DEFEAT FASCISM

 I'm not prescient, or smart, or highly educated. Well, that last I am by the standards of my state. But after the Covid epidemic slowed, and people got checks, my nephew and I decided that there was money to be made in day-trading stocks of sound, but undervalued, retail companies.

The decision rewarded us quite well. When, unlike Elon Musk, I decided I had enough, I ceased the enjoyment and concentrated on Life-Partner, her animals, and my guitars. By then, fixed-income vehicles had moved into yields of nearly five percent. Following conventional advice (I ain't smart enough to figure it out on my own) I moved us from equities (except for that little percentage on the top of the investment pyramid that can't hurt but might provide some fun in the autumn days of life) and sat back.

Now that America has chosen a band of thugs, charlatans, neo-Nazis, and grifters to run the three branches of government, I realize how temporarily fortunate I am. I say temporarily for I know I talk too much for them to grant me immunity for long. So these days I enjoy my good fortune and work on what I'll utter as my last when they line me up against the wall. I've narrowed it down to:

(1) Foxtrot Delta Tango
(2) I told you so.
(3) What were you thinking?
(4) You gotta hate people of color awfully bad for this, and
(5) Would someone please buy Donald Trump a banjo?

I guess the bottom line is that choosing someone to govern the country ain't like picking a favorite on a reality-TV show. Too bad 77,302,580 Americans didn't figure that out in time.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 When I was eleven years old, a beloved English teacher suggested I read “Jane Eyre.” When I said that I didn’t like books written by women, she told me that I was “too smart to be prejudiced.”

I looked up the word and contemplated it. I allowed it to change my path in life, a journey that led me from Brontë to Zora Neale Hurston and Sylvia Plath, among so many others, not to even mention James Baldwin.

I think I wasn’t as prejudiced as I was badly programmed.

Now, I’m afraid that we are losing the ability to see progressions in language, vis-à-vis, the journey from unlearned, to badly influenced, to prejudiced, to ethnocentric, to xenophobic, to bigoted, to paranoid, and, finally, to racist.

The labeling of any nuanced action as the unassailable extremity of racism seems, at least to me, to pass over so many lesser manifestations that might possibly be treatable via gentle teaching, thus halting a journey that is bound to end badly. There should be a hole in the prison wall of distrust through which one could escape ere hatred takes hold.

Failure may doom us as a society if we force the young to choose poorly and permanently, via the placing of labels. We begin life so full of wonder. What happens along way?

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 There’s a French term: “L'esprit de l'escalier” or  ”staircase wit” meaning the predicament whereby one thinks of the perfect reply too late, i.e. as when going down the stairs. One for me in 2024 came from overhearing two well-educated young men discussing the upcoming 2024 presidential election.

“I don’t like either candidate,” one said.

“I don’t either,” the other said, leaving the conversation hanging like the Sword of Damocles.

Many times since, I’ve wished I’d said something along the lines of:

Fellers, it’s not a popularity contest.

It’s not a reality-TV show where the principles of theater determine a winner.

It’s not an issue to be regarded as lightly as choosing a coffee shop.

It is the result of a hard-fought battle that allows you to cast a vote for the future of your country.

It requires complex analysis in determining which party, admitting neither meets our beliefs exactly, will leave our country in better shape.

On a planet with probably less than 100 years of sustainable life remaining, it is a chance to choose leaders that may try to lengthen that life.

It is a chance to choose a party that will offer succor to "the least of those among us," for your near ancestors were likely among that group for a time.

It is a change to pay homage to decency in America.

It is complex situation like the Greek myth of Scylla and Charybdis in which a choice must be made between two less than perfect outcomes.

You men will not face the situation I faced in which a faceless Draft Board could send your young bodies to war. But you face your own test of love of country. For goodness sake, treat it with the respect it deserves. Your children and grandchildren demand it of you.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 An acquaintance of mine, formerly a friend, finished a long career recently in the federal government caring for “the least of those among us.”

If that person was still employed, at any moment a 19-year-old thug could walk in, tell them that they were fired, their email was discontinued, and they had only a few minutes to exit the workplace.

The odd thing is the fact that the person is a confirmed MAGAT, dedicated to supporting the dismantling of America government. The only discernable reason is adherence to a set of life-rules set down by anonymous bronze-age scribblers.

Aliens of the future who study the ashes of this planet will shake whatever serves as their heads at findings like this.

DEFEAT FASCISAM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Isn't it odd that the MAGAs never offer a precise date at which America was so great? You know, the time they want to return to.

Seems that they indicate somewhere in the 1950s. Or was it in 1981 when the last recorded lynching took place in America, an affair in the MAGA state of Alabama.

Nah, I don't think MAGAs, particularly in my state, would connote greatness with the end of lynchings.

Should we eliminate the years from 1955 to 1975. That's when young men were being forced to go to war, many, including me, against their will. But wait, that didn't affect most of them, particularly the leaders. So maybe.

Or 1963 when Lee Harvey Oswald killed President John F. Kennedy? Nah, a step in the right direction, but that brought in LBJ and passage of the Civil Rights Act.

