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“Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops.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.

WRONG PROBLEM

 Peter Drucker, known as the "father of modern management," once said something to the effect that a manager who makes the right decision on the wrong problem is more dangerous than the manager who makes the wrong decision on the right problem. Just imagine the bull who, upon being forced into the ring, goes into decision-mode and decides that his problem is that little red cape, then makes the right decision therefor.

It dawned on me that many are wrestling with the wrong problem while attempting to understand what happened last Tuesday. They pose it as, "They watched her speak and him speak and made the decision based on what they saw, deciding to vote for him. What a problem."

I don't think that's what happened.

I don't think they ever saw or heard her speak in an unedited manner. I'm afraid that the bulk of Americans now get their vote-forming information from the following:

• Entertainment venues posing as news centers,
• Social media posts governed by algorithms that concentrate on desired outcomes,
• Evangelical pulpits,
• Church deacons, and
• Families and friends.

If they should happen to encounter dissonant facts, the result would resemble the scene in the original Star Wars film. Here's how it would go.

"I have found facts that don't agree with what you are saying."

Hand gesture: "These aren't the facts you're looking for."

"These are not the facts I'm looking for."

Conclusion: It's impossible to change an opinion with facts or logic when that opinion wasn't formed with facts or logic.

THE COMING STORM

 Some years back, in a public college, I read an essay called “Our Schizophrenic Society” for Dr. Grant Bogue’s sociology class. The general gist of it argued that Americans should not be surprised that kids were growing up confused in a family that mandated church attendance while the father cheated on their income taxes, and so forth. Despite a long search, I’ve never been about to find the book of readings in which it appeared. Nonetheless, I’ve always found it instructive, more with each passing day. I won’t mention the cult who worships their Beloved Leader as the fulfillment of the second coming.

There are many concepts that have been lost in the era of social media. One is hypocrisy. Americans no longer see the connection between a draft dodger and a man who seeks to revamp our military. They worship a man with multiple divorces in the name of their deity who railed against the concept. This is the same deity who mandated that we offer succor to "the least of those among us." There seems to be no cognitive disillusionment with a president of the United States of America whose treatment of "the least" involves caging them and separating them from their families.

Lying. Well, that commandment doesn't apply to Beloved Leader. Things depend more on opinion than on acts.

Someone once said, "When things are at their worst, they must mend."

An Ernest Hemingway character once said, "Isn't it pretty to think so?"

THE COMING STORM

    What kind of America will emerge from this tragic decision she has made? Damned if I know. I know one thing. It won't be based on educating the masses for critical thinking. One can obtain a preview of that from our little state just west of the Mississippi River.

    We have enjoyed (?) a two-year head start. We've already started dismantling the public school system. Oh, it won't be completely destroyed. It will stand ready to educate that segment of society Orwell called, in 1984, the Proles. They will receive just enough education to perform the necessary common labor work and be able to find their way to the pubs.

    Real education will rely on private schools partially funded with public tax dollars. They will teach everything from nuclear physics to proof that the Universe is 6,000 years old and resulted from simple thoughts over a six-day period.

    Not much room will exist for literature, history, philosophy, or art.

    Our marriage didn't produce offspring, just one miscarriage and a normal amount of effort. I, therefore. will enjoy a tragic gift of curiosity. I can simply observe since we have no children or grandchildren to make us mourn. I'm far enough down the list, just after teachers and librarians, that Death will likely beat them to me. I won't see it all, but maybe a portion. For example:

    Hitler came into power in January 1933.

    The first state-supported book burning took place in May 1933.

    I may live to see those.

    No children or grandchildren, but may I please mourn for those of my dear friends who don't deserve what's coming?

THE DAY AFTER

 A friend asked what I would do now following the election. My answer: “One thing I won’t do is join a raging mob and go crap on the floor of our United States Capitol building. Other than that, I don’t know.

Thoughts that come to mind are from our great writers:

“Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean; the world has grown grey from thy breath; - Swinburne

“The fewer men, the greater share of honor.” – Shakespeare

And one ray of comfort from a protestant hymn:

“The sun’s coming up in the morning.”

We can resist but it must be done in a more challenging way. We have to face the reality that yesterday may have accommodated the last real election in America for some time. The playbook so far derived directly from Nazi Germany. Much of the support came from Russia.

That doesn’t bode well for free and honest elections.

I’ve seen some times that most Americans, probably less than one percent, haven’t during which I wasn’t sure the sun was coming up in the morning.

Know what? It always did.

ELECTION 2024

This marks my final comments on the upcoming election. After today I will cease my involvement other than to transport anyone needing the help to go and vote. I am optimistic that America will not descend into anarchy and fascism. I think we will defeat the madness. The military, and life, have taught me, however, to hope for the best and prepare for the worst. So I must consider the unthinkable.

If Americans should make the worst decision they have made since 1861 and the election, as it currently determines success, should unfold against my choices, I will accept the result. But I will mourn, as did the Psalmist, who sang "By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion."

My life is almost over, so I’ll not mourn for myself. First, I’ll mourn for my friends who have children and grandchildren facing life in a country without a moral base. I’ll mourn for those living outside a “bell curve of normality” due to race, religion, origin, sexual makeup, or gender. I’ll mourn for “the least of those among us” who will have no place other than servitude in a country refitted to serve only the wealthy and their immediate allies. I’ll mourn for the rest of a world that looked to America for guidance. Also, I’ll mourn for those upon whom reality will most tragically and destructively dawn—a large portion of those who will have voted for the brigands and grifters. Yes, those who voted against their best interest.

But will I comply and remain silent? No. The military also taught me to, if captured, resist the oppressors. This can weaken them and make their jobs so much harder. It undermines their efforts to forbid righteousness. It helps keep them from dreaming up additional evil. I’ll resist as best I can until she receives the word to send a squad for me. My place on the list will probably be somewhere below the teachers and librarians. If I live long enough to see my country saved from fascism, I’ll not be in the group forced by our saviors to walk by and view the corpses of our brothers and sisters who met destruction while we said, “We knew nothing,” even as the stench of the death camps rolled across our beloved land with every breeze.

Do I imagine myself as a hero? No. But I am an American, and I’ve still got some fight left in me.

EPIPHANY OF THE DAY

 STONES

Maybe it is because I am a veteran of a foreign war that several people have asked for my impressions of The Great Arlington Campaign Photo Op. My thought? Thank goodness for the United States Navy wherein I learned language appropriate to the task, language that I shall try to avoid.

The white tombstones called to mind a story I heard once. An older veteran of World War Two told it to me. He was a former member of United States Naval Construction Battalions, better known as the Navy Seabees. That organization accepted older enlistees, and given his age, it was his only chance to serve. And serve he did, for almost four years in the South Pacific. Never sell "elderly" men short.

He told me of coming home on a troop ship. As it sailed through the Golden Gate, people on the Marin County side had painted huge white boulders and placed them on the hillside. They spelled out, "Welcome Home Boys."

That always touched me. It still does when I think of the fact that no such welcome sign greeted our plane when it landed in California. A much different welcome awaited us.

So what do I think of a draft-dodger desecrating a sacred place like Arlington Cemetery? I think Donald J. Trump and his followers are living ancestor of the sons of bitches that yelled "Baby Killers" at us on our arrival home.