James Dobson died last week – and if you didn’t hear the news about that, it might be because the cheering drowned it out.
Not a lot of people in my circle of acquaintances know anything about Dobson, which is something worth discussing in itself. If you didn’t, Dobson was an evangelical author and the founder of such fundamentalist organizations as the Family Research Council and the radio program “Focus on the Family.”
The short way of describing Dobson is that everything you loathe about Christian fundamentalism in contained in the works and words of Dobson:
The school children murdered at Sandy Hook were God’s retribution for homosexuality.
Women in a marriage consent to sexual activity in exchange for the protection provided by a man.
Girls speak twice as many words a day as boys.
And the only way to get a child to behave the way you want is through painful punishment.
Dobson spread this stuff, Family Research Council claims, to 200 million people around the world. It was his way of combatting what he perceived to be the permissiveness that was swept into society beginning in the 1960s.
He was MAGA brainwashing before Trump’s ascent. He was the anti-Dr. Spock.
A persistent theme in the social media posts about Dobson’s death is the idea that his philosophies and teachings are the reasons adult kids have nothing to do with their parents.
Among the more common phrases on the Bluesky site: “rot in hell,” “rest in piss,” “good riddance.”
I found out about Dobson during the early days of the Internet when I tried to start a parenting news website called Raisin. I kept seeing press releases from Family Research Council and its mouthpiecs. Gary Bauer, a former Reagan administration official who tried to run for president in 2000 and got less than 1% of the vote in the New Hampshire Republican primary.
So that’s how I became acquainted with their extreme ideology.
As I said, most of the people I know have any idea about any of this. They’re not evangelicals and they certainly would be more apt to follow trained child psychologists’ advice about how to raise their kids.
My friends and acquaintances would be horrified by the thought that their children might be afraid of them. Their operating theory is that a child is conceived in love – and that’s the guiding principle in their upbringing.
So think about it. There’s an America where Mr. Rogers, Elmo and Arthur are the heroes. There’s another where a wooden implement is the dominant force.
It might explain what’s at the root of our super divided society. The old ways of doing things vs. the thought out way of doing things. If you can see a “Make America Great Again” philosophy in this retro view, it’s understandable.
To the point that there was actual glee in Dobson’s death at age 89.
The Romans believed that of the dead, you should speak nothing but good. To which actress Bette Davis, when hearing about the death of rival Joan Crawford, supposedly said “You should never say bad things about the dead, only good. Joan Crawford is dead. Good.”
It seems cruel to pick on dead people. I get it.
But there’s a reason the Munchkins sing “Ding Dong the Witch Is Dead” when Dorothy plops the farmhouse on the Wicked Witch of the East. Some bad stuff was going down in Oz, and until her demise, the Munchkins were suffering.
It’s a little more serious here. Thousands of adults who are troubled or estranged from their parents are wishing that some god really did strike people down with lightning. it was just too late when it came to Dobson.
The lessons I take away are twofold.
One, I think I’m OK, but I really hope I have lived my life in a way that my passing is not reason for anyone to celebrate.
Two, I can think of at least one person who’s a constant presence in our lives these days whose death might be celebrated more than Dobson’s. I, for one, have Champagne on ice for that one.
Anyone who thinks winning the lottery is the ultimate success isn’t married to someone they love.
Somehow, I think the odds are longer. There are more than 8 billion people on this planet. Out of them, I found the one.
There are two reasons I bring this up.
One is that last week was the 40th anniversary of our engagement. I’d like to say that I did something wonderful for the occasion. But, honestly, I’d forgotten the occasion when I exchanged an unused Met game ticket for the contest that night. So much for being sentimental (for those irate about this, rest assured the Mets lost.)
The other reason is the resurfacing of comments by Indiana Gov. Mike Braun. Three years ago, when he was a senator, he told inquiring reporters that the Supreme Court should leave the matter of interracial marriage to the states. It was taken – I wonder why – as an indication he’s not crazy about the idea. Soon after, he backtracked and said he didn’t understand the question and opposes all forms of racism.
That’s nice.
I suspect this remark resurfaced in light of a lot of Trump-inspired opprobrium about people who aren’t white. WItness the occupation of Washington, D.C., by red-state national guardsmen, the effort to gerrymander non-white representatives out of office and even Trump’s attempt to tell us that slavery got a bad rap that caused that no-big-deal Civil War.
My relationship – hey, my marriage – is interracial. Being different races isn’t the reason we’re married, just as being different races wasn’t a reason not to marry. It’s just that the one in 8 billion people I fell in love with happened to be from the other side of the world.
The side benefits of interracial marriage are amazing. I’ve been exposed to cultural experiences I never would have seen. My kids – who, like every offspring of interracial parents I’ve seen, are gorgeous – can tell the difference between good-and-bad dan tats and cannoli.
If there’s a minus, it’s that other people sometimes seem bothered by it.
We’ve gotten fisheyes from department store clerks in Florida, cab drivers in Hong Kong, waiters in a Brooklyn restaurant. My kids didn’t tell me until they were grown up how much antipathy they faced in our mostly white suburb.
On the other hand, we’ve been blessed with total support and pride from both our extended families.
Obviously, that isn’t always the case.
