WHO DO WE THINK WE ARE OR OUGHT TO BE?

By Edwin Cooney

You and I individually have a lot in common with America the beautiful —  rich, powerful, and invariably sensitive! Among many, many other things, we want to be rich, healthy, powerful and especially appreciated for who we are. To the exact extent we aren't any one of these things, we resent it.(I guess in that way, we're all a little like President #45 — and in that sense we can be as dangerous as a Colt 45!)

Back in the 1960s, Paul Harvey used to wonder aloud and most eloquently why the world didn't always appreciate us, especially with its need to be protected from the evil deeds of the Kremlin. At that time, we were awash in Vietnam with few allies and few friends it seemed. Then came the day when Mr. Harvey had the answer. I'm guessing that being a Midwesterner, it's likely that Mr. Harvey may have been an isolationist like Charles A. Lindbergh prior to World War II. 

It's also my guess that after World War II his avid opposition to Communism was what primarily fed his support for military actions in foreign policy. However, on this occasion, Paul Harvey asserted that we had become the leader of the world's greatest movement, because we'd managed ourselves so well from our very founding that the entire world was out to imitate us. Nevertheless, Paul Harvey decided that we ought to never become involved in another nation's struggle militarily unless we were willing to achieve military victory.

Our withdrawal from Afghanistan raises that question once again. After all, both the last two presidents have seen the need to end a twenty year war that has cost us trillions of dollars and too many lives. Still, their separate advocates will assign blame to each as they pat themselves on the back for a perspective for which they're proud and not accountable because their perspective is strictly a summing up of a set of circumstances, possibilities, and likelihoods. Last Tuesday, Kentucky GOP Senator Mitch McConnell suggested that, like President Trump, he thought we'd been there long  enough, but he found grave fault with the manner in which President Biden had conducted the withdrawal of our forces. Last Wednesday night, President Biden appeared to assure you and me  that our forces would continue to be in Afghanistan beyond August 31st until all Americans were safely out of that country.

Partisans on both sides of the political aisle will invariably make the best argument for their case while accusing the other side of everything from appeasement to reckless gunboat diplomacy. Meanwhile, you and I will legitimately wonder who we are and who we ought to be with regard to Afghanistan!

Many people will assert that America ought to stop trying to be the policeman of the world. That was what presidential candidate George W. Bush asserted during the 2000 campaign against Al Gore. However, only a year later in the wake of 9/11, we decided that even though we shouldn't be involving ourselves in "nation building," perhaps it was time we focus on some "nation destruction” with regard to Iraq, Pakistan and maybe, just maybe, even Iran. Perhaps we might even throw in North Korea while doing some nation-smashing!

The first obligation of every government in the world is to protect itself and its people. Abraham Lincoln in his first inaugural address insisted that no government worthy of its existence possesses within its laws a process for its legitimate destruction. (He asserted that as an answer to those who insisted that the states had the right to secede and thus to destroy the Union.) Our task today is to handle the world in such a way as to enable the American people to exist safely, prosperously, and, lately, healthfully!

Happily or sadly, we live in a world from which we can never be safely isolated or recklessly aggressive. We live in a world we didn't entirely create. However, since at least 1917 when we tried to "make the world safe for democracy," our fingerprints have been all over its creation.

We certainly didn't entirely create this world. However, until significant changes occur for which we have no, or little, part in creating, we're bound to pay whatever price it costs to keep the world as safe, clean, healthy, prosperous and peaceful as we can — however we taxpayers feel about it all!

As the sitting president, Joe Biden knows that he'll have to take the blame for whatever mistakes his state and defense departments make, because he sought election to the presidency so that he might assume great accountability and responsibility. In the meantime, like his predecessors, he will be forced to counter the situation — whatever it is in Afghanistan — so that the best interests of the American people prevail.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

GROW UP, YOU INDIVIDUALISTS — FREEDOM ISN'T YOURS, IT'S EVERYONE’S!

By Edwin Cooney

As Covid19 continues to spread throughout America, it is doing so through unmasked and unvaccinated Americans aided by their determination to be free rather than well.

