We Shall Overcome, If We Want To

The eleven innocent victims of Pittsburgh's Tree of Life synagogue shooting have been laid to rest, as has the first of the two lesser-known victims of the Kroger shooting in Jeffersontown, Kentucky; the second is being buried today.

For those of you who may have missed the Kentucky shooting, the victims died from multiple gunshot wounds, shot by a man who later allegedly said to someone in the parking lot, "Don't shoot me. Whites don't shoot whites."

We've learned that before the brazen murders at the grocery store, the suspect apparently tried to enter a predominantly black church. One of the reasons he wasn't able to get into the church was because significant security upgrades were made after the murders at Mother Emanuel in Charleston back in 2015. Cameras. Automatic door locks. That kind of thing.

Robin Young, co-host of Here and Now on NPR, has an interview with Billy Williams, a staff members of the First Baptist Church - it's well worth a listen. You can feel the emotion in this account: what if the shooter had come during a service, when the doors are unlocked? What if I had been here and opened the door when he tried to get in? How do we heal, having lost a parishioner in the shooting?  How do we help, now?

It's not your fault if you didn't hear much about this one. We certainly didn't see the president tweeting about these two innocent Americans. They're not on his radar, and I don't think I'm wrong in saying that they're never going to be: they were killed by a white man, not by a brown-skinned immigrant or gang member. They were black folks in their 60s, not white schoolgirls on Long Island or college age young women from California of the Midwest. Maurice Stallard and Vickie Jones simply don't fit his narrative. He knows it, and we all know it.

Certainly the scope of these two shootings is vastly different, even though they have the common denominator of hate as a root cause. The shock of what happened in Pittsburgh - 11 Jewish victims, one a 97 year old Holocaust survivor; a synagogue literally (not just Joe Biden literally) in Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, for Pete's sake. We handled the vandalism at cemeteries and bomb threats at Jewish organizations and schools (including multiple incidents at the JCC in my area) pretty well, and moved quickly past those, but this? This knocked us off our feet.

We thought we had expressed enough collective rage and outrage over the shootings and loss of life in Charleston; we expressed more after the shooting in Sutherland Springs, Texas back in 2017, although that had no racial or religious motive; and now we offer up more rage and outrage on behalf of the victims at Tree of Life.

Flags were ordered lowered to half mast in honor of those lost in Pittsburgh, as happened in honor of those lost in Sutherland Springs. No similar respect was ordered for the Kroger victims. It would have been respectful, but I don't think it's necessary.

We have a problem in America - well, several, if we're honest with ourselves and each other, including a gun problem.  And before you yell at me, I included that link not to make this about guns, but because that post touches on a lot of other things we do to exacerbate the problems that guns in the wrong hands create.

But it's bigger than the weapon - it's the weaponizing of hate, the purposeful weaponizing of hate, that we really need to solve. And that requires admitting we do it; calling out those who purposely fan the flames; refusing to accept their denials; and individually committing to making it stop.

Lowering flags for a couple of days is one thing. Lifting up hearts and filling them with love for those lost, for their families, their churches and synagogues, and for all of us, that we find a way to end the hate, is not limited to a Presidential Order time frame. It will long outlast that act, if we do it right.

And we can do it right, if we want to. We just have to want to.

My Middle-aged White Lady Perspective: It's Not the Statues

I've seen this meme on Twitter, on Instagram and on Facebook in the past few days - you may have seen it too, if you spend any time on social media.

It's just one of several making the rounds these days, post Charlottesville, when self-proclaimed neo-Nazis, white supremacists and white nationalists from Union states and Confederate states gathered, with first with torches, and then with helmets and shields and clubs and a well-armed 'militia' of supporters to protest against the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee.

I can't help thinking that the people who thought the original meme was funny would not think the same of the one to the left; would you agree?  Would we see a lot of high fives and "damn straight" and "exactly"and similar comments on this?

