TITLES — ARE THEY SUBSTANTIAL OR ARE THEY MERELY AN ILLUSION?

By Edwin Cooney

I was riding home from bowling last Wednesday night with a good friend of mine, David. We were discussing newly existing circumstances and their significance within our bowling league. The changes have been both significant and severe. In the last year we've lost three of our sighted assistants, one to death, and the other two to resignation. Additionally, three bowlers who were active through the 2017-2018 season have passed away. We now have a new president, vice president (me), and that's it. Our president also serves as our treasurer owning, as she does, a business.  There exists among us seven bowlers a very limited idea of the value that functional structure brings to a group such as ours. Suddenly, David said to me, "I don't worry about titles and offices and such things as that. To you, everything is political!" "Not so much political," I said, "administrative or organizational perhaps, but not necessarily political.”

When I was growing up in the 1950s and 60s, there was a very high degree of emphasis on titles and positions of all sorts. These titles came from the expectations of parents, preachers, and teachers. We learned the significance of generals, captains, sergeants, and privates. Every police department had its chief. The town or city had its mayor, the state had its governor, and the President of the United States was at the head of America the Beautiful.

All of these titles and expectations of responsibility and accountability are inevitably interrelated in order that they ensure the maximum efficiency and effectiveness of our society or what we later learned to call in college "the body politic."

Still, with all of this historic practice of emotional, spiritual, intellectual, economic and socio/political organizational structure at the close of the second decade of the 21st Century, there seems to be less of a grasp of, or  respect for, vitally essential positions within society and even in life itself!

Not all of this is necessarily bad, either. After all, there are a lot of meaningless titles that have little to do with how well an organization functions. Life is always a bit of a weeding and pruning operation.

However, some stations in life are priceless. I'm thrilled every time one of my boys calls me “dad.” Yet I know of children who lovingly call their parents by their first names. The three I'm thinking about love their parents as much as my wife and best friend who wouldn't dream of addressing their parents so informally and familiarly. Within your family, you are inevitably a brother, sister, uncle, aunt or cousin. You're honored when you become a husband or wife, father or mother. Ultimately, there's that thrill of thrills when you become a grandma or grandpa!  

However, having asserted this, there are those among us who resist the possibility of being subject to a certain title. One of these types of people happens to be me.  A very minor reason I didn't go after a doctorate in education is that I couldn’t imagine being addressed as Dr. Cooney. Perhaps that's because way back in my childhood I wanted to be a medical doctor and was rather severely chided for my lack of realism. (The truth is that emotionally, for whatever reason, I still think that the title “Doctor” ought to be strictly applicable to a medical professional.)

Then, there's the historic reality that although there have been many heroic kings, queens, presidents, medical and other "doctors," no one achieves genuine human greatness through their title, whether inherited or earned.

As of this date, I happen to be president of two worthy organizations. One is merely a chapter of a very wide service club. I am the president of the Syracuse Host Lions Club in Syracuse, New York. My colleagues actually call me "King Lion.” (I'm much, much more comfortable being considered “president” than “King Lion.” The idea of any personal link with royalty is just simply beyond my imagination!) I’m also President of the New York State School for the Blind Alumni Association headquartered in Batavia, New York. This is largely a political position because in order to achieve it, I had to lose to formidable opponents three times. I've held this position since Tuesday, July 1st, 2014. In this position, I'm hardly either a dictator or ruler. I'm subtly deferred to because of my respected responsible accountability to the organization as a whole. I possess no grandeur nor should I. Still, I revere the office because of what it means to the membership which reflects the highest and most memorable achievements and principles of our residential school. 

The idea that the lack of respect for titles seems to be growing is disturbing to me for several reasons. First, with titles come expectations of coordinated responsibilities and accountabilities. Second, without these titles of respect and accountability, there is likely to be an era of chaos. Chaos is anarchy and anarchy invites and even encourages everyone for himself and himself alone. It would recall the period of time which existed between the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of our modern era in the mid-seventeenth century which recognized royalty, the church and little else as legitimate. That was the Medieval System throughout European history, one of my eras of study in college.

Try this observation on for size. You and I may be tired and disdainful of titles and privileges, but they are precisely what those who would mold democracy to their own profit cherish the most.

The significance of who we are through what we've achieved and the responsibilities and accountabilities to which we are committed constitute the bulwark of our liberty. It's as simple as that.

