Taking the Gloves Off -- An Open Letter to the Clan

To the clan, all 41 of us:

For years in these Northwest Ruminations, I have pulled my punches so as not to offend the true believer among us, the true believer in the Apostle’s Creed or Trump or Evangelism or whatever. And I have sought not to offend those who do not like being lectured to (which includes all of us.)

But tonight, on this eve of finishing my 92^nd lap around the sun, and being elder of the clan, our current nonagenarian, I will take off self-constraints and tell you candidly what concerns me about us and this society that now belongs to you and your offsprings. And I will presume to tell you what you should do.

I’m not thinking about matters like global warming but, rather, about us as citizens of this 400-year-old experiment. Right now, it seems to me that we are f*****g up our system so badly (fouling, fiddling, FUBARing, use your own f word) that I am beginning to doubt Madison’s rebuttal – Federalist #10 -- to the argument that a democratic-republic cannot work in a large, dispersed, heterogeneous community. I still have hope that it can – and will again. I will tell you what I think you should do.

My first concern: we Americans have become crude and inured to behavior that would have drawn censure from my mother and probably yours. We turn a blind eye to vulgar flaunting of wealth, to seeking unethical advantage, to telling jokes about immigrants and anyone considered “other”, to turning away from people in need, to naked greed, to selfishness, to gratuitous violence – all too often committed by people who flaunt their Christianity -- too often, faux “Christianity.” For God's sake, let's all of us clean up our acts.

It is community we have turned our backs upon. In our exalting individual freedom, you and I have eroded our sense of and commitment to community; we have let self trump community. Time to re-build your community, however you constitute it. Get involved; take on a responsibility; volunteer to a committee, whatever.

Second, our understanding of the Declaration of Independence is scanty, at best. Thomas Jefferson’s sacred words in the declaration’s second paragraph, backed up by John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Livingston, and Roger Sherman representing defferent political views and values, are not mere cant but, rather, are directions. “All men are created equal” means that all must be respected and treated equally by us and all must be given equal opportunity to pursue their “safety and happiness.”

Next, I am concerned about how little is known of, and attention is paid to, The United Nation’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the crowning work of Eleanor Roosevelt (and a notable Cold War defeat for the Soviets.) We are a signatory to it, yet we have dishonored it again and again since 1948. It’s time to renew our commitment to it’s principals by adopting its articles as the platform of a pacificatory, progressive party. (Go and read it here.)

Next, I am concerned about our knowledge of and respect for history, ours and other countries’. From both there is much to be learned about evolving relations between citizens and their government.  Why did the Weimar Republic collapse? Why do ’racies’ arise again and again: like Aristocracy? Autocracy? Kleptocracy? Have Democracies ever been made to work? (And don’t tell me about Athens: Athens, where women citizens were not even allowed in the Bouleuterion or to appear in court, much less to vote. Meanwhile, Athenians' slaves cleaned, cooked and served their meals.)

We also must pay attention to current affairs; what can be learned from watching Erdogan, Magyar, Putin, Modi, General Sisi, Netanyahoo? It’s a rare autocrat who has his/her people’s welfare at heart; perhaps Ataturk was one such, maybe mis-guided Netanyahoo. But history tells of the many others who were clearly lusting for power, as were Hitler and Stalin. Others sought to build Empires by annexing or conquering territory and imposing his or her governance, as did Napoleon and the Great Khan. Yet others had their own welfare at heart: riches, advantages for himself, family, and sycophants: the amoral kleptocrat model we see in charge here today.

Of course, the worst of all would be an egomaniacal, empire-building, narcissistic, kleptocrat desperate for adulation, and lusting after power and Greenland.   

History and current events teach that rule of law for all is one protection from such ‘racies.’ but only if the independence of the courts is protected. If the ‘crat’, the autocrat or kleptocrat or even the democrat, enjoys an overwhelming majority in the legislature, that majority can and likely would alter and weaken the courts which are proving to be our guardians. The lower courts, that is; we have a Chief Justice willing to emasculate the lower courts in his career-long quest to legitimize a Unitary Presidency. May this, too, pass.