Interracial marriage wasn’t completely legal in this country until 1967, when the Supreme Court ended so-called “miscegenation” laws via the case of the Lovings of Virginia – a Black woman and white man who married. That ruling voided those laws everywhere, although it took until 2000 – 14 years into our marriage – for the last state to do so.
Most laws against interracial marriage focused on Black and white couples. Especially Black man-white woman couples that caused nightmares for those who combined racism and sexism. But there was also hostility toward all other kinds of combinations – any mix of white, Black, Latino, Asian and Indigenous people (and, of course, any mix of sexual orientation involved, but that’s a topic for another time).
When I was born, less than 5% of Americans supported interracial marriage. Even when the Loving decision came, a majority opposed the idea. Shortly after we married, it turned – more Americans supported interracial marriage than opposed it. ( I don’t think we had anything to do with it, but who knows?)
In the last Gallup survey taken four years ago, 94% of Americans approved an interracial marriage – just about a complete reversal of the percentages from the 1950s. About 1 in 5 American marriages are multiracial.
It’s a wonderful thing to see.
All kinds of combinations sitting in the stands at Citi Field, walking with their families at Disney World, attending a Beyonce concert in Los Angeles, running to a gate at O’Hare.
It also seems to drive some people crazy.
Part of what we’re seeing from Trump and the MAGA creeps is an attempt to reestablish “racial purity.” Whites with whites. Other races with their own, in a diminished stature.
It seems to make them nuts – not that they need much to achieve that – to see multiracial kids and not know whether to treat them as white or whatever other race they are. How can you profile people if they’re not exactly the ones you want to profile?
The fact is interracial marriage is contributing to what makes America truly great – the idea that we are committed to the important principles of love and inclusion. Interracial marriage has given us Barack Obama, Derek Jeter, Alicia Keys and The Rock.
It doesn’t matter if you’re the same race. It doesn’t matter if you’re a mix of two or more races.
It matters what you bring to the American table, what you contribute to make this a better country, and whether or not the person you love is that one in 8 billion you dream of finding.
The people with whom I went to high school would be floored to learn that, in my 71 years, I’ve run two New York City Marathons and more 10K and 5K races than I can remember.
They would be floored because I was not – shall we say – physically fit when I was a teenager.
I was heavy. That’s the kind word. There are lots of reasons why. But as much as my heart saw myself as athletic, my body never cooperated.
When I went off to college and then after I graduated, I saw the advantages of working out. One day, on a beach vacation to Rhode Island, I started running. I did that on and off into my late 60s. When I tore my meniscus hiking and developed arthritis, I switched to a stationary bike – although I am thinking about making my first run as a 70-year-old in the next few weeks.
The reason I mention all this is that there is nothing about what one of the women instructors on my Peleton calls my “fitness journey” that has anything to do with having taken physical education classes in school.
And so when Trump, in one of his efforts to bring back the tried-and-truly-useless of the past, declared last week that he wants the Presidential Fitness Test returned to the nation’s schools, it sounds about right.
He hasn’t the slightest clue what it would take to help our nation’s kids live healthier lives.
The Presidential Fitness Test, for those who forgot, was this four-part event that your whole gym class did. It consisted of sit-ups, squat thrusts, straddling some lines and running a lap around the school track.
The point supposedly was to show how fit you were compared not only to your classmates, but to other kids around the country.
The test was one of the stupid things about physical education in elementary and secondary schools.
Gym classes are mandatory because, supposedly, they instill the notion that kids should be fit.
But what they do is completely ridiculous.
For kids who are would-be athletes, wanting to compete in interscholastic sports, they’re 45-50 minutes of beating their chest and showing how strong, fast or whatever they are.
But for kids who need help in getting healthy, they’re a waste of time at best and, often, a chance to be humiliated or bullied.
There is no effort – none – to help kids in need find a program that will help them improve their physical well-being.
The test that Trump wants to reinstitute is about competition and superiority. He panders to bullies because he is one – and this gives them another chance to show off.
Most kids don’t need any more of that. They need to be encouraged to do healthy things. They need someone to ask them what kinds of things they’re comfortable with doing. They need to start slowly and build a love of physical activity as a way to get in touch with themselves and the world around them.
I’ve run races in my home of New York, in Florida and California and even London. Not once did I think about something that happened in a gym class that was about conforming to the rules and competing against the school jocks.
Not once was I made to feel useless, even though I came nowhere close to winning a race. As opposed to when I couldn’t do a forward roll, swing off the rings or wrestle a state champion almost 100 pounds lighter than me,
And yet, I’m willing to wager that I’m in a better place physically than 90% of the people in my gym class because I enjoy exercising.
President Barack Obama got rid of the Presidential Fitness Test because it was a complete waste of time and unhelpful.
— 10 sitcoms all based around some guy named Sheldon.
— A bunch of shows purporting to be about the FBI.
— A bunch of shows purporting to be about military investigators.
Right now, the only thing I ever watch that airs on CBS is “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” – and I only watch the clips I see on social media.
But as we all know, that’s going to end. CBS announced that it is ending the entire “Late Show” franchise. The announcement says the economics of late night television led to the decision.
And we all know that’s crap. CBS ended the show because its parent company, Paramount, is being sold to Skydance, the pet project of the Ellison family. That $8 billion deal has to be approved by a Justice Department that insists on fealty to Donald Trump.