I guess it was the Reagan years when we had a stock market crash, increased deficits, and felonious activities emerging from the White House.

At any rate, do they not realize that whatever date they choose, the very safeguards that they are now bent on destroying were then in place?

Wait. Do they mean the 1850s?

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

Real men do things differently than do charlatans. Take, for example, Dwight D. Eisenhower. When he was General Eisenhower (five-star) and Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in he directed the Allied invasion of France in June 1944.

As author Steve Drummond points out in his engaging book “The Watchdog – How the Truman Committee Battled Corruption and Helped Win World War Two” the invasion, despite modern mythology, was far from a certain success.

As a result, General Eisenhower did what real men do. He accepted the possibility of failure and made sure where the blame would lie. In one of the most famous speeches never given, he penned the following and put it in his wallet, just in case.

“Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available. The troops, the air and the navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.”

Try as we might, we could never, had our imaginations been gifted for a moment with the talents of a Shakespeare, imagine the present goofball, who some call the President of the United States of America, achieving such a pinnacle of manhood.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 What is bothering me today is this question of America’s enemies. My country had me, along with hundreds of thousands of my peers, fighting them during four of the peak years of my life. Now just who was the enemy at the time for me and the others?

They say it was the Vietnamese.

I don’t think so.

Vietnam was the excuse.

The real enemy was Russia. The two countries were fighting it out by proxy. China was on the sidelines, pitching in and hoping both of the others would lose. Sound familiar?

In my opinion, as one who had a vested interest in the affair:

We, including those whose names are on The Wall, were fighting Russia. Now, after more than 50 years, Russia has won.

Will Trump and Musk scrape the names off The Wall?

Or will they just fire the ones responsible for its care?

Either way, betrayal is a hard pill to swallow. Just my opinion. Share yours if you wish.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Some years ago, when my country demanded it of me, I spent four years of my life, one in a war zone, helping protect the world from Russian thugs. To a large extent, and according to general consensus, we failed when the country we defended yielded to Communism.

In a larger context, though, we and our country accomplished much in a global economic sense. The U.S.S.R. supported the country where we fought and that support, accompanied by other efforts at world domination, cost a lot. In short, we bled Russia dry. Our system worked. Hers didn't.

And the wall came tumbling down. A global power saw itself demolished from within.

But wait.

The idea of destruction from within took sprout like a spring seed planted in warm soil.

If guns and cannons didn't work, what might? Could it be money? The lure of wealth and power is much greater than love of country. Why not try it?

We now, therefore, sit seemingly helpless as our country, the beloved one to whom I gave those four years, falls from a rot within. We may be one of the few countries in history that chose its destruction in a fair election. Russia will gloat as she changes the flag I love. I'm too old to care.

But I do.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 I'm not the best or most decent person, so don't take this as so-called "virtue signaling." Back during the Covid 19 crisis, though, when they sent us all money, I was afraid to go out and spend mine. Instead, I sent it to a nonprofit here that I know serves "the least of those among us."

I did profit though. I sat down and got to thinking. I decided there were a lot of people who were, in fact, gonna go out and spend theirs. I started researching retail outlets and made a list of those who were solid but whose stock was temporarily undervalued. I concluded that a little bump in America's spending habits had the potential for making money.

In short, I did some day trading. Made nearly $30,000 ere things started cooling off. We're living comfortably now, partly assisted by that windfall. Periodically I send part of it to that same nonprofit.

How come I trust it? I first saw the man who created it years ago at a festival walking around with a basket attached with a sign asking for money for the poor. Later, I decided that an organization founded by such a man could be trusted.

Now a majority of Americans place that kind of trust in people who inherited their money, not the ones who walked the streets like the Galilean asking us to remember the needy. It has brought America to an ugly place.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Sometimes when Spring is about to break out and the winter sun moderates, I think of one of the two men who influenced my life the most, particularly the one who spent the winter of 1944-45 in the Ardennes fighting the Nazis. I remember some of the things he told over the supper table or while we were tending cattle.

When quietly sitting and watching patches of sunlight break through a tree line. "That always reminds me of seeing those parachutes hanging from the trees."

On artillery barrages: "You just prayed to live one more second, just one more second."

On fear: "The ones who got killed were the new ones who would freeze when they told us to move up."

On karma: "It was during the last couple of days of the war. We were camped at a spa in Germany and the Germans were up in the hills. They would lob a shell over from time to time, just getting rid of their ammunition. One landed near us in the chow line and took the head off of a man just standing there. And he was the shortest guy in the company."

On life: "It's hard to kill a man. It's amazing how much a person can take."

On luck: I was by a window when the shell landed. Shrapnel hit me all over but I survived it. There was an iron stove across the room that was completely destroyed."

On Russians: "They would ask us, after the war, "What you gonna do when we come after you?"

It may be best that he is not alive to see what they are doing to the country he defended.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 How do we know when we are rich? Does it occur when we purchase that home we’ve always dreamed of, or that automobile? Does it occur when we find we have the largest bank account in the neighborhood or that our children dress the best?

Is it when we realize that we have enough? Is it when we have plenty?

Apparently not: the richest man in the world, and his billionaire sidekicks have it all but still want more.

Perhaps the more proper question is: What does it mean to be rich?

My Sainted Mother once told me that the day she felt she might not be poor all her life was the day her family acquired an electric butter churn. Don’t ask.

A dear friend, born in El Paso, Texas to an Hispanic family told me of his memories as a young child when his family shared, with three other families, a fourth of the covered bed of a farm truck as they followed the harvest across America. He gestured to a modest home smiled and said, “And look what we have now.”

Is that being rich?

A man grew up in our county with barely just enough mental capacity to hold a job, marry, and raise a family. He was quiet and friendly and folks didn’t think about him much until they needed help with a minor task, assistance in mending malfunctioning equipment, or a hand in treating livestock. they might ask him for a ride to church or to pick up groceries for them. He was just a face in the community and easy to forget until he died of cancer.

That’s when those headed to his funeral found that, although they arrived early, the church had already filled to overflowing and the nearest parking spot was a quarter of a mile away. That’s when folks remembered him and a kindness he had once done them.

Ya’ll think whatever you want, but for me that man died a richer person than Elon Musk will ever be.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Maybe the question isn’t why 77,302.580 Americans came to believe that Donald Trump and Elon Musk are exemplary beings who should rule the country. Perhaps a more suitable question is: how?

I’m certainly not smart enough to figure it out. There were signs, though. Had I been attentive, I might have noticed. For example:

Knowledge had outrun our ability to reason. We treasure, almost above anything, our cell phones. They developed from science and stole our minds and hearts. They didn’t help most, though, better understand how we evolved from blue algae to minds that created nuclear bombs and the Jupiter Symphony in a brief galactic period of less than five billion years.

It’s as if our minds are like buildings that soar hundreds of stories into the sky but rest on no foundation of bedrock.

Today's challenge: Read

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 There comes a time when being nice won’t overcome evil. That time has come. I may become physically ill if I hear another person advise me to respect the opinions of others.

-          Should I respect the opinions of members of a cult that denigrates the heroism of John McCain?

-          Should I respect the opinions of members of a cult that mocks a disabled person on national TV?

-          Should I respect the opinions of members of a cult that calls my brother and sister veterans who died for this country “suckers and losers?”

-          Should I respect the opinions of members of a cult that attacked the United States Capitol, maimed police officers, and defecated on the floors of that national symbol of America?

-          Should I respect the opinions of members of a cult that is now destroying so many aspects of what made America great with a promise, to the deluded, that it will make America great?

No, there is a tipping point at which decent America must say:

-          Please, have you no sense of decency?

-          We will move toward the enemy until all are free.

-          Those children will go to decent schools.

-          A woman will have the same freedom with her body as a man.

-          Nice won’t get it. Nazi Germany fell not from having people be nice to it but by brave men assaulting the beaches with armaments made by their brave wives, sisters, and daughters.

-          The last vestiges of slavery ended not from respect for opinions but from the bravery of young children who marched into schools amidst curses and jeers.

One of the most popular books published in America on changing opinions was How To Win Friends and Influence People written by former salesman Dale Carnegie. In it he listed some 21 ideas to avoid conflict, from “Don’t criticize condemn or complain” to “Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view.” His readers have a attested to their efficacy for nearly 100 years.

It was long whispered, however, among the campfires of the faithful, that even Dale Carnegie sometimes joked that he might have included a final chapter that read: “When all else fails.”

The time has come to rebuke the acts of the unrighteous. To hell with being nice.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Hope evades us in these times. Where do we find inspiration when the forces of darkness rule every turret?

Perhaps from sources near us.

How about our brothers and sisters of color? They have survived over 400 years of persecution. On that path, they excelled in every field in which they were allowed to participate. Take sports, for example. Their excellence now forces us to place an asterisk beside the name of any white star who didn’t face athletes of color.

Their music formed the basis of many of our prevalent styles of popular entertainment.

The literature they managed to leave floats like sparkles of gems on a sea of mediocrity.

They flew, sailed, and fought heroically for a nation that despised and abused them.

After the trench warfare of WWI, the invasion at Normandy, the Chosin Reservoir, and the Ia Drang valley, they weren't allowed to vote when they came home.

They excelled in countless important achievements in America history for which they received no credit.

To teach youth about the acknowledgement of their many contributions is against the law in my state and forbidden in more and more instances at the federal level.

Their descendants today have grandparents who weren’t allowed to sit in the ground floor of a movie theater or enter the front door of a restaurant.

Ad nauseum.

Yet they have survived. As the darkness descends upon us, let us ask them how.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 America needs some heroes. These days remind one of an old western movie. You know, the one where the bad guy has no moral restraint and holds his pistol to the heroine’s head. Despite the potential consequences, the hero drops his gun and yields. Righteous heroes, the ones bound by morality, do that.

Justice comes nonetheless. Sometimes through what the ancients called a “deus ex machina,”  literally “a god from a machine,” or an unexpected solution to a problem or a contrived ending to a story.

-          The hero’s Quaker wife, who has lived a live free of violence and has never held a gun, shoots one of the bastards from afar.

-          The gun misfires.

-          A distant sidekick solves the dilemma.

-          The townsfolk converge to convince the terrorist of his doubtful future.

America stands on threshold of disaster now. The fascists who have pushed her to the edge have no moral compunction whatsoever against pushing her into oblivion. Their long-range plans lie far beyond the borders of a single country.

Those who would defend Democracy, only slightly less in number, stand paralyzed by their opponents’ lack of morality-based restraint.

There will not be a deus ex machina described in the history of our nation.

We need some good guys.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Presidents Day. America has benefited from some great presidents. She has suffered, and now suffers, from some stinkers.

We attribute great events to great individuals such as presidents. Some thinkers, however, like Leo Tolstoy, didn’t subscribe to what was known in his day as, “The Great Man Theory.” Rather than the actions of one person shaping history, he attributed events to the combined action of hundreds of thousands of individuals.

Let’s look at perhaps our greatest president, Abraham Lincoln. During his term of involvement, the union was saved and slavery, one of the darkest spots in America, ended. He receives much of the credit. But what else happened that may have influenced, at least to some degree, these admirable things?

-          An obscure woman wrote a book called “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”

-          Another obscure woman taught us the value of freedom by her work in the Underground Railroad.

-          A group of elderly men sitting on the United States Supreme Court ruled that American people of African descent enjoyed no benefits of citizenship.

-          Thousands of property owners in the American South performed such mendacious deeds on fellow human beings as to arouse the indignation of the righteous.

-          Over two million American men, for that many different reasons, donned the uniform of the United States of America to defeat insurrection and save the Union.

-          Thousands of leaders in Europe and elsewhere declined to support a group of rebels waging war against their mother country in order to preserve the institution of slavery.

And so it goes. Where does greatness lie?

Within each of us, that’s where.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Useful idiots abound these days, unfortunately on both sides of the political spectrum. It is a term that originated with Russians Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin, mega-madmen who raised mass genocide in the pursuit of power to a level not to be matched until Pot Pol arrived on the scene in Cambodia. It refers to those who help maintain power but aren’t part of the inner circle of actors.

A more apt descriptor might be “useful idiot” for we cannot assume these folks are stupid. Rather, they are sometimes quite intelligent enablers who do not consider the harmful effects of a given cause, political or otherwise. They attribute to a given cause its positive effects. They ignore the harmful, even disastrous effects.

The tragic aspect is that they exist on both extremities of rational behavior and can join hands to place pure evil into power.

On the far right, useful fools pursue the eradication of a women’s choice for abortion to the extent of supporting laws that subject a 12-year-old to the bearing of a rapist’s child.

On the far left, they respond to the actions of a renegade police officer by supporting the demolition of entire commercial areas of a city by mobs screaming, “Defund the police.”

Sadly, we have reached a point in our approach to universal problems such as inadequate health care, lack of housing, crime, and poverty that we now cling to the far margins of rational thought.

Imagine the process of addressing of cognitive thought to solving a problem.  Our workspace is a long spectrum of analysis allowing for major complexities. Take the issue of immigration, for example.

On one far end the useful idiots scream “open borders.”

On the other far end the useful idiots scream “concentration camps, walls, and machine gun nests.”

Any person advocating an approach lying somewhere in between based on logical thinking and compromises encounters vicious, sometimes career-ending attacks on their personal and professional stature. Moving even beyond the strictures of Mafia doctrine, even family members and friends lie within the field of fire.

Fascists love the strife and opportunity caused by this dialectic.

It has placed America in her current condition of impending doom and will get worse as we end progressive education and replace it with indoctrination based on loyalty to the forces in power (FOP).

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 It seems unlikely that we’ll have elections anymore, not like we used to. Events point that way, at least to me. Why? It’s something that a columnist said once. I think it was George Will and it occurred at the height of Newt Gingrich’s power. He was altering forever, and for the worse, the stature of political discourse in America. He was drunk on success as was the political party he managed. Known as part of a group of sycophants known as “Reagan’s Robots” he saw a country not governed by thought and compromise but by one-party rule with his party ruling forever.

Then the columnist said something prescient. He said a ruling party should always temper its actions based on the understanding that the opposition party might be in charge someday and use the same power and tactics.

In other words, what happens when your enemies enter your castle and seize your weapons?

I think this current bunch, at least some within it, is smart enough to know that. With that knowledge and the power they have built with help from controllers of information outlets posing as news sources, there is little indication that they will countenance competition. Why should they?

They have the police.

They are assuming control of the military.

They have both houses of Congress.

They have the United States Supreme Court.

They have the money.

They have a large base that has eliminated morality and ethics from its religious beliefs.

They have control over the flow of what is called information in this age.

They have blame-victims aplenty to instigate fear among the populace.

They have an embedded belief that there is never enough wealth or power.

Conclusion? Anything resembling a popular election must go. It should be easy in the great scheme of things.

