The wonderful and inspiring activism of the Parkland HS students has engendered an ongoing dialog in social media between gun enthusiasts and those who want guns regulated or banned. Netflix did a special featuring comedian Jim Jefferies.
Watch it here …
And the second part …
Jeffries confronts the faulty logic and lapsed common sense of many pro-gun arguments. Perhaps humor is the best way to do this.
Some of my conservative friends are responding to posts by angry Democrats with, “Be a good loser.” In sports, where it’s only a game, being a good loser means congratulating the other team and thanking them for a good game. It’s play â or should be.
But the policies and actions of our government are not a game. It is the responsibility of every citizen to make certain that government is good government. In this election a man has been elected whose values and character are deeply flawed. Much ink has been devoted to cataloging his shortcomings. His choices of advisors and staff are not encouraging:
The short list of White House cabinet picks (see below) reads like a Whoâs-Who of rightwing know-nothings (Sarah Palin), dangerous retreads (Newt Gingrich and John Bolton), arch conservatives (Sam Brownback), disgraced hacks (Chris Christie), Wall Street regressives (Steven Mnuchin), and raving opportunists (Rudi Giuliani). Already installed as chief strategist and senior counselor is a white supremacist (Steve Bannon), and, as chief of staff, a Trump toady and party apologist (Reince Priebus).
If personnel is policy, this isn’t looking good. [Robert Reich, Facebook 11/14/16]
In our democracy being a good loser means defending American values as embodied in the constitution. It also means defending inalienable and inherent human rights. Among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness â which are possible only with conscious stewardship of our planet, equality, peace, integrity, and community.
We may have lost but we’ll never give up, whatever it takes!
Instead of our usual year-end letter, weâve decided to speak from our hearts about the current election and what it means to us.
Jonesborough Courthouse
Weâve written this essay togetherâsharing our spiritual concerns and our extensive analysis of the situation. Itâs divided into five sections:
How did we get here?
Personality vs. Character/Morality.
Who benefits from our disconnection, confusion, and disillusionment?
Values worth dying for?
The concerns we have are not going away (no matter who wins).
We hope youâll receive our letter in the spirit that weâve written itâas an invitation to ongoing inquiry. Our country is at a crucial turning point.
How did we get here?
Many of us are distressed with the current state of American politics, the ugliness, the bitterness, the distrust of the media, the candidates, the Congress, each other.
League of Women Voters Yard Sign
When Richmond and I were young adults, we trusted our parents, our family doctor, our banker, our teachers, and our neighbors. We respected news people like Walter Cronkite or Bill Moyers and their investigative journalism. We used to feel connected to our larger world. But extreme mobility and digital media have broken down that sense of community and connectedness.  Now everything has become âentertainment:â news, food, sports, gun violence. Weâre texting, Instagramming, Facebooking, Tweeting, running to keep up, grasping for diversions. Weâre accomplished but exhausted, successful but soul-weary.
Many Americans spend more time viewing and reading about sports events than they do about the workings of our government. Retired Supreme court Justice David Suter, in 2012, spoke about “Civic Ignorance” and how it puts democracy at risk. He expressed the fear that an autocratic leader could exploit discontent and seize power by promising to fix dysfunctional government.
Bit by bit, what used to give our lives meaning has been eroded. Advertising tells us weâre not good enough. Media shows us there are only winners and losers. The implicit assumption is that power and force alone win the day. Family dynamics in movies and on TV show competition, cynicism and sarcasm instead of loyalty, caring, hope and generosity of spirit.  The world as the media presents it often seems evil, untrustworthy, and downright scary.
In politics, widespread gerrymandering has resulted in extreme candidates who support partisan stagnation, and fail to perform basic functions like appointing judges, funding government operations, and working towards viable solutions to our state and national problems. Lobbyists are paid more than our legislators and their staff combined (and there are 23 lobbyists for every person in Congress). Elected officials spend more time raising campaign money than they do preparing bills or deliberating on legislation. Everyone, including our representatives, is fed up.
