Morning Fog

Flagging Veterans Day Observances

Today is Veterans Day in the U.S. I'm a veteran, and I put my U.S. flag out this morning, as I do for other key national holidays, e.g. Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Flag Day of course, and others. Election Day too, although I confess I forgot to put it out this time.

That's a habit my Dad probably taught me. He was an army lifer, but even after he retired, he observed this simple gesture of patriotism and national unity for years. More important, so did most of the neighbors in the university town where he retired, even though none of them were veterans, so it wasn't just a military thing.

I've noticed lately though, that few observe this tradition. I suppose in the aftermath of "my" war (Vietnam), when public respect for our military services seemed to hit a new low, people began to be a little ashamed to fly the flag, or just felt that it was a corny remnant of a more innocent decade. Could it have a revival now?

It's not clear. Nowadays, if we see a house with a flag, we assume a Republican lives there. And when we see a whole wall of ginormous flags (as at Trump rallies), or people riding around flying huge flags from their pickup trucks, we all feel sure these are Republican events. Conversely, when the left rallies politically, we are more likely to see black U.S. flags, or upside-down ones.

We have allowed the political right to take over our national emblem, and I think as a nation we should resist that. So Morning Fog says, if you own a flag, get out there and hang it on these national days. If you don't have one, go buy one today and fly it next time. And if you're a political candidate or the organizer of a demonstration, make sure the number of real red-white-and-blue flags at least exceeds the number of those other ones. Corny, maybe, but it can help us all remember our shared interests and culture.

Footnote: The Tin Lizard seems to have a Veterans Day post, too. Check it out.

 

Trump Truth - What Time Is It?

Even a broken clock, they say, is correct twice a day.  

But how about a clock that is broken in a different way?  Let's say its hands run erratically forward, backward, or even suddenly change direction 180 degrees?  How often would such a clock be correct?  No one can predict.  This is more complex, like the problem of an infinite number of monkeys tapping away at an infinite number of keyboards -- how frequently would they create a line, or even a whole play, of Shakespeare?

Still, we can admit the possibility that such a clock would sometimes be right, and perhaps even more often than the standard clock.  That brings me to Donald Trump.

Trump spouts a lot of nonsense, and he stirs the political pot with plenty of good old-fashioned lies, often more blatant ones than a "typical" politician deploys.  Yet every now and then he is right.  A few recent examples:

• Jeb Bush's contention that his brother George "kept America safe" from terrorism is indefensible poppycock.  Bush and his administration were asleep at the switch, hardly taking the terrorist threat seriously before 9/11/2001.  It can be argued that his policies and actions might even have had some small role in precipitating the attack.  Bush recovered nicely with an impressive retaliation, but that's a different matter.  (Jeb's insistence on this point cannot have won him any fans.)
• Yes, the Pope was out of line to stand on the other side of our border and register his views on a hot political issue in the U.S.  It seems he realized that belatedly.  
• Apple should indeed cooperate with the Feds in unlocking the secrets of the Bakersfield terrorists' iphones.  Apple's attitude has been pompous posturing.  Since when have we relied on corporations - the ones who shamelessly buy and sell our personal data, prod inordinately into our lives every day - to preserve our rights and freedoms? 
• On taxes, Trump admits he pays as little as he legally can, but also in on record stating that he sees many people who make immense amounts of money but pay virtually no taxes, and "it's unfair."  

This sort of thing is at the heart of Trump's populist appeal.  He speaks seemingly off the cuff, but has a very sure sense of hitting somebody's hot button with every sound bite.  Those snippets that don't resonate with voter A or voter B will be ignored; he needs only to give them one or two that are meaningful to them. 

Oh, and speaking of truths, Cruz has one:  Trump isn't really a Republican.  He's all over the map.  

 

 

 

Good News

Sometimes I think Morning Fog is too focused on being critical, on pointing out what's wrong rather than what's right.

Could that be the reason I haven't written a lot lately?  Is it possible that the world suddenly changed, becoming in a trice the "best of all possible worlds" in which Voltaire's Candide professed to believe?   Well, no, I rather doubt that.  A brief look at the day's news from Syria (refugees, mayhem, the senseless destruction of world-heritage art) or the mass killing du jour, should put that notion rapidly to rest.

Nevertheless, there have been a couple of recent blips on the world screen that offer a hurrah moment.  Let me focus on those today: 

I. 

First, I applaud President Obama's executive order re-naming our nation's highest peak -- no longer Mt. McKinley, it will revert now to its local name, Denali.  This seems (to me) the right way to go. 

It's nice to hark back to a name that can be identified as native-American, but the broader point is to prefer names that reflect local and/or historic usage, rather than some politician who will be totally forgotten in a couple of decades.  

McKinley was no great shakes as a President; his main claim to fame appears to have been to get shot, which served to place his name not just on the recently de-commissioned Mt. Denali, but a school in nearly every town in the country.  Let's continue the trend and return to "Idlewild" for that airport in New York, and move on to "Mt. Whitney," preferably and more interestingly known as Tumanguya.

II.

More recently, a young man named Dylan Marks was shark-fishing from his kayak along the Pacific Coast when he snagged a hammerhead and ended up with a serious bite wound on his foot.  The "regular" Morning Fog might question the wisdom of shark fishing from a fragile craft like a kayak (however, this seems to be a bit of a fad at the moment), or of dangling his foot over the side while doing so (but hey, dude, that's probably a typical California posture - the Laid-Back Loll?).

But today's posimistic Morning Fog applauds Mr. Marks for his attitude after the event:  He resisted the bait dangled by his TV-journalist interviewer, who tried to get him to say he had been attacked.  No, he insisted, he respects the sharks; this particular one most likely bit his (Marks's) foot out of confusion and fear; it was not an attack.  Furthermore, Marks claims he will give up shark fishing.   A cool and sensible response.  Let's have more of those!

 

A Woman For U.S. Currency

The U.S. Treasury is looking at putting a woman on U.S. currency within the next few years.  That's a fine idea, though there appear to be a few bumps along the way.

A minor one, in my view, is whether she ought to be on the $10, or the $20.  Initially I didn't think it made much difference, but blogger Alexandra Petri helped sway me to the view that if someone must go, it should be Jackson, not Hamilton.  Hamilton's contributions to the building of our nation are more far-reaching and admirable than Jackson's.  I would add one that Petri missed, too:  Hamilton was no slouch on progressive civil rights thinking.

So on this narrow issue, I vote for replacing Jackson if possible, though I suspect the decision will be made on more practical terms, i.e., the twenty has just been updated; the ten is due for remodeling.  We can always dump Jackson later, maybe even Grant and Franklin too, as inevitable and probably irresistible cries arise to represent African-Americans, Latinos, LGBTs, and others on our legal tender. 

The harder question is:  Which woman?  That's going to require a lot of thought.  Coincidentally, Ms. Petri's blog post also helps illustrate the difficulty of making the selection, because to argue the merits of Hamilton and all his contributions to the nation, is, like it or not, also to raise the question of what woman measures up.  The "people's choices" so far identified don't bowl me over in terms of their impact.  I began thinking about others, but had no luck thinking of someone who approached the broad-reaching, fundamental, and lasting impact that Washington, Lincoln, and maybe Hamilton have had.

Might that be because women were unenfranchised in the early days of the Republic?  Obviously, yes.  It just makes the choice more difficult.  I don't have the answer, but I don't envy those who will have to make the decision.  Because, while I am sure we'll come up with a viable choice, I'm sure that choice, be it Tubman, Roosevelt, Anthony, Parks, or another, will evoke objections from the fans of the others.  Let us just hope that politicians can stay out of it, or at least avoid injecting partisan factors. 

One marginal thought:  In this discussion I have heard the view that women must be on the currency so that girls and young women will be led to realize they, too are "worthy," or can reach the pinnacles of success, etc.  To be blulnt: That's nonsense, or I hope it is.  In the 21st century, any young, or even old, woman who needs that sort of visual reinforcement to help her recognize her potential probably is not the sort who has much potential.  She'll need more imagination and gumption than that.  But even if I'm wrong about the power of example, I believe inspiration is more likely to come from depictions in television, film, and popular culture, than from the faces on the currency we never look at.

 

The I's of March - Israel and Iran

Plenty has been written about Benjamin Netanyahu's address to a joint session of the U.S. Congress yesterday, but on the serious side, I like David Ignatius's analysis - in brief it is simply that the Israeli PM raises some serious points that can lead to a better agreement with Iran, if one is to be had. 

Personally, I believe it's a fool's errand, in the long run, to think we can prevent other nations from "getting the bomb," but if they're going to get it, we should be on cordial diplomatic terms with them if possible -- and that's the crux of what Obama is doing.

Beyond the finer points of negotiating with Iran, however, there's quite a mixed brew of "angles." Some are noted below, with my take.  

• Does Netanyahu go by "Bibi" because he fears being referred to as "that nothin' yahoo"* instead?   (I suspect so.  But he may deserve the second appellation because of his unyielding hard line on such issues as settlements.)
                                     *(Note this is "yahoo" in the Swiftian sense, long "a".)
• Is his willingness, in a fit of pique, to make this end-run to supporters in Congress an insult to President Obama?  (Yes, but both of them will get over it.)
• Isn't the PM being rather high-handed in assuming he, or we, can dictate to Iran?  (Of course.  U.S. diplomacy - especially when influenced by Congressional interest in an issue -- does this all the time, usually with negative consequences.) 
• Is it true that Bibi's main motive is to help himself win the upcoming election in Israel?  (I don't doubt that a bit; for any politician, winning an election is far more important than foreign policy realities.)

Well, none of those is really too serious, but here's one that is:   This whole episode clearly demonstrates a fundamental issue with our Israel policy, namely, that we can't step back and consider our policy toward the near Middle-East region because everything tends to be skewed to an "Israel first" approach.  That flaw is like a turd in a punchbowl -- it attracts all the attention, and it isn't very healthful.  It would be preferable if our Israelocentric citizens and their supporters in Congress could identify more readily with the broader U.S. interest. 

History Lashes Back

Events in Israel/Gaza, Ukraine, and on the U.S.-Mexican border have captured our attention in recent months.  Although they are unfolding in different parts of the globe,  they have certain features in common.  

First, of course, each vies to be singled out as the best example of man's inhumanity to man.  Irredentist Russian nationalists in Ukraine have resorted (first) to an uprising against their government with Russian support and (second) to warfare against unarmed passenger aircraft.  (Here, we might excuse the latter as just a tragic accident, had they confessed the deed and cooperated with international investigation. They have not.)  Meanwhile, parents of children in Central America have made a lamentable decision to abandon and endanger their children by sending them north.  A cadre of Muslim zealots began, and continues, a war that will kill lots of the very people they claim to be fighting for. 

All these fomenters of trouble share both a sense of desperation, and a cynicism about using other people's lives to advance their own purposes.

It can also be argued that each of these crises arises from various past attempts to "correct" history.  The state of Israel was created and imposed by WWII Allies with total disregard for the reality on the ground at the time, a reality that had itself been created by the Ottoman Empire.   The American southwest was effectively stolen from Mexico (which in turn had stolen it from the native American inhabitants).  The exactly boundaries of "Ukraine' as a national construct have never been clear, but Russia under Stalin defined them as a ploy to gain additional votes in the UN, including areas of very mixed ethnicity; and subsequently in the Soviet period, Russia encouraged the settlement of ethnic Russians in Ukrainian areas.  

Land grabs and the migration of peoples are a part of the tapestry of history.  Sometimes they form a new reality that lasts for centuries; sometimes they are less permanent.  But History doesn't like to be "corrected." Those who attempt it can find themselves in difficulty.   

     

There Oughta Be A Law -- Sometimes [2]

It's the in thing, legalizing marijuana.  The District of Columbia is considering a proposal to do it.  I think it's generally a bad idea, but on the analogy of alcohol, it's easy to see why many local jurisdictions are being tempted to do so.  I'm sure trying to enforce a total ban on the weed is one big time-consuming headache for police forces and for our justice system; in theory decriminalization frees them to fry bigger fish.  In fact it's a tacit recognition that a ban is practically unenforceable, whereas legalizing sale can bring in cold hard cash from taxes. 

So, I understand when they say that part of the proposal is that possession of relatively small amounts of the substance would be legal. 

But how about another part, the one that would allow people to grow the plants in their own premises?  (But "only three plants," no more.)  More legislative dumbness, it seems.  For how could that limit possibly be enforced?  I suppose that on the "throw-the-book" theory (see "There Oughta Be A Law Sometimes - Part I") it could add a few days to a penalty for anyone whose house was being raided for other infractions.

If the sale of marijuana is legal based on an analogy with alcohol, though, doesn't it make sense for it also to be regulated and taxed in the same way alcohol is?   Do we have laws anywhere (I'd be interested to know) permitting people to distill their own liquor as long as they only make a gallon? 

I'd think governments would want to restrict marijuana to sale, not cultivation.  Once you tell somebody they can grow the stuff, there's really no limit and no hope of enforcement.  And strapped local governments will just be losing money.

Is There A Lesson In Iraq?

If you read the news from Iraq over the past week, you might wonder, "What went wrong?" and/or, "What next?"  After all the effort that the U.S. put into fighting and nation-building there, the progress Al-qaeda has recently made military is very disappointing. 

Events are still unfolding and we can't forersee the outcome, but it's tempting to conclude, as some have, that our efforts were in vain (so it's Bush's fault for having gone in there on a false pretext in the first place), or that our withdrawal was too hasty (so it's Obama's fault, for having been to much in a rush to get out).   I tend toward the latter view.  Why?  Obama's exit was at least based on a true premise (or two):  That the U.S. public was getting really tired of war, and that it was costing us a fortune.  Bush's initial sally, however, was based on a will-o-the-wisp that had never existed.

But on a deeper level, probably, it doesn't really matter.  Our history over at least the past six decades, beginning perhaps with Korea, has been a constant see-saw of war, usually with one President starting one (they do that) and another making haste for the exit (they do that, too).  Each party has played each role over time.  

David Ignatius's most recent column seeks to explain what's occurring in Iraq by looking at what occurred in the region, which is probably far more realistic.  He analyzes steps Iran has taken to make it happen, and if fault is to to be assigned, he blames missteps by the Maliki administration.

Now we're getting somewhere!  It's all very nice for U.S. politicians to talk of spreading democracy, but when we try, we seem to ignore some very learnable lessons. 

First, that the "democratizee" must meet certain conditions - at least a bit of a democratic tradition, strong institutions, a sense of national cohesiveness that is stronger than the centripetal forces of tribalism and sectarianism -- for otherwise it is almost certainly doomed to be very messy, if not a total failure.   

Second, that if it is to be undertaken, the "democratizer" will have to reckon with a lengthy, slow-acting process with many setbacks along the road -- the kind of thing for which we have, unfortunately for the dreams of Presidents and Senates, shown very little talent. 

Third, that events and players exogenous to us are also an important factor that we can't control.  Yes, Iran has, according to Ignatius, played a clever hand behind the scenes, and it's not surprising that they attempted to do so. 

Very similar lessons can be learned by reviewing what's happened with the Arab sping, especially in Egypt; or what's going on in Syria just now.   So it's not just Iraq, though our experience in that country does, or should, cause us more anguish than others as we consider the cost of it to us and probably to the people of Iraq.   

 

Earth To USG - Get Real About Snowden

I'm sure I've pointed out before how amusing the Saturday newspaper can be, in which are published the gripes and outrages (and only very rarely, the kudos) of "average readers."  This past weekend was no different:

• a career diplomat lamented that the Post, in criticizing the number of politically appointed ambassadors, had nevertheless written at length about those appointees, while not even mentioning the names of the career folks;
• somebody was offended at breakfast by a humor piece in which the writer had described how his dog tends to vomit (the content was obvious from the title);
• a woman complained that the paper had covered a burger-eating contest even though "there is an obesity epidemic;"
• another writer took the editors to task for publishing a story about two teenagers being shot, and a few pages later, a photo of two actors in a TV show, one pointing a handgun at the other;
• yet another reader took offense at the use of the term "pimped-out" to describe a cocktail, alleging the term glorifies sexual violence.

Every Saturday they continue.  The Post publishes a few representative (?) letters; I'm sure there are thousands more that go unpublished.  I'm afraid a lot of these comments just show the advanced average age of people who still read the "print" newspaper.  Be that as it may:  The common thread seems to be the expression of a wish that the world were a different or nicer place, and that since it isn't, the job of the media is to pretend that it is, sheltering us from unpleasant news, or at least prettying it up (dare I say,  "pimping it out"?).

Maybe the U.S. government should write in next Saturday.  Something along the lines of "we were disgusted [note: "disgusted" is a common word in these letters] that the Post reported Snowden as a sympathetic character, or a crusading whistleblower, when he's so obviously a traitor through and through."  Not so different, because here again, the writer (Uncle Sam) would be arguing that its fantasy world is the real world, and don't dash my illusions, please. 

The government should save its breath, because it's only normal that the media become more absorbed by the counterstory than the party line.  Snowden is what he is, but what, exactly, is that?  Stay tuned for the exciting sequel tomorrow, right here on Morning Fog.

Penny-Pinching

President Obama on Google yesterday, speaking on the question of doing away with pennies:

“We remember our piggy banks and counting up all our pennies, and then taking them in and getting a dollar bill or a couple of dollars,” he said. “One of the things you see chronically in government is it’s very hard to get rid of things that don’t work so you can then invest on the things that do. The penny ends up being sort of a metaphor for the larger problems that we’ve got."

People have been pointing out for years that it costs the U.S. government more to mint a penny than the penny itself is worth.  Would anyone miss the penny, really?  It's been a decade at least since many merchants started keeping a penny tray beside their cash registers, where people could either leave their unwanted coppery coins, or pick up one.   Personally, I used to save them for parking meters but in my area parking meters no longer accept them (even a nickel will get you only two minutes).  And it's worth noting that Canada recently gave up their penny. 

IF anybody decided we really needed pennies, we could think about making them more cheaply (plastic? recyclable potato starch?); or we could just redefine our coinage, defining a penny as worth one-twentieth of a dollar rather than one one-hundredth, and so on up the line, so the quarter could transmogrify into the much-needed dollar coin that wouldn't burst through your pocket.  But really, no one is going to be able to build a serious case that we really need pennies.  All coins may be endangered, sooner than we think -- cash transactions are becoming as scarce as hen's teeth, with people are using their credit cards for even the tiniest purchases these days. 

I like Obama's thought of the penny as a metaphor for other problems we face.  There is no logical reason to persist in producing metal pennies that cost more than they're worth.  Yet the opposition to dropping the penny is entirely built on deep-rooted emotion and nostalgia, which makes this simple coinage issue more difficult to resolve than seemingly more controversial matters like drones or guns.  

(Incidentally, will the NRA, in its "response" today to the State of the Union message, propose that every citizen has a right to a drone?)