Religion and the First Amendment plus a Reader's Take on the "Occupy" Movement

 
Occupy Movement Demonstration in Kansas City

The Occupy Movement

The "Occupy Wall Street" movement has gained supporters across the country and has even shown up here in South Florida.  We are witnessing the beginning of a "revolution" and I urge everyone to read more about the movement, understand why it is gaining such momentum, and support it either by participating in it or just making it a conversation piece in your social interactions.  If we ever expect our business and political leaders to change their behaviors (based primarily on greed and power) we need to be a part of this "revolution"!  As always, this is my opinion and I welcome discussion.

What disturbs me most about the current state of affairs of our political and corporate systems, as well as the condition in which we find our country economically, is that we are now suffering from decades of governance and decision-making that have benefitted those in power to the detriment of the working classes.  I am not espousing socialism or communism but there has to be some middle ground that has escaped the view of our current office-holders.  Wouldn't it be more beneficial if folks like Boehner and Reid, Pelosi and McConnell, and their cohorts, would say, "What can we do together to provide for our people and their futures?  What has to be done to address the needs of the citizens of our great country?  Well, I think the "Occupy" movement is basically fed up with the same things I see.  The participants run the gamut of personalities and positions, races and religions, geography and wealth.  They are us, and they deserve an ear.

Marty Troum

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JL


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Modify the First Amendment?

Ever wonder why the Founding Fathers included this language in our Constitution as part of the First Amendment included in the Bill of Rights?  

”Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

Europe, from which most Americans of those days came, had a horrible history of Catholics persecuting Protestants, Protestants persecuting Catholics, and both groups persecuting Jews, not to speak of persecution within religions of individuals whose views differed from the dogma of those “in charge” that week. Christian heretics who questioned the Trinity were burned at the stake.  The Inquisition slaughtered millions and the Crusades were bloody in attempting to wrest the “Holy Land” from control by the Ottomans, who were of course Muslims.  And Islam itself has always included a dichotomy between Sunnis and Shiites which continues to result in bloodshed between them, even today.   Islam also is sometimes ruthlessly intolerant of non-believers, particularly Jews and Christians.  Only this week, Muslims killed 24 Coptic Christians in Egyptian rioting.

Our Founding Fathers knew all of this, and to keep the virulent disease of religious intolerance from our shores, put the First Amendment language shown above into our Constitution.  Generally it has worked well throughout the years.  Americans have always considered religion to be a personal matter, the dictates of which stop at the walls of a house of worship and the limits of one’s conscience.

Most of the founders of this country were Christians, mostly Protestant, although there were Catholics and Jews in the thirteen states as well, but we must always remember that this is no more than a historical fact.  There is nothing divine about it; it is just history.  Those who claim that this is a Christian country because it was founded on Judeo-Christian principals are claiming a religious connection which just doesn’t exist.  The mention of “God” in the Founding Fathers’ documents implies no more than a belief in a Supreme Being, or Power, and the citing of both Old and New Testament theology identifies the United States as a moral and observant nation, but does not make us a Christian nation, nor endorse any religion in particular.  A priest, minister, imam or rabbi giving an invocation at the beginning of a session of Congress does not make that clergyman’s faith the nation’s faith.  It does not establish a religion.  All it says, much to the consternation of the nation's atheists, is that "We Believe."  The Third President of the United States was nominally a Protestant, but that did not prevent him from being considered a “deist” by many.  Any religious dressing, such as murals or statuary in the halls of Congress or in the Supreme Court Building illustrates this very general commitment to morality and religion but nothing more. The military has chaplains, but not because the government demands them; they are a service for the troops, most of whom have some sort of religious faith, and chaplains of all denominations are trained to serve all faiths in the military.

But America is changing.  I would be closing my eyes if I denied that a small number of devout Muslims in this country look forward to its downfall, and work toward it, because they believe that the existence of any religion other than Islam is ultimately unacceptable, whereas the United States Constitution declares the contrary, protecting the existence of all religions.  And since the First Amendment guarantees the free exercise of any religion, one that includes such “jihadist” concepts is permitted.  That creates a conundrum for us all. 

Separation between “church” and state is not present in countries dominated by Islam.  Iran’s Ahmadinejad may be his country’s President, but the titular head of state is the Ayatollah in charge of the “faith” there.  In Afghanistan, attempts at a secular government are constantly opposed by the Taliban which sees the state and Islam as one.  The only houses of worship permitted in Saudi Arabia are mosques.  This oneness of “church and state” does not fit well into the American idea of the free exercise of any religion, a First Amendment guarantee.  

But this danger isn’t limited to Muslims.  Only the other day, an eminent Protestant clergyman stated that Mormons, of which two are seeking the Republican presidential nomination, are not Christians, but just a “cult,” however moral they might be.

Look at the support many Evangelical denominations have for the State of Israel.  To them, the existence of Israel is a prerequisite for the second coming of Jesus Christ, at which time all that don’t accept him will be left behind to die when the Earth is destroyed in a titanic upheaval.  These good Christian folks don’t think much of their fellow men who don’t share their beliefs.  Let them stay and die, if they don’t choose our way, they seem to believe.

In the mountains of Montana and Idaho, groups of racist “Aryans” play at war in their training camps, sporting swastikas, adulating Adolf Hitler and spouting anti-Semitic slogans.

Some years ago, when entering an office building where I worked, I was physically blocked by a burly fellow wearing a monk's robe who felt his religion permitted him to prevent anyone from entering the building because there was a totally legal abortion clinic on another floor. Physicians who legally perform abortions have been gunned down by those whose faith condemns abortions, convinced that those who legally perform them are actually murderers.

We are not that far from contracting the disease that the First Amendment is supposed to protect us from acquiring.  Islam is at the head of the line, but other faiths as well are using the protection of the First Amendment not only to sometimes attack other religions but to protect their right to carry out activities which they believe proper but may actually be inimical to American Democracy.  All of them share one common belief, that their faith is the only true one and everybody else is misguided at best or at worst, not worth allowing to live in peace.  This is the fruit we are harvesting because the First Amendment says that ”Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”  

It’s that “free exercise thereof” that creates a problem, because with those words, we allow religions in our county to take the position that “they” know the truth and that no one else does, and act upon that premise.  How dare the Christian clergyman mentioned above refer to Mormonism as a cult?  The good reverend differs only in degree from the Church of England storm troopers who murdered Puritans in the seventeenth century because they didn’t like their more ascetic approach to Christianity.

Founding Fathers Signing the Constitution

How about this.  Let’s change the language of the part of the First Amendment referring to religion to read ”Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, provided that free exercise does not include attacking physically or verbally, or in any way denigrating or insulting, any other religion practiced in the nation or individuals because of their religion.”  (Proposed additional words are underlined.)  

I don’t recommend that any legislation made "constitutional" by this change should result in violators being hauled off to jail, nor cause the padlocking of the doors of offending denominations’ houses of worship.  Offenses, however, ought to be punishable by fines sufficient to guarantee that the Founding Fathers’ intent in establishing religion freedom in this country would not be compromised by the Amendment’s present wording.  Right now, that language's permitting "the free exercise” of religion allows belittling, attacking and manifesting intolerance toward other faiths, as well as the support of actions inimical to American Democracy.

Jack Lippman

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Steve Jobs' Cancer, a Story from the Boston Common and "Politicklers #1"

How Steve Jobs Got the Short End of the Stick

The TV and newspaper stories about Steve Jobs’ death the other day indicated that he died of pancreatic cancer.  About 95% of pancreatic cancers originate in what are known as exocrine cells, and they are extremely aggressive malignancies with survival after diagnosis averaging less than a year.   Jobs’ cancer, however, fell among the 5% of pancreatic cancers which originate in what are known as endocrine cells.  Functionally, these cells perform different tasks (exocrine cells produce enzymes, endocrine cells produce hormones) but cancers stemming from endocrine cells, called neuroendocrine carcinomas, are much more indolent, growing much more slowly than those originating in exocrine cells.  This is why Jobs was able to survive seven years with his cancer and able to function well over much of this period.  Victims of neuroendocrine carcinomas usually look pretty good until the cancer is very far advanced and has metastasized to other parts of the body.