Whatever niche of responsibility and accountability you attain in any group in which you are a member, without taking yourself too seriously, do perform it to the hilt for, in the long run, your place and your mission is a vitally important thread in the fiber of your liberty and that of your children. 

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

"THE ONLY CURE..."

By Edwin Cooney

Ninety-one years have passed since Alfred (Al) Smith, the 1928 Democratic presidential candidate, uttered that immortal phrase: The only cure for the ills of democracy is more democracy!

According to a headline I recently saw in the New York Times, some 145 corporate executives have written the United States Senate that this gun violence crisis is simply unacceptable. They're right, of course, but before recommending a solution to the crisis, let's first examine the NRA/GOP/Trumpian solution. It can be summed up in two words: "MORE GUNS!"

The argument goes four-fold. First, more good people than bad people have guns. Second, limit the rights of good people to own guns and you automatically expand the number of bad people who will get guns. Third, as more good people carry guns, the message will go out loud and clear to the bad that it's becoming too dangerous to their well-being to own guns. Finally, the second amendment guarantees the individual's right to own guns. So, let's deal now with these four arguments.

I agree that there are more good people with guns than bad people with guns, but no assessment of the number of people who have guns has ever been a predictor of who will prevail in a gunfight.

Second, gunfights aren't won by numbers, they're usually won or lost by strategies and tactics. Good people, unlike baddies, aren't generally interested in using their guns in any kind of a battle situation. Hence, their mindsets aren't ordered toward aggressiveness nor battle discipline. Additionally, which group, goodies or baddies, are most likely to possess body armor?  

Third, the idea that "the bad" can receive messages is a nearly absolute myth. The bad among us are only different from the good in their perception of their lot in life. As they see it, their well-being, often their very safety, has already been taken from them. Bad people are usually on a mission to avenge their victimhood whether real or imagined. Their violence is not usually a child's dare. It's a mindset or attitude toward society in general. Too often, the outlaw equals the good guy in his or her willingness to kill in defense of their personhood and liberty.

Finally, there is the debatable applicability of the Second Amendment of the Constitution. Here's that amendment in full:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The purpose of this amendment is the assurance that the people will permanently have the right to establish a well regulated militia to protect their liberty. The right to "bear arms" presupposes that guns will always be the most sufficient method available to defend our liberties. The validity of that amendment has been affirmed by the United States Supreme Court going back to 1934. I think it's important to remember three vital factors dating back to the 1790’s when that amendment was passed by Congress and ratified by the states.

First, a gun was more than a weapon during the days of James Madison, Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry.  A gun was a vital tool for acquiring food and many of the materials for clothing. Anyone living outside of a city needed a gun for their mere existence. Back in the days of Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone, guns invariably dispatched more animals than they did people. In 2019, the difference between the number of animals and the number of people killed appears to be growing smaller.  Second, the weapons being developed that could threaten our liberties are invariably much beyond the capacity of any gun to stop them. China or Russia can steal your money and your liberty electronically faster than Jesse James, Billy The Kid, or Matt Dillon could ever draw. 

Florida GOP Senator Marco Rubio advocated last Friday in the New York Times for passage of greater background checks and the red flagging of potential gun-toting terrorists. One wonders when Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump will catch up to Senator Rubio. Soon, I hope!

I can't avoid the following question! If the right to form a well-regulated militia is the real issue here, might not the black and Hispanic parents of school children be encouraged to form such a militia to protect the liberties of their school children as long as their targets are the powerful men who support the NRA? Couldn't that legitimately be defined as "a well regulated militia”?

So, back to Al Smith: No! The cure for the ills from gun violence is not more guns.

It's time to widen background checks on those who purchase guns, tax the hell out of ammunition making it even higher than the tax on tobacco, and make it legal for local judges to investigate potential gun-toting terrorists.

It's time to bring an end to this gun violence before the persons and families of NRA lovers become someone's legitimate target in defense of their own liberties and that of their children's!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

SEE THAT GUY? HE'S RUNNING AGAINST HIMSELF! WOW!!!

By Edwin Cooney

Not very often, but occasionally, I wish I were an intimate friend of President Donald Trump. If I could have that man's attention and trust for just an instant or two, I would, as an act of patriotism rather than partisanship, demonstrate to him his political achilles heel.

