WILLIE MAYS WAS THE BEST AND THE GREATEST OF NEW YORK'S CENTER FIELDERS

 By Edwin Cooney

As a Yankee fan, my favorite center fielder was Mickey Charles Mantle. Many friends of mine would vote for Edwin Donald “Duke” Snyder. A broad swath of American baseball fans, however, would vote for Willie Howard Mays, Jr. At the very outset of his big league career, Willie was both friendly and optimistic. However, after having gone some 23 hitless at bats, Willie went to Giants' Manager Leo Durocher and said something like: Mr. Leo, send me back to the minors. I can't hit major league pitching. Leo Durocher's reply was: Willie, you're the greatest center fielder I've ever seen and you'll stay right there! Of course, Leo knew Willie would and eventually did hit. Leo's reassurance had, however, reinforced Willie's self confidence! Unlike Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Hank Greenberg and other sluggers, Willie was only 5 foot 11 inches tall, but he had big hands and, according to the Times' Richard Goldstein, superior peripheral vision, enabling him to judge pitches and fly balls with unusual precision.

Willie Mays was born on Wednesday, May 6th, 1931 in Westfield, Alabama, not far from Birmingham, to two unmarried people. Willie Howard Mays and Annie Satterwhite were never married to each other.

Willie's mother eventually married and had nine children. She and Willie remained happily in touch well into Willie's big league career. While growing up, Willie lived with his dad who, it is said, was named after the Republican President William Howard Taft. Taft’s party ascended from Abraham Lincoln. Willie Howard Mays, Sr. was a boilermaker and a Pullman porter. As a baseball center fielder like his famous son, he was called "Cat."

One of Willie's heroes was, of course, Jackie Robinson. In the 1960s, Robinson scolded Willie for not forcefully speaking out for civil rights. Late in 1968, Willie Mays held a press conference explaining that different people had different ways of accomplishing the same goal. He said he wasn't a good speaker and he couldn't demonstrate, but in all of his public talks to fellow Blacks, his messages were the same as Jackie's.

As wonderful as Willie's career was, he had some disappointments. When the Giants moved to San Francisco, rookie Orlando Cepeda, rather than Willie, was voted by San Franciscans as the most valuable San Francisco Giant. When Willie sought to purchase property in San Francisco, it took an intervention by Mayor George Christopher and the San Francisco Chronicle to sufficiently pressure the owner of the property to sell Willie the land. Then, on October 16th, 1962, there was the Giants' loss in seven games to the Yankees. (Note: That happened to be the same day President John Kennedy was told of the Soviet missiles in Cuba!)

In 2015, President Barack Obama awarded Willie Mays and, posthumously, fellow baseball super individual Yogi Berra the Presidential Medal of Freedom. President Obama told Willie in 2009 that if it hadn't been for him and Jackie Robinson, Obama could never have been elected President of the United States. I agree with that!

It's been fun, however, learning to love Willie Mays. I've been taught to do so by a number of very special people!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY

MR. TRUMP’S SECRET

By Edwin Cooney

Donald Trump's secret is his knowledge of you and me. Mr. Trump knows a number of vital things about us that many, if not all of us, don't realize about ourselves. He really gets it that we want our problems solved, not analyzed, not negotiated. Nor do Americans want to be reminded of their past sins, be they native American genocide, chattel slavery, or religious bigotry against Catholics, Jews, Mormons, and, of course, Muslims. After all, we're the “land of the free and the home of the brave!”  

Many years ago, I was at a bar in Binghamton, New York. America was pretty content with itself as it had just elected Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society. Vietnam was a bother, but we had only about 100,000 soldiers playing “bang bang” in Vietnam's jungles. The Soviets were also a bother but they were an ongoing nettlesome problem even though Nikita Khrushchev had recently been banished. In the minds of many Americans, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King was a national hero and the winner of the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize. However, according to our then beloved FBI director, J. Edgar Hoover, Dr. King  was even more nettlesome than Khrushchev. Dr. King was himself a “Communist” according to Director Hoover. Having been a strong Goldwater supporter, I sat at that bar that night bemoaning LBJ's Great Society. Suddenly, the bartender, a not so gentle gentleman named Dominic, said, “It's a good thing I'm not running this country.” I remember wondering what would he want to do and how would he do what? For years, I've heard people at all points of the political compass advocate everything from a modern Constitutional Convention to doing away with the Electoral College to banning political philosophies and even religious faiths.

Donald Trump's secret is simple. The best way to put it is this: Donald dares! Other politicians explain, apologize, and, worst of all, pontificate. Donald simply does most of what he says he'll do. He wavers a bit on such topics as abortion timelines and health care, but otherwise he dares to dictate and millions are ready to buy it, provided it doesn't smack of Marxism.

As for his indictments of President Biden and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark A. Milley on charges of treason, those indictments, should they occur, won't fly!

Mr. Trump never explains, because most Americans aren't looking for an accounting; they aren't interested in details. Others' civil liberties (not their own, of course) aren't either important or significant.

Like all presidential candidates, Donald Trump is about his agenda. Unfortunately, Americans are looking for heroes, not teachers. Just ask hero moguls from over the years how popular their heroes were throughout America! Whether their heroes were the Lone Ranger, Dick Tracy,  Matt Dillon, Superman, Marcus Welby, or “The Shadow,” they insist on a national hero. Even Ronald Reagan wouldn't fit this year. After all, Mr. Reagan was a mere “consensus” politician.

As for issues, solutions are both simple and straight as an arrow. Here are some issues with their solutions:

Civil Rights are no one's business especially that of the government. As for gender conflicts and ambiguities, those are spiritual not social or even medical issues.
As for the poor, Donald reminds us that Jesus said we'd always have the poor with us. Hence, their condition is their divine social and spiritual lot!

While generally subscribing to the Golden Rule, his attitude is that like kindness and charity, the golden rule comes from God and ought to be administered as individual charity not governmental or ideological largess.

Heroes give from strength and sense of duty. Politicians plead, promise and cater to the poor and elites alike.

Politicians are forever out in 21st Century America. Heroes are forever and ever in! Donald dares: that’s what makes him a hero.

Now you know the secret!!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY

MEET LORD ATTITUDE: HE RUNS ALL OF US!

By Edwin Cooney

As I was walking down the street the other day, I came face to face with a gentleman with such an attitude that I rightly guessed that he had to be His Highness Lord Attitude. Lord Attitude's attitudes are so grandiose that Donald Trump avoids running into him! But, I had the gall to interview him the other day! Aren't I brave?

"How did you get so high and mighty, Lord Attitude?" I asked as I recovered from my shock of actually meeting him on the street.

"Oh! I was invented and ultimately assigned by the Almighty, Lord of Lords to monitor and report to Him on what attitudes are most affecting the seven deadly sins!" He exclaimed puffing on his bejeweled pipe.

"Remind me, please, of those seven deadly sins," I inquired.

"They're pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth."

"Are all of these sins bad?" I asked.

 "Of course, they're bad, stupid. After all, they're called cardinal not venal sins," huffed Lord Attitude. "They have greater and lesser degrees of intensity and do different degrees of damage, but they're still deadly sins."

"Forgive me, please, Lord Attitude," I groveled, "but isn't attitude a sin?"

"Calling me a sinner is like calling a cop a crook, you mere popinjay!" He huffed. "These seven sins are deadly to the exact extent that they feed off one another and thereby grow in their intensity. Attitude isn't a sin! Attitude can be good, bad, creative, humble, and humorous to name just a few attitudes."

"The reason I was anxious to talk to you is that a friend of mine who writes a baseball letter, picked on Aaron Judge rather than Shohei Ohtani as an example of a baseball player making more money than he's worth. I ask you, dear Lord Attitude, wasn't he guilty of both envy and pride?" I snuffled.

"You're damn straight he was both of those things, but you sniffle and snuffle thus empowering his near righteous taunts. Even worse, you bore me more than does your friend's obvious selective righteousness!" he said, turning half away from me.

"I know you're on the street due to weightier and greater matters," I said. "So, how do you assess Biden vs. Trump?" I asked.

"Biden is extremely guilty of pride, but to the degree it's possible, he's an "excuse me" sinner in comparison to the other six sins."

"As for Trump, he's a grand performer of all the seven deadly sins," asserted the mighty Lord Attitude.

I started to ask Lord Attitude which of his attitudes was most significant but suddenly he turned on his heel and stomped into the wild blue yonder.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

TWO ENTITIES BEYOND POLITICS

By Edwin Cooney

We've elected men of many different attitudes and characteristics to be president of the United States. When one enters a voting booth however, one is accompanied by two realities -- availability and wisdom.

Many Americans believed Clinton and Nixon were primarily different types of liars;

Grant was regarded by millions as militarily brilliant, personally decent, but too subject to the bottle and too naive of and thereby too easily influenced by scheming politicians and money makers;

Woodrow Wilson turned out to be a twice-elected racist;

FDR was a slippery but grand and effective politician;

JFK was too handsome and charming to be ignored;

LBJ was almost pure politician;

Lincoln's politics were deliberately misunderstood by partisans on both side of the Mason-Dixon line;

George Washington was the only president considered above politics, although he, too, was eventually politically evaluated as a Federalist late in his second term.

Had the worst attributes of the above presidents been the primary aspects for national consideration, there's a good possibility none of them would have been elected with the exceptions of FDR, Lincoln, and Washington.

As the result of last Thursday's verdict of a jury of his peers, former President Donald Trump is a convicted felon. Having been so convicted, Mr. Trump has crossed the Rubicon that separates acceptability from rejection of his candidacy.

What's ironic about it all is that the party that's insisted that it's the "party of law and order" is about to endorse the first convicted criminal in American history. Unfortunately, Republicans who would "hold their noses" but vote for Mr. Trump are no different than Democrats who held fast to Bill Clinton in 1999. (Note: I would not have voted for Mr. Clinton had he been the Democratic nominee in 2000!) Sometimes brilliance and political social commitments aren't sufficient to earn one's loyalty!

No president, be his name neither Lincoln nor Washington, is above personal and moral evaluation! As for those who would stay home and vote for neither candidate, that's a right, but so is the right to be ignorant or even stupid.

Should Mr. Trump be elected to the presidency by a bunch of Americans (holding their noses), history says that we'll likely survive it with our democracy intact, but it isn't going to be any kind of a "political picnic!"

The wisdom of a vote for President Biden may be highly questionable, but a vote for Donald Trump is as close to criminality as legality and criminality ever come in our government of laws and men!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY