he would follow the existing Constitution and the laws.

Minority President

The number of candidates shaped the outcome of the election.  No one candidate received a majority of the popular vote.  Lincoln got 39% while Douglas received just over 30%.  And while Douglas was a strong second in several Northern states, Lincoln was able to win every one, and gain enough electoral votes to win the Presidency.  Breckenridge had 18% of the popular vote, but with a strong showing in the South, ended up second in the Electoral College.  And John Bell won three states and came in third in the Electoral Vote with only 12% of the popular vote.  Douglas ended up fourth in the Electoral College.

Add Douglas and Bell together, the “middle ground” votes, and while together they might have a plurality of the popular vote,  they still wouldn’t do much better in the Electoral College.  America in 1860 was locked into two camps, enslavement and anti-enslavement; there was little left in the middle.    Had the Democrats somehow avoided splitting into two camps, they likely would have won.  But the point was, that even a “popular sovereignty” guy from Illinois was too “extreme” for the enslavement South.

2024

So where are we today?  If the nominees of 2024 are a repeat of 2020, we know that the election will be a knife-edge choice.  While Biden won the electoral vote by seventy-four in 2020, the popular vote in the swing states was incredibly narrow.  Less than 100,000 votes out of the 152 million determined the election winner, just like in 2016, where Clinton won by three million, but lost the crucial electoral states by a total of 74,744 votes.

How did Joe Biden succeed in Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin in 2020?  He picked up the “Never Trump” voters, those Republicans who couldn’t stomach MAGA-ism.  And they are the voters most likely to go to a “No Labels” candidate, along with those few independents and  moderate Democrats convinced that Biden is under the thrall of the “radical” left.  

Those voters cross age groups and genders.  We know that the MAGA “Red Wall” won’t crumble to what they view as a “RINO” movement.  But we do know that those few voters still “in the middle” can’t win an election, but do control the outcome. 

Our Republic

Our politics today aren’t like a multi-lane interstate highway.  We are driving on a two- lane “Red and Blue” country road, and the “No Label” movement is trying to take it’s half out of the middle.  There’s only one result from that; a head-on collision with one Party or the other.

The Republicans of 2016 didn’t split into two parties like the Democrats of 1860.  Instead, they signed onto the MAGA “pledge”.  Even the so-called “establishment Party” of the time, Paul Ryan, Reince Prebis, Mitch McConnell, Dan Quayle and Dick Cheney; jumped on board the MAGA train.   By staying together,  they orchestrated the Trump win in 2016.  And while all of those leaders have disavowed Trump now, they created a new MAGA Republican Party that they can’t control.

Many Americans are uncomfortable with that, just as many were uncomfortable with the choices of 1860.  But, at least for now, there isn’t a “moderate” movement that can create a majority to win the Presidency. Which leaves us with that same “binary choice”, the one we made in 2016 and 2020.   What the “No Labelers” can do, intentionally or not, is guarantee an extremist victory, of the side with the most loyal followers.  In short, the well-meaning “moderates” of No Labels, will end up giving America another four years of Donald Trump.  They’re driving down the middle of the road, and they’ll take-out the Democratic Party in the Blue lane.

I’m not sure the Republic can survive that.

FDIC

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation just seized First Republic Bank, the 14^th largest bank in the United States.  First Republic had $104 Billion in deposits.  Some of those were insured by the FDIC (up to $250,000) but the vast majority were not.  If First Republic went bankrupt, billions of dollars would be at risk. More importantly, it might shake the faith of Americans in the banking system, and shatter the foundation of our financial structure, trust in banks.  Like the first domino in a long line, one bank failure could lead to the next.

What was wrong with First Republic?  Like their Northern California fellow failed Silicon Valley Bank, they invested too many of their deposits in “unavailable” assets, like market or government bonds.  Banking hasn’t changed that much over the centuries.  Just like the Bailey Savings and Loan in Jimmy Stewart’s movie “It’s a Wonderful Life”, people expect to go to the bank and get their money when they want it.  If word gets out that the bank doesn’t have their money “on hand”, then more and more depositors demand their savings.  It’s called a run on the bank, and if the bank can’t access funds to cover that “run”, they close.

Henry Potter

So it’s not that the money wasn’t “there”, but it wasn’t available.  The First Republic money managers chased profits, and forgot the first rule of banking:  cover the deposits.

But if you’re worried about a widespread “bank failure”, relax.  First Republic was seized by the FDIC. It was then sold off to the largest bank in the United States, JP Morgan Chase.  Remember the scene in “It’s a Wonderful Life” when the mean old Henry Potter offers to “save” the Bailey Savings and Loan, by buying it?  It’s kind of like that:  First Republic was done, and the “insurance company”, FDIC, sold it off to big old mean Jamie Diamond and Chase Bank.

Of course that’s another problem with American banking.  

Too Big To Fail

First Republic had $212 Billion in assets when it folded like a “house of cards”.  For JP Morgan Chase, absorbing it was hardly a  gulp.  Chase is over fifteen times bigger, valued at over $3.2 Trillion.  The other “big four” are Bank of America at $2.41 Trillion, Citigroup with $1.77 Trillion, and Wells Fargo with $1.72 Trillion.  Number five, US Bancorp, is far behind at $585.14 Billion.  For perspective, my bank, Park National Bank headquartered in Newark, Ohio, has $9.6 Billion in assets.  And here in Pataskala, the Pataskala Bank has $40 Million (the 4,457^th biggest bank in the US).

Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo have a “vested” interest in keeping the American banking system working.  Only a systemic failure of the whole structure would dramatically impact them.  So they not only work to “make money”, but they also are willing to absorb the “minor” losses of smaller banks to keep the system rolling along.  It’s in their best interest, besides the interest of the American economy.

And the FDIC did exactly what they are supposed to do.  They protected the assets of the First Republic depositors without having to pay out from FDIC insurance funds.  Now, instead of First Republic controlling those assets, Jamie Diamond does.  First Republic customers seamlessly become Chase Bank customers.  The FDIC transferred the responsibility rather than “eating” the loss themselves.

How Big is Too Big?

But how powerful does that make Jamie Diamond, President of Chase, and the other “Big Four” bankers? Sure, absorbing First Republic was in the best long-term interest of Chase, but how much “public faith” is now invested in a few “private” individuals?  Jamie Diamond (Chase), Brian Moynihan (Bank of America), Jane Fraser (Citibank) and Charles Scharf (Wells Fargo) have tremendous sway over the American economy.   We (Americans) depend on them to do the “best thing” for our Nation – at least, as long as it’s in the best interest of their banks.

In “It’s a Wonderful Life”, the entire community came together to save the Bailey Savings and Loan.  It’s beautiful, and very socialistic (really – I used that word in an essay!!).  In the economic crisis of 2008, some of the biggest banks were forced to swallow banks almost their own size (Lehman Brothers).  After that, the US determined that we shouldn’t have single banks that could “tank” our entire economy.

And I guess we don’t – we now have four.  That’s not what was in mind twelve years ago, but it’s exactly where we are now.  And that’s the very definition of power and vulnerability. 

Common Courtesy

We all know one thing for sure.  We aren’t going to live forever.  No one has to go into great detail about that, it’s just a fact of life.  We know it from “anecdotal evidence”.   When you get to my “great age” of sixty-six, you have a whole list of folks you knew (and loved) who no longer are with us.  And we also understand the correlation between old-age and death.  The older you get, the closer you are to dying.  It’s what it is; dwell on it and get depressed, or accept it and, as the Tim McGraw song goes, “Live like you were dying”.

 But, at least here in America, it’s not considered polite to talk about other folk’s impending death.  Even in politics, where, like a knife fight, there are no rules (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid); you still don’t talk about someone dying.

Lack of Oxygen

Unless, of course, you’re Nikki Haley, former Governor of South Carolina and United Nations Ambassador, running for the Republican nomination for President in 2024.  The problem Haley has, is that all “of the oxygen” is gone in the Republican race.  First there’s Trump:  on civil trial for rape, indicted for business fraud (both in New York); awaiting indictment in Georgia for election interference; and facing Federal charges for stealing classified documents and fomenting an Insurrection.  Talk about a lack of oxygen, all of that turmoil sucks the media coverage completely dry.

And then there’s the quixotic DeSantis campaign.  The Governor of Florida can’t travel to Fort Lauderdale to view the flooding, but he can fly to Israel on an “economic excursion”.  And speaking of economics, DeSantis is attacking the biggest economic force in Florida, Disney Corporation.  So we get the “side-show” of DeSantis versus Mickey Mouse, which makes the Governor look more and more like Mickey’s friend – Goofy.

There is so little “oxygen” left, that Haley can barely light a match, much less light her campaign “on fire”.  What’s the phrase, “…desperate times require desperate measures”?  And there is nothing more desperate than a Presidential campaign ignored.  It’s not just media, it’s the money that media coverage generates.  Haley can’t raise cash, and that’s a death sentence for a political campaign.

Do the Math

In a Fox News interview, Haley said:

“I think that we can all be very clear and say with a matter of fact that if you vote for Joe Biden, you really are counting on a President Harris, because the idea that he would make it until 86 years old is not something that I think is likely.”

Can we Nikki?  Is it really so clear that if you reach 80, it isn’t likely you’ll reach 86?  Let’s look at the facts.  The Social Security Administration is in the business of estimating life expectancies.  They have a whole country, and almost ninety years of data, to get a clear estimate of the life expectancy of eighty year-olds.  And here it is:  while the life expectancy of a newborn male in 2023 is a little over 74 years, the life expectancy of an 80 year-old male in 2023 is…7.74 years.  The life expectancy of an 81 year old male is 7.25 years.  Simple addition shows that Joe Biden, on average, can expect to live until he’s at least 87 – after a second term of his Presidency is over.

Goofy

So, Governor-Ambassador Haley; as a matter of fact we can estimate that Joe Biden will outlive his Presidency.  That’s clear.  But what’s also clear is the desperation your ill-fated campaign for the Presidency must feel.  This is not a slip, a mistake.  You made a clear strategy choice, trying to “Call a spade a spade”. The problem is, that the “spade” you called was actually a “heart”.  It was a dumb move, and it made you and your campaign look impolite, socially inept, and willing to “light your hair on fire” to get attention.  

But there really is so little oxygen left on the Republican side of the campaign, that your hair didn’t light.  So, like Governor DeSantis, you just look a little,“Goofy”.

By the way, the same actuarial table says that a 66 year old man faces a life expectancy of a little over sixteen years.   Thinking back, I realize how quickly sixteen years goes by.  Not just the first sixteen, birth to driver’s license, but the middle sixteens, like thirty to forty-six or fifty until now.  I better get going – and “start living like I’m dying”.  

Morning Routine

My morning routine is set in stone:  get up and take care of the five dogs, all looking for affection. They get their time outside, the morning round of medications (cased in cheese), and then breakfast.  Once they are satisfied, I begin the existential consumption of Starbuck’s French Roast coffee and face a blank word processor page on my MacBook Pro.  

 The “background noise” to all of this is MSNBC’s Morning Joe.  I always have “half an ear” on what’s going on in the country and the world as I prepare five breakfasts and  grind a batch of beans for the thick-black coffee, though I tune that ear out when Joe (of Morning Joe) goes off on his daily rants.  

There’s always a recap of the nation and the world, and there’s often the most important guests of the day.  Co-host Miki Brezhenski has a strong interest in empowering women.  Not only does she bring the most powerful women in the country on “the air”, but Miki ramrods world conferences designed to advance women. Such strong figures as Huma Abedin and Amal Clooney are often on, as well as former Senator Claire McCaskill and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

And that got me thinking:  I’ve always thought women could do anything.  I’ve always anticipated that women are powerful, in the family, and as co-workers, bosses, and friends. Then I realized:  I’ve been surrounded by powerful women my entire life. No wonder I anticipate powerful women, it’s been that way since I was born.

Mom

I always knew my parents had an equal partnership in their marriage.  They made decisions together and shared equally in all of the important moves our family made.  There wasn’t, ever; “Wait ‘til your father gets home”.  In my youngest days, Dad was on the road selling television shows for much of the week.  Mom “ran the show” here at home, through six different houses and five different towns. 

But I didn’t find out until I was fourteen that Mom was a member of British Special Operations Executive during World War II.  Mom was essentially a spy, dropped into enemy territory by small airplanes to deliver messages, supplies, and plan and carry out espionage missions.  She was one of the small percent of SOE agents who survived the war.  She handled that, then left her home in England, family and country to come to America with Dad. After that, three kids, a house, a dog and the world really weren’t that big a challenge.  (To read more about my Mom – here’s her writing – My Story.)

Mom always took on projects, but was happy to take care of us kids (there were three) and partner in Dad’s career.  They were a team as he moved up the corporate ladder, from salesman to sales manager, station manager to Vice President, and finally President of Multimedia Program Productions.   When Dad wanted to “make a sale”, or evaluate a future employee, or needed advice – Mom was the go-to.  Whether it was a fancy dinner in New York, or around the family table in Cincinnati; they were a “team”.

No Limits

So I never learned that there were “limits” about what women could do – Mom broke all of those “rules” before I was ever born.  That was the lesson she taught my sisters as well.  In fact, all of us learned that there really weren’t limits.  Mom and Dad encouraged us to reach for whatever dream we wanted to follow – then put in the hard work to get it done. 

 And even though Mom didn’t have a “job” or “profession” while we were growing up, we all inherited the “Dahlman trait” of working hard.  In fact, we all still share that, a willingness to lose ourselves in our work, both physically and mentally.  It’s the “work ethic” (perhaps of the 1960’s) that doesn’t really understand the new term “work/life balance”.

In the Family

My older sister became a brain surgeon.  She was a woman entering a “man’s” field, not the first by any means, but an early barrier breaker in the 1970’s.  She was hazed and emotionally abused by her “mentors”; both as part of the “traditional” internship process, and even more so because she “dared” to think she could be “one of the boys”.  

But she ultimately succeeded.  They redesigned the operating table so she could work while she was pregnant with twins. She became the “premier” neuro-surgeon in her hospital and had a full career, retiring at the “top” of her game.  Her skill set didn’t just include surgery.  She brought unusual empathy for the patient and their family to the table as well.

My middle sister dedicated her life to her artwork.  She followed her art from New York to Seattle to Oakland and back to the “Big Apple”, always putting in the hard work that makes artistic expression a reality.  She switched from printing, to painting, to three dimensional “soft” sculpting.  It was her passion, her vocation and avocation, and she continues to put in those long hours even to today.

Mom made sure there were “no limits” on what they could do, and certainly not  limited as a woman.

Profession

I worked with powerful women.  One co-worker became the first woman to coach a men’s team at our high school.  Through example, she taught both girls and boys that women had the knowledge and skills to be a powerful force, and achieve whatever goals they set.  She coached at the highest high school levels, guiding athletes of both genders to the State finals.  She was a pioneer, in a field dominated by men who learned to respect her knowledge and dedication.  And she was (and is) a good friend.

Another co-worker was an early woman in the ranks of high school administration.  After a career as a superb teacher, she was overlooked for administration again and again.  But she stayed in the fight, finally achieving an assistant principal’s position, and ultimately running a high school as the principal.  She brought a whole different skill-set and attitude to the job of running a high school, one that included empathy as well as control and leadership.  To this day, former teachers and students speak her name with a special fondness and even reverence.

Jenn 

And finally, I married a powerful woman, Jenn.  She too broke into a field where men were the“norm”, computer programming for the US Government.  She wasn’t the first, but faced the same prejudice that my sister faced in medicine, and my friends faced in education.  And she did it the hard way, learning in an industry that completely changed over and over again throughout her career. 

She raised a great son as a single mom, designed most of the changes as we expanded our joint home, and now, in retirement, is dedicated to returning lost dogs to their owners.  Jenn and I, like my parents, are full partners in our lives, making  our decisions together.  It’s the way we both are; neither would have it any other way.

For those men who are uncomfortable “competing” with women – get over it.  Women learned how to overcome prejudice and misogyny a long time ago.  In the process, they became strong and skillful.  It’s made them more than “equal” to the task at hand.   The sooner men accept that, the better we all will be.

Golf

I am not a golfer.  Golf is one of the most frustrating athletic activities I’ve tried.  It’s not that I can’t hit a “good” shot, it’s that every good shot is followed up by one going the wrong direction.  Golf just isn’t enjoyable for me; I can walk outside in beautiful settings (and drink a beer) without ruining it with golf clubs.

But I did try for a couple of years, dutifully going to the golf course and putting in “my time”.  And while it had nothing to do with golf, I did learn some things.  One of the most important:  don’t screw around with geese.  If a goose wants your ball, GIVE IT TO HIM!! I’m not sure how smart geese are, but I do know that once they determined your former ball is now their present egg, it’s best to drop a new one and head on down the line.

Geese are determined, and at full wing-span and running straight at you, very intimidating.  Sure, in the end you would probably win a full-on battle with your nine-iron, but at what cost?  Blood, feathers, spectacle and probable removal from the golf “community” for eternity.  So leave the geese alone, and let them have their “eggs”, even if it’s a fancy Titleist that cost $15.

Golden Eggs

Aesop told the famous tale of “The Goose and the Golden Egg”.  The story goes like this:  a man had a goose that laid a golden egg each day.  He took the egg to the market, and made a good profit.  But the man got greedy, and wanted more eggs. So he killed the goose and cut it open to find more.  But, alas, there were no more golden eggs.  He killed the goose that laid the golden eggs, out-smarted by his own greed.

Into our language came the phrase, “Don’t kill the goose that lays the golden eggs”.  If you’ve got a good going, don’t mess it up and lose everything. 

Florida Man 

Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida is a man used to getting his way.  He was a successful collegiate baseball player on the Yale University starting nine.  He was a successful academic, going to Harvard Law school, and serving in the US Navy.  While still serving, he was appointed an Assistant US Attorney in middle Florida, and soon after his honorable discharge he was elected to Congress.  

He was narrowly elected Governor of Florida in 2018, then overwhelmingly reelected in 2022.  The Governor is using his powers and a gerrymandered Republican super-majority in the state legislature, to make Florida his “golden goose”.  From “anti-woke” and “Don’t Say Gay” laws to ignoring Covid protocols, DeSantis uses Florida as his “example” of how he would run the United States as President.  The Governor hasn’t “tasted failure” in his life:  to mix fables, everything he’s touched has turned to gold.  

Disney

The Disney company is a huge economic presence in Florida.  Just in state and local taxes, Disney pays over $1.1 Billion a year.  Disney employs over 75,000 Floridians, not just at Disney World, but at Disney Resorts, Disney cruises, and other Disney owned businesses throughout the state.  Disney World alone has an appraised value of over $2 Billion.

And Disney brings in millions of tourists to Florida each year:  tourists who stay in non-Disney hotels, drive on Florida toll roads, eat at Florida restaurants, and visit other Florida businesses (NBC).  The Disney businesses bring an estimated $75.2 Billion into Florida each year (Tallahassee). Florida has a total gross domestic product of $1.07 trillion, Disney represents over 7% of that total (Statista).

Disney, a multi-national corporation, has a huge media presence in the United States.  The Disney Corporation owns the ABC network, the Disney Channel, ESPN and ESPN2, ABC Family, Fusion TV, Disney Junior and Radio Disney.  And Disney still makes and markets movies, including their 2012 purchase of the Star Wars franchise.  So Disney is so much bigger than just Disney World. The total value of the company is over $200 Billion.  Disney World represents one percent of that value (Statista). 

So why in the world of Aesop, Mickey Mouse, and Golden Egged Geese; would DeSantis pick a fight with Disney Corporation?

This Goose Won’t Die

The Disney Corporation had the audacity to “buck” DeSantis on the “don’t say Gay” law.  DeSantis demanded corporate obedience, Disney responded with rainbow colors and union protections for gay employees.  When DeSantis didn’t get “his way” with Disney World, he threatened to take away their “special status” in Florida law.  

Disney World is so big, it takes up a “county’s” worth of land.  In their original agreement with the state, the area encompassing Disney World was designated the Reedy Creek Improvement District.  Essentially, Disney World was the governing entity, including responsibility for police, fire, sewer, water and roads in their territory.   The Board of Disney World (Reedy Creek) is the actual governing body with legal jurisdiction.

Who Pays

Governor DeSantis passed legislation to end the agreement, and place his handpicked representatives on the Reedy Creek board.  But before they could officially take office, the Reedy Creek Board perpetuated their agreement with Disney, nullifying the state legislation.

Meanwhile, even if DeSantis can rest control, the state government will find itself responsible for roads, police, fire, water and sewer, instead of the Disney Corporation.  Sure, Disney might have to pay more taxes, but in the end the state is likely to pay more for services than it gets in taxes.  If DeSantis goes through with trying to “ruin” Disney World, with a possible state wetland or even a prison built nearby; he will be, as my mother used to say, “Cutting off his nose to spite his face”.  The big loser of screwing with Disney is DeSantis’s constituents – the people of Florida. 

Cooked Goose

Disney is bigger in Florida than even Ron DeSantis.  Like violating the  “etiquette” of the golf course, the Governor is taking a nine iron to the Disney goose.  The problem is, like the banks, “that goose is too big to kill”, and unlikely to lay eggs for DeSantis either.  

But the man who “can do no wrong” is convinced that attacking “woke” Disney will make him the darling of the MAGA Republicans who control the primary process.  So far though, all he’s done is make Disney look smart, and DeSantis look – well – just Goofy.   As far as Florida is concerned, Disney is laying an egg every year; in taxes, in income, and in helping to drive the economy.  DeSantis might somehow be able to fend off the Disney Goose with his Nine Iron of a legislature, but in the end, you know what he’s doing.

He’s killing the Florida goose that lays the golden eggs.  The headline will ultimately read:

“Florida Man Kills Golden Goose, and cooks his own”.

Just a note:  This essay was done – finished, or at least ready for more editing on Sunday morning. Then, I managed to do something I haven’t done since I was typing on my Apple IIC back in the 80’s.   I was just finishing up a chapter of my Master’s Thesis, twenty pages of cross country running history. Then lightning struck.  No, it wasn’t a brilliant workout plan to win the State Meet, it was real lightning, and close by.  The power went out, and so did my Apple IIC, along with twenty pages of text NOT saved to the floppy disk drive (5 ½ inch floppies – kids today would have a whole different definition for that!!).

Somehow, today’s essay disappeared:  not saved under the wrong name, not in the “recovery” file, not out in the ethernet – just gone.  So here’s round two, maybe better, maybe worse, but no way to compare and tell. I’ll definitely save.  Enjoy the fruits of my duplicate labors!!!

Guns

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote an essay in the “Guns Series” called Fear Itself.  It was about the historic linkages between Americans, guns and fear, right from the very beginnings, even before the American Revolution.  I won’t repeat all of that (you can click the link above if you’d like), but this past week has been the “example to prove the point”.

In Kansas City, an old white man shot a skinny young black man for mistakenly knocking on his door.  No words were spoken, just gunshots through the door, hitting the young man in the head.  In North Carolina, a middle-aged black man shot a white neighboring six year-old girl and her father.  The cause:  a basketball rolled into his yard, and they tried to recover it.  In upstate New York, a white man shot and killed a twenty year-old white girl.  Her mistake:  pulling into his driveway.  

There’s more.  There’s the cheerleader in Texas who was shot for getting in the wrong car.  And the Florida men: the mistaken grocery delivery drivers shot at by a home owner, and the University of Tampa man (white), shot and killed for getting into a private car he thought was his Uber ride.  Both district attorneys declined to file charges.  Under Florida’s infamous “stand your ground” law (remember Travon Martin back in 2012?) the homeowner and driver were “in the right” defending their property (save).

Legal Tender

All of these incidents have three things in common:  fear, guns, and innocent victims.  The shooters were fearful:  of the knock on the door, the neighbor in the yard, the strange car in the driveway, the stranger opening the car door.  And they all had guns.

Fear is the “legal tender” of our media world.  Here’s today’s “random” feed from my Fox News app as I write this essay.

• Mass shooting leaves at least nine people hurt at after-prom party in Texas
• Wisconsin attorney reacts to trans woman flashing male genitalia at girls in locker room
• Christian prayer warriors to attend Satanic gathering in Boston
• Dangerous Hawaii man scales razor wire fence in jail escape
• Texas cattle found dead with tongues cut out with “apparent precision”
• Backlash intensifies following transgender state lawmaker’s “hate filled” remarks
• Former Disney World employee took hundreds of “upskirt videos” (save).

Be afraid. Don’t send you kids to parties, or locker rooms.  Satanists are out to out-pray you, and dangerous criminals aren’t stopped by razor wire.  Transgendered women are full of hate, and even at Disney World the employees are perverts.  I’m not sure what’s up with the cows, but it’s pretty weird, if not scary (save).

Orientation

It’s not just about guns.  When I was a kid back in the 1960’s, homosexuality was illegal in much of the United States.  Saying you were homosexual – gay –  wasn’t illegal itself, but having physical love was against the law.  Of course there were gay people, but most were “in the closet”, rumored and secretly discussed, like the man who lived across the street in Cincinnati.  I remember being seven and trying to understand the whispered, “ He’s a man who left his wife for another man”.  

The famous Stonewall Protests weren’t until 1969, and when I started teaching a decade later, teachers still “weren’t allowed” to be gay.  Of course some were, but their secret was closely kept; open knowledge would cost them their jobs.  Americans feared what they didn’t understand.

Even in the 1990’s I was teaching when a male student had the “audacity” to come out in high school.  He was beaten up in the locker room and constantly bullied in the hallways.  It seemed that many male students, and even some of the staff, thought he “earned” the beatings by being honest about his orientation.  That was all about fear, that somehow being openly gay might cause an “epidemic of gayness”, or that he represented a threat to the other males in the school.  Even just thirty years ago, we didn’t understand the forces that drove sexuality.

It’s not that it’s easy to “come out” as a gay person now.  But there’s a lot more understanding, and a lot less institutional bias then there was just a couple of decades ago (save).

Gender

Today, transgendered kids face the same kinds of discrimination.  They face the fear of others who don’t understand, and aren’t willing to allow them to live their lives.  Some of the persecutors are folks my age, schooled that gender is all about a single ‘Y’ chromosome and genital equipment.  And parents worry – will “peer pressure” make my kid trans?  Are you kidding? Science now knows that there are dozens of factors that go into gender, and that, as difficult as it is for the “regular” world to understand, there are boys trapped in girls bodies, and girls in boys bodies (save).

But multiple state legislatures across the United States are outlawing medical care for those trapped kids. Instead of allowing the kids, their parents and doctors to determine what course they should take, legislatures are virtually requiring them to grow up in bodies that are betraying them daily.  The state legislatures are doing it to “empower” the parents, but really they are stripping them of their ability to make the best decisions for their kids.  And as for the surgical solutions – hysterectomies and castrations followed by reconstruction; there are almost none of those performed on minors in the US.  That’s the “straw-man” argument, just like the “gay child molester” boogie man.  

Legal Cruelty

It’s cruel.  We’ll look back in a score of years, and wonder just how we could have stooped so low, just as we look back at the 60’s gay laws.  We are bullying the most vulnerable, using them as political pawns; and generating fear.  And, as the transgender state legislator from Montana so eloquently put it, there will be “blood on the hands” of the lawmakers who wrote those laws.  It will be the blood of suicidal young people, forced to grow up in the wrong gender.  Some fear what they are told “not” to understand – and so they don’t.

If I were a parent, already struggling to help my transgendered child, I would be more than outraged.  Those states are not just legislating, they are putting already at-risk children in greater danger.  For parents trying to “save” their kids, that’s an unacceptable threat.

And for those legislators with future blood on their hands, it’s unconscionable.

(save)

 

Artificial Barrier

The “debt ceiling” is an artificial barrier.  It was created by Congress, and it can be altered, expanded, or abolished by Congress. But while it exists, it poses a serious hazard to the American economy.

The concept of the debt ceiling is pretty simple:  Congress sets a hard “ceiling” on the amount of debt the United States Government can have.  Once the government reaches that limit, it can no longer borrow money to cover expenses.  Since the US Government is in debt to the tune of almost $32 trillion, and is running a negative budget this year of $1.3 trillion (CBO), the practical effect of “hitting the ceiling” is the US Government will stop paying its debts.  And part of that is payments for the US Government bonds that finances debt.  In short, the US Government will default on its loans.

One thing to get very clear, is that the debt ceiling is not a “budgeting” item.  Congress operates on a “double entry” system.  They pass a law, say to build a dam.  Then they pass a second law, to spend the money to build that dam.  Twice Congress had the opportunity to NOT spend the money, the actual dam law, and then the dam finance law.  So all of the spending that causes the US Government to reach a “debt ceiling” is money already twice agreed to in the US Congress.

Dishwashers

Or to put it in more personal terms, like most Americans, we carry some debt.  We have a mortgage on the house, we have a car loan, education loans, and we have a few credit cards with debts on them.  Every time we spend money creating a debt, we make a choice.  Jenn and I chose to buy a new washing machine (the old one broke).  We spent the money to buy it.  (We chose not to replace our broken dishwasher – yet. After all, there’s only two of us…)  

But what if we said, one day, that we have hit our “debt ceiling”, and we aren’t paying on the loans or the credit cards anymore.  After all, we’ve hit a “ceiling”.

For a couple of weeks there’d be silence from the creditors.  Then would come the flurry of notices, failures to make payments, threats of debt collection and perhaps even foreclosures.  And ultimately, the full force of the law would be used to require us to pay our debts.  And meanwhile our credit rating would be trashed, and no one would allow us to borrow money from them, through loans or credit, again.  Or, if they did, they’d charge a huge cost, high interest, to protect them from the risk of our defaulting again.

Interstate Highways and Aircraft Carriers

If we didn’t want to hit the ceiling, we shouldn’t have spent the money in the first place.  Once we spent the money, and made the commitment to pay it back, anything other than paying it back is reneging on the deal.

What is the practical impact of the US Government “reneging” on its debts?  No one is going to send the “world sheriff” to foreclose on the Capitol Building.  Unlike our personal debts, they won’t be evicting the military from their bases, aircraft carriers, or repossessing the Interstate Highway system.

What will happen is that folks will no longer buy the US Bonds that finance the trillions of dollars of debt, at least at the interest rate the Treasury Department is offering.  So Treasury will have to pay more in interest to sell the bonds, costing us (both the you and me ‘us’, and the United States ‘us’) more money.  In the long run, just like personally trying to borrow money after defaulting, the “cost” of that money will be higher because the risk is higher.

That will echo throughout our financial system, as the price to borrow money goes up.  Mortgages, car loans, credit card interest rates, home improvement loans, second mortgages and flexible interest rates all will jump. 

And, of course, since the Government can’t spend money, they can’t pay workers.  We’ve been through Government shutdowns in the past (for other reasons).  Millions of workers go without paychecks, and government functions come to a standstill.  Those “essential workers” who are required to work, do it with the “faith” that they will be paid in the future, but in the meantime, they can’t pay their personal bills.  And things we depend on, from the Internal Revenue Service to the National Parks, close.

The Brink

Congress created the debt ceiling to “make a point”.  It put every legislator “on notice” that the debt was going up.  It started in 1939, after six years of the New Deal legislation to combat the Great Depression.  But it was raised for the Second World War, lowered after the War was over, then raised again for the Korean War.  Since 1960, it’s been raised seventy-eight times, forty-nine times under Republican Presidents, and twenty-eight times under Democratic Presidents (US Treasury). 

The point obviously wasn’t made.  The first debt ceiling law in 1939, placed the maximum at $45 billion.  

Both parties used the debt ceiling as a negotiating chip in the past.  But neither Party allowed the US to default on its obligations, because of the danger of catastrophic economic consequences.  In the end, leadership has avoided, “Cutting off our nose to spite our face”.  

But we live in unprecedented times.  Our era of political polarization, the tenuous hold the Republicans have on the House of Representatives, and more significantly, the slim margin that Kevin McCarthy holds on the Speakership, brings us much closer to the brink.  McCarthy knows:  Republican John Boehner lost his Speaker’s seat because he “gave in” on a debt ceiling negotiation with President Obama.   McCarthy has an even narrower margin of support than Boehner had.  

Sure we’ve got until sometime in June before we fall off the cliff.  The “wizards” of the Treasury can manipulate the debts and borrowing to keep us clear for that long.  But, come June, we will hit a “hard ceiling”.  

We, the American people, are depending on our leadership (on both sides) to find a way to step back from disaster.  Hold your breath, it’s going to be a scary “ride”.

Precedence

 The law is really all about stories of the past.  The decisions made by jurists long dead still influence our law today.  The origins of the American legal system goes all the way back to the English Courts of Assizes, the first circuit judges in the 12^th Century whose decisions set precedence that still carry weight in the English legal system, and even here in the United States.

In the 1980’s I spent a brief sojourn at the University of Cincinnati’s Law School where I made it through “Torts” class.   “Torts” are damages committed by a person against another. Today it is the basis for many of our civil law suits.  On the first day we learned this “story”.  In the 13^th century,  two boys on a hill found almost identical rocks.  Being boys, they determined to simultaneously throw their rocks over the crest of the hill. (As a teacher and coach, I found that throwing rocks was a genetic predisposition of boys, not unlike spitting off of bridges, cliffs and overhangs).  

So the rocks were launched, soon followed by a cry of pain.  The boys raced to the top of the hill to see a man on the other side with blood streaming down his face.  A rock struck him in the eye, putting it out.

Neither boy knew whose rock hit the man.  Neither did the man himself.  But he still took the boys to Court, as it was clear that one of the boys launched the rock that took his eye.  And the judge wisely determined that the boys acted with such reckless disregard for the danger of their actions they were BOTH responsible, and the man needed to be compensated for his loss.  Each boy’s father had to give the man a pig.  There is no record of how the fathers punished their sons.

And there it was:  not an “eye for an eye”, but two pigs for one. 

Cold, Hard, Cash

The second story is more recent.  In a car accident, a young man was paralyzed from the waist down.  It wasn’t his fault, but for the rest of his life, he would require special care, including hospitalizations and procedures, to deal with his paralysis.  In addition, he would never stand to be married, or “walk his potential daughter” down the aisle.  In fact, his ability to create that daughter would be especially arduous. 

So there was all the costs of his care, plus all the costs of his suffering.  And then then there were limits on how much he could earn.  He was seventeen, with a life expectancy of seventy-two years.  Add all of those care, suffering, and loss of income together – and those were the damages that his lawyer would ask in court.  It was more than two pigs.

What If

Law School is all about “what if”. Alter the facts of a case slightly, and then figure out the impact of the change. So, alter this “equation” just slightly, and make the young man a Division I Football prospect, already signed to a major university.  Now his earnings potentials are much greater, and so are the prospective damages.  It might not be “fair” to the person who caused the accident – he didn’t “intend” to hit a football star.  But he acted in the same “reckless disregard” as the two medieval boys with rocks.  And he (or his insurance company) will pay.

The moral that my Torts professor taught us was this:  in civil law, the only punishment is money.  Courts can’t make others feel the pain and anguish of paralysis, or the loss of an eye.  All Courts can do is try to recompense the injured for their damages.  And that’s all calculable, in cold, hard, cash.

Libel

Libel is a special kind of a “tort”, and the law is a bit more complicated.   It is defined in the legal “Bible”, Black’s Law Dictionary, as a, “Defamatory statement published through any manner or media.”  Libel is a lie, that “defames” someone or something.  But libel often runs up against the American “black letter law” of the First Amendment, guaranteeing freedom of the press.  So if someone goes on the news and tells lies about someone else, they might be subject to libel, but the news broadcaster might not be.  

What if a news broadcaster intentionally lies about someone (or something), and does it with full “knowledge aforethought” and malice (the intent to harm someone). Or maybe they have that same reckless disregard for the truth of the two boys throwing the stones. Then they can be held accountable for their libelous statements.  And like the poor one-eyed man, or the paralyzed seventeen year-old athlete, the damages are calculable in cold, hard, cash.

We Know

We now know that Fox News broadcasters intentionally, willfully, and with “full knowledge aforethought” lied about the Dominion voting machines in the 2020 election.  They did it, because the lies improved their ratings, kept their viewership, and therefore maintained their profits.   They not only lied, but they did it for their own financial benefit.

It wasn’t just about Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, and other the sad Trump lawyers appearing on Fox News and telling their lies over and over again.  It’s that the Fox News personnel knew that they were lying, and continued to amplify those lies.  We have the texts, even recordings, where Fox New personnel acknowledged the lies, and that they were doing it to continue their profits – “malice aforethought”.

Get What You Need  

I know that many of those politically “aligned” with me are disappointed today.  We were all hoping for a weeks-long flagellation of Fox News by the Dominion lawyers. But yesterday, as the Court prepared for opening statements, Fox and Dominion settled. There will be no weeks of airing Fox News impropriety, no Tucker Carlson on the stand admitting to his lies.  But remember, it’s a civil case.  No one, not even Rupert Murdock himself, would ever go to jail from this case.  So we should take this “win”.   

Fox Corporation is going to “for sure” pay Dominion (and its lawyers)  $787.5 MILLION.  And they’re going to do it soon, not in a few years, but in months.  Sure Dominion asked for $1.6 Billion, and there was the potential for even more in punitive damages.  But Dominion has the right to determine the “value” of their “eye”.  And if $787.5 MILLION makes them “whole” – then good for them.

Fox News may never admit the lie, but they sure as Hell are paying for it.  To quote the Stones, “You can’t always get what you want. But if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.”

High Priests

When I was a younger man, I thought of the Supreme Court as a kind of “Temple of the Law”.  I saw the Justices as the “high priests” of American jurisprudence, bringing their differing views of the Constitution to the table to have “learned” discussions about what our Law should be.  They had carefully orchestrated private sessions, held around the table and strictly regulated by protocols developed over centuries.  It was almost a religious experience, like the Christian Council of Nicaea.  

No staff, no prompts, no outside influence allowed.  The most “junior” Justice did the housekeeping “chores”, getting the water and closing the doors.  And around this exalted table, from the Chief to the most Senior then down the list, they gave their views, and listened to each other.

And after that first conference, the Chief would call for a preliminary vote.  If he was in the majority, he assigned a Justice to write an opinion (or took it himself).  If he wasn’t, then the most Senior Justice in the majority would make that decision.  It was ethereal, almost like the angels determining the pathways of heaven.  

Battles of Intellect

As I grew wiser, I realized that many of these Justices held fierce views, and had other influences in their lives.  Some were former Governors or Senators, one even a President.  Of course they brought a keen sense of politics to the table, a better understanding of the results of their actions in the “real” world, down from the “Mt. Olympus” on Capitol Hill.  

The “most activist” Court of the 1950’s and 60’s, was led by a former Republican Governor of California, Earl Warren.  Among the members of his Court:   Senator Hugo Black, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission William O. Douglas, Harvard Professor and founder of the ACLU Felix Frankfurter, Attorney General Tom Clark and former NFL Player Byron “Whizzer” White.

Even into the 1990’s and early 2000’s, there was still the view of the Court as a battlefield of intellectual prowess and conviction.  There was the “great conservative” Antonin Scalia, versus the “great liberal” Ruth Bader Ginsburg. They had battles of will and intellect, tempered by a best friendship outside of the building.   They brought their “best” to the Court, and fought fiercely for their view of America.

Tattered Robes

Sure there were “hiccups”. Justice Abe Fortas, nominated for “Chief” by President Johnson in 1968, was taking $20,000 as an annual retainer from Wall Street corporate raider and convicted felon Louis Wolfson.   While that wasn’t illegal, it definitely was unethical.  Ultimately Fortas resigned under pressure from the Republican Nixon administration, who were anxious to get a liberal off the bench for a more conservative voice.  

$20,000 a year:  that’s “chump change” compared to today’s Court.  I’ll get to that soon enough.

The “holiness” seemed to fade as the appointment process became uglier.  Nixon had his troubles replacing Fortas (paybacks – for sure).  Then there was the infamous late 1980’s Reagan appointment of Robert Bork, a devout conservative, that became an ideological battleground in the US Senate.  Led by Senator Ted Kennedy and a younger Joe Biden, the Democrat majority refused Bork’s nomination.  It was “hardball” politics, without the façade of politeness.  It was soon followed by the Bush Administration’s nomination of Clarence Thomas, accused of sexual impropriety.  Bork failed to win approval, but the Biden-led committee ultimately approved Thomas for the Court.  From then on, politics were raw and open in Court appointments.

Ideology and Law

The big change in the US Supreme Court is that now that the law seems to comes second, ideology comes first.  An avowed political group, the Federalist Society, wraps the law around to advocate for their own political beliefs.  The concept of precedent, one of the “holiest of holy” precepts of American Law, is tossed aside to achieve seemingly political ends.  (To my remaining conservative friends who read these essays, I freely admit that precedent definitely favored MY views, not the Federalist Society’s). 

The nomination hearings for some recent Justices of either “side” were tame, like Sonja Sotomayor, Neil Gorsuch, and Katanji Brown-Jackson.  But there also was the contentious hearing for Amy Conan Barrett, and the accusations of sexual misconduct, tears and beers about Brett Kavanaugh.

Under the Robe

But we got a revealing look at the pockets under the robe with recent reporting on the financial actions of Justice Clarence Thomas.  He took millions of dollars in free vacations from conservative “friend” Harlan Crow, and even sold his mother’s house to him (his mother is still living there).  Oh, and Crow also provided the funds to start Ginny Thomas’s conservative political action committee (the Justice’s wife).  If $20,000 a year was enough to force Abe Fortas out, then Thomas is definitely far beyond that (inflation included).

Don’t expect him to resign.  Besides Thomas’s obvious hubris about ethical concerns, there is a “world” of conservative pressure to keep their most Senior and devout member on the Court.  That’s especially since a Biden replacement would make Chief Justice Roberts the “swing” vote again.  Robert’s is as conservative as they come, but more concerned with precedent and the moral standing of the Court, than the current majority of Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Barrett and Kavanaugh.

High on the Hog

It’s kind of ironic.  89 year-old Senator Diane Feinstein of California is recovering from shingles.  She’s missed almost two months of attendance in the Senate, and fifty-four Senate votes (though she is working from home).  Some of her fellow Democrats from California are calling for her resignation.  Her absence is holding up Democratic nominees to lower Federal Court benches.  While Feinstein isn’t resigning, she voluntarily allowed her seat on the Judicial Committee to be temporarily reassigned to another Democrat.  If Senate procedures won’t allow that, and she isn’t ready to return, don’t be surprised to hear Democratic calls for her resignation increase.

But Thomas, with daily reports about even more ethical violations, stands firm.  And so does his party.  Personal ethics aren’t an issue to today’s Republican Party leadership.  Anything is fair game, as long as Thomas continues to push their agenda.  The sanctity of the “Temple of the Law” ain’t what it used to be.  One of the “high priests” is living “high on the hog”. 

Memes

There’s a meme going around on Facebook.  

            “A Rock in bad hands killed Abel.

              A Rock in good hands killed Goliath.

              It’s not about the Rock.”

The National Rifle Association is holding their annual convention this weekend in Indianapolis.  Just an aside:  you have to go through a metal detector to get into the Convention hall to hear Trump or Pence; no personal guns allowed in there.

The NRA’s famous “gun rights” claim is:  “The best protection from a ‘bad guy’ with a gun, is a ‘good guy’ with a gun.” 

That definitely was true in Nashville and Louisville in the last couple weeks.  The “good guys” stopped the killing, responding immediately and courageously to mass shooters.  One rookie Louisville police officer is still in the hospital.  But it didn’t save the six already dead in Nashville, or the five in Louisville.  And that didn’t work out for the twenty-one kids and teachers in Uvalde, Texas.  The “good guys” stacked in the hallway for an hour, unwilling to take out the “bad guy”.  Meanwhile, kids bled out from their wounds.

How Many Rocks

To push the “Rock in hand” analogy a little bit farther, try this.

“A fight in a gravel pit uses rocks.

  A fight in a sand pit uses sand. 

  Sand is ‘safer’ than ‘rocks’.

 Don’t fight in a gravel pit.”  

And that’s where we are in the United States today.  We live in a “gravel pit” of guns, with 1.2 guns per person, all 334,625,932 of us.  For us non-math majors, that’s over 400 million guns in the United States.  We don’t live in “gravel pit”, we’re buried in gravel.  No wonder the weapon of choice in the United States, from gang-bangers to mass murderers to suicides, is guns.

It’s not that other countries don’t have mental illness, crime, gangs, suicides, or even wars.  It’s that they are in a “sand pit”, not a gravel pit.  There are fewer guns.  Canada, for example, has .34 guns per person.  Even in Yemen, wracked with civil war and battling with Saudi Arabia; .53 guns per person.   

And of course, we don’t just have guns, we sell guns designed for warfare.  The “assault style” rifle (yes, I know AR originally stood for Armalite) was designed for war.  The “trick” was a rifle that would be light and efficient.  But the real “value” of assault weapons in war:  the wounds created by these rifles were devastating, disabling the wounded and requiring massive and immediate care.  When someone got hit by the high velocity round from an assault rifle, they were “taken out” of the battle, and so were a couple of others to care for them. 

There are eleven stores where I can buy “my” rifle within twenty minutes of the house.  I not only live in the gravel pit, but I can easily access the “big rocks”.  So can everyone else.

Books not Rocks

The NRA claims that if “everyone” had a gun, our Nation would be much safer.  But we know that’s just not true.  Statistics aside; if we were all safer, then people wouldn’t be so scared.  But we know that many Americans are afraid:  afraid of strangers, afraid to go to the mall or the city, afraid to send their kids to school. 

 Here in our community, we just had a big “dust-up” about temporarily moving the public library into part of a school building.  The concern – that the library threatened the safety of the kids in that school.  And you know what?  After months of discussions, the library was temporarily moved — somewhere else.  Why is the library such a threat?  We live in a gravel pit, and we need to fortify our schools against any “stones”.  Even the public library, is now a threat.  Who thought books were so threatening?  

Out of the Pit

I know, “…the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”.  I’ve already written about the Constitutional dilemma of taking a single phrase out of full context, but the reality is this.  We, the American people, can regulate guns.  We can regulate the size, the style, the numbers and styles of bullets.  And we can regulate the gun owners, including their “qualifications” to own and use guns. 

 Supreme Court Justice Jackson (and others) noted that the Constitution is not a suicide pact.  But for thousands, 12,237 in the United States in 2023 to date, our current interpretation of the Second Amendment is a literal suicide pact.  In fact, half of those deaths were actually suicides (Gun Violence Archive). If gravel is killing our children, then get them out of the gravel.  Gun violence is the leading cause of death for children in the United States (New England Journal).  

It’s time to start crawling out of the pit.

Essays on Guns

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

Runaway Train

Our Nation is on a “runaway train” of events.  Just now, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld part of the abortion drug ban of an extremist Texas Federal Judge.  It’s not the nationwide ban he called for, but it still limits access to the drug, Mifepristone, that’s been used for over twenty years and shown to be safer than Tylenol and Viagra.

Monday, we got started with another mass shooting, this time in Louisville, this time a bank.  The common theme is what we’ve heard over and over again:  a young white man, an assault “AR-type” rifle, untreatable wounds.  Five died, more wounded, including the two young police officers who heroically confronted the shooter within minutes.  They did their “job”:  one officer sworn in just days before, was shot in the head.

US secrets about Ukraine were leaked to the open internet. Donald Trump is back in New York for another court action and trying to silence Michael Cohen with a massive lawsuit.   President Biden is rejoicing in his Irish ancestral homeland, and there’s an internal Democratic spat over Senator Feinstein’s absence.  It’s hard to catch your breath, difficult to keep up.

New York Minute

But let’s pause for a second (maybe a New York minute), and look back at what’s happening in Nashville.  Last week, the super-majority Republicans in the Tennessee State Legislature expelled two young Black men who represent parts of Nashville and Memphis.  The two Democrats had the audacity to join children protesting the lack of any gun regulations in Tennessee, after three nine year-olds and three adults were killed in a school shooting.  Justin Pearson and Justin Jones took to the “well” of the chamber along with White representative Gloria Johnson to join in the chants for change (see last week’s essay, Tennessee).

The Republicans voted to expel Pearson and Jones.  Johnson narrowly remained in her seat.  The point was obvious:  young Black men in the Tennessee State Legislature should barely be seen, and never heard.  The Leadership of the House seemed to take pleasure in removing them.

That created a national firestorm.  The “Justins” (the signs read “No Justin, No Peace”) were vaulted to national prominence.  Not only did the old Republicans in Tennessee make them martyrs to the civil rights cause, but the Tennessee Democratic Party was reinvigorated with both energy and funds.  The Democratic controlled local governments in Nashville and Memphis, charged with filling the interim open seats, reappointed the Justins.

Republican Leadership

On Monday Justin Jones paraded from the Nashville City Hall to the Tennessee Capitol in a triumphant return.  Yesterday Justin Pearson was reappointed in Memphis and paraded through that city. He will return to the Capitol today.   By the end of the week, both will be back in the small minority of Democrats in the Tennessee legislature.  And the Republican leadership has to answer the question: what was the point?

Surely all of this was foreseeable, even to them.  Regardless of their political viewpoints, Justin Jones and Justin Pearson are charismatic and politically seasoned, able to take clear advantage of what the “old white men” of the Tennessee legislature decided.  The protests, the parades, the rallies on the Capitol steps and the reinstatements – all were perfectly obvious to anyone with a sense of Tennessee’s political climate. 

Representative Johnson claims it was out of sheer pique.  The Republican leadership lost control of “their” House when the three went to the rostrum “in the well” and began chanting.  The great “capital sin” was that they were “out of order”, violating the “decorum” of the House.  That the three would dare do such a thing was so outrageous that expulsion was their only remedy.  Johnson sees the action as simply wielding the absolute authority that a super-majority of Republicans have, regardless of the consequences; the hubris of power.

The Script

In a larger sense, the Tennessee super-majority is simply following the “script” of the National Republican Party.  Their national answer is to “double-down” on power, and on the small base of Republicans who believe that somehow protests, by minorities and more particularly by Black people; are un-American.  Catering to the White, soon-to-be minority base, is the essence of the MAGA philosophy that dominates Republican politics today.  It abandons any pretense at a “middle ground” political view. Just demonstrate ruthless power and control, and satisfy those voters who are terrified of changing demographics.  

It is not just “Trump” politics, it is the governing strategy of DeSantis and Florida and Abbot in Texas.  The ruthlessness isn’t just seen in heavy-handed legislative action and gerrymandering to protect Republican seats.  Abbot is begging for the opportunity to pardon a White man who was convicted of murder for shooting a Black man with a gun in a protest.  DeSantis is scrubbing the Florida public school curriculum for references to race.  Like the House leaders in Tennessee, it just seems extreme to crazy.

The danger is, that, at least for the short-term, it works.  And, of course, that’s the point.

Carville

James Carville is a strange guy.  He is the famous (infamous) political operative behind the Bill Clinton successes:  but Carville’s bald dome, often covered by a Marine or LSU baseball cap; angular body and almost incomprehensible Louisiana accent makes him – well – eccentric.  Carville made his reputation in the 1990’s Clinton campaigns, but since has built a career as a progressive international campaign operative.  

Carville is known for “Carville-isms”.  And one of his most quoted applies to Presidential campaigns:  “It’s the economy, stupid”.  

Economic History

Carville knew in 1992 and 1996 that the condition of the American economy played into the hands of his empathetic but flawed candidate.  In 1992, President George HW Bush was fresh off victory in the First Iraq War, but had a nation suffering in recession.  That recession triggered the third party candidacy of Ross Perot, who likely syphoned enough votes from the incumbent to clinch a Clinton victory.  War victories aside, it was, “…the economy stupid”. 

John Kerry ran into that same struggle in the Presidential election of 2004.  The Nation was three years past 9-11.  While George W Bush showed tremendous leadership at that time, by 2004 we were mired in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Kerry, a Democrat who made his original reputation as an anti-Vietnam War veteran, was leading in many polls up to the last few weeks of October.

But, after the economic crash of the 9-11 attacks, the United States recovered nicely.  The economy was humming along in 2004 for the Bush Administration, and Bush was re-elected to the Presidency in spite of his foreign policy misadventures.  It was, “…the economy, stupid”. 

Today’s Economy

With all of that, you’d think Republicans could feel good about the upcoming 2024 Presidential elections. Biden managed to ride out the Covid economic disaster, but the “treatment” that  sustained the economy through 2020 and 2021 is now exacting a cost.  The stock market that dropped over 15,000 points in 2020, almost half its value, rebounded back to within 2000 points of the 2019 peak.  Unemployment dropped from over 10% to a fifty-year low of less than 4%.  

But the price of the “cure” was inflation.  Prices surged up, first from the imbalance of supply and demand, then from increases in wages.  While the rate of inflation has slowed now, Americans are still looking at soaring energy, housing, and food prices.  If that remains the case next year, it would be great material for Republican Presidential candidates. “It’s the economy stupid”.

The one thing any Republican candidate should do, is focus on that issue.  Anything else becomes a distraction to the shared experiences that every American citizen can relate to:  buying groceries, filling up the gas tank, or paying the electric bill.  Whether Republicans can really do anything about that is questionable, but they can definitely lay the blame at Biden’s feet.

But that’s not what’s happening. 

Wedge Issue

Instead, Republicans have opened a “whole can of worms” (worms really do come in cans – Amazon) of “wedge issues”.  Wedge issues divide voters, pushing them to take an absolute position on one side or another.  There is little room for moderation when it comes to wedge issues, instead, there is polarization with a chasm of emptiness in between. 

Three issues where Republicans have “doubled down” on divisive issues:  abortion rights, guns, and race.  

The Trump appointed Supreme Court erased fifty years of women’s rights by overruling the Roe abortion decision.  Instead of setting a new standard, the Court “punted” the issue, sending the question of if-or-when a woman can get an abortion to the individual states.  So now the United States is a mish-mash of abortion regulations.  Some states are even attempting to regulate the travel of their citizens, criminalizing attempts to leave the state to get abortion care.  And, now in Texas, a renegade Federal Judge is trying to nationally outlaw one of the two primary drugs used for medical abortions.

The Republican stand on abortion led “Red-Red” Kansas to vote down a state constitutional amendment to ban abortions, elected an entire slate of Democrats to the Michigan executive branch, and last week turned the determining seat in the Wisconsin Supreme Court to a progressive.  It’s been a political “loser”, with the exception of motivating the 30% Republican base.  And it has motivated even more the Democratic base, women and younger voters, to come out and make their opposition heard.  Last I checked, you can’t win with only 30% (that’s a “Dahlman-ism”).

Guns and Minorities

The Republican stand on guns is doing a similar thing.  While most Americans, including gun owners, would accept moderate regulation of who can have guns, the Republican state legislatures have gone to the far extreme.  States like Ohio and Florida (and Tennessee and Kentucky) are voting full “Constitutional Carry” laws, with no requirements at all for publicly carrying a firearm.  This absolute position is pushing moderates to the Democratic side, in light of the almost daily dose of mass shootings.  You can’t win with only 30%.

And Republican actions on minority and LGBTQ issues are polarizing to the extreme.  Last week’s action by the Tennessee state legislature, expelling two Black legislators, is reminiscent of the 1950’s and 60’s segregation fights.  And constant attacks on city governments, local prosecutors (like Manhattan and Atlanta) all have racial overtones.  Add that to the drumbeat of anti-LGBTQ legislation sweeping through Republican controlled legislatures nationwide, and again the Republican’s seem to be the party of extremists, doubling-down to their base but ignoring everyone else.  You can’t win with only 30%.

Big Picture

So here we are, 18 months out from the 2024 elections.  From this vantage point it looks like a rematch of Biden and Trump, one that ought to be winnable for Republicans should the economic situation remain the same.  But their focus on all of these polarizing issues takes their message “off the ball”.  Sure it might be good for maintaining their base, and it certainly for the Republican primaries.  But they are missing the big picture.  They can’t win with 30%.

And that’s fine with me.

Russian Gamble

It’s been more than a year since Russia, a sovereign nation, invaded Ukraine, another sovereign nation.  The world, and clearly Russian President Putin most of all, thought the war would be over in a few days.  His goal was a lightning strike at the capital, Kyiv; take out the President and the government; and replace them with a Pro-Russian Ukrainian regime.  You can be sure he had an entire government ready to take office.

A lightning strike, so quick that the only reaction that NATO and the United States could make would be to strengthen the NATO countries’ borders, and protest loudly in the world.  Putin was willing to accept the punishment, economic sanctions, in return for total control of Ukraine.   NATO would be faced with a  de-facto Russian victory.  Their only military alternative would be all-out war, something that no one in NATO would legitimately contemplate.

Called Bet

As we now know, the Russian “gamble” failed.  Everyone, including Putin himself, over-estimated the strength of the Russian Army.  We saw the results:  Russian commanders using cell-phones that targeted their location for Ukrainian attack; Russian forces unprepared for anything more than an “exercise” in Ukraine; Russian logistics completely unable to supply their forces.  As it turned out, the strategy was “lightning strike” or nothing.

And, as it turned out, the Ukrainian forces were willing to sacrifice for their homeland.  Russia with the second most powerful army in the world, failed against the 27^th ranked power, behind Thailand, Spain and Indonesia (CEO).  That resistance gave the United States and NATO the opportunity to pour support into Ukraine, creating the supply chain their Army needed to withstand a long-term slog against the tired Russian forces.  

World War I

What was supposed to be Putin’s “brilliant strike” both at Ukraine and NATO, turned into an unending slog of forces.  It wasn’t like the great victorious tank battles of the Soviet forces in World War II.  It turned into the ugly slow-motion slogging of trench warfare and artillery of World War I.  The Soviets ultimately won the Second World War, but the First cost the Russian monarchy their thrones, and their lives.

So here we are, on the cusp of the second set of “spring campaigns”.  Russia is trying to consolidate the existing gains in the eastern province of Luhansk and Donetsk, and even more importantly, keep the southern province of Crimea.   Ukraine, on the other hand, is looking to take back as much territory as possible, including perhaps invading into Crimea, where the Russian Southern Fleet is based at Sevastopol.  Putin could find a way to justify losing parts of the Eastern Provinces, but he can’t stand losing Crimea and his only warmwater port.

So the United States and NATO can celebrate – Russia is not the formidable foe we all thought they were.  But we shouldn’t forget that while the Russian forces are still using the battle tactics of mass attack – throwing untrained troops into the slaughter to overwhelm their opponents – there are still some things Russians are very good at.  One of those is internet mis-information.

St Petersburg

We know Russia was able to intervene in the  US Presidential election in 2016, sowing discontent and amplifying one side against the other.  Russian social media agents even arranged real rallies, and worked to reduce Democratic voter turnout.  Their success may not have been determinative:  the 2016 election was so close that almost anything might be the critical turning point.  But there is no question that the operatives in St. Petersburg had a significant impact.

They haven’t gone away.   This week several classified US documents appeared in “alternative” social media.  The documents showed Ukrainian troop concentrations and supply status, and were labeled “Top Secret”.  But the documents oddly have specific errors included in them, errors that would not have been part of the original Pentagon produced reports (NPR).

Stolen or Fake

Are they really stolen documents, taken from the Pentagon?  Or were they somehow leaked by the United States, either through carelessness, or to pursue some intelligence objective.  Or are they doctored by Russian Intelligence and placed by the St. Petersburg team.  Is this just another Russian operation to make the US look foolish, unable to hold onto its most classified secrets?  Is the goal to drive a wedge between the US and the Ukrainians, or the rest of NATO? 

Because – if these were real Top Secret Documents – why would there be obvious errors in them?

Surprise

The Russian tank forces aren’t what they used to be.  And while Russian soldiers are as brave as ever, their commanders still seem willing to wantonly waste their lives on the battlefield.  Russian killed and wounded in Ukraine are estimated to be near 200,000 (NYT).  Russian communications have improved since the beginning of the conflict, but at the cost of as many as fourteen Russian Generals.  

But Russian cyber-warfare capabilities are still powerful, one of the top five most powerful in the world (Secure World).  Don’t be surprised to find that the Top Secret document story is more complicated than just a “spy” in the Pentagon.  

The Ukraine Crisis

• How Good Are They – 4/10/23
• Marking Territory – 3/15/23
• Ukraine and America – 2/28/23
• Kherson – 11/14/22
• When Winter Calls – 9/12/22
• A Full Plate – 7/26/22
• Ukrainian Independence – 6/30/22
• No Victory Day – 5/10/22
• Desperate Moves – 4/27/22
• This is the Time – 4/20/22
• The Winning Message – 4/18/22
• Victory Day – 4/12/22
• Chapter Two – 4/11/22
• Zelenskyy’s Choice – 3/31/22
• The Gaffe – 3/28/22
• Putin’s Choice – 3/27/22
• Far Away From the Front – 3/20/22
• The Next Step – 3/17/22
• Thinking the Unthinkable – 3/14/22
• Russian Oil – 3/11/22
• Kyiv’s Choice – 3/8/22
• The Logic of Madness – 3/7/22
• Lights Out – 3/6/22
• Ante Up – 3/3/22
• State of the Union  3/2/22
• The Guns of March 3/1/22
• Sanctions 2/26/22
• What Happens Next 2/24/22
• The Games Begin  2/22/22
• Talking with a Friend 2/18/22
• Trip Wire 2/2/22
• On the Brink 1/23/22
• The Ukrainian Dilemma 12/5/19

Values

A friend of mine brought a recent Wall Street Journal (NORC) poll to my attention (WSJ – paywall).  The headline reads:

 America Pulls Back from Values that Once Defined It, WSJ-NORC Poll Finds

 Patriotism, religion, and hard work hold less importance.

The polling contrasts results over the past twenty-five years to how important Americans find the following:

• Patriotism – down 32% (1998 70%, 2019 60%, 2023  38%)
• Religion  – down 23% (1998 – 62%, 2023 – 39%)
• having children – down 20% (1998 – 50%, 2023 30%)
• community involvement – down 35% since 2019 (1998 46%, 2019, 61%, 2023 24%)
• tolerance for others down -22% (1998 80%, 2023 58%)
• Hard Work – down 13% (1998 75%, 2023 62%)
• money – up 10% (1998 31%, 2023 43%).

Note – 2019 results included when it marked a significant change in the polling track.

The numbers seem almost “apocalyptic” for American civilization.  The “top line”: values that make America into America are drifting away.  We are becoming (or maybe already are) a nation of narcissists; valuing family, religion, community, and country less; and unwilling to work hard for a living.  In fact, the only thing we seem to value more is money.  It is a statistical argument to show that the “idyllic” America of the past is gone.

But let’s analyze some alternatives to this “end of America as we know it”. 

Polling 

First of all, we need to recognize that polling in and of itself is dramatically different.  In 1998, polling consisted of human beings calling other human beings in their homes on land lines.  In 2023 (and 2019) polling is “robo” polling, trying to reach folks on cell phones where the answerer is unlikely to pick up a number they don’t recognize.  Polling in 1998 was a direct interaction, but polling today tends to only reach those most motivated to be polled.  

So pollsters cannot depend simply on “large numbers” to reach an accurate conclusion in their polling data. Instead, they create a “model” of the population they are polling, then call until they reach enough folks that match the factors in the model they are looking for.  So if the “model” is inaccurate, so are the results.  

We know this is true, because here in 2023 we are well aware that polls can be surprisingly wrong.  We’ve seen it in election after election, really since 2012, when polling seemed “certain” but the election outcomes were very different.  And we know that there are partisan polling organizations (not NORC) that intentionally skew polls for their own political purposes.

Not only has it made Americans very wary of polls, but it also shakes American’s confidence in our electoral process.  Since polling results and election results are often so different, it raises the specter of some failure on one side or the other.  That specter is inflamed by politicians claiming election fraud.  Is it the polls, or the ballots?  Americans in 2023 are uncertain.  That’s two American institutions we don’t trust.

Patriotism

According to the poll, patriotism declined, slowly by 10% over twenty years, then dramatically 22% in the past four years.  Accepting those numbers, there are two huge factors in this decline:  “MAGA-ism” and Covid.  

Covid put Americans in a difficult “patriotic” bind.  Was it “patriotic” to isolate, wear masks, and get vaccinations; all to protect your family, community and Nation?  Or was it “patriotic” to demand the “freedom” to gather, go maskless, and ignore vaccinations?  Both sides claim to be representing the “best” of America.  But only one side claimed the trappings of patriotism, flags and Constitutional language (you can’t take my RIGHTS!).  The other side based its argument on science and humanity, not necessarily protecting themselves and others for “God and Country”.

“MAGA-ism” created much the same patriotic dilemma.  The MAGA figurehead, Donald Trump, literally wrapped himself in the flag, “…Proud to be an American…”, and told Americans that they were losing their nation, their religions (white Christianity), their jobs and their future.  Flying the Star Spangled Banner in front of your house largely became symbolic for a particular political view (though it still flies proudly from my front porch).  

So this dramatic drop in “patriotism” in the past three years might have more to do with the working definition of current patriotism, than actual love and willingness to sacrifice for country.  Patriotism to many seems synonymous with extreme nationalism, so those who don’t agree with that would not define themselves as patriotic.  On the other hand, I would argue that acts of American patriotism include the Black Lives Matter marches of 2020, the fierce stand of the two young legislators in Tennessee last week, and the huge increase in women and young people turning out to vote.  They just don’t describe themselves as “patriots”.  

Institutions

Many Americans lost trust in our “institutions”.  That’s not just restricted to government institutions like the FBI or the Boards of elections.  Public schools are under increasing fire, as are local governments, and police departments all over the country.  Our current political climate undermines institutional trust from both sides.  In addition, we have discovered betrayal from “trusted” institutions from major churches to Little League Baseball to the Boy Scouts.  Not only were children molested, but those institutions played a large role in protecting the molesters.  

So it should be little wonder that Americans are losing “faith” in institutions, and particularly organized religion.  Those institutions often are involved in the fraught political issues of our time, right or wrong.  When church members found themselves in political conflict with their own “religion”, many walked away.  So, like the question of patriotism, the question of religion might well be more a matter of definition.  Is religion a “going to church” thing, or is religion a question of faith?  The NORC poll doesn’t make that distinction. 

Community

The “hidden number” in the poll is involvement in community.  That increased 15% from 1998 to 2019, then crashed 37% in the past four years.  The obvious answer to that is Covid.  Americans stopped being involved in their community for over a year of shutdowns in the pandemic.  In that time, we “lost” the habit, not just of community involvement, but of many other kinds of social interaction.   Even movie theatres haven’t recovered from the pandemic.  

Folks changed their lifestyles in “lockdown”, and not just in their views of their community.  They also became less tolerant of others as they sat in the social media-fed isolation, and found less motivation to “work hard” at their computer screens, or were put at risk as “essential workers”.  Lockdown isolation certainly encouraged narcissism (the importance of “money” versus “hard work”).  It’s not the whole reason for that polling, but it’s a significant factor.

Apples and Oranges

America is a very different place then it was in 1998.  That was before the Clinton Impeachment, before the attack on 9-11, and before the election of the first African-American President.  America fought a war in Iraq based on a false accusation, and the longest war in American history in Afghanistan.  Oh, and then there was that thing called the internet and social media.

The definitions that made “sense” in 1998; patriotism, religion, family and work aren’t the same as many have today.  So to make comparisons based on those “words” may well be comparing apples and oranges, rather than potatoes and potatoes.  In spite of the flaws in polling in 2023, even if the results are accurate, the pollsters may not be asking the right questions. 

With all of that, I think the“demise” of America is highly exaggerated.  

Imperfect Union

When James Madison wrote the Preamble to the Constitution, he used a grammatically odd phrase.  He wrote:  “We the People, of the United States of America, in order to form a more perfect union…”(italics added).  More perfect:  how does a “perfect” thing become “more perfect”?  Isn’t perfect just that; perfection unable to be better because it is the best?

Madison was a Virginian, a white man who enslaved other humans at Montpelier, his plantation.  He was well aware of his own imperfections, and that the representatives of the thirteen diverse states created a document that was far from perfect.  It was full of compromises.  It accepted the inherent evils of enslavement and usurpation of Native lands. And, it balanced conflicting powers and interests.   Madison well knew that the Constitution was not the end, but the beginning of a National journey in government.  It was not perfect.  But he established our great national goal:  to strive to become “more perfect”.  A worthy goal even though established by flawed, less than perfect men.

It is one of my favorite phrases describing our history and our present:  a flawed nation of flawed individuals striving to become “more perfect”.  After Thursday, we have a lot of “perfecting” to do.

Evil at Work

A couple of weeks ago, an armed individual shot her way into a Christian elementary school in Nashville.  She killed three adults and three nine year-old children, and was ultimately killed herself by rapidly responding Nashville police.  Perhaps the most haunting security video shows her shooting her way through the locked glass doors, then stalking the hallways looking for victims.  Regardless of her mental state, the video shows cold-blooded evil at work.

Nashville is the capital of Tennessee, and the Capitol Building became the focus of righteous protest.  Citizens; mothers and fathers and children themselves, demanded that the state legislature do something to protect children in their schools.  They made their voices heard in the public hallways and galleries of the building. Ultimately some of the protestors refused to leave the Capitol property, and forty-three were arrested by the Tennessee State Police.  

In the midst of these protests, three Tennessee legislators, two young Black male legislators and one white woman, joined the parents and children in the state legislative chamber demanding that changes should be made.  Tennessee Republicans have a super-majority in the legislature (gerrymandering works), but these three legislators were all part of the minority Democrats.  After the protests were over, that majority held them accountable for violating the “decorum” of the House.

Expulsion

The ultimate penalty for violating “decorum” is expulsion from the legislature.  But expulsion is a seldom used penalty.  Child molesters, domestic abusers, and even members who urinated on other member’s seats (really?) were allowed to stay in the body.  But for the audacity to join children in protest, the Republican majority demanded that the three Democratic members be expelled.

The protests were about gun control and protecting children in schools.  The Tennessee Republicans are in the thrall of the Second Amendment and the gun powers, and are unwilling to take any steps to further restrict gun access.  Tennessee doesn’t even have “Red Flag” laws that allow courts to keep guns away from the mentally ill.  So, America thought that the expulsions were all about guns and the power of the gun lobbies.  But we were wrong.

After the expulsion “trials” were over, and the Republican expellers’ lectured the Democrats (“…you don’t understand…” the ‘you’ that symbolizes ‘your kind’) how sacrosanct the decorum rules were, the legislature voted.  By overwhelming majorities they removed the two representatives from Nashville and Memphis, both Black men.  Justin Jones is twenty-eight, Justin Pearson twenty-nine.  But the Tennessee Republicans were unable to reach the two-thirds majority necessary to expel Gloria Johnson, a fifty-one year old white woman from Knoxville.

Racism

It became obvious.  The “old (and not so old) white men” of the Tennessee legislature weren’t so worried about gun protests.  They were incensed at the audacity of two young Black men.  This wasn’t about guns, or school safety, or children.  This was about the “snake under the table” of American history.  It was all about racism.  

Ten years ago, even the Republican super-majority of the Tennessee legislature wouldn’t have dared act so blatantly.  Ten years ago, there was still a veneer of modernity, of a Nation beyond the ugly white supremacy of our past.  The black and white films of the 1960’s protests on the Edmund Pettis Bridge, and of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis, Tennessee; were just that – past, a part of our history, before we were more “perfected”.  But like the dried bandage on a bloody wound, the Republican super-majority of the Tennessee legislature has made it clear. They ripped the bandage off to reveal their truth: young Black men should seldom be seen and never, ever, heard.  Racism lives.

This should be the part where I talk about “… The arc of moral history is long but bends towards justice”.    And Dr. King was right.  But it feels like the arc is bending the wrong way right now.  We seem far, far from our perfect union.

Classroom Rules

I write political essays.  While (hopefully) many are educational, and a few are just “story time”, most are outright, blatant, political commentary.  I spent twenty-eight years in a classroom, making sure my students felt I was a neutral party in our political conversations.  Often, I would take a side that was opposite to my personal opinion.  Sometimes it was to bolster a minority view in the class, to empower them to express their views.  Sometimes it was because there was no opposing opinion expressed – someone had to represent the “other side”.  

My classroom rule was to “cherish” every opinion.  That was the goal, to make sure my classroom was a place where students could freely express themselves.  It was all about teaching good citizenship, the ability to analyze issues and reach a “considered” opinion.  The only rule was no “ad hominen” arguments.  No one was “stupid”, no group was “dumb”.  We gently discussed racism and gender roles; conservative and liberal philosophies; and the hot issues of our time from the Iran hostages to 9-11 to the abuses at Abu Gharib.  

I don’t envy today’s teachers.  Just from my brief “substitute teacher” experiences, the battle lines are so hardened that it’s difficult to get students to listen to each other.  As a substitute,  I don’t have the rapport with a class to even attempt those kinds of discussions. But even reading a story about a man who accidently gained absolute physical power somehow ended in current politics.  When I evoked the saying, “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” several students muttered “Biden” under their breath.  I didn’t go any further – it’s 2023 an era when that kind of open discussion could get out of control – or get substitutes “removed” from the sub list.

Essaying

There are two ways people can read my current thoughts.  Some 2,640 “subscribe” and  get every essay in their email, either from the WordPress program I use, or directly from me.  And then I “publish” on social media, Facebook and Twitter, publicly putting my views “out there”.  

And, oddly perhaps, I still try to follow the “classroom rules” of old.  Sometimes the essays generate discussions.  We’ve had good “talks” about gun violence and Ukraine, and the usefulness of college education.  Some of those are in public, and some are private through email and messaging.  I love the discussion, the back and forth, just like my classroom days.  And this time, I express my views, but try to find middle ground that is so often missing in today’s debates.

In the old classroom days, there occasionally were students who tried to dominate the conversation, attacking anyone with a differing view, and used harsh words and bullying tactics to win the argument.  That’s when I would intervene and try to back them down.  If that didn’t work, I’d remove them from the discussion.  If reason didn’t dominate, bullying wasn’t the alternative.  In those days we had other terms for them:  hard headed, bullies, or just assholes.  In our modern social media era, we now call them “trolls”.  

Trolling

Beginning with my “essaying” in 2017, I found a lot of “trolls”.  I was called a traitor (not one) and a bleeding heart (guilty); accused of supporting pedophiles (really?) and, perhaps worst, of trying to indoctrinate generations of students. (If I was doing that, I sure did a lousy job!).  Some I have been able to bring around to the “classroom rules”.  But some I had to cut off, “block” in Facebook terms.  I’m not letting someone else use my “bully pulpit” to spread lies and misinformation.  And I’m not letting them literally bully others from expressing their views.  I won’t accept the insult that protecting transgendered and gay rights is the same as pedophilia, or that the students protesting for protection in Nashville are the same as the Insurrectionists of January 6^th. 

I blocked a “friend” yesterday.  He won’t see this essay, and I’m sure won’t understand why I did it.  He’ll say I was unable to argue his points, that this was his ultimate “win”.  So be it.  But I am sad.  Removing a kid from class was always a sign of failing the job – cutting someone out of “our” discussion is the same way.  But in this era, when there is no longer an accepted “truth” or “facts”, you can’t always moderate the discussion, or even work to the center. 

Sometimes there is no middle ground.

Free Publicity

Yesterday we had the spectacle of Trump flying from Florida to New York.  He got millions of dollars of free publicity.  Cable news went “all-in” on coverage, with reporters almost on every corner.  I’m surprised they didn’t follow the plane in the air.

Today Trump is the name on the lips of every newscaster and commentator.  The circus is in town.  MSNBC is filling “dead air” until 2:15 when the actual indictment will be read.  Again, another day of all-Trump, all of the time.  Give the Trump folks this:  they’re definitely making lemonade out of lemons.  After all, he is going to be indicted in Criminal court today.

So until 2:15 there’s really not much to say about that, though they are saying it anyway.  

MAGA

While Trump himself is in trouble, “MAGA – ism” is alive and well in the United States.  How strong is “MAGA-ism”?  Of all of the “leaders” of the GOP, only three have stepped up to say Trump should end his run for a second term. Only Asa Hutchinson, Chris Sununu, and John Kasich, if he’s still considered a Republican, have the courage of their convictions.   The rest have jumped on the bandwagon:  a “political” prosecution, a “Soros backed” prosecutor, charges even the “Democrat (sic) Justice Department wouldn’t bring”.

All of those others, from DeSantis to Pence to Huckabee-Sanders, aren’t “Trump lovers”.  But they are “Trump voter lovers”, and they know that MAGA voters control the Republican primaries.   They are not afraid of “fear itself”, they are afraid of offending MAGA voters and losing elections.  It is, in fact, the absolute truth of our times here in the early twenty-first century:  it’s all about getting elected.  The “Profiles in Courage” of other generations don’t seem to inhabit our current politics, at least not much on the Republican side.  

Ohio Pride

Here in Ohio, we take some “pride” in not being as “extremist” as other states – like Florida.  But the reality is that the Ohio State government, dominated top to bottom by gerrymander protected Republicans, may be even farther “right” than the Sunshine State.  Florida passed a no-license concealed carry law this week.  Ohio passed that law a year ago:

As of June 13, 2022, anyone 21-years-of-age or older who is not prohibited from firearm possession under state and federal law, and meets the definition of a “qualifying adult,” may carry a firearm in public without a permit or background check (Giffords).

The Florida Senate just passed a ban on abortions after six-weeks.  Ohio’s had that law for years, the so-called Heartbeat Law (though there isn’t really a heartbeat in a six week-old fetus).  It’s still tied up in Court, but when it finally clears, it will be the law here.  And while Ohio hasn’t “caught up” to Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill yet, that’s coming.  The state Board of Education somehow, some way, ended up with a Democratic majority.  So the state Republican legislature is working to remove most of the Board’s authority to control school curriculums.  They’ll never call it “Don’t Say Gay” in Ohio, but the ultimate impact will be the same on Ohio schools.

Minority Rule

In fact, Ohio’s Republican legislature wants protection from “majority rule”.  Ohio, like many states, has a referendum process that allows voters to pass laws and Constitutional amendments on a statewide ballot.  Ohio Republicans saw what happened to “Red-Red” Kansas, when a statewide referendum to restrict abortion rights failed 59% to 41%.   Surprise:  here in Ohio there’s a new proposal to require a 60% margin for referendum passage.  Gosh – I wonder where that number came from?

And, of course, Ohio proved its “MAGA-ism” by turning down Democrat Tim Ryan for the United States Senate, and choosing Trump supported JD Vance for the six year term in 2022.  Like the ROYGBIV color spectrum, the state has moved from indigo to violet to red; Trump red, MAGA red.  Ohio Republicans did it with a suit and tie and a hand in the pocket of the power companies instead of a red hat, but MAGA it remains.

Whatever happens to the twice-impeached defeated former President in Court today, or in Atlanta, or in Washington DC in the next few months; he has reshaped the Republican Party in his own image for the next decade (at least).  It doesn’t take Trump to drive MAGA-ism in American life.  His supporters are afraid of progress, afraid of changed demographics, afraid to lose their built-in racial advantage.  And Republican politicians are catering to those fears, some out of true-belief, but many “just” to get the votes to remain in power.  

Trump is the issue of the present, but not the future:  MAGA-ism is.

State Funeral

Tomorrow will have all the gravity of a state funeral.  We’ll watch “the motorcade” leave Trump Tower, and weave its way four miles through the New York streets to the Court House. I’m sure they’ll be cameras stationed at every intersection along the way (further snarling traffic).  Maybe some young MAGA tourist will echo President Kennedy’s funeral and salute the black SUV’s as they go by.  When they get to the Court House, it’s not likely the Secret Service will exit the twice-impeached former President at the front door.  It’s a Court House and there’s surely a “Sally Port” entrance through an underground garage.  Will see the motorcade slide into the building, with maybe with a profile glance of the former President in the window.

Mr. Trump will be escorted upstairs, booked, “mug-shotted”, and fingerprinted.  He’ll be “arrested”, and read his rights.  But he won’t be put in a cell, or stripped searched.  He’s not going to be detained.  Eventually he’ll be escorted (no handcuffs) down the hall to the Courtroom, the same hall where his finance guy, Alan Weisselberg, was walked not so long ago.  The indictment will be read, and his lawyer (likely not Trump) will plead a firm “not guilty”.  The judge will set the terms of release, bail or on his own recognizance, and whatever other restrictions are appropriate.  Maybe he’ll just tell the former President to stop threatening the District Attorney and his staff.  

Unprecedented

Then Mr. Trump will get back in the motorcade and head for the airport.  There’s a speech scheduled from the ballroom of Mara Lago on Tuesday night.  As Donald Trump has always said, better to get bad publicity than no publicity.  The attention of the Nation, both his followers and his detractors, is fully focused on HIM.  No reason for the former President to waste the opportunity; there’s money to raise, and victimhood to stoke.  

“Unprecedented” is the overused word of our millennium.  For the past eight years, since Donald Trump came down that “golden escalator” in Trump Tower, much of what he’s done is “unprecedented” in American history.  So I guess it shouldn’t surprise anyone, that Donald Trump is the first former President ever brought up on charges. 

And it won’t be as unprecedented if he’s brought up on more charges in Atlanta at the beginning of next month.  His demand for Georgia’s Secretary of State to find enough votes for him to win, was election interference committed in plain view.  And now we know that the Federal classified document Grand Jury heard new evidence.  Trump himself was rummaging through the boxes of classified documents, and ordered his attorneys to lie to the Federal agencies.  Not only did he keep classified documents and defy subpoenas for their recovery, he obstructed justice and suborned perjury.  It’s hard to see how the Special Prosecutor, Jack Smith, can avoid indicting him for that.

But all of these charges are preliminary to the “main show”.  

Main Show

Donald Trump may be found guilty of the “porn star” charges.  He should be guilty of election tampering in Atlanta (though a Republican Governor might step in and end that with a pardon).  And Jack Smith likely will win on the classified documents case.  But the “main show” is the other Federal Grand Jury in Washington, conducting the investigation into the January 6^th Insurrection.  If…if…if; if Jack Smith can make the direct connection through Mark Meadows from the rioters to Donald Trump, they can charge him with conspiracy to disrupt the US Congress.  And that charge carries three penalties:  $10,000 fine, up to ten years in prison, and disqualification from ever holding Federal office.

The MAGA crowd doesn’t really care about the “porn star” stuff.  That’s been “baked into” the Trump persona since the “Access Hollywood” tapes.  In fact, it kind of helps Trump’s image with some – “wow, he can ‘do it’ with a porn star!!”.   And the “perfect call” with Secretary Raffensperger will be read as simply a man asking for a “recount”.

Heart of the Matter

But the Insurrection case cuts to the heart of the matter.  MAGA-world is still convinced that it wasn’t a riot.  The believe, really believe, that the Insurrection was just a peaceful protest.  In spite of what we saw with our own eyes that day, they think the “peaceful protestors” were “driven” into the building by “police tear gas”, and lead on by “Antifa agitators”.  The shooting of one of those protestors was a “murder”, and the whole event a Democrat leftist plot.

So, if…if…if, if the twice-impeached former President is indicted for conspiracy to commit insurrection, don’t be surprised when the real reaction shows up.  That’s the big one, the charge that will go completely against the grain of MAGA world.   It’s the charge that could finally end our long national nightmare of Trump.  And it’s the charge that could fracture our Nation.

Un-Precedented

The twice-impeached former President of the United States was criminally indicted in New York yesterday.  The actual indictment isn’t publicly available yet, but it’s seems clear the that Manhattan Grand Jury is charging multiple offenses, including felonies.  We will know more when Mr. Trump appears in Manhattan Criminal Court, sometime next week.

This is the first time a former President faces criminal charges.  While other Presidents and former Presidents were scrutinized for their actions, none have actually been indicted (or indicated, as the case may be).  Former President Nixon was the closest, named as an “unindicted co-conspirator” in Watergate charges.  But his successor, Gerald Ford, gave him a blanket pardon for “anything he might have done” as President.  So Nixon dodged the court, setting a precedent that we lived with until yesterday.  As historian and author Michael Beschloss noted; the Nixon precedent opened the door for Donald Trump to do whatever he wanted.

Privilege

To tell the truth, Richard Nixon’s resigning from office was a time of celebration for me.  He committed crimes in office, and it was sad that he kept the country in turmoil for more than two years.  But that turmoil ended with his “victory wave” from the door of Marine One as he left the White House for the final time.  For those of us who believed in equal justice before the law, we thought he should held accountable for his actions.  Ford’s pardon denied the nation that closure for Nixon’s crimes.

This is only the first of many indictments Trump faces.  And there is no “saving pardon” likely here. Federal charges loom from the Department of Justice, both in the classified documents case and the January 6^th Insurrection.  But even if President Biden (or a future Republican President) decided to grant a pardon, both the Manhattan and Georgia charges are in state courts and not subject to Federal action.  Our long national nightmare of Donald Trump is going to last for another couple of years.  There is little joy there.  But there should be some satisfaction:  no man, even a twice-impeached former President, is above the law. The Founding Fathers wrote that there would be no titles of nobility or privilege in the United States. The Constitution is fulfilled.  

Constitution

No surprise that instead of accepting the Grand Jury actions, many Trump supporters, including a crying Senator Lindsey Graham, are screaming about “injustice”.  Injustice really would be if a Grand Jury found that, even though Trump might have committed crimes, he could not be held accountable.  But the litany of “regulars”, from Mark Levin and Sean Hannity to Graham and Marjorie Taylor Greene “scream foul”.  

More worrying is the statement by Republican Governor and Presidential candidate Ron DeSantis.  He basically offered Trump “sanctuary” in Florida, stating as Governor he would refuse to recognize a New York request for extradition.  That all sounds “powerful”: the “Free Florida” acting as a sovereign state.  But that clearly violates the US Constitution.  Article IV, Section 2 states:

 Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime.

So while DeSantis could delay the inevitable, and force New York to go to Federal Court to enforce the Constitution – in the end, if Trump decides to hide in Florida, he would be “delivered up” (Puerto Rico v Bransted 483 U.S. 219).  And it would lead to US Marshals arresting a former President protected by a Secret Service detail, with all of the fuss that might create.  As an acknowledged “flight risk”, Trump would then be held in confinement  — Riker’s Island?  And they would have to accommodate the Secret Service detail as well.

Path Forward

So DeSantis got his “sound bite’, and Trump will probably show up in Court next week.  What’s of concern is that a Presidential candidate was so quick to jump on a clear Constitutional violation. Looking at his actions violating the First Amendment in Florida already, DeSantis must not have been listening in Professor Tribe’s Constitutional Law class at Harvard Law School.

Donald Trump put our nation in un-precedented times.  Every action we take determines not only his fate, but what we expect from our future leaders.  Ford took the “easy way out” in 1974, avoiding the pain of a Nixon trial and possible incarceration.  But by avoiding that pain, it set the stage for our current agony.  There is only one correct path forward:  allow justice to take its course.

Together

As President Biden often says:  “We are the United States of America and there is nothing, nothing beyond our capacity if we do it together.”  But clearly there is one thing we cannot get together to accomplish.  We cannot, will not, have not; gotten together to protect our children from gun violence.  Gun violence is the number one cause of death for US children (1-19) today (Kaiser).  

It’s not like there’s an argument “for” allowing children to die from guns.  But we are completely unable to muster the will to even attempt to solve the problem that allows (and I do mean intentionally allows) clearly mentally unstable people to blast their way through school doors and murder nine year-olds and adults.   Our leaders send “heart-felt thoughts and prayers” after the fact.  We lower our national flag to half-staff.  We talk about fortifying the schoolhouse doors, or providing more armed guards to  patrol the parking lots and halls.  But we never get to the core of the issue.  No other nation in the world has mass shootings like the United States.  In fact, no other nation in the world would tolerate it.  But we, the People of the United States, do.

Foundation of Fear

Underlying the very foundation of the United States is a tradition of fear.  Franklin Roosevelt described it in his first inaugural speech:  “…(N)ameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”  While Roosevelt was describing the economic impacts of the Great Depression, America has acted in fear from the very founding of our Nation.  

The Constitution is based in fear.  Americans were afraid of a chief executive, and carefully circumscribed the powers of the President to keep him or her from being too dictatorial.  The Founders were desperately afraid of a standing Army that would take control.  So they only allowed the Congress to fund it for two years at a time.  Every general officer was specifically approved by the legislature (Article 1, Section 8).

The small states were afraid of the democratic power of the large population states.  So the legislative powers were divided into a popularly elected House and a selected Senate where all states, large and small, were equal.  And all of the states were afraid of the powers they were ceding to the central government.  One way they “balanced” that fear, was to call for the establishment of state “armies”, called militias (Article 1, Section 8).

The states of enslavement were desperately afraid that their immoral economic system might be restricted.  So they empowered slavery. They authored  the three-fifths compromise (Article I, Section 2), a specific ordinance demanding the return of runaway slaves (Article IV, Section 2), and a ban on restricting importation of slaves for twenty-two years (Article 1, Section 9).

Fear Enshrined

And since that wasn’t enough to satisfy some, the Bill of Rights were quickly added to the document.  Those Amendments protected the rights of people against the government.  The right to practice their religion, free speech, free press, assemble and ask the government for changes were defined in the First Amendment.  Rights in the judicial process were protected in the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Amendments.  Protection against the standing Army was listed in the Third Amendment.  And a right to have weapons was established in the Second Amendment.

Reasonable Fear

At the edge of the new United States was a frontier fraught with dangers.  The new nation was imposing its authority on traditional Native American lands.  Not surprisingly, the resident tribes struck back against those incursions.  The settlers were fearful.  They could only look to themselves and their neighbors for protection, even the state capitals were too far away for immediate aid.  So every man had a rifle, a means to defend himself and his family against attack.  And most were organized into a militia, to respond to attack as rapidly as possible.

The Southern portion of the new nation was based on an enslavement economy.  As the number of enslaved people grew, the slaveholders need for weapons to maintain control grew as well.  When slaves ran away, armed patrols were sent out to return them for punishment.  And when the enslaved rose up in revolt, the Southern militias were called out to put them down.  Historians identify as many as 313 such revolts starting in 1739, even before the American Revolution (PBS).  It shouldn’t be a surprise that Southern men were better prepared for War in 1861; they’d been practicing for generations.  They were afraid of retribution from the people they enslaved.

The fear of an over-arching government is as American as the Constitution.  So holding onto weapons and organizing against the government is as traditional as the Whiskey Rebellion or the shots fired at Fort Sumter, the Black Panther movement of the 1960’s or the Branch-Davidians of the 1990’s.  America is “all about” guns:  guns and fear.  And that is what makes us different from most other nations in the world.

Fear Today

That tradition of “fear” continues today.  the slave owners of the 1800’s knew one way to assuage that fear is to hold onto guns.  Our politics today are built on fear.  We are afraid of “the cities, full of crime”.  But murder per-capita is actually lower in the biggest cities.  Birmingham, Dayton, Baton Rouge and Memphis are in the top ten of murders.  Chicago is twenty-eighth, New York City and Los Angeles don’t even make the top sixty (neither does Columbus, Ohio, CBS).

We are afraid of “them”.  Politicians build their careers on “us versus them”.  We see it in the culture politics of the far-right: “they” are coming to, “…change your children, steal your religion, and take your jobs”.  And America’s traditional protection against things we fear:  guns.

Of course “they” are coming for those guns as well.

We face a national crisis of murdered children.  And we bring the baggage of a history of fear; fear assuaged by guns.  The problem is this:  if more guns could fix this problem, we’d be the safest country in the world already.  America is awash in guns, with 1.2 guns per person, almost twice as many as any other nation in the world.  But we aren’t safe; instead we are afraid.  Afraid to send our children to school, to go to the city, to shop at the grocery.  And what makes us afraid: those same guns.

And that’s America’s dilemma.

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