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Facing the myths in our personal histories

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There are memoirs where one is quickly reminded that not everyone shares the same experiences. When well told, moving through these new worlds can be enlightening, jarring, and often gripping. Then again, there is the occasional book where the reader finds a story that mirrors one’s own experience in astonishing detail.

Ty Seidule‘s fearless and direct Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner’s Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause — part memoir, part history, part call-to-action — was that reflection for me. In his skillful hands, the story is also enlightening, jarring, and gripping. The Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Ron Chernow may have captured it best when he wrote, “Ty Seidule scorches us with the truth and rivets us with his fierce sense of moral urgency.”

The author’s bio is important in understanding the accuracy of Chernow’s description. Seidule grew up in Alexandria, Virginia, where his father taught at Episcopal High School. Historian Charles Reagan Wilson has called Episcopal a “Lost Cause denominational secondary school.” Seidule then moved with his family to Monroe, Georgia, where he completed his high school studies, graduating from a whites-only “segregation academy” in 1980. Monroe was the site of the only mass lynching to occur in the United States after World War II, yet Seidule knew nothing of that history when he lived in the community. After high school he moved to Lexington, Virginia, where he attended and graduated from Washington and Lee University (W&L). Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Tony Horowitz has called Lexington “the second city of Confederate remembrance: Medina to Richmond’s Mecca.” Seidule holds a Ph.D. in history from Ohio State University and is professor emeritus of history at West Point, where he taught for two decades. He served in the U.S. Army for thirty-six years, retiring as a brigadier general. His books include The West Point History of the Civil War.

To write such an honest and direct case against all that he had been taught, Seidule brings his professional understanding of history; a long reverence for Robert E. Lee; deep indoctrination into what was expected of a white, Southern male; and a belief that an oath to defend the United States should not be broken. Seidule calls for nothing less than a total reckoning with American history to set the record straight. And he does so by laying out the path to his own personal reckoning with riveting detail, great attention to the facts, and a blunt directness that one would expect from a brigadier general who also happens to be a historian.

Seidule walks the reader through each step of his youthful indoctrination of the myth of Robert E. Lee as the greatest man who ever lived, and who led the Confederate army in a just cause for states rights. Lee, according to the myth, only lost the Civil War due to the overwhelming resources of the North. One learns of the lessons Seidule absorbed in 1960s Alexandria during the Civil War centennial and the civil rights era. Those lessons were heavily imbued with the Lost Cause myth, with Lee’s greatness central to that story. He learned them thanks, in no small part, to the history books the state of Virginia gave him to read in school. Seidule includes deeply personal chapters about his time in Monroe, and in Lexington, and then as a rising young army officer at bases named for Confederate generals who were traitors against the United States. It is at West Point, however, where he had his “a-ha” moment, and recognized that what he learned his entire life was a lie. Throughout he uses the historian’s tools to deconstruct the myth, lie-by-lie, with facts and straight talk.

It is the directness of the language, the refusal to sugar-coat the facts or his own personal failings, that brings the reader to see the righteousness of his work. He admits an adoration for the myth of Robert E. Lee that is a religion. Seidule was in awe when he first walked into Lee Chapel at W&L.

“I saw the altar, the Holy Table. Except that on top of the table lay Robert E. Lee’s statue. My school worshipped Robert E. Lee, literally…At Lee Chapel, we had a church dedicated to the southern saint…Traveller’s bones (from Lee’s faithful horse) became another relic for pilgrims and Lee Chapel became the St. Peter’s Basilica of the Lost Cause religion.”

Seidule doesn’t mince words. Slavery was THE cause of the war as explained before in this blog. How can we be so certain? The leaders of the Confederate states told us so at the time. Use of the word “plantation” sugar coats the reality, so Seidule calls these sites that were central to the southern economy by a more accurate name — enslaved labor farms. He explains that the earliest official name for the war is the “War of the Rebellion” which suits him just fine, because that’s what it was. Civil War is okay as well. But when “War Between the States” or “The War of Northern Aggression” is used, he knows that a Lost Cause myth is behind it.

Then he moves into discussing the two armies who fought in the War of the Rebellion, and how they came to be misnamed (thanks in part to a years-long campaign by the United Daughters of the Confederacy). We usually reference the Union army…

“as though they belonged to an organization that fought only one war. An army relegated to the dustbin of history, as Karl Marx would say. No, the boys in blue fought in the U.S. Army for the United States of America. The names we use matter. By saying Union and Confederate, Blue and Gray, North and South, we lose the fundamental difference between the two sides. The United States fought against a rebel force that would not accept the results of a democratic election and chose armed rebellion.” (emphasis added)

In his final chapter entitled “My verdict: Robert E. Lee committed treason,” the myths about Lee the man are similarly laid bare for the lies they are. Southerners heard that Lee was the only student ever at West Point to go four years without receiving a demerit. In fact, five other students in his class achieved the same honor. Contrary to myth, Lee was not kind to the enslaved persons he owned, received primarily through his wife’s inheritance. He split up families through the sale and the rental of those individuals, and did all in his power to try and ignore the provision in his father-in-law’s will that all the enslaved individuals under his ownership would be emancipated five years after his death. Another part of the myth is that Lee “had” to resign from the U.S. Army because he was a Virginian, and all sons of Virginia put their state above country. In fact, Lee was one of eight U.S. Army Colonels from Virginia at the time of secession. Seven of them remained loyal to their solemn oath to the U.S. Constitution. Only Robert E. Lee resigned and broke his oath. Lee said he was fighting for Virginia, but he quickly resigned his commission leading the State of Virginia’s forces to accept a role in the Confederate States of America’s army. He did so because he profited from slavery.

Robert E. Lee was the only senior officer who was actually in charge of hundreds of enslaved workers and in the U.S. Army in 1861. His views — before, during, and after the war — were much more closely aligned with the large slaveowners of the South than with his fellow Army officers. In 256 hard-hitting pages, Seidule refutes the myth-making around Robert E. Lee point-by-point, and reminds the reader on multiple occasions that the myth was constructed to win the narrative for slave-owners who had lost the war.

Lee’s decision to fight against the United States was not just wrong; it was treasonous. Even worse, he committed treason to perpetuate slavery.

Seidule, a fellow Southerner, is seven years my junior. I was drawn in to the Civil War centennial from 1961-1965 and hiked battlefields with my father from Shiloh to Nashville. While my university years were not spent at one of those colleges that were attracting the “status-seeking white Southern high schooler” (e.g., Sewanee, Duke, Davidson, Vanderbilt, W&L), my friends were there. I lived in Americus, Georgia, during the time that Seidule was in Monroe. Americus has a very complicated history when it comes to civil rights: a few years before I moved to Americus, the deacons of the First Baptist Church stood outside the front doors to keep Blacks from attending, and lynchings were a part of the city’s history. We moved to Staunton, Virginia, in 1983 while Seidule was less than 50 miles away in Lexington. Most importantly, my beloved grandmother was a life-long member of the United Daughters of the Confederacy and a proponent of the myth of the Lost Cause. I read her UDC magazines as well as the works of Douglas Southall Freeman — Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer who helped solidify the myth as much as anyone.

Seeing the myth we both were raised on as just that — a myth — has taken time. The truth continues to unfold. Ty Seidule has helped all Americans who wish to know more of that truth understand the facts, and their own personal histories, in a much deeper and richer way with this highly recommended book. As he notes at the end:

Racism is the virus in the American dirt, infecting everything and everyone. To combat racism, we must do more than acknowledge the long history of white supremacy. Policies must change. Yet, an understanding of history remains the foundation. The only way to prevent a racist future is to first understand our racist past.

More to come…

DJB

Image by James DeMers from Pixabay

Lamentations and reflections for Holy Week

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In our second year of a Holy Week overlaid with the heartache of a worldwide pandemic which is exacerbating the social and economic injustice of our times, a Saturday Soundtrack with lamentations feels right for the season. As was the case in 2020, my son, Andrew Bearden Brown, plays a role in this post. As one of the singers, Andrew is part of the program Lamentations: Music and Reflections for Holy Week from St. John’s Lafayette Square in Washington, DC.

This posting comes early, on Maundy Thursday, to give readers the chance to enjoy the music throughout the weekend.

The 38-minute program alternates between reflections by priests in the church on life in a year in quarantine and beautiful music by Tallis, Tomkins, and other beloved composers and arrangers.

Members of the St. John’s choir provide the music: Tory Wood and Samantha Scheff (sopranos), Charlotte Stewart (alto), Andrew Brown (tenor), and Christopher Jones (bass). The quintet is under the direction of Brent Erstad.

You are encouraged to listen to the entire program, as the reflections are thoughtful and provide context. However, if your focus is solely on the music, you can find the beginnings of each piece in the video by going to the time markings below.

The program includes:

  • Reflection | Rev. Robert W. Fisher
  • The Lamentations of Jeremiah I — Thomas Tallis (5:34)
  • Reflection | Rev. Savannah Ponder
  • When David Heard — Thomas Tomkins (18:49)*
  • Reflection | Rev. William Morris
  • There is a Balm in Gilead — arr. William Dawson (26:40)**
  • Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Chile — arr. Carl Haywood (31:14)
  • This Little Light of Mine — arr. William Bradley Roberts (33:53)

Whatever your religious tradition or beliefs, Andrew and I hope in this year of lamentations for our broken world, you can find solace in the beautiful choral music of Holy Week.

More to come…

DJB

Image by Myriam Zilles from Pixabay.

*I sang this piece with Canticum Novum in the 1980s and 1990s in the Shenandoah Valley. It is one of the most heart-wrenching musical cries of despair imaginable.

**If you are having trouble picking him out under the masks, Andrew begins this piece with the tenor solo.

Weekly Reader: The war for government

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Upon passage of the American Rescue Plan, President Joe Biden asked us to remember that “the government isn’t some foreign force in a distant capital. No, it’s us, all of us, we the people.” Since 1981 and the Reagan revolution to undermine democracy for the benefit of the oligarchs in the private sector, “we the people” as the basis for our government has been a radical concept. It is time to end that long discredited campaign.

As always, this Weekly Reader features links to recent articles that grabbed my interest or tickled my fancy. I hope you find something that makes you laugh, think, or cry.

Anand Giridharadas, writing at The Ink, takes on the task President Biden outlined with a thoughtful and timely piece: The war for government.

“Forty Januaries ago, Ronald Reagan, upon assuming the most powerful governmental office in the history of civilization, declared in his inaugural address that “in this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” 

There was faulty reasoning with Reagan’s pronouncement then, and — after 40 years — we’ve seen all too well the harmful impact of work to undermine our democracy for personal gain. Giridharadas makes the case that Biden is just the right person to begin to unwind that selfish and destructive belief system.

“We don’t yet know if Biden has the stomach to make as strident a case for government-as-solution as Reagan made against the state. But it would be foolish not to observe that, thanks in part to the agitations of those who have shown the war on government to be an epic disaster (and who have fought Biden oftentimes), something new is happening. The proof that it is happening is that a moderate like Biden is on board.

At this point, Giridharadas includes the best short description of the intersecting crises of the past year — tied to their long-term impacts — that has come across my computer screen this year.

“I don’t think Biden had a religious awakening. I think the five intersecting crises of the past year made it impossible for anyone in his position to attempt to be anything but transformational and go down in history as a serious person. There was Covid, of course, and the more chronically unhealthy country it found. There was the economic crisis it unleashed, and, again, the more chronically precarious and hard-up economy that crisis exacerbated. There was the racial crisis put front and center by Black Lives Matter and, more generally, a growing recognition of the need to reckon with things long overdue and make the society safe and healthy and dignified for people of all marginalized backgrounds. There was the democratic crisis revealed by the fact that, for a while there, we weren’t sure about a peaceful transfer of power. And there was climate, the question that refuses to go away, even in plagues, with coronatime perhaps serving as a test drive for what it looks like for the world to rally together. 

There are no personal solutions to problems like these. There are no corporate solutions to them. There are no nonprofit solutions to them. As Carol Hanisch once taught us, there are only political solutions to shared political problems like these. The strange gift President Biden inherited was a network of problems so deep-rooted, so far-reaching, so long-in-the-making, so gnarled in their intersections, that they provide the best cover and ammunition in years to advocate for government (emphasis added).

This is an excellent article that I encourage you to read in full. We have to stop making war on ourselves.

One doesn’t expect to read about the need for intervention to deradicalize the Christian right in a magazine website devoted to foreign policy. But two assistant professors at The Citadel, Melissa Graves and Muhammad Fraser-Rahim, make the case for intervention at Foreign Policy magazine in their article Deradicalization Needed for Evangelical Christian QAnon Believers. They suggest we need programs in the U.S. similar to those designed to reform violent jihadis abroad. Such work could help tackle the spread of QAnon and other conspiracy theories in evangelical communities.

“Religious people are particularly susceptible to conspiracy theories due to their belief in the supernatural and their endorsement of a good-versus-evil worldview.“

“Christian communities have suffered extreme damage from divisions among believers caused by QAnon theories. Online support groups have sprung up in recent months to offer support for family members of QAnon members. In a recent op-ed, New York Times columnist David Brooks aptly observed, “there is strife within every [Christian] family, within every congregation, and it may take generations to recover.” QAnon conspiracies are just the latest iteration of a long tradition of right-wing extremism, rooted in white supremacy and anti-Semitism.“

Graves and Fraser-Rahim note that one recent event put this issue front and center.

“Nothing, however, has shifted the narrative regarding evangelicals and QAnon as much as the Capitol insurrection. No longer is QAnon seen as a fringe belief among white evangelicals; rather, it is the basis for a newly emerging violent Christian extremism. Elizabeth Neumann, a former top official at the Department of Homeland Security, has acknowledged the national security threat posed by those who are violently motivated by QAnon conspiracy theories.

Once again, Jennifer Rubin at The Washington Post hits the nail on the head with her option piece Biden excels at his first news conference. The media embarrass themselves.

“Try as they might to seem “tough,” the media did not succeed in knocking Biden off message. Biden spoke in great detail and length to show not only his mastery of the issues but also to suck tension and conflict out of the room. He simply would not be lured into accepting a false premise devised by Republicans (i.e., that his nice demeanor prompts parents to send kids thousands of miles under deadly conditions). ‘I’m going to send him on a thousand-mile journey across a desert and up to the United States because I know Joe Biden is a nice guy and he’ll take care of him? What a desperate act to take,’ he said. ‘The circumstances must be horrible.’”

In his humor column for the Chicago Tribune, Rex Huppke also goes after the press (or one especially poor excuse for a news channel), in Biden refuses to play into the Fox News narrative, and it’s making me and Sean Hannity FURIOUS!

“As a loyal Fox News viewer, I am disgusted by President Joe Biden’s stubborn and un-American refusal to behave in a way that matches the narrative I have been receiving.

Biden is, I’m told, a senile old man who barely knows he’s there, and also a radical leftist tyrant fiendishly scheming to turn America into a socialist hellscape that outlaws Dr. Seuss and the Bible and, if it exists, the Dr. Seuss version of the Bible.“

We’ll end with one other post that should make you smile. Tennessee writer (and current LA resident) Tracy Moore writes of how she has rediscovered her roots in the Washington Post piece How covid-19 gave me back my Southern accent.

“Everyone claims to like Southern accents these days, but what they mean is an anachronistic upper-class affectation, where people lose the letters “g” and “r” on the back side of words. What they don’t mean is an Appalachian dialect, where an “r” shows up in places it’s got no business being. I would learn that superfluous consonant in warsh is called the Intrusive R by linguists — even the operative word, intrusive, suggests an infection.

I spent a lifetime reshaping my speech. It took some doing — the flat “i,” as in “Ahm nihhhnteen,” took years to tamp down, and resurfaced whenever I had a couple of beers. I made sure warsh didn’t stick, but the shame did, and it got me both ways: ashamed I had ever sounded so country in the first place, and ashamed I’d lacked the courage to stay true to it. Still, I don’t believe for a second I’d have made it as a journalist any other way.“

As a result of lockdown during the pandemic, Moore has learned to come to terms, and even embrace, her roots.

While never possessed of that East Tennessee Appalachian accent, I have been known to launch into some harsh — for many ears — Middle Tennessee country dialect. One colleague in particular used to poke fun at my accent and especially the use of the word “might” in strange places.

Oh, and yes, I have been known to say “that dog won’t hunt” in a professional meeting. Get over it.

Enjoy your week of reading.

More to come…

DJB

Image by Lynn Melchiori from Pixabay

The phone call

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A former colleague posts an article each day on LinkedIn to help her friends and readers navigate the world. My work day often begins by reading either the full article or Anoka’s helpful summaries, which is how I learned about the existence of telephone anxiety.

An article on The Conversation website reported that a 2019 survey of UK office workers found 76% of millennials and 40% of baby boomers have anxious thoughts when their phone rings. As a result, 61% of millennials would completely avoid calls if possible, compared with 42% of baby boomers.

In my family both parents enjoyed talking on the telephone, so this new information surprised me. However, I may be behind the times. In a recent conversation on the topic, our millennial son told us that his generation believes phone calls can be an imposition on someone else’s time. And when this tweet showed up in another context and hit too close to home, I was reminded that there are many different perspectives to consider.

Nonetheless, let’s have a look at telephone anxiety. There were several reasons given in the article as to why people feel anxious when the phone rings (or chirps, or whatever) for them. Anoka summarized them as:

  • Talking on the phone can be daunting because we’re limited to just the sounds of our voices.
  • Research also suggests phone anxiety is related to a preoccupation with what the other person thinks of them.
  • Another reason phone calls can sometimes feel overwhelming is the pressure that comes with being someone else’s focus.
  • A phone conversation can feel impulsive and risky.

I admit to having experienced pangs of worry in the past when taking certain calls. But on the same day that Anoka posted her article, I used the phone to call a friend. We once worked together on an almost daily basis. Over the last 20 years, however, we had done little more than exchange holiday letters. Now in his 90s, his last letter led me to think that a call would be welcome.

It turned out to be the best twenty minutes I spent that day.

After getting over his surprise to hear this voice from the past, we jumped in to discuss the pandemic and current family situations. Then we moved into a discussion about work and associates, past and present. Even into his 90s he is writing an autobiography about the lessons learned from landmarks. He had a suggestion for a project I am involved with at the moment. We both were able to express our appreciation for the support given by the other over the course of our careers.

Given the health effects of the coronavirus on those over the age of 65 — an age group that may also struggle managing Zoom technology — the all-too-important human touch often has to be limited to coming “over the telephone wire” as we used to sing. But reaching out and hearing that human voice brings so much meaning that an email or even a letter cannot achieve. That can also be true even for those in younger generations.

To combat phone anxiety, the article suggests making a list of the people you need to speak to on the phone, such as friends or colleagues, and then going through each one by reflecting on what it is about the call that makes you anxious. If you think you might benefit from seeking professional help, counseling is a great option and there are a number of talking therapies available.

But one of the most effective ways to overcome phone anxiety is to expose yourself to more phone calls. Pick up the phone and call someone you haven’t talked to in a while. Take a chance that it won’t be an imposition but will, in fact, be welcomed. Say hello in there. Then do it again. And again. And again.

You will likely receive just as much in making the call as the other person will in hearing from you.

Above all, be kind.

Have a good week.

More to come…

DJB

Image by Alexandra from Pixabay

Exploring the roots and branches of American folk music with Low Lily

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One of the joys of writing Saturday Soundtrack — my weekly music post — is the discovery of new musicians and new bands that pop up unexpectedly in the research. I came across Low Lily last fall while catching up on the music of Matt Flinner, an artist recently featured on Soundtrack. This Vermont-based vocal and string band…

“explores the roots and branches of American folk music with traditional influences and modern inspiration that weaves together a unique brand of acoustic music. Liz Simmons (vocals and guitar), Flynn Cohen (vocals, guitar and mandolin), and Lissa Schneckenburger (vocals and fiddle) are masterful players with deep relationships to traditional music styles ranging from bluegrass to Irish, Scottish, New England and Old Time Appalachian sounds. When you combine this with stellar composition skills and inventive arrangements you get music that is rooted yet contemporary.“

Low Lily | Old Songs, Inc.

The band’s “outstanding and meticulous” vocal blend first drew me to the group. This comes from many years together on the road, both as a band and as key members of projects by other musicians. Hope Lingers On, written by Lissa Schneckenburger with Liz Simmons on the lead, is a wonderful tune in which to hear their beautifully crafted harmonies.

My love, when honor is gone

My love, when honor is gone

In our darkest hour hope lingers on

My country, when justice is gone

My country, when justice is gone

In our darkest hour hope lingers on

I will not hate, and I will not fear

In our darkest hour, hope lingers here

Next let’s explore the band’s instrumental work — featuring fiddle and mandolin leads by Schneckenburger and Cohen — with the lovely tune The Good Part.

10,000 Days Like These was the title track of Low Lily’s 2018 album, featured here in a live version. That’s followed by The Girl’s Not Mine with a lead vocal by fiddler Lissa Schneckenburger.

Matt Flinner joins the band in this 2019 live performance of the bluegrass tune Love of the Mountains.

One of the band’s more recent projects has been a remix of Dark Skies Again from the 10,000 Days album.

“Went real far from home, I didn’t know what I’d find

Things had been tough and I needed some peace of mind

I put miles of ocean between me and it all

Lay down under the stars til I felt real small.

Dark skies again

Dark skies again

I’ve been hanging around that dirty town too long

Sometimes you don’t know where it’ll all come down.“

We’ll end where we began, with another great vocal mix — this time underpinned by a beautiful bass line — on Nobody Knows.

Nobody told me that the road would be easy…but it is nice to have such beautiful music to take us along the path.

Enjoy.

More to come…

DJB

Image of Low Lily from HOME | LOW LILY. I love the Gibson A-4 mandolin Flynn Cohen holds in this picture. I have one from 1921 that features the same red sunburst coloring and similar marks of wear. It is a beautiful instrument.

Cliff Dwellings

Weekly Reader: A groundbreaking moment

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With the issues around social justice, the future of democracy, climate change, and a global health crisis, we are clearly living in a historic point in time in the United States. But one piece of history that may not be fully understood or appreciated by most Americans is the confirmation of a Native American as Secretary of the Interior. As Secretary Deb Haaland’s new boss might say, it is a really, really, really BFD.

As always, this Weekly Reader features links to recent articles that grabbed my interest or tickled my fancy. I hope you find something that makes you laugh, think, or cry.

Dr. Len Necefer, writing an op-ed for Outside Online, notes that The Department of the Interior Shaped My Life in a moving story about the groundbreaking news of Secretary Haaland’s confirmation and what it means for Native Americans.

“I was raised in Lawrence by my Navajo mother and Scottish and Romanian father. As a child, the juxtaposition between the history of Haskell Indian Nations University and the vibrancy of the young Native people pursuing a college education left me confused about how these two realities could exist on this small plot of land in eastern Kansas. Growing up, I would present my Certificate of Indian Blood to the Indian Health Service clinic on campus for routine dental and medical screenings, as promised in treaties from over a century earlier. 

Because of the unique relationship that the federal government has with American Indian tribes, and the fact that American Indians have a unique political and legal identity in addition to race, my healthcare and education were controlled by the policies of the Department of the Interior. The policies of Congress, the Department of the Interior, and consequently those of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, over the past century have defined Haskell and the many Native people within it by the (failed) policies, (lack of) funding, and multitude of (broken) treaty obligations.“

As Dr. Necefer notes, “a number of secretaries of the interior in recent decades have been more supportive of tribes and advanced beneficial policies.” However, not a single one of those secretaries has “had to live with the effects of these policies after their tenure.” Until now.

There is no one size fits all for Native Nations when it comes to economic development, energy, and climate policy….The challenge of this position, in this time, is significant. Secretary Haaland not only inherits the long and tumultuous history of the position she has been appointed to, but also the uncertain questions of the role of federal lands in climate policy….Auntie Deb, as she is known endearingly within many Native communities, is well aware of how her tenure will affect her life, those of her community, and Native people throughout this country. She has a stake in the game, and her future success will open the door for many other Native people after her.

This is truly a BFD.

History is also being made in the response to the coronavirus, as the administration works to clean up the mess made by the former denier-in-chief. While most of the nation recently watched President Joe Biden’s thoughtful, sober, and hopeful speech concerning the response to a deadly, worldwide pandemic with the gravity it deserved, Mark Sumner, writing at The Daily Kos, let us know that those who chose to turn to conservative media sites for information found something…how shall we say it…different. He observes that Fox News’ coverage of Biden speech underscores the total disintegration of conservative news.

“Meanwhile, on Fox News, viewers saw a presidential address as they never had before — with a real-time box allowing Tucker Carlson to mug for the camera in response to everything Biden said. Under the banner “Live Tucker Reaction,” Carlson did his best to demonstrate outrage and disgust with expressions large enough to overcome the relatively small size of his on-screen box. Meanwhile, the shifting Fox chyron offered its own commentary, including reminding viewers repeatedly in the last 10 minutes that “Biden speech nearly finished; Tucker will respond.” And spending the last couple of minutes pouting that “Biden should be finished.”

On the one hand, it may seem a wonder that Fox News decided to air the speech in any form. After all, since President Biden moved into the Oval Office, Fox has determined that it would be much better to cover anything — including devoting a full day to a misread press release about a plastic toy potato — rather than deal with the issues facing the nation. But the Carlson-in-a-box episode may serve to underscore something that’s been obvious for months: Fox News is dead.“

John Stoehr, writing for The Editorial Board, looked at Mitch McConnell’s hissy-fit about getting rid of the filibuster and writes, Actually, McConnell has always been bad at his job, and nuking the filibuster will prove it.

“It didn’t have to be this way — and it might not have been this way had Mitch McConnell lived up to his reputation as a master tactician. Think about it. If you don’t want the majority to emasculate you, and you don’t have a tool for stopping the majority from emasculating you, there’s only one thing to do: stop giving the majority reasons for emasculating you. Mitch McConnell could have vowed not to abuse the filibuster, as he has so many times before, in the hope that the Democrats don’t take it away. Instead, he vowed to block everything if the Democrats take away his favorite tool for blocking everything. I can’t imagine Nancy Pelosi doing something so dumb.

Of course, this is the man who stole a Supreme Court seat before looking the other way while the Russians sabotaged a Democratic presidential candidate. This same man rammed through another Supreme Court justice by breaking the rule he totally made up to prevent a former Democratic president from naming a Supreme Court justice. To prevent the Democrats from nuking the filibuster, he would have to keep his promise not to abuse it, but honestly, after all this time, why would the Democrats trust him?“

Stoehr has another important Editorial Board piece, this time about the really bad coverage of the border situation, in Chuck Todd and the anti-moral press.

Reporters prefer covering partisan conflict, especially conflict that has no foreseeable way of being resolved. Conflict begets attention begets profits—or just a feeling of being pivotal to the country’s destiny. The press corps will be at the heart of the action even if its members have to invent the action.…

“The border is an old mess the new administration must clean up. But it is not a ‘political crisis’ unless Chuck Todd and others think decency and law constitute political crises.“

I’ll end with links to four articles you should really, really, really read.

First up, my friend and former colleague Tom Mayes interviews Empire State Development EVP Holly Leicht for Preservation Magazine in Loss, Redemption, Renewal: The Moynihan Train Hall. While the transportation solution isn’t perfect by any means (that would require demolishing Madison Square Garden), the design work on the James A. Farley Post Office Building in Manhattan is beautiful in helping bring back memories of old Penn Station in New York.

Cory Albertson, writing in The Bitter Southerner, has a deeply personal article entitled The Radical Queerness of Dolly Parton. This thoughtful essay by the Georgia-born Albertson offers thanks for the ways Dolly’s music, stage presence, and insistence on being different spurred him to “hitch a ride with the wind.”

If, like me, you’ve laughed at the Progressive insurance commercials about how to avoid becoming your parents, you’ll enjoy the report by Ashley Fetters in The Washington Post entitled, The story behind Dr. Rick of the Progressive insurance ads.

“It doesn’t hurt that when Progressive introduced the Dr. Rick ads in April 2020, they quickly became a warm, sunny island of gentle observational humor in a vast sea of grim commercials murmuring about “these uncertain times.” Or that they’re performed by a cast of veteran improv actors recruited from the Groundlings and Second City. (In one roundly beloved bit, two of Dr. Rick’s patients struggle not to stare at a stranger with blue hair. ‘We all see it,’ Dr. Rick tells them under his breath, as they continue to gape. ‘We all-l-l see it.’ That bit was largely improvised.)“

And for something you never expected, take a look at Liz Alterman’s post in McSweeney’s entitled 24 Surprising Ways to Injure Yourself When You’re Over 50. I laughed especially hard at numbers 10 (opening a jar}, 11 (moving that jar back and forth as you squint to decipher its expiration date) and 15 (reaching into the backseat of your car for an umbrella). I’ve come dangerously close to injuring myself with all three!

Stay safe out there and have a good week.

More to come…

DJB

Image: Bears Ears National Monument by DJB

Thinking while male

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After a recent and particularly egregious blunder, my apology was accepted, accompanied by the comment that, “I knew you were just thinking like a male.”

In the context, it sure sounded like an oxymoron.

There are studies showing how men and women think differently, but that’s not what happened in this instance. My actions were the result of not really thinking at all. After misreading an email and misremembering something from the past, I proceeded to push ahead without listening to suggestions that I could be wrong.

In the end things worked out fine. However, my unwillingness to stop and ask for help put me squarely in the mindset of “thinking while male.” I wasn’t really thinking deeply about what I was doing. Unfortunately, I do it often enough to recognize the signs.

Stereotypes can be harmful and are often used to avoid getting to know people as individuals in order to look down on them as a group. They also describe behavior, roles, and preconceived notions we absorb from an early age as appropriate for our gender or social class. One of the best known stereotypes of the male mindset is the willingness to drive for long periods of time rather than stop and ask for directions. In this case, it becomes a stereotype because so many of us have adopted this behavior without giving a great deal of thought as to the reasons for our actions. But these routines don’t have to be self-fulfilling prophecies in our own lives. We can defy convention. Habits do not have to become destiny.

In our family discussions, we’ve now reflected over which past factors may have contributed to an increase in my oh-so-self-assured lack of judgment. Identifying the problem and calling something by name is a first step in making the conscious decision to break the routine that leads to bad habits. We discussed things I could do to be more present and mindful. I was also gifted a little book by Lee Coit, Listening, where I’ve been reading about the difference between the limitations of ego and the understanding that comes from following an inner guide that is deeper and connected to a truer vision of the world. Listening to that guide requires stillness, avoiding the tendency to pre-plan, and having no investment in the answer to the questions other than wanting to follow what is true. I don’t have to always be “right.”

Shifting from a busy job filled with tasks and challenges to the different pace of the next third of my life is not a simple step. Even after taking a gap year and then enduring — along with the rest of the world — pandemic lock-down, I still find I rely too much on the old habits. Yet as one of my mentors suggested, this time in life can be so much more meaningful if I will slow down, be present, listen, and think deeply about what is before me.

That means I will need to stop “thinking while male.”

Have a good week.

More to come…

DJB

Image by John Hain from Pixabay

The distinctive, raspy vocal stylings of Elise LeGrow grab hold and won’t let go

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Canadian singer and songwriter Elise LeGrow grabbed my attention with her vibe on Who Do You Love, breaking the Bo Diddley classic down to a new set of bare bones for my Halloween version of Soundtrack. Her rasping howl brought ‘a tombstone hand and a graveyard mind’ to life and I was immediately determined to hear more. So here we are with a full-length treatment on Saturday Soundtrack.

LeGrow was signed to a publishing deal in 2009 after a live performance at the NXNE festival in Toronto. And while many of her early efforts on YouTube are covers, you can immediately hear the distinctive voice and musical sensibilities on tunes such as Bill Withers’ Ain’t No Sunshine.

The beautiful Anymore, also from 2014, displays an ease and control with her voice that can be mesmerizing.

LeGrow has a wonderfully “raspy” voice that takes over no matter the spirit of the tune. She explained it this way to American Songwriter.

“I’m told that I have a lot of ‘sound.’ One of the challenges that I’ve encountered again and again is finding the right sound for the song. Ultimately, the song is the most important thing to me. It’s more important than the production, it’s more important than the show — it’s all about the song. So, for me, the vocal tone is there to serve the song. It’s one of many tools that tells the story. So, my vocal tone on this song (Evan) is really broken up, and I think that fits the sentiment of the song. Whereas, some of the other songs on the record have a completely different vibe, so you’re going to hear a lot of different tones coming out of me in the future. They’re all a little raspy! But, this song was much more intimate, it has a more intimate tone than you’ll hear on other songs of mine.

Her first full-length debut album, Playing Chess, was drawn entirely from the catalog of Chicago’s iconic Chess label, home to Muddy Waters, Etta James, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry and so many more. While her grandfather was a drummer and trumpeter active in Chicago’s jazz scene in the 1950s, LeGrow had only a passing familiarity with the history of Chess. But after realizing that many of the artists she admired had recorded for the label, she decided to make their music her own. 

LeGrow didn’t faithfully recreate this material. Her interpretations, as one reviewer notes, “strip the tracks of their previous identities, transporting them to a world where the past and present are inextricably intertwined.” I am especially fond of the live acoustic versions she has posted of several of the tunes.

The album begins with the aforementioned Who Do You Love. Other favorites from the album include You Never Can Tell, and Rescue Me. LeGrow takes these familiar songs and — with her inimitable style, phrasing, and arrangements — makes them her own.

In one of her more recent releases, she sings of the loss of a young friend, a song she wrote over several years.

What inspired this song was a friendship with a boy named Evan. We met in high school — he was actually my then-boyfriend’s best friend. When I met Evan, we instantly became friends and we shared this crazy time. We had a whole group of friends that all lived in this neighborhood together and we used to party a lot… we were teenagers, we were kids. When I look back on those years, it really feels like it was a ‘golden age.’ This song is the culmination of 10 years of grappling with the loss of my friend Evan and the emotions that came with that. That’s why it took so long to write it — I’d sit down and try to write, but I’d just get overcome with sadness. I think what allowed me to finally put pen to page was focusing on the good memories we shared. That’s what I talk about in this song; the music we listened to, the TV we used to watch, the joyful moments. 

Let’s end with Drinking in the Day, another LeGrow tune that showcases both her singing and songwriting skills.

“Oh babe, don’t say you’re doing fine
Don’t hide yourself away, something on your mind
You’re drinking in the day, coming from the way
Sometimes it’s good to cry, cry cry cry cry“

Enjoy!

More to come…

DJB

A vote is a kind of prayer

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On Wednesday, March 17th, Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia gave his initial speech on the Senate floor.* Coming from the first African American senator from Georgia, it was a historic occasion.

Warnock met the moment, delivering a powerful and moving statement about past injustices, present work to save the right to vote in our democracy, and the future of the nation that rests upon that right. 

Watching the video of Senator Warnock’s maiden effort may be the best 22 minutes you’ll spend today.

“My mother grew up in Waycross, Georgia. You know where that is? It’s way ‘cross Georgia. Like a lot of Black teenagers in the 1950’s she spent her summers picking somebody else’s tobacco and somebody else’s cotton. But because this is America, the 82-year-old hands that used to pick somebody else’s cotton went to the polls in January and picked her youngest son to be a United States Senator. Ours is a land where possibility is born of democracy. A vote, a voice, a chance to help determine the direction of the country and one’s own destiny within it. Possibility born of democracy.“

Senator Warnock was focused on voting rights and the attempts of conservatives in Georgia and across the country to suppress the votes of Blacks and other people of color. And he speaks eloquently, from his background as Senior Pastor at historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, about a vote being a prayer for the world we desire.

“I was honored on a few occasions to stand with our hero and my parishioner, John Lewis. I was his pastor but I’m clear he was my mentor. On more than one occasion we boarded buses together after Sunday Church services as part of our Souls To The Polls program, encouraging the Ebenezer Church family and communities of faith to participate in the democratic process. Now just a few months after Congressman Lewis’ death, there are those in the Georgia legislature, some who even dared to praise his name, that are now trying to get rid of Sunday Souls to the Polls, making it a crime for people who pray together to get on a bus together and vote together. I think that’s wrong. In fact, I think a vote is a kind of prayer about the world we desire for ourselves and our children. And our prayers are stronger when we pray together.

These suppression tactics are nothing new. Senator Warnock notes that politicians have often wanted to cherry pick their voters and keep others from voting who don’t agree with their politics. Rather than change their policies to reflect the will of the people, these politicians are working to change who can vote.

“To be sure, we have seen these kinds of voter suppression tactics before. They are a part of a long and shameful history in Georgia and throughout our nation. But refusing to be denied, Georgia citizens and citizens across our country braved the heat and the cold and the rain, some standing in line for 5 hours, 6 hours, 10 hours just to exercise their constitutional right to vote. Young people, old people, sick people, working people, already underpaid, forced to lose wages, to pay a kind of poll tax while standing in line to vote.

“And how did some politicians respond? Well, they are trying to make it a crime to give people water and a snack, as they wait in lines that are obviously being made longer by their draconian actions. Think about that. Think about that. They are the ones making the lines longer — through these draconian actions. Then, they want to make it a crime to bring grandma some water as she is waiting in line they are making longer! Make no mistake. This is democracy in reverse. Rather than voters being able to pick the politicians, the politicians are trying to cherry pick their voters. I say this cannot stand

There is so much to consider in Warnock’s speech. He not only calls out the hypocrisy of those who want to protect minority rights in the Senate through the filibuster but then deny minority rights to Blacks through voter suppression, but he also hits on dark money, corporate support for these tactics, and the shameful Supreme Court decision led by Chief Justice Roberts to gut the protection provisions of the Voting Rights Act.

And like every good preacher, The Reverend Dr. Warnock knows how to close. Read, mark, and inwardly digest these words about democracy being the political enactment of a spiritual idea.

“And so as I close — and nobody believes a preacher when he says “as I close” — as a man of faith, I believe that democracy is a political enactment of a spiritual idea. The sacred worth of all human beings, the notion that we all have within us, a spark of the divine, to participate in the shaping of our own destiny. Reinhold Niebuhr was right: ‘[Humanity’s] capacity for justice makes democracy possible; but [humanity’s] inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.’”

Senator Raphael Warnock received a standing ovation when he finished. He should also receive our thanks and support.

More to come…

DJB

Image by John Mounsey from Pixabay

*Here is the full transcript of Warnock’s historic speech.

On Tyranny

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“History does not repeat, but it does instruct.” So begins Timothy Snyder’s slim yet vital book On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century. Snyder — a historian of the Holocaust who teaches at Yale — has written a guide to resisting tyranny that provides present-day advice in the vein of that used by the Founding Fathers when they sought to build a governmental system of checks and balances that would be resistant to the tyranny that overcame ancient democracy.

To help instruct us in the 21st century, Snyder looks at recent history.

“Today our political order faces new threats, not unlike the totalitarianism of the twentieth century. We are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism, or communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience.”

Snyder is no believer in American exceptionalism. Instead, he notes that while we “might be tempted to think that our democratic heritage automatically protects us from such threats…this would be a misguided reflex.”

After opening this 126-page book with thoughts on history and tyranny, he moves through twenty short lessons that resonate with the power that comes from long, serious study of the interwar years in Germany and the horrors that came after the rise of fascism, Nazism, and communism. Snyder’s lessons and writings are very accessible, but that doesn’t make them less compelling. His very first lesson is “Do not obey in advance,” followed by a few short pages that show how most power acquired by authoritarians is freely given by citizens of a country. In that act, they are teaching the authoritarians seeking power what they can do.

There are lessons dealing with the need to defend institutions, think for ourselves, and take responsibility for our actions in the civic sphere. As an example, Snyder writes that “you might one day be offered the opportunity to display symbols of loyalty. Make sure that such symbols include your fellow citizens rather than exclude them.” Other lessons and suggestions are focused more on the individual choices we make to stay active and alive in a civil society, such as joining and supporting causes; reading more books and spending less time on the internet; making eye contact and small talk.

Snyder’s book was published in 2017, about a year into Donald Trump’s presidency. So much of what he describes of Trump’s language and actions worsened over the course of his term, culminating in the failed insurrection of January 6th. Lesson #6 — “Be wary of paramilitaries” — discusses actions in the 20th century run-up to World War II that were repeated following Trump’s lies about a stolen election. Lesson #10 — “Believe in truth” — ends with the chilling reminder that “post-truth is pre-fascism.”

Synder is especially aware of the misuse of language, and he has no problem in showing how Trump’s language is very much like Hitler’s in that it only serves the leader.

“Hitler’s language rejected legitimate opposition: The people always meant some people and not others (the president uses the word in this way), encounters were always struggles (the president says winning) and any attempt by free people to understand the world in a different way was defamation of the leader (or, as the president puts it, libel).”

Lesson #19 — “Be a patriot” — begins with two pages of things that a patriot is not, each taken from Donald Trump’s life, campaign, and first year of his presidency. Patriotism, he notes at the end of this long list, “involves serving your own country.” Donald Trump is a nationalist, not a patriot. A nationalist “encourages us to be our worst, and then tells us we are the best.”

“A patriot, by contrast, wants the nation to live up to its ideals, which meanas asking us to be our best selves.”

What makes Snyder’s work so important is that he shows a way forward. Each lesson is built on actionable steps we can take. And he returns to the critical need to study history in the epilogue “History and Liberty.” He notes that “the habit of dwelling on victimhood,” the province of the nationalist, “dulls the impulse of self-correction.” History, on the other hand, “gives us the company of those who have done and suffered more than we have.”

This is a work that can be read in a very short sitting. But if you are like me, many of the pages will be underlined and filled with margin notes, and its lessons will stay, hopefully, for a lifetime. For as Snyder notes at the end, “to make history, young Americans will have to know some. This is not the end, but a beginning.”

Writing the preamble for the fall 2020 issue of Lapham’s Quarterly two weeks before the election, Lewis Lapham speaks in Uncivil Liberty of how the labor of democracy never ends. Lapham is a writer of great eloquence and “lethal wit”, both of which come through in this important essay that pairs nicely with Snyder’s book. One of the opening quotes to the preamble is the famous scene from the 1976 film Network featuring the outraged news anchor, Howard Beale.

“I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it and stick your head out and yell, ‘I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!‘

While the county has been slow in getting to its feet, Lapham asserts that

“two weeks before the 2020 presidential election, they’re up from their chairs and out in the streets, mad as hell, insisting that their lives — black, white, and brown; young, old, and yet to be born; male, female, transgender, or none of the above — matter. The long-delayed uprising was provoked by the Memorial Day death of George Floyd, unarmed black man, age forty-six, arrested on suspicion of passing a counterfeit twenty-dollar bill in a Minneapolis convenience store. A passerby took note of the incident with a cell-phone camera that sees Floyd in handcuffs lying facedown on the pavement. A police officer pressing his knee into Floyd’s neck holds the position for eight minutes and forty-six seconds; Floyd struggles to breathe until he loses all trace of a pulse.“

As many have written, the officer’s face lacks all trace of human feeling or expression, Survivors of the Holocaust, writes Lapham, “mention similarly empty faces of the Sonderkommando loading Jews into an oven.”

One of Lapham’s great strengths is his call on history to help us understand those lessons we need to apply to today’s events. And he understands and does not underestimate the authoritarianism of Donald Trump and today’s Republican Party.

“On the day that George Floyd died, the American people had been locked down for three months, sheltering in place from the storm of the coronavirus spreading into all fifty states. The death toll was moving steadily up (100,000 on June 1; 200,000 as of October 1); the economy slowing to almost full stop; 22 million people summarily unemployed; the nation’s churches and schools shut down; sports events, funerals, and weddings canceled; bars, restaurants, public parks, and movie theaters closed.

Liberty, equality, and fraternity being suspended until further notice, citizens of all ages and colors were given the opportunity to feel the loss of their freedoms of movement and thought, the chance to realize that black persons live every day of their lives fearful of venturing into an environment known to be armed and dangerous. Given time for further reflection, the home viewers awakened to the fact of their having been locked down not just for three months but for fifty years — not only under heavy government and Silicon Valley surveillance but also by the colossal capitalist cash machine under the knee of which freedom is a privilege fully available only to those who can pay the going price.…

The capitalist subjugation of democracy makes money the measure of all things, sets the exchange rate for our value as human beings. The terms and conditions of the two witness-protection programs build up in the citizenry a stockpile of fear and resentment akin to the dead trees in a mismanaged California forest. The sight of George Floyd dying in Minneapolis touched off the wildfire of nationwide protest on May 25, 2020. Donald Trump’s tossing a rhetorical match into the same compost heap of fear and resentment elected him president of the United States on November 8, 2016.”

As he often does, Lapham turns to Thomas Paine as the voice of democracy that we need to recover. Even the Founding Fathers found Paine’s rhetoric both too simple and too radical for their purposes once he helped inflame the revolution with his Common Sense. But Paine’s vision of

“America’s democracy is geared to the hope of the future….We protect the other person’s liberty in the interest of protecting our own, and our virtues accord with the terms and conditions of an arduous and speculative journey. It isn’t easy to be an American, and if we look into the mirrors held up by our prime-time situation comedies and our best-seller lists (invariably topped by memoirs and travelers’ tales), we see that we value the companionable virtues — helpfulness, forgiveness, kindliness, above all tolerance.

If democracy means anything at all, it is the holding of one’s fellow citizens in thoughtful regard not because they are beautiful or rich or famous but because they are one’s fellow citizens, and to know what they say and do is taking part in the shared work of the imagination among a multitude of voices, talents, quirks, colors, interests, and generations. The labor never ends, entails the ceaseless making and remaking of customs and laws, of matinee idols, equations, and songs.“

Democracy, in both Snyder and Lapham’s view, allies itself with change. The labor never ends. Nothing is final.

“Freedom of thought brings to society the unwelcome news that it is in trouble, but because all societies, like all human beings, are always in some sort of trouble, the news doesn’t cause them to perish. They die instead from the fear of thought and the paralysis that accompanies the wish to make time stand still.“

Snyder and Lapham, important voices for our time, would have us read, and them make, some history.

More to come…

DJB

As always, this Weekly Reader features links to recent articles (or in this case, a short book) that grabbed my interest or tickled my fancy. This week, my fervent hope is that you find something that makes you think and act.

Graves of those who fell at Normandy fighting fascism in World War II by DJB