MizB VIEWS FROM THE TOWER

Celebrating King

2012-01-16T07:12:00.001-05:00

Yesterday, January 15th, was the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s actual birthday. Had he managed to live to the present, he would be 83. For several reasons, I feel deeply motivated to write this year’s first Tower post about Dr. King, his influence on my life, and my less-than-happy feelings about his status in the present as well as the recently-dedicated King Memorial in Washington DC.

I was 16 when King was murdered on April 4, 1968 at the age of 39. I’ve never forgotten (or entirely recovered from) the sense of loss, rage and helplessness I felt in response to what the King Family and many others (including the jury of a 1999 wrongful death suit) believe was a government conspiracy.

In addition to grief and anger, there were countless poignant moments in the initial wake of the assassination: for the nation, for the black community, within the civil rights movement, and in the lives of individuals.

The moment that occurred in my family was this: my [white] maternal grandmother, a poor, uneducated Russian-Jewish immigrant who, more than 50 years after emigrating to America could still barely speak English, was living with my parents and me at the time. The night of the assassination, my folks and I were going to a neighborhood [activist] church for a memorial service and my grandmother said she wanted to go with us, because “he was a good man; this is a bad thing.” At her funeral, my [black] father told this story, saying how moved he had been that this woman who had literally never set foot in a church in her life, willingly went and stood, linking arms with us, weeping and singing We Shall Overcome.

This year is the 25^th anniversary of the federal holiday. In the spirit of this occasion, I am consciously grateful to have lived when King lived, to have witnessed his work to combat the racism he so deeply understood lessens America’s greatness and impedes its progress. And I still marvel at the courage and foresight he displayed (and the criticism he endured, even from his colleagues in the movement) when he broadened his message to include opposition to the Vietnam War and the destructive, enormous poverty in America, both of which he viewed as essential components of championing non-violence, justice and economic equality.

Martin Luther King, Jr. certainly deserves to be lauded as a great African-American icon. But it has long pissed me off that, even to this day, he is not commonly recognized simply and truly as a great American by all Americans. It is a telling, distasteful reminder that racism is still very much alive and well that he is not regarded as such by the general public – meaning white people, a considerable number of whom, both ordinary citizens and federal legislators, fought for years against establishing the King holiday, then, years later, doggedly opposed having a King Memorial in the nation’s capitol.

And that Memorial, which was supervised by a racially-diverse committee and should be a handsome, inspiring tribute, is instead a peculiar structure that is quite unattractive: carved out of a massive slab of white granite, barely resembles him (among other incorrect features, King’s signature mustache is hardly-visible or just plain missing ), and displays what many critics regard as an inappropriate (and heavily edited) King quotation.

The designer has had the chutzpa to “explain” that the quote problem was because of space limitations. But what can possibly justify a design that didn’t incorporate sufficient space for a longer, much better and intact quote? Dr. King wrote numerous books and countless hundreds of speeches and sermons – and this was the best they could come up with? It makes me wonder just how much that diverse committee actually knew about King, his work and his writings.

Which brings me to my primary King-related pet peeve. Aside from his 1963 March on Washington “I Have a Dream” speech; his “Mountaintop” sermon, delivered the night before he died; and his book, Letter From a Birmingham Jail, many Americans of all ethnicities (particularly contemporary youth) are sadly unfamiliar with the content, even existence, of King’s extensive body of written work. In essence, to the general public, King’s legacy has been reduced to a postage stamp’s worth of information, not unlike that about Honest Abe Lincoln and his log cabin, and George Washington’s chopped cherry tree.

I do rejoice today in the life and work of Martin Luther King, Jr., as well as the brave, tenacious efforts of his widow, the late Coretta Scott King. I also applaud the subsequent individual and collective accomplishments of their children.

But the country’s general understanding of black history seems to consist of this inadequate picture of Dr. King, along with the fact that George Washington Carver did marvelous things with peanuts; Madam C.J. Walker was the first to invent and market black hair care products; and Rosa Parks wouldn’t change her bus seat. Most people don’t even know that in 1872, feminist Victoria Woodhull and abolitionist Frederick Douglass were the presidential/vice presidential candidates put forth by the independent Civil Rights Party.

It is my great hope that from this day forward, there will be an ever-increasing interest, understanding and appreciation for all that Dr. King achieved and espoused, because it has enormous pertinence to present-day America – as well as a considerable increase in the public’s familiarity with the much wider world of black history. Until that happens, we as a people will never fully “overcome.”

Democracy In Action, GOP Style

2011-12-22T14:02:00.004-05:00

In my opinion, the GOP’s political positions, cultural attitudes and active policies are in likely danger of literally destroying this country. Currently, this effort is coming very strongly from Speaker John Boehner’s unbelievably deceptive (and so far successful) effort to kill the extensions of cuts in middle-class payroll taxes and much-needed unemployment insurance extensions.

Boehner claims this is because the 60-day extension isn’t long enough; Father Teresa, well known nationwide for his concern for the poor, believes the extension should cover a full year. And so it should!

But what Boehner and most of the media are not saying – and relying on the politically lazy American public not to notice – is that Boehner’s “generous” year-long-extension counter proposal has as many extraneous rotten policy links tied to it as Jacob Marley’s ghostly chain.

Top among these encumbrances is the ability to con- struct the environmentally-dangerous Keystone oil pipeline. And, to add a little indignity to his so-called concern for the middle-class, unemployed and elderly, Boehner’s proposal calls for shorter extensions for
unemployment insurance, along with mandatory drug testing to get unemployment insurance at all.

Boehner’s compassionate plan also calls for severely cutting back Medicare payments to medical providers (in addition to such cuts already in place for 2012); and a law that forbids the use of Food Stamp electronic cards in “liquor stores and strip clubs,” since, as everyone knows, countless children are starving because their degenerate caregivers are blowing the food benefits on lap dances.

However, as reprehensible as Santa Boehner’s Clause may be, it can be filed under “21^st century politics s.o.p.” What is even worse is the GOP’s ongoing, nationwide effort to prevent people from voting in 2012 – specifically, the people most likely to vote for that foreign-born, Muslim/ Socialist, Barack Obama.

This is an issue that should be of great concern to all Americans, regardless of your political beliefs, because what stops the vote for your adversary this time around may stop the vote for you next time around!

For your thorough edification, I’m reprinting the following article (italics are mine), which I dearly hope you will read in full. Afterwards, I hope you’ll contact U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder at the Justice Department and let him know you demand that these voter suppression efforts be stopped (which the DOJ has the power to do). Here’s the article:

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GOP VOTER SUPPRESSION PLAN: SEVEN TACTICS TO BLOCK YOUR VOTE IN 2012

If you live in a state where voting is becoming tougher, plan ahead to register, to get the right ID and to know where you can vote.

Reprinted from AlterNet, December 20, 2011, by Steven Rosenfeld, who covers democracy issues for AlterNet and is the author of Count My Vote: A Citizen’s Guide to Voting (AlterNet Books, 2008).

If you are a member of a racial minority, student or young voter, working poor, elderly or disabled, your ability to vote may be a lot harder in 2012—especially if you live in states that have a history of racial repression during the Civil Rights Movement.

Simply put, the Republican Party knows which segments of society helped to elect President Obama and other Democrats in 2008, knows tens of millions of these people did not vote in the 2010 midterms, and has worked very hard to stop these people from voting again next year.

Their strategy has been simple: raise the barriers by complicating the rules to register to vote, to get a ballot, to vote early or speedily. What follows are seven major trends that will affect you if you live in a state with new rules.

Republicans know that most people do not pay attention to the fine print of election law. They get excited in the final days before presidential votes. But that may not be good enough in 2012.

Whether you are encouraged, discouraged or something in between about the coming presidential season, if you want to vote, look at the trends described below, see if you live in one of these states, and plan ahead: to register, get the right ID, and know where you can vote. If you don’t, the Republicans may silence your vote and voice.

“Heading into 2012, we are seeing the largest assault on the right to vote since the post-Reconstruction Era,” said Denise Lieberman, senior attorney with Advancement Project, a national civil rights organization.

“This is an unprecedented attack on voting that could affect more than 5 million voters in 2012 in states that represent nearly two-thirds of the electoral votes needed to win the presidency. Twenty new laws and executive orders in 14 states stand to turn back the clock and make it harder to vote. In 2011, two-thirds of the states introduced legislation that could impede voters and more is on the horizon for 2012.”

Tactic One: Toughen Voter ID Requirements

Before this year, most states allowed voters to use all kinds of identification, even utility bills, to get a ballot. Not anymore. Now a non-expired, state-issued photo ID is needed in eight states: Alabama, Kansas, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Mississippi, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin.

Looking at 2012, similar bills or ballot measures to toughen ID rules will surface in New Hampshire, North Carolina, Nebraska, New Jersey, Maine, Minnesota and Missouri, where legislation already has been filed.

Before 2011, only two states, Georgia and Indiana, prevented voters from casting ballots if they did not have a government-issued photo ID. In 16 mostly southern states with a history of Jim Crow laws, the Justice Department must “pre-clear” or approve any change to voting laws before they can take effect. The ID laws in Alabama, South Carolina and Texas have not yet been cleared.

Last week, Attorney General Eric Holder gave a major voting rights speech opposing all voter suppression tactics. But the Justice Department has not yet made a determination about these and other new voting laws in “covered” states.

Here’s why this is such a devious strategy. The GOP knows most Americans have little sympathy for people who lack photo ID. Polls by Democrats show that. There is a class divide here, where minorities and lower-income people, including students, disproportionately lack state-issued photo IDs. College ID cards are not the same. The GOP also knows that recent presidential elections [have] often come down to very close votes in a handful of states, and many people in those states will want to vote next fall, but will discover they cannot.

The voting eligible population of Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin, which all have new ID laws, is 29 million. Of that, the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School has reported that 10.3 percent – or 3.2 million voters – lack a state photo ID. In those states, Lieberman said, the number of voters without the requisite photo ID is larger than the margin of victory in the 2008 presidential or U.S. Senate (Texas) races.

In other words, with one change in law, the GOP will require Democrats and Independents to do “a better job” turning out voters in 2012 than they did in 2008 when electing Obama.

Tactic Two: Create Hurdles To Get Required ID

It takes time, money, patience and determination to get the required photo IDs. In some states, state budget crises have led to shortening the work weeks at the state agency, notably motor vehicles, or even closing branch offices—such as in Wisconsin, Tennessee and Texas — where people need to go to get the ID.

The ID itself may cost between $10 and $30, but there can be hidden costs if other forms of identification are needed to verify one’s identity and residency necessary to get a state ID. For example, not everybody has a birth certif- icate, marriage license, passport, divorce record or other documents, adding a complicating and time-consuming factor.

The requirements for secondary IDs, if available, can cost upward of $200 (for naturalization papers, not passports), and 17 states require a photo ID to get a copy of a birth certificate, which by itself can take weeks or months. Many elderly people born at home simply do not have these underlying papers, transportation, or funds to get the required voting ID. These bureaucratic steps amount to a poll tax, a notorious tactic used to stop African Americans and poor whites from voting.

Tactic Three: Intimidate Voter Registration Groups

The Republican Party knows that the majority of people who register to vote in registration drives tend to be in minority and low-income communities, and are likely to vote for Democrats, if they vote at all. They also know that voter registration drives can be sloppily run, with errors on as many as one-third of all the applications turned in, although local election administrators are well-versed in weeding out bad forms (although they resent the last-minute workloads).

As a result, seven states tried to add new restrictions on groups and their members doing voter registration drives in 2011, and these laws passed in Florida and Texas. The restrictions in these populous states must be pre- cleared by the Justice Department, which has yet to act.

But the impact of these laws—which, in Florida, creates a more rigorous schedule to turn in applications and imposes stiff fines for errors—has already discouraged some groups, such as Florida’s League of Women Voters, from even getting started for 2012. In addition to Florida and Texas, Michigan is also considering legislation to more aggressively regulate the registration drives.

Tactic Four: Try To Eliminate Same-Day Registration

In recent years, states have tried to make the voting process easier—not harder. One of the most convenient ways to help people to vote is to allow them to register at the polls or county offices and then vote.

In 2011, Republicans in Maine and Ohio eliminated same-day regis-tration, although citizen-led organizing overturned the Maine law on Election Day this past November and put a ballot initiative on the November 2012 Ohio ballot, suspending a package of draconian election laws until that vote. Meanwhile, North Carolina's legislature will consider a bill ending same-day registration next year.

Another hurdle concerns proof of citizenship. Arizona was the first state to require proof of citizenship to register to vote, but the law has been tied up in court. Meanwhile, bills requiring proof of citizenship passed in 2011 in Kansas, Alabama and Tennessee. Only Alabama's law has to be cleared by the Justice Department, which has yet to act.

Tactic Five: Curtail Early Voting

In recent years, states have also tried to make voting easier for people by creating or expanding the option to vote before the first Tuesday in November. In 2011, five states — Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Tennessee and West Virginia—passed laws rolling back early voting options.

Florida’s law reduces early voting from 13 days to seven days. That is potentially very damaging to minority communities, as nearly a third of all Floridians cast early ballots in 2008, with African Americans doing so at twice the rate of whites.

In Ohio, the law—which has been put on hold by a ballot initiative that will appear in November—would have eliminated voting on the Sunday before Election Day.

In Georgia, the law reduced early voting from 45 days to 21 days; and in Tennessee from 15 days to 13 days. The changes in Florida, Georgia and Tennessee must be pre-cleared before they can be implemented. However, the Justice Department has yet to make its determination in those states.

Tactic Six: Ban Felons From Voting

Many people remember what the Florida Secretary of State did in 2000 with erroneous lists of convicted felons in her state: she intentionally purged tens of thousands of legal voters, which was one of many factors leading to George W. Bush’s victory in that year’s presidential battleground state. That tactic’s ghost has risen in Florida and Iowa, where governors have issued executive orders either delaying or revoking the rights of former felons to regain their right to vote.

Across America, there are 5.3 million people, dispropor-tionately people of color, who cannot vote because of felony convictions.

Tactic Seven: Bleed Election Administration Budgets

This may be the least-understood and most far-reaching barrier as people try to vote in 2012. Already, tight state budgets have given cover to political decisions in Tennessee, Wisconsin and Texas to limit the operating hours of, or [to] close, the state offices where residents can obtain required photo IDs.

As a result, waiting times in the offices that remain open have grown longer in Tennessee and Wisconsin. In Texas, there are 34 counties with no Department of Public Safety Offices, including four counties where the Hispanic population is more than 75 percent.

Limiting access to voter-related services before Election Day creates very troubling precedents for Election Day, when longtime polling places might be consolidated and moved with little public notice, or under-staffed by poll workers, who are volunteers — not professional election administrators. In other words, not only do would-be voters in many states have to get their credentials in order, it may take them much longer to vote, because poll workers will have more work to do to process voters.

In Madison, Wisconsin, County Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl said the time it will take to process voters next November “has at least doubled.” In Florida, 30 percent of voters in 2008 voted early. If that state’s law stands, cutting the period in half, that means perhaps an additional 15 percent of the states’ voters will have to be processed on Election Day, doubling waiting times at peak hours. Meanwhile, as states have to spend millions to produce new voter identification documents, that will cut into promotional messages alerting voters about changes in the process.

And Where Is Obama’s Justice Department?

The biggest variable that may curtail or blunt these various voter suppression tactics is [the] Justice Department taking any number of steps to reject laws limiting or complicating the right to vote in the 16 states covered by the federal Voting Rights Act—which are mostly in the Old South. Attorney General Eric Holder gave a major speech last week in Texas where he criticized the laws aimed at discouraging voters and suppressing votes.

However, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division under Obama has not been very assertive in protecting voting rights. In its first two years, it filed fewer lawsuits than the administration of George W. Bush. While it has the power under the Voting Rights Act to reject many of the draconian laws passed by some of the biggest states — notably Texas and Florida—it has yet to do so and the 2012 political season is about to begin.

“The Justice Department plays a very important role,” said Advancement Project’s Lieberman. “Not only are they required to clear new voting laws in states that are subject to this pre-clearance requirement, generally 16 states in the South, but they also have the ability to bring affirmative lawsuits in any state under Section Two of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits laws that have a discriminatory impact on voting. They can also intervene in other lawsuits alleging Constitutional violations.”

The attorney general’s speech last week decried many of the new hurdles to voting. But civil rights lawyers want action—not words—and are nervous about the Depart- ment’s reticence to act. Last week, the Advancement Project delivered 120,000 petitions to Attorney General Holder urging the DOJ to do just that: enforce these federal voting laws.

In the meantime, the very people targeted by Republicans—racial minorities, young voters, the working poor, the elderly and people with disabilities—should not take any chances. They should get their identity papers in order, be sure to register before state deadlines, and look for online tools to find polling places. In other words, they need to know and assert their voting rights, because the system may not help them in 2012.

Playing the Race Card

2011-11-28T11:34:00.007-05:00

Last night, a friend who lives in the boondocks of a middle-American state, a peace-loving woman with hardly a harsh thought in her heart, told me she had to firmly resist hitting someone upside the head, because she saw a bumper sticker on a car that made her see red. It showed a [normal] picture of Obama and read: Don’t Re-Nig in 2012.

It took her a while to fully digest what “re-nig” was clearly meant to imply, because she just couldn’t believe what she was seeing. “I wanted to wait for the owner of the car to come back from wherever they were, but they’re all armed out here, and I was afraid.” Not chicken, just sensible, particularly in a place where more people have gun racks in their cars than baby seats. But it sure was a reminder that race (as in racist) was a player in 2008 and is rearing its hooded head again in 2012.

In fairness, many people genuinely dislike and distrust Barack Obama, because they truly believe he’s a Socialist (primarily in reaction to what they like to call ObamaCare), a tax loving/blood sucking Democrat who wants to steal from the middle class and redistribute to the poor, and the man who nearly bankrupted the nation by bailing out Wall Street and the auto industry.

There are many who strongly object to his pro-choice position on abortion (baby killer!) and his acceptance of gay rights and gay marriage (even though Mr. Obama has made clear he supports same-sex unions, not marriage, but so what: he supports sodomy!).

There are also those who think he’s arrogant, anti-Semitic and just plain unqualified for the job. And there are those of us on the Left who, while understanding what he’s been up against since taking office, still feel very betrayed by his Republican Light behavior in a futile attempt to foster bipartisan cooperation in Washington.

That said, I can’t help but feel that lots of people are resisting seeing – or at least talking about – the obvious element of racism in at least a considerable portion of the Far Right’s disrespect of America’s first black president. While I was somewhat shocked by the bumper sticker my friend saw, it was only somewhat, because I’ve had no doubt that racism is the 600-lb. gorilla in the political room that nobody wants to acknowledge.

Many folks feel it would be counter productive. I disagree. I think one of the big mistakes the President has made is not bringing up the issue of race since his splendid speech on the subject during the 2008 campaign. Contrary to some popular belief, just because we have a black president does not mean that racism in America is a thing of the past; indeed, this achievement has only brought the reality of racism closer to the surface – but not any closer to meaningful discussion.

