POLITICS – Page 19 – Don't Gel Too Soon

Money, Madoff, Seniors and Struggles

NO this is not the lazy way out – sending you to another blog. Ronni Bennett is a highly visible, highly regarded "elder blogger" and has formed a large, vital community around her blog Time Goes By. A retired CBS News producer, she moved from Manhattan to Maine for a more affordable standard of living and she's got her fingers on many pulses. Today, she writes about the already tragic costs of the economic crisis for "the rest of us" – those not losing fortunes because of Bernard Madoff but just losing ground.

I think the Madoff story is worth the attention it's getting, not just or even mainly because of the damage it did to high-end investors but because someone of such stature (Head of NASDAQ) would – and could- do such things – and that he got away with it for so long. It's institutionally mind-blowing. As I wandered the web reading stories for this post, I discovered more reasons, too. It did disproportionate damage to Jews and Jewish charities – and Madoff was Jewish. Another "how could he?" Non-profits around the world, literally, are devastated; an example of the non-profit chaos generated by Mr. Madoff's activity.

Even so, Ronni's point about the focus on the big stuff when there are so many stories, especially at this time of year, is worth taking a look at. She's right about that; we need to see more profiles of those people who "work hard and play by the rules" and are struggling to figure out how to survive. They're our neighbors – and, in many cases, they're us.

Harvey Milk, Toni Morrison, James Baldwin and the Pain of Gay Life in America

I was in high school when I read Giovanni's Room, James Baldwin's heartbreaking story of pain and loss. It was the first time I'd understood anything of the harsh realities of life for gay men, and it changed me, opened my soul and my mind the way great writers are supposed to. Toni Morrison, his close friend who has often said that she misses him still, told NPR's Michele Martin how much she would have loved to see his reaction to the election of Barack Obama. Me too.

I kept thinking of Baldwin as I sat in a screening of Milk ,the story of a gay man, years later, who fought discrimination with determination – and humor – and lost his life to an assassin in the process. Harvey Milk, played by Sean Penn, moved to San
Francisco from a dead-end job in Manhattan and ended up launching a political gay rights movement that took over first the Castro, then San Francisco, then the nation. Battling anti-gay referenda in cities, towns and states, he made it possible, in ways probably not dreamed of when Baldwin fled US racism and homophobia by moving to Paris in the 1940's, for gays to live openly.

Here's what's hard though. Baldwin wrote Giovanni's Room in 1956, when gay men suffered, for the most part, in secret. Harvey Milk led his battles in the 1970's, as, at least in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York, they emerged from the closet into the light, fighting for their rights every day as efforts were made to push them back into silence. In California, one of Milk's greatest successes was the defeat of a bill that would force the termination of all gay teachers.

Look at us now. On the same landmark day that we elected Barack Obama president, California, in a statewide referendum, repealed the right for gays to marry. Similar efforts have become a cottage industry, and have succeeded all over the country.

Where kids are concerned, Florida, where Anita Bryant originated her cruel anti-gay campaign in the 70's, is still fighting to maintain a recently-overturned ban on gay adoption. Arkansas and Utah ban any unmarried couples, straight or gay, from adopting or fostering children; Mississippi bans gay couples, but not single gays. Arkansas voters last month approved a measure that, like Utah's bans any unmarried straight or gay couples from adopting or fostering children, a clever way to be "nondiscriminatory." Gay couples who want the non-biological parent to adopt their baby have to choose carefully in which county they file their papers. Get the wrong judge and you're toast. Perfectly fine candidates can lose elections because of their stands supporting gay rights.

To read the policy side of these issues in more detail, visit Leslie Bradshaw. She's one of the most passionate writers about the past election and the current state of gay rights and discusses the issue far more completely than I can.

But to a pop culture vulture like me, it's sad to sit through a docudrama, which is basically what MILK is, 52 years after Giovanni and 30+ after Harvey Milk, and feel that, in too many ways, it could be today's news.

ADD: I just discovered this post from Uppercase Woman. A great survey/meditation on gay marriage.

John Kennedy, Barack Obama, 2 Inaugurations and 2 Generations of Dreamers

I seem to be living in the WayBack Machine this year. Lots of memories of 1968 and even 1963. Now as January 20, 2009 approaches, yet another looms. January 20, certainly, but in 1961.

See that crowd? Somewhere, way in the back, probably at least a block beyond, stand an almost-fifteen-year-old girl and her mother. Fresh off an overnight train from Pittsburgh, having arrived at Union Station in time to watch the Army flame-throwers melt a blizzard’s worth of snow on the streets of the inaugural route, they make their way to their parade seats: in the bleachers, way down near the Treasure Building.

I spent most of 1960 besotted with John Kennedy. And Jackie. And Caroline. And all the other Kennedys who came with them. Most of my lunch money went to bus fare as, after school, I shuttled back and forth “to town” to volunteer in the local JFK headquarters. I even had a scrapbook of clippings about Kennedy and his family.

So. My parents surprised me with these two parade tickets. My mom and I took the overnight train and arrived
around dawn Inauguration morning. We couldn’t get into the swearing-in itself, of course, so we went to a bar that served breakfast (at least that’s how I remember it) and watched the speech on their TV, then made our way along the snowy sidewalks to our seats, arriving in time to watch the new president and his wife roll by, to see his Honor Guard, the last time it would be comprised solely of white men (since Kennedy ordered their integration soon after,) in time to see the floats and the Cabinet members and the bands and the batons.

It was very cold. We had no thermos, no blankets, nothing extra, and my mom, God bless her, never insisted that we go in for a break, never complained or made me feel anything but thrilled. Which I was. As the parade drew to a close, and the light faded, we stumbled down the bleachers, half-frozen, and walked the few blocks to the White House fence. I stood there, as close to the fence as I am now to my keyboard, and watched our new president enter the White House for the first time as Commander in Chief.

That was half a century ago. I can’t say it feels like yesterday, but it remains a formidable and cherished memory. It was also a defining lesson on how to be a parent; it took enormous love and respect to decide to do this for me. I was such a kid – they could have treated my devotion like a rock star crush; so young, they could have decided I would “appreciate it more” next time. (Of course there was no next time.) Instead, they gave me what really was the lifetime gift of being a part of history. And showed me that my political commitment had value – enough value to merit such an adventure.

Who’s to say if I would have ended up an activist (I did)- and then a journalist (I did) – without those memories. If I would have continued to act within the system rather than try to destroy it. (I did) If I would have been the mom who took kids to Europe, brought them along on news assignments to Inaugurations and royal weddings and green room visits with the Mets (Yup, I did.) I had learned to honor the interests and dreams of my children the way my parents had honored my own. So it’s hard for me to tell parents now to stay home.

My good friend, the wise and gifted PunditMom, advises “those with little children” to skip it, and since strollers and backpacks are banned for security reasons, I’m sure she’s right. But if you’ve got a dreamer in your house, a young adult who has become a true citizen because of this election, I’d try to come. After all, he’s their guy. What he does will touch their lives far more than it will ours. Being part of this beginning may determine their willingness to accept the tough sacrifices he asks of them – at least that – and probably, also help to build their roles as citizens – as Americans – for the rest of their lives. Oh — and will tell them that, despite curfews and learner’s permits, parental limit-setting and screaming battles, their parents see them as thinking, wise and effective people who will, as our new President promised them, help to change the world.

Edgy, Funny Prop. 8 “Musical” — Hilarious or Horrible? Doogie, Jack Black, CJ (aka Juno’s stepmom), Maya and more

I missed this one* so figure maybe you did too. I promise to be back with a "real" post soon but it's pretty provocative so wanted to share it. (Read more about the battle over Proposition 8 here.) There are a lot of comments on the original page that call it blasphemous and it's certainly edgy – but well – what do you think?

*For background on the video, try this.

Obama, McCain and the Power of Words

I'm working on a big new post on a weird topic but in the meantime, the always original David Wescott has done, (at the suggestion of his wife), a very interesting word cloud comparison. Basically, he created clouds for the election night speeches of President-elect Obama and Senator McCain. Both the differences and the similarities are striking. Take a look.

Obama’s Economic Team, Yeah They’re Good But I’m Excited about Melody!

I started writing about this as the announcement was made and got called away. Now I discover that my friend and very wise colleague PunditMom has basically said everything I would have said – so go read her evaluation.

I still want, though, to share my sense of this remarkable woman. It's very exciting. Melody Barnes, now a top adviser to President-Elect Obama, is one of the most impressive, decent and unpretentious people I've worked with in Washington or anywhere else. She's smart, she's interesting, always open, funny and committed. She is a wonderful choice. Since she's been working with the transition for some time it's no surprise, but it still says a lot that she's there. Here's a interview with her that will give you an idea of her thinking and of the way she responds; calm, orderly, thoughtful and usually, wise.

Not much detail, I know. My own experiences with her were peripheral and intermittent but this I know: her presence in the Administration is yet another piece of evidence supporting what I wrote yesterday. The values, outlook and core of this Administration offer more and more hope that they're bringing smart, capable and "no drama*" people with them as they take over in these very difficult times.

*Yeah, yeah I know but Larry Summers is just one guy.

Barack Obama, Style, Change, and Basketball

I really like Barack Obama – anyone who reads this blog knows that. And it's not just his ideas that are so attractive; his style is just stunning. I'm no starry eyed kid; I've been around the block with many candidates who looked better than they turned out to be. But in this case, it feels like the more you look the better it gets. It's scary, in fact, because it can't be true – there are sure to be grim and discouraging moments and long dry periods. Even so, there is so much room for hope. I wanted to share a couple of moments that add to that hope as we look forward in these very scary times.

First, last week's issue of the New York Time Magazine included a piece by Ron Suskind, author of A Hope in the Unseen, called Change. You really should read it, but for now consider this story that Valerie Jarrett told Suskind as evidence that I'm not delusional to be so excited about the basic qualities of this man.

It was in Iowa, just a year ago. Obama was way behind Hillary Clinton. The heavyweights were called in, 200 members of Obama’s national finance committee. The money people. Many had given mightily. And now, it seemed, nothing was working. Obama said that before they
all gathered to pass judgment, he wanted them — all 200 — to meet his grass-roots field team in Iowa.They did, then gathered in a room at an Iowa arts center. The room was tense.
Obama explained that day that they were running a different kind of campaign, a real grass-roots campaign, one that grew from the bottom up, from the dirt, and that it takes time for those roots to take hold. And the heavy hitters nodded; yes, they understood that idea, but it wasn’t working. The polls were the proof. They showed Clinton with a double-digit lead.
And Jarrett can remember how Obama looked at them, hard-eyed, everything on the line. “ ‘Did you think I was kidding when I said this was the unlikely journey?’ ” Jarrett recalls him saying. “‘You thought this would be simple? No, change is never simple. Change is hard.

“
‘Listen, I know you’re nervous,’ he went on. ‘But if you’re nervous, I’ll hold your hand. We’re going to get through this together. And if we win Iowa, we’ll win this country.’ ”

Jarrett said: “He turned their emotion around. He made sense of it. He told them why we were there and what was within our grasp. And people became jubilant. You
never heard cheering like that. That was the turn, where it happened.”

To me that says it all. There's lots more in the piece though; I just read it last night and was just knocked out by it.

Then, thanks to RoadKill Refugee, who always seems to find things no one else has noticed, I came upon this remarkable interview between Obama and my old boss Bryant Gumbel. Again, everything that is revealed seems positive. Wise, funny, unpretentious – a man, as so many have observed, who is comfortable in his own skin; a man who doesn't have to prove anything to anybody.

Make of these what you will – but amid all the staffing speculation and bailout talk, school choice, puppy shopping and Inauguration gossip, this is a look at what appears to be some of the real stuff behind this person we've chosen to lead us for the next four years.

OUR TOUGH ECONOMY: OK, I ADMIT IT, IT SCARES ME

I don't know about you but I'm really getting scared. Although we've gone from a two-wage-earner family to one student and one consultant whose income is unpredictable, that's not the issue. It's the sense of vulnerability that just won't quit. I wake up and see overseas markets sinking each day and knowing that ours will follow, listen to layoff numbers of a size that I don't think I've imagined, much less seen before, remember the hard time all my high school classmates went through during the big steel strikes, and worry.

Bill Clinton used to talk all the time about Americans who "work hard and play by the rules." Well guess who's getting hosed now? A good friend of mine, a widow, has lost 50% of her 401K and she's in her early 60s so there isn't all that much time to recoup before she starts to need it. For many, medical expenses as they aged were supposed to be cushioned by savings; now each expense is a real economic violation. Friends in service businesses like dog walking, the guy who cuts my hair and relies on mall walk-in business that's not appearing, all the small, non-urgent elements that are the underpinnings of an economy — they're rickety and that's scary. Forget about the auto industry – that's almost too big to get your head around. But a young mother running a pet care business so she has more time for her family, a deli owner, a home childcare center, an occupational therapist or piano teacher or online yarn entrepreneur — a new college grad with no job prospects, an independent consultant like me — we're vulnerable.

My anger at George Bush and the past eight years has grown geometrically in the midst of all this. Remember the ant and the grasshopper? Well Bush, who ran as a sturdy, sensible ant, has squandered all the reserve that might have helped us weather parts of this crisis. He's put us so far in debt that we are a bad example and object of rage, disappointment and distrust. In yet another element of the disdain in which we're held, our profligate, self-indulgent conduct of both war and economic policy has left us in tatters with not nearly enough resources to take care of ourselves without enormous pain and sacrifice. I've been out of work. I've been in debt. We've climbed back from two separate crises, one of our own making, one not, and moved ourselves to a place where we have a little equilibrium. That's a vulnerable asset, and we're going to have to struggle to protect it. But we're so much luckier than others.

If you're trying to get out of the heady debt so many Americans were seduced into, there's no room for a layoff or slowdown. If you need a job to keep your Green Card, if you need holiday work to pay for SATs and college applications, if you're retired and fear for your savings, if you need summer jobs to stay off the streets, if your kids need extra educational intervention, this mess is going to land on you. And that's only if it doesn't get so bad that the photo at the top of this post is a reality once again.

Clearly I'm not the only one thinking about the Great Depression. This TIME cover, which will certainly be a classic, evokes a famous photo of FDR in its picture of President-Elect Obama. "The New New Deal" it says. Hoping, pleading almost, that the inspiring, calm and competent Roosevelt will be channeled in this new President, along with a great portion of Abraham Lincoln. Clearly, the evocation of presidential icons from both parties reflects the comprehension of the scope and magnitude of the issues we face – and the urgency surrounding them. Just as clearly, I'm not the only one who's worried. AND I keep adding to this as news breaks – now the Dow is below 8,000. I think I just need to shut up and post.

RACHEL MADDOW, BLOGGERS AND PAJAMAS

Thanks to Sue Katz of Sue Katz Consenting Adult for posting this. Everyone loves Rachel, and this is but a tiny sample of why.

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.