From my middle-aged white lady perspective, people (on both sides) don't care about the statues per se - certainly not because "the beauty that is being taken out of our cities, towns and parks will be greatly missed and never able to be comparably replaced!"

People do care, deeply, about what the monuments symbolize. And what they symbolize, if we are to believe the ones who protest in their favor, is a white heritage, where blacks are not taking over our country, where Jews are not replacing them, and where, it seems, whites would not be failing in procreative department, and would be popping out babies left and right to ensure that the white race does not get trampled by blacks, browns, and yellows.

And, they symbolize a country where whites are in control "culturally, politically, socially - everything. We define what America is."

The statues, particularly those that rise on government property, symbolize our history of racism, of institutionalized racism, not just the personal kind that people of color experience every day.  And it is our history, yours and mine, even though we were not alive at the birth of America, or during the civil war, or Reconstruction

Because in our lifetimes - for  Pete's sake, I'm only 59, my husband 10 years older - in our lifetimes, America struggled with racism, continues to struggle with racism, a century and a half after the Civil War.

Would it surprise you that there have been over 4,000 lynchings in America, from the 1870s to the 1950s?

In 1951, the family of 8 year old Linda Brown sued because the child was bused to a segregated school when she lived within walking distance of an all white school; this was the Brown vs. Board of Education case, which was sort of resolved in 1954, when the Supreme Court ruled that  'separate but equal' schools for blacks violated the 14th Amendment - which was adopted in 1868. The Court in 1955 ordered states to integrate their schools (Brown II). And finally, in 1958, the Court ordered desegregation of schools (Cooper vs Aaron case) was required, and that the threat of violence was not a reason for continued segregation.

Also in 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for not giving up her seat on a Montgomery bus to a white man. Several months earlier, Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old schoolgirl, was arrested for a similar offense. Parks' arrest led to the lengthy Montgomery bus boycott; in 1956 that the Supreme Court ruled that the bus segregation ordinance violated the 14th Amendment.

How about voting rights? Blacks were given the right to vote under the 15th Amendment, which was ratified in 1870. The Civil Rights Act of 1957 allowed the federal government to investigate and prosecute cases of voting rights infringement. Later, we had to enact the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to try and eliminate requirements such as poll taxes, literacy tests, and other inhibitors to voting, and also established the practice of federal approval of changes to voting laws in states where discrimination had historically occurred.

The VRA has been updated many times over the years, in part because of efforts to restrict voting rights continue to occur to this day.  According to the Brennan Center for Justice,

Overall, at least 99 bills to restrict access to registration and voting have been introduced in 31 states. Thirty-Five such bills saw significant legislative action (meaning they have at least been approved at the committee level or beyond) in 17 states.

Federal courts have called out in gory detail the extent to which several of these laws are driven not by any sense of urgency for protecting the sanctity of the ballot, but rather to limit the ability of blacks to vote.

In the 1950s and 1960s, African-American churches were regular targets of violence, including one incident in September 1963 that killed four schoolgirls. It didn't stop in the 1960s. In fact, Congress passed the Church Arson Prevention Act in 1996.  Not 1966, folks - 1996.  And it didn't stop then, either.

Yes -- in my lifetime, and yours, America has had issues with racism; we have issues with racism today, and we will continue to have issues with racism in the future, if we pretend that it's just the symbols that people are upset about.

It won't go away if we pretend it doesn't matter or doesn't impact us. It won't go away if we pretend the problem is violence, not racism. It won't go away if we pretend that speaking out against racism is the flavor of a day, rather than the flavor of several generations.

It won't go away unless we want it to.

Sidebar: After the Bullets...

There has been no let up in the comments and discussions following the shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise and three others at the ballpark in Alexandria, VA.

Calls for unity, and cooperation, and tamped down rhetoric, and bipartisanship across the spectrum, from regular people to public servants in Washington continue, even as a couple of handsfull of Republican men meet in secret to reform healthcare, one sixth of the American economy. (They must not have gotten the memo?) And while many are hopeful, most are not holding out hope that this will last any longer than these types of "calls for (fill in the blank)" typically last - five or six news cycles? Ten, maybe?

