Killer's Regret

by Dennis Green

I watch a dramatization of a story I feel as if I have heard before. An old man’s voice recounts the events of several days during the Battle of the Bulge. As an American soldier, this man shot and killed a young German soldier, not well but badly, and the other man took two days to die. There in the snow, under bombardment, the old man says, they were stranded only a few feet apart in separate cavities in the ground.

“I saw him when I shot him, a young man, fair, with blonde hair and calm blue eyes. I could hear him lying there dying. All night long. The next day, he was still muttering and coughing, and then, finally, he fell silent. I haven’t been able to forget him. All my life, ever since then, I wake up in the middle of the night thinking of him. I can’t get him out of my mind…”

The man who speaks these words, we are told, died at the age of 90 a few years ago, a short time after this recording was made. The visuals are uncertain, showing snow, and a snow bank, and a dark night sky. But we believe him.

And I wonder to myself, Did that German soldier who shot and killed my cousin Stanley in that same protracted battle survive the night? The war? Did he have such nightmares? Could he never get the image of Cousin Stanley out of his head? Did Stanley’s killer feel any regret?

For that’s what they are, all of them. Killers. Many of them are decorated with ribbons and precious metal. But they are still killers. They defy the Sixth Commandment, contorting logic and reason to justify what they do. Warriors like me know exactly what they do. They kill. They damn themselves to eternal fires, just from that one moment. Fire first.

I know that our species is conflicted. We hail the Ten Commandments until they get in the way of our natural instincts, to fuck, to cheat, to kill, to steal, to covet our neighbor’s ass, especially if she’s gorgeous. We are every bit as hypocritical as Muslims who kill Muslims in defiance of the Qu’ran.

The Commandment in the Old Testament is either serious, or it’s not. There is nothing in the Bible to justify the excuses and the ducking of its meaning…”Well, we didn’t really mean warfare or capital punishment or cops shooting a suspect who reaches for his waistband…” The shooting, in the back, of an unarmed man on a BART platform on New Year’s Eve last year has prompted outcries of injustice only from the Black Community of Oakland. How many white ministers joined those protests? Is religion color-blind, or not?

And now, the latest Pentagon documents released by Wikileaks details the 150,000 civilian deaths in Iraq caused by the U.S. invasion, occupation and war. Only a fraction of those are attributed to our enemy. And in those same documents, the callous and deliberate torture of prisoners is also described in cold-hearted, chilling detail.

The U.S. and its leaders are obviously guilty of war crimes, and if we ever lose our military power to wage war, some of the guilty may one day be brought to justice. Meanwhile, the Pentagon has given us, yet again, a reputation as bullies and killers all around the world.

So when I heard that old soldier’s lifelong regret for, as a young man, shooting and killing another young man, who lay moaning and dying, weeping and calling out to his mother, and how those sounds and images stayed with him the rest of his life, I can’t help but wonder how many thousands of our own boys come home with similar nightmarish memories. And on this Sunday morning, I pray for their eternal souls.

©2010 Dennis Green

Neanderthals

by Dennis Green

Matt Taibi, one of the finest political analysts at work in America today, has a new article in Rolling Stone about the Tea Party which is hilarious and insightful: “The Truth About the Tea Party.” Early on, he sums up his findings after spending many weeks among them: “They are full of shit.” I love the candidness of Journalism 2.0.

Taibi focuses on Rand Paul, M.D., the son of Libertarian Party candidate for President in 2008, Ron Paul, a very sincere, if whacko, Texas politico. Rand was rigorously opposed to big government and all government spending until a bill came up to limit funding to physicians by Medicare. Suddenly, this M.D. turned politician was all in favor of government spending. And that was just his first change of mind.

Tea Party candidates who have made it past the primaries are demonstrating their stunning lack of knowledge about even the things they swear are dear to them. Delaware U.S. Senate candidate Christine “I Am NOT A Witch” O’Donnell recently asked, “You mean the separation of church and state is really in the Constitution?” Duh. When asked, after saying she opposed Supreme Court activist decisions, which decisions she opposed, she couldn’t think of any. Three days later, she pleaded, “Well, I’m in complete agreement with this Court, because it’s so conservative.” Right, Christine.

Other Neanderthals endorsed by the Tea Party believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old, in keeping with Creationist theory. If America is behind the advanced world in science and math, these folks are not going to help us catch up!

The Colorado Neanderthal has claimed that “Being gay is a choice,” (as if there’s anything wrong with being gay…), and that people who choose to be gay will recruit others they come into contact with, (the “Gay Agenda”), and that therefore they should not be allowed to marry, adopt, teach or even run for office, as they might turn the entire Congress gay. (As if they’re not pretty happy already!)

In the many Tea Party rallies Taibi attended, he saw no black people at all, and almost no one under 50. Most of the people attending these rallies, in fact, were past retirement age, and when he asked them, most admitted they were collecting Social Security and on Medicare. Yet they railed against government spending and government programs of any kind.

A surprising number, Taibi writes, were in those little motorized wheelchairs, and all of them admitted they got Medicare to pay for them by gaming the system.

Personally, I was intrigued for awhile by the Libertarian philosophy, especially Ron Paul’s. He is opposed to war, to the criminalization of drugs, to any government interference in our lives. Including sexual orientations, and any ban on gay marriage. He still is. But I soon discovered just how contrary and contradictory his son and the other Tea Party Neanderthals really are.

Once he won the nomination of the Republican Party, Taibi writes, Rand soon abandoned most of his Libertarian views and positions, just as he did his opposition to government spending except when it comes to cashing those Medicare checks. I only hope the college graduates of America feel the same way I do, and get to the polls this year in larger numbers than ever.

America is at a crossroads. We can descend into the conservative abyss Great Britain did in the 1980s when its empire finally collapsed, or we can renew ourselves as other great powers exhausted by warfare have finally done. China’s renewal can be an inspiration, not just a threat. But if we let the Neanderthals take over, we will never know greatness again.

©2010 Dennis Green

Meg's Illegal Nanny

by Dennis Green

It's a paradigm familiar to anyone who lives in California -- the wealthy matron who hires an illegal alien from Mexico to rear her children. Much more common than the tomato farm field hand toiling in the hot sun just outside Bakersfield, all over Southern California, tucked away in little make-shift apartments over the garage are these live-in nannies available 24/7 who work for little more than room and board, exploited by their employers.

When I was married to the Blonde Bombshell from Orange County, I had a sister and brother-in-law who lived on Balboa Island in Newport Beach, two blocks from John Wayne, who fit the stereotype completely. They had two little girls, belonged to the John Birch Society, and paid a live-in Mexican nanny a pittance to live in that one-room apartment over their garage and be constantly on-duty.

"Green Card? I don't need no stinking Green Card!" And they never bothered to verify, or even do the most cursory background check to be sure they were not breaking the law. In her first debate with Jerry Brown this week, Meg Whitman said, in response to the subject of illegal immigration, "All employers have a strict responsibility to verify the Green Card status of people they hire to work for them."

A good, sensible, conservative answer, right?

But now Meg's nanny of 9 years is suing Whitman for lost wages, and the story of her firing is perhaps typical of Compassionate Conservatism. "She called me in and told me I was fired, and that 'From this moment on, I don't know you and you don't know me!'" No sverance pay, or even back wages. Unfortunately, Meg had not, in the words of Ronald Reagan, done due diligence to "Trust and verify!"

How embarasking, as Olive Oil might say. More importantly, Supreme Court nominees have been disqualified for less.

Whitman's first excuse? "I didn't know. She used her sister's immigration papers. How could I know?"

Her second excuse? "Well, her attorney is Gloria Allred, a notorious lawyer for pushing women's rights and defending immigration scofflaws. She's also supported Jerry Brown, contributed money to his campaign, and is hardly objective." Look who's talking.

But in my opinion, Meg is a goner. Her high-priced political consultants must know that. SHE must know that. For she has suddenly been identified to the voters as "One of THEM!" the ugly, dreaded Super Rich who are above the law, who needn't abide by the rules of polite society that the rest of us respect. All along, we've had our suspicions, and now they are confirmed.

We might vote for a sassy, successful female, even a centrist conservative like Meg. Until she takes on that awful shroud -- Privilege! Once she identifies with the very rich, the very privileged, we all know how the rich get richer. They cheat on their taxes. President Bush cuts their taxes way below the rates they paid under Reagan. On Wall Street, they cheat on their investments, and when they get in trouble, Bush bails them out.