We must have a balance of views in a legislature; no one has a monopoly on best policies, on the correct political view. Don’t just vote the label; look at the character of the candidate seeking your endorsement and your entitlement. Be a Gamaliel of moderation and respect for the law.

We need to exult Cincinnatus, teach his example, and search for another such as him or her among our party leaders. Vance or Rubio ain’t it; Newsome or Sanders aren’t it. Maybe Whitmer or Moore? Rahm Emmanuel, as attractive as he is, isn’t a Cincinnatus. Perhaps my man Corey Booker? Maybe.

We must remind ourselves and these faux Christians among us that He taught us to welcome the stranger.  This means the immigrant and asylum-seeker.  And how else to bolster the population and our labor force? Encouraging women to become home-makers and baby-makers may be denying us 50% of the nation’s brain power and productivity -- and isn't going to replenish our labor force. Remind yourself where your grandparents and great-grands were born.

Universal day care/preschool would release from home detention those women among that 50% who want to work and raise a family. Universal day care and preschool enriches children lives and prepares them for learning and for collaboration in our society. For becoming educated. Support enrollment in the Dolly Parton Imagination Library and in TK programs. (Don’t know what they are? Look them up here and here.)

With regard to education: are you educated? Have you read or are familiar with Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex; with Steinbeck’s East of Eden?  I think there are only nine stories of which Fathers and Sons is but one. Others are Road Trip (The Odyssey – I found the Fagels translation the most accessible, Kerouac’s On the Road, Tolkien’s Lord of the Ring); Love (Romeo and Juliet, Maugham’s Of Human Bondage, Pasternak’s Dr. Zhivago); War (Caputo’s A Rumor of War, Homer’s The Iliad, Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage, Tolstoy’s War and Peace); Inanity of Life (Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, Heller’s Catch 22); Courage in Defeat (Hemingway’s For Whom The Bell Tolls, Heminway’s Old Man and the Sea, The Book of Job); Aging (Shakespeare’s King Lear, Stegner’s Crossing to Safety); Compulsion (Melville’s Moby Dick; Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment); Origins (Fuente’s Terra Nostra, The Book of Genesis, Silko’s Ceremony). Of course, the best of these fit into more than one category. If you haven’t read them, read them.

With AI taking on an increasing role in analysis and writing and coding, we’re going to need more philosophy and history majors asking why? Where do we want to go? And where have we been? We need to nominate and elect more senators like Patrick Daniel Moynihan, willing to work in either D or R administrations, to challenge and improve effectiveness, And we need more Richard Fenymans to ask the dumb or unaskable question. Ask the unaskable question of your Congressperson or at the next caucus.

We must restore and protect a level playing field in our political-economic system. Remember, even Adam Smith (not my congressman but the Scottish master of political-economy [what they called economics in those days.]) Even he, of Wealth of Nations and the Invisible Hand, called for government regulation of competition lest monopolists jigger the system and create uneven playing fields. Milton Friedman should have read Smith more carefully.

Well, I’m getting pretty heavy. I need to lighten up – Oh, and, yes, we need comedians to open our minds, perhaps even to lead us (Al Franken? Volodymyr Zelenski? Bill Maher?)

Remember also that Progressive is not a dirty word. It was first popularized by TR, a Republican. And Conservative is not, either; it means honoring the institutions that got us here and protecting and sustaining our core values. By those definitions, I am a liberal conservative democratic-republican. But be wary of simplistic labels.

Also, be wary of religions, which too often come to believe they guard the truth, the correct way. Follow whom you will: the Buddha, or Jesus of Nazareth, or Muhammad, or Aristotle, or Zoroaster, or Johanan ben Zakkai, or Adi Shankaracharya or whomever teacher you choose -- but don’t follow religions. For myself, I do not believe in the Apostle's Creed; therefore, I am not a Christian. Perhaps an agnostic fellow-traveller is a better descriptor.

Welcome and worry over the artist; what is s/he trying to say to us, to get us to see? Better yet, express yourself in art as many of us already do. The joy of expressing yourself in art – whether designing jewelry or painting or drawing or making prints or sculpting – is a balm in these rash and raucous times.

Well, It’s getting close to my bedtime, so the old gentleman will close by presuming to tell you what to do (as I warned you at the beginning and despite you don’t like being so told:

•         Value (and willingly pay your taxes for) education, especially of the very young, and of adults who think   they are finished with school.
•         Welcome the stranger.
•         Value diversity; tolerate it even when it makes you uncomfortable.
•         Be wary of organized religions.
•         Behave in ways your Mom and Miss Manners would approve.
•         Visit and ponder over a history museum and an art museum.
•         Believe that all men and women are created equal and do as that belief demands of you.
•         Value the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
•        Value marriage vows. Not married? Treat your partner as though you were (and behave toward s/he in     ways Miss Manners would approve.)
•         Believe that a "Democratic Republic is grounded on the sovereignty of the people” as John Ferland   says; and remember: we’re in charge. Vote.
•         And, especially, laugh. Don’t forget to laugh.

Good night.

“God bless us, everyone!”

C E Taylor

These sunny days on the patio with the sun fading southward somehow reminded me of my Grandparent’s place, Elhedo Lodge on Lake Moraine, near Hamilton, NY. I spent much of a sleepless last night thinking of Granddad C E Taylor. He used to tell visitors the lodge’s name was Onondagan, meaning welcome (but sometimes “in peace” crept into it; it varied from telling to telling.) None of which was true. The lodge was named for their daughters: my mother Eleanor, Aunt Helen, and Aunt Dorothy.

This was just one of CE’s many fibs and pranks and stunts. Like once a month playing 26 games of chess simultaneously at the St. Petersburgh Lawn Bowling Club. Or, at the St. Louis Worlds Fair, by stepping into and posing in a Madam Tussaud wax figure exhibit -- until an alarmed customer spotted the imposture and called the cops. Or, at the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1906, by pretending to print paper blanks into $5 bills from a hand-cranked, pocket printer. Real $5s were hidden in the roller, so he was, in fact, legal. This time, it was a storekeeper who called the cops.

My Grandparents settled in Earlville, in the Mohawk Valley of upstate New York. The village had a circular, bandstand park in the middle of town. CE, having been apprenticed to a blacksmith, a professional carriage horse trainer, and then obsoleted by the adoption of the automobile, opened the town’s first car dealership, around 1906. He would take one of his Franklins, set the choke or spark or whatever, set the steering wheel, put the car in gear, and step out, leaving the car all day circling the park on its own at 2 or so mph. That got villagers talking about Franklins and, shaking their heads with a wry smirk, about “that there CE.”

CE occasioned much scoffing in 1919 after the local paper reported that he had gone to Norwich and paid an outlandish $25 for a ride in a barnstorming WWI aeroplane. The next Friday, a bi-plane circled over the village, coming lower and lower apparently preparing to land in a meadow just east of town. Everyone rushed out to see the plane. And there was CE in a ticket booth selling 20-minute rides for $5. The plane rides continued Friday through Sunday. Sunday evening, CE and the pilot split their considerable take and the aeroplane flew off to home.

Autos and airplanes came, but CE never lost his love of horses, his tandem and pair rigs, and especially harness races with their trotters and pacers towing satellite sulkies. Grandpa took me to my first horse races, harness races at Vernon Downs. Bewitchingly beautiful -- but CE wouldn't let me bet: "Your Grandma would skin me alive if she learned I taught a grandson to bet on the ponies." 

Granddad wrote and published short stories in magazines such as Field and Stream and Outdoor Life. Mainly, stories about his beloved hounds and retrievers.

CE inspired us, The Super Seven cousins, to pursue our curiosity, to use our imagination, to find the humor. He loved adventure tales. CE introduced me to Richard Burton's books which eventually led to The Seven Pillars of Wisdom and, perhaps, to my propensity to fall in love with the likes of Bilbo Baggins and Frodo and all the rest; with Capt. Aubrey and Dr. Maturin; with Luke Skywalker and the Force. CE always had a full head of hair, an outrageous sweet tooth, and a pocket full of butterscotches or horhounds. 

CE created a rich and full life for his beloved Alice and for the rest of us until a broken hip took him off at age 90. Foks tell me I favor him, and so I try to do.

Hatreds May Fade Away But They Never Die

Yesterday was the 30^th anniversary of the massacre of Srebrenica. It passed with no apparent notice here, though there probably were in Bosnian neighborhoods of St, Louis, Chicago, Toronto, Utica, and elsewhere in the Bosnian diaspora. Some say 8,6000; others, 10,000 Muslim Bošnjaci were systematically assassinated, rank after rank, by Serbian Orthodox troops under command of a fellow, but Serbian Orthodox, Bosniak, General Ratko Mladić. Mladić also commanded Serbian troops during the siege of Sarajevo.

Also yesterday, appropriately, came word that General Ratko (isn’t that the right name for such as him?) Mladić, 83, had died while still imprisoned in the Hague. Mladić, hiding in rural Serbia, was captured in 2011 by Serbian security forces (at that time, Serbia was seeking admittance to the EU, and needed to be seen as reformed  – but is still awaiting admittance.) He was tried by the United Nations’ International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, convicted in 2017, and sentenced to life in prison. (As you probably know, the US has rejected membership in and refused to recognize authority of the UNICTs and of the International Criminal Court, not only passively citing our sovereignty but also undertaking active opposition, which has included sanctions, legal barriers, and non‑cooperation. Jack Smith’s service in the Hague as an ICC investigator and later as Chief Prosecutor of Kosovo War Crimes trials, is in the eyes of he who shall not be named and of MAGAs his “treason” to the US.

When Ann and I were in Sarajevo in 2019, we visited the Srebrenica Memorial Center, another of Europe’s many grim memorials to man’s bottomless capacity for inhumanity to his fellow man. The Center should be a required stamp for any tourist visa holder or penalty upon leaving Bosnia of a healthy fee. The exhibits and photos are stomach-churning, searing themselves into one’s memory. Unlike Buchenwald or Treblinka, slowly fading into ancient history in the minds of young people, Srebrenica is still fresh enough to be relevant, still horrific enough to chill the blood.

Can such happen again? Of course. The only thing we seem to learn from history is how not to learn from history. And in the case of the Balkans, these land of honey (bal) and blood (kans), hatreds do not die. They may fade away but they never die. If the Russia-Ukraine War spreads, it may be Serbia that brings it to the doorsteps of NATO (i.e., Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Croatia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Rumania, and Greece) via its dream of Greater Serbia throughout the peninsula. It is Ratko we should remember and vilify in our memories that this never happens again.

For more on the Balkans, read Rebecca West’s Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, A Journey Through Yugoslavia, as relevant today as when written on the eve of WWII. 

Je suis Canadien

 You’ve heard about Trump attacking Canada: fantasizing about it becoming one of our United States; trashing the tri-lateral trade agreement he signed with our two largest trade partners (yes, trade with Mexico and Canada are each larger than trade with China, and have been so for many years); and now putting punitive tariffs on Canadian products, claiming that our overall trade deficit with them and their attitude justify it. Take away our oil and electricity imports, however, and it turns out we have a manufactured goods trade surplus with Canada.

Trump is pissed at Mark Carney, first because of his speech at Davos calling for consortia of mid-sized economies to stand up to giants like the US, China, Germany and Japan; second, because of his rejection of Trump’s notion about Canada becoming part of or subservient to the US; and now, because he won’t roll over in Trump’s tariff war.

