An Open Letter To Nancy Pelosi

Dear Madame Speaker:

I am a registered Democrat, who has voted for Democratic candidates in every election since I was 20, when I voted in my first election (1976).  There was one exception, one year, but don't ask:  it's a long story, and has absolutely nothing to do with why I'm writing this today.  I have given money for Democratic and progressive causes for decades, to the point where it hurts, simply because I believed (and still do) that it was the right thing to do, and that the fate of the nation and perhaps the world depended on as many of us as possible doing so.  I have been, in person and in print (including online, in social media and on this blog) been a strong and steady advocate of the aforesaid candidates and causes, frequently leading to more arguments (and insults) directed at me than I can count.  I'm not saying all of this to complain, by any means.  I simply want to let you know where I'm coming from, politically speaking, before I go any further with what I have to say today.

And, before I get to that, I have two other things to say, specifically addressed to you.

First, as a fellow native of Baltimore, I have been an admirer of you and your career for a long time,  You do our city an enormous amount of credit.  You are the daughter and sister of two mayors of Baltimore, and learned from an early age how politics works at the most basic level:  the streets and blocks on which ordinary citizens live, love, work, fight, and build a future for themselves and their families.  You then, as an adult, went all the way on the other side of the nation to build a separate political career for yourself, and rose through that career to become the first female Speaker of the House of Representatives.  You lost that position for a time largely by fighting for something you believed in very strongly, the Affordable Care Act, but you continued to lead your caucus for six more years and become Speaker again early this year.  I know you are willing to fight against tough odds on a matter of principle.  I know that you know how to survive in a business that can be very unforgiving in its setbacks.  As is the case with everyone else in our city, I am proud of you and what you have accomplished.

And second, although I'm sure that you would have no way of knowing this, yes, I've read your e-mails.

You know which ones I'm talking about.  The ones in which you say you haven't heard from me lately.  Of course, I'm well aware of what you actually mean when you begin your e-mails in that fashion.  It's my money that you haven't heard from lately.  You, and, with a few notable exceptions, a lot of politicians and political organizations to which I have, in the past, been what could be considered generous.

And yes, there's a reason lying behind my recent lack of generosity.  I'm here today to tell you all about it.

Last fall, when your party won back control of the House, but failed to do the same in the Senate, I was fully prepared for legislative gridlock.  I knew that you and your Democratic colleagues were prepared to pass a number of bills that, legislatively speaking, were doomed to die in Mitch McCONnell's Chamber of Horrors.  I was fine with that, and knew that you were as well.  After all, legislating for a party is a way of setting an agenda for the public to see, even when the legislation has no hope of becoming reality.

But what I did expect--indeed, demanded, under the circumstances--was a no-holds-barred effort to investigate, hold accountable, and if necessary (and this necessity seemed pretty damned strong to me) impeach the current Criminal-in-Chief, D***** J*** T****.

And, boy, have I been disappointed.  Me and several other million people who wrote, phoned, knocked on doors, gave money, advocated in various ways and, above all else, voted with that one goal in mind:  to fully expose the corruption of the most corrupt occupant of the Oval Office in the history of the Republic (and yes, I am including Richard Nixon, whose corruption I didn't think could be surpassed).

True, there have been few timid attempts at investigations.  True, there have been a few Democrats in the House who have made it clear they are willing to go much further than that, that they are in fact ready to take the I-word and put it front and center in the House's agenda.

But, as the leader of the House, the buck stops with you.  And you have blocked that buck with the ferocity normally shown only by NFL players in the final minutes of a Super Bowl.

Your reason?  It's too "divisive."  In your stated view, impeachment doesn't happen until around 80%, maybe even 90% decides it's OK for it to happen.  This despite the fact that it took an actual impeachment proceeding in the case on Nixon to get a consensus on impeachment that was anywhere close to being that size.  And this despite the fact that the Republicans, when they controlled the House in the '90s, launched impeachment proceedings against then-President Bill Clinton with far less than a consensus that size.

Well, then, let me walk you through a few facts in what has by now become, in my mind, a near-desperate attempt to change yours. 

To begin with, Madame Speaker, you are waiting for a bipartisan consensus that is already here.  The Republicans would not hesitate to describe one of their proposals as bipartisan if they could enlist the support of a single Democrat.  The Joe Lieberman era, of which I do not have fond memories, was rife with such moments.  You now have a single Republican Congressman in favor of an impeachment investigation.  Actually launching such an investigation would, as it did in the Nixon-Watergate case, bring along a good many more, especially in those swing districts filled with freshperson Democrats filled with fear at the thought that doing their constitutional duty would imperil their job security.

Actually, you could start by showing them that T**** voters are not uniformly lined up behind T****, as is the case here.

And this gentleman is far from alone.  T**** likes to brag about the stock market, but his voters, the ones who care about “jobs, jobs, JOBS” just aren’t feelin’ it.  Take a look.

And they’ve got good reason to feel that way:

None of this should be surprising.  T**** is and always has been an economic fraud, which is illustrated not only by his so-called career as a business person, but also by his so-called “accomplishments” as President.

His primary legislative accomplishment, the tax-cut bill (sorry, Paul Ryan, but it was never a “jobs” bill) has been shown by every measure to be an utter failure.  And this at a time when even millionaires are willing to argue for tax increases.

He promised to bring back the coal industry, but the coal industry is still going under. 

He promised to get better trade deals, but all he has done is pushed this country to the brink of a world-wide trade war on multiple fronts, for which the American people are receiving no benefits except higher prices for consumer goods

T**** is, in fact, a grifter, a con artist who has separated thousands of people from their money by promising them the moon and failing to deliver even a slice of green cheese.  And that self-dealing tendency trickles down to the type of people who are attracted to working for him.  This is the personnel dynamic of any organization:  good people attract other good people, and bad people attract bad people.  Case in point:  Kris Kobach, who wanted a lot more than the moon in order to be T****’s immigration czar.

Further case in point:  Jerry Falwell, Jr., carrying on his father’s legacy of serving God and mammon by denouncing any actual Christian who opposes T**** of the unpardonable sin of being an “employee.”  I’m guessing that the second Reverend Falwell only values employees when they are pool boys willing to pose au naturel with his wife.

Even worse, T**** is not merely, like his predecessor-in-impeachment, Bill Clinton, a serial philander; he is, unlike Clinton, a serial rapist, whose victims keep coming forward one by one to testify to his physical perfidy.  E. Jean Carroll has most recently done so, bringing the number of publicly-known victims of T****’s appetites well into double-digits.  Can you, as a woman, look the other way at this?  Can you expect the women members of your caucus to look the other way?  Can you expect their constituents, or yours, to do so?  More importantly, should you have any such expectations?

T**** is presiding over the systematic destruction of the planet, by dismantling the system of environmental regulation that was put into place nearly 60 years ago by a Republican President (one who, in fact, was nearly impeached himself), and has been supported by governments of both parties throughout the intervening decades.  That this destruction is proceeding apace is even acknowledged by publications that support T****, such as the New York Post.  And this, mind you, is the same New York Post that tried to suppress the Carroll story.  I never thought I’d live to see the day when I would see photographs of polar bears going through dumpsters, wandering outside of their habitat because we have systematically destroyed it.  But here we are. 

T****, charged by the Constitution to ensure that the laws are faithfully executed, including treaties by which the United States has bound itself, has effectively become an international criminal, along with members of his Administration, by detaining potential asylees in camps that not only deny those imprisoned their rights to petition for safety, but directly imperil them and the children who are brought along with them.  Even worse, T**** has cut aid to the countries from which these people are fleeing, forcing them to flee in greater numbers than would otherwise be the case.

The cruelty on display here is not inadvertent or accidental; it is systematic cruelty as a policy tool, and, given some of the venom T**** has spewed at immigrants, calling them “animals” from “s---hole countries,” it may very well be cruelty for its own sake.  Why else would conditions like these

be considered acceptable?  Especially when the funding currently available is more than enough for at least adequate facilities.  Why else would public donations of necessities be turned away?

And why would anyone, let alone anyone with a connection to T****, be allowed to make a profit off of it?  

No one ever told T**** that one can seldom, if ever, make a dog hunt by beating it.  Yet these people are being treated in these camps at a sub-human level, one that has already lead to the known deaths of seven children.  How many more children do we not know about?   And yet, rather than responding humanely to these tragedies, we waste time and decency debating what the camps should be called.  That debate can save neither a single child, nor the increasingly endangered soul of the nation.  Perhaps this is why, despite the perception that immigration is T****’s signature issue, it has become the issue on which he gets the greatest disapproval rating of his presidency:

And, when it comes to families from other parts of the world, T****’s abortion policies may be spreading the same kind of misery.

In short, T**** is a crook.  As crooked as can be.  And I haven't even gotten into his love affairs with foreign tyrants that advance his ego at the expense of American interests.  Or his willingness to sell his office, its powers and its perks, in ways that advance his private business (to which he shouldn't even be connected while President).  Or ... well, I'm pretty sure you get the general idea at this point.

Madame Speaker, your behavior under the weight of the public case for impeachment hearings is no longer reasonable or otherwise prudent, if it ever was at all.  It merely telegraphs weakness, which allows people to libel you with impunity.  It creates a vacuum that, even when handed an opportunity to hold Trump to account such as the concentration camps on the border, is instead filled by Mitch McCONnell in a way that might actually subject more children to harm, or even death, as recently happened.  And all because, as pointed out by Joy Reid on Twitter, you are by your inaction effectively giving McCONnell, and Senate Republicans, veto power over a process that is supposed to be initiated and controlled in the first instance by the House, of which you are the leader.

This is the same veto power that McCONnell asserted over the Supreme Court process during the last year of Obama’s Presidency.  At the rate of inaction currently being set by Congressional Democrats, the American people may be subjected to one-party government on a permanent basis—and by default, not defeat at the polls.

If anything, McCONnell’s unwillingness to pursue any legislation that protects the integrity of our elections is itself a damning admission of guilt not simply on the part of T****, who McCONnell is clearly protecting, but the entire Republican Senate caucus, and perhaps the entire party itself.  That caucus, and the party, seems to function less like a political movement and more like a criminal enterprise, as the conduct of McCONnell’s wife (a T**** Cabinet secretary) amply illustrates.

Contrast both your behavior and that of McCONnell with the more forthright statements of the evidence against T**** by Robert Mueller, the special counsel assigned to investigate T****’s Russian dealings, in the report his investigation produced and in the press conference he recently held to discuss his findings, to say nothing about his planned testimony next month before the House Judiciary Committee. 

For that matter, look at how cowardly T**** acts when the subject of Muller’s report comes up.

A Republican, Mueller has been subjected to a tremendous level of abuse by members of his own party, but it has in no way and to no extent dissuaded him from doing his duty.  I have sometimes found myself thinking that, if it is the fate of this nation to be governed by no one other than Republicans, let it be governed by Republicans such as Mueller, who are motivated by things that are above rubies.

And the fact that a McCONnell-led Senate trial would undoubtedly acquit T**** in record time, and despite the fact that some have used that reality as an admonition for not impeaching him,

that fact is that is all the more reason to pursue impeachment like the Hound of the Baskervilles going after its hereditary prey.  McCONnell’s political genius—to the extent that it can fairly said to exist—is in finding ways to shield his caucus from difficult votes.  Impeachment, on the other hand, is perhaps the only tool provided by the Constitution, apart from the budget process, that allows the House to force the Senate to take a difficult vote.  For G-d’s sake, Madame Speaker, use that tool.

Can’t you see that McCONnell is desperate to make you NOT want to use it?  Does it take the potential for an open rebellion from within your own caucus, the one you supposedly rule with an iron fist, to make you understand that, if all of the dithering on your part is about a desire to keep your job, the path to keeping your job lies in this instance in doing it in the first place?  Especially since Trump has all but confessed that the things he “didn’t do”—collusion, obstruction—are things he would willingly do in the next election, without any sense of wrongdoing about it.  Even his own Congressional defenders took him to task for doing so.

This further reinforces the point that, between now and Election Day 2020, if T**** is not held to account, he could conceivably act out in a way that could do enormous harm not only to our political system, but to our country and even the world.  A war with Iraq?  T**** could conceivably order that or worse if he thinks that it would give him even five more seconds of public adoration.  His short-term thinking may have already put him in the position where he has no choice but to pursue that option.  And, let’s face it, when it comes to his “thinking,” especially regarding the subject of Iraq, T****’s thinking is something less than razor-sharp.

If you are worried about a rerun of the Bill Clinton impeachment episode, which cost Republicans a number of seats in the 1998 midterm election, you’re making a major mistake.

Clinton was a popular President, which shaped the public reaction to his impeachment, along with the lack of connection between his offense (lying under oath during a deposition related to a civil suit) and his public office.  And, in fact, the impeachment process did have a delayed political effect:  two years after those midterms, Republicans won both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.  Impeaching T**** just might give history a chance to repeat itself here.  Only, this time, in favor of the Democrats.

And it may prevent something even worse:  the collapse of our entire system of government into armed camps, ready to shoot each other rather than to work together for the common good.  Have you looked at what has been going on in Oregon, over the fate of something as innocuous as a climate change bill?  In order to deny the Democratic supermajority in the state Senate an opportunity to consider the bill, the minority Republican members walked out of the statehouse and into the protective arms of Idaho militias, leading to the shutdown of the state house for security reasons, and with the full blessing and approval of the state GOP.  This in turn lead the Governor to send state police after the legislators, and caused some observers to wonder whether our entire democracy may be at the breaking point.  In the short run, all of this lead the minority to successfully bully the majority.

So, yes, I'm wondering:  what the hell are you waiting for?

If you're waiting for the supposedly liberal press to somehow save you, forget it.  No matter what the Republicans say to the contrary, they're simply not all that liberal.  I'm not sure they ever were; freedom of the press, as the saying goes, belongs to the person who owns one.  It's a property right, and Republicans are nothing if not the party of property rights.  And the Republicans who own the presses, and the airwaves, and the Interwaves, and all the other marvelous means of communication that we take for granted make sure that their employees (i.e., reporters and editors) know on which side their proverbial bread is buttered. 

Which is why those employees, for the most part, are past masters at the art of sucking up to the powerful, the recently powerful, and the perhaps-soon-to-be-again powerful.  Case in point:  Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who arguably falls into all three of these categories.  She is the daughter of a former Governor of Arkansas, she was recently (and memorably, in a bad way) the White House press secretary, and she is rumored to be in line to run for her father's old job in the near future. 

In her most recent job, she earned the reputation of being perhaps the worst press secretary in the history of the White House.  She was dishonest to a fault, she was abusive to reporters without regard to the fact that press secretaries often depend on the goodwill of those reporters when their boss is in political hot water, and she was far too eager to do little more than carry water for a boss who himself practises the art of deception at an Olympian level.

So what did the White House press corps do for Ms. Sanders, upon her departure from their midst?  That's right, exactly what everyone would do for such a reprehensible human being--everyone, that is, in Washington, where every second of everyone's life is a potential career move.  They threw an enormously expensive farewell party for her, on the grounds that lying and abusive conduct can easily be overlooked for the sake of "civility."  Never mind the fact that both press secretaries and reporters have an obligation to the public that transcends any obligation they might have to each other.  It's all about civility.  In fact, it's all about access.  After all, if you expect to see each other again ...

And then, there's the question I don't want to ask, but feel that I have to ask:  does T**** have something on you?  Or someone you care about?  Or someone you know?  I don't want to believe that, but I need you to understand that your conduct in connection with the impeachment question is so out of line with reality on the ground that I have no choice but to raise it.  And, as I said earlier, you have always been someone who understands things from the ground up.  Which is why I don't think I have to explain to you that, if I'm right on this point, you owe it to yourself, all of your supporters, and everyone in this country to come forward and come clean.  Even if that means resigning from Congress.

I don't want that to happen.  But I need to get your attention.  Literally millions of us need to get your attention.  And, since you are a politician, there's only one sure-fire way to do it.

I'm responding to your e-mails.  By not responding.

That's right.  In the words of a disappointed parent to a child who has underperformed in college, I'm cutting you off for the time being.

No more contributions.  Not.  One.  Penny.  Until you and your House colleagues can show some understanding of your constitutional duties AND IMPEACH T****.  NOW.

If you cannot impeach this President, you can't impeach any President.  It is impossible for me to believe that the Framers had that intention when they wrote the Constitution.  They put the Impeachment Clause in there as a fire alarm for those rare but real moments in our history when the Constitution itself is on fire.  And, right now, we're in the middle of the biggest five-alarmer we've ever had.

Madame Speaker, you hold a constitutional office.  You are a party boss, but your first allegiance is to our system of government.  You and your colleagues have sword an oath to protect that system.  In the words of the Avengers from their most recent movie, whatever it takes.  You did not sign up for the easy task.  You signed up for the necessary one.  Do it.  Or I and my like-minded, deeply disappointed Democratic voters will find someone who will.

But I want it to be you.  I'm begging for it to be you.  I'm begging you to make the author of the words in this column eat them.  Don't wait.  Your America, and my America, can't afford any more delays.

Sincerely,
Stephen Rourke, actor, lawyer, theater preservationist, and lifelong Democrat

Was Raj The Apu Of "The Big Bang Theory"?

I came to the "Big Bang Theory" party late (as did my wife, with me) in its 12-year run on CBS.  That didn't stop either us from enjoying it immensely, and appreciating the fact that it celebrated the "safe space" that geeks now have in the larger American culture.  When one or more of the characters talked about being beaten up as a child, boy, that was something I could relate to all too easily.  And, if the discussions about physics, engineering, and biology went over my head, as much of it did, the many references to popular movies, TV shows, and comics books most certainly did not.  Even if I'm forced to disagree with Raj on the subject of Aquaman:  I don't think that he sucks at all (and the success of the recent film based on the character suggests that a lot of people agree with me).

Raj.  Aye, there's the rub, to borrow a phrase.

Last week's TBBT series finale left me with more than a minor sense of disappointment, and not because I was sorry to see the show come to an end.  The past season's episodes had, with a few exceptions, a vague sense of deja vu in its comic set-ups and payoffs.  Dialogue that once seemed inordinately clever no longer seemed to live up to the deserved reputations of its earlier seasons.  So, as is always the case with any series, it was time for it to end.

And there were payoffs for most of the major characters.  Sheldon and Amy won the Nobel Prize for Physics, and, in the process, Sheldon finally found the freedom to acknowledge that friendships had not only made the moment possible, but sweeter as well.  Howard ended up not only with Bernadette, and a trip to the ISS, but a son and a daughter as well.  Leonard made peace with his love-withholding mother, and Penny found a successful career; they married and ended the show expecting a child.  Even Stuart, the comic-book-store guy, ended the show with a girlfriend.

And then there was Raj  Still stuck on an H1-B visa; not even a green card for the poor guy.  Still without a girlfriend.  Even worse, the final season gave him an engagement that broke up within a few episodes of the end.  All he gets in the last episode is a random encounter with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, who seems to be none too happy about the experience.  In short, he's basically the same, vaguely Harpo-Marxist, happy-go-lucky, token Indian character he was at the beginning of the show.

And the word "Indian" is what I feel is at the heart of this.

Prejudice is a pernicious thing.  It's not always completely obvious.  It becomes engrained in our thoughts and actions sometimes without our realizing it.  We often don't intend to think of members of various cultures in stereotypical terms.  We see a member of a particular demographic group depicted in a work of either fiction or non-fiction, and, perhaps because of our own laziness, or our unspoken need to feel good about ourselves, we accept that depiction as accurately applying to every member of the group in question.  Speaking for my part for a moment, I think that it has taken years of experiences with Indians, first in New York, and then as law clients, and then ultimately as a visitor to the country itself for a week to see not just a "people," but the full range of individuals that make up that people.

So, I find myself thinking about Raj's 12-season arc (or, perhaps, lack thereof), and wondering:  is he the Apu of TBBT?  Is he the character who ultimately, while never failing to be likeable or even sympathetic, leaves the viewers with just a faint taste of close-to-racism in their mouths?  And that might not be even fair to Apu; at least he, on "The Simpsons," got married and became a U.S. citizen.

It's not my purpose here to point an accusatory figure at anyone involved with TBBT, or damage its legacy, which I think deserves to be celebrated.  But I have to say that, at the very least, there's a certain laziness in the way in which Raj was all-too-frequently used as a vehicle for cheap humor, much of which focused on his ethnicity and not his individuality.  If that fact alone doesn't bother more of us than I think it does, then the problem rests not with TBBT or anyone involved with it.  It may rest with all of us, for being content to see Raj as a stereotype, and not as a human being.  If we had asked for more, I think the show would have delivered more.  We didn't.  I think that's on all of us.

In the meantime, best of luck to Kunal Nayyar, who deserves a chance to shine in a role that will give him far more to work with.  And best of luck to everyone involved with TBBT; you made this geek very, very proud.

My Tribute To The MCU

If you're among the handful of moviegoers who, at this point, have not yet seen "Avengers:  Endgame," there will be a spoiler or two in a paragraph or two.  Perhaps more spoilers and paragraphs than that.  We'll see.  But, in any case, this is your warning just in case you still want to see the movie (and, if you have no interest in comic-book movies, you may just want to skip this post altogether, with no offense on my part).

At any rate.

I discovered Marvel Comics when I was, at a guess from my slowly fading childhood memories, about seven or eight years old (or, about 1963 or 1964).  I'd already been introduced to Superman and the DC Comics world, so I was already hooked on comic books.  But there was something different about Marvel's books.  I didn't know what it was, right away, until 1966 when my family moved to a new neighborhood and, for a time, I felt unmoored emotionally.  A classmate in my new school shared some of his Marvel books, so I began to slowly read more of them.  And soon, I was buying almost all of Marvel's magazines, every month.  Ah, for the days when a dollar could get you eight--EIGHT--comic books, plus four cents that I could give back to my dad.

What I'd figured out at this point was why Marvel seemed different, and more attractive to me than other comic book companies.  Like me, their characters were unmoored.  They had super-powers, but not-so-super personal lives.  Even worse, perhaps, their efforts to save and protect others were often misunderstood, and under-appreciated, by the society they attempted to help with their unique abilities.  They seemingly could only find solace by themselves, for the most part.

And, memorably, with each other.  Marvel created several super-groups that showed these heroes and heroines fighting and suffering together, sometimes breaking apart, but often coming back together.  The Fantastic Four.  The X-Men.  And the Avengers, which, over time, have incorporated almost all of the other characters in the Marvel comic-book universe.

For about three years, I read almost everything Marvel put out, getting into their work so much, and especially their inventive artwork, that I would spend hours copying art by their best artists (my efforts fell very far short, but it was still fun).  Then, I entered adolescence, and my interests changed just a bit.  I gave up comic books altogether, but still followed Marvel's growth into a company that started to branch out into other media, with decidedly mixed results.  I give props to Bill Bixby, Lou Ferrigno, and everyone else for "The Incredible Hulk" TV series, for focusing on the character's human dilemmas and not his rampages.  But that illustrated a problem:  for decades, the technical limits of the medium prevented TV and film producers from exploiting the full potential of the characters in a visually plausible way.

So when the year 2000 arrived and "X-Men" was released, I thought that it might be possible to revisit my childhood.  Not only because the world of special effects had finally caught up to the world of comic-book art, not only because the film had A-list actors, but because the filmmakers took the themes of alienation and flawed personal lives and actually used them in a serious way in the movie.  As did the later "X-Men," "Daredevil," and "Fantastic Four" films.

And on their heels came the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which Marvel used to launch its own studio.  Twenty-two feature films, filled with my all-time favorite characters, telling a unified story across the course of more than a decade.

I was excited, at first, but also worried.  I wasn't worried about how the films or the characters would look.  But I was worried about how faithful they would be to the characters, their concerns, the way they would interact with each other and the non-super-heroic characters in their lives.  I guess that, to a degree that surprised even me, the advent of the MCU managed to wake up the 10-year-old that still resided deep inside of me.

Now that the 22-film arc is complete with "Endgame," I can honestly say that the 10-year-old is feeling very happy for the most part.  I can't honestly say that I agree with all of their choices, and with the leaving-out of some aspects of the books I read.  Nor am I completely happy with the deaths (and, in one case, the transformation) of several beloved characters.  But, to my complete and utter surprise, they moved me in a way I wouldn't have expected in over 50 years.  All while somehow telling a completely unified story.

To paraphrase a line from one of my all-time favorite films, "Lawrence of Arabia":  before they did it, I've had said it couldn't be done.

I don't know what lies ahead for the MCU.  But, whatever it may be, my inner 10-year-old and I will continue to look forward to enjoying it.

'NUFF SAID!

A Modest Proposal For Mary Bubala

Last week, I wrote a post in which I took Mary Bubala, now a former reporter for WJZ-TV in Baltimore, asked a question in an on-air interview that implied fairly strongly that demographic considerations mattered with regard to qualifying for public office--specifically, in this case, the mayoralty of Baltimore.  In case you have not followed this story, she asked an African-American interviewee whether, after three African-American female mayors of the city left office under ethical and/or competency clouds, it was time for "a different kind of leadership."  On the other hand, I might be surprised if you had not heard about this story, given the level of coverage it's received, even in New York.  Of course, in the case of the Post, promoting a story like this is just one more example of Rupert Murdoch stirring the racial pot for the sake of minimize the paper's losses, even at the expense of promoting long-term racial division in his adopted country.

That said, I've been spending some time talking to people I know locally about Bubala and the controversy over her (without a doubt) utterly inappropriate question.  I've also spent some time on social media (Twitter, specifically, to which my blog is linked) looking at the reactions to this story that people have posted.

And two things have jumped out at me.

First, a number of the Twitter posters have given Bubala a series of electronic high-fives over the racial angle in her question.  I'll spare you the specifics, and even concede the point that perhaps those posts say more about the pollution of social media by white nationalists than it does about anything else.  Nevertheless, it's worth mentioning these posts as a way of illustrating the level of potential harm to all of us--at lease to the caliber of political discourse--that can come from questions or statements like Bubala's.  If nothing else, it should underscore the fact that the question she asked is one that should never be asked by anyone, under any circumstances.

Second, a large number of people have argued that the station's decision to fire her in an attempt to defuse the controversy was unfair, and in fact an overreaction given the fact that nothing in her career prior to her asking the question had shown any animosity based on gender and race.  To the contrary, she worked for WJZ for many years and earned, in the process, an excellent and unblemished reputation as a reporter and an anchor.  To a limited extent, it was because of that reputation that I found watching the video of her asking the question to be especially disturbing and confusing.

And, as it turns out, a number of African-American viewers, some of whom have had personal dealings with Bubala, feel that she is being treated unfairly, especially in light of the fact that Bubala offered her own, unsolicited apology on Twitter for asking the question, one in question she clearly recognized that the question was wrong.  The apology did not deter WJZ from firing her.

All of this has given me a great deal of food for thought, and led me to the following conclusion.

Given the level of offensiveness embedded in the question, and the fact that she did ask it without an immediate attempt to clarify whatever point she was trying to make, Bubala did deserve to be disciplined.  But not to be fired.  From my perspective, the effect of the firing accomplishes nothing except to hide WJZ's own corporate sins in the area of promoting racial tensions, through its police-blotter coverage of Baltimore and its unabashed support of Maryland Governor Larry Hogan and his race-baiting style of politics.  When I heard about the firing, I suspected that the station felt that the controversy invited the prospect of people taking a closer look at the station's failings in its treatment of race in relation to local stories.  The station didn't want anyone to take that closer look, and fired Bubala as a way of deflecting attention from those failings.

I've got a much better idea.  At least, I think it's a better idea.  And I hope that most of you will agree with me.

I think that WJZ should re-hire Bubala, but have her spend a year (at least) on special assignment to cover stories in Baltimore that focus on the lives of its African-American citizens--their accomplishments, their struggles, their needs, and the ways in which those needs require a greater effort on the part of all of us to successfully address them.  I would not consider this strictly a "punishment" per se.  Instead, it would be an opportunity for all of us to take a closer look at the issue of race from the African-American perspective, and to be challenged with regard to a lot of our assumptions about Baltimore and what it needs to thrive.

It would be better for Bubala, for the station, for the city, for the state, and ultimately for all of us.  It would take a moment that has the potential to tear us even further apart, and perhaps do something to bring us together.

So, how about it, WJZ?  Bubala might not want to go back, at this point, of course.  But, if WJZ is not willing to pursue this, I think she should feel free to take this basic idea and run with it at another local station.

I think that, in the end, all of us would benefit.  And, in the process, perhaps a needlessly cruel moment could become the beginning of a healing one.

America: A Fish That Is Rotting From The (Orange) Head Down

At some point in the past week, I wanted to blame the current state of America, as it slowly stagnates from kleptocracy to full-scale authoritarianism, on the mainstream media, with its penchant for reporting "both sides" and doing nothing to find out which one of them is telling anything close to the truth.  I even made a note to myself that, in writing to start off the month of May, I should spend my time and bytes arguing for the need for this 21st-century Watergate of ours to have its own Dan Rather, someone who would go after the truth regardless of personal cost (and who, in the end, did pay a price through a Karl Rove-created setup that, to be fair, he did not examine closely enough to protect himself).

But Watergate unfolded at a time in our history when there were still media outlets, even ones owned by Republicans, who were committed to letting the truth unfold in whatever direction it needed to do so.  Just as, by the same token, there were Republicans who understood that the best interest of both their politics and their country depended on following the truth to the end, even if the short-term political price was steep.  And just as there were Democrats who understood that advancing their politics and ultimately solving the needs of the nation, involved fighting on behalf of both their politics and their nation, without regard to waiting for an exact match between their politics and the mood of the people.

It seems odd to say it, and certainly odd to feel the need to do so in the first instance, but all of the forgoing almost makes me nostalgic for the Watergate era.  Not the scandal itself, of course, but the fact that, in those days, there were enough people in positions of power to give our Constitution, and the institutions it established, the kind of weight on behalf of the powers and ideals contained therein to truly protect the public from internal threats, as well as external ones.

I still believe that people like that exist, and that they exist on both sides of the Great Ideological Divide that remains the obsessive focus of the MSM.  For my part, I do the best that I can to try to be one of those people.

But I'm no longer certain that their are enough of us to make a real difference, must less even make a successful attempt to bridge the divide at all.

Why?  For the simple reason that I think the rot from decades of largely unquestioned right-wing extremism, coupled with more than two years of T****, has seeped into our institutions to the point at which the institutions, and perhaps even the Constitution, are no longer capable of serving the functions for which they were designed.

And make no mistake:  the rot has seeped across the national level, and all the way down to your local TV news station.  In fact, let's start there:  at the proverbial bottom of the food chain.

This past week, a reporter at a local Baltimore television station insinuated that demographics are actually a qualification for political office, by asking whether the city, after having three African-American female mayors, needed to go in a different direction when choosing its next leader.  Even more egregiously, she posed that question to an African-American woman.  You don't need to take my word for it; you can check this out right here.

Again, to be fair, the reporter apologized on Twitter for asking the question, with an explanation that seemed less than completely convincing.  But she works for a station that views Baltimore as something that should be covered only with police-blotter stories, along with the ubiquitous sports and weather coverage.  I have made the observation to others that, if you relied only on the station's footage, you would expect to be ensnared in yellow police tape every time you tried to cross the city line from the suburbs.  Baltimoreans of all colors should boycott and demonstrate against the television station until the reporter is disciplined.

Now, for the national angle, let's move away from Baltimore 40 miles south to Washington, D.C..  To the House of Representatives, its Democratic majority, and its leader, Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

For a long time, they were willing to wait for the results of Robert Mueller's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election before moving ahead with any attempt to impeach T**** for his many and various sins against our democracy.  Those results are now available, and they show without any honest question that the T**** campaign worked with the Russian government in its efforts to win the election, and that T**** himself, in a variety of ways, actively attempted to interfere, and in some cases did interfere, with Mueller's investigation. 

In the process, it has become painfully clear that Robert Barr, the Attorney General, has been acting not as the nation's chief counsel, but as a ribbon-clerk for T**** and his various unsavory interests.  Barr has even gone so far as to suggest that a President (actually, he means this "President") can shut down an investigation of his or her actual wrongdoing based upon a sincere and unilateral belief in his own innocence, and to imply that he might shut down the investigations Muller farmed out to U.S. attorney offices throughout the country.

Pelosi and the House Democrats, in other words, now have enough of a predicate in actual testimony and investigative work to commence impeachment proceedings without being worried about the appearance of being motivated by partisan spite.

Or so one might think.

Instead, we have the spectacle of Pelosi and her Democratic counterpart in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, joyfully announcing an agreement with T**** to advance a $2 trillion infrastructure bill--with a promise to figure out how to pay for it later, and with congressional Republicans already balking at the proposed size of the spending.

We also have Pelosi herself talking about moving to stay in the political center lane, or T**** will carry out a coup d'etat against any 2020 election results he does not like.

To describe this kind of thinking as unbelievable is to be too kind by far more than half.  Pelosi and her Democratic colleagues in Congress are effectively telling all of us that they would like to do their job in guarding the hen house, but they have to wait until the fox is willing to let them in it.

This is the same Nancy Pelosi who, only a few months ago, said in a New York Times Magazine interview that power is never given, and must always be taken.  What the hell is stopping her from doing that right now?

In both of these cases, I have to contend that we see the corrupting influence of a "President" who does not govern by the rule of law and the interests of all the people, but by what he can get away with for his own private, personal benefit.  And Presidents, as all of T****'s predecessors have been willing to concede, lead by example.  A President sets the proverbial tone not only for his or her Administration, but for the entire nation.

Whoever said a fish rots from the head down (besides Michael Dukakis in 1988) was right.  It most definitely does.  Even when its head is orange from spray-tanning.

On a slightly more positive not, Pelosi and all of us should take a look at this.

And realize that a hopeless cause isn't truly hopeless, so long as you're willing to fight for it.

And, if you'd like to take a small step in that direction, click here, and let Mother Jones (a publication well worth supporting, and with which I have no connection) give you the opportunity to do so.

Democrats--And All Of Us--Should Worry About the "Killer Bs"

What--or rather, who--are the "Killer Bs"?  And why should Democrats--indeed, all of us in this country--worry about them?

They are four of the leading candidates in the Democratic primary for the 2020 presidential election.  In the order in which they entered the race, they are:  Bernie (Sanders), Beto (O'Rourke; no relation, by the way), Buttigieg (better known as "Mayor Pete," which is somewhat easier to pronounce), and, very, very recently, Joe (Biden, landing after a perplexedly long period of circling the field).

The application of the "B" part of the label is too obvious for even this much of a comment.  The "Killer" part, however, may not be.

These four men (with the emphasis on "men") control, according to recent polls, garner support, in a field of 20 candidates and counting, including a significant number of well-qualified women and candidates of color, from approximately 70 percent of respondents.

At the risk of sounding sarcastic, which I do more easily than I like to admit, I'm not sure I gave that last point enough emphasis.

Less than three years after the first woman nominated for the Presidency came within a few thousand votes of actually winning it, and less than 11 years after the county elected its first African-American President, the political party that made all of that history is apparently content to ignore, and perhaps even reverse, all of that history in favor of the one form of "political correctness" that has always dominated and poisoned our politics as well as virtually every aspect of American life:

The version that favors white Christian men.

This seems to be based on some sort of irrational fear of losing this demographic cohort as part of the Democratic base.  But this fear is an utterly irrational one.  That demographic fled the Democratic party decades ago.  And it's not coming back, no matter how many finely-buttered words the killer Bs offer on the subject of "economic anxiety."

These voters primarily live in red states, where they have regularly voted for Republican candidates at the state and local levels.  Candidates that, once elected, have worked night and day for the sole purpose of comforting their donors (many of whom live elsewhere), and afflicting the very people who put them in power in the first place.  Candidates who, in the process, have driven the economies of their states into ruin, and the blue residents into other states where it is possible to vote for sane public policy.  Ever wondered how, or why, this kind of political insanity works?

I'm sorry to have to say it this bluntly, but I might as well:  race is the key.  It always has been.  I sometimes fear that it always will be.

And I also fear that the Killer Bs are too in love with the idea that, because they are white men, and also Christians except in Bernie's case, they somehow have some kind of magic power to persuade their demographic cohort in red states and elsewhere to join with women and people of color to build a common vision of our nation's future.  Biden, in particular, suffers from this self-delusion.  As a long-time Senator from Delaware, his entire career has been built on the reach-across-the-aisle fantasy that always ends up with Democrats selling out their values for the sake of enacting bad Republican ideas.  The Hill-Thomas Supreme Court hearing fiasco is but one example; Biden's opposition to busing and support for mandatory sentencing laws are others.  It was only when he became Obama's "wingman," and backed the policies of a progressive President, including the Affordable Care Act (now almost as sacred as Medicare), that Biden developed a following among progressive voters in his party.

White men voting for T**** didn't cost the Democrats the Presidency in 2020.  Progressive voters buying into the Jill Stein delusion, with perhaps a little help from Vladimir Putin, did a lot more damage to Hillary Clinton's campaign.  But Hillary did the greatest damage to herself, by not working harder to shed her well-earned corporate image and appeal to progressive voters.  That failure is best summed up in two words:  Tim Kaine.  When I heard that Hillary had picked him as her running mate, my immediate reaction was "uh-oh."  I knew that she needed to go bold, and she showed with that choice that she was going to play safe instead.  Trump's nomination on the Republican side and Bernie's insurgency should have combined to tell her that safe was not an option.  Unfortunately for all of us, that didn't happen.

And, from the looks of things right now, it may not happen again.

We can't afford to let the Killer Bs kill our democracy by re-electing T****.  Right now, I have no idea how to stop that from happening.  I feel trapped by their failure to understand that, right now, the country is engaged in a cold war that has the potential to become a hot one.

Look at the events of the past week.  Our "President" doubled down on his support for white nationalists.  Yet another racist attack on a synagogue followed, with a senseless tragic death as a result (as well as several wounded, including the rabbi).  And, after a few token words of "sympathy" for the victims, T**** flew off to a self-fellating rally in Wisconsin in which he accused Democrats of murdering babies.

The Killer Bs are looking for a common ground with Republicans that no longer exists.  They are aspiring, on the other hand, to lead a party whose base consists of (added emphasis again) the majority of the people of this country:  women and people of color.  That's where the votes are.  And that's where the future of the country lies.

If any of the Killer Bs want my vote, they had better act on that simple truth, and make sure every one of their actions and words reflect it.

Starting right now.

The Need To Fight For Climate Change

I read the New York Times online now, and only subscribe to the Sunday edition of the hardcopy paper because doing so is still cheaper than paying directly for online access without a physical subscription.  When I do get the Sunday paper, I find it challenging to read more than a few articles in an entire edition--and often, my life is otherwise busy enough that, even at that pace, the papers can stack up a few weeks at a time.  But I've made an exception for last week's edition of the Sunday Times Magazine, which is entitled "The Climate Issue."  I've just read the first few articles in it, and am planning to read the rest of the issue over the course of next week.  I recommend that you do the same, if you can get a copy or find a way to access it online.

Does it say anything new about the subject?  From what I've read so far, I would say that the answer is no.  Then again, I've read as much as I can about the subject over the past thirty years, so there may not be that much that is new for me to absorb.  But what I have absorbed makes me not only convinced of the seriousness of climate change as an existential threat to human life on Earth, but despairing over the inability of our political system to facilitate any level of debate over how to address the problem, and save ourselves from ourselves.  For make no mistake:  we are both the problem and the solution.

That climate change is both a problem rooted in the actions and inactions of the human race, and is accelerating at a rate that gives us little time to address it successfully, is beyond any doubt.  But what is also beyond any doubt is the level of denialism sponsored and facilitated by the financial interests whose current modes of money-making would be threatened--in some cases, perhaps, even destroyed--by any serious effort to tackle the problem.  Had these efforts not been successful to date, we could very well have solved the problem by now.

But they have been successful, in part because they've adapted to the rate at which the available evidence has been accumulating against their cause.  Step 1 was to deny that there was any problem in the first place.  Then, as evidence began mounting that there was a problem, they said it was too small to worry about it.  Then, as the effects become too large to ignore, they conceded that there was a problem, but said it was unlikely that humans were its cause.  Finally, and more recently, they have actually begun to concede that there's a problem, that humans are the cause, and that something needs to be done--but that the solution is to spur entrepreneurial activity by way of having more babies.  In effect, there's nothing that the end of the world might do to us that the right combination of capitalism and social conservatism can't cure.

In plain English:  anything but a big-government solution.  And this is where the level of their dishonest lobbying descends to ad hominem levels.  The "big government" solutions to which they object (some of which, like a carbon tax, actually have roots in conservative thinking) are, in their view, just a proxy for a socialist, one-world takeover of our country.  Even though there's no evidence of this alleged conspiracy, they keep pushing it anyway.  And, thanks to forty years of public policy that has put the majority of our nation's wealth in their hands, they have no reason to think that they can't keep on pushing it.

What makes this effort especially insidious is the fact that, as the articles in the Times climate issue illustrate, the financial interests fighting the efforts to solve the climate problem have known all along about every aspect of it--its causes, its likely effects, and its potential cures.  Not for the smallest measurable instant has that knowledge in any way deterred them from their efforts to keep on lining their pockets by spreading ignorance and fear among everyone else.  There's a simple reason for this:  they've been working on ways to profit on the misery they're helping to create.  For them, the changing planet simply creates new and, perhaps, more lucrative ways to exploit everyone else.  And not the least of these ways is the greater likelihood that even the most basic essentials of life--air and water--will become so scarce that people will be willing to do and give anything to have them.  Far from being a disaster for global capitalism, in other words, climate change will enable its takeover of the entire planet.  Perhaps forever.

If you have any doubts about this, then take a look at this story from the magazine, about how the Pinkertons stand ready to be a police force for the brave new world that those who push back against climate change solutions would like us to accept.  Or this story, about how they are in fact ready to profit off of the destruction of our world.

But then, take a look at this story, about how people in a small Peruvian town are using the court system to fight back against this perfidy.  And understand that it is only through efforts like this that disaster for everyone--or almost everyone--can be avoided.  Understand that there is no glide path out of this dilemma.  Understand that, ultimately, there is no savior from the effects of climate change except for the one you see in the mirror, in mirrors all over our dying planet.

Climate is the problem, but global capitalism in its present form is the real enemy.  Fight it.  Today, tomorrow, and every day until we can be sure that the planet, its riches, and its opportunities are saved for everyone to enjoy.  Which is why I will leave you with the closing paragraph from the lead article in the Times' climate issue:

It has become commonplace to observe that corporations behave like psychopaths. They are self-interested to the point of violence, possess a vibrant disregard for laws and social mores, have an indifference to the rights of others and fail to feel remorse. A psychopath gains a person’s trust, mimics emotions but feels nothing and passes in public for human (with a charming Twitter feed, say). The psychopath is calm, calculated, scrupulous — never more so than while plotting murder. There can be no reasoning with a psychopath; neither rational argument nor blandishment has a remote chance of success. If this indeed is the pathology that we are dealing with when it comes to the climate impasse, then we should be honest about the appropriate course of treatment. Coercion must be the remedy — exerted economically, politically and morally, preferably all at once. The psychopath respects only force.

A Tale Of Two Theatres; Or, The Death Of Innovation In Real Estate

When one thinks of Birmingham, Alabama, theaters may not be the first thing to come to mind; instead, one is far more likely to think of its role in the civil rights movement, which is of course notable all by itself.  But Birmingham is, like a growing number of cities across the country for something else that has a bearing on civil rights:  the restoration of its remaining historic theaters to theatrical use, incorporating in the process references to the roles that these buildings played in enforcing legal segregation between whites and blacks.  Thanks to the help of city government, and community members, some of these buildings have already come back to magnificent life, while others are slated to share their fate.

You can read about this in detail here, thanks to the BBC, which found the proverbial "local angle" in the name the Alabama city shares with its British counterpart.  What was especially interesting to me was the story about the Lyric Theatre, in part because it had spent decades between its early glory days and its more recent restoration largely in a state of abandonment--that is, when it wasn't being employed as either retail space or as a porn theater.

To put it another way, the Lyric could easily be a distant real estate cousin of the similarly-named Lyric Theatre on West 42nd Street in New York, along with eight other theaters on the block.  They too had their early days of glory.  They too fell into alternative and frequently disreputable uses.  And all of them have, thanks to the intervention of the city and state, been restored to their former theatrical glory, right?

Well, only partially right.  Of the nine theaters on the block, five are now being reused for theatrical purposes, while another has found live as an event space frequently featuring performances, and yet another has become the lobby for a multiplex.  As for the remaining two, one was largely torn down, with its facade incorporated into a branch of Madame Tussauds.

And the final one, appropriately enough named the Times Square Theatre?  For literally years now, it has remained untenanted, because the New 42nd Street Corporation, the entity that controls all nine buildings, has been determined to turn it into retail space, on the grounds that its stage house is too close to the street for soundproofing purposes.  Personally, I have always found this to be a highly dubious rationale: the building's architectural cousin, the Music Box Theatre on West 45th Street, should theoretically suffer from the same limitation, yet that hasn't stopped it from being used regularly for many of Broadway's most memorable productions.  You can make your own judgment about the similarity of the buildings here and here.

And yet, in spite of this, the historic fabric of the building is about to be diced into pieces, thrown into an architectural blender with more modern (i.e., more "blah") elements, and resurrected as space for one or more transient retail tenants which will, presumably, fill the New 42nd Street's coffers.  However, as an architectural and functional travesty, this almost pales in comparison to what is being done to the Palace Theater on West 47th Street, which is being jacked up 30 feat from its present location so that new retail space can be built underneath it.

I'm not kidding, folks.  As New York Post columnist Cindy Adams might put it, only in New York, kids, only in New York.  You can read about this dual travesty in stomach-churning detail here.

So what, you might say?  The buildings will still exist, and the retail uses will add more economic vitality to New York's theater district, right?

Wrong.  Somebody forgot to tell the geniuses who came up with these plans an important point:  bricks-and-mortar real estate is dying.  At all price points.  Even at the discount level.  Even the businesses that profit off of dying retail enterprises see no future in it.  Take a look.

That's my point in partially titling this post about the death of innovation in real estate.  Developers seem to have no ability to imagine how empty spaces can be reused.  Artists, on the other hand, have always been able to come up with creative uses for abandoned spaces.  I can think of one word, appropriately New York-related, that sums this up:  Soho, a former industrial neighborhood in lower Manhattan where artists turned abandoned factories into lofts and gallery spaces.  Now Soho has become a luxury neighborhood, one that includes high-end retail outlets.

It is not just the cultural future of cities that lies in the arts; it is their economic future as well.  Empty spaces should be filled with artistic enterprises that create new value, especially in an era when retail has become almost entirely a virtual enterprise.  This is all the more so when the space in question, like an abandoned theater, was designed for artistic purposes in the first place.  That purpose should be celebrated and maximized, not shoehorned out of the way by real estate people lacking in vision and imagination.  If only the Times Square Theater could have been reused in a way that truly celebrated its artistic past while providing creative opportunities for commerce, that would have been a win-win scenario.

I suspect that, in a few years, the theater will go back to being abandoned as reality-based retailing continues to decline.  Perhaps then, the win-win scenario could become reality.

Take Them? Why Not? We NEED Them!

Sometimes, even a "counter-puncher" can punch himself in the face.  Especially if that "counter-puncher" happens to be named D****** T****.

I'm referring to His Orangeness' recent trial balloons regarding transporting refugees via bus to U.S. cities that have designated themselves as "sanctuary cities," without any formal acknowledgement of their legal status, or any other due process that might subsequently protect them against harassment, or worse, by government or private actors.  In his warped view, this will somehow teach the governments of these cities, as well as their political supporters, not to oppose T**** on any aspect of immigration policy, lest they suddenly be inundated by people he has described as "animals."

Unsurprisingly, especially since T**** is the one proposing this, the legality of this proposal is dubious at best, and (more likely than not) non-existent at worst.  In fact, officials within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security have apparently been discouraging him for some time from pursuing it.  This, along with other reasons, probably goes some distance toward explaining T****'s recent purge of several of his top DHS appointees, most notably the Department's Secretary, Kristjen Nielsen, who have spent much of the past two years testing and frequently exceeding the boundaries of both their legal and moral authority to satisfy their boss' need to use immigrants--and refugees in particular--as a political whipping post.

But now that Stephen Miller, the architect of T****'s crueler anti-immigrant policies, is now poised to be the sole whisperer in T****'s ear on the subject, all gloves and bets appear to be off.  The limits will no longer be tested, or even merely exceeded.  Instead, they will be smashed to pieces, transforming the United States--the nation of the tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breath free--into a pariah in the community of nations, and (far worse) the author of an incalculable amount of human misery.

On the other hand, with regard to his proposal for sanctuary cities, maybe that's not entirely the case.  In fact, assuming that it doesn't involve massively unacceptable violations of national and international law (a generous assumption), perhaps there's a case for letting him proceed with doing it.

Let me explain.

T**** has also said recently that no one, documented or undocumented, refugee or otherwise, can be allowed into the county, because he has arbitrarily made the decision that the country is full.  To borrow a reference to his alleged favorite holiday, Christmas, there is no room for the stranger and sojourner at the inn of America.

Well, that's what he believes.  And, like much of what he believes, it's 100% wrong.  The fact of the matter is that there are large portions of this country that have been largely abandoned by their former residents, and that can hardly be called cities or towns in any meaningful sense.  They are largely collections of real estate and infrastructure that once housed productive activities and meaningful lives--and could do so again, with a modest amount of governmental effort and investment.  Immigrants would do the rest, if they could just be allowed into the country and be given the opportunity to do what they have historically done in cities and states all across the U.S..

And, in the process of doing this, they would not only boost tax revenues at both the state and federal levels, they would create jobs that would put less fiscal stress on social programs at both levels.  This recent article from the New York Times fairly summaries the value of immigrants to the decidedly "empty" stretches of the American landscape.

The article mentions Baltimore as one city that his experimented with policies designed to encourage immigrants to move in and participate in the rebuilding of struggling communities.  As a native and nearly lifelong resident of the Baltimore area (including city neighborhoods), I can testify from personal experience that it is very far from being "full."  Within the boundaries of the city itself, there is a large number of vacant blocks for which there are no current plans other than demolition, and the vague hope that someone with money will come along and decide to translate all of the resulting vacant lots into some sort of urban paradise. 

Of course, anyone familiar with Baltimore's current struggles with public safety and integrity within the city government can guess as to how much of a fairy tale that hope is, actually.  On the other hand, maybe the huddled masses currently massing at our southern border are the potential authors of that fairy tale.  What if they were the one with the potential to make it come true?

And what if calling T****'s bluff on his "sanctuary city proposal was not merely good fiscal and humanitarian policy, but a vehicle for scoring political points as well?  It's painfully clear at this stage that T****'s political appeal rests fundamentally on his lifelong intolerance toward people of color.  What greater form of payback could there be for Democrats and their supporters than forcing him to act on his dishonest words, and let the results provide all of the rebuttal to them that is needed?  After all, a lot of the "empty" areas of this country are in so-called red states--the ones that have been abandoned by blue residents tired of living with decades of failed Republican policies.  The ones left behind have been led to believe that immigrants have "stolen" their jobs.  But what if they had the opportunity to see immigrants created new businesses and jobs, both for themselves AND for their new neighbors?  Is it too much to hope for the possibility that, if immigrants are given the chance to show what they can do, they can effectively make their own case to even the most intolerant of audiences?

Perhaps that is too much to hope for  I have to admit that two-plus years of life under T**** has done a lot to set back my sense of what might yet be possible in the American experiment.  But I'm determined to not let it be set back any further.  And, as a nearly lifelong Democrat and a partner in an immigration law practice with my wife, nothing would make me happier than to see a "counter-puncher" punch himself in the face with his own ignorant, racist bravado.  After all, Trump started with everything, financially speaking, and found new and novel ways to turn it into nothing.  As this Times article illustrates, those with nothing often have not only the greatest incentive, but for that very reason also have the keenest insight, on how to create value.  Perhaps those "animals" could teach T**** a thing or two about capitalism.

Actually, I don't think he's teachable, any more than he's a real capitalist.  Otherwise, by now, we'd have seen his grades as well as his tax returns.

Go ahead, D******, and make my day, as well as the day of thousands of people who still believe in the promise of this nation, even in the face of your ignorance, your bigotry, and your insufferable ego.  Bus them in, and knock yourself out in the process.

After all, at least one newspaper in your home town is begging you to do it.

What Is A "Semite," Anyway?

Since I'm about to launch into a discussion of an understandably sensitive topic, I might as well clarify in advance my personal interest in it.

I am a recent convert to Judaism, having been married for nearly 27 years to a Jewish woman and, for much of that time, having been a fundamentalist Christian and then, for a time (and the subject of another post, soon), not much of anything, religiously speaking.  I came to Judaism not because of the influence of my wife and stepchildren (and their families), but  because it seemed, over time, the best and most enlightened way of having a relationship with G-d.  In particular, the influence of Jews in this country in culture and liberal politics has always given me a favorable view of both Jews and Judaism generally.

So I am proud to say that I am Jewish, to identify with the Jewish community, and to offer unqualified support to the current and continued existence of Israel as a Jewish state and a homeland for Jewish people from all over the world.  And, as a consequence, I treat any statement that impinges on those interests in any way, shape, or form with the strongest possible opposition, consistent with my values as a Jew.

And, I am sorry to say, recent remarks by Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota fall directly into that category.  I contributed to her campaign, and see then (and now) the value of having not only Muslims in Congress, but Muslims having a greater role in American life in general, not just because it's consistent with our values as a nation, but because it also offers a chance to formulate policy based upon a rational understanding of Muslims, and not an "understanding" largely shaped by Fox News.  I repudiate her statements without reservation or exception.

But calling Representative Omar's comments out as "anti-Semitic," as some conservative Jewish commentators such as John Podhoretz have done, is a very different story.  And I'm writing this now, in part, to explain why that is true.

Despite the ancient nature of Judaism, the term "anti-Semite" (and variations thereof) as a term for hatred of Jews and Judaism is relatively recent.  In fact, it has a very specific geographic origin:  Germany, where Adolf Hitler used it in his book "Mein Kampf" to explain in part the basis for his perverted view of the world and his people's place in it.  Given that fact, as well as the subsequent historical record of Nazism in the Third Reich and the post-World War II world, and the Holocaust above all, it is not surprising that the terms "Semite" and "Jew" have become interchangeable in contemporary culture.  And that is not entirely due to Hitler; the origins of the link predate him by a considerable margin.

Take a look at this Wikipedia article, which discusses in detail the biblical origins of the terms "Semite" and "Semitism."  Originally, the term covered a wide number of racial and religious cultures in the Middle East, including Arabs.  That ended beginning in the nineteenth century in Germany, when it became fashionable in Germany, Hitler's adopted country, to use the term as a form of shorthand for spreading hatred of Jews.  This became the cultural and political topsoil in which the seeds of Nazism were to sprout in the following century.

So, when conservative commentators use the words "anti-Semite" or "anti-Semitism" as a vehicle to attack the remarks of Representative Omar, and similar remarks made by Arabs or Muslims, or people otherwise linked to Semitic peoples or cultures, I am sorry to have to point out that they are (hopefully without meaning to do so) ratifying a use of language that has the most unsavory origins possible.

And that should trouble Podhoretz at least a little bit, not only because he is Jewish, and a staunch defender of Israel's existence and identity as a Jewish nation, but also because he was an advocate of spending trillions of dollars, at an additional and more horrific cost of thousands of lives--Jewish, Christian, and Muslim lives--on a war of choice that has destabilized the entire Middle East, and offered an invitation to Vladimir Putin to expand the influence of Russia in the region.  Russia, a nation with its own notorious history of persecuting Jews.

It should trouble Podhoretz, and others on his side of the political fence, that their indiscriminate use of these words may have played a role in the worldwide spread of violence against Muslims, including the recent tragedy in New Zealand.  Go ahead and say that I'm stretching a point; I don't think I am.  To borrow a quote from this article, "it's like a virus."  Go ahead and point out that the speaker was talking about white supremacy; try and tell me where white supremacy begins and hatred of the Jewish people begins.  I have followed bigotry as a Christian and a Jew, and I have always found white "pride" and hatred of Jews to be joined at the proverbial hip.

It should trouble Podhoretz that his words indirectly ratify the "soft bigotry" of evangelical Christians toward Jews, the kind that professes undying love for Israel while cloaking its desire to convert every single Jew on the planet, in and outside of Israel, under the pretext of "completing" their Judaism.  Yes, "completing" it.  Again, I lived in the belly of this particular beast for more than 12 years of my life, so I can assure you from personal experience that I know what I'm talking about.  Would it help if you had an example of what I'm talking about?  

Well, here you go.  Take a good look at it.  It's less than two minutes long, so it shouldn't be inconvenient to do so.  And overlook what you will in it.  For example, the fact that, for most of this prayer, she neither bows her head nor closes her eyes.  This is clearly not aimed at a deity, for whom no physical reverence is being shown; it's aimed for a far less supernatural audience.  Or, if you wish, you can overlook the no-fewer-than-13 references to the "name of Jesus"--I'm sorry, the "NAME OF JESUS"--mixed in with the neat little commercial for T**** and his allegedly pro-Israeli policy.

But what you shouldn't overlook is the fact that the leader of this prayer goes out of her way to show blatant and grotesque disrespect for the purpose of the legislative session:  the swearing-in of Pennsylvania's first Muslim state legislator.  Under the circumstances, there could not have been a worse way to open the session, unless possibly the phrase "Death to Islam" was thrown into the mix.

And sometimes, the bigotry is not always soft.  Sometimes, it's much more overt, as in this case.  Yes, I am sorry to say, there are still plenty of examples of this type:  evangelical ministers who profess to love Jews but make it clear that this "love" gets folded into a decidedly Christian agenda, not one that respect the rights of Jews and Christians to worship G-d in very different ways.  And, as Jeanine Pirro demonstrated recently, the hard bigotry has a place in our secular culture, where it extends to Muslims as well as Jews (and kudos to the very neoconservative--and Jewish--Bret Stephens for calling it out).

Above all, what should trouble Podhoretz is the fact that, in Israel, the government of Benjamin Netanyahu has now become a persecutor not only of Muslims, but of other Jews.  With reference to the former, it has attempted to create security for Israel by turning the West Bank region into a de facto prison for Palestinians, and an opportunity to marginalize the Palestinian presence on the West Bank through additional settlements.  It has, in the process, only bought temporary "security" for the Jewish state by continuing war by other means, and created a new generation of terrorists in the process.  In Netanyahu's mind, the only road to "peace" in the Middle East is the one that enables one Semitic people to control the fate of another one.  (Again, do you think I'm exaggerating?  Take a look at this and tell me if you still feel that way).

Perhaps worst of all, it allows Netanyahu to define which Jews get to be protected by him at the expense of the rights of other people, including other Semitic people.  Israel was founded on the basic of a distinctly Jewish vision, but emphasized as part of that vision the rights of all people, Jewish or otherwise, to live in secular equality with each other and freely practice their respective faiths.  That was the Israel that I grew up supporting, and still support.  Netanyahu's Israel--an Israel where one part of the Jewish community can persecute another not merely with impunity, but with the blessing of the government--is not that Israel.  Read this very carefully, and see if you still disagree with me.

My point?

Podhoretz, and anyone else wishing to call out persecution of Jews (as should we all) should re-think what it means to reflexively use a phrase that itself was born out of bigotry, and whose continued use without a proper understanding of its place in history runs the risk of fueling bigotry toward the very people it should actually serve to protect.  Perhaps our particularly divisive moment in history, nationally and internationally, ironically provides an opportunity to re-think what we mean when we talk about anti-Semitism.  Perhaps we can broaden our usage of it in order to condemn not only hatred toward Judaism and Jews--which must and always should be condemned--but to also condemn hatred of the other cultures and peoples who rightly should be considered Semitic as well.  Whether Podhoretz likes it or not, Jews and Arabs are both children of Abraham; we might as well build our ability to relate to one another around that fact.

Perhaps doing so will help us to realize that someone from Representative Omar's background, as a refugee and a Muslim, has the capacity to broaden her understanding of human suffering, and call out injustice when she sees an example of it particularly offensive to Jews, as she did in this instance.  Where was Podhoretz's response to either her tweet, or to the offensive behavior of the Representative that led to it?  To borrow from the linked article itself:

{Crickets}

That's my point.  As long as Representative Omar continues in the right direction on her learning curve, I will continue to support her.  And as long as Podhoretz continues to use the phrase "anti-Semite" as an epithet of convenience against people to whom he is effectively related but with whom he lacks the ability to reason, I will continue to call him out.