Personality vs. Character
Two 2016 candidates used the discontent to challenge the political establishment. Ordinarily such grassroots-driven change would be cause for celebration of the democratic processâbut not so much this time. One so-called âpopulistâ candidate has appealed to fear, bigotry, hate, and a false nationalism that has rallied many to him for what he’s not: ânot a politicianâ, ânot politically correctâ, ânot elitistâ, and ânot a compromiser.â Perhaps more hopefully, Bernie Sanders won major changes in the Democratic platform and pulled Hillary back to her Progressive roots.
Quakers have a saying, “Let your life speak.” None of us live up to our ideals all of the time, but it does matter that we learn from our mistakes. Weâve looked into the records of both candidates. Hillary Clinton is a career politician whose accomplishments and failures are very public, but sheâs got a long record of service and caring for the poor and the middle class and the experience and temperament to lead and govern.
Donald Trump, on the other hand, has the appearance of success in business, but the more one learns about him, the less there is to like or respect. Heâs a savvy and skillful promoter of new enterprises. But 1/3 of his ventures have been outright failures. Another 1/3 have been marginal at best, and 1/3 have âmet expectationsâ according to theNew York Times. Heâs presided over six bankruptcies that represent about $4.7 billion in losses to his investors and creditors. He openly brags that he personally made money as those companies failed. Just this month the Trump Taj Mahal closed. Though Forbes Magazine estimates Trumpâs current net worth at $3.7 billion, economist Robert Reich has calculated that the funds he received from his dad, if invested in an average performing portfolio, would now be worth $12 billion. His career is also besmirched by his predatory practices with vendors and contractors. Trump left a trail of unpaid bills and more than 3,500 litigations building his personal wealth. His crude remarks about women have dominated the headlines as we wrote this. His public speeches and appearances have been so full of misinformation and outright lies that he has set records with fact-checking organizations.
Daily Newspaper Endorsements (Wikipedia) as of October 22, 2016
No major daily newspaper, and only 3 of the more obscure ones, have endorsed him. USA Today, The Atlantic Magazine and eight others have savagely denounced him. Yet he remains the GOP candidate for President with polls showing that 43% of voters will vote for him.
To us, itâs more alarming that his followers donât seem to care about Trumpâs lack of merit or character. Many say they just want to elect him because âhe will shake upâ Washington. They quickly segue into a rant about Hillary as representing all that is corrupt and wrong with establishment politics. But, if you âburn the house downâ to dispatch the vermin, then what?
We note that the Trump campaign staff was recently restructured at the insistence of the Mercer family, one of Trumpâs billionaire backers. The short version of a longer story is that the Mercers want somebody in the White House who wonât mess with Wall Street and specifically who won’t impose a transaction tax to make flash trading unattractive.  Since the Citizens United decision, big money has been a problem, but the Koch brothers and the Mercers are now directing campaigns and the votes of successful candidates for narrow self-serving purposes.
Perception is a tricky matter. What we âseeâ depends on what weâre looking for andwhere we stand. When Iâm fearful and exhausted, I see danger at every turn and deceit in every person. When Iâm feeling more bouyant, I see possibility, and other people represent hope and support. We constantly decry negative campaigning, but it works because negativity and characterizations are so contagious. A colleague says, âMy boss is a jerk,â and itâs all too easy to agree without any facts. We assume characterizations are based on evidence, but actually we make the characterization in anger, and then begin to collect evidence to support it.
