SHAME

To EVERY single organized Jewishgroup in America from the Associated Jewish Federations, to the Jewish Community Centers Association, to the Shul’s, the Temples to the American Jewish Congress, from Rabbi Marvin Heir, who spoke at the Trump Inauguration, to the Orthodox Rabbi’s who helped Ivanka Trump Kushner convert to Judaism, to the Rabbi’s of the Kushner Family Synagogues in New York City to the the synagogue in Washington DC, to the New York City Federation home to the many friends and donors of the Kushner Family, to the Congregants who share Shabbat Services with both the Charles Kushner Family and Jared Kushner Family…TO ALL OF YOU…WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING FOR!

The man calling himself president of the USA, held a rally in Harrisburg PA and in attendance, and witnessed on video, were members White Supremacy groups. They paraded around the arena patrolling the audience, and no one from the Trump Crime Family or his hired henchmen tried to stop these Racists and Anti-Semites, nor did Trump utter a word to the audience insisting that this IS not Nazi Germany!…TO ALL OF YOU JEWS WHO HAVE BEEN AND REMAIN SILENT…WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING FOR!

My entire professional career has been in the jewish communal field. All of my entire career working as a jewish professional, at conference after conference, study session after study session i have been told, reminded, lectured that “Work Does Not Set You Free”, “Never Again”. I have proudly worked within the greater community as a Jewish professional teaching various other demographics who we are as Jews, and our goal for fair and equal. I have raised my kids at JCC Pre School’s/ JCC Camps,I have welcomed Jewish Seniors, survivors of the Holocaust into the JCC, knowing they were not only safe in this new environment, but safe in America…As a Gay man I also learned that Silence Equals Death…To EVERY single Jew in this country, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR….Nazi’s were in attendance at a Trump rally and Trump is not a candidate any longer, but the guy sitting in the Oval Office…and all I hear is the deafening sound of YOUR silence! SHAME, SHAME, SHAME!

Trilogy Part 3

Trilogy Part 3

We all have heard the word ENABLER, many of us who have friends or family suffering from forms of addiction, either become very defensive with the word ENABLER, or have found some comfort understanding the power of ENABLING, and NOT ENABLING, of course both the positive and negative affects. Often times we pretend that by not mentioning the THING, the THING will somehow disappear, or like a villager in some tucked away hamlet, saying, no evil means seeing no evil which means there is no evil. There are some people, even in 2017, who find it difficult to believe that addiction is ACTUALLY a mental illness, perhaps some of those people, also believe climate change is a gimmick, Noah actually had a an arc with dinosaurs, and Eve was formed from one of Adam’s ribs, thus any female is truly a form of chattel, owned by men. Sometimes it just seems easier to make excuses for the addict…to tell those around us, the addict will soon get better, even though no action but ENABLING has taken place. Often times we run away from the topic, while the addict still suffers. Many times we also believe, leaving the addict to his or her own devices, might teach them a thing or two, surely changing their ways…We all suffer the consequences of lives wasted, we all suffer the consequences of those whose lives become empty or momentarily full while they enjoy their addiction…Its a life after all…not A life, but life!

Again, and again, the supposedly professional news outlets via the CBS/ABC/NBC and the newer kids on the block, the Cable News Networks, CNN/MSNBC (Not mentioning FOX, because after all how would one classify pure propaganda as anything but PURE PROPAGANDA), have become ENABLERS to anything and anyone Trump. Proudly and boastfully these news casters ACTUALLY repeat the lies, the fabrications, the pure narcissistic exaggeration, the imaginations of the Legion of Trump as subjects worth a debate.  Trump brags his First Hundred Days, were better than anyone in the history books, and with sheer ignorance each and every news outlet provides a talking head to debate the lie, the factual ineptitude of a statement like that. As ENABLERS, these news outlets, permit Trump to demolish the democracy for his own selfish whims. Lies are not news, fabrication of truth is not news, letting these Trump Goons to embellish every single incorrect and motivated lie is like saying to the alcoholic friend, you might have a point, drinking vodka is definitely less debilitating as gin, its like saying to drug addict, perhaps you are correct, since the doctor prescribed your pain pill and you have abused it over and over again, it is still not like being as bad a Meth Head!