Neuroendocrine carcinomas usually originate somewhere in the area of the pancreas or the liver, leading to the term hepato-pancreatic to describe them.  Eventually, they spread elsewhere, but the liver is usually quickly involved.  Often the primary source, likely to be in the pancreas, is never precisely pinpointed even though the cancer has already spread.  Some physicians feel that if metastasis has already taken place, pancreatic surgery to locate and remove the "unknown" primary would do no good.  Others disagree.

Because neuroendocrine carcinomas develop slowly, they are often initially misdiagnosed and diagnosis is made only after the cancer has spread.  In medical schools, doctors are taught that “if you hear hoof beats, think horses.”  Well, the hoof beats of a herd of zebras make the same sound as a herd of horses does, but they are different!  And this is why the stripes of a zebra are often used as a symbol by organizations dedicated to neuroendocrine carcinomas.

Since its victims usually survive five or six years, not so much attention is paid to this type of cancer as is paid to other more aggressive malignancies.  Sometimes it is referred to as a “carcinoid," implying a lesser degree of severity since some neuroendocrine tumors actually may not be malignant, and those that are, as I have pointed out, are not  so aggressive as are other cancers.  Ultimately, however, they kill.  It just takes longer.  I have heard it referred to as "cancer in slow motion."

How do I know this much about neuroendocine carcinomas?  Well, that was the diagnosis of the tumor found in my wife, who passed away last year, back in 2005.  Initially found in her bones, but also present in the liver, it was treated from its onset as a hepato-pancreatic tumor, and ultimately had fatal hematological effects.

And this was the same kind of tumor that Steve Jobs had.  He looked good, as did my wife, and when his liver was severely compromised, he underwent a transplant.  Nevertheless, despite whatever good the transplant did, the primary malignant lesion still remained there somewhere in his pancreas.  He then went to Europe, as did my wife on four occasions, for molecular targeted radioactive therapy which temporarily forestalls the growth of neuroendocrine tumors but is not generally available in the United States.  It is a sad commentary that countries with socialized medicine such as the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and Switzerland seem to devote greater resources to the study and treatment of neuroendocrine carcinomas than we do.

Why am I writing all of this?  Well, Steve and my wife got the short end of the stick because what they had was a relatively rare kind of cancer.  There are only a few thousand cases a year diagnosed in this country and not that much research is being done on it.  Drug companies and research centers are not bending over backwards to find a cure.  Their efforts are directed toward more common cancers that we hear about every day such as those involving breasts and lungs.  Often the chemotherapy used to fight neuroendocrine carcinomas is FDA approved for another type of cancer, but used “off label” for the neuroendocrine cancer because that is all that is available.  People like Steve Jobs and my wife, unfortunately, suffered from a rare disease, and that is the worst kind to get, because the knowledge and resources to cure it just aren’t there. 

I am sure Steve Jobs’ passing will result in a greater emphasis being placed on seeking a cure for pancreatic cancer, but I am afraid that most of it will be directed toward the very aggressive malignancies which comprise 95% of pancreatic cancers and not to the slower growing neuroendocrine carcinomas which claimed Steve’s life and that of my wife. It is logical, although unfortunate, that the limited resources available be directed toward combating a disease that is usually fatal in a year or less as opposed to one whose victims may survive half a decade or more, which both Jobs and my wife did.  For more information on this disease, check out the extremely comprehensive information found at www.carcinoid.org.

Jack Lippman

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Most readers of this blog are alerted by Email every time a new posting appears.  If you wish to be added to that Email list, just let me know by Emailing me at Riart1@aol.com.
JL


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The Professor

The professor continued to deposit his belongings into the brown shopping bag on the ground between his legs. He had just finished his daily presentation to the passers-by ambling through the pathways of Boston Common. As he bent forward sitting on the park bench, I was struck by the dichotomy between his shiny, thread-bare, black suit, frayed cuffs, and scarred shoes and the shiny, crisp bag with its Lord and Taylor logo. He was a swarthy man with slicked-back black hair, neatly dressed, about 40 years old. 

My friends, who had already begun to disperse after the professor’s performance, were anxious to begin our hike back to Boston English High School to be on time for the trolley-cars that would soon be arriving to transport us back to our homes in the outlying districts of Boston.

     

Today had been another one of our illegal holidays, playing hooky to visit Boston Common and the nearby Red Light district known as Scollay Square. After attending a movie and a strip-tease show at either the Old Howard or the Casino burlesque theaters, we always stopped in the Commons to attend the professor’s performance. We never did know if he was a real professor.  Everyone called him that because of his obvious intelligence and expertise in mathematics.

He performed feats of mental acumen that never failed to awe me, and my friends, who were struggling through the twists and turns of trigonometry and geometry.  Give the professor a number, and he would respond instantly with its cube root in the blink of an eye.

He was only one of a  cadre  of  weirdos who collected in Boston Common each day to preach, orate, argue, or perform in various ways ... much to the delight of the onlookers made up of shoppers, tourists, and homeless denizens who called the Common “home,” and, of course, my hooky-playing comrades and me.

After his performance I delighted in chatting with him.  He was soft-spoken, and his self-assured manner enhanced his wise old man image that I had formed of him.  He seemed so wise compared to my 15 year old’s understanding of the world.  I delighted in listening to him wax eloquently on a wide world of subjects.  He’s probably a prime influence in my later interest in philosophy and metaphysics.  I have never forgotten his best pronouncement that the secret to long life is to maintain a full mind and an empty bowel. 

Sid Bolotin

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Politicklers #1

I raised a question in the last posting about who you thought would get the Republican Presidential Nomination.  My guess is that is will be George Romney. While he has the least appeal to the right wing of the Republican Party ... from which almost all of the other candidates come ... he has the most appeal to independent voters.  Republicans know that these right wing candidates are unelectable.  That is why they tried so hard to get Chris Christie to run, since he was able to win the governor's chair in a Democratic state.  If Christie had decided to run, the G,O.P. would have had to close their eyes to the fact that he is for gun control and has a liberal policy toward illegal immigrants, but that's okay since a central plank of any Republican platform is hypocrisy. 

Romney presents a problem too.  When he gets the nomination, Conservative Republicans will just have to grit their teeth and support George, whose state-run health insurance program in Massachusetts included a mandate that provided that everyone be covered, like it or not.

It is very puzzling that all of the other candidates bitterly oppose this provision which is part of the Affordable Health Care Act too.  Why?  Actually it was a Republican idea, developed as an more palatable alternative to what the Democrats originally wanted, a single payer Federal option.  The Democrats adopted this G.O.P. concept in the hope it would garner some Republican support, since it originally was their idea.  Of course, since the word "compromise" does not appear in the G.O.P.'s lexicon, the Democrats were disappointed.

And speaking of candidates, Herman Cain is getting a lot of notice lately.  He won't get the nomination, of course, because his "9-9-9" would be the most inviting target the Democrats could wish for.

The American people will not agree to reducing everyone's income taxes to 9%.  Sure, everyone would pay less, but the wealthy would save far, far more in dollars than anyone else.  Imagine the glee in the salons of Palm Beach when someone with taxes due on an adjusted gross income of $2,000,000 finds his tax bite reduced from $700,000 to $180,000.  Those with an income of $50,000 might find their taxes reduced from about $9,000 to $4,500 but they would also see who really was benefiting most greatly from Cain's fantasy.  Americans are not blind.

And the 9% sales tax would hit the $50,000 earner who spends all of his or her money to live off of and would be taxed 9% for everything he buys.  The wealthy would also pay that tax, but since they are not living month to month, they would have a lot more income that they do not spend, and which would go untaxed.  Again, Americans would not be blind to the regressiveness of such a tax.  It would be a burden for the poor but just a barely noticeable nuisance for the wealthy.

Finally, while dropping the corporate income tax to 9% might bring a few overseas-based firms back to the United States, it would also drop a big bundle of cash into the laps of all corporationsl, reducing their tax bite by as much as 26%.  This would not go unnoticed either.  So Cain is not a viable candidate.

(I would be remiss if I didn't point out that the idea behind Cain's fantasy is that the money which corporations and wealthy individuals would save from his "9-9-9" plan would supposedly be invested in business and result in job creation, and with more people working, even with income taxes maximized at 9%, Cain believes tax revenues would be higher than they are now.  To augment this would be the 9% sales tax revenue he proposes.  We know that the infamous Bush tax cuts did not produce job growth and we have no reason to believe Cain's version of universally discredited "trickle down" economics would work either.  Neither the wealthy nor corporations "prime pumps" because doing so is not in itself profitable.  Only the government, which is not out to make a profit can "prime pumps" and create jobs.)
JL

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A Short Story and a Question about the G.O.P. Race

I read something the other day that a survey recently revealed that a good percentage of Americans do not know what the initials G.O.P. stand for.  Some thought it stood for "Government Of People."  I am sure readers of this blog know it stands for "Grand Old Party."  

