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Stories of 9-11

So it’s Sunday, and this is another Sunday Story – in fact, several of them. And they all have to do with 9-11, twenty years ago.

History

The terrorists attacks of 9-11 left a deep wound on the United States.  There are a lot of “befores”.  “Before” 9-11, we acted with abandon, as if terrorist attacks couldn’t happen here.  Sure we had our own home-grown terrorists, like Timothy McVeigh who launched the devastating attack on the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995.  

But somehow that was different.  As horrible as it was, it was targeted against the government.  It was, to use the phrase of the Kennedy  assassination conspiracies, a “lone gunman” kind of assault.  And there was the original attack on the World Trade Center, in 1993.  But it failed, and it too seemed like a “lone gunman” kind of thing.

(The Oklahoma City Memorial to the 168 killed and many more wounded is just a moving as the 9-11 Memorial in New York, or the Shanksville Memorial in Pennsylvania.  All are absolutely worth visiting.)

But 9-11 was different.  We talk of 9-11 as our generation’s Pearl Harbor, but Pearl Harbor was a military assault on a base by a known world enemy.  9-11 used our own planes and our own citizens as the weapons of destruction.  And it while government buildings were on “the list”; with the Pentagon hit, and the Capitol or White House next; the World Trade Center and Shanksville were civilian, with civilian victims.  

So 9-11 was different.  It changed how we travelled, and, right or wrong, how we looked at some of our fellow citizens.  It made us afraid:  of the mall, the ballgame, the airport.  Many stayed close to home for a long time.

Family

After 9-11, I felt it was my obligation as a teacher to learn as much about who attacked us, and why, as I possibly could.  That way I could pass that knowledge onto my classes, seventeen and eighteen year old’s whose nation was attacked, and who might become the “point of the spear” in our military response.  That week, from Tuesday morning on, has the crystal clear memory of any horrific event.   It takes very little effort, even twenty years later, to go right back to those moments.

On a personal level, I was worried about my parents.  They were supposed to leave for England on Thursday.  As members of the “Greatest Generation”, the warriors of World War II, neither Mom nor Dad was easily frightened by terrorists.  They were stubborn, but it was more than just the journey.  It was about “winning”.  They, and particularly Dad, weren’t going to let the terrorists “win” by stopping them, and preventing Mom from going home to see her family.

So Wednesday there was a lot of “talk” in the family, about driving to Canada to fly out, or re-routing trips to be on the first planes back in service.  So while I was cramming myself to teach the kids, I was also trying to talk Mom and Dad back “from the cliff’.  

New Jersey

And I was also worried about my sister.  She and her husband were adopted New Yorkers, who lived in Brooklyn for many years.  Now they had a place in Lyndhurst, just across the Hudson from Manhattan in New Jersey.  My brother-in-law was in Manhattan when the planes struck, going to work.  His train from New Jersey passed underneath the World Trade Center shortly before the planes struck, and he spent many hours that day walking back home after the disaster.  They didn’t have cell phones then, so for a lot of the hours my sister didn’t know his fate.  But she could walk half a block up the road, and see Manhattan, and the smoke and ash from the destruction.

By Tuesday night we knew they were safe, but they still seemed incredibly vulnerable.

Stakes for the Tent

While I was powering through in the classroom, I was also worried about my kids, the boys and girls cross country team.  In the classroom we learned about the attackers and their history, but out on the course I hoped we could do “the normal thing”, to have one regular part of their day.  Sure we discussed what was happening, but I wanted the kids to feel that their life could go on, perhaps altered, but still might be “regular”.  We practiced, and we prepared for our Saturday meet.

A cross country “tradition” is the big Black and Gold tent that we pitch at each meet.  It is our “headquarters”, where we meet, leave our stuff, find our parents, and shelter from the rain.  And we needed more tent stakes, something that I’d left to Friday night after practice.  Friday also happened to be my birthday.

So I was driving to buy tent stakes.  And I was talking to Mom and Dad on the phone, about cancelled trips and birthdays.  And I was kind of “zoned” from everything that was going on that week.  As I entered Broad Street at 5:30 in the afternoon, I looked both ways, saw nothing, and pulled out.  I then looked left again, just in time to see the compact silver car smash into my driver’s side door at forty miles an hour.

The Suburban

All my fault.  I was in my Chevy Suburban, a big “Secret Service” type car.  It took the blow well, but the impact was hard enough to break the wheels off the axle and bend the roof above the door, totaling the car.  I managed to get out, and checked on the other driver.  It was a man and his wife, and their small child who was in the back seat.  The man had airbag burns on his arms, his wife was stunned, and the child had a cut lip.  It wasn’t good, but could have been so much worse.  I was thankful for that.

Two things stood out in my mind in those moments, once I realized no one was badly hurt.  First, that all around the wreck there were empty beer cans.  They didn’t come from my car, and I really don’t know whether it was from his, or just dumped by the road.  But I knew that I wanted a blood alcohol test at the hospital, so that there was a record of my non-drinking state.  

And the second thing that stands out was what a witness said as they overheard my discussion with the Pataskala Police.  I told them what happened, and made sure the officer understood that the silver car was in no-way to blame.  And the witness said to someone, “That’s the most honest thing I’ve ever heard”.  I thought that was silly, it was clear what happened, why would anyone even try to lie about it?

I was transported to the hospital with a possible concussion.  The guys on the squad were former students, and asked if they could practice putting in an IV line, even though they didn’t think I needed it.  That turned out to be my worst injury the bruises from the IV, but was a small price to pay for their care. 

Key Largo

Fifteen years later, we retired. Like many couples, Jenn and I wanted to do some travelling.  In 2016 we decided to take a week on the Florida Keys.  We flew down to Miami, rented a Jeep, took the top down and headed to Key Largo to hang out with the iguanas by the swimming pool, look for manatees by the dock, and drink a lot of mojitos, a mix of rum, mint, sugar and lime.  

We managed to make it down to the city of Key West for a day, a place that we both would like to re-visit and spend more time.  It’s a town that can make a party out of the sunset, with hundreds gathering on the pier and cheering the sun going down.  There’s a few mojitos served there as well.  Maybe more than a few.

We also took the glass-bottomed boat tour out of Key Largo, to see the coral and sea life.  As we waited on the dock to board the boat, an older oriental couple sat down beside us.  We began a casual conversation with the man, Mr. Young, who was from New York.  We were headed to the “Big Apple” the next week, and he was excited to tell us about his city, and the restaurants, and how to get authentic Chinese food.

Red Bandana

Then he started to talk about his wife, who was there beside him.  He introduced us to her, Ling Young.  She was a 9-11 survivor from the 78th Floor of the World Trade Center, saved by a hero of that day, the man with the “Red Bandana”.   Ling was badly burned when the plane struck the building, and was surrounded by those killed in the attack.  Through the smoke came a young man with a red bandana over his face, who got her to the stairwell, and down to the 61st floor.  

Then he urged her to continue to safety, and turned around and went back up to the fire.  She managed to escape, the young man, later identified as twenty-four year old Welles Crowther, did not.

Mrs. Young had horrible burns, and told us there were more than twenty surgeries.  She became a leader of the 9-11 survivor movement, helping the victims, but also keeping alive the memory of heroes.  Mr. Young told us about how she didn’t like to speak in public that much, but, as he said, “When Vice President Biden calls on the phone and asks, you go”.  And now we were getting on the glass bottom boat with them.  We enjoyed the trip, but learned so much more about strength and real heroism, than coral and barracudas.

Yesterday

For twenty years I avoided videos of 9-11.  It was all too fresh in my mind.  It took several years to be able to see twin-engine jets speeding across the sky without thinking about it, not a good thing when you live on the landing approach to Columbus Airport.  So I avoided the video of the planes flying into the buildings, the smoke and ash clouds boiling through the streets.  Those were all still to fresh, too close.

But this year I could watch without re-entering that time.  That’s good, not just for me, but for America.  9-11, for many Americans, has stopped being an open wound.  Now it’s a scar, a symbol of the memory of pain and fear, but not the pain and fear itself.  That’s at least true for me, but probably not for Ling Young, or the parents of Welles Crowther, and all of those others who lost their loved ones on that day.

Twenty Years Ago

In 2019 I wrote this essay for the 18th Anniversary of 9-11. I’ve gently updated a couple of things – but it’s worth saying (again). It was 20 years ago…

November 22, 1963

I was six years old when John F Kennedy was shot in Dallas.  My memories of the time are clear:  released from school; something awful happened in Dallas.  The teachers wouldn’t tell us, so us second graders talked about monsters attacking the state. The staff wanted our parents to handle it.  On the walk home I argued with some boy who said the President was shot. I didn’t believe him. Words turned to fists, a second grader versus a third grader.  I think I won.

When I got home, Mom met me at the door, tears in her eyes.  I wish I hadn’t punched that kid; for the next few days it was grainy black and white television, first from Dallas, and then the funeral from Washington. The caisson carrying the flag covered casket, the rider less horse behind with the boots strapped backwards in the stirrups; the President’s family stoic and brave. 

So I guess if you were six on September 11th, 2001, you would have some pretty clear images of what happened, even if, you didn’t have much understanding.  To put that in perspective, you’d be twenty-six today.

It is amazing how quickly “events” become history.  What feels like just a couple of years ago, is now in an eighth grade textbook.  

Tuesday Morning

Tuesday morning, September 11th, 2001, I was in “recovery” mode.  We had just completed our big home cross country invitational the previous weekend, I was looking forward to getting my team ready for the next competition, and getting back to concentrating on my classroom.  I taught senior American government class, and we were reaching the end of the first unit, trudging through the US Constitution and the Amendments.

At Watkins Memorial High School we started the day early, the first bell rang at 7:19.  The school was under construction; all of the in-class TV’s were off line.  So it was on a restroom run between second and third period that a fellow staff member told me of a plane, crashing into the World Trade Center in New York.  

A tragedy, a horrible accident; I talked briefly to my class about it as we started.  When another staff member came to the door, and told us of the second plane, we all knew it was something more than an accident.

The Planes

I wanted to know what was going on, and I wanted my classes to know too.  We moved outside and sat in the band bleachers of the football field, facing north, and turned up the radio from my jeep.  The class sat and listened as the third plane crashed into the Pentagon, and heard the rumors of other planes “out of contact” with air traffic control. We heard reports of a fourth plane down in Pennsylvania.

And as we sat in the bleachers, we watched the final approach leg into the Columbus Airport, (then Port Columbus, now John Glenn International.)  We listened as the World Trade Centers collapsed, and watched as plane after plane, maybe forty of them, lined up to land right in front of us.

Later that day the football coach and I rigged up a television with an outdoor antenna in our school’s wrestling room.  Hundreds of kids came in at lunch time, watching, wondering, and looking for answers:  who did this, why, and how could it have happened? I spent any breaks on the phone, trying to reach my sister and her husband in New York.  All the lines were down, crashed by the volume of calls. When I finally did talk to them that evening, my sister was at home when it happened. But my brother-in-law had to walk home from the City.  His train passed under the World Trade Center just a few minutes before the first plane hit.

My Mission

We released the kids from school, finally.  I went home that night with a mission, to find out everything available, so I could teach my kids what this was all about.  The Amendments to the Constitution would have to wait (it would end up being two weeks). American Government at Watkins Memorial was going to be about what happened to our country, and our lives, on September 11th.  

