Roger O Green

Hey, what a difference a month makes

Harris/Walz

What a difference a month makes. Like a lot of people, by the time the Republican National Convention was over, I was thoroughly depressed. When Joe Biden was running, he rightly pointed out the risk to democracy if his opponent were elected. Unfortunately, the Republicans said the same thing if the Democrats won.

Even as I heard the calls for Joe Biden to step aside, I couldn’t imagine how that would work out. Kamala Harris’ polling numbers weren’t much better than Joe’s. The pundits also noted that she never got any footing in the 2020 Democratic campaign season, which was true.

Do you know who else ran not one but two dismal Presidential campaigns? Joe Biden, who dropped out of the 2008 campaign after faring poorly in Iowa. Of course, Barack Obama then picked him as his running mate.

So, I am cautiously optimistic. In retrospect, I should have KNOWN that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz would be the Presidential/Veep candidates for the Democrats. I jest. But it feels so right.

The Republicans are currently on the defensive. A disoriented djt insists that the attendance at his “rally” on Jan. 6, 2021, before the storming of the Capitol, was larger than the quarter million on August 28, 1963, when MLK Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. He has fantasized that Joe Biden might somehow snatch back the nomination. People around him say he’s been knocked off his bearings.

Uh-uh

Harris/Walz has pivoted to We’re Not Going Back. Some have criticized it as unduly negative, but I think it’s wonderful. It’s oblique. Go back to what? The time before Roe v. Wade? Before Jan. 6? It’s a counterweight to Make America Great Again, Again.

Now, the GOP candidate is considered ‘Too Old’ by a majority. “Mental Fitness Increasingly Worry Voters.” Like Biden, he can’t pivot to become younger, and touting his alleged prowess in basic cognitive tests isn’t helping. I only wish the press had been harsher on djt earlier, because he’s been saying crazy stuff for quite a while.

Also, several pundits have noted that the “weird” labeling is particularly effective. If one attacks djt on policy, he’ll say his position was misrepresented. But if one points out his mixing up California politician Willie Brown with another black man, and you say, “That’s weird,” you don’t have to ask if he’s losing it. After Hillary Clinton used “deplorable” to describe MAGA fans, they embraced it, but weird is a different thing.

I should write about tech bro JD Vance and how Silicon Valley owns him, but nah.

DEI

When Harris got down to her Veep candidates, you knew there would be a white man. That DEI! If you’re gonna have a black South Asian woman, you gotta have a white guy. Walz seems to be the least likely candidate. Gov. Roy Cooper (NC) looks like how a president would have been portrayed in many 1980s disaster films. Josh Shapiro, governor of Pennsylvania, looks like a policy wonk. US Senator Mark Kelly (AZ) looks like, well, an astronaut. Then there were the forty-somethings, Gov. Andy Beshear (KY) and US DOT Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

MN governor Tim Walz is the least telegenic, but he has a Midwestern genuineness and a great biography, which people are attracted to. “He tossed off multiple zingers about how ‘creepy and weird as hell’ the Republican ticket. Coach Walz’s sudden rise in the Democratic Party was no accident. And according to the satirical Borowitz Report, “in an extraordinary show of support from the furry mammals, America’s cats gave a full-throated endorsement to…Walz.”

Interestingly, according to an article published in the National Library of Medicine in 2023, “We vote for the person, not the policies: a systematic review on how personality traits influence voting behaviour.” The GOP candidates and most of their proxies are not very nice people. Their “stolen valor” attack on Walz is overblown, e.g., and is funny coming from the campaign of Captain Bone Spurs.

RFK, Jr.

When Biden was still poised to be the Democratic candidate, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. seemed to have the chance to be at least a spoiler. His stock is down now, and John Oliver’s skewering on Last Week Tonight didn’t help.

Worse, from Behan Communications: “Since ‘weird’ seems to be the word of the moment, we thought we’d hop right in with some news about… [the] presidential candidate of the Comic Relief Party.

“Where to begin? With his admission that he dumped a dead bear cub in Central Park 10 years ago? Or that he once had a freezer full of roadkill meat? Or that doctors told him he has a dead worm in his brain? Or that he somehow believes, according to testimony he gave this week in an Albany, N.Y., courtroom, that an intent to move somewhere is ‘the only requirement for residency?'” He has been “disqualified from the New York ballot over his false residence claim.” It’s likely to affect other states where he used that bogus address.