You’ve seen the headlines and perhaps short news clips of Carney’s speech to Canada. But until you see the whole of Carney’s speech, you don’t grasp what a powerful leader he is. My Vancouver (BC) friend Bryan R sent me the tape of his statement to the nation and his press conference. Here it is; the first 23 minutes are his views and report on why Canada is withdrawing from the trade talks and retaliating, dollar for dollar; the rest is press conference give and take: https://www.cpac.ca/headline-politics/episode/pm-carney-speaks-to-media-after-suspension-of-canada-us-trade-talks?id=6b77d2c2-d09d-47fb-9bf1-7c88f3c2445c.

 Take a look. Compare the Canadian leader behind his podium with ours. Their leader is articulate, smart and resolute; he is self-aware and self-controlled; he knows what his goals are and how to use his tools (e.g., dollar for dollar retaliation) to achieve them. He knows how to deal with a playground bully.

 And think about our Iran war; first we fight to close the Strait of Hormuz, next to keep it open, now to close it again. We achieved regime change, and now we face a more determined and radical regime than before. Meanwhile costs, interest rates, and inflation rise. What kind of leadership is that?

 A US/Canada trade war makes no sense. It is a trade war nobody can “win.” It raises the costs of living and of making – of food, gas, electricity, clothing, booze and beer, cars, lumber (for building new homes,) steel and aluminium (I said I was a Canadien), dairy products, beef, and all sorts of products. It hurts US households more than it does Canadian ones, but it hurts both sides.

I am a loyal American, but boy – do I ever admire Mark Carney and what Canada is doing and stands for. Compare how they handle immigration with our ICE-tyranny. Would that Mark Carney’s example embolden Republican Senators and Representatives to stand up and take charge. 

In the meantime, one of our granddaughters, a student at Toronto Metropolitan University, is awaiting her Canadian work permit and intends to eventualy become a Canadian citizen. Another loss for America.

When is Enough Enough?

 When is Enough Retribution Enough?

Retribution: isn’t that just a nice word for revenge? Netanyahu’s campaign is being defended and rationalized as destruction of Hamas and justifiable retribution for 7/10/’23. His campaign is being attacked as genocide of Arabs in Gaza and the West Bank, an unjustifiable retribution for 7/10/’23.

In 1943, the Nazi regime in Germany had instigated war and, as some people knew, was committing war crimes against their Jewish citizens, other minorities, and political opponents. “Bomber” Harris and General Spaatz collaborated on “strategic bombing” of Germany, a campaign aimed at destruction of war industries and, moreover, at demoralization of civilians -- a campaign rationalized in part as retribution. The Russians felt it; the western allies felt it – the satisfaction of revenge.  Hamburg, Dresden, Frankfort, Berlin, and other cities we obliterated; in all, 1,080,000 civilian casualties resulted, 300,000 killed and 780,000 wounded, in the bombings of Germany. 

After the war, a comprehensive US Government assessment, the US Strategic Bombing Survey, concluded that strategic bombing “significantly weakened Germany’s war economy” but “did not break civilian morale.” The campaign against civilians was defended by some as a strategic necessity and attacked by others as genocidal retribution.  

Is there a difference between then and now? How do Netanyahu and Major General Asor, head of Isreal’s Southern Command, which includes Gaza, differ from Roosevelt and General Spaatz, head of Strategic Air Command in WWII? Are they war heroes or war criminals?

When and how do you stop retribution? How much killing is enough? The Israelis lost 1,195 citizens on October 7^th; they have killed 72,000 Gazans since invading to eliminate Hamas – and to exact retribution?

How does one cease retribution, to declare over and enough? Especially in a democratic republic where leaders draw their legitimacy from a majority of the electorate? If people want revenge, they must have it – unless.

Unless there is a leader, a movement, a spiritual wave that eschews hate and revenge.  Jesus taught love of enemy. The Buddha taught that hatred is never appeased by hatred. Muhammud taught that forgiveness is superior to retaliation; that violence is only justified against attackers and that violence against civilians and non-combatants, especially women and children, is forbidden. Rabbinic law replaces ayin tachat ayin, an eye for an eye, with compensation, measure for measure.

The best way out of retribution is to never enter into it. More easily said than done, obviously. Humans are wired for revenge – an eye for an eye appears in the Code of Hammurabi, in the Torah, and later in the Bible books of Exodes, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. But the bloodbaths of the 20thC should have taught us that vengeance, retaliation, revenge doesn’t work. In the end, the vengeful are as wounded as their victims, if not more so, and the victims will spawn multitudes seeking their vengeance in turn.

Ghandi said “an eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.” Confucious said “before taking vengeance, dig two graves”. Netanyahu isn’t listening. The new ayatollah isn’t listening. Trump isn’t hearing. What other world leader will lead his people into vengeful victimhood, into the dead-end of retaliation? Who will have the strength of character to say “no, enough”?

You'll Never Guess What I'm Reading

A few years back, I was privileged to work on some tricky issues with a very gifted woman, my successor as President of the Board of Horizon House, Karen Lane Rahm. Aside from her various public service roles, she was curious and adventurous. (After she termed out of the Horizon House Board, she went to live in Paris for six months to polish her French and wrote charmingly of her explorations in a series of posts she called "Karen at Large.")

Somehow, one day, we talked of books and she mentioned belonging to an Anthony Trollope reading club. In my ignorance, I was astounded; I had read Trollope's Barchester Towers as a junior in high school, but assumed no one today bothered with that 19thC relic. I could remember nothing whatsoever about it and had only a vague sense that I had found it of no interest whatever. Callow youth.

Well, a few years ago, I undertook to re-read what I read or should have read those 75 or 70 years ago. I learned by these re-visits that my high school and college professors knew what they were about. I have re-read Moby Dick, Gulliver's Travels, Don Quixote, The Book of Job, Magic Mountain, You Can't Go Home Again and several others. (I also am now re-re-reading the Fagles translation of The Odyssey.) 

Last year, I came across a reference to Trollope's Palliser series of novels, so in honor of Karen, I decided to explore why such a keen intellect as hers would be enthused by an obscure 19thC English novelist, one whose works on Kindle were listed at $0 or a buck or so. I downloaded and opened Phineas Finn, the Irish Member because it appeared to be about English politics. And, indeed, it absolutely delighted me with its sly wit and descriptions of the foibles, pretentions, and posturings of upper class England. I found myself chuckling again and again; Trollope is funny!

Now I'm hooked. I'm 2/3rds through Can You Forgive Her? (1865), which preceded Phineas Finn in the series. Four to go. 

I am sure that this admission will not surprise my buddies but merely confirm, for them, their assessment of Fletch, their weird friend. So be it. 

In the Present

In these fraught times, one side is promising something wonderful about the future while the other, something horrible. Or one side is blaming the other for something in the past and and the other in turn, finding something new to blame the first for. One side magnifies past sins of the other, while the other heaps blame upon the first. Both make grandiose promises about the future.

Past or future; we need to stop for a moment and call out something uplifting from the present that we all can share, especially this semiquincentennial weekend (who came up with that!) Let me suggest:                 

    Oh beautiful, for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain.

    For purple mountains' majesties above the fruited plains. 

    America, America, God shed his grace on thee

    and crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea.

Words by Katherine Lee Bates in 1895 and set to the music Materna, composed by Samuel A. Ward in 1892. 

America the Beautiful says it all to me, plus I can sing it. And it isn't rooted in conflict, in bloody Fort McHenry or any other conflict. No having to extol courage under fire. We've had enough of bombs bursting in air. 

Of course there are many who have doubts about that brotherhood stuff; I can think of a couple whose initials are SM and JDV. Invariably, such patriots consider themselves good Christians, i.e., good Catholics or good Protestants -- or good Buddhists or good Hindus or good Muslims or good whatevers, despite that their creeds endorse universal brotherhood. These folks have been steeped in suspicion of the other, in dislikes of strange names or odd (to them) hats or foods or worship. (We're suspicious of their foods until one of them opens a hot restaurant in town.) 

Well, I've wandered away from something many of us should be able to agree on here in the present: America has beauty inherent in her. 

Let's work together to make it manifest once again.

        PS Ann points out to me that over half of the USMNT are immigrants.