And speaking of readers of this blog, don't forget we count on you for your contributions, be they political, from the left or the right, poetic, photographic or literary! Send them to me at riart1@aol.com.  Finally, for those of you who may be interested in the "dirty sidewalks" mentioned in earlier postings, the issue has been quietly and amicably resolved and I am looking forward to cleaner cement in the future.

And here is one of my favorite short stories, again from the archive developed when I was active in the Cascade Lakes Writing Group.  Enjoy it, and let's see if you can send us one of yours!

                                                         

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Conklin Avenue

I walked up the stairs leading to the wooden porch of the house on Conklin Avenue.  Surprisingly, it hadn’t changed much in the fifty or so years since I had lived there with my parents on the first floor in a two bedroom flat.  Seated on the top step, his chin resting in the palm of his hand, was a boy of about nine or ten.

“Whatcha want, Mistuh?” the boy called out.  “You lookin’ fo ma mama?”

“Not really,” I replied, “but if she’s home, I would like to speak to her for a moment.”

“Whatcha sellin’ Mistuh?” the boy answered.  “Mama tole me not to let no people in selling stuff.  We ain’t got no money anyhow to buy nothin’ so you might jus’ as well go away.”

I smiled.

“No, son.  I’m not selling anything, but I would like to speak to your mother if she is home.”

“Mama tole me never to talk to strangers and tell them whether or not she in the house or not.  None of nobody’s business, anyhow.  Whadya want anyway, Mistuh?”

“Son,” I continued.  “Believe it or not, I used to live in this house many years ago when I was just about your age.  I happen to be in town today, and I just figured I’d drive by the house to see if it was still there, and if it had changed very much since I used to sit on the stoop, just like you’re doing now.”

“Whatsa stoop, Mistuh?” the boy asked with a puzzled expression on his face.

“That’s what we used to call the steps in front of the house.”

“Stoop,” he repeated. “That’s cool. Stoop.  What’s your name, Mistuh?  Mine is Winston but most everyone calls me Winny.”

I was about to tell the boy my name when the door opened behind Winny and a tall woman, wearing a floral apron just like my mother always wore when she was working in the kitchen, came out on the porch.

“What you doin’ talking to dis man, Winston?  Get on about sweeping up in back, like I tole you to do and stop sittin’ on the steps dreamin,” and turning to me as Winny scampered off down the stairs and disappeared around the side of the house, continued, “What do you want, Mistuh?  If you’re sellin’, we ain’t buyin’.”

I explained to Winny’s mother how I used to live in this house, and because I was in the neighborhood, I wondered how it looked half a century later.  Actually, the neighborhood looked pretty much the same as it had then.  The two family houses had held up well, and you could see from the roofs, painting and siding that had been done, that the current residents of Conklin Avenue took pride in where they lived.  To the side of the “stoop,” where we had hydrangea, there was now a neat rose garden in front of a row of yew hedges.

Winny’s mother, seeing me admiring the roses, smiled and said with pride, “I put those in myself.  The pink ones on the left, I jus’ put in this year.  The others we put in a couple of years back, but they keep comin’ back nice if the black spot doesn’t git them.  Takes a lot of spraying to keep them nice.  Ya wanna come in for a cuppa coffee and look at the house?”

I nodded affirmatively.

“Winston,” she called out.  “You come in and sit down with this man and yo mama and have your lunch.”

After lunch, we took a quick tour of the well-kept house which hadn’t changed very much from what I remembered, except for different pictures on the walls, most strikingly the one of Jesus in the place where my mother had a sepia toned picture of her grandparents posed for a wedding or some such occasion back in Russia.   Winny’s mother took pride in her housekeeping, and it showed. 

“Mrs. White,” for that was what she had told me her name was, “Would you mind if I went down to the basement?”

“Why would you want to do that?  But we got nuthin’ to be ashamed of.  No bodies down there. Winston, you take the gentleman down into the cellar and show him what’s down there.  There’s nothin’ much but a storage bin, the furnace and hot water tank, but watch out, sometimes there’s spiders and bugs and crawly stuff down there so I’ll stay up here.”

Winston led me to the door off the corridor leading to the bedrooms at the back of the house.  I remembered it well.  The light switch was on the right side at the head of the stairs where it always was.  I remembered it as being a bit higher, but I guess things always seem higher when you’re a kid.

The old coal furnace had been replaced by an oil burner, and the coal bin, into which the coal delivery man had poured half a ton of coal down a shiny chute they carried on their truck once a month, was gone.  I walked over to a brick wall, behind where the pile of coal used to be and counted the bricks on the wall, starting at the bottom.

“Whatcha doin’ Man?” Winny asked.  “Yo gonna get your hands dirty.”

Ten bricks up from the bottom and two bricks to the left from where the masonry protruded, I nudged a worn brick, many times painted over in shades of gray or rust, which to my pleasant surprise moved under by thumb’s light pressure. Excitedly, I turned to Winny.

“Son, you wouldn’t happen to have a screwdriver or a penknife handy, would you?”

“Sure, Mistuh. Take my knife,” said the boy, pulling a two bladed pen knife from the back pocket of his jeans.

Wedging the knife’s blade under the brick, I was able to remove it easily.  I extended my hand into the opening and felt, through years of dust and pebbly chips, for what I hoped was still there.  And it was.  I smiled broadly as I gripped the box which lay in a crevice behind where the brick had been and gently pulled it out, placing it on the concrete floor.  Then, after carefully replacing the brick, I handed the knife back to Winny.  The boy handed me a rag which he had found and we wiped fifty years of dirt from the box.

“Let’s go back upstairs, Winny.  I want to show you and your mother something.”

Once upstairs, seated at the kitchen table upon which the fastidious Mrs. White had spread out the real estate section of yesterday’s Newark Star Ledger, I displayed an elongated blue Cut Rite Waxed Paper carton, securely fastened with about three feet of string which, if my memory serves me correctly, probably came from a cake carton from Megdal’s Bakery on Bergen Street.  Opening it carefully, because the cover’s serrated metallic edge was rusted, I lifted an object, wrapped in a layer of waxed paper and also tied firmly with more bakery twine, from the carton.  Removing the wrapping, I slowly unrolled its contents, the May 1943 issue of Captain Marvel Comics.

“Who’s dat on de cover?” Winny inquired, suddenly interested.

“Well,” I said, “that’s Captain Marvel.  He was sort of a Superman type character and I collected the comic books in which he appeared.  He really was a boy named Billy Batson, who turned into Captain Marvel to fight the bad guys.”

“I see from de cover dat he is flying.  How come he could do dat?”  the boy asked.

“Captain Marvel,” I continued, “had all kinds of super powers.  And Billy Batson could turn into Captain Marvel just by pronouncing the word ‘Shazam’!”

“What kinda word is that?” Mrs. White interrupted.

Replying to her, I explained that “Shazam” was a made-up word, consisting of the initials of famous ancient Greeks or Romans or their Gods: S for Socrates, H for Hercules, A for Achilles, Z for Zeus, A for Archimedes and M for Mercury.

“Oh,“ Mrs. White paused.  “I thought it was some kind of Afro name, like Shabazz, you know, Malcolm X’s widow’s last name.  That would make it a lot better.”

“What do you mean,” I inquired.

“Well, dis Captain Marble, or whatever you call him, is a white man, like you.  No offense intended, but I don’t want Winston here, and I see he is getting interested in dat comic book already, setting up some white man as his hero.  There’s enough of that on TV already.  I wish this Captain fellow was black.  Now, that would be jus’ fine.  But he ain’t, so you can take the book with you, an’ it’s been nice talking to you.”

“Mrs. White,” I said, “I can’t take this comic book with me.  I just wanted to see if it was still there where I hid it when my mother threw out my other comic books fifty years ago.  This is your house, where I found it, and it belongs to you.!”

“I tole you I don’t want my son having a white superhero to read about.  So take your comic book.”

“Mrs. White, what would you say if I told you that this comic book may be worth two or three hundred dollars?  Would you still tell me to take it?  Really, it’s yours to keep.”

Mrs. White and Winny looked at me incredulously.  From the identical way their mouths hung open, you could see they were mother and child.

“Tell you what.  If you can git that kinda money for dis comic book, go right ahead. Jus’ make sure you send us some of it.  Okay, Mistuh?”

So I left with the comic book, and that evening, was amazed to find that I was able to locate a buyer on the internet who was willing to pay $1200 for the May 1943 number of Captain Marvel Comics, even one that had been rolled up in waxed paper for over fifty-five years.  Once the buyer’s check cleared, I went to the Young Readers section of Barnes and Noble and purchased whatever biographies they had of great, black Americans, ranging from Nat Turner to Colin Powell, and shipped them off to Winny.  I also sent his mother a check for the remaining $967.   

A few weeks later, I received two thank you notes, one from Mrs. White and the other from a Reverend Lewis Tillinghast on the stationery of the Mount Olivet Missionary Baptist Church, expressing appreciation for my $500 donation.  Shortly thereafter, Winny called me on the telephone and proudly boasted that he had started reading the books, and already, he was wondering whether he should be a doctor or a lawyer.

Jack Lippman

       
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A Question for Thoughtful Republicans 

 

Thoughtful Republicans are mulling over whom they should support for the Republican nomination to run for President in thirteen months.  There have been several debates on television and the declared candidates have been traversing the country seeking support in the primary elections which will select some of the delegates to the G.O.P.’s convention in Tampa this summer.

They are asking themselves several questions:  

1. Should we nominate a candidate whose chief attribute is his ability to defeat the Democratic candidate, who is likely to be the incumbent, Barack Obama?  

2. Should we nominate a candidate best equipped to carry out the party’s platform, which is likely to include planks such as 

a.   reduced government spending wherever possible,

b.   repeal of the Affordable Health Care Act,

c.   continuation of tax cuts for the wealthy,

d.   support of right to work laws throughout the country,

e.   a restructuring of Social Security and Medicare,

f.    moving Medicaid programs to the individual states,

g.   reduced corporate taxation,

h.   a reduction of environmental conservation programs,

i.    return of the function of the Department of Education to the states,

j.    solving the energy problem by allowing unlimited offshore drilling,

k.   diminished regulation of industry, business and particularly of the banking and investment marketplace,

l.    repeal of the Dodd-Frank legislation,

m.  increased political support for the State of Israel,

n.   commitment to reducing unemployment by encouraging the wealthy and businesses to use the resources developed by lower taxation to create jobs,

o.   tighter control of immigration and benefits available to those here illegally, and

p.   increased Second Amendment rights for gun owners? 

3. Should we nominate a candidate who, while accepting the party’s platform as contemplated above,  will adhere to it, but within the framework of primarily making all of his, or her, decisions based on what is best for the American people, and not for the Republican Party?

Whom do you think the Republicans will nominate?  II have my opinion, but I would like your input.

JL

                           

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Letters to Editors, Checking Email, Miro and more on Dirty Sidewalks

Check Your Email for the Truth

When you receive an Email dealing with politics or the economy containing material you suspect is untrue, you should not just let it go.  The sender has probably sent it to many other recipients, and if the material is incorrect, you should Email the sender, pointing out his errors and suggesting that, if he or she has any integrity, they forward an Email correcting the misinformation to all of those whom they misinformed.   (Since some Emailers are ideologues who don’t even know the meaning of the word “integrity,” they probably will ignore your request, but others may send out a correction, so it is worth trying.)

To check out information you feel is incorrect, you might go to www.snopes.com.   Another alternative is www.factcheck.org.   Snopes is an independent organization, funded by advertising, although some right wing sources claim, with no basis whatsoever, that it is supported by George Soros.  Factcheck is run by the Annenberg Public Policy Center.  Rightwingers sometimes criticize Factcheck because in a 1995 program, the “Chicago Annenberg Challenge,” the Annenberg Foundation, long before the establishment of Factcheck, financed a public school improvement program in Chicago which was directed by Barack Obama who was a community organizer at that time.  A distinct advantage of Factcheck over Snopes is that its material may be copied and pasted into your Email whereas Snopes’ material cannot.

Both sources are frequently criticized by those on the right, but the only reason they seem to do so is because they resent having their opinions challenged. I have found that both sites document falsehoods, regardless of their source.

JL


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Letters to the Editor

Some people, myself included, have occasionally written letters to the Editor of their local newspaper.  When we were living up north, I would write to the Editor of Newsday (Long Island, NY) and down here, I write to the Palm Beach Post.  Most of my letters go unpublished, but some have been printed.  I am most proud of my letter to the Palm Beach Post published in December of 2001, almost ten years ago, which pointed out the danger of globalization and outsourcing of jobs because of the damage it could do to our economy by creating unemployment.  Another one of my letters, published in 2007, warned against the dangers of investments in speculative vehicles, including mortgage-based securities and the danger that posed to our economy.  This is one of the reasons I have no faith in economists.  Most of them cannot see the plain truth, the handwriting on the wall or whatever you may call it, which is clearly evident to me, and probably to you as well.

But getting back to letters, until recently, when you saw something in a paper that moved you to offer your opinion, you would write a letter to the Editor.  If the newspaper chose to publish it, your thoughts reached many thousands of readers.  Nowadays, most newspapers put their content on their internet versions, where you still might see that same something which moves you to offer your opinion.  Rather than suggest that you do this by sending a letter to the Editor, by mail or on line, newspapers such as the Palm Beach Post, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, the Miami Herald or the New York Times offer you a simpler way to make your comment right at the bottom of the article where it will appear on their website.  This is a lot easier than writing a letter to the Editor.

The problem with this is that the comments you may make on the web site reach far fewer readers than letters published in the newspaper.  True, you are almost guaranteed that your thoughts will appear there, but you have no idea how many people will look at them.  Except for the New York Times, such comments may be looked at by even fewer people than are reading this blog.  Another consideration is that traditional letters to the Editor are looked at by the paper’s editorial staff to decide what gets published.  Someone knowledgeable reads them. Comments made on the internet, however, are handled at a far lower level, and the only reporter who might look at them would be the one who wrote the original article.

My recommendation:  If you have something to say, write a traditional letter to the Editor and send it by mail, or via their web site’s mechanism for doing so.  Keep it short, to the point, and always reference the article in the newspaper which moved you to state your opinion.

Jack Lippman

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Hitting on Miro

Back on January 12, I posted material on the abstract painter, Joan Miro, on this blog.  You can review it by inserting “Miro” in the search box on the lower right side of the blog.  I mention this because over the months that posting has been accessed far more than any other prior one which appeared on the blog.  I would suspect that its continued popularity is because our posting shows up on search engines when someone is trying to learn about Joan Miro.  Our recent record of four hits from Romania would lead me to suspect that a recent assignment regarding Miro was given in Art History 101 at the University of Bucharest, sending some of the students to Google to find out about him.

JL

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Dirty Sidewalks

Of local interest to those of you who read the recent story of my dirty sidewalk (go back to the posting preceding this one for the story and a picture), I want to bring you up to date.  Yesterday, I received the following Email from our Property Manager.

Good Afternoon,

Inspection of the common sidewalks show that it has been “defaced”. The cleaning of the sidewalks had been budgeted for 2011 and completed. The Board is looking into possibly two times per year for future; but at this time I ask you to please repair the sidewalk to not show “Clean Me”.

And here is a copy of my Email response to her:

I recall that, quite properly, you recently requested some residents to clean their driveways or to clean their mailboxes, both of which are the responsibility of the homeowner to maintain. Obviously, the Association is interested in keeping the community looking well.

I would hope that this desire goes beyond asking homeowners to live up to their responsibilities in regard to mailboxes and driveways and also applies equally to the responsibilities of the Association as well. The Association occasionally manages to find resources to do a lot of things which are not adequately budgeted for and keeping all of our sidewalks clean should be one of them.

Perhaps some of the scheduled landscaping work, gatehouse work or even clubhouse updating work can be reviewed so that this more immediate need can be met. I trust that you will pass this on to the Board, and until they properly carry out their responsibility of maintaining clean sidewalks throughout the community, I choose to leave the partially cleaned sidewalk in front of my house as a reminder to them. It this sidewalk could talk, that is what it would say!

Thank you for your Email. I know you are only doing your job.

Stay tuned for further developments. 

JL

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