Assassination and the Great Man Theory of History

 Posted Saturday, April 26th

Saturday was a glorious spring day but only when we got home in later afternoon did we learn of the 

spoiler: the attempted assassination at the Correspondents’ Dinner.

Assassination: 

That attempt to alter history and derail governance comes from acceptance of the Great Man theory of 

history: remove the Great Man and change the future. 

Has it ever worked? Did the assassination of Julius Caesar change the dissolution of the Republic, or 

only hurry it onward? It certainly did not restore the Republic which Caesar had already undermined. 

And Lincoln? The American Democratic-Republic form of governance only became stronger as 

Congress ruled the roost throughout the rest of the 19^th C., especially after the 13^th and 

14^th Constitutional Amendments were ratified.  

 

“Great Man” did not emerge again until Roosevelt, the Depression, and WWII. The Executive Branch, 

especially the Pentagon, became the center of policy and initiative. 

So, knock off the Great Man and you derail governance? Most often only the most deranged 

romantic believes strongly enough to become an assassin. Failed assassination strengthens the 

Great Man. Successful assassination most often puts the system into the hands of a new, would-be 

Great Man.  

 

Much as I want Trump gone, assassination is worse than he, an aberration, a lazy man’s answer. We 

need to do the hard intellectual work of understanding process, cause and the forces bending our future. 

We must reject the Great Man theory of history. It is a simpleton’s myth.

 

The simpleton now in the Oval Office must be removed but only through a Democratic-Republican 

process.    

What the hell are we doing?

From my 21stC Journal of a 20thC  Man: 

I awoke thinking about the war. What the hell are we doing? We should be focusing on ending our war, our illegal, unjustifiable American/Iranian war of choice, using our time and energy, using our best people, to find a settlement to end this horror. Instead, we are using our time and energy seeking settlement of someone else’s war, one between Israel and Lebanon. We are not in that war. We have no troops on the ground (I hope!) We are not bombing either Lebanon or Israel. Theirs is not our war. We ought to be gone, to deny support and provision of our precious arms to either combatant. To unlink negotiations.

I know, as always, easier said than done. In America, strong voices call out support Israel; other strong voices yell support Lebanon, few say to hell with both of you. In Iran, the strong voices say Lebanon is also a victim of the USA for Israel is but America’s agent. Others say America is Israel’s agent. The Israeli/Lebanese war, Iran says, must be included in whatever cease fire or suspension is to be reached with America.

This makes it impossible for us. We should simply stop. Shift the world’s attention to Lebanon and Israel. Humiliation of not “winning” is better than escalation of death and destruction, loss of face better than loss of blood. And if done deftly, by accomplished diplomats of which we have a few and explained by glib and gifted spokesmen of which we have many, we might come to be seen by some as one of the peacemakers of whom Christians, Jews, and Muslims speak so highly.

“Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!”

Among the ten writers who contributed to the screenplay of The Wizard of Oz, Noel Langley is the most likely author of the famous line Frank Morgan, who played the Wizard, delivered when TOTO pulled back the green curtain to reveal an old charlatan frantically trying to manipulate the smoke and noise machine which created his fearsome image. Remind you of anything or anyone haunting our dreams today? And how about those flying monkey ICE agents? Remember Judy Garlands' remonstrance: "You’re a very bad man!” Langley had Morgan reply with genuine humility, "Oh, no my dear,  I'm just a very bad Wizard."

We're unlikely to hear such humility from our charlatan. TOTO raises a fundamental question for us: who are the folks behind the curtain? Who are these folks guiding, animating, managing the would-be wizard and his executive orders? What is their stake?

Do I believe Trump studies or even cares about issues like (today's NYT) who picks the art that appears in our overseas embassies? Does he know how the American artist representing us at the Venice Bienniel is selected? Does he care that that artist is an ex-pat who emigrated to Mexico years ago? Appointed by a luxury pet food dealer from Tampa? Who behind the curtain does?

Who behind the curtain has an interest in psychedelic drug deregulation and accelerated FDA clearance, particularly of Ibogaine, the leading psychedelic of interest? Ibogaine World, a Cameroon-based company whose corporate structure, finances, officers, and ownership are unknown is also the leading supplier of Ibogaine and will play a primary role in Trump-ordered accelerated FDA testing and clearance. Such exploration of psychedelics and mental health appears a promising avenue of research, but who behind the curtain is pushing it and why?

Is it likely that Trump really cares about professional baseball regulation and operation of the college football transfer portal? Judging from his Executive Order somebody behind the curtain does. What is their stake in this? 

A recent order deals with the definition of Made in America. Did he really concern himself in that or did someone behind the curtain manage that one? Those folks behind the curtain have discovered a powerful tool for effecting their agendas. Other March and April ExecOrders deal with elections, DEI, housing, fraud, FEMA oversight, sports, manufacturing, and consumer protection. Who initiated these? Who is behind these revisions to our economy, our social structure, how we raise and educate our kids? And what's in it for them -- ideological purity? Insider advantage? Reduced regulatory obstacles? Or just power for powers sake?

You don't need to use Executive Orders to gain admittance behind the curtain. Who is pushing reductions in air and water emission standards? Reduction in renewable energy commitments? Reduction of incentives for adoption of EVs? The list is endless; the damage senseless -- except to those who put their self-interest ahead of the nation's.

We'd better start paying attention to those folks behind the curtain before they restructure America to a new set of values and priorities through their control over the aging charlatan dozing in his gilded, oval office.

Manners, the magic sauce of marriage.

Those of you that have access to my journal can answer the question of why no blog posts since March 6th.  It was the 5th when I took a header during a zoom session, my entry into the doldrums of health care and injury treatment. But enough , , ,,

I have been married off and on for 65 years. How often I have heard said, or read, that marriage takes hard work. Not sure I agree.

It wasn't lack of effort that sank Barbara's and my marriage. Well, maybe in a way it was. I put a lot of effort into the marriage -- but enough? Who am I to say? But Barbara did not, could not. Not a fault; she just did not have any effort to spare from her struggle with chemical dependency, in her case dependency on JD. Even after achieving sobriety, her efforts were rightly focused on her demons.

That is the extreme situation. If less afflicted folks adopt a simple standard, marriage is easy. That simple standard? Manners. Manners your Mother taught you. Manners the Golden Rule yields. Manners the Boy and Girl Scouts taught. Manners my Aunt Sis used to push on her nephew and nieces.

Good manners are practiced less and less in this coarsening country of ours. Ann's friend Mary Mitchell swims upstream, writing about and lecturing on manners as a business: lecturer at the State Dept's Foreign Service Institute, consultant to a broad array of international corporations, author of nine books on etiquette and civility, plus Mary in person, politeness personified.

Manners and marriage? Show gratitude. Listen carefully and without judgement. Listen without interrupting. Smile. Imagine oneself in your spouse's shoes. Patience and forbearance. Express, explicitly, admiration for those qualities that attracted you in the first place for the roots of those are likely viable in both of you. Take the initiative. Converse; conversation is the universal solvent.

Time dulls these if one is not self-aware. Pain and physical problems of one's own turn one's attention inward. I am now struggling with this. Practice selflessness -- putting the needs of another ahead of your own. Selflessness is hard to habituate and sustain. 

And of course, show to others the mannerly behavior one wants to receive, aka the Golden Rule. 

Manners make marriage easy -- well, not easy, perhaps, but manners are the lubricants that make marriage increasingly easier. It is not hard work to be polite, to show respect, to demonstrate empathy, to smile -- perhaps to laugh.