Month: January 2017

I did not vote for Donald Trump and I am incredibly frightened by the actions of our 45th President in just the first week of his presidency. But, I continue to believe – for the moment – that most of my fellow Americans who voted for Mr. Trump do not support the racial, religious and gender-based hatred that is at the heart of a tired white supremacy, which seems to be enjoying its moment in the sun in the Trump White House, particularly among his chief propagandists. I’ve heard some Trump voters state that they don’t care about all the hateful, demeaning, sexist, untrue and preposterous things Mr. Trump has said. They voted for him to bring back jobs to the United States and to focus on helping Americans first. I can support those objectives to a point. Here’s my offer.

I will work (through my votes and my words and my actions) with anyone, regardless of where you live or the party to which you belong or whether you’re a conservative, a libertarian, a liberal or a progressive, to help support leaders who can bring about good sustainable 21st Century jobs for all Americans. I also want all Americans to have access to good education and training that helps them be prepared for these good jobs. That might mean a college degree for some people and it might mean the very latest technical training for others. But, I don’t want Americans to be saddled with a mountain of unaffordable debt in order to get this education and training.

I also will listen to any good ideas about how we can rebuild our crumbling infrastructure. Same goes for energy and climate and immigration issues. We don’t have to agree on everything to agree on some things. We can table larger, foundational issues on which we don’t agree and at least tackle some smaller, more pressing problems where we can find common solutions. For example, we don’t have to agree that there is global warming (I believe it) to be able to help residents in Miami Beach and Norfolk address the steady rise in street flooding because of rising water tables. That’s not a philosophical debate; that’s a reality check.

Here’s where my offer ends. I won’t work with, support, or count as my friend (Facebook or otherwise) anyone who supports any action that attacks people based on religion, race, gender or gender identity, national origin, sexual orientation, physical or mental disability, or any other discriminatory, hate-fueled and bigoted basis. I won’t stand by or just go along with this orgy of xenophobic nationalism. Those actions will not make America great again. Those actions have already greatly weakened our democracy.  The world thinks less of us today than it did a month ago. You won’t be better off in this apocalyptic version of America. The soul of this nation – indeed its viability –  will be permanently damaged if we head down this path and I will fight anyone who wants to take us there.

I’m rising to defend the media. Not because I like them. Because I think they are critical to our survival. Over the weekend, I watched the final 60 Minutes interview by retiring CBS reporter Steve Kroft with President Obama. Overall, the President got a chance to give his own assessment of his Administration’s accomplishments and shortcomings during the past 8 years. But, I also was struck by the often disrespectful and confrontational tone of Kroft (“Are you going to pay for things again?”). Pivoting to earlier last week, we saw President-Elect Trump at his first news conference in 6 months angrily refusing to acknowledge a reporter from CNN because the reporter’s network had run a story about the supposed existence of Russian intelligence containing compromising information about the President-Elect. Mr. Trump dismissed CNN as “fake news.” This behavior should alarm you, whether or not you like CNN – or FOX or MSNBC.

While President Obama seemed completely unflustered by his confrontational grilling, essentially acknowledging that answering difficult or unfriendly questions from the media is part of the job, the President-Elect acts more like his good friend, President-for-Life Vladimir Putin, who imprisons members of the media when displeased.  I don’t think it’s hyperbolic to suggest that it’s a frighteningly quick trip from delegitimizing one media organization to a complete undermining of our free press and receiving all “news” from state-run propaganda organizations. Just ask folks in Russia or Venezuela or even Mexico.  Oh, right, you can’t.

A vigorously independent media (even a 140-character count version) is absolutely crucial in our fight to preserve this Constitutional democracy. We get to question and criticize our elected officials. But, only with the media’s help can we citizens have a fighting chance at ensuring that the President and Congress remain accountable to the American people. All Americans.

I argue this even as I admit that I am not a fan of the media in its currently metastasized form.  In fact, I despise many of today’s network leaders. Back when I was studying journalism at the University of Florida, the profession seemed like an honorable one of getting to the truth. Not so any more. In this age of Twitterized attention spans, selective echo-chamber media sources, fake news and 24-hour, all-time, anywhere media coverage, the race to the bottom in reporting surely is near its nadir. It seems that the media both attacks unworthy or misdirected targets (e.g., Hillary’s pneumonia-gate) and fails to understand the complexity of the news it reports with any degree of intellectual rigor (FYI, transgender doesn’t mean dudes in the ladies room).  And, yes, it manufactures news.  All in an effort to feed its voracious revenue goals.

Still, the thing is we’re all in danger if we don’t fight for an independent media. Remember, it was the Washington Post that coined the term McCarthyism to warn Americans of that demagogue’s rise. Who will warn us of the dangers in our current environment where any dissent, any criticism, any difference or any disagreement seems under attack? Who?

Lately, I’ve been obsessed with Ancestry.com.  It started out as a strategy to replace my obsessive intake of news and social media. But, there was more.  Perhaps it was the upheaval surrounding buying and selling homes, or maybe it was the words and actions coming out of the election season, but I also felt a sudden urgency to know that I belong. Somewhere. Anywhere. What I now appreciate more fully than ever is that I belong to the community of family and friends that I have acquired throughout my life. I belong to the people who love me, and to the places that accept me.  I belong exactly where I am.

Back to Ancestry, can tracing your dead relatives really help connect you? As it turns out, there are worse approaches. If nothing else, through the effort I learned some interesting pieces of my history. On my father’s side, so far I’ve traced my lineage back to Clement Briggs, who was born in 1587 in the English town of Southwark, Surrey, now part of London. He made one of the voyages to America and later died in 1648 in Weymouth, Massachusetts Bay Colony. A grandson, John Briggs, was born in Kingston, Rhode Island in 1668, just 30 years after Roger Williams founded Rhode Island to escape the religious zealotry of the Puritans back in Massachusetts. John’s descendants would be native Rhode Islanders all way down through my father and older brother. Thanks to the fact that my parents hated cold weather, I broke a nearly 300-year trend by starting life in Winter Park, Florida.

On my mother’s side, I discovered that my great grandfather, James Gorman, was born in County Roscommon, Ireland in 1873. This part of Ireland was particularly ravaged by the great potato famine of the 1840s. Today, County Roscommon is the home of the Irish National Famine Museum at Strokestown Park. My great grandfather immigrated to the United States at just 17 and later settled in Providence where he met and married my great grandmother, another Irish immigrant. Their eldest daughter, my grandmother, was born in 1903.

Fast forward to 2017.   I live in Baltimore with my spouse.  I’ve chosen to make Maryland my home for 13 years because I love the land and the water and the history and the people of this great state as if I were a native. It seems as if Maryland’s “middle temperament” suits me just fine. I belong here. But, I also love and feel connected to my family and friends throughout the United States and beyond. I know that I belong to this particular group of particularly amazing people because they love and accept me as completely as I return that love and acceptance. Finding one’s place is important and may take you around the world or just around the block. Regardless of how and where you find that connection, it’s important to celebrate all the people in your life who help you belong. Wherever you may be or wherever you may be going.