“MY BAD!” — HOW SORRY MUST I BE?

By Edwin Cooney

I like to do nice things for people that make them feel personally comfortable and appreciated in the present, as well as secure and optimistic in their future.

Hence, a couple of weeks ago, when a loving and well-meaning friend of many years sent me an item announcing that cell telephone numbers were about to be made available to telemarketers, I was anxious to spread the word. Their calls to your cell phone would end up costing you money.

Perhaps the greatest avenue of unfiltered everything these days is the internet. (I had started to write “unfiltered knowledge” but everything on the internet, or almost everything, is unfiltered, isn’t it?!) In short, the internet is a vast library of fact, fiction, fear, anger, love, hope, confidence, warnings, assurances, past, present and anticipated future.

The little announcement my friend sent to me explained that one could keep one’s cell phone number from intrusive telemarketers by calling the national “Do Not Call List” at 888-382-1222. The blurb assured readers that this would keep one’s cell phone number private for the next five years. Recipients of this information were to telephone the national “Do Not Call List” from their cell phones, not their landline phones. It sounded reasonable enough to me, so I passed this information on to most of my very favorite people.

Several very conscientious friends responded within minutes informing me that my information was false — and, even worse, a hoax. As documentation they sent me a link to Snopes, the urban legend people, who make it their business to separate fact from fiction in these volatile times. Here’s your copy:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/cell411.asp

Fortunately for me and for my friends, the “hoax” was harmless. Calling the number (as I did) will add your cell phone to the Do Not Call Registry, but the government already prohibits telemarketers from calling cell numbers. Nevertheless, budding columnists are under a special obligation to distribute factual information even when doing so merely as a good neighbor. Hence, I’ve had to learn a basic lesson once again: get your facts straight, Cooney!

Embarrassing as the need for this reminder is, my need to “spread the word” is as American as Paul Revere, Samuel Morris, Alexander Graham Bell, Joseph Pulitzer or Bill Gates —- all individuals who employed various means to communicate information quickly.

The question for me then has to do with the urgency of communicating. What’s behind that urge?

When someone calls you to tell you that Uncle Harry has struck it rich or an old classmate is finally getting married or that a man named Washington got caught telling a lie in traffic court, what is your immediate tendency?

If you are like me, you will often have an urgent desire to share that information with those who mean the most. Seldom is that information ever documented and yet usually it is accurate.

A sense of urgency is inevitably based on one’s values. Certainly Paul Revere’s sense of urgency on the night of April 18-19, 1775 was not only a realistic urgency but, as it turned out, an historic one. The colonists’ safety and security was certainly in jeopardy. The desire to protect the wellbeing of others is a most basic and essential force that drives our individual sense of urgency.

I believe that most of us, in one way or another, strive to be helpful to others on a daily basis. All of us, in one way or another, like to inform, protect, and entertain those who matter to us. Therefore, we freely pass on tidbits of humor, inspiration, and information to one another. One of our strongest human needs, after all, is to be useful or, even more, to be needed.

Last week, I thought I had useful and perhaps even urgent information that I ought to pass on to others as a good citizen and as a friend.

Alas, my information was false. Even worse, it was a hoax and I was had. Due to my own recklessness, others might also be had. My bad!

Of course, information is valuable only if it is true. As one whose reputation as a writer largely depends on sound judgment, my lesson this week is that I must check and double check information even when I’m merely trying to be a good neighbor.

If the egg on my face from this occasion can hardly be anything but scrambled, the irony is that much of what I know that is wise and good very often can’t even be measured, let alone documented.

Hmmm! This just occurred to me. I wonder if I wouldn’t be better off as a distributor of ideas rather than being a distributor of FACTS! Don’t good ideas often create conditions for new and sound facts?

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS — IT’S THE SEASON OF THE BLEEDING HEART

By Edwin Cooney

About ten days ago, someone sent me an email (complete with attachment) showing Christmas Trees with the insistence that “…These are Christmas trees, not Hanukkah Bushes, Holiday Trees or Allah Plants. These are Christmas Trees.”

Okay, okay already — I hear you! I get it that you want to be wished a Merry Christmas. Okay, “Merry Christmas” and may you have many more merry Christmases with trees and nativity scenes and Santa Clauses and all that good stuff! So, why all the fuss?

The answer is simple. Some politically-oriented “Christmas traditionalists,” convinced by those who insist that they hate “liberal victim-hood,” believe that Christmas has become the victim of deadly attack by left wing socialist secularists — of course. Hence, Christmas must be saved.

As for who will save Christmas? Why, patriotic Americans, that’s who! I know George Washington, Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson resisted celebrating Christmas back in the eighteenth century seeing it as a “bloody British” holiday, but many facts are disconcerting. Even though Washington, Franklin and Jefferson didn’t much like Christmas, they can still be considered true patriots. They might even have preferred to wish you “happy holidays!”

The surface issue is, of course, old-fashioned religion, but the cause is good old-fashioned merchandising. Nothing wrong with it; it’s as genuinely American as apple or cherry pie. The sad part about it however is that it’s a culture war at Christmas time --nothing more! A “Merry Christmas wish” is good. A “Happy Holidays wish” is pretty close to evil.

Tell me true now: when you receive a Christmas greeting from JCPenney, Nordstrom, Chevron or your bank, don’t you feel warm and cuddly all over?

If someone wishes you “Merry Christmas” and someone else wishes you “Happy Holidays,” does either wish do damage to your personal dignity, political freedom, or religious beliefs? Are you incapable of having a Merry Christmas during your Happy Holidays?

Emotionally, I’m a traditionalist. I love Christmas and leave it to my sensibilities as to what degree I allow commercialism to affect me. I love Baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph, the Three Wise Men and “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” (my favorite Christmas carol alongside “Joy to the World” and “O Holy Night”). I love the Christmas tree, the cookies, and the Christmas punch. (Here, you can have my eggnog — drink all the eggnog you want — I’ll stick with the brandy.) I love Santa Claus, hugs and other possibilities under the mistletoe, but I don’t see the preservation of Christmas as a moral issue. Nor indeed should it be a political one.

Of course, no American institution as popular and profitable as Christmas can be entirely exempt from politics. However, as one who loves politics and many politicians, I’d like to see politicians and talk show hosts both on the right and the left take the season off. They should be home with their families generously imbibing and distributing Christmas and/or Holiday cheer. Christmas is, after all, the season of the bleeding heart. To celebrate the Christmas season or holiday time is a free choice. I know government subsidizes Christmas by paying workers even when they’re on holiday, but shucks, private CEO’S also get paid for doing exactly nothing on both Christmas and New Years Day.

Christmas is a season to give and to receive in joy, not in political resentment. (I know political resentment is a “joy” to both the left and the right, but some joys are more appropriate than others depending on the season). Christmas or Holiday Season is a time for love and laughter. If someone wants to refer to his or her tree as a Christmas tree, or as an Allah Tree, or a Hanukkah Bush, how does that lessen the value of what I call my tree?

If Uncle Henry wants to call his evergreen tree his “Drinking Tree,” with good cheer, let him. Even better, join him under his “Drinking Tree” and have a hot chocolate if that’s what you want.

Let this holiday season be about goodwill and good wishes. Let it be about the comfort and satisfaction of others. Never mind either Christmas commercialism or religious pomposity. Allow others to be as secular or as religious as they choose. Forget about others’ attitudes in comparison to your own. Cheer their hopes, especially when their hopes are about them and not in the least about you. If someone wants to celebrate another religion or no religion, offer him or her your blessing.

How about this idea for a Christmas or holiday project: offer everyone around you, regardless of their political or spiritual faith, the most splendid gift within your power to grant them. Extend to them and expect them to extend to you the willingness to be your friend.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY

MUCH MORE THAN A SONG!

By Edwin Cooney

Last Tuesday, December 8th, 2009, marked the 29th anniversary of one of the more tragic events in American history. At approximately 10:50 p.m. EST, twenty-five-year-old Mark David Chapman put four .38 caliber hollow point bullets into the back of John Lennon as Lennon and Yoko Ono entered the 72nd Street entrance of the Dakota, their New York City home.

The deed possessed the magnitude of a presidential assassin’s mission. It tore the hearts and rent the souls of millions of people all over the world.

In less than a half hour following the shooting, thousands of people amassed in front of the Dakota as well as outside of St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center where Dr. Stephan Lynn pronounced John Lennon dead at 11:15 p.m.

“All we are saying,” They tearfully sang, “is Give Peace a Chance.”

Next they would sing “Imagine,” the title song of John Lennon’s September 1971 solo album release.

To imagine is to create a mental image of something beyond one’s normal capacity to grasp. To imagine is to create, believe in and sustain, beyond all logic, a concept or cause that can’t possibly be measured. Thus, John Lennon invited you and me to:

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one.

As I, last Tuesday, listened once again to those immortal words, I felt compelled to decide for myself what the power of that song really was.

Since no one can measure the depth of one’s capacity to imagine, I decided at the outset that John Lennon’s suggestion that we “imagine” is an invitation. Invitations are ultimately far more powerful than commands. Commands can only be issued for measurable outcomes. An invitation is reserved for powerful opportunities such as the commitment to a humane cause or love for a person.

To imagine there’s no heaven or hell and that all the people might live for today, is, it seems to me, an invitation to advocate for grace and goodness, but without the expectation of an ultimate reward.

To imagine that there are no countries, nothing to live or die for, no religion and that all the people may live life in peace, is an invitation to sweep aside the significance of personal limits, politics and international borders.

To imagine that there are no possessions, no greed or hunger, would by itself bring about “the brotherhood of man.” Hence, all of the people sharing all of the world would assure all of us would live as one.

It’s tempting, as one listens, to decide that nothing about the song is real. After all the song contains three glaring ironies; first, John Lennon--one of the richest men on earth--invites you and me to imagine that there are no possessions; second--as perhaps leader of the “British invasion” of the rich American record market, he bids us to “…imagine there’s no countries” asserting that “…it isn’t hard to do.”

Finally, comes the greatest irony of all. John Lennon, if not an atheist, certainly an agnostic, invites us to imagine “…no religion.” Yet, as “Imagine” reaches its climax, one realizes that this man of music, poetry, and intellect has just brought forth much more than a mere song. To comprehend the possibility of a world without war, without the need for possessions, greed, and hunger is a world not of a dreamer, but rather, a definition of Heaven on earth.

As the music stops and silence prevails, the source of its power hits you with full force. “Imagine” by John Lennon is much more than an invitation, poem or song.
Perhaps he didn’t realize or even intend it back in the days dominated by his passion for art, music, poetry, political activism and Yoko Ono when he composed it, but John Lennon’s “Imagine” is ultimately a prayer.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

SOMETIMES I WONDER

By Edwin Cooney

How many heroes have you had in your life? My numerous heroes can be categorized in approximately three interest areas: historic/political, sports/entertainment, and personal.

Very few men in history mean more to me than Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill —and today, November 30th, marks his 135th birthday.

Sure, he’s been gone since Sunday, January 24th, 1965 (almost 45 years now), but I occasionally wonder: with the world the way it is today and Winston being Winston, would he still be one of my heroes? The fact that I even hesitate over this question disturbs my heart and troubles my mind. (Okay! Maybe it’s even the other way around!)

Winnie was imperfect, even for his time. He’d drink wine at breakfast if he so chose. His drinking throughout the day and into the night was a combination of wine, whiskey and champagne. (I don’t know that he ever drank tea!) He was overweight, didn’t exercise, and smoked cigars like the proverbial chimney. Not even his magnificent voice was flawless. He lisped all his life and had a slight stutter. He could be cruelly sarcastic when it suited him. My favorite of a whole slew of Churchillian observations is what he had to say about Sir Stafford Cripps. Sir Stafford (Prime Minister Churchill’s first Ambassador to the Soviet Union) was handsome, always “dressed to the nines,” capable and erudite. Observed Winston, “There but for the grace of God, goes God.”

A lifelong militarist and imperialist, Mr. Churchill nevertheless was no reactionary. Although he both supported and reported on British adventurism in the 1890s and early 1900s in Africa and Asia, Churchill could be severe with British politicians who blatantly ignored what he saw as the legitimate rights of British subjects. Even more, he didn’t see his own personal and political outlook as more patriotic than the outlook of his political opponents.

While it’s certainly true that the only realistic path Churchill could take when forming a government in May 1940 was by a coalition of the leadership with Labor and Liberals along with Conservatives, he was perfectly willing to do so. He never doubted Liberal or Labor patriotism because, after all, Conservatives had been as unrealistic about Hitler as everybody else.

Winston Churchill well understood the nature of political parties. According to the 2002 Churchill biography by the late Roy Jenkins, Churchill, while running as a Liberal during a special election in 1909, drew the following distinction between Liberalism and Socialism:

“Socialism seeks to pull down wealth, Liberalism seeks to raise up poverty. Socialism would destroy private interests; Liberalism would preserve private interests in the only way in which they can be safely and justly preserved, namely, by reconciling them with public right. Socialism would kill enterprise; Liberalism would rescue enterprise from the trammels [meaning hindrance or impediment] of privilege and preference.” Winston never ran from the label of politician.

The Churchill mindset was inevitably a military one, but he also possessed a sense of social justice. He was sympathetic to home rule for Ireland. Additionally, he favored national health insurance and social security for the aged. He was leery of unions but understood their value and recognized their legitimacy.

On the surface, it would appear that Winston Churchill would be hand in glove with today’s right wing foreign policy. After all, he hated tyranny and increasingly endorsed conservative economic concepts. Nevertheless, as shown above, he could draw distinctions. Communism was evil, but Churchill never thought for a moment that by defeating Hitler he’d defeat all evil (in contrast to Messrs Limbaugh, Hanity, Beck and Madam Palin, et al). When once asked about Britain’s Cambodian policy, he is said to have observed: “I don’t worry about little countries such as Cambodia and little countries such as Cambodia don’t worry about me.” Oh, how much I hope that this quotation is not apocryphal.

As I see it, the sharp distinction between Churchillian military and political truculence versus what pours forth from today’s right wing is that Churchill was humble enough, even with his considerable vanity, to acknowledge that his political, socio/economic and spiritual values possessed no monopoly on respectable legitimacy.

Perhaps the key to the eternal Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill can be found in his prescription for a truly powerful nation’s most healthy outlook on the world:

“In war, resolution; in defeat, defiance; in victory, magnanimity; in peace, good will.”

In peace, good will? Hmm! I can live with that. So ought you!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

TWO GRATEFUL GOBBLERS

By Edwin Cooney

Like you, I was brought up to be thankful for having been born in America, “Land of the Free and Home of the Brave.” Lately however, I’m increasingly confused by the angry level of our political discourse.

Whenever I’m confused I drop into my local watering hole to consult Lunkhead and Dunderhead whose cordial but contentious political and social certainty almost always helps me focus.

Lunkhead, who preaches from the right, was as usual sitting to my left, a dead cigar in his face, stirring his scotch with a swizzle stick. Dunderhead, who pontificates from the left, was sitting where he always sits, to my right, sipping his usual lime-doctored Mexican beer and munching on handfuls of salted peanuts.

“You look confused, me lad!” observed Lunkhead as I took my seat between them.

“I’m both confused and conflicted this Thanksgiving,” I admitted. “I’ve always been raised to be thankful, at least once a year, for having been born in the land of the free and the home of the brave. However, if I’m to believe some, I’m living in a land that’s no longer either free or brave, as evidenced by the man who “we, the people” knowingly elected President in 2008. First, they insist that he’s a non-Christian, non-native-born leader who would sacrifice our freedom in exchange for “nanny care” government. Even worse, they insist that in world affairs our new president prefers a worldview of America to an American view of the world. Hence, he’d cheerfully surrender to terrorism. Still others insist that President Obama’s leadership here at home has put us back on the road to recovery from the precipice of a catastrophic national depression brought about by a bunch of “economic royalists” (FDR’s old term). In foreign affairs, these same people insist that President Obama is strengthening our national security by bringing America back into harmony with the world. So, should I be scared or grateful? I’m confused!”

“Well,” said Lunkhead, “You put it nicely. I know I’m plenty scared! I fear we’re being led by a non-Christian socialist president who is more world-centered than he is American-centered. Whether he’d surrender to terrorism is, at least, arguable. It’s also a fact that we are being led through an abomination of overspending and “big brother” “snooper vision” [an old Paul Harvey term] by Barack Hussein “Obamination” [a new right wing talk show host label]. Still there’s much to be grateful for: the NFL, the NHL, the NBA, college football and basketball, country music and, above all, Fox News.”

“Nuts!” shot back Dunderhead. “Here at long last we have a president who realizes that the individual’s well-being shouldn’t totally depend upon his monetary value, a president who realizes that we have to understand the world if we’re to get along peacefully in it, and all you can be thankful for this Thanksgiving is the NFL, the NHL, sports, country music and Fox News? God knows you do need educating, Lunkhead!” hissed Dunderhead.

“Wait a minute, Dunderhead,” said Lunkhead. “Do you think the first Thanksgiving dinner enjoyed by the Pilgrims grew and hunted itself? Do you really believe that the birds, beasts, and fish that were served jumped out of the forests and water and onto the Pilgrims’ plates as a result of some big government recreation program? Was the first Thanksgiving earned or was it a government “giveaway?” I say it was earned by hard work and shared as charity with a local Indian tribe.”

“That’s damned interesting that you put it that way, Lunkhead,” said Dunderhead. “Our first national Thanksgiving was the first—to use your words—“government giveaway.” After all, the 52 remaining Pilgrims from the Mayflower were alone in a land of millions of Native Americans. They didn’t know squat about where to find the best fish or game, they knew nothing about what crops they could grow in the soil of Massachusetts, but the most knowledgeable and powerful source for the identification and distribution of the information at the time were the Wampanoag Indians. Well, that’s what a government does: identify and distribute information. The Indians knew what to do and where to go and how to utilize those essential life-giving resources, Lunkhead. The Indians, after all, didn’t have to help those strange-looking, helpless, undocumented aliens from Europe. They could have wiped them out with little trouble. Instead they administered a little ‘government assistance’,” said Dunderhead with passion.

“So,” Lunkhead fired back, “you’ll be grateful for big government this Thanksgiving, hey, Dunderhead?”

“No, not exactly that,” responded Dunderhead. “I’ll be grateful this Thanksgiving just as the Pilgrims were at the very first one in 1621 that the leader who commands the most potent military force would act toward me with justice and grace rather than with fear and loathing. Even more, I’d expect him to act the same way toward you, Lunkhead,” said Dunderhead, signaling for a new beer.

“Here’s my bottom line question,” I said. “My holiday peace of mind depends in good measure on your answer. Are you fellows thankful for one another?”

“We insist on the right to abuse each other,” asserted Dunderhead.

“Damn right,” said Lunkhead, “It’s our birthright.”

So I handed them their Thanksgiving gift. I gave them each a bottle of -- you guessed it -- Wild Turkey. I’m nothing if not thankful—even for those two contentious gobblers!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

MUSINGS OF A WINNER’S FAN

By Edwin Cooney

Fear not, I don’t apologize for my pleasure in the Yankee’s recent World Series triumph over the Philadelphia Phillies. I do however propose to put this phenomenon we call “fandom” into perspective.

A fan is short for fanatic and, as we all know, fanaticism, especially religious or political fanaticism, can be dangerous. Danger to life and limb is one thing; danger to one’s assurance that his or her favorite sports franchise, entertainer or author has no peer is, for the most part, delightfully benign. However, because the word “fan” is the root of “fanaticism,” there is an understandable intensity to the emotion we expend favoring our heroes.

When Phillies’ centerfielder Shane Victorino grounded to Yankee second baseman Robinson Cano for the final World Series out, I was at my favorite watering hole enjoying a glass of foamy libation. I’d resisted such libation earlier in the evening, but alas, the intensity of the game loosened my resolve and there I was, beer glass in hand, as the New York Yankees won their first baseball World Championship in nearly a decade. I was pleased to say the least. Most of the people in my favorite watering hole were much less than pleased -- to say the very least.

Since both my residence and my watering hole are a continent west of Gotham, Yankee fans are scarce. A’s, Giant’s, Dodger’s, Angel’s, Padre’s and even Mariner’s, Rockies’ and Diamondback’s fans reside in this neck of the American woods in great abundance — and not only are they plentiful, they can be both nasty and rabid, especially when traveling in packs.

My oldest son, who has been victimized by A’s fandom since childhood, has a fantasy. He proposes to get into full Oakland A’s gear and travel to the Bronx. There, on the hallowed ground of Yankee stadium, he proposes to openly insult local denizens into chasing him from the park and down into the subway where he’ll nimbly jump aboard a subway car and get away from those frustrated Yankee fanatics.

Meanwhile, back at my local watering hole, as soon as the echo of my applause faded away, a discussion occurred as to whether or not I was bragging about my team’s traditional superiority. I insist that I never brag about the Yankees because, after all, I myself have never gotten a base hit, stolen a base, scored a run or put out an opponent. The one thing all fans have in common is their inability to contribute to the success of their heroes.

From time to time, I do point out the major reason why a lot of teams aren’t successful. Many team owners won’t spend the money it takes to hire the necessary players, coaches, and others for the essential team development that allows the Yankees to achieve what they do. What many fans don’t realize is that rich teams such as the Yankees, Red Sox, Angels, Cubs, Mets, and Dodgers pay a luxury tax. Some team owners put that money into team development; others put it in their pocket. Were I a fan of a luxury tax revenue receiver, I would want to know which type of receiver my team owner was. Many team owners are simply cheap! Too often, their motive is profit rather than victory.

I also argue that the Yankees’ money doesn’t buy championships because win or lose they always outspend their opponents. The truth is that money definitely helps, but it takes much more than money to be a champion. Non-Yankee fans don’t like this distinction largely because it blunts their favorite beef against the Yankees.

As the 2009 World Champion Yankees accompanied Mayor Michael Bloomberg through New York’s Canyon of Heroes two days after their victory, no doubt good citizen Yankee fans cheered as other team’s fans, those other citizens, did whatever they do best. Surely, Yankee fans hugged and congratulated one another generously offering each other assurance that there’s no finer baseball team than the mighty New York Yankees. Surely they were bold in their pride…but, wait a minute.

Like all other fans, Yankee fans are sensitive to anything short of approbation for their heroes. Like other fans, their pride can be shattered by the slightest suggestion that their triumph is unfounded or, even worse, illegitimate.

In a mere instant, pride fades into pain, cheers become tears and all that’s left is a very special hope. That hope is that next year’s Yankees’ triumph will be of such magnitude that all baseball fans may be sufficiently humbled so that they, too, may grovel at the feet of the mighty Yankee Yogi forever and a day. Amen!

PRAYERFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

A SPECIAL MISSION FOR A SIGNIFICANT DAY

By Eddwin Cooney

As I’ve often observed in these writings, since a regular year contains only 365 days with which to mark the births of some seven billion human beings, each day of the year is significant to someone. Aside from your birthday and those of the people you cherish as well as perhaps your wedding anniversary or a favorite holiday, I’m sure there are some specific dates that mark meaningful occurrences in your own life. November 9^th is such a day for me.

It was on Tuesday night, November 9^th, 1971 that I met and began dating a very special lady. Her name was Marsha Marie and our closeness lasted from that night until November 12^th, 1972. I’ve been privileged to be close to a few ladies in my adulthood, but Marsha was special. Petite, soft-spoken, and keenly intelligent, Marsha possessed a rather mischievous sense of humor. Thoughtful of others, Marsha was sweetly accommodating to those she loved. Our closeness was playful and sweet but all too short, and I miss her still.

Thirty-five years have passed since I last saw Marsha and it was a difficult parting. She had ended our relationship a year and three days after it began and I missed her immediately. We began seeing one another again, ever so cautiously, in the spring of 1974 and I had hopes we might resume our former togetherness. Alas, however, it was not to be.

I raise this whole matter because every November 9^th that passes I’m reminded once again of the value and potential of opportunity. In my heart, November 9^th will always be my “Opportunity Day.” It isn’t that I haven’t had rewarding relationships with others since that “sweet season” of some thirty-eight years ago. It’s just that I’ve learned how painful missed opportunity can be. That sweet time is so long ago and yet so vivid.

I was a junior/senior in college during that sweet 369-day season. During that time: Richard Nixon was the president. He visited China during a very intensely close and personal week of our relationship; the first baseball player’s strike occurred in April 1972; J. Edgar Hoover died; George Corley Wallace was shot and subsequently paralyzed while campaigning for president; President Nixon and Soviet Premier Brezhnev signed the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty in Moscow that May; Elvis Presley performed in Buffalo, New York in April and at Madison Square Garden that June; and then there was the Watergate break-in which took place on June 17, 1972.

The late Speaker of the House of Representatives, Thomas (Tip) O’Neill (D-Mass) has often been credited with the observation: “All politics is local.”

In that spirit, I respectfully offer my own observation: “Everyday is personal.”

As surely as personal deeds direct our fortune, the days that engrave them forever into our awareness are the lodestars to our ultimate wisdom. Every time I hear a talk show host pontificate, hear a sermon from the pulpit, read an opinion piece or write a column, I’m reminded that little of what we think, say, or do is truly objective. We have our hearts in most of what we do and, if we don’t, we ought to.

Across the veil of years, I like to believe that what Marsha Marie and I shared could have blossomed into a deeper and more lasting relationship. Whether or not that’s true, I know that I, personally, could have done more than I did to nurture what we shared.

Certainly there are a number of other days that are important to me. Some of them I may include in future writings. November 9^th, however, my personal “Opportunity Day,” is, for me, especially special.

Thus, in fond remembrance of my time with Marsha Marie, I offer November 9^th as Opportunity Day. Ah, but perhaps it is the memory of a different day which triggers the energy and love you possess to fuel the realization of dreams yet unrealized.

If such a day comes to mind, grab it and make it your Opportunity Day. By so doing, you’ll have definitely enhanced mine.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

A WORLD SERIES IN NOVEMBER?—BRRRR!

By Edwin Cooney

Sure it’s November, but it’s really and truly World Series time—honest! So, what does a November World Series say about you, me, and this land that we love? Can a World Series ever reflect what America is capable of feeling or doing? The answer is that the World Series, in one way or another, always reflects what Americans are all about.

If the 2009 “Fall Classic” goes as late as Thursday, November 5th, it will pass the record of November 4th set in 2001. Ironically, just as that World Series took place on the latest date in world series history (up to now) due to the events of 9/11, it was also a war which was the reason for the earliest start of the World Series.

As the 1918 season got under way, America was at war (as it had been in 1917) with Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey -- otherwise known as “The Central Powers.” The American “Expeditionary Force” was fighting in France and the outcome was by no means certain. Back on May 23, 1918, the War Department under War Secretary Newton D. Baker issued a “work or fight” order. That meant that every able-bodied male must either be fighting in France under General “Black Jack” Pershing or be working in a war industry-related factory by July first. Film actors were exempted, but baseball players were not.

Fan attendance at baseball games was down except strangely enough in Pittsburgh. Amidst considerable squabbling, team owners decided in mid-summer to end the season on Labor Day, September 2nd. Thus, 124 American League and 103 National League players spent much of 1918 in new and unaccustomed uniforms. All 227 major leaguers who enlisted or were drafted did survive, but one former major leaguer would make the “supreme sacrifice.”

On Thursday, September 5, 1918, as 19,274 fans greeted the Red Sox and Cubs in Chicago for the opening World Series game, Americans were sufficiently mindful of “the war to end all wars” to start a tradition. In the middle of the seventh inning of pitcher Babe Ruth’s complete game shutout of the Cubs, a military band played the “Star Spangled Banner”. It has been played before every game since. Ballplayers were sufficiently appreciative of their civilian status that Fall so they avoided a near strike over the reduced amount of money being offered by the owners as World Series compensation. Series losers would get approximately $600 and winners about $1,200 -- approximately half what they’d been receiving -- and the players were not in the least happy about it. A player’s strike was only narrowly averted.

The 1918 World Series was over by September 11th. The Red Sox were “World Champions” for the fifth time in 15 years -- and for the last time for the next 86 seasons. On Saturday, October 5th, about the time the series would normally have begun, Captain Edward Leslie Grant (“Harvard Eddie” they called him) was killed in action in France’s Argonne Forest. Captain Grant, a native of Franklin, Massachusetts and a Harvard graduate, played ten years as a left-handed batting infielder (mostly at third base) in the majors with the Indians, Phillies, Reds and, finally, with the New York Giants. If baseball’s small but vital sacrifice wasn’t noticed by many, it must be remembered that Eddie Grant was only one of 116,708 men who was sacrificed to “…make the world safe for democracy.”

So one has to wonder: what does this year’s late (and perhaps snow-driven) World Series say about you and me? Scheduling and financial considerations appear to have more to do with 2009’s November World Series than any national emergency. Despite our involvement in both Iraq and Afghanistan (as far as this observer knows), no current or former major league ball player is risking life or limb on a foreign battlefield. The $600 and $1,200 1918 World Series checks might equal the tips that bat boys receive from this year’s World Series participants. Attendance in 2009, despite the recent economic downturn, was satisfactorily high.

A November World Series might say any number of things about 2009 Americans:

It may show that we’re a longsuffering people since we put up with baseball day in and day out for seven long months. It might demonstrate a vulnerability to national obsessive indulgence. On the other hand, November baseball might indicate to a potential enemy how tenacious we can be should they dare mess with us.

Author Doris Kearns Goodwin remembers attending the World Series in Brooklyn with her father during the 1950s wearing merely a light sweater against the October chill. My guess is that she’ll be sitting indoors wearing her sweater during this year’s series. One thing is certain though: hell won’t freeze over as quickly as a November World Series! BRRRRR!!!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

BEYOND DEBATE

By Edwin Cooney

I think I’m getting old. I must be. It isn’t that I don’t like to argue. It’s just that old arguments get exceedingly boring after awhile.

A few days ago, someone sent me a piece called “Conservatives vs. Liberals,” which I sat down and answered with the idea that I’d use the answers to that commentary as this week’s column. The problem is, I just don’t have the heart for it. Don’t misunderstand me, I can answer these charges with the force of a political blowtorch, it’s just that it really doesn’t matter. It only convinces the convinced. Articles such as the one sent me and responses such as the ones I gave only reinforce. They don’t inform and, even worse, they don’t even come close to teaching. They’re designed to do one of two things: encourage or hurt. That’s all they do.

Okay! Here’s what the Conservatives are saying about Liberals in this piece. I’ve rewritten the complaints here in rather mild form:

Liberals don’t merely dislike guns, they don’t want other people to have them.
Liberal vegetarians want to ban all meat and meat products.
Liberals don’t stand up to foreign enemies, they surrender to them while pretending otherwise.
Homosexual Liberals demand government legitimization as a substitute for self- acceptance.
Liberal blacks and Hispanics want government to protect them rather than standing up on their own.
The Liberal poor expect others to take care of them.
Liberals want to ban talk show hosts they don’t like.
Liberal nonbelievers want to silence believers rather than just letting them alone.

Conservatives insist that they strongly disapprove of government as a solution to any socio/economic problem. Liberals, on the other hand, see government as a legitimate tool for the solving of socio/economic injustices. Ah! But so do Conservatives.

Conservatives want government to:
Put prayer back in the public schools.
Keep marijuana and prostitution out of the “free” market place.
Ban gay and lesbian marriages while at the same time providing economic benefits to traditional marriages.
Provide tax money through the voucher system to private and religious schools (especially Christian schools).
Build lots of prisons as long as they are not in their neighborhoods.
Provide sufficient federal money to large corporations for national defense research and weapons development.
Deregulate Wall Street and all banking operations.
Regulate smut and porn in movies and magazines.
Replace income taxes with a consumer or value-added tax.
Remove restrictions from the acquisition and sale of all guns.
Allow people to make their own choices as to whom to hire, to fire, to associate with or live next to.

In other words, Conservatives, like their Liberal cousins, demand that government reinforce their personal agendas. I remember a time when the federal government’s “top cop” was a Conservative icon. His name was J. Edgar Hoover. Also, I can’t help wondering what 1960 Conservatives would have said had Senator John F. Kennedy suggested giving federal aid to Catholic schools. The major difference between most Conservatives and most Liberals is whether individuals or whether the government should have the greater influence over America’s treasury. In other words, the strategy for Conservative problem solving is privately financed social pressure while the strategy for Liberal problem solving tends to be publicly funded laws.

While most of our “Founding Fathers” were reasonably well off for their time, Patrick Henry and a few others were the exception. Through The Enlightenment they successfully warded off monarchy. The Divine Right of Kings was substituted for the divinity of the people, but for the upper crust of the people (or, if you prefer, of society) that’s the way it was. It hardly could have been otherwise. It wasn’t intentionally exploitive, although there was plenty of exploitation of both slave and free labor from the onset of our republic.

Since FDR, another force has risen. Liberals, most of whom came from the working class, lack the monetary leverage Conservatives traditionally possess for their self-protection and upward mobility. Thus Liberals seek government-backed social affirmation for their inclusive agenda. Conservatives on the other hand utilize private pressure and money in the form of unspoken and unwritten but powerful rules devised to exclude the “riffraff” and sustain the status quo.

Here’s the bottom line. If America is about liberty and justice under law, when are we going to begin to be concerned about the liberty of those who disagree with us at least half as much as we insist on our own self-righteousness? If we insist that someone else is on the “radical” left, then where’s the “near” left? If we insist that someone is on the “wacko” right, where’s the “sane” right? Don’t we, after all is said and done, have an obligation to make ourselves come to grips with this whole idea that what we think is always right and that what someone else thinks is always wrong or, even worse, immoral?

Tell you what. I have the response I had intended to offer right here. If you’d like to see it, all you’ve got to do is ask.

Did I suggest at the outset that I was getting too old for some things? That’s certainly way beyond debate!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

DISCOVERING THE GREAT DISCOVERER

By Edwin Cooney

CHRISTOPHER WHO?
It’s all a part of our modern befuddlement! First it was “Spiro who?” Then it was “Jimmy who?” However, for the last five hundred years or so, for many Americans it has been “Christopher Columbus who?”

COLUMBUS DAY—JUST ANOTHER DAY?
I don’t know about you, but for me, Columbus Day, when I was growing up, was just another day!
Halloween was much more fun!
On Thanksgiving Day, one ate turkey with all the trimmings.
On Christmas Day, there was baby Jesus and neat presents (except for the clothes, of course).
Valentine’s Day meant cards and candy and maybe a kiss from a sweet little classmate.
George Washington and Abraham Lincoln were bigger men than your daddy, which was why we celebrated their birthdays. Both George and Abe, after all, were born in log cabins which they helped their fathers build.
I mean, they were real folks!
Easter was about resurrection, rabbits, and candy.
Memorial Day and Fourth of July were about soldiers and firecrackers, marshmallows and watermelons.
Labor Day was the last fun picnic day before school.
As for Columbus Day, there were parades, but you very seldom got the day off from school—and besides, who was Christopher Columbus anyway?

In the fall of 1792, about the time President Washington was reluctantly seeking re-election, the New York City Society of St. Tammany celebrated the 300th anniversary of Columbus’s discovery of America. Not until 1866 and 1869 did the Italian-American communities of New York and San Francisco, respectively, celebrate the man whose name is spelled and pronounced Cristoforo Colombo in Italian and Cristóbal Colón in Spanish.

In 1892, it was just good politics for President Benjamin Harrison to issue a proclamation honoring the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s first great discovery. (Not that it helped much: Harrison lost his bid for a second term to Grover Cleveland, the man he’d beaten four years before.)

In 1905, the state of Colorado began celebrating Columbus Day as a holiday. By 1920, October 12th was annually celebrated just about everywhere as Columbus Day. In 1937, FDR made October 12th a federal holiday. Always seeking to do things bigger and better, in 1968, LBJ made Columbus Day the second Monday in October so that federal workers might use that extra day as part of a long weekend vacation.

WHO WAS CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS?
Sometime between August 26th and October 31st 1451, Christopher Columbus was born the eldest son of Domenico and Susanna Fontanarossa Columbus. He would eventually have three younger brothers, Bartolomeo, to whom he was closest, Giovanni Pellegrino, Giacomo, and a sister Bianchinetta. Most historians believe he was born and raised in Genoa, Italy where his father was a woolen merchant. Christopher and brother Bartolomeo were interested in sailing and fascinated by cartography, the study of maps and charts. It was this fascination that eventually took both Columbus brothers to Portugal which, in the late 1470s, was the world leader in oceanic exploration. While there he met and married Doña Felipa Perestrello e Moniz, the daughter of a wealthy merchant seaman who had sailed with Prince Henry the Navigator. As part of his marriage dowry, Columbus received his late father-in-law’s oceanic maps and ocean current charts. It should be noted that the Columbus brothers had little formal education and had taught themselves Italian, Latin, Greek, Spanish and Portuguese.

The couple was married in 1479 and had their only son Diego in January 1480. By 1485, Felipa was dead. Later that year, rather than merely sticking the five-year-old in a convent, Columbus took Diego to Spain. There, Columbus met Beatriz Enriquez, an orphan who was a weaver, and became her lifelong mate. Although the couple never married, Columbus taught young Diego to think of Beatriz as his mother. In 1488, Christopher and Beatriz had a son Ferdinand. Ferdinand and Diego both became pages to Prince Juan of Spain, son of Ferdinand and Isabella. It was Isabella who would partially finance his four voyages (in 1492, 1493, 1498 and 1502) to the New World.

Although Columbus could be vain, ambitious, and cruel, it is still reasonable to believe that he was usually responsive to the needs and vulnerabilities of those around him. By the time he left Palos, Spain on August 3, 1492 for what he believed would be East Asia, he was typical of the young upwardly-mobile professional of his time.

WHAT DID HE DO?
Although Leif Ericsson and Thorfinn Karlesefni, two Viking explorers, preceded Columbus to the New World by nearly half a millennium, it was timing that made what Christopher Columbus did matter. Columbus’s first voyage began the continuum of exploration that resulted in our comfortable occupancy of 2005 America.

