Columnist.
My high school colors were green and white. At graduation the boys wore green robes and the girls wore white. No one considered the girls inferior because of the color of their robes. Today, we live in different times. My alma mater, Walter Johnson High School in Montgomery County, Md., is one of several schools to have decided that their commencement ceremony this year will feature single-color robes to respect transgender students and those who do not identify as either male or female. In the age of Caitlyn Jenner, any effort to classify the sexes is becoming increasingly difficult, if not downright impossible. The Washington Post reports "student advocates" have been campaigning for this, claiming the use of one color for boys and another for girls does not allow for the full panoply of "gender identity" increasingly on display in the marketplace of the bizarre.
An advisory committee to the Food and Drug Administration has recommended approval of a drug created to raise a woman's libido. It's called flibanserin, but it is popularly known as "female Viagra." The 18-6 committee vote does not guarantee the FDA will give final approval to the drug (it has been rejected twice before), but the agency has a record of mostly going along with the committee's recommendations. Men of a certain age may rejoice at such a breakthrough. Imagine the possibility of no longer hearing "not tonight, honey, I've got a headache." Think of the time and money this pill could save men. No more expensive dinners. No more mandatory chick flicks. No remembering birthdays or sending flowers. No back rubs or faked sensitivity. Just a simple pill and she'll be "ready," as the male enhancement commercial euphemistically calls it. Cut to the chase, except there would be no need for a chase. No romance. No "getting to know you." It sounds like the 1973 film "Westworld" where lifelike android women fulfill any male fantasy and never say "no."
I was not surprised to see historian David McCullough's latest book rocket to the top position on The New York Times Best Sellers list. Not only is "The Wright Brothers" beautifully written in McCullough's familiar narrative style, it reminds Americans of what we once honored and promoted: vision, initiative, talent, genius, entrepreneurship, faith, even clean living. Orville and Wilbur Wright took many personal and financial risks. They paid for their experiments with a "flying machine" out of the small profits from their bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio. Incredibly, after the first flight at Kitty Hawk, N.C., in 1903, which lasted just 12 seconds, and subsequent longer flights in the next two years -- many of which were photographed — skeptical newspapers and especially the U.S. government would not believe that humans could fly. Previous attempts had failed, some spectacularly. The assertion that "If God had meant Man to fly, He would have given him wings" was deeply embedded.
Martin O'Malley, former Baltimore mayor and Maryland governor, announced his presidential candidacy on Saturday, and said some things that could be taken as criticism of President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. "Today, the American dream seems for so many of us to be hanging by a thread," said OâMalley, adding "We must save our country now. ... Tell me how it is that you can get pulled over for a broken taillight in our country, but if you wreck the nation's economy, you are untouchable." Who is he blaming for "wrecking" the economy? Big banks and Wall Street, not the Obama administration, which has presided over slow economic growth, an increase in the number of Americans who want to work but can't find jobs and more than 46 million people on food stamps. Last month, the Commerce Department reported the economy contracted 0.7 percent in the first quarter of 2015.
"Black lives matter!" was the chant heard at recent demonstrations in cities and towns from Ferguson, Missouri, to Baltimore, Maryland. Yes, they do matter, but apparently not so much to some other blacks. Only when a white police officer shoots or engages in other behavior that results in the death of a black man do black lives seem to matter. While Memorial Day weekend featured the traditional parades, barbecues and moments of silence at baseball games for those who gave their lives in wartime to preserve our freedoms, in some of America's biggest cities virtual shooting galleries produced the sort of carnage more likely to be found in the Middle East from Islamic State terrorists. In Baltimore, which was wracked by violence just one month ago after Freddie Gray, an African-American man, died while in police custody, 32 people were shot. Nine of them died. That brings to 35 the number killed in Baltimore just in May and the month isn't over.
I didn't attend my commencement ceremony at American University in Washington, D.C. I chose instead to receive my degree in the mail. I didn't want to listen to a boring speaker, likely unaffiliated with the school or anyone in it, drone on in Washington's notorious summer heat. Too bad graduates of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy did not have the same option. They had to endure a commencement address by President Obama on "climate change." Linking the rise of Islamic terrorism to a warming planet, the president told the grads, "Understand, climate change did not cause the conflicts we see around the world. Yet what we also know is that severe drought helped to create the instability in Nigeria that was exploited by the terrorist group Boko Haram. It's now believed that drought and crop failures and high food prices helped fuel the early unrest in Syria, which descended into civil war in the heart of the Middle East."
If you visit Mount Olympus, you will see scores of crumbling statues to false gods once worshipped by ancient Greeks. The same is true in Rome, where statues of political gods, notably those named Caesar, lay in ruins. We are more sophisticated today. Moderns don't bow to Zeus. Many of us, though, put our faith in the false god of politics, despite its track record of not being able to achieve all of the things we project upon it. The late comedian George Carlin may have put the blame for this where it belongs: "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups." In order to accurately judge an idea, policy, or individual "stupid," one must first have a standard by which stupid can be measured.
My first job in journalism was as a copyboy at the NBC News Bureau in Washington, D.C. In my early 20s, I asked Bill Corrigan, the newsroom manager, "What must I do to get on the air?" He replied, "Get a college degree and a minimum of five years writing experience with a newspaper or wire service." In those days every reporter at NBC News and the other two networks came from print because television was relatively new and as network news president Reuven Frank noted in his book "Out of Thin Air," we were making it up as we went along. I got the college degree, but avoided the wire service and newspapers (until later) and have managed to enjoy a decent career in broadcast and print journalism. The rules of the road to journalistic success have changed dramatically, as has the definition of journalist. Today, one can self-identify as a journalist without any background or experience.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch has announced a Justice Department investigation to determine whether the Baltimore Police Departmentâs practices are unconstitutional and violate civil rights; in short, whether or not the police force there is racist. It will come as no surprise if the investigation concludes that it is, because accusing the department of racism diverts attention from the city's real problem: Baltimore, a laboratory for liberal policies, is a failed city that has shortchanged the poor for decades. Baltimore has received over $1.8 billion in stimulus money from the Obama administration, including $467.1 million to invest in education and $26.5 million for crime prevention. Still, parts of the city remain mired in poverty and despair. There are 16,000 vacant buildings in Baltimore and an unknown number of "vacant" fathers. Between 2000 and 2010, Baltimore lost 5 percent of its population. The liberal solution of raising taxes hasn't worked. Many of those who could escape the city have.
"Shocked," "surprised," "stunned" were some of the words used by broadcasters, columnists, political "experts" and pollsters when a Conservative Party victory was forecast by exit polls on election night. Former Liberal Democrat Party leader Paddy Ashdown was so certain the exit polls were wrong that he announced on the BBC he would publicly eat his hat if they were right. British chefs may now be considering whether a traditional bowler or a Carnaby Snap Brim from Christysâ would make the most palatable meal. When the actual results were in — a Conservative sweep, with the exception of Scotland — the experts were even more gobsmacked. How could this have happened? They had predicted an outcome too close to call, a hung Parliament and the possibility that Labour Leader Ed Miliband, who ran a campaign attacking "the rich" and promised higher taxes, was poised to become the next prime minister.
The Obama administration says it is still trying to determine whether ISIS was behind the attack in Garland, Texas, in which two terrorists were shot dead after trying to kill people attending a "draw the Prophet Muhammad" contest. ISIS is not only claiming responsibility, but promising new attacks. On anonymous message board JustPasteIt, a group that identified itself as ISIS posted its intentions: "The attack by the Islamic State in America is only the beginning of our efforts to establish a wilayah (governing province) in the heart of our enemy. Our aim was the khanzeer (swine) Pamela Geller and to show her that we don't care what land she hides in or what sky shields her; we will send all our Lions to achieve her slaughter. ... To those who protect her: this will be your only warning of housing this woman and her circus show. Everyone who houses her events, gives her a platform to spill her filth are legitimate targets. We have been watching closely who was present at this event and the shooter of our brothers. We knew that the target was protected. Our intention was to show how easy we give our lives for the Sake of Allah."
They called it "Question Time," borrowing the term from the prime minister's weekly appearance in the House of Commons, but this was surprisingly and refreshingly different. On Thursday, the three main candidates for prime minister — David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg — one by one appeared before an audience of voters at the Leeds Town Hall where for a half-hour voters asked them informed, pointed and detailed questions. The host, the BBC's David Dimbleby, called for questions and occasionally followed up, but mostly voters drove the program. Two of the candidates were called liars right to their faces. In the U.S., we may think our candidates liars, but we rarely have a chance to call them on it. The British complain that they are tired of this long campaign, which has lasted just five months. They should consider what Americans have to put up with — year-around election cycles that never seem to end.
In 2-1/2 hours of oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court Tuesday, Justice Anthony Kennedy asked the right question: whether it is appropriate for the Court to discard a definition of marriage that "has been with us for millennia," adding, "it's very difficult for the court to say, 'Oh, well, we know better.' " Kennedy, who is regarded as the swing vote on this and many other controversial issues, may not answer his own question the way proponents of traditional marriage wish, but the question is not rhetorical. Should this court, or any court, re-define and force the states to accept a new definition of marriage that will not only affect same-sex couples, but open the door to other petitioners, for example, polygamists, who wish to "marry" more than one person? If human history, tradition, the Bible, the Constitution and biology are to be ignored or re-defined, on what basis do courts say "no" to anything? If "equality" and "fairness" are the new standard, one might as well have no standard at all because such emotional appeals could justify any relationship or form of behavior.
When future historians analyze the decline of America they need look no further than the trivialities increasingly occupying our time and concerns instead of substantive matters seriously threatening our existence. The latest in a long list of examples is the two-hour ABC special last Friday devoted to former Olympic athlete Bruce Jenner and his coming out as a transgender person. Two hours! Neither ABC, nor any other media giant, has paid that much attention to international threats from Russia, China and the rapid rise of Islamic fanaticism, not to mention the Bill and Hillary Clinton financial empire. What is wrong with us? This constant feeding of our lower nature and fixation on what not long ago was regarded as bizarre, even perverted, is contributing to a warped culture and the devaluing of the qualities necessary to stabilize society. It is as if a lid has been lifted from the sewer and all the waste is now flooding the streets, posing a threat to our national well-being.
"...that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain..." —Abraham Lincoln, the Gettysburg Address While the U.S. military in recent years has had a difficult time winning wars, it has had an easier time surrendering to political correctness and social experimentation. Arguments against gays in the military were rejected, and now there is a push to allow women in front-line combat positions, though many believe most women do not have the upper body strength to carry heavy loads on their backs or perform in ways that achieve the mission and protect their comrades. Last week a new challenge emerged that could present an even greater threat to military effectiveness and unit cohesion. At a Pentagon news conference, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey, said that the capital of Anbar province in Iraq, Ramadi, is not central to the U.S. and Iraqi aims of defeating the forces of the Islamic State.
"Don't know much about history" —Sam Cooke It's an old joke, but one that is a commentary on our times. A pollster asks: "What do you think about the level of ignorance and apathy in the country?" The person replies: "I don't know and I don't care." Each week, Jesse Watters of Fox News interviews mostly young people about politics, government, current events and history. He claims their displays of ignorance are not edited. The worst part is that the interviewees don't seem to care that they know little about their government and country. In a recent episode, interviewees couldn't name President Obama's accomplishments or any of the Republican presidential hopefuls.
There are classic films, like the ones on TCM and AMC, and there are modern films. There are few modern classics. "Little Boy," in theaters April 24, could be a modern classic. The film is set in a Southern California town during World War II. A couple's oldest son, London Busbee (David Henrie), is drafted, but is barred from service because of his flat feet. The father, James Busbee (Michael Rapaport), goes instead and his youngest son, Pepper Flynt Busbee, 8, beautifully played by Jakob Salvati, is devastated. Pepper and his father have a very close relationship (they call each other "partner") and almost from the moment his father leaves for war, the child is plotting ways to get him safely home. After being enthralled by a magician named Ben Eagle (Ben Chaplin), Pepper tries magic with some hilarious results.
In the video announcing her presidential candidacy, Hillary Clinton says the economic deck "is still stacked in favor of those at the top." She should know because she has gobbled up a lot of cash for speaking fees and the Clinton Foundation. The video also includes the word "reinventing," a kind of self-reset button (it didn't work with the Russians, but she apparently thinks it will work for her). After 67 years on this earth, the last 23 of which have been in the political spotlight, Hillary thinks the public may not know who she is. In fact, we do and this video is an attempt to apply tinted glass to her campaign wagon in hopes of obscuring the real Hillary.
When people speak of "the first woman president" they usually mean Hillary Clinton, who is expected to announce her candidacy soon. But there's another woman, a Republican, who will shortly vie for the top job. She is Carly Fiorina, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard. The polls don't register much support for Fiorina, but if people listen to what she has to say, particularly about Hillary Clinton, that could change. In an interview, Fiorina told me that, unlike a male candidate, she could better take on Hillary Clinton: "No matter what that man says, she will play the gender card or the war on women card. She won't be able to do that with me."
Too bad the "framework" of a nuclear weapons deal with Iran didn't come four days earlier on April Fools' Day. It would have been more appropriate. The United States is being asked to foolishly believe promises by a regime that is religiously motivated to eliminate Israel and ultimately the United States, is the premier sponsor of terrorism in the world, has a record of breaking promises, including past promises about nuclear weapons, and still holds American prisoners, including a Christian minister, a Washington Post reporter, a former Marine and Robert Levinson, a retired DEA agent taken hostage in 2007. Did Secretary of State John Kerry demand they be released as part of the framework? We don't know because the deal that isn't yet a deal has not been formalized and if an agreement is actually reached by the next deadline in June, we still might only know what they tell us, unless Congress holds hearings and asks the right questions. Shades of Rep. Nancy Pelosi's line about the need to pass Obamacare to find out what's in it.
