trump Destroying Heroes

Update: Thank ye, Steve in Manhattan for adding this article at Crooks & Liars' Mike's Blog Round-up! Please remember to support your public libraries as trump and his lackeys are nuking library funding outright through shutting down the IMLS agency. (posted at my writing/librarian blog) /rage

If there's any good news is that millions of us are rising up in protest, if the turnout at the Hands Off rallies are anything (of course, the mainstream media barely paid notice).

There's been a lot of bullshit happening in this second round of trumpian destruction, but this is something that drew my ire. trump continues his war on American history - and on our education and literacy - by getting his fellow racists to purge our libraries to straight-up whitewash everything (via Lolita C Baldor at AP News):

The U.S. Naval Academy has removed nearly 400 books from its library after being told by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s office to review and get rid of ones that promote diversity, equity and inclusion, U.S officials said Tuesday.

Academy officials were told to review the library late last week, and an initial search had identified about 900 books for a closer look. They decided on nearly 400 to remove and began doing so Monday, finishing before Hegseth arrived for a visit Tuesday that had already been planned and was not connected to the library purge, officials said. A list of the books has not yet been made available.

As a librarian, this enrages me. NO LIBRARY - be it public, be it school, above all a university library - SHOULD EVER PURGE A BOOK ON POLITICAL ORDERS.

The Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, the Air Force Academy near Colorado Springs, Colorado, and the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York, had not been included in President Donald Trump’s executive order in January that banned DEI instruction, programs or curriculum in kindergarten through 12th grade schools that receive federal funding. That is because the academies are colleges.

Pentagon leaders, however, suddenly turned their attention to the Naval Academy last week when a media report noted that the school had not removed books that promoted DEI. A U.S. official said the academy was told late last week to conduct the review and removal. It isn’t clear if the order was directed by Hegseth or someone else on his staff...

Hegseth has aggressively pushed the department to erase DEI programs and online content, but the campaign has been met with questions from angry lawmakers, local leaders and citizens over the removal of military heroes and historic mentions from Defense Department websites and social media pages.

In response, the department has scrambled to restore some of those posts as their removals have come to light.

The confusion about how to interpret the DEI policy was underscored Monday as Naval Academy personnel mistakenly removed some photos of distinguished female Jewish graduates from a display case as they prepared for Hegseth’s visit. The photos were put back...

While the AP News weren't able to confirm in that story which books were getting removed, follow-up reports got out that some of the books under fire were biographies on Martin Luther King Jr, and WWII soldier - and major league baseball Hall of Famer - Jackie Robinson.

In short, Hegseth and trump and the rest of their anti-woke racists were desperate and eager to purge books on American heroes.

This is indefensible. Former congresscritter Steve Israel makes the case (via The Hill):

As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, I took on the issue of professional military education. It may not have garnered many headlines, but education was viewed as critical from the top echelons of the Pentagon to the remote operating bases I visited in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We sharpen our warriors’ effectiveness when we develop their skills in critical thinking, languages, cultures and history. But we are now going dangerously backwards.

The New York Times reported that the U.S. Naval Academy is identifying books in the school’s Nimitz Library that may be pulled from circulation because they relate to so-called diversity, equity and inclusion. Among the 900 potential offenders: a biography of Jackie Robinson, “The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr.” and “Einstein on Race and Racism.”

The Chinese military is expanding. Russia is threatening Europe. But you can sleep better tonight knowing that the Navy is keeping its men and women safe from Jackie Robinson...

The irony in this move is rich. In the name of freedom, we mustn’t let our future leaders do things like, oh, read what they want to read. We must treat them like snowflakes, so brittle and sensitive that they must be protected from the offensive views of Robinson, King, Einstein and whoever else is on the blacklist of the Navy Blue and Gold.

Our warriors need body armor, not censorship. The best of them want to build their intellectual resilience. When I visited them in Iraq, Afghanistan and our military academies at home, many consistently told me that they fought better when they had time not only to drill, but to learn. To read...

It was a Marine who later explained to me why military education was so important: “If you know how to think, you realize you don’t have to kick in the door and start shooting; sometimes, you can find a safer way — for yourself...”

Instead of supporting our warriors with libraries that will give them an unvarnished telling of history, the Pentagon has decided to whitewash it. Instead of encouraging critical thinking skills, the Navy has decided to dull them...

