The slow demise of unvarnished facts on the YBR. Is truth on life-support?

I am neither a scholar nor a sage. In truth, no one gives a rat’s ass what I have to say, but say it I will even if no one reads this blog post.

In the spirit of being transparent, I will admit without embarrassment that I am a fact-checker despite the fact that I am continually told that I should not let facts get in the way of a good story. Should it matter if the family event happened on Thanksgiving in 1982 or if it happened at Easter in 1983? It shouldn’t matter as long as the purpose of the story is told as folklore, but not to “prove” something of some importance. That’s when facts matter. But, what is just as important (in my opinion) is if the facts are
unvarnished and not tainted with prejudice. I would also add that a fact not told is as bad as a lie.

I am an ardent believer and supporter of “facts” when those “facts,” after being scrutinized without prejudice, are deemed to be “unvarnished.” Then and only then can a just “argument” be made.

Arguments are actually meant to clear the air and bring about change that is true and just. Unfortunately, arguments today fail to take “all” the facts into account. Despite the “fact” that I might want something to
be “true,” I have to be willing to fully evaluate the unvarnished facts before what I believe is actually true,

I love to harvest facts. I harvest them by listening to different voices. I do not limit my reading and research to one set of “beliefs.” Of late, I am of the opinion that we have lost the ability to find out what is
true. We are more interested in “proving” our point, instead of finding or learning the truth.*

The airwaves, internet, and print are filled with stories coming out on the June Sixth hearings and the Hunter Biden Laptop. In both cases, I don’t believe either the arbiters of the hearings or the investigators of the laptop are out to find out what is true. I fear that in both cases the decision of what is “true” was decided long before any hearings or investigations began.

We have become so divided that to use a trite expression we can’t see the forest for the trees. I listen to the ladies of the View and to the WABC radio hosts. etc. While I admit to being “View-sided,” I don’t take sides before I can harvest the facts. The problem with many facts is that they are not sagebrush. Facts have long roots that run deep. There is no denying, again in my opinion, that what happened at our Nation’s Capitol on January 6, 2021 was a travesty. The how and why it happened needed to be investigated. But, instead of an unprejudiced hearing, a mob mentality often tainted the proceedings. 

There have been a plethora of “facts” divulged by the “witnesses” at the hearings. Is what they said the truth and nothing but the truth? Or were some of the “right” questions not asked because the answers might have challenged some of the other facts? 

The same logic applies to the Hunter Biden laptop investigation. If the investigators are only out to prove they are “right,” more than likely they won’t be asking questions that don’t fit their scenario.  There is, I “believe,” a greater truth in all that is happening today. And that truth is we are so divided and so angry that we have become blind to the truth. Hatred is killing all of us. If we can no longer be objective when it comes to finding the truth, we will be a nation built on a mountain of opinions.

And that I believe is our current state of affairs. Statements are made by politicians, broadcasters, and people in the media in a “factual” tone. Many of us take these statements to be solid, unvarnished facts when in truth they are not.

Call me an “unbeliever,” but when facts are thrown at me, I need to do some homework. And even then I often need to do more “fact-checking.”

OZ NOTE: To tie this into the YBR. Emerald City was not green. When the young man who landed in Oz after a balloon mishap was declared the Wizard of Oz, he set out to build “his” city. Since he loved the green of the Land of Oz, he called it the Emerald City…but since it was not green, he made all the people wear glasses with green lenses. The people never took them off. The fact that Emerald City was not green didn’t matter to them. Hmmm. Does that sound like us?

*I use the word truth here with some hesitancy because “truth” is a philosophical/religious construct. It is about “self-evident” matters. Truth and true are not the same things.

 

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The hijacking of innocence on the YBR.

“Between May 1961 and the end of 1972, there were 159 hijackings in American airspace. The majority of those were between ’68 and ’72, a five-year stretch, and sometimes they happened at the rate of one per week. You could have multiple hijackings in the same day — it was not an infrequent occurrence.”

I am a member of that shrinking community that remembers hijackings. In the spring of ’69 I flew home on El Al after spending a year studying abroad. Two soldiers holding machine guns were sitting in the rear of the plane. El Al was a likely candidate for being hijacked. Was I scared? Not really, and not because I felt invincible. I just didn’t want to be paralyzed by fear.

Today airline passengers rarely, if ever, worry about being hijacked. Measures are in place to minimize the risk. Today, though, we have new and more pernicious fears. The fear that fills us today was activated by yesterday’s elementary school shooting in Texas where 19 “innocent” children and two “innocent” educators were killed.

