Sunday, February 19, 2017

Immigration: Putting a Lid On It


Anyway, as I was beginning to say:

I responded to Senhora N. Fermeira's cartoon with a chuckle, and left it at that. Still, it got the back of my mind to thinking, which can be a dangerous thing.

Among the few bits of current-events media I occasionally view / read / listen to are various metropolitan newspapers. This article came up via the Washington (DC) Post this past Thursday:


My heart's with those folks firmly left-of-center, and I chafe at sounding like a conservative – even while I recognize that some conservatives can find common cause with a number of things I value. So I couldn't let this one lie, and quickly located a meme that nutshells my first-pass response to that squib:


(Dipping momentarily into the "picky-picky-picky" department: the meme's got the wrong relative pronoun… and the verb should be "conflate", not "obfuscate". Thank you; sincerely, your favorite grammar-knotsie.)
Senhora nurse is a solid conservative – and Calvinist, too, so we've locked horns more than once. She also makes a world-class pudim.
So I emailed my grumble-of-the-moment her way, including that screenshot and a link to the article:
From: Aging Child [mailto:AGeneChilde@YouWho.com]
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2017 9:43 PM
To: Senhora@Yabbadoo.com
Subject: The Problem Is...
At least two major current issues in our country suffer from low-brow, cognitively-impaired people's acceptance of lumping too many different things under the same word.
In this case, "immigrant". My father was an immigrant, and so is daughter Portia's mother. Your ex-husband is an immigrant; so were his parents. So have been many of my colleagues and bosses over the years. And you and I are descendants of even further immigrants… and I'm sure that, like me, you and your children support opportunities for immigrants to this country.
What I don't support, and I'm positive you don't either, is entering this country illegally: under the fence, over the river, crammed into a shipping container, and so on. That's criminal at the very least, and playing into the hands of even more criminals.
And that's a separate issue entirely from the rights of people who, like the Schildts and Pauli and Fermeiras and more, came into this country through legal means.
To give these two groups of people the same label, cheapens Fermeira and Pauli and Schildt efforts and labor and struggles. These immigrants in our families don't deserve to be characterized alongside lawbreakers, scofflaws, and (in some instances) parasites. (Oh, and drug- and gang-criminals as well.)
The average American lemming today, dedicated to the Kardashians, self-focus, and mental sloth, easily buys into quick and monodimensional banners: e.g., "Support Immigrants!" Well, I do, and your late in-laws did; as well we should.
I don't support – please pardon me – Juan Wetback coming here extralegally, and insisting he has a "right" here. He doesn't; period. I won't leave him lying in a ditch if he's struck by a car while walking to his construction job and the see-no-evil management that pays him under the table. Once the hospital's patched him up, though, send him back across the Rio Grande – on his American dime, if he's saved any up. If not, the fine paid by his employer will do the trick.
Regards,
Gene
The Lord looked down from the holy heights, viewing the Earth from Heaven, to hear to the groaning of the prisoners, and release those doomed to die. — Psalm 102:20-21
She emailed back:
From: N. Fermeira [mailto:Senhora@Yabbadoo.com]
Sent: Friday, February 17, 2017 12:40 AM
To: Aging Child <AGeneChilde@YouWho.com>
Subject: Re: The Problem Is...
Quite! Sometimes I can work up intense indignation about it. When I think of what my Puritan ancestors endured, what my Scots-Irish forbearers suffered and how diligently my German ancestors worked to build America, the outrage burns.
F
"It is easier to hide behind philosophical arguments, heavily footnoted for effect, than it is to admit our hurts, our confusions, our loves, and our passions in the marketplace of life's heartfelt transactions." ― Ravi Zacharias, Can Man Live Without God
She's not kidding about the Puritans, either! While I hail in part from the land of Cotton Mather, Senhora can trace one line of the American piece of her lineage back to 1600s Massachusetts Bay… beating me out by a couple centuries.
Anyway, having made my own protest on the lousy, conflated terminology, I got to thinking about how superficial the proposed responses/solutions are. Most conservatives seem to favor simply nabbing every green-card -less noncitizen within our borders, and cramming them all into a cattle car shoved over the southern border.
(Having half my genes fresh from Germany, I'm also sensitive to the idea of people in cattle cars.)
So I knew I might be poking a stick at a non-quite-sleeping pitbull, in writing back. But write back I did, folding in some leftovers from an earlier debate with close friend Chuck:
From: Aging Child [mailto:AGeneChilde@YouWho.com]
Sent: Friday, February 17, 2017 7:49 PM
To: Senhora@Yabbadoo.com
Subject: RE: The Problem Is...
My father worked to get some German academic professionals established stateside (e.g., he may have been some later help with Werner von Braun and Arthur Fiedler) – and vice-versa, for that matter; sometimes folks want to move their pied-à-terre off American soil (I nearly did in the early nineties… with his help). He had no interest in assisting anyone who wanted to work outside of the law, nor did he foster parasitism in anyone (including in his own children… hear, hear!).
One of my maternal uncles, grandson (I think) of Irish immigrants, was for decades a researcher and inventor with DuPont. And you can cite many more non-scoffers of the law in your foreign-born family and ancestry.
Self-determination is a pillar on which we founded the strengths and achievements of this country. And somewhere it shifted from strength to weakness, over into self-focus, so now we have generations of welfare dependents, me-me-me – even the more-recent "tune in, turn on, and drop out" on the then-young Anglo side, and tribe-think on the brown and yellow side… often a tribe of one.
I suspect that pillar's first fissures formed after World War I – look at how our "The Yanks Are Coming" veterans became bonus-deprived hobos, and those who didn't serve in the trenches degenerated into Fitzgerald's "lost generation", given to swan-diving off Manhattan skyscrapers in 1929 when their aggressive self-pursuit brought the whole nation down around them.