Out in the front yard that evening, the sky was completely empty of planes, but one.   Air Force One, taking President Bush back from Nebraska to the White House.  It looked odd and lonely; the escort fighters must have been high above.

The next weeks were filled with questions and information.  We learned about Al Qaeda and Wahhabism, the puritanical version of Islam they practiced.  The Class studied the difference between that and the Islam worshipped by the Taliban, the group that controlled Afghanistan and allowed Al Qaeda to set up bases there. We learned history:  of Afghanistan, of the Middle East, and that Islam didn’t attack the United States, Al Qaeda did.  

The class asked questions about how we should respond.  These were seventeen and eighteen year olds (now thirty-eight) and the question of war had tremendous immediacy to them.  Several of the students in that class would end up in the armed forces, fighting in the mountains and villages of Afghanistan.  They all came back, but many suffered injuries, both physical and mental, that they are still struggling to overcome today.

Twenty Years

It doesn’t seem that long ago.  On Friday of that week, I was in a car crash.  My Suburban was totaled, my fault, but fortunately no one was hurt. On Saturday my cross country team went to the Galion Invitational, and since I had to find a ride to school I got there early.  That gave me the opportunity to have a long talk with our bus driver, the sweetest older man ever, Lester Kahrig (here’s a link to his story.)  We talked about war, about what would happen to these kids on the bus.  He talked about “his 9-11” when he was seventeen, Pearl Harbor, and about the war he fought in the Pacific. 

Those weeks were the best teaching I’ve ever done.  They were also the best learning my classes ever did.  There were no tests, no matching “Osama bin Laden” to “leader of Al Qaeda;” there was no need.  The kids wanted to know, needed to know.  I don’t remember any principal saying that I could take my class this direction, but they knew it was the right thing to do.  

Twenty years since 9-11, and we finally have let Afghanistan go.  One of the things we learned in those weeks is that controlling Afghanistan is like holding desert sand in your hands, you might think you’ve got it, but slowly, inexorably, it slips between your fingers.  The harder you clench, the more slips away.  Every conqueror from Alexander the Great, to the British, to the Soviets figured it out.  America learned the lesson too.  

The Afghanistan List

The Afghanistan List (essays on Afghanistan dating back to April of 2017)

Monuments to Mistakes

Richmond

Yesterday, the statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was removed from “Monument Avenue” in Richmond, Virginia.  The street in the former capital of the Confederacy, originally had monuments to Lee and  Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, J.E.B. Stuart, Jefferson Davis and Matthew Fontaine Maury; all Confederate heroes.   The others are already gone, Lee’s was the last remaining Confederate memorial.  The horse mounted statue was removed and dismantled.  The only remaining monument there is to trailblazing Black tennis star Arthur Ashe, a Richmond native.

Lee lived for only four years after the end of the Civil War.  Even during the War itself, he was aware of the pains in his chest that signaled a failing heart.  But in those four years as a defeated leader, he made his views clear about what was best for the future.

The War

In 1869 Lee was invited to join a “conclave” of former Union and Confederate officers at the Gettysburg Battlefield to mark the positions of the opposing forces during the struggle.  His response to the invitation was:

Lexington, VA., August 5, 1869.

Dear Sir–Absence from Lexington has prevented my receiving until to-day your letter of the 26th ult., inclosing an invitation from the Gettysburg Battle-field Memorial Association, to attend a meeting of the officers engaged in that battle at Gettysburg, for the purpose of marking upon the ground by enduring memorials of granite the positions and movements of the armies on the field. My engagements will not permit me to be present. I believe if there, I could not add anything material to the information existing on the subject. I think it wiser, moreover, not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered. (bold added)

Very respectfully,
Your obedient servant,
R. E. Lee.

Of course, it was also the scene of his worst defeat, hardly a place he was likely to want to revisit.

Monuments

In addition, he was asked several times to help create or dedicate monuments to the Confederacy.  His response to one of his former Generals (Thomas Rosser) expressed his view:

As regards the erection of such a monument as is contemplated; my conviction is, that however grateful it would be to the feelings of the South, the attempt in the present condition of the Country, would have the effect of retarding, instead of accelerating its accomplishment; & of continuing, if not adding to, the difficulties under which the Southern people labour. All I think that can now be done, is to aid our noble & generous women in their efforts to protect the graves & mark the last resting places of those who have fallen, & wait for better times.

Our Nation Forward

Lee understood that there were obligations in defeat as well as victory.  On the night before his final surrender at Appomattox Courthouse, he rejected his subordinates plan to “dissolve” his Army into the mountains to continue the fight.  He understood that they were fighting for a goal of legitimacy that was unattainable in what we would now call a “guerilla” movement.

The Civil War ended in June of 1865, one hundred and fifty six years ago.  Yet it still reverberates in our current affairs, as the United States struggles with the issues of racial equality and voting rights.  It took until yesterday for Richmond to stop memorializing a man who chose his state over his country, slavery over freedom, and the past over the future.  However “honorable” some view Lee’s actions, he also could have chosen a different path, one that would have made the United States a stronger nation.  He could have made the choice his fellow West Pointer, friend and Virginian, Union General George H. Thomas, the “Rock of Chickamauga” made.  Lee could have continued to serve the Army that was his career, and the nation he swore to defend.

Lee didn’t want memorials.  He recognized defeat, and wanted the nation to move on.  Like the Confederate battle flags that were NOT allowed at his funeral, Lee saw the nation as burying the War, and succeeding in Peace.  

But others who followed Lee in War refused to accept his advice in Peace.  The good news:  unlike the disaster of Charlottesville four years ago, the removal of Lee’s monument was done without violence or protest.  As Lee said, those monuments: “…have the effect of retarding, instead of accelerating its (the nation’s) accomplishment”.  We would be wise to follow that advice now.

For more information about “erasing history” and the Confederate Monuments – click on this link – Erasing History..

Blindness

Alt-Other

It might surprise those who read essays in “Our America” with any frequency, that I am subscribed to some “alt-right” newsletters (I even somehow ended up on the “Trump for President” mailing list – I didn’t do that!!). Part of the original mission of “Our America” was to try to explain the success of Donald Trump to a 2017 shell-shocked “Resistance” movement. It was, and still is, important to hear what “the other side” is saying – if for no other reason than to get past the “Those people are all ignorant” mindset.

“Those people” aren’t by and large ignorant.  And “they” are our neighbors, and co-workers, and the person in the car next to us on Broad Street.  To quote Pogo, “We have met the enemy, and he is us”. But they have selected a set of information sources that only give them a specific view of their world. (By the way, “they” certainly believe that “we” do the same.  There are many times I’ve been warned, “Stop listening to the ‘mainstream media’ and learn the ‘real facts’ of hydroxychloroquine, or vaccines, or voter fraud, or Joe Biden’s mental state.”)  

Pre-Disposition

One of my self-assigned duties is to gather some of that information, to get a better understanding of how seemingly normal and reasonable people, believe what seems to be such outlandish things – such as taking de-wormer will cure Covid. Some of our friends and neighbors are told by their trusted sources that Ivermectin works. And they have been conditioned to belief that whatever the “mainstream media”, sometimes even Fox News, says is not to be trusted. So when their source says “the ‘mainstream’ is lying, this is good stuff,” they are pre-disposed to believe it. And they do.

Pre-disposition is an important concept. We, they, all of us, want to believe “facts” that fit into our preconceived notions. The “skids are greased” for ideas that already match our mindset. Those ideas slide right into our thought process, because we want them to be true. And thoughts that are “against the grain” of our ideas find it tough going.

Every Problem is a Ball

Need a non-political example?  So it would make “pre-conceived” sense that good soccer players would make good track athletes.  Soccer players run, a lot.  They run fast sometimes, and slow other times, but they are always on the move. They are well conditioned, and that should translate well into track speed.  And sometimes it does.  But “speed” in soccer is different than “speed” in track.  A fast soccer player still needs to maintain body control, an ability to change direction and manipulate the ball.  All of that makes for a skilled running posture, with hips low, and arms high, ready to change position and direction.

A sprinter in track is on the sheer edge of out of control. A famous track coach, Brooks Johnson, described sprinting as continually almost falling. It’s a maximal straight-line effort, with no need to change direction. In track, if you make a right turn, you’re wrong. In coaching soccer players for track, it takes a significant amount of re-adaptation to change their “natural form” to get maximum success. Hips are higher, arms are lower; there’s no holding back. One thing’s for sure though. They are awesome at the team handball game at the beginning of practice. It’s right in their “wheel-house”.

So if you’re great at soccer, every athletic problem looks like a soccer ball (that’s a steal from one of my favorite phrases:  “If your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail”).  You use your pre-developed skill to resolve the new problem.  But when a coach asks that same soccer player to run with knees up and arms down, it feels completely un-athletic to them.  It goes against “the grain” of all of their previous training.  They are literally “pre-disposed” to run the way they were taught, from “bumble-bee” times.

Color Blind

The alt-right has found another edge to reinforce their audience’s pre-dispositions. It has to do with race and “color-blindness”. An article by the founder of Prager University, an alt-right “information center”, rants about how racist us “lefties” are for demanding that our nation recognize the inequalities caused by color. The article claims that the ultimate form of non-racism is color blindness; that if we simply treat everyone “the same” then everything would be “just fine”. In fact, the article posed the question: “If we were all blind, would there even be racism?”

The answer to that question, by the way, is yes. But that’s not the point. The point is: Slavery ended in 1866, but it took ninety-eight more years to enact laws to end segregation, the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Today, if you are a young man of color, the sixth leading cause of death is violence from the State, particularly the police (UMich). That’s more than twice that of young white men (US News).

Starting Lines

Being “color blind” leaves those of color in the same position they are in now: behind. To use another track and field analogy; if everything is “color blind” then everyone presumably is at the same starting line. But because of our history, that’s not the “real” truth. The truth is that there are two starting lines – one ahead, and one behind. And that means that our world is NOT equal, and we can’t just be color blind and make everything “OK”.

Color blindness “feels” right, if you are a white person, it fits right into pre-conceived notions.  Like the soccer player playing soccer, it fits with a lifetime of training.  But, this life is a track race, and the soccer form doesn’t fit.  The “common sense” solution of “just treat everyone the same” doesn’t work if everyone didn’t and still doesn’t get the same opportunities, the same chance to succeed.  You can’t ignore history (some of my alt-right friends are now screaming “CRITICAL RACE THEORY”).  

Before everyone is “equal”, everyone has to have a fair start, at the same starting line.  And when we get to that (we ain’t near close yet), then we can start using words like “color blind”.  That’s the goal, but not reality in these United States.

Five Hundred Years – Every Decade

Ida

Tropical storm Ida was a typical Caribbean storm for August.  It moved over Cuba, causing lots of rain and some damage, but nothing extraordinary.  Then it moved onto the Gulf of Mexico.  There’s a good reason why the Gulf beaches are popular with vacationers – the beaches are white and the water is warm.  But warm water is a problem.  The heat from the warm water serves as the “fuel” for storms, intensifying the amount of moisture in the air, and increasing the fury of the winds.  

The “regular” tropical storm Ida turned into a Category Four Hurricane Ida, virtually destroying the power infrastructure of Southeastern Louisiana.  Much of the region will be without power for weeks, maybe even longer.  The major transmission lines, even into New Orleans, are shredded.  