I am but a common man, a citizen and I realize how ENABLING the news outlets have become. Never debate anyone Trump…let them tell the lie. Take the words of the lie for example about the First Hundred Days; Compare and contrast the First Hundred Days of the last decade of presidents. No need for a debate, show the facts, and when anyone Trump begins to hoot and holler, be like Sargent Friday from the TV show ‘Dragnet’, and say, “Just the Facts Ma’am.”

Trilogy Part 2

A Trilogy Part 2

I was in 7th grade, the year 1962, it was my Social Studies Class (imagine  a curriculum designed to instruct students about the world around us). Our classroom was on the second floor, the school had those very high windows, which always required a very long rod with a tiny hook on the edge to be used to latch onto the the lock at the top of the window; permitting easy access to open or shut the windows. We were in 7th grade and our Social Studies teacher reminded us during our very first day in September that we were young men and women, and each of us had responsibilities, all of which should be taken with pride and in earnest. (I knew the word earnest, and its meaning, but somehow once our teacher used it in a sentence to describe all of us, many of us then used it as a nickname whenever an insult was necessary, like Hey Earnest your shoe is untied…it was 1962). One day, the teacher asked the kid who always was cracking jokes, to unlock the window. This guy was a popular kid, and usually was king of the hill, and never ever was called Earnest. He was a cocky kid, and when asked to open the window, stood up and shouted “ma’m, yes ma’m”. It seemed funny, but laughter was not tolerated in this classroom. (Why is it always so difficult to stifle a laugh while sitting in a classroom). This guy walked over to the long window rod with the hook on it, sort of showing off at just how dexterous he was, and how simple of a task this should be. (It was not, for most of the rest of the boys who were tasked in opening the window…girls need not apply to do manual labor in this classroom) Usually, the opening of the window was stressful for everyone, especially anyone who ever tried to do it, so most of the class tried their hardest to NOT watch. The teacher was about to explain to the classroom all about the ABC countries of South America…Argentina, Brazil, Chile, so she was standing at the chalk board, writing the names of the ABC nations, her back to the classroom…As the teacher was writing the word Chile, there was a sudden crashing sound and a shattering of what sounded like glass…all of this followed by a bellowing, “God Damn It.”

There was a collective shout, a few giggles (we had cause to finally let that held in laughter out, and also added some wow’s! Still with her back to the classroom, the teacher continued to finish the spelling of the word Chile, then turned to face the class. There was silence, total silence, except for the kid who was not so dexterous, he was still saying “God Damn It.” The teacher, now moving toward her desk (in those days they were front and center of the classroom with invisible barbed wire strung around for good measure) She bent down slowly but surely, reached for something (we were all certain it was either a large bandage as the show off kid was bleeding, or a paddle…(yep corporal punishment thrived in 1962). But the collective we were all wrong, our teacher pulled out a Bible. (in those days we read a passage from the King James Bible, recited the Lord’s Prayer and stood for the Pledge of Allegiance…those were the days also before any kind of integration and at least 95% of the student body were from Jewish families in the neighborhood). The teacher held up the Bible, almost as a show and tell item. The teacher then almost in a trance, said…”No one shall ever use the Lord’s name in vein, THIS IS AMERICA! Then the teacher said to all of us, place your hands on your desk folded and leave them there, while we (the kid bleeding pretty badly and I) go to the nurses office, and think about the Lord.” Trump has been crowned king, he is the omnipresent, the one Evangelicals believe was anointed by Christ. He is the GUY who is now representing AMERICA. When I grew older and with advent of the 70’s and beyond, I thought I knew another kind of America. But as my 7th grade Social Studies teacher reminded us, THIS IS AMERICA…not just for everyone!

Trilogy, Part 1

A Trilogy Part 1

Lowering standards for the Department of Education…eliminating the EPA, insisting that any idea, ANY idea find fruition demanding that the GOP create Trump Care, no matter if it removes pre-existing conditions, no longer covers millions of Americans, and IS not affordable…White Supremacists in the West Wing…nepotism rampant…tax breaks for billionaires…dissing Canada, Mexico…golfs, lies about golfing, continues to golf and continues to lie…no tax returns, EVER…Campaign Staff singled out by FBI for Russian collusion…invites hypocrites, liars, treasonous enemies of the state and wealthy donors to become Cabinet Members….

