Again....

Let's please stop the madness.

• Let's please talk to each other. 
• Let's please recognize that many of those involved in acts of violence are often sick or afraid individuals and not representative of any one or any thing. 
• Let's not allow our fears to overcome the fact that we are actually far safer and less crime-ridden than we have ever been. 
• Let's not allow media on any side to incite us into greater anger or fear.

Let's please stop the madness!

Super Tuesday is Coming!

You would think I could find something better to talk about on this leap day Monday than politics. Actually, I probably could, but tomorrow is another big day in the election year. Yes, all the media are hyping the possibilities and probabilities along with the odds and percentages of each candidate.

So far none of these "Big Days!" in the election cycle have proven to be decisive. Will tomorrow? Eh!

It would be nice if it did. We could settle down to less hype, although I doubt that would happen or bring about more discussion of issues. That is not happening in this election year. I don't see why things should change. What I have seen is that the "Establishment" of both parties is trying to figure out what to do with this runaway train of dissatisfaction that is threatening the very heart of both party machines.

Chris Christie supports Trump instead of Rubio and Lindsay Graham says that the GOP has gone "batshit crazy." Democrat pundits try to point out the errors in Bernie Sanders' logic, trying to undermine his apparent support. Trump continues to be Trump, what looks like an almost unstoppable ride to the nomination.

The rest of us sit on the sidelines and scratch our heads. I shake my head many times a day when I hear the news and ask

What in the world has happened to our system?

I know there have been mud fights like this before. I know that politics has never been a "let's sit down and discuss this like gentlemen" system. At least not when it comes to elections! (And yes, it was almost always men, so the gentlemen is not out of historical context.) But this year seems to have hit a new low, jumped the shark, or whatever superlative description you want to use.

Popular author and pastor Max Lucado did something new and unusual for him last week. He wrote an editorial piece that was published in the Washington Post calling for decency in the campaign. He cited Donald Trump's language and tactics and, rightly, I believe, said that such tactics wouldn't even be fit for a "middle-school election." All these things, Lucado said, are done with the Bible in one hand.

What became the "money quote" for me in the article was this paragraph:

The stock explanation for Mr. Trump’s success is this: He has tapped into the anger of the American people. As one man said, “We are voting with our middle finger.” Sounds more like a comment for a gang-fight than a presidential election. Anger-fueled reactions have caused trouble ever since Cain was angry at Abel.

Lucado has never made political statements in public before. He could not, I am sure, sit idly by with these.

Like Lucado I am looking around and seeing this anger-fueled election.  And if I think it's bad now, I don't believe we have seen the half of it. I received a robo-call the other day which sent shivers up my spine. It was from some person somewhere who claimed to be a "white nationalist" supporting Donald Trump because we are facing "white genocide" where "beautiful little white children" are being denigrated and killed. He even got in a non-named attack on "Cubans" who are running for president.

We have seen crazy memes on Facebook likening socialism (i.e. Bernie Sanders) to Hitler and Stalin with no awareness of history, politics, or economics. Hillary is easily depicted as the most foul and criminal person ever to run for president.

It is only the end of February. No matter who is nominated in either party, the general election will become a bloodbath of hatred, prejudice, and many other very difficult insinuations and downright declarations.

I can do nothing about it, I am afraid. All I can do is write these posts, send them off as words of hope that we can do something to avoid the pain of what we have been seeing. I am powerless.  Not a new idea for me as a recovering person. So in the end I find myself in that extremely difficult position of having strong opinions, strong fears, and a deep, heavy cloud of despair filling the election season around me.

When that happens all I can do is say the Serenity Prayer again.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

I will continue to look for the ways I can do something, praying for the courage to stand up for those things, but also knowing that in the end all I can really do is write these posts, express my opinions, and then vote.

I promise I will at least do those.

Maybe we can hope that tomorrow some of this will find some resolution. Maybe we can begin to talk about some of this with a little more decency. I am not hopeful, at least about the public dialogue, however. But maybe, as we ponder these things and look into our own national soul, we can find a way to bring about the change in the election atmosphere that we need.

Enough of a Horse Race

I have been watching the horse race and carnival sideshow we are generously calling the Presidential Election Campaign. All anyone seems to be interested in is:

• Who's ahead? 
• What are the polls saying? 
• Can anyone beat Trump? 
• Is Cruz that awful a person? 
• Is Hillary going to tank again? 
• Can Sanders be a socialist and still win?

That last question is as close to the issues as anyone in the press will go. And that's nothing but pulling a word out that will raise concerns and issues with voters. I am saddened, afraid, and downright upset about the whole process so far.

I know I have mentioned here before that I have been interested in politics since 1956 when, at age 8, my family's support for Adlai Stevenson was in  the minority in our north central Pennsylvania town. Politics hooked me as something interesting and important. The campaign of John F. Kennedy in 1960 settled my political addiction once and for all. I ended up a political science (government) major in college. I am a believer in voting rights being as important constitutionally important as gun rights or freedom of speech and the press.

In my study of history I also know that our campaigns have often been rabble-rousing affairs. The infamous John Adams-Thomas Jefferson election being among the slimiest, at least as far as name-calling and general truth-stretching.  In some ways, then, this particular election cycle has "fine pedigree" in our early history.

But I am not aware of any election cycle that could be considered as amateurish, mean, and so far off center as this one is. At least not at the presidential election level. There have been incompetent candidates at times. Some of them even got elected. But this one seems to be truly unique- one of a kind.

• When issues are discussed, they result in sound bites that call for carpet-bombing of women and children or having Mexico pay for a wall to keep their citizens in. 
• A reporter tells the story of how in most Trump rallies he points at the enclosure in the back where the media and reporters are kept and the crowd boos. Yet, it is that very media who is reporting and keeping him on top. 
• A conservative magazine comes out with an issue of essay about why Trump isn't right for America.  
• On the fringes someone has come up with the great view that Hitler was a left-wing liberal since he was a "socialist."  Therefore Bernie Sanders is like Hitler.

The party establishment of both parties is uncertain. Party hacks, both Democrat and Republican are afraid that if the non-establishment candidates get nominated they will lose. The political process has been hijacked by several different factors.

• Anger
From the end of the 2008 election cycle, anger has been at the bottom of almost everything from the GOP. Hints of it have shown up before, but this is beyond anything we have seen in a long time. The extremely virulent opposition to Obama's presidency has been so deeply rooted in those against him they have wanted him to fail so they could take over. If he had succeeded- unthinkable to them!

• Social media
What plays on social media? What gets attention? The mainstream media has been as much at fault in this as has been the biased media of Fox or MSNBC. Add the easily available presence of all kinds of opinions on Facebook and the Internet and you have an opening for any and all opinions to be expressed. Of course, most are preaching to their own kind, but their presence- and coverage in the press- only goes to flame the anger. No- I am not saying that we should limit any of these. Perhaps we need to discover that these views are the extremes- unwilling to compromise at any time with anybody. And that is not how democracy works.

• Money
The Koch brothers are only the visible sign of the invisible evil of an oligarchy at work. Since Citizens United, corporate money has dominated. Here, from Wikipedia, is a way of looking at it:

Plutocracy is a form of oligarchy and defines a society ruled or controlled by the small minority of the wealthiest citizens. The first known use of the term was in 1652. Unlike systems such as democracy, capitalism, socialism or anarchism, plutocracy is not rooted in an established political philosophy.

Actually we seem to have developed two sides of this- the liberal plutocracy and the conservative plutocracy. These are the ones who fund and support the established orders. They were deprived of some of their historic power starting with Teddy Roosevelt's progressive reforms in the GOP in the early 20th Century and Franklin Roosevelt's with the Democrats in the 1930s and 40s. They have been working hard to gain it back- and are succeeding. They have convinced the greater population that "trickle-down" economics works and that "job-creators" deserve breaks in order to create jobs. Again, this is happening on both sides of the political spectrum. Part of the appeal of a Trump or a Sanders is that they present themselves as outside this system of support.

• And did I mention anger and hate?
Add hate to the anger and you have a dangerous mixture. I would even go so far as to say racism is the final straw that has broken the political process.No one will ever convince me that the opposition to Obama's presidency was not fanned by racism. That does NOT mean that all of us whites are racists. Many who opposed Obama were not- and are not- racist. But there is an undercurrent of racism- systemic racism- that has been at work which then pulls in the interest of those who may truly be racist. I believe it took the election of a "liberal" African-American to bring it out. I also believe that some of the "birther" crap about Cruz stems from the same underlying Euro-centrism. Rubio as another Hispanic and Sanders as Jewish will face it if nominated.

So, in the next couple weeks we will see Iowa and then New Hampshire play a role far beyond their place in the American political scene. Anything can happen, of course, in either state. But it will not be based on substantive issues. Not at this point. Everything is too raw. We need some perspective, which has been sadly missing so far. I don't see it as getting any better.

Nor do I have any idea who will end up as the nominee of either party. Sanders, at this moment, has as good a chance as Hillary, who is on a potentially razor-thin edge. Trump and Cruz are certainly the most likely front runners, at this moment. I hope and pray that the tenor of this campaign will change, though history keeps me quite hopeless about that outcome.  But I also remember that Pat Robertson and Mike Huckabee have both won the Iowa caucuses in the past.

I have hunch it is going to be quite a ride.

Why I'm Afraid

We were listening to a public radio program the other day that was reviewing where the 2016 election cycle is at this moment. One of the comments was that even the most hard-core and experienced political observers are at a loss to explain what is happening this year or to begin to sort it out. In short, they are even more confused than usual. All the conventional wisdom of the past seems to be irrelevant. This is especially true in the GOP race where Donald Trump, with no political experience, is leading.

At first they (the experts) said he was a flash in the pan, stands no chance, will start tanking once the lack of truth or the extreme bombast of his message is seen.

Now they (the experts, again) are saying he could very likely win the nomination.

Then there's Dr. Ben Carson, another inexperienced politician and Ted Cruz whose colleagues find little good to say about him.

A look across Facebook indicates a deep and indescribable divide in the nation. Sure, the extremes, left and right, get the press. They yell the loudest and make the most outrageous statements and therefore you notice them.

But this seems different this year. Deeper, more contentious. While I am not an expert, I am an old political science major who has lived through, watched, and participated in political campaigns in one way or another since 1956. That's 60 years of watching and I have to admit that for the first time in all these years, I am afraid of what is happening.

Before going into detail let me say that some of my friends will tell me that I am overreacting to the early ups and downs of this crazy political season. They will remind me that Pat Robertson and Mike Huckabee have previously won the Iowa caucuses. We are a long way from the conventions, let alone the general election. A lot can- and most likely will- happen.

I hope that is true. I pray that is true.

I also hope and pray that the GOP doesn't do something even more stupid than nominating a Trump, Carson or Cruz. I hope they don't find a way to play with their own election rules to keep Trump from winning. The divide will only get worse.

Having said all that, back to the fears.

The only other time I remember being afraid in a presidential election was in 1964 when Barry Goldwater came across as an extremist, ready to go to war. "extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice!... [M]oderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!" he famously said. We had been on the edge of our seats since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 when we knew we had been only a blink away from a nuclear exchange. Here was Goldwater seeming to be a saber rattling politician.

This seems different. The fear is coming from within our national psyche. It is division and hate that seems to be taking the upper hand. It is name-calling and prejudice and stereotyping people of all types from both sides of the political divide. I have previously talked about why some of these issues are so important. The depth of the anger and prejudging of others by the color of their skin or the way they worship or the type of clothes they wear is taking over the news and airwaves.

• We have Sikhs being attacked because some people can't tell the difference between them and Muslims.
• We have people claiming that "white lives matter" as a way of denying that African-Americans are often profiled and attacked simply because they stand out.
• We have presidential candidates wanting to deport all Mexicans, build a wall on our southern border and close all borders to Muslims.
• We have many who don't believe that Obama was born in the United States and that he is a Christian.
• We have seen a rise in what used to be called "nativism" the idea that native-born and established residents take precedence over immigrants.
• We ignore the fact that our police forces are made up of human beings, some of who can and do make mistakes and commit crimes, while most are just like you and me- trying to do a job the best they can. Yet both sides refuse to accept that. Police are either demonized or placed on pedestals.

None of this is new. These prejudices and policies grow out of our history. We have seen them before. The KKK wasn't just anti-Black. They were often more vehement in their hatred for Jews and Roman Catholics. Italians and Irish were persecuted, stereotyped and harassed. Some of our current presidential candidates are playing on these deeply-seated fears. They are fanning the flames with language that is as incendiary as they claim the "Black Lives Matter's" language is.

With this increasing polarization and ramping up of the rhetoric what might happen if, in the end the extremist views lose? Or win? In a loss they will claim persecution. In a win they will gloat and rattle their own sabers more forcefully.

Either way could spell danger to our very democratic ideals. In search for security- ultimate and complete security- we can easily be convinced to give up more and more of our liberties. Abraham Lincoln famously said:

America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

Either the left or the right could accomplish this. Any extremism that seeks to reduce our freedom and liberty for whatever reason can accomplish this. And it will be done in the name of preserving our democracy. Remember we are the nation whose military leader once commented that they had to destroy the village to save it. The language and logic of extremist views of either side is neither safe or logical.

That is why I am scared for this next year. 2016 may very well be one of those watershed years of our history. It may be one where we make decision that will set a direction for the next 50 years. This nation- and our democracy- the "shining light to the nations" we have claimed to be- is being called to make some important decision this year. The level of anger and hate and horrific rhetoric may prove too toxic for us to survive the way we have.

I don't believe that the American people- US- the USA- will go that direction. We have a deep and enduring sense of what is right and wrong- and I believe we will maintain that. We were created as a nation with flaws and, yes, sins. But we have worked and grown and embraced change as it was needed. We have sought often to move away from the "bad" and more toward the "good."

• Democracy works on compromise, on discussion, on listening with open minds and ever open hearts to our fellow citizens. 
• Democracy works to protect the rights of the minority as much as the rights of the majority.
• Democracy works to preserve values and principles and is an ever-changing, ever-evolving process that seeks to discover what can be done next.

I for one will be watching closely and praying often for our sanity and future. I hope and pray I am overreacting and that my ultimate faith in our country will be be made real. I will keep writing about it.

In the Face of More Violence

No, I don't expect ever to have it stop. Violence is endemic in human nature. It probably goes back to some of those primitive parts of the brain that protected us when we were, well, primitive and constantly in danger in the pre-civilized world. Self-protection can often include having to fight back in some form or another.

But violence as we see it happening way too often is not a form of self-protection. It is anger and fear, hatred and judgment and often just plain uncaring reaction and deep mental illness. Two stories in the recent week exposed this.

The first was the latest mass shooting in Colorado Springs. Some "Una-bomber"-type loner decided to take issues into his own hands. The guy was crazy. Period. He was enticed by whatever demons were in and around him to want to kill people. Perhaps he was fed by the anger and hatred currently swirling in our political system. It was an act of domestic terrorism.

Most acts of terrorism are the acts of crazy people enticed and spurred on by leaders who are also crazed by their ideologies and angers. Leaders like Osama Bin Laden gathered followers to do his crazed work for him. The Taliban does it. The KKK does it. They increase fear and anger with half-truths and no-truths. They spread lies based on their own blindness to other people's beliefs.

Yes, we also have religious leaders and politicians who do that. They would deny that they want the kind of violence enacted in their name that sometimes happens. Yet, Trump encouraged and supported in his own sideways way violence against a Black Lives Matter protester and enacted his own mocking personal violence against a reporter. They will all deny to their dying days that they support this kind of behavior. I believe that they believe that. I also believe they do not understand the results of their actions and words.

The other event took place in Biloxi, MS, at a Waffle House restaurant. From the Sun Herald:

About 1 a.m. Friday, [a man] lit a cigarette in the restaurant in the 2400 block of Beach Boulevard. Police said she [the waitress] was enforcing store policy when she asked [him] to put out the cigarette.

Police believe [he] pulled a 9mm handgun and shot [the waitress] once in the head. She died a short time later at Merit Health Biloxi.

Read more here

Not an act of terrorism. A senseless act of violence.Maybe drugs and/or alcohol were involved. (I would bet money on that!) He reportedly suffered from a Traumatic Brain Injury a number of years ago.

But this is the kind of incident that raises the gun issues more than the guy in Colorado. I am not in favor of getting rid of guns. That would be a waste of time and energy. But I am in favor of finding ways of reducing the senseless violence wrought by guns.

A "good-guy with a gun" could not have stopped this. The waitress carrying a gun herself would not have stopped this. These are the senseless acts; the great loss of innocent lives as these happen over and over.

Again and again and again I ask the same question- why can't we sit down and discuss these issues instead of standing on ideology that in the end spurs crazy or sick or troubled individuals to commit crimes of violence and death. These incidents are far more likely to happen than some Syrian refugee doing an unspeakable act.  These scare me far more.

I eat in restaurants, shop in malls, sit in coffee shops, walk in office buildings. Those are the places where things like these happen. That is the fear engendered by the news that is based on a greater reality than the refugees. Yes, we need to have proper controls and immigration guidelines, but we also need more sanity in the "gun debate."

That is always part of my prayer for the safety of our country!

Overheard in Recovery: Anger

They didn't mean it as a take-off on an old line about Jesus and life, but I heard it that way:

Know anger, no happiness
No anger, know happiness.

One of those truisms heard around 12-Step meeting tables is that for those in recovery issues of anger are downright poisonous. They will, without question, build in dangerous thoughts and finally into a relapse. It comes from the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous where Bill W. and friends said:

It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worth while. But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal. For when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And with us, to drink is to die.

If we were to live, we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the brainstorm were not for us. They may be the dubious luxury of normal men, but for alcoholics these things are poison.[Emphasis added.]

Anger is a barrier, a block that keeps what Bill W. called the "sunlight of the Spirit." I believe from what I have seen over the years that this is not even a "dubious luxury of normal men." The pain that anger engenders is devastating. It tears people, families, communities and nations apart. Anger undermines any possibility for hope.

Anger is often appropriate when someone hurts you, of course. But what do you do with it? How does it eat away at you as you seek revenge or retribution? That is the point where anger moves from a human emotion to a primal or primitive survival reaction.

Underneath anger is often a secondary emotion. It is a response to hurt, fear, embarrassment, sadness. When one is anger we feel as if we can at least do something. Strike back! In reality whether the anger is directed outward and hurts other or turns inward and hurts ourselves (our self) it can destroy more than it can build.

Righteous anger can even be worse. Righteousness is always a difficult foundation on which to build anger. It justifies and gives permission to do something that can hurt others. It is far better to take that energy of anger and turn it somewhere helpful, positive and hopeful. It is better to build with it rather than tear down.

As the anonymous quote at the top said, the result will be happiness.

Frozen...

For a heart stained in anger grows weak and grows bitter.
You become your own prisoner as you watch yourself sit there
wrapped up in a trap of your very own
chain of sorrow.
-John Prine


An extra today, here's John Prine explaining the song and singing it live in 1978. What a musician and songwriter.

Fridays For Wisdom

 

Anger is never without a reason,

but seldom with a good one.

--Ben Franklin