Here are the topics for this week's blog: my large distraction; whither the Republicans?; George Will on Trump; a changing America; a historic end; the university "within;" the "new" No Child Left Behind law; final holiday thoughts.

A bump in the road. I apologize for the lapse in my weekly blog, but our telephone rang this past November 21st with our Breckenridge management company telling us that there had been massive water damage to our condominium due to a frozen clear water pipe in the third floor. Of necessity, for the next few months our time will be divided between the city and mountains, fighting the insurance wars and shepherding the unit back to good order.  :-(((
 
The "New" GOP. This article from The Atlantic discusses the future look of the GOP, not a promising forecast. The American political system has been, essentially, a story of two competing parties, from the original Federalists and Anti-federalists to today's Democrats and Republicans. Our forays into third party politics have been short-lived and mainly issue- or personality-oriented: the mid-19th century Know Nothings, TR's Bullmoosers, Eugene Debs's Socialists, Strom Thurmond and the Dixicrats, George Wallace's Southern Democrats, Eugene McCarthy's Anti-Vietnam movement..... Whatever the outcome, for better or for worse, The Donald has pledged his undying love, support, and allegiance to the Republicans, no third party candidacy, where he'd be a sure loser! ¿Quién Sabe?

George Will on Trump. Yet another conservative writer, George Will, expounds on Trump's vexatious  personality. When you next have the chance, turn off the sound watch Trump, then try to picture a President Trump meeting one-on-one with any prominent world leader or group -- friend or foe. Talk about a bad dream!
     After citing the results of 1912 (Taft, Wilson, and TR) and 1964 (Goldwater and LBJ), Will continues, "In 2016, a Trump nomination would not just mean another Democratic presidency. It would mean the loss of what Taft and then Goldwater made possible — a conservative party as a constant presence in American politics." I am definitely not a Republican, but I would consider a diminution of our two party system a very large problem for America.

Not your "old" America. The story in the Washington Post about a recently argued Supreme Court case noted this interesting factoid: "...nearly half of the [America's] under-18 population is made up of racial minorities, while 70 percent of voting-age citizens are white. The United States is undergoing a boom in demographic diversity..." and those most affected will the aging white population.
     In many other nations, a number of which are now under duress, those under-18 account for 70%  or more of the national population.There the now-dominant groups are aging and very unsure how to accommodate/deal with their new demographics and political realities.

The last lump. A lump of coal is often thought of as a bit of Christmas-time lore: you were "bad," so you received a not-so-fine present, a lump of coal. On a more economic and current issue, an article from Foreign Policy noted the closure on December 18th of England's last deep pit coal mine. It was, of course, British coal that fueled both the industrial revolution and the British Empire. At the end, though, only 450 deep pit miners remained, all of whom now face uncertain futures. Coal also provided the initial fuel for America's entry onto the world's industrial stage and has been in the news lately as the Obama administration has moved to put in place ever-more stringent emissions standards. American miners, too, face an uncertain future.

The Clemson football team's "new" facility. If you were wondering what else might be wrong with higher education -- in addition to "trigger warnings," "safe places," and demands for political correctness -- consider this story, with its accompanying architectural renderings. Clemson University has decided that their football players need their new, very own, private sanctuary. Note that in the following quote, athletic deficits, are a major driving force behind the ever-increasing (and unpopular)  "athletic fees" charged to each enrolled student.

     It’ll be their home on campus, when they’re not in class” said Clemson athletics spokesman Joe Galbraith of a building that represents the latest innovation in the athletic facilities arms race that is costing many of America’s largest public universities hundreds of millions of dollars and shows no signs of subsiding.
      Facilities spending is one of the biggest reasons otherwise profitable or self-sufficient athletic departments run deficits, according to a Washington Post review of thousands of pages of financial records from athletic departments at 48 schools in the five wealthiest conferences in college sports.[emphasis added]

   
     Left unsaid in the first paragraph: the facilities already available to Clemson's students are not good enough for the football team. Really?

Every Student Succeeds (ESS) Act. The teachers reading this blog (in the classroom or retired) might want to peruse conservative columnist Michael Gerson's thoughts on the new education law just passed/signed in Washington. While admitting that No Child Left Behind was a "mess" from the beginning, Gerson sees new problems on the horizon with ESS.

Finally, I will close this year's last blog with the hopeful thought from the Christmas column by the Washington Post's  E.J. Dionne.

The narrative of Jesus’ birth in Luke’s Gospel has retained its power beyond the realm of believers because it renders one of the most peaceful moments in all of scripture: a gathering of angels and shepherds celebrating the “good news” and “great joy” of the birth of a baby “wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger....[with] no rumors of war, no clashing armies, only a bright and blessed  calm.

And, from Michael Gerson, here are Dietrich Bonhoeffer's thoughts on the content and future of religion.

As a theologian, Bonhoeffer was farsighted. Modern Western societies, he argued, were becoming “radically religionless.” It is not possible to re-impose this consensus, and mere nostalgia is pointless. But religion — in Bonhoeffer’s view, a changeable form of “human self-expression” — is not the same as faith. “If religion is only the garment of Christianity — and even the garment has looked very different at different times — then what is religionless Christianity?”

Thank you for reading. May your New Year begin on a hopeful note.   

Here are the topics for this 2-week blog: BC and AD vs. BCE and CE; Martin Neimöller and Donald Trump, too satisfied, too complacent?; what is ISIS/ISIL?; cause to celebrate; preparing for the inevitable; a memorable holiday performance.

Politically (in)correct? No longer BC and AD, but BCE and CE. BC -- Before Christ -- is out and BCE -- Before Common Era is now preferred. Similarly, AD -- Ano Domini  -- is replaced by CE -- Common Era. Who dreams up this nonsense?

"First they came.....for the socialists and I did not speak out..." These historic words from Martin Neimöller have now become a part of the discussion surrounding Donald Trump's call for banning Muslims from entering the US. Watching Trump's fellow candidates decide how to respond has been interesting, to say the least. Jeb Bush was notable for his quick response, "[Trump] is unhinged." Ruth Marcus, Washington Post columnist, said Trump had "crossed an uncrossable line." Time will tell.

Risks? This past week Washington Post columnist, Charles Lane, wrote about the consequences of   America's penchant for sloppy thinking about risks. For example, Lane notes that "...the late economist Hyman Minsky... first theorized that financial stability itself could be destabilizing." Complacency, even with advances in technology and other endeavors, can lead to future problems, unintended consequences.

What to make of  ISIS/ISIL? In a column "After the [British] vote," James Meek (London Review of Books,) ponders these questions: "So what is IS? Is it a proto-state, with infrastructure that can be attacked and formal command chains that can be severed from the air? Or is it a nebulous, diffuse set of compadres, ideas and websites, easily moved around the world?" In their respective speeches British Prime Minister Cameron (to the House of Commons) and President Obama (to the nation) posited their answers. Interesting reading.
     Meek also commented, "People mistrust originality, especially in politicians. The safe political performance is an enactment of the familiar." This is the mold that Trump continues to smash.

Indeed, 1915 was a very good year. Columnist Harold Meyerson notes, "When it comes to the birth of American geniuses, 1915 was a very good year...the centenary of Orson Welles, Arthur Miller, Saul Bellow and, on Saturday, the guy who gave eternal life to the Great American Songbook — Frank Sinatra." The CBS program on Sinatra and his era was filled with both songs and history. Most enjoyable!

The ultimate experience. In an unusually titled article in the High Country News, Laura Pritchett writes poignantly about her father's death. "He didn't die with dignity (so I threw a party)," her first "death cafe."  She related the story of her experience when her father faced death after suffering from Alzheimer's -- without any previously written, clear directives about his death.
     She notes, A Pew Research Center study found that less than half of people over 75 had given much thought to the end of their lives, and incredibly, only 22 percent of them had written down wishes for medical treatment. The same study, though, found a sharp increase in all adults putting something in writing (six of 10 of us), which indicates that percentage-wise, it's the slightly younger folks who are preparing now for their inevitable deaths...[W]e find ourselves without much guidance in a culture that's conflicted and confused about dying....What lies ahead is unexplored territory, much like death itself, really.you

"A Christmas Story." A rollicking good time was had by all at the Dec 19th performance at the Denver Center. The acting and music were superb and the appreciative audience reacted accordingly. The balmy December weather was a welcome treat, too. 

Thank you for reading, I hope your week goes well.