The uncomfortable truth is that not too many years ago the likelihood that people would refrain from using an effective vaccine, especially because its use was being urged by the national government, would have been most unlikely. Of course, that was a time when federal authority saved us from economic depression, won a world war, educated millions on the GI Bill, and served as the strongest weapon against advancing Communism. Just as significant, government strongly and effectively advanced and supported the Salk polio vaccine. (Note that religious and civil liberty objections to main-stream practices have always been and should be honored to the maximum degree possible!)

Sadly, something has changed thus bringing about a tyranny of a nature that has never been, insofar as I'm aware, identified in a history book or even in a political science tome. I will try to define what it substantially is: this new phenomenon is a political and social anarchy grounded in self-centered individualism!  

 

The root of this anarchistic aggrandizement lies in the tendency to define liberty as individualistic rather than collective. What too many conservatives appear to believe is that you and I are the masters and mistresses of our individual liberty despite the fact that the only individual liberty that exists is an absolute state of nature. (Note: A hermit whose habits are ruled by the environment might be said to live in a state of nature.)

The most graphic example of the borders of your freedom and mine has been that my freedom ends where your nose begins. The best way of describing the borders of liberty or freedom in 2021 terms is that my liberty ends when the exercise of my personal liberty or freedom makes you sick.

To the extent that it can affect your well being, my right to avoid wearing a mask or getting vaccinated is an act of tyranny. One of our most enduring principles has always been that we are eternal enemies of all tyrannies! Tyrannies are political and behavioral acts that generally require political rather than criminal correction.

A state of liberty or freedom exists when everyone's well being is guaranteed. Even more, absolute freedom does not ultimately depend on the existence or absence of government. Those who define liberty or freedom as a purchasable commodity are usually those who have sufficient funds and influence to purchase and protect their idea of their individual liberty!  

Much of what I've written above is also true about those who are in denial of climate change, the only difference being that there will never be a need to advocate punishment for those who are in denial about climate change. As the climate evolves, its effect will ultimately punish all of us. How many wild fires, intensive heat waves, hurricanes, and tornados must it take for the most nonscientific person to reach the conclusion that humankind is doing something very, very wrong with the climate?

The debate we are accustomed to listen to in 2021 is whether the national government or state governments constitute the surest path to freedom, safety and prosperity. I think it's vitally important to remember that less than a decade after independence from Great Britain, our founding fathers sadly but realistically reached the conclusion in 1786 that the authority of the states needed regulating by a sufficiently empowered federal system of government. Less than 20 years later, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Marshall (a cousin and political rival of President Thomas Jefferson) empowered the high court with the right of judicial review to judge the constitutionality of all laws. Hence our Founding Fathers clearly recognized the need for adjustment in the newly established government!

Today, at least two state governors, Ron DeSantis of Florida and Greg Abbott of Texas, are making every effort to thwart the authority and power of the federal government to protect your physical well being in the name of your individual freedom. Years ago, the late conservative commentator Paul Harvey asserted that freedom is more than about individual rights. He stated that in addition to being free to exercise individual rights, "there was also the right or freedom and obligation to do what we ought!” 

For openers, let's understand what freedom and liberty are and what they can't be.

First, freedom is a license to function freely and fully in society. 

Second, freedom or liberty is not a license for antisocial behavior, specifically that which is destructive of other’s personhood and property.

Third, freedom must belong to everyone living and functioning within society or else everyone's freedom is potentially endangered.

Fourth, true freedom and liberty can't be manipulated to serve the rich and thereby justify the existence of the poor!

Fifth, perhaps the attainment of freedom and liberty began with the founding of this great nation, but freedom and liberty as entities won't depend on this nation or even its existence if America chooses to exchange them for enlightened oligarchy.

Thomas Jefferson often spoke and wrote about "the disease of human  liberty" which he hoped would spread throughout the whole world. Unhappily, the disease that's been spreading lately, Covid19, is the antithesis of our individual freedom and liberty. Thus, we're justifiably at war with Covid19 and nothing else. The disease must be our only target for destruction.

What worries me most of all is that it's increasingly difficult to be positive about the future of just about everything. My shining light is gratitude that I've lived seventy-five plus years in freedom and comfort. Another way to say it is that only the past is guaranteed, the future is up to us. 

The truest form of freedom and liberty is the inclusiveness that we must insist on to guarantee to one another if we are to "keep on keeping on!”

Thus my opinion: masking mandates and Covid19 vaccinations are precisely the original obligation of the states. If the states insist on blocking or refuse to issue these mandates, then the federal government must so do!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

IT WAS INDEED A GRAND OLD PARTY!

By Edwin Cooney

The Republican Party died at its off-and-on-again residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C. on Thursday, August 27th, 2020.

There's some dispute as to whether the Republican Party was born in Jackson, Michigan or Ripon, Wisconsin in 1854 but there's little doubt as to its purpose. It stood for reform and it stood for union. Its first presidential candidate, John Charles Fremont, was the illegitimate son of an immigrant mother. Although a brilliant surveyor and field commander, he had a tendency to overstep his military and executive authority. Its second nominee was a humble backwoods rail splitter born in Kentucky and raised in Indiana who came to both legal and political prominence and some good fortune in Illinois. 

The party’s origins were primarily midwestern and northeastern. Its opponents were primarily southern states-righters. In the traditions of the Adams, Clays, and Websters, the GOP stood for what its founders regarded as "the American System," a combination of good government and a prevailing standard of good citizenship and private enterprise. (Some historians even insist that the Republican Party's heritage goes back through the Whig party of the 1830s and 40s and back still further to the Federalists of George Washington, John Adams, and Alexander Hamilton.)  Its pedigree was far from perfect, but it was born to mean well. Within its first two decades it could and did brag of its gifts to the public: victory in the Civil War and passage of three constitutional amendments that expanded liberty as long as the Congress and the Supreme Court would allow such progress to prevail. Additionally, there was the completion of a national railroad and the establishment of the land-grant college system followed by the party's efforts at civil service reform.

Recognizing government as the legitimate tool of John and Susie Q Citizen, Teddy Roosevelt led the party to tackle such needs as preserving the environment, establishing a food and drug administration, and the protection of consumer products. Finally, in 1910, Teddy Roosevelt asserted in a speech in Osawatomie, Kansas that human rights ought generally to prevail over property rights.

Like its Democratic cousin, it was vulnerable to idealistic factionalism and changes in various circumstances, foreign and domestic. The GOP's greatest leaders, Eisenhower and Reagan, left behind achievements that broad sections in both major parties could applaud despite some grades of differences of appreciation between them. Occasionally political candidates in both parties have presented themselves and their platforms as significantly different from conventional candidates. "A choice not an echo" was the cry of the Goldwaterites in 1964. That cry constituted a shift in the regional background of the GOP from an eastern-oriented party to a southern and western brand of conservatism which began the Republican party's trek to today.

Since its beginning, the political party system has been suspect by millions of Americans — beginning with the “father of our country” General George Washington. Two members of his original cabinet for whom he had considerable affection, Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, formed the first two political parties, Democratic-Republicans and Federalists. In his farewell letter published in Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser in Philadelphia on Monday, September 19th, 1796, President Washington asserted that although it's natural for people to be drawn to political parties in a republic, it's vital that such parties should not form along geographical or religious lines. It is also vital that political parties, relying on organization and favor, should be strictly controlled to minimize the jealousies and revenges endemic to a political command structure. 

What Washington called the “political spirit" always serves to distract the public councils and weaken the public administration of established government. He noted that the political spirit inevitably agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms. The political spirit kindles animosities between one party against another which foments riot and insurrection or a revolt against the established government. (Note: These assertions are restated according to the author's understanding and interpretation of President Washington's farewell letter rather than being a direct quote from it.) However one interprets what occurred last January 6th, at the very least it was an intended riot against federal order and authority and was thus seditious.

In proclaiming the death of the GOP I mean no favor toward the Democratic Party! Like its GOP cousins, the Democratic Party is almost always subject to impending potentially fatal division. What saves it, despite its historic divisions, is that no element of the Democratic Party has been in a position to vanquish all other elements of the party. In addition, since Franklin Roosevelt, only John F Kennedy, its martyred president, has been sufficiently strong within the party to affect it's future course. However, even though Lyndon B. Johnson took temporary command to move the party beyond “Camelot” or “The New Frontier,”  Vietnam abruptly ended Johnson’s influence over the party.

On the other hand, Republicans generally endorse their elected chief executive with a zeal that only Democratic president Franklin D. Roosevelt was to enjoy. Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, and even the defeated George H. W. Bush retained the love and respect of their GOP constituency well after their public service was concluded even though Bush suffered considerable damage from the right at the convention that renominated him in 1992. Hence, it's not hard to understand why that party's most recent president, Donald Trump, retains such traditional GOP loyalty. What weakens the Republican Party's appeal is its lack of idealistic principles to which every conventional or moderate future leader might advocate.

When President Trump accepted renomination at the White House last August 27th (which marked former Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson's 112th birthday), the Trump campaign put forth no set of party principles in the form of a political platform. For many, that was all to the good, except that left the party open to the interpretation of being a party of a single man rather than a party of healthy consensus. Hence, with little to offer, Mr. Trump's party is clearly all about Donald John Trump and nothing else! Your financial status, your health, your struggle with a ravaging pandemic and climate change are not the government's business or concern.

Sadly, Mr. Lincoln's party of union, unity and reform has gone by the boards. We're no longer created equal as Mr. Lincoln once insisted. Divided, the new Trumpian party seeks to reign.

That sad reality isn't good for anyone, even the ambitious Democrats. All parties and all elements within parties need challenge and competition. Even more, mere opposition to "liberal Democrats" isn't enough! A newly constituted Republican Party must have answers to climate change, needed health care reforms, and other issues. At present, with perhaps the exception of the antichoice movement, there's nothing meaningful or even  personal about what it offers. 

Ah! This just occurred to me! In order to successfully challenge the Democrats, perhaps the former Republican Party should copy the example just announced by the City of Cleveland and the Cleveland Indians.

Why not call a new Republican Party “The Guardians”?! Sounds pretty good, doesn't it?

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

    

SO LONG ONCE AGAIN, LOUIS — TOO FEW OF US WILL MISS YOU!

By Edwin Cooney

Last Friday, the Cleveland Indians of the American Baseball League announced that after much consideration, they will become the Cleveland Guardians at the close of the 2021 baseball season. Many will be pleased to know that Cleveland, Ohio is choosing a name that's inclusive and protective of the entire community that is symbolized in the structure of the bridge just across the street from their new stadium, Progressive Field.  Many are pleased that baseball will abandon the too long habit of sports teams naming themselves derisively after Native Americans when so many Americans of past eras have feared and loathed and even admired them for their bravery under great odds. 

It all began back in 1897 when the then Cleveland Spiders were in the National League. Suddenly there appeared, seemingly from out of the proverbial blue, an unbelievable rookie outfielder of amazing talent.  

His name was Louis Francis Sockalexis. Louis was a member of the Penobscot Tribe from Old Town, Maine. He was fast, often running the 100 yard dash in 10 seconds. Additionally, he was unusually strong. One story has it that Louis Sockalexis once hit a 600 foot home run during the dead ball era when baseballs were often squishy rather than hard and tightly wound as they are today. It was said that he once threw a baseball from the top of Oak Hill on the Old Town Indian Reservation that struck the smokestack of the Jordan Lumber Mill three quarters of a mile away. Louis Sockalexis was 5 feet 11 inches tall and weighed 185 pounds. He batted left-handed and threw right-handed. His baseball fame lasted almost four months between April 22nd, 1897 into the July Fourth weekend of that year. During that all too short time, "the Chief" (as he was naturally called), 

hit .338, 9 doubles, 8 triples and 3 home runs. It was eventually observed by some of his teammates that Louis simply became too popular too fast for, without warning, it was suddenly all over.

Sunday, July 4th, 1897, Louis, along with many teammates, began celebrating Independence Day accompanied by an old nemesis — the bottle. Three years earlier, he'd been expelled from Notre Dame for drunkenness despite being a star football player. After the weekend, he couldn't or wouldn't stop drinking even after hurting an ankle while trying to sneak out of a third story hotel window which was being guarded by teammates who were determined to protect him against himself.

Louis's injured ankle slowed him down and he began making fielding errors to the extent that he only played two or three more games in 1897. He would only play 21 games in 1898 and a mere 7 in 1899, finally being released by the Spiders. The Spiders would themselves be banished from the National League at the close of 1899 following a season of 20 wins and 134 losses.But there's more!

Also expelled by the National League along with the Spiders at the close of 1899 were the Washington Nationals. Both teams joined the new American League in 1901. The Washington Nationals or “Nats “became the Washington Senators who would be remembered as "first in war, first in peace, and last in the American League.” Meanwhile, the Cleveland Spiders originally became the “Cleveland Naps” after their newly acquired Hall of Fame star second baseman Napoleon Lajoie. By 1914, Nap Lajoie had retired and Cleveland needed a new name. Hence, a local newspaper ran a contest for  Cleveland fans to suggest a new name. The winning entry came from a fan who suggested that the new name be the “Cleveland Indians” after their wonderful 1897 Penobscot Indian star, Louis Francis Sockalexis. Therefore, for the last 106 years, the former Spiders and Naps have been known as the Cleveland Indians. Just five years after becoming the Indians in Louis's name, they won the 1920 World Series and the name “Bill Wambsganss” outshone the name Sockalexis when he made the first and only unassisted triple play in World Series history against the Dodgers. Thirty-three years after 1915, the names of two Black players, Larry Doby and Satchel Paige, became household words in Cleveland, Ohio and all over America as the Indians won the 1948 World Series over the Boston Braves. (Note: Is it significant or merely ironic that the Indians defeated the Braves in a World Series?) 

Things continued downhill for Sockalexis once he was back at home in Old Town, Maine following his 1899 release by the Spiders. His body inevitably thickened and his dress was continuously shabby. He was in and out of jail for vagrancy. He became a regular panhandler rather than a laborer. Finally and inevitably, his body wore out on Christmas Eve of 1913. Born on Tuesday, October 24th, 1871, he was 42 years and exactly two months old when he passed away on Wednesday, December 24th 1913.

Alcoholism, we've finally come to realize, is not a measurement of poor character but a physical reaction to alcohol. Louis's natural gift was brilliant  athletic ability. He is the only player I know of that, 14 or 15 years following his unconditional release, would have a team named after him, however ironically and indirectly!

As the Indians become the Guardians, the irony is that for the second and final time they are saying: Louis, for all eternity farewell!

It has already been observed that by becoming the Cleveland Guardians (inspired by giant Art Deco statues on the city's Hope Memorial Bridge), the final five letters of their new name continue to be “nians.”

Might the spirit of Louis Sockalexis have something to do with that?

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

RAW RHUBARB —THAT'S TRUMPIAN THROUGH AND THROUGH!

By Edwin Cooney

Yes, indeed, raw rhubarb is an acquired taste and I've acquired it. However, unlike 73 million Americans, I refuse to pick my rhubarb from Donald Trump's rhubarb patch.

The beauty of rhubarb is that, in addition to being a fruit, it is often described as a quarrel: "I had a real rhubarb with my lady last night and she beat the hell out of me! POOR ME!”

It was essential that in 2017 I started out giving the newly minted president the benefit of some doubt. True, he was a different sort of man. First, he came from a business rather than from a political background. Second, he came from privilege thus having little taste or even regard for the less than privileged. Third, for millions of Americans he was an anathema to other politicians. Too many Americans, to suit this observer, were ready to "throw the baby out with the bath water!” Thus, as he entered the White House, President Trump, with majorities in both houses of Congress, had a pretty clean slate on which to write. So, the obvious question is: what did he write on that clean slate?

Not all of what he wrote was negative. After all, he had his party's conservative agenda to fulfill and he did that within months by introducing tax cuts to stimulate a rather sluggish economy. Even his proposal to do away with Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act was well within the domain of his presidential and political prerogative. The same was true of his proposal to build a wall that he swore Mexico would pay for. However, the tone of his administration was “rhubarbish” from the very outset. His insistence that foreigners, Muslims and, certainly, socialists and most communists (Vladimir Putin excepted) were an anathema to the future well being  of the American people.

President Trump's obvious enjoyment of confrontation came from his earliest experiences in business and finance. For too long, as the president and his closest advisors believed, government was too much about politics and, although he avoided Calvin Coolidge’s assertion that "the business of America is business," there was little doubt that he believed exactly that. (Note: many Americans since FDR's day had hoped and prayed for a strictly business oriented administration.) He demanded from Congress precisely what he wanted.

There was no such thing as there once was, the existence of a "loyal opposition.” It's true that some Democrats between election day of 2016 and 2017 Inauguration Day questioned the validity of Mr. Trump's election, but there was nothing new in that. After all, following the 1876 election of Rutherford B. Hayes, the 1960 election of John F. Kennedy, and most certainly the contested 2000 election of George W. Bush, there had been widely based wonderment of the legitimacy of those elections. It has even been speculated that had Hillary Clinton been elected over Mr. Trump, the Trump people were ready to proclaim the election results "a hoax" and immediately proceed with the help of Fox News and other sources to establish an election bid in 2020.

As uncomfortable as it is to assert, Mr. Trump's ongoing rhubarb (or, if you prefer, quarrelsomeness) prospers because we've become a quarrelsome people. We seek our own facts on topics we're barely educated enough to understand. People's religious or nonreligious orientations are dismissed as secular, socialist, and fundamentally both suspect and evil. This all became apparent even before the occurrence of January 6th.

Politicians, from FDR through Joe Biden, in one way or another, have used fear to advance their respective causes because a free peoples' hopes and dreams are inevitably the stuff of alternatives and choices at the ballot box. This natural reality, however, has always been accompanied by an expectation that the wishes of the voting majority ought to prevail until the next election.

As we approach 2022, what seems to matter to most Republicans is the ultimate return of Donald Trump to the White House. This seems to be taking place despite the legitimate ambitions of other possible Republican candidates named Pence, Pompeo, and, perhaps, even Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. (When was the last time a former vice president and a former secretary of state were available for either party’s preference?)  This observation is by no means anti-conservative because Pence, Pompeo and DeSantis all regard themselves as rock-ribbed conservatives.

The reality, however, is that we're currently embedded in a national rhubarb which is flavoring our future — largely due to the courtesy of Donald Trump. It's hard not to worry that we're headed for a government of, by and for Donald Trump.

Taste for that outcome is in too many American mouths to suit me! The former president's rhetoric is clearly more divisive than uniting. Saddest of all, Mr. Trump's rhubarb sourness appears to be deliberately designed toward disunity and political domination, more than has anyone's rhetoric since that of Confederate President Jefferson Davis. No nation's peace and prosperity has ever thrived on disunity — and that includes the The United States of America! 

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

PAST PRESIDENTIAL FLAVORS

By Edwin Cooney

The public watches every administration at least temporarily haunted by an impression of what I'm calling a “flavor.” (Someone somewhere might substitute the word “stink” for “flavor” but I'm too genteel to use a word like stink. I wonder if anyone will actually buy my gentility!)

Andrew Jackson left office on Saturday, March 4th, 1837 and for the better part of the next 25 years Old Hickory and what he would do or not do was anticipated by the Democratic Party. It helped to elect Martin Van Buren, James K. Polk, Franklin Pierce and, finally, James Buchanan. When President Abraham Lincoln took his final breath at 7:22 a.m. on April 15th, 1865, the era during which almost anything really significant happened was in his name whether he would have approved of it or not. Following the dreadful term of Lincoln's vice president Andrew Johnson, Grover Cleveland would be the only Democrat to occupy 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue between 1869 and 1913, but even Cleveland had to run twice to get a second term. As for Woodrow Wilson who took office in 1913, although he was more highly polished and much better educated than Andrew Johnson, Wilson was every bit as racist and an unreconstructed southerner.

Teddy Roosevelt's flavor was one of expectation of progressive politics when he left the presidency and headed for Africa to do some big game hunting in 1909. William Howard Taft had some anti-trust success that was soured by a lack of anticipated progressivism. Woodrow Wilson left the presidency on March 4th, 1921 an internationalist rather than merely an unreconstructed racist southerner. It wasn't until that future war that Wilson had warned against that American voters realized that he was right and they were wrong. However, for twelve long years after "Woody Wilson,” everything from Democrats and progressive Republicans had the Wilson “odor” and was doomed for failure at the pens of Harding, Coolidge and Hoover. Warren Harding was simply incompetent by his own admission. Calvin Coolidge left office well regarded, but he was steeped in the government flavor which brought about the Great Depression. Herbert Hoover could never grasp the people's genuine need for government assistance. Thus his administration left a hungry and dry taste in most people's mouths.

When FDR, a sick, crippled and spent old man at age 63 who seemed to have been president forever died on Thursday, April 12th, 1945, the difference he'd made in so many lives flavored the Democratic Party and even the government as useful tools of and for the people. It lasted to the end of LBJ's turbulent administration on January 20th, 1969.

Truman's flavor was political cronyism and military stalemate in Korea. After all, America was used to winning its wars. Harry Truman's flavor changed only with the gradual realization of the stability of his foreign policy ventures.

Ike's flavor was government despite Republican dogma. Supported largely by Eastern progressives named Tom Dewey, Henry Cabot Lodge and Hugh  Scott, he spent billions of taxpayer dollars on his highway system and was open to limited civil rights proposals as passed in Congress by LBJ and supported by the up-and-coming Kennedys. JFK's flavor was "what could have been and seemingly nearly was” when he was assassinated on Friday, November 22nd, 1963 in Dallas, Texas. LBJ's intention was to leave a "Great Society" energized by liberty for all and regulated by a benevolent government in the FDR tradition, but failure in Vietnam and the turbulence of civil rights issues left his administration stale in taste and emotionally exhausted by its "credibility gap."

President Nixon's flavor, despite our arrival on the moon, the birth of the Environmental Protection Agency, the opening of Communist China, and the close of our involvement in Vietnam, was the flavor of Watergate and all it implied. Thus Gerald Ford's administration ended with a reputation of cronyism because Ford had pardoned his friend Richard Nixon.

Jimmy Carter's real flavor is just now coming into fashion. When he was defeated, his failure was flavored by an economy in full free-fall, a foreign policy seemingly indecisive and defeatist. Carter was a well-intentioned president above his head to the extent that, at least during the 1984 and 1988 Democratic conventions, delegates more than less muted their genuine affection for him. President George H. W. Bush's flavor, despite some solid achievements, was that he wasn't really “one of us” because he couldn't appreciate the significance of a grocery store barcode. Additionally, his vice president, Dan Quayle spelled the word “potato” with an “e” --so, back they went to the ranch and the golf course where they functioned better for all of us!

"Slick Willie" was William Jefferson Clinton’s ultimate flavor and it sticks to him this very day despite his obvious smarts and crowd appeal. George W. Bush hung on tight to the politically potent coattail of Evangelical Christianity, free market economic dogma, but his lies about Iraq's expanding weapons of mass destruction and the less than successful Iraq war caught up with him when the economy collapsed.

President Barack Obama was personally more popular than the performance of his administration when it constitutionally gave way to Donald Trump on Friday, January 20th, 2017. Warm and genuine, his rhetoric, like his Affordable Care Act, couldn’t quite overcome his lack of pure political skills. Thus, he was forced to rule more by executive order than by domination of Congress.

I've given you all of these presidential administration flavors and will present you with my taste of Donald Trump's flavor when we meet again next week.

Please stay tuned!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY

HAPPY 245TH BIRTHDAY, UNCLE SAM!

By Edwin Cooney

Tell me, how many other people do you know who became 245 years old this weekend? Did you wish him a happy birthday, and if you did, was it a wish, or a thought? Now if you think this is mere trivia and therefore doesn't matter, I can take you back to a time when one of America's most powerful and  important men, J. Edgar Hoover, insisted that "a wish is a father to a thought.” 

It was March of 1972 and one of the raging issues aside from the Vietnam War and the bussing of school children, especially amongst hungry liberal Democrats, was how long J. Edgar Hoover would hold onto his mighty office of Director of the FBI. One day, a CBS news reporter actually was able to confront Director Hoover, microphone in hand. The conversation went something like this: "Mr. Hoover, is it possible that you'll soon retire as FBI Director?" Director Hoover: "The wish is father to the thought!” Reporter: “What's that again?” Mr. Hoover: "The wish is father to the thought!" Reporter: "What does that mean?" Mr. Hoover: "Just exactly what I just said!" The interview was over. A little less than two months later, on Tuesday, May 2nd, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, after 48 years as FBI Chief, was dead of a heart attack at age 77.

Ever since that March day, I've wondered if a wish really and truly is father to a thought! So, if I take time out of my day of beer swilling, hotdog munching, sweet corn gnawing, and baseball game absorbing to wish Uncle Sam a happy 245th birthday, is my wish a "father to a further thought” or can it stand on its own?

Even more to the point in this age of fading national unity, what do I have to think and believe in order for my "happy birthday" wish to Uncle Sam to ring true? Must I believe that Joe Biden was corruptly elected president last November? Must I be a conformist or am I free to be a dissident? 

Like individuals, nations have birthdays that range from so-so to happy to very memorable! America's birth on July 4th, 1776 which was a Thursday, actually occurred two days earlier on Tuesday, July 2nd in the wake of Delaware delegate Caesar Rodney’s frantic and dramatic ride from his farm in Delaware to cast Delaware's vote for independence. “Caesar Rodney's ride for freedom” became official the instant he cast his vote that Tuesday, July 2nd, 1776. However, the Declaration of Independence became official the day that historic document was published which was the fourth of July, two days later. Hence, one might label America's actual birthday as both struggling and happy. After all, during the years between 1776 and 1781 (when Lord Cornwallis surrendered to General George Washington at Yorktown, Maryland), its independence hung in the balance.

Metaphorically, most nations are given birth by the people who populate, nurture, defend and ultimately love them. Unlike those who give them birth, they only age when the generations who inherit their gifts fail to meet their ongoing needs or to the extent their people are unable to protect them from domination by their sister nations.

Just as individuals endure birthdays that are not always happy, the same is true of nations, even nations as great as the United States of America. Here are some examples: During the War of 1812, from Saturday, July 4th, 1812 through Monday, July, 4th, 1814, the United States saw much military humiliation. On Tuesday, July 2nd, 1861, President Abraham Lincoln suspended the privilege of habeas corpus throughout the Union due to the immediate threat of Confederate sympathizers during the Civil War. (Note: Habeas corpus is the right of those imprisoned to appear for a speedy trial following their arrest.) July 4ths during World War II were certainly less than happy American birthdays. I'm guessing that in view of the successful Normandy Invasion, Tuesday, July 4th, 1944 was a hopeful American birthday celebration. As for a few happy American birthdays, perhaps Saturday, July 4th, 1801, America's 25th anniversary, was happy since Thomas Jefferson, one of our major founders, was president. It's possible that Wednesday, July 4th, 1804 was a happy birthday because the Louisiana Purchase which vastly increased American territory as far west as the Pacific had been finalized and was about to be explored by Lewis and Clark. I'd guess that Monday, July 4th, 1921 was happy because by then women had the right to vote and, on that very day, President Warren Harding signed our peace treaty with Germany — between two golf games. (Note: since the Senate had rejected Woodrow Wilson's peace treaty containing the League of Nations, State Secretary Charles Evans Hughes negotiated a brand new treaty with Germany to officially end World War I for the American people. According to one Harding biographer, Harding signed the new treaty at New Jersey Senator Tom Freilinghuysen's dining room table while putting on fresh golfing clothes.)

Just as you and I are ultimately responsible for our happy birthdays, so are nations! People inevitably age, but nations only age when they won't agree to suspend some of their preconceptions which are necessary to bring about national unity and that ultimately spell domestic peace and equity.

Hence, happy 245th birthday Uncle Sam! It may not be easy this year to be happy, but we ought to at least be working on our national happiness to honor your birthday this weekend!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY