A Nation of Immigrants

We lived in the Washington, D.C. area in 1976 when our United States of America celebrated the Bicentennial of our founding. If I remember correctly one of the main themes of that celebration was that we were, and still are, and always will be, "A Nation of Immigrants." Except for the native peoples whose lands are within our borders, every single one of our families is originally from someplace else.

Few of our ancestors came from someplace else's upper and privileged classes. Most of the original immigrants who came here were poor, oppressed, and often without any other hope in this world. Some of them even came here out of fear for their very lives.They were refugees, seeking asylum.

I trace my family lineage back to Norway, Germany/Switzerland, and Bohemia. I doubt that the original Myers immigrants faced much resistance based on their country of origin in the 1750's. I don't know much about my Grandmother Myers' families' experiences, but Nordic types probably assimilated relatively easily. My mother's Czech ancestors came here just around the turn of the 20th century, and I understand that "eastern" (more properly "central") Europeans did face discrimination initially, although their skin color probably saved them from the worst of it. Race, whatever it is or isn't, matters.

It is easy for me to forget that my forebears came from someplace else because I've always been here, as were my parents. It is easy to forget to be grateful not only for the courage of those who first came, but also for the nation that gave them a chance, though sometimes begrudgingly.

Many Americans are here because their ancestors were brought here against their will, often as slaves. That African Americans are also here today is testimony to the very different level of courage required of their forbears. That they are Americans with us is testimony to the nation that still has not completely given them a chance, and to the magnanimity of their spirits.

The clear intention of the Trump administration is to encourage us all to forget...to forget our past, and to forget to be grateful. It is doing everything that crosses into its bone-headed little brains to say to the world, "We don't respect you and we don't want you. Go away and go home."

Is this the kind of America Americans want? Is this really what everyone who voted for Donald Trump was hoping he would do, and is it the way they hoped he would do it? The heavy-handedness and clumsiness of his immigration order is evidence that the White House is not up to the job it has been given to do. Even some Republicans and conservatives are saying that now.

And is it the kind of American the world wants, and needs, and looks to? I'd like to hear from the people from other lands who happen upon this blog. How do we look to you now?

We are "A Nation of Immigrants." Even President Donald Trump cannot change that fact.

In case you are wondering...

...I watched the inauguration ceremony of Donald J. Trump as the 45th President of the United States.  The whole thing. I didn't turn it off, and my heart didn't die. It was stabbed through several times, but it didn't die. Must be my pacemaker.

Much of it I did not like, and much of it offended me in its cutting denial of any patriotism short of DJT's version of "America First."  I have to wonder if the USA has any friends (other than, perhaps, Russia) left on earth after that speech. Doesn't seem that we want any, or think we need any.

I had prepared for today. Had joined the ACLU for the first time in my life, had upped our gift to the Sierra Club, and had joined the Cuyahoga Valley National Park Conservancy. Will be in downtown Cleveland tomorrow with my wife (if I can find her,  for we are going at different times), to march for the rights and rightful place of women in our country.

How could I not be there? My granddaughters need me to be there.

Random Thoughts Regarding the Impending Trump Presidency

I am not at all pleased with the prospects of a Donald Trump presidency, paired with Republican majorities in the Senate and House, and accompanied by Republicans in control of many statehouses and state legislatures. Not at all.

In my customary fashion I keep turning all that doesn't please me over and over in my mind, often in the middle of the night, searching for answers, or at least a way out.

Here are some of the thoughts keep invading my troubled head...

• Maybe a Trump presidency won't be so bad. Maybe we will all be surprised, and more workable solutions to ongoing challenging problems will be forged and perhaps forced upon us…but probably not.
• Maybe in the face of the unpredictability and irrationality of Mr. Trump and his kind more thoughtful and less doctrinaire Republicans and Democrats will work together to craft legislation and develop programs that will effectively counter the most extreme and uncompromising excesses of their respective parties, and appeal to the remaining middle of American politics…but, probably not.
• If Hillary Clinton were being inaugurated on January 20, many of my fellow citizens would be as unpleased as I am, especially if Democrats were in power everywhere else in government. I imagine that many Trump supporters have a hard time thinking my anxiety about a Trump presidency has any basis in fact. They are as happy for Friday’s approach as I am distressed by it.
• If Hillary had won, despondent Trump fans would probably be discussing not watching her inauguration, and some Republican office-holders would not be attending, which I would find woefully unpatriotic and small-minded. After all, the inauguration of a new President is an act of our democracy, not the installation of a new form of government.
• O, wait; I am thinking about not watching Donald Trump's Inauguration.
• Donald Trump has chosen people of small spirits, limited brain-power, and large bank accounts to be his closest accomplices. I fully expect them to do the heavy lifting on most everything while he travels and tweets the country pointing out how great America is now that he's in charge. They are the people we have to get to if we are unhappy with what's happening.
• I think President Obama has faced overwhelming odds the past eight years, and it's a miracle he has accomplished anything at all. I appreciate his mind and his ideals. I will miss his maturity and style. But I think he has been less effective than he would have been had he been a better politician, by which I mean more able to reach out to his adversaries and make them his friends, and influence them personally. I think it would not have been easy for him to do that because I think he and I share many of he same personality traits: we like to think about things, to turn them over in our minds, and announce their resolution in the expectation everyone will see it our way. I am not a good politician.
• I am a little weary of the parallel disdain for Trump and adulation for Obama that's coming across my Facebook feed. Would Obama look so good to us if Trump didn't look so bad? Would Obama look so good to us if Clinton were about to take the oath of office? I wonder...
• As of right now, I intend to watch Mr. Trump's Inauguration. The official parts of it anyway...not the concerts, parade, balls, etc. I think you should watch, too, because this is our event–our American event. It is not Trump's or the Republican party's coronation. I think it is fine that the National Cathedral is going to participate (sorry, my new Episcopal friends) because I think someone up there on that podium needs to know that those of us who perhaps did not vote for him are watching, and that all of us are looking for evidence that when he said the night of his election that he intends to be president of all Americans he really meant it. Same thing, only with higher stakes, for office holders not attending: he will be President, like it or not, and you are doing no one any good by symbolically burning a bridge you might need in reality. He will not forgive or forget your snub. Actually, the great thing to do would be to show up anyway, and take control of the news about event. I am probably not welcome at his Inauguration, but I will be there Friday…watching…although I do reserve the right to turn off the TV if my stomach starts to churn and my heart starts to die.

Abraham Lincoln Speaks to This Week

Abraham Lincoln Speaks to This Week

A couple of days ago I accidentally happened across my recording of Aaron Copland’s A Lincoln Portrait, and felt compelled to listen.

This 1942 work begins with orchestral music reminiscent of mid-19th century America, providing the setting for hearing selected words of Lincoln’s, which close it. Recordings are not hard to find.

Lincoln’s words must have seemed compelling and appropriate to 1942, and as I listened to Gregory Peck narrate them on my recording I found them relevant, again, to our moment in history. In a week that begins with the celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr., and his achievements and ends with the inauguration of Donald J. Trump as our president, they still speak.

To me, Copland’s music somehow charges the words with additional power. But if you do not have access to a recording, you may want to read and reread the words by themselves this week. They are for all Americans, no matter what place on the political spectrum we occupy. I’d be interested in your thoughts about what they say to you in 2017...

Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this congress and this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation. We, even we here, hold the power and bear the responsibility. (Annual Message to Congress, December 1, 1862)

The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country. (Annual Message to Congress, December 1, 1862)

It is the eternal struggle between two principles, right and wrong, throughout the world. It is the same spirit that says 'you toil and work and earn bread, and I'll eat it.' No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation, and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle." (Lincoln-Douglas debates, October 15, 1858)

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy. (Unknown, though in Lincoln's Collected Works)

That from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion. That we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain. That this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth. (Gettysburg Address)

An Apology for My New Year's Post

The power of social media to push some (many?) to lock-step positions overwhelmed me at the end of 2016/beginning of 2017 when I posted something like, "Fast away the old year passes...but not fast enough." I had succumbed to the pressure to join in, to seem to be part of something bigger than myself, to attract a lot of "likes." I am sorry I posted it.

My post was sorta cute, hardly original, and generated a tiny response. But it was driven by the many expressions of gratitude that awful 2016 was over from friends who, like me, were sorely disappointed by the elections' outcomes. Even as I typed and posted it I was thinking, Really, Dean?  Is that what you really think? You know that overall 2016 was a good year for you and your family, for many people you know and millions you don't know, and that the act of turning a calendar page does make a hill of beans difference anyway. So why put this up there for all to see?

If I'd been thinking, I'd have posted something like, Actually, 2016 was a good year for me and my family in most ways, even considering the outcome of the election. I kind of hate see it go.

(If the election were the reason for the enthusiastic farewell to 2016 on part of many, who among them was thinking 2017 will be better when 2017 is the year all those who were elected in 2016 take office and will begin their dirty work?)

My New Year's experience alerts me is to the enormous power social media have to numb our ability to think and speak for ourselves. It is easy to see this power when it affects people with whom we disagree, and hard to see it when it settles into our own brains. My news feed is bloated with shares about how great President Obama is/was, and about how awful President-elect Trump is/will be. Few of them advance the discussion of either person's present or future impact. In fact, the avalanche of them chokes attempts at meaningful exchanges.

Frankly, it was refreshing to read Cornel West's "unappreciation" for Obama's presidency. Posts like that, even when I disagree with parts of them, wake me up, make me think, make me question the assumptions swirling around me, and force me to seek conclusions I can call my own.

So, to any who care, I offer this apology for misleading you: For me, 2016 was quite good as years go. I regret inviting you to think otherwise.