Lots of people have mentioned that Donald Trump, both as a candidate and since the election, has been a key factor in emboldening people on the fringes, through his 'textbook' racist comments and his denigration of, well, pretty much everyone, whether overt (women, Mexicans, POWs, Gold star families, the disabled) or covert (blacks, uneducated people, and more), via his hideously insulting professions of "love" for them.

Others have blamed Barack Obama (no specific examples, just in general), Bill Clinton (same), Hillary Clinton (her basket of deplorables), Congressional Democrats, liberals in Hollywood, free speech protesters at Berkeley, Congressional Republicans, Rush Limbaugh... even, again, regular people like me who express opinions around the vast water cooler that is "social media."

(Ironically, I've yet to see someone blame lifelong Independent Bernie Sanders, the candidate of choice for the gunman, according to his social media record. Sanders, by the way, is still widely and erroneously described in the media as the Democratic Senator of Vermont, which is mind-boggling to me, but that's a whole nother post.)

The bully pulpit, it seems, whether the one at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave or the one at The Little Garden in The Valley, where I sit, is actually filled with bullies.

This hand-wringing about the words we use and how we use them, would not be occurring to this degree had the gunman not targeted members of Congress. It does not occur, as I noted in my post, when extreme words about abortion lead to murder.

It did not happen, to this elevated level, when racist words and beliefs led to the murder of churchgoers at Mother Emmanuel.

It did not happen, even, when the Sandy Hook murders were claimed to be fake; parents are still hounded by people who believed the words, and acted on them.

It did not happen when the citizenship of President Obama was challenged.

It did not happen, did it, when Hillary Clinton's lesbian-child-sex-ring from the-back-of-a-pizza parlor led to a man going there to take matters into his own hands?

When we challenge each other on the power of words, we're told they don't matter. Violent movies, video games, song lyrics? They have no impact, we're told, and besides, that's artistic freedom. Same with references to drugs, smoking, drinking and sex - mainstream movie sex, I'm talking about, not porn. Those don't matter, they don't influence anyone, that's just art. (Maybe someone should tell the ad agencies that their work doesn't matter?)

All of this, we're told, people know it's not real. They know it's fake. And yet, "fake news" influenced our presidential election, and continues to influence people's thoughts, opinions, conversations, and memes.

Words don't matter, we're told. Until something like this happens, and the political becomes personal. Then, everything matters.

But, as you all know, tonight's game has taken on a much deeper level of meaning. Beyond anything that we would have thought. By playing tonight, your are showing the world that we will not be intimidated by threats, acts of violence, or assaults on our Democracy. The game will go on.

Here are some words I think matter.

If people, politicians and pundits really believe that words matter, they need to believe that all of them do. If people, politicians and pundits really believe that inflammatory rhetoric matters, they need to believe that all of it matters. If people, politicians and pundits really believe that extremism matters, they need to believe that all of it matters. If people, politicians and pundits really believe that gunmen shoot innocent people because they have mental health issues, they need to believe that all of them have mental health issues.

If people, politicians and pundits want to show the world that we will not be intimidated by threats, acts of violence or assaults on our democracy, we all need to play the game as if that really matters. 

Ladies and gentlemen, let's play ball.

What Kind of Problem Do We Have? Pick One.

I've had lots of gun conversations in this blog, and with friends around the lunch table, with family at the dinner table, and with total strangers on comment boards and the like.

Generally, my positions and beliefs are as follows:

• I believe that having as many guns as people in America is a problem; I don't know who has 'my gun' but I've never met them, I have no idea what their intentions are, and I wish they had asked me first. 
• I believe in reasonable gun control, including background checks for all gun sales at gun shows, stores, and online.
• I believe you should have more magazines on your coffee table than bullets in your magazine. 
• I believe that, if  you have a family member with a mental illness, you should know better than to keep guns in your house. 
• I would not for a single moment feel more comfortable if every Tom, Dick and Harry was wandering around wearing a sidearm in plain sight, much less carrying it in their shorts or their socks or their shoes or wherever one conceals a weapon.

