Tag Archives: Subjectism

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WHEN WE LOST OUR GREATNESS

There are two things I want to write about today that, at first glance, seem incongruous.

One is the 13th anniversary of the murder of 26 children and educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Eleven days before Christmas, a person who had just slain his mother went to the school and fired an automatic weapon at 6- and 7-year-olds and the adults responsible for them.

The other is the wanton sinking of Venezuelan fishing boats in the Caribbean Sea by the United States military. So far, as of Wednesday afternoon, the death toll is 87 people, with some still missing. 

Trump and his lush Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, claim the boats are carrying fentanyl to the United States – which is damn near impossible given the fact that these boats would have to refuel multiple times to make it the closest U.S. port. And the seizing of a tanker Wednesday could escalate the crisis further.

So here’s what they have in common:

Dehumanization.

Self-indulgence.

Bloodlust.

Cowardice.

And the dismantling of the idea that this nation is a great beacon of freedom, opportunity and fairness.

Dehumanization: I’m sorry that even the start of the piece contributes to that.

When we think of Sandy Hook and the Caribbean, we see numbers. Numbers that can be seen as either a lot of people or just a microfragment of the world’s population.

That’s not what they are.

They’re lives. They’re a woman who dedicated her life to educating children. They’re a fisherman looking to catch some tuna to feed his family. They’re a little girl who loves science and might have been on track to cure a form of cancer.

They’ve been reduced to victims. They will not get old or prosperous or fall in love. They will stay who they were.

And they leave families to grieve. To ask why. To feel guilt for something they didn’t control. To feel the loss forever – anyone who thinks a grieving mother, father, child or spouse ever actually “gets over it” is a moron.

So why are these good people – young or grown – gone?

Self-indulgence.

This idea that an individual should be able to have whatever weapon he (and it’s mostly he) wants so he can hear the bang bang, smell the sulfur and feel the groovy recoil. That it’s a right established in the Constitution that they walk around with these mass murder machines at any time and use them when they perceive a threat.

And, as much as it sickens me to repeat this, the flip comments of the NRA goon after Sandy Hook was that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. 

As if the people who do the shooting don’t perceive themselves as good guys. As if a good guy with a gun has actually stopped any mass murders in the 13 years since.

In Venezuela, the self-indulgence is the idea that American taxpayers have given their dollars for weaponry that’s just sitting there. If you’ve ascended to the power to use it, why not? It’s not your money. But they’re your toys. 

And if you want to show toughness, show what a real man you are, wiping out fishing boats without due process or warning isn’t any different that killing monsters in a video game.

Bloodlust. Proving your manhood by killing people. 

There are people who think that, if you showed the mangled bodies of children massacred in an elementary school, it would stop such shootings. 

BS. All it would do is give the gunmen aspirations. Could the next one do a better job of wreaking revenge for who knows what.

If you don’t indulge your bloodlust directly, you tell people you control to kill people. How members of the U.S. military, with a history of integrity and ethics, can honorably live the rest of their lives after what’s happened in the Caribbean is an exercise in either self-delusion or murder.

Or cowardice. When Hegseth faces judgment for what he’s done, he’ll say he didn’t pull the trigger. That he was acting in America’s best interest. That he was following the instructions of his commander-in-chief.

He will be the one arguing – in a federal courthouse or before an international tribunal – that the soldiers pressing the missile launcher had free will. This after he tried to court-martial Mark Kelly for saying soldiers are obligated to follow illegal orders.

The gunman at Sandy Hook took the easy way out. He killed himself when he heard the police coming. He faced no judgment from any human. If you believe in God, maybe he faces some consequences in the afterlife – if you don’t, he got away with it. 

He won’t be reading this screed or any other condemnation. The book is closed on his miserable existence. 

That brings me to my last point. American greatness.

You and I were raised to believe this is the greatest nation on earth. It wasn’t that far-fetched. We cured diseases, put men on the moon, created jazz, baseball and Oreo cookies. We went without a king or queen for 248 years, helped rescue the world from fascism, made English as universal a language as there is on this planet.

Yes, we enslaved Black people for hundreds of years. Yes, we stole land from people who were here first. And yes, we treated women like property. But we aspired to be better and, over time, we’ve been getting there. There was a long way to go, but it felt doable. In order to form a “more perfect union.” That “more” is essential.

But we’ve decided that this is too much. Too many decided that being great is about throwing your weight around, looking like a tough guy, scaring instead of loving. Me first instead of all of us together.

There is nothing incongruous about Sandy Hook and the effort to drag us into a war against Venezuela. It’s the same weakness, meanness, pettiness, self-interest that has plagued our country for way too much of our lives.

Our elected representatives did nothing – absolutely nothing – to try to prevent future Sandy Hooks. Our current representatives are doing nothing – absolutely nothing – to stop the loss of innocent Venezuelans and American soldiers.

How can a nation this small of heart, this self-consumed, this disregarding of humanity claim greatness? That’s what you and I need to overcome to get us back to what we think we should be.

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THE BEAUTIFUL

This is a quick rumination after spending a day at one of this nation’s greatest attributes – its national parks.

In 1872, President Ulysses Grant established the world’s first national park – Yellowstone, mostly in Wyoming, but with small portions in Montana and Idaho. It was designed to preserve some of the beauty of this nation while there was still the chance – stopping overwrought from tapping these lands purely for profit.

I haven’t been to a lot of U.S. national parks. But I have been to Yellowstone and Grand Teton in Wyoming, Petrified Forest and Grand Canyon in Arizona, Joshua Tree in California, Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee, Shenandoah in Virginia and Haleakala in Hawaii.

There are all treasures. They are also an example of the wonders creative thinking can perform when it comes to making a better place to live.

The proponents of Yellowstone feared that the area of the Rockies would suffer the fate of Niagara Falls, which had already become a seedy tourist trap obscuring the magnificence of the waterfalls. Designating Yellowstone a national park not only protected Old Faithful and the grizzly bears from unscrupulous profit-seekers, but it gave a boost to tourism as an American industry.

The park I went to today was clean and beautiful. It left me – a city boy – in awe of what natutre can create. And it made me grateful that someone in the 1870s thought enough to preserve our natural heritage so that Americans they’d never meet would marvel at these wonders.

Would that we approached all our problems in the same way – getting ahead of them and protecting them from the unscrupulous and exploitive.

I’ll write more about this in the future. But for now, consider packing your loved one(s) into the car and exploring the most beautiful array of parks in the world.

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¿DÓNDE ESTÁ MI HERMANO?

When I was in the fourth grade, our teacher tried to teach us Spanish.

It was unusual then to teach elementary school students a foreign language. But that might be the best time to do it.

That’s because I still remember the sentence atop this piece, more than 60 years later. And I cannot tell you what Italian word I supposedly learned this morning on Duolingo.

Hispanic language, culture and overall presence weren’t quite as noticeable in my world in 1963 as they are today. I don’t remember tacos, much less taco trucks. Bad Bunny would have been some malevolent cartoon character, not a singer. Signs weren’t in two languages, just English.

Not that there wasn’t any Hispanic influence. “West Side Story” – the musical and the movie – remained fresh on people’s minds, in part because of the incredible music and storytelling.

But when my class got its Spanish lessons, I thought the only place it might come in handy was if I went to Spain one day.

I bring this up because we have entered Hispanic Heritage Month. It seems strange to start a month-long celebration in the middle of September, but that’s because it’s timed to commence with Mexico’s independence celebrations and include those of other countries in our hemisphere.

This must be – at best – a bittersweet celebration. Thousands of Hispanics have been swept off the streets of our country by the new Gestapo, the agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. They’ve been sicced on people based pretty much on the fact that they kinda look Hispanic – it seems that whether these folks have documentation or not is inconsequential. 

These agents have been empowered by a miserable president trying to distract the nation from his multiple failings as a leader and human being. And they’ve been given license by a Supreme Court that puts privilege over justice and expedience over process – the Constitution they’re sworn to interpret fairly reduced to an annoying memo.

In the “again” part of MAGA, a lot of the inference you can draw is that America was a better country when your supermarket cashier didn’t have a Spanish accent, when congas weren’t the drums of street musicians, when the guy who cut your grass was sunburned red instead of brown.

But that’s not how America works. Period. Pizza and hot dogs came from adapting to immigrants from Europe. Jazz came from working in the rhythms of Africa. Our military and public service heroes trace their  origins to every corner of the globe.

I have no Hispanic blood or members of my extended family. It doesn’t matter. These are my people – just as everyone on Team America who abides by the principles of our freedom are my people.