This tragedy overshadows any other fear we can think of because it is universal. Rare is the person who doesn’t have an emotional connection with a child. Rare is the person who has not been moved to tears by the tragic loss of life…again, in a school where innocence should reign supreme.

The airwaves and every form of social media will be flooded with outrage. Gun-talk will dominate many conversations. And the opinions will be divided. Stronger measures to make our schools a safe place will be bandied about. Some will argue that short of making our schools more “prison-like,” our schools are too vulnerable. They are literally sitting targets.

Teachers, who are on the front line, are totally distraught today, and rightfully so. They feel so helpless. They can’t help but think that such a tragedy could happen at their school. They are at risk of being paralyzed by fear. And it doesn’t help to tell a teacher that the “odds” of a school shooting happening at their school are a million to one. What happened at Robb Elementary (Texas) yesterday…what happened at Stoneman Douglas High School (Florida) in 2018…what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary (Connecticut) in 2012…and what happened at Columbine High School (Colorado) in 1999, happened in EVERY school in America because there isn’t a teacher who doesn’t believe or wonder that it could happen “here.”

Short of gun laws and extreme protection methods what can a teacher do? The fear of not being able to do anything will result in emotional paralysis…and that would be terrible for their students. As tragic as last week’s shooting at a grocery store in Buffalo was, people will continue to shop. The reason behind the Tops grocery store shooting can be identified and isolated. It can be rightfully called an extreme racist act, and as such the matter can be discussed. But, a school shooting? Such an act defies reason, and that’s why it leaves us heartbroken and helpless.

Does that mean we can’t do anything? I think there is something we can all do, and it needs to go way beyond talking about mental illness, even though mental illness has been a common factor among all the shooters.

Here’s something to consider, or should I say, ponder, and I suggest this at the risk of being called a sexist. The shooters were all males—-teens or young men. That’s not to say that a teen girl or young woman could not have been a shooter.

I have no answer, but I do think it is a question to consider.

And while we’re considering that, here’s something else to think about. Regardless of the age of the shooter, once-upon-a-time he was an innocent young boy. He was a pre-schooler, a kindergartener, a first-grader….He was in “your” class.

With anywhere from 20 to 30 students in a class, it is a gargantuan task for a teacher to connect with each and every one of their students. When a teacher greets their students on the first day of a new school year, they have no idea who those students (really) are. Since in my experience teachers are generally kind and loving people, they only see the goodness and innocence of their students. But, not all students are alike. As much as we don’t want to admit it, not all children come from loving homes. And where there is no love being shown at home, it is a challenge for a child to believe they are capable of being loved, and as a result they often don’t know how to love.

Unfortunately, many of those children fall through the cracks, especially if they are quiet loners. And then there are the “troublemakers,” the student who is the bane of existence for even the strongest teacher.

The expression that the “child is father to the man,” is so true. Without the ability to deal with the pain of not being loved or fitting in, or being the butt of “mean” kids, many children sail the seas of childhood without a rudder.

Teachers, since many of them are also parents, know how difficult it is to parent a child. If a parent is not really equipped to be a parent, there is a risk that the parent might overlook the tell-tale signs of a troubled child. Or in some cases, the parent is dealing with emotional or mental issues that have a long-lasting impact on their child.

Love is never part of a school curriculum, but loving always has a place in every class across America. Just imagine that if even only one or two teachers along the way provide that love and care a student needs, what a difference there could be. And if a teacher’s gut tells them there is something amiss with a child, how great it would be if just one or two teachers might be the “force” for change in a child’s life.

Love and kindness. Openness and inclusion. Cheer and goodwill. All are, in my opinion, in a teacher’s “wheelhouse.”

The “Prayer of St. Francis” comes to mind

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

That’s a big order for a teacher, but I believe if a teacher believes they are a force for good, they can do something to change the horrid landscape of school shootings. Instead of going to the head of the class with fear in their hearts, they need to shower their students with the goodness that comes from being a teacher.

Of course a teacher still needs to be cautious and prepared for the unexpected, but the fear of what could happen should not overshadow all the good that will happen.

Needless to say, we are living through extraordinary times. Anger and hatred have divided us in ways that none of us ever expected. The chasm that divided us has caused a terrible vacuum…and the little I know about the subject, nature abhors a vacuum. As a result, our children are being sucked into the black hole of despair. Our children are suffocating.

