ReportFromTheFront's Blog

Wow.

           In August of 1971 and just prior to the start of my senior year in high school, I -  along with those of my classmates who would be turning eighteen before a date certain -  was summoned to school to register to vote. It was a very exciting time for us as the law had just recently lowered the age of majority from twenty one. We were, most of us at least, very excited. Not only would we be able to vote in the upcoming election between Richard Nixon and George McGovern, we would also be the first to be so young to do so in, well…perhaps ever. We didn’t know, really; but the prospect of actually being the first to do something so important and be a small part of history just seemed to heighten whatever it was we were feeling at the time. Make no mistake about it – everything you ever heard or read about the apathy of many people of those years was real. Fueled by the lingering anger and anxiety over civil rights, the riots, three major political assassinations within a span of five years and the outrage over the war in Viet Nam, it was slimy and sinuous thing. It was insidious and permeated our young lives in ways that historians and pundits continue to write about to this day but can’t quite put their fingers on. To paraphrase (with my heartfelt apologies) Wavy Gravy, the great philosopher and self appointed spokesman of the Summer of Love: ‘If you understood what was going on, you weren’t really there’. Still, we were excited, yes we were. We were anxious to claim our birthright and make our voices heard.

            We were ready to vote.

            I cast my first vote sixteen months later and am proud to say that I’ve voted in every election since. Though my candidate didn’t always win – the RFTF win/loss column presently stands at 7-2 – I was always an eager participant in the political process and happy to discuss the merits of my man versus the missteps of the other guy.

            That is, until now.

            Things have changed, I fear, and not for the better. There is an old sales axiom which says that you can sell just about anything if you package it just right. The press, it seems, has taken that page from the Sales Handbook to heart in a most disquieting way. Thanks to the ever vigilant American 4th Estate this election and its process are different. This is the election about making major league issues out of what really amounts to nothing and presenting them with a ‘shocking’ spin just to sell more papers. This is the election about pettiness and non issues where the economy, the environment and the Iraq debacle are unceremoniously pushed aside in favor of the things that, it seems, are really on the minds on voting Americans across the nation such as the real source of Cindy McCain’s cookie recipes. Never mind her husband’s (revised) position on global warming – we’ll get around to that eventually. Why bother to listen to Barak Obama’s views on revitalizing our sagging economy when we can discuss his smoking habit to exhaustion? As of last week, the debate du jour was about which candidate is the bigger patriot and possesses more love of country; the one who wears a flag lapel pin or the one who doesn’t; the one who served or the one who didn’t.

            Oh, yes – And let’s not forget the biggest non-issue of all: faith. Though there’s no real way to quantify this, my guess is that the word ‘faith’ has been uttered more times by all of the presidential hopefuls in this election cycle alone than by all other presidential candidates combined since the founding of the republic. Yep, faith is important in that it provides one with all of the spiritual intangibles that hopefully, in the end, makes one a better person.  Instead of devoting themselves to the development of real world, achievable solutions to the problems that plague us as a nation, both McCain and Obama court pastors who and other religious figures in an effort to prove which man is the better Christian. Like I said, faith is important, but being a good Christian won’t make someone a better President. By way of example, allow me to cite Jimmy Carter. President Carter was – and still is – a man of deeply held religious convictions who didn’t just attend church for the photo – op. Yet, despite the depth of his convictions, there can be no argument that his presidency was, in a word, rather vanilla.

         So what, Mr. Candidate, do you really plan to do to pull us out of the Iraq quagmire in a timely manner? Where are the promised oil revenues your predecessor assured would be ours in order to underwrite the financial burden that has now made us an economic colony of China? What is your plan to revive our dangerously sagging economy? What about healthcare reform? Whaddya think about a revised tax code that distributes the burden more equitably and closes loopholes for large corporations such as the oil companies?  How about a plan to save the environment and stave off global warming? These are questions on my mind. These are the things which, in the end, matter most.

          When I was a young boy, I used to be able to ride the bus for the princely sum – at that time - of fifteen cents. In those years, a Coke cost a dime, a pack of gum was a nickel and penny candy was, well, a penny. If you bought an entire100 count box of hot cinnamon Fireballs (the unquestioned reigning favorite at my elementary school which became so popular, it was smuggled in like contraband and spawned a cottage industry whereby individual pieces were upcharged and sold by our 5th grade version of the Mafia for a nickel apiece), the store we bought them from threw in an extra twenty five pieces.

            I was standing at a bus stop one day waiting for the bus to take me home when a bigger boy who lived at the end of the block breezed by on a motorcycle, stopped and offered to give me a ride home thereby saving me my fifteen cents. I don’t think I opened my eyes or even remembered to take a breath until he deposited me in my own driveway. Scared though I was, I was hooked. As soon as I was able to drive, I asked my parents for a motorcycle. The answer, of course, was a resounding no. After marrying the first Mrs. ReportFromTheFront, I informed her that I wanted to ride. ‘Over my dead body’, she said; a thought which, shortly thereafter, began to have its own singular appeal.

            After jettisoning the first Mrs. RPTF, I eventually got a bike, taught myself to ride and joined the Montgomery County chapter of ABATE. I started to go to the weekly meetings and discovered to my surprise that the only substantive issue on their agenda – road trips aside - was a concerted endorsement of legislation for the repeal of the local helmet laws (In Maryland, all riders must wear a helmet Not so in Pennsylvania, Ohio and a smattering of other states). I couldn’t believe how vehement they were about it. Some of the members almost frothed at the mouth whenever the subject came up – which was usually the case every week. They even employed lobbyists and aimed them at the State House in Annapolis. These guys can’t be serious, I thought. Foolishly, I made the mistake of openly disagreeing with them at a meeting one evening. After all, I reasoned, in the event you go down, anything to protect you has got to be a good thing. Oh, not so, was the angry response. To prove their point, my (now) opponents on the matter produced mountains of data, expert analysis and numbers you wouldn’t believe to support their position showing, in fact, that helmets were nothing more than window dressing. Not only were they useless in a crash, helmets, they said, actually caused more injuries than they prevented.

            I ultimately left the group over this issue and their seemingly single-minded pursuit. Sure, they had all of the aforementioned stuff to back up their position, but to me, it only proved the old axiom that no matter the issue or how crazy your position, you can always dig up numbers to support you. Say what you want, anything to cushion the impact between a rider and an onrushing immovable object to my way of thinking has just got to be, as I said, a good thing.

            It’s just common sense.

            And so it is with detractors and nay-sayers with respect to the subject of global warming.  Through the ages, the earth has gone through several cooling and warming trends, the pendulum taking multiple eons to swing either way. What is happening now however, the recent phenomenon we call Global Warming, is something completely different and not the net result of the waxing and waning of Mother Nature. What is happening now is artificially driven by mankind and the waste products pumped into the atmosphere and waterways since the onset of the Industrial Revolution, and visibly occurring over the course of mere generations. In the most simple and basic of terms (and with apologies to comedian George Carlin), think of it as looking at a confessional line and actually being able to see it move.

            Ice shelves at both poles are receding at an alarming rate sometimes resulting in the ‘calving’ of icebergs as big as some states. So much ice is disappearing so quickly – resulting in a sharply diminished range for polar bears and snow foxes – that the existence of both species is in doubt. Ocean temperatures are rising ever so slightly (Imagine for a moment if you will, the enormous amount of therms required to change the temperature of so large a mass). This not only affects the long term longevity of a broad variety of plants and animals – both ocean and land based - but our weather is being affected as well with hotter and more oppressive summers followed by longer, colder and more brutal winters in many parts of the world. The occurrence of severe weather such as tornadoes and hurricanes are on the rise. Droughts are happening more often and affecting ever widening areas. The symptoms I’ve listed here are just the tip of the iceberg, to coin a phrase. More things are happening – or at least being detected – every day and are just too numerous to list here, but I think you get the idea.

            Despite all of the empirical evidence, no less a personage than the President of the United States and hard core Republican members of Congress have – at least until recently – mythologized global warming and reduced it to the status of a political football. It wasn’t until the President became concerned about his legacy, that he became a recent convert and begrudgingly acknowledged the possibility that his perhapsprevious position on global warming may have been a bit too hasty.

            Remember too, that this is the very same President who has steadfastly refused to call our treatment of enemy combatants captured in Iraq and Afghanistan as torture and will not - under any circumstances  - acknowledge that the United States is now in a recession.

            While it may be a pie-in-the-sky view to believe that all candidates running for elected office at any level only do so because they want to serve and truly have the best interests of the electorate at heart. In the real world however, it must be acknowledged that it is a basic characteristic of politics to blow with the wind a bit, to tell a particular audience that which they want to hear and to pander for votes. It is the nature of the beast and, unfortunately, unavoidable. If candidates – and ultimately office holders – would only take a firm stance on issues, speak their minds and vote their convictions, we wouldn’t have the political turmoil we experience every four years and the world we live in would be a better place.

            After all, it’s only common sense.

           I think it’s a pretty safe bet to say that – barring unforeseen circumstances – Barak Obama will be our next President. Between them, the Clintons have both stuck their feet in Hillary’s mouth so often, it’s a wonder she doesn’t drop out from sheer embarrassment and John McCain is, unfortunately, the present day Republican equivalent of Michael Dukakis.

           I have a co-worker who is an African émigré and very proud to be on his way to American citizenship. He is intelligent, articulate, well read and well spoken. Sadly – depending on your point of view – he is more knowledgeable about the political process in this country than many native born Americans I know. He is so fired up about this election he even donated his vacation time to work for the candidate of his choice in Ohio during the primary there. In many ways, he is a man to be admired and sets a wonderful example that I wish more people would follow.

            We had an in-depth discussion the other day about Barak Obama and the very real possibility that he will emerge victorious this upcoming November, thus making history as the first African American President of a country whose Declaration of Independence promised equality for all, but failed so horribly to deliver throughout most of its history.

            ‘I fear for him’ I said. ‘I’m worried for Obama the same way I worried about Joe Lieberman when he ran with Al Gore in 2000’, remembering the three political assassinations of the 60’s which occurred within a five year span of time.

            My friend then said two things I did not expect. Rather than admit the very real possibility that someone opposed to an Obama Administration might choose to express himself by getting rid of the problem in, shall we say, a very final and definitive manner, he laughed and merely brushed off my remark as nothing more than negative thinking. Instead of looking backward, I should, instead, look forward. He then expressed confidence that, 40 years later, such a thing could not possibly happen because between blacks and Hispanics, white people are in the minority and besides – black people own more guns than do whites.

            My reaction, of course, was one of incredulity.

            Let me state for the record that eventual Democratic candidate or not, eventual President or not, I hope nothing happens to Barak Obama. Even if he fails to garner the Democratic nomination or - if he does manage to get the nod - if he fails to win the general election, I sincerely hope there isn’t another Lee Harvey Oswald, Sirhan Bishara Sirhan or James Earl Ray waiting for his chance to make a place for himself in the darker annals of American history. Sometimes, when I find the time to devote some thought to this, I am saddened somehow. I am saddened and I feel a sense of shame because – as one of those native born Americans I referred to earlier – I don’t have the confidence in this country that my friend has.

            You see, I am of an age where I can remember segregation in this country. I remember passing businesses in Southern and Eastern Maryland that fearlessly displayed signs stating ‘Whites Only’ and ‘Coloreds Only’. I remember the furor over school integration and the antics of George Wallace and Strom Thurmond. I remember the marches, the images of flailing billy clubs, the hosing of peaceful crowds, the dogs. I remember the riots.

            I remember it all.

            Apparently, so does the federal government, which wisely decided to provide secret service protection to Obama and his entire family. Someone, somewhere in Washington correctly reasoned that even in 2008, there are still prejudiced people out there who have been taught discrimination and hate as family values; people who would rather be publicly disemboweled rather than see a black man in the White House.

            By way of example, allow me to cite the state of post-Katrina New Orleans. If you’re not familiar with the general location and layout of that fine city, you should know that New Orleans is, in the simplest of terms, situated basically at the bottom of a bowl. When the Army Corps of Engineers was designing the series of dikes and levees which were eventually destroyed, the decision was made to construct them to withstand only a force 3 hurricane reasoning that the chances of a more powerful storm were so astronomically remote the additional cost could not be justified. Had I been there, I would have cautioned that the additional expenditure of funds would pale against the cost of rebuilding an entire city. As for the odds of a force 4 or 5 storm? Remote or not, it would only take one. As it turned out, New Orleans got pummeled with two such storms only a week apart.

            ‘Why then’ my friend asked, ‘didn’t they provide protection to Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton or Shirley Chisholm?’

            Good question. Easy answer. Neither was ever a serious contender in the grand scheme of things. Neither Jackson or Sharpton have ever held elective office. Jackson was (and still is) so mush-mouthed, one can barely understand him. Sharpton is nothing more than an attention junkie who would never have achieved notoriety of any kind had it not been for the Tawana Brawley debacle. Chisholm, unfortunately for her, was just way ahead of her time. Barak Obama, on the other hand, is a serious contender. This, in the eyes of an extremist, makes him a threat.

            Whether Obama gets the brass ring or not, one can’t help but be proud of him, of his accomplishments and of just how far he has come. After all, within my lifetime, this country has gone from overt, unbridled racism to a time when a black man can run for President and actually have a real chance of winning.

            To my friend, I say that I hope that we, as a country and as a culture, have grown somehow, that we have made progress along the road to being a colorblind society; that segregation, racism and separate-but-equal are fast on their way to becoming dishonorable historical footnotes. I would like to think that Barak Obama would be safe for these reasons and more, and not just because whites fear the black uprising that would surely follow the discharge of an assassins’ bullet. I'd like to think that we're just a bit better than that.

          I once overheard the latter part of a conversation at the height of the frenzy involving the abuse of children at the hands of Catholic priests. “Don’t they have anything else to report?” one of the speakers asked.

            ‘No, my dear, they don’t’, I thought to myself. And they shouldn't.

            Like many people, I can think of few things more abhorrent that the sexual abuse of anyone much less an innocent child, especially at the hands of a religious figure such as a priest. Rather than recoil in horror and take whatever steps were necessary in order to deal with the problem as one would expect, the Catholic Church – which has known about the problem for more years than you or I know about (or they are willing to admit for litigious and other reasons) – simply pushed the issue aside and chose to ‘counsel’ victimizers and transfer them to other postings.

            In other words, the Church chose to play ‘King Log’ as the saying goes and buried its collective heads in the sand while conducting business as usual. If the brave souls who finally came forward hadn’t done so, no one would have done anything. Instead of protecting the innocent, the Church decided to gird its loins and circle the wagons in order to protect its own. After all, we don’t want to do anything that might affect the old collection plate.

            Even so, even after the issue finally surfaced and began to gain steam fueled by the admissions of an increasing number of people who decided to further disrupt their lives and come forward, the Church admitted nothing, conceded nothing and gave no ground until forced to do so by the threats of finding itself on the receiving end of multi-million dollar lawsuits and criminal proceedings. ‘There may have been an occasional incident involving a priest and a parishioner’ we were initially informed, ‘but we can be assured that these were truly rare & isolated’, or so went the initial acknowledgement, although they knew better. It took the power of the subpoena to force the Church’s compliance with federal and state prosecutors conducting the investigations.

            Last time I checked, lying was one of the big no no’s.

            Still, after multiple settlements in efforts to avoid civil trials – settlements which, so far, have bankrupted six arch-dioceses, admissions from the Church have been grudgingly forthcoming.

            To his credit, Pope Benedict XVI has commented on the issue, calling the acts of abuse horrible and admitting that the Church’s handling of the entire affair “badly managed”. To his discredit, however, the Papacy chose to do nothing, say nothing relative to the size, impact and duration of the scandal prior to coming to the U.S. Once here – or at least in transit – did Benedict decide that the matter finally merited a more serious comment or two in order to placate the American faithful.

            One can’t help but believe that if it were not for this trip, he might not have said anything at all.

            Despite what the pontiff may think, meeting and praying with a select group of victims for less than a half hour won’t accomplish anything in the long run except to gloss over the issue at large and make good press as the Church tries to demonstrate it’s ‘deep concern’ and willingness to meet the problem head on. What about voluntarily granting access to Church records in order to make the job of identifying perpetrators and their victims easier rather than waiting to be subpoened? How about making unlimited funds available for treatment of victims whose lives have been permanently damaged? Has anyone given even the remotest thought to removing known abusers permanently from their ministries. What about – for starters – excommunication? As I recall my world history lessons, the Church had no problem bringing that particular weapon to bear against the faithful for crimes far less serious than sexual child abuse.

            Nope.

            As of this writing, not a word. Not a peep. Nuthin’.

            One can’t help but wonder about the Church’s silence and unwillingness to help the people it mercilessly preyed upon.

            A while back, I decided to weigh in amidst the furor surrounding the on-air remark by Don Imus [The Mouth That Roared, 4/10/07] about the Rutgers’ Women’s basketball team wherein he referred to them as “nappy headed ho’s”.  The column was not aimed at Imus for putting his mouth in gear before engaging his brain so much as it was intended to take the Black community at large to task for the mock indignation and insincere self righteousness that oozed into and permeated every story, every interview and every news bite, relevant or not.

            My position about Mr. Imus and what he said is – as it was then – that statements like the one he made have no place in the public airwaves. My position about the so called ‘outrage’ expressed by Black America also remains unchanged. If African Americans want to change the way others refer to them, then they’re going to have to begin by changing the way that they refer to themselves; Cleaning up and cleaning out the language and imagery in rap and hi-hop music & videos and treating each other with respect, for example, won’t completely solve the problem, but it would sure be a great start.

            I raise the subject of Don Imus in response to the announcement by Citadel Broadcasting that “The Mouth That Roared” will return to the airwaves on December 3rd. Further details such as show times, markets, etc. were not available as of this writing, nor do we know any specifics about the shows’ format or content. We’re just gonna have to wait and see what the “I-Man” comes up with.

            The question on everyone’s mind, of course will be ‘Has Imus learned his lesson’? I’m sure he has. I’m fairly certain that Don Imus will have learned that times have changed, people have changed and that society itself has changed. Today, in the fledgling years of the 21st century, there are some things that you just can’t say on the radio anymore. Like it or not, the boundaries of public domain have changed as well, and if you want to be on the radio, you’ll have to change too.

            What I am wondering, however, is whether Black America has changed and if so, how? Imus’ change will be self evident by the transparency Citadel will most assuredly put in place and the daily content of his show. His humor will surely be self deprecating and he will – at least in the beginning – stay away from hot button issues, especially race. If the ‘suits’ at Citadel have any sense, they’ll also have a producer riding shotgun with a lightning quick finger on a delay switch…..just in case.

            But what about African America? In all fairness to Don Imus, any changes they have made should be equally apparent. But alas, as I look around, the state of Black America in this regard appears to me, at least, to be the same as it has always been. The lyrical content of rap and hip-hop offerings remains as objectionable now as always. Young black people – men in particular -  still openly and shamelessly refer to themselves and others using the dreaded ‘N’ word – a word so feared that almost no media outlet will sanction its use. Maybe, as I said last time, it’s just a Black thing and I just can’t understand.

            I suspect, somehow, that I understand all too well.

             So when Al Sharpton and his ilk rear back on their respective haunches, beat on their respective chests and rail into the wind, I will turn a deaf ear and a blind eye.

Give me your tired, your poor, your wretched masses yearning to be free…..”

            No line from any poem is as famous throughout the English speaking world or is as instantly recognizable as this one from Emma Lazarus’ ‘The New Colossus’ which appears at the base of the Statue of Liberty on Ellis Island, NJ. (That’s right – New Jersey. Don’t believe me? Look it up.)

            Robert Frost once defined poetry as nothing more than “the right word in the right place.” In this case, I wholeheartedly agree, for no other phrase of which I am aware so aptly expresses our national open invitation to the rest of the world.

            And so they came and are still coming today. By train, by plane by boat or on foot, it matters not to us for we are all the children of immigrants. If you can get here and promise to abide by our laws & way of life and do your best to become one of us, c’mon in - we’re happy to have ya.

            Oh, and one more thing.

            Learn to speak English.

            No, really. We mean it and we’re not kidding.

            In fact, I mean it and I’m not kidding, either.

            You see, it just so happens that English is the language we speak here in the good old US of A. We don’t speak oh, I don’t know……(let’s just pick a language at random, here) say, SPANISH. Nope. We speak English. And since you chose to come here (We didn’t hold a gun to your collective heads and kidnap you.), it would be nice of you to acclimate yourself to our culture and learn to speak our language and not the other way ‘round.   

            I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m getting real tired of having to resurrect my high school Spanish in order to communicate in my own country. By all rights, I should be able to walk into any business, anywhere in America and transact my business in English. I shouldn’t be forced to creatively put together a combination of English, Spanish, Pig Latin, American Sign Language and whatever other remedies I can think of in order to get my message across. More times than not – and even after all the aforementioned effort – I usually have to wait around until my friendly smiling adversary chases down someone to translate. Even then, chances are less than even that I’ll be able to accomplish my goal – whatever it happens to be.

            What irks me more than anything I suppose, is that when I ask many Hispanics I encounter – most of whom speak little to no English whatsoever - many of these same people will admit they’ve been here for years and still just speak little, very limited English. I just can’t seem to understand why anyone would knowingly move to another country and not bother to make the slightest effort to learn the language.

            Speaking strictly for myself, I would feel rather impotent if I had to always be dependant on someone else in order to be able to function beyond my own door. What do they expect to do in an emergency – especially if there isn’t a bilingual someone on the other end of a 911 call? - Just wait until the 911 operator can find someone to translate while Dads’ heart bursts out of his chest and on to his lap?

            This just makes no sense to me.

            On one hand, I blame the utter laziness of our new Hispanic citizenry. I firmly believe that it’s not that they can’t learn the language, it’s that they don’t want to bad enough. And when you get right down to it, why should they bother when they have good ol’ American business coddling them? Take a good hard look around and you’ll see what I mean.

            Almost every sign in every store window is bilingual – English and Spanish. Not Korean, not Arabic and not Chinese even though the D.C. area has very large groups speaking these languages and more. Have you been in a Home Depot lately? If not, you should go. In the three stores close to me, every sign is in Spanish and English. Businesses of all kinds are falling all over themselves to recruit anyone who is bilingual & fluent in English & Spanish. What? You are fluent in Hindi? Try the CIA; They’ve got an office just down the road.

            If I were a member of another non-English speaking ethnic group, I’d want to know why no one has bothered to accommodate me the way they have the Latinos.

            On the other hand – as I’ve already intimated – I also blame the American business machine in their relentless pursuit of the good ol’ American greenback. They’re in the catbird and laughing themselves sick all the way to the bank, thanks to the readily available and incredibly cheap (and I mean really cheap, brother!) labor pool who will work like slaves and won’t quit or complain, no matter what. Rather than encourage or require their employees to speak English, they blithely look the other way while their staff & customers struggle to communicate. After all, why should they care? They obviously have something the customer wants or the customer wouldn’t be there in the first place. If the customer bolts? No worries; There’s a lot of people out there and that guy can be replaced.

            A perfect example of what I’m talking about here is McDonalds. I cannot begin to relate you how many countless times I’ve had to revert back to my high school Spanish just to order two cheeseburgers (dos hamburgesas con queso), fries (las papas fritas) and a Diet Coke (un Coca Cola diet) because the person at the counter couldn’t hablo our lingo.

            After a recent visit to a McDonalds in New Jersey where I twice tried to order a Sweet Tea and was first handed a bag containing two cheeseburgers. My second attempt got me a small hot tea on the next attempt, I finally asked for the Manager who – in a combination of broken English and Spanish – apologized for the errors and explained that they don’t have Sweet Tea in Jersey.

            If the guy they posted at the Drive-Thru spoke English, he would have been able to tell us that in the first place.

            So how do we solve the problem? Well, like all social issues, there are lots of facets and gray areas however, I have the following suggestions:

1.         The states should not grant Drivers’ Licenses to people who cannot   

            speak English. After all, if applicants can’t speak English, they cannot

            read the manuals in order to become familiar with the laws, nor can they

            read and understand signs, other traffic control devices or even the

            instructions on a parking meter.

2.         Businesses should require all employees to speak English at all times

            while at work. If they knowingly hire someone who doesn’t speak the

            language, continued employment should be made conditional upon the

            employee’s enrollment in an English course along with a passing grade.

            This isn’t the entire answer, of course, but it would be a great place to start.

          It has often been the assertion of the rest of the world that Americans are crass and without taste or panache of any kind. Over the past many years, we Americans have been compared (unfavorably) and contrasted (again, we didn’t do well) with many other societies in matters of culture, conduct and so forth. More times than not, we seem to fall short somehow and never quite hit the finish line, so to speak. At the end of the day, we do what we’ve now gotten so used to doing: We show the world our true colors with our consummate inability to exercise good judgment and an innate talent for making poor choices. Part of this stems from the fact that in many areas, we know nothing about quality and couldn’t tell good from bad even with neon signs and a Presidential Directive staring us all right in the kisser. 

         And so it is with American Idol. For you see, the same crowd that kept the hirsute but no-talent Sanjaya Malakar coming back week after painful week gave Melinda Doolittle the boot Wednesday evening and sent her packing back to Nashville.

          Someone, anyone, please explain this to me.

          By any standard of measurement, Melinda Doolittle is the best vocalist ever presented in the history of this competition. Phrasing, breathing and staying on pitch no matter what – especially when singing outside of her comfort zone – combined with a broad range, versatility and an inherent ability to interpret any song and make it her own, clearly made her the one to beat. Melinda is a natural born talent who – after graduating with a BA in Music from Belmont University - went on to make use of her talents as a backup singer for such notable artists as Aaron Neville, Michael McDonald, Alabama and CeCe Winans, just to name a few. In other words, this girl has chops.

          With all due respect to Blake Lewis and basing the decision purely on talent alone, he should have been the one sent home instead of Melinda. Now don’t get me wrong, I like Blake and I enjoy listening to him. Clearly, what he does is unique – at least among the singers showcased thus far – and he is entertaining to watch, but the beat-box thing he uses as his ‘hook’ is going to get old and I’m just not certain if whatever’s left will be enough to carry him through with a career of any duration. When you get right down to it however, and as talented as he is, Blake is simply the weakest of the three, vocally speaking. 

          Yes, I will grudgingly concede that Melinda Doolittle is not as young as Justin Sparks or Blake Lewis, her last two competitors and lacks the ‘cutesy’ appeal those two enjoy. However, in the end, I must remind America that as Simon Cowell was wont to say each time he had to endure the immature and out of control Sanjaya Malakar:

          “This is a singing competition”.

          Or at least it’s supposed to be.

             Sometimes I wish I had been born a girl.

            No, really.

            Mothers and daughters develop special relationships beginning at the moment of birth that dissolve the mists of years between them and allows them to evolve from teacher and student to friends. There are exceptions of course, but by and large, mothers and their female offspring become friends and members of the same club with parallel goals. They always seem to understand each other somehow, even when not a word passes between them. They talk to each other; more importantly, they talk with each other with a complete understanding, and in a way that men just can’t seem to achieve. They do things together. They share. They feel. And when they feel, they are able to express those feelings openly and without shame or embarassment of any kind. When a woman feels, everyone – especially other women (members of the same club, remember?) - understands.

            It’s not the same way with men. With few and very rare exceptions, fathers and sons don’t develop friendships with each other. We remain friendly adversaries and competitors to the very end. We don’t talk much and instead of including them in everything we do, we show them only what we think they need to know and only on a need-to-know basis. I’m not certain whether it’s nurture or nature, but when we feel, we aren’t able to express those feelings. We hold them inside and deal with them on our own hidden away from the scrutiny of others. It’s a ‘man thing’ we reason, something that no one else will understand…..Maybe not even other men.

            When both of my kids were little, I rough-housed with both of them and loved it. I even started to teach them some martial arts. Our brand of horsing around usually consisted of wrestling with Dad making the requisite sounds of a TV grunt n’ groaner and of course, lot’s of tickling. Eventually, we’d all be exhausted – at least I was – and we’d fall together in a heap laughing until we couldn’t laugh anymore.

            My son was about 11, maybe 12, when he came up to me one day and started giving me jabs in my shoulder. He said “Hey, Dad – Guess what? I’m as big as you are now and one of these days, I’m gonna be bigger than you and you’re gonna be the one on the bottom of the pile.” Well, I suppose I hadn’t noticed it before, but he was right. He was now big enough to look me straight level in the eye ( For the record, I’m only about 5’6” at the height of my powers and he was growing at an incredible rate). Now, I could see where this conversation was going and decided that the best thing to do would be to stop it dead in its tracks right then and there. “Well, Buckaroo (he liked to be called that),” I said. "You’re right. You’re as big as me. But before you go getting any ideas, there are a few things you oughta know: 1) No matter how big you get, I’ll always know more than you. 2) I’ll always be sneakier and meaner than you and 3) I don’t fight fair.”  “Oh”, he said. And with that, he walked away rubbing his chin with a quizzical look on his face that seemed to say “Hmmmm……I think I better give this little more thought before I challenge him for leadership of the pride.” 

            About eight months later, he got my attention again with the old shoulder jab routine (harmless but effective) and informed me that one day he’d win our little sparring matches. “Now why would you say that?”, I asked. His response: “Well Dad, you taught me everything you know.” “What a silly thing to sayl”, I replied as I reached out, grabbed his hand and gently applied a wrist lock (again, harmless but effective). “I taught you everything you know.”

            Now can you imagine this exchange taking place between any mother and her daughter? I can’t. Such a thing would just never be possible within the realm of their universe. The fact that in reality, they are mother and daughter is irrelevant. They’ve evolved and now they're sisters. On the other hand, ask any father of a son and you’ll find that almost all of them have had the same experience in one way or another as I did. Daughters, you see, grow up with only one goal in mind: To attain full membership in that exclusive club I talked about along with all of the appertaining rights and privileges thereof. Sons, on the other hand, grow up looking to prove to themselves and everyone else at one point or another that they are bigger, faster, smarter, stronger and more capable than their fathers or – at a minimum – at least as good, thus enabling them (they think) to establish themselves as the dominant male of the group as their genes are telling them to do. It is when they are just reaching the apogee of their powers that our own begin to slowly diminish, just when it seems, that we are going to need them the most. Sounds like something straight off of  the Discovery Channel doesn’t it? Well, maybe. The truth is that perhaps we’re not as far removed from the rest of the animal kingdom as we’d like to believe.

            The problem, I think, is that men don’t talk. We grunt, we nod our heads, but we don’t talk. Not really. I think it’s a rule of some kind. Whether it’s self imposed as a gender or societal I cannot say. Whatever the root reason, we don’t talk because somewhere along the line we learn that this is something we are just not supposed to do. Talking, we are taught, equals betrayal – betrayal of others, of our group, but most importantly, betrayal of ourselves. Maybe this is why in most animal species, the males always lead a solitary existence. Because of this ‘rule’ we can’t tell our sons after they reach a certain age or level of maturity, how much we truly love them, how awfully proud we are of their accomplishments and of the young men they are growing up to be. Rightly or wrongly, we think that though unspoken, they’ll just intuitively know without having to be told. “Of course, I love him. Of course, I’m proud of him”, we say. “I shouldn’t have to tell him.”  Yes, we should.

           Maybe this is why depression runs rampant throughout the male gender. Time magazine wrote extensively a couple of years back citing male depression – if I recall correctly – as the unseen epidemic. We don’t seek help – we can’t – because to do so would involve, well, talking. Common sense should tell us that it’s impossible to keep all those feelings continually bottled up without it affecting other aspects of our lives, sometimes with grave consequences. All feelings (especially deep rooted ones) need an outlet and sadly we men just don’t seem to have one. Yet somehow, some way, our subconscious will tirelessly work like a team of trapped miners to dig and claw its way to the surface in order to give them an escape route.

            Right now, men are only permitted to express themselves on practical matters. We’re problem solvers. That’s what we do. All the other stuff, we leave to women because in this area, they alone are empowered to do things that we, as men, are not able or not allowed to do. But if we men could talk – I mean really talk, to each other and to our sons - if we could be as open as women are allowed, even encouraged to be, then perhaps fathers and sons could grow up to be friends and form an exclusive club of our own.

            After all, as American Express says, “Membership has its privileges”.

             For decades, it has been the position of the scientific community that there are two things that separate man from the rest of the animal world and make him unique: the ability to laugh and a sense of self awareness

            I would like to add a third distinction: The ability to be incredibly stupid and live to tell about it. You see, animals in the wild can’t afford to be stupid. If they let their guard down even for a moment, chances are they’ll end up as some other animal’s dinner.

            Mankind on the other hand, is unique in that we alone have the ability to do incredibly moronic things and survive despite our best efforts to the contrary.

            Don’t believe me? Well, sit back and read about these fine examples of God’s handiwork and their well documented escapades:

            Two years ago, a Japanese woman paid a man the equivalent of $10,000US to murder her husband. When the hit man failed to perform and decided to keep the money, she called the police to report a robbery.

            In 1889, a baseball player played with shotgun shells in his pockets. While he was batting, a wild pitch hit him in the leg and his pants exploded.

            An Arizona man accidentally shot himself in the leg while hunting. In order to call for help, he fired off his rifle and shot himself in the other leg.

            A farmer in Uruguay tried to perform some self-dentistry by shooting a painful toothache with his pistol. Not only was he able to extract the painful tooth, he also blew out his jaw.

            A movie-theatre manager in Seoul, South Korea found that “The Sound of Music” ran entirely too long. He fixed the problem with some clever editing that never occurred to the director of the award winning musical: He cut out the songs.

            And the award for surviving complete stupidity goes to:

            The man in Clermont, France who blew up his house with a washing machine. It seems that the Monsieur was trying to remove a grease stain from a shirt by adding a cup of gasoline to the wash along with the detergent. When the machine changed cycles, a spark ignited the gas and blew out the first floor of his home, knocking him unconscious.

            “I feel a bit stupid,” the man admitted later.

          On March 22, I wrote a commentary about gun control. My comments were in response to the overturning of DC’s strict statutes wherein I came down on the side of stricter gun control to the point where I said I would even endorse a repeal of the 2nd Amendment. After all, I reasoned, the times have changed since the Constitution was written. Despite the propaganda from the gun lobby, the reasons for gun ownership and the conditions existent in those years as originally stated by the Founding Fathers no longer exist. Though the pro-gun ownership groups will deny it, the fact of the matter is that they have never – not once – been able to successfully rebut any argument presented by advocates for gun control. Every time the NRA gets backed into a corner on the issue, they quote inane catch phrases like “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.”, or cry ‘foul’ and fall back on the last bastion on which they can rely at this moment, something which - at least for now - cannot be argued with: the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution.

          In my close, I invited interested readers to voice their opinions and post comments to the blog or write directly to me at ReportFromTheFront@hotmail.com with a promise to revisit the subject after hearing what other people had to say. I then circled the wagons and prepared for a long siege.

           Surprisingly, no one wrote and there were only eleven comments posted on what I felt was surely to be a very hot topic considering the firestorm that usually accompanies this subject every time it’s brought up. Considering the events in Blacksburg, Virginia today, I think it’s only appropriate to do so now.

           As I said, there were only eleven comments. Eight were from pro-gun advocates relying solely on the entitlement granted by the Constitution (Of those, five were from the same person). Two comments loosely attributed the growing incidents of gun related violence to a lack of enforcement of laws presently on the books . The remaining one was a comment on the fact that the plaintiff behind the DC lawsuit wasn’t even a resident. In one of the multiple comments from the same writer, he promised to ‘burry’ [sic] me. In response to a totally unrelated posting last week, he was kind enough to inform me that he was just putting the finishing touches on the first installment of his response to the March 22 commentary. If it’s taken almost a month to formulate and he's still not done, I don’t think he has much of an argument to make.

          The thing I found most interesting was that none of the respondents attempted to refute anything I said. Sure, there were the usual and not unexpected comments that the views I presented were full of holes, that I hadn’t done my research, etc. Still, no one – and I gave everyone ample opportunity – even made a half hearted attempt to factually contradict the commentary in part or as a whole.

          Not one.

          Today’s events are shocking and saddening as things like this always are when they happen. If guns were outlawed and available to none, I can’t help but believe that shootings like this would eventually never occur and that gun related violence would start to become increasingly rare just through simple attrition if nothing else. My heart and prayers go out to the families of those killed and injured today along with the rest of the Virginia Tech community.

          My remarks stand.

            One would have to be a hermit or living on a research station somewhere in Antarctica to not even be remotely aware of the torrents of outrage pouring out of the black community over remarks made by radio host Don Imus on his broadcast last Wednesday wherein he referred to the members of the Rutgers Women’s basketball team as “nappy headed ho’s”.

            On one hand, I understand the discomfort and mortification African Americans must feel at this moment and the animus they hold for Don Imus as yet more proof that racism isn’t quite ready to give up the ghost just yet……..Maybe in a couple more generations perhaps, but not now. This is something that cuts to the core of people – black people in particular – who are alive today  that still remember segregation, discrimination and the wholesale denigration that comes with being a second class citizen in a country that promised equality for all but for most of its existence failed to deliver as promised.

            Regardless of his intentions or the venue in which he thought he was working, Imus’ comments have no place in the public airwaves and should not have been part of the program. People feel and think what they feel and think, and unfortunately there’s not much of anything you or I can do about it. In my opinion however, if you harbor ill will or have negative opinions about any particular segment of the melting pot that is our population and feel the need to express yourself, you should wait until you arrive at the safety of your own home and say them to the dog, if at all.

            But on the other hand………

            On the other hand, I don’t understand all of the over-the-top furor this has caused – not because I condone what Imus said, because I clearly don’t – but because I don’t see how the black community can feel justified in its furor and self rightousness when one considers the double standard it employs and steadfastly clings to.

            Why, for example are the notoriously anti-white and virulent anti-semitic rantings of Louis Farrakhan tolerated? Why is it permissible for Al Sharpton – now one of Imus’ most ardent detractors - to unapologetically make anti-semitic remarks and loudly proclaim every crime perpetrated by a white individual upon a black individual as a racially motivated hate crime? As wrong as it was for Imus to say what he did, the things Farrakhan and Sharpton have said are much worse in substance and intent.

            If African Americans would shut these men (and others like them) down, shut them up and proclaim their public utterances and remarks of this kind as unacceptable, I might be more sympathetic. But they don’t and they won’t so as a result, I can’t. It’s that double standard I mentioned just a moment ago.

            In his column in today’s Washington Post, (“Mysogeny in the Morning”), Editor Gene Robinson asked “why would Imus think to use the word ‘ho’ to describe those young women from Rutgers?”

            The answer, Mr. Robinson is because you, the black community, said it’s okay.

            Just watch any rap or hip-hop video and you’ll see exactly what I mean.

            The so called lyrical content of many of these ‘songs’ is worse that anything Imus, the Greaseman or Mel Gibson of recent memory ever said. Some – such as Ice-T’s ‘Cop Killer’ urge the wholesale shooting of police officers. Many more advocate forcible rape against women of any race and violence against white people. Still more extol the virtues of the so called 'thug' lifestyle and repeatedly refer to all women – young black women in particular – as ho’s, bitches and worse. Sadly, language such as this has now become a part of the American lexicon.

            Maybe it’s just me, but I am not aware of anyone in the highly outraged African American community trying to put a stop to that. Or maybe – like those T-shirts say – it’s a a black thing and I just won’t understand. Somehow, I doubt it.

            Don’t believe me? Just stand on a street corner in any urban area and listen to how young black people – boys and men in particular – talk to each other and about each other, to say nothing of the wholesale use of the dreaded ‘n’ word. Considering the present goings-on surrounding Don Imus, the words double standard should quickly come to mind.

             Is life imitating art or the other way ‘round? I don’t know but whatever the case, this sort of thing is just plain wrong.

            So if you want to know who gave Don Imus the okey-dokie to say what he said, Mr. Robinson, the answer is you did.

             If the black community at large wants to be credible in their outrage the next time something like this happens (and make no mistake about it, this won’t be the last racial remark to make it on the air), they’re going to have to take a good, hard look in the mirror  and be honest about the reflection staring them right in the face.

            In Stephen Lawhead’s “Arthur”, Lancelot is trying to counsel King Arthur concerning the High King’s desire to go to battle in response to a wrong done to him. “Bear”, Lancelot said, “A thing is either right or it is not”. In this regard, African America would do well to listen to Lancelot.

As unbelievable as it seems, the Bush administration has once again managed to shoot itself in the foot, this time with the firings of eight federal prosecutors. You would think by now that they would have run out of feet as suitable targets, but somehow the President and his inner cadre' - dubbed the Texas Mafia - still manage to perservere.

Ever since Thomas Jefferson came into office, it has been the custom and prerogative of every incoming president to replace unelected government personnel upon taking office with individuals of his choosing in order to promote the agenda of the incoming administration - much as Mr. Bush did when he assumed office for his first term. As a result, the replacement of federal officials every four years isn't new and is hardly newsworthy. People in certain positions in the federal government accept these appointments and take their jobs knowing full well that they could possibly be seeking other employment before they know it.

What makes this round of firings different is that it came about in mid term and appears to be solely for purely political reasons - as denied by the White House - and not based on poor performance as has been attested to by the President and others.

Multiple reams of email traffic provided to the Justice Committee clearly show an intricately planned strategy to replace the eight prosecutors at the center of this maelstrom because of the belief by the Bush administration that they were guilty of pursuing Republican quarry too vigorously, Democratic individuals not vigorously enough and, in one specific case, to reward a protege' of political advisor Carl Rove.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has repeatedly denied any prior knowledge of, or involvement in, any the firings despite the written evidence supplied to Congress which contradicts him. Once this was pointed out to Mr. Gonzales, his only tacit (and reluctant) admission - that something was obviously amiss at Justice - was to tout what has now become the all too familiar catch phrase of the Bush adminstration: "Mistakes were made". Mr. Gonzales, it seems, has forgotten that he is no longer George Bush's lawyer and that with his elevation to the position of the country's number one law enforcement official, he is sworn to uphold and pursue the interests of the American people and not the personal agenda of one George W. Bush. For his part, Mr. Bush has somehow managed to conveniently forget that as well.

Though all unelected federal workers in all departments and at all levels serve at the pleasure of the President, the firing of these eight prosecutors was uncalled for and completely unjustifiable by any yardstick of measurement regardless of which party affiliation you happen to claim. The records show that they people did not have poor performance ratings nor were they biased one way or the other in the cases which they were prosecuting. The lies put forth by the administration to explain and justify their replacement - something which, sadly, it appears is coming all too easily to Mr. Bush these days - as support for this latest bonehead move should not be tolerated.

I believe Congress should pursue Mr. Bush, Mr. Gonzales and anyone else involved in this incident with all of the pressure that they, as the worlds most powerful legislative body, can bring to bear. If they do, then perhaps Mr. Bush will remember that he was elected President and not King.

Once again, the issue of gun control has reared its ugly head as a result of the recent Court ruling striking down the District’s strict gun control statutes, some of the most restrictive in the country. The resulting – and not unexpected – firestorm following the ruling has once again shaken the gun ownership tree, allowing nuts on both sides of the issue to fall noisily to the ground.  

Now when I was a boy, my Dad owned two rifles and a pistol, all of which he taught me to use. He wasn’t a member of the NRA nor was he the recipient of any formal firearms training save what he got in boot camp prior to being deployed during the Korean conflict. Nevertheless, he was able to teach me to shoot and to shoot well; so much so that I grew to like target & BLEEP shooting and actually got to be pretty good at it. To this day, when I go to Ocean City, the first amusements I go to lose my money at are the ones involving shooting of some kind. I still enjoy it. 

Over the past several decades however, I’ve become increasingly disturbed at the dramatic rise in violent crimes, especially those involving the use of guns. Shootings at Post Offices across the country, schools (Columbine, for example), shopping malls and in traffic disputes are - despite our growing dismay and best efforts to the contrary – getting to be more commonplace than any one of us wants to admit or should be comfortable with. The plain and simple fact of the matter is that firearms are just all too easily available to anyone who wants them. The checks and balances put into place in order to keep guns out of the hands from people who shouldn’t have access to them are not effective – even if strictly administered – and just not working. 

 As a result, and after many years of thought on the subject, I’ve decided that the right thing to do with regard to this issue is to stand with the gun control advocates. More than that, I am in favor of a Constitutional Amendment repealing the 2nd Amendment and a total national ban on gun ownership with one possible exception, which I’ll discuss in a moment. 

Now at this very moment, a whole bunch of people have stopped reading this and are busily wrapping themselves up in the American flag and waiving about copies of the Constitution with the 2nd Amendment conspicuously highlighted, all while calling me un-American, unpatriotic, a traitor to the cause and worse. Look, guys – Just sit down & relax. Let me explain: 

From what I have seen over the years, all of the arguments put forth by the NRA in favor of gun ownership have been reasonably, logically and successfully addressed by those on the other side of the argument. When all else has failed (as it almost always does) the NRAers always fall back on the one singular justification that – for the moment, at least – can’t be ignored or argued with; The 2nd Amendment guarantee of the right to bear arms. What they seem to forget (or conveniently ignore) are the times in which the Constitution itself was written. 

In those years, most of the national governments of Europe were oppressive tyrannies which catered almost exclusively to the desires of the wealthy class (the few) and ignored the basic needs of the general populace (the many). There were no – repeat, no – freedoms of any kind. You did what you were told, lived how you were ‘graciously’  allowed to live by people who knew nothing of your existence and didn’t care to. In brief, these were the conditions that eventually led up to the American Revolution in the mid 1770’s and the French Revolution just 13 years later. 

The U.S. Constitution was written in 1787, just 11 years after the Americans had won their freedom from England. The memories of the revolution itself and the reasons behind  it were still fresh in the minds of the founding fathers and those who fought alongside them. The Constitution was their way to try and cement their hard won independence and embark on what the French writer Voltaire was to characterize as ‘The Grand Experiment”.  The insertion of the 2nd Amendment into the Constitution was their sole solution (or so they thought at the time) to guarantee that the populace would have some recourse if the ‘experiment’ failed and America regressed backwards into a dictatorship. 

In addition, it must be pointed out that in 1787, a gun was as necessary a part of any household as is a telephone today. After the war, there was no paid professional army or militia per se. The people themselves were the army and militia if needed. There was no such thing as a police force. Also, if you wanted dinner, you went out & shot it. You didn’t call Dominos. Lastly, let’s not forget the native Americans who weren’t real thrilled with the Europeans who were slowly but surely taking away their ancestral lands & territories and, ultimately, their very way of life. 

        Today, we have a paid, professional army; States have militias and every jurisdiction has a police force, all of which serve to protect us and provide civil order. If we’re hungry, we have tons of options Colonial America never even dreamed of. With the exception of the extremist nut cases, the realistic chances of America regressing into a dictatorship of any kind are pretty remote. Simply put, we as a society simply wouldn’t stand for such a thing. Lastly, for the crowd who steadfastly maintains the need for firearms ownership as protection against armed criminals, the key, of course, is to simply make them unavailable to all instead of the patchwork of availability which varies from state to state thereby eliminating the ‘If I can’t buy a gun here, I’ll buy it there’ opportunism. The “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people” argument is lame. The plain fact of the matter is that anything you can think of can be misused and turned into a weapon. The other fact of the matter is that guns of any kind have only one purpose: to be used to maim or kill something. 

So my question to the gun owning populous is this: If you don’t need a gun as protection against the government, to participate as a member of the army or state militias, if you don’t have to hunt in order to eat or for protection, Why do you need one? 

The answer is that you don’t. 

You may want a gun, but you don’t actually need a gun. 

The only reasonable exception I would endorse would be ownership by true firearms collectors who would be strictly licensed and regulated. Transfer of ownership would have to be registered  - much like the sale of a car - so that any gun bought or sold could be tracked. 

That’s it. That’s my position. I’m sure it’s not gonna be the popular one, but that’s how I feel and why.  

I invite anyone who would like to share their feelings - pro and con - to post a comment to the blog or write to me directly at ReportFromTheFront@hotmail.com. I plan to revisit this topic in a few weeks and will be happy to include your comments.

          We have a little Shih-Tzu named Petie. He’s about as cute as anything God ever put on four legs, but he’s well…..inherently stupid. When he goes for a walk, he has trouble deciding which leg to lift and when called upon to perform his only other biological function, he seems to spend an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out the best position, calculating the proper angle of trajectory and so on. You get the idea.             

     Right now, he has a roommate. Me. Lucky for me, my sudden assertion of squatters’ rights seem to be of absolutely of no importance to him whatsoever and it appears that he could truly care less. All he knows is that he now has company for the moment and he seems to be okay with that.