During his first voyage, it is generally acknowledged there was no mistreatment of the native population. He agreed with Queen Isabella that Christian love rather than coercion was the best way to treat the Arawak natives who greeted him on Watling Island, one of the Bahamian Islands, that October 12th 1492. Columbus renamed Watling Island San Salvador. Cuba and Hispaniola were his final two ports of call during his first voyage. Native artifacts, some gold, and even some Indians were the souvenirs which Columbus brought back as gifts for Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand. The queen fell in love with the natives and dressed them in clothes made of the softest velvet!

On his second journey to the New World, Columbus discovered that the thirty-nine men he had left behind at the settlement called Navidad had been killed by the natives for assaulting their women. It may well have been this episode that brought out the harsh side of Christopher Columbus for it was during this second voyage that he became tough on both his own men and the native populations he visited.

Near the close of his third voyage, which began in 1498, the king and queen sent a governor to Hispaniola who was authorized to arrest Columbus and return him to Spain in chains. There were reports of native enslavement as well as physical abuse against both the Spaniards and natives. There is documentation that Columbus ordered some of the enslaved natives to mine for gold under the threat of having their hands chopped off if they were unsuccessful. Finally, there is documentation of sexual enslavement of the native population.

By the time he returned to Spain in November 1504 from his fourth and final voyage, Christopher Columbus had fallen from royal favor. He was no longer Admiral of the Oceans and Seas or Governor of the lands he had visited. This was in part due to complaints about him as an administrator, but there were other factors.

First of all, he was no longer unique. Other explorers had visited the New World on behalf of Spain, Portugal, and England. Maps of the northern and eastern parts of South America had by then revealed that Columbus had not reached the riches of eastern Asia as he had claimed. One of those explorers was an Italian mapmaker named Amerigos Vespucci. It was he and not Christopher Columbus for whom the two American continents would be named.

CELEBRATING CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS!
In evaluating whether or not Columbus’s clear mistreatment of Native Americans or indigenous people should bring about his removal as one of our national heroes, three things should be considered. These are:
(1.) Was his treatment of Native Americans unusual for his time?
(2.) Was his treatment of Native Americans a part of a pattern of treatment followed by others at his specific recommendation?
(3.) Was his accomplishment enough of an historical turning point to make him uniquely significant?

For me, the answer to the first question is, that as horrible and reprehensible as his mistreatment of Native Americans was and as difficult as it is for our modern consciences to stomach, it is instructive to take the following into account:

Great empires such as those of Alexander the Great, Genghis Kahn, the Ottoman Turks, as well as Spain, France, and England advanced via their militaries rather than by their physical and social scientists;

Also, one should consider how Spain, France, and England treated their own people; Columbus’s last voyage was over by 1505 and Britain’s Henry the Eighth hadn’t even begun his thirty-eight year Reign of Terror in England yet; The Catholic Church and the governments of France and Spain hadn’t even begun to draw, quarter, hang, behead or burn any of their political opponents and religious heretics in Columbus’s lifetime; Therefore, why single out Columbus for special condemnation?

The answer to question two is a slam-dunk. Columbus as much as anyone else you want to name is singularly accountable for his own actions and absolutely no one else’s. He didn’t direct or command the actions of either Cortes or Pizzarro. Of course, Columbus’s cruelties are a part of the record of his life, but so are the practices of the religious, political and social mores of the 15th and 16th centuries which most certainly had their effect on his behavior. The days in which Columbus lived were a combination of religion tinged by superstition along with social and political institutions that demanded the absolute submission of the poor and those who were different. This explanation does not excuse Columbus; it includes him in a time that is much beyond our comprehension.

Finally, it was Christopher Columbus who, with his brother Bartolomeo and his two friends Martin and Vicente Pinzo, were ready to command the Santa Maria, the Pinta and the Nina respectively, before anyone else was ready to sail for any other country. Thus began a continuum, not of immorality but of discovery. That is what we celebrate.

By all accounts Christopher Columbus was an excellent father, a considerate and faithful lover, a marvelous brother, and a loyal friend. On top of all that, he was one hell of an explorer.

No way, however, would he ever get my vote for governor!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

AH! HERE’S OCTOBER!

By Edwin Cooney

In the midst of controversial and momentous national decisions and events, sometimes it’s refreshing to be frivolous. So, here goes!

I really like it when October rolls around. Even though Thanksgiving (my favorite annual holiday), Christmas, and New Year’s Day all loom with promises of happy gatherings and gifts of love and mutual goodwill, October remains for me the happiest time of the year. The reason is simple: October is for me a month of eventful anticipation. October is crammed full of enjoyable events, zesty tastes and smells, crispy sounds, and stimulating textures along with the anticipation of the happy holidays in November, December and January that are just ahead.

What better feeling is there than happy anticipation? Anticipation, as I see it, is that invigorating force that energizes the mind and spirit sufficiently enabling you and me to derive meaning from our lives. Additionally, October is the first really serious month of the Fall season. September is gentle, but in October, fall gets brisker without giving in to winter. In the Northeast and upper Midwest there is the fall foliage. Canadians celebrate their Thanksgiving Day holiday the second Monday in October and all of North America celebrates throughout the month with hayrides, October fests and, finally, Halloween.

Six American presidents have October birthdays, more than in any other month:

Jimmy Carter was born on October 1, 1924 -- the first president born in a hospital;
Rutherford B. Hayes was born on October 4, 1822 -- the second president born in Ohio;
Chester Alan Arthur was born on October 5, 1829 -- although Arthur was born in Fairfield, Vermont, his American place of birth was as controversial as President Obama’s is with political opponents;
Dwight D. (Ike) Eisenhower was born on October 14, 1890 -- the first president born in Texas (sorry, LBJ!);
Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt was born on October 27, 1858 -- the only president born in New York City);
John Adams was born on October 30, 1735 -- the first president born in Massachusetts.

October means shakedown time for NFL upstarts, the opening of the basketball and hockey seasons, and, of course, the baseball playoffs and World Series. Of course, the “World Series” has never really been a “world” series except the times when Canada’s Toronto Blue Jays played and won the 1992 and 1993 World Series over Atlanta and Philadelphia respectively.

Like every other month, October has had its momentous occasions. In 1964, the Soviet Politburo wrenched power from Nikita Khrushchev sending him into forced retirement and replacing him with Leonid Brezhnev. That same October of 1964, the Chinese government exploded its first atomic bomb while, in Britain, Labor Party leader Harold Wilson defeated Conservative Party leader Sir Alec Douglas-Holme thus becoming Labor’s second Prime Minister.

On Friday, October 4, 1957, while the attention of most Americans was focused on the New York Yankees/Milwaukee Braves World Series (which that day was tied at one game apiece), Russia seemed to rock the soul of America by beating her into space with the launching of Sputnik One. Much of the population was suffering from an “Asian flu” epidemic at the time, but that was no excuse. Not even President Eisenhower, popular as he was, could convince most Americans that Russia’s success in space wasn’t as serious to our national security as many feared. Of course, Ike knew we were spying on the Soviets with the CIA’s U-2 flight program, but naturally, “mum” had to be the word on that!

Of course, every month has something to offer. April showers do bring May flowers and June is the month for brides and grooms. The Ides of March still hold drama and mystery for those on the verge of making big decisions, especially political or life-changing ones. January is always new and February is the month for candy and Valentine’s Day hugs and kisses. July is our national birthday and August is vacation month for many. September brings the new school year and television season, while November and December provide festivals of gratitude to nature and nature’s God for our many blessings.

For me, however, it’s October that stands head and shoulders above all other months on the calendar. October sweeps away the past and invites the future. The senses, sounds and smells of October are crisp as if to awaken us sufficiently to grapple with Jack Frost who will soon be making his entrance.

Mostly, however, there is that invigorating sense of anticipation which assures me that there exists a sufficient supply of strength, energy and wisdom to carry you, me and all we cherish through to those beckoning Octobers yet to come.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

ANOTHER WORRISOME WAR WATCH

By Edwin Cooney

As President Obama administers our national affairs this fall, his most nagging crisis -- tactically, economically, politically and morally -- may well be the war in Afghanistan.

Already, some of those who once patriotically advocated that war in response to 9/11 (including Conservative columnist and author George Will, among others) are now having second, third, and fourth thoughts. Of course, today’s Commander-in-Chief is no longer one of their own political faith, but should that matter? Answer: sure, it matters – even though it shouldn’t.

One of our great American myths is that successful wars make heroes out of presidents. The record, however, looks something like this:

George Washington fought the Revolution as a general not as president,

Andrew Jackson will always be the hero of the Battle of New Orleans while his presidency is subject to critical review.

Abraham Lincoln perhaps came closest to being a presidential war hero, but John Wilkes Booth put an end to that possibility.

William McKinley never reaped any kudos from the 1898 Spanish-American War nor did he seek to do so. (“A full dinner pail” was Bill McKinley’s bid for re-election in 1900 rather than a slogan boasting of “imperial America”.)

Teddy Roosevelt, of course, made political capital of his Spanish-American war experience while running for election as president in 1904, but he was a private citizen, not a president, when he gained and claimed his fame.

President Woodrow Wilson was a political, physical, and emotional wreck after his return from the World War I Paris Peace Conference. (The president would only be a hero to the idealistic once the U.S. Senate defeated our participation in Wilson’s League of Nations).

FDR died before World War II ended thus barring him from enjoying presidential war hero status.

Like Jackson before him, Ike was a military hero rather than a presidential war hero.

Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford all had their fingers burned in Vietnam. President Ronald Reagan found no glory in Beirut, Nicaragua, Granada, or even over Tripoli in 1986. If George Herbert Walker Bush was a presidential war hero after Desert Storm, somebody forgot to tell Pat Buchanan who challenged and critically damaged his 1992 re-election effort. Finally, if young President Bush is a presidential war hero after Iraq, somehow this observer has missed it.