But Ida had more for the nation.  After losing its “hurricane status” by the time it reached the Mississippi border, the weather system ended up dumping so much water on the Northeast, that the New York City subway system was flooded out.  At least twelve died in Louisiana, though that number is likely to rise.  But over fifty died in the Northeast, many drowning in their cars, unprepared for the inundation of inches of rain per hour.

In Louisiana it was different, it wasn’t the flooding, it was the wind damage.  Total losses may reach the ultimate 2004 “Katrina” levels.  And in the northeast, it was a “500 Year” storm.  The problem:  that’s a 500 year storm, nine years after another 500 year storm, Superstorm Sandy.

Worst Ever

Here in Central Ohio, Ida brushed by.  There was a lot of rain, some flash flooding, but it wasn’t too bad.  Not as bad, frankly, as the week before, when a “regular storm” stalled over the southeast corner of Franklin County.  Here in “beautiful” Pataskala we got a couple of inches of rain in an hour:  four miles to the west they got five inches in an hour.  Cars were flooded in parking lots, roads closed to protect drivers, and  a good friend who lives on a rise and never had water problems, lost a fully finished basement under inches of water. 

We’ve always had storms, always had hurricanes, always had inundations.  Why we walked through two feet of snow to school, uphill, both ways, when I was a kid.  We can all remember “the blizzard of ‘77”, or the “tornadoes of ‘74”.  But while we can all reach back in memory to “the worst ever” storm we endured, things really are getting worse.  The “500 year storms” continue to occur regularly, and it’s not just playing “the odds”.  

One answer is the Gulf of Mexico.  It generates much of the Eastern United States summer weather, particularly the hurricanes, who gain their power over the Gulf.  And the equation is simple:  the hotter the Gulf, the more powerful the storms.  And the Gulf of Mexico has grown increasingly hotter over the past decades.

One Part of the Problem

The Gulf is only one part of the rising temperature worldwide.  And that creates the “storm equation”.  More heat, more energy, means more “significant weather events”.  It’s not necessarily the “worst ever”, but it’s more “worst” storms in succession.  

That same dynamic creates the heat and dryness of the West, burning up in forest fires.  That same dynamic is melting the Arctic ice, raising sea levels throughout the world.  And it’s creating droughts in Central America, fueling migration to the North. 

Science 

This is not a “political” point, this is scientific reality.  But, like the COVID vaccines and masks, this has become  “political”.  Somehow, one side has determined that trying to deal with global warming is “bad for the economy” and will hurt working people.  As my mother would say, “They are robbing Peter to pay Paul”.   It’s cheaper today to ignore the science, but the “payback” will be for future generations.  By the way, they said that back when I was a kid in the early 1970’s:  global warming will get worse, and the economic cost will grow.  They were right, things are worse, and will get “worser”.  We are paying the price already, and that price tag will continue to grow.

The New Guy

This is the next in the Sunday Story series. There’s no political point – just a story of an old teacher in a new setting.

Friday the Thirteenth

The last time I substituted in a classroom in an actual school building was on a Friday the 13th.  That March day lived up to its reputation:  it was the last day of classroom instruction for the 2019-2020 school year.  I was a “long-term” substitute, taking over for a middle school social studies teacher.  But the Covid-19 virus had other plans.  The classes that I was just getting to know; squirrely but fun sixth, seventh and eighth graders; were all done with in-person school.  I’d see them again, but it would be on a computer screen via Zoom meetings and online instruction.  Teaching in the traditional sense was over for the year.

With the vagaries of Covid, I chose not to enter a school building in the 2020-21 school year.  As a career educator that was weird too.  I’ve spent almost my whole life in and out of school buildings and classrooms, as a student, a teacher, Dean of Students and a coach.  But not last year, not with Covid.  I did get some contact with kids, but it was as a track official.  We were outside ( I didn’t officiate indoor season), with plenty of room.  And as Covid version-one came under control and vaccines became available, we all started to get back to normal.  But I still didn’t go in a school building.

So what changed?  The new variant of Covid is as dangerous as ever.  But with vaccinations and masks I hope that I can go into a school building without risking too much.  It’s about three things really:  contact with friends (still teaching and coaching), connecting with kids, and to be honest, there’s nothing wrong with a little extra money.

All New

But much has changed since I last was in a school building.  First of all, the number of kids I know in the school is down to almost none.  It’s been seven years since I worked in the District, and four years since I coached.  That’s a literal lifetime in a high school – a four year cycle of brand new kids means there only a few (very few) who know me.

The administration has changed as well.  There is only one left that I worked with, Mark, who followed me as Dean of Students.  I only vaguely know the Principal or Assistant Principal.  Even most of the secretaries and custodians have changed since I left.  

But the biggest change is – a brand, spanking-new high school building!  Checking into the building this morning felt a lot like being a “new kid” going to a different school. (I’ve been that guy.  We moved a lot when I was a kid, three elementary schools, a junior high in one district, high school in another, then college).   I decided to get there early:  I didn’t even know where to park, much less how to get into the building, and I wanted time to figure things out.  

The first thing I found was that there was no getting into the building.  Unlike the “old” building, where there was always an open door somewhere, this new one was locked tighter than a bank on Sunday.  Even a call into the building (“Help!! I can’t get in”) only went to voicemail.  Eventually an old colleague came by, and with her key fob was able to get through the two security doors into the main office.   It makes security sense – this is the way of modern education, but it starts out as a challenge.

But when I got in the office it was to a familiar face, Kim; with twenty-eight years on the job.  That smile made at least some things feel familiar, and she directed me to the new person handling the building substitutes. 

Check-In

Checking in felt a lot like staying at the Motel Six.  You got a key to the classroom and a folder with all of the “important” information (security protocols, who to call in an emergency, paperwork for attendance).  And then, just like at the Motel, they hand you a map with “your room” colored in.  The new building has four wings and two floors.  It’s laid out a lot like the Mall – stores on the top, stores on the bottom, with the big “anchor” stores replaced by the gym and auditorium.  

And like the Mall, there’s a center court, what “in the day” we would have called the cafeteria, but now is the “Commons”.  A big screen TV is available on the wall, with seating for eight or ten at each of the individual tables, and  smaller “high tops” as well. 

So there’s more to it than just – “your classroom is there”.  A detailed path is required.

Luckily there was just one hallway – far down from the front office “suite”.  And there I was – back in a classroom, subbing “Introduction to Statistics” (luckily not particularly advanced stats – I had a chance of figuring it out).  And when the students entered the room – it really was back to normal – sort of.

Free Time

It is a new world.  Maybe ten percent of the students are wearing masks, though most of the staff do.  And for some of those students they are “accessories”, like a scarf or a hat, carefully hung around their neck or ear, but not in place to block anything.   Parents – just on the percentages (the subject of our worksheet in class today) your kid ain’t wearing a mask, no matter what they tell you at home. 

The terror of any substitute teacher is a two-word phrase:  “FREE TIME”.  Keeping students busy is one of the few tools a substitute has – it’s not like there’s time to establish rapport, or a sense of classroom community.  Remember the movie Teachers (Nick Nolte) when the history teacher “Mr. Ditto” dies in class – but his students continue to hand out worksheets and pass them back in, period after period?  That’s a good sub-teaching day – lots of work, no FREE TIME!!  (So “Ditto” is an ancient term.  It came from the smelly purple inked “ditto” copies that all students’ sniffed, but dittos went out in the mid-1980’s – replaced by Xerox type copies.  Too bad, no smell in those). 

So when the worksheets are done – then it’s the time that substitutes dread.  I was lucky on two counts. Most of the students were seniors, who know how to “get along” with a sub.  They’re not interested in trouble, causing it, or getting in it.  They just want to get on with the day.

And second, there’s cell phones.  One class networked the front and back of the room together to play a game on their phones, others are watching re-runs of the Ohio State-Minnesota football game.  And the rest – they’re texting someone, probably in another class.  But if they’re interrupted – “I’m talking to my Mom”.  Hey, I’m a sub, as long as the worksheet is done and you’re not disruptive – text with anyone you want!!

In Control

Discipline didn’t seem to be too much of an issue.  My major correction of the day:  “Please reduce the amount of quiet profanity coming from your group”.  The students turned suitably red in the face and looked at each other – from that reaction I hoped the problem was resolved.  They then giggled when I said I was old and going deaf and but not deaf enough, yet.  Their verbal “slips” got even quieter.

If you get the drift that substitute teaching is more being a controlling “presence” than actual teaching – you’ve got that right.  I’d love to actually teach – but when I was an in-class teacher I could never really depend on the substitutes to do substantive work.  I often did leave multiple instructions:  here are the worksheets, but if you don’t want to do that, here’s the topic of our class for discussion or even lecture today.  

But worksheets are safe, if you’re a sub.

  • The Sunday Story Series

Un-Deciding Law

Precedence

Roe v Wade has been “decided law” in the United States since it was pronounced in 1973.  Justice Harry Blackmun wrote the 7 to 2  majority decision for the Court, laying out a right to privacy based in the United States Constitution.  The decision weighed the right of a woman to determine what happens to her body, versus the right of the fetus inside of her.  

Justice Blackmun and the Court determined that the government (the state government usually) could not regulate the woman’s right to control her body, until such time as the fetus could exist outside of the woman’s body . That was approximately twenty-eight weeks after conception.  While that decision has been “trimmed”, allowing more state regulations (and restrictions), the Court has upheld the Roe decision for forty-seven years. In a major companion  case in 1992, Casey v Planned Parenthood, the Court recognized that advances in science allowed for earlier survival of fetuses, and that the State could regulate abortions earlier in the process.

Casey also created a different standard for regulating legal abortions, those now before twenty-four weeks.  It allowed states to create regulations for abortions prior to fetal “viability”. But it stated that those regulations couldn’t create an “undue burden” that would prevent women from having the procedure.  But still, in Casey the Court upheld the “right to privacy” decision of Roe.

That’s been the “state of the law” for the past twenty-nine years.  States that have anti-abortion majorities in their legislatures have pushed the “undue burden” standards, creating law after law restricting legal abortions.  And the Court has consistently defended the Roe-Casey standard:  until yesterday.

Texas

Regardless of your opinion about women’s rights and abortion, you have to admire the work of the Texas Legislature.  They knew that direct regulation of early, legal abortions would be thrown out under the Roe-Casey standard.  So they found a way “around” the law.

Instead of “regulating” directly by creating legal barriers, the State of Texas has taken a “civil” approach.  If they directly stated their goal of making all abortions illegal six weeks after conception, the law would be thrown out.  Instead, they gave every citizen “the right” to sue any other citizen who aids someone to get an abortion after the six week deadline.  All of those sued could be liable for up to $10,000 in damages.

Sue Me, Sue You Blues

There is an old legal maxim, “You can sue for anything”.  But in reality, to take someone to Court, the first hurdle is to show that you have “standing”.  Standing in civil court means you can show direct damages from the person you are suing – that you have been “hurt” and need to be made “whole”.  If you can’t demonstrate that damage, you don’t have standing in court to bring the case.  But what the State of Texas did, was to make EVERYONE damaged by the abortion after six weeks, giving EVERYONE “standing” to sue.

The woman getting the abortion can’t be sued (that would create an undue burden). But the nurse who led her to the exam room, the doctor who performed the procedure, the secretary who set up the appointment, the driver of the car who took her to the procedure: all can be.  All of them can be liable for up to $10,000.  Even if a court determines they aren’t liable, they still are forced to defend themselves and pay for attorneys.  If they don’t defend themselves, then the court would rule against them.  And they would have to do it over and over again, for each abortion performed.