Trump is still in the Oval Office…we all still complain, ring our hands, and read how this latest con is the one that will get him…but it doesn’t…it never does…Cable News Networks still pretend that anyone Trump might be truthful and invites Trump talking heads to debate their own alternative facts…The family still has control over all of their businesses…Princess Ivanka, pretends to be the reasonable kid, while hiring laborers seemingly working out of labor camps in China…Jared’s dad, and Jared are still buds with Mafioso, hiring two guys with felony records for their family board, but Jared is given special security badge…We cry, we wallow, we wail, we touch our hearts with disbelief…we receive tons and tons of emails from every possible Democrat National Committee, telling us that this next gift IS the one to make the difference…Trump is still King, still writing Executive Orders undoing any sane and sensible law in this nation…and no one YET has stopped him.

I wake up each day fearful of my phone, going to Facebook knowing that if Trump hasn’t started the Third World War yet, he is attacking our ally’s. I worry how many more pieced of freedom and equality will be torn and shattered…I wonder when Martial Law will be declared…and I continue to only hear silence from the truly religious, the the real Patriots…I begin to wonder IS it true, good things DO happen to bad people, and Good people just get shit on…

Beyond the Pale'

Beyond the Pale’: Unacceptable; outside agreed standards of decency.The paling fence is significant as the term 'pale' came to mean the area enclosed by such a fence and later just figuratively 'the area that is enclosed and safe'. So to be 'beyond the pale' was to be outside the area accepted as ‘home'.

"Tear down this wall!" is a line from a speech made by Ronald Reagan, in West Berlin on June 12, 1987, calling for the leader of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev to open up the barrier which had divided West and East Berlin since 1961. The wall came tumbling down and Reagan took the credit.  "A few months ago, I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and evidence tell me it is not.” Ronald Reagan, denying the Iran-Contra Affair, November 1986 The Iran-Contra Affair: involved a secret foreign policy operation directed by White House officials in the national security council (NSC) under President Ronald Reagan. The operation had two goals: first, to sell arms to Iran in the hope of winning the release of U.S. hostages in Lebanon, and second, to illegally divert profits from these sales to the Contra rebels fighting to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. Discovery of the secret operation, in 1986, triggered a legal and political uproar that rocked the Reagan administration. The numerous related investigations and indictments did not end until 1993 and even then questions remained about the roles of senior White House officials in this arms-for-hostages deal. The Republicans still adore Ronald Reagan, as if he, and he had been one of the Founding Fathers of this nation. The Republican’s ALSO, loved the idea of knocking the Communists on their heads, showcasing the vibrancy, and evolved aspect of Democracy. The Republicans used to insist, while Jimmy Carter was president, that the USA would NEVER be blackmailed, trading money for the release of hostages. The Republicans were pissed that Reagan had done so, and had he not been found to be a lying politician, Reagan had a few more dollars at the ready to pay more blackmail. Ronald Reagan, many historians now write, describe him of suffering from a form of dementia all the way back to 1987, but he WAS the president, and NO average American citizen had the right, to know how mentally or physically unstable the a president might be.

2017, the official functioning of the US Government may be shut down because Donald Trump, insists on building a Wall, one which he promised during his Putin run campaign, would be paid in full by the Mexican Government. 2017, Donald Trump is immersed in at least a half dozen illegal and treasonous scandals involving Vladimir Putin/Russian Oligarchs/ Rosneft, an integrated oil company majority owned by the Government of Russia. 2017, and the Republican Party has decided, due to severe blackmail circumstances and a distaste for the parts of Democracy that permit you and I to be equal persons as  are Corporations, to build a new Wall, and to embrace the Communists…All of this while current historians are quite concerned about the mental and physical state of the Guy sitting in the Oval Office. We learn nothing from history. As if history is Beyond the Pale’.

