Solidarity With Capital Gazette Victims

As an independent writer, self publisher, blogger, etc. I hope everyone really takes some time to think about the importance of a free press and the work that journalists do on a daily basis. Some of the work is mundane. A lot of it is hard and it's guaranteed that most every piece will annoy someone, somewhere. Sadly threats and disrespectful actions are part of what comes with the job.

Intimidation, fear and physical harm happen far too often to journalists around the world. Thankfully, a belief in telling a story usually outweighs all of that. Solidarity with writers, storytellers and journalists everywhere as we grieve the five lives lost in Maryland.

Guest Article By David McReynolds - What Will History Have To Say Of Us?

The author of this piece is David McReynolds, an old friend and partner in crime, literally. David is a  long time socialist and pacifist, retired, living in Lower Manhattan. Here are his thoughts on the separation of families at our borders.

This week Donald Trump staged a show in which his racism was masked by the use of the tragedy of others.

While parents at the border were frantic about where their children were, Trump brought together a handful of Americans whose sons and daughters had been killed by aliens.

The tragedy of those deaths was real, the grief was a fact, not a political position. It would not matter whether the deaths had been by accident or intent, or whether the agents responsible were citizens or aliens. Let nothing I write here be taken to minimize the death of loved ones.

But Trump had something else in mind. Trump, the talented but empty man, unloved by his father, not terribly bright, clearly a bit mad, and racist to his core, was using the grief of those on stage as if they compensated for the horror Trump had imposed on the immigrant community.

In the face of parents whose children had been taken away from them by the thousands, and are now scattered in holding centers across the nation, Trump wanted us to see those alien, human, frightened men and women, hoping for safety for their children, not as our brothers and sisters, but as killers, rapists, and the agents who had brought grief to the handful Trump had gathered for his TV show.

What is stunning to me is not that Trump would stage this show, not that he tore the children at the borders from their parents - there is, to Trump, no moral center, no trace of any awareness of right or wrong. No, what is alarming is that there is a willing audience for Trump, that the racism in our nation, at times so masked we even elected Obama as President, can be brought to the surface, cultivated like a lethal virus, turned into a political force.

The issue is not Trump. He learned the social graces well enough to move freely among the very rich, to have the Clintons at his wedding, to buy the silence of those he abused - great money has great power. No, the issue is us, the public, and the question is why Trump has any following at all.

What has happened to the evangelical community that it supports him? That a man would put on a stage show of those who have suffered, to divert the public from the issue of those now suffering, suggests the sickness of the man. But what of us? Is there any grief greater than that of a mother or father whose child has been lost "In the system", who cannot be reached, touched, embraced?

We are entitled not to agree on some single "correct position" on immigration, but we are not entitled to use children as bargaining chips for political ends. Trump is not Hitler - he lacks the complexity of Hitler. But we risk being the German people. The evangelical church needs, with great urgency, to read the gospels on which it is based. To remember the words of Jesus on the value of children. Jesus saw them as of intrinsic value. Trump sees them only as coins in a political game.

He has gone too far, at last. He has always allowed himself a tiny wiggle room. When he launched his campaign by attacking Mexicans as killers and rapists he added "and some I'm sure are good people", so his followers would not see the depth of his racism. But now that slight qualification is gone. He has not only used the children as political coins, but in his stage show of those who suffered from attacks by aliens, he has used human grief for entirely political ends.

History may bury Trump. But what will it have to say of us? Of those in the GOP whose fear of losing a primary has forced their silence? Rarely has raw evil been so clearly in view.

Governing By Chaos and Confusion

As I've watched and listened to all of the news about our country's zero tolerance policy and the separation of children from their parents, I've been struck by many things. The policy certainly has forced many people to think about children and families. Its made us think about the underbelly of racism in the US and how deep it may run. Its made me think about prisons, detention camps and 'tender age facilities', the latter being a name the government has come up with for baby and toddler detention facilities. I've also thought about history and the future and what all of this says about our country and its current leadership as well as our political state of affairs.

All of the above is the initial and perhaps logical response to what is going on. But recently I realized that there is something much more significant that needs discussion as well as some answers from political leaders. Watching what can only be described as management incompetence, I realized how big and serious our problem really is and we should all pay attention.

The crisis at the southern boarder has shown us that the emperor, or more specifically, the president, really doesn't have any clothes. We elected a person with no experience in running a government. We put him in charge. We watched as his transition team recommended and hired outsiders without checking competency. We watched as more and more staff became frustrated with a lack of management skills, both on their own part and that of their leader and other team members. All of this has happened over a period of time and it has worn many people out. It is debilitating.

But it also brings us to the reality of today. The government of the US is in total disarray and is sending a message of incompetency across the globe. What we are seeing is the inability to verbalize and implement policies and plans. We are all witnessing poor communication, confusion, and contradiction from the top and between and among agencies of the federal government. Imagine if you will that this government had a serious crises threatening homeland security. How confident can anyone be that agencies involved would be able to handle such a crises after watching things unfold in Washington and Texas over the past week. Homeland Security and Health and Human Services can't even coordinate a numbering system between their agencies for tracking parents and children. The Department of Justice came up with a policy with no implementation planning. Resources at port of entries were not planned for. Housing and holding facilities were not thought about. I could go on and on.

Yes running governments and bureaucracies is hard. Its difficult. That's why people try hard, in both the government and private sectors, to hire extremely competent people to perform operational tasks. Shooting from the hip may sound like fun but we are seeing the results up close right now. Yes our government is managing through chaos and confusion. All of this should send shutters through all of us relative to how badly most sectors of government are probably running under our current President. I fear we are just seeing the tip of the iceberg. This is a manufactured crises. Imagine an unplanned and real crises. This isn't the coordination we should expect and we certainly don't deserve it.

A Very Deep State

Donald Trump has spent a lot of time talking about a 'deep state'. He has felt used, abused and threatened by bad actors in the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, the Republican Party and his own White House. Bad, bad people all out to get him.

But in reality we have been given a glimpse into his own 'deep state': Children & toddlers disappearing around the country in the middle of the night. And think about it, they have no identification, they have no passports, nothing. Yet they and their handlers are walking through airports and flying on airlines, who by the way, try to deny their involvement. Try that yourself. Somehow TSA is waving these folks through. Airlines, police and military are all participating without question. Police deny access to properties by the media and public officials. Contractors move children with gag orders.

In the midst of all of this, First Lady, Melania Trump travels to Texas and meets what are described as smiling & happy children. She checks out neatly made beds and listens to a Lutheran shelter explain that everything is fine for these 55 children. No need for mothers here. All is well. A very deep state indeed.

History Will Have A Say

History will not look kindly on anyone who remains silent about what is happening in our country. Baby and child prisons in the US should be unacceptable on every level. In reality, they aren't. People of color have been totally dehumanized and are being kept from entry into our country, even when threatened with the worst violence. Politicians, Republicans and Democrats, have failed us all. Imagine, no one, including elected officials have been allowed to view current baby prisons. There is no oversight and pictures are provided by the government. People sworn to uphold the Constitution are clearly subverting it. The Presidency and Congress are a disgrace. Yes, history will not be kind.

People working for federal agencies, private contractors, White House and Congressional staff and yes, all of us, will have to answer to history. Reputations will be held to account and families will be ashamed of relatives and their actions or inactions. There will be heroes here and there - people of conscience who speak up and refuse to follow orders.There are times when people need to ignore and not follow unjust and immoral orders. It has happened throughout history and will continue into the future. There will be courageous people working for ICE, Boarder Patrol, Homeland Security and private contractors who will refuse to continue to participate in the separation of children and families. They will need encouragement and support. History will be kind to those souls.

The Trump Presidency will be time limited. It will end. I believe it will be seen for what it is - a nationalistic and racist regime - anti democratic and worse. History will tell the story and it will be a stain on many.

Crimes Against Humanity - The Shame of Separating and Imprisoning Children

What do we as Americans stand for, a flag or principled values? We are in a terrible state in this country - for some a state of denial, for some a state of shock and for others a state of perceived resistance. But the worst among us are those who are in a state of obedience to crimes being committed against young children and families in the name of their government, deterrence and nationalism.

Many of my friends know that I spent a substantial amount of time in prison in the mid 60's opposing conscription and speaking out against the Vietnam war. The thoughts I'm putting to paper here are influenced greatly by that experience. The experience included detention centers, maximum security walled penitentiaries and toward the end a farm prison camp with no walls but fences that could be climbed. I have listened recently to pundits referencing immigrant camps, refurbished Walmarts, cages, dormitories and on and on. They are all however, talking about very young children as well as teenagers, being separated, at times brutally from their parents, clearly as an act of punishment. This is abusive and criminal. None of us would sit quietly by if it happened to us. Legislators wouldn't allow it if it was their children or grandchildren. White House staff wouldn't allow it if it was their children or grandchildren.

We should all be ashamed and we should all speak up.

Let me be very clear as we see, read and hear about these children and families. Prison is prison, is prison, is prison. Let's call it what it is. This is what we do in our prisons. We control people's ability to leave a variety of geographical or physical locations. We control who people talk to or who they have as visitors. We control mail. We control where people sleep, toilet themselves, eat and spend leisure time. We use a bureaucracy of insulting rules to control large groups of people being held in involuntarily settings because someone tells us it's ok and the right thing to do. Most of these rules are meant to intimidate and frighten potential resisters and rule breakers. Sometimes we do these things in the name of rehabilitation (name only in most cases), sometimes we're more honest and do it in the name of punishment and deterrence. Guess why we're doing it to children and families today seeking asylum in America? Clearly punishment, control and deterrence. Yes laws and policies need to be changed but people can and should be treated humanely in this process.

People need to understand that peoples lives, relationships, mental health and future interactions with families and society are influenced by all of these types of actions. Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, reaction to authority and violence, as well as general attitudes toward peers and society are incubated in these settings. Some ,if not most lives, will be changed forever

I have known people destroyed to the core by prisons, mental health facilities or any institutional setting that tries to destroy individualism. I have also met and known heroes, saints and great people who knew how to beat the dehumanization, yet it was always a chore and steep prices that were paid.

But here we are today as a country, accepting and promoting  the separation of babies and youngsters from mothers and fathers and placing them in tents, buildings, dormitories and cages or cells. It is wrong. It is illegal. It is abusive and it has to stop as quickly as possible.

In the end though, we all create our own prisons. Sometimes the cages and cells, fences and walls  don't matter. The reality is that there can be prisons created out of big White Houses, where people and families live and work in their own isolation. Prisons can be created in huge domed buildings in Capitols where mostly old white men in crumpled suits look at each other with blank looks or smirks. Imprisoned by their friends, their money and donations. In their self importance, they try to punch their way out of paper bags all day long and they fail.

As you lay down your head to rest and as you rise in the morning, please think of these youngsters and families and in the end speak up for them. We have to. We really have to.