CHQ: Our Greatest Challenges

local news

chq The Chautauqua Institution has a series of lectures based on a theme. For instance, The Evolution of the Modern Presidency was the theme in week 1, June 22–29.

For week 5, when my wife and I were there, the topic was Our Greatest Challenges (That We Can Actually Do Something About). All of the events were at the amphitheater.

Monday: “Scholar, cultural critic, and staff writer at The Atlantic Thomas Chatterton Williams surveys the current American conversation on race, shares how he has evolved in his conception of race and societal division, and provides his perspective on creating a space for productive conversation and bridge-building. “

He was an organizer of what many called the Harper’s Letter, “A Letter on Justice and Open Debate” in 2020. It had several prominent signees, including Noam Chomsky, Margaret Atwood, Salman Rushdie, Garry Kasparov, and J.K. Rowling. It attempted to address what is loosely called “cancel culture.” (The Atlantic called it A Deeply Provincial View of Free Speech.) Openness, Chatterton Williams notes, is “a necessity in a free society.”

He also spoke on racial identity. His 23 and Me genetic test notes he is 59.6 European. His father had always been defined as black, but his daughters are so fair that they could pass in Stockholm as Swedish. As long as society imposes racial and other categorizations, he believes we are limited in terms of how we can truly communicate with each other. (I don’t know what that looks like, but that’s for another time.)

A free press

Tuesday: “Margaret Sullivan, the Egan Visiting Professor at Duke University, award-winning media critic and groundbreaking journalist will… evaluate the state of local journalism; offer models for re-establishing this critical community institution; and share ways that individual and community action can create solutions.”

Like many of a certain age, she was inspired by the reporting of the Watergate scandal. She started as an intern at the Buffalo News and eventually became its first female editor-in-chief.

At the time, newspapers were wildly profitable because advertisers had few ways to target their potential customers. But competition, first from Craigslist, hurt the bottom. Eventually, Facebook, Google, and others circulated the expensive-to-create news content for free and this gutted newsrooms.

This is most unfortunate. Sullivan cited the two Buffalo News reporters who broke the story about the root causes of the 2009 plane crash near Buffalo after the national press came, reported the incident, and then moved on to the next story. That type of investigative digging costs money and time.

The decline in regional news coverage means local officials are often not held accountable, and corruption is more likely. Also, when local cultural criticism is gone, replaced by wire services, what’s lost is the fabric that ties a community together.

Good news

The good news is that some entities, such as the Daily Mississippian, which often shares stories with dailies and weeklies in the Magnolia State; ProPublica, Investigative Journalism in the Public Interest; and others, are attempting to fill the breach.

Still, Sullivan, who has also held significant roles at the New York Times and Washington Post, suggests that the audience follow and pay for local news and contribute to “free” investigative sites such as the Guardian, et al. Read about Rebuild Local News.

Most importantly, she called people to be “engaged citizens at the local level. You can make sure you vote… If everyone who still believes in a reality-based press were to pitch in, I think we can restore the foundations of local journalism.”

Project 2025: Reproductive rights

DOJ run amok

From the Center for Reproductive Rights – https://reproductiverights.org/roe-v-wade/

The Project 2025 agenda has drawn a bullseye on reproductive rights. It aims for “the next conservative administration to attack reproductive rights from several angles, including by removing the term ‘abortion’ from all federal laws and regulations, reversing abortion pill approval, punishing providers by withdrawing federal health funding and restricting clinics that provide contraception and STD testing. “

It is not comforting that Paul Dans left his director role at the Heritage Foundation, which oversees Project 2025. Sure, djt’s campaign “welcomed” the news because it has been trying to distance the candidate from the plan for months now that folks are paying attention.

The Republican nominee for President has a position on the issue that has been described as “pure jibberish” as he tries and fails to BS his way through questions about Mifepristone.

After the Dobbs decision was leaked in the spring of 2022, I posited that the country could be worse off post-Roe than it was pre-Roe. Sometimes, I HATE being correct.

The SCOTUS leak

(SCOTUS never discovered the source of the leak. Based on Chief Justice Roberts’ public comments, I assumed that he was seeking a “middle ground,” perhaps a ban after 15 weeks. There could have been a 3-3-3 or 3-4-2 outcome, with the CJ getting one or more of the newbies on the court on his side. But when someone – one of Alito’s or Thomas’ clerks? – spilled the beans early, voila! Roe gets overturned.)