Fealty is not the way to describe Colbert’s attitude toward Trump. It’s more like middle-fingerty.
But let’s be fair. CBS has long stopped being the “Tiffany Network” of our youth. Is there any comedy on the network of the caliber of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” or “All in the Family” or “M*A*S*H”? Is there any drama on CBS that reminds you of “Mission: Impossible”? Where are the “Young People’s Concerts” and “See It Now” and “The 20th Century” and “CBS Reports”?
Does CBS News carry the same cachet of the Murrow-Cronkite-Rather era? CBS paid $16 million to settle a suit from Trump that alleged “60 Minutes” doctored an interview with Kamala Harris – would the old CBS have caved like a sandcastle in a tidal wave?
It makes me wonder: Has the idea of television networks become obsolete?
In my younger days, networks were gathering places. News – local and global. Sports. Music. Ed Sullivan tried to entertain an entire nation in one hour. It might have been schlocky at times, but it was an effort to bring the nation together around a small screen.
Now they only seem interested in maximizing the cash generated for the least amount of effort. You used to look forward to the fall preview issue of TV Guide and the new shows on the networks. Is there still a TV Guide, much less a fall season?
Maybe it’s time to say goodbye to eyes and peacocks and whatever you call the ABC logo,
Maybe networks can be formed by confederations of artists: performers, writers, tradespeople, producers. First, teaming to create interesting new programming.
Second, forming a link among the shows that give them a shared branding. Arista or Canelot or some other fantastic name that link news and programming of the highest quality at little or no cost to viewers.
It’s complicated, but it doesn’t seem impossible. It’s what over-the-air TV was, in a way, when people my age were born.
Right now, with cable and streaming, we have more choices than ever before. But it never seems as though there’s anything GOOD on. Instead of another news panel on what goofy thing Trump said today, how about innovative investigative reports on health crises around the world, or medical breakthroughs, or re-examining historic events.
A TV confederation would need to find a way to make it economically feasible for the people working in it. That, not the technology, seems to me the biggest stumbling block.
What’s going to keep legacy networks in business is the understandable argument that camerapeople and make up artists and actors need to feed their families. If you can make it so that so that people make decent livings without the infrastructure of networks and affiliates, it would make American media more immune to the kind of ridiculous pressure it faces from the Trump gang.
I don’t have a lot of answers. I’m not sure how this would work. But I’m sick of capitulation and mediocrity.
Colbert’s cancellation isn’t the end of this – I would not bet money that he will still be on the air until his contract runs out next May. I think the Ellisons will unceremoniously end “The Late Show,” Jon Stewart and “The Daily Show” and anything resembling independent reporting at CBS News.
It will be the watery pablum that CBS puts our every night.
It’s time to revolutionize American media. To think differently.
The following are things I normally don’t contemplate in the course of a day: The University of Pennsylvania, women’s swimming.
And yet, here I am, writing about the University of Pennsylvania – henceforth to be called its sports team name, Penn, to save electrons – and women’s swimming, which I usually only watch during the Summer Olympics, if climbing or basketball isn’t on.
The reason is that Penn reached a “settlement” with the Trump administration for having allowed transgender athletes to compete for the school’s female teams. In particular, the women’s swimming team, for whom Lia Thomas set school and NCAA records three years ago – before Trump won last November’s election.
The administration claims Penn, which was adhering to NCAA policy at the time, violated Title IX rules regarding fairness in women’s participation in sports.
Penn has agreed to take away Thomas’ school records, set down its new policy in writing and apologize to women who competed against Thomas. In return, the Department of Education has agreed to release $175 million in federal funding for which Penn had already qualified.
So, to start off, let me say that while I didn’t attend Penn, I personally know some really smart people who did.
I also know that Trump attended Penn, but given what I’ve seen from other grads, he didn’t picked up anything from history, literature or any other required courses. And I do wonder how many fellow attendees of Penn’s renowned business school, Wharton, have bankrupted six casinos?
Anyway, here’s my first thought: Thomas started competing in college as a male swimmer, and made Penn’s men’s team. After freshman year, she came out as transgender. She was unable to compete in women’s races until her transitioning hormone treatments took hold.
Thomas broke no rules that existed when all this happened. Because of the changes in her body, her race times slowed – although they were still fast enough to be among the top female swimmers in the nation.
Some of her teammates didn’t want her on the team. But some of them did. So did several swimmers from competitor schools.
Once Thomas won the women’s 500-yard freestyle at the NCAAs, there was an effort to take the victory away from her. And any OIympic hopes she had were dashed when swimming’s international governing body banned transgender women except for those who transitioned before puberty.
So let’s pretend – and damn I wish we really could – that Trump didn’t win last November. That he and the Republicans somehow incensed by this didn’t put their thumbs on the scale.
How could the government claim that Penn violated Title IX or any law if what they did was legitimate in 2022? Think of it this way – if New York recriminalizes marijuana in 2027 after establishing state-regulated weed shops, will the government prosecute the lines of people who go to the cannibis store in Nyack every weekend?
That’s what really troubles me about this whole thing. Trump is setting up a situation where things that were legal in the past can now not just be declared newly illegal, but prosecuted under laws that didn’t exist when the action occurred.