Throughout Obamaâs Presidency, some peopleâs perceptions were constantly jarred because they were not expecting to see a Black man accorded the perquisites of power.  (Consider how differently you and others you know might perceive a white Marine holding a rain umbrella for our Black president.) The Guardian, a conservative British magazine, not historically a Hillary fanâdid an in-depth analysis of Clintonâs fundraising and policy positions and finally concluded that Clinton was âfundamentally honest and truthful.â PolitiFact did an exhaustive analysis of Clinton and all the other candidatesâand consistently found her to be âthe most honest of this yearâs presidential candidates,â yet according to Harvardâs Kennedy School of Government, she has received more negative media coverage than either Sanders or Trump.  Robin Lakoff, a professor of linguistics at UC Berkeley observed that, âWith Hillary everything she does is either different from what men do and itâs âwrong,â or itâs the same things that men do and thatâs âwrong,â and thatâs because the underlying thing about Clinton and her candidacy is itâs not normal. âNormalâ is a male candidate, a male voice, a male tie.â (see an excellent article from Rolling Stone, Oct., 2016, âHillary Vs. the Hate Machineâ ) Is perception equivalent to reality? Since Lee Atwater first said it, political strategists claim it is.
Who benefits from our disconnection, confusion and disillusionment?
Is there a global conspiracy thatâs destroying our American way of life? Are low-wage workers in developing countries stealing our jobs? Are corporations only rapacious and exploitative? What happened to the social certainties in life, where men were men and women were women and they liked it that way ⌠where people âknew their placeâ and were respectful?  Where are the âjust warsâ where the enemy is clear and the cause worth dying for? Where are the alternatives where thereâs clearly a right and a wrong choice? When did we stop âloving our neighborsâ and being âour brotherâs keeperâ?
Letâs explore the question of âwho benefits?â If weâre a nation divided, seduced by drama and diversions, fear and uncertainty, how much more easily we fall into scapegoating others instead of seeing the huge injustices against all of us. Â A university study representing the population of the USA as 100 people showed that, during the slow economic recovery 2009-2013, the one richest individual would have acquired $9.10 of every $10 generated, while the 99 of us got the remaining 90 cents! Â Or looking from another perspective, real wages for the middle class have stalled since the mid-70âs, but during the same period, âwages for the top 1% have risen 165% and wages for the top 0.1% have risen 362%.â (Thomas Piketty quote)Â In the words of Abraham Lincoln, âA house divided against itself will not stand.â When weâre divided as a nation, our allies despair and our enemies delight!
Values Worth Dying For?
Our soldiers are sworn to defend the US Constitution with their lives if necessary. It’s up to each of us to ensure that the values enshrined therein are honored so this nation merits the ultimate sacrifice. There is far more to it than just wearing a flag pin.
Who, lately, can relax and enjoy day dreaming, playing, thinking, laughing, or just calling a friend spontaneously? The news is full of corporate exploitation (the Epi-pen scandal and the Wells Fargo scam being the latest as we write this). With an eight figure annual compensation package, what could a CEO lack that would explain such greed? If Iâm all alone with no sense of a community that cares about me, if my vote is meaningless and my voice isnât heard, if one believes that thereâs only winners and losers (me vs. you) ̜  then working endlessly to get all I can and fighting to hold onto it makes perfect senseâespecially when some are so obviously âgaming the system.â From this perspective, civic duty, personal character, stewardship, and kindness seem like quaint, outdated sentiments.
How difficult it is to see clearly when we are constantly bombarded with distorted messages, with lies repeated over and over until they sound ânormalâ and âtrue,â with memes that areâwell, mean!  The sophisticated systems for slicing and dicing us by our interests and preferences are legion: what magazines we read, what pages we âclickâ through to on our computers, what products we buy, our income levels â all types of personal information is gathered. Marketers have been parsing market segments for a long time. Now political campaigns have brought these techniques to a new high (or low) so that our perceptions can be cleverly manipulated.
The 20th Century is over, and we sense that the 21st Century is taking a new direction. As teacher and futurist Joanna Macy has said for many years, âThis is the time of the Great Turning [away from a consumption society towards an earth-preserving society].â
Cover of Funny Times
As activist and commentator Van Jones has observed, âWe will either turn on each other or towards each other.â The paths have been diverging for a long time and are now irreconcilableâand as poet Robert Frost declared, âAnd that [which path we choose] will make all the difference.â
Richmond recently observed, âEveryone is a minority.â Weâre easily confused and defeated when weâre isolated from each other, but evidence is now robust that when all members of a group participate in decisions, those decisions are stronger and more relevant to all our needs. Quakers have practiced consensus â finding the sense of the meeting â for centuries. The fact is we are interconnected, intimately bound to every other person in our humanity and our well being. (âAll of us together are a genius,â Lynne Twist has famously said.) How can we learn to listen for our commonality instead of our differences? As supporters for Clinton (or Bernie) or Trump, we all love this country, want a better future for our children, are frustrated with the deadlock in Congress, seek meaning in our work and our relationships. We need each otherâs wisdom and experience, but we must work together to benefit from it.
