The Golden Rule

When I heard about the shootings in Atlanta on Tuesday, I soon began playing in my head a song from childhood.  It became an earworm, which I still can't get out of my mind.  Called "Wun Long Pan," from The Blue Book of the John W. Schaum Piano Course series, it introduces students to sixteenth notes through the following lyrics:

"Wun Long Pan, Is famous Chinese Detective,
Wun Long Pan, He gives the crooks a chase.
Wun Long Pan, Is famous Chinese Detective,
Wun Long Pan, He always solves the case."

Here's the picture that accompanies this simple, clunky tune:

The year before I started piano lessons and learned to play "Wun Long Pan," my second-grade teacher taught us about Mao Zedong, whose name at the time was spelled in English as Mao Tse-tung.  He had most likely appeared in an issue of My Weekly Reader.  All I remember about this lesson is the way my teacher pronounced his name: Mayo Tease Tongue.

Wun Long Pan and Mayo Tease Tongue were my introductions to Chinese culture in the early 1960s.  The sad thing is I don't think much has changed since then.  Too many Americans wouldn't object to the illustration of Detective Pan, the absurdity of his name, or the disturbing syntax of the lyrics.  Moreover, newscasters and politicians continue to mispronounce Asian names, either as deliberate insults or as insensitive slights.  As one student said in response to a survey at the University of Alberta, "It is important for me to have my heritage name pronounced correctly because it makes me feel like I belong."

Exactly.  That's one of our main problems today.  Too many fellow citizens feel unwelcome and unworthy, as if they don't belong.  We can fix this, and it begins with respect: treating others as we would have them treat us.  Sound familiar? 

Dogs to the Rescue

I'm out of town, and it's been a long day . . . but still I watched Oprah's interview with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry tonight.  All three seemed honest and earnest and, in Meghan's case, sad.  Clearly she's become a target for the British tabloids and, at the same time, unsupported by the royal family.  To say that she's endured racist attacks is an understatement.

The interview wasn't totally depressing, however.  My favorite line came at the end when Oprah asked Meghan and Harry about their lives now.  Harry talked about his love for his growing family and his pride in his wife, and then he added, "The dogs are really happy."

This made me smile.  There's hope for Meghan and Harry.

So Long, Farewell, Aufwiedersehn, Goodbye!

We've almost made it.  Four awful years with President Trump whittled down to barely three remaining days.  

Here are some of the people I won't miss:

De facto advisors like the MyPillow guy and the Fox and Friends team.

Pseudo-lawyers like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell.

Nepotistic heirs, you know their names.

Deceitful press secretaries like Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Kayleigh McEnany.

Destructive cabinet secretaries like Betsy DeVos and Mike Pompeo.

Here are some of the qualities I won't miss:

A president who separated families.

A president who ignored science.

A president who lied.

A president who mocked his people.

A president who fostered white supremacy.

When Joe Biden takes the oath of office at noon on Wednesday, January 20, we get to start over.  Sort of.  We can't forget the last four years or banish these unfortunate characters and the values they espoused, but we can expect a new standard of governing.  And with it, a renewed pride in our country.

Neera Tanden Stands Out: An Enemy of the Left and the Right?

When President-elect Joe Biden announced his choice to lead the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) last Monday, many pundits claimed that Republican senators would sink Neera Tanden's confirmation.  Hers would be the sacrificial nomination that Republicans could comfortably thwart.  She's "unfit to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate," Tom Cotton of Arkansas said, because of her frequent nasty tweets about Donald Trump and his congressional allies.

Democrats attacked the hypocrisy.  Claire McCaskill, former senator from Missouri, said on MSNBC, "We've had a president who has used his Twitter account like a battering ram.  Now all of a sudden it's a disqualification for someone to serve in the cabinet that engaged in her own opinion on Twitter?"  Biden suggested the same in his Tuesday interview with Thomas Friedman, saying that such Twitter use "disqualifies almost every Republican senator and 90% of the [Trump] administration."

The controversy about Tanden, a former adviser to Hillary Clinton, grew as liberal Democrats criticized her nomination.  Supporters and staff of Senator Bernie Sanders "seethed" at the announcement; as Holly Otterbein writes in Politico, "Tanden is one of the Democratic elites who helped sink [Sanders's] 2016 campaign behind the scenes, not to mention a union-buster, a threat to Social Security, a hippie-puncher who constantly picks fights with the left, and much more."  

That Tanden apparently "punched" or "slugged" or "pushed" Sanders's 2020 campaign manager Faiz Shakir years ago has added to the dissension.  Writing in The Guardian, Arwa Mahdawi asserts that "Neera Tanden's unremorseful bullying should disqualify her from Biden's cabinet."  Mahdawi argues that the fact that women are held to higher standards of behavior than men are doesn't excuse women's behavior; rather, we should hold everyone similarly accountable.  "If you can't manage your temper," Mahdawi concludes, "you shouldn't be managing the budget."

Tanden's problems with the left don't end here.  As the Washington Post reported yesterday, Tanden's work for the last nine years heading the liberal Center for American Progress (CAP) has led to fund-raising efforts with "deep-pocketed donors who made their fortunes on Wall Street, in Silicon Valley and in other powerful sectors of corporate America."  If her nomination goes through, "Tanden [will] have a hand in policies that touch every part of the economy after years spent courting corporate and foreign donors."  Though Tanden has support from Senators Elizabeth Warren and Sherrod Brown, prominent progressives who respect her ethical standards, she still faces questions from others.

Why so much interest in Neera Tanden?  Perhaps because the controversies that surround her reflect the conflicts we face in U.S. politics today.  Women in power, especially women of color, still attract suspicion.  As the daughter of Indian immigrants, she has a name that most Americans don't recognize.  And what about Tanden's bullying?  In the wake of unprecedented presidential bullying, should we care?  When Amy Klobuchar announced her presidential candidacy in February 2019, many stories highlighted her treatment of her congressional staff.  We tend not to hear these stories about men.  There's also the role that corporate and foreign wealth play in our politics.  Progressive think tanks depend on this money as much as conservative ones, and the staffs of Republican and Democratic administrations alike cycle through high-powered jobs with inherent conflicts of interest.

Neera Tanden's nomination illuminates the messy, uncomfortable sides of politics.  But is she qualified for the job?  Undoubtedly.  After four years of incompetent and inexperienced officials directing government agencies, she's an excellent choice.  Still, the challenges of gender, race, temperament, and money persist even as Democrats take charge--challenges that won't go away easily, it's important to note.  

Those Damn Suburban Neighborhoods

Here's Donald Trump at a campaign rally earlier this month in Johnstown, Pennsylvania:

"Suburban women, will you please like me?  Please.  Please.  I saved your damn neighborhood, OK?"

I've been a suburban woman for most of my life, and I'm wondering what exactly Donald Trump has saved me from, or rather, what he's saved my DAMN neighborhood from.

The coronavirus?  No.

Climate change?  No.

Failing infrastructure?  No.

Expensive health care?  No.

Rising drug prices?  No.

Right wing terrorists?  No.

Oh, that's right.  He saved my DAMN neighborhood from all those scary people of color.  Except for the fact that my WONDERFUL neighborhood is filled with people of all races, and many of us reject Trump's racist appeals.  Apparently we're not alone.  The Guardian reports that "Biden leads by 23 points among suburban women in swing states. . . and by 19 points among suburban women overall."

Meanwhile, the campaign is sending Ivanka Trump out to convince us that her father is "the people's president."  The idea is to soften his corrosive personality and policies.  She doesn't mention, of course, the 545 migrant children whose parents are missing or the 225,000 Americans dead from COVID-19. Nothing about our 32.8 million fellow citizens who lack health insurance or that children remain the poorest age group in our country. 

No, the Trumps think we're all still watching Leave It to Beaver and Father Knows Best.  But we've grown and embraced change.  Most of us recoil at President Trump's racist insinuations; they degrade and insult our communities.

This man needs to go.  So does his family. 

Our country cannot tolerate such hate and division.

From a Knee to a Strike: NBA Players Lead a Movement

You might think that the Republican National Convention clouded the week for those of us who support Joe Biden.  But despite the showmanship, the lies, and the flouting of the law, you could find good news elsewhere if you looked for it.  The highlight for me?  

The NBA players' strike on Wednesday.

In response to the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin, the Milwaukee Bucks refused to play basketball.  They were followed in protest by the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Houston Rockets, the Los Angeles Lakers, and the Portland Trail Blazers.  Other athletes also stood up: Major League Baseball canceled games, and the WNBA and Major League Soccer suspended events.

Why does this matter?  After all, by Friday NBA players had agreed to return to the court.

Three reasons:

The players secured concessions from coaches and league officials: a plan to convert some arenas into polling sites, an agreement to run ads promoting voting rights and accessibility, and a commitment to a new social justice coalition designed to tackle issues of inequality.

The players acted together, reminding us of the power of collective protest.  With Republican legislatures having weakened unions over the last several years, athletes have become a new force.  Moreover, the ripple effect that occurred from one sport to another compounded their impact, making clearer their protest against racial injustice.

The players commanded our attention amidst other events including Hurricane Laura, the 2020 March on Washington, and the RNC convention.  They did so, I believe, because sports is arguably our biggest pastime.  Whether it's basketball or tennis or football, US athletes are national figures, more vocal than they were before.

By taking a knee four years ago, Colin Kaepernick initiated the movement we see today.

Who's It Going to Be?

It's about time for Joe Biden to tell us his VP pick, and just as I did during the presidential primary, I've vacillated in my preferences.  

I started with Stacey Abrams, a formidable and brilliant woman, and decided that her lack of experience in the federal government disqualified her.

I moved on to Val Demings, whose impassioned closing remarks at Trump's impeachment trial impressed me more than anyone else's, and then decided that her experience as a police chief made her vulnerable.  

I thought briefly about Barack Obama's friend and adviser Valerie Jarrett, but she never emerged as a strong contender.  On to Susan Rice, a smart and effective UN ambassador.  I read today, though, an article about her immense wealth and investments in troubling companies, and she's also linked, unfairly, to the Benghazi sham.

Okay.  Deep breath.  What about Karen Bass or Tammy Baldwin?

Answer:

They're all excellent candidates.  Any of the women on Joe Biden's list would distinguish herself as capable, knowledgeable, and compassionate in ways that neither Mike Pence nor Donald Trump can touch.  They're sharp women, leaders in all kinds of settings, with demonstrated values that left the White House on January 20, 2017.

I'll support whoever Joe selects.  What I won't do is this: evaluate her appearance, question her ambition, challenge her strengths, or assess her family.  It's wrong and distracting.  

We need women at the highest levels of government, and now we've got another chance.  It's not one that I intend to waste.

Hatred

The voice that left the message was course and vile. "Ain't none of your business how I'm registered . . . I'd never vote for a Democrat, they're all crooked and stupid . . . Don't ever send anything to me again."  

Really?  This in response to a friendly, straightforward Get-out-the-Vote letter that my daughter and I sent to fellow Durham Democrats in our neighborhood.

So it's okay that people make calls like this? to a neighbor no less?  Especially when you're a registered Democrat who would logically receive such a letter?  I don't know why she's chosen to register as she has, perhaps to vote more effectively in local primary elections, but she shouldn't be surprised to get mailings from the Democratic Party.  What bothered me the most, though, was the hate in her voice.  Why not a simple, polite call that asks me to remove her from my mailing list?

I was watching the funeral service for Congressman John Lewis when the call came in and fortunately didn't answer.  The anger I felt simply listening to the message was hard enough to contain.  I felt like calling her back with an equally hateful response or sending her a demeaning letter.  But I thought instead about John Lewis:  his humiliations, his arrests, and his beatings.  The hatred he endured over a lifetime of 80 years dwarfed my bad encounter with a neighbor.  Like him, I wouldn't let this experience poison me.

Still, it's hard to know what to do with hate.  Martin Luther King, Jr., would counsel love.  Others, forgiveness.  For me, it's enough to say that I might understand my neighbor if I had lived her life.  And while I won't exactly turn the other cheek, I'll refrain from meeting hate with hate.  It's the best I can do right now.

Suburbanista

Someone needs to tell Donald Trump that he's got his suburbs on backwards.  Sure, they're not one size fits all, but their style has changed.  Suburbs no longer wear uniforms; they're colorful and varied, even subversive at times.  I know, because I live in one.

Determined to eliminate a fair housing law established under Barack Obama, President Trump is warning that Joe Biden's zoning policies will "abolish our beautiful and successful suburbs."  He thinks he's scaring us by saying that crime rates will rise and property values decline.  It's all code, of course, easily deciphered, for Black and Brown people moving in.  "Suburbia will be no longer," he says.

The trouble for Trump is that suburbia isn't so White anymore.  Nor is it Republican.  In fact, Democratic households outnumber Republican ones in my north Durham neighborhood, where people of different colors, ages, and genders have lived together for years.  Many of us detest Trump's endless race baiting, and we denounce his response to protests in support of Black Lives Matter.

Interestingly enough, protesters in Portland have employed one of suburbia's trademark symbols--the leaf blower--to counter tear gas attacks from federal agents.  It's as if urban and suburban citizens have joined together to demand civil rights.  Whereas Trump wishes to pit the two against each other, we've teamed up to stand him down.

So on this Sunday in July when the body of John Lewis crosses one last time over the Edmund Pettus Bridge, soon to be renamed in his honor, let's remember what he said: "I believe in freedom of speech, but I also believe that we have an obligation to condemn speech that is racist, bigoted, anti-Semitic, or hateful."

Racist appeals to suburban voters meet the Congressman's definition and must be condemned at every opportunity.

Education 101

Saturday's editorial in The New York Times, "Reopening Schools Will Be a Huge Undertaking. It Must Be Done," elicited almost 2,000 largely oppositional comments.  In it, the editorial staff argued that public schools should open this fall with unprecedented federal funding and with imaginative use of outdoor space.  As one reader noted, the word "teachers" appeared only once, in the second-to-last paragraph.

This says it all to me and, at the same time, doesn't surprise me.  "What do our teachers think about re-opening?" seems like an obvious question.  Yet for too long our society has discounted the role and expertise of its teachers.  We don't pay them enough, we don't support them enough, and we don't consult them enough. . . but we ask them to solve society's problems that society fails to solve.

Consider for starters poverty, hunger, racial disparities, and economic inequality.  We expect our teachers to overcome these challenges and ensure that all of their students achieve at a defined level-- despite low salaries, marginal benefits, and often poor working conditions.   At a most basic level, the schools that my kids attended lacked soap in the bathroom dispensers, doors on stalls, sufficient cleaning supplies, working windows, and mold- and asbestos-free classrooms.  Even when there's no coronavirus circulating, many Durham schools are neither safe nor clean.

Just as the pandemic has exposed the failure of public health and elder care in the United States, so it exposes public education.  How did we get to the point where teachers buy their own paper?  Need subsidized housing?  Work second jobs?  Crowdfund surgeries and new equipment?  Why do we tolerate dilapidated buildings and aging school buses?  Why do we short-change our children and their teachers?

It's past time to ask these questions.  Covid-19 will eventually resolve, but the ills that plague our schools will not unless we demand something different.  As fellow citizens protest policing and racism, let's add public education to the conversation.  It's related, after all, and it serves our future and our national treasure: our children.

Random Thoughts, 4th of July Weekend

I've always wanted to see Mount Rushmore, in part because I like Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest.  But not anymore.  The land belongs to the Lakota, the sculptor was a white supremacist, and the carved faces (a quartet that's never made sense to me) insult the lives and history of native Americans.

If Donald Trump wants to call his opposition an angry mob whose behavior defines the word "totalitarianism," then he can very well learn how to pronounce it.

The Washington Redskins should have changed their name decades ago.  Given the recent outcry of protest across the country, FedEx and Nike have pulled their support, and it looks like the name will finally change.  Two of the team's main corporate sponsors, their money made the difference.  I guess we should celebrate this?

Mandy Cohen, North Carolina's Secretary of Health and Human Services, lamented our state's lack of chemical reagents to run more coronavirus tests, but we need help from the federal government to do so.  "We can't solve that problem from the state level," she said.  In the midst of this pandemic, do Trump's idolatrous crowds in Tulsa and the Black Hills have any idea how morally and criminally negligent his administration has been?

My mother and I watched two episodes of The Dick Van Dyke Show on Friday night in memory of Carl Reiner, who produced the show and occasionally appeared in it.  Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore are two of my favorite comedians, and we laughed and laughed.  It felt good.

Rebuilding

When I restarted this blog four months ago, I was excited to think that I'd be writing about the coming presidential election, starting with the Democratic primaries and moving into the general election.  I love national politics; I'm fascinated by the two parties, the candidates who emerge, the winnowing that takes place, the roll of pollsters and pundits, and the final call on a Tuesday night in November.

But this time it's different.  The Democratic primary yielded no single candidate who ever captured my whole-hearted enthusiasm, and the Republican party has tied itself to a president whose values upend the country I love.  Donald Trump's rally last night in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was so offensive and destructive that it's hard to see how we'll recover.

Still, Donald Trump didn't come out of nowhere.  He tapped into a hatred that has long haunted us, one that surrounds us every day but one that we choose not to see.  George Floyd's murder made it impossible for us to look away, finally, but the hard work ahead feels equally impossible.  I don't know where to begin.  I feel weary, not up to the challenge.

I know that it's time for younger voices, for younger leadership.  Kids and young adults are wiser than the rest of us, certainly when it comes to sensitivity surrounding race, gender, and culture.  Many in my generation grew up with Dick and Jane readers and Father Knows Best television shows.  Our worlds were white through and through and often still are.  How do we change?

All kinds of ways. . . books we must read, voices we must hear, organizations we must support, ideas we must consider. . . and votes we must take.  Here's what must happen as elections move forward:

Joe Biden hires and hears consultants much younger than he.

Donald Trump's supporters face their hatred; if and when they don't, the rest of us call them out.

Elections officials do everything they can to ensure a fair vote.

Candidates at every level make clear where they stand on institutional redesign--from police departments to prisons to public schools to health care to immigration to climate change to banking--and we elect those who will follow through.

We, the people, start to rebuild our country.

Overwhelmed

It was enough to deal with Donald Trump.  Day after day, since his inauguration in 2017, many of us have feared what he'd do next--who he would insult, what dangerous position he'd take, what ignorance he'd reveal.  The lies, the nastiness, and the stupidity all at our expense.  We wondered what catastrophe would develop under his watch.

We found out.

First, the coronavirus--scary and unknown--still out of control in much of the country.  Alarming in itself, the disease also strained our economy and put millions out of work.  We're still reeling and have no idea what lies ahead.

Next came George Floyd, murdered by Minneapolis police on May 25. The same story of white police officers killing black people, the blight that rots America every day.  When will it end, we ask, only to learn of the death of Rayshard Brooks on Friday night in Atlanta.

Finally, the protests.  All across the country, understandably angry protesters have generated a movement and a voice for change.  Rioting and violence, yes, but mostly huge, peaceful crowds weekend after weekend, all in the midst of a pernicious pandemic that feeds on people massed together.

All of this, and no leadership in Washington.  No wonder we're on edge.

But now is not the time to retreat from the tension.  We can't afford to slide into complacency.  We're called upon, each of us, to take our part in creating a more just and fair America.  Whether it's through our vote, our advocacy, our faith, or all of these combined, we need to act.

The fate of America rests with all of us.

Another Wish List

Last week I posted a list of my personal wishes during this time of coronavirus.  In light of the murder of George Floyd last Monday, I post a new list.  Here's what I wish for America:

1. A dinner table where everyone is fed.

2. A neighborhood where everyone can jog.

3. A school where everyone is educated.

4. A hospital where everyone has the same chance.

5. A police department where everyone is safe.

6.  A government that works for everyone.

7.  A people that confronts its racist past.

8. A nation that's willing to force change.

9. A United States that gets it: "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

10. An America that redefines "We, the People," to include everyone.

I wish I was in the land of cotton. . .

. . . oh that's right, I already am.

And so are a lot of other people who, I think, are still working through the final vestiges of the Civil War.

Let me explain.

Following the president's State of the Union speech last month, a New York Times commentator said that the country's political climate has not been so polarized since the Civil War.  And in the month since that speech, the climate has grown even worse as the Republican party holds the rest of us hostage to its narrow, privileged platform--determined to defeat President Obama regardless of the cost.

Enter "Dixie": the 2012 electoral map that shows all of the old Confederacy, except for Virginia, as solidly red.  Call me whatever you want for raising the issue of race, but I think the election--and then, to top it off, the reelection--of a black man reignited the smoldering ashes of Atlanta, Richmond, and Gettysburg.  One hundred fifty years is not that long for a nation to recover from such a traumatic war--a war that was fought largely over the place of the black man and the states' rights to determine that place.

That a black man now sits at the top (with his black family living in that whitest of white houses) has taxed some people so much that they can only lash out--which is exactly what's happening.  And isn't the word "sequester" an interesting one as the focus of all the rage?  It sounds ominously like "secession" and means essentially the same thing as "segregation."

The writer of "Dixie" had it right: "Old times there are not forgotten."  Someday they will be, I feel certain.  But in the meantime, those who wish to remember are choosing to destroy whatever they can on their way down.

Pining for the Past

Though I often find columnist David Brooks' cultural observations compelling, I rarely agree with his political arguments. Imagine my surprise, then, to read in this week's column, "I sometimes wonder if the Republican Party has become the receding roar of white America as it pines for a way of life that will never return."

He couldn't be more right in my view, though I sympathize sometimes with those howling Republicans--particularly when I compare the homogeneous, white classrooms of my childhood with the racially and economically diverse classrooms of my children. There's no doubt which of these settings is more challenging.

Yet on the same day that I read David Brooks, I skimmed through pages of John Hope Franklin's autobiography Mirror to America, and learned that while I was a child in one of those classrooms in the early 1960s, he--with his Harvard Ph.D. and professorship at Brooklyn College--was being denied bank loans in New York solely because of his race.

The America of the past may call to us, appealing to our wish for what's comfortable. But what's comfortable isn't necessarily better. Nor is it realistic or just.

Let the Republican Party roar and pine all it wants, applauding Newt and his racially charged innuendos. Theirs is a bitter and stingy America, one rooted in mist and mythology. The America of the present--and that of the future--demands more from us, and we must meet the challenge.

Oddities

We live in strange times. Often I read the news and wonder how we got where we are--sometimes we seem far off track, and other times we seem surprisingly progressive. Here's what jarred me this week:

That a billionaire who owns the New Jersey Nets will run against Vladimir Putin for president of Russia.

That the Durham Public Schools website posted crucial parent information initially only in Spanish.

That somehow it's OK that the secretary of health and human services, Kathleen Sibelius (acting on behalf of Barack Obama), can overrule F.D.A. scientists and researchers.

That American military base schools are not subject to "No Child Left Behind" (George Bush) or "Race to the Top" (Barack Obama)--and that their students perform better than peers at regular public schools.

That it's still not OK to eat raw chocolate chip cookie dough, even when you make it yourself.

That our love for dangerous and violent sports--especially football and ice hockey--isn't all that different from that which drove Roman Colosseum fans centuries ago.

That advocates for the Keystone XL oil pipeline include TransCanada employees Paul Elliott and Gordon Griffin, both friends of Hillary Clinton--who, in her role as secretary of state evaluates the proposal and recommends for or against it.

That Michele Bachmann's husband Marcus has a Ph.D.

That nasty Newt Gingrich has a shot at Iowa.

That we're still dealing with voter suppression efforts after all these years, and that--fortunately--Attorney General Holder understands the danger.

The Color of Evil

When I first heard that a government building had been bombed in Oklahoma City in 1995, I said to my family--"Those people are crazy over there"--meaning that a terrorist group from the Middle East must have committed the crime. A similar initial thought crossed my mind when I learned of the attacks in Norway: Middle East extremists must have chosen an unlikely target for shock value.

We all know the endings of these two stories.

As if reading my mind on Friday--and perhaps the minds of many others--news commentators kept telling us that the gunman, once he was identified, was "blond-haired and blue-eyed." In others words, he wasn't what you think: dark-skinned, dark eyes, dark hair.

Perhaps we are wired in some fundamental way to blame "the other" when it comes to the unthinkable. More often than not, though, "the other" is in our own backyard.

The color of evil knows no color wheel. That we need constant reminder of this shows the depth of both our ignorance and our fear.

The Birth Certificate

What's striking about Barack Obama's birth certificate is that we actually have a President of the United States

* with the name Barack Hussein Obama II

* with an address at 6085 Kalaniansole Highway, Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii

* with an African father from Kenya, East Africa

* and with a Caucasian mother from Wichita, Kansas.

The ongoing flap over this birth certificate is the direct result of the information above. Many Americans have never gotten over the fact that a majority of us elected a black man as President of the United States. To them, funny-sounding words like Kalaniansole and Oahu aren't really American words; Kenya is simply not a part of the civilized world; and an 18-year-old white woman from Kansas had no business having a child with an African man--let alone a child who would one day become President of the United States.

Mr. Obama is generous to call this monstrous distraction "silliness." In fact, it's bigotry through and through.

Reality Checks

Just days before the assassination attempt in Tucson, my friend Dee and I were talking about how impossible it is in America to speak honestly about the problems we face.

We all know, for example, that children who arrive at school ill-fed and unprepared are unlikely to succeed; yet to say so is racist. We see our dismal rankings in international health statistics and know that we don't have the best health care in the world; yet to say so is treasonous. We know that pouring billions of dollars into Afghanistan won't repair our crumbling bridges, roads, and airports; yet to say so is unpatriotic.

It didn't seem like anyone was speaking honestly about anything--until Saturday afternoon when Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik let us have it. Outraged by the killings in his home community, he said that "the anger, the hatred, [and] the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous." He cited "the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government" and lamented that "this has not become the nice United States that most of us grew up in."

Finally. Someone not afraid to speak the truth.

We need more people like Sheriff Dupnik--willing to name the ways our society has veered off-track and lost sight of the common values of decency, respect, and fairness. If a sheriff in Tucson, Arizona, can name so clearly an insidious undercurrent in modern America, then other elected officials can do the same.

We should expect no less from those who call themselves leaders.