There was nothing offensive in what Martin Luther King represents even as a man of peace who stood for civil rights. MLK may have spoke against the Vietnam War, but so did others of his era, and there is no shame in letting our military schools offer his biographies to highlight the man's overall commitment to justice.

There was nothing offensive in what Jackie Robinson represents even as a veteran of the Second World War - one of the few "good" or Just Wars humanity's ever known - who faced court martial during his service over refusing to move to the back of a segregated bus, and who broke the racial barriers in professional baseball to make it truly America's Game.

But these men - and many other men and women who impacted our nation's history over the centuries - offend trump and Hegseth and others among trump's ranks of hate-driven lackeys all because the likes of King and Robinson were heroes who dared to confront and bring an end to the institutionalized racism that scarred the United States since our nation's birth... and clearly still scars us to this day.

MLK offends the likes of trump because Reverend King dared to win the Nobel Peace Prize fighting for our nation's soul, sacrificing his own life in the pursuit of equality, justice, and economic fairness not just for Blacks but for the poor.

Jackie Robinson offends the likes of trump because Robinson suffered years of public attacks by haters while proving racists wrong that Black players were just as good as Whites, helping his Brooklyn Dodgers make playoffs and even a World Series championship. Jackie entered the hallowed Hall of Fame - notorious as one of the hardest sports halls to join - and his jersey number retired by all the major league teams in honor of what he endured.

King and Robinson and dozens if not hundreds of other American heroes - those who are Black, or Latino, or Natives, or Asians, or Women - offend trump and his ilk because King and Robinson and those hundreds of Blacks and Latinos and Natives and Asians and Women all defy the white supremacist myth that only White Men are capable and worthy of respect (that even the most mediocre White Man is superior to all others).

Rather than step away from an easily disprovable lie - that Whites can be mediocre and ought to live with the reality that We Are All Human capable of both greatness and failures - trump and the patriarchal racists would rather whitewash - literally - every fact and human face from our history books, from any form of information and knowledge that can inspire our generation and those who follow us.

trump will erase the fact we have heroes who aren't him - that there are heroes with different faces and different skins and different genders than him - just to make himself a false god.

Damn him.

Do not purge our heroes from the shelves, America.

Do not let these tiny, broken, hollow men erase everything good about our nation.

Remaining Awake

The thought that keeps me going in dark days like this one:

Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice. 

-- Martin Luther King Jr., 

trump and the Republicans have turned that arc into a goddamned pretzel, but the fight continues.

April 4th Remembrance of Reverend King

In this moment, remembering that we killed a man who dared to speak for justice and peace, for equality both racial and economic, we must think back on the words he spoke to inspire us towards the better angels of our nature:

"...We proclaim our devotion to democracy, but we sadly practice the very opposite of the democratic creed. We talk passionately about peace, and at the same time we assiduously prepare for war. We make our fervent pleas for the high road of justice, and then we tread unflinchingly the low road of injustice. This strange dichotomy, this agonizing gulf between the ought and the is, represents the tragic theme of man's earthly pilgrimage."

- from the Strength to Love sermons

I'm choosing that quote because on this day, the great threat to American democracy, the rough beast that spread injustice behind him like a wake of destruction, is facing justice this afternoon in a Manhattan courtroom.

Even Reverend King would be popping the champagne on watching this Shitgibbon get a semblance of justice after decades of trumpian racist rage.

April 4: Martin Luther King Spoke About Violence

What Reverend King said about violence holds true on this anniversary of the evening that violence claimed his life:

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate...Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that...

The violence of war we see every day will not end until the haters are gone.

The violence of mass shootings we endure every day will not end until the haters are gone.

We all have to make that moral choice to stand up and fight, not for the sake of hate but for the sake of those we can love.

Update: Christ. I looked back at my other memorial blog articles for MLK and I keep quoting this same paragraph. I gotta get fresh material next time...

All Apologies to Reverend Martin Luther King Jr, Almost Forgot This Day

Let's be honest, if Martin Luther King Jr was alive today he'd... be avoiding the pitfall of Twitter and speaking from his church via Skype to tell his parishioners to STAY AT HOME and STAY HEALTHY unlike certain other Christian sects who want to KEEP SHOWING OFF and GETTING THEIR OWN PEOPLE SICK.

Also, he'd be answering every one of trump's lies about Coronavirus and the failing federal government response which is doing little for the states overwhelmed by the crisis.

