Thursday, April 27, 2023

Biden - Trump -- Again????

I’m surprised to find myself writing this, but I haven’t wanted to vote for a president of the United States since the 2016 election, and it doesn’t appear my view is about to change anytime soon. In ’16, I thought it was Hillary Clinton’s to lose and figured she’d win up until that fatal moment when she castigated half of all President Trump’s supporters as deplorable. She lost my vote with that comment; instead, I voted for the Libertarian.

In 2020, I very reluctantly voted for Trump – and much of that was due to President Biden’s mental acuity, which reminded me all too well of my mother when she was suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease. I don’t believe for a second he’s fit for office. On the other hand, one might say he’s got a decent staff that (mostly) keeps him going.

Given that Trump never figured out how to act presidential, I wasn’t surprised he lost in 2020. As The Wall Street Journal pointed out in an editorial just prior to the election, only Trump could fire Trump and, given his petulance over the course of four years, he did – successfully!

Enter the 2024 election, and my only thought is please, God, spare us another contest between those two.

I’m ever hopeful – I’m allowed to dream, right? – others will want the presidency as much as Biden and Trump do and give them a run for their money during the primaries. On the Republican side, U.S. Senators Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins could make interesting candidates. So could former Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker as well as current Governors Chris Sununu and Brian Kemp. I wonder if former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley can pull off the nomination. She appears to be as much of a longshot as U.S. Sen. Tim Scott.

Given that we’ve heard so much from Florida’s Ron DeSantis, I wouldn’t be surprised if he burns out. If that happens, Murkowski, Collins, Baker or, possibly, Sununu or Kemp could step in. Given Kemp’s two election wins over Stacey Abrams, he could make a very viable candidate.

The Republicans need to moderate their stance on abortion (as Haley has suggested) and push more of an economic agenda with lower taxes. They also need to go heavy on defense and crime. If they can figure out the messaging on those issues, they can probably win the presidency in 2024.

The Democrats need to have a heart to heart with Biden. Forget his politics, his mental health makes him bad for the country. Democratic politicians who should consider running against him for the nomination include U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore. There are likely others.

The Democrats need to modify their stance on abortion, too, put a damper on woke politics, take the southern U.S. border issues seriously, and moderate their views that the government can solve all problems. Like Biden, they need to say that people like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping are threats.

Alas, I dream!

Thursday, February 23, 2023

People, Putin and Vladimir's Great Terror


If anything is surprising about Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine, it’s that the plan was practically written by a retired British Army general. Sir John Hackett, in his novel,
 The Third World War: August 1985, published more than 40 years ago, along with his co-authors, described how the Soviet Union invaded western Europe, used a nuclear missile, and, after Great Britain and the United States responded in kind, experienced a coup. Coincidentally enough, in the novel, it’s a Ukrainian, Vasyl Duglenko, who becomes the Soviet Union’s new leader and sues for peace, bringing down the federation and leaving Russia isolated and alone.

The only question today is how Putin’s "special military operation" ends. Will he turn to nuclear weapons, as described in Sir John’s book, or will he continue to fight a conventional war, possibly expanding it against NATO? Will another revolution break out in Russia, similar to what happened during the First World War? And will Putin’s allies, whether it’s China or a former Soviet republic, join him on his military adventure or decline the opportunity? 

The only thing that’s certain, as of right now, is that the West is responding to Russia’s aggression and Putin’s war aims haven’t been met, at least not yet. Given that NATO appears to have found its backbone, it doesn’t appear Russia will be successful.

 

The best way to end this – to show the average Russian, and those in the government, that Putin’s military adventurism was ill-conceived and without any payoff – is for Ukraine to inflict the highest number of casualties possible against Russian armed forces and to liberate the territory that Moscow seized in 2014. Anything less could provide the average Russian, as well as someone in Putin’s government, with a lingering sense that their invasion is or was winnable. 

 

As for Putin’s latest speech, if he wants to return the country to its “glory days” of the 19th century, so be it. By isolating his country from the West, which has a higher standard of living than Russia, Putin is leading it onto a suicidal path, economically and militarily. In addition, he is, without question, worried about his citizens because he’s censoring and silencing them. Most certainly, he’s making sure Moscow has one reliable ally, China, which could very well be encouraging this fool’s errand so it can gain insight into the U.S. and allied response should it attack Taiwan.

 

Then there’s the issue of Moscow suspending The New START Treaty. Could this lead Putin to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine or a NATO country? It’s hard to fathom he isn’t aware of how NATO would respond. But given the underestimation of NATO’s response to his conventional attack, a nuclear exchange isn’t out of the question.

 

If Russia’s military operation continues without success, say for another year or two, which appears possible, Putin could likely become even more apprehensive, not so much about how he’s perceived by other countries but by his own people, perhaps even those closest to him. Will it lead him to enact a modern-day version of Joseph Stalin’s Great Terror?

 

Russia has a history of revolution. It’s not limited to just 1917. Its people turned against their leaders recently, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, taking down the Soviet Union. At some point, after experiencing the despondency of a soured economy and anguish and torment from burying their sons, brothers, cousins, fathers, and uncles from a failed military operation, they’ll likely do what Sir John and his co-authors wrote: They’ll revolt.

 

How bloody could this next revolution be? Could it be successful and who will be in charge next – one of Putin’s former cronies or a surprise, someone no one saw on the horizon?

 

Putin would be well-advised to declare victory and leave Ukraine.

 

 

 

 

Tuesday, April 26, 2022

Battling Racism -- More than 30 Years Ago

While my newspaper colleagues examine racism inside and outside their profession, I can’t help but think I went through something very similar more than 30 years ago.

I first crossed paths with Jessica Hughes in April 1985 when I called seeking advice about where to host a bachelor party in Philadelphia.  She was a United Press International broadcast sales executive while I was a UPI newspaper sales executive in Dallas.

 

Back then, UPI was a leading competitor to The Associated Press and Reuters, serving hundreds of newspapers, radio and television stations around the world with breaking news reports from its bureaus across the United States and the globe.

 

Later that year, after transferring to Philadelphia, I met Jessica for the first time, face to face.  Prior to our meeting, I pictured an erudite, mainline Philadelphia lady.  

 

She was African American, and it was surprising because UPI did not have many, if any, African Americans in its sales ranks in the 1980s.

 

Jessica was quite graceful and about 12 years my senior. She was also a single mother and caring for her aging mother.

 

A year later, after becoming her boss, we made sales calls together in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, visiting a number of newspapers and television and radio stations. During our trips, she talked about some of her previous experiences, including setting up appointments with people she never met and listening to their racist jokes.

 

She mentioned their surprise – the shock across their face – when they met her face to face for the first time.  Never did it occur to them, because of how well-spoken she was, they were talking with an African American.

 

Jessica never said anything. She was far too professional. She went about representing UPI gracefully and professionally.

 

In March 1987, a few months shy of my 25th birthday, with my new boss, taking him to meet a top-paying client, I told him I was resigning at the end of April to pursue my MBA at Northwestern University.  He inquired who should replace me.  

 

We discussed the likely candidates, and when he asked about Jessica, I said, based on previous conversations with her about my intention to leave, I wasn’t sure she wanted the job.

 

“That’s good,” he replied.  “Because UPI can’t afford to be represented by a black woman in Pennsylvania.”

 

I didn’t react to what he said but thought she already is. In time, she applied for my position, and I enthusiastically endorsed her application.

 

Weeks later, as my time at UPI was coming to an end, Jessica's status was unsettled. She wasn’t sure where she stood with UPI’s senior leaders. Eventually, they hired someone outside of UPI to replace me – another white man.

 

A year later, after moving to Chicago, a former UPI colleague said Jessica was looking for me.  I promptly called her.  She was pursuing a racial discrimination lawsuit against UPI and asked if I would give a deposition. Absolutely, I said.

 

I contacted her attorney and gave one over the phone, specifically mentioning what my former boss said about the reason Jessica couldn’t replace me. The smoking gun, as the cliché goes, was out of the bag.

 

A year later, I took three harassing phone calls from UPI’s attorneys.  Each time, they attempted to get me to recant. During the last call, I said if the case went to trial, my deposition would become my testimony.

 

They soon settled with her.

  

What I learned was how economic discrimination is. There was about a $10,000 salary gap between us. By not even considering her application, UPI was, in effect, keeping her down.

 

As for my actions, I do not consider myself any sort of hero. I did what anyone would do for a highly respected colleague.

 

African Americans have a bona fide complaint about discrimination. Certainly not every white man or woman is a racist, but there are plenty of racists out there, sometimes, I learned more than 30 years ago, in the most surprising places.

 

This article first appeared on News & Tech magazine’s website in July 2020. The magazine has since closed.

Monday, March 30, 2020

Massachusetts & Covid-19

In the interest of self-quarantining, self-isolating and social distancing – and all the craziness this damn coronavirus requires – I send you this report from Massachusetts.

I admit I was caught flat-footed about this epidemic/pandemic two weeks ago due to a meeting and probably because I wasn’t paying much attention to Covid-19.  

After the meeting, I went to Shaw’s, the local grocer.  It was mobbed.  The entire town – population about 13,000 – was in a shark-like frenzy, snapping up whatever it could, from paper towels to toilet paper to cleaning supplies, especially sanitizing hand wipes.  It’s nearly out of eggs, and there was a substantial run on meat and pasta.

Up until yesterday, it was the same at every store – no toilet paper or paper towels and damn few cleaning supplies, even at Costco.  I was surprised to discover the local Target was out of printer paper.  So I went to Wal-Mart, where I found two boxes – totaling 10,000 sheets – for $60.00.  

There was a bright spot, however.  Wegman’s, another grocer, was selling paper towels and toilet paper on Friday.  To be sure, they put limits on how much customers could buy.  I snatched up one of each.

1984 or Ray Bradbury?

What’s worrisome is how much behavior has changed.  Several people wear surgical masks.  Where they once acknowledged one another with a friendly greeting, now it’s about avoidance in the aisles.  They scoot away, like sand crabs on a beach.

The state’s public K – 12 schools are closed until at least May 4 but, as I see it, the kids won’t see the inside of a classroom until late August or early September.  There’s some attempt at digital schooling but it’s limited to homework assignments sent via email.  There’s no such thing as video conferencing a class but word now is that's about to change.  I fear that high school graduation for many, including my sons, will be delayed by a year, maybe longer.

At least the liquor stores are open.  They’re deemed an “essential business” by the state’s government.  Although I'm suspicious about that.  I think state officials want us so drunk we won’t notice what they’re doing.

On Saturday, I noticed a blinking sign outside a town’s fire and police department.  It blinked, “Why are you out?” followed by “Go home.”

How is one supposed to take that message, especially if they work at a grocery store?  Or they own a liquor store?  Or, like a local baker, are holding onto to dear life to survive this crisis?

Will the fire and police department put them on their payroll or fund their businesses?

I'm also noticing civil disobedience.

A high school athletic field near me was closed in the middle of last week.  The week prior, it was filled with high school kids, parents and others as a place to stay in shape.  Then, it was shut down.  On Thursday and Friday, sunny days with temperatures in the 60s, a few people returned – despite the town’s order.  

Better yet, while driving on a house-lined street last Thursday, I saw a man, appearing to be in his 60s, sitting on a lawn chair in his driveway sipping a martini.  He was doing the same on Friday.  It seemed to be his way of telling the establishment to shove it. 

Those of us wishing to take a walk are likely to become Leonard Mead in Ray Bradbury’s “The Pedestrian.”  The police will arrest us because all we want to do is live.

Friday, March 27, 2020

Our Obsession with Tom Brady

If there’s one story I’m tired of reading, it’s Tom Brady, quarterback extraordinaire.  If the drama about his future wasn’t bad enough, Patriot fans were worse.

They were addicted to this story, obsessing over every word and every report, whether it was from ESPN, a newspaper, or some other source that seemed to have the goods on the man and his coach, Bill Belichick.

The question that’s answered only speculatively – why would a six-time Super Bowl-winning quarterback – a league record – who appears to be in an excellent partnership with his coach, leave for a team in the basement?

As the father of two sullen teenage boys, I can tell you the last thing they want is advice.  Like a lot of kids, they see their old man as not just antiquated but extinct.
  
They only need their emancipation so they can show that every idea I provided, every lesson I taught and every philosophy I said will make them successful is wrong if not wholly false.

Brady’s relationship with Coach Belichick is likely the longest one he’s had since growing up with his father.  After 20 years – about the same amount of time kids are home full-time – it’s time to unshackle the chains.

Of course, that doesn’t mean the move to Bruce Arians, Tampa Bay’s head coach, will be seamless.  His new quarterback comes with a few demons, the largest being Coach Belichick, who, unlike his former protégé, has more Super Bowl victories than he does.  Eight to Tom’s six.

Will Tom be as good a student of Arians’ game as he was of Belichick’s?  Will he call an audible when given a direct order?  Will he fight Arians over who’s best-suited to lead the team?  In solving their quarterback problems, did Tampa Bay do the one thing the Chinese fret over – create another problem?  Arians should be concerned.

Then there’s the question of why a relatively healthy man, about to be 43, continues to put his physical well-being at risk?  Seriously, what is there left to do?  His immortality is assured.

Like a lot of married men, he’s got a career wife.  The word is she’s worth nearly $500 million, making Tom’s NFL multimillion-dollar earnings look like pennies.  This is a man not so much competing for another Super Bowl ring as a man fighting for his dignity.  

In a day and age when we obsess over washing our hands and create new and deceiving Orwellian terms like “social distancing,” the fact that we obsess over questions about Tom Brady, the Patriots, and Bill Belichick reminds me that our lives are empty.

Thursday, March 19, 2020

Feeling Safe?

The late great comedian George Carlin was right:  If we don’t expose ourselves to viruses, we weaken our immune systems, and that’ll put us into early graves.  Or maybe it’ll just kill off wealth, the stock market, the 21st-century economy and, possibly, our freedom.

Given the threat in the atmosphere today – a Chinese-born disease that’s infected more than 200,000 around the globe (and keeps rising) and killed more than 9,000 (and growing) but also seen more than 85,000 (and rising) recover from it – Carlin’s got a point.

Once President Trump and the country’s governors declared a “state of emergency,” they inflamed panic, unleashing a jittery public on grocery stores and pharmacies, seeing products no one never imagined being in such high demand – sanitizing hand wipes, hydrogen peroxide, toilet paper and paper towels – sell out in hours, if not minutes.

Schools are closed, and the government shut down many businesses – some of them, like bars and restaurants, the most vulnerable to any economic disruption – all in the name of safety.  I wonder how “safe” the unemployed are feeling.  Those on the lower end of the pay scale – restaurant, bar and daycare workers – are the “safest.”

Joining the panic are large companies, like Apple, that closed all its stores outside of China for two weeks while other firms told staff to work from home.  Meanwhile, churches and other houses of worship told their congregations to dial up the Good Lord from home.

And now comes a new, vile and deceiving Orwellian term – “social distancing,” although according to Merriam-Webster it’s been around since 2003.  Still, you can’t be social yet be distant.  At least if you operate in the real world, not that false party at Facebook.

And word is coming forth that gun sales are increasing – big time! – because Americans are scared.  

The biggest insult being pawned on us mere citizens, taxpayers if you prefer, and the unemployed, are the dates schools and some businesses, like gyms, are expected to reopen.  They’re arbitrary, but they’ll convince far too many that the disease that once threatened their lives is contained.

In other words, the only thing government, businesses, school, and religious leaders have done is provide us with a false sense of security.  Or should I say, lied?

By late April or early May, we’ll see many more infected with some strain of the coronavirus, and tragically, many more deaths, perhaps a few due to gunshot wounds, I predict.  All because the one message the government needed to deliver was unsaid – take responsibility and be careful.

Feeling safe?

Thursday, October 19, 2017

Book Review: Why the emigrants immigrate – Stories of the English and the New World


If there’s fake news, there’s fake history and this might be the very reason every U.S. citizen should buy a copy of James Evans’s book, Emigrants:  Why The English Sailed to the New World. 

American folklore – which all too often passes for historical knowledge – suggests the Pilgrims came ashore in 1620, made friends with the natives, settling peacefully along the Massachusetts coastline while earlier settlements, Jamestown, Virginia and Newfoundland, Canada, receive little, if any, attention in U.S. classrooms and in the country’s culture. 

And that’s the reason to buy this book.  What Evans does so masterfully is dispel many myths Americans hold near and dear about the country’s founding and write it so that is neither accusatory nor presumptuous. 

Nearly 400,000 English men, women and children sailed for the New World (which included the Caribbean) in the 17th century for any number of reasons – to find riches, to escape religious persecution, for safety because they were loyal to the executed English king, Charles I, or because the Old World’s economics provided so few opportunities that they were without a reason not to take what was, for many, a fatal voyage. 

The Pilgrims, of course, are dominant in the story about American settlement.  But as Evans, a BBC historian, suggests, “... religion was not the reason which prompted English men, women and children to emigrate ... Some went to fish – astonished at the teeming resource in the western Atlantic, at a time when European (fishing) stocks were much depleted, thinking that while many crossed and re-crossed the ocean to do so, there might be a benefit in staying to live.”

“In spite of all these reasons for emigrating, there is little doubt that the majority who went from England to America during the seventeenth century did so for none of them.  They were, as it was said of one shipload, ‘mostly miserable poor people.’  They went because they were desperate, and because this was a course, perhaps the only course, which offered some hope ... England, then ... (with) ... Its rising population – what one Londoner called the ‘late unspeakable increases of people’ – ... made ... the majority of opinion (certainly of published opinion) backed a ‘diminution of the people’, by transplanting ‘no small number of them’ into some other soil,” Evans writes.

In other words, as English leaders saw it, the country needed to rid itself of its poor.  If those leaving thrived in the New World, wonderful, that would benefit England.  If they died, well, so be it, a point-of-view that seems all too similar to Mexico’s view of its citizens heading to the United States:  They’re expendable and the home country is better off without them.

Why does any emigrant leave their country – to become an immigrant in a different one? 

The same reason so many Latin American emigrants (as well as others from across the globe) leave their homes – hope that the new country will be better than the current one.

Seventeenth-century England was dangerous, especially during its Civil War, when pitched armed battles between those for Parliamentarian rights and those defending the government and the monarch of Charles I were fought in the 1640s, taking about 85,000 lives.[i]   Charles would eventually be tried and beheaded and the country ruled by Parliament’s leader, Oliver Cromwell. 

England’s economy and employment opportunities were also undergoing fundamental change, colliding with numerous years of crop failure and the “cloth industry, that bulwark of England’s economy, was sickly and collapsing,” leading one man to lament that everything was “‘in a heap of troubles and confusions.’” 

But if political danger and economic troubles weren’t precarious enough, there was always the trouble of being part of a faith that wasn’t fully trusted.  Much of the trauma suffered by those seeing profound problems with the Church of England, or having a different faith, whether it was Puritan, Catholic or Quaker, could suffer dearly at the hands of the authorities, as detailed not only by Dr. Evans but also in an earlier book, by John Barry, entitled, Roger Williams and The Creation of the American Soul:  Church, State and the Birth of Liberty.

The first English settlement – more likely a seasonal fishing camp, say some historians – in the western Atlantic was St. John’s, in what is Canada’s Newfoundland, in the 1580s.  It was a harbor for fishing ships and, in time, the English were joined there by many European fisherman, too. 

The first versions of diversity are also seen in some 17th century English settlements in America.  William Penn never wanted an exclusively Quaker community in Pennsylvania, telling those who followed him that liberty of consciousness (religious faith) was paramount, especially since he witnessed religious discrimination in England.  In earlier decades, Roger Williams promoted religious tolerance in Rhode Island and the stock holders of some English colonies told their colonists, upset that there was a lack religious cohesion, that it was the least of their worries.

Of course, settlement in America was more than just about fishing, harvesting tobacco and an improved life.  It was also about the century’s global politics.  In other words, it was a chess match, with a series of moves and countermoves.  In many ways, the St. John’s settlement and those that followed were checks against England’s significant European rivals, like Spain, which built a fort in St. Augustine, Florida, in 1565, and the Dutch, who started settling New York in 1614.[ii]

Is any of this significant 400 years later?  The great 19th century German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck thought so, Evans writes.  When asked what he thought the pre-eminent fact of the modern world was, Bismarck said, it was that the United States spoke English, inheriting just enough English culture to keep it tied to Great Britain.  Although Bismarck passed before they happened, he likely wouldn’t be surprised to know that this shared language and heritage weighed heavily in 20th century history, deciding the outcome of both World Wars, the Cold War and the post-war world.  This combined language, culture and history will likely determine world events long into the future.

(For those readers curious to know what distinguishes an emigrant from an immigrant, see the following:  https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/immigrant-emigrant-emigre-refugee-how-to-tell-the-difference)




Publishing Information:

Emigrants: Why the English Sailed to the New World, by James Evans, published Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London, 2017, 303 pages, including endnotes and bibliography, price:  £20.00

The book is currently available on Amazon.com’s UK website, amazon.co.uk., and the prices you pay will be in British pounds, converted into your local currency on your credit card bill.  The book won’t be available in the United States – according to Barnes & Noble – until early March 2018.