America is worth dying for when out leaders play to our highest aspirations and shared vision. It’s not worth it when our leaders play to greed and manipulate us with fear .
The issues that concern us are not going away
Cover of The Week
No matter who is elected President, the issues that divide us are not going away. We urge you to prayerfully consider your vote, and then vote for something, not against something. There are no âperfect candidatesâ (thatâs an oxymoron like âperfect parentsâ or âperfect childrenâ), but the character of the person whoâs at the top of the ticket does matterâas well as the character of candidates all the way to the bottom of the ticket.
In the spirit of full disclosure, we have historically split our votes when choosing candidates, but this year weâre voting a straight Democratic ticket. Why? Because after careful analysis, the facts show that:
Over the past 64 years, when the Democratic party controlled the White House (from Eisenhower to Obama), every economic indicator was betterâproductivity, wages, the stock market, the pace of the unemployment rateâs decline, the rate of economic growth. (Source: Mark Watson and Alan Blinder, Princeton U. professors of economics)
Tax cuts and trickle-down economics havenât worked despite 30 years of âtestingââask the citizens of Kansas, whose Governor promised a âmarch to zeroâ taxes and huge economic growth with tax cuts and austerity âand instead delivered an economic catastrophe! When George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton raised taxes, we experienced a surge in economic growth.
Now, eight years later, itâs clear the âdreadedâ and much maligned Economic Stimulus Package did avoid another Great Depression, created jobs, avoided a budget deficit that would have been twice what it currently is, and build hundreds of new bridges and hundreds of miles of re-paved highwaysâwithout spiking inflation or causing deflation (Source: those same Princeton U. economists, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, and Goldman Sachs, among others)
Those who work hardest to eliminate poverty are the poor people themselves. There are always those who exploit the system, but it appears that the significant âwelfare Queensâ are special interests who use âthe commonsâ but donât participate in what it takes to make the commons thrive for future generations.
Obamacare isnât perfect and the Social Security âtrust fundâ is declining, but the answer isnât scrapping these essential programs but working across-the-isle to address what doesnât work based on evidence, not emotion.
Wedding Chapel Sign
Recently, in a Tennessee wedding catererâs storefront chapel, we saw a sign that said, âAs two families are becoming one, we ask that you choose a seat and not a side.â This sounds like pretty good advice for this political season.  When the election is over, our democracy needs us allâour active engagement, our constructive criticisms, our vote, our voice, our willingness to stay at the tableâand to make room at the table for those unlike ourselves. Our greatness as a country is in our diversity. Unless weâre full blooded indigenous people, weâre all descended from immigrants whose courage and vision got us here and whose creativity and tenacity allowed us to become successful here.
As we made phone calls and canvassed door-to-door, we were struck at the enthusiasm of the folks voting for Hillary and at the anger of those voting against Hillary or for Trump. None of us makes our best decisions in a mood of anger. We strongly believe that our democracy will be safe with Hillary Clinton and at grave risk with Donald Trump. This election is not about personality – it’s about the character of the candidates and the values they model. We pray, not for political victory, but for the highest good of all concerned.
As Quakers, we seek âthat of God in every person.â We invite you to join us in âminding the Light â in ourselves and each other, so that we keep the flame of democracy burning brightly. As one of the tellers at the National Storytelling Festival said last week, âFaith is light in your heart when all your eyes can see is darkness.â Letâs keep faith with our democracy. Our election process isnât an athletic competition. America is great. We remain the worldâs best and strongest hope for a fair, just, inclusive, thriving future.
Weâd love to hear your thoughts. We also hope youâll take our essay and discuss it with othersâor take the bits that resonate with you and write to your friends. Our democracy needs every voiceâif we can learn to listen with mutual respect and open hearts.
Peace,
Marguerite and Richmond
October 24, 2016
“And the work of generosity shall be peace, and the effect of generosity will be quietness and security forever.” Isaiah 32:17
Storyteller and humorist Donald Davis’ lawn sign in Jonesborough, TN. Photographed at The National Storytelling Festival, October 2016.
“Freedom’s Safest Place” is how the NRA styles itself in its current series of self-promoting ads. The ads run on YouTube.com and tend to be linked as preludes to gun-related content. They also show up if Google searches have associated your internet address with gun interest.
NATIONAL RIFLE ASSOCIATION VIDEO SERIES
Everyone interested in the interplay of gun violence and politics should take time to watch a few of these. They stoke the fears of gun enthusiasts, promote guns as the solution to violent crime and terrorism, and in not so subtle ways reinforce a conservative political agenda.
On August 8th, 2016, Donald Trump was speaking about the prospect of Hillary Clinton nominating the next members of the Supreme Court of the US. âHillary wants to abolish, essentially abolish, the Second Amendment,â Trump said at a rally in Wilmington, N.C., on Tuesday. âBy the way, and if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I donât know.â
The facial expressions and body language of those present was alarming. Smiles, glances at companions that said, “Did he really say that out loud?” And, most shocking, nods of agreement.
Apologists immediately “clarified” Mr. Trump’s meaning saying he was only acknowledging the legendary political cohesiveness and clout of the NRA. But here I will make the argument for a much more sinister meaning.
FREEDOM’S SAFEST PLACE
What does this tag line mean? If you follow NRA’s interpretation of the Second Amendment, it affirms the notion that Americans have not only a right but a patriotic duty to own and be proficient with arms. The idea is that freedom’s enemies, foreign and domestic, would never prevail against the populist will of an armed and ready citizenry. Should the government get out of hand, the people so armed can and will defend freedom; or so the myth goes. If you listen carefully to Wayne Lapierre’s “We Don’t Need You” rant, he’s articulating the anti-establishment, anti-elite anger of what’s come to be termed populism. “I am the NRA, and I’m Freedom’s Safest Place,” he says.
Yes it is a myth. The stereotypical NRA life member is overweight, over 50, and no match for a squad of modern combat trained troops no matter what his gun collection holds. But more important, which political faction do these latter-day Minute Men represent?
In their fantasy, these defenders of liberty imagine a clearly defined enemy. Someone or some ideology that all good souls agree is Freedom’s enemy, and all are willing to die a hero’s death to repel. Alas, the real world is many shades of grey, full of nuance and complexity, and not something that all unite in recognizing as “the enemy.”
But, the myth has become reality in some dark recess of a few minds. And this is the context for Mr. Trump to refer to them as “the Second Amendment people.”
One observer of the Trump crowd said that there was a pause after Trump said, âBy the way, and if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. …” His impression was that Trump heard something in the shouts of the crowd and responded, as he so often does. We can’t tell just what he heard in the crowd’s shouts, but for sure it was not a nuanced statement about the political cohesiveness and clout of the NRA’s Second Amendment defenders.
Thomas Friedman observes, “After all, an informal Trump adviser on veteran affairs, Al Baldasaro, a Republican state representative from New Hampshire, already declared that Clinton should be ‘shot for treason’ for her handling of the Benghazi terrorist attack.” In his column he compares the extreme hatred and anger of Trump’s followers to the climate that culminated in the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in 1995.
Is it really hard to decode “…Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I donât know.” What would a gun zealot, one of the Second Amendment people, one who hates and fears Hillary Clinton, be expected to think was meant?
Television programs, magazine, books, etc. that are regarded as emphasizing the sensuous or sensational aspects of a nonsexual subject and stimulating a compulsive interest in their audience. [Usage example:] ‘a thrilling throwback to the golden age of disaster moviesâweather porn of the highest order’ — âPornâ as defined in Oxford Dictionaries.
When I began my research for the essay Gun Sense I looked at a lot of YouTube amateur video showing people enthusiastically shooting watermelons, pumpkins, bottles of soda, and even propane bottles. The common factor was the explosion when the bullet smashed into the object. It reminded me of my first gun and how much I loved to shoot stuff at the age of ten.
As of boy I had a Daisy Red Rider 650 shot air gun. I learned the basics of handling a ârealâ gun safely. I was taught to presume that it always was loaded and cocked and never ever point it at anything I didnât want to hurt. Once I demonstrated the proper respect for its care and uses, I was allowed to shoot without adult supervision.
Kids will be kids, and I was no different. Target shooting escalated to tin cans and bottles. I quickly learned that shooting steel BBs at hard surfaces caused them to return from whence they came with stinging force. I survived and never âshot my eye outâ as adults often predict when a kid has a BB rifle.
As a teen I attended NRA sanctioned marksmanship courses and learned the rules and practices of firing bullets from 22 caliber guns. On one or two occasions Iâve fired 32 caliber and 45 caliber semi-automatic pistols. Need I say that the excitement of firing these serious weapons is vastly greater than shooting my Red Ryder?
ADDICTIVE THRILL
There may be an addictive quality about the thrill of using tactical weapons. We live in an addictive society and there are many, many activities that stimulate our senses and give a rush of excitement or other satisfaction. We overeat, smoke, binge watch TV, and so on.
Video Game Addiction is actually a thing. Itâs listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manal of the American Psychiatric Association. Playing video games is exciting and people get a rush from the very realistic simulations. One can develop a craving for that stimulation that makes playing the games become obsessive. The more visually realistic and dramatic, the bigger the rush.
Is it such a leap to think that activities involving the tools of real combat would give a similar rush?  The video clips that follow are selected for hundreds available on the web. As you watch, observe the people in the videos. Whatâs their affect? Are they excited? Could this become obsessive? Decide for yourself.
WHAT DO YOU FEEL?
How’s your pulse?
These are videos of and by adults who have invested $500 or more in a firearm that is not for hunting and, though sometimes used for competitive marksmanship, is being used here as a kid uses a BB gun. It’s the civilian semi-automatic version of the military fully automatic M-16. Hardly a toy.
This is why I think “Gun Porn” is a thing, just like video game addiction, gambling addiction, and other activity addictions.
Much of what we read in the media about defense is politicized, and can even be laced with deliberate dis-information. The Center for Defense Information has been around for nearly 40 years and was founded by retired military.
The Defense Monitor by CDI/POGO
I have been a long-time supporter of CDI â at least 20 years. Under Adm. Gene LaRoque and Adm. Eugene Carroll it was a reliable source of fact and sober analysis. I became disappointed in the direction it took a few years ago with Bruce Blair as Director because it became more opinion and case-building advocacy â just another shrill voice among many.  Recent issues seem more objective and balanced so I âm once again a reader.
Military spending is far and away the most burdensome part of our federal budget for taxpayers. The amount of waste is astonishing and it defies all efforts at reform. CDI is one place to go for objective, fact-based reporting and analysis.
For about 10 seconds our conversation was impossible. Two Navy jets on final approach to the US Naval Station just a couple of miles from where we are camped made a deafening roar that it was impossible to talk over. âThe sound of freedom,â Mark declared after they passed.
That sentiment has provided me with a lot of food for thought over the last several days. Itâs is emblematic of the widely held belief that our overwhelming military strength alone is capable of safeguarding our freedoms. Although I recognize our need for strength, I question the scale of our military and the focus. Russia and China together spend half what we do each year. I think a great deal more than military power is required to keep us free. In fact Iâm coming to believe that the greatest enemies toward freedom lie within our own society. Continue reading Fear→
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