This Court

Opponents to the Texas “civil law” asked the Supreme Court to “enjoin” the state from allowing it to go into effect.  The Court declined to intervene, in a 5 to 4 decision.  The three Justices appointed by President Trump; Barrett, Kavanaugh and Gorsuch were joined in the majority by Justices Thomas and Alito.  Chief Justice Roberts and the “three liberals” on the Court; Kagan, Breyer and Sotomayor were in favor of “staying” the law, but were out-voted.

The majority “hid” behind a legal technicality.  They claimed that they weren’t “sure” they had the legal power to regulate this novel “civil” action without a full hearing and explanation.  And, they “relied” on “assurances” that the Texas state courts would somehow regulate this.  But the Justices in the majority are very much aware that this was a way to circumvent Casey’s undue burden standard – by placing a civil “burden” on all of the other folks.

The Result

For the short term, abortions in Texas are limited to six weeks.  Since many women don’t even know they are pregnant in six weeks, their “right” to make choices for their bodies is gone.  And what about those women who can’t afford to go out of state to get a later abortion? they are faced with the choices of keeping an unwanted pregnancy, or finding an illegal abortionist.  The impact is most severe on the economically dis-advantaged.

My mother had an expression: “If it’s good for the goose, it’s good for the gander”. Perhaps this is the “new” way to change our society. If it worked in Texas for abortion law, perhaps it might work just as well in New York or California or Illinois for – say – gun laws. This is the “Pandora’s box” Texas, and the majority of the Court, opened.

And for the long term, it foreshadows a more direct threat to Roe;  a Mississippi case going before the Supreme Court in October.  The 5-4 split certainly isn’t the way the Chief Justice wants to overturn a landmark decision like Roe v Wade. But it is likely that the “five” aren’t so worried about the niceties of Court etiquette.  They have the power to throw out stare decis, the precedents established by Roe and Casey.  Don’t be surprised if they do it.

Sixty-Five Doom

Big Jake

I used a quote from a 1971 John Wayne movie, Big Jake, in an essay the other day, “My fault, Your fault, Nobody’s fault”.  Yesterday, as the remnants of Hurricane Ida poured down on Central Ohio, I found that movie on TV.  It was a “retired folks” afternoon:   a “we don’t have to do anything in the rain,” kind of thing.  And I began thinking as I watched old John Wayne.  Big Jake was the first of his last spurt of cowboy movies, all in the last eight years of his life (Big Jake, The Cowboys, Cahill – US Marshal, Rooster Cogburn and The Shootist, his personal epitaph).  He played an “old tough guy”.  But how old was this “old” guy?  Bad news for me:  John Wayne was sixty-three years old when he made Big Jake.  That “old guy” was almost two years younger than I am now.  

Membership Card

I think it’s been a week of sub-conscious awareness of impending sixty-five-doom.  I got my red-white-and-blue senior citizen membership card yesterday (Medicare).  By the way, the good folks at Medicare had one more little surprise for me when I got my card.  They’re sending me a bill for $592 – payment for the first four months of service.  Only after that can I pay on the “monthly” $148 program.  Thank goodness I didn’t have to purchase Medicare A (just B), that would have cost close to $2000!!

Historic Age

And I find myself relating to President Biden more and more.  He’s seventy-eight, and balancing Covid, Infrastructure, Afghanistan, Hurricane Ida, burning California, Voting Rights and all the rest, all at the same time.  He sounds tired – and should be.  It doesn’t matter how young or old you are – that’s a lot on any President’s plate.  Yet, unlike the public silence of other Presidents withdrawing from world conflicts, Biden stood up in front of the American people and explained his actions in Afghanistan.  Regardless of where you stand on that subject, you’ve got to admire his strength, determination and willingness to put his reasons forward to the American people.

One of the historic figures that stresses me out age-wise is Franklin Roosevelt.  He died at sixty-three years of age – after serving as President for thirteen years (a good reason in itself for not serving more than two terms).  But FDR looked “old” for a long time – hard to imagine he was younger than I am now when he died.  And Lyndon Johnson, only a few years out of office, didn’t manage to qualify for the program he created, Medicare. He was sixty-four when he passed.  Of course, the legend has it that after he left the White House at sixty, he took up chain smoking cigarettes and drinking Cutty Sark (Scotch) and soda once again, and driving his car like a madman around his ranch in Texas – he was going to “die happy” I guess.

Get Going

I will say that impending sixty-five-doom is a motivator in one way.  You might think retired folks get to sleep in, but you haven’t met our dogs.  They are usually up at first light, and I was hoping that as the summer neared an end, they would sleep later.  Not true. Right now 5:23 am is the time that at least one decides it’s time for breakfast.  And when one is up, they all (five at the moment) join in.  There’s no ignoring them.  So regardless of whether I watch the 11 pm news, or wake up in the middle of the night to read the Washington Post, the bell for breakfast (or more exactly, the bark for breakfast) goes off before the dawn’s early light.

So sleep remains a rare commodity.  And it would be easy to ignore my workout regime: “I’m too tired” echoes in my head.  But so far, it’s still a couple of miles on the elliptical, and calisthenics after, five days a week.  I’m proving that I’m not THAT OLD – at least to me.

It’s the first of September.  My favorite season of the year, fall, is almost here. I’m going to a Cross Country Meet tonight.  I’m even going to substitute teach in school on Friday, back in a classroom for the first time since Friday the 13th of March, 2020.   Jenn and I are planning a big Lost Pet Recovery event coming up.  And we are also going on an actual “trip”, a cabin getaway in a couple weeks – so it’s definitely time to get over getting older. 

Guess I’ll get my mileage in now – it’s going to be a busy day. 

Let’s Face it

The last C-17 flew out of Kabul’s airport yesterday. The war that began on October 7th, 2001, for the United States, ends today, August 31st, 2021. It was a war that even got two opposing Presidential candidates to agree – whichever won the US Presidency in 2020, we were leaving Afghanistan. 

Ending Ugly

Let’s face it:  we could have left “better”. There must have been a more effective strategy than the Trump initiated, Biden completed “Withdrawal Plan”.   We should have found a way to leave the Afghans stronger. But if that meant staying in-country longer, losing more than just the thirteen young people we did – then it probably was not worth it.

There is no good way to give up.  It was going to be ugly no matter what. And while the ugly failure of twenty years of “nation building” was more than jarring – give Biden credit. He is taking the heat rather than risking American lives to push it to a “second term” or another President.  Biden feels that he owes it to the American military to NOT risk their lives any more in a stalled conflict. Agree with him or not, he is a man of honor and commitment. 

Mission Creep

Let’s face it: US involvement was absolutely justified. The tribe governing the country sheltered the terrorists who attacked us. We defeated the terrorists and their “protectors”. It was a righteous cause. But it slid into what we now call “mission creep”. We went from fighting al Qaeda and the Taliban to propping up a corrupt government. 

And as several commentators noted, we also “sub-contracted” our mission to Afghanistan. More civilian contractors were in-country in the end than US military. Erik Prince of Blackwater, the former “private security” firm, even suggested we should out-source the fighting to trained mercenaries.  One President listened to him. And while we didn’t do that, we did contract out a lot of the other functions of war, from advising to supply.  We propped up those companies as well. The “military-industrial complex” that Eisenhower warned us about back in 1960 was in full force In Afghanistan.  And those contracting corporations had every financial reason to extend the conflict. So President Biden stood up to them as well. 

Mission Continues

Let’s face it – the US mission to Afghanistan has changed but not ended. ISIS K has made it clear that we must still be interested and involved. And so has the ideological descendants of al Qaeda. So the CIA and our Special Operators will once again walk the streets of Kandahar and Jalalabad and Kabul.   This time as covert agents, rather than the irregulars of an occupying force. But our involvement in Afghanistan is not over.  As we are in Syria and Iraq, Somalia and Sudan, Pakistan and Indonesia; we will still be in Afghanistan.

We can be proud of the last eleven days, the “airlift” from the unfortunately initialed “KIA” (Karzi International Airport).  In a limited mission, the United States Armed Forces put over 5000 troops on the ground and airlifted over 120,000 people out of Afghanistan. We sacrificed thirteen service members, and injured several more. But we not only brought out American citizens and other foreign nationals, but many thousands of the Afghans who aided us in our twenty-year involvement.  And for those who say “we abandoned” the rest, the effort is not over.  While the C-17’s have completed their missions, now other, more covert means are in development.  

Politics

Let’s face it – everything in America today is political, from the flag we fly on the front porch, to the mask we wear to protect us from Covid.  And Afghanistan has been political ever since George W Bush pulled our troops out of the mountains of Tora Bora and sent them to invade Iraq (to prevent Saddam Hussein from having “weapons of mass destruction”). The end of this war is no less political, even though it likely would have looked the same under Biden or Trump.  But what shouldn’t be divisive is the fate of our Afghan friends.  They helped us in our time of need in-country, now we need to help them as they face exile from their homes.  

We welcomed South Vietnamese into the United States in 1975, recognizing their sacrifice was even greater than our own.  We should do the same to the Afghans, encouraging them to resettle here in the United States.  Of all of the issues dividing us, they should NOT be one.  But the hypocrites, so quick to blame President Biden, are also demanding that they be settled elsewhere, as if their loyalty and friendship wasn’t “good enough” to live in the US.  I hope most Americans see past that baseless “not in my backyard” racism, and welcome them to their new homes. 

City on a Hill

Let’s face it:  the War in Afghanistan did not end well.  Like the British Empire of the 19th century, and the Soviet Union in the 1980’s, we could seize the country, but we could not hold it.  Americans failed the lesson of history –  our arrogance doomed us to repeat it.  But perhaps we can learn for the future.  The lesson is not to “never get involved”.  It should be that we recognize that what’s right and what works for Americans isn’t necessarily right for everyone else in the world.  The American experiment may well be Reagan’s “Shining City on a Hill”, but we can’t impose that City on others.  They must come to it of their own will.

The Rear Guard

Victory is Sweet

We like to think of America’s military victories as glorious affairs.  Whether it’s Andrew Jackson at the Battle of New Orleans, defeating the British Army fresh from the battlefields of the Napoleonic Wars, or the Union forces chanting “Fredericksburg” from Cemetery Ridge as Lee’s Confederates stumbled back across the fields of Pennsylvania:  victory is sweet.  Retreat or withdrawal – not so much.  That Civil War battle is a good example:  the day after Lee failed at Gettysburg, his Army began the long “loser’s march” back to Virginia, wagons filled with the wounded who could stand the journey.

But the Union Army stayed in place, not initiating a new attack against the Confederates. They stayed because the shock of the losses in their victory at Gettysburg was so great, that the “glorious victory” felt a lot like the massive defeats they’d suffered before. Sure, they won, but the cost was so high. It was the worst battle of the Civil War, a combined 7,000 dead and 33,000 wounded. The Union Army lost 28% of their effective fighting force (the Confederates 37%). The Union “victory” cost 3155 Union dead – their absolute defeat at Fredericksburg eight months before cost “only” 1284.

The Rear Guard

Left to face any Union advance was the rear guard, the Confederate cavalry who protected their retreating Army. Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart, the cavalry commander who famously left General Lee without intelligence before the battle, lived up to his legendary reputation as he screened off the movement of Lee’s forces back to Virginia. He faced an overwhelming Union force should their commander choose to send them. His actions, and Union General Meade’s hesitation to further commit his forces, allowed Lee’s Army to escape. But there were 654 wounded and dead from both sides in that “rear guard” action, summarized as the battle of Williamsport. Those soldiers too made the ultimate sacrifice.