Hitler proved that.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 The point of America’s greatness is a personal one. Some moments that stand out to me may not stir the emotions of others. For example:

I think America was headed toward greatness when the troops of Generals George Meade and Ulysses S. Grant’s army had fought their way through The Wilderness, having suffered great losses, learned, that instead of retreating back to Washington as lesser leaders would have commended, Grant ordered them to head toward the insurrectionist army to restore our Union and end slavery.

I think America was on the verge of greatness when Lincoln delivered his second inaugural address.

I think America saw greatness during the first 100 days of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration.

I think America was great the day that, after allied troops that had landed in Normandy during the year before, America’s 79^th Infantry Division troops, my future father-in-law among them, crossed the Rhine River and became among the first Allied troops to enter Nazi Germany.

I think America was great the day that Joseph Welch initiated the end of the hateful and destructive career of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy with the words, “You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency?”

I think America turned toward greatness the day that nine of the bravest young Americans who ever blessed this country entered Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, my home state.

And I think America became great the day that Barack Obama took the oath of office as her president.

Sadly, the people who rule my America today would have me arrested and punished for expressing these thoughts. Feel free to share your own.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

Make America great again: The slogan that killed a dream. A nation died while we searched for a moment, the moment when America was her greatest.

Was America greatest when the troops of George Washington crossed the Delaware River and won a victory that energized her revolution? Patriots would have it so.

Was America greatest when her Supreme Court issued the Dred Scott decision which stated that African slaves and their descendants were not considered citizens of the United States and therefore could not sue in federal court, essentially declaring that enslaved people had no legal rights to protection under the Constitution? Our current administration thinks it so, wishing to apply it now to the country’s first inhabitants.

Many Americans now think greatness occurred sometime in the 1950s. That is when income tax rates were near their highest, and

-         when citizens were being slain in the South for aspiring to vote,

-         when our children faced a life in iron lungs as a result of polio,

-         when women couldn’t obtain credit on their own,

-         when young men faced the military draft to go unwillingly into undeclared and unmotivated wars,

-         when veterans who had fought for America in WWII and in Korea faced denial of the GI Bill of Rights due to the color of their skin,

-         when drafty, leaky, shabby, and unsafe houses were good enough for some, and

-         when education in America existed on a binary system of quality.

Moments are difficult to pinpoint. Defining them requires thought, bravery, and compassion. America was at her greatest when these factors came into play, long ago in a country far away.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RISIST

 It is an evolutionary irony that those to whom America has been most generous are now the chief demons of her destruction. Perhaps it goes back to our primal instinct to gorge on food when the supply was always unpredictable. Plenty never seems enough to those who have it.

It wouldn’t seem to come from our religious background. In the Christian gospels, for example, Luke 12:48 states, "From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked."

Later, the phrase Noblesse Oblige was a byword for any noble action of merit. Translating to "nobility obliges", the words represent the idea that nobility has an obligation to demonstrate impeccable conduct and to protect and serve one's subordinates.

Even the military seems rooted in the concept. From and address by Col J. D. Willis, commander of the Air Force’s 17th Training Group:

“Gen. George S. Patton, the WWII-era general known for his bluntness and battlefield acumen, espoused one component of Noblesse Oblige when he stated 'you are always on parade.' An effective leader must always conduct him or herself in a manner they would like their subordinates to emulate.”

We have arrived in America at a point where the rule of conduct for our present leaders is that power is  granted for one’s self-aggrandizement and profit. It also serves to reward the loyal, notwithstanding their use of the favors granted.

The concept of "Noblesse Oblige" historically meant that nobility had obligations to give. In modern society, it means each person sharing his/her special talents or gifts. Unfortunately, our present rulers exhibit no special talents other than those of using inherited wealth for the purpose of making more money, building power, and punishing those with differing opinions.

What a model for our youth to emulate.

DEFEAT FASCISM: READ REBUKE RESIST

 Andrew Jackson, the presidential model of the Musk/Trump regime, defied the Supreme Court by refusing to enforce its decision in the case of "Worcester v. Georgia." This bit of history includes the famous statement by Jackson regarding the Supreme Court Chief Justice: "John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it."

Similarly, Joseph Stalin dismissed the power of religion when he asked, “How many divisions does the Pope have?”

We have assumed that an heroic stand by a few brave attorneys, and the adherence to the Rule of Law by the lower courts, may be the only effective protection has against the onslaught being waged against America.

It is a vaguely comforting thought.

Until …

Until we consider that we may be erroneously assuming that Elon Musk and Donald Trump have any intention of abiding by any set of laws.

To wit:

The police lobby has registered its support of the regime.

The former TV pundit running the Defense Department has demonstrated the future of an officer who doesn’t subscribe to the party’s dictates.

A snap of the finger will produce from the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate a slate of supporting litigation mimicking the Nuremburg Laws.

Any case that should reach the United States Supreme Court is pre-adjudicated to support the current administration.

There may, in fact, be enough power over enough states to dismantle the United States Constitution.

A slight majority of American voters support this.

A slight minority of American voters don’t, but face the obstacle outline above.

A significant segment of American voters don’t care one way or another.

A deplorable segment of American youth will believe whatever their cell phones tell them in lieu of braving the elements and the forces of darkness to protest.

Is political overreach the only possible salvation for our country?

