POLITICS – Page 9 – Don't Gel Too Soon

Life and Death on the Coast of France REDUX

It doesn’t look at all real – I know that. But it is. It’s also a place I’ve wanted to see for as long as I can remember. And here we are. Here we are! The sweet, formidable beauty of this place is matched only by its astonishing history – as a monastery, a prison and a target, from ancient times to the carnage and suffering of D-Day.

Mt-Saint-Michel has, for more than a thousand years, stood atop the rock upon which is was built. Its timelessness is much of what attracts people, I suspect, along with its ice-castle beauty and the awesome commitment of its inhabitants: the sacrifices made by these men on the mountain top, alone, virtually silent, with nothing to do but pray and take on their assigned chores, meditate and live out their lives in as holy a way as possible

SMEglise ike diorama crop — Ike sends US troops off to the D-Day invasion of Europe that helped win WWII.

Nearby, the small town of Saint-Mère-Élgise and its museum await the summer celebration of the 70th anniversary of D-Day and its remarkable exercise in vision, courage and grit. This diorama of General Eisenhower’s last visit with the men he was sending to fight and die is a moving one. Anyone who has ever seen his 1968 conversation with Walter Cronkite knows how well the General understood that half of those he sent out on D-Day would never return.

SMglise resistance — Resistance Armbands

SMeglise death book crop — Prayers to say if death is near; provided by the military

One group of special heroes and heroines represented at the museum were the Resistance – women and men who parachuted behind enemy lines, worked with local opponents of the Reich to complicate their war and, at great personal risk. transmitted by hidden radios everything they learned about their German enemy.

Aside from their real-life-spying, they also served in special, high-risk, low profile operations, commemorated in history, in films and in novels. I often used the Resistance stories and the children running messages and doing other support work as a way to engage our sons in history when we traveled. The drama and courage, and relevance, was and still is irresistible.

What you see here another of the profoundly moving exhibit items at the museum. Look carefully; it’s a page of prayers to support young soldiers dying in the field. Breathtaking as you stand among the photos of these young men and see how wise it was to offer them this comfort, and wonder if today’s military is inclined, or allowed for that matter, to provide similar comfort.

In all, the life of the monastery and loss that surrounds the beaches of Normandy really are bookends to how we live our lives. Life and faith, war and peace, courage, sacrifice, defeat and victory. It is the greatest gift of travel when these things present themselves and we remember how fragile, and how wondrous, the privilege of being alive and aware really is.

NOTE: This post was first published on May 8th, the day we made this trip. But today, on the anniversary of D-Day, it seemed right to offer it once again.

Antwerp and the Immigrants

That’s the view from the deck tonight. We docked late so had just over an hour to visit the new immigration museum built in the former headquarters of the Red Star Line, which for years carried dreamers from the old world to the new. Here’s how they looked through the eyes of painter Eugene Van Meighan, whose parents owned a pub across the street.

This fellow stands watch just a block away, reminding us of those who trudged, carrying all their worldly goods, from the railway station at the end of a grueling trip to Antwerp to the embarkation point: the Red Star Line terminal. It was quite a trek.

The museum has managed to take a story we all know and, with the very ordinary tools of words and pictures, make it new again. There is a sweetness to the presentation, including portrayals of physical examinations, decontamination, and general misery, combined with respect for the travelers and pride in the role the company, and the city, played in so many futures .

Of course this city is more than an immigration hub. It’s also got a long history of its own, built around, among other things, the guilds that preceded trade unions. Their icons top several of the buildings that surround this lovely city hall.

Just down the street is the Cathedral and a flurry of chocolate shops, coffee houses and souvenir vendors. We could have gone to Brussels tomorrow, but have decided to stay here and enjoy where we are. We’re a bit weary of moving so fast, although grateful for all we’ve seen and learned. It’s time for a nice, slow day, and that we shall have.

I Hate Spanish and the EU. How About You?

Portuguese is really hard; even they think so. It is also, and you better remember this, NOT just another kind of Spanish. They’d rather have you “mangle the Portuguese than try to use Spanish and think we’ll understand.” There’s a strong national pride here and “Spain is our only neighbor so sometimes we have to hate them.” It’s Spain and the ocean, actually – one on one side, one on the other.

In between language lessons today, as we wandered the Medieval town of Guimarães we learned even more about local feelings toward the Euro and the EU. Here are some of the opinions/facts (?) offered in the past two days:

The Euro doubled all the prices but salaries didn’t go up.
The EU has made it difficult to impossible to rescue old buildings because no one can afford to do it privately and neither can the government.
Portugal’s membership in the EU has been a disaster. They have a huge debt which is not their fault and Europe and the rest of the world calls them spendthrift when the (aforementioned) inflation has made it tough for this small country to operate financially.*
The EU also governs what countries control what industry. Larger nations forced Portugal to destroy the ships that sustained their centuries-old fishing industry because the big guys already controlled fishing.**
The EU tells countries what they are going to grow and produce and many agricultural traditions are being lost.
The EU has banned copper pans for cooking and the traditional Portuguese egg custard has always been made in copper pans and it just doesn’t taste the same in any other vessel.

Look again at this poster. It says “We Are Not the Debt” and complains that all Portuguese are being blamed for their country’s debt to the EU when, they say, it has largely been the EU’s policies that made the borrowing necessary in the first place.

Nobody will ever accuse this lovely, colorful country, with its passionate politics, of being a simple place; part of its charm is the passion with which their views are held. Our visit here as been a happy, enlightening surprise.

* NOTE: a couple of knowledgeable people on this trip have taken exception to this, claiming that it was not the Euro but the huge amount of public spending that has caused their debt.

**NOTE: These same knowledgeable people, one a CEO and the other an active environmentalist, maintain that the ban on fishing was instituted because the waters off Portugal have been massively over-fished and the only way to preserve the fish population was to cut off fishing and allow them to replenish. Yet another person, Chilean, told me he thought it was just that Portugal could not compete and so was encouraged to try other industries. Clearly, if I get that many opinions in one day, this country’s relationship with its economic future, and with the EU, is complicated.

Lisbon, Visas and Jews

Praca de comerce2 — Praça do Comércio at the harbor entrance to Lisbon.

Lisbon is a gorgeous city with a tough history. We spent today with a specialist in Jewish life here – which went from a quarter of a million souls to 700 between WWII and today. Between the Axis and Salazar they never had a chance, and before that…. well the stories of abuse and expulsion are too hideous to describe.

It’s enough to say that through the centuries Jews were permitted in Lisbon and Portugal for short periods of time and then expelled. When the economy tanked and needed a boost, the king always invited them back. For a while. Then the cycle began again. Each time it was “convert or leave.” And if you do leave, you go without your money, your goods or anything else. Those who remained, as “cryptojews” (secret Jews or those practicing old Jewish ways even though they were no longer identified as Jews,) or were unfortunate enough to be around during one of the angry Jew-banning periods, retribution was swift and terrible. Torture, burning at the stake, slow, Game of Thrones deaths by other means and, more than once, forceable seizure of children who were then either adopted by Christians or enslaved. One particularly terrible story involves 1506, right around Passover, when thousands faced grisly, dramatic trials, sentencing and death. It is not a pretty story.

Passover massacre memorial — Memorial to those who died in 1506

It took until the early 21st Century for anyone to acknowledge and commemorate this terrible time.

There’s lots more, all of it sadly familiar, although in many ways the Portuguese were more horribly creative than most in what they did to the Jews in their midst.

There are also stories of enormous courage, including Aristides de Sousa Mendes, a diplomat who saved thousands of Jews by issuing visas and exit papers to them after having been forbidden to do so. Mostly though, even today the terrible stories outweigh the good ones. By a lot.

We learned all this, and so much more, from a spectacular guide named Paolo Scheffer whose knowledge is exceeded only by his passion for sharing it.

Revolution anniversarhy photo cropped — The world’s coolest coup (NBC News)

That knowledge, although focused on Jewish history and art history, also covers the politics surrounding the EU and the Portuguese economy, the days of dictator Antonio Salazar and the wonders of the 1974 “Carnation Revolution” whose 40th anniversary was celebrated on April 25th. The uprising against Portugal’s fascist dictator killed only four, and featured carnations in gun barrels and on demonstrators.

It’s wonderful to recall, but this day has been replete with memories of uprisings of a different sort, always with the Jews as targets. Perhaps recalling the carnations and all they stood for also reminds us of the vulnerability of all minorities in all cultures and the need for all of us to rise up to protect them.

Welcome to the End of the World

It’s 3:30 in the afternoon and we’ve just returned from a trip to the barren cliff of Sagres, which was, until the 15^th century, the end of the world.

It was there that Henry the Navigator, the third son of King John of Portugal, sent the explorers he trained and financed out to explore what lay beyond the lands they knew.

It’s an inspiring story – a charismatic royal, never to be king, transforming Portugal and, really, the world. Sadly, all this wonder emerged despite, not because of, our guide. It’s tough to overestimate the power of a guide on a bus full of eager learners. She can seduce, enchant and mesmerize, or she can issue rote descriptions, lecture on the virtues of diversity to a crew of people who are on the trip because it’s what they already value, and, eventually, become toxic force within the community. And that’s what she was. Which wouldn’t be worth mentioning except that by the time we left the bus we were so bummed we were sniping at each other. Agitated and angry, disappointed and dismissed. OH and she forgot to show us where the statue of Henry was and wouldn’t turn around the one roundabout between us and his lovely presence pointing out to sea.

When you travel, every day is a jewel to be burnished, full of potential experiences and lessons and joys to share. So when someone violates the trust of leading this crew of nomads, it’s a grave offense, particularly painful in such a bleak, beautiful, Wuthering Heightsish landscape.

Fortunately, we rallied, went into the Portimāo for lunch, met some cool expats and saw trees wearing granny squares,

some crazy ceramic benches with one tale of the history of Portugal illustrated on each one and a couple of really interesting political posters. Tomorrow: Lisbon!

Remembering Ed Bradley: Fini Bi Bi One More Time

Ed was part of a 60 Minutes piece reported by Wynton Marsalis on Sunday. I thought again of his gifts and his wonderful self, and decided to republish this piece, written on the day he died.

Ed Bradley died today – of leukemia. He was not a usual man — not at all. Good, funny, gifted, fierce, loving and decent, he was a gentleman to the core. For two political convention seasons in the 80s I was his CBS News floor producer. In the midst of one of them, his mother had a stroke and was very ill in Philadelphia. She wouldn’t let him miss work though – insisted that he be on the convention floor every night. The convention was in New York , so Ed drove to Philadelphia after we were off the air each night, sleeping in a limo on the way to Philly – spending the night and morning with his mother and then returning in the limo the next day. He was there for her — and for his work, as she insisted that he be.

If you saw him on 60 Minutes, interviewing Aretha Franklin in the kitchen with a dish towel over his shoulder, chopping while they talked, or jamming with Aaron Neville, you saw another, wonderful Ed — no pretense, no baloney. And if you saw him with his godchildren – daughters of the wonderful Vertamae Grosvenor, you saw yet another part of this remarkable man.

Somehow though, when I read the CNN Alert just an hour ago — what I remembered at once was that night in 1975 when Saigon fell. I was just back from maternity leave and alone on the overnight for the foreign desk at CBS. As a long-time CBS correspondent in Vietnam, Ed was the last guy out — or just about. What I can’t get out of my head is his account of walking down the deserted embassy hallway — where almost all the lights were out except one far down the hall — and his description of thinking of “the light at the end of the tunnel” — and then – as he signed off for the last time from Saigon – ending with the words of Saigon hookers “fini bi bi.” I’m not sure I can describe the sensitivity and sadness of this report – but I do remember sending him an email “Ernie Pyle, move over.”

The thing is – he was at least as wonderful as he was gifted and as talented as he was dear. It’s just so sad to think of him gone and of such a miserable disease. He’s leaving a beautiful legacy but that doesn’t make it OK. Not at all.

Oh Gwyneth! Mom to Mom to Mom

Gwyneth Paltrow has serious mom shoes to fill. Her own mother, Blythe Danner (you’ve probably seen her in those osteoporosis ads, or as almost everybody’s TV/movie mom…) is a spectacular actress who took a long professional hiatus to stay home with her kids as they grew up. If you had seen her show up at that MASH unit in Korea as Hawkeye Pierce’s great lost love, or as Alma in Eccentricities of a Nightingale you’d know just how much she gave up and we all lost. Her daughter has often acknowledged how aware she was of that decision.

I think one reason it’s tough to watch all the hating on Gwyneth, especially by other women, is that her mother is so extraordinary. I interviewed her once for a story on the Girl Scouts, of all things, and she was fierce. About acting, about her leave from acting, about not raising her kids in Hollywood, about almost everything.

As I’ve watched her daughter all these years, with weird baby names and regimens and what seem like odd decisions, I’ve watched her the way a mother might. Understanding and probably respecting the quest, the efforts to build an original life and, of course, the professional success, and worrying about The Interview and other events that made her sound more shallow than she probably is. Springing to her defense, as Danner did, seems reasonable. The downpour of venom does not.

I know I’m challenging a lot of women I deeply respect but it just seems so — unnecessary. The women of America face a true political emergency, and if the right takes over Congress this fall we are in real danger. Let’s hate more on the people responsible for that and leave this poor, complicated woman to fix what she can and recover from the rest.

From Bunny to Brave Leader of Us All. Happy Birthday Gloria!

Gloria in her "underground" Playboy Bunny garb for her 1963 expose in SHOW Magazine. — Gloria in her “underground” Playboy Bunny garb for her 1963 expose in SHOW Magazine.

I was 17 the first time I saw this, a Pittsburgh kid with grand ambitions for worldliness and intellectual heft and the ability to do the New York Times crossword puzzle in ink; so many that I actually subscribed to magazines like The Saturday Review, The New Yorker and SHOW: the Magazine of the Arts, where Gloria’s famous Playboy Club expose first appeared.

My reaction: “What a showboat, dumb thing to do!” My (never-less-than-honest) mother responded “You’re just jealous!” And she was right. Gloria had done something I so wanted to do – and so early in her career! How could I ever get from a Monongahela River mill town to that?

I never dreamed that Gloria, too, came from an industrial town – Toledo – much less that we would both have attended the same college, that I would hear her speak at my sister’s Smith graduation, and that, amazingly, I would actually come to know this remarkable woman. And here, on her 80th birthday, is what I learned:

In 1974, I told one of Ms’ spectacular co-founders how much I admired her. She replied “That’s how I feel about Gloria.” Heroes have heroes too, and hers was Gloria.

In 1982, for Ms. Magazine‘s 10th birthday, I produced an anniversary story called “A Day in the Life of Gloria Steinem” for the Today Show. The camera crew and I took a train from Penn Station to Philadelphia with her and followed her from event to event, including a couple of large public appearances. At least once every couple of minutes, a woman would walk up to her to thank her for something: courage, perspective, “you changed my life.”

Every time, every interruption, every stop on the street or in the hotel lobby or the ball room or the train, she treated each woman as if she were the first one she’d ever met. She listened intently. She responded in a very personal way. Every time.

To Gloria, every woman: each of us, all of us, has mattered to her. We are not just a formidable, critical cause, we are women who one by one by one have been living the lives women live, unequal, unheralded, amazing lives.

It is this that has made her the most remarkable of leaders, of change agents and of women. Never, in all the marches and speeches and honors and sadnesses has she forgotten that each one of us is all of us. She is not just a leader, she is a shining example. And inside each of us, we know it.

Happy Birthday Gloria – and thanks, from all of us here now and the girls and women yet to come.

Take a look at this MAKERS profile, too.

Darrell Issa, Rudy Giuliani and Debo Adegbile: What a Crummy Day

It can’t all be about race, can it? Even though House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa stands over his seated African-American Co-Chair and speaks to him like a house slave. It was mortifying to watch.

That Co-Chair, Maryland Rep- Elijah Cummings, had demanded the opportunity to speak at a hearing Issa had adjourned over his objections. If you think I’m over-reacting, watch it for yourself.

Monday, America’s Mayor abdicated his title, if he hadn’t already, as he described totalitarian Vladimir Putin as decisive, and “a leader” — as opposed to a dictator which is pretty much what he is. The drumbeat went on: John McCain, Lindsay Graham, Sarah Palin and the rest of them. But here’s Giuliani:

Then today. Here’s how the New York Times tells the story of the Debo Adegbile:

Debo Adegbile did his job, and for that he was deemed unfit by the Senate to become the head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. His misstep, specifically, was helping represent a death-row inmate while he was director of litigation at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.