Since "a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down,” I'd offer the names of three Democratic presidents for his consideration who ultimately tasted the bitter cup of abiding political distrust in the wake of their arrogance toward others.

Although President Thomas Woodrow Wilson was barely re-elected over former Associate Justice Charles Evans Hughes in November 1916, he was a very popular wartime president by late October of 1918. The economy was on a solid wartime footing and the news from Europe was that Germany was about to toss aside Kaiser Wilhelm the Third and surrender to The Allies. Nineteen eighteen was a congressional election year. Late in October, even as the news was getting better, President Wilson put out a plea for the election of Democrats as the only party which could help him win the war. The result was a disaster for President Wilson and his fellow Democrats. In the Senate, Democrats went from a 53 / 42 majority to a 48 / 47 minority. In the House, they slipped from a 216 / 210 minority to a 237 /191 minority. Within a year, Woodrow Wilson went from being a beloved world statesman to a defeated politician. His clearly arrogant moralizing and stubbornness cost him his League of Nations and a huge slice of his reputation in history. Today, rather than being considered a "great president,” he is now merely a "near great president."

Although Franklin Delano Roosevelt's fall wasn't nearly as great as President Wilson's, his failure to consult with either his cabinet or congressional leaders before he announced his decision to "pack" the Supreme Court severely damaged his political prowess until the outbreak of World War II. FDR's November 3rd, 1936 victory over GOP candidate Governor Alfred M. Landon was a massive one, forty-six states to Landon's two (Maine and Vermont). Roosevelt received 27,747,636 popular votes to Landon's 16,679,543.  FDR's  electoral vote was 523 to 8. Roosevelt's move to pack the Supreme Court was, to an arguable degree, reasonable. Like Woodrow Wilson whom FDR served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, FDR's act was both high-handed and arrogant — even though it had some merit. Subsequently, Franklin Roosevelt, great as he was, could not get either the public in general or the Democratic Party in particular to trust him with the absoluteness he surely craved. The party would nominate and elect him twice more, but its love was marred by uncertainty as to his personal integrity.

A few days ago I began reading Tim Alberta's new book “American Carnage: On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War and the Rise of President Trump.” Within it, I found another president's arrogance. That president was a man named Barack Obama, a president I hold in very high regard. However, within three days of his inaugural, he made a blunder that cost him the ability to lead with a sufficiently high degree of effectiveness. According to Alberta's book, there were two crucial meetings between President Obama and the congressional leadership. The first occurred on Monday, January 5th, 2009 while Obama was President-Elect. When that meeting was over, GOP leaders were impressed with Obama's willingness to take into account GOP proposals on crucial issues. One GOP staffer observed, “if he governs like that, 

we're f—ked." In order to get a grasp on events, they needed to go to war with Obama. On Friday, January 23rd, when GOP House leaders handed the newly minted president the list of their priorities he'd invited them to present, his reaction was originally receptive. However, in the inevitable discussion of those GOP priorities, the president asserted: "You know elections have consequences and I won." That was the gateway Republicans were looking for to get at Obama's appearance of high purpose. For the next year and a half, President Obama had sufficient majorities in Congress to pass measures without Republican help. However, Republicans had an agenda of their own, namely that of purifying their party to appeal to American values over those of a left-wing president with African and perhaps even Islamic values. President Obama's blunder freed the GOP to define itself rather than follow a president it never intended to respect.

As I see it, President Trump's problem isn't conservatism. Conservatism appeals to people's intellectual, social and spiritual values. Most Americans are either drawn to or repelled by the policies and ultimately the person of the President of the United States. "I vote for the man" remains the individual personal proclamation down through the years.

Three years ago, Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton by defining her as “a crook” among other things. Mr. Trump's victory apparently was more personal than it was patriotic or political. All of this president's challenges are personal rather than matters of principle or patriotism. Thus, in 2020, if he's to be re-elected, President Trump is going to have to face a formidable opponent plus the democratic presidential nominee. Unlike four years ago, President Trump has a record and an image he’s going to have to overcome. 

Donald Trump, meet your biggest opponent — Donald Trump!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

IT'S A BIRD! IT'S A PLANE! IT'S WONDER WAYNE!

By Edwin Cooney

Yes, indeed! I've got a very dear friend named Wayne. I've known only three Waynes in my life and they're all quite memorable. The first Wayne was the first black kid I ever knew. Wayne Anderson was often quite naughty, not because he was black, just because he was Wayne. I remember when we were in fifth grade anticipating our upcoming travels home from our residential school for Easter vacation. Wayne told the class, "My mama loves to see me come and she loves to see me go!" Wayne Number Two was the son of a Trailways bus driver in Batavia, New York. Wayne Fuller was a great guy and an excellent radio broadcaster. He actually broadcast baseball games of the Batavia Muckdogs of the New York-Penn League for a number of seasons. He also broadcast on WBTA-AM in Batavia. His specialty was oldies from the 1950s through the 1970s. Even while broadcasting, he worked for Trailways as had his dad. When Wayne passed away last year, his friends took him on a Trailways bus to his final resting place next to his mom and dad. 

Yet, there is one Wayne who is special to me and lives in my heart. I call him

“WONDER WAYNE.”

Dr. Wayne Mahood is a retired professor from the State University of New York at Geneseo. He was my professor of Secondary Education in Social Studies. Wayne taught education classes to potential teachers. I met him in late August of 1971 when I visited his office in a building known as "Blake C." I thought I'd introduce myself to all of my potential instructors before entering their classes.

Wayne was just 37 that fall. I liked him right away, primarily because almost from the very instant I sat down in his office he seemed exceedingly open to having a person with total blindness with an ambition to become a classroom teacher in secondary education in his class. From the very outset, he was both inquisitive and interested. Apparently, I made something of an impression on him. Almost immediately after I became one of his students, he made me the subject of an article he wrote for a professional journal. He once read me the article and it was quite flattering without being the least bit pedantic.

Wayne was most helpful to me both professionally and personally. In fact, he holds the distinction of being the only person to actually hire me professionally as a teacher. In the spring of 1975, I co-taught a graduate studies class in non-visual communication with a gentleman who had been my supervising teacher while I was student teaching. Additionally, Wayne recommended me for a high school social studies teaching position in the summer of 1973.

Through numerous luncheon conversations over the years, Wayne has taught me a number of valuable lessons such as how to draw distinctions between dogmatic and objective outlooks. He helped me to understand the significance of the social structure of various groups in society. During our education classes, we learned to take sociograms in order to realize the various levels of communication and socialization taking place in every segment of society.

When he learned that I was writing these columns, Wayne was very interested in becoming a reader. Few weeks have passed over the last fourteen years that he hasn't been available to offer a comment of some kind.

Wayne has an ongoing interest in local as well as in national history. He's written books about the Civil War and about a family member who was a sheriff in Missouri during the 1930s who suffered the indignity of having one of his black prisoners lynched from his jail. His special interest is the history and times of various generations of the Wadsworth family of Western New York.  The Wadsworths were longtime supporters of SUNY Geneseo. In 1960, when Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. resigned as Ambassador to the United Nations to join Richard Nixon as his potential vice president on the GOP national ticket, Jerry Wadsworth was appointed Ambassador to the UN by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Wayne has written several books on the history of that remarkable family which has been involved in public affairs since the 1790s. 

Forty-eight years have passed since I walked into Wayne's office during the week of Monday, August 30th, 1971. That was the week before the fatal Attica prison riots against Governor Nelson Rockefeller's Corrections Commissioner Russell Oswald. That was the fall that a Republican President, Richard Nixon, recommended that we Americans adopt wage and price controls in order to regulate inflation. It was the fall that Nixon prepared for his trip to China and we were all singing "Bye Bye, Miss American Pie."

There are two reasons I'm introducing Wayne to you. First, I would like Wayne to know  what he means to me and how highly I regard him. Second, although I am not related to him, he has nevertheless granted me a substantial legacy. That legacy is, to the extent I utilize it, a balanced outlook on matters public and private that I've tried to apply every time I sit down to write these weekly musings. A balanced outlook doesn't in any way rob one of the right to opinion, even severe or radical opinion on occasion. What it does do is allow one to reach decisions about events largely devoid of political dogmatism or what I call “canned thinking.” The fact of the matter is that Dr. Wayne Mahood, Professor of Education at SUNY Geneseo, showed me —  at one time a very dogmatic Republican — the pathway to both intellectual and even spiritual freedom.

Thanks, Wonder Wayne! Stand tall and proud, for you really and truly are "A LIVING WONDER!"

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY