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NOBODY ASKED ME, BUT…

The legendary sportswriter Jimmy Cannon, one of my career inspirations, used to occasionally put together a column of his random pronouncements on life.

The column was entitled “Nobody Asked Me, But…” and was cherished by his readers at The New York Post, the New York Journal-American and the King Features Syndicate nationwide.

Now, what’s embarrassing about what I’m about to do is that Wikipedia, of all things, is pre-calling me out on this. In its Jimmy Cannon entry, it has these two lines:

This gambit has been eagerly seized upon by newspaper columnists ever since, not only on the sports page but in every other section. Columnists who “borrow” this device will typically lead off with some lip-service tribute to its originator, such as “In the words of the immortal Jimmy Cannon: Nobody asked me, but…” and then they’re off.

That itself is not an original Wikipedia thought. It was cribbed from a 2008 column by Michael Getler on the PBS site.

To cut to the chase, I had some random thoughts. And since you already know the world’s a mess and Trump is an idiot, for this week, I’ll pass on some of these musings. 

I’m not going to start them with “Nobody asked me, but…” But, to be honest, nobody did.

—

— I can imagine most prominent people doing mundane things. I can’t imagine Donald Trump doing any of them.

Can you picture him grilling burgers in the backyard? Pumping gas at a self-serve pump? Coaching a girls’ softball team? Putting up the Trump family Christmas tree? 

Neither can I. I can see every other President in my lifetime – even patricians like JFK, Ronald Reagan and the Bushes – doing that.

I can’t even imagine him dressing himself – and that’s despite the fact that he’s dressed like someone dressed themselves but don’t know how.

— Soccer – football to those of you outside the USA – bores me. Among its other misfeatures is the idea that when the clock runs out, the game – oops, sorry, the match – might not be over.

But stoppage time – the amount they put back on the clock for timeouts and other interruptions – might have a real-life usefulness. If – and only if – when someone dies, the power that runs the universe gives you back the time you lost forced to do stupid, time-wasting things.

This thought occurred to me yesterday as I tried to open one of those plastic bags ripped off a roll in the produce section of the supermarket – and it took me five minutes to secure a bulb of garlic.

I think two years total returned would be about right.

— It was 75 degrees the day we returned to New York after two weeks in Hawaii.

Two days later, I wore four layers and still shivered as I watched the Mets at Citi Field for the first time this season.

Today, four days after that, it was 80. Until it was 65 when the clouds rolled in and a shower passed through.

The beginning of spring here is now a time for making firm plans. The ground might be freezing. Or melting. It might rain. Or snow. Or burn with the heat of a blow torch.

— We passed two cars pulled over to the side of the road. Apparently, there was some sort of mishap involving the vehicles.

My wife watched two guys come out of one car and confront the woman driving the other. She wondered who was at fault.

I told her that was easy to tell.

Her car had New York plates. Their car had New Jersey plates. The cops can write those guys a ticket now.

— Speaking of New Jersey, I admit to falling for an April Fool’s prank played by the state government.

The state released a social media statement saying it was ending the ban on self-service gasoline pumps – that everyone who drives in the Garden State needed to learn how to pump gas, pronto!

I was all set to lament the passing of the best thing about New Jersey – you never get out of your car at a gas station. The rest of the country can only imagine what was standard practice when I got my license in the 1970s.

But, again, apparently Gov. Mikie Sherrill and the gang was just looking for a few yuks on April 1. Hope the guffaws last awhile. Well played.

— Finally, I turn 72 today. 

That, to me, is the biggest joke of all. 

I couldn’t imagine being 72 back when birthdays were big days of celebration. When my parents bought presents and took me bowling or to miniature golf, or had friends and/or family for a party. I couldn’t imagine it when the AP started giving me the day off as part of working there in my early 20s. 

Being 72 is unreal. It’s remembering completely different worlds at various stages of life. 

The future is always depicted as scary. And there are things about my 72nd birthday that do frighten me. The world is getting warmer. It’s getting angrier. The United States has forfeited its place as the moral leader of the world.

But there are reasons for hope. I can listen to any song written in or before my lifetime. I can watch any movie from the beginning of cinema. The next episode of “The Pitt” is coming up.

For the first time in over a half-century, people are returning to the vicinity of the moon – a place where men once walked. 

So despite all the gloom and doom scrolling, despite Trump and the worst people ever to run the world running the world, I’ll choose optimism. I’ll choose to think that I will see better things.

Nobody asked me, but that’s what I believe.

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ALOHA (THE GOODBYE EDITION)

POIPU, HAWAII – By the time you read this, I will have left Kauai, where I’ve spent the past two weeks.

It’s been mostly terrific. Because I love Hawaii. Especially this island, Kauai.

We’ve been very lucky – almost lottery-quality lucky. The three other main islands – Oahu, Maui and Hawaii – were inundated by rain in what’s called Kona Storms. Parts of the other islands remain underwater. People needed to be evacuated from homes, roads flooded. Miraculously, and thankfully, there is no official death toll attributed to the storms.

Here on Kauai, we got a lot of rain right after we arrived two weeks ago – 6.5 inches at the airport where we landed. We spent the first two days of our vacation cooped in our room.

But it stopped raining early last week and, for the final days of our trip, we got what we came for – sunshine, warmth, a chance to wander around the Garden Island.

Hawaii and Kauai, when they are like they’ve been this week, are glorious.

Yes, there’s the weather and the Pacific Ocean.  The lush greenery. The best seafood anywhere. The magnificent sunrises and sunsets.

Hawaii, though, is glorious for what it represents; the incredible diversity of the United States of America.

It is the crossing point for so much of the human race. Starting with the Polynesians, who settled on the uninhabited islands in the first millennium and lived perfectly well until the late 18th century. 

That’s when the British came. They didn’t expect to find the islands, but once they did, they liked what they saw. They enjoyed the food, the pearls and the young women. They gave back guns and diseases. 

The Russians came here, too. So did the Japanese and Chinese. 

And, of course, the Americans. 

I’ve spent much of early 2026 reading history about Americans and their attitudes toward indigenous people, both in North America and beyond. They weren’t much into sharing, or abiding by agreements. I think that’s what Trump sees as America’s greatness, aka double dealing. The islands ended up belonging to us.

In 1960, Hawaii became the 50th state. We haven’t added any since. 

When you come to Hawaii, you notice two things about people. One is that the folks who stay in hotels and resorts tend to be overwhelmingly Caucasian. Certainly more so than home in New York.

The other thing is that the people who actually live and work here are overwhelmingly not Caucasian. They’re an incredible mix of native Hawaiian, Asian, Hispanic and everyone else you can imagine. 

With all that difference, you might expect conflict. Nah!

I have not seen hot tempers or a lot of rudeness. I’m sure the folks who live here could tell me stories. But, for the most part, everyone says “Aloha” to each other and smiles. It seems as genuine as a casual encounter can be.

Amid that placidity is what’s around us – a turbulent ocean. The waves make a lot of noise. They spray and splash and crash and thunder on the lava rocks and the sandy beaches. It’s choppy and looks especially daunting to those of us who live near more tranquil waters.

It’s a lot like the world we live in.

There’s a lot of churn out there. There’s a lot that can get in the way of our happiness. Rogue waves after a tsunami. The flooding you can expect from 24 inches of rain in three days. A brutal sun that burns skin a little faster than in northern climates.

And yet, working together, we solve it.

We get on surfboards (actually, they get on surfboards, I’m not going near one). Then we ride the waves, crash out eventually, and go back out and do it again and again.

The magnificent music created by the slack key guitar and ukelele ease the mind and reach deep into the soul. You could float a tanker with all the sunscreen for sale.

People wear loud shirts and dresses, forget what socks are, read and walk and dream. 

Hawaii is what America should be. It’s impressive that it actually is part of America, because except for the flags and the occasional post office, it often seems like another world.

That’s not to everyone’s liking. There are bumper stickers and graffiti saying “Hawaii is not America.” And the Americanization that has taken place is scary enough to some people that a song on Bad Bunny’s Grammy-winning album warns Puerto Ricans against suffering the same fate.

So let’s work it out. Let’s find a way to make sure Hawaiians and every other American can be their true self and enjoy the pursuit of happiness promised in the Declaration of Independence nearly 250 years ago.

Let’s welcome those who aspire to be us, who want to contribute to a great national effort toward the more perfect union sought by the Constitution. No one – no one! – is “an illegal.”

Let’s solve our real problems amid the stormy seas around us – climate change, equality, economic justice. Let’s explore and question and tolerate and enjoy.

That’s what I see on the beach here on Kauai. I know when you read this I’ll be back among the maelstrom we’ve been experiencing all year – hell, ever since Trump went down the escalator.

But, for now, I’m going to enjoy it – and wish fervently that you and your loved ones get to enjoy it again as well.

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LOST VALOR

Yes, we’re just a few days past the 2025 Academy Awards, but let’s reveal the plot for the Best Picture winner of 2036.

The title could be something like “Lost Valor” or “Following Orders.” It takes place in the dark times of the mid to late 2020s and is about a sergeant first class in the U.S. Army. We’ll call him Chad.

After graduating from high school in Missouri, Chad enlists to get the kind of technical training the military provides. His parents also believe it might shape him up after he occasionally got into trouble hanging out with the guys and gals.

Chad likes the Army and his fellow soldiers. He figures maybe two two-year tours and he’ll be in position to get a better paying job in or near his hometown.

But then, Donald Trump decides to war on Iran.

Chad is a good soldier. He carries out orders from superiors to perfection and receives commendations throughout his tour. And when he gets the word to carry out an attack on an Iranian position, he doesn’t question the order, he does what he’s told.

So when it’s discovered that one of the attacks he launched ended up killing 125 Iranian civilians, including children, Chad initially shrugs it off as an accident of war. Some of his fellow soldiers are a little more troubled by what happens – they’re out-and-out angry, and there starts to be discord in the unit.

Months later, Chad is on leave. When he gets to St. Louis in his uniform, he’s notices 175,000 people in the streets protesting the very war he’s been risking his life fighting. He’s disgusted – until he notices a girl he dated briefly in high school. He thinks they parted on good terms, but when he goes up to say hello, she looks at his uniform and snarls.

He responds angrily and is soon met with contempt by other protesters. They call him a baby killer. A St. Louis police officer needs to get him away to avoid a physical altercation.

Chad goes back to his hometown and is shocked to see that the people there are nearly as angry. Gasoline is $6 a gallon, local farmers can’t sell their corn in foreign markets and several local businesses are boarded up. 

He remembers seeing people paying for soldiers’ meals at the local lunch spot. He remembers old guys buying a round for hometown military personnel. 

None of that happens. Even his parents look at him warily. Instead of being a local hero, Chad is a pariah.

He’s heard something about this. During and after the Vietnam War, veterans were treated with contempt for “losing” to the Communists. They couldn’t find jobs or even a sympathetic ear – they were considered deranged or warped. That’s how Rambo got to be Rambo.

Chad is relieved to return to the Middle East, to his barracks. But his compatriots got the same treatment in towns from Augusta, Maine to Pismo Beach, California, from Fort Pierce, Florida to Lihue, Hawaii.

“We just did what we were told to do,” the men tell each other. They’re shaken and disgusted. The MAGA types among them say the news media is to blame, reporting only when bad things happen. 

But Chad isn’t so sure. The girl in St. Louis, the guys at Susan’s Restaurant, his own mother – all of them can’t be brainwashed propaganda victims of whatever is left of liberal news media.

The movie ends with a ceremony at the base. Pete Hegseth is there to give out special medals with the image of Trump flanked by eagles with spears in their talons. The official medal of Operation Epic Fury – the idiotic name for this mess.

When it’s time for Chad to get his medal, he walks up to Hegseth, lets him pin the tacky looking medal on his chest – and spits in Hegseth’s face.

— 

All that is a long way of saying this: There is no honor in this war for American soldiers who choose to participate. 

It’s worse than Vietnam. In Vietnam, veterans were badly treated because it was considered the first U.S. loss. But the American people changed their mind about Vietnam as the war progressed – they realized they had been deceived by America’s leaders. Most prominently, Lyndon Johnson. So it was unfair to blame the soldiers when the attitude shifted.

The Iraq War was another stupid mistake. But except when soldiers committed atrocities, such as at Abu Ghraib, veterans returning from that war and from Afghanistan were not faced with recriminations.

That’s going to change here.

The American people have never supported this war. And soldiers were warned – Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, who served with far more honor than anyone in this clown show of an administration, reminded soldiers before this and the Venezuela adventure that they are not obliged to carry out illegal or immoral orders.

And that’s what Iran is.

So when the kid from “Hamnet” wins Best Actor by perfecting his Missouri accent, as British actors are wont to do, he’ll be recreating a scene that’s bound to happen a lot from now until this nightmare ends.

It’s a terrible thing Trump, Hegseth and the rest of these yutzes have done to dishonor young people who believe in serving their country. People with honorable intentions shouldn’t be forced to weigh the morality of their service.

They’re clearly not the biggest victims of this mess. But their struggle will be Oscar bait.

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CAVEAT EMPTOR

The town supervisor where I live suffered a tizzy recently.

His name is George Hoehmann and he, of course, is a Republican. He won election in 2015 supporting, among other things, a limit of two terms in office. He is currently serving his sixth two-year term.

Hypocritical or not, the small percentage of Clarkstown, New York’s population that votes in local elections believe he’s doing a good job. So it’s hard to begrudge him.

Recently, Hoehmann got upset about something he saw online. The post, according to Hoehmann, called for a boycott of local businesses whose proprietors ally themselves politically. 

Given his penchant for flouting supposed rules, I’m going to make the assumption that Hoehmann is upset with the boycotters because they’re not enamored with his party or the felon in the White House who leads it. 

Hoehmann responded with a social media post.

“Clarkstown small businesses are the backbone of our community. Today, I saw a partisan political activist social media post targeting many of our local small businesses for a boycott due to the alleged partisan affiliation of their owners.”

“This is an affront to our community and way of life in Clarkstown.”

“These businesses provide many varying services to our community. They employ our family members. They donate to our local student groups, sports teams and community organizations. These businesses feed our families, cloth our kids, fix our homes, and go above and beyond for our residents every day of the year.”

“I call on all elected officials and candidates for public office to join me in reaffirming our support for all local small businesses and reject this unacceptable assault on our Clarkstown small businesses.”

Now, unfortunately, I can’t seem to find the posts about which Hoehmann is spewing. Unfortunately, for two reasons. One is that it would help me write more knowlngly about what exactly he’s talking about. 

And two because I would like to know who not to do business with.

Hoehmann – who I equate with Rolf in my Trump-era “Sound of Music” because our congressman, Mike Lawler, is more like Herr Zeller – has more problems than just being a lousy writer. (Note: Maybe before writing screeds he should learn the difference between cloth, the noun, and clothe, the verb.)

He seems to believe that I and anyone seeking to combat the effort to subvert American democracy should overlook that when it comes to getting our gutters cleaned.

Because it comes down to a simple question: Why should I give my money to someone who’s going to take that money and give it to Donald Trump?

I’m retired. I’m fortunate to have a modest amount of money to live on for the rest of my life – a sum recently made more modest by the wackadoodle economic and military craziness of Trump and his Little Rascals.

It is my prerogative to spend my money as benefits me. And it benefits me not to see that money used to support people who bomb Iranian schoolgirls, raise prices through reckless tariffs, and shoot people protesting their terrorizing anti-immigrant policy.

Last year, I was going to a medical practice in New Jersey to treat the arthritis in my knees. I had undergone surgery on the left knee with the doctor in charge of the practice and wanted help mitigating the ongoing pain.

I was about to begin therapy on the knee – with the same practice – when I decided to check out the Federal Election Commission website’s database of political contributors.

It was there I learned that the doctor donated more than $30,000 in the 2024 cycle to Trump and various PACs supporting him.

He is no longer my doctor. I found someone who didn’t have any political affiliation I could determine on the FEC database, And I got better treatment at a better price.

I will not eat at a pizza place or shop at a meat market that shows Fox News. I avoided the locksmith who put Trump signs all over his yard. 

I have the right – and, in my mind, the obligation – to do that. It’s my money. I was the one who got up at 3 a.m. to work early shifts for almost 40 years to earn it – and I’ll be damned if some Rolf thinks I should be supporting a Trump enabler because he coaches girls’ softball.

Or “cloth”s my kids – who I believe don’t want anything to do with him, either.

I understand the risk. If everything is political then there’s no respite from it. It adds to the constant anxiety that permeates this country in 2026. And it puts businesses I support at risk of being avoided by Trump sycophants.

But Hoehmann helped deliver this atmosphere. And just like term limits, it’s easy for him to say ignore what those MAGA types do with your money.

The only unacceptable assault is his on American independence.

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GOUGING THE SCAB

In 1978, my father and I engaged in an animated debate on a car ride home. Amazingly, it was about Iran.

What was amazing was who was on what side.

At the time, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was Shah of Iran. He had been a strong ally of the United States for more than 25 years – ever since the U.S. and Britain engineered the coup that toppled an elected prime minister in 1953.

But there was growing opposition to Pahlavi from various groups within Iran. Some sought democratic reforms. Others sought to turn Iran into a religious state – a la Saudi Arabia except for Shi’ite Muslims instead of Sunnis.

Pahlavi’s ruthlessness worsened as he struggled against opponents. And his use of imprisonment, torture and murder became the subject of a “60 Minutes” piece – a reminder in this sad age of how powerful good journalism can be.

Dad – who would be best described today as a moderate – was mortified by what he saw. And when something bothered him that much, he was almost evangelical on the subject.

So why were we debating?

I – supposedly the wide-eyed liberal idealist – said that while I agreed that the Shah was a horrible human being, what would we be getting if he just left? Would there be a nascent democracy? Or would the religious fantastics – led by the exiled cleric Ayatollah Khomeini – turn Iran into an even worse place?

Dad thought it didn’t matter. Torture is evil. Anyone who tortures the people he supposedly leads doesn’t deserve to lead.

He was adamant. And it turned out Jimmy Carter, a strong advocate for human rights, kind of agreed with him. The United States withdrew its support of Pahlavi, who fled the country. 

But it was Khomeini and the fanatics who took control. And it has been a mess ever since.

A mess that has entangled the United States more than once since 1979. Of course, most famously, soon after Khomeini took power, with what we call the Hostage Crisis. American diplomats held by Iran for more than a year after Pahlavi was allowed to be treated for cancer in New York.

The closest we’ve come to reconciliation was late in Barack Obama’s presidency. His team – with the help of Europe, China and Russia – got Iran to agree to repurpose its nuclear development away from weapons in return for the release of assets frozen during the Hostage Crisis.

—

The name “Iran” is supposedly derived from the Persian word for “Land of the Aryans.”

Unfortunately, the definition of the word “Iran” in the United States and much of the West is “oil.”

There are lots of places in the world with which this country has had fraught relationships. We seem to be able to leave Vietnam alone after fighting against its interests for about 20 years. 

But the problem with Iran is all that oil. It’s one of the biggest pools of black gook in the world. 

And they don’t want us to have it.

It has a lot to do with the fact that we’ve thwarted their efforts at controlling their destiny in the past, and they don’t trust us not to do it again.

Like Trump did last weekend.

There’s some fantasy that Iranian protests against Ayatollah Khamenei, the brutal leader taken out in the initial attack, meant that the Iranian people might see us as liberators.

Mazharf. That’s the Persian word for baloney.

The Iranians have no reason to trust us. They don’t want us in their lives. And this war we’ve started – whether it’s already ended or drags for months – won’t change any of that. We’re not getting their sweet, sweet oil – which we really wouldn’t need if we committed ourselves to a clean energy future, but that’s another issue.

They, like my Dad did, have long memories. Torture leaves a scab and the U.S. has been picking at it for all of my nearly 72 years and more. 

This time, in fact, we didn’t just pick at it. We amputated it.

It’s not unfathomable that we will end up devastated by this. The Iranians are perfectly capable of inflicting pain on us – now or years in the future.

Ultimately, my father was on the right side of history. Even if the ayatollahs were vicious, hateful men, they were Iranians. It was up to Iranians to decide how to handle this. 

And now, who knows?

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TIME IS UP FOR “TIME TO TIME”

Did you watch this week’s State of the Union address? 

I sure as hell didn’t. I phoned a friend, played a computer baseball game (OOTP – I highly recommend it!) and cleaned some of the mess on my desk.

Three years ago, we were in Palm Springs when President Biden delivered the speech. His detractors – and even some supporters – wondered if he’d become too addled to stay focused. Biden proved to be pretty sharp and the speech bolstered his standing in the polls.

And that’s the problem.

Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution contains this line about the role of the president: “He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.”

There are three things that are archaic about that sentence. The first was noticed immediately by any woman who reads this blog. The second was the unnecessary Capitalization of select Nouns.

The third is the whole damn speech.

Tuesday night was a spectacle. Trump spent a record one hour and 47 minutes telling us how great he is, how lousy Democrats are and tarnishing any glow the U.S. men’s hockey team earned by winning the gold medal in Milan.

But let’s be fair. It’s not just Trump who has made the State of the Union anything but what the founders intended. The speech has been a political event more than an actual government function for a long time. 

Republicans heckle Democratic presidents. Democrats heckle Republican presidents. The presidents get their speechwriters to deliver gotcha lines to garner headlines – back in the day of newspapers and broadcast news – and memes, for social media today.

But does any president actually give Congress information about what’s going on in or concerning the United States of America?

You and Congress already know. It’s on TV or online. It’s in the e-mails and texts you get from friends, family and organizations you support. 

All the president does is either repeat the facts or, too often in Trump’s case, tell you not to believe your eyes and ears.

That wasn’t the case when Alexander Hamilton was singing about taking his shot while helping to craft the Constitution in 1787 (OK, he probably wasn’t singing, but I’m having a fond flashback about seeing “Hamilton” with my daughter.)

Up until the early 20th century, the president probably did reveal things in the State of the Union about what was happening in this country. Of course, up until the 20th century, the president also didn’t generally deliver a State of the Union speech – it was Woodrow Wilson, in the first year of his presidency, who began a tradition of an in-person address to Congress.

Until that time, the president sent a letter to Congress meeting the requirements of Article II, Section III. 

But Wilson’s appearance came at the dawn of the broadcast age. It was on radio and it was a way to emphasize the second part of Article II, Section 3 – “and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.”

Over the past 113 years, that’s what it has become. A free political ad for a president’s agenda. A chance to get his message to the American people without the filter of analysis or context that journalists provide.

What a waste of time and energy! Nothing was accomplished by Trump’s speech except that his supporters heard what they wanted to hear and we detractors found another reason – as if we needed it – to get ticked off that this buffoon holds the nation’s highest office.

Wouldn’t you rather have seen a new episode of “High Potential” on ABC or the season premiere of “NCIS” on CBS? Or a good college basketball game? Or the replay of a spring training game?

Because you were more likely to learn something about the state of the union from any of those broadcasts than from hearing Trump spew.

If there’s going to be an effort to amend the U.S. Constitution after the Trump debacle – and I’m beginning to think there really needs to be, since in many ways this document is failing a stress test – it might be that time to time has run out for the State of the Union.

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YEAR OF THE HORSE’S ASS

Gung Hai Fat Choy!

The lunar new year began Tuesday. It’s the Year of the Horse in the Chinese zodiac, which means that for people born in 1954 – including me – and every 12 years after, it’s our year.

Unfortunately for us, and fortuitously for the People’s Republic of China, it’s also another year of Donald Trump.

Trump was actually born in the Year of the Dog, 1946. But like everything else, he interjects himself into everyone’s life with the finesse of a steamroller. So even though people like me should be celebrating, Trump is trying his damnedest to make sure he’s in as many conversations as any single human can.

Why is this fortuitous for China?

Well, for one thing, no American president has – until now – driven steadfast allies running into the arms of either Xi Jinping and any of his predecessors as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. The crown jewel of this debacle has been Canada’s embrace of China as a trade and political party. 

Thanks to Trump, it’s now as easy to go from Toronto to Beijing as it is to go from Toronto to New York. China recently waived visa requirements for Canadian citizens despite a history of not always being welcoming to those folks. And given the way border crossing has become tougher in North America, a Canadian needs his or her passport to go to either China or the U.S.

Because of Trump’s idiotic tariffs – his tariffs should never be described without the adjective “idiotic” – Canada has now increased its purchases of Chinese raw materials and products, while China has decided that Canadian soybeans taste – if’s that what you do with soybeans – better than ones grown in the 50 states.

In addition, Trump’s determination to stomp out vehicles that don’t run on good ol’ drilled-from-the-ground petroleum, Chinese electric cars will soon find their way into Winnipeg, Sudbury and Halifax. And, unless he’s stupid enough to further restrain Canadian-U.S. ties, Trump will be able to tool on his golf cart at Mar-a-Lago while Chinese-built electric vehicles purr on the streets of Palm Beach.

It’s not just Canada. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer recently returned from a productive mission to Beijing.

So we’re driving – literally and figuratively – our greatest historical allies into China’s sphere of influence. That wasn’t exactly the intention.

I think Trump is fine with China aligning with Japan and South Korea – again, among this country’s best allies since the end of World War II. It’s in line with the vision he shares with Xi and their puppetmaster, Vladimir Putin. 

Asia is China’s sphere of influence. Europe is Russia’s – that’s what the Ukraine war is about. A

And Trump wants control of the Western Hemisphere. That’s what the Greenland nonsense is about. That’s what the Canada as 51st state nonsense is about. That’s what the seizing of Venezuela’s Maduro is about.

But by being Trump, Canada isn’t falling sway to his, um, charm. It’s aligning with the slighted Europeans – including such angry nations as Britain, France and Denmark. And if it benefits Canada with the bonus of pissing off Trump, Prime Minister Mark Carney has shown that he’s all in – or “elbows up” as they say up there.

While there are multiple polls showing how politically weak Trump is in the United States, it’s unrealistic to believe he won’t still be president when the Year of the Sheep rolls around on February 6, 2027.

So fighting his dictatorial willhea (that’s a word my father made up to indicate a craving) is going to take a lot of energy in 2026, it’s what we have to do. It’s what we have to keep doing to save the country we believe in.

Honestly, though, I’m all for making a part of Trump a part of this Year of the Horse.

I’ll give you a guess as to which part.

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GAME PLAN

Congratulations to any of you who root for the Seattle Seahawks. 

Being a former sportswriter, I know that a winning Super Bowl team is the one that executes its game plan better. On Sunday, the Seahawks’ plan appeared to be focusing on the younger members of the New England Patriots’ offensive line and pressuring their quarterback. The Patriots came close to figuring it out in the fourth quarter, but came up short.

There’s a lesson here for the forces trying to undo the mess that is the United States of America.

We have midterm elections in nine months. In special and off-year elections leading up to November, Democrats are far outperforming the norms. They’ve captured legislative seats in what were thought to be safe Trump districts and taken over municipalities previously run by Republicans.

Democrats are winning because most Americans are sick of this Trump crap. They’ve seen the U.S. embarrassed on the world stage, the economy slide, and the disgrace of mass arrests and extrajudicial murder by the human waste known as ICE.

But success can only be fueled by anger for only so long – although I suspect people are so angry that this feeling will last longer than usual.

Democrats – and the non-Democrats who can’t stand what’s happening to our country – need to come up with a game plan. One that will spell out what they plan to do to not only end the nightmare of Trump II, but to make life genuinely better for the 342 million-plus Americans who aren’t billionaires.

This plan should not be developed by a liberal think tank, or by the groups perceived as being on the left.

It should be developed by the people who it affects. What the Democrats need to do is travel the country listening to the problems people have – and then sounding out solutions.

Take healthcare, which until the Trump threat to democracy was probably the biggest problem people in this country faced.

I’m on Medicare, so healthcare costs are merely outrageous. For many people who aren’t 65, they border on catastrophic. The cost of taking care of yourself and your loved ones should not be an impediment to your financial viability.

The country might finally be ready for universal healthcare. Maybe Medicare for All. Maybe even something as advanced as Britain’s NHS.

But Democrats need to get their push for this from the American people. The ones who are paying outrageous premiums, who are committing huge chunks of their financial wherewithal to pay for prescriptions Having town halls throughout the country – forget the blue state/red state thing – is an important way to get a public impetus for improving healthcare. 

Pointing out that Trump is constantly proclaiming that he’s “two weeks away” from a great plan to replace the Affordable Care Act, drawing up a plan – maybe naming it for a place where a town hall came to a solid conclusion – and then getting just about every Democrat running for the House, the Senate and the statehouses to stand behind that plan. 

That’s what needs to be done to ensure Democrats are not just using rage bait. That it’s finally time to stop screwing around with people’s lives and start making those lives better.

And not just with healthcare. Infrastructure. Immigration. Women’s rights. Climate change. Campaign finance reform. Ending corruption.

This isn’t that original. In our lifetime, the Republicans have run on the Contract for America and Project 2025 – and as miserable as they are, they’ve executed them well. 

The New Deal is an example on our side – we’re still reaping the benefits of FDR’s vision and the impetus for real change. It led to the Democratic Party controlling Congress pretty steadily from the 1930s to the 1980s.

It’s a game plan. Just like what the Seahawks executed in Super Bowl LX. Only this time, both Pioneer Square and Copley Square – and every place in between – will find reason to celebrate.

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Uncategorized

ERASING ERASURE

Carter Woodson created what has become Black History Month because he refused to be erased.

Woodson became a black historian the hard way. His parents, both slaves until a few years before he was born, needed his income in rural Virginia. So he worked as a sharecropper and miner, moving to West Virginia at 17 to dig for coal there.

Well past the age most people graduate from high school, Woodson began attending classes. He finished in less than two years, then got a degree from Berea College in Kentucky. After a stint working for the U.S. government in our then-colony of The Philippines, he got a second bachelor’s from the University of Chicago and then a Ph.D. from Harvard.

But this was the early 20th century – I’m guessing the time period that some folks in red hats perceive as when America was great. 

So when Woodson, with credentials that probably blew away most of those deciding, was refused admission to American Historical Association conferences, he took his wisdom and created the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History.

Because Woodson knew – as anyone with even a smidgen of understanding knows – that Black history is American history. It’s an integral part – American history and accomplishment is woefully incomplete without an understanding of what Black people endured and contributed to this country.

Woodson first created Negro History Week 100 years ago. It later became Black History Month and continues to this day with the guidance of what’s now known as the Association for the Study of African American Life and History. 

He put in February. Not, as some comedians like to joke, because it’s the shortest month, but because it’s the month in which two of the most important figures in Black American lives – Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass – were born.

Black History Month has grown more prominent in recent years. The association that runs it has an annual theme for its commemoration and program, this year focusing on the celebration’s centennial. Other years have seen attention given to education, economics, politics and the arts.

Of course, since the 2024 election, Trump and his gangsters have tried to diminish Black history. There should just be history is the gist of what they’re saying, trying to make it seem as though racial bigotry and animus have been eliminated.

In some cases, retroactively. In Philadelphia, signs discussing how enslaved Africans worked at George Washington’s home were taken down; the city is suing the administration to get them returned. Last year, the dolt occupying the Secretary of Defense’s (that’s right!) office was forced to retreat after an attempt to remove references to the Tuskegee Airmen from training material.

Erasure is not limited to Black people. You’re watching it in real time at the Super Bowl.

It is – to say the very least – insulting the intelligence of anyone with half a brain to think there needs to be an “All American” alternative to the scheduled official halftime performance of Bad Bunny. It implies a) that the Super Bowl is a strictly United States event; b) that Puerto Rico, Bad Bunny’s home, is not part of the United States; and c) that any of the human leaf blower voices listed on the alternative show are in any way comparable to one of the most dynamic and entertaining performers in the world.

But bigots seem determined to have their say. I’m an elderly Italian-American man and the only Spanish I used to know was the translation of English language ads and warnings on the New York City subway (Aviso: La vía del tren subterráneo es peligrosa. Si el tren se para entre las estaciones, quédese adentro. No salga afuera. Siga las instrucciones de los operadores del tren o la policía). That said, the only reason I’m watching the game is to share the joy of Bad Bunny with hundreds of millions around the world.

Bad Bunny, like Carter Woodson, refuses to be erased. So do other Black, Hispanic, Asian, and indigenous people. So do those of us Caucasians who refuse to accept a homogenous white identity, instead relishing the history of our immigrant ancestors.

Combined, those histories tell the real story of a country that hopefully will be great again after we fight off Trump’s effort to destroy us from within.

If you wonder why Black History Month is a big deal, there are two important reasons. One is that you’re going to hear and read a lot of interesting stories that you didn’t know before about Black contributions to America’s struggle.

The other is that no history is invalid or unworthy. History is history. It’s how we know that reverting to the past doesn’t make America great – learning from it and improving on it does.

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L’ETOILE DU NORD

When my wife and I visited Minneapolis in 2024, we loved it.

Of course, having close friends there doesn’t hurt. Or the fact that, as in every other trip I’ve taken to the state of Minnesota, the temperature never fell below 70°. That includes two trips in late September and early October, when New York was in the 40s. I have no idea what it’s like when the high is minus 10°.

But even putting those things aside, we noticed things about Minnesota that surprised our Gotham-centric eyes.

First, it’s a really beautiful place. The Mississippi River begins in Minnesota and it frames Minneapolis. It’s not as wide as it gets when you’re further downriver – in St. Louis, for example. It seems like you see life on both sides.

Not to mention Minnehaha Falls, a wonderful park that includes the impressive cascade on the outskirts of the city.

Second, we ate really well there. The idea of peanut butter on a hamburger would gross me out. Not in Minneapolis. Same with a stuffed hamburger. Or a tater tots casserole, aka hot dish.

We even ventured to an Italian restaurant. I never do that outside New York since it’s hard to believe any other city – except maybe Boston – has decent cuisine of my ancestral home. But it was wonderful – a great array of antipasti, pasta and carne that would be at home in Carroll Gardens or Arthur Avenue.

The Twin Cities don’t lack in culture. We attended a wonderful production of “The Lehman Trilogy” at the relatively new version of the Guthrie Theater. In a previous trip, we visited the beautiful Walker Art Center. There are independent bookstores all over the place.

And, of course, Minnesota is the home state of Prince and Bob Dylan.

You’ve heard that people in Minnesota are over-the-top nice and try at all costs to avoid hurting your feelings.. Let me give you an example:

On our last day in the area, we had lunch with friends at a pub in the south part of the city. It was a Monday, and I was somewhat distracted by the fact that the Mets needed to beat Atlanta to make it to the postseason.

I tried to avoid the game – my friends aren’t big baseball fans. But as were leaving the restaurant, I watched on the TV screen as Francisco Lindor homered to put the Mets ahead in the ninth inning.

I do not hide my feelings when I’m watching the Mets. I let out an enormous “Go, go, go, yes!” as the ball cleared the fence.

At which point a server in the restaurant, quite naturally for a Minnesotan, blurted “Who cares about the Mets?”

I was undaunted. I went out to the parking lot to catch the end of the game and say goodbye to my friends. At which point, the server came running out and apologized profusely for her outburst.

I mean, the rowdy New Yorker is the one who disturbed everyone’s lunch. But she was the one who expressed remorse. My wife and I laughed, because there was no way this ever happens in New York without somebody’s middle finger going up.

Minnesotans are nice. They look out for one another. There’s less crime and a genuine effort to alleviate poverty. They are culturally diverse, welcoming people from throughout the world to a place where a lot of immigrants from tropical areas are probably shocked by the climate.

It might seem like heresy for a native New Yorker, especially if you know how chauvinistic I am about the City that Never Sleeps. But I could live in Minnesota.

So why did Trump pick on Minnesota?

Exactly because of all of the above. And because Minnesota hasn’t voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1972 – and has only voted for a Republican (Eisenhower twice) three times since 1932, the first time it ever went Democratic.

The red states where Trump is beloved are generally failures. Crime is higher. Living standards are lower. And, of course, bigotry keeps anyone not white and Christian from thriving.

That won’t do as far as Trump and his minions are concerned. Their hatred for Tim Walz and Illan Omar and Amy Klobuchar and everyone else from Minnesota is based on the perception that the competence of Democratic leadership is a taunt rather than an example.

So Trump and Stephen Miller and the rest of the pond scum were determined to make life miserable in a place where it isn’t. The results are there. Hundreds of non-criminal immigrants – undocumented or otherwise – whisked away by secret police. Disruption of businesses, schools, houses of worship. And murder – at least two that we know of.

What Trump and Republicans didn’t count on was the fact that Minnesotans are fierce about their niceness. They mistook civility and kindness for complaisance and apathy, and ended up with exactly the opposite.

I love Minnesota. I love the Minnesotans I’ve met in my life. They are real Americans, the real patriots. And they deserve better than what January 2026 has given them.

It’s the North Star State, l’etoile du nord, because it’s a guiding light for the United States and the world. Never more than now.

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