LeftWingCapitalist

Kamala Harris has what it takes to be a good president -- Trump does not

2024-10-16T17:59:00.000-07:00

What I hope to see come out of the 2024 election is what I have wanted in every national election since the first one I remember, and that goes way back to 1964. A path forward to better national prosperity; improved civil rights, especially for persons who are often looked at as "those others;" enhanced national security, much of that through alliances and America being perceived as a global leader in solving problems in ways that share the benefits throughout the global community; national support for and investments in scientific advancements and innovation; and international respect for America's values and integrity.

For this year specifically I will add this: Dramatically less divisiveness. A more unified social and political environment where the opposing groups will disagree respectfully and without hostility. That's one I've never had to think about before.

I do not believe these goals to be unique to me. I think they are shared by many, and I also think that they are part of the national heritage. For two and one half centuries, in fits and in starts, we and our predecessors have made progress on them all.

Leadership is vital

None of these aspirations can be accomplished by any one person, but leadership counts for a lot. Whatever progress can be made in these areas depends upon whomever becomes President in January 2025.

Kamala Harris has the temperament and the vision to make progress on these goals. Donald Trump does not -- his temperament and vision would stifle and destroy progress, not encourage and build it.

Kamala Harris beats Donald Trump on character (she is honest, he is a liar). She is patient and optimistic where he is revanchist and hostile.

Harris will inherit a good economy and continue the policies that have made it so. Trump inherited a good economy in 2017; he mostly didn't screw it up until the pandemic. That's when his basic desire for chaos asserted itself, and his chaotic mismanagement laid the groundwork for supply shortages, a primary cause of inflation.

Speaking of inflation: The Inflation Reduction Act of August 2022 -- largely a string of investments in clean energy -- coincided with an annual inflation rate of 8%; too high. It also coincided with the beginning of a precipitous drop in inflation, now down to about 2.5%. So, perhaps not such a bad name for that legislation.

Looking forward

Looking forward, Harris will support that set of investments and those of the Infrastructure Act of 2022 so as to continue and increase their benefits. They would be under threat of repeal or mismanagement from a Trump presidency. In fact, Trump's plan for deportations and tariffs are a recipe for higher inflation. Fewer workers means less production which means (once again) higher inflation; higher tariffs are the same as a national tax on consumption (again, higher inflation). The prices of those items that are tariffed will increase, and the prices of things in which the product contains something that is subject to higher tariff will also increase.

America's prosperity is not well-spread. Too much goes to too few at the top. Harris will push for higher income taxes for the wealthiest and the highest earners (a potentially dis-inflationary program), as well as for big business. Trump's record from his presidency was to dramatically reduce those tax rates, causing a major jump in the Federal debt.

Let's get that top bracket up a lot, maybe to 50%. It's been higher in the past and the economy kept growing and was healthy. When it was brought way down was when we started having the ultra-high pay disparities -- we don't need the highest paid executives making hundreds of times what the typical worker makes, that's where we are now as a legacy of the much lower tax rates for the highest earners.

Harris is for the law; Trump is for the dis-order

Harris has a successful legal background, having been a district attorney and California Attorney General. She has read and understands the Constitution, the nation's basic set of laws and order. Trump says he will pardon the convicted insurgents from the January 6 attempt to overturn the 2020 election. . .that's anti-law and pro-disorder.

Unlike Donald Trump, Kamala Harris has never sexually assaulted someone and been found guilty in a court of law. She has never falsified election-related financials and so been found guilty of many counts of fraud. Folks, Trump had a jury trial. He and his lawyers had their say on the jury selection. In his arrogance, he did not even testify in his own defense!

She is definitely not a bully and has not called for termination of the Constitution so that she can rule without restraint, all of which are Trump positions. Harris has not tried to force state election officials to "find" votes for her or to change state election results, something that Trump and his legal minions spent months doing in November and December of 2020.

Upon losing the election of 2020, and then being unsuccessful in his attempts to steal the election from Joe Biden, Trump absconded with boxes of classified material. He kept them in a public bathroom. Who knows who has seen what, thereby possibly exposing others named in those documents to harm, even death? And then when the FBI came to investigate and reclaim the items, he obstructed lawful actions. Not a big deal to Trump, I suppose, following his failure to live up to his oath of office on January 6, 2021.

(Oh, Trump said, Mike Pence won't disqualify the electoral votes so that I can continue being president? And my insurgents at the Capitol say they want to hang him? "So what?" as revealed recently by Special Counsel Jack Smith's court filing. And let's not overlook some other parts of that work which are showing that Trump began this process before the election.)

America will look better to the rest of the world with Harris as President

With her track record as District Attorney, Attorney General and now Vice President, it is clear that Kamala Harris is offering herself up to be in service to the nation for the nation's interests, not for her own. She has continued to make that clear during her vice-presidency and actions as presiding officer of the Senate.

Trump with his focus on retribution and divisiveness (signs of being a sociopath) is all about doing this for himself. Trump's presidency owed something to Russia, a hostile foreign power, and Russia's Vladimir Putin, the man who defines Russia as hostile-to-America-and-the-West-and-all-that-they-represent. Harris helped to achieve a variety of Federal investments in infrastructure. The best that Trump could manage was a presidency's worth of "infrastructure weeks."

The Harris campaign is one of America is good, it needs to be better, and here's how we can make that happen. Trump's campaign, on the other hand, has degenerated into one where, for the first time in American history, he sees those who disagree with him as "enemies within" who should be prosecuted for their political positions, perhaps even beset by U.S. armed forces.

Let me say it differently: That. Has. Never. Happened. Before. In. American. History.

Kamala Harris is not perfect. Nobody is. But she is a decent, caring person who is proposing a presidency that is a much better bet to reduce domestic divisiveness than is Trump's negative, hostile, disloyal to the Constitution, un-American bullying and posturing.

Harris is thoughtful, experienced, knowledgeable and brave. She can provide leadership to help make progress on things that matter to Americans. Trump cannot. He is increasingly unable to clearly articulate policy; he is often incoherent publicly and shows no ability to act otherwise within the functioning of the government. He is unaware of proven experiences and facts, and so is without the needed knowledge to make decisions that are in the nation's best interests. He depends upon his character of being a cowardly bully to carry him along. This type of presidency would cause a great loss of international respect for America's reliability and integrity.

Harris will represent America to the international community as reliable and committed to values that are the legacy of more than two centuries' worth of history and progress. Other nations will know that the United States can be trusted to continue a heritage that, for all its flaws, is much more good than otherwise.

American needs Kamala Harris and Tim Walz for President and Vice President.

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How many former U.S. Presidents want immunity from prosecution for criminal acts?

2024-07-05T18:21:00.000-07:00

One hundred and seven justices have served on the Supreme Court of the United States prior to the current Court. Remarkably, only this past week has it come to light that somehow, during a two century period, all 107 missed the part of the U.S. Constitution that confers absolute presidential immunity. Can you believe that?

No, neither can I. And that's because the Constitution does no such thing. It has no provision for presidential immunity from prosecution for potentially criminal acts committed by a person while occupying the office of the presidency.

What we are now calling "immunity" was clearly on the minds of the members of the Constitutional convention of 1787. A form of immunity does, in fact, appear in the Constitution, but written so that it applies only to members of Congress. Section 6 of Article I says

The Senators and Representatives shall receive a compensation for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out of the treasury of the United States. They shall in all cases, except treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other place.

(The emphasis is mine.)

Article I sets forth the design and responsibilities of the two Houses of Congress. The above passage provides members of Congress with protection against prosecution for allegedly unlawful speech uttered during Congressional session. (This privilege "flows" to congressional aides, too. The Legal Information Institute of Cornell Law School provides an extensive background analysis of Section 6 and immunity, as well as of the entire Constitution.)

In the same way that Article I describes Congress, Article II describes the presidency and "executive power." Nowhere in Article II does any sort of analogue to Congressional immunity appear for the benefit of the President. I am by no means a Constitutional authority, but the plain evidence of the Constitution's own text convinces me that immunity was a consideration during the Convention, and it was purposely avoided in describing the presidency even while a limited form was written in for Congress.

History and the Declaration of Independence provide us with context for why this should be so. In 1776, executive power and authority over the thirteen English colonies was vested in the King of Great Britain. The Declaration sets forth the reasons for independence; the preponderance of those reasons allege criminally unlawful actions taken against the colonies by King George III. The colonies had no legal recourse because the king was immune from prosecution for these actions.

It makes no sense to think that distrust and fear of unrestrained executive power exhibited in the work of 1776 would have no direct influence on the writing of the Constitution in 1787. America's "basic law," the Constitution, provides no presidential immunity.

The current SCOTUS ruling -- made by the Republican-appointed majority, with dissent only from the Democratic-appointed minority (although with potentially significant disagreement from one of the majority) -- strikes me as openly partisan because it benefits former president and convicted felon Donald J. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president in this year's election. I see no way it benefits any other president.

(No other currently-alive former president has lobbied for immunity from criminal prosecution for acts committed while in office. Looking back into 19th century history shows that we've had some real stinkers as president, but none who committed or attempted to commit criminal activities, with the exception of 20th century Richard Nixon.)

Trump wanted this for obvious personal gain -- prosecution of his criminal offenses in attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election is probably impossible now before this year's election. The Court's decision does nothing to rebut the facts of the cases lodged against Trump, but without trial, the benefits of judicial decisions prior to the election that would be gained by the nation's voters will be denied.

But I think the Court's decision diminishes and harms the United States another way, too.

The foundation of American global leadership and influence has been the stability of its basic law. This has given the peoples and governments of other nations confidence in aligning themselves with American policies and values, along with supporting the American financial and industrial infrastructure that makes possible those policies and values. It has helped to maintain confidence in the ownership of Unites States bonds, helping to keep a lid on interest rates and maintaining the U.S. dollar's "reserve currency" status.

The stability of our legal system has provided a convincing story that our policies and values are preferable to those of others, such as China's and Russia's, because it has fostered a climate of legal fairness with an aversion to favoritism.

This decision of presidential immunity is a major departure from that heritage. It looks like favoritism. In doing so it weakens the American argument that our system of governance is exceptionally better than those of places such as China and Russia because it makes our leadership look more like theirs, but with more internal friction and less political, institutional and social cohesion. America's formerly solid "rule of law" now looks shaky and subject to self-serving decisions by whoever occupies the White House.

The Republican SCOTUS majority has done something that benefits those other nations that sell themselves as more dependable environments for various partnerships; at least one of those -- Russia under Vladimir Putin -- is and has been openly hostile to the United States and our American way of life.

What happens next?

As mentioned above, the facts behind the criminal cases against Trump appear to have emerged intact. The SCOTUS decision requires the evidence be presented in lower court to determine how they adhere to the different types of presidential actions -- and so then they are categorized as immune, not immune or perhaps quasi-immune. The decision's writing is clumsy, vague and somewhat sloppy (like its reasoning).

Irrespective of how they fall into the different categories, the facts show that Trump incited a violent and armed mob to attack the Capitol of the United States on January 6, 2021. Among other criminal actions, he also is proven to have deliberately failed in his duty to ". . .preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States" by spending that afternoon watching the violent, armed attack and taking no action to stop it and preserve, protect and defend those who were being attacked as they were trying to do their Constitutional duty.

Lives were lost, and the United States of America was diminished that day. He might now be immune from prosecution, but Donald J. Trump was the cause.

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Progress and innovation: 2023 was a very good year for Americans

2024-01-24T18:34:00.000-08:00

2023 was a very good year.

Covid receded to the background -- it is still with us, but with fewer cases, less hospitalization, lower mortality and generally milder cases. It's similar to flu and the common cold. Give credit to vaccination.

That's fine, some will say, but how about inflation? Good point -- inflation fell off a cliff during 2023, wages went the other direction, and for those living in the United States those are great things.

Still shocked at pandemic-era unemployment? That's old news: The national unemployment rate has hit the floor. Worried that our nation is losing its scientific and technological creativity? Read on to become convinced otherwise.

Let's look at a sampling of the year's noteworthy and perhaps overlooked accomplishments to get some idea of how good the year was and what that means for the future.

All government: American government worked well. Our politics is messy and could use much more cooperation and less obstinate standing on principle getting in the way of compromise, but for the most part all levels of government did a good job of providing needed services.

Federal, state and local governments consistently provided services such as: Public health and safety; public education; disaster response and relief; access to public lands; national defense; foreign relations; research and development; issuing visas to tens of millions visitors; naturalizing almost one million new citizens; road work; other public infrastructure upkeep.

FBI data show crime rates continue to decrease (near to all-time lows) and the National Retail Federation retracted its earlier assertion that organized shop-lifting was rampant and increasing. Bear in mind that American retailers annually book more than $7000 billion ($7 trillion) in sales, so when it comes to shoplifting we are hearing about fractions of a percent of total business and no evidence of an increasing trend.

U.S. national economy: The nation enjoys overall prosperity. The evidence is clear. For example: Malls in December were packed with shoppers. I experienced it; you probably did, too. Respondents to multiple opinion polls done at and prior to that time revealed around 70% were positive about their financial status.

If you followed the year's business commentary you might have noticed that much of it was centered around the "tight labor market." That's another way of saying that 2023 saw an increase in wages and worker incomes due in large part to historically low unemployment. Year-over-year wage growth was 4%. Inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index ended the year at 3.2% annually based on the reading from the second half of 2023. Post-pandemic government stimulus and policies encouraged businesses to bring people back to work (remember all the Help Wanted signs earlier in the year?) thereby creating more supply and therefore disinflation.

Unfairness and inequities still exist, but rising wages and falling inflation mean progress in a variety of ways for the future as economist Paul Krugman describes in a recent Opinion piece in The New York Times.

Physics, astronomy and overall cosmology: With funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation, scientists at NANOGrav (short for North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves) accomplished the first-ever detection of something called low-frequency gravitational waves moving through the universe.

Why is this notable? We have seen numerous remarkable pictures of stars, galaxies and other astronomical characters in their innumerable and gargantuan existences. Check out NASA's web site for some great pictures from the Hubble and Webb observatories. Those pictures have helped to confirm something that has bedeviled the cosmological scientific community for decades: We cannot see enough stuff to account for the gravity-ordered appearances and existences of the things that we do see.

Apparently only about 5% of whatever it is that makes up our universe is observable. In other words, all those stars, planets, galaxies, black holes, quasars and so on can account for only 1/20th of the mass that is needed to make gravity do what it does to put all those things together. NANOGrav is looking for the other 95%, and last year's discovery is a big step in the direction needed to figure out the other 95% of the story of how everything (ourselves included) has come to be as it is.

The human genome: Improving our understanding of human genetics is key to the long-term development of defenses against disease and helping to make informed decisions about medical treatments. Did you know that until last year the 20-year old human reference genome was largely based on samples from only one individual? (I did not know this.) The U.S. National Institutes of Health has now put together a new "pan-genome" based on sequences from 47 people; the intent is to continue expanding it to include sequences from about 700 individuals. The prior pan-genome was largely that of European descent; the new one will overcome the limitations inherent in a single geographic origin.

Medicine and health: Could there be a cure for cancer? Recent research has shown that the answer to that question is now "Yes, it's likely." Bacteria has been found in and among tumors, creating conditions promoting growth of the tumors. Such a discovery suggests that counteracting or killing the bacteria could help to fight cancer.

Artificial intelligence: I struggled with this one. News about "AI" used up a lot of last year's oxygen. (I'm using quote marks because there is not yet a convincing case for intelligence that is artificially-created by our human intelligence.) I struggled not because this isn't important, but because I had a hard time convincing myself that the consumption of all that oxygen accomplished anything meritorious.

Here's why it's included: Last year's news and controversy about "AI" accomplished a level of public awareness of a potentially pervasive, commanding and influential technology that the preceding fifty years' worth of discussion had not been able to produce. The general understanding of "AI" -- whatever it might be -- is so warped by hype and braggadocio that it begs for clarity, especially in the moral and ethical realms -- what will it be able to do? What should it be able to do? It will be tough going to get good and acceptable answers to those questions.

The "AI" that was introduced late in 2022 and became widely discussed during 2023 is primitive. By relying on massive amounts of computing power it can accomplish certain well-defined tasks much faster than you or I could, but that's much like saying it can follow directions to stack blocks one atop another. Intelligence begs for creativity and innovation -- "AI" does not now show those abilities. Speed and precision might be astonishing, but there is no soul. Will there be one? Should there be one?

Let's be wary of human-corrupted "AI" tools that are used to create "deep fake" type lies, but also realize that for every such tool there's another better one that will expose the corruption underlying the manipulation of reality.

I'm going to be optimistic and say that 2023 accomplished an important public awareness that will continue. That is needed progress.

NASA and Taters the cat: Cat videos are popular and entertaining. NASA has provided us with one that is also important. Here's why: Exploratory data gathered by decades' worth of space-faring equipment is sent back to Earth for analysis. The method of this sending has been and continues to be good old-fashioned radio technology. It is pokey slow transmission requiring hours or days to send packages of data. The use of laser technology could be from 10 to 100 times faster. NASA prepared a video of Taters the cat, sent it (the video, not Taters) 19 million miles away from Earth, and then used a laser to transmit it back home in a fraction of the time that would have been needed by radio frequency methods. See the video and read the NASA article here.

I've just scratched the surface with these brief stories. How much of this type of news do you think is generally known? If not much, or not enough, it's at least in part because most people most of time look to television and clickbait-infested social media and online videos for news reporting of current events.

Too brief to provide much detail and context, often sensational and frequently sycophantic, such mass media fire hoses are usually devoid of critical analysis. That void is too often filled with conspiracy stories, so knowledge of accomplishments becomes a forgotten casualty in the popular consciousness. Sycophancy and conspiracy try to poison critical analysis; taking time to learn about remarkable accomplishments is an antidote to such poison.

If you want more from elsewhere on recent accomplishments, I recommend Bill Gates' busy and interesting blog. His thoughts on the accomplishments in 2023 and his outlook for 2024 can be found by selecting here. Included is an expanded view of current "AI" successes as well as ideas on what it might eventually be able to do.

People understand that the future is shaped by the progress that comes from accomplishments. The results of last year's cancer research will help to better focus this year's research; perhaps next year will see the beginnings of a cure. Last year's wage-earner earned a wage increase that already puts her ahead of inflation, and she understands how that carries forward into the following years, while inflation declines, to her increasing long-term benefit.

One final thought: The students I work with are well-prepared to enter the workforce. They are graduates of public education and are thoughtful, informed, skilled and energetic. I have no doubts about their abilities or their prospects for success and for the benefits and progress that will derive from that success. Each year to come will produce new remarkable accomplishments. I look forward to many new good things that will come of efforts yet to be done.

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Happy 2024!—Let’s Give a Shout Out to Technology

2023-12-31T17:12:00.000-08:00

by Guy Heston

To celebrate the holidays we decided to treat ourselves to two nights at the Fontainebleau, the newest hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. At 63 stories it is the tallest building in Las Vegas and a swell joint that I highly recommend. It is also a decidedly high tech joint.

Being a senior, I try very hard to accommodate and appreciate new technology. When we moved from our 100 year old house where the light switches were a simple matter of up for on and down for off, I eventually learned the intricacies of our new house where the light switches (I guess I really shouldn’t call them switches), are mini-control panels, and can be remotely controlled from your phone. I have gotten used to and appreciate them.

But our room at The Fontainebleau threw me for a loop. There were control panels everywhere. I first noticed there wasn’t one of those plastic door hangers where you advise the staff you either want your room to be serviced or not. No, there was a control panel where you chose “service” or “privacy”. If you chose privacy, a little red LED light came on outside the door. So far so good and saving the planet from more plastic waste.

Then there were the control panels for the lights and drapes. Did you want all of the lights on or all of the lights off? Just the bathroom lights on? Dimmed lights? Bedside lights? The bedside control panel slightly resembled an I-Pad, and my favorite option was turn everything off so I could rest in peace. I never did figure out how to turn the bathroom lights out, so I just closed the door and tried not to feel guilty about wasting energy.

And then there were the drapes that seemed to have a mind of their own. I swear to you I did not touch anything, but twice they decided to close on their own. Luckily, I found an option on one of the control panels that had three options for the drapes—“Drapes Open,” “Drapes Closed” and “Drapes Stop”, plus the same three options for the sheers. I really wanted the drapes to stop messing with me but figured the drapes open was the better option. Viola! The drapes reopened to our view of The Strip. Twice.

And there was this little gizmo on the coffee table in the shape and approximate size of a bow tie. The Fontainebleau is bow tie themed, right down to the carpet. But as I sat there staring at it I wondered what this gizmo did. I eventually figured out each side of the bow tie had q-codes for the restaurants, bars, etc. So the days of the little printed booklet with hotel information are apparently numbered. I’ll get over it.

The high tech telephone vaguely frightened me so I just left it alone and figured if there was an emergency I could just press “O” and shout “Help!” I never did figure out how to activate the hotel internet and decided two days off the grid might be a blessing in disguise. It was.

Turns out I am not alone. Brian Merchant of The Los Angeles Times in his December 28 column, “Smart and Dumb Devices: A List of Grievances”, summarized readers’ gripes about technology. Comments were offered about Waze, Ring, keyless entry systems, self checkout and so forth.

I suspect most of the comments were from seniors.

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Why do we have all these Christmas things?

2023-12-22T17:11:00.000-08:00

If you are anything like me you have enjoyed the sights, sounds, events and traditions of Christmas time without giving much thought to how these things have come to be. Let's take a few minutes to consider some of the history behind this annual festival and how it shapes today's and tomorrow's world.

Religious origins

To begin with what should be obvious: Christmas is an English language word to denote the festival of the birth of Jesus of Bethlehem during the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus. Other languages use other words. Navidad is Spanish for the same event; in Italian it is Natale, German-speakers will say Weihnachten, with the French it is Noël, and there are numerous others. Greek was widely spoken in the Empire, especially in the eastern regions where Christianity first took hold, and was a type of lingua franca for the next fifteen centuries; notably, the Greek word for savior is Khrīstos (as rendered for our contemporary English-speaking convenience). The first reference of a Khrīstos mass occurred about one thousand years ago. Centuries before, by the year 336 the Christian bishop in Rome had selected December 25 as the date to recognize the birth of Jesus. No evidence -- whether secular or religious -- of the validity of that or any other date has been found. In any case, it was an inspired choice by positioning a celebration of the growing religion of Christianity near to the long-established and popular festivities of Saturnalia for the winter equinox.

Yule log

The yule log tradition dates its beginning to long-ago European cultures, probably prior to the Roman Empire. Its origins can be found in pre-Christian festivals celebrating the winter solstice. So, yes, it can be said to have roots in pagan culture. As an accessory to the Medieval European Christian celebration, the yule log is traditionally a very large piece of wood placed on a hearth of suitable size, first fired on Christmas Eve and rekindled each of the twelve days of Christmas. As the centuries passed the use of the hearth for providing warmth declined, and with that change the dragging of a large hunk of wood into the house became needlessly onerous and impractical. However, we can thank the creativity of 18th and 19th century French bakers for the continued existence of the yule log in its contemporary form as a dessert -- the bûche de Noël. Vive la France! Variations include the Bismarckeiche ("Bismarck oak") in Germany; the Italian tonchetto di Natale; and the Vietnamese bánh khúc cây giáng sinh ("Christmas tree log cake").

Music

Christmas music -- both sacred and secular -- is so numerous as to be beyond concise description. However, the brief carol "Silent Night" has a particularly touching origin: On Christmas Eve of the year 1818 the young Austrian priest Joseph Mohr realized that his church organ was likely to be unusable due to water damage from a nearby flooded river. It was his previously-written poem that became the lyrics for Silent Night when Mohr -- a skilled player of the guitar -- asked his friend Franz Xaver Gruber to set it to music suitable for the guitar. Gruber quickly accomplished this for a portion of the poem and the evening service included the guitar-strumming performance. Humble beginnings, indeed, for a piece that has been translated from the original German into at least 300 other languages, earned a UNESCO Heritage designation, and can be found in a heavy metal arrangement.

Christmas tree

Honors are due to the peoples of Germany for creating the Christmas tree (although Latvia and Estonia both claim to have been first in this event). Strasbourg -- now in France, but then in Germany -- is mentioned as introducing fir trees decorated with apples by 1605, and its Cathedral likely had a Christmas tree in 1539. In 1554 the nearby city of Freiburg prohibited the felling of trees for Christmas uses because the practice had become so pervasive. A Silesian duchess is known to have placed candles on Christmas trees in 1611. The custom of using greens, such as tree branches, to decorate for various holidays was already common in Germany and other parts of Europe; expanding to the once-a-year use of an entire tree was probably an easy development for some folks. But the use of Christmas trees spread slowly. England and its American colonies delayed in adopting the Christmas tree practice. It was not until 1840 that Prince Albert (originally from Germany) and Queen Victoria popularized the idea of having a Christmas tree. It caught on in Britain and easily spread to the United States.

Those quirky and influential English

Long before the time of Victoria and Albert the English were remarkable for the extravagance and lengthiness of their Christmas celebrations. In the centuries following the Norman conquest of 1066 those who were wealthy and fortunate hosted feasts and celebrations that spanned several days around Christmas. (The pre-conquest Saxon/Danish/Norse population was predominately Christian, but was not known to have given much thought to Christmas-time celebrations. The renowned Saxon King Alfred the Great of Wessex was devout and pious, but suffered from serious digestive problems and probably gave little thought to hosting lavish buffets.) English Heritage describes medieval Christmas affairs with these observations:

Medieval people really let rip with twelve full days of Christmas festivities, reaching a crescendo on 6 January, 'Twelfth Night', when presents were exchanged. . .Medieval celebrations also combined the servants-as-masters antics and gift-giving of Roman Saturnalia with customs belonging to the midwinter feast of Yule. These included the Yule Log (kept burning throughout the season), decorating houses with evergreens and eating richly decorated boar's heads, sometimes washed down with mulled 'braggot', extra-strong ale with honey and cinnamon, spiked with brandy.

Boisterous medieval festivities were directed by a Lord of Misrule, whose word was law. The Christmas games he ordered could be rough; among the tamest was 'Hot Cockles', where blindfolded victims had to guess who'd slapped them from behind. If the guess was right, the slapper became the victim. Blending devotion with drunken partying, medieval Christmases were also important state occasions, when kings ceremonially wore their crowns at feasts and lawgivings. . .Tudor Christmases were even more full-on than medieval, but were a tad less boisterous, at least at Court. . .This was also a time for plays (like Shakespeare's 'Twelfth Night'). . .

Fast-forwarding to 1645 finds England convulsed by civil war, with the Parliamentarians gaining the advantage over the royalty. Puritans -- those who aimed to "purify" English society and religion by removing all vestiges of paganism, a portion of whom were the majority of settlers in New England -- discerned paganism in Christmas celebrations and so caused Parliament to officially declare that Christmas was not a holiday with religious services. In 1647 Parliament banned all Christmas festivities and celebrations. Popular feelings in favor of Christmas celebrations were supressed until 1660 when the monarchy was restored under Charles II. The Puritanical inclination towards constant hard work and limited (or no) play was overcome by royal support of the natural human desire for occasional festivity. King Charles is credited with reopening theaters and restarting traditions such as decorating churches with holly, sponsoring Christmas-oriented games, banquets and dances.

Some of this seeped into Colonial America where it took root and survived the colonialist rejection of the monarchy. Nor did it merely survive; it evolved and prospered. Even as the English author Charles Dickens strongly influenced the development of new Christmas attitudes in Victorian culture, his popularity in America caused similar acceptance here. The historical Saint Nicholas predates Dickens and the Victorians by many centuries, but the Saturday Evening Post and Coca-Cola images of Santa Claus and other similar manifestations of that quantum theory elf are contemporary lineal descendants of A Christmas Carol.

Both sacred and secular

These brief perspectives are inherently European and American in their heritage, and so can only acknowledge that there are also other Christmas experiences from entirely different cultures: Shinto and Buddhist Japan, Hindu India, Catholic and Indigenous Latin America, Africa, Asia and even Orthodox Christianity.

I think that what is common to all is this: Our own individual experiences, as well as those that are historical, show the events and activities of Christmas time as a fusion of both the sacred and the secular. The product of that fusion is a flexible environment that helps us to communicate seasonal messaging to family and friends, provide others with some charity, enjoy the time with its frivolities and festivities and take some contentment from the hope that we each do our own little part to make the world a better place.

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Let’s Hear It for Infrastructure Maintenance!

2023-10-16T17:10:00.000-07:00

(By Guy Heston.)

Americans seem to take our infrastructure for granted. Turn on the faucet and here comes the water. Flick a switch and on come the lights. The gas company will make sure you are warm in the winter. We expect everything to work with nothing more to think about than paying the monthly bill, which we gripe about but pay anyway to keep the lights and heat on, and with precious little thought about what has to go on to make all of the infrastructure function.

We are making a mistake with this thought. Infrastructure requires ongoing investment and maintenance to keep everything working. It doesn’t happen magically, and if we don’t pay for it through our utility bills, taxes and programs to help those less fortunate keep the lights on, we will suffer the consequences—blackouts, worse floods and fire damage, roads in disrepair, more unhoused people because they can’t pay the bill and so forth. Yes, there will always be natural disasters such as the recent fire in Maui and Category 3 hurricane in Florida, but well built and maintained infrastructure can often greatly lessen the damage and heartbreak.

I worked in public transportation for three decades and was always amazed by elected officials’ lack of interest in infrastructure maintenance. I could always find federal grants to fund new buses, transit centers, customer amenities and the like, and it was a given that we had to have a public event to celebrate the arrival of new buses or the opening of a new transit center, where elected officials could talk about what had been accomplished for the community and show off shiny new stuff. Great photo opportunities for the press.

Maintenance of such infrastructure was another matter, and in my experience a topic that politicians found about as interesting as watching an egg boil. When I would explain the importance of keeping up the infrastructure the taxpayers had invested in, slightly glazed eyes seemed to be the order of the day. There was even a rule (since thankfully modified), that federal transit funds could not be spent on maintenance. More than once I was told by an elected official that operational expenses for a new project was my problem, not theirs.

When each fiscal year I would draft our transit system's proposed budget, my first order of business was to talk to the maintenance staff. What do we need to keep things running? Resealed shop floors, reupholstering of bus seats, that sort of thing. Nothing sexy about it but kept things running in a good state of order. And for newly proposed capital projects I learned to ask how we were going to keep said projects well maintained. Some of them were cancelled because I didn’t get a good answer.

I was once asked to participate in a focus group on the strategic future of the California State University. The faculty members of the group, rightly so, talked about the importance of student outcomes and investing in faculty. When it came my turn to comment I said it was also important to invest in the maintenance of the 23 CSU campuses infrastructure. I proffered that we were sitting in a lovely classroom near the grassy, tree lined campus quad and that it took money to keep everything functioning so the faculty could teach and the students learn. Based on the quizzical looks I received you would have thought I had just landed from Mars. The faculty members looked at me with the interest of watching an egg boil. I glanced at the chief facilities officer of the university who was also participating in the group and we exchanged slight smiles and kept quiet.

So here is my proposal. Let’s make our nation’s infrastructure maintenance glamorous. A newly resurfaced road with Beyonce dancing on it in a TikTok video? Barbie sitting in a bus with new seats and a refurbished engine (yes, well maintained buses are needed during an emergency evacuation)? Harry Styles showing off a new maintenance shop floor? I realize that none of this is likely to happen, but perhaps it is time to reimagine our nation’s approach to infrastructure and remind our elected officials that decide on the use of taxpayer dollars that maintenance may not be glamorous but is critical in everyday life and even more so when a natural disaster strikes. Well maintained roads, water systems, power grids, public transit buses and the like keep our collective lives running.

Sexy, no. Needed, yes.

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Let's have more reporting on geniuses we don't know about -- we already know more than enough about the other kind

2022-12-19T17:40:00.000-08:00

"Genius is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration." That's according to Thomas Edison, although he might have said 90/10 instead. Doesn't matter. Either way, whenever I read something about "a genius" I think of Edison's description.

Edison was a prolific inventor. With over 1000 patents and a variety of business ventures to his name he was widely acclaimed in his time. For good reasons -- think, for example, of the electric light bulb -- journalists reported on him prolifically and sometimes breathlessly as his work brought benefits to the individual and the community.

Edison eventually put his attention, creativity and perspiration to work on building tools needed by the embryonic motion picture industry. This led to his 1908 formation of the Motion Pictures Patent Company (also called the Edison Trust). Despite the Sherman Antitrust Act, Edison was attempting to monopolize the production of motion pictures.

The MPPC's seven year life-span was spent mostly in controversy, conflict and court. During that time much of the industry decamped to the part of Los Angeles, California known as Hollywood as a way of putting physical distance between themselves and the grasp of the Trust. By the time the Trust was broken the players in motion picture production were committed to Hollywood being their base of operations.

The genius of Edison deserves to be remembered for his positive contributions. But genius -- especially the type described in Edison's definition -- gets nudged by unexpected events to pop up again and again, providing astonishingly satisfying end results.

Here's a reader's commentary that begins at the intersection of journalism and genius and goes from there to tell two stories that were "news" to me. -- Garry Herron, ed.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear LWC,

I don’t know about you but I am getting a little weary of hearing about Elon Musk. Yes, yes, I know, he is widely considered a genius and reportedly the richest person in the world. He upended the automobile industry, shoots rockets into space and for $44 billion now controls your ability to tweet.

Good for him, although maybe not so much for the Twitter staff members forced out. Capitalism needs investors, disrupters to shake things up and so forth. But must the media seemingly follow every minor detail of his life? Recently The Washington Post food section “Voracious” was simply gaga (sorry, Lady Gaga, I couldn’t help myself) to announce it had learned that Mr. Musk’s favorite drink is, drum roll, Diet Coke! The Post went on to treat us to a nap inducing history of Diet Coke.

Please, Washington Post, stop. What he does with Tesla, Space X and Twitter is indeed newsworthy but I suspect most of us do not care a whit whether Mr. Musk drinks Diet Coke, Pepsi or Jack Daniels whisky. Oops, I hope I didn’t give him any ideas about buying a whisky company.

I think it’s time to give a shout out to some of our perhaps under appreciated geniuses. My first nominee is Robert Kern, who passed away in November at age 96 in Waukesha, WI. Do you have a portable emergency generator in your garage? You have Mr. Kern to thank for it.

In the mid 1950’s he was working to build motors for the railway industry but lost his job because of increased competition from the quickly expanding airline industry. He adjourned to his garage and began working on his idea to develop emergency generators. His idea evolved into Generac Corporation which to this day makes 75% of the portable generators you find at Home Depot, Lowe’s, etc. He sold the company for about $1 billion in 2006 and became a philanthropist, donating $100 million to the Mayo Clinic as an example.

Next up is Marcus Urann, a farmer in Massachusetts. If you like to serve beautifully sliced and plated jellied cranberry sauce from a can at your holiday meal, Mr. Urann deserves your thanks. In 1912 he invented it! And, frankly, I think his canned Ocean Spray tastes better than the homemade sauce I make just to show I know my way around the kitchen. It takes 15 billion cranberries a year to make the canned sauce, and here’s a shout out to whoever figured out it takes 15 billion cranberries.

If you’ve gotten this far you might be wondering who I would nominate for my third under appreciated genius. It would be me, of course, but my spouse might disagree and I certainly don’t want to appear bitter or jealous of Mr. Musk, so I hereby withdraw my nomination. Elon earned his fame and fortune and he and Twitter can have at it.

To be fair, I first learned the above information about Mr. Kern and Mr. Urann from the reporting of the Smithsonian Magazine and New York Times, so thanks to them. My point is there are lots of under appreciated geniuses in our midst past and present, so perhaps the media could look for more of their stories and histories and report those, and forgo reporting on Mr. Musk’s beverage preference.

Right now I’m going to go into the kitchen and pop open a Diet Coke. Whatever you do this holiday season may it involve lots of time with your loved ones and a meal that includes a delicious can of jellied cranberry sauce!

Sincerely,

Guy Heston

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Support your local social studies teachers

2022-09-02T15:10:00.000-07:00

We ask a lot of our teachers, don't we? Especially high school teachers. They teach children who morph into "young adults" right before their eyes. Questions about the studies become more profound. Children will pester and probe with "why?" Teenagers will start asking "why not?" (A personal favorite, shared with my high school buddies and tolerated by an empathetic chemistry teacher who eventually clamped down when a rogue chemical experiment briefly obliterated the school's educational decorum. The only damage was to pride, and Mr. E's disciplinary action was appropriate. Provocative questions can take you to unexpected and enlightening places.)

I think this becomes especially challenging in social studies or civics classes. History, governance, social structures and how accepting individual responsibilities contributes to the community are topics that are wide open for interpretations and challenges. Those of us who found ourselves at this age during the 1960s and '70s were fond of repelling anything we considered to be intrusive by saying "Stay out of my space!" If this reminds you of. . .you, well, good.

Public education is expected to explain why a democratic form of government provides the best living environment for the individual. A successful democratic government responds to the will of the majority to solve social problems, maintain public safety, avoid harm, and achieve progress in making the country better in the future. Civics and social studies courses take the lead in delivering on that learning experience.

Part of the educator's job is to inform students on how the U.S. Constitution is the basic national law for American governance. It has been amended, interpreted, bent and massaged for over 230 years. When this has worked well it has been due at least in part to the fact that the Constitution's authors, and the succeeding congressional representatives, presidents and federal justices, have held to a common understanding of the country's history and how that history provides guidance towards a better future.

Now we see that recent Supreme Court decisions (and other events) illustrate a gradual but striking loss of the common understanding of American history. I think that teen students will pick up on this and want to learn what has changed or been lost, why that has happened, and how it will affect them for the rest of their lives.

Let's take a look at what might merit youthful attention, and conjure up some ideas on where that could lead.

This year's SCOTUS decisions encompassing abortion (also directly affecting personal privacy), gun control and religion seem to me to be intensely personal to the youth, perhaps even more so than with their elders. The majority opinions in these decisions depend upon historical citations whose anecdotal evidence is of the sort that would be unconvincing in high school debate competitions. (I know this from long-ago personal experience.)

It won't take much for an inquisitive civics student to dig into the recent SCOTUS decision rescinding the constitutional right for a woman to make a private decision to abort a pregnancy and find that the historical underpinnings of the decision are, at best, wobbly. Abortion was an individual woman's private decision and part of normal life at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. The majority professes to be guided by the original intentions of the Constitution's authors, so then why misrepresent its history?

Inquisitive students will go farther on this. For example, if the 9th Amendment invites the discovery and adoption of individual rights beyond those already identified -- and it does -- why should a right to abortion and to the privacy of that decision not be eligible to be recognized as constitutional? Suppose a girl asks that question and finds that the anti-abortion answer is founded on religious belief; wouldn't you expect her to counter that with "Why should somebody else's religion be imposed on me?" I would.

Regulation of private gun ownership and of the availability of certain types of firearms is a real attention-getter for students. Much gun-related carnage happens in places frequented by teenagers, such as schools, shopping centers and crowded events. Teachers will be asked why semi-automatic firearms are so readily available even though they are capable of causing far more death and injury than were 18th century cannons, the possession and use of which were reserved for national defense? Why prefer a demonstrably dangerous individual right at the expense of general public safety when there is a history of limiting the individual's right so as to provide a public benefit?

As for religion, students will learn that one of the foundational reasons for the nation was to escape the coercion and destructive conflicts of a state-sponsored religion. A public school coach or other employee is by definition part of the state or local government. If that employee is enabled -- as SCOTUS has now done -- to publicly display religious practices while on duty, isn't that a type of inherent state coercion, and won't it be seen by students as invading their individual space? And what about U.S. history during the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries showing a continual national trend towards the greater separation of church and state?

Yes, I'm putting ducks in a row. But these ducks are real, not imaginary. We all can remember enough of our youth to know that we and others around us were capable of challenging the adult status quo. As parents and friends of parents we know that today's and tomorrow's teens are well prepared to have these discussions, and they have the intentions of doing so.

The SCOTUS decisions overviewed here result in remarkable state-enabled and state supported intrusions into a person's space around personal and private decisions, personal safety and freedom from religious coercion. I think this will be an underlying motivation for thoughtful student confrontations with their civics and social studies teachers.

Do we want today's students to become tomorrow's engaged adults and national leaders? We say that we do, but for that to happen teachers, parents and communities ought to be prepared to experience a type and intensity of student activism that has been seen only rarely since the civil rights and anti-war protests of the 1960s and early 1970s.

Support your local social studies teachers. They will be appreciative, the students will be better prepared to assume and fulfill adult responsibilities, and we will end up with a more successful and better democracy.

###

Where Was the Celebration?

2022-07-20T15:37:00.003-07:00

By guest author Guy Heston --

In this summer of our discontent (inflation, a new COVID variant, messed up airline schedules, etc.) I thought we actually had a great cause for optimism and celebration but didn’t take it.

On July 11 the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, better known to us as NASA, and in cooperation with the European and Canadian space agencies, sent back the most incredible images from the James Webb Space Telescope.

The images of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 were stunning, incredible glimpses into the universe in which we reside. The White House hosted an event to unveil them. Some of the images from distant galaxies were reportedly from 4.6 billion years ago (I’ll leave it to the scientists to determine how that was figured out). You can find the images at nasa.gov.

To me this event was right up there with the USA landing Neil Armstrong, Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Michael Collins for the famous July 20, 1969, Apollo 11 moonwalk. It was another giant leap for mankind, viewing the awesome images from the giant mirrored observatory, and with more to come.

I can still remember sitting in our family living room watching the grainy television coverage of the Apollo 11 moonwalk, which you can also find at nasa.gov. It was a moment of great national pride and a cause for celebration. As a nation we held our heads high.

So where was the celebration with these awesome images of our universe? The mainstream media such as the New York Times and Washington Post provided the obligatory coverage and pictures, but from my perspective the coverage was more or less dropped after a couple of days and the top headlines were back to the January 6 hearings, inflation, gas prices and such. The galaxy pictures seemed like a meh moment. (I had to look this one up, too. -- ed.)

As far as I was concerned the images from the observatory were cause for a national party and dancing in the streets to celebrate what we are still capable of if we put our minds and dollars to it. Alas, if I am reading the room correctly, we are apparently not in the mood for a national party. Drat.

I made reference earlier to the July 20, 1969, moonwalk. That isn’t the only anniversary worth mentioning. On that same day in 1976 the Viking 1 landed on Mars and we were treated to wonderful images of our solar system neighbor.

We have many reasons in this summer of discontent to look down and out. Thanks to NASA for showing us how to still look up and out. Let’s celebrate!

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For Putin it is about much more than Ukraine

2022-03-10T17:50:00.000-08:00

August 1968

The Ogre does what ogres can,
Deeds quite impossible for Man,
But one prize is beyond his reach,
The Ogre cannot master Speech:
About a subjugated plain,
Among its desperate and slain,
The Ogre stalks with hands on hips,
While drivel gushes from his lips.
-- W.H. Auden

W.H. Auden composed August 1968 immediately on hearing of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. Fearing the eventual spread of subversion brought on by education throughout its empire, the Kremlin was desperate to exterminate Czech ideas about independence and free thought. Decades later, the Kremlin and its dictatorial boss are consumed by the same fears and so also employ acts of desperation.

There is so much to be said about Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine; it cannot all be said in this one posting. Questions are asked which can be best answered with the benefit of knowing background and context. For that reason this essay covers the historical issues that are at the root of the conflict.

Why does Putin want to invade, subjugate and control Ukraine? What does this mean for the United States, Europe, NATO and democracies world-wide? Why is this happening, and why now? Why does the enormous and well-equipped Russian army seem to be struggling against the much smaller Ukrainian defense?

Why do we in the West and especially here in the United States find these questions so hard to answer, except by saying that we have no idea of what Putin really wants or how far he is prepared to go in this conquest? What should the U.S., Europe and NATO be doing to help Ukraine?

Writing for The Washington Post about a month prior to the invasion, Michael McFaul, America’s ambassador to Russia during the Obama administration, described how Putin once explained to then-Vice President Biden that Russians do not think in the same way as Americans. For Putin, subduing Ukraine is about much more than just Ukraine. These are McFaul’s words:

“In the United States, the dominant analytic framework for explaining international relations today is realism. This theory assumes that all countries are the same: unitary actors seeking to maximize their power or security through rational calculations in an anarchic world.”

But, McFaul says, Russia is in fact different. “Putin does not think like us. He has his own analytic framework, his own ideas and his own ideology – only some of which comport with Western rational realism.” Ambassador McFaul continues:

“. . .Putin believes that the West unfairly dictated the terms of peace at the Cold War’s end. In Putin’s view, the West imposed liberal restructuring inside Russia, compelled Moscow to sign lopsided arms control treaties, expanded NATO with no regard for Russia’s interests, and — the greatest sin of all — divided the Slavic peoples of the Soviet Union into separate countries and then “systematically and consistently pushed Ukraine to curtail and limit economic cooperation with Russia.” (Actually, it was the leaders of the three Slavic Soviet republics who signed the agreement dissolving the U.S.S.R. in December 1991, not leaders from Washington, London, or Brussels.) Now that Russia is powerful again, Putin is prepared to risk a lot to revise this so-called American imperial order, especially in Europe. He sees this mission as his sacred destiny.”

I struggle to understand how Putin could show enough commitment to something greater than himself to earn the phrase “his sacred destiny.” But I embrace McFaul’s insight when he adds (emphasis is mine):

“Preventing Ukraine from becoming a member of NATO is therefore only one dimension of Putin’s revisionist agenda. Even if Biden and his NATO allies wanted to offer that concession, Putin won’t be satiated. He will press on to undo the liberal international order for as long as he remains in power. Normalizing annexation, denying sovereignty to neighbors, undermining liberal ideas and democratic societies, and dissolving NATO are future goals.”

Ambassador McFaul observes that Putin feels threatened not only by America’s support for democratic institutions world-wide, but also by the attraction that those institutions hold for populations at large. He continues by saying (emphasis is his):

“. . .Putin believes that U.S. support for democracy abroad threatens his autocratic rule. During Putin’s reign, most crises in relations with the United States have been triggered not by NATO expansion, but by democratic mobilizations — Putin calls them “color revolutions” — within countries, be it Georgia in 2003, Ukraine in 2004, the Arab Spring in 2011, Russia in 2011 and Ukraine in 2014.

“. . .there is no deal to be had between the United States and Russia as long as Putin is in power. U.S. leaders cannot command other societies to stop wanting democracy. Putin will always fear mass protests and feel threatened by democracies, especially successful ones on his border with a shared history and culture such as Ukraine.”

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine late last month shows that he felt the timing to be good. Europe had tied itself to Russia for fossil fuel energy supplies and so would be unwilling to jeopardize that relationship by supporting Ukrainian resistance to the invasion. Former U.S. President Trump’s denigrations of NATO had left that alliance leaderless and dispirited. Ukrainian defenses were poor and could not withstand a quick assault by the Russian army. Perhaps he had even convinced himself with his own propaganda that the Ukrainian population would welcome an invasion.

(I find that last point unlikely, but it is a theory that has been offered by some observers. A variation on that theme was discussed by U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Tefft, who served in that position during both the Obama and Trump administrations, in an interview with the New Republic’s editor Michael Tomasky. Maybe I am too cynical.)

Putin was wrong on all those theories.

Europe is not ready to roll over for Russia. Germany – probably the nation with the most exposure to Russian energy exports – has had a dramatic change of attitude.

Annalena Baerbock, Germany’s foreign minister, was candid about the future of German – Russian relations. Soon after Putin ordered Russia’s army to invade Ukraine, she appeared in a televised interview and was asked about the recent meetings of Chancellor Olaf Scholz with Putin, and of herself meeting with her Russian counterpart Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

“We were lied to stone-cold,” Baerbock said. “The chancellor was lied to, I was lied to by the Russian foreign minister, the entire international community was lied to.”

NATO has found itself with disciplined, consistent and pragmatic leadership thanks to U.S. President Joe Biden and his Administration. Congress is doing its part by developing and passing legislation to provide massive amounts of aid to Ukraine and to the nations that are accepting Ukrainian refugees. Trump’s disrespect for NATO and his apparent subservience to Putin is in NATO’s rear-view mirror.

As for Putin’s pre-invasion diatribes – distractions, all of it. Biden recognized that fact as it was happening – remember that he was Putin’s audience as Ambassador McFaul was watching and listening – and he, I think, shared that with European and NATO leaders. Biden and his Administration publicly revealed Putin’s falsehoods in the weeks leading up to the invasion.

Domestically, too, Putin needs distractions.

He has been in charge of Russia for over two decades and has little to show for it except a large and well-equipped military. Russia’s economy is smaller than Italy’s; the average Russian is far less prosperous than the average Italian. Putin’s national economic leadership can only be called abysmal.

Putin’s distractions about Ukraine are warped misstatements of history. (National Geographic politely calls it “tangled history”.)

Released from Russian domination by the end of the Soviet Union, Ukrainians have had three decades’ worth of independence to develop a national identity. The events of 2014 that have so disturbed Putin show that Ukrainians prefer a government of liberal democracy.

The Ukrainian capacity for resistance has flummoxed Putin and the Russian army. Ukrainians now have feelings of national community – to use Ambassador Tefft’s preferred phrase – as well as historical reasons to maintain that community. Putin does not seem able to appreciate this.

The revolution that ended the Russian Empire was followed by a brutal civil war. Ukrainian kulaks – peasants who were wealthy enough to own good farmland – were a big part of the losing side. I once knew a fellow who was a descendant of kulaki farmers, and I asked what he wanted to do with his life. His response was immediate. “Go kill Russians,” he said. Why? “Because I am kulaki,” he replied.

A decade after the civil war, Soviet leader Stalin and the Kremlin government continued to be dissatisfied with the degree of capitulation shown by the Ukrainian population at large. Their method of choice to produce full compliance with the Soviet formula was an engineered famine – crops and food were forcibly taken from Ukraine. Millions perished; some portions of eastern Ukraine were depopulated, providing room for Russian settlers transported in by the Kremlin.

With the Russian invasion, Putin has trampled on the treaty made among Russia, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and the U.S. that guaranteed Ukraine’s independence in exchange for it giving up all the nuclear weapons it inherited with the demise of the U.S.S.R.

This is not the stuff of history that creates feelings of Ukrainian good will towards Russian domination.

Most of the rest of the world -- liberal democracies in particular -- will look at the lies and betrayals and arrive at this: International trust in Putin and his government is a thing of the past.

Putin is not a stupid person; he knows these things. He might not have appreciated the degree to which Ukrainians are attached to their own national identity. But he wanted to distract the world.

I think the distractions have been revealed for the lies that they are. Putin might feel a “sacred destiny” for himself, but there is no honor in pursuing a destiny that hurts the innocent and would destroy a nation’s sovereignty. Ukraine and its people will suffer for one man’s view of his destiny; unfortunately, that cannot be stopped by anyone except Putin himself, and that seems unlikely. At this point, Putin seems committed to prosecuting a war against Ukraine that targets and terrorizes the non-combatant population.

Putin (and Russia) will be hurt by Western sanctions and absence of trust. Without money, the Russian military eventually grinds to a halt. Without trust – and why would Putin be trusted now? – Russia will be severely limited in its international commerce.

Rapidly replacing fossil fuels with non-fossil alternatives will enable Europe and others to be free of Russian coercion and inflated pricing. Oil, for example, is priced in U.S. Dollars, but its price is determined by the forces of global supply and demand. Using electric vehicles instead of those with internal combustion engines will defeat the malevolence of petro-states such as Russia that act to create oil price-induced inflation. We have a second chance now to learn what we should have learned from the politically-caused oil supply disruptions of the 1970s.

Vladimir Putin might not think about these things the way that Westerners do. But Ambassador McFaul makes the sensible point that not all Russians think in the same way as Putin. Let’s remember that as we oppose Russia’s assault on Ukraine.

For thirty years those in the world who prefer government of democracy to that of autocracy have been comfortable enough to assume that democracy and free markets had become self-fulfilling. That period has come to an end -- there are others in the world who think differently from us. Vladimir Putin is the Ogre. Such creatures are dangerous, but not invincible.

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The things we can live with less of, if need be

2022-01-27T11:25:00.000-08:00

by Guy Heston for LeftWingCapitalist

OK, I admit it. When the pandemic first burst upon the scene, I developed a slight case of hoarding.

A trip to the Smith’s supermarket and instead of buying two cans of soup it was six. I don’t really like canned green beans but soon enough we had six of those as well. Not to mention lots of rice, dehydrated mashed potato mix, applesauce and whatever else might be in stock. Our pantry was a bit overstocked.

There was also the trip to Target. Paper towels on the shelves—well let’s get some of those. Soap, hand sanitizer, shampoo, laundry detergent, toothpaste, etc., and soon enough the cupboards were full of it. I tried not to be greedy, but the truth is I overbought and I feel a bit guilty about it. I certainly did my part to contribute to supply chain disruptions.

As the current omicron variant makes its way around the world, I have once again noticed our local market shelves a bit understocked. Maybe it’s because so many workers are calling in sick, maybe it’s continued supply chain disruptions or a combination thereof. I don’t know but offer a four star salute to every supermarket and Target worker in our great nation, as well as all the good people involved in producing and delivering the goods.

But here is something I do know the pandemic has taught me. I can do without certain things, or at least not so much of them.There is a perfectly good cloth towel next to our kitchen sink and I can therefore get by without so many paper towels. Do I really need to swish my hands with sanitizer every time I touch something? Can I wait until I have a full load to run the washing machine or dishwasher? How many cans of green beans do I need or want?

Don’t get me wrong. I am one of corporate America’s dream consumers, as evidenced by my Target and Macy’s bills (let’s not even get started about Amazon). I am very thankful for it all and feel blessed to have it within a short drive to the supermarket or a click away on the laptop. There are many others in our country and the world who don’t have such easy options.

My grandparents who survived the Great Depression in small town Iowa knew how to get by with just the essentials, including a backyard garden where my grandmother taught me how to pick rhubarb and greens she had grown. I’m not going to be planting rhubarb anytime soon inasmuch as I live in a desert city. But maybe I could take a lesson from my beloved grandma and get by with a little less. Now don’t ask me to give up my Pledge© furniture polish, but perhaps I could cut down a bit and do my part to loosen up the supply chain and control inflation. I am going to give it a try for the time being.

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Guy Heston writes his observations of U.S. lifestyles from the perspective of his own life experiences that have been lived at the intersection of rural and urban America. He is retired from an executive position at a metropolitan public transit company.

Resolving a disagreement gains more ground than winning an argument

2022-01-27T11:22:00.000-08:00

by Ray Rawls for LeftWingCapitalist

What is the difference between an ‘argument’ and a ‘disagreement’? An argument can be a disagreement to which people have added hate, anger, attacks, provocations, or revenge. None of these additions constitute a real enhancement to the point being made. Skills like negotiation and problem solving would have a much more positive effect on influencing the other person in the disagreement.

In a marriage, in order to win an argument, one person may take a very extreme position and refuse to listen to the other side, which just enrages the other person. This may lead to emotional and sometimes physical violence over unimportant issues. Why? Why not either let the issue alone entirely or disagree but refuse to escalate the emotions which cause suffering? If you disagree over an important issue, then make your point of view known in a kind and respectful way and let the other person think about it. Leave anger out of it. Usually the other person’s primary concern is that their issues are heard and respected. I think most married couples really know that there is no ‘winning’ in a marriage unless both parties ‘win’.

The length and severity of the Covid-19 pandemic has hurt or threatened us for a very long time. I suspect it has awakened our ‘fight or flight’ response. Since there is nowhere to run, our instinct is to fight. That may explain the increase in violent crime as well as some predisposition to be more argumentative. In the U.S. our society is more polarized than ever and seemingly less tolerant of others’ ideas. We need to find the resources to cope with higher degrees of stress and manage our own personal response to this stress in a better way.

Where is this heading? We are only going to face harder times and worse challenges as climate change progresses and parts of the world become potentially uninhabitable. We need to pull together and not pull farther apart to handle the bigger issues coming. The earth is too small for us to forsake multilateral cooperation.

Pandemic-amplified stress is causing unfortunate behavioral changes. Physical violence has increased but that is not the only kind of violence. You can kill somebody physically when you stop their heart. You can kill somebody verbally when they suffer irreparable damage from your actions and words. The Buddha said, “When a person is born, there is indeed an axe in the mouth. The fool speaks evil and cuts himself off with the axe.” Our words can cause damage or incite physical violence.

Trolling can do such damage. Trolling in fishing refers to dragging a baited line behind the boat to lure fish to bite the tasty treat. Trolling on the internet refers to posting very emotionally charged messages which stir up people’s emotions (in a negative way). Some trollers have even posted mean messages on a funeral site and laughed when the family of the deceased suffered. The negative emotions of the family fed a positive emotion in the troller.

In a disagreement at work with a coworker or a client, you can also treat the other person respectfully and make your point of view known without resorting to anger or escalation. This will make the other person more likely to hear you and consider your ideas. Who knows? You may get a WIN-WIN!

In international relations, engagements can be calm and respectful, or emotions can prevail and endanger whole societies. With so many nuclear weapons (as well as other weapons of mass destruction) in the world, we all want our governments to be careful not to cause too much conflict.

Then there is social media. Social media thrives on emotional responses. Advertisers want to engage the emotions of their customer base. Political parties want to engage the emotions of their audience to follow them. Advertisers want to engage the emotions of their readers so they will spend more time on their site and hopefully act in a way that means more revenue for the advertiser. How can social media engage emotions without doing harm? This is certainly a big issue for our world.

We all hope that the future will be bright and the whole world will thrive but that will not happen automatically. It will require effort on all our parts to be respectful and thoughtful about each other and our environment. We can each start by trying to keep our small portion of the world thoughtful and peaceful while we engage with one another.

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Ray Rawls served in both the U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force. Those enlistments were followed by a lengthy career as an Information Technology professional in the corporate world. He has a strong religious background and has thoughtfully studied behavioral science for many years.

Is it a war or only a skirmish? Is there a difference?

2021-07-30T17:37:00.000-07:00

Culture wars have reached our quiet little village. Does it matter? Yes, it does.

At this point, the battling is contained to a few meetings with some belligerent confrontations and a bunch of letters and commentaries published in the local paper. Some of those have included more than a tad of hostility. But no dueling yard signs yet. Maybe a truce will be agreed before things go farther. Hope abides.

It started a few months ago when the local school district proposed a new elective course for high school students. An ethnic studies course would be offered to juniors and seniors. With some well-thought and passionate input from students describing individual stories of damaging prejudice and ignorance, a curriculum has been developed.

There's always opposition to change. And, I get it -- change can be scary and it can be threatening. That's why a lot of change gets done gradually. Ethnic studies is one of those things that has been gradually changing and improving. Compare a current American history textbook for high school use today with what was common decades ago (yes, I know, the memories are perhaps few and somewhat dim) to understand the vast improvements in the telling of non-majority stories in U.S. history.

Nonetheless, reporting of opposition presentations in school board meetings, as well as the writings published in our local weekly, indicated growing heat in the matter. As a community member without a vested interest in a high school course -- no such students in this household -- my feelings about the matter (and/or my vanity?) convinced me that I could help reduce temperatures by contributing my thoughts to the public discussion. So I offered those ideas in writing to our local weekly newspaper. Here is what was published:

Having read numerous articles and letters about the proposed ethnic studies elective course at (local community) High School, I want to say that I hope it is implemented. I am confident that students will enjoy it and gain from it. I say this as an "outside observer" because I am neither a parent of a student, nor am I a professional educator. Even so, I hope the reader will stick with me for a few minutes because I have a story to tell.

I was young, college-educated, employed in a demanding professional career, recently-married and an avid student of American history when -- much to my surprise -- I discovered that the name "Manzanar" meant nothing to me. I had inquired of my then-wife how her parents had met. Learning that their encounter occurred at Manzanar, we journeyed into the Owens Valley to visit it. There I started to understand how they, along with 120,000 others at Manzanar and nine other similar locations, spent a few years of their young lives. In a fit of wartime xenophobia afflicting the U.S. government and much of the nation's population, they and their families were forcibly uprooted from their homes, leaving behind significant property and other items of value. My wife's parents, along with most of the others incarcerated at Manzanar and the other camps, were U.S. citizens. But because they were Nisei, they did not look like the majority white American population, and so they were objects of suspicion and hostility.

This was not America's finest hour. But it was a milestone in the anti-Asian prejudice and exploitation that had been part of the development and growth of the United States for the previous century and more. (Unfortunately, events of the last year regarding the origin of the corona virus pandemic have created an additional similar milestone.) And yet, my education had taught almost none of this history.

Learning from this delayed education helped to make me a better person. It gave me a better understanding of others who have backgrounds different from mine. Since this has been a national educational experience, I feel it has made the United States better, too. For any country much of its history is deserving of pride, but some is the stuff of shame. Nations that recognize and learn from their mistakes of the past will grow, change and prosper. Those that do not will, I think, be diminished.

The published remarks of the opponents to this ethnic studies class -- a course that appears to be a telling of otherwise overlooked histories -- seem to me to be based on a fear that it will subvert the telling of the American story as that of one undiluted success after another. If that is so, then I will concede that their fear is to one extent well-founded: education is the ignition of subversion. Learning history helps us to understand the mistakes of our past and how to benefit from the lessons of those mistakes. And, yes, education also provides the foundation and the tools necessary to subvert obstacles that are in the way of becoming better.

Most of what we have around us today is good. Let's not get in the way of the young ones who want to learn how to take all around them that is worthy and add to it. My high school education was all the poorer for not telling the century-long story of the Manzanar episode. Curricular mistakes like that are too easy to make because there is so much history that needs telling. The proposed ethnic studies course cannot be expected to avoid all such mistakes, but I think it will be a big help and an educational step in a good direction.

If this is a skirmish it will fizzle. But it may be preamble to something big, possibly something like the answer to this question: What is the American identity? National identity is a fundamental cultural characteristic. It is one that has changed before, each time in the face of determined opposition. With each change the United States has grown, not diminished. There is no reason to think this time should be, or will be, different.

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Why did he bring that flag into the Capitol?

2021-01-15T16:22:00.001-08:00

One image from the January 6 mob attack on the U.S. Capitol sticks with me. It is only one picture, but by itself it tells a story of conflict, prejudice and failed leadership. The picture is of a man, one of the mob, who is strolling through the halls of the Capitol carrying a flag mounted on a pole resting on his shoulder. The flag is the Confederate battle flag from the American Civil War: thirteen white stars arrayed along two diagonal-crossed blue bars, all overlayed on a red background.

I know nothing about the man in the picture. The flag, though, has a well-known story. Throughout the Civil War it served as a symbol of rebellion and armed conflict. In a time before radio communications, the flag was used to identify locations of Confederate military units and to help in their deployments when in battle against elements of the Union forces.

The Civil War was about slavery and the supremacy of Southern white masters over their property, the Black slaves. Leaders in most of the slave-holding states were convinced that the institution of slavery was doomed by the Abraham Lincoln presidency, and feared that their wealth would suffer. To protect that institution, eleven Southern states (and parts of two others) seceded from the Union. The thirteen stars recognized that secession.

The Union victory crushed the institution of slavery, but it did not end prejudice and lawlessness spawned by that prejudice. The battle flag lived on, becoming an emblem of white supremacy. Clearly, the flag is a part of American history, but it does not deserve to be a part of American heritage. To see it displayed in the U.S. Capitol is offensive. Keep it inside museums where it can be honestly and factually described for what it was and what it has represented; there is no other place for it.

I don't know that I can blame Donald Trump, losing candidate for reelection and outgoing president of the country, for this fellow bringing the Confederate flag into the Capitol. But I believe that I can blame Trump for the words from his mouth and from his Twitter fingers that caused the perpetrator to think that he was entitled to carry that flag into the Capitol. That makes Trump the Offender-in-Chief.

Let's review Trump's assortment of recent offenses against American democracy and see how they all can be tied together with that flag.

Trump has sought to overturn the election won by Joe Biden with evidence-free assertions of fraudulent voting. He has trampled state laws by attempting to interfere in final voting certification, going so far as to demand in the state of Georgia that officials there should "find" more Trump votes. As of this writing he has neither conceded to President-elect Biden, nor has he supported the necessarily complex efforts needed to assist in a smooth transition of powers from his Administration to Biden's. He has publicly harangued his supporters to believe that he is the victor and Biden the loser.

In response, the January 6 mob -- including the flag-carrying man -- gathered at the White House that morning. Trump spoke, urging them to assault the Capitol so as to stop Congress from accepting the votes of presidential electors pledged to Joe Biden. Vice President Mike Pence was singled out as a target, too, since he had earlier refused Trump's demands to disqualify electoral votes for Biden. (With good reason -- the Constitution provides no such powers to the Vice President. Pence has apparently read the Constitution; it seems that despite his four years in office, Trump has not.)

Trump has not -- and, I think, will not -- accept accountability for his actions that set off the riotous behaviors of the mob of his supporters. There were fatalities among the rioters and Capitol police; that and other violence will lead to numerous legal prosecutions for law-breaking. Those consequences should be shared by the Instigator-in-Chief Donald J. Trump.

Put all of this together and Trump became a renegade president on January 6, 2021. He is the only such president, and the House of Representatives has correctly impeached him for his actions.

Trump might end up being considered the worst U.S. president because of his actions on January 6. No other president has attempted to subvert a presidential election and the peaceful transfer of power to a new president and administration.

Nor should there be any doubt that such behavior is to be tolerated. Having happened once, impeachment -- even if conviction is not delivered by the Senate -- and any subsequent lawful prosecutions lodged against Trump should be relentlessly conducted with sufficient strength to impress upon the country and the watching world that Trump has stirred up a righteous anger among the majority of the American populace. We, that majority, fully support the fact that no person, not even a president, is above the law.

Perhaps it is fitting that the flag of rebellion and armed conflict in a failed attempt to perpetuate slavery and the supremacy of one skin color over all others should be the enduring symbol of Trump's closing days of his presidency

###

Biden has a governing mandate like none before. He should use it to go big.

2021-01-07T15:58:00.006-08:00

Joe Biden was always going to have a mandate to govern. A winning margin of over seven million votes against an incumbent president -- one who insisted that the so-called stimulus checks from the 2020 CARES Act be printed with his signature so that voters would get the idea that they should give him thanks for the helicopter money -- is by itself a convincing mandate. Incumbent presidents who run for reelection almost never lose. Putting those pieces together provides President Joe Biden with leadership power that can come only from such clear evidence of the popular will of those who are governed.

Yesterday, January 6, changed all that. President-elect Biden will be inaugurated on January 20 with a mandate to govern based not only on the math and the demographics and the state-by-state map of his victory, but also with the authority that comes from being the sole occupant of the moral high ground on which rests the leadership qualities of the Office of the President.

In contrast, Donald Trump -- loser and outgoing president -- used his time yesterday to cede any possible claim to that high ground by personally inciting a mob of his followers to attempt insurrection against the American government. In doing so, Trump's post-election behavior is perhaps more dishonorable than that of James Buchanan, acclaimed as the worst American president for failing to take action to stop the beginning of the Civil War in 1861.

The story of Trump's vanity project to subvert the election is well-known. Prior to the election I wrote in this space and described him as "un-American" in recognition of his undermining of the country's democratic foundations. Yesterday's events are a direct result of Trump's behavior; NPR has summarized January 6 in a timeline and with revealing photos.

I think we always knew that Trump's version of "law and order" was that of an outlaw. Now that has been confirmed in full view for all the world to see.

As I sit here writing this, there is growing sentiment to hamstring Trump by invoking the twenty-fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and by conducting impeachment. Amendment XXV requires action by the Vice President and the majority of Cabinet members; it would result in Mike Pence, as VP, becoming "acting president." Impeachment is done by Congress, and would end with Trump being evicted from office and -- critically -- being forbidden from holding any elective office in the future.

Whether either of these actions comes to pass is an open question. But even if neither happens, it is clear that Donald J. Trump no longer can claim even a shred of moral authority associated with presidential leadership.

And so we come back to president-elect Joe Biden.

When newly sworn-in, President Biden will be stepping into an office that has been severely damaged by predecessor Trump. There is a leadership vacuum in America, and to prevent that empty space being filled by un-democratic elements Biden will have to occupy it with rapid and decisive actions that are visible and constructive.

He needs to show accomplishments -- the bigger, the better. With Trump reduced to a malign specter, and on the heels of a massive vote win in the November election, Biden has the winds of a governing mandate at his back.

There is always temptation to put up an ordered list for a new president: Do this first, and then that, and for third priority get going on. . . In reality, of course, there are lots of Priority One's, and then there's everything else.

Even so, here's my list of things on which the new President Biden should Go Big: An effective national pandemic strategy with clear, consistent messaging on safety measures, as well as assistance to the States for rapidly administering vaccinations; ensuring that there are consequences for the perpetrators of yesterday's insurrection, including Trump for his subversion of American democracy; an economic stimulus program that pours funding into research and development (especially for non-fossil fuel projects) as well as national infrastructure repair and rebuilding; reforms to immigration policy and practices that encourage and enable legal immigration, while simultaneously reducing motivations for illegal immigration by fixing security and economic problems in certain Central American countries; commitment of U.S. re-engagement with our traditional allies, alliances, treaties and agreements; actions for addressing the emergencies of climate, civil rights, nuclear proliferation, environmental protection, and world-wide human rights and democratic reforms; there's more, but that's a good start.

The downstream effects of what happened yesterday are potentially enormous and for some people they will be dangerous: increased covid-19 infections, hospitalizations and deaths will occur; damage to national security due to theft and vandalism within Congressional offices by the rioters could be significant; Trump's executive actions prior to yesterday, as well as anything he attempts to do over the next two weeks, could be invalidated as a consequence of his subversion of the election. And also, the toxicity of the far-right social media forums that -- as The Washington Post is reporting -- "voice glee in the aftermath" of insurrection must be dealt with as an incubator for domestic terrorism.

All of this shows why we need a professional, knowledgeable, well-populated and experienced Federal government. What is written above is a collection of problems that newly-installed President Biden will face, along with this question: If government doesn't act to solve problems, then what good is it?

President Joe Biden will be dealing with a world that has changed much in the last four years. Some problems are new, and almost all of the same old problems have become bigger and worse over that period. To top that off, the Trump presidency leaves a swamp-like sucking bog of unresolved questions about covert hostile foreign influence that intends damage to American democratic institutions. The report of the Mueller investigation must be revisited, and actions taken based on its findings.

Much time will be needed to score big accomplishments, but -- as the saying goes -- fortune favors the bold. Biden should boldly assert his governing mandate, and relentlessly pursue big solutions and fixes to big problems.

The compelling reason to fire Trump and hire Biden

2020-10-15T16:11:00.001-07:00

Is there a single reason to elect Joe Biden president of the United States and fire Donald Trump from that job? Is there something that clearly differentiates one from the other and provides a compelling reason for change? I believe there is.

For those who look to the future, the presidency of Donald Trump provides a multitude of reasons that scream for a change: chaotic and ineffectual pandemic response, degraded support for public health capabilities, working to destroy the Affordable Care Act without having a replacement, disrespecting allies and subverting international alliances that have fostered American security and prosperity; these are just some of them. It is not enough for his campaign to say that he has occasionally been part of a positive this-or-that. Twice a day a broken clock is right, but it is still broken.

Overall, Trump's presidency is a failure, and there's no reason to think that a re-elected Donald Trump would do anything differently -- he is on record as saying "I will never change." As president, Trump is as broken as any person can be, with only one or two prior presidents who might be competitive in a broken-president contest (no one reading this was alive during their times).

Trump has failed to accomplish any major effort to bring positive results to the majority of Americans. His two touted major accomplishments -- changes to the Federal income tax codes, and appointments of Federal judges, including Supreme Court justices -- are successful only for the supporting special interests. The great majority of the income tax benefits have flowed to the wealthiest individuals -- some were specially targeted at real estate developers, such as Trump himself -- and to large corporations, without producing the promised long-term structural investments. The more-conservative judiciary is the result of appointments by a president who lost the popular vote by millions and has never tried to reach out to the larger part of the U.S. population. That cannot bode well for the future.

As significant as are those failures, the compelling reason to fire Trump is something that is even worse. It is the things done by Trump that damage the fundamental structure of American democracy.

The presidency of Donald Trump has diminished the United States of America, both domestically and in the eyes of the rest of the world. This has been made crystal-clear by his repeated refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of presidential power should he lose the election. In fact, he maintains that his victory is inevitable because the "only way" he can lose is if the Democrats "steal" the election. These are the words of an autocrat or a dictator, not of a legitimate president of a democracy.

Curious to learn of reaction to this from somebody whose politics are right-of-center and who is what might be called "traditional Republican," I sought out a recent column by Ross Douthat (12/10/2020 at nytimes.com). Douthat -- not a Trump fan -- is searing in his assessment. He says that ultimately this will come to little, if anything, because Trump is a "weakling" president, and a "corrupt incompetent who poses as a strongman on Twitter." Those are among Douthat's milder comments.

Having said similar things, I cannot disagree. If Trump were a confident, secure leader he would not be saying over and over again that he, not Hillary Clinton, really won the popular vote in 2016 because of "millions" of illegal votes cast and counted; oddly, apparently and incredibly, every single one of those, in Trump's telling it, was for Clinton.

Let's remember that one of Trump's first official acts was to establish a commission to identify and document voter fraud. The commission disbanded empty-handed. As also shown by independent studies, voter fraud is insignificant. Most voters are honest people, but also numerous safeguards against fraud are built into the American voting systems.

Trump has been a weak president because he has never had a governing mandate -- the popular vote loss in 2016 denied the mandate at that point; it became three times worse in the 2018 election, as measured by votes for Democrat and Republican House candidates, when Trump asserted that people should vote for Republican candidates because "the election is about me!" -- and he has never tried to be a unifying leader who could build such a mandate.

But I think Douthat lets Trump off too easily. There's more in this than the actions of a desperate loudmouth. In saying he can lose only because his opponent is dishonest, Trump has announced to Americans, and to all the world, that American democracy and its supporting "rule of law" might not be the best way to run a country. Trump is the only U.S. president to have said such a thing.

Does it really need to be said that trust in the validity of the government and the law is foundational for American prosperity and international influence? As a reminder, at least, perhaps it does.

If a candidate for president maintains that the only valid electoral outcome is the one in his favor, then once the election is finished how can the results be universally trusted? If that trust does not emerge, then the entire system will be shown as a house of cards that falls in the first strong breeze.

Without even so much as a facetious apology or one of his well-known wishy-washy restatements, Donald Trump has sent a message that is heard both domestically and internationally: The American government and its laws might not be trustworthy. Foreign investors should view investment decisions differently, and possibly take their monies elsewhere, or at least demand a higher risk premium when going to the U.S. Americans should prepare themselves for a less prosperous future as imports become more expensive, domestically-produced items also become more expensive and of lower quality and less innovative because of reduced competition from imports, and talented workers and entrepreneurs from elsewhere choose to avoid the uncertainties of American governance and of the potential weakening of the rule of law.

None of this should be a surprise. After all, how can Trump communicate trustworthiness when his 2016 election campaign was supported by Russian government efforts? Remembering that Vladimir Putin, Russia's perpetual president, has publicly declared Russia's hostility towards the U.S. makes it easy to ask a question such as: What geopolitical deals lurk in the shadows?

Trump tells people at his mostly-maskless campaign events that his recent bout with covid-19 has left him immune from re-infection. Such immunity is not yet established. And in any case, the event attendees could become victims of infection, illness and possibly death from others in the crowd. Trump's message is that people should support him notwithstanding the possible suffering. This is simply a statement that the ends are so good that they justify any means of getting there. Sound familiar? He is echoing the ends-justify-the-means communist theory of the Soviet Union of Cold War days.

Put all of this together and only one conclusion emerges: Trump has undermined and continues to undermine democracy in the United States, he has diminished the standing of the U.S. in the eyes of the world, and he has displayed himself as un-American.

Presidential behaviors are the legacy that either contribute to or detract from making progress in achieving the Constitution's goal that reads "to form a more perfect union." The United States of America is not perfect, and probably never will be. But it can be made more perfect, even if that has to happen in fits and starts.

The evidence of Trump's years in office, and of his June 2016 declaration "I will never change!" is proof that he will never build on the legacy of his predecessors to lead towards the future. Instead, through lying, mockery, ignorance, bullying, disrespect and divisiveness he indulges in self-absorbed delusions of grandeur. In addition to seeking foreign alignments with non-democratic leaders in preference to those who are democratic, his public adulation of the white supremacist leaders and imagery of the failed Confederacy borders on worship of illegal secession.

Sadly, these are the things that Trump does best. But again, don't take just my word for it. In the aftermath of the first debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump -- in which Trump would not commit to a peaceful transfer of power should he lose the election, and also infamously incited armed and rogue white supremacist militias to "stand by" -- Lexington, the U.S.-based columnist of the British publication The Economist, a business-oriented periodical, has this to say of Trump's behavior:

He interrupted, contradicted and traduced Joe Biden, and sometimes also the moderator, Chris Wallace of Fox News. He cavilled and scowled; he huffed and he ranted. The ferocity of his claimed grievances was formidable. It was also ludicrous. It might once even have seemed comical, were he not America's president. . .Was there a strategy to this beyond his usual refusal to be constrained by rules and need to dominate? Maybe not; those urges explain most of what Mr Trump does. But the strategic implications of his thuggery look no less dire for being, in all likelihood, unplanned. . .

If the need to mobilize and manage national resources to fight a pandemic has not caused change in Trump for the better -- and it has not -- then nothing will. In asserting that the virus will "just disappear" Trump displays both ignorance of, and disrespect towards, science and the disease itself. He shows no ability to act on any level higher than one that is staged by his urges for thuggery.

There are many reasons to elect Joe Biden as the next president of the country. He shows he is different from the incumbent because he is respectful and will work to promote trust -- he has clearly said that if the voters reject him he will accept defeat. That right there is the basis of democracy and a hallmark of successful leadership.

There is one compelling reason to elect Biden and fire Trump.

Donald Trump is un-American.

###

Words and innuendo from the highest office in the land

2020-09-16T17:29:00.000-07:00

(Thanks to guest commentator Andy Garcia for these observations on free speech -- its value, and its potential for both good and bad outcomes.)

For those of us who have sat in locker rooms and listened to a coach’s emotional call to action or have heard patriotic words from commanding officers calling us to duty or who have read a poem and been touched to the bone, we know the power of words. They are instruments that can appeal to our intellect and our emotions with the same facility. They can stir our passions for good or evil.

Words spoken in a crowd can cause rational and compassionate citizens to forsake their reason and stampede for the door, trampling everything and anybody standing in their way. Words can touch our hearts and make us risk our very lives for the sake of another’s. When we hear words dripping with anger and hatred, bigotry and self righteous emotion, we know these words can cause damage. We know from our common sense and personal experience that words intended to stir anger and resentment can trigger action that is both violent and reprehensible.

We as a country took part in the most devastating war the world has ever known, costing an estimated 60 million lives worldwide, because of the hateful words spoken by a monster who was able to convince a nation that some of its citizens were superior to others and that some among them were not fit to live. We have seen the pictures.

We live in a country that values free speech. This principle is codified in our Constitution and has been defended again and again in our courts and on battlefields around the world. But free speech comes at a cost. We allow the skinheads and the bigots with their tattooed swastikas to speak their hatred; allow the fear mongers and the extremists to broadcast their lies and conspiracy theories. We do this even though we know it may cause harm and diminish our national civility. It is the price of freedom and we are willing to pay it because we know the alternative is worse.

But the power of words cannot be ignored and the right of extremists to spread bitterness and intolerance does not mean that the rest of us must sit silent against them, even when their appeal to hatred and call for violence is by innuendo and insinuation, even when it comes from the highest office in the land.

###

About the United States Postal Service and Woodburn, Iowa

2020-08-27T15:34:00.000-07:00

("That a line of posts be appointed under the direction of the Postmaster general, from Falmouth in New England to Savannah in Georgia, with as many cross posts as he shall think fit." -- Second Continental Congress, July 26, 1775.

Guest author Guy Heston has written the following about the value of the United States Postal Service.)

My father was born and grew up in Woodburn, Iowa, joined the Navy at 17, served in Korea, and eventually settled in California, where I grew up. From time to time our family would pile into the car and take a road trip to Iowa, which might explain why to this day I love road trips and budget motels.

Woodburn is a classic small Midwestern town, beautifully nestled among rolling hills roughly one mile off the state highway. It got its start as a railroad town and its peak population in the early 1900’s was 400 or so. There are towns like this all across America.

There was a grocery store, gas station, meat locker, country school, lumber yard, tavern, telephone exchange, three churches, and a United States Post Office. All of the basic things you need to keep a small town and nearby farms up and running.

The last time I went to Woodburn was two years ago on an Iowa road trip. The grocery store, gas station, meat locker, school and lumber yard were gone. The Disciples of Christ church was still serving its congregants and had helped to restore the closed Catholic church to save the building for posterity. The Methodist church had long ago fallen in a fire. The population had dropped to less than 200. As far as I could see there were two active businesses, the tavern and the post office. If you needed food it was an 11-mile drive to the Hy-Vee grocery store in Osceola.

And there it was on Sigler St., the main street of Woodburn—the United States Postal Service’s small but neatly maintained building, only open two hours a day, but connecting each and every resident of Woodburn and the many nearby farms to the USA and the world, fulfilling the mission of the USPS.

Putting aside the controversy over mail-in ballots, President Trump seems to think this is yet another case where a mega-rich private sector person (who also happens to be a mega-donor to the Trump campaign) can come in and run a government agency more efficiently from day one. So we have Postmaster General Louis DeJoy in charge of our mail.

In my more than 30 years in public service I was often the recipient of this particular arrow: You bureaucrats should be fired and the private sector can do this at half the price. It was always from a person who was angry that I would not or could not accommodate their demand.

We are already seeing the results when a postmaster general with no applicable experience marches in and tries to run a large government agency, firing people left and right and issuing orders without even taking the time to get the lay of the land and ask people with experience and knowledge about what to do and how to do it. He could have easily learned things from someone who has actually worked for the post office and understands how it works.

Earlier this week, Congress was in the mood to ask questions about what the postmaster general has been up to, and why, according to the USPS’s own reporting, on-time mail delivery is declining.

As The Washington Post reported, “Things got plenty heated during Monday’s hearing. Rep. Stephen F. Lynch (D-Mass.) mentioned the many members of his family who had worked for the Postal Service and asked, ‘After 240 years of patriotic service delivering the mail, how can one person screw this up in just a few weeks? Now I understand you bring private sector expertise,’ Lynch continued. ‘I guess we couldn’t find a government worker who could screw it up this fast.’”

Admittedly, the Congressional hearing was largely political theatre, but it was amusing when Rep. Katie Porter (D-Ca.) asked Postmaster General DeJoy the price of mailing a postcard,. He did not know, bringing back memories of George H. W. Bush’s 1992 debate with Bill Clinton when President Bush admitted he did not know the price of a gallon of milk. And it became clear that while Mr. DeJoy may be a multi-millionaire private sector expert on supply chains, he knows precious little about moving the mail.

So I pose this question: what do we want from the United States Postal Service? Do we want it to run as a private sector business, in which case I can assure you the Woodburn post office would be promptly closed, as would hundreds of others across our great nation. Or do we want it to run as an essential public service, helping to keep America connected? Yes, most of us send mail electronically these days, but we depend on the USPS to deliver our packages, prescriptions, greeting cards and so forth. I vote for the USPS as an essential public service that should be properly funded. Room for more efficiency, sure, but still a government agency run for the good of the nation.

A final note about Woodburn. It is still a lovely town, and a cafe has recently opened. If you have never experienced small town America, now (please wear your mask) would be a great time for a road trip. Woodburn residents are right friendly, even if they don’t know you. And please keep an eye out for the local post office. It’s right there on Sigler St. You can’t miss it.

The country isn't broken -- the government is. It can be fixed.

2020-07-31T17:49:00.000-07:00

Though Donald Trump is a weak and incompetent president, it is becoming ever harder to attribute his behavior to anything other than maliciousness.

This week he has floated the idea of delaying November's election. Let's take a look at what's behind this.

First, the president has no authority to do such a thing; only Congress can do this. Through wars and depressions (and a pandemic) America's elections have been held as scheduled, without delay. Since Trump did not use his usual "I am supreme and can do anything" style then we can assume that he already knew he cannot touch the election date. So why talk about it? More on that later.

Second, do you suppose it occurred to him that he might end up vacating the White House and handing the key over to Nancy Pelosi? A long enough delay might bump up against the immovable object of noon, January 20, 2021. With no election at that point, the Constitution mandates that Trump would be out of a job -- the presidential and vice presidential terms in office are exactly four years -- and the fact of constitutional succession would make the Speaker of the House -- currently, Representative Nancy Pelosi -- president of the United States.

Third, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden warned months ago that Trump might try something like this. Naturally, he was verbally accosted by spokespersons for the Trump Administration and the Republican party who were aghast and mortified at the idea. They maintained that no responsible and qualified candidate for elected office would even mention such a thing. (Their reaction to Trump actually doing such a thing? Silence.)

None of this matters to Trump, of course, because he is simply trying to undermine public confidence in the election. That is a shameful historic first for an American president.

It is also an indication of Trump's fear. He fears the electorate. He even fears public protest to the point where he had to seek the feeling of bunker-safety at one point, soon followed by having armed Federal forces disperse the protest with tear gas so that he could use a Bible and a church as campaign props.

And what about his use of Federal border patrol forces in Portland (and maybe elsewhere) to establish his "law and order" bona fides? What has happened during those forces multi-weeks long presence in Portland?

Initially numbering around a hundred or so people, the protests have grown to include thousands. No roving bands of "violent anarchists" (words used by Trump and his very personal Attorney General Barr) have been apprehended. They don't exist.

The Federal courthouse is the center of the action, and the Federal government has the authority to protect Federal property. However, the Constitution reserves police powers to the states and their municipalities, and Federal forces that venture beyond the boundaries of Federal property are therefore engaged in police work and so are in violation of the Constitution. They have done so in Portland.

Also, keep in mind that these Federal personnel are trained as military units to intercept organized crime forces engaged in drug trafficking at the borders. They are not trained in community-oriented policing. That fact alone makes their presence unreasonably dangerous and provocative.

Trump owns any incitement that has caused "law and order" issues. He has been president for almost four years. The protests might not be perfectly harmonious -- unfortunately so, because then the worthwhile messages will be obscured -- but the reasons for the demonstrations are valid.

Those reasons have very deep historical roots. But Trump has publicly worshiped icons of the Confederacy, and that has understandably stimulated what grows from those roots. Ask yourself this: Why would an American president celebrate traitors and those who would endorse human slavery? The answer should be very disturbing.

The top elected leader has the responsibility to reach out to others for understanding, and then to manage the development of solutions that will create progress. But Trump fears doing so. Reaching out to those who disagree with him would require him to change, and he prides himself on not changing.

Trump has advertised that he enjoys creating chaos. In doing so, the Trump presidency has created disorder. He will not change.

What about the pandemic? Simply put, it is yet another event that has revealed Trump's incompetence at managing a complex environment. That is apparently odd for a person who claims to be successful at business, but we don't really know how successful he has been, do we? On the other hand, game show hosts do not have to be skilled at complex management since everything in that environment is controlled. Which provides an insight to Trump's character.

America has a glorified game show host as president. His incompetence is revealed by current events. He fears the consequences. His fearful reaction is to spread his fear by mocking the validity of the nation's elections. Simply put, this is maliciousness that works only for Trump's benefit and will harm the country because it damages the public's trust and confidence in the government.

The rest of the world -- with the likely exceptions of Russia's and China's leaderships -- watches this show in horror.

The government is broken.

Because Donald Trump is a failed leader for a democracy, and a failed leader for the concept of democracy.

It's time that a new president be put to work fixing the government.

Why would four Minneapolis police officers ignore a man's pleas for help?

2020-06-04T18:19:00.000-07:00

Basic human nature is to help somebody who is in distress. We don't do this because we are civilized. We do this because we are human. Prehistoric humans did this: Skeletal remains reveal individuals whose death occurred many years after severe bone fractures had healed. This could not have happened if cries for help had been ignored.

And yet, as of this writing, the evidence shows that a man named George Floyd was brutalized by four Minneapolis police officers after he was placed in handcuffs. For five minutes Mr Floyd repeatedly cried out for help as the four held him in a suffocating position. It wasn't until almost four minutes later that the officers removed their combined weight on his body; by then, Mr Floyd had perished.

These officers could not find it in themselves to behave as humanely as did prehistoric humans of 100,000 years or more ago. Why not?

Mr Floyd was a man of color, a minority. That he was a victim of deeply ingrained racism is an inescapable conclusion.

But there should be another conclusion, which is this: Racism in America is increasing because it is more acceptable to be racist.

People like me are on the outside looking in. Not being a minority means that we cannot experience racism's consequences: discrimination, anxiety and lack of opportunity. Not having experience in policing means that we cannot understand a police officer's job.

But we can still recognize that a police department is a naturally hierarchical organization, and the people at the lower levels are subject to influence and direction from those at the upper levels. The single person in authority at the very top of the hill of hierarchy has the opportunity to be hugely influential in the attitudes that police officers take with them as they do their jobs.

Just like anything subject to gravity, shit rolls downhill.

The election of 2016 made Donald Trump president. Trump owes his election - at least in large part -- to the visibility he gained from claiming that Barack Obama, the nation's first black president, was not an American citizen and therefore not a legitimate president. That is a plainly racist position intended to pander to the emotions of systemic racism. Trump's words and actions since the election have maintained and expanded that position. You don't need me to go into three years' worth of details on this.

There is simply no other way to say it: That's a whole lot of shit rolling down from the top.

It is not likely that Mr Floyd's death -- and those of others -- will be fully avenged in the courtroom. Prosecutions of police misconduct are rarely successful. Even if this time is different, racism is systemic. It cannot be removed in court.

And, admittedly, it cannot be removed by one future election. Several will be needed. Peaceful demonstrations of protest against racism will and should continue. But this year's election can make the protests more effective by removing Trump and changing the messaging from the top into something that says "Racism is unacceptable!" That will be better than what rolls downhill now.

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States must start now for universal vote-by-mail; Congress and White House should help

2020-04-21T16:50:00.000-07:00

Basic good business management says that you always have a Plan B in case Plan A won't work as expected. Good managers recognize vulnerabilities in the organization and then design and implement a backup plan to use when the vulnerabilities become disasters.

There's no reason why government shouldn't act the same way. Especially when it comes to voting, which is the foundation of democratic governance.

In-person voting is a great thing: It's historic, nostalgic and sociable. It's also vulnerable to a host of nasty things, some local at the precinct level -- neighborhood power outage; flooding from a broken pipe, etc. -- others of greater scope that could be state-wide or national -- a pandemic that interferes with the integrity of an election would be a disaster of the highest magnitude.

In-person voting is Plan A for most states. There's a good chance it will be a failing plan for this November's election, possibly even for elections beyond this November's, because of the SARS-COV-2/covid-19 pandemic. At this point, we don't know enough about the virus to understand what danger it presents in a few months', or a few years', time.

Vote-by-mail should be Plan B for all elections. Or, at the least, Plan B should be a combination of vote-by-mail and in-person voting. (In some states, it is already Plan A when combined with complementary in-person voting availability.)

I have been a permanent vote-by-mail voter for 40 years, having applied for that status based on a job that required frequent and sometimes last-minute travel that would cause me to be away from home on election days. My experience with vote-by-mail has been flawless.

California has done away with the need to apply for such a status. Starting with this year's recent primary election, all registered voters are mailed a ballot several weeks prior to the election date. At least four other states also do universal vote-by-mail. All states allow vote-by-mail for reasons of illness or travel.

Wisconsin's recent election is Exhibit A for why vote-by-mail should be available nation-wide. Milwaukee, the state's largest city, intended to have 180 polling locations; instead, the pandemic caused staffing to shrink so much that it could open a mere five locations. Fortunately, Wisconsin enables voters to request mail-in ballots at will, and many people had done so, thereby reducing the demand for in-person voting.

Vote-by-mail has enjoyed solid bipartisan support. . .and still does, according to a YouGov report released early this month.

But elected Republican officials, starting with President Trump, are blocking the common-sense preparations needed to have vote-by-mail universally available in time for the November elections.

An absentee ballot seems to be good enough for Trump to use for himself -- he used one in Florida's election -- and he has said that such voting should be available to older voters and members of the armed forces, voting groups that he thinks will be favorable to his reelection.

For all other voters, though, Trump says that the availability of vote-by-mail invites fraud that favors Democrats.

Voting fraud has been studied extensively and has been found to be exceedingly rare. In fact, immediately upon his inauguration, Trump started a voting fraud investigation into the 2016 election. After almost a year of existence, the investigation went out of business, having found no voting fraud.

The only recent evidence of voting fraud came from a 2018 North Carolina congressional election, and it favored the Republican candidate.

Anti-fraud measures for mail-in ballots are available. At the individual voter's choice, a mailed ballot can be tracked via email and text messages, as is done in California and Colorado. Other schemes can be devised and used, too.

For example, my wife and I decided not to mail our ballots last month (even though we did not need to place postage on the envelopes!) and instead took them to our local voting center at a nearby fire station. There, we were greeted by the friendly volunteer poll workers, one of whom took us on a tour of the place and described the use of the voting machines as well as the security measures available to both in-person voting and mailed ballots. Without fanfare -- and without physical contact with a frequently-touched surface, or close proximity to another person -- we deposited our ballots into the appointed vault.

As for Trump's other complaint -- well, it's just a stalking horse. Trump's true intent is to undermine the democratic process. The health of our democracy depends upon the availability of the right to vote. All political parties should want that. At this point, Trump and the Trump Republicans oppose it.

In the United States of America, the voting process is managed by the states, not the Federal government. However, Congress and the president can and should provide federal funding to the states to put vote-by-mail in place in time for the November elections.

Voters should not have to risk their health in order to cast their votes, or fear for their safety when they do so. Vote-by-mail is a common-sense and proven voting method that minimizes those risks and fears. Trump and the Trump suck-ups oppose this idea to make voting safe. Democrats support it.

Work on this needs to start immediately in order to meet the needs of a November election. There is no good reason not to do this.

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Memo to: All Corporate Chief Marketing Officers

2020-04-08T16:22:00.000-07:00

(Looking for a break from the non-stop coronavirus/covid-19 news? Read this from good friend and contributing author Guy Heston for a few smiles and perhaps a "right on!" moment or two.)

MEMORANDUM

April 8, 2020

To: All Corporate Chief Marketing Officers in the USA

From: Guy Heston, Consumer

Subject: Market Research

Hi all. I am writing to inform you of my new policy regarding your market research efforts. This new policy, effective immediately, is as follows: If you want my opinion you have to pay me for it. I prefer cash but am willing to accept a prepaid debit card or, providing your company has not filed for bankruptcy or been bought by a private equity firm in the past three years, a corporate check.

I know it can be hard to adjust to a new policy so I thought it might be helpful to explain why I have implemented it.

Because you keep relentlessly bugging me for my opinion.

I go to the corporate-owned pharmacy to get my ibuprofen, and my roughly three-feet long cash register receipt (I am considering implementation of a new policy on the wasteful use of paper and will keep you posted on this), offers me the opportunity to participate in a prize drawing if I will kindly go on-line and rate my experience. The prize strikes me as cheap, and the odds of me winning it seem long. Pass.

I take my car for servicing and, since I have to give up my e-mail and phone number to schedule the appointment, the dealer staff hunts me down to ensure that, if I am contacted by corporate market research, there would be no reason to rate my experience anything less than exceptional.

The place where I used to get my morning coffee would always offer a free cup of joe on my next visit if I participated in the on-line survey in which I was randomly selected to participate. Not bad. Then corporate got stingy and my last receipt said I would get that coffee only if I bought a food item. Honestly!

I go to a department store for a clothing refresh and upon check-out the sales associate flashes a four-star smile, writes her first name on my receipt, and says she hopes I will give her an excellent rating in case I am contacted by corporate (yes, they have my e-mail and receipt number, and apparently can match it with the first name of the clerk).

I visit my doctor in my new clothes (see above) for the annual physical, and sure enough here comes an e-mail survey from corporate health care asking me to rate my doctor. I have been going to the same doctor for more than 20 years, so I think corporate can safely assume I believe he’s a fine guy. Even so, just to be nice to my doctor, I fill out the survey, rating him a 10. Two decades makes this a solid relationship, so this one’s given for free.

You get the drift, and I think you are, on a scale of 1 to 10, making a 9.3 marketing mistake with way too much emphasis on the metrics. I imagine you sitting in a conference room reviewing said metrics, concerned and drinking strong black coffee when the overall customer satisfaction rating dips from a 9.2 to a 9.1, or excited and having donuts with coffee (maybe the fresh-ground Kona variety) and cream when the rating goes from a 9.2 to a 9.3, based on customers who have been offered a potential prize to part with a casual opinion and employees who know how the system works.

Metrics are fine to a point, so to speak, but toss in a little more qualitative data to brew up a better blend of customer reactions. I once took great heat from the management team at the company I was working for when I implemented a policy requiring all managers to spend one day either answering the customer service phones or being in the field mingling with customers. Some of the managers were not happy campers with this policy, but I remain convinced they came out of the experience better informed about customer opinions.

Hopefully, this explains my new policy of cash on the line if you want to know what I think. Incidentally, I know you can pay cash to ask me and other consumers for our opinions—I was once paid several hundred dollars to drive new cars and pipe up with my opinions, and a few hundred dollars more to walk around a make-believe showroom, observing and commenting on mock-ups of prospective new car models. I think I used the proceeds to buy some more new clothes.

If you have any comments regarding this new policy, please let me know.

Hope everyone has a good day. Cheers!

Guy

Five minutes was it all took to be counted for the next 10 years

2020-03-20T15:27:00.002-07:00

A couple of days ago the U.S. Mail delivery to the LeftWingCapitalist household included a mailing from the U.S. Census. It had an "Occupant" sort of addressing, not a name. Inside the envelope was a brief letter providing an an introduction to the 2020 United States Census, with directions for how to respond via an on-line service. Responding would require about 10 minutes, according to the letter.

We did it in five minutes. Not because of anything special -- no super-fast internet connection; no extraordinary keyboarding skills; no skipping of questions. The questions were few, they were clearly stated, and the "user experience" (business-oriented buzz-words) was clean. It was quick and easy.

There was no question about citizenship.

Here are a few census-related factoids. You probably have plenty of time to read these while you are waiting out the coronavirus Covid-19 restrictions on normal activities.

The first known census (many years before the first U.S. census) was conducted so long ago that the Egyptian pyramids still reflected the bright sunlight in the Valley of the Nile. About 3800 years past (around 1800BCE) a Pharaoh of the Egyptian Middle Kingdom required a census of the realm's population. The era of great pyramid-building was past, but at least some of the pyramids would have still been covered in their finish of polished limestone to provide a mirror-like reflection of the daily sunshine.

In the U.S., we do a census every ten years. This is a Constitutional requirement. The first was done in 1790, and they have been conducted every ten years since. The results of the census will determine each state's number of representatives in the U.S. House of Representatives (and therefore also presidential electors) as well as allocations of hundreds of billions of dollars of Federal funding each year (probably growing to trillions of dollars annually within the next decade).

The 1790 U.S. census reported a total population of 3,929,214; New York was the nation's largest city with a population of 33,131, or about .8% of the total. This year's census will reveal a population of about 330,000,000; New York City remains the nation's most populous city, with about 8.5 million residents, or approximately 2.6% of the total.

April 1 is the official "census day." The census questions are asked with respect to who is to be living where on April 1. If the occupant(s) of a residence has/have not responded to the census invitation by or soon after April 1 (yes, the invitation letter includes a code linked to each address that must be entered as part of the on-line user experience mentioned above) then whoever lives at that address should expect to see one or more reminders showing up in the mailbox.

Anybody who totally blows this thing off should expect a U.S. Marshall to. . .no, that's not going to happen. Responding to the census is required by law -- it's in the Constitution, that can't be changed without an Amendment -- but no law enforcement agency is tasked with compliance actions. Instead, the extremely friendly, patient, understanding (and unarmed) employees of the Census Bureau -- mostly seasonal hires, just for this one job -- get to make the visits. (However, the first U.S. census was conducted by U.S. Marshalls.)

The 2020 census began on January 21 in the small Alaska village of Toksook Bay. This one was done in person, not through the internet; about 5% of U.S. households are expected to be done in similar ways. About 95% of U.S. households will respond via the internet (hopefully so, anyway).

People who don't want to respond are going to have to be really determined because the Census Bureau intends to keep pestering them (both by mail and in person) at least into August.

This is the first time that the Census Bureau has used satellite imagery to verify addresses that have been added or changed since the last census.

Individual responses -- in other words, personal identification -- are confidential by law for 72 years; this information cannot be disclosed, and cannot be shared with other government agencies.

The census is conducted in multiple languages; the on-line version provides toggles for the languages. It will be interesting to hear how well this works.

Five to 10 minutes. That's all it takes.

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Let’s Celebrate Government Bureaucracies!

2020-02-04T11:40:00.000-08:00

(My friend and contributing writer Guy Heston has always been a keen observer of the doings of bureaucracies of all sorts. It's good to have him send his thoughts on the subject for publication.)

Just so you know, next Tuesday is National Government Bureaucracy Appreciation Day. How do I know this? Because I have declared it so.

I always thought there was some government bureaucracy in the deep bowels of Washington, D.C., that approved national days of this or that, but it turns out there is no such bureaucracy. There is nationaldaycalendar.com, a website that makes a valiant effort serving as a gatekeeper of its officially approved national days of this or that. But anybody can declare a national day and promote it on social media, or if they've got extra money laying around, a full-page ad in The New York Times. Thus we have National Coffee Day, National Hazelnut Cake Appreciation Day, National Squirrel Appreciation Day and the quaint National Heimlich Maneuver Day. That squirrel day really fries me as I have spent many an hour trying to keep squirrels from pilfering in our back yard, but let the squirrels have their day of appreciation.

And now, thanks to yours truly, we have National Government Bureaucracy Appreciation Day—please mark your calendar for next Tuesday. Why on earth would I declare such a day? Because, having spent 32 years as a government bureaucrat (I preferred to think of it as public service) many a time I suffered the slings and arrows of public comment along the lines of I was feeding at the public trough and wouldn’t be able to make it in the private sector if I tried. For the record, I did work in the private sector and got along quite nicely; and, for the record, most of the public vitriol aimed at me was because I wouldn’t or couldn’t do what the commenter was demanding and I was therefore deemed a miscreant.

The worst slings and arrows were often, unfortunately, from the press. This is not a media bashing article, but I do wish to point out that in their role as government watchdog, some members of the fourth estate rely on tired stereotypes of government officials, assuming we are clueless, insensitive and cavalier.

Here’s an example. In his January 11 commentary column in The LasVegas Review-Journal -- he could have subtitled it “Give up your cars!” -- columnist Victor Joecks held court on his theory that global warming is highly over-rated and unloaded the usual vocabulary about government officials when you disagree with them. In this case said officials were bringing forth such proposals as more high occupancy vehicle lanes and reduced use of natural gas, which Mr. Joeck’s vehemently disagreed with. So said officials were naturally described by him as pen pushers and bean counters.

I have no problem with Mr. Joecks opposing HOV lanes and such. But he could show a little more respect for those who work in the public sector. Pillory the proposals if you wish, but let’s not get into stereotypes about pushing pens and counting beans. There are many tired stereotypes of journalists (see Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant in “My Girl Friday”), but I’m not going to go there because it is a disservice to journalists and the country. I submit the same holds true of public servants.

Finally, now that the Super Bowl is over and our great nation prepares to celebrate National Government Bureaucracy Appreciation Day, may I call your attention to the President’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, the famous expert on Middle East relations, who according to The Washington Post has created the Office of American Innovation, dedicated to improving how the government works. Speaking as a former government bureaucrat, I can confidently advise Mr. Kushner this office will require bureaucrats to run it. There is delicious irony in his creating a government bureaucracy to address the government bureaucracy.

Personally, I’m kind of fond of most government bureaucrats, such as the ones who get me through the airport safely, make sure the road gets fixed, etc. It isn’t always pretty and there is sometimes corruption and certainly room for improvement, but it’s a pretty good system in my view.

As the famous journalist Linda Ellerbee says, “And so it goes.”

Trump broke the law. GOP thinks that makes him a good president. Rest of the world watches in horror (excepting Russia).

2019-12-12T16:49:00.001-08:00

Campaigns may not solicit or accept contributions from foreign nationals. Federal law prohibits contributions, donations, expenditures and disbursements solicited, directed, received or made directly or indirectly by or from foreign nationals in connection with any election — federal, state or local.

-- Federal Election Commission

President Donald Trump tried to bully the president of Ukraine into publicly announcing that his government would begin an investigation into corruption that would implicate -- by name, but without any evidence of criminal wrong-doing -- Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, thereby providing a personal political benefit to Trump. Actually conducting such an investigation was not important to Trump; he wanted only the announcement. The evidence presented to the House of Representatives impeachment investigation has made this clear.

The evidence is bipartisan -- some of the most convincing came from Trump's own political appointee, the ambassador to the European Union -- as well as professional and non-partisan, having been provided by career State Department officers. The White House transcript of the key phone call between Trump and Ukraine president Zelensky that prompted the whistle-blower's complaint establishes Trump's intent in the conversation to be as venal as that of a mob boss intent on the shakedown of a hapless target.

The introductory text that appears above my writing is provided by the Federal Election Commission. Since foreign time, money and effort would be needed to make the public announcement, Trump's demand for such an undertaking was a solicitation for "contribution, donations, expenditures and disbursements" on his personal political behalf.

Any other candidate for an elected office in the United States would be indicted for breaking the law. (If Joe Biden, or other Democratic candidate for president had done something to violate the Federal elections code, that person would no longer be a candidate; the Democratic Party would not accept such a candidacy. If you don't believe me, go ask.) Since the Justice Department is now maintaining that a sitting president cannot be indicted, the only remedy left is impeachment.

And, yes, impeachment is political. The Constitution sets forth impeachment in sparse wording. Gerald Ford described it this way: "Grounds for impeachment are whatever the House decides they are."

The Constitution's authors needed the use of only a few words to describe impeachment because they were already familiar with it. England's Parliament created impeachment in the 1370s, more than four hundred years prior to the writing of the Constitution. (The Constitution's authors were Englishmen before they were Americans; they knew much about English governance.) Parliament had used impeachment multiple times during the ensuing centuries; one was underway at the time of the constitutional convention.

Impeachment was originally intended for misdeeds in international affairs and for actions that compromised the national interest in pursuit of personal gain. This is how it had been used in England; it was with this knowledge that impeachment was included in the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution's phrase "high crimes and misdemeanors" is not an American invention; it was first used by Parliament in 1386 for the intent described above. That was the context in which it was included in the Constitution.

In the current case, what U.S. national interest would be served by Trump's shakedown of Ukraine's president? Since no evidence of criminal activity on the part of Joe Biden or his son Hunter has ever been presented, then the answer to that question has to be -- None.

Then, who would benefit? Aside from Trump, connecting the dots leads in only one direction: To Russia and its president Vladimir Putin.

Russia covets Ukraine for economic, geopolitical and historical reasons. Putin covets the wealth and power that comes from maintaining his grip on the Kremlin. A weakened Ukrainian leadership is unable to offer much resistance to Putin's no longer concealed support and encouragement for the armed insurrection in the part of that nation that borders Russia. As the results of that insurrection appear to draw those areas closer to Russia, Putin's popularity within Russia will be supported.

Add to this the fact that Putin has declared Russia's hostility to the United States, and to our American values of democracy, equal civil rights, the market-place economy, freedom of expression and independence of thought and belief, and we are left with a sum total of a huge amount of benefit for Vladimir Putin and for Russia's national interests.

(We are also left with the tantalizing and unanswered question: What is behind Trump's apparent fondness for Putin?)

On the other hand, the U.S. is left with reduced influence caused by international mistrust of American intentions because of Trump's suborning of foreign policy to his personal interests. In other words, if Trump's actions are allowed to go unchecked at this time, might they not be repeated in the future, if not by Trump then by a future president?

Trump's attempt to extort election help from Ukraine's president and government clearly is qualified as law-breaking and governing malpractice for which impeachment is the remedy.

Given what is known about Ukrainegate -- yes, let's call it that -- Republicans and the Republican Party would be expected to show some understanding of the harmful consequences that will be yielded by the dark cloud of suspicion that Trump's actions have caused to hover over current and future U.S. relations with other countries. But, at this point, that is not the case.

So, though I expect that the Democratic-majority House will vote to impeach, I cannot expect that the Republican-majority Senate will vote to remove Trump from office.

And America's claim to world-wide moral authority will suffer.

Should Trump be re-elected in 2020, I think America's international prestige would fall even further.

Recently I have been studying America's involvement in the Second World War. I have been reading on-the-spot accounts reported by journalists via the media of the time. You will probably recognize the names: Edward R. Murrow; Ernie Pyle; William L Shirer; Howard K. Smith; Gertrude Stein; John Steinbeck; C.L. Sulzberger; the media included New York Times, CBS, Life, Scripps Howard, Associated Press; and many other journalists and media companies.

These journalists wrote about the thoughts, feelings and experiences of the soldiers, airmen, sailors, doctors, nurses, mechanics, assembly workers and all sorts of other Americans, both on U.S. soil and abroad. A common thread in the reporting that describes the feelings of the people they came to know -- and in some cases saw perish -- is that the war was being fought to maintain American and allied independence from malign foreign influences.

After all the sacrifice of that time, and all the effort that went into establishing U.S. leadership for such a national value, it would be a great shame if the resulting moral authority were to be squandered by the careless and self-interested actions of an American president.

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