Meaning that you have to predict what’s going to make MAGAs upset two years from now so that you don’t violate some future law that you don’t know about.
And that’s really difficult. Because worrying about an epidemic of transgendering never seemed to be either in step with reality or much of a threat to society.
I mean, as long as someone doesn’t infringe on your rights, why do you care how they identify? I’m for being happy – if someone is going to be happier transitioning, why should they be stopped or, worse, criminalized? People have been crossing gender lines as long as people have memories.
But it’s really not about gender bending. It’s about control. It’s about deciding that your attitudes toward life need to be everybody else’s. Particularly if you can benefit from it financially or politically.
That’s what happened here. Penn broke no laws. It abided by the rules at the time. Had it barred Thomas for whatever reason, the school would have been in violation of the rules.
And yet, because a new regime with new rules took power, the school has to grovel to get the money it had already been granted. Not only that, it has to “apologize” to athletes who competed against Thomas.
Now here’s the part that really, really bothers me:
Why didn’t Penn stand up to this?
Does the school really believe it acted wrongly or in bad faith when it let Lia Thomas swim? Did it do so with malicious intent to denigrate women’s sports, even with the support of some of their athletes?
Did the school know, when Thomas transitioned, how the hormone therapy would affect her ability to compete? Did anybody – including Thomas – know for a fact that she would retain some of her athletic skill?
And, finally, does anybody actually belief that men, in order to win some kind of athletic recognition, would subject themselves to the psychological and physical trauma of transitioning from male to female?
Is the money that big a deal? Have we become so afraid of the legal process that we fear the consequences – even if we did nothing wrong?
It’s not just Penn and it’s not just about this issue. Just this morning, Paramount, parent of CBS, agreed to pay $16 million because Trump claims “60 Minutes” manipulated an interview with Kamala Harris to his detriment. The company agreed because it wants Trump’s government to approve a merger that should be decided on its merits, not who got paid.
Columbia capitulated. Law firms capitulated. He’s trying to get Harvard to do it. There’s quite a collection of elite roadkill.
I get it – Trump perceives himself as having the power over everything. But he doesn’t – unless it’s given to him.
How do we stiffen spines for a fight to preserve this country? That’s the kind of affirming therapy the institutions we’ve thought of as the protectors of freedom need desperately.
Last week, I contended that my generation of baby boomers is a disappointing lot.
This week, a generation of younger New Yorkers agreed.
That’s what I make of Zohran Mamdani’s surprising win in the Democratic primary of mayor of New York. Actually, Mamdani hasn’t won yet, but he’s well first in the first tabulation of ballots in the city’s ranked-choice voting, and runner-up Andrew Cuomo already conceded.
If he wins the general election in November – he’ll be favored but is not a lock – the 33-year-old Mamdani would be one of the youngest mayors in the city’s 400-year history. Jeez, he’s younger than my daughter.
And that – more than any other reason – might be why Mamdani shocked the city’s political establishment.
At age 71, there’s nothing I can drink or eat that gives me the boost of energy from walking the streets of New York. Like so many other great cities, it’s where young people flock to eat, to listen, to play, to watch, to have fun. It moves fast. Its active residents want nothing more than to be able to move at their own pace without encumbrance.
Most of all, it’s a city tired of being encumbered by a generation that believes tall buildings and luxury define greatness.
New York is about waiting in line 40 minutes for a $5 roast pork takeout dinner in Chinatown. New York is about sitting by the Central Park Reservoir while a four-person jazz combo performs a stunning rendition of “Embraceable You.” New York is about art around you, strange outfits, unisex bathrooms and the quest for the perfect pizza slice.
Mamdani seems to understand that.
The people in the Democratic establishment don’t. They think they’re living in a city that requires the approval of the monied class to fund development. They fall back on people with well-known names and older celebrities as if they – and not the young people in pubs and bodegas – are the city’s future.
I don’t live in New York City – I live north and west, in a place that’s trying its damnedest to be nothing like New York City. But because the people who live in the ‘burbs often depend on the city, they resent it.
That’s all crystallized in the congestion pricing debate. Nobody around here wants to pay $15 to drive south of 60th Street in Manhattan, and they see a toll for doing that as a violation of their privilege to use their car wherever the hell they want.
People who live in the congestion pricing zone love it. There’s less traffic, making the streets safer to cross. There’s less noise and pollution. Less horn honking. Buses run faster. Ambulances have fewer obstacles.
Mamdani seems to stand for ideas like that. He wants to find a way to make bus service free and faster.
He supports the idea of collective city-run supermarkets – not, as residents of Park Slope in Brooklyn know, a completely novel idea. This way, those who are less affluent don’t have to pay the gouged prices you can find at a Morton Williams or Gristedes – supermarket chains you and your wallet should be grateful aren’t in your area.
Mamdani’s win has shaken up New York politics and has the TV talking heads chattering. It has Republicans laser focused on demonizing him in order to get one of its longshots to squeak through. And it has the national Democrats in a quandary – do we embrace or ignore this guy?
So here are four thoughts:
— TRUMP: If you don’t think Mamdani’s win has something to do with Trump, you aren’t paying attention.