Who’s Guarding Now

The United States began its withdrawal from Afghanistan years ago. As the forces dwindled down, we depended first on the Afghan Army, then a faulty agreement with the Taliban to act as our “rear guard”. Ultimately, we made the tactical error of betting on both. When the Taliban began their march to power, they were technically not in violation of the “paper”. The United States (Trump Administration) agreed to leave by May 1st. It was July.

Then the Afghan Army made what for them was the logical choice. If the Taliban were going to be the ultimate “winners”, why fight? The military that the US spent twenty years building and financing, literally disappeared, along with the Afghan President who fled to the United Arab Emirates. There was no one left to act as the “rear guard”. The United States sent in 6000 troops to serve in that duty, protecting the evacuation of both US citizens and our Afghan allies. In the end, it is American troops that are serving as the rear guard, as the final protectors of the American withdrawal.

And the longer the withdrawal goes on, the more exposed those final (and literal) gatekeepers become.  This week we recognized how exposed they were.  The only way to get “the right” people into the airport and onto the evacuation planes is to wade out into the crowd and bring them to a gate.  There is no greater moment of exposure:  US soldiers, Marines and Navy Corpsmen, in the middle of the throngs gathered at the gates, escorting those with the “proper” papers, literally to freedom.  

Honor

And in the middle of that throng desperate to leave Afghanistan, are others desperate to kill Americans.  

The nature of withdrawal means that those lines will compress, into smaller and smaller circles.  The enemy will be closer, the target more vulnerable.  The longer we maintain our rear guard, the more opportunities the enemy will have to launch attacks.

This will not get “better”. The thirteen young service members who made the ultimate sacrifice are likely not the last of our “rear guard” to fall. It is the nature of their mission: sacrifice that others’ may escape. We can argue and debate how the “end” of Afghanistan occurred. We can allow our ongoing political vitriol to flow into this tactical nightmare. But as that happens, let’s not forget those that we have asked to serve as that last “rear guard”. They stand protecting the others. And they do so with honor.

Always Did, Always Get

Old Sayings

There’s a “wise” old expression:  “If you always do what you always did, you always get what you always got”.   I heard the retired Generals on TV decrying what’s happening in Afghanistan.  One even proposed that we should send in troops to support those few regions where Afghans are fighting the Taliban.  And many are issuing a stern warning:  we cannot, with ‘Honor’ leave those that helped us behind to the mercy of the Taliban.  

Honor is a funny word here.  Most of those generals had the opportunity to really make a difference in Afghanistan.  They could have “changed” the course of America’s involvement when they were in charge.  But time after time, their only answer was:  we need to stay, we need more troops, we need more money, we need more, more, more, more.  So now when two opposite Presidents, Biden and Trump, say it’s time to get out – all the Generals can still say is the same “more”. (What – I’m saying that Trump was right?  Well, in principle yes, but don’t get carried away.  His “greatest deal ever” with the Taliban wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on.  And there’s always another wise expression, something about  “a monkey, a typewriter, and Shakespeare.”) 

Different

“More” is not the answer here: “Different” is.  We need to do something different.  And it’s not an “unknown Different”.  It’s called “over the horizon operations”.  

We need to get as many folks out of Afghanistan as we can now.  We have already evacuated more than one hundred thousand, with thousands more to come before the air operations end.  But that ending has to come soon, whether it’s President Biden’s August 31st, or a few days later.  We are leaving.

Retired Four-Star General Barry McCaffrey agrees with the President.  He said it straight: “This war is over”.  He opposes sending any further troops.  The old Iraq War Corp commander wants to wrap up this mission, and get out.

And what of those who can’t get to the transport, who “miss the flight”?  Well, for some, it may require Special Operations Forces to go in and get them.  That ain’t easy, and it’s expensive.  But it can be done – ask Osama bin Laden (oh, maybe not him).  If we can find and kill him, we can find and rescue who we need to.

A Target

That was an “over the horizon” operation, and may be what we need to do (and probably are doing now. It’s not like Admiral Kirby will get up there and announce it to the media).  And those can go on.  But the target of six thousand US Troops, and near one hundred flights a day, in the middle of a hostile zone; cannot go on for much longer.  A bomb went off this morning, several were killed, among them thirteen American Marines, and dozens more injured, including more US troops.  But what happens when a shoulder launched anti-aircraft missile hits an Air Force C-17 with six or seven hundred passengers in it?  The US is pushing its luck, every extra day.

We had twenty years to figure out Afghanistan.  We broke up al Qaeda, and we removed the Taliban rulers.  Then we helped set up a government and a military to hang onto what we established.  It didn’t work:  our fault, their fault, nobody’s fault (that’s John Wayne from Big Jake).  It is time to get out and let Afghanistan do what the Afghans have done for generations:  tribal struggles for power and wealth. 

Defining Democracy

We can talk about what we did wrong – as many have said there will be plenty of blame to go around.  And we can recognize that the American notion of “nation building” has not worked.  It didn’t work in Vietnam, nor in Iraq, nor in Afghanistan.  

I am not an “America Firster”.  We have legitimate reasons to be involved in the world, and we should support democracy wherever it exists.  But we cannot create democracy out of whole cloth.  It must first have a foothold that we can encourage, not an ideology that we force on another nation.   It must be inherent within, not externally imposed.   

We cannot “always do what we always did”, in spite of the many “Old Generals”. We need to find new means to achieve our goals:  a secure America and world, and fertile ground for the “self-evident truths” of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  None of those goals will be achieved by staying in Afghanistan.  As President Biden stated – except for Osama bin Laden, would we never have invaded Afghanistan in the first place.

What’s the Deal

Retirement

To be honest, this feels a lot like an “old retired person complaining”.  But here it is.  I was a public employee, a public school teacher before I retired.  I worked for thirty-five and a half years (to be precise, I wasn’t going to leave in the middle of the year).  The “retirement deal” I got sounded pretty good.  I could retire at a high percentage of my best three years, and I would get additional cost of living adjustments (COLA’s) after I retired.  That was the deal through my most years of my employment – no surprise “take it or leave it” offers at the end.  And it was what I depended upon as I planned my future.

State Teacher Retirement (STRS) is different than most other forms of retirement.  As a teacher, they didn’t even take Social Security or Medicare out of our paychecks.  We were separate, and the “deal” was that our retirement system would provide a pension and health insurance, better than Medicare and Social Security.  We wouldn’t “need” those services.

Promises Made

It was a “straight” pension program.  We paid ten percent of our annual salary into the system, our employer added another eight percent.  So STRS got thirty-five and a half years of eighteen percent of my salary to invest.  There wasn’t any choice to make back “in the day”; it was sign up and start teaching.  Thirty or more years down the road, STRS would “take care” of you, with your own money.  The deal was to work for moderate wages and get a solid pension afterwards.  But the deal is changing, long after the promises were made.

They started to change the rules in the last years right before I planned on retiring.  All of a sudden, the Ohio State Legislature was worried that the public pension systems – STRS, SERS (school employees), OPERS (public employees), SHPS (Highway Patrol) and OP&F (police and fire) might not have enough money to cover their obligations.  There were a lot of factors, but one was us “baby boomers”.  There were a lot of us, and we were retiring and living longer, and that was putting pressure on the system.  For forty years, the “baby boomers” carried the systems, with more of us working and fewer retired people.  Now, that ratio started to reverse.

Too Much to Ignore

But you’d think if the systems got thirty or more years of eighteen percent of our income, that would be enough.  And add to that sum, all of the money they could make by investing that money “for us”, and it should cover everything.  If the phrase, “it takes money to make money” makes sense, then they had plenty.

If they just stuck the money in the stock market, using the Dow Jones Industrials, they’d averaged  ten percent per year.   Standard and Poor’s Index, would have been eleven percent over the past forty years.  But the vagaries of the stock markets were too dangerous, they thought, so they diversified the funds.  That made sense, originally.

But, particularly after the Wall Street crash of 2008, the pressure was on the “funds” to make more profit.  And, no one, the state leaders thought,  could make profit than private investment folks (just like the ones that crashed Wall Street in the first place).  It didn’t hurt that Ohio’s Governor, John Kasich, had made his “fortune” at Lehman Brothers. So STRS began to pay millions of dollars to have private investment firms control some of their “nest egg”.  And how big is the “egg”:  over ninety billion dollars.

Life in the Taj Mahal

And in the meantime, you had all of those “public” employees at STRS (they actually retire in OPERS) controlling the investments from STRS Headquarters in downtown Columbus: 275 East Broad Street.  It’s a beautiful building, reminiscent of a high class Hyatt Hotel.  And of course, there’s the heated sidewalks, the brick floored covered garage, the in-house child care and the expensive art and sculptures.  They definitely had money to spend, and they spent it.  And that’s all good, as long as they covered all of their retirees costs.

There were some early signs.  For two decades STRS issued retirees a “Thirteenth Check” each year.  But in 2000 that stopped.  And retirees looked at increasing costs of health insurance, particularly for dependents. 

And in 2015 STRS suspended Cost of Living Adjustments.  At first it was for five years, but now six years later they are still suspended, with little hope of returning.  Meanwhile, the investment staff lost half a billion dollars investing in Panda Energy in Texas, and more in high end real estate with little hope of recouping the costs.  But the staff still managed to “achieve” $7.8 million in annual performance bonuses for themselves.

So with all this, what’s the point.  

Broad Street, not Wall Street

STRS, and the other pension funds in Ohio, shouldn’t be “Wall Street” style investment houses.  They aren’t there to make their “associates” a profit, or provide them with all of the “Wall Street” type perks.  They should be protecting the future for their members; the now retired, and the future retirees.  But there’s a lot of living “high on the hog” going on, with little concern for the impact of cuts to their members.

And there’s the more basic question.  If the staff is achieving millions of dollars of performance goals, why is the fund still continuing to charge increased costs to the “members”?  Shouldn’t the “performance” be based on achieving one basic goal – taking care of their members?  That’s not what going on.

Meanwhile, if you are a retired teacher, all of the promises are in question.  You don’t “need” Medicare, but with increasing STRS insurance costs, you probably do.  You don’t “need” Cost of Living Adjustments, but the real “cost of living” continues to increase.  Do we really want seventy-five year old substitute teachers? Or your old first grade teacher greeting you at Wal Mart?  That’s not the “deal” we made.

But at least if we have to sleep on the sidewalks at 275 East Broad, they’re heated.

The Watchers

Young Gun

I was twenty-one years old, but a seasoned campaign veteran in the spring 1978.  I’d started campaigning when I was fourteen, and seven years later, I’d organized  several counties and run the Cincinnati sign operation for the successful Jimmy Carter Campaign. I’d also run a winning Congressional Get Out the Vote effort.  So I was pretty confident that a State Representative Campaign wouldn’t be too difficult.

We had beautiful literature, wonderful sign locations, and highly visible signs and bumper stickers.  I was proud of what we were doing, and even prouder of my candidate.  She was a great speaker, great with people, and had a true desire to make things better.

Our one concern:  the core of our “base” in the State Representative District was in a  traditionally Republican area.  And while that was good news for the general election, it was a problem in the primary, where only Democrats were allowed to vote for us.  But there wasn’t much of interest on the Republican side of the ballot, and many of our supporters were going to“cross-over” and declare themselves Democrats for the purpose of voting for “us”. 

Closed Primary

Seven years as a campaigner, and I thought I knew all about the “polling places”.  Back then, long computer lists were posted on the doors, updated by hand every couple of hours to show who voted and who hadn’t.  And as a campaign staffer, I could enter the polling place and measure how things were going.  

Ohio is a “closed primary” state.  That means that you have to be a “registered” Democrat to vote with a Democratic ballot.  But you could change you registration upon request at the polling place.  You simply asked for the Democratic instead of the Republican ballot, and generally that’s all it took.  Next time the voting rolls were updated, there would be a “D” beside you name.  It happened all the time:  over six years of voting listed beside a name, you might see R-D-R or R-D-D (or mine – a D-D-D).  

And we also knew about the technicality.  If you asked to change party affiliation, a “poll-watcher” could challenge that change.  That would require the voter to fill out a form, saying they supported the other party, and wanted to change. They simply said yes – and signed the form.  There was a penalty for lying – it was fifth degree felony.

Of course there was absolutely no way to know if anyone was lying.  The one thing almost every American knows is that the ballot is “secret”, and has been since the late 1800’s.  So no one would ever know how you voted before or on that ballot.  It wasn’t attainable information.  And wanting to vote for a particular candidate was in fact “supporting the other party”.   So it wasn’t a lie, and it wasn’t  a big deal. 

Poll Bullies

But our wily primary opponent knew that fear was “9/10’s of the law”.  So he sent big, burly watchers to the polling places in our base.  Their job:  to verbally challenge every R to D change, and force them to sign the affidavit.  The watchers made sure to emphasize the penalties, and many voters began to wonder, “Am I doing something wrong?” Instead of thousands of votes in our base, we got a couple hundred.  Many of our supporters didn’t even vote at all, but left the polling place concerned and confused.  We lost the election, and I learned another valuable lesson in politics – intimidation works.  

That was forty-three years ago – and I can assure you things haven’t gotten better.  Here in Ohio we still have those laws, though absentee voting makes it less intimidating to change parties.

Enabling Intimidation  

Poll “watchers” can challenge any voter’s legal right to vote.  And while they aren’t supposed to challenge “without cause”, the sheer presence of someone willing to make that challenge, is enough to keep many from voting.

One of the major demands of the Republican voter law “retrenchments” throughout the country is to grant even easier access to poll watchers.  It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, the 2020 Trump campaign was looking for off-duty police officers to volunteer to “watch” in largely Democratic and minority precincts.  And now in Texas, Georgia, and Arizona – the watchers can take an even bigger role in the polls.

So when a voter goes into the wrong precinct, has a change of address, or has some other glitch in their registration: the poll watcher can challenge their right to vote.  Now in most states the voter has the right to ask for a provisional ballot, one that can be “cured” of defect after the election.  But with intimidating poll watchers, how many will walk out of the polling place, confused and concerned and afraid that somehow, they “broke the law”?  And how many of those watchers will it take to change the outcome of an election?  Ask the Trump Georgia campaign of 2020 – it wouldn’t take much.

Election law is arcane.  It’s easy to make a mistake.  Ask my very-well educated friend who missed signing a ballot petition in two places.  When he asked the Board of Elections personnel if everything was OK, they said they thought so.  He turned in the application – then they disqualified him from the ballot, and even from running as a write-in candidate.  And if a candidate can make that kind of mistake, what can happen to the casual voter? 

Land of the Free

Is that what we want American elections to be about – intimidation and threat rather than an open and welcoming voting system?  Tripping folks up on technicalities easily “cured”, rather than protecting their vote?  Don’t we want it to be easy for every legal voter to cast their ballot, not harder?  In an era when I can buy a car, sell my house, and even go to my doctor without leaving my home – why force folks to “go” vote? Is making it harder really “American”?

Making it harder to vote does give a political advantage to one side.  The ever-shrinking Republican Party is staring into the face of changing demographics.  Those changes are leaving their Party behind.  Republicans are struggling to stay in power.   Their chosen solution is NOT to make their Party more widely appealing.  Instead, it’s to make it more difficult to vote, for everyone – and hope that their own fewer voters still show up.

To misquote John Mellencamp – “That ain’t American, for you and me”. 

School Masks

Dress Codes

I was the Dean of Students of a local high school for eight years.  One of my primary, and least favorite jobs, was enforcing the student “dress code”.  It wasn’t the best duty for a career track coach.  I was used to seeing kids in track apparel:  from speed suits (one-piece form-fitting spandex) to “short-shorts” (distance running 3” spilt shorts) to sports bras (support garment for women designed to be worn as “outer wear”).  Normal practices and meets involved seeing boys and girls in what might in other circumstances be called, “various stages of undress”.

The Rules

But what worked on the track didn’t necessarily fit in the classroom.  At the time, the dress code was specific.

  • students must wear shoes
  • underwear type shirts cannot be worn as outerwear
  • pants must be worn at waist level
  • see-through clothing not allowed
  • shoulder strapped clothing must be at least 4-fingers in width
  • tops revealing the midriff are not allowed
  • boxer shorts are not outerwear
  • skirts, shorts and dresses must reach mid-thigh
  • hair styles neat and clean and must not provide a hazardous condition
  • holes in clothing cannot reveal underwear or inappropriate body parts
  • no hats, sunglasses, leather trench coats, dog collars, spike chains,
  • no dew rags, scarves,  beanies, stocking caps, sweatshirt hoods or bandannas.
  • jewelry that can be used as a weapon not allowed
  • tattoos or other body decorations considered offensive must be covered.
  •         Watkins Memorial High School Student Dress Code – 2013-14

Tinker v Des Moines

And all of that was based on a United States Supreme Court case, Tinker v Des Moines.  The 1969 Vietnam War era case balanced the Free Speech rights of students against the reasonable need of public schools to provide them an education.  The critical phrase, “Disruption of the educational process”, became the basis for public school dress codes throughout the country. If the school could show that a form of dress, say, wearing leather trench coats, was disruptive of the educational process (because of the possible dangers hidden by the coat, made famous by the Columbine High School shootings), then the school could ban them.

Disruption, of course, is in the eye of the beholder.  Like the 1960’s Supreme Court standard for pornography, it was a kind of “I know it when I see it” decision.  And disruption evolved over time.  A cross-dressing boy or girl would never have gotten past the front office in the 1980’s, but by the 2000’s were just a part of the “student scene”.  And the era when boxer shorts were considered “outerwear” was mercifully short, maybe just a single school year (1988-89).

But schools have had Court-backed wide authority to determine what students are allowed to wear and what they aren’t.  So much so, that a decade ago, some public schools determined to implement school uniforms.  While that issue hasn’t risen to the Supreme Court level yet, it’s an open question at best whether schools really have that much authority.  Uniforms seem to be the ultimate suppression of students “free speech” rights under Tinker.

Arguing for Masks

So if a school can ban dew rags and sunglasses, dog collars and hats, can a school implement a rule requiring face masks, under a dress code regulation?

As a former Dean of Students, here’s the argument I would make to allow it.  Students are concerned about the spread of the Delta-Variant of Covid-19.  That concern is real and provable, and goes beyond their own personal health.  Many students have family members, from siblings to grandparents, who are more vulnerable to the ravages of the disease.  And since the school has not taken the position that students are required to be vaccinated (that will happen in some schools, particularly at the college level, once the FDA accepts the vaccine for “regular use”) students have no way of knowing which students are vaccinated or not.

Students are required to sit in classrooms, placed side-by-side in student desks with as many as thirty in a room.  While that situation increases the risk of viral spread, it has been demonstrated that proper wearing of face masks significantly reduces the risk.  

So all students wearing masks would make the entire environment safer for all students.  A student not wearing a mask in that environment, could be seen as “disrupting the educational process” per Tinker v Des Moines.  Just like students are required to wear pants, and tops (with at least a 4-finger shoulder strap) then they can be required to wear masks as well.  It’s not just about modesty or commonality, it’s about preserving the health of all.

Authority

Schools have this authority independent of the state governors.  The only control that some of those governors can implement over schools (depending on the state) is to restrict funding.  And while funding is important, it’s not an absolute authority.  After all, it’s only money.

So schools could implement a mask mandate, as many of the more urban school districts have.  And when the case goes to Court, they may well be able to defend their authority to do it.  A real fear of contracting Covid is truly disruptive of the educational process.

Eat it Too

Winning

The United States is a nation used to “winning”.  We won the American Revolution.  You can argue about the War of 1812, but the former colonies took on the most powerful nation in the world and survived.  And the list goes on:  the Mexican American War, the Civil War, the Spanish American War, World War I, and World War II.  We know how to do parades down Fifth Avenue in New York, and Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington.

What we don’t know how to do is “withdraw”.  We went into the Korean War in 1949:  we’re still there.  The Vietnam War was the “longest” in American history, but we all knew what was going to happen when American troops left after a decade of combat.  Less than two years later, we saw the disastrous final days of the collapse of Saigon.  Sure we “won” the Persian Gulf War, freeing Kuwait, but it left a segment of our leadership unsatisfied.  They wanted to “finish” the job.

Shock and Awe

So back we went in 2003, the US using the “Shock and Awe” of a massive air campaign to denigrate the remaining Iraqi defenses.  Then our tanks and troops attacked, quickly marching into the capital of Baghdad, gaining control, and tearing down the huge statue of Saddam Hussein, symbolic of the end of his reign of terror.  We later found Hussein himself, hidden in a sewer hole.  He was tried and executed.

It was easy to win, but hard to hold.  And when we tried to leave, the power vacuum created the space for ISIS to sweep over the government we helped set up.  It took our Kurdish allies, the ones we abandoned a decade later in Syria, to overcome the ISIS Caliphate.

And now there is our “new” longest war, the near two decades in Afghanistan.  We went into the nation to remove al Qaeda and punish the governing Taliban for protecting them.  We achieved both of those goals early, but like Vietnam and Iraq, there was no easy way out.  Al Qaeda was driven away, and eventually Osama bin Laden was killed.  But the Taliban, while defeated, were not vanquished.  As long as the United States remained, they were held at bay, but it was always apparent that when we left, the Taliban would rise up again.

Inshallah

President Biden knew that whenever we left Afghanistan it was going to be ugly.  But the United States wasn’t prepared for the Afghan government to collapse like a popped balloon, giving little resistance to the Taliban.  What the Biden Administration thought would be a months’ long process of withdrawal, became days.  It’s a failure of intelligence, and, of imagination.

It’s hard to blame the Afghan Army.  If you know that your defeat by the Taliban is inevitable, why resist?  Better to take care of your family and property, if you can.  The future is “written”, why risk death and destruction to delay it?  The Islamic term is “inshallah”, as Allah wills it.

So what’s happening today in Kabul is ugly, just as ugly as 1975 in Saigon. And while the President is “technically” right – no helicopters lifting Americans from the embassy roof as the Viet Cong came in the front door – the US is still being chased out of the country. And we did send helicopters to bring Americans from Kabul hotels, and 5800 US Troops hold the airport, so there’s that.

Both Sides Now

The President’s political opponents are jumping on the crisis.  From the left, while fully in favor of leaving Afghanistan, there is an outcry of “what will happen to the women and girls”?  And from the right, “what will happen to all those who helped American forces”?  And they are both correct.  

Leaving Afghanistan in the hands of the Taliban means that the advances women have enjoyed in the past two decades will be lost.  The Taliban believe in Shariah Law, where women have no place outside of the home.  And those Afghans who aided the American Forces are at extreme risk, there is no doubt.

But both sides want to “have their cake and eat it too”.  Neither left nor right wants to remain in Afghanistan.  It is a war that has no “victory” for America.  What we hoped in 2001, was that we could “create” a democratic state there, one where the ideals of American government, balances of power and popular representation, could be demonstrated.  But the long tribal traditions of Afghan life are far too strong to be changed by American blood or treasure.  As the Russians, the British, and even Alexander the Great discovered:  Afghans will chart their own course.

No Solution

So when the left decries what will happen to Afghan women, they are correct.  But there is no good solution to that problem, no way to force Afghanistan into a modern mold of gender interaction.  Well, no way without remaining indefinitely in-country to hold the Shariah Law at bay.  And even the most vocal on the left aren’t calling for that.

And when the right demand that we protect those who aided US Forces, they aren’t wrong either. But they are contradictory. Protect our Afghan allies, but don’t dare bring them to the United States. They are brown, and Muslim, and all the things banned from entry into the US by their leader, the former President, in the first days of his administration. Protect those “friends”, but not in my neighborhood. They are hypocrites.

One Way Out

The United States is evacuating from the Kabul Airport.  We are taking thousands out of Afghanistan:  American citizens, allied Afghans, and others who can find a way onto the C-17 transports.  For those who remember history, it is a “Berlin Airlift” in reverse, coming in empty and leaving with record numbers of passengers.  Our Armed Forces are doing their best to make-up for the failures of our withdrawal.  But we are one catastrophic air failure from disaster.  And inevitably there will be those left behind, and for the women of Afghanistan, there is no good solution.

Blame President Biden, or President Trump, or President Obama, or President Bush.  Blame US intelligence for not imagining the collapse, or the US State Department for not recognizing the urgency of those left behind, or the US Armed Forces for not protecting our Allies.  There’s plenty of blame to go around.  But recognize this:  as ugly as the US withdrawal is, it was always going to be a disaster. 

Because disaster was the only way out.

No Shoes, No Shirt, No Mask, No School

 

Exposure

Yesterday, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey threatened to take millions of dollars away from school districts that dare to mandate masks to stop the spread of Covid.  Last week, Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida tried to withhold the salaries of school superintendents and board members who did the same.  A few days later, he found he didn’t really have that power – but he tried.

So let’s look at the facts.  The Covid virus now confronting us, the Delta-variant, is hundreds of times more infectious than the original ‘B’ virus we faced last year.  Because it is so infectious, more children are getting sick.  And at the moment there is no vaccine for children under 12, and many of the therapeutic drugs (like remdesivir) have very limited testing on younger children. 

It would make sense then, to avoid having children exposed to the virus.  And, as we discovered in the first round of Covid last year, it’s not just about one person wearing a mask.  It’s about everyone wearing a mask – to prevent transmission from a person who is infected and doesn’t know it, and to prevent infection by others.

What We Learned

We did make some discoveries last year.  With the original Covid, outdoor transmission was unlikely.  We all waited for the “super spreader” outbreaks after the Black Lives Matter protests.  They didn’t happen, because most wore masks and the protests were outdoors.  On the other hand, indoor crowded events, particularly unmasked, did generate disease transmission.  President Trump’s unmasked indoor rally in Tulsa (where Herman Cain caught Covid and eventually died from it) and the massive motorcycle rally at Sturgis both were “super spreader” events. (Note:  while the rally was outdoors, the drinking afterwards was definitely indoors).

And even though the contrast WAS political (BLM versus Trump and Sturgis) it wasn’t about politics – it’s about the science:  masks or no masks, indoor or outdoor.

But the current version of Covid is much more infective.  And we know that schools are traditionally where diseases spread – from chicken pox to measles to the flu.  And that makes sense.  We put groups of individuals in close contact with each other indoors for extended periods of time – we call it “class”.   So viruses spread, and kids get sick.

It is common sense to try to control the infectiousness in schools, just like it was for the chicken pox, the measles, and still is for the flu.  But for those diseases, we have well accepted vaccines and treatments.  What were school-wide measles or chicken pox epidemics in “my day” back in the 1960’s, are now anachronisms – “back in the day” stories.  And, by the way, back “in the day” we also lined kids up for the polio vaccine:  in schools.

Masks work – that’s not a question, it’s a fact.  Mask everyone, and they work even better.   That’s what school superintendents’ know – and they know it’s how to protect “their” kids, and their staff, and their communities.

What Governors Know

So why don’t Governors know that?

DeSantis, Ducey and Greg Abbott of Texas (who now has Covid) all claim that they are fighting for “the freedom” to not wear masks.  It’s a claim of individual liberty.  But those same Governors accept that children have dress codes in schools, can’t carry weapons, and even demand that they be allowed to pray.  So they don’t seem to have a problem with letting schools control all kinds of other actions, including what children (and staff) wear.  So why masks are different than Budweiser hats or jeans with holes in the crotch is hard to figure.

It may just be political expediency.  DeSantis, Ducey and Abbott (sounds like a TV law firm) all are dependent on a Trumpian voter base for re-election.  Unfortunately mask wearing is politically symbolic – and the Trump base doesn’t wear them (or get vaccinated).  So it’s possible that the Governors are just pandering to their base.

Health

But I hope they would put the health of their constituents, all of their constituents, first.  So is there some scientific theory that might explain their adamant position?  The “herd immunity” view is that the more people get the disease, the better off our whole society would be.  The problem is that many will die, and that more will have long term effects from Covid. 

The advantage of the “herd immunity” argument is that it doesn’t require any community controls.  Commerce can continue without abatement, which in plain language means that the economy shouldn’t be impacted.  But that depends on everyone being willing to risk getting sick:  including kids.  Restaurants and stores won’t be filled if folks are afraid of getting infected.  So “herd immunity” might not be such a great idea.

And, of course, the hospitals will be over-filled, and folks will die – there’s that.

Educators are notoriously hard-headed – take it from me, I was one.  And teachers are incredibly protective of “their” kids.  So it really isn’t a surprise that schools are defying Governors and mandating masks, just like they mandate pants in the dress code.  It’s a lot more important than modesty.  It’s the health of their kids.

Coming Home

A Flower in Your Hair

My friends who fought in Vietnam felt attacked.  They came home, often on a direct flight straight to the US from Da Nang in the war zone, to a country ripped by division.  They were advised to change into “civies” before they left the plane – a uniformed soldier might get insulted or spit on or even attacked as they walked through the airport.  

Many were draftees, with no real choice but to go and fight in Vietnam.  But others volunteered, legitimately feeling that they were fighting for their country.  Either way, they weren’t politicians, not involved in setting the policies that resulted in what was then America’s longest war.  They were doing “their job”, often times as “bait” to draw out the enemy insurgents.  Much like the more recent veterans who “cleared” the roads by driving down them to trigger Improvised Explosive Devices, Vietnam vets were often marched through the jungle to trigger ambushes and create a  “fire-fight”.  

Many of those Vietnam vets came home conflicted.  They didn’t know what they fought for, other than the men beside them.  It was a war of survival in the jungle, of an enemy who often killed from unseen positions, or used women or children as traps, or punji sticks camouflaged on the trail. 

War on Facetime

Many of my friends who came back from Afghanistan felt the same way.  The enemy was “part” of the environment, fighting from their home villages.  Friend and foe alike were hard to identify.  Such simple considerations as not shooting children could result in losing a fellow American.  The ground rules were not the same, not what they grew up with in American small towns like Pataskala.   And when they wanted to see those small towns – they were only a phone call away.  

My Vietnam era friends often asked – what were we fighting for?  There really wasn’t a clear answer:  we went into Vietnam to “save democracy”, but that Vietnamese democracy never existed.  We went to stop Communism, but found we were really just stopping the Vietnamese from choosing their own government.  

And we found in Vietnam that no matter how strong we were, we couldn’t defeat a clearly weaker enemy.  More bombs were dropped on Vietnam than in all of World War II, but it didn’t seem to have an impact.  The Viet Cong and North Vietnamese soldiers could live on a cup of rice a day.  And they were motivated to win back their country.

Mission Creep

The War in Afghanistan lasted for twenty years.  America went into battle with righteous might, the rubble of the twin towers still smoking on the tip of Manhattan.  We knew why we were there.  But somewhere in the two decades after, that cause seemed long lost.  “Mission Creep”, starting with one goal but finding the “finish line” constantly moving, became the hallmark of US strategy in Afghanistan.  As we withdraw today, some cry “Al Qaeda will be back”.  But it rings hollow, it really wasn’t even why we were fighting for most of the past two decades.

My friends who fought in Afghanistan ask – why did I fight there?  But unlike my Vietnam era friends, they should have a clearer understanding of their mission, even though it got lost as the War dragged on.  They were fighting against the foes of the United States.  And while the Taliban did NOT attack the Twin Towers, they enabled those who did.  But like most wars, in the end they were fighting for each other, for the man or woman who stood shoulder to shoulder with them.  And some of those were Afghans, now left behind as the Taliban take control.

Not in Vain

The difference between the two wars is that the Afghanistan War veterans have a clearer view.  They can be sad and angry about how the United State ended it, but can be clear about the heroic goals of their service.  You did us proud, as did your grandfathers in Vietnam.  As as nation we might not agree on many things, but your sacrifice was not in vain.  For two decades you cleared the nation of our enemies, and gave the Afghans hope for a future.

There is a “theory of revolution”.  It goes like this:  revolutions don’t happen when people are oppressed.  They happen when oppressed folks are given hope, and that hope is taken away.  From the American Revolution to the French and the Russian, it wasn’t at the lowest time that the people rose up.  It was the time after hope was snatched away that revolution began.  We can hope that is true in Afghanistan as well, for a time when the Afghans themselves will determine that the Taliban way is not what they want.  And the example they will look to, the time of hope, is the two decades provided by US Forces.

Our Afghanistan Veterans did that.

Bite the Bullet

The Tet Offensive

The United States involvement in Vietnam stretched from 1956 to 1975.  While the initial eight years was as “advisors” to the South Vietnamese Army and government, from 1964 on the United States became direct combatants in the country, with over half a million troops “in-country” by 1968.  

And it was in that same year, soon after the US military announced that we had “control” of the countryside, the Vietcong and North Vietnamese Army forces launched the Tet Offensive. From the DMZ in the North, to the capitol in Saigon in the center to the Mekong Delta in the South; the Tet Offensive attacked US and South Vietnamese forces throughout the countryside.  That offensive was ultimately driven back – but from that point, no matter how many bombs we dropped, the US was only “treading water” in Vietnam.

Vietnamization

The US signed the Paris Peace Accords five years later in January of 1973, and began to withdraw forces.  President Nixon told us that his plan of “Vietnamization” would put the South Vietnamese Army in position to defend their own nation.  The final US combat troops left Vietnam two months later.  

The North Vietnamese gave the Americans “cover” and waited.  It wasn’t until the spring of 1975 that they launched a final attack on the South Vietnamese government, which collapsed like a “house of cards”.  American’s still in Vietnam were caught unprepared, and scrambled to get out of the country.  Vietnamese who supported the US efforts were mostly left to the “mercies” of the North Vietnamese forces.  It was as ugly as we thought it could get.

The Lesson

What lesson should the United States have learned?  That however much equipment, bullets and guns, advisors and training supplied to a nation; none of that can substitute for the “will to fight”.  When armies don’t believe in their leadership or their cause, they are unwilling to fight and die, no matter what the quality of their training and weaponry.

We learned that same lesson again in Iraq.   From 2002 until 2011, The United States “stood up” the Iraqi Army after the defeat of Saddam Hussein and the election of a new government (remember the purple thumbs?).  We trained and supplied, and advised.  But when US forces were asked by the Iraqi government to leave, and President Obama gladly took the opportunity to move out, ISIS forces came out of Syria and quickly overwhelmed the Iraqi Army.  

The ISIS fighters believed in their cause, and were willing to fight and die for it.  The Iraqi Army, much like the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, did not.  So even though they were outnumbered and out-weaponed, ISIS prevailed.  It took the Kurdish Forces, knowing that ISIS represented an existential threat to their homes and lives and backed by the US, to drive ISIS out of Iraq.

9-11

The United States invaded Afghanistan in October of 2001.  Our goals were clear:  destroy Al Qaeda who attacked us on 9-11, and punish the Taliban government that allowed them to use their nation as a base.  But while we damaged Al Qaeda, we lost the opportunity to destroy them in the mountains of Tora Bora.  And while we “stood up” a government that opposed the Taliban, spending twenty years and billions of dollars to keep them in power, that government never, ever, stood a chance of existing on its own.

Meanwhile the Taliban sharpened their abilities, training against the best military ever seen in world history, the United States Forces.  And when the United States said enough after twenty years of stalemate and withdrew its forces, the well trained and highly motivated Taliban had no problem removing the uninspired government troops.

Doomed to Repeat

It’s really even uglier than Saigon in 1975.  The Afghan President was out of the country before his capitol in Kabul was even under pressure.  With the President gone, it’s no wonder that the Army folded without even a whimper.  His message was clear – get out if you can.  Afghans who made their way to the international airport desperately demanded a seat on a flight out –to anywhere. 

Americans have been taught the same lesson over and over again:  in Vietnam, in Iraq, and now in Afghanistan.  We can always maintain a stalemate, always use American blood and treasure to prop up corrupt governments and maintain status-quo.  But ultimately, we cannot create the “will” of a people to fight.  As much as we believe in democracy, in the “purple thumb” of Iraq, our beliefs were not the question.  It was the beliefs of the Vietnamese, Iraqi and Afghan peoples.

Richard Nixon began the withdrawal from Vietnam, but it was Gerald Ford who “took the hit” for the “fall” of Saigon.  Barack Obama took the blame for the rise of ISIS (remember Trump called him the “creator” of ISIS), but got US troops out of Iraq.  And now Joe Biden is determined to end US involvement in our longest struggle – twenty years in Afghanistan.  His mantra is the  “Buck Stops with Me”.  It’s ugly, and awful, and we are abandoning those who depended upon us.   

And it was going to happen whenever the US determined to leave.  

Outside My Window – Part 12

So this isn’t a “Sunday Story” – though it is Sunday, and this is kind of a story.  This essay is more like the “my life and times” essays of the “Out My Window” series – so here you have it – Outside My Window.

Medicare 

Earlier this summer I wrote an essay about my adventures in signing up for Medicare (Medicare and Me).  This week I had my “final” phone meeting with the Social Security/Medicare folks, and got everything figured out.  I am now a proud member of Medicare Part B, just waiting for my Red, White and Blue card, the sign of ultimate senior-hood.  And better yet, in several years I too can become a member of Medicare Part A, compliments of my wife’s eligibility.  This time everyone had the correct information, and the phone call was efficient and friendly.

Fence Dentistry

I’m not sure what did it, but somehow in the same week I signed up for Medicare, the hottest week of the summer; was when I decided to replace several fence posts on our picket fence.  Last spring a sixty mile-an-hour straight line wind came whipping past our neighbor’s house to the west, and managed to “bend” the fence to the east.  It wasn’t falling down, but the posts holding up the pickets were definitely bowing towards the rising sun.  I’ve tried, but there’s no good way to straighten them out (picket fence orthodontics) so out they came, cement and all.  Each post hole was enlarged, and a new post cemented into place.  Instead of braces, think teeth implants.

It can only be done one post at a time, otherwise the whole fence falls down.  So I was out proving something to nobody:  digging holes, pulling posts and mixing cement.  Sixty-five (almost)? Ninety-two degrees?  Stop Working?  Oh Hell No, though Jenn and the neighbors appeared to be waiting for my “imminent” collapse. 

The fence is up, and straight, and I proved — Ahh well, I don’t think I proved anything.  Time to seal the deck next!!

Call to Duty

Why such a hurry?  Well starting tomorrow the week is set aside for Jury Duty.  The Common Pleas Court of Licking County made their call last May, but were flexible enough to move the date out of track season.  Now it’s time to fulfill my civic duty, and the next five days are the property of the Court.

I’ve been on Jury Duty before.  The last time it was a short stint, I lasted less than a day.  My roles at the local high school put me in contact with too many of the faces in the courtroom.  I knew the prosecutor, the bailiff, and several of the other jurors.  Once they asked if I knew anyone in the Court, and I got through my list  — the Judge thanked me for coming and excused me from further duty.  That five day stint didn’t last past lunchtime.

But I’m definitely ready to be on the jury, if need be.  I’ve cleared all five days for Judge Branstool, and I’m getting prepared.  Now to watch Twelve Angry Men (the 1957 version with Henry Fonda) and Runaway Jury (Gene Hackman, John Cusack), two of my favorites to get prepped.  

Courthouse Rules

Licking County does not allow electronic devices in the Courthouse.  Not only can I not take my computer in the building (no writing essays as I wait) but I can’t even take my cell phone.  That’s a cultural throwback, even if I have an impending Medicare card I’m still addicted to the constant flow of information from the box in my pocket.  So it’ll be locked in the “vault” in the Jeep, and I’ll have to depend on a five hundred and seventy-one year-old information transmission device:  I’ll read a book. I’ve already started I Alone Can Fix It by Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Phil Rucker, about the final year of the Trump Administration (is anyone surprised by that?). 

The only other issue here in Licking County is the growing question of our “Covid-19 Delta Variant” era:  to mask or not.  I got the “shot” last March, but I’m literally going into a room of complete strangers in a county where the vaccination rate is only 47%.  Like most of the country, the rates of infection are up here.  The County Health Department consistently avoids mandating restrictions – but repeats the CDC guidelines for mask use.  It’s the easy out for them.

So I’ll leave my phone, grab my book and mask, and head over to Newark, the county seat, to report for duty by 8:45 tomorrow morning.  It’s going to rain anyway, the deck will have to wait for the next heat wave.

The Out My Window Series

My Cousin Brendan

My cousin Brendan O’Connor passed away Wednesday.  He died in Tampa, Florida, at eighty-three years of age after a prolonged illness.  It’s unnerving:  I never thought of my first cousin as “old”.  

I first met Brendan when I was six.  We were living in Cincinnati in the early 1960’s, and Brendan came “to visit”. My mother was from England, and her large family was still there.  Brendan was the son of her oldest brother Leslie, and like his sister before, he came to visit America and stay with his aunt and uncle.  It was a family tradition.  Before “the war” (World War II) Mom stayed with Leslie and his wife Marjorie in Belgium, and she was happy to repay the favor.

Leslie was killed flying his personal aero plane in 1959, so when Brendan arrived in 1962, fresh out of the British Army, the accident was still fresh.  But I didn’t know about all that.  What I knew was that this HUGE man, my cousin, was here.  You see, I would grow up to be by far the tallest in our immediate family at 5’7” – so we are short group.  When Brendan arrived at 6’2” or more, he seemed enormous, and very climbable.  

Brendan stayed for a month or two, exploring Cincinnati, then I think he went back home to England.  But a few months later he was back, this time to stay and make his life here in America.

Brendan ultimately took US citizenship, but he was always, as Gilbert and Sullivan would say, “an Englishman!!”.   He was a big man, kind hearted, with that British accent.  When he came in the door there was always a big “Hel—Lo!!!”, always two parts with the pause in the middle.  He became a salesman, finding a niche in selling artificial flowers.  First it was in Cincinnati, then he moved out all through the Midwest. Everyone knew the big Englishman with a trunk full of flowers and a hearty laugh.

For a long time, Brendan was “on the road”, travelling from town to town selling his products.  When I turned sixteen, I bought my first car from him.  It was a 1969 Plymouth Fury III, and it was only three years old – a new car to me.  But the Plymouth already had well over a hundred thousand miles.  Bren covered his “territory” many times, across Iowa and Kansas, Indiana and Illinois.

But he always stayed in touch, close to the family and particularly to Mom.  When he fell asleep at the wheel and literally drove into a train, Bren left his totaled car in Kansas and came straight to Cincinnati to recover.  And he was always back to Mom’s house for holidays and birthdays, and especially Christmas.  Mom made everything “English” for Christmas.  For Brendan it was just like home.  He was a part of our family, and he was definitely Mom’s favorite.

Brendan found Carolyn, and they got married and settled in Chicago.  We saw a bit less of him then, but still stay connected.  And there were the “happenstances” (what Mom would call one of her “coincidences”).  Mom and Dad, my sister Terry and her husband and kids, and I were on summer vacation on Cape Cod.  Brendan knew we were there, but no plans were made.  I don’t think he even knew we were at a house in Chatham.

We were exploring, and stopped at a grocery store.  As we got our supplies, we heard a familiar voice on the other side of the shelves.  “Mom – I think Brendan and Carolyn are here!”  There was a joyous reunion in the parking lot!

Brendan became involved in the “British” club in Chicago.  And while he was proud of his English heritage, he also was proud of his adopted country, now thirty years his home.  He applied for American citizenship, and was honored to take on the obligations of our country.  So he had both, the Englishman and now the American.  It was a good life.

Unfortunately Carolyn got sick, leaving Brendan a widower far too soon.  He was just sad, alone.  So he closed up his Chicago operation and moved to Tarpon Springs, on the Gulf of Mexico just north of Tampa.  He got involved there too, President of the Tarpon Springs Kiwanis and part of the Florida governing board.  And he met Mary, a retired school administrator and also a widow.  They soon fell in love and married.

They found a beautiful house tucked away on along the golf course, opening to their own swimming pool in the back.  Brendan and Mary were more than just Florida retirees.  They stayed involved in the community and church.  They went on cruises with their friends, and entertained poolside at their home.  And they stayed connected to his family here in Ohio.

And when Brendan got sick, it was Mary who stood by him, taking care and managing hospitals, nursing homes and doctors.  

I last saw Brendan at his 80th birthday party, at their home in Tarpon Springs.  Family was “represented” – I drove over from Sebastian where Jenn and I were camping, my sister Pat flew in from New York, and Brendan’s nephew David came in from England.  Brendan was already battling illness, but we all had a good time reminiscing about the past and avoiding present politics.  At breakfast Sunday morning, Brendan, aware of his own mortality, asked me if I would do the eulogy for his funeral.  

Funerals are complicated in this age of COVID.  There will be a memorial service in Tarpon Springs sometime next month, and I hope in can attend.  But I made a promise to a cousin,  a friend, an American and an Englishman.  He led a good life, an adventurous life, and a life that made those around him better.  What more can anyone ask for?

Rest in well-earned Peace Brendan:  we will miss your “Hel-Lo!!”