AUTUMNAL THOUGHTS OF ROGER WILLIAMS

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

AUTUMN LEAVES

As I write I am looking out at our autumn leaves. Yesterday I took a drive up into New Hampshire and marveled at how quickly the bright colors were appearing. It is a great season.

One of my favorite songs is Autumn Leaves. 

I especially like to hear it on the piano.

When I first heard it was when the famous pianist Roger Williams was playing it.  I am betting a lot of my readers also heard his rendition of Autumn Leaves “back in the day!”

Williams also played a wonderful rendition of Lara’s Theme from the movie Dr. Zhivago.  Again, a great hit for those of us listening to piano music in the 60’s and 70’s.

Both of these songs really did not need words! They were outstanding in instrumental versions.

Roger Williams died this month. Perhaps it is “chance” that he died in the autumn season but I find something surreal about it. Also, it seems somewhat fitting that he should take his exit in the autumn.

In the late 1960’s I met Roger Williams in Pittsburgh, PA. Richard Nixon was a candidate for president and Roger Williams was the entertainment for the night. The event was held in Pittsburgh’s Civic Arena, probably more known for it’s retractable roof and as the home of the Pittsburgh Penguins. But in my memory it was the night I first heard Roger Williams play the piano.

I was politically active in those days and I had a pass that permitted me to go backstage. As I hurried back after the performance, with expectations of meeting Richard Nixon and other political notables, the only person I found was Roger Williams. He was open and friendly and kindly signed a piece of paper that I took home and taped to an album I owned of his work. It was as if all the important people had rushed off to important engagements and Roger was left behind. Today I wonder if Roger was maybe the most important person present that night…even though we didn’t realize it!

Although I never saw him again, I am aware that he played for presidents and kings, politicians, large audiences in major concert halls and he provided a great deal of dance and “making out” music for college students and young adults!

I had a chance encounter.

It was memorable and meaningful. Imagine how many chance encounters Mr. Williams must have had with people throughout his storied and successful career. And he must have known how much his music meant over the years.

Do yourself a favor. Put on a CD of Autumn Leaves and sit back and remember those days. That music is as hummable, memorable and as classic today as it was then.

Roger Williams.

A class act.

RIP

A DECADE TOO LONG

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

A DECADE TOO LONG

We have now experienced the longest war in American History.

The Afghanistan mess!

Is it a war? 

Did Congress declare it a war?

Do Americans think of it as a “real war?”

Will the world be changed in broad positive ways as was the case at the end of WWI and WWII?

What in the world are we doing in that poppy growing, bribe taking, historically corruptible part of the world?

Osama bin Laden wasn’t there. He was in Pakistan. Our allies and friends, the Pakistanis clearly knew he was in their country. So surely our costly intelligence gathering community must have known we would not find him in Afghanistan.

The question remains: exactly what are we doing in Afghanistan?

More importantly, should we be sacrificing American treasure, the lives of young men and women, tax dollars needed urgently here at home, in Afghanistan?

Where is the national interest? What about Afghanistan warrants the horrific expenditure in dollars and lives?

There is no “winning” in Afghanistan. For those of you who remember that we did not “win” in Vietnam, surely you understand that even the vaunted Russians could not defeat the Afghan enemy.

Afghanistan has problems. The largest seems to be the Taliban. Americans do not like the Taliban. It appears lots of people in Afghanistan continue to like the Taliban. If that were not the case, we would not be in year ten of trying to defeat the Taliban.

Personally, I do not like Texas. I tried to like Texas. I went to Austin, Houston, Dallas and San Antonio. I just do not like it down there. To me it is just a group of people with big hats and no cows.

I didn’t like the way Lyndon Johnson of the Texas State Teacher’s College looked down at his cabinet because they had been educated, mostly, in New England.

I didn’t like George W. Bush’s swagger, the one he explained as “the way we walk in Texas.”

I don’t like the climate, the lay of the land, or the braggadocio that I find there.

So did I declare war on Texas? Did I want to fight Texans without declaring war? Did I think for one minute I would ally myself with some Texans who actually owned cows and ranches to rid the state of those who did not?

Nope.

I just don’t go there. My decision rid me of the problem and did not cost me one dime. It was simply common sense.

So I want to suggest to the President of The United States and all those who work for him and all those who sit in Congress that we just declare victory in Afghanistan and bring all our troops home.

 And then we should have the Secretary of State declare that no one can get a visa to visit Pakistan. That should solve the problem. It stops the loss of American life and the expenditure of American dollars.

It is not my intention to be simplistic or trite. I understand the responsibilities of world power. I identify with the plight of the downtrodden. It hurts me deeply to consider the American lives that have been lost on Afghan soil or to contemplate those that will be lost in the future of this mad adventure.

It is time to put an end to the American involvement in Afghanistan.

Does anybody currently holding important office in Washington, DC understand world history?

Not since the times of Attila the Hun and Genghis Kahn has anyone even come close to winning an engagement like the one in which we are currently involved.

The distance is too far, the historical record too clear, the cost too dear, the payoff too little and the goal too hazy for us to go one more mile down this road.

For further information:  jacksonblair@gmail.com

Have I Got a Vacation For You !

Notes of Concern…

                               …Jackson Blair

Have I Got a Vacation Location for You !

As we begin to stare into the face of fall, and with anticipation of a cold and snowy winter, people begin to think of vacations in the sun. Folks dream of Florida,  the Caribbean and Hawaii. Young people dream of spring break in Fort Lauderdale, or at least they once did.

Well, this week I learned that taking a hike in a war ravaged country like Iraq is right up there on top of the list for the younger set. No Fort Lauderdale for those youngsters.

A great deal of planning, not to mention consultation with parents, must have gone into putting together a way for young American citizens without military or government connections or influence to actually travel to a war zone and just go out for a walk.

I can understand their eagerness to see the countryside. Everybody knows Iraq used to be beautiful. Remember those scenes of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and tributaries when Cleopatra was wooing old Marc Anthony.

But I digress.

So off into the woods of Iraq go our dauntless three American young people. Evidently they went without any sort of map, or an out of date map, typical of kids these days, as they somehow stepped over some sort of unmarked boundary and ended up in Persia. Well, actually they ended up in Iran but I am assuming they used an old map when that country was known as Persia. That would explain a lot!

Their desire to get out of Iraq would be understandable.

Their desire to get into Iran, arguably a worse place for anyone with an American passport, defies all logic.

So the Iranians grabbed them and let the world know they had captured three American spies. Gee how does one jump from finding three hikers/campers to a charge of espionage? One would expect that perhaps the Iranians found it hard to believe that three young Americans decided to take a walk in Iraq and accidentally ended up in Iran without some sort of government encouragement or help. You know those Iranians. They have such vivid imaginations.

Years later, all three are now free thanks to the generosity of the government of Oman that decided, just out of the kindness of their hearts, to pony up $1.5 million in bail. (Note: the Congressional Research Service wrote last month commenting on US-Omani relations:

“The stakes for the Administration and Congress in Oman’s stability are considerable. A long-time U.S. ally in the Persian Gulf, Oman has allowed U.S. access to its military facilities for virtually every U.S. military operation in and around the Gulf since 1980, despite the sensitivities in Oman about a U.S. military presence there.” )

Gee, you gotta hand it to those Omanis. And they didn’t even mention previous and future foreign aid from the U.S.

So our government demonstrated again that we do not pay any sort of ransom for any body.

No sir.

The Omanis demonstrated that they could be counted on in a pinch.

Yes sir.

The Iranians demonstrated they could score a cool $1.5 million to use on some “people oriented” national project, say like making nuclear bombs to throw at the Israelis.

And some of us wonder why the CIA continues to recruit on college campuses in the good old “U.S. of A.”

How stupid is that?

For further information:  jacksonblair@gmail.com