Here the topics for the past week: another mass shooting; ISIS ally?; modern refugees; William Gates; the devil's bargain; that famous statue.

San Bernadino, CA: Yet again, another mass shooting. In his recent Slate article, Mark Joseph Stern recalls the admonition of Justice John Marshall Harlan II, "a conservative, [who] famously described the protection of these rights as a balancing test, weighing 'respect for the liberty of the individual' against 'the demands of organized society'."
     Neither Democrats and Republicans have the inclination or political clout to really ask and then pursue the solutions to the obvious question: Why are there so many mass shootings in America? Why is the continual  "breaking news" story so often about mass mayhem? Why does anyone outside of law enforcement or the military of need an AK-47?



William M. Gates, a voice of reason. Gates was the secretary of defense in both the Bush 43 and Obama administrations. His opening paragraph speaks truth:

Many Americans are mad as hell at our political leaders — both Republican and Democrat — and are giving voice to their anger through the likes of Donald Trump and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). The anger is understandable. The federal government is paralyzed, unable to tackle any of the major problems facing our country or even accomplish basic functions such as enacting annual budgets for federal departments and agencies. The anger derives equally from governmental ineptitude, arrogance and corruption, and self-serving politicians more concerned with getting reelected than with the nation’s future.

Gates continues, saying our next president must understand our less-than-simple system of checks and balances; speak bluntly to Americans; and be a restrained, resolute problem-solver, a true unifier. A tall tall order, indeed! See anyone with that stature on the horizon? I'm not sure I do. So in keeping with our system, who might be the best compromise possibility?

The devil's bargain. Regarding the conflict with ISIS, Oleksandr Turchynov (secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine) reminds us of Winston Churchill's comments about having Stalin [now Putin] as an ally. "This [wartime alliance] was not a bond forged in friendship and trust. It was a temporary partnership of necessity in the face of a common enemy... But shared grief is not the same as shared interests. Cooperation with Russia in the fight against the Islamic State needs to be carefully weighed against several bigger foreign policy issues."
     For the US,  destroy ISIS vs. for Putin, keep Assad in power. Strangely the US goal has an uncertain outcome, while Putin's is a specific with favorable consequences, i.e. "direct interests in Syria as a regional ally, a market for Russian military exports and a base for the Russian navy’s Mediterranean fleet. But his approach is influenced by wider considerations, one of which is to prevent another authoritarian regime from succumbing to the demands of its people."
     It is stunningly disconcerting how history has a way of repeating itself. Clear thinkers (e.g. Churchill and George Kennan, to name but two) understood that allying with Stalin to destroy Hitler was necessary, but had unknown future consequences for allied foreign policy. So, too, does allying with Putin against ISIS.

Emma Lazarus. You probably remember these famous words: “Give me your tired, your poor, /Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, / The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. / Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: / I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”
     Time magazine's November 19th special edition, "Exodus," is well worth a trip to your supermarket / neighborhood news stand. The article is replete with an investigation of the current mass exodus from the Middle East to Europe, as well as poignant pictures of "these huddled masses." As the article notes, this is the first mass exodus of the digital age; refugees come with their smart phone and necessary sim cards. One not atypical young male, having successfully arrived in Greece, chose electricity before food -- he was desperate to phone his family, to let them know he had arrived safely in Greece.
     The Time authors note, as have others, that this mass migration has a disproportionate number of professionals and successful entrepreneurs, many of whom say that absent the violence they would willingly return home. This is hardly the notion one gets from many American politicians looking for a good sound bite, a few more votes, and election/re-election in 2016.

Thank you for reading. Enjoy the approaching winter season.

Here are the topics for this week: Thanksgiving; one's past legacies; crybaby kids and college education; what The Donald saw; higher (?) education; cartoonist Toles on the new Republican party; Paris from afar; a lack of history; awesome science this week; holiday music.

Thanksgiving. E.J. Dionne's holiday column, "The discipline of gratitude," speaks to gratitude given by both the well-to-do and those less-blessed.  "Perhaps those with the least best understand Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel’s famous aphorism: 'Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy.' " Dioneed closes, "We need to remember what the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr taught us: 'Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone. Therefore, we are saved by love.' ”
     Columnist Charles Lane, "A lesson from Lincoln on Thanksgiving," remembers James Madison, perhaps the main author of the Constitution, who wrote, “So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities [Federalist No. 10] that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts.” Lane ends, "Today, be thankful that the conflicts, dysfunction and threats of our time do not equal those of Lincoln’s — but reflect on how far we still are from adhering to his wisdom."
     Columnist Harold Meyerson, notes that Thanksgiving is our holiday of refugee commemoration. We have no holiday to commemorate the first successful English settlement, Jamestown, which was a commercial and political venture, or the first French and Spanish settlements, which were also commercial and political. We celebrate only the arrival and survival of a band of Pilgrims seeking not only opportunity but also refuge. Of the many and varied American creation epics, this is the one we have chosen to celebrate.

The burdens of one's past. Prior to becoming the 28th president, Woodrow Wilson was president of Princeton University. Pointing to WW's admittedly racist past, some students want his association with the university totally expunged. However, as this article notes, one of today's problems is our unwillingness to use the conjunction "and" in examining a person's past acts and deeds. To use a more recent example, Richard Cohen notes that LBJ had his past faults and he spearheaded the civil rights era. Likewise, WW was a leader in many early 20th century progressive movements and was burdened by his bigoted views of the past. Then there was the mid-1950's problem with Rome's upcoming hosting of the 1960 Olympics and using the Fascist era Foro stadium.
     My Alma mater, Penn State, was faced with a similar dilemma: one of its library's wings had been named for the then-legendary, beloved football coach, Joe Paterno, who over the years had donated a considerable sum of his salary to the main campus library. Then came the very public, slimy mess arising from the child sex abuse scandal involving a long-time assistance coach, Jerry Sandusky. A recent google of the PSU website indicated that the "Paterno wing" remains named for Papa Joe. With that scandal in mind, I urged my Denver city council representative to vote against naming a Denver Public School stadium for a still-living former football coach, suggesting at least a not uncommon five year hiatus.

Not adult education. Kathleen Parker's column about the crybabies we have raised is worth reading, especially if you have begun to wonder why colleges need syllabus "trigger warnings," and so-called "safe places" for their students. Parker opines that it all begins with the current parenting climate where Johny or Janey are never to be told they are "bad, they are only "acting badly." Then there is the "everyone gets a trophy" syndrome. I would add what I call the "google syndrome" that discourages memorization -- just google it. The teachers in the audience are all to familiar with this.
     On Friday (Nov 27), Washington Post columnist Fareed Zakaria discussed the effects on college campuses of the effects of the growing multiplicity of ethnically oriented organizations and courses. He cites numerous studies that indicate these groups/courses, while well meant, actually encourage exclusion, not inclusion. He cautions that all should take to heart Chief Justice Warren's famous statement in the landmark Brown decision: "separate [is] inherently unequal."
     But, Zakaria says, "the prevailing ethos seems to be that if one feels hurt or offended that is the end of the discussion." He favors noted black historian W.E.B. Du Bois who said, “I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not."

What The Donald "saw." David Ignatus notes that Candidate Trump is much given to lobbing hand grenades rather that being specific. I would assume that most of my readers "saw through" Trump's claim to have seen "thousands and thousands of Muslims cheering when the World Trade Center towers fell." Of course he did, but only if he was watching reactions from some Muslim countries carried on any number of news outlets. No one has yet to produce footage of cheering Muslims in NJ.
     The problem is that not all of Trump's followers are really knowledgeable about world affairs and just take him at his word. Ignatus points out that. "These aren’t just a politician’s exaggerations: They’re dangerous fabrications, meant to engender fear at a time when calm is needed."
     Indeed, over the years I had more than a few high school students more knowledgeable about world affairs than  Donald Trump will probably ever be. Now, would I give credence to Trump's advice on how billionaires can influence policy and avoid taxes? "You 'betcha Red Rider." On foreign policy, absolutely not!