Sorry about this year, Reverend. Hopefully by next year we'll do your memory better.

This Should Be a Martin Luther King Birthday To Honor Peace and Justice

Instead today we got a bunch of gun nuts holding a rally in Richmond VA to try and intimidate the state government into not passing stronger gun safety laws.

This is an intentional insult towards a man who won a Nobel Peace Prize for promoting non-violence protesting, and a sharp reminder that Reverend King was gunned down because of his civil rights and anti-poverty campaigns. Yes, for a time King owned guns during the early days of the Civil Rights efforts - when his house was attacked and threats on Black lives very real - but by the 1960s he gave them up because they conflicted with his message of nonviolent protest and a realization that justice should not have to rely on violence.

But tell that to to mostly White and mostly racist Second Amendment Cosplayers taking over the streets of Richmond today.

The turnout is expected to be just the goddamn gun worshipers: the Far Left and the Gun Reform groups had declined to counter-protest to avoid triggering any violence in the streets... which is something the Far Right Gun Violence groups are eager to provide today.

This is sad. We should be focusing on what Martin Luther King Jr would be focusing on: affordable housing, better jobs, safer streets and not just for Blacks or minorities but for all the poor.

So what would Martin Luther King say about all this? From the "Drum Major" speech in 1968:

...And the other thing is that it causes one to engage ultimately in activities that are merely used to get attention. Criminologists tell us that some people are driven to crime because of this drum major instinct. They don't feel that they are getting enough attention through the normal channels of social behavior, and so they turn to anti-social behavior in order to get attention, in order to feel important. And so they get that gun, and before they know it they robbed a bank in a quest for recognition, in a quest for importance.

And then the final great tragedy of the distorted personality is the fact that when one fails to harness this instinct, he ends up trying to push others down in order to push himself up. And whenever you do that, you engage in some of the most vicious activities. You will spread evil, vicious, lying gossip on people, because you are trying to pull them down in order to push yourself up...

We are watching tiny souls give themselves over to the worship of a weapon, a machinery of death, on the one day we should be respecting life and peace. All so they can push themselves up at the expense of instilling fear in everybody else.

On a day where we shouldn't have weapons.

Happy birthday to Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. We should be honoring you better.

What Could Possibly Go Wrong If the Feds Stop Protecting Us From the Homegrown White Violent Fringe

On this anniversary remembrance of Martin Luther King Jr's assassination, I want to point out a situation that should be getting a lot more coverage in the national media than it is (via Betsy Woodruff at the Daily Beast):

The Department of Homeland Security has disbanded a group of intelligence analysts who focused on domestic terrorism, The Daily Beast has learned. Numerous current and former DHS officials say they find the development concerning, as the threat of homegrown terrorism—including white supremacist terrorism—is growing.

In the wake of this move, officials said the number of analytic reports produced by DHS about domestic terrorism, including the threat from white supremacists, has dropped significantly. People in and close to the department said this has generated significant concern at headquarters...

It's probably been greeted at trump's Mar-A-Lago parties with the popping of champagne bottles. Just as we're seeing in public more evidence that the angrier, more heavily-armed factions of the Far Right are striking out at the targets they hate the most - sending bombs to trump's public enemies, stockpiling weapons and plotting attacks on Congressional Democrats, growing reports of American Nazis vandalizing Jewish and Muslim communities - and getting none-too-subtle prods from their idol who refuses to condemn their bloody rampages.

Back to Woodruff:

Former officials pointed to a spate of domestic terror attacks in recent years as evidence that DHS erred by shuttering this branch. From the massacre that left 11 people dead at a Pittsburgh synagogue to a shooting targeting Republican members of Congress in June 2017 to bomb threats that a deranged Trump fan directed at prominent Democrats and CNN, violent attacks informed by homegrown hatred have left Americans increasingly terrorized...

Pressed on whether DHS disputes this reporting, a senior DHS official pushed back.
“The same people are working on the issues,” the official said. “We just restructured things to be more responsive to the I&A customers within DHS and in local communities while reducing overlap with what the FBI does. We actually believe we are far more effective now.”

But Sgt. Mike Abdeen with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department told The Daily Beast that his office used to receive a significant amount of material from I&A, but that the communications have dried up in recent months. For the last six months, he said, I&A has been mostly silent. He added that this has been consistent with broader changes in how the department communicates with his office.

“It’s been very quiet lately,” Abdeen said. “It’s changed with the new administration. It doesn’t seem to be as robust, as active, as important—it is important, I’m sure, but it’s not a priority. It doesn’t seem like engagement, outreach, and prevention are seen as a priority as we used to see in the past. There were roundtable meetings in the past, there was more activity, more training, more seminars. Now it seems like it’s gone away.”

There's a reason for that.

trump has made it clear before he likes being the Bully in the room. Even with the Mueller Report in his pocket, he wants his revenge on everyone he thinks isn't being fair (i.e. worshipful of) to him. trump enjoys the idea he has a rabid mob literally at his command, and has been baiting his crowds into increasing hatred towards the enemies - Media, immigrants, Blacks, libruls, anyone not wearing a MAGA hat - he knows are out there.

he also knows his time is limited. Despite his efforts to silence the Mueller Report, nobody is buying his and Attorney General Barr's "Summary" trump claims EXONERATES ME WOOHOO. House Democrats are starting to rev up their investigations into trump's multiple misdeeds, finally requesting his tax returns for examination (under an unusually-worded investigation into the "auditing of Presidential taxes" in the first place). They've also voted to use subpoenas on Barr and the DoJ for the full unredacted version of Mueller's Report, which the leaks from Mueller's staffers - people who haven't leaked in two years - are telling us did not exonerate trump at all and may be worse than what Barr's Letter suggests (leading up to the possibility of BARR getting charged with Obstruction on this... ooooo).

What's happening is that trump is doing whatever he can to tie one arm behind the collective backs of our federal, state and county level law enforcement agencies ahead of any upcoming hate rallies by the White Nationalist types that are sure to spawn when (not if) trump is directly threatened with arrests or impeachment. I don't wanna be the guy to throw conspiracy theories like this out there... BUT...

I'm someone old enough to remember the worst terror attack before 9/11 in the United States was pulled by a determined wingnut with a handful of friends.

I'm enough of a history student to remember not just the Klu Klux Klan behind lynchings and attacks on Blacks and Jews across the nation post-Civil War, but involved in mass raids into Black communities from Rosewood to Tulsa to Wilmington. We had attacks on Civil Rights marchers and Birmingham teens recorded on our television broadcasts. Today is the anniversary of the death of Civil Rights' staunchest and most eloquent defender for God's sake.

I'm enough of an American to recognize that we Whites persecuted and rounded up Native tribes into forced marches and unwanted lands, that we excluded Asians and attacked their communities, that we shipped Japanese into internment camps.

Our nation has a sordid history of race relations that almost always turns on white mobs arming themselves and attacking The Other on any pretext: mostly out of fear, and mostly driven by rage.

It isn't paranoia to think this. It's history.

And trump is trying to repeat that history as a means of keeping himself in power.

The best way to do that is to rig the game. After all, cheating is the only trick trump knows.

Rev. Martin Luther King Jr Day 2019 (w/ Updates)

I will be part of the City of Bartow's float for today's Martin Luther King Jr parade. I'll report back how it went.

Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education. - The Rev.

Update: Just got back, will upload photos as soon as possible.

Newer Update: Adding some photos with some context! For anybody who's never been in Bartow, here you go!

At the starting point near Main and Broadway

City of Bartow's official float!

High school marching band. I been there when I was in 9th Grade.
I sympathize.

When the drummers warmed up I suddenly found myself
stepping in place and rolling my feet out of habit.

Keep an eye on this house.

Gotta zoom in...

LB Brown House! A key location of African American and Floridian history.

At this point it was hard to keep up with photos because we entered the neighborhoods where families and kids were lined up for the candy handouts our float was giving. Which is kinda not what Martin Luther King Jr. stood for, other than his civil rights focus on poverty and against hunger.

As for celebrating Reverend King's efforts, the city hosted an afternoon gathering at Carver Recreational Center.

As for honoring Reverend King's fight for civil rights and a better America, well that fight keeps happening every day. Get to work.

Anniversary: A Voice That Will Not Stay Silent

Sleep, sleep tonight
And may your dreams be realized
If the thunder cloud passes rain
So let it rain, let it rain
Rain on him - "MLK" U2

What you thought I was gonna quote "Pride (In the Name of Love)"?

Well, I can do that too.

Early morning, April Four
Shot rings out in the Memphis sky
Free at last, they took your life
They could not take your Pride...

Uh, yeah. Bono found out later that Reverend King was killed in the evening, around 6 PM Memphis time. Oops. Still it's the thought that counts.

But if you want a quote that matters, here's one from the man himself:

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied." - Letter from  Birmingham Jail (1963)

To the Black Lives Matter movement.

To the Stoneman Douglas students.

To the women in the streets marching for their lives, to the teachers striking for better pay and better schools, to every protester across the globe.

Stay safe. Stand Tall. Speak for Justice.

Anniversary: Still a Mountaintop to Climb

Tonight, fifty years ago, a preacher got up to give a speech at the Mason Temple in Memphis TN. The Reverend had spent some years fighting for civil rights for Blacks in a United States that had been segregated for decades, that had been violent towards minorities, that had been keeping down the poor and the poverty-stricken.

He spoke about the fight he was leading at the time for sanitation workers in the city, how it was not only for better wages but for better lives. He spoke about the need to confront poverty not just for Black families but ALL the poor. He spoke about the importance of standing up and speaking out. How boycotts were necessary. How the voices of the many were necessary to make those in power finally listen.

He talked about the brush with death he had years earlier, about how it woke him up to the importance of living now and fighting for life. He talked about all the threats he received, not just from Whites angry and driven by race hatred but by those in power who feared the changes he called for, not just against the racial dynamic in our country but the sharing of wealth that could break the cycle of hatred and violence that kept the poor down.

He spoke of hope, knowing that he himself might not live to see such a day.

Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the Mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live - a long life; longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen... the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. So I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!

...we killed him the next day.

For a brief while - 40 years later - we had a Promised Land. We had Obama, trying to fix a broken economy and end two bad wars, we had an end to hatred against gays, we had chances to fix our immigration system to keep those who wanted to live here and be Americans, we had an opportunity to listen to the better angels of our nature.

I'd like to think a time traveler met with Reverend King the hours before he gave his speech, and took him to see Obama and his family celebrate his electoral win in Grant Park in 2008. I'd like to think King wasn't told about the rise of trump, and the hatred that rose with him and stains our nation today.

King spoke about the long arc of the moral universe, bending towards justice. Right now that arc is a pretzel. But justice is real it's there, and it's worth protesting for, standing up for, praying for, living for.

We ALL still have that mountain to climb to a better nation, one that's not driven by fear, riven by hate.

He saw the Promised Land. He saw the hope that is justice in a moral universe.

Keep climbing.

Some Thoughts On Martin Luther King Jr. 2018 Edition

(Update: Thank you Batocchio for the link to Mike's Blog Round-Up on Crooksandliars.com!)

"...The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes.  ...Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that..." - from Where Do We Go From Here speech (1967)

"The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice" - a saying attributed to Reverend King, based on sayings from a speech by Unitarian minister Theodore Parker. King says it in one line where Parker took a whole paragraph, and King says it better. (this is kinda like how Jimi Hendrix's take on "All Along the Watchtower" is waaaaay better than Bob Dylan's original)

Never forget King spent his last years fighting against poverty and income inequality, seeing that as a universal problem for everyone's civil rights:

We have come a long way in our understanding of human motivation and of the blind operation of our economic system. Now we realize that dislocations in the market operation of our economy and the prevalence of discrimination thrust people into idleness and bind them in constant or frequent unemployment against their will. The poor are less often dismissed from our conscience today by being branded as inferior and incompetent. We also know that no matter how dynamically the economy develops and expands it does not eliminate all poverty...

The problem indicates that our emphasis must be two-fold. We must create full employment or we must create incomes. People must be made consumers by one method or the other. Once they are placed in this position, we need to be concerned that the potential of the individual is not wasted. New forms of work that enhance the social good will have to be devised for those for whom traditional jobs are not available...

MLK essentially argued for guaranteed basic incomes before it came into vogue a few years ago.

Also, this:

I know this kinda goes against Rev. King's admonitions against violence,
but never let a white guy in a bowtie speak for what King stood for.

Also, I really think if Reverend King were alive today (ducks to avoid Huey's thrown chair) he'd be under arrest for beating the everloving hell out of trump.

Martin Luther King on the Weakness Of Violence

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes...

Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
- Where Do We Go From Here? (1967)

Words of Wisdom On This Day

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. ... Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

--Martin Luther King Jr. from Where Do We Go From Here (1967)