I told my friend that, in a way, I was glad the racist messages were starting to come out, because it shows what an important role racism plays in the country’s resistance/refusal to accept the President’s legitimacy. The birther craziness, the claims that Mr. Obama is a Kenyan-born Muslim not an American-born Christian, the sneering attitude towards his background as a community organizer, the inability to understand the First Lady’s apparently unforgivable statement in 2008 that for the first time she felt proud of her country (!!!), and, just last week, Rush Limbaugh calling Mrs. Obama “uppity,” are all intertwined with racist sentiment.

The presence of Herman Cain among the current Republican presidential hopefuls is supposed to demonstrate that the Right doesn’t object to black people per se; as Conservative poster girl Ann Coulter observed, “Liberals can’t stand that our blacks are better than their blacks.” (You can’t make up shit like that.)

But the simple racist reality is that even if Cain wasn’t a know-nothing blowhard and an alleged sexual harasser, there is no way that both major parties would put up a black candidate. Many white people’s heads would explode from coast to coast. And the fact that Cain doesn’t seem to know (or at least acknowledge) this racist reality adds another level of political naivety to his other idiocy that completely boggles the mind.

Anyway, I did an extensive Internet search for the “re-nig” bumper sticker and couldn’t find it. Perhaps it was a custom job; a number of the Web sites that sell hundreds of anti-Obama bumper stickers (and T-shirts, mugs, etc.) give customers a chance to write their own messages. But I did find the following bumper stickers, available individually for very reasonable prices and at bargain basement rates in bulk:

Obama To Tax Aspirin – It’s White And It Works!

Don’t Blame Me, I Voted For The White Guy
If He Wins, Can We Still Call It The White House?
Obama Loves America Like O.J. Loved Nicole

Hey Obama, Yo Mama!

King Had A Dream, We Have A Nightmare

Big Brotha Is Watching Us

Obama: White Guilt 2012

High Five For Failure

If You Get Close Enough to Obama’s Ears, You Can Hear
The Ocean

No Mo’Bama

Give Tiger A Break, Obama Is Screwing
The Whole Country

I’m Not Racist, I Hate His White Half, Too

Obama’s Chillin’ While The Oil’s Spillin’

Welcome To Economic Slavery

Don’t Tax Me, Bro

We Shall Overcome [with Obama’s “O”
logo as both letter Os]

Rush Is Right

I’m Not Racist, I Don’t Like Biden, Either

Mo’ Drama Bama.

The photo above is my personal favorite of the racist visuals available; others include the always-popular Obama as a monkey, Obama in caricature with huge lips and ears, and of course, Obama as Hitler (and Mao, and Marx, etc.), Obama as the devil, and, in a bow to the Democratic Party as a whole, Obama as a donkey.

We on the Left would do well to start including race in our political conversation, not as a way of dismissing the President’s shortcomings or his opponents fiscal and “moral” objections, but in order to demonstrate how unbalanced and ignorant and personal so much anti-Obama feeling is.

It’s a reminder that no matter how disappointed we are about how he handled his first term, he must have a nothing-to-lose second term, in which he will, hopefully, live up to the Right’s greatest fears and our greatest hopes. We can't afford to permit Teabag Republican heartlessness, self-righteousness and ignorance to take hold. If it does…Lawdy, Lawdy, what we gonna do?

Contemplating Thanksgiving

2011-11-23T06:15:00.062-05:00

It seems to me that, over time, liking Thanksgiving has become politically incorrect and it pisses me off. I presently know people (and knew others in the past) who hate Thanksgiving, because they feel it’s an insult to the memory of Native Americans who were culturally brutalized, materially ripped off and physically destroyed practically to the point of extinction by Europeans who came here in search of their manifest destiny. And of course, all that is true.

More recently, people object to Thanksgiving as a celebration of gluttony. “We have a holiday where we stuff food into other food,” Bill Maher (an unapologetic non-foodie) once said. (I guess no one’s had the heart to tell him that there are many dishes that involve stuffing food into other food.) Maher also criticized Thanksgiving on the grounds of history, saying (and this is the quote as I can best remember it): “It’s just so us in our denial of our true history to celebrate the one nice moment we had with the Indians. It’s like a date rapist saying, ‘Let’s not dwell on that, let’s think about the lovely dinner we had earlier in the evening’.”

Nonetheless, I’m not ashamed to say that I love Thanksgiving and have since childhood. It was always my favorite holiday – partly because it meant wonderful food (I am an unapologetic foodie), but mainly because it was a non-religious holiday, which I greatly appreciated in dealing with my awkward bi-religion/bi-racial circumstances. And I adored the Thanksgiving Day Parade – in the years before TV producers decided it would be a good idea to add corny, lip-synched entertainment in front of an entrance to Macy’s, which has since rendered the parade unwatchable.

I have no recollection of being taught in school that Indians were bad. In fact, I have a clear memory of a happy fourth grade Thanksgiving play in which I recited a portion of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s endless epic, The Song of Hiawatha while another kid played a tom-tom drum: “By the shores of Gitche Gumee / By the shining Big-Sea-Water / Stood the wigwam of Nokomis / Daughter of the Moon, Nokomis.” That’s all I remember and I’ve since learned that the poem bears no relation to any Indian history whatsoever.

Indeed, the classic Thanksgiving myth isn't true, either. Members of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe were not invited to the Pilgrims' "First Thanksgiving," which the transplanted Brits thought of purely as a harvest festival, not a special occasion of giving thanks. The Indians basically crashed the party -- but politely, bringing substantial food to share.

Anyway, I digress. America’s actual history with Indians was never mentioned in our elementary school history books (for obvious reasons…) – except for that nice dinner we had with them earlier in the evening. For that matter, our history with the Indians, along with the detailed brutality of slavery and the World War II national encampment of the Japanese (legal immigrants, second-generation-American-born Japanese and others) was left out of the curriculae too. Remember, this was the 50s to mid 60s and books offering corrected, expanded history didn't yet exist below the college level.

No, what taught me that Indians were bad were movie and TV westerns in the 50s and 60s, because the Indians were always ablaze with war paint, whooping and swooping down on settlers and pioneers to scalp them, burn their homes, forts and wagons, and steal white women. It wasn’t until I discovered Buffy Saint Marie in my early teens and later read Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee and saw the film Little Big Man that I learned the horrible truth about what white European Americans did to Native Americans.

However, none of this has lessened my love of turkey with gravy, dressing, sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie. Perhaps this means I’m putting my stomach ahead of my politics, to which I say: "Ahh, not really; please pass the cranberry sauce." Besides, being introduced to these new arts and history sources came about the same time that I realized the contemporary Thanksgiving has nothing to do with Pilgrims and Indians and all that came after. It’s about gathering with friends and family if possible, but whatever the circumstances, genuinely acknowledging the blessings and tender mercies in our lives.

And it’s about the food. And it’s about football. And it’s about the prelude to Christmas which, for most people, thank goodness, has no more to do with the birth of Christ and Christianity’s crazy, bloody history than Thanksgiving is about Pilgrims and Indians. Mass majority Christmas is about the food and Christmas trees and Christmas presents and Christmas music, both secular and religious. I was in a big choir in high school and every year we sang the “Hallelujah Chorus,” which was wonderful to be part of (I was still an angelic first-soprano) and delightful to hear. So I guess my point is: lighten up ya’ll. We have little enough to celebrate these days, and if we choose to delight in these traditional holidays in our own, somehow-meaningful way, that's a good thing.

This Thanksgiving, I’ll be alone – for the first time by choice. I won’t have to travel or dress up and I'm not doing much cooking, but sweet potatoes will be involved. I won’t watch the parade or football. What I will do is sleep late, then look for the original Miracle On 34^th Street on TV. I’ll light two Yahrzeit candles, one for my departed loved ones -- and one for the Indians. I’ll think about and speak out loud what I’m grateful for and offer thanks to the general universe for my largely good fortune. I will have a Happy Thanksgiving and hope you do, too.

Old Modern Man

2011-11-20T05:12:00.001-05:00

I miss George Carlin terribly. I think of him often. I wonder what he would have said about our sick, wacky times. Carlin was never a political comedian in the sense that he commented on politics and politicians; he thought it was all bullshit and that voting was pointless. But he certainly spoke knowingly and critically of our age, always being funny and usually wise and eloquent, as well. I miss him because his honesty and intelligence, as well as his humor, comforted me, acknowledged me, justified me. George made me feel proud to be an outsider because he was King of the Outsiders and he made that pretty cool.

I got to interview George Carlin twice, both times by phone. The first time was when I worked for HBO and one of his specials was coming up. The second time was when I did some freelance work for the producers/ creators of Shining Time Station / Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends and George was the lovable Mr. Conductor.

Carlin, especially in his post-heart attack years, was reputed to be difficult to deal with (for producers, suits and such, which was probably true) and no easier to interview. But on both occasions, which were about five years apart, he was pleasant and easy-going; willing to answer any question I put to him; and generous with his time. Maybe it was because I wasn’t a journalist but instead just a p.r. hack trying to do her job; Carlin always respected ordinary working folks. I think it was because he was just a decent guy who sometimes gave greedy or bossy or nervy people a hard time. After all, he was George Carlin.

If George were here now, he’d probably be quietly, maybe anonymously, sending food and blankets to assorted Occupy Wall Street sites. He would be talking about the legitimacy of gay marriage, tax and income inequality and the danger wrought by the Religious Right’s slow, steady, disciplined 30-year-climb from minor local politics to the less-than-hallowed-halls of Congress, the Court and the White House. He would be angry, brainy and funny as ever. And he would be a sane voice in crazy times.

A couple of hours ago, I saw a re-run of the Mark Twain Prize ceremony that honored George Carlin a few months after his death at the age of 71 in June, 2008. It ended with Carlin’s complete performance of his magnificent routine, “A Modern Man.” Whether you recall it fondly or never heard it, I present it here for your enjoyment and edification:

“I’m a modern man, digital and smoke-free; a man for the millennium. A diversified, multi-cultural, post-modern deconstructionist; politically, anatomically and ecologically incorrect. I’ve been uplinked and downloaded, I’ve been inputted and outsourced. I know the upside of downsizing, I know the downside of upgrading. I’m a high-tech low-life. A cutting-edge, state-of-the-art, bi-coastal multi-tasker, and I can give you a gigabyte in a nanosecond. I’m new-wave, but I’m old-school; and my inner child is outward-bound. I’m a hot-wired, heat-seeking, warm-hearted cool customer; voice-activated and bio-degradable. I interface with my database; my database is in cyberspace; so I’m interactive, I’m hyperactive, and from time to time I’m radioactive.

“Behind the eight ball, ahead of the curve, ridin’ the wave, dodgin’ the bullet, pushin’ the envelope. I’m on point, on task, on message, and off drugs. I’ve got no need for coke and speed; I’ve got no urge to binge and purge. I’m in the moment, on the edge, over the top, but under the radar. A high-concept, low-profile, medium-range ballistic missionary. A street-wise smart bomb. A top-gun bottom-feeder. I wear power ties, I tell power lies, I take power naps, I run victory laps. I’m a totally ongoing, big-foot, slam-dunk rainmaker with a pro-active outreach. A raging workaholic, a working rageaholic; out of rehab and in denial. I’ve got a personal trainer, a personal shopper, a personal assistant, and a personal agenda.

“You can't shut me up; you can't dumb me down. ‘Cause I’m tireless, and I’m wireless. I’m an alpha-male on beta-blockers. I’m a non-believer, I’m an over-achiever; laid-back and fashion-forward. Up-front, down-home; low-rent, high-maintenance. I’m super-sized, long-lasting, high-definition, fast-acting, oven-ready and built to last. A hands-on, footloose, knee-jerk head case; prematurely post-traumatic, and I have a love child who sends me hate-mail.

“But I’m feeling, I’m caring, I’m healing, I’m sharing. A supportive, bonding, nurturing primary-care giver. My output is down, but my income is up. I take a short position on the long bond, and my revenue stream has its own cash flow. I read junk mail, I eat junk food, I buy junk bonds, I watch trash sports. I’m gender-specific, capital-intensive, user-friendly and lactose-intolerant.

“I like rough sex; I like tough love. I use the f-word in my e-mail. And the software on my hard drive is hard-core—no soft porn. I bought a microwave at a mini-mall. I bought a mini-van at a mega-store. I eat fast food in the slow lane. I’m toll-free, bite-size, ready-to-wear, and I come in all sizes. A fully equipped, factory-authorized, hospital-tested, clinically proven, scientifically formulated medical miracle.

“I’ve been pre-washed, pre-cooked, pre-heated, pre-screened, pre-approved, pre-packaged, post-dated, freeze-dried, double-wrapped and vacuum-packed. And I have unlimited broadband capacity. I’m a rude dude, but I’m the real deal. Lean and mean. Cocked, locked and ready to rock; rough, tough and hard to bluff. I take it slow, I go with the flow; I ride with the tide, I’ve got glide in my stride. Drivin’ and movin’, sailin’ and spinnin’; jivin’ and groovin, wailin’ and winnin’. I don’t snooze, so I don’t lose. I keep the pedal to the metal and the rubber on the road. I party hearty, and lunchtime is crunch time. I’m hangin’ in, there ain’t no doubt; and I’m hangin tough. Over and out.”

There’s Somethin’ Happenin’ Here – And What It Is Is Exactly Clear!

2011-11-18T00:05:00.003-05:00

Today marked the two month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement. Since it began, OWS events have sprung up in cities and towns across America – 1,000 locations in all. OWS has struck a chord among an increasing number, and an increasing diversity, of Americans in the “99%.” And how was this anniversary celebrated? With police…shall we say, “over-zealousness.”

It would appear that mayors from coast-to-coast have been on conference calls together (so says the grapevine) trying to figure out how to “handle” OWS – and have concluded that a paramilitary use of their police forces is the way to go. Sharp, progressive, creative thinking, eh?

OWS – despite its lack of a “specific” agenda, blah blah blah – has been remarkably disciplined in its commitment to non-violence, all the more remarkable because, unlike during the Civil Rights movement of the ‘60s, they have not been formally trained in non-violent tactics. Nonetheless, the original group in New York has been dispossessed from Zuccotti Park, their personal belongings confiscated, and their persons subjected to outright violence by heavily armed and shielded police. (I guess it was too cold for fire hoses and all the dogs were busy elsewhere trying to sniff out marijuana.)

Has the OWS been messy? Yes. Have they inconvenienced and interfered with the normal comings and goings of others? Yes. Have there been legitimate concerns about public health and safety? Yes. Have municipal governments done anything to positively, non-violently and economically address these issues (allowing port-o-potties, for example)? No. And what has been the result? Greater determination plus increased and more focused action by OWS. Today was a National Day of Action for OWS; from sea to shining sea they left their campsites and marched, and occupied other locations, like banks and subways.

The far-right has declared that OWS is dead, but they’ve already demonstrated considerable confusion about what constitutes life and death. Indeed, OWS is very much alive, growing, maturing, and attracting increasing participation and media attention. More than 30,000 people (including a lot of organized labor) marched in Manhattan tonight and nearly 300 were willingly arrested. I know it’s been a while since we’ve seen one, so we may not immediately recognize it – but this is the beginning of a New American Revolution.

Something else happened yesterday that is also revolutionary. Six representatives from a group of 200 very rich people known as The Patriotic Millionaires met with tax phobic troublemaker, Grover Norquist, begging him to release Republicans from their “no new taxes ever” pledge and finally increase taxes on those earning $1 million (or more) annually – acknowledging the disparity between their contributions and those of the 99%. Norquist dismissed them as “Democratic Party hacks.” They suggested that Norquist move to Somalia.

The photo above is the iconic picture that has come to define the infamous Kent State Massacre, an Anti Vietnam War protest held at Kent State University in Ohio in May, 1970. During that event, National Guardsmen responding to the “uprising” killed 4 students and wounded 9 more – and America was up in arms.

“Kent State” inspired Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s song Ohio, and, Buffalo Springfield’s For What It’s Worth, which was actually written in 1967 in response to the LAPD’s assault on hippies, over time has also become associated with Kent State. Currently, the song’s lyrics* have been used as a denotation for OWS. The message is simple: don’t respond to legitimate protest with military force; don’t dismiss earnest Americans as socialists/communists; don’t accuse sincere political activists of being dirty, drug-sodden, sex-crazed loonies; don’t demonize Americans demanding reasonable economic, political and social change. In short, don’t allow Fox News to shape your views about what’s happening.

* There’s somethin’ happenin’ here
What it is ain’t exactly clear
There’s a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware

I think it’s time we stop, children, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down…

…Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you’re always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away

We better stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down…

What Constitutes Personhood?

2011-11-02T05:31:00.000-04:00

This past August, Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney got a lot of heat for his assertion that “corporations are people, too” while speaking at an Iowa State Fair. The audience did not appreciate this millionaire’s personification of corporations; I didn't either.

Now, the idea of what constitutes personhood is coming from another familiar quarter. Some segments of the anti-choice movement – which has been trying to reverse the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion in 1973 – is trying to redefine personhood in their effort to re-criminalize abortion.

As reported in the New York Times on October 25^th: “A constitutional amendment facing voters in Mississippi on Nov. 8, and similar initiatives brewing in half a dozen other states including Florida and Ohio, would declare a fertilized human egg to be a legal person, effectively branding abortion and some forms of birth control as murder. With this far-reaching anti-abortion strategy, the proponents of what they call personhood amendments hope to reshape the national debate.”

What makes this effort even more horrific than it seems at first glance is its attack on contraception, definitely including IUDs and morning-after pills, but potentially capable of affecting all forms of female birth control (nobody’s saying a word about condoms), as well as stem cell research – and we thought that battle had been fought and won!

In case you’re wondering (as I did for the longest time) why anti-choice proponents object to contraception, the very thing that prevents unwanted pregnancies, is this: as much as they object to abortion, they are equally opposed to what they define as “fornication,” meaning, any sex outside of marriage by both sexes whatever their age, and, engaging in recreational sex, even within marriage, rather than having sex solely for procreation. In short, they don’t just want to make abortion a crime, they want to make sex a crime. Welcome to the 21^st century, where once again Puritans rule!

Interestingly, as the Times also notes: “The drive for personhood amendments has split the anti-abortion forces nationally. Some groups call it an inspired moral leap, while traditional leaders of the fight, including National Right to Life and the Roman Catholic bishops, have refused to promote it, charging that the tactic is reckless and could backfire, leading to a Supreme Court defeat that would undermine progress in carving away at Roe v. Wade.”

The two things I find most appalling about these initiatives is (1) they are based on religious definitions of morality/sexually-appropriate behavior, which is completely unacceptable in a secular society, and (2) they are trying to extend the definition of personhood to include a spec of microscopic goo, which is what a fertilized egg is. In short, this is totally crazy.

However, maybe we as a society would not be poised at this ludicrous juncture if pro-choice advocates had, from Day One, been willing to face the secular moral and legal aspects of our position. In this regard, I am again motivated to quote the always-interesting Camille Paglia, who wrote on Salon.com during the 2008 campaign:

“Let’s take the issue of abortion rights, of which I am a firm supporter. As an atheist and libertarian, I believe that government must stay completely out of the sphere of personal choice. Every individual has an absolute right to control his or her body… But the pro-life position, whether or not it is based on religious orthodoxy, is more ethically highly evolved than my own tenet of unconstrained access to abortion on demand. My argument…has always been that nature has a master plan pushing every species toward procreation and that it is our right and even obligation as rational human beings to defy nature’s fascism…

“…Hence I have always frankly admitted that abortion is murder… …I [also] support the death penalty for atrocious crimes (such as rape-murder or the murder of children). I have never understood the standard Democratic combo of support for abortion and yet opposition to the death penalty…

“…Not until the Democratic Party stringently reexamines its own implicit assumptions and rhetorical formulas will it be able to deal effectively with the enduring and now escalating challenge from the pro-life right wing. Because pro-choice Democrats have been arguing from cold expedience, they have thus far been unable to make an effective ethical case for the right to abortion.”

Fair enough. So, I will now attempt to make an effective ethical case for the right to abortion:

When a woman becomes pregnant, whatever the circumstances, the fetus within her is in the process of developing into a human being. But at least until the 7^th month of pregnancy, that fetus is unable to survive outside the woman’s body and fully develop on its own. Therefore, while it is understood that a fetus is a living human being in development, it does not have legal, independent personhood status until birth. The unborn do not have a “right to life” that supersedes the rights of a born, autonomous woman.

While a fetus is within a woman’s body and is not capable of surviving outside of it, the fetus is an integral part of that woman’s body. As such, the woman has the right to do with her body what she sees fit, including the removal, the killing, of the fetus, thereby preventing its full gestation and birth.

While this may be distressing to some people, their distress does not alter a woman’s right to control her own body, including whether or not she becomes pregnant, and if so, whether or not she chooses to bring the pregnancy to term.

The justification for killing the fetus is the same as society’s justification for killing in self-defense, in defense of one’s family and home, in the course of war, in the course of law enforcement when necessary, and as a form of judicial punishment for heinous crime. Society recognizes that killing, however repugnant, is sometimes necessary, and a secular society recognizes a woman’s right to abortion as one of those necessities, because giving birth to a child that one does not want or is unable to care for is patently irresponsible and cruel.

Those who object to abortion on religious or other personal moral grounds should not have them, and the law should not attempt to coerce them into doing so. Similarly, those with moral objections to abortion – much as those who object to participation in war – have no moral or legal right to prevent another person’s abortion.

Rediscovering George

2011-10-26T05:31:00.000-04:00

I’m pleased to take a welcome break from discouraging politics to tell you how much I’ve enjoyed the new documentary portrait of musician/singer-songwriter/film producer George Harrison, entitled George Harrison: Living in the Material World. It debuted on HBO this month, and if you are or ever were a Beatles fan, not to mention a Harrison fan, it’s really worth seeing. It features some familiar Beatles footage as well as Beatles material I’ve never seen, and, a lot about (and with) George individually. Directed by the indefatigable Martin Scorsese and produced by him and George’s wife of 30 years, Olivia Harrison, the film also offers interviews with her and their son, as well as an assortment of music and film notables, including old friends and family.

I must admit that after the Beatles broke up, I didn’t pay much attention to Harrison’s ongoing career (I was wrapped up in John & Yoko), nor did I realize how many popular Beatles songs were written by him, rather than the famous Lennon & McCartney duo – among them “Here Comes the Sun,” “If I Needed Someone,” “Blue Jay Way” and “Something (in the way she moves)”; I did recall “Don’t Bother Me,” “I, Me, Mine,” “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” “Savoy Truffle” and of course, “Tax Man.” Apart from the Beatles, Harrison released numerous albums and generated such hits as “All Things Must Pass,” “Beware of Darkness,” “Wah-Wah” and “My Sweet Lord,” to mention a few.

I also forgot that it was George Harrison who produced “The Concerts for Bangladesh” – the concerts, the album, the film – which was the very first rock- star-studded event to serve a charitable cause, pre-dating “We Are The World,” Live Aid, all the other Aids, and all of Bono’s good work.

Now all this may say more about my foggy memory than George Harrison’s show biz prominence, but I also forgot that it was he who assembled The Traveling Wilburys, which began as musical fun among friends: he and Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne. I knew he had produced Monty Python’s The Life of Brian, but I didn’t know he mortgaged his house to do it, or that he formed a film company that produced other Python movies, along with an impressive list of other well-respected films.

I knew it was George Harrison who discovered Hindu spirituality for himself and turned the other Beatles onto it as well. I didn’t realize how strong a part it played in his life right up to the end, long after his band mates left it behind, or to what great extent his musical teacher, Ravi Shankar, was his spiritual teacher, as well.

Despite all I’ve written here, you’ll find much more to learn – and admire – about George Harrison, the man and the artist, in this new documentary. It’s a reminder of how much the Beatles gave us, together and individually, how much we’ve lost – and how much they left us.

A Noble Occupation

2011-10-22T03:39:00.007-04:00

I’ve been paying close attention to the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement since Week 2 and I have to say, as a counter-balancing relief from the babble of the current herd of Republican hopefuls, OWS is refreshing and encouraging.

What has surprised me is the number of people – mostly on the Right, but the Left and Center, too – who keep trying to dismiss (or smear) this socio-political phenomenon, because they haven’t stated clear goals, or provided a manifesto or list of demands. It’s like listening to someone blurt guttural screams for HELP! and standing aside, asking, “Yes, I understand you want assistance, but can you please clarify exactly what it is you want help for; and if you don’t mind, could you put your request in writing so that it can be studied by the proper committees?”

Talk about you-don’t-get-it!

Remember the 1976 film Network (written by Paddy Chayefsky, directed by Sidney Lumet) starring the late, great Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway and William Holden? It’s set in the 1970s, when the three major networks still ruled television, and tells the story of a grand old broadcast newsman left over from the salad days of grand old broadcast newsmen, a la Edward R. Murrow. One day, Howard Beale (played by Finch) comes to the studio to do his nightly newscast and instead he gives a sermon of desperation that is eerily pertinent to our times, even though it’s 36 years later. The following is taken directly from the script:

“I don’t have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It’s a depression. Everybody’s out of work or scared of losing their job, the dollar buys a nickel’s worth, banks are going bust, shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter, punks are running wild in the streets, and there’s nobody anywhere who seems to know what to do, and there’s no end to it. We know the air’s unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat, and we sit and watch our tee-vees while some local newscaster tells us today we had fifteen homicides and sixty-three violent crimes, as if that’s the way it’s supposed to be. We all know things are bad. Worse than bad. They’re crazy. It’s like everything’s going crazy. So we don’t go out any more. We sit in the house, and slowly the world we live in gets smaller, and all we ask is please, at least leave us alone in our own living rooms. Let me have my toaster and my tee-vee and my hair-dryer and my steel-belted radials, and I won’t say anything, just leave us alone.

“Well, I’m not going to leave you alone. I want you to get mad – I don’t want you to riot. I don’t want you to protest. I don’t want you to write your Congressmen. Because I wouldn’t know what to tell you to write. I don’t know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the defense budget and the Russians and crime in the street. All I know is first you got to get mad. You’ve got to say: “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this any more. I’m a human being, goddammit. My life has value.” So I want you to get up now. I want you to get out of your chairs and go to the window. Right now. I want you to go to the window, open it, and stick your head out and yell. I want you to yell: “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this any more!” Things have got to change. But you can’t change them unless you’re mad. You have to get mad!”

That, ladies and gentlemen, is what the OWS is about. Beale’s rage against the machine and call-to-expression is one of the greatest in modern cinema, and I wanted to reprint it for those of you who have never seen the film (or haven’t seen it in a long time). OWS is about everyday people being mad as hell with the economic and political system, with being ripped off, pissed on, treated like children, and being completely excluded from the bounty of the 1%. What’s the mystery?

Network remains pertinent, timely, throughout. At first, the network powers-that-be are furious. But when they discover that millions of people from coast to coast are in fact yelling out their windows, they realize that Beale has hit a nerve – and they can capitalize on it! They take Beale off the nightly news and give him a show of his own. They call him “The Mad Prophet of the Airwaves.” And the old man comes out each week, gives a powerful rant, then swoons into a dead faint as the audience cheers. Reality TV 36 years before its time!

But in art as in life, one day Beale goes too far. Voicing the rage of the common man (which can always be ignored…) is one thing – but challenging the machinations of BIG big business is quite another. Here’s what Beale says that gets him into trouble:

“All right, listen to me! Listen carefully! This is your goddam life I’m talking about today! In this country, when one company takes over another company, they simply buy up a controlling share of the stock. But first they have to file notice with the government. That’s how C.C. and A. – the Communications Corporation of America – bought up the company that owns this network. And now somebody’s buying up C.C. and A! Some company named Western World Funding Corporation is buying up C.C. and A! They filed their notice this morning! Well, just who the hell is Western World Funding Corporation? It’s a consortium of banks and insurance companies who are not buying C.C. and A. for themselves but as agents for somebody else! Well, who’s this somebody else? They won’t tell you! They won’t tell you, they won’t tell the Senate, they won’t tell the SEC, the FCC, the Justice Department, they wont tell anybody! They say it’s none of our business! The hell it ain’t!”

This is the daily business reality that affects all of us. This is the chicanery that OWS is mad about. What’s the mystery?

Beale can’t be allowed to go on telling that kind of truth. So Arthur Jensen himself (beautifully played by Ned Beatty), the corporate honcho of C.C. and A., takes Beale into an imposing conference room and reads him the corporate riot act. Doesn’t this, too, sound very much like the global economic present – the era that OWS is mad about? Just substitute China for Russia and the corporations of today for those of yesteryear and it’s enough to make you shiver.

Jensen says:

“You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I won’t have it, is that clear?!...You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There are no nations! There are no peoples! There are no Russians! There are no Arabs! There are no third worlds! There is no West! There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and… interwoven, interacting, multi-variate, multi-national dominion of dollars! petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars!, Reich marks, rubles, rin, pounds and shekels! It is the international system of currency that determines the totality of life on this planet!

“That is the natural order of things today! That is the atomic, subatomic and galactic structure of things today! And you have meddled with the primal forces of nature, and you will atone! Am I getting through to you, Mr. Beale?

“You get up on your little twenty-one inch screen, and howl about America and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and ITT and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today. What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state – Karl Marx? They pull out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories and minimax solutions and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments just like we do. We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable by-laws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale! It has been since man crawled out of the slime…”

This post has gone on long enough I think. I hope you’ve enjoyed these golden snippets of Network and suffice it to say that you should think twice about the invectives being hurled at the OWS: they’re radicals, they’re killers, they’re anti-Semites, they’re a bunch of dirty hippies taking up space.

No. They’re you and me and everyone in the country, who, for one (or more) countless reasons is mad as hell and won’t take it any more. I hope New York has a mild winter.

The "Thelma and Louise" of 9/11

2011-09-11T08:56:00.006-04:00

Every time I watch a movie that shows the New York skyline before the attacks of September 11, 2001, I gasp a little. Sometimes I tear up, other times I feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach – again. I don’t often consciously think about that day and its awful myriad of consequences. But when I see an image of the old skyline, with what now look like magnificent giant rectangles (buildings that prior to 9/11 I frankly thought were an ugly, charmless, over-the-top eyesore), all the shock and sadness come rushing back. I’m an American and a New Yorker and far from immune to the feeling and memory of that horror.

Much has happened in the ten years since. In part, I feel as Dick Cavett described in his New York Times column on 9/9/11: “Have you, perchance, decided — as I have — not to spend the weekend re-wallowing in 9/11 with the media?” Yet I also believe that 9/11 should not be forgotten, and that we still have much to learn and understand about that event.

So the bells and bagpipes ring hollow when I consider that “ground zero” remained a gaping hole in the ground for nearly a decade before a fitting memorial was constructed/landscaped, and an inexplicably taller, larger, monstrosity was erected in place of the original monoliths. (Think what might have been a better use of that land – a new Museum of American History, or a new SUNY or CUNY school. But that wouldn’t have been “commercially viable.” That downtown land is too valuable to squander on education, beauty and fresh air!)

What I think of most these days when I do ponder 9/11 is the unconscionable treatment of the First Responders and clean-up volunteers. In many instances, their courage and generosity have been rewarded with serious illness, but their right to financial compensation and the very best health care that they shouldn’t have to pay a nickel for is consistently questioned and frequently denied.

It’s the same mistreatment of those we also hail as heroes with the “We Support the Troops” crap: flags and parades and medals, but young men and women being routinely sent into harm’s way without proper/necessary equipment of many kinds; being subjected to numerous tours (three, four and more) instead of the traditional one or two; being paid so little that thousands of military families live in sub-standard housing and require Welfare and food stamps; and when they return, being subjected to poor or no health care and unwarranted scrutiny of the “cause” of their injuries!

Very few 9/11 First Responders and volunteers will be part of official tenth anniversary ceremonies today, an insult that speaks (screams) for itself.

I also think of that famous quote: “Those who would sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither liberty nor security” (variously attributed to Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine). So when I think of 9/11 now, ten years later, I think of the Patriot Act, a brutal attack on civil rights and legal procedure that citizens have accepted without question in the name of security, just as we accept the imposition of airport and other security measures that appear to do little more than continually close the proverbial barn door. Perhaps our two most traumatic responses have been our loss of innocence and sense of safety, and, the terror of being violated in a way that the mainland of America has never been violated before.

The 1991 film Thelma and Louise came to mind within the last couple of weeks in regard to another matter. Then the film “just happened” to be on TV last night and I began thinking about it in relation to 9/11. Since the movie is 20 years old, I won’t consider myself a “spoiler” if I recap the essence of the story.

Thelma, an obedient, ditzy little housewife and Louise, a capable and emotionally scarred waitress, set off for a weekend vacation in the mountains. For Thelma, their stop at a honky-tonk bar leads to too much drinking, a little suggestive dancing, and an attempted rape by a nasty good-ole-boy in the parking lot. For Louise, armed with her friend’s gun, it leads to a flashback of being raped herself, a verbal altercation with the attempted rapist, and her shooting him dead.

From that moment on, these two ordinary little gals from Arkansas zoom through a series of new incarnations – from frightened victims to brazen criminals to avenging Amazon warriors. They shed their feminine propriety for a “macha” kind of chutzpa and discover a comfortable new wildness in themselves.

Even before they’re surrounded by an army of police, they acknowledge their transformation to each other. “I can’t go back,” says Thelma, “something’s crossed over in me. I just couldn’t live.” “I know what you mean,” answers Louise. So by the time they’re cornered fugitives, they would sooner die than be defiled by a system that would never have believed or helped them. They don’t go back. They clasp hands and drive their car over the edge of the Grand Canyon.

I think something like that happened to America and Americans after 9/11. We lost our innocence along with the sense of safety that comes with being powerful. First we got scared and allowed an opportunistic government to curtail our freedoms. Then we got mad and consented by general silence to two ill-advised wars that are still raging. Then finally, we had enough.

Some of us expressed our rage and need for positive change by electing Barack Obama. Others created the Tea Party. We all “want our country back,” by which we mean many different things. Hardcore conservatives want to get the black president out of the White House, not pay taxes and move back to Mayberry. Hardcore liberals want a sane, engaged government that’s got our backs; we want justice for all and to give peace a chance. We all want to go back to what we personally recall as the best part of the 20^th century, the American century.

But we can’t go back. Something’s crossed over in us all.

Important Memories and Strange Bedfellows

2011-08-25T11:52:00.000-04:00

I received an email this morning about the Holocaust. I have an uncle by marriage (he was married to my mother’s sister, now deceased) who is a very conservative man, born and bred in poverty in the little towns around Meridian, Mississippi. He has remarried to a woman who is a devoted born-again Christian and, judging from other emails I’ve received from her, is also quite conservative. This morning’s email came from her.

It’s important to me to note here that my uncle has made a generous, ongoing effort to maintain an uncle/niece relationship with me since my aunt’s death, which is a little ironic, since we had no relationship to speak of while my aunt was alive. That was largely my choice, because I had never really forgiven him for banning my black father from visiting their white New Jersey home when I was a kid. I didn’t particularly like my aunt, either. When I was a teenager, I christened them Aunt Tarantula and Uncle Fuck. Fortunately, we all grew up and calmed down – and my uncle had a very nice relationship with both my parents during the last 15 years (or so) of their lives. And my uncle’s second wife, Tommie, was accepting of me as a niece right from the start. If you can keep politics out of some relationships, the ties that come to bind can surprise you.

Earlier this year, my uncle and step-aunt visited Israel with a Christian touring group. They came back filled with delight and, I think, a sense of renewal. For some Christians and Muslims, as well as Jews, Israel is regarded as a holy, treasured place. “Everyone who considers themselves a Christian or Jew should go there,” said my uncle. Since the “Left” abandoned Israel and it became embraced by the “Right,” my uncle has taken a great interest in Israel’s safety and survival, and has developed a genuine simpatico with Jews. It’s too bad this didn’t happen when he was married to my aunt, who, at his request or through her own instincts (I don’t know which), hid the fact that she was Jewish from his family for the first 15 years of their 30+ year marriage.

Anyway, Tommie sent me an email with a link to a video about The Auschwitz Album, which is very moving and informative and I hope you’ll take a look at it. I sent her the following verbose reply:

Dear Tommie,

Thank you for sending this to me.

No, I've never seen this album before, but I of course have seen many other photos and hours of Nazi war footage over the years. I have been fascinated, appalled, and in many ways galvanized by the Holocaust since I first saw footage from the camps on TV when I was about 8 years old. My parents and grandparents did not hesitate to explain the Holocaust to me -- as much as the Holocaust can be “explained.”

When I was growing up in the 50s, knowing about the Holocaust, which at that time had ended so recently, was the duty of all Jews and something essential that had to be understood by Jewish children so we would keep the memory alive. I have very vivid memories of Nathan, our local small grocer in the Bronx, who wore short-sleeved shirts even in the chill of winter, because he wanted people to see the number tattooed on his arm and talk to him about what happened. I also remember my grandfather sitting close to a little white plastic radio, clutching the arms of his chair and crying as he listened to the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Israel.

I wonder if many secular Jewish children today know anything about this shattering event.

Since the Holocaust, there have been other horrible instances of mass murder around the globe, properly described as genocide. But the Holocaust is unique – not because it happened to Jews, but because it happened in Germany (and Poland, and throughout Nazi/Fascist Europe), one of the most refined and “civilized” countries in the world that has made virtually unparalleled contributions to art, music, science, literature, social development and religious reformation.

It is different because of its cold, meticulous organization. The Nazis were not ignorant peasants or savages, killing with machetes and rocks and malfunctioning guns out of misplaced passion and ignorance. They were calm, cool executors of a deliberate, evil, master plan, so planned and so “thrifty” that they made sure to collect gold fillings from the mouths of the dead and use their skin for soap and lampshades, and save their eyeglasses for recycling.

Yes, it was the ultimate act of anti-Semitism, but it was also an outrageous cautionary tale about what so-called civilized people/countries are capable of doing to other people who are fully integrated into society. Before the Holocaust, many Jews were prominent German businesspeople, educators, renowned artists/musicians/writers/scientists, community leaders, and local/national politicians, many of whom identified themselves as Germans ahead of viewing themselves as Jews. There were lots of poor, commonplace Jews, but there were also a good number who were rich and had fine homes and beautiful, treasured belongings.

The Holocaust is also unique because it was not done to cleanse society of destructive elements, but because the aim was to permanently rid society of everyone and anyone deemed inadequate by the twisted standards of Aryan superiority. Which is why it's also important to remember that there were not only six million Jews who were destroyed, but another six million people, as well: Catholics, political dissidents, Gypsies, homosexuals, the mentally challenged and physically deformed – essentially anyone considered inferior, but more significantly, considered unnecessary, worthless.

The Holocaust was the pivotal event of the 20th century and has much to teach us in the 21st.

Especially now, as America and Europe endure such socially/politically/ financially difficult times, it's important to remember what unvarnished hatred can lead to, what resentment of immigrants and minorities can lead to, what the desire to be rid of criminals and drug addicts and “social deviants” can lead to. It's so much easier to destroy rather than compromise and co-exist. It's why the present feels so dangerous and frightening.

And, if for no other reason, the Holocaust is reason enough to support Israel, which was created by and for Jews (not to mention the British...) as some insufficient compensation for the devastation of the Holocaust. I know that many people believe Barack Obama is anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian, which provides just another reason to hate/oppose him. But that's not true. PM Netanyahu is a conservative leader with conservative views about how to protect/preserve Israel. There are many, many Israelis who do not agree with his opinions and approach. And these dissenters must be heeded, because the Arab Spring is creating a larger, tighter ring of hatred around Israel than has ever existed – and as the US's key negotiator said after resigning out of frustration, Israel will not survive without local allies. How this can/will be achieved remains to be seen, but in memory of the Holocaust and as an act of important present-day diplomacy, it's an alliance that must be created.

If you wish, feel free to pass the above rant on to anyone you'd like.

Pontifically,
Jeanne

Summer Blues

2011-08-24T08:04:00.000-04:00

I’ve been neglecting ya’ll; sorry ‘bout that. I’ve been a little busy, a little unwell, writing other stuff (I don’t limit myself to political rants), and feeling very disheartened and disturbed about our social, governmental and overall future.

The debt-ceiling debacle really knocked the wind out of me, and Bachman winning the Iowa Straw Poll as well as Perry entering the presidential race finished me off. Except I reserved a little energy for knocking TV news over the head with a lead pipe. Now if I could just get my hands on a pipe…

You know, I don’t sit around here in the Tower just being grumpy because I think I’m smarter than everybody else and I have the solutions to the mega-problems (and they are problems, not “challenges”) we’re confronted with here at home and around the world. That said, there is something each day that renders me speechless because of its stupidity.

Yesterday, it was an article in the Times about new scientific research that “proves” men can truly be bisexual (it’s been assumed for some time that women can be bisexual, because our sexuality is more “fluid,” no puns intended, I’m sure). I just sat back and sighed. I had no idea there was a question about this, let alone that someone doubtless got a major grant to confirm it.

Among the stupidities that most distress me are (1) the frequent obtuseness of those who practice science and their insistence on applying a hard-wired “testing” process while ignoring all “anecdotal evidence,” by which they’re saying that human experience doesn’t “prove” anything.

And (2) the ridiculously rigid way that science – and people in general – regard human sexuality. It has been my experience and observation that all sexuality is “fluid.” Yes, we’re born with a basic sexual proclivity: essentially straight or essentially gay. But that doesn’t mean that people don’t experiment, or go through stages, or even, much to their surprise, occasionally (or once) find themselves strongly and genuinely attracted to someone outside their basic sexual comfort zone.

I don’t imagine that this latest study takes into consideration that bisexuality isn’t always a clean, even, 50/50 split – in fact it rarely is. And since they’re not considering anecdotal evidence, I assume they’re also not taking into account the influence of religion, family expectations, social disapproval, professional consequences, etc. Apparently, this study was based solely on arousal, and as men (and women, but men more so) themselves know, they can become aroused watching herrings mate if their need for sex is particularly great at that moment.

I guess the rigidity and stupidity bother me so much because they reveal such a lack of imagination and sense of wonder. It also bothers me because the same rigid scientific approach has always been taken in regard to psychic phenomenon and spooky/occult stuff in general. Scientists – whom I genuinely respect and value – are the ultimate five-senses crowd; if they can’t see, feel, hear, taste or touch it, they doubt its existence, whatever “it” is. You would think that the discovery of germs, the atom, and other micro- and nano-scopic…stuff would lead them to be open-minded about everything, but too often the reverse is true.

Another stupidity that raises my blood pressure is people who reject the reality of major climate change – manmade or otherwise. There were three significant earthquakes yesterday: in Virginia, Colorado and San Francisco, not to mention that Japan has again been hit, repeatedly, since the big one in March. In addition, a killer storm named Irene is heading our way, we’re winding down one of the hottest summers we’ve ever had nationally, and the famine that is ravaging Somalia is the worst in 60 years. How is it possible that these erratic and damaging weather and “natural” disasters are unrelated to a global population of nearly seven billion, and a totally unprecedented use of fossil fuels? How was this morphed into a Left Wing Conspiracy?

Which brings me back to politics. I’ve decided that in the best interest of my gastric health and emotional sanity, I’m not paying too much attention to the Republican race until the GOP candidate is selected at their convention next summer. I’m also not going to listen too closely to anything the President has to say, but will instead keep a close eye on what he does. Anything more will turn my summer blues into an autumnal nervous breakdown.

Clarification of 2012 Predictions

2011-08-08T08:00:00.002-04:00

The following is quite long, but except for this brief intro, I didn’t write it, I’m just the messenger:

I recognize that many people regard the 2012 phenomenon as a mountain of New Age trash and, indeed, there’s been a lot of misinterpretation and misunderstanding about this subject.

In the interest of correcting some of these erroneous ideas, I’m reprinting the following interview with Carlos Barrios, a Mayan elder, who is just as disapproving of the misinterpretations as the 2012 cynics – but for obviously different reasons, of course. This piece is making the rounds on 2012-related sites on the Web. A friend sent it to me; I found it on several sites, including The Official Web site: December 21, 2012 and Dr. Kashonia’s Blog, and now I pass it along for your edification.

You may continue to be a 2012 non-believer, but at least you’ll better understand what it is you don’t believe. The piece is long and I won’t attempt to summarize it. I’ll just make this one important point: December 21, 2012 does not mark the end of the world, but rather, is the date of a particular astronomical event (that whole planetary alignment thing). In general, 12/21/12 refers to a period of change and transformation that is already in process and will continue for several years after 2012.

****************************

Carlos Barrios, Mayan elder and Ajq’ij (is a ceremonial priest and spiritual guide) of the Eagle Clan. Carlos initiated an investigation into the different Mayan calendars circulating. Carlos along with his brother Gerardo studied with many teachers and interviewed nearly 600 traditional Mayan elders to widen their scope of knowledge.

Carlos found out quickly there were several conflicting interpretations of Mayan hieroglyphs, petroglyphs, Sacred Books of ‘Chilam Balam’ and various ancient texts.

Carlos found some strong words for those who may have contributed to the confusion:

Carlos Barrios: “Anthropologists visit the temple sites and read the inscriptions and make up stories about the Maya, but they do not read the signs correctly It’s just their imagination. Other people write about prophecy in the name of the Maya. They say that the world will end in December 2012. The Mayan elders are angry with this. The world will not end. It will be transformed.”

“We are no longer in the World of the Fourth Sun, but we are not yet in the World of the Fifth Sun. This is the time in-between, the time of transition. As we pass through transition there is a colossal, global convergence of environmental destruction, social chaos, war, and ongoing Earth Changes.”

He continues: “Humanity will continue, but in a different way. Material structures will change. From this we will have the opportunity to be more human. We are living in the most important era of the Mayan calendars and prophecies. All the prophecies of the world, all the traditions are converging now. There is no time for games. The spiritual ideal of this era is action.”

Carlos tells us: “The indigenous have the calendars and know how to accurately interpret it — not others. The Mayan Calendars comprehension of time, seasons, and cycles has proven itself to be vast and sophisticated The Maya understand 17 different calendars such as the Tzolk’in or Cholq’ij, some of them charting time accurately over a span of more than ten million years.

“All was predicted by the mathematical cycles of the Mayan calendars. — It will change –everything will change. Mayan Day-keepers view the Dec. 21, 2012 date as a rebirth, the start of the World of the Fifth Sun. It will be the start of a new era resulting from and signified by the solar meridian crossing the galactic equator and the Earth aligning itself with the center of the galaxy.”

At sunrise on December 21, 2012 for the first time in 26,000 years the Sun rises to conjunct the intersection of the Milky Way and the plane of the ecliptic. This cosmic cross is considered to be an embodiment of the Sacred Tree, The Tree of Life, a tree remembered in all the world’s spiritual traditions.

Some observers say this alignment with the heart of the galaxy in 2012 will open a channel for cosmic energy to flow through the Earth, cleansing it and all that dwells upon it, raising all to a higher level of vibration. Carlos reminds us: “This process has already begun. Change is accelerating now and it will continue to accelerate.

If the people of the Earth can get to this 2012 date in good shape without having destroyed too much of the Earth, we will rise to a new, higher level. But to get there we must transform enormously powerful forces that seek to block the way.”

The date specified in the calendar Winter Solstice in the year 2012 does not mark the end of the world. Many outside people writing about the Mayan calendar sensationalize this date, but they do not know. The ones who know are the indigenous elders who are entrusted with keeping the tradition.

Carlos tells us: “The economy now is a fiction. The first five-year stretch of transition from August 1987 to August 1992 was the beginning of the destruction of the material world. We have progressed ten years deeper into the transition phase by now, and many of the so-called sources of financial stability are in fact hollow. The banks are weak. This is a delicate moment for them. They could crash globally, if we don’t pay attention Now, people are paying attention.”

The North and South Poles are both breaking up. The level of the water in the oceans is going to rise. But at the same time land in the ocean, especially near Cuba, is also going to rise. Carlos tells a story about the most recent Mayan New Year ceremonies in Guatemala. He said that one respected Mam elder, who lives all year in a solitary mountain cave, journeyed to Chichicastenango to speak with the people at the ceremony. The elder delivered a simple, direct message. He called for human beings to come together in support of life and light.

“Right now each person and group is going his or her own way. The elder of the mountains said there is hope if the people of the light can come together and unite in some way. We live in a world of polarity — day and night, man and woman, positive and negative. Light and darkness need each other. They are a balance.”

“Just now the dark side is very strong, and very clear about what they want. They have their vision and their priorities clearly held, and also their hierarchy. They are working in many ways so that we will be unable to connect with the spiral Fifth World in 2012.”

“On the light side everyone thinks they are the most important, that their own understandings, or their group’s understandings, are the key. There’s a diversity of cultures and opinions, so there is competition, diffusion, and no single focus.”

Carlos believes the dark side works to block unity through denial and materialism. It also works to destroy those who are working with the light to get the Earth to a higher level. They like the energy of the old, declining Fourth World, the materialism. They do not want it to change. They do not want unity. They want to stay at this level, and are afraid of the next level.

The dark power of the declining Fourth World cannot be destroyed or overpowered. It’s too strong and clear for that, and that is the wrong strategy. The dark can only be transformed when confronted with simplicity and open-heartedness. This is what leads to unity, a key concept for the World of the Fifth Sun.

Carlos said the emerging era of the Fifth Sun will call attention to a much-overlooked element. Whereas the four traditional elements of Earth, Air, Fire and Water have dominated various epochs in the past, there will be a fifth element to reckon with in the time of the Fifth Sun — that element is ‘ETHER’.

The dictionary defines Ether as a “hypothetical substance supposed to occupy all space, postulated to account for the propagation of electromagnetic radiation through space.” Perhaps it could be defined as the “space between space”. I would suggest it could be manifest as the alignment of charged particles from our solar system (Sun), and our galaxy (Milky Way) surge. The Ether element represents spiritual energy.

“The element of the Fifth Sun is celestial. Within the context of Ether there can be a joining of the polarities. No more darkness or light in the people, but an uplifted unity. But right now the realm of darkness is not interested in this. They are organized to block it. They seek to unbalance the Earth and its environment so we will be unready for the alignment in 2012.”

“We need to work together for peace, and balance with the other side. We need to take care of the Earth that feeds and shelters us. We need to put our entire mind and heart into pursuing unity and unity now, to confront the other side and preserve life.”

“We are disturbed — we can’t play anymore. Our planet can be renewed or ravaged. Now is the time to awaken and take action. Everyone is needed. You are not here for no reason. Everyone who is here now has an important purpose. This is a hard but a special time. We have the opportunity for growth, but we must be ready for this moment in history.”

Carlos says: “The prophesied changes are going to happen, but our attitude and actions determine how harsh or mild they are. We need to act, to make changes, and to elect people to represent us who understand and who will take political action to respect the Earth.”

“Meditation and spiritual practice are good, but also action. It’s very important to be clear about who you are, and also about your relation to the Earth. Develop yourself according to your own tradition and the call of your heart. But remember to respect differences, and strive for unity. Eat wisely — a lot of food is corrupt in either subtle or gross ways. Pay attention to what you are taking into your body. Learn to preserve food, and to conserve energy. Learn some good breathing techniques, so you have mastery of your breath. Be clear. Follow a tradition with great roots. It is not important what tradition, your heart will tell you, but it must have great roots.”

“We live in a world of energy. An important task at this time is to learn to sense or see the energy of everyone and everything — people, plants, animals. This becomes increasingly important as we draw close to the World of the Fifth Sun, for it is associated with the element ‘ether’ — the realm where energy lives and weaves. Go to the sacred places of the Earth to pray for peace, and have respect for the Earth which gives us our food, clothing, and shelter. We need to reactivate the energy of these sacred places. That is our work.”

“One simple but effective prayer technique is to light white or baby-blue colored candles. Think of a moment in peace. Speak your intention to the flame and send the light of it on to the leaders who have the power to make war or peace.”

Carlos reminds us this is a crucially important moment for humanity and for Earth. Each person is important.

He said the elders have opened the doors so that other races can come to the Mayan world to receive the tradition. “The Maya have long appreciated and respected that there are other colors, other races, and other spiritual systems. They know that the destiny of the Mayan world is related to the destiny of the whole world.”

“The greatest wisdom is in simplicity. Love, respect, tolerance, sharing, gratitude, forgiveness. It’s not complex or elaborate. The real knowledge is free. It’s encoded in your DNA. All you need is within you. Great teachers have said that from the beginning. Find your heart, and you will find your way.”

Bad, Sad, Mad

2011-08-02T04:40:00.002-04:00

I imagine President Obama isn’t feeling too well tonight. Since I don’t think he’s delusional, he must know that the insane and protracted debacle that just accompanied the raising of the debt ceiling has ended with a really bad deal. It pleases no one and may very well kick-start an economic decline that won’t stop until we hit bottom. This man whom, I believe, genuinely wanted to help make America better – for everyone and everything – must know that he’s made a piss poor job of it, but I don’t think he fully understands how and why he and we got here. But I’ve got the audacity to think I do understand, so here goes.

Things as they are now really started with the rise of Ronald Reagan and, simultaneously, the rise of Christian fundamentalism and the assassination of John Lennon, all of which occurred in 1980. What was then called The Silent Majority was very displeased with the events of the 60s and 70s that ushered in a new era of social permissiveness. They didn’t like what they saw as the success of the civil rights, women’s rights and gay rights movements. They didn’t like uppity blacks and hippies and The Pill and the wholesale questioning of the existence of God. They didn’t like the tough economic times of the 70s, or Jimmy Carter trying to rein them in, he with his sweater in a cold White House and the 55 mph speed limit and the energy crisis and his complete inability to get a whole bunch of American hostages out of Iran.

So, in the leadership of Ronald Reagan they saw a man who had seen the error of his own youthful Democrat, union-supporting, Hollywood-decadent ways and had been born again (as it were) in the sobering waters of Republican conservatism, traditional social and religious values, and unbridled free-market capitalism. He made them feel comfortable and hopeful and much less afraid.

For their part, the Boomers – most in our 30s, a few in our 40s – were so demoralized by Lennon’s death and the end of his love-and-peace message that many of us allowed ourselves to be seduced by cocaine and unprecedented opportunities to make a lot of money, which seemed like a good idea, because it had turned out that love was not all we needed, and an ambitious younger generation (the Yuppies) were snapping at our heels like Pac Man.

Bill Clinton notwithstanding, things went on in this vein for a couple of decades, including an increasing lack of compassion for the poor, the under-employed, and the in any way vulnerable and needy on virtually everybody’s part. The Silent Majority and Boomers may have been different in many ways, but they had come to share a love of money and success and feelings of safety. They had kids and careers and comfort and they wanted to stay that way. It was during these years that glamour was prized, and people shopped ‘til they dropped for things that were to die for.

Then 9/11 happened and America suddenly realized it was vulnerable in an unsafe world that was changing once again, filled with new kinds of revolutionaries, new kinds of heathens, more people who wanted a slice of the good times pie and we didn’t feel like sharing. So we kept Bush-43 around for eight years, because he was butch and patriotic and God-fearing, and didn’t back away from a good fight or reckon with no new-fangled ideas.

Then along came Barack Hussein Obama, a clearly dangerous (liberal) black man (!) with a frightening foreign name who was young and handsome and talked real pretty about change and hope. So the Reagan Democrats and Traditional Republicans and Super-Good Christians organically joined forces and morphed into a revitalized population of über-conservatives (soon to be known as the Tea Party) and radical Christians who eschewed science, common decency and common sense, along with the poetry and parables of the Bible, and chose instead to take everything literally, from the ancient Bible to the 200-year-old Constitution, to the obvious liberal dangers of the new millennium. They did not see, and still do not see, any reason for rethinking or updating or changing anything, because if they concede to change, the terrible “other” wins.

And when Barack Obama won in 2008 – thanks largely to a whole new generation of uppity blacks and deviant young people – the now not-so-silent majority/minority made it their mission to bring him down even before he could get on his feet.

For his part, President Obama gravely underestimated the toxic level of racism that would be added to an already-vile witch’s brew of philosophical and political opposition. His chief goal – the one upon which hope and change were firmly tethered – was to make everyone in the Washington power structure play nicely together, understand and respect each other’s differing views, and from the epiphany that would result from this new rapprochement, they would work together to change America for the better.

Maybe it would have worked if Bush-43 hadn’t ratcheted up the debt and deficit, decimated government regulation and oversight of nearly everything, and put two wars on America’s American Express card. But he did. And Barack Obama inherited an indescribable mess. He kept the American (and world) economy from falling over the proverbial edge of the proverbial cliff, but he didn’t get a lot of credit for that, because to most people (like me), economics is math and math is something we don’t understand.

Then the President took the initiative in changing some things he could change on his own, but he hasn’t gotten a lot of credit for that, because modest but meaningful changes are small news and the media didn’t cover it. Lastly, the President simply would not abandon his “let’s all get along” prime directive, nor did he play hardball with the disparate members of his own party. It may also be that negotiation just isn’t his strong suit. In any case, he ended up presenting the country with really crappy versions of change initiatives we wanted, like universal health care and strong financial reform and making the rich & corporations pay up and, now, even raising the debt ceiling came with poorly thought out, never discussed, and damaging laws and protocols that may very well push us over that cliff after all.

The President turns 50 this week and I imagine that even for a president, that’s a rough milestone to reach. It was a bitch for me. But it was also the point at which I decided to stop caring about what other people thought of me and just be and accept myself as I am – and let the chips fall where they may. With any luck, Mr. Obama will have the same impulse and let us know that if we re-elect him in 2012, he’ll be the Obama we voted for last time, rather than the largely ineffectual compromiser he’s been during his first term. He’s only got one term left and he’s got nothing to lose. I hope he’ll see it that way – before the rest of us lose everything.

This is an urgent political message regarding the President's speech tonight

2011-07-25T22:22:00.002-04:00

If you have a mortgage, a loan, a credit card, investments in stock, are on Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid HOW THE GOVERNMENT RESOLVES THE DEBT CEILING CRISIS will directly affect you.

If the nation goes into default, the stock markets (here and worldwide) plunge or crash, and America loses its standing as the world's #1 leading country, THESE CONSEQUENCES will directly affect you.

Do you like the President? Do you hate him? In this instance, it doesn't matter.

The President spoke to the nation tonight and asked everyone in the country to contact their Congressional representatives and tell them what you want.

The options are simple:

(1) the bipartisan balanced approach to raising the debt ceiling, which means severe cuts (including Defense) as well as closing tax loop holes and raising taxes on the top 1% of the country who are millionaires and billionaires,
OR
(2) the Tea Party Republicans' cuts only approach, which will make devastating cuts in everything but Defense, and will unquestionably affect everybody who has a mortgage, a loan, a credit card, investments in stock, are on Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid.

As someone who is on Social Security & Medicare; who knows other people on these two programs; and who knows several people who are on Medicaid, I AM LITERALLY TERRIFIED.

If these programs are cut FOR CURRENT RECIPIENTS without compensating revenue, my friends and I may very well not get our checks in August/September and going forward; my friends and I may very well not have access to any health care.

And you, in your own circumstances, will also likely be EQUALLY SCREWED.

I BEG you to do what the President asked.

Here's a link to finding contact information for your Congressional representative:

https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml

Do what you think is the right thing. Your voice, your "vote," is desperately needed RIGHT NOW.

Thanks for reading this,
Jeanne

Anyone Who Had a Heart

2011-07-20T20:53:00.002-04:00

I’m a news junkie, but I don’t pretend to know a lot about the legalities and procedures of political process. That said, after watching the President act like a school principal trying to negotiate with rival teen gangs over the last few weeks, I am more dismayed than ever. I understand that with the Republicans having the majority in Congress, and the Tea Party’s Rasputin-like power over those Republicans, Mr. Obama has had to walk some fine lines.

But from up here in the bleachers, it’s seemed like he gave up the game before it even began. From what I’m able to understand, the budget/deficit-raising deal that’s currently on the table – and which the über-conservatives still aren’t happy with – doesn’t seem to do much about increasing revenue (still no higher taxes for the “job creators”) and seems to do a great deal of spending cutting, including the benefits that millions of older, sicker, poorer Americans depend on to survive. Yet the President seems happy, because he got the gangs to work somewhat together. It’s all about his mission to be bipartisan by any means possible – and perhaps necessary – but I’m still left dazed, confused, and feeling mightily betrayed.

Given that the President is also running for re-election in the midst of all this, it’s no surprise to me that the old Dionne Warwick hit, Anyone Who Had a Heart, has been swimming through my aching head. Lest you don’t know or remember the lyrics, here’s how it starts out:

“Anyone who ever loved could look at me
And know that I love you
Anyone who ever dreamed could look at me
and know I dream of you
Knowing I love you so

Anyone who had a heart
Would take me in his arms and love me, too
You couldn't really have a heart and hurt me,
Like you hurt me and be so untrue
What am I to do?”

Mr. Obama’s official campaign arm, Obama For America, seems to have settled on the first of what I imagine will be several campaign slogans. On the OFA homepage, a photo of a smiling, charming Obama has the tagline: Are You In? You can click the box that says Yes, I’m In! and select the ways that you can Get Involved Today! And if you Google search for OFA, you’ll see the sentence “Barack’s hair is greyer, but he’s still fighting!”

Someone on the President’s campaign team, or his post-Emanuel chief-of-staff, or Michelle, has to tell Mr. Obama in a way he can hear that we in the core base that put him into office (the aging hippies and lefties; the unprecedented number of young people and minorities) are not happy. We’ve spent three-and-a-half years waiting to see the commanding, outspoken, counter-Washington-culture Candidate Obama emerge from the non-communicative, ever-compromising, Republican- Lite President Obama, but he hasn’t come out.

I’m among the folks who will vote for Obama again, because I know the alternative will be unthinkable and I’ve had a lifetime of voting for the lesser of two evils. But the people who fell in love with him and his hope and promises of change, believed that a true progressive/liberal Democrat was going to be in Executive power for the first time in decades. These people – those who may not have voted for years or ever voted before – need an explanation from Obama before he can rely on them to traipse to the polls again.

They need to understand the reasons behind his turn of face; why he put bipartisanship ahead of accomplishment, particularly in his first two years when the Democrats held both houses of Congress; why the country ended up with such sloppy, complicated, way-in-the-distance health care reform with no public option and no significant challenge to the corrupt health insurance industry; why financial reform is virtually toothless; why women and their health and freedom were thrown under the bus; why the vast majority of the already-insufficient stimulus money wasn’t spent; why nothing special or important was done for blacks and other minorities; why he hasn’t proposed FDR-style public works programs to lower unemployment and increase the quality of the nation’s crumbling infrastructure; why he has remained closed-mouth about the union-bashing going on from coast to coast; why he couldn’t get the Democrats all reading on the same page. In essence, why did he change?!

We all know that Obama stepped into an unanticipated mine field when he took office, that Bush trashed the country like a drunk rock band in a fine hotel; that the extent of the national debt and deficit were unprecedented; that the economy was literally on the verge of collapse; that he was then confronted with a Great Recession that rivaled the Great Depression and still isn’t really over; and that he has been treated with an intensity of disrespect that no white President has ever experienced (no, not even Lincoln). It’s because we know all this that there hasn’t been angry protest, even rioting, in the streets. But he can’t just turn around now, all glib and folksy and homeboy and ask us Are you in? He’s not prepared for the answer. And we’re still waiting for answers from him.

Republicans, Reclaim Your Souls

2011-07-18T09:41:00.003-04:00

Until fairly recently, we had a vibrant two-party system in this country. Yes, Democrats and Republicans have always had significant differences in preferred practices and policies. But the Republican Party has gone from being fiscally and otherwise conservative, but still willing to compromise with Democrats to create laws and programs that serve the public and national good, to functioning as a barrier to compromise, civility and common sense.

There are currently numerous older and previous members of both houses who have been speaking publicly about the “old days,” when Republicans and Democrats socialized together and there were members from opposite sides who were nonetheless good friends. It may have been the day of smoke-filled back rooms, but it was also the day of camaraderie, decency and some shared goals.

Now, it’s a whole new ballgame. Both on and off the floor, Democrats and Republicans stay in their segregated groups. They have become more than just partisan. They are no longer two different teams playing the same game by principled rules. This is largely because the Republican Party has been kidnapped by the Tea Party, a disruptive, ill-informed, right-wing-extremist fringe group. And, it’s important to note that the Tea Party in general criticizes the Republicans for not being conservative enough.

The Tea Party has become a well-oiled political machine and a powerful lobby for a large number of assorted ordinary folks who believe in honoring the success and excess of the rich; who value religion over science; who champion free markets in all things, regardless of any negative impact on society; who prefer rogue capitalism and the profit-motive to social service and compassion; who so want to revive the past that they will not acknowledge the obvious differences and imperatives of the future; and, most of all, who think that their beliefs should be the law of the land – even if they’re contrary to the separation of church and state. Indeed, the Tea Party will not accept secular law that is in conflict with its values, even though a majority of Americans do not share those values.

As a result (as we’ve all noticed), the Republican Party is in a hyper state of Stockholm Syndrome – the dynamic that occurs when a kidnap victim is held by charismatic captors for so long that they begin to identify with their captors and defend them against the people from their “prior” lives who are trying to free them.

It is time for all Republicans – politicians and citizens alike – to stand up to the Tea Party, which is taking them down a wrong, dangerous road. Whatever their personal religious beliefs may be, Republicans must renew their faith in the wisdom of secular government as mandated by the Constitution in America – a country that abounds in differences of faith and opinion and prides itself on its diversity.

It’s also time for Republicans to rededicate themselves to governing in the public interest and respecting the office of the Presidency, even if they don’t care for the man who’s currently President. It’s time for the Republicans to stop combining the doing of their jobs with the campaigning for their jobs. It is unconscionable to state shamelessly that as a party you will not work with the President and that your primary goal is to bring him down, no matter what he offers and no matter what the consequences may be.

The Republicans have a right – indeed, a duty – to stand by their party’s core principles of belief in small government, low taxes, moderate government spending and, now, the need to address the national debt and deficit. They do not have a right to be obstructionist, petulant, rigid, indifferent to the welfare of the people, and threatening to the economic health and world standing of the country.

To the great dismay of the Left, President Obama has been more than obliging and cooperative. He, in fact, is playing loose and easy with the core values of the Democratic Party. Real Republicans should see this. It is only because the Republican Party has allowed the Tea Party to threaten its honor, its history, its common sense, and the better angels of its nature, that at this juncture they will not play a fair game.

Reclaim your souls, Republicans. If you do, you just might win the essence of what you want, as well as the 2012 campaign. (I don't want you to win, but if you don't get a grip, everyone will lose, big time.) I urge you to stop buying in to the fear and loathing and ridiculous extremism of the Tea Party. You are the party of Lincoln and Reagan. Look at what they did and ask yourself what you should be doing now.

Working Class Roots: From Hardworking Acorns, Political Trees Grow

2011-07-13T04:33:00.006-04:00

photo: me in my artsy-fartsy teens

Since I started a full-force political rant on the Fourth of July (I’m sure some of you think I’ve been ranting since starting this blog in 2007…), I’ve been thinking about my parents a lot while mulling over the subjects of class and race and politicians behaving badly. My parents were lifelong Democrats with many views definitely left of center, and without question, they played a major role in shaping my politics and values. Isn’t that what parents are supposed to do?

My father, who was black, spent his youth as an ordinary seaman and eventually a Merchant Marine who served with valor during WWII on two different oil tankers that were set on fire. After that, he was a waiter and wine steward (First Class) in the heyday of the great trans- atlantic liners: the S.S. United States, S.S. America, etc.

When, after seven years of marriage, my mother rebelled against being a seafaring widow and insisted he find work on land, my father then spent more than 25 years as a skycap for TWA. He was an unabashed working class man and an ardent union man. He made more in tips than he did in straight salary. He wouldn’t buy foreign cars and indeed made a constant conscious effort to Buy American in every way possible. He was a naturalized citizen, born and raised by “town people” (for reference, think “lace curtain Irish”) on the British West Indian island of St. Vincent. His father, who emigrated here after him, worked at the Chunky Candy factory in Brooklyn for about 30 years. Sans hardhats and beer bellies, they were regular American guys.

My mother was a typical New York Jewish girl. Both her parents came from some part of Eastern Europe that was sometimes Russian and sometimes Polish, depending on how the political winds were blowing. He was a tailor, when he wasn't skipping off to Florida to wear white suits like a dandy and bet at the dog track. She spent most of the year literally flicking chickens and doing whatever odd jobs she could get, and in summer, she cooked in one or more kitchens in the Catskills hotels.

Sometimes the family was on Relief (as Welfare was then called) and my mother’s most vivid memories of her Depression childhood was the year that Relief gave all the poor kids red blazers that marked them as Relief kids for all to see, and, the day she came home from school and found her mother sitting on the sidewalk, crying, all their furniture and worldly goods around her. They didn’t foreclose so much in the Bronx; they just evicted.

After high school, my mother worked in some large government office in New Jersey, where one of her co-workers, on learning she was Jewish, said “I never met a Jew before. Where are your horns?”

As time passed, my mother spent 14 years going to Hunter College off-and-on at night, slowly and reverently accumulating credits like Krugerands towards her BA in English Lit. By day, she worked her way up in New York’s legendary schemata trade – or, more accurately, worked her way back, back in the back offices, from bookkeeper to office manager to comptroller. They were nasty, seedy little offices with roaches and no windows; the pretty stores were up front. She ended her working life with 17 years as the manager of the subscription department of a hoity-toity Wall Street newspaper (not the Journal) for which moguls paid hundreds of dollars for a year’s supply of weekly editions. In all those years, she never bought a piece of stock, because the market made her and my father nervous.

This was my family; these are my roots. Because I was an only child, as well as an only grandchild and niece, I was as spoiled as a kid could be and since my mother was in the rag trade, I was always dressed to beat the band. My mother took me to concerts and museums; I went to the movies with my parents. My father never let us put milk or juice cartons or salad dressing bottles on the dining table, because that was crude. He would set the table the way he used to set them on the big ships. And he made classy cocktails: Manhattans and Brandy Alexanders and Whiskey Sours and Sidecars. I was only in my teens when I graduated from Shirley Temples. My father believed that if he taught me how to drink properly, I wouldn’t be a drunk. He was right. Booze is one of the few vices I’ve never had a problem with. Knowledge is power.

My father’s leisure time was spent largely in bed, reading newspapers or magazines or books on geography, history or religion; that was his hobby. My mother was an avid reader, a very occasional writer, a talented amateur painter, and a lover of opera, dance and theater. She attended as many such performances as she could, often with me. And because my father worked for an airline, they could fly for free so long as they went off-season and stand-by, so they did, they traveled to many places ‘round the country and ‘round the world. In these ways, they were somewhat different than other working class folks. But all the years my mother spent struggling to come up with new things to do with chopped meat and chicken helped keep everyone’s feet on the ground.

I was always a little racially confused and I certainly wasn’t religiously rooted in anything (culturally, yes, but not in matters of faith). My father was Episcopalian, but he didn’t make a big deal about it and my mother was a classic intellectual Jewish agnostic.

My childhood wasn’t some urban, ethnic, Leave It To Beaver, but if I wasn’t a happy kid, it was largely because I was lonely and already affected by depression, although we didn’t know that for a long time. Still, people loved me and took care of me; I ate a lot of wonderful food; I was showered and surrounded by books and music. I went to good public schools, where, according to virtually every teacher I had, I wasn’t working up to my potential. But I sang (I had a very beautiful voice when I was young) and took piano lessons and wrote poetry and songs and watched a lot of TV.

I also did household chores (no pay, just family obligation) and was a babysitter (to learn the value of work and money). We talked politics at the dinner table and I learned what mattered. (But I didn’t know, for example, that there was a social stigma about working for tips; it never occurred to me). When I got older, they let my friends and me make posters for anti-war demonstrations in the living- and dining-rooms. And for several years, I was the beloved “kitchen lady” at Pacifica Radio WBAI during fund raising drives. I also went to a nice Lefty summer camp for teens run by the YM & YWHA. In the main, it was all good.

So lately, as I watch my country go nuts, I find myself reflecting with frequency on my past and digging ever deeper to get a firm hold on what grounds me, even when I’m not thinking about it consciously. Gather yee flowers – and yee strength – where yee may.

This Is Class Warfare

2011-07-11T22:55:00.002-04:00

Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime. Teach a man to create an artificial shortage of fish and he will eat steak. – Jay Leno

My fellow Americans…please look closely. We are in the midst of genuine Class Warfare, and the rich are winning – not because they’re more powerful (per se), but because they are fully engaged in this fight in order to protect their best interests. The middle class, working class, and poor are losing – because we are not fully engaged, we are not united, and we’re very confused about what our best interests are and who in politics (greatly imperfect though they may be) are motivated to serve those interests.

Take note. The Republicans are not your friends – nor are they your chief enemy. The primary enemy in America today is the Tea Party. They can no longer be dismissed as a wacko fringe group. No matter how ridiculous you think they are, they are also well organized, growing in numbers, passionate about their beliefs, and willing to engage in a battle to make their opinions the laws of the land at the federal, state and local levels. With every passing day, the Tea Party is developing into a major third party in this country. We ignore them at our peril.

Republicans used to be fiscal conservatives. They were ideologically conservative, too, as demonstrated by their behavior/attitudes toward the civil rights and women’s movements (particularly their historical opposition to integration and legal abortion), and they have never been supporters of gay rights, either. But it’s only since George H.W. Bush (with a quick, fairly ineffectual intermission with Bill Clinton) that Republicans have become radical conservatives, initially because of the increasing influence of Evangelical Christian political activists.

However, it is only since the election of Barack Obama – too black and too liberal (in their view) to tolerate – that all components of the Right have become mega-radicalized and have joined forces to repeal the progressive strides of the mid-20^th century and ensure that Obama doesn’t succeed in further progressive efforts. The sad irony is, they have only prevented Obama from succeeding in moderate, deeply compromised efforts. As a result, we’re in trouble.

Our main problem isn’t the economy or unemployment or the erosion of longstanding civil rights, and it isn’t the debt, the deficit, bad health care, poor education, or decreasing environmental protection. Our main problem is that we do not know who and what we are, we are not united, and many of us are too busy, disillusioned, or just plain unmotivated to be politically active in any way.

Let’s start with who and what we are. For quite a few decades now, the middle class – sometimes called the lower middle class – has been unwilling to see itself as working class. If we wear ties (men) and business suits (men and women) to work and live in at least a half-way decent home, we consider ourselves middle class. We look down on the poor as much as the upper middle class and rich do, even if we’re currently unemployed and can’t find work, or our homes are either under water or in foreclosure. We take pride in this middle class label, ignoring the fact that conservative power and an economy skewed to the rich have rendered this label meaningless.

It isn’t just laborers or factory workers or miners or migrants or servants who are working class. Those who think themselves middle class are working class, too. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that if you depend on a company for a paycheck, even a substantial paycheck, you are working class. Even if you are an entrepreneur, individual contractor or freelancer, whether you’re doing well or just managing by a very thin margin, you are working class. If you are out and out poor, perhaps on public assistance, perhaps on Social Security retirement or disability, you are working class. Put more simply: if you can’t afford to light your cigars with $100 bills, you’re working class.

My advice to you is wake up and smell the sweat – and the danger. There are many politicians and others at the top of the food chain who do not care about you. Even if you’ve worked hard all your life, even if you became a Reagan Democrat 30 years ago or, for some inexplicable reason, identify with the Republican or Tea Parties now, the upper crust does not care about you. They have no sympathy for your unemployment, or mortgage problems, or inability to send your kids to college, or the fact that whatever money you accumulated in 401ks or IRAs or T-bills or stock investments were wiped out in the economic collapse of 2008.

Nobody with serious money cares about the working class. Those with serious money and the rich – the distinction being, rich is something you can blow in a New York minute; wealth is something that doesn’t weaken, that flows from generation to generation, no matter what. The rich may once have been working class; the wealthy, never. Either way, they don’t care about you.