They work in our communities. Their kids go to our schools. They pay their taxes – which is a damn sight more than what too many of these so-called patriots empowering the Republican Party do.

Their culture makes ours more radiant. Their food makes ours taste better. Their bravery and dedication keep us safe. Their happiness reflects well on us.

And that includes those who have come from Central America fleeing authoritarian regimes, gang warfare and crushing poverty – those who couldn’t wait for a documentation system that’s broken and corrupt, geared to let in white South Africans and nobody else.

We should not let spoiled brats like Trump, Homan, Noem and Miller dictate how these people are treated. They have no clue.

I didn’t learn much Spanish. Other than that one sentence in fourth grade, and the Spanish version of the warning on subway cars about not going on the tracks.

But.

¿Dondê esta mi hermano?

Mi hermano estâ aquî. Gracias a dios..

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THAT’S THE NEWS

I lucked into a daughter whose love of theater surpasses my own.

In fact, she’s written plays that were staged or read, and – BRAG ALERT – they’re really good.

What my daughter doesn’t write is news copy. That’s what I used to do – for much of a 40-year career.

I’m glad she loves writing. I’m also glad she’s not in the profession that helped pay for the education that led her to writing plays and TV scripts.

The reason this thought  came up this week is that my daughter took me to see the Broadway production of “Good Night, and Good Luck.” It stars George Clooney, who directed the film from which the play is derived. In the play, he portrays broadcast journalism legend Edward R. Murrow after playing Murrow’s producer, Fred Friendly, in the film.

In case you haven’t seen it, or forgot, “Good Night, and Good Luck.” highlights Murrow’s CBS broadcasts on Sen. Joseph McCarthy, whose crusade against people he perceived as Communists led to an atmosphere of fear in the 1950s. It captured – and was focused – on the fear of the era, educating another generation about a dark period in American history.

The movie is excellent and I recommend it if you can find it on a streaming service or old DVD. 

But I thought the play underscored a great point in a way the movie didn’t.

The play, much more that the film, takes place in the CBS “See It Now” newsroom. It depicts what’s great about journalism – the collaboration among colleagues, the rush of tracking down a hot story, the matching of wits with really smart people.

Murrow and his crew were disgusted by McCarthy’s intimidating and smearing. The parallels to 2025 America are obvious to anyone who checked their news alerts at the theater before turning off their phones.

But the play also highlighted the nature of the business known as broadcast journalism.

TV stations and networks have big newsrooms. They produce some incredible work – few newspaper pieces can match the power of a well-produced piece on a “See It Now” or its offspring, “60 Minutes,” not to mention some of the great PBS documentary series such as “Frontline.”

But big newsrooms are expensive. And, as many of the scenes in the play highlight, they don’t exactly bring in big numbers – news only gets ratings when it’s catastrophic, like the September 11 attacks. People even turn off Election Night coverage to watch old movies

There are scenes throughout the play when CBS’ chairman, William Paley, reminds Murrow that it’s the sponsors who pay his and his co-workers’ salaries. Murrow and Friendly even have to pay the costs of their McCarthy broadcasts because sponsors won’t.

I’ve seen the respect for broadcast journalism go from awe to awful. When I was young, there were icons on the air – Walter Cronkite, John Chancellor, Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather, Mike Wallace, Daniel Schorr, Judy Woodruff. Barbara Walters was an outstanding interviewer, pressing for a point when a politician kept trying to dodge it. 

People trusted and admired these men and women. They accepted that what they reported was as factual as it could possibly be.

Time, unfortunately has eroded that trust in two ways.

One is the quality of what we call news. Too much of what passes for news in the 21st century would have been scoffed at when I was young. Somebody setting a record on “Jeopardy!” A male celebrity’s stupid remark. A female celebrity’s apparel choice.

On TV, local newscasts forsake important issues in their community if they have video of somebody being rescued from a river in Thailand. The only stories that seem to take place in their market are easily filmable crime scenes and suspects, often the exceptions to the statistics that show crime decreasing in a city.

Celebrity and sensational stuff have been increasingly infringing on news. Even Murrow, the patron saint of broadcast journalism, did interviews with people like Liberace and Zsa Zsa Gabor to satisfy CBS’ ratings cravings. 

The other problem has come up a lot more in the past 30 years, since the creation of Fox News by Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch: Calling propaganda “news” and blaring it 24 hours a day.

It plays on people’s fears and addiction to personalities. And it makes crises out of nothing – think famously of Barack Obama wearing a tan suit or Joe Biden eating an ice cream cone. It trumpets clowns like Donald Trump – unless he accidentally does something that hurts Fox’s bottom line – and promotes morally bankrupt ineptitudes like Jesse Watters and Sean Hannity as “newsmen.”

In the play’s final monologue, Murrow – speaking to some unnamed awards dinner – muses that television should inform as much as it should entertain. That primetime should be used not just to show westerns and comedies, but also discussions of domestic problems and foreign policy.

The problem is that it’s unlikely you’d get even 1% of the audience for “Tracker” or “Chicago Fire” for those kinds of discussions. The most popular news show, “60 Minutes,” is a notable and laudable exception, but it is more about hot-button issues than in-depth discussion of matters that matter.

As a result, we’re not as smart as we should be. We’re susceptible to demagogues and liars.

I went into journalism as my way of informing a world I wanted to improve. I thought the truth, whether it fit with what I believed or not, was the most important thing – that’s what I told the Northwestern professor who interviewed me in 1971. He warned me that, while my thinking was admirable, the truth was not as rock solid as I thought.

As “Good Night, and Good Luck.” reminded me, I love journalism. I love what it accomplishes when it’s good. There are still colleagues of mine doing incredible work – and I’m so proud I know them.

But I’m happy my daughter is a playwright and screen writer. Because I think that, in 2025, she’ll help people find the truth about the world a lot more efficiently than if she worked in a newsroom. 

This isn’t Edward R. Murrow’s America any more. We’re all the worst for that – and the path back from that is hard to see.

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ENTITLEMENT 

As of the moment this gets posted, I am 71 years old.

I can’t comprehend being 71. I remember being 17. It doesn’t seem that long ago.

Being 71 is something I never imagined. When I was pining for some young woman, when I got bored in a Sociology class, when I played second base in my town’s youth baseball league, I couldn’t foresee the world where I am now looking back on all those things and more.

There are lots of things not good about being 71. I go back to knee rehab Monday. My diabetes prevents me from scarfing a genuine toasted sesame bagel with a schmear of olive pimento cream cheese. I’ve seen Trump get elected president – not once, but twice, once after he tried to stage a coup after he lost,

But there are pluses. There are descriptions I can apply to myself that I would have had a difficult time justifying in my youth. I call them entitlements because I feel as though I’Ve earned them.

CURMUDGEON 

I’ve aspired to curmudgeondom ever since I started working as a wire service writer.

One of my mentors was Charles J. Morey. He was a phenomenal broadcast sports writer for the Associated Press. He was nearing retirement age when I was hired in 1977. 

His talent – writing simple, clear, declarative sentences that someone could read on the radio with ease. That he was able to string them together with wit and charm made him great.

But Charlie seems very forbidding when I met him at age 22. I’d get to work at 4 and he would sitting at his desk, arms crossed, waiting for his replacement. He was perpetually cranky and full of invective, particularly about the management of the organization. 

He was never, ever afraid to express his views out loud. 

My managers told me that I should try to be as good as writer as he was. But they also said you don’t want to share his personality. 

They got it wrong.

I loved the idea of being this inscrutable old man who passes down proclamations as if residing on Mount Olympus. And I loved the idea of making people think twice before bringing up a stupid idea.

I’d like to think that, with the passing of time, I’ve ascended to Mount Curmudgeon. And once my time among the mortals is past, Charlie is waiting for me with an Irish whiskey, arms crossed in the corner of a room, with my empty chair next to him.

CUT-RATE

A year before I turned 65, I went into New York to have a drink with a former colleague. On the way down, I stopped at the New-York (the hyphen isn’t a typo) Historical Society. If I waited a year, it would have cost me $10 less.

I revel in senior discounts. I pay half-price for the subway and commuter rail. I pay lower prices to get into museums. I bought a Senior Pass for National Parks just before Trump screwed them up and didn’t pay to visit Joshua Tree, Haleakala and Sagamore Hill. I get 10% off every time I go to the local supermarket. 

It might seem silly to those of you paying the full price for everything. But it’s a small pleasure that makes me thing I’ve got something that those of you who aren’t 65 or 71 don’t. 

Of course, there is one drawback: I don’t ever get questioned about whether I’m entitled to a senior discount. 

I’m reminded of the time my 72-year-old grandmother visited my parents, taking a bus from Queens to the North Shore of Long Island. She was indignant. She hadn’t said anything, but the driver charged her the senior fare.

“How did he know I qualified for it?,” she scowled, believing that it was hard to look at her and know she was 72.

I don’t get carded, either. That must mean I look every bit of my 71 years. 

Great. 

CONSEQUENCE

When I was young, I wanted to be famous. I originally sought a career as a TV reporter, thinking the fame I’d attain would garner respect I didn’t get a lot of as a heavy kid in the suburbs. 

That didn’t happen. 

Would it have been cool to be a household name? I’m not sure. I have friends and family who have attained measurable success – I can find them on Wikipedia – and they seem happy and grounded. Some sought the limelight, some didn’t. 

But sometimes I wonder if fame is an opiate. People can’t handle the pressure or the adoration. They turn to ways to numb the feeling – alcohol, drugs, abusive behavior, infidelity, violence.

So I haven’t attained celebrity. And I don’t feel as though as I’m missing anything. 

Because I believe I’ve attained consequence instead.

Consequence is contributing to your world. It’s having people seek your advice and respect your opinion. It’s gaining from the experience and wisdom of others. It’s sharing a honest laugh with a few good friends and your family. 

It’s helping to bring two great kids – the most fun people I know – into the world and sharing their triumphs and occasional setbacks. It’s spending my days with someone I love who seeks my counsel as she wrestles with her own efforts at making a mark.

I couldn’t imagine consequence when I ambled home from high school or drove from my summer job at a tire store. But I also couldn’t imagine cellphones, streaming TV and air fryers, either. 

I’ll take it. And, betraying my curmudgeon aspirations, gladly. 

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Economy

WE NEED A RAISE

The median monthly rent in the United States, as of 2023, is $1,348, according to the Census Bureau (assuming Musk and his rodents haven’t been screwing around with the data).

If you had a minimum wage job and devoted your entire paycheck – 100% we’re talking, sans vacation, and assuming no taxes are taken out – you’d be short $108 every month. 

Also: heat, electricity, food, transportation and clothing would have to appear magically, since you’d have no money left for anything besides your landlord.

The national minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. It has not risen in 15-1/2 years. Remember all that inflation everyone complained about the past couple of years? It ain’t because people getting the minimum wage are getting rich – makes you wonder who actually is causing prices to rise.

In fact, they keep falling back, making their lives more difficult. In the process, because people getting the minimum wage aren’t getting raises, it allows employers to limit the raises they give workers making a little bit more. “You should be grateful you’re getting $10 an hour because I could be paying you $7.25” is the attitude we’re looking at here.

Somehow, most politicians forgot that the people doing the least desirable jobs in our country might be well-served getting a little more money for doing them.

Now, to be fair, a majority of states and territories have minimum wage rates above the national mandate – the highest being Washington, D.C.’s $17.50. But a lot of states have minimum wage rates at the national average, below the national average or even no minimum wage at all.

It fails to take into consideration the fact that people have lives outside their jobs. That they’re supporting themselves and want to build the kind of financial foundation that allows them to realize their dreams.

Businesses thinks that’s not their problem. Being successful is. But if a business can’t make it without paying the people powering it a living wage, maybe that business needs to rethink what it’s doing and how.

A living wage in 2025 America being something in the vicinity of $20 an hour.

Oh, my goodness, that’s inflationary. That’s what the conservatives – the so-called “job creators” – will say. But, again, we had inflation without anyone – especially getting in the minimum wage category – a raise. 

Not only should the minimum wage allow people to actually make a living earning it, but it should also be indexed according to inflation. In other words, a rise should come just about every year – not every 15-1/2 and counting.

This is not a radical concept. Twelve states and Washington, D.C., all have annual minimum wage adjustments. Three of those states – Alaska, Missouri and Montana – voted for Trump three months ago. We do it for Social Security – and employers seem to able to pass on price increases whether or not they raise workers’ wages.

Now a lot of you are thinking “With all the crap going on since TrumpMusk took over, it seems like raising the minimum wage is a low priority.”

Stop thinking like that.

We should have learned by now that you can’t beat something with nothing. Since the Reagan years, Democrats have had to come in and clean up messes left by Republican presidents.

Let’s stop doing that. Let’s advance an economic agenda that benefits the people who somehow vote against their interest and see Trump as a hero. Let’s offer a better path, actual help for the problems they need solved.

Americans – especially young people and those working the thankless jobs that pay the least – need to be able to afford to live. A program to raise the minimum wage and provide a universal basic income, as I suggested two weeks ago, might go a long way toward remedying the economic anxiety millions face.

It would have the added benefit of making the heads of Trump and the Republicans who enable him spin.

If you get a chance, call or write your representative, your senator, the White House and tell them Americans need a raise.

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COME ONE, COME ALL

Trump promised his minions mass deportations. 

So why is anyone surprised that the topic of conversation in the United States this week is mass deportation?

The stories of ICE raids in schools and workplaces are heartbreaking and cruel. But just as important, what’s going on is totally in stupid territory and not in any way in the best interest of the United States.

There’s a feeling of screaming into the void. You can tell people their rights and protest all you want. But a plurality of Americans gave Trump a victory and he believes he has a mandate to do this crap.

So here’s what I think is the best way to respond to this BS:

To the people who want to come here from Guatemala and El Salvador, from Haiti and Cuba, from China and Myanmar, from Rwanda and Congo, from Syria and Somalia, there should be one word – albeit in a different language for each.

WELCOME!

The only people we should stop from coming into this country are the ones who want to avoid going through one of the legal doors – I’d be suspicious of their motive in coming here. But for everybody who comes to a border crossing – people fleeing gang violence, political oppression and/or crippling poverty – I think we should tell them to come on in.

I think that’s the right response to Trump.

That might seem crazy. The sentiment among his supporters is these are people leeching off American prosperity. 

They’ve been stoked into this sentiment by decades of xenophobia. There are strains throughout American history and they’ve been applied to all kinds of newcomers. They never seem to go completely away.

The latest strain cropped up around the turn of this century. It was stoked by people like Lou Dobbs, who spent every night on his CNN broadcast proclaiming that America’s borders were broken and that unwanted people were taking American jobs.

And, of course, the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, exacerbated fears that people were coming into this country to destroy it. Forget that the terrorists came into this country legally. Forget that their gang leader was a citizen of a supposed ally, Saudi Arabia. 

As far as the stokers were concerned, it was the woman trekking hundreds of miles in brutal conditions trying to get in via a boxcar in 110-degree weather or across desert land in the Southwest who was the “real” threat.

It was – and is – bullshit. Because we found ways to exploit them. We used their desperation to put them in jobs citizens didn’t want to do, pay them what we thought were miserable wages and hold the threat of deportation over their heads if they complained. And we did little to improve conditions in the homelands of these folks, forcing them to flee or die.

It was a situation that needed resolution – the “illegal” border crossings were a contrivance, because people felt the need to get here somehow. And there were people in both parties who understood that – who came up with ideas to help resolve the manufactured crisis.

But the gurus of right-wing power madness had other ideas. Immigration was a gift that kept on giving – fear-mongering as a recruitment tool. As a political strategy.

Trump and the Fox News klan latched onto this nonsense and exploited it brilliantly.

The people who believe in humanity – that would be us – always play this game on their turf. We seem to think that there’s a problem because they tell us there’s a problem. So we try to find a way to placate the radicals when all this is their way of gaining and maintaining power.

Here’s what we want:

We want everybody who wants to come here to come here. We want people who are willing to take the jobs Americans don’t want to do – fruit picking, meat packing, lawn mowing, burger frying – to take the jobs Americans don’t to do. If people are desperate to escape oppression and poverty – and are willing to do anything to make their lives better – we should be their champions.

It makes no sense to create this bizarre system that forces people to use desperate measures to get here. What Trump is doing now enables the coyotes – the people who extort the tired and poor, and make them indentured servants. He’s not hurting MS-13, he’s making it more powerful.

And instead of this nonsense of blackmailing Latin American countries into taking people rounded up by Gestapo wannabes on the streets of our cities, we should work with those countries to improve conditions and allow people to live their best lives in their own homeland.

But those who want to come help us – to make America truly great? Let ’em in. Let them help us build a better country. 

A strong country,  a country that calls itself the most powerful in the world, that calls itself the world’s beacon, isn’t afraid of Honduran 4-year-olds. It embraces them, it educates them and gives them comfort and safety. And then when they succeed, it’s our success as well.

I’m here because a century ago Benito Mussolini was a prick in Italy. My wife is here because 75 years ago Mao Zedong was a prick in China. There are millions of us who can tell that story, from every land on this planet. We’ve worked together to create a nation that – at its best – captures the world’s imagination. 

Because we’re not all the same. And a few more in our situation, wherever they’re from, can help.

That’s what we need to push for. Double down, not double over.

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FREE MONEY

Last summer, in my happy ignorance of thinking there was no way Trump could return to office, I was stuck at a Met game sitting next to a couple of his adherents.

It was a Met game, so you would hope they’d be focused on seeing the Amazins win.

But, nah, why would they focus on that? More than sufficiently lubricated by strong beverage, they began spewing the mantra of the indignant:

There are people getting free stuff!

They spent the whole game complaining about various groups who were getting things they perceived they weren’t. Forget that they were sitting in one of the more expensive sections of Citi Field – and could apparently afford spending a ton on booze. They screeched “These people” – and there was strong language that the people to whom they referred were not of pale complexion – are getting giveaways of money and cellphones and whatever else from Joe Biden and the rest of the Democratic elite.

Alas, they prevailed in November and we are now three days into this go-round. And instead of lamenting what happened, I’m focused on what we should do.

And that is give free stuff to everybody.

Actually, it’s not stuff. It’s money. Cash. 

It seems like a good time to figure out how to initiate some form of universal basic income (UBI) in the United States.

There are several ways to do UBI. But basically, the idea is to give everybody money on a regular basis. The standard idea would be $1,000 a month. It would go to every person in a household, which means if you and your spouse have two kids, that would be an extra $48,000 a year in family income.

And it would go to you no matter your status. Employed or unemployed. Husband or wife. Parent or child.  Billionaire or living hand-to-mouth. 

What would that extra money provide? 

Obviously, if you’re unemployed, it would provide you with some income. (Although it’s likely unemployment benefits might be better – in New York, weekly unemployment pay goes up to $500.)

If you’re working two jobs to make ends meet, maybe you can quit the one you like least. Or you can buy time to get a better job. UBI begins to compensate women for staying at home with their kids. It is a way to help families build the kind of generational wealth so many can’t afford. 

Andrew Yang, when he ran for the Democratic nomination in 2020 and before he lost his common sense, made UBI a cornerstone of his campaign. His argument was that the tech revolution is chewing up jobs faster than it’s creating them – and that giving everyone money would soften the blow for unemployed families and the rest of the community.

There have been several small efforts at UBI around the world. The results are generally positive – people receiving a steady supplement are significantly happier than those who don’t.

It is, of course, a form of socialism. Although a kind of socialism that some doctrinal conservatives seem OK with.

In fact, there is one place in the United States where a form of UBI has been in effect for more than 40 years. It is not a hotbed of liberal thought like California or Massachusetts.

It’s Alaska, one of the most politically conservative states in the union. Every resident of the state get a check from the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend – paid for by the revenue generated from the production of oil and gas in the state. 

Last year, each Alaskan received $1,702. You and your spouse have two kids – that’s $6,808 just handed to you.

The thing is that Alaska addresses the issue that opponents would flag instantaneously: How do we pay for this? In this case, oil companies are paying to deplete the state’s natural resources and the money is going to people.

It’s likely a UBI program would require an increase in government revenue of about 75%. And right away, critics would scream about imposing an at least 50% tax increase on the American people. Nobody wants that.

So the task facing anyone who thinks UBI might be an idea whose time has come is daunting: paying for it. Is it an effort to get the wealthy to pay a larger share of the burden after they backed Trump in order to get even more tax breaks? Or are there creative ways to generate the revenue: a national lottery, leasing fees from government land?

The idea is to have an idea – to have more than one. Finding ways to improve our lives needs to be the focus, because our warnings about what a horror Trump is went unheeded by a plurality of our countrymen.

So let’s see if CBI is something that we can push and advance – something you can be certain is not in the interest of selfish bastards like Trump and his tech bro friends. 

Because everyone likes getting stuff – if only to pay for another scotch-and-soda in the 6th inning. MAGA types might be less indignant if they’re getting it too.

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Uncategorized

DECONGESTIVE

Big changes usually happen over time – years or decades.

Which is why New York’s imposition of congestion pricing interests me so much. That and the fact that I live in the suburbs north of the city, where the pitchforks glisten and children listen to hear adults whining in the snow.

Congestion pricing – if you’re not aware of it, you probably don’t care, but I’ll describe it anyway – is a toll on vehicles entering the area of Manhattan from Battery Park to 60th Street. That includes such places as Times Square, Chinatown, Greenwich Village, Wall Street and the World Trade Center. Cars pay $9 in peak periods and $2.25 off peak.

The purpose is twofold. New York’s mass transit system desperately needs upgrading and repair. Legislators, mainly from rural and suburban areas, never fund the system adequately. So this will raise money for the work that needs to be done.

The other purpose is to relieve the unbearable congestion on Manhattan streets. Motorized vehicles were an afterthought for the city fathers of the Big Apple. So we have gridlock on many streets and the accompanying pedlock for people who have to walk around the areas. 

It’s cool that NYC is trying something so different to the American experience. I can’t think of too many changes so quickly imposed – except for the pandemic when everything was shut down and most everyone was forced to stay at home.

It’ll take a few months of analyzing the data to see if congestion pricing is successful in reducing traffic, whether that helps the air quality and if the tolls are raising the money as expected.

But congestion pricing is already considered an abject failure and an insult by the people who live here in the suburbs.

The primary reason is that they want things to stay the same. It’s great for them. They drive down to Manhattan, look for street parking to avoid paying for those $50 garages, and go door-to-door with impunity.

Pedestrians are not their problem. Foul air is not their problem. Rundown subways and clogged bus lanes are not their problem.

Suburban commuters are goaded by the lame politicians they elect. As with other things in this era, they stoke anger about things that are unfamiliar or seem hostile to the status quo.

The idea that New York might impose congestion pricing has been around for at least a decade. But the only response legislators and executives in the suburbs conjured was lawsuits. That was the plan – we’ll sue the city and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, and just the threat will force them to back down.

It didn’t work. Now what they’re hoping is that Trump, after he takes office on the 20th, will work some kind of magic to get rid of the plan.

It’s lazy, stupid  – and typical for the fatasses who worm their way into office around here.

What should they have done?

I’m not denying their right to employ pet lawyers at taxpayer expense to adjudicate a grievance. But maybe, just maybe, while they were doing that, they could have come up with actual plans to help the people they represent adapt to the new reality.

Was there any effort by New Jersey or the New York suburbs to develop alternatives to driving to midtown? Free bus service, either to the city or to the commuter rail stations outside it. New park-and-ride lots – and repromotion of existing ones – to encourage car pooling or to offer shuttles to the zone. Setting up offices in the zone to promote alternatives and provide information about congestion pricing.

No. The knee-jerk solution is the courthouse. Sue the city into submission. Don’t adapt to the reality, obliterate it.

Now, I also don’t want to let this seem as though I’m putting a halo on the people who support congestion pricing. Yes, I think it’s takes some gumption to implement a plan like this. Bravo.

But maybe, just maybe, the proponents could have made people more aware of the alternatives to driving. Yes, we know about the subway, suburban buses and commuter rail. How about creating satellite parking lots near rail stations to encourage using the train? What about using all these abandoned or nearly abandoned strip malls and shopping malls to provide commuter assistance services?

And what about expanding the use of water transportation – in a zone surrounded on three sides by rivers and a bay – to get people to where they need to be quickly and more efficiently?

One other thought: 

When I was walking through Midtown just after Christmas, I would count the cars at every crossing and multiply by $9. There were hundreds of dollars at every intersection, thousands – maybe even millions – of dollars over the course of a day.

It would be cool if, every day or every few days, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority disclosed how much money it took in – and then announced what, specifically, that money will be used for.

If it takes $350,000 to repair an escalator at Grand Central Station, tell people that the receipts for January 9 will be used for that. (I have no idea if that figure is even close, but I use it as an example.)

Let people see specifically what the money is being used for and there’s a chance you might at least shut up some of the numbskulls who keep saying the authority won’t spend the money on improvements.

That would be an out-of-the-box idea. Just like congestion pricing.

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