back from the dead

I had to do it sometime.  It's been well over a month since the election, and there has been a silence from here.  Except for a couple of status statements right after election day on Facebook when my feelings were still completely raw, each time I sat down and tried to put into words something to say, and then after staring at the blank screen in front of me, nothing came.  I wanted to wait until something inspirational came along.  Nothing did.  Then I wanted to wait until maybe I thought I had something to say that might have a bit of meaning to it or perhaps be a starting point for healing, if for nobody other than myself.  Nada.  Finally, I did not want to put something out in the blogosphere that would sound whiny, sore loserish, or simply another complaint about what we can all see coming.  I am still waiting for that moment.

In the long run, however, this is my space, my thoughts.  If it sounds too bad, too whiny, too woeful, well...  too bad.  It's my space.  It's my thoughts.  I do not need to apologize for that -- ever, even if I really did want my ramblings here to be more upbeat than this.

A little less than a year before the election, we were in England for the wedding of some good friends.  I was asked at the time about our now president-elect, and told the folks there to relax.  We might be a lot of things, but we are not that dumb.  The morning after the election, I posted this:

"believe it or not, we all fervently hope we are wrong, and that he will rise to the occasion and do what is best for the country, that all of us will move forward and heal the nation and ourselves. right now, there is a rawness inside that is not quite ready. while i accept the results of elections and he is going to be the president whether i like it or not, i for one cannot yet bring myself to even say his name right now. my hope is that he will show me something very soon so that i can. believe it or not, i hope he can show me something so that i can actually become proud that he is our president".

We are now only two days away from the meeting of the electoral college.  I was wrong before the election, and it looks like I am still wrong.  Yes, he has not even been sworn in, let alone officially elected, so there is still time to think he will do something that will allow me to be proud to say he is my president, just like I thought when George W. "won" the election in 2000.  I would like to think that, but this time it feels different.

The election has unleashed a viciousness that was previously lying below the surface.  We are seeing and hearing things we never thought would reappear in America.  Bigotry has roared back, if it was ever really gone.  Our "leadership" is not only not forcefully condemning it, not only not taking action to combat it, but is encouraging it via passive-aggressive acquiesence.  In some cases, they are actually encouraging it.  We have a top advisor, who apparently puts his kkk hood on the coat rack when he arrives in the office in the morning.  Then there are the cabinet selections, almost none of them seeming to have any qualifications for the position other than the fact that they have tons of money and are willing to grovel at his feet.

So what does this election mean for me -- and the corollary, what do we do?

For one, we certainly do not participate or encourage armed insurrection, as some have done during the Obama years.  For my family and I, we return to our roots.  We marched in the 1960's against racial injustice.  We marched in the 1970's against the Vietnam War.  We then "grew up".  We raised families.  We have created careers and lives for ourselves.  We have bought cars, houses, fancy computers, cell phones and trinkets that in the long run kept us warm, safe and dry, but did not mean all that much.  Along the way, we lost ourselves and our values.  Right under our noses, we let the simmering viciousness of the past fester and the lid has been lifted allowing it into the open.  So now...

We march again today.

We march against bigotry, because when we do so, we march for all of us.

We march against ignorance, because when we do so, we march for all of us.

We march for all the women amongst us, because when we do, we march for all of us.

We march for intelligence, for education, for health care for all, for climate change, for science, for thoughtfulness and for forgiveness, and most of all, for peace.

We no longer look the other way when he appoints another rich ignoramous into office.

We finally do what we were supposed to do all along.

We do what is right.  We stand up for the values that make us who we are and made our country what it was.  I do not mean the "values" that those who call themselves "values voters" mean.  I mean we support the downtrodden, not spit on them and ask the police to remove them from our sight.  We educate our people, and start that education with the alphabet, mathematical tables, history lessons and what we used to call civics, which I take to mean teaching how to become polite and contributing members of society.  We do not start the lesson with "In the beginning..."

We remove guns from our streets, and if we cannot get the politicians to grow a spine and pass laws that remove guns from our streets, we vote and remove those politicians from office.

We heal ourselves.  We heal our people.  We pass universal health care, because that is what every person deserves.

Most of all, we learn respect, and what the word actually means.  You don't earn respect by making a ton of money and then bullying people.  You don't earn respect by twittering, tweeting or whatever it is called at three in the morning because somebody called you a silly name, or just disagreed with you.  You earn respect by honestly listening to people, hearing what they have to say, and then explaining yourself without demeaning those who disagree with you.  You earn respect by treating people with the respect you want for yourself.

Finally, I apologize for the length of this diatribe.  I also apologize because it probably is not as well written as I would have liked, and much of it probably makes little sense.  There were some things over the last month and  half or so, however, that just had to get off my chest and get out there so I could breathe again, let alone write.  I will try to do better next time.

As I said, it has been a while since I last posted.  I had hoped to have fun with this blog.  I still might.  After all, at the moment, the Giants have a winning record.

an apology

Sixteen years ago, on election night, before all the nonsense started, I sat before the television in the living room, seething and saying a few things that people are just not supposed to say, especially in front of their children.  In response to my son Jon, then twelve years of age, who asked why I was so upset, I told him I could not believe that this country was about to elect as its president a man who the average third grader could out think.  I owe an apology to George W. Bush.

In my opinion, George W. Bush was an absolute disaster as a president.  We will be trying to dig out of his executive decisions and policies for generations to come.  Listing them here is pointless.  We can just go to the Middle East and turn from there in any particular direction you choose.  I firmly believe, however, that as wrong on so many levels and on so many issues that George W. Bush was, he was at heart an honorable man, who was only doing what he thought was right.  I do not believe he was a malicious person at all.  His post-presidency has proven that.  I cannot say the same about the current nominee from Mr. Bush's party.

George W. Bush never bragged in public about groping women.

George W. Bush never shamed the looks of a woman in public because that woman opposed any position he took or asked him a question he had trouble answering.

George W. Bush began a war against the wrong enemy in the wrong country at the wrong time, but even in invading Iraq and then Afghanistan, never said that all Muslims are evil and should be banned from entering the United States.

George W. Bush never even hinted that Muslim-Americans should not be allowed to peacefully practice their faith in the United States.

George W. Bush, while he never attended a funeral for any fallen soldier, never publicly denigrated the family of a fallen hero simply because they disagreed with him politically, and then never doubled down on that, claiming that the mother of the fallen hero stood by her husband silently, obviously agreeing with every word he said, claiming that she did not speak simply because she was not allowed to as a Muslim.

George W. Bush never mocked the disabled under any circumstances I am aware of, even when one happened to be a journalist who had written something he disagreed with. 

While I believe his campaign to this day owes an apology to John McCain, George W. Bush never denigrated his service to this country simply because his plane was shot down and he was taken prisoner by the North Vietnamese.

George W. Bush never stayed up at the wee hours to twitter nonsense about his perceived enemies.

George W. Bush never demanded that all Mexicans be sent home, simply because they came to this country seeking a better life, something that applies to just about every single one of us, regardless of our ethnic origin, unless we are pureblood Native Americans.

George W. Bush never called all Mexicans rapist or murderers, and then fell back for a second conceding that some of them may be honorable and decent people.

George W. Bush never accused a federal judge of bias simply because the man is of Mexican heritage.  

As I recall,  George W. Bush speaks at least some Spanish. 

George W. Bush never refused to pay people who worked for him.

George W. Bush never avoided paying income taxes and then claimed it was the fault of people who could have changed the laws in order to make him pay taxes.

George W. Bush never claimed a bankruptcy filing was simply taking advantage of the laws of this country, and then claimed it was the fault of people who could have changed the laws to prevent him from doing so.

George W. Bush released his income tax returns for public scrutiny, and then never had his children claim that the tax returns were too complicated for anyone else to understand, as if there are no accountants and tax professionals in the world who could not read the returns and tell the rest of us what was in them.

George W. Bush released his health records for public scrutiny.

George W. Bush never caused an entire professional sports league to go out of business.

George W. Bush never publicly called on a foreign power to hack into his opposition in order to discover something, anything, he could then use against them in a campaign.

George W. Bush never encouraged people attending his rallies to beat up a person in the audience for disagreeing with him.

George W. Bush never called for his political opponents to be jailed simply for being his political opponents.

George W. Bush never even suggested that a way to get rid of his political opponents was to have somebody kill them.

George W. Bush never claimed the United States electoral system was rigged, unless, of course, he wins.

George W. Bush never publicly called upon his supporters to go to the polls, not to vote, but to intimidate others from doing so.

George W. Bush never stated that he would not accept the will of the American people if they did not vote in his favor, and then followed up by suggesting to his followers that they take to the streets if he did, in fact, lose the election.

No, George W. Bush never said or did any of the above.  As I said, I believe at heart that George W. Bush is an honorable and decent, though entirely misguided man.  The present presidential nominee of the republican party, however,  has done each and every one of these things, and most likely much more that I could not think of off the top of my head while writing this.  Honor and decency are not only traits that I do not believe him to be capable of, but are traits I believe he would view as weaknesses.  

As such, I owe and hereby give George W. Bush an apology.