First Amendment in college news. In his usual acerbic manner, George Will discusses the recent spate of stories about what is happening on some notable college campuses. His opening paragraph sets the tone. Give thanks this day for some indirect blessings of liberty, including the behavior-beyond-satire of what are generously called institutions of higher education. People who are imprecisely called educators have taught, by their negative examples, what intelligence is not. Will ends, So, today give thanks that 2015 has raised an important question about American higher education: What, exactly, is it higher than?
     Occasionally I have interesting emails with a former student, a classics professor formerly at Colorado University, now at Yale. I forwarded the link to Will's column and await what I am sure will be another informative discussion. What makes these conversations so interesting is that he was so bright; he could have been a nuclear scientist, medical doctor, really any field -- he chose the classics! A glimmer of reasoned hope in the collegiate universe.

Washington Post cartoonist Toles. (Nov 26th) The problem facing the Republican establishment, to wit:


Paris from the other side. This link is to an article from the London Review of Books about the aftermath of the Paris violence by Adam Shatz, entitled "Magical thinking about ISIS." It is always informative to read what those on the other side of the pond are thinking/saying. Shatz points to an unintended, but perhaps inevitable, consequence, "Recognition as a war combatant is not ISIS’s only strategic gain. It has also spread panic, and pushed France further along the road to civil strife."

What Americans do not understand. In a recent Atlantic article, Graham Allison notes his epiphany while researching/writing his new biography of Henry Kissinger, when he said, "the missing gene in modern American diplomacy: an understanding of history." Further, that "key decision-makers know almost nothing not just of other countries’ pasts but also of their own. Worse, they often do not see what is wrong with their ignorance.”
     Returning to Harvard after a four decade absence, Professor Kissinger referred to the assertion by the ancient Greek historian Thucydides that “The present, while never repeating the past exactly, must inevitably resemble it. Hence, so must the future.” To which one might add George Santayana's assertion, "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Allison says, "Kissinger demonstrated, as Winston Churchill observed, that 'the longer you can look back, the farther you can look forward.' ”
     Why should it not surprise us that so many presidential candidates are similarly woefully ill informed?

Can you believe this? Here are links to two science stories I ran across this week: one about star-eating black holes and the other about neatly aligned giant boulders in the Bahamas. Both fascinating; the latter can be visited, seen, felt, the former can only be viewed by radio telescope across billions of light years.

Oh, come all 'ye faithful. A friend and I share one holiday thought: Christmas songs are meant to be heard/sung only after Thanksgiving. So while eating Thanksgiving left overs on Saturday, JW played his collection of Bing Crosby holiday music. Most enjoyable.

Thank you for following me. Have a good week.

Here are this week's delayed blog: beach rainbows; formation flying and shore birds; ships at sea; sweating glasses; O. Henry note; the wild turkey; dysfunction in D.C.

New Smyrna Beach, FL. I spent a few days in NSB for the condo's semi-annual Home Owners Association meeting. The climatic changes between CO and FL still take me by surprise. It was barely 32 when I left Denver and, as usual, the airplane was cool, but the jet way at Orlando International always announces what lies ahead. Peel off two layers, keep on the light long sleeves, otherwise my unseen, but ever present, dermatologist whispers warnings in my ear! Put on the hat, too!

Watery rainbows. On several afternoons, rain clouds gathered over the Atlantic, thinly obscured portions of the pale blue sky, and gave birth to several pale, watery rainbows. They reminded me of what I have seen before in Hawaii.

Pelicans and shore birds. Only rarely do you see a lone pelican. They drift up and down the shoreline, flying in formation, descending towards the water, their forward speed providing just enough lift to let them skim above the waves. If fish are spotted, one or more will nose-over, plunging into the water. If Mr. P swallows, you know the dive was a success. The shore birds, big and small, run/strut to and fro, eyeing the sand for unseen edibles in the sand. A group gathering indicates good feeding.

Passing ships. I am always surprised to see so few ships from the shore. Apparently, the water is shallow enough that the larger ships plying the coast are just over the horizon, or they are using the nearby inter-coastal water water way. Several days running, though, a sail boat was visible, usually headed north from NSB towards the Daytona area.

Humidity. In Denver, we gauge the humidity by how much an ice filled glass of water sweats. Many times it does not sweat; a coaster if nice, but not really necessary. In FL, everything sweats! If the refrigerator door is open just a bit too long, the glass shelves "fog up." Conversely, in CO you do not doddle over your sandwich making, lest the bread dry out. In FL, you put the bread in the sack and use it quickly before it turns moldy.

Banana Republic. Originally this now pejorative term designated a Central American dictatorship and was first penned by O. Henry, most associated with the short story. Among Americans bananas are eaten at a rate greater than apples and oranges combined. For other facts, go bananas and see the above link.

Ben's bad (?) idea. This coming Thanksgiving, especially if there's an eagle's nest in your area, pause to remember that Founding Father Ben Franklin proposed that the national bird should be the American wild turkey. Seen in their usual setting both birds are admittedly majestic, one usually strutting through the woodlands only rarely in a tree, the other soaring above or perched searching the area for food.

Dysfunction in D.C. I heartily recommend this column by Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne. I am sure our friends (and enemies) abroad are more often than not wonder about what comes out of our nation's capitol. Leadership squabbles, lack of a budget (coherent or otherwise), unwillingness to raise taxes to pay for burgeoning social programs...... The list goes on and on.
     There remain a string of either increasingly irrelevant or demagogic or strident Republican candidates. The looming, leading Democrat seems to offer little more than the family's past litany of not always above-board programs and policies.

Thank you for reading. Have a good week.

Here are this week's topics: school boards and money; OH marijuana initiative; 60th anniversary; death at an early age; doomsday message; the past as teacher; Congress's dismal ratings; NH and IA; the "forgotten war;" non-fiction reading; Republicans -- round ?, whatever.

Jefferson County, CO. The results are in for a Colorado school board election that drew national attention. Three members were recalled in a vote that money-wise was characterized as David vs Goliath: a modestly voter-funded recall effort vs more than a million dollars from a Koch Brothers-backed organization. Now comes the county superintendent's difficult task of reconciliation.

Ohio and pot. The voters there decided not to become the 6th political entity to legalize marijuana, medical or recreational. The proposed multi-faceted constitutional amendment may well have contained the seeds of its own defeat; voters had multiple reasons to vote NO. On the Sunday preceding the election, CBS's "60 Minutes" aired a segment detailing what OH officials called a state-wide heroin epidemic. There will no doubt be research into the program's impact on the vote.

Roll Call, the insider's guide to Congress. (Monday, November 5)  

To some Americans, 60 years of watching Congress’ every move might seem like sentence in purgatory, but for the editors and reporters at Roll Call, and for those of us who have been regular readers, it has been one hell of an interesting ride.
Exactly 60 years ago, Sid Yudain, press secretary to Al Morano, R-Conn., created a Capitol Hill community newspaper — Roll Call — to serve what he called “the most important community in the world.” It quickly caught on, becoming the small town paper of the Congress, divulging the gossip whispered in the corridors and chronicling the comings and goings of members and staff, the day-to-day tidbits of birthdays and births, weddings, retirements and deaths.

Unfortunate parallels, Russia and USA. This past Wednesday's Washington Post article noted that the deaths among certain groups (i.e. white, middle-aged, middle-class workers) in Russia and the US appeared to have similarities, "... the real cause in each instance was the end of a world that had sustained them." Only the early HIV/AIDS  era and collapse of the USSR have produced similar statistical anomalies. 

Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, and Peter Donaldson. For Americans who grew up in the Cold War era, the voices of Murrow and Cronkite are well known. For Brits, the same can be said for Peter Donaldson, the "voice" of BBC. In the dark days of the Cold War, the British government asked him to make a radio message they hoped would never be played, the one announcing that Britain had been attacked by nuclear weapons. The message was, of course, classified but soon leaked. The brutal, chilling radio message said, in part,  "This country has been attacked with nuclear weapons...Stay in your own house, there's nothing to be gained in trying to get away.” A colleague said "... Donaldson’s voice '[was] rich and warm and resonant and without a trace of affectation ... when he read the news you trusted him.' ” Cronkite in his prime often polled as the "most trusted" man in America.

Intelligence Failures. The Christian Science Monitor book review says Ardennes 1944 offers fresh insight into the calamitous Battle of the Bulge. A lesson, as it were, of how Germany misread Allies' resolve, especially the American forces and, in turn, how Allied intelligence misread the warning signs of the Germans' impending offensive thrust. Noted historian and WW II scholar, Anthony Bevore, said, “There were indeed many fragmented pieces of information which taken together should have indicated German intentions, but as in almost all intelligence failures, senior [allied] officers discarded anything which did not match their own assumptions.” Sound familiar? Failures in Iraq, Syria, et. al.

