Notes of Concern...
...Jack Blair
The President and The Reverend
One of the most surprising friendships these days is the one between Barack Obama, President of The United States of America and the Reverend Al Sharpton. Frankly, it defies the imagination.
On the one hand we have a well educated, very bright and accomplished black man who has not been tainted with scandal, does not do nefarious deeds, and has a lovely family life.
On that famous “other hand” we have a very slimy, ambulance chasing, rabble rousing instigator who is not worthy to carry the shoes of true civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King, Congressman John Lewis, Ambassador Andrew Young and so many other honest, hard working good people throughout the tough years when equality was not freely available and had to be won.
I had not heard of Reverend Al Sharpton until moving to the New York City area for my work. It was at the time of what is now known as the Tawana Brawley affair. I know a lot of my readers may not have heard of this or read about it so I want to offer this brief explanation from Wikipedia:
“Tawana Brawley Attorneys Alton H. Maddox and C. Vernon Mason joined Sharpton in support of Brawley. A grand jury was convened; after seven months of examining police and medical records, the jury found "overwhelming evidence" that Brawley had fabricated her story. Sharpton, Maddox, and Mason had accused the Dutchess County prosecutor, Steven Pagones, of racism and of being one of the perpetrators of the alleged abduction and rape. The three were successfully sued for defamation, and were ordered to pay $345,000 in damages, with the jury finding Sharpton liable for making seven defamatory statements about Pagones, Maddox for two, and Mason for one. Sharpton refused to pay his share of the damages; it was later paid by a number of black business leaders including Johnnie Cochran.”
Al Sharpton and his pals ruined the careers of some very good men. They used Tawana Brawley to accuse, to condemn, and to incite. What she claimed- never happened. It was race baiting at its worst. Any American who did not see this affair, using a young teenager to destroy the careers of attorneys and law enforcement officers as anything but slimey and tawdry had to have been working from another agenda.
Now Al Sharpton wears a mantle of dignity. It started with his calling himself Reverend. The news reports still refer to him as Reverend Al Sharpton. He freely uses that title to suggest he is an honest, bible believing, religious leader and friend. My readers might be interested to know that Reverend Al Sharpton was licensed and ordained a Pentecostal minister by Bishop F.D. Washington at the age of nine. We are not talking here about a man who studied through various colleges and universities and learned at the feet of serious teachers of religion, like Dr. Martin Luther King. We are talking about a kid of 9-10 just being named a minister for reasons totally unknown to this writer. The fact that the press never mentions this is an indictment of them.
This “Reverend” has offered some observations over the years that should call into question why any serious person would give him the time of day. They are too numerous to mention but I will share a few of his quotes with you (you can find footnotes on the Wikipedia page) if you wish to read more:
On the subject of Jews: "If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house."
On the subject of Mormons "As for the one Mormon running for office, those who really believe in God will defeat him anyways, so don't worry about that; that's a temporary situation."
On the subject of homosexuals "White folks was in caves while we was building empires.... We taught philosophy and astrology and mathematics before Socrates and them Greek homos ever got around to it."
Well, you get my drift. There is a treasure trove of these kind of Sharpton remarks out there if you care to search for them. They speak volumes as to his intellect, his morals and his contributions to civil life in America.
The Reverend Sharpton obviously can deliver votes. And as we know, politicians make strange bedfellows. From the outside, one could understand candidate Obama hoping to win a Sharpton endorsement. Many great presidents, and almost all candidates, do pander a bit to people with whom they would not usually associate.
I understand that. But I also understand when the election is over, and there are no future elections to worry about, there is no need to play in that kind of cesspool any longer.
That being said, President Obama invited the Reverend Sharpton to Mrs. Obama’s 50th birthday party at The White House. One would assume that was a very sought after invitation so one could reasonably assume the Obamas actually do like Reverend Sharpton and include him in their small, family events.
This was an eye-opener for me.
But an even greater surprise was to find the Reverend Sharpton invited to The White House Dinner for the President of France. I know how the White House Social Office works. They are diligent in finding guests with some relationship to the visiting dignitary. In this case, the CEOs of American companies doing business with the French, a smattering of high level Senators and Representatives, an Ambassador or two, movie stars that the French government might have identified as people the French President wanted to meet. Believe me, seats at formal White House State dinners are hard to come by.
But the Reverend Al had a seat, along with his current girlfriend and they were at the table next to the table headed by President Obama.
I find it personally disgraceful that a figure like Al Sharpton would be at either of these events.
Surely there are black leaders more deserving.
Surely their are black legislators and Ambassadors that should have had that seat.
So I leave it to my readers: why would the President of The United States want to break bread with a guy like Al Sharpton.
But then I am reminded of the President’s long association with the controversial Reverend Jeremiah Wright, the reverend who almost brought down his campaign for president.
Thursday, April 24, 2014
Tuesday, April 8, 2014
Imperial Presidencies
Notes of Concern....
...Jack Blair
Imperial Presidencies
For a long time American presidents modeled themselves on George Washington. One of the first things George did was tell the “Founders” he did not want to be a king. From that point on everything he did helped define what a president was supposed to do.
In more recent history presidents have favored acting like Kings. We have all the pomp and circumstance in entertaining at The White House. The costs of entertaining often seem like the exceed the basic costs of governing.
Barack Obama did not start this trend but he has happily participated in extending it. And if the numbers are to believed he has extended the imperial presidency considerably.
We do not need this kind of stuff.
Hopefully, one day we will have a President that reverses this trend.
DARN!
President Obama went to Brussels, and he did not take me.
I have been to Brussels, but I think doing Brussels with the Prez would probably beat the experience of traveling there on my own.
I held out hope until the last minute when he ordered “wheels up” on Air Force One, and I wasn’t among the passengers.
It seemed to me that since he was taking 900 people with him, in light of all those emails and letters I received during his presidential campaign, surely I would be on the list.
Well, I have comforted myself in the knowledge that his travel group, at 900 persons, would probably have not given the two of us much personal time. So, what the heck!
It was pretty decent of him to also take 45 vehicles and three planes. He doesn’t come up short when he is planning a trip. Still, my math shows that each of the 45 cars is going to need to carry 20 people. Well, in fairness, I don’t think the Prez is gonna have 20 in his car. He will ride with a driver and an agent. So actually, the other 44 cars are gonna be pretty full.
Those Belgians will think the circus has come to town. I shouldn’t go there, but with that lead-in, I have to mention that packing clowns into small cars has always been a show-stopper at the circus.
Let's see how it plays in Europe.
Now the three plane thing will probably work out pretty well. The Prez will get about 1/3 of Air Force One for himself. His nearest and dearest will take up the other 2/3. Now my readers are a pretty smart group and are probably thinking the other two planes will handle the remaining 800 or so people.
Wrong!
Got you there!
You forgot that the 45 cars have to be transported on one of the planes. So unless people are going to sit in car seats in the plane carrying the cars, the second plane is going to be filled to the overhead luggage bins.
I suppose in some dark and dank room in the budget office, there is a guy in a green eyeshade who could tell us what this trip is going to cost the American taxpayer. But unless he is being recorded by the NSA, we will never know.
I don’t think even Edward Snowden knows.
What we do know is that the Belgians are putting up 10 million Euros to help protect our guy and his cast of 900. With the current exchange rate. that means our Belgian friends are coughing up millions of US dollars.
Now with the cost to the US, which clearly will be larger than the Belgian millions added to the cost to the cost of the trip, I expect that total could keep a small country fed for some time.
But in the big picture, it is important for 900 of our guys to meet up with some similar number of other guys so we can size up the enemy. Whoops, that is so we can size up our friends. Whoops, why do we need to do that?
The answer to that is way above my pay grade as a U.S. Citizen and voter.
But if I were the Prez, here is what I would do.
I would get up in my White House quarters and ring for the steward at and ask for a plate of Eggs Benedict. Since I would soon be talking to my counterpart in Belgium, I might say hold the home fries and bring me some Pommes Frites with a dollop of mayo. Put the Pommes Frites in a paper cone when you serve them.
They serve those things all over Brussels. It could help get me in the mood for the chat.
After my valet laid out my suit and I was dressed and ready, I would walk over to The West Wing, down the stairs to the Situation Room, and give the signal.
The head of Belgium would be on the screen. I would be on the screen. Other world leaders would be on the screen.
The sound system would be perfect.
The NSA would be spying on us so we wouldn’t need a secretary to take minutes.
And we could just chat as long as we wanted. We would probably each have a Cabinet Officer or two in the room and maybe a general or two depending on what we were discussing.
End result: o millions of tax dollars saved
o acknowledgement that since Al Gore invented the internet we actually
don’t need to travel.
o 889 people who got to stay home with their families
o 44 cars that don’t need to be gassed up
o thousands of Belgians whose regular day will not be screwed up
by presidential motorcades of 44 cars.
o not a chance of anyone getting assassinated
o the meeting would be over in time to work in a round of golf because
the wife is over in China with the kids and the mother-in-law
o Boys Night Out!
Game-Set-Match!
You have to admit, this idea has potential.
...Jack Blair
Imperial Presidencies
For a long time American presidents modeled themselves on George Washington. One of the first things George did was tell the “Founders” he did not want to be a king. From that point on everything he did helped define what a president was supposed to do.
In more recent history presidents have favored acting like Kings. We have all the pomp and circumstance in entertaining at The White House. The costs of entertaining often seem like the exceed the basic costs of governing.
Barack Obama did not start this trend but he has happily participated in extending it. And if the numbers are to believed he has extended the imperial presidency considerably.
We do not need this kind of stuff.
Hopefully, one day we will have a President that reverses this trend.
DARN!
President Obama went to Brussels, and he did not take me.
I have been to Brussels, but I think doing Brussels with the Prez would probably beat the experience of traveling there on my own.
I held out hope until the last minute when he ordered “wheels up” on Air Force One, and I wasn’t among the passengers.
It seemed to me that since he was taking 900 people with him, in light of all those emails and letters I received during his presidential campaign, surely I would be on the list.
Well, I have comforted myself in the knowledge that his travel group, at 900 persons, would probably have not given the two of us much personal time. So, what the heck!
It was pretty decent of him to also take 45 vehicles and three planes. He doesn’t come up short when he is planning a trip. Still, my math shows that each of the 45 cars is going to need to carry 20 people. Well, in fairness, I don’t think the Prez is gonna have 20 in his car. He will ride with a driver and an agent. So actually, the other 44 cars are gonna be pretty full.
Those Belgians will think the circus has come to town. I shouldn’t go there, but with that lead-in, I have to mention that packing clowns into small cars has always been a show-stopper at the circus.
Let's see how it plays in Europe.
Now the three plane thing will probably work out pretty well. The Prez will get about 1/3 of Air Force One for himself. His nearest and dearest will take up the other 2/3. Now my readers are a pretty smart group and are probably thinking the other two planes will handle the remaining 800 or so people.
Wrong!
Got you there!
You forgot that the 45 cars have to be transported on one of the planes. So unless people are going to sit in car seats in the plane carrying the cars, the second plane is going to be filled to the overhead luggage bins.
I suppose in some dark and dank room in the budget office, there is a guy in a green eyeshade who could tell us what this trip is going to cost the American taxpayer. But unless he is being recorded by the NSA, we will never know.
I don’t think even Edward Snowden knows.
What we do know is that the Belgians are putting up 10 million Euros to help protect our guy and his cast of 900. With the current exchange rate. that means our Belgian friends are coughing up millions of US dollars.
Now with the cost to the US, which clearly will be larger than the Belgian millions added to the cost to the cost of the trip, I expect that total could keep a small country fed for some time.
But in the big picture, it is important for 900 of our guys to meet up with some similar number of other guys so we can size up the enemy. Whoops, that is so we can size up our friends. Whoops, why do we need to do that?
The answer to that is way above my pay grade as a U.S. Citizen and voter.
But if I were the Prez, here is what I would do.
I would get up in my White House quarters and ring for the steward at and ask for a plate of Eggs Benedict. Since I would soon be talking to my counterpart in Belgium, I might say hold the home fries and bring me some Pommes Frites with a dollop of mayo. Put the Pommes Frites in a paper cone when you serve them.
They serve those things all over Brussels. It could help get me in the mood for the chat.
After my valet laid out my suit and I was dressed and ready, I would walk over to The West Wing, down the stairs to the Situation Room, and give the signal.
The head of Belgium would be on the screen. I would be on the screen. Other world leaders would be on the screen.
The sound system would be perfect.
The NSA would be spying on us so we wouldn’t need a secretary to take minutes.
And we could just chat as long as we wanted. We would probably each have a Cabinet Officer or two in the room and maybe a general or two depending on what we were discussing.
End result: o millions of tax dollars saved
o acknowledgement that since Al Gore invented the internet we actually
don’t need to travel.
o 889 people who got to stay home with their families
o 44 cars that don’t need to be gassed up
o thousands of Belgians whose regular day will not be screwed up
by presidential motorcades of 44 cars.
o not a chance of anyone getting assassinated
o the meeting would be over in time to work in a round of golf because
the wife is over in China with the kids and the mother-in-law
o Boys Night Out!
Game-Set-Match!
You have to admit, this idea has potential.
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Sticks & Stones
Notes of Concern...
.....Jack Blair
STICKS & STONES
When I was a youngster and we were taunted by others we would say “sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me!”
That was then.
This is now.
The words “coffee table” cause fear to run right up my spine. Those words bring memories of hurt and agony and fear. Then they combine with embarrassment, the kind that starts out slowly and just creeps through my entire being.
Recently, while vacationing and staying in a friend’s guest room I heard the bathroom “calling” me. This is not really “hearing” as much as “feeling” as my ears don’t work very well, and they certainly do not at night when the hearing aids are on the nightstand.
I answer the call. I climbed out of bed and headed toward the little night light my host had been kind enough to leave on over the sink. Straight ahead, toward the light. No problem.
Then it was time for the return trip.
In this instance, you should feel free to think of the word “trip” as both a noun and a verb. We all like to make the most use of words, right?
It only occurred to me afterward, a long time afterward because not much occurred to me during, that my body heading away from the light blocked the light from showing me the true path back to bed. Essentially, I was walking into a very black cave of a room.
That is when, with my body in full forward movement, a coffee table jumped out and hit me at knee level. I fell head first into the coffee table. My head was certainly “first” because it smacked the end of the table cutting my face in three places and doing a version of the Tango on my left eye.
The force of the fall caused me then to roll off the coffee table and onto the floor, banging up my right shoulder and rib cage.
Things get a little foggy here.
I am wondering how I could have not wakened my wife with my fall.
My wife says she asked me if I had fallen. She says I responded yes.
I have no recollection of that conversation.
I am thinking, boy, she sure is hard asleep.
She says she asked me if I would like her to help me get up.
She says I said, "Leave me alone!”
I have no recollection of that conversation.
She says that ticked her off, and she just went back to sleep to let me deal with my own problem, the ingrate that I had seemed.
I steamed that I could be dying there on the floor and was getting no help from my wife.
I am pretty sure I stayed down for the count, but I did finally awaken and pull myself up to a standing position. I went back toward the light, the bathroom, and my face was covered with blood.
Now I was really not having good thoughts about my wife.
As is usually the case, it was much less bad than it looked. Blood had made streams from my three cuts, and my face looked like a school map showing all the major rivers, but in red. I washed off my face, determined I had just three small cuts, and went back to bed...giving the coffee table wide berth. I hugged the walls of that bedroom the way our dogs hugged the outside walls of the house after we put in the electric fence!
I remember my last thought before falling asleep: who puts a coffee table at the end of a bed?
The next morning my face and left eye socket looked like the painting Monet did of the colorful flowers in Giverny, France. In fact, my face and eye looked like the palette he probably used, the one with all those little dabs of color into which he could dip his brush.
In the light of day I got a good look at that coffee table, you know, the one at the foot of the bed, the one down low where it can get a good contact with a guy’s knees in the dark, the one that had a clean enough surface to allow a fellow to slide right off onto the floor.
Not a scratch! Nada. None.
You would never have known we even had an encounter.
Days of icing my eye finally brought the swelling down.
Days of icing my shoulder finally lessened the pain.
It took more days for me to be able to breathe deeply without getting a pain in my chest.
Since this happened on the first night of our vacation, I had many opportunities to expand and broaden the story I told as I was asked by everyone I met, “What happened to you?”
This was another teaching opportunity.
So I took it.
I told everyone not to put a coffee table at the end of their bed.
Coffee tables go in front of sofas.
One sits behind a coffee table and drinks a cup of coffee and chooses little snacky things.
Coffee tables do not hid around in darkened rooms waiting to preparing to dish out to humans a lot of hurt.
Sticks and stones may break my bones...but believe me coffee tables are something else to watch out for.
And while words will never hurt me, I am still not buying my wife’s version of events.
.....Jack Blair
STICKS & STONES
When I was a youngster and we were taunted by others we would say “sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me!”
That was then.
This is now.
The words “coffee table” cause fear to run right up my spine. Those words bring memories of hurt and agony and fear. Then they combine with embarrassment, the kind that starts out slowly and just creeps through my entire being.
Recently, while vacationing and staying in a friend’s guest room I heard the bathroom “calling” me. This is not really “hearing” as much as “feeling” as my ears don’t work very well, and they certainly do not at night when the hearing aids are on the nightstand.
I answer the call. I climbed out of bed and headed toward the little night light my host had been kind enough to leave on over the sink. Straight ahead, toward the light. No problem.
Then it was time for the return trip.
In this instance, you should feel free to think of the word “trip” as both a noun and a verb. We all like to make the most use of words, right?
It only occurred to me afterward, a long time afterward because not much occurred to me during, that my body heading away from the light blocked the light from showing me the true path back to bed. Essentially, I was walking into a very black cave of a room.
That is when, with my body in full forward movement, a coffee table jumped out and hit me at knee level. I fell head first into the coffee table. My head was certainly “first” because it smacked the end of the table cutting my face in three places and doing a version of the Tango on my left eye.
The force of the fall caused me then to roll off the coffee table and onto the floor, banging up my right shoulder and rib cage.
Things get a little foggy here.
I am wondering how I could have not wakened my wife with my fall.
My wife says she asked me if I had fallen. She says I responded yes.
I have no recollection of that conversation.
I am thinking, boy, she sure is hard asleep.
She says she asked me if I would like her to help me get up.
She says I said, "Leave me alone!”
I have no recollection of that conversation.
She says that ticked her off, and she just went back to sleep to let me deal with my own problem, the ingrate that I had seemed.
I steamed that I could be dying there on the floor and was getting no help from my wife.
I am pretty sure I stayed down for the count, but I did finally awaken and pull myself up to a standing position. I went back toward the light, the bathroom, and my face was covered with blood.
Now I was really not having good thoughts about my wife.
As is usually the case, it was much less bad than it looked. Blood had made streams from my three cuts, and my face looked like a school map showing all the major rivers, but in red. I washed off my face, determined I had just three small cuts, and went back to bed...giving the coffee table wide berth. I hugged the walls of that bedroom the way our dogs hugged the outside walls of the house after we put in the electric fence!
I remember my last thought before falling asleep: who puts a coffee table at the end of a bed?
The next morning my face and left eye socket looked like the painting Monet did of the colorful flowers in Giverny, France. In fact, my face and eye looked like the palette he probably used, the one with all those little dabs of color into which he could dip his brush.
In the light of day I got a good look at that coffee table, you know, the one at the foot of the bed, the one down low where it can get a good contact with a guy’s knees in the dark, the one that had a clean enough surface to allow a fellow to slide right off onto the floor.
Not a scratch! Nada. None.
You would never have known we even had an encounter.
Days of icing my eye finally brought the swelling down.
Days of icing my shoulder finally lessened the pain.
It took more days for me to be able to breathe deeply without getting a pain in my chest.
Since this happened on the first night of our vacation, I had many opportunities to expand and broaden the story I told as I was asked by everyone I met, “What happened to you?”
This was another teaching opportunity.
So I took it.
I told everyone not to put a coffee table at the end of their bed.
Coffee tables go in front of sofas.
One sits behind a coffee table and drinks a cup of coffee and chooses little snacky things.
Coffee tables do not hid around in darkened rooms waiting to preparing to dish out to humans a lot of hurt.
Sticks and stones may break my bones...but believe me coffee tables are something else to watch out for.
And while words will never hurt me, I am still not buying my wife’s version of events.
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