1968 – Page 6 – Don't Gel Too Soon

Robert S. McNamara: Did His Atonement Suffice or Did He Just Outlive Our Anger?

It's hard to understand the role of Robert McNamara and feelings toward him, particularly during the Johnson Administration, but if you think "Dick Cheney during the Bush years" and multiply, you'll come closest. McNamara, who died today, was one of the great villains of my 20's and 30's. Secretary of Defense, a major architect of the Vietnam War and defender of the ideas behind it, he supported both Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson in their attempts to "save democracy" there. He entered the new Kennedy Administration in a blaze of glory just five weeks after being named, and then resigning as, president of the Ford Motor Company. A supremely successful and confident executive (who opposed production of the much-reviled Edsel), he seemed a creative and promising choice.

What he became was a symbol of all that seemed wrong with American foreign policy, especially in Vietnam,(including the "domino theory" claiming that if Vietnam "fell" other nations in the region would fall as well) and one of the subjects of the landmark book about this foreign policy team, David Halberstam's The Best and the Brightest. In addition to the vast, deep anger at the direction of the war and the philosophy that defined it, McNamara and all he represented reminded us daily of what we saw as both the arrogance of the US decision to enter and remain part of the war in Vietnam and our conviction that we were being manipulated, spied upon and lied to.

Paul Hendrickson's The Living and the Dead best described McNamara's impact by visiting the stories of five people affected by the war. Here's an excerpt from the first part of the book; it looks long, but you'll be glad you've read it:

In the Winter of 1955

His
wife wasn't drinking milk with her Scotch in the hope her stomach might
hurt a little less – not then. A man bearing a child hadn't set himself
on fire below his Pentagon window – not yet. A wigged-out woman hadn't
stolen up behind his seat in an outdoor cafe in the Kodak winter sun of
Aspen to begin shrieking there was blood on his hands. (He was applying
ketchup to his hamburger.) A Viet Cong agent – his name was Nguyen Van
Troi — hadn't been found stringing fuses beneath a Saigon bridge he
was due to pass over. Odd metaphors and strange turns of phrase weren't
seeping from him like moons of dark ink. His pressed white shirts
weren't hanging loose at his neck. He wasn't reading Homer late at
night in an effort to compose himself. His dyslexic and ulcerated son
hadn't been shown in a national newsmagazine with his ropes of long
hair and kindly face reading aloud a list of war dead at the San
Francisco airport. Reputed members of an organization called the
Symbionese Liberation Army didn't have stored in a Berkeley garage some
crudely drawn but surprisingly detailed descriptions of the interior
and exterior of his resort home in Snowmass, along with thumb-nail
sketches of members of his family. (WIFE: name unknown to me. She is
small, not outstanding in appearance & probably not aggressive. .
.") He hadn't stood in the Pentagon briefing room in front of his
graphs and bar-charts to say with perfect seriousness, "So it is
fifteen percent of ten percent of thirteen-thirtieths that have been in
dispute here. . ." He hadn't stood on the tarmac at Andrews, at the
rollaway steps of his blue-tailed C-135, before winging to a high-level
CINCPAC meeting in Honolulu, and told another tangle of lies into a
tangle of microphones, made more artfully disingenuous statements to
the press boys, this time about the kind of forces – which is to say,
combat forces – soon to be shipped to the secretly escalated war. ("No,
uh, principally logistical support — arms, munitions, training,
assistance.") He hadn't hunched forward in his field fatigues at a news
conference in Saigon and said, as though trying to hug himself, and
with only the slightest belying stammers, "The military operations have
progressed very satisfactorily during the past year. The rate of
progress has exceeded our expectations. The pressure on the Viet Cong,
measured in terms of the casualties they have suffered, the destruction
of their units, the measurable effect on their morale, have all been
greater than we anticipated" — when, in fact, the nations chrome-hard
secretary of defense had already given up believing, in private, a long
while ago, that the thing was winnable in any military sense. The
president of the United States hadn't called him up to yell, "How can I
hit them in the nuts, Bob? Tell me how I can hit them in the nuts!" —
the them being little men in black pajamas in a skinny curve of an
unfathomable country 10,000 miles distant. He hadn't yet gone to this
same president and told him he was afraid of breaking down. The
expressions "body count" and "kill ratio" and "pacification" and
"incursion" hadn't come into the language in the way snow — to use
Orwell's image — falls on an obscene landscape. The casualty figures
of U.S. dead and missing and wounded hadn't spumed, like crimson
geysers, past the once unthinkable 100,000 mark. Nor had this man risen
at a luncheon in Dean Rusk's private dining room at the state
department (it happened on February 27, 1968, forty-eight hours before
he left office) and, without warning, begun coming apart before Rusk
and dark Clifford and Bill Bundy and Walt Rostow and Joe Califano and
Harry McPherson, telling them between stifled sobs, between what
sounded like small asphyxiating noises, between the bitter rivers of
his cursing, that the goddamned Air Force, they're dropping tonnage on
Vietnam at a higher rate than we dropped on Germany in the last part of
World War II, we've practically leveled the place, and what's it done,
nothing, a goddamned nothing, and Christ here's Westmoreland asking for
another 205,000 troops, ifs madness, can't anybody see, this thing has
to be gotten hold of, it's out of control I tell you. . .

No.

None of this.

Not yet.

It all lay waiting in the decades up ahead.

Pretty amazing, huh? Those are just a few of the moments that informed McNamara's War years, and mine. And the engendered the rage, the hateful things yelled at marches, the weeping, the tear gas, the chaos and the fear. And McNamara knew it. He spent much of the rest of his life trying to atone for those years, first by leading the World Bank in its sunnier years and urging America and the world to help the starving and the lost. At least once, he broke down at a major appearance as he described the world misery the Bank sought to abate. Later, he collaborated on a book, Argument Without End, that struggled to understand and, some claim, apologize for, the war.

As many of the obits noted, especially that on TIME's website, ("Robert McNamara dies, no escape from Vietnam") for many, next to LBJ, McNamara was the war. And as Hendrickson's book noted, he haunted those directly affected by the war even more than the rest of us.

Somehow though, it's difficult to retain rage as ideas soften and history teaches us more about times we lived when we were young. I remember that when Nixon died a friend called to talk about it. I wasn't home, and she said to my son "What really makes me mad is that I think he outlived our anger." I'm still trying to figure out if that's how I – we – will feel about this death. McNamara certainly tried to both understand and to atone for Vietnam but the damage of that war, up until today, remains. As I've written before, since Vietnam, every national campaign including the last one, and, you can be sure, any one that Sarah Palin runs in the future, is informed by – colored by – sometimes defined by – what happened then. President Obama has certainly blunted the culture wars, generational change will absolutely change many issues, especially related to gender rights, but I wonder… When the right gets mad – gets desperate – they can easily reignite the culture wars that were the bi-product of the Vietnam era. And Robert McNamara is responsible for those, too.

I don't know. Really, I don't. But I'm ending with this Charlie Rose interview with McNamara from 1995. Take a look. There's more of the whole man here. The question is now much he deserves, after what the Defense Secretary in him did, to expect us to think about all the rest.

Farewell to Eden Lipson, A Great Mother, Editor and Friend

There were so many of us in 1968, joined to battle the Vietnam War by helping Eugene McCarthy run for president. We lost the Senator several years ago, and Eli Segal, one of the best, soon after. Today I learned of the loss of another of the dear ones, Eden Ross Lipson. She died this morning of pancreatic cancer. You can see from this photo that she was a woman who relished life and laughter. Her greatest joys: her husband and her kids.

Although we shared a history from the campaign, we also shared some great lunches and adventures in Manhattan, where she had dozens of friends who loved and respected her. Principled and kind, she was a joy and support to so many.

In her work as Children’s Book Editor of the New York Times Book Review, Eden produced what is still the classic work on children’s literature. I knew her as she wrote the first edition; it was a real labor of love. Her understanding of kids, of books and of writing and purpose made her an ideal guide for anxious parents and savvy librarians alike.

Her generosity went far beyond the love of children that made her such a great advocate for the joy they would find in their books. It was she who gave me my first review assignment and it led to an entire side career as a book reviewer that lasted for years. She was a tough and smart editor, too.

I remember my review of one of my favorites: Jane Yolen’s The Devil’s Arithmetic. A time-travel Holocaust story, it is a beautiful book. I submitted a very positive review. Soon after, Eden called. In a tone slipping between amused and professional, she reminded me that not all parents were as open as I was, and that I needed to add some kind of caution to parents who were more protective about at what age their kids were exposed to tough information. She was right, of course. I began an embarrassed apology. Her response: if people didn’t need editors she wouldn’t have a job! I fixed the piece and it ran. Later, it was Eden who connected me with the editor who published my first book. She did it, as she did all things, with no expectation of reciprocal benefit. These sorts of things are typical of the warmth and kindness she showed to everyone who knew her.

Life is strange. Eden was someone I knew, respected and cared about. I lost touch with her, as with so many others, when we moved to Los Angeles. My life then just didn’t allow for working to stay connected; there were hard things happening and they made it difficult to think outside the immediate circumstances of my life. And so I’m doubly sad as I struggle to write about a woman with such a mind, and a spirit, and a heart.

I’m comforted to know, though, that she had friends and family around her, supportive and caring, in her last days. That’s no surprise; it’s what she offered so many others.

Behind Every Stimulus Package Are People Who Need Help

I spent part of Thursday sitting in Starbucks on the GW (George Washington University) campus after a meeting, loving being around all these students buzzing and working and laughing. I loved college; could feel my head growing. It's an amazing time in a young person's life and one that forms much of who we are later. Now, though, the carefree collegian is a thing of the past. Everyone has jobs and student loans. Instead of leaving school with a "sky's the limit" ambition, many must look first for the job that will help them pay off their loans, and only then for the one they'll really love.

Here are some stories:

When my husband graduated from medical school we had under $4,000 in loans to pay off.
One of my son's friends left undergraduate school with over $100,000 in debt
A wonderful friend who is a born teacher went to law school and then to a firm. I asked her why. She told me she would only be able to consider teaching once her loans were paid off – and they were enormous.
As I've written before, both of my parents were formed by the Depression. Each hoped for a career they were never able to pursue; instead they took the subject-related scholarships they were offered and were grateful to have them. A would-be artist became a teacher; an architect a lawyer. Neither complained overtly about this; I learned these facts in passing and both were quick to add how glad they were to have been able to go to college at all.
My sisters and I were blessed to have college paid for; we were told that our education was our inheritance and not to look for much more, which was fine with us. But most families just can't do that anymore. It's too expensive.
Many political observers posit that there would have been no anti-war movement in the 60's if college students had had to work while in school. Most of us had our tuitions taken care of; that meant that we had time to organize and raise hell.
I remember a good friend, at dinner, saying to me bitterly, "Jim and I never had time for that stuff. We were both working to get through school. You guys were so righteous but you had no idea what we were doing just to be able to stay through the semester."
I told a recent college graduate how impressed I was with what he'd accomplished. His response: " didn't do anything. Colin slept in his van for a semester because he couldn't pay both tuition and rent. Be impressed with him!"

So. This is kind of a random list but when we're arguing over stimulus packages, we need to remember the people behind them. Like these.

Pete, Bruce, Beyonce and Obama: the Changing of the Guard

There they are: two of the cultural icons of my political life. Pete Seeger, close to 90, peer and colleague of Woody Guthrie, creator of We Shall Overcome and Turn Turn Turn, of Abiyoyo and Sam the Whaler, leader of The Almanac Singers and the Weavers. If there was a civil rights rally or a labor rally or an anti-war rally, he was there.

Beside him, Bruce Springsteen, a modern troubadour whose songs speak for many Americans whose opinions are never sought, whose voices are seldom heard.

As they stood together at the Lincoln Memorial in celebration of the Inauguration of Barack Obama, they represented, to me, all that I had believed and tried to help bring into being. To many, though, they were “the ultimate in subtly old-left populism.” Speaking about the concert early Sunday before it began, I kept talking about Bruce. A younger friend gently suggested that he was probably not the day’s headliner. That would be Beyonce Knowles, she said. I’m sure she’s right.

As one who was present the last time “the torch was passed to a new generation;” as a strongly defined Baby Boomer, it’s painful to hear anchormen celebrate the fact that “there will never be another Baby Boom President.” It’ s not that I mind the fact of that; it’s just painful that it seems to be something to celebrate. So many of us have tried so to be productive agents of change, have spent our lives working either full or part of the time to see that our country offers more to the least powerful, demands quality education, justice and maybe, even peace. So to hear Joe Scarborough revel in the fact that “16 horrible years of baby boomer presidents is over” really hurts. All my adult life we’ve been tarred by the brush of the least attractive of us while the work of the rest of us went unnoticed. For most campaigns, as I’ve written before, we were the secret weapon of the right.

So as exciting as all this is, especially for one who has supported Obama for so long, it’s also bittersweet because I feel the shadow of the disdain in which so many of us are held. I really don’t know how to respond. If I were to try, it might be by offering some of the words to Si Kahn‘s They All Sang Bread and Roses. It’s better with the music, but it does the job.

They All Sang “Bread and Roses (Si Kahn, 1989,
1991)

The more I
study history,

The more I
seem to find

That in
every generation

There are
times just like that time

When folks
like you and me who thought

That they
were all alone

Within this
honored movement

Found a
home.

And ‘though
each generation fears

That it
will be the last,

Our
presence here is witness

To the
power of the past.

And just as
we have drawn our strength

From those
who now are gone,

Younger
hands will take our work

And carry
on.

BARACK OBAMA, JUDITH WARNER, EXPLAINING HISTORY TO KIDS: MRS. HAMER AND JACKIE ROBINSON

A dear friend sent me this New York Time column by the sometimes controversial Judith Warner. In it, Warner muses about the cosmic change we all know came last Tuesday, and her young daughters’ seeming inability to understand the magnitude of what has happened.

“Look,” we said, pointing to the headline “Racial Barrier Falls.” “This is huge.”

We labored to make them understand that their world — art that day,
and orchestra, and Baked Potato Bar at lunch — had irrevocably changed.

But how can you understand change when you’ve only known one way of being?

They were happy because we were happy. They rose to the occasion in
that bemused way children do when adults tell them what they should
feel. They were glad to be rid of George W. Bush and to be saved – for
now – from the specter of Sarah Palin.

Of course one of the reasons for this is that, for younger people, unless they’re well-briefed, it is less of an earthquake. They know we believe that they are part of something wonderful, but they don’t know as viscerally as we do the terribleness that came before. It was easier, 30 years ago, with my own children. They went to a pretty progressive elementary school where Martin Luther King Day was a cornerstone of the winter curriculum. In the first grade they learned about the kid across the street who wouldn’t play with him, and of the pain that caused. They watched Eyes on the Prize more than once in class. When we settled on annual giving, their vote was for the United Negro College Fund. Their babysitter told them stories about not being able to go into Virginia smoke shops to buy a candy bar, about the scary cruelty that was her childhood. It came from someone they knew. It wasn’t history, it was their friend’s life.

But they’re a generation or more older than Warner’s girls and, growing up in Manhattan they knew more, and heard more, from people for whom it was more immediate. There are fewer of those people now, as Selma and Montgomery fade farther into history. It will take more work, more commitment by schools as well as parents, to help these small people understand what has happened. Work worth doing though, I think.

As I’ve thought about this, I’ve recalled that my parents never completely described to me the impact of the Depression on their lives. They were, I later learned, enormously affected but there really wasn’t a way to explain it – at least for them. They had suffered too much. It drove me to study Depression history in college, when much of what I’d wondered about became clear. That was a sad landmark instead of a proud one, but it’s also about troubled experiences difficult to communicate. A challenge either met or avoided.

I agree that one way to help younger people understand the wonder of what has happened is just as Warner described it. Let them be “happy because we’re happy.” Explain as best we can. Personally though, I’m not against a little indoctrination: the story of Dr. King’s lost playmate, or Jackie Robinson or Fannie Lou Hamer or Rosa Parks (there’s a kids’ song “When Rosa Parks Sat Down, the Whole World Stood Up”) or Charlayne Hunter-Gault. And the question I used so often: “How do you think you would feel if that happened to you?” From the known to the unknown, the familiar to the unfamiliar, just like any other lesson. Allow the natural compassion of a loving child to emerge, and their sense of justice and wonder will not be far behind.

BLOGGING BOOMERS #93 AND I’M HOST. ELECTION POSTS AND LOTS MORE

From here in Washington, DC, nerve center of exhausted political junkies and traumatized McCain supporters comes this week’s Blogging Boomers Blog Carnival.

Those two Fabulous After 40 gals (who are fabulous) remind us that if we think we might be shrinking "You’re right. Starting at 40 we lost half an inch in height every decade."

What’s a boomer gal to do, other than wear high heels? Check out
Fabulous after 40 for fashion advice on How to dress to look taller.

John at SoBabyBoomer has found a new study has found that women have a
greater variety of bacteria on their hands than men do. So, he wonders, "Should guys worry about holding hands with
women? Find out at SoBabyBoomer.com

Maybe those germy women would feel better if they knew how to manage in today’s economy? If, so this week’s Vaboomers is for them. They’re sponsoring a free seminar: How to Manifest What You Need in Difficult Times" for women coping with the current economy.

The Midlife Crisis Queen has something different on her mind:

We
make all kinds of mistaken assumptions about the opposite sex when it comes to
sex. Here’s some wrong assumptions made by men and here’s some made by women.

Boston’s own Rhea Becker, like most of us, still had the election on her mind. As she says "History was made this week. A baby boomer was elected president of the United States. Learn more at The Boomer Chronicles.

Also with elections on her mind, Janet at Gen Plus shares her reaction to Obama’s acceptance speech. And, like any of you, yes….she wept.

Meanwhile, over at LifeTwo, we’re getting some exciting ideas: The key to happiness, according to university researcher Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, is the concept of "flow." Flow are those activities in which you are so deeply involved that you feel outside reality.

As usual, I Remember JFK has a great social memory to offer: TV Trays. "The living room of the 1960’s was a warm, friendly place. True, times had changed since our parents might have first purchased our modest homes fifteen or twenty years prior. Most living rooms in the US had a new center of attention: the television set. That one-eyed monster changed the purpose of the home’s central location from a place of casual conversation, or possible listening to the radio, to the spot where our parents unwound after a long day at work, accompanied by a cocktail, Walter Cronkite and a TV dinner.

Thankful for new leadership in the land, Dina at This Marriage Thing challenges us all to bring that same feeling home with the Gratitude Project. I’ve actually been there – it’s pretty cool.

Oh and if you can stand one more election post, here’s mine. It’s about having been in Grant Park during the 1968 Democratic Convention riots, and watching Obama accept the presidency on that very spot.

OBAMA’S VICTORY GARDEN – EXORCISING DAYS OF RAGE

Grant Park 1968 – in the heart of Chicago. Grant Park — where my friends and I were gassed and beaten – terrified and abused – during the Democratic Convention in 1968. Grant Park – haunted by so much.

Here’s how I remembered it on the 40th anniversary this summer:

I wonder if you can imagine what it felt like to be 22 years old, totally idealistic and what they call “a true believer” and to see policemen behave like that. To see Chicago Mayor Richard Daley call the first Jewish Senator, Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut, a “kike” (you had to read his lips – there was no audio but it was pretty clear) and to see your friends, and colleagues, and some-time beloveds with black eyes and bleeding scalps. To be dragged by a Secret Service agent from your place next to Senator McCarthy by the collar of your dress as he addressed the demonstrators, battered, bruised and angry. To see everything you’d worked for and believed in decimated in the class, generational and political warfare.

Why does this matter, you ask? Because, this moment – 40 years later — as Barack Obama assumed the leadership of our country with such an elegant speech, informed and supported in part by the values, and people, who fought, bled and wept through those awful days and by a majority of those as young now as we were then and just as committed to the vision they’ve been offered and by an enormous, excited turnout, black and white, — he did so on this same site, in the shadow of the Hilton where we put all the kids with broken heads — and tried to keep the tear gas out of our eyes. We’ve been haunted by that time for so long, and as far as I can tell, this was an exorcism. As I heard a commentator say this morning: “The culture wars are over. The Vietnam War is over.” And not a moment too soon.

What’s happening is far larger of course. Yesterday morning we voted in our lovely DC neighborhood, middle class, well-kept, bikes and an excellent walk-to-it elementary school, so of course
there was a long line waiting to vote in a riot of autumn color. We stood for two hours even though Washington would clearly choose Obama, (and did so with 92% of our votes.) Each individual vote
wasn’t urgently needed. Instead, it was the need to cast the vote that
was urgent.

Diverse in age and history, largely African-American, our community stood
together, talking, laughing, meeting new friends in front of or behind us
in line. People had their kids with them, called grown kids on the phone from line and waved at late-arriving neighbors. It was one of those moments where you feel history all around you, and a remarkable privilege to be voting in such company, who’ve worked through all the years of discord to maintain a civil, multicultural community. A bonus.

Beyond this landmark day, though, the next months are going to be tough. As the new White House staff, cabinet and administration form, all this free-floating joy will take on concrete forms that remind us of the huge challenges and risks that face us. There will be things that disappoint us, and things that make us mad. The reality that caused people to elect this man will descend upon us in a relentless economic, social, military and persona avalanche and we may be hard-pressed to remember the joy we felt last night; the promise that has so engaged us.

When that happens, I will think of the older African-American man who called out “shalom” to us in the canvassing orientation when he saw my friend’s yarmulke, of the excited first-voters — just 18 or newly naturalized — whom we met as we walked through one Virginia housing complex after another, of our four-year-old door-bell-ringer beside himself over “Obama” and asking everyone from the supermarket checker to his teachers to vote for him, of my sons last night calling and texting literally across a continent and an ocean, of the day I was electrified by the broadcast of Martin Luther King on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, of the fact that 66% of under-30 voters, so long detached and cynical*, voted for Obama, and, finally, of the distance we have to go – and won’t — unless we work together to resolve each challenge and, perhaps more importantly, each disagreement.

This is a great day. And a scary one. And now, as our new president-elect prepares to do his part, we have to resolve to do ours: to work through those disappointments and disagreements, to accept the call to contribute and to sacrifice and, as he and Abraham Lincoln before him asked us, to heed to the “better angels of of our nature.” They’re there – and we’re going to need them. If they can show up, and Barack Obama can show up, so can we.

* (speaking of younger voters): A friend of my sons (a third son, really) sent me this from one of his favorite blogs. It’s just so sweet.

Stumble It!

CANVASSING FOR OBAMA: ARE YOU STRONG OR LEANING? THE OBAMA-MCCAIN RACE FROM THE GROUND FLOOR

That’s my four year old friend, his dad and our friend Lea at the door of a home in Virginia. We spent Sunday afternoon canvassing for Obama and the down ticket races in this housing development whose residents had names from Gomez to Kim to Ilbibi to Hussein to Brady.* These were town homes with small back gardens, beautifully kept and facing out onto mini-wooded areas that made it feel peaceful and apart. Not fancy, just well-designed and executed. Plastic bikes and push toys sat out in the open; we even saw some skateboards left leaning against a tree. Not too much worry about theft, apparently.

As we walked, I realized that this – these homes occupied by families of so many backgrounds, were part of what we were campaigning for: the opportunity of all Americans
building their lives to find a place – a home — a life. And that the battle, underneath the craziness, is about the best way to guarantee those rights — and possiblities – to more of us.

The past week or two have been painful for Obama supporters. Polls are down, Sarah Palin seems to have hijacked much of the campaign, the McCainies are attacking and the attacks, however vicious or frivolous they may be, (and the are) seem to be sticking. That’s what drove me to Virginia Sunday. In all my years around politics I’ve never done field work; for most campaigns I’ve been a reporter and during those years I was scrupulously careful to remain neutral and apart. Now though, I’m out of the news business and I can campaign. And so Sunday I was walking around Virginia with three friends, a water bottle and a clipboard. Our assignment: talk to the folks on our list, find out if they’ve decided for whom they will vote and check the right boxes. We check Strong, Lean, Undecided. If they support our guy, we make sure they’re registered and ask if they want to volunteer.

We didn’t really meet anyone we could try to convert and in our 57 stops we hit lots of "not home" — it was Sunday afternoon after all, and the rest were either for Obama or "We’re for the other guy — you’ve come to the wrong house." The lack of conversion candidates didn’t matter though because we were mostly building a registration and GOTV (Get Out the Vote) list that will be accurate and useful on election day. The coolest moment: meeting an 18-year-old first-time voter– I suspect a first-generation American and clearly excited to be voting for Barack Obama.

*I’m using names of the same ethnicity but not the real ones; that feels too intrusive.

Continue reading CANVASSING FOR OBAMA: ARE YOU STRONG OR LEANING? THE OBAMA-MCCAIN RACE FROM THE GROUND FLOOR

RETURN OF THE CULTURE WARS – BUT DID THEY EVER LEAVE?

Some very smart analysts, including POLITICO and PressThink founder Jay Rosen, are talking about the current Republican strategy in support of Sarah Palin as a "reigniting of the culture wars." Attacking with all the code words of past anti-"left" vocabularies. And here’s Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal:

I’ll tell you how powerful Mrs. Palin already is: she reignited the
culture wars just by showing up. She scrambled the battle lines, too.
The crustiest old Republican men are shouting "Sexism!" when she’s
slammed. Pro-woman Democrats are saying she must be a
bad mother to be
all ambitious with kids in the house. Great respect goes to Barack
Obama not only for saying criticism of candidates’ children is out of
bounds in political campaigns, but for making it personal, and
therefore believable. "My mother had me when she was eighteen…" That
was the lovely sound of class in American politics.

When the McCain Summer of Love ad debuted, I wrote this – They Will Campaign Against Us Until We’re Dead, and Maybe After. If you watch CSPAN, especially Washington Journal, you know from the phone calls how much anger still exists; how much hatred of the generation I grew up in. Against our opposition to the war, mischief and outrageousness, and even more, our search – no, demand – for peace. Going after all of us, FORTY YEARS LATER, still works.

I guess that since I’ve been posting quite a lot about that time forty years ago, the memories are long on both sides. But Barack Obama was 7 years old in 1968. It’s not and never was his culture war. It is, however, the never-ending flash-point in the conservative playbook, a safe way to rile folks up and re-ignite the hatred and anger manifested in the 60’s and 70’s and again in the 90’s when that Boomer couple, the Clintons, were in the White House.

I’ve given up trying to figure out how to respond. Most Americans, including us 60’s people, love our country and loved it then. It was the a desire to return the country to its true nature — just as it is today — that drove us. But it’s far more useful to the McCain campaign to taunt us — and Barack Obama; and to divide us, too, with these ancient battles. The tough part is figuring out how to answer.

MUSIC, POLITICS, PATTI SMITH, KRIS KRISTOFFERSON, ROBERT HUNTER AND A LONG WALK

For weeks I’ve been writing about politics here, but today – some personal politics. They say the personal is political, and for me, the personal is music (and political) — and music makes all the difference — through time, sadness, joy, loneliness, political anguish, even spiritual connection.

I’ve started walking every morning – around two miles. Part of the reason is that I never get to listen to music anymore, so on my walks, I pretty much let my iPod take me wherever "shuffle" wants to go. For while we moved from Bruce to Great Big Sea to Juno. Then things got serious – an anthem really, of a time in my life when I valued awareness, aliveness, presence above all else: along came Me and Bobby McGee. Kris Kristofferson wrote it but this is one of the few videos I could find of him performing it – Janis Joplin’s version was the famous one. Still — it was this version, Kristofferson’s, that spoke to me.

A cut-loose road song and a love song too. "Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose." I remember my mother railing against this chorus — claiming that freedom was real and important and much more than "nothin’ left to lose" and she was probably right, but then… Then that road life was one I craved but never had the nerve to undertake and this song was my chance to travel along. Later, on Saturday Night Live, Gilda Radner did a monologue as "Bobby McGee" who had moved home, and whose "mom even kept my room for me." She’d given up. There I sat on our water bed in our Upper West Side apartment in our married, new baby life, and cried. It was way too familiar. Made me face the gap between what I had wished and what I was, that gap we all face as we enter "grown up" lives, with kids and responsibilities.

Then, around the time my walk reached Georgia Avenue, I traveled to London’s Grosvenor Square, and Scarlet Begonias. The Robert Hunter/Grateful Dead song included this description: "Wind in the willows playin’ tea for two; The sky was yellow and the sun was blue, Strangers stoppin’ strangers just to shake their hand, Everybody”s playing in the heart of gold band." It sounds comical now, I suppose, and it was really about Dead concerts, but I remember so many marches where people passed food around, each taking what they needed, and driving on the turnpikes on the way as we gave M&Ms to each tollbooth operator along with our quarters and even, at the first Clinton inauguration, being hugged by some guy I’d never met as I stood alone, close to tears (again) when Bob Dylan came out and surprised everyone.

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