That’s why it’s essential that we, all of us, the larger, combined Working Class, pay attention to what’s happening in Washington DC and state houses across the land. Look at what’s happening to unions. Look at what’s happening to wages (stagnant for years), look at what’s happening to prices of everything (increasing daily), look at your overall circumstances (somewhere between shaky and dire?), look at your children’s future (dicey?), look ahead to your old age (scary?). If the machinations of politicians are worrying you, if it pisses you off to hear the rich described as “job creators” when all they do is sit on their money or outsource employment opportunities to countries with cheaper labor, if you’re angry or frightened or outraged, think about who and what you are.

Then, acknowledge to yourself that, like it or not, you’re in the midst of class warfare, and not doing your bit for the war effort – whether on the frontlines or the home front – just isn’t cricket. And, is certainly not in your best interest.

Singin’ the Independence Day Blues

2011-07-04T19:29:00.001-04:00

George Carlin used to say that he never understood the concept of national or ethnic pride, because pride is what you should feel about something you’ve accomplished, not something you had nothing to do with. “I’m not proud to be Irish,” he’d say by way of example. “That was just an accident of birth; both of my parents and their parents were born in Ireland, so I’m Irish.” He would often add – while voicing his disapproval of “hyphenated Americans” – that he was born here, which made him an American. I’m with George. So, I’m not proud to be an American – but I have always been pleased and grateful to be an American, and in many ways I still am.

But this year, I must add that I am ashamed of what America is becoming – ashamed and alarmed, because of our dysfunctional, partisan, corrupt politics; the devastation of our economy; the zeal of Republicans/Conservatives; the ennui of Liberals/Progressives; and the dithering, dangerous ineffectiveness of Democrats. Years ago, one of my mother’s friends often said, “We are living in perilous times.” What must he be saying now? What can any thinking, concerned, Leftist-in-some-kind-of-way person say now? How about saying this: “Yes, I’m discouraged, disgusted, busy and exhausted – but I’m willing to do something, because something must be done!”?

I had a rather startling epiphany the other night. I watched – with a combination of horror and awe – two fascinating programs on C-SPAN. They featured speeches from two annual political conventions that were held in Minneapolis last month. The first was that of Netroots Nation, which says on its Web site that it “…Amplifies progressive voices by providing an online and in-person campus for exchanging ideas and learning how to be more effective in using technology to influence the public debate.”

The other was that of RightOnline, described on its Web site as “…A project of [the] Americans for Prosperity Foundation dedicated to advancing liberty and prosperity for all Americans through greater citizen participation online.

Both organizations conducted Blog Conferences during their events. RightOnline also held a workshop called “Facebook 101.” One of the speakers told a heartwarming story about an 82-year-old woman who spoke with him briefly before the workshop, then contacted him on Facebook a few weeks later asking to “friend” him and vice versa, and she had already acquired 500 new “friends.”

Obviously, Republicans and Conservatives who were outpaced by miles by the new media infrastructure of Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign were determined not to be caught with their hard drives down this time around. What they’ve learned and how they’ve learned to use it is nothing less than impressive (and, therefore, downright terrifying).

Equally frightening was an address to the large RightOnline assembly by Conservative blogger/professional journalist Andrew Breitbart, whose Web site is very large, very impressive, and looks/reads like a full news network site. He was introduced by someone who predicted that “he’ll be to online media what Rush Limbaugh is to radio.” This former liberal is indeed smart, charming, funny and undeniably compelling. He said his personal goal is to “take down the institutional Left,” and he also observed – with considerable accuracy, it pains me to say – “Liberals believe that they don’t have to lift a finger, all they have to do is say ‘I’m a Liberal’ [and their work is done].”

There were, of course, other speakers at RightOnline, and you can check out my link to their site for specifics – but I want to summarize by telling you the three ideas, oft repeated, that I found most interesting. First, the well-organized Right genuinely believes that President Obama campaigned as a Moderate but has governed as a Liberal. The fact that Liberals believe Obama campaigned as a Progressive but has governed as a Right-Compromising-Moderate says something very important about the two opposing views, which is that each has a very different view of reality.

Their second belief is that they are, as Breitbart put it, “in a monumental revolution to bring America back to being a Right-Center nation.” This is important, because so many people on the Left are merely obsessed with the notion that the Right is looney-tunes – which I agree with, but our opinions are no practical match for people who believe they are in the midst of a genuine American Revolution, and as you may have noticed, they are unified in this belief and acting on it, both at grassroots and in the halls of political action.

Third, the president of the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, noted that “it’s hard to be a Liberal in America today” because the Right has indeed become so well organized and united in their goals. He also cited Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama as having “ruined America” with “radically Left-Wing policies” and it is from these that the Right is determined to “take the nation back.”

For the past several years, every time I saw a sign or heard a person say “we want our country back,” I assumed they meant they wanted to take America out of Barack Obama’s black/Muslim/born-in-Kenya hands. And while I still believe there are elements of racism (not to mention idiocy) in their opinions, their actual concern, their true belief, is that America has been co-opted and destroyed by Left Wing actions for decades.

As for Netroots Nation, sadly I must report that they came off as lame in comparison – not in their ideas, but in the size of their live audience and the specificity of their calls to action. Cenk Uygur, a Turkish-American Liberal standard bearer whom I have never heard of – which may say more about my ignorance than his status – was their guest speaker. He’s a regular MSNBC host, as well as the creator/host of a syndicated Liberal radio talk-show, The Young Turks, and a frequent contributor to The Huffington Post.

Uygur spoke eloquently and at length, saying that “this is a Class Warfare.” Regrettably, most Liberals and the country’s working and middle classes don’t know it, which in itself is a huge problem. Uygur noted that America’s Founding Fathers were indeed Liberals, because of their belief in government’s protection of the rights and welfare of the People, and the separation of Church and State, regardless of each man’s personal religious beliefs.

Most important, Uygur stressed that campaign finance reform is urgent and essential because “Corporate America owns the American political system.” He pointed out that while the Right adamantly opposes higher income and corporate taxes, the old Leona Helmsley maxim that “only the little people pay taxes” has become increasingly true because of ever-increasing payroll taxes. Another blow to the little people will come from the Right’s desire to raise the retirement age from 65/66 to 70. And of course, mention was made of the dangers and hardships caused by union busting. Uygur, and others, said all the correct things – except what can and should be done about them.

I’ll begin to close with a rough summary of these ideas about those of us on the Left: (1) we cannot abandon Barack Obama no matter how pissed off or disappointed we may be, because the alternatives are unthinkable; (2) we have a moral obligation to find some bit of time in our busy lives to engage in some form of political activism, because not doing so is irresponsible, given the arduous efforts by the Right; and (3) we can’t afford to be glib or indifferent or wrapped up in our own little worlds as to believe that all that’s happening is political-bullshit-as-usual and there’s nothing so special about politics and elections this time around. It’s not so, and I BEG ALL OF US not to be blind to the cautionary lessons of history.

Adolf Schicklgruber was viewed as a joke when he tried to become a fine-art painter in early-1920s Vienna. Even later when, as Adolf Hitler, he became chancellor of Germany in 1933 and turned the Weimar Republic into a totalitarian, autocratic dictatorship he named the Third Reich, this seemingly-silly little man was an object of scorn and dismissed as unimportant, both by many at home and at high levels of the international political community. They thought him ridiculous and essentially harmless, never imagining he would become the vituperous agent of Nazi barbarism. But Germany’s grim economy, high unemployment, unprecedented levels of hunger and homelessness, not to mention the international disrespect heaped on this once-proud nation, began to make the ridiculous seem like salvation.

I don’t believe the American Right Wing is comprised of hateful, murdering Nazis. But I do believe their ire is dangerous, their beliefs are demented, and their capacity to gain power and reinvent America in their own anti-government, anti-labor, anti-social-safety-net and pro-profit-making-everything is very real.

On this Independence Day, let us think of what America was and can be if guided by compassionate, educated (science based), secular, progressive leadership – and what it could become if we sit back and do nothing, allowing the Right Wing zealots to take power in all quarters.

What’s in a Word?

2011-06-30T06:50:00.007-04:00

Since the passage of gay marriage in New York State last week, I’ve been talking to friends about their reactions. Gay and straight, some people are delighted, others seem disinterested, particularly straight people who think it’s fine but it really doesn’t have anything to do with them (and are therefore not thinking of the rights issues and political implications of the matter that affect us all).

One straight woman said she’s very happy and proud of New York and cited, along with the fairness of the law, the many ways that the state/cities can benefit financially. I agree. This will be a boon to wedding-related retail goods, services and tourism (honey-moons!), which is a great side benefit of something that needed to happen for completely other reasons.

Another friend said the greatest importance is that gay couples will now have all the legal rights and privileges (and shared problems) that married straight couples have, from health care coverage, to hospital visiting and living will decisions to greater child adoption and custody rights, etc., et al. These and other practical key issues will continue to be highlighted as the fight for marriage equality continues.

The two responses that interested me the most – and which have been a large part of the marriage equality debate since it began – were the liberal woman and conservative man who both said they were fine with gay couples having the rights of marriage, but they don’t like that it is called marriage. They feel “the union of a man and a woman is the definition of marriage” argument is inviolable, he on religious grounds, she on the grounds of tradition and proper English usage. And apparently the state of Rhode Island agrees, because yesterday it legalized “civil unions” for “same-sex couples,” not gay marriage.

Although I’m an Interfaith minister, I have no religious issue with the use of the word marriage, and as a prescriptive language maven (which I wrote about extensively a few posts back), it doesn’t bother me either; published definitions of marriage of course describe it as a union between a man and a woman, because until very recently (and hardly entirely even now), gay people were not considered normal, healthy, equal persons and their relationships were not considered legal, even valid, in most places.

Using the word marriage – and the word gay – is vitally important. From a civil/human rights standpoint, as well as a legal definition, the word marriage is what makes the committed relationships of gay people equally legitimate as the committed relationships of straight people. It sends important messages: love is love, commitment is commitment, and families take many forms, no matter what combination of two persons the marriage is comprised of.

Emotionally, being two wives or two husbands is very different from referring to each other as “spouse” or “[life]-partner.” Those words have none of the romance of husband, wife (or marriage), and they fail to convey genuine intimacy and betrothed alliance between two people. Not using the word marriage makes the relationship seem lesser-than [straight marriages]. If you’re a straight, married (or even divorced) person, think about how it first felt to call someone husband or wife, to describe yourself as married. Wasn’t there a special sense of warmth, connection, and status, that came with that? Isn’t there still at least a semblance of that, even if you’ve been married for a long time?

I believe the root of the objection to the word “marriage” for gay couples is largely religious, rather than linguistic. While I believe in the importance of the stability and consistency of language in the main, I also appreciate that great social change, such as civil rights and feminism, have brought new words into the lexicon and altered others, and when that happens for such major reasons, I think language is improved, rather than degraded.

But more than religion or language, I think the idea of “gay marriage” is very new, very uncomfortable, very alien to lots of straight people – who have never met a gay person (to their knowledge). Many of them equate gay with the most outlandish participants they see in gay pride parades. Some still don’t believe people are born gay; and they certainly don’t believe that gay relationships are equal to straight ones. To them, gay marriage is an oxymoron and a cheapening of their “real” marriages. I know my two friends who dislike the use of the word marriage don’t fall into this category of less sophisticated people, but I think many do, only it’s become politically incorrect to express such ideas (which is why political correctness is such a pain in the ass and should be the antithesis of progressive thought – but that’s another post…).

The continuing fight for gay marriage is essential. But so is giving all Americans a chance to knowingly interact with gay people so they can see that gays are not freaks to be scorned or feared. And the only way that’s going to happen is if more and more people come out of the closet – to family, friends, people on the job, folks in church, the other guys on the bowling team, the other gals in the quilting and book clubs – just plain everybody everywhere. And invite these straight people to your gay weddings. Every little bit helps.

Why Gay Marriage Matters

2011-06-15T05:34:00.003-04:00

June is Gay Pride Month and on Sunday, June 26^th, the annual Gay Pride Parade will wend its way down Fifth Avenue to Christopher Street in the Village. For many young and middle-aged gays and lesbians, this is a familiar rite of Spring; they know gay people haven’t yet achieved full human and civil rights, but in their experience, gays have visibility and a considerable measure of legitimacy.

Anyone 60 or older can remember when being gay was a dirty, dangerous secret; when being exposed as gay could destroy your career or separate you from your family forever; when gay people were called the “twilight people,” because they only came out at night, seeking connection in Mafia-run bars or sordid gathering spots, such as “The Trucks” in NYC’s not-yet-trendy meat packing district, or the secluded “Rambles” in Central Park.

As I write this, my head swimming with many youthful memories ranging from the sad to the bittersweet to the exuberant, the New York State Senate is one mature vote away from legalizing gay marriage – or, as it’s becoming known, “same-sex” marriage, because there are still a lot of people who can’t croak out the word gay. Call it what they will, it is vitally important, because it will bring gay and lesbian “twilight people” a giant step closer to living in the full light of day.

PBS is broadcasting at least two wonderful gay documentaries this month (in place of some of the old war horses we’ve been watching for more than 30 years): American Experience: Stonewall Uprising and Out in America, both of which do an excellent and artful job of summarizing the misery of gay life before the gay rights movement came of age and rage on June 27, 1969, and what has happened since.

In brief: prior to that early summer night, the vast majority of gays and lesbians lived lonely, desperate lives in which lying and hiding were the norm. Homosexuality was illegal and the American Psychiatric Association defined it as a mental illness (a form of psychosis). Gay bars were routinely raided and patrons arrested and often brutalized by law enforcement.

Often, families would have their [teen/adult] gay children confined in mental institutions, where they were generally subjected to aversion/shock therapy and even lobotomies. Military purges of gay service people were common and usually ended in dishonorable discharge. It was assumed that homosexuality was a depraved lifestyle choice and it was the Dark Ages for millions of men and women in 20^th century America (before that and elsewhere, it was even worse.)

Gay people were deprived not only of their human rights but also of their right to be human: to have a positive sense of self, to love and be loved, to have family and community and the protection of law, to live in the full light of day. And if, despite these impediments, gays and lesbians were able to form committed, lasting relationships, they were denied the opportunity to announce, celebrate and affirm their love in the time-honored covenant of marriage. The gay rights movement has come a very long way. It still has a way to go – but in New York State, right now, there is the very real possibility of legal gay marriage. Halleluiah!

As we know all too well, there are those who oppose gay marriage. They say it’s a “threat” to the American family. They say it’s an abomination before God. They say that marriage is sacred – and that it is only meant for a union between a man and a woman. If pressed, many of these same people will tell you that homosexuality is at best a sin, and at worst a depraved… lifestyle choice. They don’t believe people are born gay – and even if they are, gay marriage is a bad thing, especially for children, who might, as a result, get the idea that being gay is okay. (Note to kids: being gay is okay.)

To those people who are guided by conservative, religious values, homosexuality will never be regarded as healthy and normal, and gay marriage will always be unacceptable. However, since this is still (ostensibly) a secular country, individual religious views need not be considered. All that the law has to recognize is that gay people can be respectable, responsible, law-abiding citizens, and their committed relationships are as legitimate as straight relationships.

This has been amply demonstrated throughout the land. Indeed, gay marriage reinforces the institution of family; gays and lesbians have a special appreciation for marriage and family precisely because it has been denied them so long. Given the 50% divorce rate among straight couples, gay marriage could emerge as a significant stabilizing social influence. (Wouldn’t that be a kick…?)

So, here’s to a Happy Gay Pride Day, one and all, an occasion which will be made all the more joyous if the New York State Senate does the right thing and makes gay marriage legal now. It’s time.

Weiner Weary

2011-06-08T21:20:00.006-04:00

The smart, delightful Maureen Dowd wrote an interesting column about the fallen-from-grace Rep. Anthony Weiner today, “Your Tweetin’ Heart,” in the New York Times. She’s clearly put out with and put off by the cyber-licentious Congressman, and I’m not saying I plan to start a fan club for him, but (as Dowd points out about many contemporary women), I really can’t get worked up about this.

Whatever Weiner or any man does sexually (or pseudo-sexually) is his own business and that of his partner, if he has one. A man’s sex life should not be an issue in regard to his role, and performance, as a political leader. Of course, many folks claim to be upset because he lied – to the press and public – and Americans like to pretend they’re all incensed about lying, as if they never do it themselves. Yes, of course he was stupid to lie, but that’s what people do, especially public people, particularly when it’s about (gasp! horror!) S-E-X!!!

To me, the issue isn’t what Weiner did sexually, or even that he lied about it. To me, the issues (there are two of them) are that this country is immature and Puritan when it comes to sex, and (we claim) that public behavior – especially if it’s political – can’t be separated from private behavior. I disagree.

There have been sexual/political scandals since the beginning of political time; people are titillated by what their public figures do in the bedroom (or the back of a car, or a bathroom, or in the netherworld of something called cyberspace). I’m probably in the minority in not caring in the least. I also don’t judge the “health” or “goodness” (or lack of it) about what people do sexually.

My attitude is: whatever two (or more) adults do that is consensual, non-violent, and does not deliberately spread disease, is their business. If they want to slather each other in peanut butter and swing from a chandelier, who cares? It’s time that we as a nation grew up about sex, rediscovered the notion of privacy, and protested loud and clear when the media and other politicians try to bring down a politician because of his sexual behavior. It’s bullshit.

One can be a “kinky” liberal or conservative or some political stance in between or otherwise. That doesn’t mean you can’t be politically rational or serious or genuinely effective. If we (as a nation) are going to condemn every political man – or woman (God forbid!) – for what they do sexually, we’re going to end up with (a) nobody, (b) a handful of happily monogamous people or (c) a bunch of celibate wackos who worry me more than the ones who dress up like Little Bo Peep.

The other thing I want to say here is that I think women who have a man in their lives – husband, boyfriend, whatever – shouldn’t get so uptight if he’s into porn or sexting or even cyber-sexing. It’s time we accepted that men apparently have different sexual needs and drives than we do (this distinction is, of course, a generalization and surely there are exceptions to any rule).

Men – or so male comedians keep telling us – need a greater variety, creativity and frequency of sexual outlet than do women. I would not be happy about my man (if I had one) gallivanting in the real world outside of our relationship; I’d feel betrayed and, quite honestly, threatened. But, if it made him feel better to watch porn or sext to a stripper or whatever make-believe crap gets him off, so what? It leaves me time to watch movies he doesn’t like, read a book or take a nap.

I think America needs to take a nap, then wake up and say: “We’ve got serious stuff to deal with. Enough about Weiner’s wiener and let’s get down to business!”

Another Week in Wonderland

2011-06-04T19:05:00.006-04:00

What is one to make of the fact that Marshall Matt Dillon (James Arness) and Dr. Death (Jack Kevorkian) died in the same week? Probably nothing – except to note that both old heroes and more contemporary ones are leaving us in droves. That’s because so many of them are old. I don’t get too distressed when noting the deaths of very old people; what else can they do (they can’t live forever, no matter who or how rich they are)? But symbolically, it was sad to see that two men – one who portrayed a heroic character, another who was an heroic character – died in a week when we could have used a few heroes.