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 A hitchhiking dog? You may not believe it. My wife doesn’t believe it. No friend in years has believed it, but it is true. My shipmates and I once had a dog that would hitchhike whenever he chose.

It was like this. I was part of a security detail of a Navy communications compound on Monkey Mountain on the south side of Da Nang harbor. There were five compounds on the mountain and we were third from the top. The Air Force occupied the highest elevation, then the Marines, and then us, We had a lovable shaggy dog named Charie, first name Victor.

Well Charlie liked to go, on occasion, to the base of the mountain and visit friends. When the urge occurred, he would stand outside our perimeter on the only road serving the mountain and, before long, someone would pick him up.

Later, a vehicle would stop outside our gate, the driver would wave, and out would hop our canine shipmate. Most everyone on the mountain knew him by name, Charlie, first name Victor.

Once, when he had been below for an afternoon, a Marine deuce-and-a-half came roaring by like it was trying to outrun an AK 47 round. A few minutes later we heard it grind to a stop and shift into reserve. Soon, it backed up to our gate.

Yep. A door opened and out jumped Charlie. He wagged thanks and trotted in with his “ready for supper” look.  The driver, a newbie, explained that he thought he was rescuing a stray and was going to make him a Marine until he passed our compound whereupon Charlie began to express his displeasure in the best of nautical terms. The driver even asked us what an “effing fenderhead” was.

Home is the sailor, home from the sea. I think we operate under conflicting urges, one to seek adventure and one to come home when the adventure is done. I learned that from Charlie, first name Victor. America is on an adventure now and we can only hope she chooses to come home soon. If a dog can, America can.

Why will people believe Donald Trump and Elon Musk are decent human beings but won’t accept this lovable bit of history? I guess if a Fox entertainment pundit told it, they would.

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 Many of the kids I grew up with had fathers who had served in World War Two. Some were missing their fathers who were among those for whom a tiny portion of a foreign field will forever be America. Two I remember had fathers who couldn’t hold jobs because they were drunkards. Yes, we call it “alcohol abuse now.” It makes it sound like eating too much pie at Thanksgiving. Euphemisms assuage guilt.

A store in my hometown sold military surplus equipment which we saved our pennies to buy. Back yards rang with our sounds as we donned backpacks, strapped on ammo belts, and charged enemy foxholes brandishing our mock M-1 training rifles affixed with plastic bayonets.

It was a good time to be proud of America.

Then came Korea. When those brave men came home, they didn’t talk about it much. No one seemed quite sure why they went or what they accomplished. Americans soon forgot about them.

All of a sudden, the equipment wasn’t surplus junk. The weapons weren’t make-believe training pieces. Everything was real. It was our turn to go.

Donald Trump bought his way out. Americans now love him for it.

Many of us went despite our misgivings. Americans have never forgiven us for it.

Do we hate them for it? No. They are inconsequential. We still love America and it breaks our hearts to see the curtains being drawn closed.

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People are now saying call your congressman. My congressman went to the Dark Side on January 6, 2021 and voted to overthrow a legitimate election. Although a flood of calls has flooded and blocked the congressional phone lines, there is no indication that our current slate of elected officials pay the least attention to the cares and concerns of their electors, as long as they have Elon Musk and Fox Entertainment on their side.

My advice? Postcards.

They won’t open letters. Calls are easily ignored. Postcards demand, and receive, at least a glance.

No, the elected officials will never see them. But a young person who became seduced by the sweet music of fascism will. Is there a chance for a Thomas Becket Moment or a flash of moral clarity? Maybe, just maybe. A multitude begins with one person.

What should the postcard say? I prefer courtesy as in, “Your mendacious approach to your honored officed has produced one positive outcome. It motivates me to send money to institutions who will resist you and your cause in the lower courts. A few brave attorneys now stand between your fascist army and my America. I choose to support America as I once did years ago.”

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 Back in the day, I lived in San Francisco for a short while. Enjoyed life there. Who wouldn't? It was during the height of the so-called "hippie movement" and I was avid observer. I lived practically across the street from Panhandle Park where Ken Kessey and his "Merry Pranksters" did their act. It was, as they used to say, "A hoot."

Entertainment was plentiful and cheap. I particularly liked the shows in North Beach put on by the drag queens. It was a harmless and creative type of humor, designed to make people feel better.

The Draft Board interrupted my carefree life. Before long I wound up on a bunker at the edge of the jungle on a mountain overlooking the Da Nang harbor hoping I wouldn’t get shot. The watches were six hours long and one was from midnight until 0600. It was particularly demanding. I did exercises to stay awake. One was to make a mental list of people in my life who had done me wrong and another of those who had done me “solids.”

The drag queens never made the first list, but a lot of politicians and self-proclaimed Christians did. Funny how the people on that list never went away but are still around in the same form with different faces, most of them snarling.

You didn't become a fascist because you love Jesus. Admit it. The Sermon on the Mountain makes you nauseated.

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 Dark days are ahead for America’s military. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, by assaulting retired Joint Chiefs Chairman General Mark Milley (four stars) delivered a stern message to officer corps of the United States military: “I now control your careers, so decide today whom you will serve.”