Of course, every wife and mother, every student of history, every citizen, every member of the clergy, and, above all, every soldier wonders why we go to war in the first place.

As Commander-in-Chief under the United States Constitution, the President is responsible for administering a war once it begins, but a declaration of war is the responsibility of Congress.

On our collective behalf, the United States Government has coordinated, funded and led some fifteen foreign wars since George Washington became our first Commander-in-Chief on Thursday, April 30, 1789. Only five of those wars (the War of 1812-15, the Mexican War of 1846-48, the 1898 Spanish-American conflict over the Independence of Cuba, World War I from 1917 to 1918, and World War II from 1941 to 1945) have been declared by Congress. The major reason for that is that modern weapons are so swift and deadly that both the timing and the administration of any foreign conflict can mean millions of lives endangered or lost rather than merely thousands. Thus the intensity, length, and swiftness of wars suddenly beginning or ending appear to be best suited to executive rather than legislative determination.

More to the point, although historians and political scientists offer economics, politics and militarism as the causes of war, I regard these intellectual reasons for war as secondary. The ultimate reason we go to most wars is really very simple. The answer is fear. Fear, as I see it, makes us angry and it is the frightened and angry nation -- not the contented one -- that goes to war.

On that long ago Sunday morning, December 7^th, 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt contentedly sat at his desk enjoying his stamp collection. Shortly after 1:00 p.m., however, when Secretary of State Cordell Hull phoned to report that at 12:53 p.m. Eastern Standard Time Japanese air squadrons had begun dropping bombs on our naval base at Pearl Harbor Hawaii, FDR became an angry rather than a contented man. America, shaken by bombs delivered by “the nation of the rising sun,” abandoned its reluctance to become involved in war and became an aroused society.

President Obama thus inherits the worrisome war in Afghanistan as surely as President Nixon inherited Vietnam from President Johnson. However, as I see it, the Afghanistan war will only be truly President Obama’s war when he endorses it through fear and fear’s child — anger.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

JUST FOLLOW HER MUSIC

By Edwin Cooney

The passing of Mary Travers of Peter Paul and Mary fame is somehow more gripping than the recent passing of celebrities of even greater prominence.

I wasn’t a fan of folk music or of that particular trio, however, there was something very real about Peter, Paul and Mary. Other entertainers were more dynamic and sensational, but, professional as they indeed were, Peter, Paul and Mary sang, it seemed, like you and me. They sang songs about magic dragons, hammering hammers, the blowing wind, and love under the lemon tree — ballads of peace, justice, wisdom, and love.

I could imagine sitting in a group with them around a roaring camp fire. We would be singing songs and telling stories as we all ate toasted marshmallows and drank Kool-Aid. As twilight turned to darkness and the crickets accompanied the silence of ever approaching night, we would vow to repeat this happy time again and again.

Peter, Paul and Mary were starkly real. Hence, Mary’s passing becomes starkly personal. Where, we may well ask, is Mary now? Might we one day go where she has gone? If we do, or even when we do, might it be more pleasant and perhaps even more placid because Mary is there?

The truth is that, as I enter my mid-sixties, I often wonder what experience lies beyond this world for me and for those I know and love. My guess is that you do, too.

Just the other day, I asked two friends what they thought the “beyond” might be like. One of them, a devout Christian, thinks that we’ll join God in the spirit world and that we will be possessed with a sense of awareness. Another friend insists that the “I” of our personhood is immortal and will do as it chooses once our bodies cease to exist. He believes that if our “I” is willing, it will enter another human being, and if it isn’t, it will do as it chooses for as long as it chooses.

Limited in comprehension as most of us are as to what form our mortality may take, what we can grasp, if we allow ourselves, is that our inevitable passing is as natural as our birth was and therefore doesn’t have to be terrifying. We also know that part of our nature is to defend, cherish, and cling to what we know. What we know best is, of course, life and a pleasant life is what we work, struggle, hope, and pray for.

From the time we are children, one of the first mysterious concepts we try to grasp is death. Grandma or Grandpa may suddenly die or, even more frightening to children, a brother or sister may be taken by accident or illness. Parents and even clergy struggle to assure children that there is nothing to fear, but from there on, it seems, these same authorities too often use death as a weapon to threaten and exert control. Hence long before our childhood passes, fear -- rather than acknowledgment or acceptance -- of our mortality can overwhelm us.

Naturally, we seek to preserve and enhance our lives and the lives of those precious to us. We never feel satisfied that people we love and cherish live comfortably enough, happily enough, or long enough. Their lives enrich our own and so we want them to have the best and the very best to us usually means life.

Fifty years ago last February, three young “stars,” met their untimely deaths. The Big Bopper (Jiles Perry Richardson Jr.), Buddy Holly (Charles Hardin Holley) and Ritchie Valens (Richard Steven Valenzuela) seemingly had far to go and much to live for. Young people everywhere wondered why the fiery plane crash that took their lives had to happen and, of course, there was no satisfactory answer. If their passing was demoralizing, their examples undoubtedly energized entertainers yet unborn to live the dreams young Richardson (age 28), young Holly (22), and the still younger Valens (17) never fully experienced.

Mary Travers’ legacy along with that of Peter Yarrow and Noel “Paul” Stookey may primarily be in the music. My guess, however, is that her enduring legacy is the sense of peace her music offers you and me.

As I comprehend the force of nature and “nature’s God” (as Thomas Jefferson might put it), Mary Allin Travers is now back where she was on Sunday, November 8th, 1936, the day before she was born. She resides now and forever in a state without fear, anxiety or pain, and, above all, surrounded by love and peace.

If we would join her when that time comes for us, we need only to honor every remaining day of our lives without fear and, above all, to follow Mary’s music.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

SOMETIMES I WONDER AND SOMETIMES I WORRY!

By Edwin Cooney

“Shame on you” is what I often imagine people are thinking or saying to themselves every time I assert that I like politicians. The truth is that I don’t feel the least bit of shame.

You and I elect people to office because of what we want, don’t want, hope for, or fear. Thus, how can we reasonably complain that they so often pander to us? After all, we vote them out of office if they tell us what we need to know rather than what we want to hear.

The problem, as I see it, is that in recent years the “old style” politician, for whom compromise was once as vital as mother’s milk, has been replaced in the public’s notice by ideologues the most influential of whom aren’t working politicians.

Two ugly incidents involving President Obama occurred this week that emphasize this reality. The first was the vast overreaction on the part of right wing talk show radio and television hosts to the president’s planned address to school children upon their return to class. Their complaint seemed to be that President Obama was about to indoctrinate America’s school children to socialism. As it turned out, all the president had to say was that kids everywhere will be better off if they stay in school rather than wasting their lives away on the streets. The message was suspiciously “red-blooded American,” if you ask me.

The second incident was the angry public outburst by South Carolina GOP Congressman Joseph Wilson during the president’s much anticipated healthcare address on Wednesday night, September 9th, 2009.

“You lie!” shouted Representative Wilson as the president asserted that medical treatment for illegal aliens will not be included in the House health care plan. Congressman Wilson’s bad manners were immediately followed by more traditional bad manners when Democratic members of the House promptly booed him. Congressional booing of presidents began back in 1993 when the newly elected William Jefferson Clinton, during his first State of the Union Address, cited congressional budget figures concerning the national deficit that were at variance with GOP figures. On three other occasions (1995, 1997 and 1998), GOP Congressmen showed their contempt for Bill Clinton during his constitutionally required reports on the State of the Union.

Democrats during George W. Bush’s administration demonstrated that they could be as rude as their Republican cousins. In 2003, President Bush was booed when he asserted that not only was there proof of “weapons of mass destruction” in Iraq, but also that yellow cake uranium was being obtained by Saddam Hussein. Again, in 2005, President Bush was booed by “guess who” while urging the privatization of Social Security because the system, he insisted, would soon be bankrupt. Each time these incidents occur, presidential opponents invariably excuse the behavior while presidential proponents express their outrage.

As President Obama labors to fashion a workable health care reform bill in Congress, he is being set upon by left wing and right wing broadcasters, print journalists and internet bloggers. These ideologues insist that they know more about what works than the president. They themselves seldom seek election for their domain is opinion. Opinion is never subject to the riggers of accountability and workability, but only to the less demanding whimper for plausibility.

Hence President Obama’s dilemma. Right wingers want him to admit that he’s a socialist after which he should shut up. Left wing bloggers and commentators want him to first shut up and then take orders. He must (they insist) name call and dehumanize as they do rather than invite practical cooperation. Rightist and leftist opinion makers insist that their world of conjecture and theory is the real world. They believe that their world of ideological prefabrication and doctrinaire-oriented self-reinforcement is where it’s at.

As for Congress, it, like the president, is accountable. Members of Congress represent a hodgepodge of heterogeneous constituencies, most of whom face day to day challenges which do not respond to canned solutions. Often it takes longer than is convenient to find workable answers, but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t working at it. Patience, not rudeness or panic, will ultimately get it done.

A generation ago, it was largely the Liberal ideologists who choked the political life out of Jimmy Carter hoping to replace him with the questionably electable Ted Kennedy. The result was Ronald Reagan, two Bush presidencies, Dan Quayle, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, and so on.

Every time ideologues of either the right or the left seek to dehumanize one another, they weaken the authority on which their hoped for political power may rest one day. That authority is ultimately constituted in the Office of the President of the United States.