I probably owe the average third grader an apology as well.

a few bundy gang protest pointers

In 1963, at the ripe old age of five, going on six, I traveled to Washington, D.C., where I single handedly led the march on the Lincoln Memorial where Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his "I Have a Dream Speech", using notes I provided him, thereby lighting one of the lasting sparks in the civil rights movement in this country.  Okay, maybe I didn't really ghost write his speech, and maybe I didn't really lead the march, and maybe all I really did was sit in the back of the station wagon, asking "Are we there yet?" every ten minutes or so, while Mom and Dad tried mightily not to entertain thoughts of strangling me, or at least act out on those thoughts.  And maybe all I did when we got to Washington was play in the reflecting pool while history was playing out before my eyes.

We do not expect a five year old to remember a hot August day, with a large crowd around him and a cool reflecting pool available to remember much of anything except the pool, and that was my only memory of the day until the day of my father's funeral forty-three years later, when my older brother mentioned my parents taking us along in a caravan bringing people, mostly people of color, to Washington for the March.  I remember asking Mom about it afterwards, and her telling me in a matter of fact manner, something along the lines of "Of course, we did.  Why wouldn't we?  I'm surprised you don't remember it".  Well,  I remember the reflecting pool...

Against this background, with the addition of occasional protest marches against the Vietnam War, Nixon, my own sit ins protesting administrative decisions at the college I attended, and keeping the spirit alive, it has not surprised me that my sons have inherited the protest mantle, Jeremy in particular, who has been extremely active in various movements, including Occupy.  I have not always agreed with him.  In fact, there have been times when I have thought the he and his fellow protesters have stepped over the line, have protested just for the sake of protesting, or have just done stupid things in their attempt to be heard.  I will, however, always stand for his right to protest, even if I do believe there is a time and place for everything, and even if I do believe he does not need to participate in every protest everywhere.

While I do not always believe in what Jeremy protests, last night he was mostly right on the underlying facts, and certainly absolutely right on the principle, in one single sentence posted on Facebook:

"You know what? Fine...the Bundys are not guilty. That means that those defending in the Dakotas           are also not guilty. Period"

All right.  Before we start up, I will concede this much. The above statement is a classic example of oversimplification.  We are talking about two completely different situations with their own set of facts and circumstances.  I was not at the Malheur Wildlife Range, and neither was Jeremy.  I don't even know where it is, except for the news reporting it being somewhere in Oregon.  I have no first hand knowledge of what happened there on a moment by moment basis.  I have also not been to the area in North Dakota where the Pipeline Access protest has been ongoing, and have no first hand knowledge of the moment by moment occurrences there.  Jeremy has also not been there, although he wants with all his heart and soul to be among the protesters.  All I know is what I read or see in the news and what I hear from people who were at the scenes, which is not much, but this is what I see in comparison.  This is where Jeremy gets it right.

The Bundy Gang, gathered, armed to the teeth in a National Wildlife Refuge where most, except their most ardent admirers, concede they had no right to be.  The Natives and Protesters, the N&P for short, gathered on the Native's ancient tribal land, where most except the Bundy's Gang's most ardent admirers, concede they had every right to be.

The Bundy Gang holed up in federally owned buildings, and from most accounts, trashed the place.  The N&P are staying in tents on Native owned land, or in the homes of people sympathetic to their cause.  I will concede that the area where the tents are located appear to be messy, but then again, we cannot tell at this point if this is the condition the N&P intends to leave the site.  Given the Natives reverence for their ancient sites, I would doubt it.

The Bundy Gang, as noted above, showed up armed to the teeth, and threatened openly to shoot any federal or state law enforcement that tried to move them out of the Malheur Wildlife Range.  Their supporters from around the country tried to get there, further armed to defend the Bundy Gang's rights. The N&P appear to have shown up with dreamcatchers, peace pipes, video cameras and a few journalists and threatened to use their bodies to block access to the Dakota Pipeline construction site.  Those from around the county who sought to join them, for the most part appear to have been similarly "armed".

There was a confrontation with law enforcement, at which time a member of the Bundy Gang was killed.  Whether or not he should have been shot is another issue; however, it is noted that the man was fully armed at the time.  During the confrontation at the Dakota Pipeline, there have been a few confrontations with law enforcement.  Nobody has been killed.  Some idiots, one of whom was a presidential candidate, decided to vandalize some construction equipment by spray painting it. 

The Bundy Gang ultimately surrendered to law enforcement when threatened to be removed forcibly, only when law enforcement negotiated with the Gang's leadership and only when it became clear that they had no support from the local population.  About one hundred people with the N&P were arrested yesterday.  There were no negotiations.  There were armed tanks and riot police, who dispatched the arrestees with mace and riot gear.  There is video of a fire having been set on the highway that does not appear to have spread and does not appear to have done anything except scorch a small area of asphalt.  There are reports that one person with the N&P fired a single shot in the air, striking nobody.  While there are reports that locals are not entirely with the N&P, there are at least as many reports that there are many sympathetic locals.

Let's be clear.  If anyone did fire a weapon in this situation, that's a crime.  The person who fired the weapon should be prosecuted.  Whomever set the fire on the roadway also committed a crime, and should be prosecuted.  The Bundy Gang?

Not guilty.

At least, that's what a jury said, and as a member of the bar, and a citizen of this country, I am compelled to accept their verdict.

Granted, I was not at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge.  I was not at the trial.  I do not know the precise charges the defendants were facing, the manner in which the testimony was rendered, the manner in which the charges were read to the jury, the jury themselves, or how they reached their verdict.  I can only assume, based upon what I do know, that for the Bundy Gang to be not guilty, either they had to have been charged with the wrong crimes, the prosecution had to have been inept, or the jurors, well... I cannot claim to know or even guess at what they saw or heard, or what they were thinking.  

So based upon all of this, I hereby give my advice to the N&P for future protest at the Dakota Pipeline:

1.  Show up wearing Stetsons, flannel shirts and jeans.  For the men, grow beards, if you are old enough. 

2.  Leave the women at home.

3.  Bring enough weaponry with you to arm a third world country, although please do not bring any actual ammunition, as we do not want anyone to actually get hurt.  When law enforcement moves in, yell that they are coming to take away your second amendment rights.

4.  Leave the children at home.

5.  Find a few government regulations that might apply, such as the types and applicability of the construction equipment, the ratio of protesters to police or the number of port-a-potties on site, and call Fox News, Breitbart and Red State Nation to let them know you are protesting government overreach.

6.  Leave the disabled at home.

7.  Carry signs saying "God Bless Exxon" or "God Bless Monsanto" or any other major company.  No need to offend here.

and most of all...

8.  Leave the Native Americans at home.

Trust me. 

 It worked for the Bundy Gang, except for the no ammunition thing.  It will work for you.

white fluffy duckies

As I get closer to retirement, friends have asked what I intend to do with my twilight years.  There have been times I thought about writing a column for the local newspaper where I end up; however, I am not at all sure that the Powell Tribune is ready for "The View From Here" that I had bounced around in my mind for a while.  Besides, I probably would have had to interview for a job, and that would have instantly killed things.

At least if I write a blog, I only have to interview myself first, and being the egotist that I am, there is very little chance of getting turned down.  About the worst that could happen would be if nobody ever looked at this aside from me, and that's not really all that bad.  I like my sense of humor, frequently laughing at my own jokes.  Yes, that's me, the weird, getting a little older guy in the corner looking at his tablet and giggling to himself.  Keep small children and pets away.  

I am not sure how often I intend to post anything here.  I do not intend to be a slave to posting just to say something, anything.  Most who know me know my political views that will probably become manifest here.  It's my guess that there will be rants over political issues, social injustice, and the single most important issue on the planet, the New York Giants, as well as anything that strikes me as funny.  While I will invite comment, I ask only that it remain civil.  To paraphrase my all time favorite columnist Stan Isaacs, who would invite comment and criticism over everything except his choice of the chocolate ice cream at Redding Terminal in Philadelphia, I will brook no dissent over the Giants.

So, what to call this enterprise?

The original thought was, as noted above, "The View From Here".  Frankly, I do not know why I moved away from this.  Thoughts drifted to something ethereal.  I thought I had landed on "The Long Walk into Nothing", but found out it was already taken.  After bouncing a few really bad ideas around in my head, I finally came upon the brilliant, yet demented idea of finding famous last words from a celebrity, even if the celebrity was extremely obscure, and riffing off of one I liked.  "Oh wow" a la Steve Jobs was rejected out of hand.  Also rejected, but not without a number of laughs, was Louise Marie Therese de St. Maurice, whose last words, purportedly while ripping one on her death bed were "A woman who can fart is not dead".  You can only imagine what the name of the blog would have been.  While any number of people who expressed undying love for their fellow man or their family was nice, people who know me would have been disappointed in the obviousness.  

James Rodgers, who was executed by a firing squad came so close, you might as well call him the runner up.  When asked just before the firing squad did their thing if he had any last requests, he replied, "Bring Me a Bullet Proof Vest".  The name of this blog, therefore, was almost "Bring Me a Bullet Proof Vest" or just "Bullet Proof Vest".  

And then, there it was.

Derek Jarman was an English artist writer and film maker.  I know absolutely nothing else about him other than reading that his last words purportedly were "I want the world to be filled with white fluffy duckies".

Mr. Jarman, this one's for you.