It takes very little imagination to think of the next step. “Don’t think of resigning. I need you and should you desert me, I can’t be responsible for your family’s future. You do have a nice family, don’t you?”

Thus the future of our military is not set by study of Clausewitz, history, or the brilliant staff of the war colleges.

The guidance of our military is now based more on the TV series, The Sopranos.

 

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We've demeaned them over the years. We've ridiculed them. We've made the butts of our jokes. And yes, we've even said that a hundred of them chained to the bottom of the ocean would be a "good start."

We've quoted Shakespeare out of context to suggest killing them all to solve a crisis.

Yes, I'm talking about attorneys, lawyers, counselors, ambulance chasers, Perry Masons.

Where are we today? The takeover of Germany by the Nazis in the 1930s is being replayed on the streets of America. The clowns have taken over the circus. As my late friend Gary "Doc" Toler said, "It's a different picture in a different frame." Despair settles on us like a freezing fog. Where shall we turn?

In one of those strange circumstances History plays upon us now and then, we scream for help. Who hears us? Who will man the ramparts? Who will pull us safe from the onslaught of fascism?

A band of brave lawyers, that's who. Let's resist the madness by supporting them.

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Sometimes I read Thomas Sowell to see how conservatives think. They say he was smart. I’m not, so I must take their word for it.

He once said he started out as a liberal, but facts got in his way.

He loved facts, or so he said.

Therein lies an interesting observation that I, a public-school product, made over time. Sowell loved to present facts and let the reader mix them as a viewer of an impressionistic painting mixes disparate colors to imply a new one. Sowell’s readers see facts and the conclusions they drew are their own affairs.

For example. He once wrote a treatise on slavery. Without once offering an opinion or, at the ending, a moral conclusion, he sprinkled the piece with facts about slavery.

It seems that a huge proportion of all organized groups, from the attendees at Adam and Eve’s family reunions to states of modern Africa, have practiced slavery.

A weak mind would mix these facts and absolve America of any shame associated with the practice. At least that seemed to be Sowell’s intent.

Everyone else was doing it. What the hell?

Now this may pass for critical thinking in some places, but it wouldn’t stand up to my Sainted Mother’s “If everyone else was jumping off a cliff …” test for juvenile guidance.

Watch a criminal trial. Opening arguments consist almost entirely of facts, sometimes the same on both sides. Nonetheless, their purpose is to lead the listeners to diametrically opposed impressions.

We can’t change the truth. As John Adams actually said, “Facts are stubborn things.” What we can change is our method of searching for moral guidance.

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Ronald Reagan once, in a foggy attempt to quote John Adams, proclaimed, with his best actor’s voice, that “Facts are stupid things.” Perhaps some collection of brain cells thought so. Who knows?

Perhaps they are not stupid things, but facts are strange things. Wherein they, in their best use, lead us to the truth, in their worst use they can lead us into a quagmire of bewilderment.

How?

Anyone completing graduate school in America learned that consumption of ice cream and the murder rate are correlated, i.e. they occur at the same time of year.

In the MAGA world, this correlation could easily be used, with undoubted success, to convince the base that eliminating the production of ice cream would lower the incidences of murder in America.

A main difference between thinking folks and cult members is the knowledge that correlation does not equal causation.

In a more provocative case, a group of high-ranking government officials once determined that Americans who owned their own home were less likely to fall victim to many socioeconomic ills such as crime, poverty, lack of education, and reliance on welfare. This was a distinct and documented correlation.

Aha. Moving more folks from renter-status to home ownership would immediately help solve those problems.

As we know, the American economy almost collapsed when home ownership was broadened to include many who couldn’t afford the cost.

Was there a causal relationship between the facts?

Who knows? Let’s just say that public administration is a more complicated process than many Americans believe, infinitely more complicated than Donald Trump can imagine. After all, he is a descendant and proponent of the “Facts are stupid things” method of governance.

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I've always been lucky with friends. Many were attorneys. I never joined in any defamation games. Instead, I tried to learn from their applications of logic and law.

The law is a precious thing, It stands between us and destruction at times, between anarchy and peace at others. Can it be used for specious purposes rather than for good? Yes, but so can a surgeon's scalpel. So can a shovel. So can a hammer.

Today I think even more fondly about the attorneys I've known. Almost all have been honest and dedicated to the rule of law and logic. Not a single one I've known has ever crapped on the floor of the United States Capitol

Today we find ourselves besieged by the forces of evil and darkness. The purposes of those in power seek are to create an America composed of a binary population of favored rulers and proles.

Standing on the walls of the Fortress of America and defending us are a few brave lawyers. Let's send them our love.

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This morning, our statewide newspaper ran the headline "Lawmakers to weigh end to hiring laws." In short they will prevent state agencies from considering affirmative action. It will pass without a hitch.

Some of you may say, "It's about time."

Some may say, "It's the end of the world."

I just say it's a sign of the era upon which we have embarked.

Here are couple of my memories.

The first professional job I had was in a small consulting firm head by three bosses, two not bad and one a blinking asshole. We'll call him "BA."

Our secretary quit. As we began to look, a friend told me of a young woman on the look for a job after a restructuring ended her department. She came highly recommended, and I mentioned her to my bosses. They invited her in. She was poised, erudite, highly qualified, and anxious. After the interview, BA walked into my office, frowned and said, "You didn't tell us she was a n****er."

Yeah. I did that.

As my career developed, I assisted cities in obtaining HUD grants for municipal improvements. The department began seriously requiring affirmative action efforts as a step to receive grants. I informed a local mayor of this, and the conversation went like this.

"You mean we have to put a black in charge of something?

"If you want this grant."

"We don't have anyone."

"No one at all?"

"Not a qualified black."

"You are telling me that in your entire city government there is not one black worker qualified for promotion?"

"Not unless you consider John in the Sewer Department."

"Been with the city for a while?"

"Some 15 years or so."

"Knowledgeable?"

"I guess so. We rely on him when Fred, the supervisor is ill. Fred's in bad health now and ready to retire."

One can see how it went. In more recent times, a city with an African American population of some 19 percent welcomed its first black city employee. Progress? I guess. It was when he was elected mayor.

Don't let them kid you. It's going to get worse.

Share at will.

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Parties change. People do too. When I was about 6 six years old, I first noticed people talking about politics. I asked my sister what would happen if Dwight Eisenhower were to be elected president. Her reply? “We will have another depression and Mother and Daddy will lose our grocery store and we’ll all go hungry.”

That scared me, so I began to pay attention. Of course all we got were long periods of boredom punctuated by racial tension and fear of nuclear war. Oh, and the defeat of McCarthyism and the forced integration of a major southern high school. By the time I was 18, JFK was saying “Ask not what your country can for you but what you can do for your country.” That was one of the most eloquent and encouraging lines ever uttered by a president.

Now, say a lad was 6 years old in 2016. When he reaches the age of 18, and is ready for the world, all he will ever have known about American politics will be Donald Trump. Whether in or out of office, barring unforeseen occurrences, Trump will have dominated the front page of almost every daily newspaper and been the subject of all nightly news and entertainment venues.

Unless our chap is highly educated, he will believe this is how government is supposed to work. If he is homeschooled by true believers or the product of an evangelist private school, (both funded partly by state taxes in my state) he may believe it is his god's will that things are as they are. If he is a product of a starved-to-the-bone public school system, he may be tuned to accept life as an Orwellian "prole."

Just think about that for a moment. Share at will.

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Perspectives change. Once I thought the “Easy Rider” guys were cool. Now I have seen neighborhoods, even cities, destroyed by the actions of drug dealers like those two. How many died while they rode across America pissing people off.  (The music is still great, though.)

 I thought the characters in “The Big Chill” were cool as well. Now I see that they were the self-absorbed assholes that would go on to ruin America. (The music is still great, though.)

The hero of “The Graduate?” Now I watch the final scene and say to myself, “She just ran off with the sorriest son of a bitch in Southern California.”

Now it’s “Animal House.” (The music is still great, though.)

Many, if not most, college graduates of the 60s saw that film and said, “That was us.” I've even heard high-class attorneys say so. What a group of colorful characters doing wild things.

Yep. They were funny as hell.

Now I realize that we just elected them to run our state and national governments.

Maybe it's not enough just to have good music.

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Here on the front porch of the Arkansas Delta we are returning to normal from a nasty bit of January weather. We don't handle snow very well. We wouldn't mind the ravages of summer heat if we could miss winter's badass moments.

Then there is the other stuff.

In the news, our governess went to Washington and took a large crowd of state troopers, maybe a full platoon or so. The only explanation is that it was a show of force. At this point their blouses are not brown, but one wonders.

Our congressional delegation is praising the president. Not one had a discouraging word about the pardoning of those who attacked the Capitol police and then crapped on the hallowed floors.

A whole generation is now thinking this is normal.

Sometimes I want to get a crowd of like-minded veterans and burn our Honorable Discharges on the Capitol lawn.

Why do I post these? I know I'm not changing things, but I want to make sure they come for me. I don't want to be one of the ones forced to walk by and view the carnage when the nightmare ends.

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Even with all the news, I have to admit that I’ve seen a worse January. That of 1968 comes to mind. I’d only been “in-country” a few weeks when what was then called “North Vietnam” decided to launch the historically infamous Tet Offensive.

In brief, all hell broke loose, and I was cast into it but certainly not to the extent that the Marines in Hue were. I was in Naval security on the Tien Sha peninsula outside of Da Nang. We pulled six-hour watches, six hours fortifying our bases, and six hours sleep for 26 days. But we made it through.

Despite what you read, it was not a surprise. Everyone knew it was coming. It’s just that those in charge, following the lead of General William C. Westmoreland, didn’t take the warnings seriously. As our modern dilemma shows only too well, things go badly when we don’t take danger seriously.

Truth is, there was one major difference between what I experienced in 1968 and what I fully expect to experience in short order.

The people wanting to destroy me in 1968 were not people whom I had once considered dear friends who loved America as much as I.