A Brief for Israel

It is April 5th, 2024.  But this needs to go upfront.  As an American who numbers Jews among my very best friends, as an American who is a sincere friend of the state of Israel, I am nonetheless deeply disturbed and horrified at the number of civilian deaths – even as "collateral damage" in wartime – in Gaza at the hands of the IDF under PM Benjamin Netanyahu.  But for 75 years, the policy and practice of Palestinians  – whether under Hamas, the Palestinian Authority or the Palestine Liberation Organization – has been the deliberate targeting of Israeli civilians.  Where was the outrage?

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While many of us bemoan the ascendancy of Benjamin Netanyahu (Israel's Donald Trump?) and his supporters, you have to wonder: if you were an Israeli Jew, would you still be patient with the daily threats of bloodshed posed by Palestinians?  Yes, Israel has over-reacted to Palestinian violence, but what would you have done?

It is my conviction that a lot of anti-Israel sentiment in these United States, especially among young people, is due to a lack of historical perspective.

Fixing a Broken System in 800 words

This piece was written to be an Op-Ed.  The Washington Post has rejected it.  I will take it down when and if some newspaper publishes it.

Bias and Donald Trump

This piece is too long for a letter to the editor and too short for an Op Ed piece or even a Ben Paine blog post.  Here it is anyway.   When I write I publish.

On September 11th, 2023, the NY Times published an article: Trump Seeks Recusal of Judge in Federal Elections Case, as she had shown bias against him.  In the end, can Donald Trump get a fair trial anywhere?  Can this, or any, judge sit in judgment on Donald Trump without bias?

Who Can You Trust?

I have a young friend whose politics are informed by a lack of trust in government, a position that I am sympathetic toward.  Our presidents have lied to us, especially about the most momentous thing of all – going to war!  Woodrow Wilson lied to us, FDR lied to us, LBJ and Richard Nixon lied to us.  Donald Trump lied to us when he need not have.  But mistrusting the establishment and/or the mainstream media has its perils, like compelling you to ask: who do you trust?  One answer is, no one: but that kind of nihilism leads nowhere.  Another answer is the anti-establishment.  But who are they?  Donald Trump, the Prince of Lies, has tens of millions of Americans who trust him, despite the clear evidence that no one else in the American tradition has ever been accused, justly, of SO treating the simple truth like poison. 

Perspective

Both Carl Sagan and his god son Neil deGrasse Tyson had “cosmic perspectives.”  That is, they thought about the cosmos, the universe, everything.  Although they both were professional astronomers/astrophysicists, their cosmic perspective forced them to include physics, chemistry, biology, zoology, botany, and a host of human sciences in their quiver of useful knowledge.  As scientists in the public eye, who never ceased to enjoy teaching us stuff we didn’t know, their true roles were as advocates for scientific literacy.

On Being Trans

Miss Netherlands, a trans woman

How long did it take Dick Cheney, vice president under George W Bush and a real “conservative” Republican, to change his thinking about gay rights when his own daughter came out?  What do you think?  A minute?  20 seconds?  Somewhere between 4% and 10% of us are not straight.  That is, 20 million of us are not straight.  Which means that most extended families have a gay member or two.  And when that person came out, the family got behind him or her.  Without blinking an eye.  The moron that didn’t was immediately ostracized from the rest of the family.  This huge number of families with gay members explains why gay rights is no longer an issue among presidents, senators, House members, and most SCOTUS justices.

Our Secular Nation

The United States is a secular nation, not a Christian nation, and this blog post is an explanation why this is OK and even necessary, even if you are a Christian.

If we were a Christian nation, what would that look like?  According to latest (2020) estimates, 69.7% of us are Christian. 

“See, that proves we are a Christian nation!”

Powers, Rights, Privileges

In a constitutionally limited representative democratic republic,

• A power belongs to a government, to compel a non-governmental entity to perform some action or to prevent a non-governmental entity from performing some action.  The sole powers that any such government has are always defined and limited by a constitution, either federal or state.
• A right belongs to an individual or a natural person, to do or not to do as he sees fit.  A right is absolute protection against governmental power. 

The U.S. Bill of Rights

Dear Reader:

It's been 10 years, maybe 30 years or more, since you read, and thought about, our Bill of Rights.  It's time for a refresher.  At less than 1000 words, it should take you five minutes to read this post.  Take ten minutes, at least, to understand what you are reading.

The Right to Bigotry

You have a right to be a bigot.  PERIOD!  A legal, Constitutional right to be a bigot!

But what exactly does that mean?  All it means is that you may not be imprisoned or fined or in any tangible way penalized – by the federal government, by your state government, or your local government – for being a bigot.  You may lose friends and you may lose your job or your livelihood, but you have a legal, Constitutional right to be a bigot.  Indeed, the biggest loser is bound to be the bigot himself – is that you? – but he is legally free to do so.

What is Constitutional, anyway?

Constitutional is a podcast, check it out!

I am pretty certain that I have addressed this maddening question elsewhere, but maybe not in my blog, perhaps in my book, To My Countrymen.  But without going back to see what I have already written that you cannot find by reading my blog, I feel compelled to address this important issue here and now.

Many Americans are pretty sure what is and what is not Constitutional, what is or is not a Constitutional RIGHT.  I believe that they are wrong most of the time, especially those who like to throw around the words “That IS (or is NOT) Constitutional” on a daily basis.  If pressed, they would declare that they have the right to their opinion about what is or is not Constitutional.  But they are wrong!  They have no more right to an opinion about this question than they have a right to an opinion on the question of: how much is two plus two?  But, of course, Constitutional rights are not so rigidly defined as the rules of counting.  But we peasants have no right to an opinion here.

Stupidity: A Rant

Stupidity is a Choice.  There, I’ve said it!

But, before I get into the meat (sic) of this essay, let me clarify the literal (dictionary) distinction between ignorant and stupid.  An ignorant person does not know stuff, a stupid person has a sub-par brain.  Both words are insults, stupid is much worse. Partly because stupid can’t be fixed.  At least, that is how wordsmiths think of these words.

Before writing this post, I figured that I should discover if anyone else had said something similar.  So, Googling “stupidity is a choice,” here is what I found (in author order):

Liberals and Conservatives

Just like biological organisms, words evolve.  That is, they change their meanings over time.  Part of this evolution is natural, reacting to a new environment; and part is artificial, where some alter the use of words for partisan purposes.  So it is with these most important and most maligned political words, liberal and conservative.  In this essay, I will attempt to demonstrate the evolution of these words’ meanings.

The goto place for a discussion of word origins is the Oxford English Dictionary (the OED to scholars) (work began on the OED in 1857 and is ongoing).  Unhappily, access to the online OED is by subscription only, at $100 / year.  So, I chose the second-best online option: the Online Etymology Dictionary.

So, let’s get to work and examine these two most consequential words in all of politics, liberal and conservative.  Indented paragraphs are lifted without editing from the Online Etymology Dictionary.

A Civics Class

If you did not suffer through a Civics class while you attended high school, you would be forgiven if you did not know:

• That the birthday of the United States of America is July 4^th, 1776
• That our national flag has 50 stars, that they are white on a blue background, and that there are 50 stars because there are currently 50 states in the union
• That our national flag has 13 stripes, that they alternate white and red, and that 13 is the number of the original colonies

Those Memphis Blues Again

His name is Tyre Nichols.  Was Tyre Nichols.  Five Memphis cops murdered a black man.  Again.  Another.  Again.  The cops are being charged with second degree murder.  I guess that’s progress, of sorts.

 

In the year of our Lord 2022, last year, in the USA, cops killed 1176 civilians, up from a record 1055 in 2021.  While cops killed more white men than black men, black men were three times more likely to end up in the morgue (as there are many more white men than black men).

 

In the Memphis incident, the five cops were black.  As if black cops can’t be racist against their own race.

 

Power in Politics

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?

Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

-- from the King James Version of the Holy Bible, Mark 8, verses 36 & 37