Dear Senate Democrats: Adapt or Lose

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As a boomer who lived through years of relatively placid U.S. politics, the parties often seeming more similar than different, I remain gob smacked at what has become of our political reality.  My age handicaps me in coming to terms with it, in recognizing that there has been a paradigm shift. But I now see with some clarity, that for a variety of complex reasons that are themselves worthy of dissertations, our survival as a thriving democracy and habitable planet depends on securing Democratic power for the foreseeable future. And securing that power requires new strategies and tactics.  The old days of “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” politics, of gentlemen’s agreements, the presumption of mutual good faith, and the like, are gone. We are on a new, more Machiavellian playing field not of our choosing. We need to come to terms with that and adapt. The stakes simply could not be higher.

Today as I perused the New York Times, evidence for the Republican threat is everywhere. It’s in the story about Brazil’s rampant hunger and economic collapse after their Trumpy Bolsonaro opened the country to the spread of Covid-19 in search of herd immunity. I think “there but for the grace of Joe Biden go we.” It’s in the article about the recently concluded climate summit, making clear that countries around the world, most significantly China (the other major greenhouse gas polluter alongside the U.S.), are less willing to participate in climate efforts since the American commitment faltered during Trump. After Trump, how can they can trust America to do our part? And it’s in the Op Ed describing the latest Republican scheme to corruptly steal elections. 

Now that we have a Republican party that shows us every day their fidelity to power over democracy, to the wealthy over everyone else, to white over Black, lies over truth, division over unity . . . I simply do not see how we negotiate with them. I see no hope for bipartisanship in the setting of a Fox-fed Republican electorate and their political champions. I say this with deep regret and fear for our future.  But you have to survive the moment before you can win the war. 

In this context, the age-handicapped Democratic wing of the Senate is having trouble adapting. They long for the old days of operating in a functional political body, a body that is, for the moment anyway, mostly dead.  They are stuck in the first phase of grief – denial.  People like Joe Manchin and Diane Feinstein haven’t come to terms with that. My own Senator Robert Menendez hasn’t either.  He opposes ending the filibuster out of concern that it will come back to haunt Democrats when Republicans are in power.  Very logical, in the old world.  Not so much now, because: (1) if Republicans gain control of the Senate (god forbid), the damage they will do freed from the filibuster is incidental to the damage they will do under its constraints, and (2) does anyone believe this Republican party will not dismiss with the filibuster at the first Democratic exercise thereof? Blocked by Democratic filibusters as they would work to re-Trumpify America, do we believe Mitch McConnell would remain true to the old rules of the Senate?  Reminder: He ended the filibuster for SCOTUS to get Neil Gorsuch through, and we’ve seen his bad faith in the Garland and Barrett affairs. Come on people.  This is not our father’s Republican party!

So, I believe Democrats’ (and therefore America’s and the world’s) only hope is in winning elections.  And to win, we need at least two things: 1) Passage of the For the People Act (aka HR1) to counteract devastating Republican voter suppression laws occurring throughout the country, and to codify some measure of fair representation and integrity to our elections, and 2) Passage of bold, popular legislation of the sort Biden is pursuing.  Those are necessary (but may not be sufficient) steps to achieving Democratic control in 2022 and 2024. Some bold legislation may make it through with Reconciliation. But HR1 will not pass with the filibuster in place. 

So time to act. Call your Senators and urge them to end the filibuster so we can pass the For the People Act. We need a groundswell of support for this to flood the Senate.  If they’ve already gone on the record in support of ending the filibuster and passing HR1, thank them.  If they haven’t yet done that, make your strong feelings heard. Check out where they stand at VoteSaveAmerica.com.

I think we’re all a bit numb to what’s become of our country and our world.  Right now with the Democrats in control, we feel hopeful. But in many ways we’re just in the eye of the hurricane. All the demons are still out there, and we need to use every available tool to keep the sun shining. Take action so we can win the moment, and then hopefully, we can work on the big stuff that got us here in the first place.

Republican Confession, 2020

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First they came for the birth certificate, and I did not speak out—

     Because no one’s gonna ask me for mine.

Then they came for the open Supreme Court seat, and I did not speak out—

     Because we’re going to need the courts.

Then they came for children at the border, and I did not speak out—

     Because my children are safe.

Then they came for voting rights, and I did not speak out—

     Because minority rule kind of works for me. 

Then they came for the rule of law, and I did not speak out—

Because laws are for the little people.

Then they came for public health, and I did not speak out—

     Because I have great healthcare.

Then they came for truth, and I did not speak out—

     Because conspiracies and lies have become my lifeblood.

Then they came for democracy, and I did not speak out—

     Because with my money and power, democracy isn’t really a must have. 

Then they came for America—and there was nothing left to speak out for.

— Adapted from original by Martin Niemöller.

Important note: This adaptation in no way seeks to suggest any kind of equivalence between the Holocaust (the subject of the original poem) and our present situation. The form was borrowed here for its power to say something about accountability and responsibility.

American Hydra

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The antihero in this dystopian story we’re all being forced to endure is an object of my — what feels like unquenchable — disdain. And I’m not talking about Agent Orange. He is but the figurehead and the method for the madness. He’s a loathsome blunder deserving of scorn, but were it not for the many headed monster called the Republican Senate, this fatally flawed would-be boy king could not have ransacked America in the way that he has. No, the true depravity in this story lies in every Republican Senator’s soul.

My disillusionment with these failed leaders is complete.  I know now that this silly little oath they take is but performance art:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.”

Their true oath is to their own power.  Replace the words “Constitution of the United States” with “my re-election” and you’ve got an honest Republican statement. Even their faux faith in God is made manifest by their disregard for these words. It’s really quite something.

I’ve been haunted by this massive Republican failure throughout this whole period, beginning with the 2016 campaign when Trump showed us so clearly who he was and Republicans went along. I couldn’t believe that elected leaders of any party would stand by such incompetence and divisiveness, not today, not in 21st century America.  How embarrassingly naive of me.

Over these recent years we’ve uncovered much insight into the complex flow of forces that have lead to this moment; about the mindset of politicians (it is said they are singularly focused on getting re-elected); about the truth of our open racial wounds and their enduring impact on our politics; about the massive propaganda machine invented by Roger Ailes, financed by Rupert Murdoch and super-spread by Mark Zuckerberg; and of course, about the fragility of our democracy. All of these have had a role in what is presently playing out.

But I want to come back to the unforgivable behavior of the Republican Senate.  Because actually, I don’t believe every politician cares only about their own re-election.  I believe there are many who care about much more than that, even as re-election may fall nearly at the top of their need hierarchies.  I believe that many would not have made the deal with the devil that these Republicans made.  I believe that many would have recognized the existential threat that a Trump-like figure would pose to our democracy, and would have been willing to stand up to him. I believe many actually do feel a full allegiance to the oath that they took.  

These Republican Senators failed the ultimate test of principle, courage, integrity, leadership, and humanity. As a result, our country has been dragged through a long period of massive suffering and failure, with more to come. The essential fault, the fault that has made all the difference, lies with each of them, not with Donald Trump, not with abstract forces and pressures in our culture, but with each and every one of these Republican Senators, personally.

I constantly wrestle with this question about these Republicans:  Why doesn’t their concern for their own children and grandchildren motivate a different course of action?  Are they okay handing off this sh**show to them?  I think it eats at me because it is that very question, about what this all means for our children, that has motivated me to care so much about our country and our planet, and to do whatever is in my power to make it good for them. That response in me has been instinctive.  Why hasn’t it been instinctive for them? 

It’s an enigma.  I will never understand how they reconcile it. And I will never forgive them for what they have done to our precious country. Never.

In Post-11/8 America What is Your Personal Call to Action?

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Let’s talk about the word “peaceful” because I’m getting fuckin tired of hearing about “peaceful protest.” | D. Firestein Protest, by its very nature cannot be peaceful. It is an attempt to upset the order of things (sometimes a weak attempt,...

 “A person in a state of dread lives in a miserable forever present. A person in a state of dread is imminently controllable. The choice to protest, on the other hand, is the choice to take control of one’s body, one’s time, and one’s words, and in doing so to reclaim the ability to see a future.”

– Masha Gessen

In my state of dread over the election of DJT*, I keep coming back to one very germane fact: The majority of the American people (54%) did not vote for him. And I presume a sizable chunk of his voters, pulled that lever begrudgingly.

*I can’t bring myself to name him, especially as President. I’m looking for a workable alternative. So far I’ve considered: Trumplisconi, Mr. Minority President Trump, President 46% Trump, Mr. Unpopular President Trump, Abnormal President Trump, or just President Donny J (which, to tell the truth, sounds about right because it conveys his core identity as a celebrity and affords him about as much respect as he’s given the Office of the President so far). I welcome your votes or other suggestions.

So “we who are repelled by the person of DJT,” are in the majority. We need to use our voices. Each one of us needs to find ways to act, which likely means going outside of our comfort zones in one way or another, to save our democracy and ourselves. That sounds corny and hyperbolic – words I never thought I’d say. Sadly, there’s no corn, just these truths which are self-evident:

After 18 months of spewing vile and divisive rhetoric against women, minorities, Muslims, people with disabilities, etc., and exhibiting not one iota of interest in learning or preparing to be president, DJT starts his relationship with the American people in deficit — a deficit in trust, in integrity, in mutual respect, in competence, and in leadership. Since being elected, he’s done virtually nothing to lessen these deficits, nothing to unify the country (in fact, if anything he’s doubling down on the divisiveness, taking a victory lap so he can gobble up the leftovers and lick the plate of rapt adoration that endlessly gushes from his peeps). Unless and until he starts singing a different tune, we don’t owe him “a chance.” We don’t owe him respect. We don’t owe him a damn thing. Rather, he owes us, bigly.

Since being elected, DJT’s initial actions signal autocratic and regressive “code reds” on multiple fronts —

  • Vast and disturbing conflicts of interest he refuses to address meaningfully
  • A cabinet full of unqualified hacks that collectively signals intent to ravage our social safety net and civil rights protections, bolster our billionaire class, and abandon the survival of our planet
  • Steve Bannon as Chief Strategist — a dangerous propagandist, malefactor and chaos-sower who has enabled a cornucopia of hate movements — or for short, a vile human being
  • Ignorance, arrogance or both with regard to international relations as revealed by his casual, uninformed and strategically dangerous calls with world leaders
  • A clear effort to disregard, if not dismantle the capacity of the press to fulfill its role as the ultimate arbiter of the truth.  For example, he has held no press conferences, and I suspect never plans to do so. Not to mention no traveling press corps.

DJT, together with Republican establishment that now controls all of Congress and most of the statehouses, has at his disposal all the levers of government to advance whatever interests he so chooses. And he has shown us what those interests are: His businesses and personal wealth, his popularity, and his taste for revenge. Further, he has shown his willingness to cross lines, violate norms, and disregard our democratic institutions and values to serve those interests.

DJT has secured the presidency not for the country, but for himself. And the extreme Right have burrowed in, like a parasite to a host, aiming to thrive.

Like most people, I’m still sorting all of this out. But for now, until such time that this new president acts to address the deep deficits he’s amassed with the American people, and the far right is defanged, I intend to trade my dread for protest.

For my personal call to action, I commit to:

  1. Starving Donny J (name seems fitting here) of popularity, depriving him –and the corporate “entertainment” media who nourish him with unearned airtime in lieu of real news — of my eyeballs, ears, clicks,  attention or affirmation of any kind. I will not watch the inauguration.  I will boycott all things “Trump” — his hotels, his wife’s and daughter’s merchandise.
  2. Seeking actual truth by being a hyper-discerning consumer of information and news.  I will limit my intake to the very few print/online/broadcast sources and journalists who have demonstrated fidelity to the truth, ability to resist false equivalencies, and journalistic integrity.
  3. Engaging more fully and directly in our representative democracy to promote issues of importance to me.   I will contact my elected officials frequently, for example to demand hearings on DJT’s conflicts of interest and condemnation of Bannon’s role in this administration.  I will actively engage in the 2018 midterm and statewide elections, to begin to right the ship .  And I will participate in organized forms of protest in support of key issues of importance to me.
  4. Supporting and engaging more deeply with advocacy organizations that advance major causes of greatest importance to me. My personal priorities would include those focused on climate change, voting rights, reproductive rights, and civil rights.
  5. Acting with kindness and inclusiveness in my everyday life, and if necessary providing protection to those most vulnerable and marginalized by this new administration.

Those are my marching orders. What are yours?

 

The Unholy Privilege of the Protest Vote (I’m talking to you Bernie or Busters — and others of your kind)

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Clinton, Trump pick up big wins

It is said that elections have consequences.

Never in a generation, has this been truer than in this election of 2016.  Given that, the act of voting for a third party to protest “the system,” or as an expression of anger over Bernie Sanders’ loss, or general frustration with the process or with lack of progress in our politics, is an extremely consequential act[1].  Because that vote will have the effect of helping to hand the Presidency to Donald Trump.  That protest vote will have very real consequences.

But those consequences are not born equally by all.  The levers of government impact those who are at the margins of society the most.  If you are among the more fortunate, living in relative comfort, enjoying some degree of power (or access to it), perhaps taking all of that for granted (like a fish to water), you will not suffer the consequences of a Trump administration like those  who do not enjoy the same privileges (though all of us will suffer).

If elected, the day President Trump takes office, the world will change dramatically.  Both houses of Congress will be controlled by Republicans and dominated by the Freedom Caucus, the most extreme stripe of the Republican Party.  Legislation will begin to flow, but unlike now, there will be no Democratic President to veto it.  The path forward will be clear for enactment of a right-wing, populist, anti-government agenda steeped in anger and contaminated with various versions of bigotry.  So for example, the new Congress will make good on their promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with tax subsidies or nothing at all.  That means millions of low income people who currently rely on Medicaid or health exchange subsidies for their healthcare, will no longer have access to that care.  (Although 51% of Americans want to repeal the ACA, that’s because most of them (58%) want to replace it with a federally funded system like Medicare for all).

But legislative changes are just one part of the picture.  What doesn’t get talked about enough is the way in which the raw power of the Executive branch itself, will impact people’s lives.  In addition to ruling through Executive Order, on day one, Donald Trump will begin populating the reins of government with new staff, with Trumpian decision makers (selected for their positions under the direction from the likes of Roger Ailes, Steve Bannon, Chris Christie, Ted Cruz, etc.) who will set the standards and priorities for government action across a sweeping set of issues and realities for millions of people[2].  These new minions will flow into all of the federal departments and authorities – from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to the Department of Justice (DOJ), from the Department of Education (DOE) to the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), and on and on.  Their reach will extend into every corner of life, particularly for those who lack any sort of political power.  Here’s just a sampling of what that will likely mean:

  • For poor children living in a city, new decision makers in the EPA will decide the degree to which they will be able to drink water free of lead, and breathe air free of carcinogens and pollutants.
  • For low or medium-income teenagers, the new decision makers in the Department of Education will determine whether they can attend college, by affecting their access to grants and loans (79% of Americans do not see college as affordable); for those who are African American, new decision makers in DOJ will decide whether their civil rights will be aggressively or limply defended.
  • For those of the Muslim faith, decision makers in the CIA or NSA will decide how aggressively they will be surveilled, and those in DOJ will decide where the boundaries of their civil rights lie, or whether to pursue and prosecute those who may threaten them out of bigotry or hate.

All of these everyday decisions and thousands more, taken by the federal bureaucracy, will have a penetrating influence on what happens in the everyday lives of millions of Americans.  This is not symbolic or abstract.  It is practical and very real.

And that’s all before we’ve even considered what a Trump administration would mean for the federal courts, and most particularly the Supreme Court, which will be profound and generational in scope.  With at least one and as many as three new lifetime Supreme Court appointments coming up in the next administration, and likely to be filled by Trump with Scalia-like Justices, we can expect a changed world for decades to come.  These changes could very realistically include:

. . . among other things.

But wait there’s more.  As Commander in Chief, a President Trump will have broad latitude and largely unchecked authority to interact with the wider world as he sees fit.  He can make foreign policy decisions based on how they enrich his many business interests abroad; he can order our military to violate international law and commit torture, putting our men and women in uniform in danger of being subjected to the same treatment; he can spout off and say ill considered, in-the-moment things that alienate our allies or energize our enemies; he can overreact to petulant dictators and trigger a minor skirmish, a regional war, or a nuclear cataclysm.  Yeah, there’s that.

And this discussion would not be complete without considering what a Trump presidency would mean for climate change.  Again, the consequences would be greatest for the most vulnerable citizens, though in the end we all suffer.  Rising waters and the impact of extreme weather events, guaranteed to occur with increasing frequency as they already have, kill those least able to escape their path or fully prepare for them, destroy property, and disrupt and displace whole populations across the globe.  Just consider the experience of Hurricane Katrina as a prime example.  Trump, backed by the Republican Party, plans to ignore science on this subject, back out of commitments to reduce carbon emissions, and return to coal-fired power plants.  If you see climate change as the existential crisis that I, most Democrats, most Americans (64% according to Gallup) and  99% of the world’s scientists do, you would agree that  this outcome is perhaps THE MOST significant consequence of this election.

Yes, elections do have consequences.

If you cast a vote for Hillary Clinton and she is elected, the results may not be exactly what you would have preferred, in an ideal world.  But what you will have, is a President who is aligned with the most progressive platform in the history of the Democratic Party, and who has already moved to the left on many issues.  And you will have a President who will be beholden to Democratic and Progressive voices who can still influence her on policy, since she is a politician who would be seeking re-election in 4 years.  You will have a President who can keep the conversation moving in the right direction.  You will have none of that if Trump is elected.

But if you sit this election out, either by voting for a third party or by not voting at all, that is, if you choose to exercise your privilege to protest, you will be enabling Donald Trump to become President.  In so doing, you will have a hand in dooming millions of Americans to undeserved suffering and subjecting the world to dangerous and potentially catastrophic consequences.

This is an election that calls for utmost responsibility from every voting age adult.  Come November 8, one of two people will become our next President.  If a Trump presidency is unacceptable to you, if you are committed to a progressive agenda, then register to vote, go the polls, and cast your vote for Hillary Clinton.  Own your part in this democracy, and choose to participate, rather than simply protest.

And then once you’ve helped to elect Hillary Clinton, work hard to hold her accountable for what matters to you, for what you believe will make our country and the world a better place.

That’s how it works. That’s what keeps America great.

 

 

[1] If you live in a solid blue state, your protest vote won’t matter, so I guess you can do whatever you want.  Still, to my mind, strengthening Hillary Clinton’s overall popular vote has value in shoring up her capacity to deliver on a progressive agenda.

[2] Through promulgation of regulations that interpret law, and through enforcement priorities.

Seeking an Education on Race in America

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MLK

I originally wrote and posted this two years ago.  What I felt then, I feel even more now, so I’m re-posting it. 

Just as the Ferguson Grand Jury announcement was coming out, I happened to be reading a passage in Rising Tide (an incredible and superbly written piece of American history by John M. Barry – more on that later) that was eerily familiar.  The passage takes place in Greenville, Mississippi just after the Great Flood of 1927 which left the entire Mississippi delta, including Greenville, devastated.  Blacks were being forced to carry out the bulk of the relief and rehabilitation work, for no pay.  One morning a policeman named James Mosely had been assigned to assemble a work crew, when he saw James Gooden, a well-respected black man in the community who had just returned from working all night, sitting on his front porch:

“Nigger, you’re going to work.

No, Suh.  No Suh. I just been workin’.

Nigger, don’t give no backtalk.

No Suh, I’m not backtalkin’ you.

Gooden got up from the porch, went inside his house, and closed the door.  Mosely followed him into this home and pulled his gun.  Gooden froze.

Nigger! Get your black ass in that truck.

White man.  Don’t pull no gun on me!

According to Mosely, Gooden grabbed for the gun.  Mosely shot him.  But Gooden told a different version to blacks who carried him to the hospital.  In an effort to save his life, two white doctors amputated his arm. James Gooden died anyway.

The news swept through the black community.  Seething, blacks stopped work . . . Rhodes Wasson recalled, ‘We prepared for a race riot here. . . We thought the blacks were going to uprise.  Everyone was buying guns.’

To calm the Negro community, Mosely was arrested, supposedly to be held for trial.  No one believed that would ever happen.  The county prosecutor was still Ray Toombs, the Exalted Cyclops of the local Klan. (Mosely never was indicted).”

That was almost 90 years ago.

This book, together with several other sources I have recently consumed, have taught me a lot about many things American.  But mostly they’ve taught me one essential thing about myself:  That I (baby boomer white person who considers herself to be relatively enlightened) still have a great deal to learn about the basic truths of the black experience in America, both historic and present.  As a result, I’m now in active search of my education on the subject.  Not to be too preachy, but I think every white person needs to undertake this search, because most of us simply do not know what African Americans know about this history, nor do we know what African Americans know about justice — and so we operate from a different set of truths.  Neither have most of us taken the time to cultivate any real personal insight into the racial biases we almost certainly harbor, though often unintentionally.

By the way, for inspiration, we can look to the young people in our lives.  Their hearts and minds are in most cases still wide open; seeking truth and justice unencumbered by calcified biases.  They will, I think, pull our society forward and through and eventually out of this mess.

So in the interest of sharing, I thought I might recommend a few sources that have contributed significantly to my own enlightenment on the subject, with direct implications for understanding the present tensions and debate surrounding Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, and many others.

Rising Tide.  This is the story of the efforts to tame and commercialize the Mississippi river in the 19th and early 20th centuries, culminating in the Great Flood of 1927 (about which Randy Newman wrote the song “Louisiana”).  There’s so much in this book about America, about our politics, our identity, and our culture, and so many lessons for today.  But front and center throughout, is the African American story in the deep south.   The factual accounting of events, their description in full detail and context, has been eye-opening, even shocking to me.  As you wind your way through this text, its rich description of the nature and depth of oppression and violence against blacks, is breathtaking.  It is a story that needs to be told in American history classes and taken up in adult book clubs around the country, but to my knowledge for the most part, is not.  I thank my brother for recommending this to me.

The Case for Reparations.  This article by Ta-Nehesi Coates appeared in The Atlantic recently, and carries the African American story forward to more recent history and present day.  It describes how blacks who fled the oppression of the south in search of work and greater justice in the north, encountered a different kind of shackle that appeared in the form of rampant, intentional, government-sanctioned housing and mortgage discrimination.  Coates explains how those practices directly and significantly diminished the wealth of African American families, a legacy that lives on today — having gutted their ability to earn equity in the one asset that is the single biggest source of wealth for most Americans – our homes.  Again, here is an article that deals in details and facts that remain largely unknown (or at the very least, not fully appreciated) by many of us, but which provide critical context for the current debate.

The Central Park Five.  This is the Ken Burns documentary about the 1980’s brutal rape of a white jogger in Central Park.  I’m embarrassed to say that this story was in many ways, news to me – not the crime itself (which I remember very well) – but the truth – which I don’t remember with the same clarity and resonance.  The truth is that the young boys (four black and one of Hispanic descent) who were accused and convicted of this storied crime, were completely innocent. The truth, which came out in 2002, is that the police and prosecutor wielded the full force of their phenomenal state powers against these children (the youngest was 14 years old), to extract false confessions that were entirely constructed by the police.

Why don’t I recall the truth as clearly as I recall the crime and the alleged guilt of the accused?  Because the guilt was captured on videotape — compelling images of young black boys admitting to a brutal crime — seared into the collective memories of millions of Americans like me.  And, if I’m completely honest with myself, it’s probably also because the guilt expressed on those videotapes fit perfectly well with pre-seeded biases I may have harbored, if even just subconsciously.   Those are the ingredients for a memorable story with impact . . . a story that people believe.

The truth on the other hand – that these boys were innocent – communicated as it was in a few newspaper headlines and articles, just didn’t break through in the same way, largely because it lacked compelling images to drive home the message.  And perhaps, just perhaps, it didn’t resonate because it was a story we weren’t too interested in hearing. But thanks to the brilliant Ken Burns, we now have a full account and countervailing images that can compete with the original false ones that were occupying our brains.  We can now more fully know the truth of this deeply disturbing miscarriage of justice, and can appreciate some of what African Americans know and feel when it comes to law enforcement and expectations for justice in this country.  After all, this took place not in early 20th century Mississippi – but in 1980s New York City.   And we know that this kind of raw, law-defying, racial injustice does not live in isolation, but is repeated in kind, throughout our country, as it has been throughout our history.

Note:  Fruitvale Station is another film that speaks to many of these same issues.  It is a dramatization of the story surrounding the shooting death of Oscar Grant by a BART police officer in Oakland, California. In the interest of wrapping up, I’ll leave this as a simple recommendation.  You can also read about it here. 

It is impossible, and irresponsible to talk about Michael Brown or Eric Garner and others, outside of this broader context.  Given historical fact and the present day, lived experience of African Americans, there can be no true finding of fact, or faith in justice served, so long as the too-familiar trappings of injustice pervade, as they do in these cases – the racial disparities between law enforcement and the communities they serve, the disrespect shown by law enforcement toward African Americans, or the failure of white prosecutors to exercise their prosecutorial function with the same vigor that they bring to other cases (after all, if they can “indict a ham sandwich” as the saying goes, why can’t they indict officers who shoot unarmed teens or whose crimes are clearly captured on videotape?).

Michael Brown, Eric Garner and others have lit a fuse I hope doesn’t go out anytime soon.  The burden is on those of us who are not African American, the ones who have generally held all the power, the ones who have not endured a history of violence and oppression and discrimination — the burden is upon us to make the extra effort to learn that history and open our minds to a deeper understanding of the African American reality in America.  The burden is on us to listen, learn and then to act to correct the many flaws in the system, so that this inexcusably long cycle of injustice is finally broken.

To continue my education and assume more of my responsibility on race, I plan to take up a long overdue read of The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, and to exercise my voice through rallies and writing.

What’s on your syllabus?

What Next After Paris?

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Vortex

Fear, and its close companion anger, is a powerful motivator – in direct competition with love.  Fear thrives on impulse; love plods, sustains, and never ever gives up.  Reason struggles for oxygen in the midst of both.

We are, unavoidably, in a fear moment, one that is familiar to me.  I have a confession to make.  After 9/11, after witnessing its Armageddon-like destruction right in my backyard, including the deaths of my husband’s team of co-workers, my fears persuaded me to believe the WMD propaganda that followed, and I supported the invasion of Iraq.  I, like so many others, acted out of fear.  And today, we are reaping the consequences of that disastrous decision.

With the invasion of Iraq, we poked a hornet’s nest, and now we’re all getting stung in the confused chaos that has followed. The inconvenient truth is, we helped create the Syria and Iraq we have today, and the ISIS we so fear in this moment (just as we helped create the Bin Laden who wreaked the last round of havoc). In that regard, we have a particular responsibility when it comes to the refugee crisis that is erupting before our eyes (but that’s a subject for another discussion).

So it is with the lessons of recent history in mind, that I recoil from reflexive, muscular solutions born out of fear and a thirst for revenge.  What to do will be hotly debated in the weeks ahead.  It is peak political season, so we can expect much of that debate will be, to use the technical term, hooey.  This situation strikes me as one of the most (possibly the most?) complex foreign policy and security challenges we’ve ever faced.  It is not a task for amateurs.  It will require every bit of expertise, fortitude, reasoned analysis and judgment our leaders can muster.  And in that vein, I for one am so very glad we have the president we have.  Many are upset that he didn’t, in his Turkey press conference, sate the national appetite for venom and victory through battle.  Yes, there is a certain satisfaction in hearing our leaders strike a strident tone in times like these, as when George W. hopped up on that smoldering pile to warn our enemies of revenge.  It feels damn good to hear that, in the moment.

But that embattled tone is nothing more than a fix, a short-term high in a struggle that is long, arduous, and complex. We can keep doing what we’ve been doing, responding to recurring moments of fear and anger with recurring deployments of troops and recurring rhetoric that temporarily soothes, like some kind of nightmarish Groundhog Day that becomes the new norm for a generation.  Or at some point, we can decide to go through withdrawal and seek to disrupt the vortex of destruction and hate that is self-perpetuating in the Middle East.  We can try a different approach that might outlast the hate, make room for peace and yes, perhaps even one day, love.  That’s a long term proposition.  I think that’s what the President is trying to do, and I support him.  I hope we and our media will do a better job during this debate than we did in the lead up to Iraq, to fairly evaluate the facts, listen to the real experts, and recognize and tolerate the nuances that complicate any potential solution (despite their annoying lack of entertainment value).

I close with the poem that came to mind as I watched Obama at his press conference in Turkey.  It encapsulates perfectly what I love, and what many on the other side so hate, about this president:

If—

By Rudyard Kipling

 

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

 

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

 

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

 

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

 

The Lost Art of Hanging Out

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My daughter’s college a Capella group sings this song called Just Friends – maybe you know it. It’s about a guy who wants to get to know a girl, and in the refrain he says —

You ain’t even really gotta be my girlfriend
I just wanna know your name and maybe some time
We can hook up, hang out, just chill

That’s nice. If he can’t have her as a girlfriend, he just wants to spend time with her (well, and also hook up with her, but skip that part for now – I’m talking about the other part). You know, he just wants to hang out together, as friends. He values being with her, just chillin’.

Those were the days. I remember those days and I miss them – the social part I mean – in college (and to a degree early adulthood) – when social life was dominated by just hanging out together. The whole thing happened organically, a product (I surmise), of a somewhat unique confluence of environmental conditions and the developmental traits of college students.

First, dorm living placed us in very close proximity to one another. That made it ridiculously easy to socialize with others. It also imposed an intimacy that quickly forced us beyond first impressions or appearances – let’s face it, once someone has seen you stumble to the bathroom at 7 a.m. donning ratty sleeping-sweats and raging bedhead, you can’t really impress them anymore.

We adults on the other hand, live in increasing isolation from one another, cordoned off in the privacy of our claimed personal spaces – our homes – where chance encounters with others are few and far between. We, instead, must intentionally plan and orchestrate most of our social experiences, and we usually don’t schedule them to take place until we’ve at least showered.

Second, we were (most of us) very busy. Socializing was something that had to be squeezed into already packed academic, extracurricular, exercise, and other schedules. It was a priority, but had to be achieved with efficiency. Hanging out is an extremely efficient way to socialize.

Wait a minute. Our adult selves are just as busy – no, way more busy than our college selves. That’s interesting. More on that later.

Third, we had no money, no space, and no stuff. College kids are generally cash-poor, have no access to well-equipped kitchens or dining rooms, and mostly rely on paper plates and plastic forks for food presentation and service. Aside from on-campus parties, the social experience was notably simple and sparse – we just hung out. No one was going to plan and prepare some gourmet feast, meticulously presented on chi chi china in some perfectly appointed house-and-garden setting because, well, we had no money, no space, and no stuff.

Compared to our younger selves, we adults have more money, more space and more stuff. Hmm. Also very interesting. A clue, I would say.

Fourth, we were unattached. The only significant relationships vying for our time on a day to day basis, were with our friends.

As adults, if we’re married, our spouses (and later, our children), occupy the center of our emotional and social lives.   Choosing to hang out informally with friends suddenly involves a negotiation concerning the needs of others and the demands of family life. The informality and spontaneity of social life as it existed before, just becomes more difficult in the context of a family unit.

Finally, we were still basically kids when we were in college. Developmentally, college kids remain largely unadulterated . . . literally. By this I mean, they haven’t yet been exposed to, let alone absorbed the unwritten social canon that operates in the mental backgrounds of most adults. They just get out there and engage, for the sake of mutual social pleasure, period. They’ve not yet succumbed to adult ideas and patterns of social life – patterns that seem sometimes to value the trappings of the social experience more so than the quantity or quality of the experience.

When did we learn this? Why do we feel we have to plan and prepare, perhaps seek to impress, or at the very least meet some imagined standard that typically involves an offering of well-prepared food, a variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverage options, a spic and span house, and a thoughtfully (if not fashionably) put-together outfit? When did hanging out somehow turn into entertaining?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to entertain my friends. I don’t want to impress them. I just want to be with them.

(Note: This is not a knock on entertaining. Entertaining can be great fun, for hosts and guests. But entertainment does not cultivate real intimacy, and therefore cannot form the backbone of a truly fulfilling social life. Hanging out, on the other hand, very much can.)

So I do yearn (in these ways), for the social life of my youth — the way it was before busy, complicated, adult life came along. I yearn for the time when we had neither the means nor the inclination to entertain, but we did have every inclination to hang out.

And therein lays the irony . . . that just as our lives become more demanding, we compound the problem by assuming even more demanding social habits. If you’re like me, you then end up socializing less, because the whole thing sometimes feels like just too much effort. We would be much better served by sticking to our original approach, because hanging out is super simple and way less demanding than entertaining is. It’s perfect for busy, time-strapped people. It requires no preparation, no cash, and no real work. Just time together — talking, laughing, complaining, catching up . . . minimally-planned, always underdressed. Food? Sure, all I have right now are these potato chips and some carrots. House a mess? I’ll move this stuff off the couch so you have a place to sit. You’re tired so you might not stay long? No worries, I can relate. Glad you stopped by.

This is honest, in-the-moment, no expectations socializing . . . a.k.a. hanging out. It’s not about getting it just so, or feeling obligated, or living up to anything . . . it’s about the fact of being together. Period.

That’s a beautiful thing.

We adults, (some of us anyway) somehow lose this essential concept as we navigate adult life, and it’s a whopper of a loss. But while we may not be able to exactly replicate the special situational chemistry that led to hanging out in college, we can get there another way — by making intentional choices to do things differently.

If you are among the very fortunate who have figured out how to maintain the spontaneity and informality of a college-like social life in your adult years, I congratulate you. Keep it up and treasure it, as I’m sure you do.

If you are like me, and have lost touch with the art of hanging out, I hope you (and I) can, as the song goes, get ourselves back to the garden. It’s where real living lives, and where real friendship has the opportunity to bloom.

On Writing

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God I hate writing.

I hate destroying my words . . . having to expunge 90% of what I put down in the first place.  Because I wouldn’t have put it there if I didn’t need to say it.  It’s mind-garble, I know, but it’s my mind-garble, and so I feel sort of attached to it, even if it’s crap, from a writing perspective.  I hate having to trash it.  I really do.

Except I love trashing it, slicing and shifting and sculpting the word blob into some sort of comprehensible shape that hopefully communicates something others can receive, maybe even be affected by. I love that.

Also I hate not writing.  I hate not being able to pluck from my thought-jumbles (on any particular subject), the words that will get me out of the starting gate.  The proverbial writer’s block.  I hate that too.

And love it.  Because it sets up a tension I must resolve, a nagging discomfort, if not obsession, that creates an acute sense of purpose, which I love. It’s a kind of pleasure in pain.  And also because it feels so good when the dam breaks, tension evaporates, and I can get to it again.  Perverse pleasures, but pleasures just the same.

I also hate writing the middle part, the part after the first sentence.  Getting from point A to whatever the ending point is, makes me crazy sometimes.  In part, because I have no idea what the ending is so I don’t know how to forge a path to get somewhere I don’t know about.   Also I hate the middle part because I have this censor in my head who likes to come around periodically and lob obstacles that put a halt to the whole process, preventing me from even getting to a first draft. It’s infuriating.

“There are many reasons,” Mr. Censor-man says, “why you should not say that.”  He elaborates.  “It’s mundane – you’re readers aren’t interested.  It’s self-indulgent . . . no one cares that much about you, per se. It’s blunt . . . you might offend or embarrass that group/your family/your friends/yourself.  It’s risky . . . you might piss off your client/your boss.”  You get the idea.

Except I truly love extracting the middle part from my brain and spewing it onto the page.  At its best, when I’m really sticking it to the censor-man, it’s exhilarating, gushing out faster than I can type.  Love, love, love that.

I hate putting my writing out there.  It’s terrifying.  What if the censor-man was right?  Despite all my efforts to say something truthful and worthwhile, and say it well, what if I fail miserably at that, or expose myself in a way I hadn’t intended.  What if I bore or disappoint or hurt or offend?  What if I reveal just how ignorant I am about a subject?  What if . . . what if . . . what if . . . fear always seizes me the moment I send my little composition out into the readersphere . . . bare and open for anyone to read and judge.

Yet I love making it known.  It’s like sending out a little probe in hopes that its signal is picked up by someone (or by many someones), and has some effect, even if never made known to me. It’s a wish for connection and impact, and I love that, despite all of its risks.

Yes, I hate writing.

I think that’s why I love it so much.

What’s the Matter with Us When it Comes to High School Sports?

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This is a short commentary on the recently reported football hazing scandal in Sayreville, New Jersey.  I am not describing the details here, but you can read about it in any number of articles, including the links provided here or here.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

– Edmund Burke

The only good news, if you can call it that, out of the Sayreville football hazing scandal is that perhaps now, at a young age, some of these young men will learn something about Edmund Burke’s meaning.  Because learning that lesson sometime later in life often has consequences much more devastating than the cancellation of a football season.  And while I would not presume any of the perpetrators of these incidents are actually “evil,” the acts themselves are cruel, debased and violent – evil-like, if not evil.

Clearly some have already learned this, because they came forward and reported what was going on.  Sadly, (and I cannot overstate how sadly), some parents and athletes in Sayreville, instead of seizing upon this very teachable moment — instead of placing values of responsibility, character, ethics, human compassion and obeying the law, at the forefront of their concern — some are angry at the whistleblowers because they ruined all their fun (aka, cancelled the football season).

Not wholly dissimilar from the Penn State abuse scandal, this is a team and a community culture gone awry.  When did we start worshipping football, and sports in general, more than anything and everything else?  Unlike professional sports, high school and college sports should not exist as ends unto themselves.  They exist in the context of educational institutions whose missions, last time I checked, are focused on shaping productive, responsible, creative, and capable young people — like this mission statement for the Sayreville School District:

Sayreville School District educates today’s learners to be tomorrow’s leaders by providing all students with a high quality, challenging education that instills character and enables our students to compete successfully in the 21st century.

The nature and demands of extracurricular sports can, undeniably, contribute to the goals of character-building and preparation for future success.  But that should be their sole purpose.  They shouldn’t exist for the entertainment of the parents or alumni; nor for the glory of the coach; nor should they exist to fuel swelled egos or testosterone highs; and they should never trump other educational priorities or fundamental personal and community values. I know many will disagree, but I don’t even think they should exist for the purpose of generating college scholarships (at least not on a scale greater than can be earned through other talents, like music or science or drama or any number of other valid, educational pursuits). High school sports should not exist for any of these reasons.

Yet they do.  And then we wonder why we get professional athletic cultures with such failed moral compasses (I’m talking about you, NFL), or business cultures marred by fraud and ethical lapses, or any of a number of other societal ills that flow from the decisions and actions of those with an underdeveloped sense of integrity or unformed moral foundation. It all starts with the lessons learned in high schools like Sayreville.

Life lessons are sometimes very hard to endure.  I’m sure the sense of disappointment, even unfairness, is overwhelming for those players who did not directly participate in the hazing activity.  But it’s not okay to “do nothing,” in this instance, and the decision of the school board and superintendent is 100% correct. They are applying a sorely-needed shock to the community. I hope it hurts enough to force real change, so the football program can get back to providing kids what they are really owed from their school and from the adults in their lives – a sound education and a strong grounding in what it means to a responsible and compassionate human being.  That would be progress.