The heartbreaking stories of women who have to practically, or actually, have to be on death’s door before receiving treatment when a pregnancy goes wrong. State legislators insist incorrectly that their draconian laws don’t handcuff doctors from providing necessary care.

As The Atlantic reported in 1969(!), and it’s true again in 2024: “As a matter of fact, no one knows what the laws which permit abortion to save the life of the mother mean.”

ABC News put out a special – here’s just a small portion– about the “dire impact of new healthcare restrictions on pregnant women.” I was alternatingly sad and infuriated. Dobbs has brought out the stupid, such as bans against in vitro fertilization.

Defund

What else is Project 2025 calling for? “The policy book instructs the Department of Health and Human Services to ‘issue guidance reemphasizing that states are free to defund Planned Parenthood in their state Medicaid plans’ and ‘propose rulemaking to interpret the Medicaid statute to disqualify providers of elective abortion.'”

It “also proposes requiring education on ‘fertility awareness-based’ methods of contraception and family planning and suggests eliminating condoms from Health Resources & Service Administration guidelines because they are not a ‘women’s’ preventative service.” The stupidity of this provision is amazing.

“Heritage recommends the next conservative administration direct the CDC to ‘eliminate programs and projects that do not respect human life and conscience rights and that undermine family formation.'” I read A Handmaid’s Tale in 1995 but thought it was fiction.

“The book recommends reversing policies that allow ‘the use of public monies … to facilitate abortion for servicemembers.'” Ah, supporting our troops!

The Anti-Abortion Movement Is Perverting the 14th Amendment. So says Jamelle Bouie in the New York Times in response to the 2024 Republican National Committee’s party platform. “In the same way it is perverse for conservative legal activists and Supreme Court justices to use the Reconstruction amendments… to dismantle this nation’s halting efforts at substantive racial equality, it is also perverse for the anti-abortion movement to use the 14th Amendment as a cudgel against bodily autonomy in the name of so-called fetal rights.”

Department of Justice and federal law enforcement

“The policy book states that ‘litigation decisions must be made consistent with the President’s agenda.'” That’s terrifying.

Do you remember Jeff Sessions? He was the first Attorney General under djt, and he was terrible. Yet he did one correct thing. He recused himself from participating in any DOJ investigation regarding allegations that Russia had interfered in the 2016 presidential election, infuriating 45.

There’s no reason to believe that a Republican AG in 2025 would have even that much integrity, based on djt’s attempt to strongarm DOJ, as acting AG Jeffrey Rosen noted in his testimony before the January 6 hearings.

“The policy book [for Project 25] euphemistically calls for the next conservative Administration’ to do everything possible to obtain finality for the 44 prisoners currently on federal death row.’ During the final months of his administration, Trump rushed 13 federal executions in 2020 — ‘an unprecedented clip’ compared to the combined total of three federal executions in the preceding 60 years.

“Project 2025 claims that the Biden administration ‘has enshrined affirmative discrimination in all aspects of its operations under the guise of ‘equity’ and vows to ‘reverse this trend’ by attacking ‘so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) offices that have become the vehicles for this unlawful discrimination.'” Ah, the old “reverse racism” trope.

“Project 2025 calls to reassign election-related offenses to the Criminal Division of the DOJ rather than the Civil Rights Division… This change would allow a second Trump administration to provide more resources for investigations into bogus claims of voter fraud and bolster efforts to overturn future election results.”

Will we have ever-challenged votes when the results don’t turn out how the White House wishes? It may sound overly dramatic, but this provision alone makes me worry that democracy itself would be in jeopardy.

Sunday Stealing: Olympic events

training

To the Sunday Stealing list of questions, Bev added a bonus question about the Olympics, which I deign to answer first.

Extra question: Olympic events that I like to watch or follow

I didn’t see much of it when I was home during the first week. But my wife, daughter, and I were away in Alexandria, VA, for the second week. So, I ended up watching more. One series of events involved the relay; passing the baton while maintaining the pace is surprisingly difficult. Another was diving; it’s astonishing how high the best divers get above the board, do several moves, do not hit their heads on the board, and then land in the water without making much of a splash. And the pole vault always amazes me.

1. I am looking forward to …

Being home for a while. Because of the remnants of Hurricane Debby, including tornados, localized flooding, and downed trees on the track, our train from Alexandria, scheduled to depart at 11:08 a.m., did not leave for NYC until much later. Fortunately, enough people canceled their reservations for the 10:24 train, which left at 11:44, so many of us caught that instead. It was a bit stressful, I must say. And we followed the Debby’s downers for hours.

2. Least favorite words

“The late great Hannibal Lecter.”

3. If I ruled the world

I’d ban assault weapons (AK-47) and mandate equitable salaries. Most inequities involve too much for too few, so food, health care, mass transportation, and green energy would be funded. And there would be no billionaires because they have an outsized degree of power.

The Wayback Machine!

4. Favorite websites and blogs

My favorite website may be the Internet Archive, “a non-profit library of millions of free books, movies, software, music, websites, and more.” It features the Wayback Machine: “Explore more than 866 billion web pages saved over time.” When working as a business librarian, I was asked to access a document from the Bureau of Indian Affairs website, but for some political reason, the site was down. I found the piece via the Wayback Machine.

5. Things I do for myself

My blog.

6. Weekly rituals

Tuesday: Attend Friends and Foundation of the Albany Public Library book reviews or author talks. Thursday: choir rehearsal, take out the garbage. Sunday: church. That said, I missed two FFAPL events and four church services because I was out of town, and choir doesn’t rehearse in the summer.

7. DIYs I want to try

Can’t think of one.

8. On my shopping list

I’m trying hard NOT to buy more stuff.

9. Places to see in your town

I’ve answered this before. I read that the city has completed the Albany Pedestrian Experience, which is a terrible name for a band.

10. Road trip must-haves

I bought an item for our trip to France where I can charge multiple phones simultaneously.

11. Guilty pleasures

Doing this quiz

12. Things I’d rather be doing right now

At this moment, I’d be sleeping because I woke up too early

13. Books I’d like to read this year

All of the ones I bought and sit, sad and forlorn, on my bookshelf

14. Lessons learned

There are too many to encapsulate; sometimes, I must relearn them anyway.

15. Vacations to take

Despite what Disney said, “It’s a big world after all.”

My dad is still in my head

Hamlet, but I’m less than 1% Danish

Obviously, my dad is still in my head.

In April, when I was at my Dad’s group at church, the pastor was reading a piece on joy by Fred Buechner. We talked about the concept. Then, I mentioned that my go-to emotional state was melancholy.

I related this story, which I wrote about back in 2010. But I left details out, which I will add in italics.

We had a piano which my father painted, lilac, I think. “When I was four or five years old, Leslie marked up the piano with some crayons. In retrospect, it seemed like a reasonable thing; he colored the piano so she could too. My father went to Leslie and asked her who had marked the piano, and she said that Roger had done it.

“So my father got the strap that hung in the kitchen – this brown leather thing about a foot long that barbers used to sharpen their razors – and started wailing on me. One of the things he was looking for from me was an apology, yet even in the midst of my pain, I was unable to do so. ‘I didn’t do it, I didn’t do it!’ I sobbed.

“Eventually, and these are pretty much in the words of my father, recounting the incident years later, he figured that I was either really stupid or I was actually innocent. Finally, he requestioned Leslie, who finally confessed, and he started wailing on her.”

I’ve told this story a few times, but usually one-on-one, to my wife or a close friend. But this time, I added, “But he didn’t f**in’ BELIEVE me!”

Huh

Hmm. That was interesting. And surprising. Me cursing, even in our closed group, is not in my nature. So the telling of this thing that happened in 1958 somehow still has a visceral reaction in me. Among other things, it informs the pain when I feel when I’m not heard, or when people make assumptions about me that are untrue. It can tick me off but later, the melancholy takes hold.

The next morning, one of my online buddies wrote to say he was having prostate surgery; it was benign. My father died of prostate cancer. It was an interesting coincidence.

And the stories on CBS Sunday Morning that day – this is why Allah invented the DVR – about “The Covenant of Water” author Abraham Verghese, who was inspired by his mother and grandmothers; and Photographer James Balog on documenting climate change: “Adventure with a purpose” somehow leaned into the melancholy.

My relationship with my father was complicated. I’m sure my sisters would say that about their respective dealings with him, too. It’s been 24 years to the day since he died. I had the ridiculous thought that everyone should die in years ending in zero because it makes the math easier.