A primer on the president

To view Barack Obama as feckless, power-hungry, uninformed, eager for war, uncaring, and ill-suited for the office of the president is stunning to me when I run across it.  I take solace that many thinkers I admire and trust do judge Obama's presidency as I do.  Not all of them do, of course, but I feel I'm in good company. 

George Bush may well go down in history as one of our worst presidents, setting us back decades in countless ways, while Obama may go down as one of our best.  Only history will tell, but that’s my prediction and definitely my hope.  Because we're at a tipping point.  My support of Obama is not based on an expectation of perfection because he can't be all things to all people and not even to one: me.  Neither is he a dictator to attain and achieve all he wants.  It’s no secret that the Congresses he has had to work with have been unwilling to work with him, and even worse, all too willing to sacrifice all of us in their effort to hamper his presidency, and they will not be judged kindly by history; maybe more like the most treasonous and obstructionistic for its abject lack of willingness to pass any meaningful legislation at a time when Americans have suffered in a manner and to an extent rivaled only by the Great Depression.  Even in light of the suffering, dastardly republicans and spineless democrats refused to work with the president, no matter how it hurts us, now and in the future.  The president is not a dictator, as much as George Bush liked to joke about that and if Congress won't deal, nothing gets done, domestically anyway.

The comparison of Obama to Dubya reminds me of just how ridiculous American voters sometimes are – the ones who vote, which is a little less than half of us.  Of those who do vote, a scary percentage of them believe Obama is Muslim and not American.  Many who do accept his citizenship announce that they cannot support him for one reason or another, always understandable righteous grievances, but so, too, did President Bush have righteous reasons for waging war – God told him to.  Voters would probably not have been happy with George Washington since he owned slaves; would have opposed Franklin Roosevelt because he was too rich and privileged; would have taken exception to John Kennedy because he was Catholic and there was that business about his father’s dealings; Abraham Lincoln was too inexperienced and besides, he proved himself to be bloodthirsty, sending soldiers off to die…  You get my point...?  :) Nobody is perfect, not even us voters.  I'd like us to take a broader view of government and our role in it, at election time and the three years before and after it.

"Obama is a war criminal just like Bush was."  You've heard that too?  When other countries issue arrest warrants for Obama's war crimes as they have done in the case of George Bush, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld and a few others in that administration, then you can allege that Obama is a war criminal.  Until that time, let's focus on the real criminals, who, although criminals, are smart enough to not travel, to stay away from those countries.

To criticize supporters of this president as uninformed, unsophisticated, and just not as aware as we should be or not smart, or have been paying attention for years on end as political junkes do :D is the kind of arrogance usually reserved for the right-wingers and evangelicals.  Why, that’s why they must be told what to think, who to love; to give up control over our own bodies.  Occupiers are loathe to support Obama, fearing co-optation from the Democrats.  I understand that, I really do, but in reality and in fairness, we should stand up for Obama if we ask him to stand up for us -- which he should do.  We must push him in the direction we want him to go rather than sit on the sidelines, saying and doing nothing except hoping for the best, and then criticize and complain when it doesn’t work out the way we’d like.

I get impatient and saddened by the “He’s just like Bush.”  “He’s no better than Bush.”   It concerns me that people are so simplistic, still, even after eight looong years of Bush & Co. and the damage they’ve done; to think that Obama is half as bad as him worries me about the unformedness of Americans, and that kind of childlike thinking reminds me how naïve American voters are -- the minority of us who bother to vote.  (There has never been an election I haven't voted in even when I was discouraged, which I am not now.)

If you haven’t been paying attention to Obama’s accomplishments (beyond the historical nature of his presidency, which also now apparently is taken for granted), read the link below.  If you need even more of a reason to support the president besides the evangelical war on women, the corporate war on environment, workers, students, and minorities, if these are enough of an impetus for you, please, read on.  Please take a moment to learn what you might not have known.  Please allow that it may surprise and inform you.

http://obamaachievements.org/list

Put the darn cell phone down...

This evening I walked to the grocery store, and it was beautiful out, sunny and mild.  I waited on the corner of Aurora and Winona, a busy intersection, and I watched for a good two minutes while across the street stood a young mother with her baby in a stroller and dog on a leash with rush-hour traffic whizzing by.  She glanced up from her phone exactly three times very briefly to check the light and then right back to her phone -- the whole time.  When the light turned green I was halfway across the street before she realized it had changed.

And APPARENTLY it would be rude to say something like, In the time you took reading your phone you could have kneeled down and interacted with your baby.  You could have smiled at your dog.  Hell, you could have even pet your dog.  You could have looked up to see me watching you in sad amazement, or you could have looked up to see a bright blue sky with pink and orange clouds. 

Apparently that’s considered rude; she certainly would have thought so.  I came *this* close.

Then, as I walked out of the store returning home, there was a guy pulling into the parking lot off of that same busy street, and he was so engrossed in his phone conversation that he couldn’t take the phone away from his ear while he maneuvered a sharp turn out of traffic into a narrow parking lot with a small boy in the passenger seat.

People need to get off of their cell phone, not only because it’s dangerous to others, but because there are so many moments we miss when we’re wired up.  There is so much eye contact that does not get made.  There are real moments of talking with a child, smiling at a stranger, greeting a clerk, noticing birds soaring overhead, and smelling the flowers along your path.  Stop using the phone as an excuse to hibernate in broad daylight and in public view. 

Remember what life used to be like?  I’m glad I still do.  If I’m standing in line at the post office, I’ll read my phone. Otherwise, I’d rather live.

Raising girls -- and what the heck would I know about it?

Listening to an interview by NY Times reporter Peggy Orenstein who’s written a book: “Cinderella Ate My Daughter,” and she writes about the Disneyfication, the “Kim Kardashaianization” of girls and girl culture these days especially in this country, and it reminds me again how very, very, very grateful I am to have had a son. 

I vividly remember sitting in my doctor’s office in 1985, almost five months along, convincing him to do an ultrasound so I could finally know once and for all, Is it a girl or a boy?  He couldn’t talk me out of it, not even in his humorous and gentle way.  So much easier to raise a boy.  For me anyway.  And then I was blessed with a good-natured, late-sleeping, energetic, imaginative, athletic, and humorous son.  I could not have gotten luckier.  Raising a girl today means suffering eighteen years or more of pink and pretty, and sexualization of girls, and the pressure to be pretty on top of competent, could be a bit overwhelming for any parent.  So much easier to raise a boy to respect girls and women than to convince a girl that she is more than her looks and willingness to please, despite the barrage of contrary messages from society; constantly fighting against the tide of objectification and sexism, sometimes – oftentimes -- against the wishes of a little girl who might succumb occasionally to society’s propaganda and pressure, and just wants to be like other girls.  That’s a big job.   It’s probably not as big a chore as I think, but it’s probably not easy.

If I had had a girl, I would have undertaken the task of rearing a fully realized girl, and it would have been a full-time job to counteract the messages that girls get today, or twenty years ago.  We would have had to endure a thoroughly pink toy aisle, Barbie commercials, and beauty products aimed at seven year olds.  Having a boy -- almost as if somebody up there were looking out for me :)  -- meant childhood was largely fun, energetic, tomboyish, and silly without the weightier worries of the parent of a girl.  That’s not all it was and it was not without its trauma and scares, but it was pretty fun. 

I can imagine some people will say that you can do the same things with a girl that you can with a boy…  I get that.  I’m just feeling really fortunate after hearing Ornstein’s interview.

It was easy to tell Martin no, we probably weren’t going to see the latest Disney movie each year (even though I relented and then quite enjoyed The Little Mermaid).  Ace Ventura and Ninja Turtles I would have taken my daughter to see, but nobody enjoys a good talking-butt joke like the boys do.  For this I am constantly, still, and forevermore grateful. 

I’m thanking Steve Scher for a fascinating and funny interview and Ms. Orenstein for an interesting perspective on raising children.

That's my white mama

The bombardment of messages of consumption and unrelenting propaganda is finally beginning to be questioned and it’s a relief to me that my lifelong cynicism wasn’t really cynicism but an awareness that something wasn’t right.  Well, maybe it was cynicism, but maybe it was healthy after all, if not always easy to bear or to share, or to hear by others.  This collective communal awakening has brought with it a new appreciation for my mother who, from the time I can remember, eschewed and mocked much of what society seemed to value.  Popular shows like “Leave it to Beaver” and “The Brady Bunch” would launch her into cranky complaints about how those shows didn’t reflect reality when all I wanted as a kid was for her to enjoy them with me.  Why can't she just be happy...?

When I was little I used to yearn for her to be like the other mothers I met, who smiled brightly and cooked dinner every night, meatloaf or pork chops, and kept immaculate houses.  Of course, we never really know how other families live.  Sometimes we only know what they choose to show us. I knew my mom couldn’t have cared less about dusting and cooking.  She read voraciously, magazines like “Ramparts,” "Free Press," and “Avant Guard,” and books about the FBI and radical activists.  She often complained about police brutality and Jim Crow laws while I longed for a mother who smiled brightly.

I also used to wish I had grown up in a small town in Iowa, in real America, because that’s what I believed refleted the “real” America, where kids rode their bikes in safety, neighbors were neighborly, and schools were clean.  It wasn’t until later that I realized those images I saw on tv did not reflect my family; they were white kids attending clean white schools with nary a brown face to be seen.  This, too, my mother grew angry about.  Now I’m grateful that I grew up in Los Angeles, one of the most diverse and progressive cities in the country because if I had grown up in Iowa, I would have been isolated and out of place, much more than I perceived being when I was young. 

As I grew older and became aware of events outside of my world, I appreciated more and became interested in the opinions of friends of my parents, people who like my parents rode motorcycles, protested the war, and enjoyed movies like “Easy Rider” and "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner."  My dad played bongos at parties, and my mother was convinced she had an FBI file.  I met and overheard conversations of adults of all races in our home, radical and traditional, who also refused to accept what the government and Madison Avenue were selling us.

My mother was ahead of her time and she paid a price for it, emotionally and probably in other ways, and if your mother pays a price emotionally, you pay a price, so it was difficult at times, sometimes traumatically difficult, but maybe that’s inevitable when you cannot live the kind of life most Americans were living.  She was never content to stay at home and not work at a time when most mothers did.  When I was young, I was confused and saddened by that.  Now I’m proud of it.

Some things I would definitely change but much I wouldn’t, and I’m more proud of her than I am disappointed.  These days of revolution and involvement make me miss her more than ever because I wish that she could have seen the Occupy movement.  I wish she could have seen the election of Barack Obama.  She would have loved and been excited by both.  I wish I could believe she sees it now but my beliefs don’t lean that way.  She instilled in me a suspicion of government and establishment that I'm grateful for.  In some ways it’s easier to believe in our collective stories and the myths that make us feel good, but I’d rather have the truth than cling to an illusion. 

A few things I remember my mother hating:  John Wayne, Kate Smith, Clint Eastwood, "Hee Haw," cooking, Ronald Reagan, fine department stores, Leave it to Beaver, southern accents, the LAPD.

A few things my mother loved: Simon and Garfunkel, Robert Kennedy, Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, Herman’s Hermits, The Smothers Brothers, Dr. King, vodka and orange juice, Eugene McCarthy, long drives with the radio on while my dad (or her second husband) drove, her cats, Angela Davis, sewing, crossword puzzles, Benson & Hedges, reading (thousands of books), Dr. Pepper, anti-war rallies, and love-ins.

She was not an easy woman to love, but I’m glad and proud she was my mother.  They raise 'em up radical in Kansas.

The title of this essay comes from a "Mad TV" comedy skit.

 

Re-elect the President and Here's Why

Three years ago I found myself in an usual position before Obama’s election and do so again today, less than one year before his (hopefully) reelection.  I was not on board with him and resented the attention he got from the press and would-be voters.  I was not sold on him until the very end, probably his election night victory speech, he in Chicago and me downtown at the Westin Hotel on the phone with my father. 

Then I was convinced, or more accurately, moved by the historic achievement of that night.  Even as a biracial American with a white mother from Kansas, like him, I resisted his seeming anointment.  I felt alone among my friends because I hadn’t drunk the Kool-Aid, hadn’t been convinced of his promises of hope and change, and needed much more than rhetoric in my presidential candidate.  As happens sometimes in my life, I was swimming against the tide.  He was so woefully inexperienced.

Again I’m swimming against the tide of popular opinion and conventional wisdom because most liberals, progressives, and/or democrats are furious with him for this offense or that, while I see him as doing a pretty damn good job, all things considered.  Have we forgotten that three short years ago our economy almost collapsed, so that he wasn’t able to do the things he (naively) wanted?  Are we unaware of the depths of right-wing cravenness and willingness to send us all into the crapper to see him lose, to break him?  I wish people would grow up when it comes to politics and recognize the realities. I believe only with the benefit of hindsight can we know how good a president was.  I also believe that Obama has finally learned what he didn’t know in the beginning, and could not know, despite the high hopes people had for him. 

I believe he should not have been elected in 2008, but since he was and since he’s acquitted himself well in the face of a near economic collapse and a treasonous opposition party and cowardly members of his own, and since this is a crucial election in so many ways (I’m looking at you, Supreme Court), to abandon him now would be irresponsible.  It would be cutting off our nose to spite our unhappy face.  But if we think things are shitty now, just wait until a republican – any republican – is in office and reverses the good things accomplished in the previous four years and piles on to the damage that George Bush has done.  Don’t do it.  Don’t abandon the president now.  You’ll be sorry.  For once, listen to my good advice : )

Two respected journalists agree with me, or rather I agree with them for the past year: James Fallows and Ron Suskind.  Suskind wrote “Confidence Men,” and Fallows the following article in this month’s “The Atlantic,” must-reads for all interested voters and especially those who feel too disappointed to vote for him again.  When we pick presidents let's do more thinking and less feeling.  Let's be practical.  Politics has never run smoothly in this country, not in real time.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/03/obama-explained/8874/

"Freedom"

“Freedom” is the new buzzword describing the denial of basic human rights in healthcare and the workplace.  Employers are free to offer restrictive health insurance to their employees that does not cover contraception (while covering Viagra).  Employers are free to terminate employees at will, with little to no reason at all.  Workers are free to work elsewhere if they don't like it.  “Free” and "freedom" are the new buzzwords, the new doublespeak employed by the neoconservative party.  Don’t fall for it. 

The Beatitudes, and power and spirit. Or is it power vs. spirit...

Prayer and Meditation
Jan 22, 2012

The last time I did get up and dance, though, someone came up and danced with me and showed me what a terrible dancer I was.  But anyway, it was just a fun party.  And thank you for setting up my prayer so nicely with that happy interlude.

What a week, with the snow and rain, sleet and wind, and here we are all stir crazy enough to come to church on Sunday morning.  If we had kids at home, we're really glad they're downstairs because they're as tired of us as we are tired of them, and here we are, some of us beating ourselves up because we weren't here to do what we are supposed to do and feeling terrible and useless and all that, not paying attention to what really is important -- and that is being centered and content where one is, because that's all that there is, really, is right where you are. 

So hopefully we're moving more to that place in our old rhythms with a little more kindness for ourselves.  I invite you to join me in the spirit of prayer and meditation.

This life we have is such a strange yet common gift, so fraught with twists and storms, betrayals, mercies, and inspirations, revelations, and hidden treasures buried before us.  There is pain in it sometimes, often loneliness; riddles and enigmas, wounds endured, inflicted in terror we cannot name.  Yes, in glories too, seen, heard, felt, borne beyond all ability of words to express. 

May we become wise enough, merciful at least to measure ourselves not by our fears or failures, however large, but by our faith and our hopes and our loves, however small; that we may truly live this mortal gift and be a source of light for others, so that by grace, all our struggles and all our joys will be daily rehearsals in what it means to be human, to be finite, to be magnificent. 

To these imperfect words we add the silent intention of our hearts.  ~Jon Luopa

(and later)

I spent a good part of this past week worrying whether or not I should share this reading with you this morning, because I was afraid of what you might think -- about me, not about the reading.  They are words I heard often as a child and were precious to me because they were enigmatic.  They are words that were often requested at memorial services in congregations on the East Coast that tend to be a little more traditional than we are here.  Families would remember this and, Would you do that?  Would you say these words for us there? 

And then I remembered that yesterday was the first anniversary of my heart attack, and I'm still here.

Audience member:  Praise be.

Praise be.  Thank you.  (Applause.)  And maybe one of the things I hope I learned from that event is that it's important to say things that are really meaningful to you when you have the time to do it, because we, none of us, know what time we have. 

So we should say what's in our heart, and for those who are able to hear it, they will hear and take it in, and those who cannot, cannot.  So just say it.

The reading comes from what we call today the New Testament.  They were words attributed to Jesus of Nazareth.  They are considered by Biblical scholars and literary professionals probably the only authentic words that we have that Jesus actually said, because they are found in all of the primary sources virtually all in the same form.  And so we think inasmuch as we have an inaugural speech of Jesus, these are his words. 

They are found most commonly in Matthew in the 5th Chapter and are known as the Beatitudes, and I'm going to read them to you in the old English translation, which is what most of us are familiar with, but then I'm going to go back and paraphrase them in the Aramaic in which they were written because the meaning is very different, indeed.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven. 

Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. 

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. 

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. 

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the Children of God. 

Blessed are those who are persecuted for justice's sake, for theirs in the kingdom of Heaven. 

This was typical of Jesus' teaching style to match two seemingly opposing phrases to each other, such that the meaning of them is really to be found in the exchange between them.  So here they are, then, in Aramaic and we think closer to what He meant when He uttered them first.

Blessed are the poor in spirit really means blessed are the empty in spirit, those who have no spirit, who have no hope, who have no dreams.  They are empty in their spirit.  There is nothing there.  When you're this way, the kingdom and all Heaven is yours.

Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted.  Mourn means only those who are able to cry with the poor, with the marginalized, with the weak, with the abandoned, and understand the pain of the world.  And most of us are so insulated from those states of being that we are no longer able to cry with the immigrant, to cry with the poor, to cry with the oppressed and the rejected.  If we are able to reclaim that natural human right, we shall be comforted.

Blessed the meek means blessed are they who own nothing, who are not possessed by their possessions; they have nothing.  Blessed are these people for they shall inherit everything. 

Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, meaning those who hunger after justice, fairness, equity, for they shall be filled.

Blessed are the merciful means blessed are those who are seeking to be forgiven.  You will be forgiven, and you will be able to forgive.

Blessed are the pure in heart.  This is one of the most ancient Jewish teachings, claiming that if your heart is not pure, you will not be able to see.  But when your heart is right, you will be able to see the world as it really is.  Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see the grandeur of the source of all being.

Blessed are the peacemakers.  Blessed are the people who attempt to reconcile the things that separate us, one from another, to reconcile differences.  Blessed are these because they will be called Children.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for justice's sake.  Interesting; one must be persecuted seeking justice in order to understand what Heaven truly is.  To live a just life is to have identified with the longing and hunger of the poor, of the empty, of the meek, of those who own nothing, and of those who weep; who stand in solidarity with the oppressed, for it was His understanding that human tears are more important than human words to understand who God is. 

Curious for us enlightened modern, post-modern people that we dismiss the concept of God because it is a concept.  But if you're able to cry in solidarity with the oppressed, you will see God, and God will be with you, because you will own the tragic nature of all existence. 

Jesus taught that as long as only a few of us believed these things, we would be like leaven in the whole loaf, and that is all that would matter.  ~Jon

(Below is a link to the third of three readings that lucky day by Jon Luopa.  His spoken words are even better than the written.)

http://www.uuchurch.org/sermon/3850