With this excuse in hand, Senate Republicans and seven cowardly Democrats, three of whom are up for re-election in November, managed to shut down Mr. Adegbile’s nomination. The final, shameful vote was effectively 51-48 (Senator Harry Reid supported Mr. Adegbile but voted no for procedural reasons).

But wait: didn’t the Senate vote to confirm John Roberts to the Supreme Court, even after learning that he, too, had assisted in the defense of a death-row inmate? That man, John Errol Ferguson, killed eight people. (Despite the help of one of the nation’s top lawyers, Ferguson was executed in Florida last year.)

So why does John Roberts get a pass but not Debo Adegbile? Because Mr. Adegbile represented Mumia Abu-Jamal, who was convicted and sentenced to death in 1982 for killing a Philadelphia police officer named Daniel Faulkner. For three decades the case has reverberated across the region, which now apparently includes the constituency of Delaware Senator Chris Coons, the last and least expected Democratic vote against the nomination.

Even those who felt ambivalent about the Mumia case, one would hope, would want the accused to have a constitutionally-guaranteed defense, right? And no one questioned Mr. Adegbile’s capacity or experience, so he should have been fine. But no. A vicious FOX campaign planted the seed and it worked, even pulling in a few Democrats. They knew they were succumbing to demagoguery; they had to.

So at a time when voting rights are under challenge across the country without a full Voting Rights Act to protect them, at a time when a public figure can call the President of the United States a “subhuman mongrel,” and just keep going, when swing state early and weekend voting hours most used by timecard workers and students are eviscerated, when our first African-American President faces fierce obstruction for anything he proposes, we pretend we are behaving like the citizens we were meant to be. And aren’t.

Bad things happen all the time these days – but these three in such rapid succession were a real kick in the gut.

Lupita, the Oscars, Race and the Un-Funny (I’m Lookin’ at YOU Chelsea)

Mocking LUPITA? Really?

The presence of President Barack Obama has clearly given haters permission to go public. It’s given conservative politicians excuses to obstruct nominees and legislation almost to the point of treason. Today’s criticism of the president’s Ukraine responses, especially that of Senator Lindsey Graham, who knows better and seems to fear his primary opponent more than he fears adversely affecting our country’s future, is the latest example.

We expect that from the predictably-racist and from opportunistic politicians. We do NOT, however, expect it from mainstream comedians on mainstream outlets like The Huffington Post. So how does it happen that the much-honored Chelsea Handler, who has 5.4 million Twitter followers, her own nightly E! TV show, and is a frequent guest on others, feels free to:

a) Tweet what she did about African Americans and the Oscars (read this, you won’t believe it)

b) EVER believe these posts would be funny

c) Continue so long on such an influential venue without interruption by her “publisher?”

She is about to launch a stand-up tour and was tweeting to promote it, but in service to that end, repeatedly tweeted what were at least disrespectful and self-occupied and at most patently racist comments not only about Lupita Nyong’o’s win, but also about past Oscar winners Sidney Poitier and Angelina Jolie (who also received this year’s Humanitarian Award,) Whoopi Goldberg, and this: “#NelsonMandela looks great #abc #resurrection -Oscars –@chelseahandler” referring, presumably, to ABC’s endless promos for their new drama Resurrection.

As of this writing, there has been no searchable comment from HuffPo beyond a bland response to the Grio.

The thing is, as the only woman late-night anchor, an edgy humorist and all that stuff, her behavior is somehow especially painful. She’s reaching younger people and, with this kind of talk, making it a little easier for them to accept it from others. Because of the huge reach of HuffPo, she’s legitimized both by her presence and their silence.

So how is it, in the 5th year of the administration of our first Black president, when best picture, best screenplay and best supporting actress Oscars went to African-Americans, and, as Larry Irving has noted, “Who says Hollywood is stuck in the past… Mexican born Director wins for Best Director. British Born Brother wins for Best Picture… Kenyan born Yale educated woman wins for Best Supporting Actress… Love it!!! In America anything really can happen…” it is possible for this to happen and be almost solely in African-American outlets like The Grio and The Root?

Come on guys! Free speech, free press indeed. But we really need to speak up when this kind of thing is still acceptable as humor. Seriously.