HONOR

Well, I'm still sitting in my own kitchen, only marginally less pissed off than I was last week. This week, the Vikings played on Thursday night, and once again, the real Vikings showed up to play. They dropped their second game in a row after a spectacular start of 5 wins. The bright spot was that I didn't have to run out to the cemetery to see if Ziggy clawed his way out. Had they one either of the last two, that would've been necessary. Minnesota teams are choke teams.....they can only get so close.....except for the Lynx. We should be extraordinarily proud of the Lynx, and we are, quietly, because no one wants to put a makkes (a plague) on their season. Added to that, I couldn't watch the Chiefs' game because it wasn't "broadcast" in my area. After years of being a KC fan, for reasons I can't really explain except to say they have nothing to do with Travis Kelce, but getting Andy Reid for the coach was far more important. Big Red is good at team, something the Vikings haven't been good at since the days of the Purple People Eaters ...one of whom recently retired as a Minnesota Supreme Court Justice. But that's neither here nor there. The important thing with the Vikings is that being a prima donna does not make for good team work, which, in turn, loses games. Hiring washed up QBs and violent criminals does not help the image or the team. So while I sat quietly by while Ziggy had apoplexy during the games, I silently followed the Chiefs....long before Big Red, before Travis, and before anyone even knew what a Swiftie was. 

The Duke of Flatbush

Very few people know...or probably care, that I follow any sports at all. Toddler me was a total Brooklyn Dodger fan. Grandpa and Dad took me to my first baseball game at Ebbets Field so I could see them before they left town. Pee Wee Reese and Duke Snider were my faves and I knew how to spit if someone said "Walter O'Malley." When the Mets were born, I became a devoted fan and stayed that way until the late 80s. I abandoned my adoration for lots of reasons, Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry being two of them. I was a marginal Yankees fan because, after all, they were the New York Yankees, but once I came to Minnesota, I fell hook, line and almost sinker for the Twins. Tom Kelly was a great manager, as was Ron Gardenhire. The caveat there being when the Yankees played the Twinkies, it was a win-win for me. It just was. 

Now, however, I'm having a conundrum: The World Series. Worse than a subway series, this one is tough. Met-Yankees woulda been a snap: Yankees all the way. But this one tugs at my little-girl heart. My bro is a Dodger guy and always has been. I've been more fickle. But truth be told, I do hold a soft spot for those boys from Brooklyn, the Trolley Dodgers. My American League loyalties are being sore tested at the moment. I suspect that it will be another win-win for me. 

The famous BCJ Baseball t-shirt

Rabbi Allen used to tell us baseball was a metaphor for the Jewish calendar. My dad used to tell me that baseball was a metaphor for life. There were good seasons and bad seasons, good games and bad games, but the most important aspect of the game was being a player with honor. That wasn't always the case with the Mets. Although he remained a loyal Mets fan while I railed against their follies and foibles, ...something I didn't always understand. He instilled in me the belief that no one could take my honor away unless I gave it to them; that being honorable was something only I could do for me. That players who behaved badly dishonored the whole team, and if I wanted to be part of a team, I had to make sure I was honorable. When I was a little kid, this ongoing conversation was over my head, but as I matured, it became increasingly meaningful. Probably the last in-depth conversation I had with him before the dementia set in was about the lack of honor in politics, right around the time Feckless Felon announced he was seeking the GOP nomination, back in June, 2015. Being my dad was a Republican most of his life, this was something to be discussed. His was a wait-and-see kinda attitude, not really believing he could get the nomination, but unwilling to dismiss him out of hand. He didn't live long enough to see. 

As terrible as it sounds, I am glad Dad isn't around now. This election would smash his heart to smithereens. 

Dad spent most of World War II in a tank in Patton's army. He was a telegrapher and in rotation with General Patton. He was at the Bulge, he was at Remagen, he was even at the liberation of at least one concentration camp, called in to process survivors because he spoke both Yiddish and French. He fought Nazis and Fascism. He had a lot to say about Fascists of all types. We spent a whole lotta hours sitting in beach chairs at the club while he talked about the war. For the first time, according to Mom; I took notes as he told stories I never heard before. I watched my dad weep as he talked about the bodies in the villages, about the skeletal survivors in one of the camps, about the nightmares he still had decades later that prevented him from sleeping through the night. We didn't know much about PTSD until his medical interview at the Minnesota VA when they moved here for assisted living. That's a whole other story. But the bottom line was....and still is....he believed Fascism could happen anywhere, even in the US, if we forgot about what Fascism looked like in Europe. 

Increasingly, the right wing of this country is moving into Fascism. This isn't being alarmist; this is the increasingly worried voices of people who know about this stuff.  In an interview given to the New York Times, former Marine Corps General John Kelly, Feckless Felon's longest serving Chief-of-Staff said: 

“Well, looking at the definition of fascism: It’s a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy,” he said. 

Mr. Kelly said that definition accurately described Mr. Trump.

“So certainly, in my experience, those are the kinds of things that he thinks would work better in terms of running America,” Mr. Kelly said.

He added: “Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators — he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”

Kelly said Trump chafed at limitations on his power.

“He certainly prefers the dictator approach to government,” Mr. Kelly said.

Mr. Trump “never accepted the fact that he wasn’t the most powerful man in the world — and by power, I mean an ability to do anything he wanted, anytime he wanted,” Mr. Kelly said. 

Once upon a time, I had high hopes that Kelly would be that adult in the room. Appointed in July, 2017, it was announced on December 8, 2018 that he would be replaced by Mick Mulvaney. When I wrote the episode, It's Not A Coup, It's A Junta on August 28, 2017, I was already wondering about generals running the West Wing. I hoped they would be able to rein in the president and maybe bring a sense of import to foreign policy that was sorely lacking. Nah. No such luck. Still, hindsight can be very interesting because in the period following his removal, Kelly began sounding warning bells about the president. After the attack on the Capitol on January 6th, 2021, Kelly said he supported the removal of the president according to the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. Was he just a disgruntled, unemployed general...or was his possible junta thwarted?

It doesn't matter anymore. What does matter is that enough people who know what Fascism is all about are pointing fingers, attempting to draw attention to the actions of a candidate who is increasingly unhinged. His rally at Madison Square Garden was shockingly racist. Yeah, it was a comedian who called Puerto Rico a floating garbage island, but it was the audience that clapped and hooted. Yeah, yeah, the GOP tried to distance themselves from it, but they hired him knowing what his comedy is about. His reiteration of lies about FEMA and hurricane recovery are just destructive to the people who are being helped. CNN stepped away to their coverage to give anchor Jessica Dean a chance to fact-check. After the fact, CNN's Daniel Dale posted an in-depth analysis of 16 lies. 

I'm going to stop now. You, gentle readers, all know this. It's not news. What happens on November 5th will impact all of us, one way or another, honorable behavior be damned. Which I think is unfortunate. 

I remain especially concerned about November 6th. January 6th, 2021 was a trial run. We're about to experience the real thing.

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

Citing cowardice, complicity, and lack of honor

 on the part of Jeff Bezos,

 over 200,000 subscribers have cancelled their 

Washington Post subscriptions.

I am one of them.

If you have a subscription, you should be, too.