Anyway, I'm not so shallow as to propose that the solution of legal vs. illegal immigrant is simply a quick-and-expeditious "round 'em up, and throw 'em out". Putting real teeth into immigration laws will reduce the floodtide of the Rio Grande; ditto a thorough housecleaning of the INS/ICE – there have to be very visible and adamantly dissuasive consequences for anyone slipping under the fence, and for those Stateside citizens who facilitate with blind eye and padded wallet.
There's the issue of families: I don't want to see them broken up; maybe an illegal's children, if under age five, even if born here, should be sent back with him/her. My sister-in-law recently got her citizenship, after years and years of study, and working when she was able – since we're no longer a frontier nation, U.S. citizenship should not be awarded automatically at birth if both your parents are non-citizens.
Kids older than five: give the non-citizen parents the choice of taking their children back with them. Maybe also give them the alternative of staying here while the children proceed through primary and secondary school, if the kids were born stateside, and only after fining the parents… what, maybe ten to twenty grand for each year they've been here illegally. (Kids graduate, and the parents go back – or must successfully apply for citizenship, having been gainfully and legally employed for some three-quarters' of their time here in the Land of the Free. And if their kids flunk out or drop out, parents are sent packing… likely with their washout children.)
If the parents can't afford the fine, here's your one-way bus ride and a sandwich. Your kids go with you, or are put up for adoption. Citizenship should also not depend on whether you or your spouse get pregnant, and how well/long you can hide afterward, before you get caught. That's rewarding a crime. Any non-native, naturalized American citizen aiding their entry and subsequent hiding should have their citizenship suspended and be fined; if they can't afford the fine, out they go as well.
Children – pun not intended – are an issue; if born here, they're innocent of their parents' illegal entry. But people hungry to be on this side of the river should not see parenthood as protection, and a free stay-out-of-jail card. That's a crime against their own children… and that kind of selfishness and thoughtlessness does argue in part for a loss of parental custody.
I don't know how realistic this is – but the status quo is killing us.
A follow-on question that must be addressed, once that one's well on the way to being resolved, is what do we owe, today, to the descendants of native-born, aboriginal Americans, who were forced from their lands and possessions? Hand-in-hand is the parallel for descendants of African/Caribbean slaves. There are just grievances… have they been wiped out by time, or is the debt still owed?
Regards,
Gene
Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people He has chosen for His own inheritance. — Psalm 33:12
These ideas still felt more superficial than realistic, more broad tarbrush than pragmatism, and narrowly elitist… they're also a first pass, not even a draft.
Senhora nurse's response surprised me… and she didn't call me out (much) on my more-progressive final paragraph.
From: N. Fermeira [mailto:Senhora@Yabbadoo.com]
Sent: Saturday, February 18, 2017 9:23 AM
To: Aging Child <AGeneChilde@YouWho.com>
Subject: Re: The Problem Is...
You've obviously given the matter a good deal of thought. :)
I'm just shallow enough to believe that rounding them up and shipping them back is a good start. Incidentally, the INS officers I have had contact with were Hispanic -- all of them. Which always made me wonder. It seems that there are two categories of INS officers -- the ones who have been struggling to do what the law demands -- and those who are sympathetic to the law breaking illegals.
No, we do not owe African-Americans reparations.
Plustard, Senhora
"Keep true. Never be ashamed of doing right. Decide what you think is right and stick to it." George Eliot
I hadn't given it much thought, in fact. But you can't simply cattle-prod eleven-plus million people southward until you run out of country… these are living people, not stinkbugs that have infiltrated a history museum. How do we address the illegality of their presence here, without dehumanizing them… and ourselves?
It was time to wrap up our mutual first-pass, non-draft debate; there's lots more nation-saving that needs everybody's attention… and this is just one facet.
From: Aging Child [mailto:AGeneChilde@YouWho.com]
Sent: Saturday, February 18, 2017 10:46 PM
To: Senhora@Yabbadoo.com
Subject: RE: Flipping One's Lid... and Betters
I've given it some thought – and I'm certain any effort would be tons more complex than either of us can imagine. (PS: I've yet to see you go shallow on anything!)
I've met very few INS officers in my more placid (i.e., boring) life… but I've noticed what you point out, the hispanicity of many of them. I'd simply assumed they'd been hired because they savvy the lingo… I doubt most river-swimmers do an intense course of Rosetta Stone English immersion (pun not intended) before hoofing it north.
I'd be curious how many of the Hispanic officers might be conditionally employed – via a backroom condition: "As long as you haul in at least two dozen fence-jumpers a day, we'll let your baby sister and her kids stay in Brownsville unbothered. You fall short more than once in any given week, out they all go… with you on the bus right behind theirs. ¿Comprende?"
There'll always be crook-sympathizers among the trusties – you've seen it (and I've sensed it while visiting) in the badge-wearing, cage-rattling gendarmes. [Part of friend N. Fermeira's nursely career was spent taking care of needy and neglected people behind bars. And I've visited a number of folks locked away, over the years; have you?]  And there are plenty of reports every few days of busted cops, politicians, bank guards, and so on. Look at who gunned down Indira Gandhi, for instance.
Which is getting far afield. So how 'bout, some really dull day, you put on an ICE baseball cap and saunter into the 7-Eleven, or Asian restaurant, and see how many folks scatter out the back door?
  

Just kiddin'.
Plus some mustard to you, too,
Gene
Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen. By faith we understand that the universe was ordered by the word of God, so that what is visible came into being through the invisible. — Hebrews 11:1-3

Momentary Detour: Immigration H(e)aven


I'll swing back to thoughts on rationalism and rationality in a few days. This week, retired nurse-friend Senhora N. Fermeira and I have been kicking around the current US debate on immigration.
Just over a week ago, under the subject line of "IMMIGRATION--WHAT WOULD JESUS DO???" she forwarded me a cartoon:
("Vetting" is one of those newer words that bothers me… not too many years ago, it referred to driving a very fast and expensive car around town, or hanging out with veterans…)
The process of – I just don't like that V-word. The criteria for reaching Heaven include 1) baptism; 2) doing God's will; 3) keeping His Commandments; 4) self-denial and acceptance of life's demands, with Jesus as template; 5) receiving the Sacraments in faith, including confession/reconciliation, and Communion / the Eucharist; 6) taking care of the needs of others; 7) striving for peace and for holiness; 8) loving God fully, and your neighbor at least as much as you love yourself; 9) being open to children in your marriage; 10) striving also for divine perfection; 11) receiving God's rule/kingdom with a child's outlook… And those are a good start.
The protestant approach of "sola fide" (by faith alone) and "solo gratia" (by grace alone), through "sola scriptura" (the Bible alone), by praying the "sinner's prayer", and accepting Jesus in your heart as your personal savior… doesn't cut it, not if you know better. See John 9:41 and 15:22 – oh, and Matthew 7:21, too, while you're at it; that last one gets me, and is a reminder to all of us that it's not a sure thing. Let's do our best, okay?
I've also wandered far afield from where I was aiming to go – which is why this little limping lamb appreciates having a shepherd!
I'll pick this up in my next posting; sorry about that.

Sunday, February 12, 2017

Rats, Rationalizing, and Rationalism


The title above isn't a sneer at rationalism, but simply wordplay pivoting on a recent and very intense background conversation via email, which wrapped up a few days ago.
Our email exchange grew out of reaction to my vote against Hillary Clinton this past November (I touched on this in last Sunday's posting). What it boiled down to, in sum, was a clash between faith – Catholic Christian faith – and rationalism.
I contend the clash was needless, that there is no clash. Like any heavily-invested dialog, with and without the heavy artillery, I think we both turned away with an armload of things to think about further – I know I did. And I'd like to look at them a bit more here, as I continue to ponder the words and outlook of this dear friend. (Since it's just me writing here, I'll quote my friend indirectly only.)
Below are the first couple of many points / questions / suggestions / assertions… all of which, again, I'm still pondering. More of these will follow:
Anti-abortionism as a self-righteous crusade: Merriam-Webster defines "self-righteous", in part, as "narrow-mindedly moralistic" (and then "moralistic", in part, as "expressive of a narrow moral attitude").
Subjectively, these terms are disparaging, and semantically weighted toward the negative. There's a clear sense conveyed that the person/outlook receiving this disparagement is on the wrong side of a good/bad dichotomy. Okay; so, what's the contrast? What's in the other balance-pan?
If it's narrow-minded to contend that the killing of a not-yet-born human is wrong, evil, and as a practice must be ended… then the wiser / good-side position is that it's okay – ?
I'm not even going to jump into that side-debate, where volumes have been written, and so much has been heatedly said for decades.
Correction: I'll stick my toe in for a moment, though. Today, it's legal in the US to abort a pregnancy throughout its full nine-month span, up to just before the baby's born (though it's increasingly hard to find a medical person willing to perform this during pregnancy's later months).
What about five minutes after the baby's born, has had its umbilical cord cut, and is breathing on its own? Is it okay if someone strangles/shoots/dismembers the baby then? It has a right to life, correct? And didn't five minutes ago? What's made the difference?
If abortion is no more than a matter of a woman's "right"… what about the younger woman in her uterus? She has no rights? And… it's okay to tear the younger woman apart and sell the pieces?
Skip it; further toes are getting into the water.
I'm also not going to view the word "crusade" as bait for a whole further discussion. You show me the insanity of the Fourth Crusade, and the cruelty of the Children's Crusade, and I'll pull your eyes over to the achievements of the First… and we can both roll our eyes at the self-serving agendas that ultimately hijacked and betrayed the intent of Urban II. Pass.
Anti-abortionism as a political wedge-issue: my friend points out very strongly that the Right/conservatism lures in potential supporters and voters by giving lip-service to their anti-abortion views, and that they in fact care nothing for life, nor for any person or issue that doesn't benefit the big corporate complex / high echelon.
I suppose I could file this under the "All Generalizations Are False" banner – but in fact I largely agree with this point. This is why I stressed to my family, as well as to this dear friend, that in voting against Hillary and the Democratic ticket, I haven't turned Conservative. While I've largely come to find that conservatives agree with me on some issues, I absolutely haven't thrown my support their way.
To momentarily put on my shallow Characterization / Wide-Tarbrush cap: generally, the American conservative is glowingly positive toward the NRA (and I am resolutely, adamantly against them); s/he favors lower taxes (which ends up cutting funds for education and healthcare); and s/he is all for deregulating large corporations (enriching the stockholders… especially those with a lot of stock) – and these three are just for starters.
I am all about none of these things.
Having typed that, let's take my cap back off.
I stand with my friend on this overall issue: I don't trust politicians – it really does seem to me that almost none of them are driven by altruism, by a selfless desire to help. Or in those instances where they may well have started out wanting to (pardon the simplistic, treacly cliché) make the community, and the world, a better place, they quickly detoured toward exclusively selfish interests. Their loyalty is almost entirely toward their biggest donors, and their thickest-pocketed lobbyist associates.
The contention against me is that I swallowed the Right's wink/nod to the social issues that matter most to me today, and have willingly empowered them to proceed unhindered with their real agenda of dismantling the country while clutching more and more power to themselves, and plowing over the rest of us. (These are my words; this isn't an indirect quote – but largely is his thrust on this point.)
Well, I disagree. My eyes were wide open as I marked my ballot (legally, Donald; do you hear me?); it's my nose that was pinched shut. I'll repeat what I've said earlier: there was no one to vote for; so I had to vote against. Sitting out an election today is irresponsible.
I'm ticked (yet unsurprised) that Trump has already gutted the EPA – yet I'm also relieved that his administration does indeed look to be working hard to directly overturn Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, as well as defunding Planned Parenthood.
Trump is unlikely to be a two-term president, at least gazing ahead from here, and so is unlikely to wreck the country (although my friend greatly disagrees with that – which I'll get to in a later posting). I say this because the Republicans have embraced him only loosely, and the grassroots strength of the opposition against him and his party and the Right in general… is so strong, and growing yet stronger, that they may even be able to engineer a turnover in Congressional majority in two years. That would be fine by me – let's just get our children out of harm's reach first, and for good.

Sunday, February 5, 2017

Putting the Pall in Politics, part two


About a week after this past US election, a very close friend sent me a quick note of sympathy/empathy on how it had turned out. He and I have batted (among others) issues of politics and American "culture" for many, many years… always from the comfortable left of center.
I still consider myself left of center, even having voted against the Democratic ticket, this time around; more on that momentarily. Suffice it for now that my vote had been a vote against, rather than a vote for.
In fairness to the honesty he's always dealt with me – and which I hope I've mostly lived up to, these many years – I shared with him how I'd voted, sensing keenly that he'd view it as a bad choice, and/or a lousy rationale:
Oh, man; you are not going to like this, my friend.
I absolutely agree with anyone who's got brains, that Trump is an arrogant jerk, underqualified, underequipped, with the intellect of Bush Jr. and the ego of Cheney… and the morals of Anthony Wiener.
I also voted against Hillary. I expect to get major heat from closest friends, and my family… but everything I value most made it utterly clear I could vote no other way, not and be true to my faith and those values, and to Him who made me and to whom I have enough to answer for already.
Below is a chunk of an email I sent around the family last week. (Father Jake Hujus is a childhood friend of brother Rich "Doc" and mine, from back-when; he's now a very traditional, very orthodox, priest on the West Coast.)
(I tacked on the note I'd sent around my family, shortly after the election, and continued.)
I haven't heard word one back from any of them, even my conservative, Marine older brother. That's okay; we're grownups now, more or less.
And you, most valued of friends, you're welcome to bust my chops on this issue, but I don't regret my vote for Pence – my vote was for vice-president; I squeezed my nose so hard over his disgusting running mate that it nearly bled.
My heart remains left of center, and if Hillary had had as much regard for unborn women as she professes for walking-talking women, and also not been about trying to shape my Church to match her viewpoints, I'd have been thrilled to color in my ballot's bubble for her. I feel for her disappointed followers, and am very worried about what stupidities the White House will soon be cranking out. It's going to be a very rocky four years.
But there's a very real chance this country may be able to put the brakes on some of its more stupid, if not outright self-destructive, directions. And that, soon – to quote Roger Waters – , "no one kills the children anymore".
One of the things I've come to treasure most about my faith is that it challenges me, rather than tells me I'm okay right where and how I am – if I wanted that, I'd be a Unitarian, or a church-hopping protestant looking for the most touchy-feely preacher.
Sometimes it's a crucible over a strong flame… which is what's needed at times to burn off some dross. And that can definitely hurt like crazy. Sometimes it's a cool breeze of comfort, and always it's enfolding arms.
Thirty-five years ago this month, I met a paralytic nun, Sister Paula, in Philadelphia (well, Upper Darby). She was unable to move below the neck – I don't remember why – and she was beautiful, especially in smile and word and spirit. In her body cast, lying seemingly helpless in bed, she looked at me closely, and asked, "Who are you?"
It's taken me just about this long to answer her, at least in part – and I said it to my family: I'm a Catholic who happens to be an American, and not the other way around.
St. Thomas More put it perfectly: "I am the king's good servant, but the Lord's first." He was beheaded for that.
Regards,
A. Gene Childe
I know your works; I know that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out. — Revelation 3:15-16
We absolutely all need friends who don't hold back on us… and the response I got back didn't disappoint. My friend's perspective on The Big Picture is always well thought out, and strong, and truly sane. And he is even more skeptical and gloomy about these next four years. Yes; I, too, am skeptical and gloomy and dreading, because, again, I really don't like Donald Trump. He both disgusts and greatly worries me; my vote was not for him, but against his opponent… because I couldn't stand with her on abortion (and some other party-platform planks as well; but abortion sealed it for me).
Again, my friend gave me sound counterpoints in his response; this included casting his keen spotlight specifically on my "I'm a Catholic who happens to be an American, and not the other way around". I strongly agree with his profound ire at American disunity: white American, boomer American, southern American, and so on. I'm glad to be an American, and I'm also ashamed at how shallow and, yes, disjointed we've become. My faith had shaped my vote, but I haven't surrendered my citizenship… or I wouldn't share in his gloom and dread.
I wrote back:
I don't think Hillary's the monster and ogre the far right's portrayed her for the last 25 years. She'd have had my vote if she'd made the unborn baby at least as valued as the spotted owl, say, or baby seal… and kept her platform out of my sanctuary. Outside of those non-negotiables, I haven't seen her degree of political – national and international – experience on a major ticket in… maybe half a dozen electoral cycles. Sanders has far better sense and objectives, but fewer mano-a-mano calluses.
When I first started soapboxing about voters' responsibilities (2000), I stressed that at bare minimum, we have to at least vote against… and like you, I did just that. I was this close [pinch your thumb and forefinger together till the nails turn white… now press harder] to voting third-party (probably Darrell Castle, despite his hyperconservatism; he also wasn't on my state ballot), or write-in (Santorum or Cruz). But it looked like it was very possible Hillary would win, and that write-ins, maybe even third-party candidates, would be lumped together and ignored.
There was no one to vote for; so whom would I vote most needfully – and effectively – against? And on what grounds? It had to be for Pence as VP, despite his blowhard hate-mongering fascist running mate. I'm tired of human lives – elderly, infirm, not-yet-born – being viewed as inconveniences (and organ banks). Bruce Springsteen cautioned us some thirty years ago: "the next time, they're going to be looking at you."
I suspect that Germany felt much like this in 1932! This time 'round, the scapegoats are Muslims and Hispanics (and nonconservatives); we're just lacking the hangover of a couple years of nightmare inflation and unemployment. (I was looking over some of my family's old German postage stamps a few minutes ago; I have a couple that were denominated at one billion Marks.) And like docile lambs – lemmings, really – we've gotten what our commitment to Short-Attention-Span Theater and the Kardashians and their clones have convinced us we need… and in fact are getting what our shortsightedness deserves.
Our country's strength lay [note the solid past tense] in individual freedoms: not kotowing to the crown, but instead determining our own destiny, and striking out for it. From a handful of bickering colonies that managed to pull together at the last minute, we coalesced ourselves into a single nation of strong communities and solid values.
As our borders opened wide and opportunities and expansive horizons beckoned, we nurtured and awarded self-determination… though now more as pioneer families, and rugged individuals. (And, yes, literally plowing over the indigenous civilizations already here.) And there were great successes, great rewards, great achievements, from the Golden Spike to the telegraph to the cotton gin…
Somewhere just after World War I, our ethos deteriorated from self-determination to self-focus and self-aggrandizement. The veterans of the Great War were kicked to the curb and became a DC hobo- tent-city, and morphed into Fitzgerald's "lost generation", soon given to swan dives off skyscrapers when the motivation of obsessive self-focus at play in the economy pulled the whole country into a shuffling unwashed breadline.
It took Zeroes in the Hawaiian skies, and goose-steppers and their ovens, for us to pull together once more and briefly become Brokaw's "greatest generation". Notice how quickly, after the fallout had settled in Japan, we reverted to self-fulfillment, and self-focus grabbed the wheel once more… and snipped the brake lines.
Focus on the family, and on the community, and on nurturing sound values and morals in our children (and ourselves), fell by the wayside of our superhighways and cluttered runways. Friendly front porches became cookie-cutter Levittowns, and every neighbor was a stranger… and someone to keep up with and excel beyond. Me first, my generation… I, me, mine.
Is it any wonder that the children of that greatest generation decided to turn on, tune in, and drop out? Notice how well that turned out, too. Their children now have faces glued to teeny screens, and can't maintain a conversation, or even spell.
Or elect a good leader.
Mi amigo, we're Balkanized. What's worse is that it's not along geopolitical borderlines, but me-and-my-little-tribe… often a tribe of just one or two, sometimes sharing a secret handshake with a neighboring tribe. Self is still enshrined, the only national god.
Sanders would have been great – I'd still have voted against him because of his abortion stance, but would hardly have been dreading the four years following on, had he won… not to the degree you and I both are.
Well, let's batten down the hatches and grip the reins. Please keep your hands and head inside the car at all times – and keep your elected representatives on a very short leash… preferably choker-chain, spikes pointed inward. Push them, pull them, prod them to do what we need them to do.
Oh, and let's toss out the electoral college while we're at it. President Albert Gore (2001-09) strongly agrees.
Regards,
A. Gene Childe
The Lord takes delight in His people, and honors the poor with victory. — Psalm 149:4

Do the Math – No Religion Needed


During the last few weeks of the 2008 US presidential campaign, I posted thoughts on what seemed most important to me, in terms of the positions and objectives of the two major candidates, their parties… and of my own.
As a registered Democrat, just-about-always voting straight-ticket over the years, I favored Obama without reserve. And I recognized the conflict between my commitment against abortion, and the Democratic Party's embracing and enshrining of that asserted "right".
I settled the conflict for myself by looking beyond – arguably, now, overlooking – that issue, and looked rather to what my hope was: that he and his team would see to the needs of the poor, the un(der)employed, the un(der)insured, and all those people – here and beyond our borders – so ignored and plowed over by the outward-bound Cheney-and-Bush-Jr. administration.
That was the sugar-coating to my tacitly giving the Democratic Party permission to make and keep abortion available to all, since at the same time the Obama administration would be fixing up and cleaning up our nation and our world. Right?
I was wrong.
In my postings, I noted honestly that wiser heads than mine had come down very differently on the scale from where I had settled, and specifically regarding abortion. And I'd already noticed the disparity in the number of deaths: at the time, some four thousand dead American servicemen and -women in Iraq over five years – yet three thousand unarmed American children, not even born yet, snuffed out... daily.
(That second number is from the CDC, as published in 2008, and not pulled out of the air and padded by a knee-jerk alarmist site – and not all states and reporting areas are even covered in those statistics. During the 1970-2005 span, thirty-six years, over thirty-eight million children were dismembered and killed by abortion here in the United States, which works out to over a million a year, twenty thousand a week, and just shy of three thousand every day: 2,925 children.
(Bringing the numbers up through 2013 – the most recent that the CDC has released – does reflect a decrease in the number of reported abortions, since the peak in 1990 of over 1.4 million children killed legally in the United States. That brings the average down to about 2,777 children aborted, 1970-2013; or 2,106 daily from 2006 to 2013. That's well over 2,100 too many.)
The meaningless, purposeless, idiotic war that George Jr. brought to Iraq had by the end of his second term in office caused tens of thousands of deaths to that country. And in the years since, especially beginning in 2010, the number's grown to… is it a million now? More, in Iraq and Syria and beyond? The mind reels. And there are millions more refugees. Thanks, George.
And in the United States alone, at least 664,435 babies were killed just in 2013.
Over the years since 2008, as I continued my growth in faith, I continued also shining light into dark corners, including – of necessity – my own inner corners. And I concluded that allowing even one not-yet-born baby to be torn limb from limb, to have its spinal cord snipped, its skull crushed… even just one… (let alone selling its pieces!) was not a fair trade-off for a better economy and lip-service to empowerment of women (and of cowardly men… myself included at the front of that line).
And in essence, it's not even a religious issue.
For me, it did take a deepening of faith to bring me to that point, where I couldn't vote for that any longer. But sharing that square with me are people of little faith, and of no faith. Have you heard of Nat Hentoff? Atheists Against Abortion? Pro-Life Humanists? Secular Pro-Life?
No crucifix, cross, crescent, magen david, saffron robe, or golden calf needed.
What's needed is heart, reason, and courage at last to say No. Not Any More. Never.