If Liberals won’t get behind President Obama’s genuine attempts to bring forth progressive government over the next three plus years, be assured that Sarah Palin waits expectantly in the wings.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

FREEDOM—THE GOLDEN TREASURE OF THE SOUL

By Edwin Cooney

My first introduction, as a boy, to the concept of freedom, was the final line in the first verse of the American hymn “My Country ‘Tis of Thee.” The words, of course, are “let freedom ring.”

As Americans debate the various components of health care reform in this first year of the Obama administration, from all points of the political spectrum there come cries for “freedom.” The ideological left insists that American corporatism and its rich right wing constituency, in order to line their own pockets, are perfectly willing to oppress the worker, the student, the single mom, and even middle class citizens. Right wing ideologists, on the other hand, insist that health care reform, especially if it brings about an increase in taxes or limits the prerogatives of “the free market,” will bring about the enslavement of free citizens by a “socialist-oriented” liberal government. Hence, the solution for both sides of the debate is, you guessed it, freedom.

The question, therefore, is whose freedom matters? Whose unbridled liberty to control our options for jobs, education, or health care benefits will ensure the citizen’s freedom or liberty in the future?

Few “red-blooded Americans” will contest the idea that freedom or liberty -- choose your word -- is essential to the continued economic, social, and spiritual well-being of this republic. Nonetheless, newspaper columnists and editorial writers, radio and television talk show hosts, corporate executives, and certainly politicians are perfectly willing to transform “freedom” from being the common goal of a united people to the divisive weapon of a hot political issue.

Although I am anxious for health care reform and believe that properly constructed health care reform will ease the financial and economic burdens too long suffered by too many Americans, I do not believe that any American is consciously interested in limiting anyone’s freedom. Conservative-minded Americans insist that they want to be free to assist the less fortunate among us rather than being forced to do so by government. They insist that such compulsion is legal thievery. Liberals, meanwhile, insist that affordable health care is a human right not a class privilege.

From strictly a socio/theological standpoint, conservatives and liberals often seem to be arguing the opposite side of their stated core beliefs. Conservatives, especially Christian-oriented Americans, often assert their belief that mankind has fallen from grace and therefore can’t be trusted to make responsible political and especially spiritual decisions. Yet these same Christian spiritual and political leaders insist that regulation of social activities not only is unwarranted, but evil by dint of being socialistic. Liberals, on the other hand, insist that humankind is basically good and yet they distrust and even label as selfish and greedy even the most civic-minded elements of private enterprise.

When you think about it, it’s hardly surprising that freedom means different things to different people. Freedom “from” is quite a different matter than freedom “to”. Freedom “of” offers different rewards and responsibilities than does either freedom “from” or freedom “to”. Again, there’s hardly a fair-minded American who will deny that a prime ingredient in freedom is responsibility. Therefore the inevitable question is: whose job is it to insure responsible behavior by free men and women?

The traditional or conservative answer to that question is that the protection of freedom is everyone’s responsibility. Ah! But what is our most powerful resource for that protection? The answer to that question, for many, is as true as it is unsettling: the answer is spelled “GOVERNMENT!” After all, the same “founding fathers” who wrote the second amendment also established the judiciary system where we freely and lawfully litigate our differences.

The final question here is: When are we “free”? If the prosperous banker, businessman or woman feels less free when taxed too highly, why is it so hard to understand when the less prosperous worker and consumer feels less free if not sufficiently paid or when costs for essential needs such as healthcare are too high?

Freedom is powerful, precious and invariably vulnerable to outrageous fortune. As such, freedom is not the sole property of either the rich or the poor. Freedom is the legitimate golden treasure of everyone’s soul.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

FROM POLITICIAN TO LEGEND

By Edwin Cooney

The passing of Edward Moore Kennedy after nearly 47 years of public service in the U.S. Senate brings forth much in the way of both nostalgia and reflection.

First and perhaps foremost, there are the days of Camelot even if “Camelot” turned out to be merely a widow’s heart-wrenching dream. The Kennedy administration was a mixture of a young president’s creativity (the Peace Corps), eloquence (his inaugural address), miscalculation (the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion), brilliant calculation (the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis), idealism (the Medicare fight of 1962), and determination (the 1962 struggle with the steel barons). Then, suddenly, in the space of four days of violence, tears and dignity, John F. Kennedy passed from a vital living being into the martyrdom of death.

Next there came the turbulence of the late Sixties starkly emblazoned in our awareness by the unforgettable issue-oriented and celebrity-bedecked presidential candidacy of Robert Kennedy. RFK’s candidacy would champion nonviolence as well as mutual love and respect before being silenced forever by yet another assassin’s bullet.

Then came the last of the three brothers who graced 1960s politics: Massachusetts Senator Edward (Teddy) Kennedy. Even as Teddy tearfully asserted that his brother should not be idealized in death beyond what he was in life, the genuine grief of millions across the country was salved by the thought that the man there, in St. Patrick’s Cathedral eulogizing his brother, might turn out to be the greatest Kennedy of them all.

Alas, such wasn’t to be. For one solid year it seemed that the elegant and eloquent thirty-six-year-old Massachusetts senator was clearly destined to sit in the White House. Only another tragedy (people feared young Ted’s assassination) could prevent that likelihood. Then suddenly there came an unexpected and bedeviling tragedy.

The weekend of July 18-20, 1969 was to be as much a Kennedy family triumph as a national one. President John Kennedy’s May 1961 goal that America put a man on the moon before the decade of the sixties was out was about to be realized. However, even before the Apollo 11 Spacecraft could enter lunar orbit after launching on Wednesday, July 16th, two families plus one political career suffered an immeasurable tragedy. For many Americans, the real character of Edward Moore Kennedy was revealed when he failed to immediately report the car accident in which he was involved that took the life of Mary Jo Kopechne, a former RFK campaign worker. Teddy was driving her “home or elsewhere” after an alcohol-ridden barbecue that Friday night.

The questions came thick and fast and over time it became clear that satisfaction with the answers increasingly depended just as much on one’s political orientation as it did on one’s sensibilities. As the reckless drowning of Mary Jo Kopechne undoubtedly revealed a character flaw or two or three in Edward M. Kennedy’s personhood, it equally demonstrated a willingness on the part of his political opponents to use his misfortune to stamp not merely the Senator himself, but even his political faith. Thus, the Kennedys passed from the gentle warmth of public nostalgia into the contentious domain of political analysis and judgment.

Still, throughout much of the 1970’s, Teddy Kennedy’s name was at the top of most people’s list of likely future presidents. In 1972 and 1976, Ted Kennedy gave passionate political orations in support of George McGovern and Jimmy Carter, the presidential candidates of those conventions.

Next came Senator Kennedy’s last plunge into presidential politics as he challenged his own party’s incumbent, President Carter, for re-nomination. However, by 1980, both his waistline and his voice had thickened; his enunciation was often blurred dulling the eloquence of his message. So it was Jimmy Carter rather than Edward Kennedy who faced (or, if you insist, lost to) Ronald Reagan thus bringing on a conservative era in politics.

Thereafter, Ted Kennedy proceeded to be the best senator possible. If it meant working across the aisle on behalf of the gentler parts of the conservative agenda, Ted Kennedy would do so. In so doing, he would befriend Senators Bob Dole of Kansas, Dan Quayle of Indiana, Orrin Hatch of Utah, John McCain of Arizona, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and, undoubtedly, a significant number of other GOP senators. He would champion issues such as civil rights, the rights of labor, the Family and Medical Leave Act, and, notably, the No Child Left Behind Act above and beyond its originator President George W. Bush.

First and foremost in Ted Kennedy’s heart was of course “Health Care.” Although he didn’t live to see its passage, it may well be that his name will be the ultimate force that makes a national health care bill a reality. If, as conservatives insist, Ted Kennedy possessed too little character to deserve election to the presidency, he possessed enough character to inspire hope in the lives of a lot of people who don’t have enough money to meet some important and, as I see them, fundamentally personal needs.

If we assign any value or legitimacy to Christ’s command that we feed his sheep as we would feed “Him,” then surely Senator Edward Moore Kennedy’s dedication to that commandment might do him more good than those presidential electoral votes he never received.

Now that he’s gone, the name Edward Moore Kennedy surely joins the names Robert Francis Kennedy and John Fitzgerald Kennedy among America’s grandest political legends.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

MY PERSONAL DILEMMA

By Edwin Cooney

It depends on my mood, at least to some degree, sometimes. (Shhh! Don’t tell anybody, but sometimes I actually like to argue.) The truth is that debate is as nourishing to me as mother’s milk is to a kitty.

What issue you ask? Any issue — health care, Barack Obama, Rush Limbaugh, baseball’s designated hitter, whether the Bible is or isn’t the word of God — you name it and whether or not I know anything about it, I’ll gladly explore the idea with you. I may do this to see how much you know and are willing to tell me, thus improving my knowledge. I may explore the topic with you because you’ve said something I find encouraging, debatable, disgusting, touching or even self-revealing.

As I’ve asserted over the past couple of years, I was attracted to Barack Obama’s candidacy because I’d grown very weary of the “culture war.” The “culture war” has been underway since the U.S. Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade on Monday, January 22, 1973. That’s long enough for me. President Obama insists that “we, the people” have more in common than we have differences. I believe he’s right, but therein lays my dilemma.

If the culture war ends, what will I have to argue about? That’s a scary question! The close of the culture war will bring about awareness that we don’t have to be perpetually mad at one another over political issues. We may even grasp the realization that we are our brother’s and sister’s keeper: they need our love and support rather than our critical indifference as they strive to make their way in the world.

Then, it’ll happen.