Where is home? Congress continues to be plagued with dismal ratings -- who wants to be ranked below the proverbial used car salesman? Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank, has a suggestion to begin to solve the problem: bite the bullet and move the family to Washington! Swell the ranks of the now much diminished, thinly populated "Congressional family." Milbanks notes, "[Living in Washington] was supposed to keep [members] from going native and succumbing to Washington’s backslapping ways...[But, as a result] lawmakers have ceased to know each other as colleagues, friends and human beings....It’s harder to savage a colleague on the floor if your kids are friends." Out with the Friday night Capitol Hill get togethers and in with the 3-day work week. Where do your senators and representative reside?

Who's on first? Political reporters Philip Rucker and Robert Coasta are the Washington Post's intrepid two-some toiling to cover the presidential contest in the two "early states," Iowa and New Hampshire. They noted comments by Stuart Stevens (Mitt Romney's chief adviser), "Evaluating the candidates on the basis of who is up and down in national polls is like looking at someone’s bowling average to determine if they can play tennis. It’s completely irrelevant. At the end of the day, all that matters are these [early] states, where you run for president like you’re running for governor.” Can anyone picture The Donald on the court?

The "Forgotten" (Korean) War. This segment on Sunday's CBS Sunday Morning program was undoubtedly an eye-opener for many viewers for whom "Forgotten," even "Unknown,"is indeed appropriate. At the urging of a Korean-American woman now living in UT, the South Korean government hosted families whose relatives are among those still classified as MIA (Missing In Action). A wall at the Korean Nation War Museum, much like our own Vietnam War memorial in Washington, lists each MIA from the Korean "police action," as it was then known. Even if this conflict is not a forgotten moment in American history for you, please take a few minutes to check the link and view the video.
    On Friday, June 30, 1950, when the war began, I was a nine year-old spending the night with my father who was the night shift press room foreman at the Meadville Tribune, the local paper. I distinctly remember sleepily reading Saturday morning's HUGE banner headline to the effect that we "were at war in Korea." I had no idea where Korea was, but having grown up with the Trib, so to speak, I soon found out. I still count this event as the day of my political awakening.
     For many years as a government teacher, I took students to the nation's capital for a week of government studies. One of those spring-time trips was not long after the Koren War memorial had opened on the National Mall. Our group of teachers visited the memorial, in part because one of our number had an uncle whose picture had been used as the face for one of the statues in the memorial. Some memorials have more meaning, are more personal, than others.We shared her grief in remembering her long-ago lost uncle.

Reading, non-fiction. My most recent cruise (Oct 18 - 31) sailed southward along the eastern Adriatic coast with visits to the Croatian cities of Rovinj, Split, and Dubrovnik and Kotor in Montenegro. While in the USAF during the dark days of the Cold War, I  was stationed in West Germany and traveled a lot, but travel to/through Marshal Tito's dictatorial Yugoslavia was, of course, out of the question. My current trip to these four Balkan cities prompted me to reread Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler's classic work about the inner workings of Stalin's iron-fisted dictatorship.
     In Dubrovnik, there is a prominent map that pinpoints the exact locations of the 1,000+ bombs and artillery shells which fell on the city during the most recent Balkan conflict, the 1990-1991 siege. As I sat in the square near the city's again restored palace, I remembered reading accounts of Nazi Germany's extreme brutality in Yugoslavia and reflected on the hospitality tendered the many German tourists who now flock southward, especially in the wintertime. Strange, the vicissitudes of war and peace, of enemies now friends.

The Republican debates. In commenting on NJ governor Christie being knocked off  the main debate stage , Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne said,   

If the Republicans did listen to the New Jersey governor, they might not have to complain about how their encounters have become a blend of a professional wrestling match and a hallway argument among high school students...Their real problem is not with formats or with who is asking what questions. It’s their own profound lack of empathy....They worry that any hints of social concern or generosity might make them sound like — God forbid! — liberals. 

     Meanwhile, the Democrats wait in the wings for their first "get together" on Saturday evening. 

Thank you for reading. Have a good week. We have our first significant snowfall in the city, but this, too, shall quickly pass in tomorrow's high altitude sunshine.

Here are the topics for this edition: Democrats, Round 1; notes from abroad; finally, the Big Game.

Democrats, round 1.  In his column, "Game Over," Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post columnist, scored it a firm Hillary victory. His view of the candidates: "[Hillary's] up against three ciphers and one endearing, gesticulating, slightly unmoored old man [Bernie Sanders]. If Biden was ever thinking of getting into the race, he’d be crazy to do so now. It’s over." (Biden did, in fact, opt out.) On Wednesday, The Donald could not resist adding his two cent's worth, referring to Sanders as a "socialist, slash communist." Apparently, the latter term remains the ultimate pejorative in Trump's circles.

Fall comes to the city. Even though the mercury hovers in the mid-70s, the lower nightime temperatures are turning the leaves. Soon the ash trees on the nearby DTC Parkway will burst forth in their annual dazzling display.

"Notes from abroad" It is always interesting to travel when the political pot is boiling. In June 1967, I happened to be in Rome on the day the Arab − Israeli "Six-day" war began; there was no need to be bilingual, the banner headlines in Italian were easily understood and the Paris-based English language edition of the International Herald Tribune spelled out the details. Of course, today the news in English is much more readily available (unavoidable), though the "views" from abroad are often different from what one reads/hears back in the states.
     What follows are short notes/thoughts from a cruise south from Venice through the Adriatic then north through the eastern Mediterranean, ending in Rome.

Venice. Flying in (window seat, please) you can see the city of islands and canals fronting on the mainland. Our excellent VRBO apartment was reached by a vaporeto, a mid-size passenger boat, an integral part of the Venetian transportation system. (Faster, pricier speed boats are available.) We were met at the appropriate dock by the mother of our host and led along the canal, "up and over" several bridges crossing side canals along the way. Local restaurants abound on the side streets, one provided our first meal.
     We then wandered the canal sidewalks heading for the central tourist attractions: the Grand Canal, St. Mark's cathedral, and its plaza. Along the way we haggled with a gondolier and took a 20 minute ride to see, in the words of the Credence Clear Water classic, "the good side of the city."
     St. Mark's is not to be missed, nearly as grand as St. Peter's. Hats are a good idea given the pigeon flocks. In 1967, I was strafed by a pigeon that, thankfully, miss my delicious gelato cone.

Rovinj, Croatia. Very old city, steep picturesque side streets, one of the smaller cities along the Adriatic coast.

Split, Croatia. A more major tourist destination. Anja has several Swedish friends who come for several weeks each winter. The palace is the main attraction with the babel of varied languages, especially German and Chinese. Hidden courtyards and their gardens lay around every corner of the palace's interior.
     Historical aside: one has to wonder how Germans are still viewed by the Croatians given the brutal treatment handed out during WW II.

Dubrovnik, Croatia. Center of the conflict between the Serbs and Croats. A major map in the city center pinpoints where each of the more than one thousand bombs fell during the siege of 1990-1991. Myriad of churches, one in the renaissance style, the remainder being baroque. The old city wall is a major attraction.

Kotor, Montenegro. Very picturesque, situated at the end of a long fjord-like mountain valley with cliffs rising 2,000 - 3.000 feet from the water. Multiple churches of all faiths except Muslim and, it being Sunday, there was much bell-ringing.

Girardini Naxos, Italy. Otherwise known as Messina. Mt. Etna towers over the countryside, today a small plume of smoke rises above the volcanic cone. A Windstar-hosted event at the GambinO winery, located at the top of a very high ridge, 3,000+ feet above the valley. The owners say it sits at the upper limit for grape growing zone. Sailing away (to Capri) numerous small towns hug the cliffs all along the shoreline.

Capri, Italy. The only cloudy day thus far, though the skies cleared in the afternoon; also the only port where local tenders must be used, not those of the ship, a union concession, no doubt. A popular tourist attraction with a long history of celebrity guests. We rode the funicular railway to the upper city. Ours was the only cruise ship in town, though there were plenty of tourists who had ferried out from the mainland. It was pleasant to watch our ship swing on its anchor 1/2 mile off shore.

Rome. What can one say other than to begin with the age-old adage, The Eternal City. Tourists -- religious and all others -- mean the city is always thronged, just sometimes more so. Tourist attractions by the hundreds, so there is always reasons to return. Two such "must sees," the Trevino Foundation and Spanish Steps, are undergoing reconstruction. The Sistine Chapel is spectacular, having been  restored/cleaned not long ago and with new modern less-damaging lighting in place. Again, a nice centrally located VRBO apartment.

Broncos vs Packers. While we traveling the ship's TV system showed the NFL game played in London's venerable Wembley Stadium. Just what America needs to export: sports violence. Anyway, we arrived back in time for the contest of titans, game of unbeatens. The town was abuzz on Monday celebrating the home town victory.

Thank you for reading. I hope the interlude between blogs was good in your "neck of the woods."

Here are the topics for this week: a very shady million dollar business; snow-guns; the "new" Labour Party; Was Alice in the House?; thinning color and the first dusting.

Mass exodus and big money. If you want to learn more about the immigrants from Syria, there was a NPR story last Tuesday about what can only be described as a truly despicable, multi-million dollar business. Violence-prone Turkish mobsters first charge exorbitant fees and then prod terrified immigrants into overcrowded boats often with incompetent captains for a truly risky trip across the Aegean Sea.

Let the snow begin. Copper Mountain and other ski areas have begun to help mother nature by producing snow. At our condo in Breckenridge, if the wind is blowing from the south you can hear the hiss of the snow guns on nearby 4 O'clock run.

Going, going... and the first dusting. This weekend's drive to/from Breckenridge and Kremling showed the fall's colors to be fading fast and a dusting of snow can only be seen on two of the 14-ers along I-70 and CO route 9. Grays and Torres Peaks are the two 14-ers closest to metro Denver and both are well dusted. The weather for the coming week is predicted to be too warm, though, for any further accumulation.

The new Labour Party. Change is afoot in jolly England's Labour and Scottish National Party (SNP) parties. (Excuse those Brits for their unusual spelling!) Since their election loss last May, Labour has grown by 150,000+, gotten younger (average age, 53 to 42), with more women than men joining their ranks. Interestingly, the SNP has also grown larger, younger, and more feminine. Meanwhile, the ruling Conservative party has not grown, rather it has shrunk and aged.

Curiouser and Curiouser. We Americans are smugly accustomed to shaking our heads as we see chaos abroad. Governments, political parties, major corporations in seeming disarray, random violence taking lives. But, what do we not see − or connect to − here at home? Our own mass shootings, increasing gang-related violence, and on the......
     Republican side. This past Thursday, news flashed out from the nation's construction-shrouded Capitol dome that US House majority leader, Kevin McCarthy (R, CA), had withdrawn his name from consideration to be Speaker of the House. The early morning story in the Washington Post read, "A House Republican Conference divided against itself meets Thursday to pick a new standard-bearer, launching the process of electing a new House speaker in the midst of a congressional session for the first time in 26 years." But wait, then came McCarthy's bombshell announcement. The House Freedom Caucus may have made the announcement inevitable. Raul Labrador (R, UT) said, "[McCarthy] has three weeks to make systemic changes. Not just talk about the changes, but to show exactly what he’s going to do.” The Republicans in the House are increasingly being called the group that "can't be led."
     Democratic side. Bernie Sanders (I, VT) continues to gain ground over Hillary Clinton in the NH polls. One has to wonder if Sanders's plain spoken, unvarnished, socialist-leaning comments will doom his candidacy? On the talk radio's popular program, "Morning Joe," Sanders said,

“In the last 30 years, there has been a massive transfer of wealth from the middle class and working families of this country to the top one-tenth of one percent. And yes, my policies will demand that the top one percent at the largest corporations in this country start paying their fair share in taxes….
I believe we should rebuild our crumbling infrastructure, invest $1 trillion into our roads, bridges, water systems, rail, airports, and create up to 13 million jobs. I believe we should raise the minimum wage over a period of several years…to $15 an hour and have pay equity for women workers. I believe that we have to revise our disastrous trade policies so corporate America invests in this country, rather than in China.

     A Roll Call story last Friday was entitled "House Republicans Cement Quarter-Century Lock on Melodrama at the Top." Apparently, the Republican party does not know what to do, to whom to turn. Washington's toxic atmosphere is obviously taking a toll. The post of Speaker of the House is constitutionally mandated (Article I, Section 2, Clause 5) and is chosen by majority roll call vote of  all House members. Theoretically, the House could even choose someone other than an elected member, though this has never happened.
     Once again, is the American pot calling the global kettle black?

On CO's green front, even more unintended consequences. Most of my readers know that, for better or worse, CO is in the forefront of the nation's ongoing marijuana experiment. The state has experienced all manner of unintended consequences flowing from these once-iilegal businesses, now more numerous than Starbucks. Appropriate labeling and wrapping for marijuana-based edibles, child-proof containers, hash oil production....the list goes on.
     A story in last Friday's Denver Post noted one of the latest effects: rapidly rising rents. Marijuana businesses are pushing up rent for existing metro area warehouse space. Charities (such as Toys for Tots, a reputable organization providing Christmas holiday toys for needy children) are now having trouble finding affordable space in the metro areas. Small start-up business are also having trouble.

Vacation time. I'll be in/out of town and the next blog will publish on Tuesday, November 3rd.

Thank you for reading. Enjoy the week ahead.

Here are this week's thoughts on the passing scene: congressional leadership; private aid; modern Native American art; trust and the "football;" cyber security; aspen-glo; our earth in the cosmos; rain in the southeast.

Wither goest the House? Reading about the discussion among House Republicans about their upcoming leadership change should give everyone cause to pause and ask, "Just what does my US representative stand for?" Further, "What do I want her/him to stand for, what's important to me?" The fact that House Republicans are seemingly being dragged into this discussion says volumes about both their party and our national government in general.

Bill Gates and malaria. Conservative columnist Michael Gerson is not prone to giving credit where he does not think it is due. Hence, I read with interest his recent column on the Gates foundation's continuing efforts to eradicate malaria, polio, and HIV. As Gerson notes, Gate's money and efforts have succeeded in chasing polio to one "small," stubborn, area in Afghanistan. He hopes to similarly diminish the effects of malaria in Africa.

Fritz Scholder at the DAM. Walking through Civic Center Park to catch the Light Rail, you would not have guessed it was the last day of September. Absolutely balmy, many flowers not yet showing signs of the approaching fall! Last Wednesday's member's preview at the Denver Art Museum featured art by Fritz Scholder (one-quarter Luseino, a California Mission tribe). Interesting, to say the least. His aim is to present his Native Americans as anything but "red."

Who do you trust? As I watch and listen to all the presidential candidates, there is one question that is always "running in the background," a question most Americans have forgotten about, want to ignore, and/or pretend does not exist. Bluntly put, "To which of these candidates would you entrust the potentially world-ending "football"? The "football" is the slang term which refers to the briefcase that's never far from the president, the briefcase with the nuclear launch codes. Whose hand do you want on our nuclear trigger? The Donald? Bernie Sanders? Hillary Clinton?......You get the idea!

Cyber security, the new worldwide danger. In a recent Washington Post op-ed, Professor Joseph Nye wrote,

Whenever countries confront a disruptive new technology that they cannot control, they eventually seek arms-control agreements. In the nuclear era, it was 18 years after Hiroshima before the first such agreement was reached. Today, cybersecurity is at a similar point. Although the modern Internet was born in the 1970s, it was only during the past two decades that it became an indispensable enabler of economic and military activity that benefits us while also making us insecure. With the advent of cloud computing and the “Internet of Things,” the area of vulnerability is rapidly expanding....Is cyber arms control the answer? Not if it’s modeled on the treaties of the nuclear era.

Aspen gold in the hills. The fall progresses quickly in the high country, the aspen leaves turn golden, a visual delight. But, for how long? Rain and wind often hurry the process. On this past Friday's drive from Denver to Breckenridge, the wind was blowing briskly and gold rained down continually. The yearly re-paving of I-70 had traffic moving very slowly for over an hour, affording plenty of time to view this fall's progress.
     Last week I commented on the "tongues" of gold that spill down the mountain sides amid the surrounding evergreens. Here's the botanical cause: aspen trees grow in groves from runners, not unlike strawberries. Hence it is common to see aspen groves side-by-side that are colored very differently.
     In front of our cabin near Alma, CO, (since sold), we saw graphic proof every fall. As you approached the cabin, the aspen grove on the left was still green, while those on the right were already turning. The dividing line was straight as an arrow, too. It was as if mother nature had swept her hand over both groves, dividing them neatly, providing a wondrous visual display.
     One tree expert writes, "...an aspen [with a 'surface' root system] can easily reestablish it’s root system with a propensity to grow saplings in a short period of time; a characteristic which enables a singular tree to become a grove of trees." There are added bonuses: aspens grow quickly, do not burn easily, and over its life-span each mature tree will absorb one ton of carbon from the atmosphere.



Who we are.  Occasionally, Washington Post columnist George Will veers off the political path, writing columns about an assortment of human endeavors. His latest column, "The human quest to find our place in the universe" was about the Hubble telescope and its follow-on, the James Webb Space Telescope.
     Will wrote,

....so a basic question of religion — where did we come from? — leads to another: Are we — carbon- and water-based, oxygen-breathing creatures — alone?....Earth revolves around our expiring sun, which is scheduled to burn out in just 5 billion years. At about that time, our Milky Way will collide with the neighboring Andromeda galaxy. This is not apt to end well. Meanwhile, however, the scientist-historians here will try to tickle from the cosmos information for its own sake. Space exploration began from Cold War imperatives, producing rocketry, intelligence satellites and national prestige. Webb, which only the United States could make happen, does not contribute to the nation’s defense, but, as its creators say with justifiable pride, it makes the nation all the more worth defending.

     I use several Hubble-produced galaxy pictures as screen savers, my constant reminders of mankind's small place in an infinitely expanding universe. Also, from time to time, I enjoy Jody Foster's 1997 movie, Contact. Yes, the plot is certainly far fetched and speculative, but it serves to remind me of what George Will wrote about our place in the "breathtakingly beautiful and unimaginably violent universe."

South Carolina's 1,000-year flood. I rejoice that when necessary the internet allows me to "check up on" friends here and there around the globe. Hurricane Jaoquin veered off into the Atlantic, but effectively pinned a huge storm front to our eastern coastline.
     I inquired about the safety of a former USAF colleague living in Columbia, SC. Being an expert geographer and hydrologist, Will gave me a picture of his situation. Short version: too much in too short a time. His house sits atop a stable, 125,000 year-old (his estimate) sand dune. He was pumping out the "basement" (actually a crawl space), but was otherwise unaffected. The dramatic TV coverage of flooding in what South Carolinians call "the low country" gave graphic proof of the damage caused by the torrential downpours. Bill, a former teaching colleague living in NC, had also weathered the storm, though he was contemplating having to replace badly waterlogged decks, stairs, and railings.
     I wish them both a dry spell.

Thank you for reading.

Here are the topics for this week's blog: the Yankee "quipper;" Francis' speech; dysfunction and violence; John Boehner's "forced" resignation.

Larry's passing. You probably knew him as Yogi. This past week sports fans mourned the passing of a true American icon. If you are into baseball, many of the remembrance stories include titles of what are surely enjoyable books. Also, let us not forget those wonderful "Yogi-isms" that have become a part of our language. Sadly, now it's truly over. RIP, Yogi.

Pope Francis' speech. The historic joint session occasioned mention of the many Roman Catholics in public office. The Vice President, Speaker of the House, six of nine Supreme Court justices, and numerous representatives and senators are Roman Catholics. In a column entitled, "Pope Francis' profound personalism (sic)," Michael Gerson, conservative columnist with the Washington Post, characterized the Pope's message at his "State of the Soul" address....historically sophisticated, gracefully appropriate, morally ambitious....For a moment, marginalized groups — from refugees to prisoners — got the center stage of American politics. Congress got a bracing reminder of its calling, including the 'demanding pursuit of the common good.' And representatives from both parties were forced to applaud the Golden Rule..." Those assembled applauded as he praised Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton. 
     How do you comport yourself when His Holiness is the speaker? Interestingly, a memo on "proper behavior " was circulated to all congressional offices, not unlike the school principal's yearly reminder about behavior at graduation. Ah well.... It appeared to work. Appropriate, polite applause even as the Pope did not shrink from noting the world's -- and our nation's -- problems and challenges.
     Because of the camera positions, Vice President Biden and House Speaker Boehner, both Roman Catholics, were conspicuous throughout and were often visibly moved by Francis' words. The Pope's post-speech appearance on the Capitol balcony was an impressive moment: equal parts reverence, awe, and spectacle.

Dysfunction and violence. We Americans are wont to look abroad and shake our heads disapprovingly over the governmental chaos and social violence we see. For example, Greece's high unemployment and financial mess and the Europe's immigration problems. We make assumptions about causes and solutions that may be totally unwarranted. We often do not understand a region's history, past or recent. We shake our heads in disbelief at continuing sectarian violence.
     Looking inward, though, we seem not to observe similar problems here at home.

• another threatened government shut down in Washington; 
• low unemployment but stagnant wages for middle and low income families that thwart upward mobility; 
• minimum wages resulting in poverty-level incomes;
• state governments struggling to find tax dollars and/or on the verge of bankruptcy; 
• increasing gun violence, civil unrest, etc.

     Unfortunately, it appears that at least two the old adages may apply: "the pot is calling the kettle black" and "Nero fiddled while Rome burned."

John Boehner (R, OH)...Speaker of the House, resigned both as speaker and his seat in the House, effective this coming October 30th. Since the Constitution requires that vacancies in the US House be filled by a special election, Boehner's resignation will, in effect, "cost" OH taxpayers the expense of a special election. A most interesting development, to say the least, for the Congress and the nation. 

     A long time Democratic colleague, House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer (D, MD), who has spent three decades in Congress, called Boehner’s resignation — and the circumstances behind it — a “big loss for the country and a loss for this institution....This is a victory for dysfunctional government,” he said just off the House floor Friday. “This is a victory for confrontation. This is a victory for taking positions that one knows cannot and will not be adopted, and allowing the government to shut down, the debt [limit] to be breached and other things to happen if you don’t get your way...This is a vote for my way or the highway,” he continued, “and that’s not democracy. That’s not how the Congress of the United States works. That’s not how America works.”
     Not everyone thought Mr. Boehner's actions were entirely selfless. The editors at the Washington Post headline read, "Mr. Boehner’s resignation is a political cop-out." They continued,  

House Sepaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) insisted on Friday that he was resigning in order to forestall a tough vote on his leadership and “protect the institution” of the House. Protecting the institution, he said, is a speaker’s primary job. We respect his devotion. But a speaker’s primary responsibility is to the nation, not the House. And what the nation needs is a Congress willing to make compromises in the national interest — compromises that Mr. Boehner may have favored but rarely had the stomach to promote.
 
     A note on succession in the US Senate: Each state's constitution applies. Senatorial vacancies may be filled either by gubernatorial appointment or special election.A governor usually uses the first option, an interim appointment, effective until the next regularly scheduled national election, thus sparing a state's taxpayers the expense of a special election. Traditionally, a surviving spouse is offered the interim appointment.

Thank you for reading. Do feel free to send along your comments on any of my ramblings.

Here are the topics for this week: THE question; Pope Francis and President Xi in America; bike paths. I delayed this posting until after Francis' arrival in Washington.

"Why do you want to be president?" In a recent column, Kathleen Parker opines that this is the paramount question to asked of -- and answered by -- each presidential candidate. She began...Once upon a time in a twinkling city on a hill, little boys and girls were taught that anyone could    grow up to become president....The children all believed it and today many, many of them are trying to fulfill the promise. While it has been proved true that anyone really can become president, it has also been proved even more true that most shouldn’t. The column is well worth reading in its entirety.

Three days, two leaders.  On Tuesday, Pope Francis arrived in the US to accolades from many Americans. Indeed, the president greeted His Holiness on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews (Maryland). Most, but not all Americans, are thrilled. In a recent column, conservative columnist George Will wrote disapprovingly, highlighting  what he called Pope Francis' "fact-free flamboyance."  From that column:

Pope Francis embodies sanctity but comes trailing clouds of sanctimony. With a convert’s indiscriminate zeal, he embraces ideas impeccably fashionable, demonstrably false and deeply reactionary. They would devastate the poor on whose behalf he purports to speak — if his policy prescriptions were not as implausible as his social diagnoses are shrill....[Francis] stands against modernity, rationality, science and, ultimately, the spontaneous creativity of open societies in which people and their desires are not problems but precious resources. Americans cannot simultaneously honor him and celebrate their nation’s premises. 

     A "ticket to ride" for his speech to a joint session of Congress (Thursday, Sept 24th) is extremely hard to come by. Even past US representatives and senators are being shutout, unable to use their valued "lifetime floor" privileges. There will be one vacant seat, however, as one member of Congress has announced he will not be in the audience for Francis' historic speech because he objects to the Pope's stand on global warming and climate change.  Anyway, 434 + seems a good number and there will be a jumbo-tron outside the Capitol and, hopefully, simultaneous network/cable/C-Span coverage.
     China's paramount leader, Xi, will be hosted at the White House on Thursday (just as Francis addresses Congress). Like the Pope, China's president is also viewed by many with suspicion. While the Pope holds sway over 1 billion Catholics scatter around the globe, President Xi's dictatorial rule encompasses 1.4 billion Chinese scattered about in his huge, far-flung nation. Both men have their dissidents to deal with and so so each in his own way.
     Later, Obama, Francis, and Xi will address the UN General Assembly, providing even more material for the pundits to ponder.

CO's fall colors. Despite dire predictions to the contrary, this fall's golden aspen display is trending (as they say today), much to the delight of those flocking to the high country. "Golden Eyeful" was the front page headline of Monday's Denver Post. I particularly enjoy the areas where rivers of aspen gold suddenly spill out, streaming down the mountain side, completely surrounded by evergreens. In truth, though, I  have to admit that a part of me still misses the multi-colored autumnal displays of my birthplace in northwestern PA.

Bikes vs. autos. This past week CO governor, John Hickenlooper announced plans to spend over $100M of infrastructure funds to make our state an even more bicycle-friendly state. Letters to the editor clearly indicated that not everyone was overjoyed!

Thank you for reading. Enjoy this first week of fall.

Here are the topics for this week's blog: the "really, really big," new, late-night show; "they're back;" not so gold this fall; bunny heaven; and fiery sunrises.

From David L. to Stephen C. Too bad the show plays so late! Even though the critics seemed to have been impressed, in my view Colbert's first show did not begin well, far too much of a largely meaningless opening. He would been much better served by "cutting to the chase," getting to his first celebrity and political guests. Yawn! Time for bed.

Meanwhile, the continuing,  awful 114th show. If Colbert was new, the title of a Roll Call story on Sep 10th merely repeated what has been coming down the pike in Washington: "A ‘Perfect Storm’ on Budget, Debt and Taxes?" We bury our heads in the sand and continue to try to fund the national government with too small, uneven revenue streams. As an ex-USAF colleague used to say, "It's intuitively obvious to the most casual dullard" that we have to either cut programs or raise taxes, perhaps both. Either choice requires gumption on the part of our 535 senators and representatives -- a willingness to risk becoming unemployed.

Fall color in the Colorado Rockies. CO's state foresters and local weather prognosticators tell us that the aspens may not be as golden this fall. A combination of higher than average rainfall and late spring's cold temperatures have taken a toll which will dim the golden hues that draw residents and tourists alike. Not to worry, this too shall pass. Nature is merely healing her/him/itself. Fear not, on the weekends the I-70 corridor is flooded with locals and tourists all wanting to see the annual fall displays.
    Years ago my now deceased stepfather was president of the National Management Association and would shepherd business visitors from around the world to see the fall colors in the "Big Woods" (northern PA's forests).  When the entire northern tier blazed with its annual show, corporate heads from Europe and Asia flocked to Talon zipper headquarters in Meadville, PA, to ride in the company's plane to see and photograph the spectacular fall colors.

Bunnies galore. I am not sure about your neighborhood,  but here in southeast Denver we have rabbits by the dozens. They scamper away as you come down the sidewalks. Just this morning, I saw a previously unnoticed rabbit hiding in one of the hedges. It was a bit too tall, though, a well-hidden weatherproof ceramic chap sporting a silly smile!

Fiery sunrises. The old saw tells us "...red skies in the morning, sailors take warning." Our last few sunrises have been quite red, the result of the new forest fires raging in CA. Haze and smoke have flitted into and out of the front range mountain valleys, too. Moisture is badly needed throughout the west.

Thank you for once again "picking me up." Have a pleasant week.

Here are this week's thoughts: another Democrat in the race?; migrants; a vote of conscience; the Latino vote; mountain arts festivals; Labor Day.

Vice President Biden. Will he or won't he? The Washington Post's Ed Keefe said, Rarely has a speech on the importance of community colleges been more closely scrutinized. That was the central theme of remarks delivered by Vice President Biden on Wednesday at one of the nation's largest universities -- at least, the stated theme. The other theme, which he only hinted at, was the political subtext: Still grieving from the death of his oldest son, Biden is weighing a presidential bid. And until he makes his 2016 decision, everything he says and does will be viewed through a campaign prism.
     Indeed, given his age, should the VP decides to run, he may well have to fall back on Ronald Reagan's famous words from that second presidential debate with Walter Mondale. "I want you to know [Reagan said] that....I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience."

European Migration. Neil Diamond sang in Coming to America: "Home, to a new and a shiny place / Make our bed, and we'll say our grace / Freedom's light burning warm..." reminding us that a desire for freedom takes many forms. While Trump and others worry about Latinos heading north, another of history's true mass migrations is taking place in Europe as millions flee Middle Eastern violence and stream north and west across the Mediterranean Sea. In Europe, freedom from violence is proving as strong as our closer-to-home economic magnet. It is only a matter of time before a European Trump" proposes fences to stem the flow. Obviously, these domestic and foreign fence "begaters" do not remember that even Khrushchev's Berlin Wall was not 100% effective. A wall built by a dictatorial regime in a puppet state was fallible. People still found ways under, over, and through.  

Study, look inward, then vote. I have written to my US representative and both senators asking that they study the Iranian agreement and then vote their conscience. Wikipedia offers this definition: "A conscience vote or free vote is a type of vote in a legislative body where legislators are allowed to vote according to their own personal conscience rather than according to an official line set down by their political party."

The Latino vs. African American vote. An op ed in the Washington Post by Bruce Bartlet suggests that Donald Trump need not fear losing the Latino vote -- IF he can swing enough of the African American vote his way, not an easy task. Bartlet bolsters his argument by reviewing the past anti-immigration stance taken by Frederick Douglas, Booker T. Washington, A. Philip Randolph, and various influential African American publications. More recently he notes that, " 'By 1993, poet Toni Morrison put the issue succinctly in an essay for Time, saying, “Whatever the ethnicity or nationality of the immigrant, his nemesis is understood to be African American.' ” Politics surely makes for strange bedfellows.

Breckenridge arts scene. The Labor Day weekend brings the yearly Arts Festival to town. Nearly 100 artists, most of whom are "on the circuit," working in a wide variety of mediums, set up their white traveling booths and engage in the normal give-and-take of greeting, explaining, selling. One booth provides music as the two CO-based guitarists entertain, sell their CDs, and display more than ten guitars, including some rather innovative designs.

Labor Day. Traditionally this holiday marks the beginning of fall and also the start of the "real" political season. All of the candidates fan out among the potential voters, early polls abound, and the pundits are busily discussing what might or might not occur. Candidates parade around, partake of the local delicacies, and make statements, some of which, down the road, may be thought to have been "spot on" or "foot in the mouth."

Thank you for reading. I hope your Labor Day weekend was pleasant.

Here are to topics for the week: priorities; empires; The Donald from the right; red moon; Denali.

Ordering your priorities. Is it fair to ask a candidate and/or legislator how he/she would arrange these categories from this alphabetical list: family, friends, nation, party, self, state. 

Empires, then and now. Talking recently with friends about our respective visits this summer to Athens, Rome, and Ephesus, we agreed about the marvelous architectural achievements of the ancient world. True, later denizens of the 18th, 19th, and 20th century empires were also builders, but one cannot but  wonder what evidence of these later empires will exist 2,000 years on.
     The Roman, Mongol, and assorted other empires were extensive, but pale in comparison to America's current far-flung footprint. Much of our overseas construction has already vanished or been changed beyond recognition.

Trump, seen from the right. Conservative columnist George Will surveys the sobering numbers candidate Trump's might face in 2016. Sobering, of course, for everyone except Donald who seems to view himself a "master magician," even the "chosen one." Trump might do well to remember that in 1912 the Republicans turned their back on a still beloved Theodore Roosevelt, who headed the third party Progressive ticket -- throwing the election to the Democrat, Woodrow Wilson. In 2016, the GOP is unlikely to choose a political novice who veers more often than not toward the absurd, especially not when there is no incumbent president in the race.
     In a recent column, conservative-leaning Michael Gerson commented, "A number of thoughtful conservatives are attempting to take the good parts of Trump’s message — his unapologetic nationalism, his identification with working-class discontents — while minimizing the parts that appeal to the lowest human instincts. They prefer their Trumpism with a little less Trump."
     Eugene Robinson, left-leaning columnist noted that two even further-out ideas had surfaced. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R, WI) said that [building a wall to the north] was “a legitimate issue for us to look at.” Not to be outdone, Gov. Chris Christie (R, NJ) that "...as president he would have the chairman of FedEx 'show these people' at Immigration and Customs Enforcement how to track visitors the way his company tracks parcels."
     Rock on!

Smoke gets in your eyes. Last Friday evening's moonrise over the Denver skyline was a sight not usually seen, thankfully: full, sharply outlined, and nearly blood-red. Smoke and haze from the fires burning to the west provided this dramatic scene. Many of our recent sunsets have been similarly fiery.

Sad history remembered. "How Emmett Till Changed the World," was the headline of this Daily Beast story. The story continued, "The brutal lynching of a black teen in Mississippi helped shape the civil-rights movement and became the first Black Lives Matter case. Before Trayvon Martin, Mike Brown, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, and 12-year-old Tamir Rice, there was Emmett Till."
     When  Emmett's body was returned to Chicago from Mississippi, his mother demanded an open casket service so the world could see how her son had been brutally tortured, shot, and hanged in Mississippi. "The graphic images were published in Jet magazine and Black newspapers. [Ms. Till's] decision changed the course of history." Indeed, even J. Edgar Hoover's FBI was unleashed on the case.
     "Two months after Milam and Bryant [both white] were acquitted for the murder of Emmett Till, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus, sparking the 381-day Montgomery bus boycott and the beginning of a Civil Rights Movement led by a young minister by the name of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The fight for civil rights, which had mostly been a legal strategy up until that time, had become a mass movement. Soon after there were Freedom Rides, sit-ins at lunch counters, boycotts, demonstrations, and marches...[A]ll of this can be traced back to Emmett Till."
     And to his very brave uncle, Mose Wright, who stood up in court and publicly identified Milam and Bryant as Emmett's kidnappers. Blacks simply did not do that in those days, especially not against whites and surely not in open court! Mose quickly left town for relative safety to the north.

Denali or McKinley? What's in a name? The re-naming of North America's highest peak has been accomplished, re-designating Mt. McKinley as Denali, the "Great One." Native Alaskans have used the peak's Koyukon Athabaskan name, Denali, for centuries. William McKinley, America's 25th president and for whom the peak was named, was from Ohio so naturally John Boehner, Senate majority leader (R, OH), and other Ohioans, just like Denali's wolves, are howling in protest. Ohio Senator Rob Portman has expressed his discontent with the name change saying decision was "another example of the President going around Congress." Really, Senator? There is a 1947 US law on the books making the re-naming quite legal. Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank called the issue the "newest Republican molehill."
     Milbank continued, "The [real problem for the opponents of renaming]...is that Alaska, run by Republicans, want the name to be Denali and have been trying to make the change for decades. The Alaska delegations — Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan and Rep. Don Young, Republicans all — heralded the move (even as Ohio's Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan, who represents McKinley’s hometown, joined the opposition)."

Thanks for reading and enjoy waning full moon during this first week of September.

Here are the topics for this week's blog: happy birthday; voting rights; issue ads; immigration; The Donald, a loser?; oil bust; an unusual, political contagion; the fear factor; fall evenings

August 25th. The day to remember my mother -- and a happy birthday to all others who share the date!

Voting Rights, 50 years on. One of the cornerstones of democracy is the right to vote.  In a column this past week, E.J. Dionne notes that, though the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was meant to guarantee the vote to all eligible American citizens, still the battle continues. "The good thing about democracy is that there are no permanent defeats. The hard part is that some victories have to be won over and over." Now the great bogey man is that illusive "fraudulent" voter. Trouble is baying at the moon does not create werewolves and very, very few fraudulent voters have ever been identified, let alone prosecuted. That old Chicago adage "vote early and often" seems to be very largely a misnomer.
     Last week the answer to a Jeopardy question was "Who was Winston Churchill," who famously declared that "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

Iran and emissions. I do not know about your area, but here in Denver we are seeing, not only TV "candidate ads," but also issue ads (largely against) on both the Iranian agreement and proposed industrial emissions regulations. This quick use of paid advertising seems a new tactic by both sides.
     Re Iran and the bomb. Seventy years ago, the US let loose the atomic genie and is the only nation to have actually used that horrible genie against other humans. Ever since there has been a growing list of nations that have the bomb, some with, some without our assistance. Russia, Britain, France, Israel (undeclared), China, India, Pakistan, North Korea. One might be inclined to think some of these nations are "scarier" than others, but it not mere possession by any nation a scary proposition.

The Newcomers. Being ever the heretic, should we now examine our immigration and citizenship processes? Bob Dylan reminded us that "the times they are a-changin' ". Over the years waves of immigration have changed, too, as has our society's perceived need for these new comers. It is a familiar story: from the mid-1800s, America's immigrants dug canals, built railroads and highways, pushed the nation westward. Indeed, these newcomers powered Manifest Destiny and pushed America to its international prominence. 
     The constitution evolved, too, as slavery was formally ended and citizenship further defined in the 14thAmendment to include those "born or naturalized" in America. This definition was largely accepted and, until very recently, had not been much questioned. It should be noted, however, that these earlier immigrants mostly came from abroad, through our Atlantic and Pacific coast ports.
     Back then, massive numbers of Canadians were not streaming southward. Now, however, the world's economic and political picture has changed and there are millions of Latin Americans streaming northward. This is one of the driving forces behind today's debate. See this link in the Huffington Post for a discussion on the legal issues surrounding this one section of the 14th Amendment.

The Donald, a loser? A blogger at The Daily Beast thinks it highly unlikely that Trump will put himself on a ballot and risk losing to "lesser" candidates, many of whom he has already derided as "losers." To put the question another way, would a bloviating megalomaniac risk suddenly looking silly and second rate? Hope springs eternal.

Oil prices. From Washington Post columnist, Fareed Zakaria, "While we have been watching the Islamic State and discussing Iran, something much bigger is happening in the world. We are witnessing a historic fall in the price of oil, down more than 50 percent in less than a year. When a similar drop happened in the 1980s, the Soviet Union collapsed. What will it mean now?" Indeed. While frackers in the US were thriving, they and some OPEC members (even the Saudis) are feeling the hurt. Unstable nations in our own backyard (e.g. Mexico and Venezuela) are facing new pressures from their growing populations. Things are not at all good.
     The Saudis “know it hurts them but they hope it will hurt everyone else more,” says [Leonardo] Maugeri [of Italy's Eni corporation], now at Harvard. "One of Saudi Arabia’s main aims is to put U.S. producers of shale and tight oil out of business. So far, it has not worked."
     Consider these economic facts, how much some national economies depend on oil: Venezuela, 96%; Russia, at least 50%; Iraq, 95%; Iran, ?, but increasing if sanctions are lifted.

"Recovering" Governors. They are a rare breed, with only 10 in the US Senate and just one in the US House. They are former state governors, who have been elected to national office. "Democratic Sen. Thomas R. Carper of Delaware put it this way on the Senate floor in December: 'We’re sort of a support group for one another — men and women who used to be somebody and be special.' ” Kermit said, "It's not easy being green" and, apparently, the same hold true for former state chief executives.
     John Kashich, former OH governor, is slowly inching up among the plethora of Republican presidential candidates, in part by touting his past executive experience. Two former governors (Crist, [D, FL] and Culver [R, IA]) are presently considering running for US House seats in their respective states. History tells us that only one ex-president was ever elected to the US House -- John Quincy Adams, (MA), who served there until his death.
     Is it possible that running for / holding elective office is contagious, much like the measles?

A pleasant, if passing, touch of fall. Last week the night-time temperatures in the Queen City of the West have dropped into the low 50s. Crickets are still singing merrily along, but the tomatoes are not ripening so quickly, though the yellow summer squash continues to be prolific. Fear not, the weather prognosticators predict warmer temperatures are on the way -- just in time for school to begin.

Thank you for reading. Have a peaceful week.