I don't like that people kill police officers. Ever.  I also believe that probably 99% of police officers would like to go through their entire career and never shoot, much less kill anyone - black or white, Christian or Muslim, child, teenager or adult, armed or unarmed, on drugs or stone cold sober.

I truly believe that some people are too foolish or stupid to be allowed anywhere near a firearm of any kind, and that we should have a way to weed them out and prevent them from owing guns.

• I think it's ridiculous that so many people get shot in or around Walmarts.
• I believe we have a problem when kids and parents accidentally kill children with guns. 
• When a person accidentally shoots himself in the leg, in the head, in the head, in the testicles, in the testicles, in the testicles, in the penis, in the foot, taking a selfie, defending a Muslim-free gun store, trying out his new holster, in the girlfriend, in the girlfriend, in the girlfriend, etc., I admit to less-than-charitable name-calling and a lack of compassion, as I shake my head.

So, if we don't have a 'gun problem' in America, what kind of problem do we have, that other civilized countries don't seem to have?

(1) I think the publicity we give people who commit heinous crimes like the Roanoke murders, the Houston police officer execution, the Sandy Hook shootings, the movie theater killing, and on and on, does more harm than good. If you're a wanna be famous nutjob, this is a surefire way to get what you're looking for.

I would prefer we never show the name or face of the person who committed the crime on television, in magazines, or anywhere else; instead, we should flood the airways and pages and the cloud with pictures and stories of the victims, whether police officers or television reporters or folks on dates or innocent children in school.

(2) Further, the lengths to which we go to 'define' these shootings, or the bastards who commit them, makes the situation worse.  Channeling Hillary Clinton here,

Was it racially motivated, or was it because the person was mad at his mother and father, or was it because of violent video games or television shows, or was it because the guy liked to play with guns, or had a mental illness, or thought the gun wasn't loaded, or had a grudge against his employer, or had a hatred for Muslims or Christians, or didn't like the military, or had a run-in before with one of the victims, or thought the best defense against a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun, or because of guys out for a walk one night and decided they'd go kill someone?

What difference - at this point, what difference does it make?

We struggle to determine whether we should call something terrorism, or a hate crime, or workplace violence, or domestic violence, or some other identifier. Who benefits from that? Not the victims, not their families and loved ones, and frankly not the rest of us. In reality, all it does is make excuses for people who have committed very bad acts.

(3) Even if we know, or think we know, or believe we have ascertained the 'reason' for the crime, we respond in ways guaranteed to inflame.

Case in point? The Charleston shootings.  The killer has racist tendencies, so the obvious answer, of course, is to remove the Confederate Flag from the grounds of the South Carolina statehouse. Because no one will ever shoot up a black church again, now that the offending flag is down.

Case in point?  New York's SAFE Act, after Sandy Hook. Some good ideas, some not so good - but crammed down everyone's throat, because Governor Andrew Cuomo knew there was no other way to get something passed. In the aftermath, we have calls for full repeal, even from people who agree with much of what's in the law, because of how it was done.

Case in point? The NRA declaring that the reason why people get killed in these horrific shootings is not because someone pulled a trigger, but because we have 'gun-free zones.' (Except, of course, when they thought it was OK that we had gun free zones.)

(4) We treat guns differently than anything else that threatens us. One person tries a shoe bomb, so everyone takes off their shoes before getting on a plane.  Heaven forbid we talk about closing loopholes in gun laws - because while we have no problem stripping in front of strangers at every airport, don't dare make us prove we're OK to purchase or own a gun.

(5) The Colorado movie theater killer was just sentenced, after what's been described as a parade of pain, to a term of life in prison for each of the 12 people he murdered, plus 3318 years in prison for wounding another 70 people.

The crime occurred three years ago; there was no doubt about his guilt, and whether he was sane or suffering from mental illness, there is no excuse for what he did, and he does not deserve rehabilitation. Should it take three years (sometimes longer) for the outcome to be known? Should we have an option for juries and defense attorneys, one that allows for a verdict or plea of 'guilty, but insane' which will guarantee the person never sees the light of day?  And does anyone really benefit from a sentence, and a sentencing production, like this, or does it just add to the murderer's fame?

(6) We have a huge 'us vs. them' mentality in America: rich vs poor, citizen vs. immigrant, Christian vs. everyone, state vs. federal government, black vs. white, this 'life' vs. that 'life', government vs. teacher, suburb vs urban, gun owner vs. non gun owner, pro-birth vs. pro-choice, reporter vs. interviewee, and so on. We seem to thrive on our differences, and forget our similarities.

Combine that mentality with our time where anyone, (like me, and this blog), can say anything we want, any time we want, and find an audience for whatever we say. This gives equal voice to ideas from the fringes as to those from the mainstream, and I think ultimately contributes to the general lack of respect and increased vitriol that we see these days.

What does all of this do? Individually we might be able to counter the effects of these issues, but when taken together, they paralyze us from actually doing anything about gun violence, or preventing the wrong people from getting guns, or doing anything about mental health, or about our frequently slow and prodding system of justice. In the end, is that what we really want? I honestly don't know.

Do we have a gun problem in America? We can, and will, continue to disagree on that, I'm sure. But one thing I do know is, no one has ever committed a similar mass murder with a bathtub.

Wondering, on Wednesday (v35)

The sound of 'Dump Trump' continues to echo across the land.  His Hairness is experiencing some nice fallout from his comments as he announced his candidacy for President that,

when Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their bet. They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with (them). They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists.

Not surprisingly, those comments, which were accompanied by others regarding the giant wall that Trump would build on the border - and have Mexico pay for - were not well received, and folks are jumping ship. NBC, Macy's, Univision, the beauty pageants Trump has - all are giving him the proverbial 'you're fired' message.  He's also in hot water with professional golf organizations; Trump proclaimed that he's got "tremendous support" because "they know (he's) right."  On the contrary, golf says this:

In response to Mr. Trump's comments about the golf industry "knowing he is right" in regards to his recent statements about Mexican immigrants, we feel compelled to clarify that those remarks do not reflect the views of our organizations.  While the LPGA, PGA of America, PGA Tour and USGA do not usually comment on presidential politics, Mr. Trump's comments are inconsistent to our strong commitment to an inclusive and welcoming environment in the game of golf.

I'm wondering whether Trump will allow these organizations to play on his courses in the future?

Speaking of golf, let us all give a polite golf cap for the NY State Legislature, and our Sonofa Governor Andrew Cuomo.  Together, they've proven once again that when it comes to giving taxpayers their money back, par for the course is good enough for them.

You see, our esteemed legislators have decided that New Yorkers need a property tax rebate again; they passed this version, a $1.3B deal, as part of the end-of-session package. While this year's version is tied to household income and the STAR program, it bears a big similarity to the last one: passed during an odd-numbered year, the checks will come during an even numbered year. Right before the election. If you ask me, this should be illegal. (Is it any wonder that they're not asking me?)

Here's another thing I wonder about: when a person commits a crime, such as the Charleston murders, and is then captured and admits to committing the crime, is there any reason why the media refers to the criminal as the 'alleged' or 'accused' killer?  He admitted he did it; why isn't he referred to as the 'admitted' killer?  Lawyers and psychiatrists and the rest will do their part to try and secure a fair outcome when things come to trial, but I think in the meantime, we should be able to describe him as he describes himself.

And finally, the field of notable Republican candidates for President has increased yet again. Here are the players that have officially entered the fray: Jeb Bush, Dr. Ben Carson, Chris Christie, Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, Lindsey Graham, Mike Huckabee, Bobby Jindal, George Pataki, Rand Paul, Rick Perry, Marco Rubio, Rick Santorum, and Trump.

If they all were to agree to play a round on one of Trump's courses, I wonder who would win, and who would wear the worst pants?

Wondering, on Wednesday (v34)

If you watch the evening news, you've probably seen a few thousand pharmaceutical commercials, everything from painful sex to painful joints to painfully dry eyes to painfully not being able to perform to painful diabetic nerve pain to painful embarrassment due to losing your keys and finding them in the refrigerator. After a rude awakening, I was thinking I might need to "talk to my doctor" about a drug, the one for painful night leg cramps. Boy I had a doozy of one in my calf around 4 this morning. I'm wondering now what drug I need to take to help me remember the name of the drug I wonder if I need to talk to my doctor about taking...

C Neibergall/AP Photo

Speaking of drugs, I think the conservatives who are up in arms about the pictures of Senator Ted Cruz (R-Canada) with posters of guns in the background need to take a chill pill.

Yeah, it's true that the guns are pointing at his head, but is that his fault for standing where that could happen, or is it the fault of the photographer for taking pictures of Cruz?  And is Cruz upset, or are the gun-shy gun fans upset?  After all, it he was the one who, at an Iowa campaign stop just a couple of days after the murders in Charleston, joked about gun control:

You know the great thing about the state of Iowa is, I'm pretty sure you all define gun control the same way we do in Texas - hitting what you aim at.

It might just be me, but I think if you crack that joke on the heels of a mass murder in a church, you shouldn't be too concerned about a bunch of paper guns in frames on the wall.

Charleston's murderer, Dylann Roof, has a clear identity as a racist bastard, but a less clear identity as a person.  Seems the national press pronounce his last name Roof like 'rewf', but the folks down south have generally said it Roof like 'hoof'. Who was it who said "You can say anything about me you want to, as long as you get my name right?" Seems Mr. Rewf or Mr. Roof missed that bit in his research.

I didn't call Roof an 'alleged' murderer, or an 'accused' murderer, as many in the media continue doing.  Why? Because he confessed. I'm also not going to call him crazy or insane or nuts or any of the common mental health terms we use so freely in cases like this.  He planned it, he did it, he admitted it. At this point let's leave it up to his lawyers to try and figure out where the dust settles. I'm comfortable calling him what he called himself: a killer, a murderer, a racist.

Another person who I won't call nuts or crazy or insane is Pope Francis. I'm going to let Catholics handle the name calling, as it seems there are many who are upset with the Pontiff for his encyclical on climate change, the environment and man's disastrous treatment of our home. Francis has continued his messaging, tweeting frequently in the past several days along these lines:

The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth.

Economic interests easily end up trumping the common good.

Many things have to change course, but it is we humans above all who need to change.

Among the folks who are irked with the Holy Father is Jeb Bush, who converted to Catholicism many years ago, and who is not afraid of using his faith in his messaging, or defending his faith publicly, as he did back in 2013 when he thought (or pretended he thought) that President Obama was closing the US embassy to the Vatican. On the Pope's encyclical, Bush had this to say:

I hope I'm not going to get castigated for saying this by my priest back home, but I don't get economic policy from my bishops or my cardinal or my pope. I think religion ought to be about making us better as people and less about things that end up getting in the political realm.

Like abortion. Or marriage equality. Oh wait, those are not political issues, sorry. Those are just tax protected Sunday sermon topics. Ending poverty, finding equal justice, saving Mother Earth, those are political issues.  Silly me.

Finally, speaking of silly, am I the only one wondering if the people who went out and bought guns, all kinds of guns, when President Obama got elected, or here in NY before the SAFE Act went into effect, are the same ones who are now out there buying up anything and everything with the Confederate flag on it?

I just don't get it. I'm wondering, should I talk to my doctor about that?