There should be an app to take care of this heinous vacuum. The funny thing is, there is an app. It’s the app of care and kindness. It’s an app that is powered by the love we have stored in our hearts.

While there is no way to say for certain that school shootings will go the way of air hijacking, I believe that our teachers, with the help of sane legislation, will make a big difference for our children.

Dedicated to the innocent victims at Uvalade.
In memory of all our children lost to the madness of school shootings.
In honor of my daughter Jennifer Begley Devine; my daughters-in-law, Sarah Miressi Begley and Courtney Muller Begley; my sister-in-law, Annette Luzon Harstein; and my niece, Jenna Hartstein – wonderful teachers all who teach our children to reach for the stars.

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Looking back on the rocky Yellow Brick Road.

May 4, 1970. 51 years. A life time? A memory? A veritable smudge on the American Canvas? It was the month I expected to walk across a raised platform and be handed my college diploma from the president of Marist College. But, a terrible thing happened on the way to an event that would mark my first step on the “real world” Yellow Brick Road.

The war in Viet Nam had been raging for what seemed like forever. Many students had either crossed the border to Canada to escape the draft or were drafted. Or…signed up for the National Guard. Or…for people like me, it was life as normal. The only problem…after the shooting and killing of four war protesters at Kent State by members of the Ohio National Guard, normal was turned upside down and inside out.

Marist, like hundreds of colleges across the country put up a “closed for business” sign. There were to be no final exams. Commencement hung in the balance. (In the end, Marist decided to hold a very solemn and subdued Commencement.)

What do I remember most about being on a ghost campus until Commencement exercises? I remember the “Wizard of Oz.” Literally remember it because I was part of a cast of the play rehearsing for a bus and truck tour of the Marist production that was to take us into the poverty belt of Appalachia in Kentucky.

Looking back, it was odd and ironic to be lost in Oz when the world was in mourning. Oz was about escaping from a grey world and finding what was over the rainbow. It was all about going to the Wizard to be awarded what we already had. It was realizing that there was “no place like home.”

If home was anything like the real home where innocent students could be killed, who would want to go home?

51 years after the Kent State shootings, the Yellow Brick Road is not paved with gold. Rather, it is paved with the result of our short-comings.

Is it possible that we left Emerald City without what we went there for? It doesn’t appear we are using our brains the way we should be; our ability to love is torn by so much hatred; and we seem to lack the courage to stand up and do what needs to be done.

We’ve got to do better.

Today’s blog is dedicated to Allison  Beth Krause, 19, Jeffrey Glenn Miller, 20, and Sandra Lee Scheuer, 20, who died on the scene, at Kent State, and William Knox Schroeder, 19, was pronounced dead at Robinson Memorial Hospital in nearby Ravenna shortly afterward.

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The long and winding yellow brick road will lead you home.

Despite the fact that college commencements have been cancelled, I have been chosen to remotely address the Class of 2020. Having reviewed Dorothy’s 2019 commencement address I could just have easily suggested that it be re-played because it was so 2020 in both scope and content.  But, people who know me, know I never take the easy way out. I am loyal to a fault.

To all the members of the Class of 2020 I say that this year turned to shit. It will go down in academic history as a real WTF year. We all know that, so let’s move on because that’s what we not only have to do, it’s what we should do.

I would like to follow commencement history by beginning my talk with a quote that is supposedly attributed to Confucius. He said, “Wherever you go, there you are.”

Think about it.  Today you are here. Tomorrow you won’t be here, you will be there wherever there might be. You have no choice but to go there to a place that is as forbidding as it is foreboding. It’s a place called the future, a place that we continually think we can control. It’s the place you are dreaming about.

Six months ago no one on this planet would have ever thought the future was so frightening. We thought we had it all figured out. And then we were hit by a virus that introduced us to an oft repeated term, the “new normal.”

I am here to tell you that we should celebrate the “new,” but get down on our knees and pray that we don’t aspire to a “normal,” new or otherwise. Normal is just another word for “ordinary,” and that’s not our purpose. We all need to strive to be extra-ordinary.

You are about to step on what Paul McCartney called the “long and winding road.” There is no doubt it will be long, and thank God it will be winding because who wants to travel a straight and narrow road.

People might tell you the world is in a chaotic state. I can’t argue with that, but I should hasten to point out that in Greek mythology Chaos was the origin of everything and the first thing to exist. From Chaos sprang the future.

You, the class of 2020 should consider yourselves the origin of everything that is to follow. You have a chance, not to follow in the footsteps of other generations, but to be pioneers on the long and winding yellow brick road that will lead you home because as Dorothy said, “there’s no place like home.”

Keep in mind that Dorothy meant that home was a place in your heart. She was telling us to find that home in us on our yellow brick road.  I challenge you to be the first genuine generation. A generation that does not discriminate. A generation that has no borders. A generation that breathes new meaning into those forgotten words of the Great Seal of the United States: Novus Ordo Seclorum (a new order of the ages).

Let me bring this home by letting me tell you that you won’t be alone on your journey. No matter how dark it might get, don’t worry, you will be found.

 

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The 2020 Presidential Race with Muck and Mire on the YBR? Is history repeating itself…again?

Preface in the name of transparency: I could never run for political office because I don’t wear a hat I could throw in the ring. I never have and never will wear a MAGA hat. I also won’t wear a hat bearing any symbols of the party that embraces donkey icons.

The 2020 Presidential Race on the YBR. Here we go again.

This is not the first presidential race where I scratch my head and say, “is this the best we can do?”  And while every presidential race is important, this one, I firmly believe, carries with it a weight that might even surpass that of the elections during World War I, the Great depression, and World War II. In 2020 we are going to the polls not only to elect the next president of the United States but of a world leader with 20/20 vision because POTUS has to have a world vision.

I ask, is this possible since we have, for lack of a better name, Muck and Mire running for office.

So we are all on the same page here, let’s refer to Mr. Funk and Mr. Wagnalls: muck is slimy mud while mire is deep mud.

Donald Muck is, without a doubt, slimy mud.  Putting aside both the ass-kissers who would follow Mr. Muck into hell and the brainless haters of the Muck who wouldn’t approve anything he did even if he walked on water, he is slimy. Giving him credit where credit is due and calling him out on some of his most egregious decisions, there is something slimy about the man. And that is not meant to be a disparaging term for a man who holds the highest office in the land. President Muck came up through the slime that comes from years of wheeling and dealing, rolling in the money, playing kissy-kissy with mindless jet-setters, and playing the part of a celebrity.

There was no way that anyone who lived such a life could not have been covered with muck. And as far as I know, there doesn’t seem to be a cure for muckiness because an inflated ego can never be cleaned.

At this point in time it appears the former Vice-President Joe Mire is going to be the candidate endorsed by the Democrats.  Joe Mire appears to be a nice and decent guy. In fact the first word that comes to mind is “harmless.”  Harmless? Is that the penultimate quality we want in our next president?  He might have served as vice-president under President Obama for eight years, but the only image I have of him reminds me of a great-uncle who smiled a lot, but was never in the room when important matters were discussed.  (And let’s be honest, Obama was playing it politically cool during the early days of the Democratic run-for-the White House.)

Joe Mire didn’t get to his political pinnacle the same way Donald Mire scaled the heights of richdom, but Good ‘ol Joe is deep in the political mud.  He played the right games, kissed the right assess, and made the most banal comments to get him where he is today.

OMG! Muck and Mire!  If there is a God can we all get down on our knees and pray for a do-over.

My gut tells me that the next four years are going to be wasted years.  The Dems don’t want to present us with greatness in any shape and form for fear that it would destroy that candidates political career in a race against Muck. And of course any sensible (if there are any left) Republican realizes it would be impossible to offer America another candidate.

Politics is not only a dirty game, it is sinful.  Our two party system is totally outdated.  It’s like an eight-track player in a day when everyone is streaming their music.  Instead of having only two boring stations to listen to, people are listening to their music, their way.

At my age I won’t live to see it happen, but I pray that my children and grandchildren will live at a time when instead of another presidential race with the next Muck and Mire, they have a chance to vote for Ready or Willing and maybe a third candidate Able.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a candidate who was really ready to take the presidential oath of office and swear they would uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States. How refreshing would it be to have a candidate ready to consider the needs of ALL Americans without playing petty party politics..even if it mean only serving one term.  Can you imagine a president ready to take on the challenges of helping the world become a place where all people are all entitled to those inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness!

And what about a Willing candidate?  Is it possible to have a president who is willing to break the chains of partisanship? Can you envision a time when President Willing doesn’t have to reach across the aisle because there is no aisle that divides Congress? What a new day it would be if we had a president who was willing to put the people first instead of the party.

Candidate Able could also be a viable candidate, but, they might not be necessary as long as both candidates Ready and Willing were able to lead with the qualities found along the Yellow Brick Road… intelligence, heart, and courage…to do the right thing.

(Please note that no alcohol was consumed while posting this blog.)

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