And they hire illegal aliens at wages far below,, minimum -- the Growers to pick their crops, the people who live in McMansions the gardeners to trim their McLawns, the big contractors hiring men off street corners to repair their leaking roofs, and the Fifth Avenue matrons hiring the housekeepers and nannies to clean their homes and tend to their McKids. It isn't that we envy them the ability to skirt the law, to get all this cheap labor. No, we resent the fact that they turn right around and bemoan, as Meg has, the porous U.S. Southern border.

If you hire them, they will come. Most of us can't afford to have a live-in nanny, or an obedient housekeeper, a gardener, or a field hand. We may even have sympathized with Cesar Chavez and Huelga! And even if we didn't, we recognize rank hypocrisy when we see it, and the terrible unfairness of people who take advantage of the system, and then tell the rest of us to complain, and to look down upon those "Lawbreakers." Those other lawbreakers.

No, I never liked Meg Whitman, caught the sickly stench of her hypocrisy from afar. But now I have a good reason to get out that Voodoo Doll.

Remediation Is Not Education

by Dennis Green

The Alliance for Excellent Education estimates that California spends about $135 million annually to teach college students what they should have learned in high school. Among the many other courses I taught at UC Santa Barbara and Westmont College — including Shakespeare and Bible Lit — I also taught remedial English composition classes for many years, so I saw the problem up close.

UC campuses enroll the top 12.5% of California high school graduates, and yet 65% of those incoming freshmen flunk the English Composition entrance exam. Many of them receive “A’s” and “B’s” in high school English, but are semi-literate at best.

The National Assessment Governing Board administers a test of core subjects, the National Assessment of Educational Progress, (NAEP), which found recently that in English and math, 4^th and 8^th graders in California rank near the bottom among all states. That is unacceptable.

Even more discouraging, a 2005 survey by Achieve, Inc. found employers estimated nearly 40 percent of recent California high school graduates were not prepared for entry-level jobs. Even in the workplace, they need remediation, further training in the basics.

In public schools, on average, only 65% of those entering high school ever graduate. In 2006, just one quarter of the 520,000 California students who had begun high school four years earlier completed the courses necessary to enroll in a four-year public university. Obviously, our schools are failing us.

While we are constantly reminded of the benefits of great schools, we are rarely or never told the social and criminal costs of those drop-outs. If public schools can take all the credit for those benefits, they should also take the blame for the costs of failure.

And no, I’m not going to blame the teachers, or their unions, for this malaise. In Sacramento, education funding has been hijacked by redevelopment agencies and budget-balancing tricks foisted off on we the people by our elected representatives. Their pet projects do not, in many instances, include the schools. Much of the effort by PTA’s and teachers’ groups now directed at raising new and much larger parcel taxes should instead be directed at Sacramento.

By the same token, if the students are failing too often, and in too many schools, let’s take the administrators by the throats and give them a good shaking. Never vote to re-elect a school board Trustee, for example, whose district is mediocre in its proficiency scores, or who has so poorly managed the district budget that it faces multi-million dollar deficits. They have been spending money they knew they didn’t have, and future monies they knew they wouldn’t have in years to come.

Shake up the School Superintendent and all his or her minions — by tying their salaries to the success and well-being, fiscally and otherwise, of the district and the individual schools they manage. Start with a ten percent cut. Their rate of failure in managing finances, physical plant and personnel would not be tolerated in the private sector. No Superintendent should be earning in a district as mediocre as Alameda, for example, nearly $200,000 per year, as Kirsten Vital does.

Finally, since Alameda teachers average $87,000 in salary and benefits per year, give them something more to do to earn their keep. Lengthen the school day past 3:00 p.m. Shorten that long summer vacation, and cut Xmas and Easter breaks in half. WITHOUT increasing that $87K.

We can’t fix our schools without major reform in the way teachers and their students interact. More use must be made of technology, and the way youngsters eagerly learn computer games. Finally, discipline must be maintained, and students must be kept busy working, learning new skills every day. Curriculum must be strengthened, even in job training programs leading to entry-level jobs upon graduation.

Until such reforms begin — from Sacramento to the teachers’ lounge — don’t give them another dime.

©2010 Dennis Green

Credo

by Dennis Green

I believe. And like all believers, I am a sum total of all that I have met, all the things I have believed in over the decades, including beliefs I held as a child and thought I had abandoned many years ago. That’s the richness of my personal mysticism after three score and ten.

There are times in all our lives when we feel it is important that we reject or deny something we once held to be true, in order to make room for something new, or simply to grow beyond where we were. But by that time, we have usually incorporated those old, previous beliefs into our very bones. That’s how it is with me.

I was raised Roman (French) Catholic, grew up in the midst of all that glory, the arched ceilings, the stained glass windows, the mourning, grieving, suffering alabaster statuary…the Mass in Latin, the rituals of standing, sitting, kneeling, genuflecting…the incense and the candles…the miters and the ceremonial processions…a worldly depiction of Heaven on Earth.

So there’s still a part of me that resonates to ritual, to ceremony and glorification. And I would not be true to myself if I denied that resonance, that connection to my own past. Taking it into account makes me a larger personality and persona than I was, say, as a sophomoric agnostic in the dorms.

And the agnostic is still there too, the denier. A very rational part of me knows that religion is corrupted by all sorts of worldly influences, that politics in church are as vicious as politics in academia, or anywhere. And so, I don’t go to church anymore, but that doesn’t mean my life is spiritually bereft.

And like Thoreau, I feel no obligation to be consistent, even with myself. Some days I scorn the concept of a personal God, at other times, I implore Him. Why should I narrow myself according to someone else’s theology or doctrine? Sometimes, I think Saul of Tarsus is still a Pharisee, and other days he strikes me as a Saint. “Do I contradict myself? Very well then…”

Some days I believe we were created in the image of God, and others that we created God in our image.

So it’s safe to say that I believe many things. Like Dylan, I believe in every breath I take. And like Dylan, I believe in Jesus and in Yahweh, in darkness and in the Light. But I don’t believe everything, or nothing. I am not a nihilist, or an atheist or a hard-headed pragmatist. No, I’m still rather dreamy-eyed, and optimistic in spite of myself.

I believe in natural selection, and that mutations happen all the time, that most of us contain at least an element or two of a mutated humanity, traits that will serve us very well someday. A very large comfort zone with computers, the internet and electronic gear may be a mutation serving us already, making some of us more successful, and more connected, than others are.

Some days I believe that “Faith” is just another word for “Ignorance” and other days I believe in the future of art, without any evidence or proof, along with the existence of my Muse.

Our DNA, after all, changes. Every one of us is a combination of the DNA from our father and the DNA from our mother. So besides those mutations and variants within an individual, each generation contains new combinations and variants. Even as an embryo, I was a platform for diversity.

I see no need to narrow my vision. Yes, I can be cynical about religion, and yes, I can still believe in the Holy Spirit. My whole life has been an encyclopedia of learning and belief. I believe in Evolution, and Plane Geometry, in politics and love. I don’t believe in politicians or ex-wives, however, or city council members scorned.

Credo. I believe. Do you?

©2010 Dennis Green

Perspective

A Young Man’s Game

by Dennis Green

There are many advantages to being an Elder of the Tribe, not the least of which is being exempt from “The Game.” The Game is also known as The Rat Race, and while I played rodentia racecara very well, I’m glad to be out of it, sitting not so much on the sidelines as in a reserved box seat, watching the action impassively.

Vying for the attention of the sweet young ladies is part of The Game, and that is much better played by young men, especially the feckless, those who are not attached to outcomes. For regardless of the outcome, even the young man knows that when he wakes up in the morning, he’ll still be all alone, and will love it that way!

But it isn’t love nor money I’m so thankful to be free of now. It’s politics. I still dabble from the sidelines in this game, which is not, as has been noted, Softball, but I don’t take any of it very seriously anymore. I know that regardless of who wins, just another rascal will be taking office in January.

For all of us, the entire species, is made up of Little Rascals — some in finance, some in education, some in marketing, but more in politics than anywhere else feel free to flaunt the Jolly Roger. And flaunt it they do. Only the politically naïve continue to believe it makes any difference which party, or even which individual, is in power.

“Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Bring in those checks and balances! With any luck at all, we’ll get gridlock.

And I had a fascinating meeting with a younger man, Jeff Cambra, who is attempting to act as a mediator between the Alameda business community and the school district, gathering people together from business and asking them what sort of new tax proposal would be, in our eyes, fair.

“I don’t even use the word ‘Fair’ anymore,” Jeff says. “I call it ‘Equitable.’” And he smiles, even though I don’t appreciate his distinction.

I’m not exactly hostile to his views, but they confirm for me a deeper understanding of what I already know about politics. A) It’s a swirling, massive cloud of forces, some of them appealing to our rationality, some to our baser instincts and emotions, and everything in-between. B) A very few people can wag the dog, and usually do. NOT consensus, not GroupThink, but the inspired brilliance of a Mad Man or two!

And now that I’m too old and lame to walk the precincts, I think I know my place, sitting by the campfire, pushing twigs into the flames all night, letting my thoughts go where they will, but eventually to the Council of Elders — those players significant enough to understand and appreciate them. That’s why I’m NOT a Jacksonian Democrat! Or a Reagan “New Morning in America” Republican either!

Nope, I’m an Elder of the Tribe, hopelessly Independent and unfettered by sexual desire, ambition or partisanship. When they pass the Peace Pipe, my lips touch it first. And when they don the War Bonnet, mine is more colorful than all the rest!

I wish Jeff Cambra well, but I also know that he’s wasting his time. At least I didn’t let him waste mine. That’s a young man’s game, and I haven’t got time for the pain, haven’t got time for the waste bin, and haven’t got time for the illusions! And from that brief meeting, another epiphany!

©2010 Dennis Green

The Sunshine Boys

by Dennis Green

There is much talk throughout California, and in my beloved hometown of Alameda, about “transparency in government.” Many references to “Sunshine Laws” are made, and here, a “Sunshine Task Force” has emerged to discuss and establish a Sunshine Ordinance to strengthen existing transparency rules. Not every little dark corner of public service, however, is being shone upon.

One local news blog site, for example, ACTION ALAMEDA News, has revealed that an Alameda School Board Trustee, Mike McMahon, has three relatives on the board payroll, including his wife and daughter. And also that the school board, in violation of state and federal law, is accepting Special Education funding without being able to demonstrate a consistent program for finding and recruiting students needing such services, and then providing them. Yet there is no outcry from the Sunshine Boys.

Gadfly Jon Spangler, City Council candidate Jeff Mitchell, and the League of Women Voters all call for more light, so long as it doesn’t shine on them, or any of their pet projects.

Meanwhile, serious charges have been raised against one City Council member, Lena Tam, who is accused of leaking confidential city documents to real estate developer SunCal. Tam’s activities are documented in several hundred pages of emails and inter-office memos CC-ed to the developer and to several local partisans, including a member of the Sunshine Task Force, John Knox-White, and a local blogster, Lauren Do. Again, not only is no concern voiced by the Sunshine Boys, but instead they make excuses for Tam and the others.

At the same time, these Shiny Day People accuse the Interim City Manager and City Attorney of various crimes and misdemeanors, without specifying any codes violated except their own sense of honor. This orb of sunlight appears to be very arbitrary about where it will shine and where it will not.

Some of the public denials of wrongdoing in the Tam case provided much local entertainment, especially the claim that John Knox-White “… did not have text with that woman!” So reminiscent of Bill Clinton, except for the missing sax. And none of these people call for an investigation of the vast SunCal conspiracy to rob the taxpayers.

New Politics in Alameda, and throughout the nation really, are beginning to shape up as the unkindest cuts of all — bitter personal attacks, snarky and smarmy blog commentaries, Tea Party and Town Hall Meeting blockheads, and viral partisanship that brooks no compromise. We can only pray that most of these newbies bought too late and too expensive, that their mortgages are underwater or in default or foreclosure, and that they will soon be packing their bags back to Fresno.

For the Sunshine Boys want to hide away their own pet projects and misdemeanors where the sun don’t shine. Their idea of transparency is a means to embarrass their opponents, not to require full disclosure of the shenanigans of public employees. Not a word from them about unfunded fire fighters union pension perks, let alone exorbitant city executive payrolls.

If they really cared about corruption, equally, on all sides, in the bowels of the school district as much as city management, I’d be impressed. But as it is, all I can see from them is just another partisan smokescreen disguised as something impartial, noble and selfless.

This isn’t, of course, the first time we’ve seen such a song and dance routine in politics. Transparency in government was the claim of Ronald Reagan’s gang, until the Iran-Contra Deal was uncovered. It was also the claim of President Richard Nixon, until those 18 minutes on his office tapes went missing. We know by now that anyone who says he has an exclusive corner on sunlight is coming from the Dark Side.

©2010 Dennis Green