First there will come the “down” side, specifically, the withering away of big shot talk show hosts named Limbaugh and Schultz. Air America and Fox will become as extinct as the hula-hoop, the pet rock, the mood ring and your automobile’s cigarette lighter. Next, commercials from insurance companies like New York Life and Geiko (I can’t wait for that one!) will vanish. As for the “up” side -- radio will have to start playing records again…remember records? With the passing of talk radio and television, we’ll need more artists to write and produce radio plays, television movies, and documentaries. We will become a more learned and cultured society. We’ll realize that private insurance companies more than big government have been getting between our doctors and us. There’ll be tort reform thus stabilizing the costs of damage claims and so much more.

The dilemma is that with these changes and the end of the “culture war,” the issue (that wonderful political entity) will either die or become an endangered species like the buffalo and the spotted owl.

A number of years ago, the ABC network’s answer to NBC’s “Meet the Press” and CBS’s “Face The Nation,” was a news interview program called “Issues And Answers.” Now, if you ask me, that’s the elephant in the room of American society. The truth is that subconsciously Americans love issues better than they do answers. That, I fear, is my bottom line dilemma!

A few weeks ago, a very fine gentleman who lives in North Dakota sent me this quote from President John F. Kennedy as a “thought for the day”.

“So, let us not be blind to our differences - but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved.”

A splendid sentiment Mr. President, but an anecdote concerning one of your presidential predecessors makes my point.

Thomas “Tommy the Cork” Corcoran, one of FDR’s two major legislation writers, hadn’t always admired the erudite president. In fact, when he transferred from the Hoover administration to the administration of the New Deal he was angry with the new president. He disliked the aloofness exhibited toward President Hoover as he struggled with the Great Depression in the final days of his presidency. However, as Corcoran wrote legislation that saved people’s homes, bank accounts and their employment, his anger slowly turned to deep admiration.

One day late in FDR’s first term, Corcoran was sent up to Capital Hill along with White House lobbyist Charlie West by the president. He was to get members’ names on a petition to bring the minimum wage bill to a vote in the house. “I’ve got it, boss,” Corcoran told the president when he returned. “Where the hell have you been, Tommy?” FDR asked. “I’ve been up on the hill getting those names,” Corcoran said. “And right behind you was Charlie West getting the names you got on that petition right off,” FDR informed the young lawyer “But boss, don’t you want the…” “Tommy, please,” said the president, “That was merely for public show. I want the issue!” he declared.

There it is, “Tommy the Cork’s” story, FDR’s 1936 re-election issue, and my own dilemma all rolled into one scary reality.

Why have answers when one can have issues? Think of all the employment opportunities that issues bring to Rush Limbaugh, Ed Schultz, even pharmaceutical companies that manufacture Tums and tranquilizers. The beat just goes on and on and on and so does my personal dilemma!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

THE ULTIMATE QUESTION

By Edwin Cooney

It was bound to happen. The ultimate question -- “do you love America?” -- has finally caught up with me.

It’s a painful question, not because of its answer, but because sincere people feel compelled to ask it.

I was a four-year-old kindergartener and America was fighting Communism in Korea when I first became aware of our country. I knew we were “the good guys” because everyone I knew -- my foster parents, my friends, my teachers in regular school and Sunday school, and, of course, my minister -- were “good” and THEY were Americans. If, as they assured me, Korean, Chinese, and Russian Communism were all bad and had to be stopped by brave American soldiers, it must be true.

Like most American boys, I loved adventure stories and most of the heroes were American to the core. I thrilled to the stories of young George Washington’s adventure from comfortable Virginia into the wilderness of the Ohio River Valley during 1753-54 where he and his companion Christopher Gist nearly drowned in the icy waters of the Monongahela River while demanding that the French stop stirring up the Indians against British settlers. I relished the stories of General Jackson’s 1815 victory at New Orleans, Admiral David Farragut’s Civil War naval battles at Mobile Bay and New Orleans, and Teddy Roosevelt’s adventure at San Juan Hill (really it was Kettle Hill) in 1898, and, oh, so many more.

The America I grew up in stood for ideals: crime doesn’t pay, freedom and justice for all, America -- the land of opportunity, and, of course, the golden rule of “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

My boyhood heroes included Abraham Lincoln who walked 15 miles to return two cents to a customer of his Salem, Illinois store and, as President, freed the slaves, Douglas MacArthur who returned to liberate the Philippines during World War II, and, of course, President Eisenhower, a soldier who became President to insure our safety and our peace.

America, of course, wasn’t all about war. America was also about baseball, the Mickey Mouse Club, Hula hoops, strong, taciturn men in cowboy hats, sweet, smart and fun-loving girls in cuddly sweaters, pop music, and, ultimately, the space race.

As a teen, I fretted about Nikita Khrushchev’s hair-trigger temper and dependence on Vodka as his finger wavered above the nuclear button. Then there were those five tense days in October of 1962 during which a determined President Kennedy, who had himself tasted war in the South Pacific, calmly and steadily applied pressure in the right place and gave ground where necessary until the crisis had passed. While during the years that immediately followed “The Missiles of October” I would have gladly sacrificed my physical well being to teach North Vietnam’s leader Ho Chi Min a lesson, I began slowly but steadily to take an intense interest in what America was all about.

America, after all, was and is my home. If Vietnam was a quagmire, if civil wrongs needed to be transformed into civil rights, if in foreign affairs we experienced crisis after crisis, what was wrong? If there were political scandals, why did they occur? Thus, my study of American history became and still remains a passion.

As I assert to those who wonder what makes me tick, my personal regard or love doesn’t require perfection. Nor do I regard political differences as moral differences.

It has been observed that forty years ago the differences between Republicans and Democrats were primarily strategic. Today, political differences are too often viewed as moral differences. Hence we have “the Radical Left” and the “Wacko Right.” Few people press the Right to identify “the moderate left” or the Left to identify “the sane right”. The result of this is that the well of ideas in this free society has been at least temporarily poisoned. Even worse, we too often dehumanize rather than merely politically oppose one another.

At least twice in our history, during the time of the Civil War and the Vietnam War, Americans have experienced this emotional phenomenon. It could be that much of our domestic frustration stems from the Vietnam War era and has been enhanced by additional political and economic crises.

Even with all of our suspicions and fears, we know that it is here where Americans have traditionally debated and created the promises and opportunities for the strongest, most intelligent and safest land on earth. Here we were born or here we came to thrive and this is our home.

As an old familiar song reminds us: “THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME.”
It’s hard not to love that idea!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

AFFORDABLE HEALTHCARE—IT’S JUST PLAIN PATRIOTIC

By Edwin Cooney

Okay, here it is: Despite three decades of tax cuts for business, the source of America’s medical care system, medical care costs have gotten way too high for most of us. Therefore, in the face of the lack of an effective check on these costs, most citizens believe something has to be done.

On the campaign trail last year, we heard countless stories of people who needed medical treatment and couldn’t get it due to the high cost of insurance coverage. Meanwhile, insurance premiums and medical care deductibles continued to rise.

Whether or not public healthcare is a human “right”, or socialistic, or even sufficiently effective is beside the point. I assert that it’s simply a question of good citizenship.

Historically, the opponents of healthcare legislation have asked the American people if they wanted government to get between them and their doctors. Historically, the American people have said a resounding “no”. So, the “free market” has had predominance in this area of our national life.

The problem is that the “free market” either can’t or won’t control its costs. Historically, there’s nothing new in this. The “free market” (or “free enterprise system”, if you prefer) once had the opportunity to wisely administer pay scales and safety conditions in the workplace and refused to do so — hence the rise of the labor union movement. At one time, private enterprise had absolute control over the sale of pure food and drugs and chose to sell cheap and rotten goods — thus, the pure food and drug act of 1906 was enacted. At one time, “private enterprise” or “the free market” had a monopoly on selling electric power to hardworking farmers and small businesses, but it refused to find ways to adequately finance the distribution of its goods and services — hence it was necessary to have public utility agencies and regulations. At one time, banking and investment had the chance to be both profitable and honorable. Too often, however, honor can be only a phase while profit always pays -- thus the need for the Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulations.

Too often the same people who insist that you should be protected from an encroaching federal government insist that unelected insurance executives have your best interests at heart far more than your fellow Americans whom you elect to public office.

The answers to the following set of questions should take us beyond the traditional arguments regarding government-regulated healthcare. Since healthcare costs are too great, what mechanism (aside from public healthcare) could be utilized to bring costs down? If affordable healthcare isn’t a worthy public issue, how can it be a legitimate product for insurance companies? If the cost of uninsured citizens utilizing medical facilities is the main reason why insurance premiums and deductibles are increasing, wouldn’t we be better off if everyone had some form of coverage that pays into the system?

As I’ve asserted many times, I love politics and most politicians. However, it seems to me that if a society possesses the means but lacks the will to keep its citizens safe from the ravages of disease because politicians are reluctant to do whatever it takes to provide the funds or an alternate system, then shame on those politicians.

Of course, the money to pay for anything worthwhile ultimately has to come from those who have it -- but what’s wrong with that so long as the mechanism established to provide the service the money is paying for works? No one is suggesting that the solution to the healthcare crisis is to make paupers out of the rich any more than healthcare advocates are suggesting that affordable healthcare ought to be free. If government care is really and truly a question of principle, why then do all of these true “red, white and blue” congressmen and women accept healthcare benefits paid for by the government? They could still buy into private plans as government employees! Perhaps government care really and truly does work.

As I see it, the real issue is money and profit. If, as it was agreed to about three weeks ago, the American Hospital Association can afford to return to the economy about 150 billion dollars over the next decade, then there must be a healthy margin of profit within the existing system. Healthy profit margins are perfectly acceptable, but huge ones are both obscene and -- frankly -- unpatriotic.

If the free enterprise system that claims to create wealth in America won’t keep the people well, then let’s “conscript” it just as we conscript our youth in wartime!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY