Lafayette, we are sorry

AN UPDATE:

Getting rdy to leave for France @ the invitation of President Macron to celebrate & honor Bastille Day and 100yrs since U.S. entry into WWI.

— Unfollow Trump (@UnfollowTrump) July 12, 2017

American troops arrive in Europe during World War I.

Bastille Day in France marks the day of French liberation from the monarchy, the day citizens in Paris rose to storm the infamous Bastille Prison to liberate political prisoners there. It is as important a holiday to the French as the Fourth of July is in the United States. The celebration this year also marks the centennial anniversary of Americans entering World War I and officials in the country have woven that into the fabric of the traditional events of the day.
     A mantra of troops arriving in France for the "war to end all wars" was "Lafayette we are here."          The origins of the statement date all the way back to the American Revolution when the French General the Marquis de Lafayette joined the Revolution as a military officer and later convinced the French government to send troops to aid the American effort. He was instrumental in securing the deciding victory in the war at Yorktown.
     Upon returning home Lafayette became a leader in the French Revolution beginning with the storming of the Bastille July 14, 1789. With assistance from Thomas Jefferson he helped write the "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen."

Lafayette Escadrille Pin. This Lafayette Escadrille
pin belonged to Charles Heave "Carl" Dolan Jr.,
who in 1915 was the 31st volunteer of the Lafayette
Escadrille (Escadrille N. 124), which was a group of
38 Americans who volunteered to join the French
 Flying Corps before the United States entered
World War I. (Wikkipedia)

     When American troops landed in Europe in 1917, the call "Lafayette we are here" acknowledged the debt owed France and the great French general.
     But even before America officially entered the war, a year earlier, American pilots joined what was called the Lafayette Escadrille, a unit of the French Air Service, the Aéronautique Militaire, largely composed of American volunteer pilots flying fighters.
     With that tradition of mutual aid and the acknowledgement of the French support of the American Revolution in place this year,                  Donald Trump has accepted an invitation to visit France July 14, Bastille Day. Only this time the American invasion could become more of an embarrassment than a triumph. Trump has already cancelled a visit to England citing expected demonstrations against him as the reason. He is even less popular in France, especially after removing the United States from the Paris climate accord. Now as the representative of the United States he looks like he wants to impose his presence on a country's most cherished holiday. To be fair he was invited by French President Emmanuel Macron, who has openly criticized Trump on several occasions over his stand on climate change. The invitation most likely was to acknowledge America's entrance into WWI.
     The objections to Trump in Europe, where he is even less popular than in his own country, go well beyond climate concerns and many consider him a danger who could start a war.
      Given Trump's record so far in visiting foreign countries, this trip should raise some concerns given the history and current situation in our relations with France. One can only hope Trump will approach it with proper respect and acknowledgement with a sense of the history and when the protests come instead of lashing out, handle them with some modicum of decorum and diplomacy.
     Perhaps we will receive an indication in the way he handles our own Independence Day, the first during his term in office.
     But given his history it seems necessary to offer our apology to the French ahead of time: "Lafayette, we are sorry."

Lafayette Escadrille, the movie


A footnote: People may question the apparent Swastika, the Nazi symbol, on the headdress in the pin. That symbol was used by Native Americans long before the Nazis adopted it. Here is a brief history of its use. Native American Symbol – Swirling Log

It's all open to interpretation, or is it?

A friend who held a PhD in comparative literature once told me a writer is the worst person to analyze his own writing. We were arguing over a passage in a book in which I took what the writer wrote literally and he said it was a metaphor for something else. In my mind if someone came up with an interpretation other than what the author meant, indicated the writer had failed.

In a story about Ernest Hemingway a critic asked him how much he used symbolism in his work and the great author told him something like "I must use a lot because you people keep finding it in there."

Somehow through my early education I missed the interpretation part of reading literature. I read everything and took it literally.  Holden Caulfield actually envisioned himself catching children running through the rye grass before they ran over the cliff. The grass, the children, the cliff. He saw himself protecting them as later in the book he tried to protect his sister from seeing all the "fuck yous" written on all the walls.

It came as a complete surprise in college when literature instructors started opening the doors to interpretation and teaching us what the writer really meant by what they wrote. At  first I found it interesting and challenging but in time I came to resent it. Who were these instructors, the epitome of that saying about those who can't do teach trying to tell us what a writer meant by something or other. I remember sitting in classes wondering how in the hell a teacher came up with that. Without thinking much about it, I mentally rejected the whole concept and didn't do well in literature classes after that. What there was to learn from these classes was craft, art, how and why authors said this or that in a particular way, word choices, sentence construction, transition, point of view.

Big Brother really is watching

A friend of mine posted the following on facebook today: (language warning)
So I have decided to quit posting on FB. It seems like prospective employers, government agents, anyone who you may enter into a financial arrangement with and the police can look at your page and find out all kinds of shit about you. I knew that, but after recently receiving a notice that the Secret Service was looking at me because of some of my anti-trump postings, I decided, fuck it. I tried but now, me, a humble little fisherman from 61 degrees north latitude, seems to be the focus of a right wing inquisition. I'm only paranoid because everyone is trying to kill me. So from now on all you're gonna get from me me is tales of my kids exploits and pictures of cats. And I hate cats. And once and for all, Fuck trump!!! He's an idiot and will be the death of our nation. Hit me with your best shot asshole.
Now this one of the toughest guys I know.  He has hiked and climbed and paddled his way across much of Alaska and much of the world for all I know. I remember once telling him I wanted to see the Southern Cross under sail. He said he had sat in a place where he saw the Cross and the North Star at the same time. The peak of Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa. What I am saying is this guy is not easily intimidated.
He has been outspoken about the current administration as have many of us, but apparently he has been singled out by the Secret Service with a warning that Big Brother is watching him. Now as far as I remember this fellow never made any kind of threat toward the president or anyone else. His criticism was strong and sometimes profane but never stepped over that line into the dark area of advocating some kind of harm to anyone.
I mean this is a guy who told me his greatest experience in kayaking was finding a case of beer on a beach and spending an extra day there. The storms and bears and other hardships barely registered compared to that fortunate discovery of beer.
As rugged looking a person as you could ever find, his demeanor is mellow and almost quiet, but quick to laugh at a joke or a funny story told around a campfire
Knowing him I have to ask why the Secret Service doesn't have better things to do than watch this guy instead of maybe the militias and militants around the country advocating civil war and blood in the streets, not to mention the people who have carried out those threats. I am asking for instance how many members of that Bundy gang are in prison after two gunpoint standoffs with federal officers?
Is this the beginning of totalitarian secret police, attempting to quiet discourse. It is no crime to criticize the government or the president even to the point of profanity. Is this the very thing my friend was attempting to warn us about, that we have a president who is determined to dismantle our government in favor of an oligarchy. 
Given the amount of hatred and vitriol spewed at the Obanas during his administration, including assassination threats, you have to wonder how many of those people received warnings from the Secret Service. Even if there was some surveillance it sure didn't have much effect because that hatred is still being voiced against the former president and his family.
The fear of course is whether this is normal for the Secret Service or has Trump issued some kind of order to ferret out his critics and silence them? Given the threat my friend feels, you can't really blame him for pulling back a little. But if Trump's people can discourage such a rough and tumble individualist as this guy, what are the rest of us going to do? Is this yet another indication of the danger posed in the posting right below this one? Election result opens a vision into a dystopian future

Of course the warning may not have come from the Secret Service at all. Could be just a Trump troll attempting to intimidate the opposition.

Election result opens a vision into a dystopian future

Either way, could this be our future?

     Last night I experienced a mental flash, a quick peek into the future that scared the living hell out of me. It began with the news that a woman had won an off-year election in Georgia. The woman, a Republican, had been quoted during the campaign that she didn't think people deserved to earn a living wage, she didn't care.

     "This is an example of the fundamental difference between a liberal and a conservative; I do not support a livable wage," Karen Handel said on Atlanta's WSB-TV in response to a viewer question about raising the minimum wage.

     That was one of several outrageous statements she made during the campaign, but it was the one that stood out for me and I wondered in that flash how anybody in a right mind could vote for someone who said something like that. But the quote and the election victory were only the beginning of the flash; they only triggered it.

     From that moment my mind went to a potentially hopeless situation. I have been able to endure the Trump administration lately because I can almost see a way out of it. As investigations move closer to revealing the corruption there is room for some optimism this horrible era in American democracy can be brought to an end at least by the Congressional election next year. Part of that hope also is that the outrageous situation in Washington will lead thinking people in the country to vote with their minds and turn out the people who are doing so much damage. But with everything that's going on a majority in one congressional district still saw the way to elect someone who does not support a living wage. People elected the very candidate who would do them the most harm.

     Then the thought broadened across the country. Will every election in the near future turn out this way? Will, despite things like a health care act that could endanger as many as 100 million people not discourage administration supporters in the 2018 congressional election. Will people still return those supposed representatives to office to continue the destruction?

     The next part of the flash went to current news about hate crimes and their increase, immigrant roundups with no legal defense, random killings of Muslims, Sikhs, black people, anybody who is "not like us."

     Also news reports have documented the growth of quasi militia groups on the country. People on the edges who train and outfit themselves to fight for their rights. Just recently one such group called for recruits in the coming civil war. A civil war? Who are they going to fight? Aren't civil wars usually fought between governments and upset citizens?  Most of these people seem to be on the side of the Trump government. Then it hit me. The civil war is not threatened against the government, it is aimed at people like me. The threat is if the criticism and investigations lead to an end to the Trump administration, the militias will  hunt down the people they blame, those commie liberals. Here is an exact quote from one such group.

     If the drumbeat of verbal attacks, leaks and otherwise destructive assaults on President Donald J. Trump, his family, those around him and their supporters do not soon abate, expect right-wing militias and other reactive vigilantes to spring into action, resulting in a full-fledged civil war, with blood flowing in our neighborhoods and streets," wrote Larry Klayman a lawyer and former Justice Department prosecutor who founded Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch.

     And this one came from everybody's favorite conspiracy twit and apparent confidante of Donald Trump, Alex Jones: "You guys better have some helicopter jump jets and be ready to get out of here real quick if the actual civil war kicks off … You’re going to get wrecked bad. There are a lot of people like Santa Claus been making a list, been checking it twice about who’s been naughty and nice. And you kick off Civil War 2, baby, you’ll think Lexington and Concord was a cake walk."

     The monologue has become more serious and more violent. Granted those making the threats are on the fringe of the political spectrum and don't represent a large number of people, but when you have an enabling president who slyly encourages such violence and turns his back when it happens, what they are saying is not entirely outside the realm of possibility.

     So, there you have it. Democrats think the closeness of the Georgia election shows they are on the right track for 2018. But suppose the close victory actually encourages Republicans and gives them the arrogant confidence to continue their destruction of the government and further depressing the general population because they think their money can win tight elections, and then they go ahead and do it. To them it's still a mandate albeit a closer one, and they have the people behind them to continue the disassembly of the Republic.

   If not and if by some miracle progressive heads regain control of our future, are those of us who still can think, going to have to join in arms against marauding goons in camo sporting AR-15s with god and the president on their side?

     Suddenly in a flash last night and then again today walking past the "Resist" bumper sticker on my vehicle and then noticing a mysterious red "X" on the front license plate it all seemed plausible – plausible to the point where I, personally, might have been targeted already. No matter what, I am removing that "X."
First shots in new civil war already fired
Trump appointee threatens another civil war
Trump encourages civil war

Pat Buchanan threatens civil war

Oath-Keeper at anti-Muslim demonstration says civil war is guaranteed

Every year's a little different

All these wild roses are on a single bush.

Sometimes the differences are subtle, sometimes blatant but there's always a difference. Most years the wild roses bloom in mid to late May. This year the first ones showed up in the first week of June and they didn't really break out until the past couple of days. Last year very few bloomed compared with previous years.

This year there are multitudes and the multitudes involve plants with numerous flowers on them. Usually you will see one or two flowers per stalk, but look at the picture. That's one plant – eight full blooms and a least five buds, all on the same stalk. This one stood out because it is growing some distance from the huge field behind it, but as I looked around I saw several more bushes with as many or more flowers on them. What made this year different?

     On the other hand my garden is the sparsest it has ever looked. Skeletal zucchini plants, but they still have flowers on them. Droopy lettuce starts seem hesitant to grow at all, onions too. Potato plants stand three feet tall but the bottom two thirds droop sickeningly. Potatoes planted outside are just starting to push through the surface.

Anywhere downwind you can catch the fragrance.

     I didn't expect much from the corn and the bird seed sunflowers were an experiment. They look healthy but not much growth since I put them outside.

    Birds have been strange as well. Last year I photographed as many as 50 sandhill cranes in the pasture near town April 27. I didn't see any this year until day before yesterday: June 6. And, then there were only a dozen and they only stayed a day. Still no occupants in the owl house and this is the second year. Mostly robins around the house and the occasional junco. I see a chickadee flitting among the spruce once in a while. Today driving to town I saw a bird silhouetted on a utility wire. It had the shape I've seen of mourning doves but that would be strange. Couldn't really place it with any familiar bird. Maybe climate change?

     One plus has been the lilac that also has its ups and downs. this year being an up one. Look at the load of blossoms; it's fuller and taller than it's ever been.
     Patience is a virtue they say. We'll see. Some days I want to rip it all out and start over.

The day the New World turned Brave

     Years ago perhaps inspired  by George Orwell and Aldous Huxley I wrote a short story about the day, the one particular day and hour, the world changed into that brave new one. It wasn't a very good short story but there have been times over the years when I have been reminded of its message and wary of what my government is doing. In it, a man of the 50s came home from his job to his house in the suburbs. His wife had prepared a pleasant dinner, his polite children sat at the table eating quietly while the adults spoke to each other. After dinner the perfect wife began clearing the table and washing the dishes while the husband returned to his favorite chair and turned on the television news. You get the picture, the bland, stable 1950s.

     During the broadcast there was a static interruption of the signal and a new face and voice came out of it first pointing out how great life for people was and then saying that recent improvements to the general benefit of the society as a whole were now to be laws and that the lives people lived, the jobs they held (ending labor unions?), the homes they owned (subprime loans?), the schools their children attended (private charter schools?) had transformed into a rigid structure for the benefit of all. To maintain order (these days terrorism would be blamed) a new National Security Force had been formed which would replace the former military and police departments (providing police departments with military hardware?); this would be couched in terms of efficiency and cost-cutting. Life would go on as usual, the inanimate face's voice said and everyone would be better off for it.

   Static buzz again and then the former newsman came back on and began reading the news again. The man in the chair had barely absorbed what had been said, but something in it bothered him enough to stand up and walk out onto his front lawn. He looked left and right up and down the street and saw several others looking aimlessly around or into the sky. Finally when he couldn't put his mind on exactly what had happened and deciding there couldn't have been much to it, he went back into his house and settled back into his chair.

    Like I said, not a very good story. But my point was things can progress in tiny increments until one day you look around and it's too late, the damage is done, the billboards are up and we hardly notice that instant when all the parts merge and finally evolve into that Brave New World.

   These days I see the attacks on the press, leading the less informed and ignorant among us to distrust what they read or watch, that consists of lies or fake news if you will. The rest of us may wonder but seldom do much. We build up the military at the same time we dumb down the population by slowly curtailing education and opportunity and grow the percentage of the population that is enveloped in ignorance. With that body of ignorance overwhelming the electorate, we elect leaders who through bombast and bullying challenge every aspect of a constitutional democracy that has claimed to be based on the elusive and difficult to define atmosphere of freedom.

     By whittling away at all aspects of that freedom and in order to do that turning the ignorant majority against those who protest at each step of the way and putting the blame for problems onto them, the governors reach the point where with one simple turn of a switch sending a televised message into every home in the country, they only make formal the state where all those freedoms have disappeared and the oligarchs now own the utopian nightmare. That was the day I was attempting to describe, never thinking that threat would actually materialize and  I would be watching the country growing dangerously close to the day when we are living in Airstrip One or 2540 London happily sucking down soma and believing we are happy.
     Fortunately in the current situation, the opposition fighting every step of the way appears to be slowly gaining the upper hand but we can't be complacent, the fight has to be kept up. It might be odd to say but maybe it's a good thing that Trump is president at this time. A more intelligent, educated, less flamboyant man would be much more dangerous. Look at the vice president and the speaker of the House.