For example, I’d like to think that Marshall Dillon would have run the likes of Sarah Palin out of town, had she and her Magical Twistery Tour bus arrived in Dodge, because he didn’t cotton to con men, even if they were pretty women. This post represents the last time I will mention Sarah Palin, because that dingbat shouldn’t be getting any attention except to point out her unceasing stupidity.

To wit, here’s what she said when she visited Ellis Island: "The immigrants of the past, they had to literally and figuratively stand in line and follow rules to become U.S. citizens. I’d like to see that continue. And unfortunately, the DREAM Act kind of usurps that – the system that is a legal system to make sure that immigrants who want to be here legally, working hard, producing and supplying revenue and resources for their families, that they’re able to do that right and legally. Unfortunately, the DREAM Act doesn’t accomplish that."

I’ll ignore both her deplorable speech and the fact that immigrants didn’t stand on line “figuratively,” and just point out that the DREAM Act only applies to persons who were brought to this country when they were young children. Their parents came here illegally and, since they were kids, they had no choice but to come along for the ride. So, our problem with illegal immigrants has nothing to do with them.

Here’s what Palin said about Paul Revere when she was in Boston: "He who warned, uh, the ... the British that they weren’t gonna be taking away our arms, uh, by ringing those bells and, um, by making sure that as he’s riding his horse through town to send those warning shots and bells that, uh, we were gonna be secure and we were gonna be free…and we were gonna be armed." I’ll just let that speak for itself.

In general, I have no interest in the Republican fracas to find a candidate, because I don’t really care who they select. I won’t be voting for him or her, and I refuse to pay attention to this frigging campaign until after the Conventions, when there’s something tangible to pay attention to. And in any case, I’m reserving my concern for what Obama will say to win again (and he plans to have $1 billion to say it with) and what he will do after he wins again.

I find it amusing (because if I don’t laugh, I’ll cry) that Republicans and Conservatives [still] talk about Obama as if he were The Great Socialist Hope that one might concede he seemed to be when he was running for President the last time, since he almost immediately made a mad dash for Center Court (as it were) and has been doing an unsettling version of Republican Lite from Day One. The fact that he’s not right-wing enough for the right-wingers doesn’t mean anything; if Barry Goldwater were alive today, he wouldn’t be right-wing enough for the right-wingers. That’s how far right the right-wingers have flown.

I also no longer have any interest in (or much compassion for) politicians who let their dicks take the lead, thereby rendering them useless for viable public service. Way back then, John Edwards was the only Democratic contender who was seriously talking about poverty and its dangerous leading role in everything from bad education to inadequate health care to poor economic growth on several levels. Now he can’t say…well, “dick” about anything.

Similarly, Rep. Anthony Weiner’s “that depends on what the definition of is is” response to the appearance of supposedly-him-but-he’s-not-sure pictures of him in his undies on Twitter (who knew you could upload photos on Twitter; I thought it was just for 140-character statements). We needed his balls in Congress, not his dick. What is it with these guys and their juvenile obsession with their wee-wees? We are such a sexually immature, Puritan country, it turns me red with embarrassment and white with fear of what will become of us.

So, I spent the week trying not to think about current events: not think about another banker who tried to play footsie with a hotel maid who didn’t want to play; not think about the e-coli outbreak in Germany that is demonizing vegetables, once again; not think about the Republicans playing “symbolic” footsie with the debt ceiling because they’re clueless about how the economy they created actually works; and not thinking about Syria or Yemen or Libya, because I just don’t have the strength (I wish they’d all just self-destruct).

Instead, I’ve been thinking about food prices, because I went shopping and every week it’s a greater shock than the week before, and I’ve been thinking about the chicken curry I’m going to make tonight, and the jicama (which I haven’t had in years) that I’ll be putting in my salad, and what kind of bread and muffins I want to bake, because I do bake, since it’s cheaper and I try to keep it cheerful.

I’ll let you know next week if anything more substantive comes to mind.

English On the Rocks

2011-06-03T00:10:00.013-04:00

As a writer, a reader, and a person living in a supposedly civilized society, I despair about the future of English, because it’s being misused, abused, belittled and just generally trashed at every turn.

I was saying to a friend just the other day: there are two kinds of language mavens – the prescriptive and the descriptive. The descriptive school says language is a living thing and it changes with the times and we shouldn’t get hung up on grammar and spelling and usage, because all that can and should be flexible. The prescriptive school says language has been honed and perfected over time and it’s important to speak and write properly, because that creates the opportunity for maximum communication, as well as an expression of the beauty of language.

As a prescriptive maven, I also feel strongly about the role of good language in thought. If your understanding and usage of language is poor, it follows that the quality of your thinking will be poor: simplistic, incorrect, limited. Clear thought, original thought, rests in good language.

I’m concerned about English, because that is the only language I know, and it is (still, so far) the international language of diplomacy and trade. (French used to have that position, but it lost it. See what happens when you don’t take care of your language?) I’m not proud of only knowing one language; I should know more, at least Spanish, since it’s becoming our nation’s second language. I don’t have a problem with that, but I do think all of us should be bi-lingual, because that will foster greater understanding among us. But for the moment, my subject is English.

First I want to address usage, because the meaning of words is becoming twisted. The Times’ language guy was recently complaining about figuratively, and the fact that people are using it to mean literally and actually, which is the exact opposite of what it means. If we don’t share agreement about what words mean, then we can easily misunderstand each other – even before we get around to disagreeing with each other based on common understanding.

Some of my other pet peeves: irregardless, a word that doesn’t exist, but is often used to mean regardless. Simplistic in place of simple. Simple means easy or straightforward or unfettered. Simplistic means stupid, or more precisely, to speak or think of complex things in an inappropriately simple manner. Decadent used as a synonym for luxurious. One could make a working class argument that luxury is decadent, but that still doesn’t give the words the same meaning. Decadent is, more accurately, a side-effect of too much luxury; it means jaded, even depraved, but certainly wallowing in the worst kind of sophistication – another word that’s rarely used to mean what it means (jaded not glamorous).

Infamous [when] used to mean famous, perhaps really very famous, but that’s not what it means. Bad people, bad things that become famous are infamous. Adolf Hitler is infamous. Adolph Green is famous (or at least he used to be…). I once heard someone call someone else superfluous, but she didn’t mean that the person was unnecessary, she meant to say that the person was super! That’s a problem.

The fact that many people today can’t distinguish among there, their and they’re drives me nuts, along with your and you’re, to and too, weather and whether, its and it’s, fewer and less than, as well as more than and over. And don’t forget about using like when you mean as. If you don’t know the difference, look it up; I don’t have the space to go into it here. Because (and, by the way, it is not incorrect to begin a sentence with because, it’s incorrect to begin a paragraph with because) I want to address other pet peeves.

The first is using nouns as verbs, which has appalled me ever since things started impacting other things. I wince when I hear that people are scrapbooking or journaling. Now they’re blogging, tweeting, texting and friending. I’m vomiting. A noun is a person, place or thing. A verb is an action. In essence, what I’m saying addresses one of our core social problems: confusing being with doing. Think about this one, it’s important.

Then there’s the frequency with which people add mis to the beginning of words and ize to the end of words that formerly had neither. I can’t explain why it’s okay to formalize but it isn’t okay to incentivize, and indeed, Strunk & White did not approve of formalize. In any case, English is inconsistent. A foreign-born person once asked me why Kansas and Arkansas are pronounced in their different ways instead of alike. Who knows? All I know is, one can misspeak, misunderstand and misinform, but one cannot misdescribe, which is what Paul Ryan accused Barack Obama of doing in regard to his kill-Medicare budget.

Last but not least – and this is perhaps the most egregious – is the offshoot of English created by…texting. If U thnk its k 2 reduce language to charmless abbreviations, you’re wrong. It’s a bastardization (I’m not sure if that’s a word…) of the language that is creeping (running, actually) into other forms of written communication, and it’s ugly and ignorant and decidedly ill-advised.

Yesterday, I wrote about our being overly concerned with unimportant things, because we can’t cope with the big issues of our time. Perhaps my fixation with proper English is one of those unimportant things. But it isn’t to me. I’m a writer and it bothers me that nobody seems to care about good writing, good use of language, anymore. I think it says bad things about where we are and where we’re going. Take it as you please.

The Problem With Life in the 21st Century

2011-06-02T00:24:00.001-04:00

In a nutshell, the problem with life in the 21^st Century is that many people aren’t living in it, we’re living in a vacuum or denial, but we’re not here in the now. Others are totally living in the now – but with no sense of history, even of the recent past. The combination of folks who can’t cope with the present and those who won’t cope with the past doesn’t bode well for the future – politically, economically, socially, personally, collectively – pick whatever context you like; we’re screwed.

Let’s start with politics. The Republicans and Conservatives are among those living in denial; they will not recognize that the present is not the past and that the future is in peril. Accordingly, they’re pursuing their old-school agenda of no taxes, slash spending, protect the rich and fuck the poor. They’ve allowed themselves to be completely co-opted by the right-wing-extremist fringe of their party, thereby aligning themselves with ignorance, hate, rejection of science and common sense, and engaging in more than a little misogyny, racism, homophobia and xenophobia, none of which have a place in the present or the future. They’re behaving as if we’re still living in the “greed is good” 1980s, and that they can continue the Reagan schema as if nothing’s changed. This is not smart. It’s stupid and dangerous and, ironically, the attitudes that will rob them of the things they hold most dear (power and money) much sooner than later.

For their part, the Democrats are hardly living, barely breathing. They won’t behave like Democrats in the traditional, progressive sense of the word, because they’re riddled with fear, confusion and self-service. The Republicans are dangerous, but they’re united in the crap they believe in. The Democrats don’t seem to believe in anything, except telling the American People that our best days are still ahead of us – which is patently false. The 20^th Century was the American Century. What the 21^st Century will be is still to be determined. But nobody – including the Democrats – is willing to recognize that we as a nation need a whole new perspective because our demographics, economy, environment, available resources, and the global power structure, have changed. This is not smart. It reveals an extraordinary lack of imagination, vision and flexibility, which will endanger us all, much sooner than later.

Politics aside, our society – and that of the other developed nations – has allowed technology to replace humanity in too many quarters – including jobs; remember when, in the 60s, workers feared automation? This is it! Forget for a minute that I’m personally a Luddite. I recognize that much of the information and communication technology that has come to define our lives is in many ways useful, whether I personally like it or not. However, since I’m not entranced by it, it’s easier for me to recognize that we’re paying a very high price for these new powers. We’re degrading language. We’re ceasing to have intimate, in-person human contact. We’re damaging our brains in unknown ways (besides the threat of cancer, we are destroying our attention spans and our sensitivity to real-life experience). And because we’re constantly in overload while moving at top speed, we’re overwhelmed by the serious issues that define our time.

As a result, we’ve become preoccupied with minor things – things we think we can change, or that distract us – because the major things that we feel we can’t change are terribly daunting. We can’t think about global political upheaval, the prospect of international financial collapse, shortages of water and energy, overpopulation, human rights, civil rights, the urgent need for campaign reform, dilapidated infrastructure, the horrific state of education at every level, the crippled state of health care at every level, inflated food prices and food shortages, the rise of possible new plagues and the lack of solutions for existing ones, the new nature of war and terrorism, homelessness, hunger, predatory banks & foreclosures, veterans in need, children in need, the death of print, the dangers of cyber-terrorism, blah, blah, blah.

So, instead, we worry about obesity and smoking and whether or not we should be vegetarian and if our age lines are showing. And we amuse ourselves into a stupor with reality TV and celebrity gossip and entertainment that gives new meaning to the words banal and mediocre. However, just as our government can’t afford to be oblivious to change and big issues and the need for right action, we cannot betray the responsibilities of citizenship, as well as being righteous human beings: good people, people with real values, not the Norman Rockwell nostalgic shit that some people define as values. But that’s not what’s happening. Instead, we’re as polarized as our politicians and quite judgmental and uncaring of others. This is the problem with life in the 21^st Century.

Regarding Bob Dylan, `Round His 70th Birthday

2011-05-30T15:43:00.007-04:00

They say that if you can remember the 60s you weren’t really there, but I was there, and while my memories are sketchy, they’re there, and I’m glad I have them. And some of my fondest memories are of Bob Dylan and what he meant to me as I was growing up. I had this poster of Dylan (left) on one of my bedroom walls for ages. I think it came with one of the rock albums, but I’m not sure. I just know that it, like he, was a constant presence, an inspiration, a yardstick, a spokesman for my times for a long, long time. The fact that he’s still with us and still writing and singing is comforting to me. It makes me feel that I haven’t been set loose into the future like a forlorn balloon, even though I have been – we all have been. May 24^th was Dylan’s 70^th birthday. I was never aware of his birthday, but his being 70 now – just 11 years older than I – feels important.

I remember reading an extensive interview with Dylan in Rolling Stone (one of the first of many in that magazine over the years), and the interviewer asked him how it felt to be the Voice of His Generation and he said “I don’t see myself that way.” I guess; it’s hard for any of us to see ourselves as others see us. But Dylan has always had public and critical response to him as an artist and a person to reflect back at him. Yet for as long as I can remember, Bob Dylan has always looked like he didn’t quite understand how he got to wherever he was and that he didn’t want the responsibility of being the Voice of His Generation. I imagine it’s hard to have greatness thrust upon you, even if greatness is what you aspire to. It just wasn’t the kind of greatness he had in mind. So it goes.

From the start, all Bob Dylan wanted was to make music, and rock `n’ roll was his first love. He wanted to be Elvis Presley before Woody Guthrie captured his heart, which took him unexpectedly into the folk revival of the 60s. He wanted to be relevant more than he wanted to be political, but he allowed himself to be embraced by the civil rights/anti-war politics of the time and to reflect that in his music as a “protest” singer/songwriter. He allowed Pete Seeger to take him under his wing. He allowed Joan Baez to share her fame and her social voice with him. He may have been sidetracked, but he wasn’t stupid.

Dylan gave the movement some of its most important anthems, but he was never on the front lines. Oddly enough, he wasn’t really a political animal, he was an artist and a poet. And when he went electric (to the dismay of the folk/political purists), he really didn’t understand why people responded with such rage. The man with so much insight and talent to express, the artist cunning and ruthless enough to be an opportunist, never understood what he meant to people, and never saw any obligation to his audience because of that meaning. That he was so clueless in his prime is what made him human. I think he gets it now and has for some time. What makes him human now is his age.

I sort of tell time by his albums, at least up to a point. I remember being about 12 or 13 and buying his first three albums, Bob Dylan, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan and Another Side of Bob Dylan and devouring them. I was among the folk purist audience who booed him at the infamous Forest Hills concert when he went electric in the mid-60s, but I came to relish the Highway 61 and Bringing It All Back Home albums. He turned me; I got it. I remember sitting in the back of the B-41 Flatbush Avenue bus clutching the Blonde On Blonde album I'd just bought (I still think it was his greatest) and actually tingling with anticipation until I could get home and play it. I remember the seductiveness of Desire and the boldness of Blood On The Tracks (his important, eloquent middle period), and the lively, interesting Shot of Love and Empire Burlesque. Then for a long time he lost me. I didn’t catch up again until 1989's Oh Mercy (which was the soundtrack for a torrid love affair I had in the early 90s) then he lost me again. The man has released more than 50 albums, not counting numerous bootlegs. In 2009 he put out a Christmas album; you can’t buy everything.

It doesn’t matter that as I got older I didn’t keep up with Dylan’s Born Again period, or his cowboy/Pat Garrett period, or his extended Greatest Hits period. I’d shake my head about his odd ventures into different things, but I respected that he dared to try, and to do it in public, too. Bob Dylan taught me to express myself and take risks at every turn – lessons I haven't always lived up to. But he inspired the poet in me and the socially caring person in me and the dreamer in me. I’m grateful for that.

Now, as an old man, the father of six (including the talented, adorable Jakob) and the grandfather of nine, Dylan represents endurance to me, and a willingness to try new things at any age. In the 90s, he created some very lovely Matisse-esque paintings, and he performed in China for the first time just a few months ago. I pray he outlives me. I would feel untethered without the voice, and conscience, and very human confusion of my generation that is Bob Dylan.

Meaningful Memorials

2011-05-27T22:06:00.009-04:00

Memorial Day is for remembering the military dead. Veterans Day is for remembering the surviving military. But as far as I’m concerned, this country does a very poor job of remembering, and honoring, the American military, dead or alive.

To start with, all that most people do to remember the military (particularly if no relative of theirs is currently serving) is wave the flag – literally from their homes, figuratively in their political views, emotionally in their hearts of hearts. Some may watch or march in a parade. Some may visit a grave or a memorial. These are all nice symbolic gestures; but aside from offering respect and dignity (not to be sneezed at, I know), they don’t mean anything, they don’t accomplish anything.

In consideration of things that might be more meaningful memorials, I feel compelled to start with something that happened this week that is the complete antithesis of what I'm talking about. Congress decided that military women who become pregnant from a rape by military men shouldn’t have their abortions (should they choose them) funded by the government. Presently, civilian government employees are so covered – minimally, of course, according to the traditional proviso: pregnancies created by rape or incest, or that threaten the life of the mother. This means that a servicewoman in Iraq or Afghanistan who has suffered a rape by a comrade in arms can just bite the bullet: keep the kid or spring for the abortion herself. It’s just our government's way of saying: we remember you. Thank you for your service.

The biggest thing that we don’t do to honor and remember the military dead – We the People and We the Government – is closely, seriously consider what the hell we’re doing before we send American military into harm’s way. Yes, of course sometimes war is necessary. But it isn’t/wasn’t necessary in Iraq, I’m way less than convinced it’s necessary in Afghanistan, it certainly wasn’t necessary in Vietnam. Truthfully, my lack of knowledge about the Korean War doesn’t allow me to assess that one. World War II was necessary; I can tell the difference. Neat, clean, minimal personnel, covert missions like the one that got bin Laden, that’s a contemporary example of putting military to good use. We should remember that.

Another thing we should remember: the military dead have families. They should not be delayed, or nickled and dimed, in receiving insurance and death benefits, and their benefits should be multi-faceted and much greater. They deserve that. If we had mindful decency in crafting and funding and executing these benefits, we would remember that.

The military dead were fiercely devoted to the surviving military. In honoring that devotion, we should remember to treat the surviving military very, very well. If they’re sick in any way, they should get the best care and therapy possible, no expense spared (or delayed). If they’re even just trying to reacclimate to civilian life, they should get the money, services and perks they need (and deserve), no expense spared or delayed.

It’s okay to have picnics and barbecues on the long Memorial Day Weekend. Everyone deserves a little spring break. But later next week, we should think about what we can do to honor our country’s military dead. Maybe it’s a relevant financial contribution, maybe it’s volunteer service, maybe it’s writing to your Congressional representatives. You’ll know what works for you. Maybe it is visiting a grave. But in lieu of flowers, please take good care of veterans.

The End of Oprah As We Knew Her

2011-05-25T18:11:00.006-04:00

Today was the official end of Oprah!, the daytime talk show that has been a personal Mecca for millions of women in 150 countries. Oprah Winfrey was on the air for 25 consecutive years. She interviewed literally thousands of people. She gave away millions of dollars worth of merchandise to her live audiences (from her own money). She was unique in television – and because of her, the lives and relationships and professional achievements of her viewers were vastly improved.

In some circles, making fun of Oprah Winfrey is s.o.p., but I would guess that those people hardly watched Oprah!, if at all. People make fun of her as an institution, with her daily show and her magazine and her production company and her Everything Oprah – but I think they’re just jealous. People make fun of her fluctuating size, her ever-changing hair, her (often) odd choice of outfits, her interviews with celebrities, the fact that she gave Dr. Phil a platform (the one thing for which I perhaps don’t forgive her), her relationship with her best girlfriend Gayle King, her relationship with her longtime man Stedman Graham. But I think they’re just nitpicking, and in any case, I don’t care.

I was never a daily Oprah! watcher, but I was a frequent Oprah! watcher and I have enormous respect for what she has achieved in her own life, and what she’s helped others achieve in theirs. Whatever Oprah Winfrey was, is and will be – in her next incarnation as the brains behind the new Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), those who have watched her frequently/regularly know that she is genuine, if nothing else. Her faith, gratitude, sympathy, empathy, and sense of purpose have been totally real.

And in the course of her 25 years, she has helped women (and men) cope with and heal, where necessary, the damage wrought by childhood sexual abuse; adult domestic abuse; drug/alcohol and other forms of addiction; the difficulties of intimate relationships, parenting, and just being a member of a family; care giving; handling finances; and, perhaps most important, achieving one’s best self through advanced education and/or taking personal and professional risks. She has also helped educate her global audiences about critical social issues, from the environment to poverty to the persecution of women worldwide. She provided a platform for broadening the world, and she gave her viewers concrete avenues by which they could help others – and not a lot of people can say that.

Oprah has, in many ways, been the mainstream embodiment of the modern women’s movement. She was never overtly political; she transcended politics. She also transcended race, and as a result gave millions of white American women something they’d never had before: a black friend.

She encouraged people to read through her book club. She encouraged people to be grateful for the good things in their lives, and to express it to others and to themselves in gratitude journals. She encouraged people to be health(ier) through exercise, and through forming better relationships with food. Oprah has always been very self-conscious about her own weight and she certainly cheered on womankind in their efforts to diet successfully. I would have been happier if she had accepted herself at any/every size and encouraged others to do the same – but Oprah isn’t perfect, never claimed to be, and weight was/is her Achilles Heel. I don’t begrudge or judge her for that.

Watching Oprah today on her last show – one on which there were no guests, no gifts, no “gimmicks” of any kind, just Oprah talking straight and sweet about what the show has meant to her – I couldn’t help but think of the many times I’d watched her and felt I’d learned something new and useful, even important. I thought of how she made me laugh and cry and feel with utter openness. I thought about how brave she is, how giving, how wise – yes, wise. I’m going to miss Oprah! – but I know that for a long time to come, I’ll have Oprah, and when she’s gone, the whole world will have her legacy. That’s not chopped liver. That’s TV put to its best use. Congratulations, Oprah. Thank you. And good luck.

America’s Newest Enemy: The Unemployed

2011-05-24T03:29:00.003-04:00

I was eagerly awaiting the new HBO movie about the 2008 economic crisis that nearly brought us asunder and to where we are now, Too Big To Fail, so I of course made a point of watching it Monday night. While I certainly enjoyed the performances of the all-star cast and even came to understand a little better how the crisis came to be, my ultimate take-away (as just an ordinary American Jane) was that the people portrayed (mostly men; financial CEOs and political finance big-wigs both here and abroad) were indeed the greedy, crooked bastards we thought they were, and I deeply resented them anew for nearly destroying the world so they could further swell their corporate and private coffers.

Due to the crisis they created, and because of the government bail-out that was initiated by Bush but has since somehow been attributed to Obama, America is still in a crippling recession (although government would have us believe it’s over) and more than 17 million people are unemployed – many of them for a year or more. This is bad, but what makes it worse is that the unemployed are increasingly being singled out as a problem – not because they can’t find jobs, but just because they exist, period.

Current workplace practices and proposed state and federal policies are demonizing the unemployed as lazy, inadequate workers who are draining business and government resources. A May 22 story from AP re-posted on The Huffington Post explained that “Unemployment Benefits Face Duration Cuts In Multiple States” because “Legislators are trying to limit tax increases for businesses to replenish the pool and are hoping the federal government keeps stepping in when the economy slumps.” The problem is, according to The New York Times on May 15, “The House Ways and Means Committee, on a strict Republican vote, recently passed a bill to let states use federal jobless money for other purposes, including tax cuts for business.” It bears noting that the deal the Republican Congress made was to maintain Unemployment Benefits in exchange for continuance of the Bush tax cuts for the richest 1%. So much for honor among thieves.

Adding insult to indigence, there is widespread government feeling that the unemployed are living high on the taxpayer hog for as long as possible, rather than looking for work or accepting the (usually lesser) jobs offered them. Indeed, in Florida, “One proposed bill would cut initial benefits from 26 to 20 weeks, deny benefits for employee `misconduct,’ force workers to accept job offers that pay at least 80 percent of their previous wage, or to accept any offer that paid as much as their unemployment benefit, once they’ve been out of work for more than 12 weeks,” the Sun-Sentinel reported on May 17.

These measures are just another example of the Republicans’ inexplicable lack of understanding of how real people live, what they need, and the compromises they make every day in an effort to survive and make the most of any and every opportunity.

There seems to be no official recognition of the fact that there is an increasing number of people whose lifelong work skills have become obsolete and in many instances the opportunities to gain new skills are simply not available. There are people who are willing to relocate for work, but it’s impossible for them to sell their homes – not at a profit, but at all. There are also people who are unwanted in the workforce because of their age; those 50 and older are the ones who have the greatest difficulty finding any sort of new job, let alone one that will compensate them at the rate of their previous job.

And now the unemployed have a new obstacle: potential employers who do not want to hire the unemployed! My friend the career counselor tells me that businesses have it in their heads that the people who’ve lost their jobs are in this position because they weren’t good workers. How this is possible is beyond my understanding. Don’t they know that thousands upon thousands of perfectly competent people have become unemployed because of our miserable economy? Are they totally out of touch with what’s happening?

The other reason companies “don’t want to be bothered” with the unemployed is that they want to reduce the number of applicants they have to contend with; they don’t want to be deluged with a thousand résumés for every job. Inconvenient, I know, but excuuuuuse me! That’s totally reprehensible – and completely unpatriotic.

Ironically, a bill was presented to Congress by Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL) on Feb. 17: The Unemployment Insurance Solvency Act of 2011, intended to “…provide assistance to certain employers and States in 2011 and 2012, to improve the long-term solvency of the Unemployment Compensation program, and for other purposes.” It was promptly sent to Committee, where it remains.

So long as displaced American workers are treated like goldbricking moochers, while state and federal governments, as well as employers, concern themselves exclusively with the horror of increased taxes, unemployment in this country will only increase. The American workforce is also Too Big To Fail. I hope the powers that be realize this soon.

The Challenges of Compromise

2011-05-19T20:21:00.010-04:00

President Obama said what was necessary in his Middle East speech today. He spoke truth to the power of change. He spoke of an entire region in transition and the importance of U.S. and global support for peaceful revolution. It was not until the last ten minutes of his 50-minute speech that he addressed the unceasing Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and in that regard he talked about the necessity for compromise. Compromise sucks. Particularly if you have strong feelings about one side of an issue. That said, the fact that neither Israel nor the Palestinians are especially pleased with his remarks is proof that he found a practical middle ground.

Given what’s been going on in the Middle East for the past six months – and what continues to occur – it would have been impossible for the President to make entirely pro-Israel comments, and indeed, it would not have been in Israel’s best interest. Similarly, had he suddenly placed America in an entirely pro-Arab/ Muslim position, it would have been a terrible betrayal of Israel and, in this instance too, not a stepping stone to a viable peace.

Those who choose to maintain a completely anti-Obama position, such as whoever’s writing the hateful and slanted American Blood Eagle blog, which called him Imam Obama and said he’s an anti-Semite, would do well to get a grip. In general, it would be really helpful if people stopped flinging terms like racist and anti-Semite around as if they were just handy catch-all phrases for things they don’t like. These words and what they represent are very powerful and it’s vitally important to make a distinction between those who take positions with which one disagrees and leveling such strident accusations.

As you probably know by now, the thing Mr. Obama said that upset Israel’s most ardent supporters is that Israel should return to the borders it had prior to the 1967 War, and that "long-term occupation" was untenable. Yes, that stung. But compromise means giving up something you care about. The President also said that Israel’s security interests must be protected, called for a non-military Palestinian state, and acknowledged that it is reasonable for Israel to resist negotiating with parties openly committed to its destruction. Guess who's unhappy about that?

In my opinion, President Obama made the most honest, pertinent and all-encompassing speech about the Middle East ever uttered by an American President. The very fact that he discussed the region as a whole and not just the Israeli-Palestinian “issue” demonstrates that.

There are those who are already dismissing the speech as a campaign tool and disparaging the President’s wisdom and sincerity. This is both disingenuous and counter-productive. There is no denying that Barack Obama is a politician and that as such he has done many things over the past three years that have been a body-jarring jolt to the progressives who put him in office. In a number of important instances, he has given the idea of “compromise sucks” disheartening new meaning.

But with this most-recent speech on the Middle East, Obama has shown an intelligence, understanding and sensitivity regarding complicated issues in an increasingly shrinking and technologically-connected world that is nothing less than laudable. If he’s gearing up for a nothing-left-to-lose second term, presenting us with the Obama we thought we were getting in the first place, America, the Middle East and the rest of the world will be the better for it.

Nostalgia and Literacy

2011-05-19T02:38:00.004-04:00

I watched You’ve Got Mail Wednesday night – for the umpteenth time. This is the 1998 Nora Ephron romantic comedy starring Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks as rival booksellers who, unbeknownst to them, are also each other’s secret e-mail pal. It’s set in New York City, primarily in my neighborhood, the Upper West Side, and it’s one of my comfort-food movies, the kind I reach for when I want a soothing slice of yesterday after a hard day in the present.

I distinctly remember disliking this movie when I saw it in the theater way back when. I was irritated by how bright and clean Manhattan looked, a far cry from its real-life appearance. And I was bothered by Meg Ryan’s choppy hair and lifeless, colorless wardrobe and her total lack of jewelry. But now, it reminds me of what New York was like even just a few years before 9/11, before we were aware of terrorism and a cloud of suspicion and fear blanketed the city and never left. It was a time – just 13 years ago! – before all sorts of New Media took over our lives, personally and professionally. There was no Facebook or Twitter or texting or e-books. The Internet was AOL and e-mail was the big thing.

The movie is also an unintended harbinger. Hanks is one of the key executives behind a chain of super-bookstores a la Borders and Barnes & Noble, which are pushing out quaint and once-thriving independent bookstores – like the children’s bookstore Ryan owns. So besides the romance, there are vital messages: about the importance of independent bookstores which, like so many Mom & Pop operations, once gave New York its distinctive flavor. At a rally Ryan orchestrates to try to save her store she asks the assembled crowd: “Do you want the West Side to become one long strip-mall? Do you want to get off the train at 72^nd Street and not even know you’re in New York?”

Alas, over the past 13 years, New York has become, in great part, one long strip-mall. Chain stores of all kinds have usurped small, privately-owned shops of all kinds, and the façade of the famous West 72^nd Street subway has been altered by renovation and expansion. Taxis used to be sedans; now they’re miniature clown-vans. Neighborhood coffee shops used to abound; now it’s all Starbucks all the time. People in Manhattan used to dress up, or dress crazy; now most people look like they just fell out of bed. All that, along with our Mayor’s numerous Nanny-State laws, has made New York as vibrant and exhilarating as Peoria, Illinois. I really miss the New York I was born and raised in, and the Upper West Side I’ve lived in for 34 years.

The film’s other thread of message is about the importance of books in children’s lives. “I realized that it wasn’t just about selling books,” says Ryan of the lessons she learned when she helped her mother (the store’s previous owner) as a child. “She was helping people figure out who they were going to be, because the books you read as a child affect you like no other books…” Embarrassed, she ends her rant.

But my rant is just beginning, because there was a very disturbing story in the Times a couple of days ago, “A Book In Every Home, and Then Some,” which reports that “some 42 percent of American children — more than 31 million — grow up in families that lack the income to cover basic needs like rent, child care, food and transportation. `These are families that are not buying books at retail,’ notes Kyle Zimmer, the co-founder of First Book.” First Book is “a nonprofit organization…which is spearheading a new market mechanism that is delivering millions of new, high quality books to low-income children through thousands of nonprofit organizations and Title I schools.”

I was fortunate to have lots of books as a kid, both those that were given to me and, as I got a little older, the ones I got for myself in school libraries and local public libraries. The article also explains that public libraries in poor neighborhoods are open fewer hours than those in other locales and also have much smaller inventories. School libraries, of course, are as deficient as the schools they’re in.

Books have been a staple throughout my life. My mother, an English Literature major whose great ambition was to teach (but she got stuck in a series of middle management jobs instead) used to read to me often – and not just from children’s books. At the age of seven I could practically recite Sean O’Casey’s Juno and the Peacock complete with Irish brogue. Books were everywhere in our home, along with music of all kinds, and my mother would get framed prints of famous paintings from the library to hang on our walls. That foundation absolutely gave me a leg up into adulthood and it's left me with wonderful memories. I don’t suppose libraries lend framed prints anymore…

It’s horrific to imagine 42% of American kids not having even a modest home library. I’m also not particularly happy about the rest of contemporary homes, where in many instances, books are giving way to electronic toys and tools and texting on colorful phones in elementary school. I shudder to think who these people will become when they’re grown, the clean slates they’ll be without the memory of books and language and imagination to fall back on.

By the way, all of the thousands of books used in the production of You’ve Got Mail were provided by numerous publishers, who then allowed them to be donated to a national literacy organization.

Nakba vs Never Again!

2011-05-15T19:41:00.005-04:00

I’ve been wanting to write a post about contemporary American views of/positions on Israel, specifically in terms of the American Left and Right, for some time and today seems definitely the day to do it. That’s because, as the New York Times reports, “Israel’s borders erupted in deadly clashes on Sunday as thousands of Palestinians — marching from Syria, Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank — confronted Israeli troops to mark the anniversary of Israel’s creation [in 1948]. More than a dozen people were reported killed and scores injured.” You should know that what Israel calls its anniversary, the Arab world calls “The Nakba,” the catastrophe. Sixty-three years later, it’s still a catastrophe to them.

When I was growing up in the `60s, the American Left – which really existed back then – was an ardent supporter of Israel, largely because of the strong support for civil rights on the part of most American Jews. Over the decades, as Jews – like most other white people in America – became increasingly afraid of increasingly militant blacks and “white flight” from the cities to the suburbs reconfigured the social structure of the country, support for Israel began to wane on the Left.

By the Reagan Democrat 1980s, the Christian Evangelical Right began to embrace Israel – not because they love Jews (they don’t), but because they champion the one Middle Eastern democracy that exists, and which happens to contain important Christian holy sites they want to see protected and to which they want to maintain access. Correspondingly, the Left discovered new-found compassion for the Palestinians, who then, like now, live largely in self-imposed poverty and a complete lack of social/infrastructural development, because all their energy (including the content of their middle schools, the madrasas) is focused on hating, demonizing, failing to recognize, and seeking to destroy, Israel.

In very recent years, most political quarters in Israel have been willing to make peace with those who despise them and support the creation of an independent Palestinian state. Their only terms have been that Palestinians and other Arabs officially recognize the State of Israel and accept its right to exist, rather than dedicate themselves to, as Hamas puts it, “pushing Israel into the sea.” This apparently is too much to ask. So, despite decades of effort on the part of the U.S. to broker a working, lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians, as well as Israel’s other Arab neighbors, peace has been unattainable – because the mere existence of Israel, in their eyes, is a Nakba – a catastrophe.

Take a look at the map above, particularly if you haven’t taken a look at a map of the Middle East in a while. Look at the upper right-hand corner of Egypt. You see that little purple bit, scrunched in among Egypt, Syria and Jordan? That’s Israel. Keep in mind that Israel has no oil. Look at the size of Egypt and Saudi Arabia. They’re enormous. Even Syria and Jordan, which are none too big, are still larger than Israel. Look at Iran – which is credited with having helped organize today’s four-pronged attack on Israel. It, too, is enormous. Yet in 63 years, none of these Arab nations have offered to give any part of their lands to the Palestinians as a permanent homeland. Why do you suppose that is? Perhaps to keep old hatreds alive?

Instead, everybody (over there) wants to take a chunk out of Israel and over the years they have. This is largely because of Jerusalem, which is the third most-sacred city in Islamic history, practice and tradition. Indeed, Jerusalem holds some of the most sacred Islamic sites in the region. And it bears noting that, like the holy Christian sites, these places have always been open to Muslims who wish to visit and make pilgrimages there. In fact, Muslims who cannot make it to Mecca, for whatever reason, set their sights on Jerusalem, and they have never been made to feel unwelcome. (Just last night, by the way, some PBS stations ran a very interesting program entitled Jerusalem: Center of the World, which is also worth seeing.)

I want to take a moment to acknowledge that it is religion and religious history that have created much of the antipathy between Israel and its Arab neighbors. In addition, I acknowledge that the establishment of Israel was fostered by Britain and the U.N. as a compensation to the remaining European Jews who managed to escape murder in the Holocaust – and in truth, this land was not theirs to give. In the process, as today’s Times also explains, “hundreds of thousands of Palestinians lost their homes through expulsion and flight.”

This is not a petty matter and making comparisons between whose misery is/was greater is not productive. However, consider the fact that had the Palestinians demonstrated even a modicum of willingness to accept Israel, the Jewish State would have done everything possible to accommodate them and help them prosper. Throughout its short modern history, Israel has turned a tiny patch of the scorched desert into a luscious land of “milk and honey.” They would certainly have helped the Palestinians do the same. But that, apparently, does not matter.

What does matter is that anti-Semitism is alive and well the world over, and is in many ways the substance that feeds the Palestinians and their Arab comrades throughout the Middle East. Nonetheless, the Palestinian cause has captured the compassion of the American Left and others worldwide. I wouldn’t mind that per se, since I can understand how the Palestinians, compared with contemporary Israelis, can seem to be the Underdog, while the Israelis are cast as key allies of Right Wing America.

To the extent that that’s true, it’s unfortunate. But so long as Israel is hated because it is the Jewish State, and so long as Jews are hated, because…because they’re Jews!, it will be my opinion – and that of many other American Jews, as well as Israelis – that Never Again! trumps Nakba. It is time for the Arab world to accept Israel’s presence and its right to exist.

And it’s time for the rest of the world – including the U.N. and the American Left – to regain its knowledge of modern history and, for once, support the Jews. The Arab Spring will turn into a bitter cold Winter indeed if all it accomplishes is a massive new wave of anti-Semitism.