This is absolutely New York Democrats wanting not to feel powerless in the fight against a dictatorship. This is absolutely an entire segment of the populace saying that we’re giving up on trying to triangulate against Trump, let’s take the stupid bastard on.
Trump knows it. He went after Mamdani in one of those whatever-he-calls-a-Truth-Social posts.
Good. Let’s take the freakin’ gloves off.
— THE MIDDLE EAST: When I was young, there was a beer commercial highlighting New York’s diversity. Each had a tagline – for instance, for Italians, it would be “In New York City, where there are more than Italians than in the whole of Naples, more people drink Rheingold…”
For Jewish New Yorkers, it was “In New York City, where there are more Jews than in the whole of Israel, more people drink Rheingold…”
That was true back then. It’s not now, but New York City is as great as it is in part because of Jewish influence. New Yorkers schlep, they buy tchotchkes, they eat knishes – and all 8 million of them know what those phrases mean.
So Israel is a big issue here, much more so than in any other locality in the U.S. and maybe the world.
Mamdani is Muslim. That’s the background to the fact that he doesn’t support what the Netanyahu government has done in Gaza. He didn’t dance around it. He made one unfortunate comment that gave opponents ammunition to say he’s antisemitic.
He’s not. Opposing Netanyahu and what’s happened in Gaza is not anti-Israel. As I said last week – and stand by – no one has done as much to reignite antisemitism in the world as Benjamin Netanyahu.
I suspect Mamdani will be more assertive about supporting Israeli’s right to exist as much as he supports the Palestinians’ right to self-determination – he kind of mumbled that in his appearance of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” this week.
Importantly, Mamdani garnered a lot of support from Jewish voters who are as heartsick about Gaza as they are about what Hamas did to kids and the elderly in October 2023. And his collaboration with one of his opponents who is Jewish, city comptroller Brad Lander, is meant to show that Mamdani will work with others to make the city a more affordable place to live.
THE DEVIL (aka SOCIALISM): Americans are conditioned to believe socialism is evil. It’s something the wealthiest among us have pushed since the Gilded Age.
In particular, because they take on the mantle of being “socialist,” communist states such as the Soviet Union and China are what are sold as being the outcome of turning toward socialism.
That’s not right. At all. We already have some vestiges of socialism. Defense contractors and farmers receive subsidies from the federal government. Most public transportation is run by local government agencies.
That’s not going to stop Mamdani’s opponents from conjuring images of empty store shelves and fleeing businesses if he’s elected.
But the real socialism Mamdani proposes is best seen in his plans for small businesses. He wants the city to foster small businesses – provide subsidies, cut fees and fines, offer mentoring programs to get new enterprises going.
That is what people want.
New Yorkers may have swallowed hard and realized they’re socialists after all. Now those who can’t stand that idea – think hedge fund managers and other moguls – need to decide if they want to do without being in the city.
If so, here’s my thought: Don’t let the limo door hit you on the way out.
DEMOCRATS: We’re now five-plus months into the dark world of Trumpdom II. Sternly worded letters, lawsuits, those endless fund-raising e-mails haven’t done much to make the Democratic party more palatable to the people who rejected it last November. For all of Trump’s plunge in polling, there’s been no political coalescing force.
Maybe Mamdani is the answer. But not in the way Democrats like to think.
The lazy thing would be to think the country is ready for a turn left as exemplified by Mamdani. And it does seem as though New York City might be ready for that after years of being run by supposedly business friendly types: Rudy Giuliani, Mike Bloomberg and Eric Adams.
But what Mamdani did was tap into what New Yorkers want for their city. His little ads were entertaining – watch the one about Halalinflation for a sense of what really matters.
Instead of preaching from a hill, Mamdani and his supporters traveled the city and understood the problems. And that’s what Democrats around the country need to do.
They do not need to mimic Mamdani’s policy ideas. They need to listen first and then adopt a plan of action that fits the community.
It might very well be more conservative. People in western Pennsylvania or Scottsdale or northern Minnesota might have their own unique issues that require action.
Listen and respond. Get a plan together. Adapt to your constituency. Be smart and engaged about it. No knee-jerk, one-size-fits-all solutions. I love New York, but I don’t think central Wisconsin should be a rural version of it.
In the midst of 100-degree heat and the casual “let’s lob a few bombs into Iran” during the past week, Mamdani’s primary win seems like a moment to cheer. It will certainly make for a little brightness among the gloom – especially if he can further build his coalition from now until November.
Baby boomers – that includes me – screwed the pooch.
We talked a good game when we were young. We were going to change the world. We were going to make it fairer. Make love, not war. War is not healthy for children, etc. The arc of the universe is long and bends toward justice, right?
All that stuff.
But for all the education we received at a much better price than other generations, for all the protests and clever music and revolutionary art and tech savvy, we bombed on two of the most important things we could have done.
One is immigration.
Maybe I’m naive, but this is not a hard problem to solve. And, in fact, reasonable politicians of both parties tried several times.
America needs immigrants. As “Hamilton” infers, they get tough jobs done. Sometimes without the credit they deserve. But they do.
But we also need to be careful. That’s the hangover from 9/11. People coming into this country intending to kill us. We need to prevent that.
Still, it is doesn’t seem intractable. Figure out a system that makes citizenship attainable over time and let people come in. Keep tabs on them. If they’re lost, you’ve got a problem – but most of the people who’ve crossed our borders want to live peaceably in the United States.
The other thing we messed up is the Middle East. In particular, Israel.
For its entire 77+ year history, Israel and its Jewish population have faced hostility surrounding it. I couldn’t imagine what it’s like to live in a country without a moment’s peace ever – although I fear we’re learning now.
The Middle East doesn’t seem that difficult. Israel gets a homeland for a Jewish state. Palestinians get someplace that they run themselves. Anybody breaks the peace, everybody in the world comes down on them.
OK, that’s a little simplistic. But it’s ridiculous that a part of the world special to more than a billion people – Jews, Christians and Muslims – should be a tinder box instead of a pilgrimage destination.
Reasonable people see that.
The problem here is that despite all the efforts made to sort this out – Camp David and Oslo among the more successful – there’s no rest for the hostility weary.
And the reason is this: For all the billions of the world who want peace in the region, there’s a de facto coalition that doesn’t.
At the center of the coalition are two forces that can’t stand each other: Hamas and its radical allies in the region, and Benjamin Netanyahu and the Gulf States on the region.
Yeah, these two sides – and the partners who back them – are eager to fight to the death – preferably the death of guys they’re fighting. These partners include – on one side or the other – Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia and the Trump administration.
So when those of us who think that two states – Israel and some formation of a Palestinian government – are the only possible peaceful solution, these two sides that hate each other coalesce to stop that idea cold.
Benjamin Netanyahu saw Hamas’ horrific attack on Israeli civilians in October 2023 as an opportunity to divert attention from the criminal investigations he faced and rally forces against any kind of peace deal with Palestinians.
And by being heavy-handed in dealing with the Palestinians living in Gaza, he gave a rallying point to Hamas.
So whenever some idiot throws a brick with the words “Free Palestine” through a synagogue window, know that Netanyahu would rather you do that than shout the words “two states.”
Because these people are an all-or-nothing coalition. They want you cleared out of the way so that they can get on with the ultimate battle for control of the holiest piece of land in the world.
There’s a solution, but it’s not going to happen. Not now, anyway.
Last weekend, millions of Americans came together to tell Donald Trump he’s a jerk. To battle his desire to be some kind of king or dictator.
What if large numbers of people around the world joined together with most of the world’s Jews and Muslims and said they won’t support anything but a two-state solution to this problem?
You see, Joe Biden’s failure here was worrying that he wouldn’t have the support to challenge Netanyahu’s wag-the-dog campaign. And worrying that if he didn’t give full-throated support to Netanyahu, he’d be accused of abetting Hamas – the terrorists who kidnapped children and elderly people, and held them for nearly two years or killed them.
The problem is that Americans are so distracted by what Trump has done in the past five months that they’re just overwhelmed by BS. And as awful as things can get in the Middle East – Trump is itching to drop bombs on Tehran to prove he still has a cock – Americans are besieged. By these idiotic tariffs, the potential gutting of their healthcare, the possibility that no one will come help them when hurricanes batter our shore, and the grabbing of neighbors off the street by secret police.
Maybe it seems as though I got away from my original point – that we, as baby boomers, failed.
I didn’t. We should have solved this problem. We had chances all the way into the Obama administration. We couldn’t muster the will or imagination to beat these people back, just as we couldn’t muster the will or imagination to overcome the forces that profit from trying to deport undocumented immigrants.
We didn’t do it. And now, the all-or-nothing coalition holds the reins, ready for the dogfights they’ve wanted for years.
We kinda knew, prior to January 20, what would happen.
Trump put together a collection of some of the worst people who’ve ever lived in this country. And that’s saying something – if their heirs donated to Trump’s campaign, Benedict Arnold, Nathan Bedford Forrest and Al Capone would have been pardoned and/or given jobs.
This collection of pond scum set out with a plan. Go after as many stable, peaceful, prosperous, honorable and – here’s the key word – diverse elements of American life that don’t support their warped view of America. Sow chaos, pick fights with entities that have been as removed from the title “enemy” as you can imagine.
Harvard. Canada. Childhood vaccinations. Bruce Springsteen. Solar energy. Women professionals. School kids of color.
And, of course, Los Angeles.
Now, to be clear, L.A. is not even close to being my favorite city in the United States. It’s not even in the top ten. Seven-lane freeways are an abomination. The Dodgers abandoned the good people of Brooklyn. I’m actually surprised there’s something they consider a downtown.
But there are people who love L.A. Not just Randy Newman. They like the quirkiness of having lots of different cultures mesh together into a spectacle for the senses – music, art, food, clothing, language. Millions of people who work hard, struggle to put food on their families’ tables and enjoy the occasional kimchi taco.
Which is why the city is one of the hubs of resistance to what Trump’s cuckoo coterie wants. Because it is, with Miami and New York, a center of immigrant culture in the United States, it is an easy target. And why so many Angelinos are out in the streets trying to stop ICE, the American Gestapo, from its heinous raids.
Destroying the immigrant idea that built this damn country is their touchstone. MAGAts act as though their families sprouted from the heartland soil and don’t have a long boat trip or plane ride in their DNA.
What they’ve been terrified of is the fact that the United States has gotten closer to becoming a majority minority country. That some coalition of Black, Latino, Asian and indigenous people will soon make up 50.01% of the population.
And they think that coalition, should it so choose, would wreak on strictly Caucasian people some of the despicable acts that Caucasians inflicted on them since arriving here. Slavery, mass deportation and exclusion acts can go both ways.
For now, the question is how to combat these manufactured outrages, the ones Trump and the gang conjured as he stewed after Joe Biden beat him handily in 2020.
Well, one thing might be to keep reminding him that he lost in 2020. Trump has been plotting revenge against the whole country – not just the states that didn’t support him – since then. Some 81 million of us rejected him and the 74 million who did vote for him didn’t do enough to ensure his return. Even winning last year didn’t make up for that loss, that failure to adore him.
But rehashing 2020 is hardly a solution to the problem we face now.
As far as Los Angeles goes, continuing the protests, even in the face of the world’s strongest military, is paramount. What’s also true is that the protests can’t be violent – Trump wants nothing more than to bully protesters and show off the force he believes he controls.
Making the people behind the ICE masks pariahs – actually, that would speed up what the rest of their life is going to be like – is one course of action. In Los Angeles and other cities, shun these people. Their money is no good in your store or they need to identify themselves fully in order to use their credit cards.
I thought about whether or not any family members of ICE agents should be targets. Normally, I would find that heinous. But these are the people who have taken children from their parents and parents from their children. They’ve raided graduations. They’ve raided the legal proceedings that immigrants are required to attend.
It would be interesting to see how they would feel about being on the other side of their bile.
But then we would be stooping to their level. We would become the same kind of unthinking, heartless being that is defiling the streets of our cities. So leave their families alone – just pick on the ICEes.
This Saturday, June 14, Trump is orchestrating a military parade through Washington. He’ll tell you it’s to celebrate the Army’s 250th anniversary. It’s actually to celebrate his 79th birthday.
It’s easy to say that you shouldn’t go. But I suspect somebody is going to do something to disrupt it. In any case, there are protests around the nation to counter this massive ego trip. Join, if you don’t already have plans.
My preferred course has always been to come up with a strong positive alternative to Trumpism. A plan that would actually make people’s lives better – accelerating a lot of the ways the world has improved in my lifetime. Promoting clean energy and improved transportation. Health care for all. Support for families no matter how they’re constituted.
But Trump has the money and the manipulated Congressional support to let his mass despicabilities take over the agenda. People are hurting.
Can you imagine what it’s like to be an ICE agent in June 2025?
Probably not, because I imagine the people who read this come equipped with compassion, intelligence, scruples, understanding of democracy and other attributes of positive humanity.
But we are people who see that all of us are real human beings, with imperfections and such. So I guess, intellectually, we know that the ICE agents we see committing these despicable acts against vulnerable immigrants are, uh, people.
So what do you think it takes to be part of the American Gestapo?
There are, according to the Department of Homeland Security, about 20,000 people who work in various capacities for ICE. That’s one in every 17,500 Americans.
Of course, that doesn’t include the local law enforcement types who want to show they can be among the big federal boys.
I can’t imagine anybody who works at ICE was particularly good at civics in school – assuming, of course, they went to school. Maybe that’s a big assumption. They missed the classes about the Constitution – or the classes they had focused only on the Second Amendment to the exclusion of the other 26 (or 27 if you count the Equal Rights Amendment).
When confronted with the concept of due process applying to all persons – you know, that Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment stuff – their brains find it difficult to grasp the concept. So they ignore it – it’s probably easier than actually reading less than 100 words – which might stretch the extent of their vocabulary.
Being fashion forward probably disqualifies you from ICE. You’ve got to wear those drab ersatz military-style outfits as befits wannabe warriors. After bemoaning mask-wearing during the pandemic as freedom-infringing, you have to wear a black one during a long day of scooping up kids and mothers.
Most people in legitimate law enforcement go after what we used to think of as real crimes such as stealing money. That was, of course, before Trump pardoned people convicted of fraud because they or their families like him.
But those legitimate law enforcers are usually pretty proud of who they are and what they do. They’re thought of as brave and even-handed.
So they put stickers in their car saying they’re cops. They show up at festivals and parades. They’re the helpers Mr. Rogers told kids to look for in times of trouble.
What if those kids in trouble listened to Mr. Rogers and ran up to an ICE agent? I imagine they’d be cursing the nicest man in history in their native language from the friendly confines of a South Sudan internment camp.
On Career Day at school, the kids of legitimate law enforcement officers show up with their Moms and Dads in uniform.
What do ICE agent parents do at Career Day? Show up in their khakis, shades and masks? Demonstrate what it feels like to experience a flash grenade? Tell the kids to make sure they have all their papers in order – and take a few with them if they look a little scared?
Assuming that people who work for ICE are family men and the occasional woman.
I can’t imagine they go to normal bars and church socials to meet people. Who wants to go out with somebody who might send you to El Salvador if the relationship goes sour?
That’s why there’s a lot of thought that ICE agents are incels – involuntary celebates. That makes some sense.
Unless, of course, there’s some app ICE agents use for meeting suitable mates. You swipe left and someone who loves to be dominated shows up as the mate of your dreams. Those handcuffs and twist ties aren’t just for lawn mowers, hamburger cooks and housekeepers. Good times.
And here’s the part about working for ICE that is going to make it unique:
You see, one day, this madness will end. You and I are determined to make that happen. We’ll be about the business of repairing the damage that Trump, Musk, the saps in Congress, the Christian Nationalists and your neighbor with the “Daddy’s Home” flag (I’ve actually seen that!) have done.
These ICE agents will still be of employment age. Except who is going to hire them? An employer and co-workers will always know that so-and-so grabbed defenseless people, hurled them into vans, denied them their rights, and sent them away from the lives they peaceably created and the people they helped.
Not to mention all the days these people will miss from work for testifying in the lawsuits that will brought against them by the hundreds. It’s hard to be a security guard at Walmart when you’re in court four days a week.
Normally, I have a soft spot for people with troubled lives. There but for the grace of God, et cetera.
Except I know I would never betray other human beings and the ideals of American democracy. Not for any amount of money – including the $40,000 bonuses Republicans are trying to give them.
So do I feel bad for these people? Nah.
Do they deserve all the opprobrium they will face for the rest of their lives?
When he isn’t busy pardoning fraudsters whose family members donate money to him, Donald Trump has the wrecking crew he assembled as a cabinet working to destroy this country.
Commercially exploiting federal land. Denying the effectiveness of vaccination in combatting disease and illness. Pissing off our traditional allies. Attempting to destroy one of the world’s most prestigious universities.
It’s like what the team the arch-villain in a superhero movie conjures. Except I don’t see any Bruce Waynes or Clark Kents in the neighborhood.
And the Democratic Party, the force best suited in this moment to fight back, is engaged in circular firing squad mode.
But Elissa Slotkin, the recently elected junior senator from Michigan, has one idea that might start to turn things around.
Slotkin suggests that the Democrats form a shadow Cabinet – a team of experts that mimics the roles of the actual team of horribles Trump assembled.
While a shadow Cabinet would have none of the enforcement power of its MAGA stooge counterpart, it would help give the Democratic Party something it needs desperately: a plan.
The “secretaries” would help to develop policies – in the same way the party develops a platform just before the quadrennial convention. Those policies would serve as alternatives to what Trump and his henchpeople are doing to America’s government and image.
For instance, with the Republicans seemingly determined to undermine Medicaid and strip it away from millions of people who need it, a shadow Health and Human Services Secretary could propose an expansion of the Affordable Care Act – aka Obamacare. That would further reduce medical costs for all Americans and stand in stark contrast.
Put that out there and see what happens. There’s a chance it could force the MAGA idiots to reconsider their plan – they’ll argue it’s socialism or whatever, but they’ll feel some pressure. As opposed to now, when all they’re hearing is that what they’re doing is bad.
Come up with an alternative that someone articulate can sell – and it doesn’t look like “he said, she said” politics as usual.
That’s the thing. The Democrats have an advantage in that most of the people who speak as leaders of the party can do so in complete sentences. From Barack Obama to AOC to Pete Buttigieg to Tim Walz, the party knows how to communicate effectively.
But a shadow Cabinet should not contain people who might be running for the White House in 2028. Or, obviously Obama – unlike the Republicans, Democrats take Constitutional term limits seriously.
Not sure exactly who that is just yet. But it could be AOC, Buttigieg, maybe Walz, Gretchen Whitmer, Gavin Newsom or Kamala Harris.
That doesn’t mean there isn’t talent to make the Democrats’ case.
Politico recently gave 21 names for a Democratic shadow Cabinet. Some of them are outright silly. Ben Stein is a hardcore Republican and I’d bet money he voted for Trump; just because his character in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” bemoans tariffs doesn’t mean he’ll stand up against them in real life. He’s also 80 years old.
And Jon Stewart, while incredibly potent as an advocate for veterans, is much more effective as a nonpartisan lampooner than serving as a party spokesman.
But some of the other names are interesting.
Letitia James, New York’s attorney general, has stood up to Trump before and even won a civil fraud case against him and his company. She is a no-nonsense law enforcement advocate and – as a native Brooklynite – isn’t afraid to speak her mind.
Samantha Power knows how foreign aid makes our country safer. She headed USAID when it was giving money to fight disease and hunger around the world – something Trump and Marco Rubio, his Secretary of State, feel is too “woke.” Having her out front as a defender of America’s generosity and compassion is a visual I’d be proud to see.
However, the personalities aren’t important. As I’ve said since January 20, the Democrats can’t just be against Trump. They have to stand for something more than returning to the status quo. They need to understand that people are frustrated with the direction of the country and want their lives to be easier.
Joe Biden understood that, but his limitations made that hard to sell – he couldn’t go to a lot of college campuses or big stadium rallies the way Barack Obama could. The Democrats need a plan of action and a bunch of articulate leaders of all varieties to go out and spell out a better future – and then watch Trump stew as those plans catch fire with the public.
It’ll take some work. But it’ll be worth it. Often bad things lurk in shadows, but they provide shade from a burning sun. And right now, the America we love is getting scorched – a little Democratic shadowing could help.
SUBJECTISM 