ALL of Us

We all, ALL of us who have pledged allegiance to the flag, ALL of us who stand for the national anthem, or place our hands on our heart, or remove our hats, and even those of us who believe taking a knee while the anthem is played who still believe those symbols represent freedom democracy and choice…we ALL must immediately realize just how perilous a road ALL of us are on, right here, right now…We have a ruse in the form of a man named Trump sitting in what was once the most powerful office in the world…Putin, pretending to be a Communist, rather than the oligarch and Capitalist he truly is…has set a trap using greed, gluttony, and ego to sway a very immature yet dangerous narcissist into playing puppet…Most of this, of course, could not have happened so brilliantly, had other wanna be’s. wanna have’s like the leadership of the Republican Party, assisted in the suicide of American democracy, thinking that the world, or at least the United States is just one more toy to own and discard when bored.

We ALL, of us, no matter how much you think Jesus wrote the Constitution, or that nothing is wrong with a few White Supremacists, sitting in the Oval Office, or that the South never lost the Civil War…ALL of us those who believe a woman actually does not need permission to tend to her body as she wishes, that the LGBT community pee and poop, love and lust, laugh and cry like any racist or saint might do…ALL of us who understand that blood is red, a heart pumps continuously and a brain controls all that stuff inside the body, no matter what the color of skin is on the outside…ALL of us are running out of time, chance and opportunity as we watch the world around us permit lies, alternative facts, insecure and selfish people take control, hoping that the stupid remain dumb and the smart burn themselves out from the madness of the ignorant. 

The countdown to the first 100 days of a person who was and his not qualified to raise his own kids, shave in front of a mirror, using anything sharp, of being hacked into office is ticking away…It is as if its just another 100 days in the life of a president, but in reality it is almost days longer that the life blood of this nation and ALL of its citizens, is dying, and decaying. I am not sure why there is still a debate as to how illegal, unethical Trump and his cohorts are and have been. I am not sure why so called news outlets STILL pretend that doom and disaster have not and are not occurring each and everyday, they permit the legitimacy of a man to sit in the Oval Office. We, ALL of us, are playing Putin’s game…its called arg among yourselves, pin the tail on the boggy man and ALL the while Mr Putin quietly and conveniently counts just how many lives and how many nations will no longer enjoy, life, liberty and happiness!

Fear of Flying

Why is it ALWAYS after the fact, after the fault, that corporations, when found fraudulent in almost anything they do, SAY: “These do not reflect our values.” REALLY, were those VALUES not reflected by an angry employee, a frustrated person unhappy with the job they chose, a disgruntled member of YOUR team, EVER discussed ahead of time, before the CEO and the Share Holders worried more about the bottom line, and before the invention of the camera on the phone came about? Why does this shit happen in the first place, if the standards and practices of ANY corporation were established to avoid any and all conflicts. was there no money for Staff Training/was the CEO’s salary in jeopardy if management time was wasted on customer service? Were managers too expensive to pay to assist the staff of any corporation to do right by the customer, by the public? It is always after an event that the shock and awe, the condolences, the apologies happen, as if out of the blue an airline employee HAS NEVER berated or beat up a passenger!

We, Americans, should have all taken great heed, when the airlines, ALL, rung their hands and furled their brows, telling us, that due to the increase in gasoline, the fares for flying must be raised. We believed them and one by one, the airlines, filled with angst flowered with true grit, said, we will have to raise prices on tickets, on luggage, on food on movies…BUT trust us, we are doing this for you, and we WILL only be doing this as long as those nasty Oil Producing Countries keep on raising their selfish prices for a barrel of crude! Hmmm, gasoline has dropped quite a bit since those days…the cost of an airplane ticket HAS NOT. We, Americans, should have also been a bit more concerned when suddenly the game of Monopoly was being played by the Airline Industry, one mega merger after the other…Yep, neither the Republicans nor the Democrats said word one about how these HUGE mergers would affect the cost of flying…Its supply and demand we are told, its how American Capitalism works we were lectured…don’t wanna fly, take the Greyhound, except there aren’t that many, don’t wanna fly take the train, except the budget for Amtrak has been cut, don’t wanna fly, stay home!

So, once again, outrage, anger, has surfaced with regards to flying. As if security lines, run by many an ill-equipped personal isn’t frustrating enough, paying more for almost anything you want on an airline flight is outrageously priced. Class war, as you wait your turn to fly waiting until the super, super super duper passengers board first, then just the super, super duper ones, then the those lowly super duper people, waiting until they call the steerage group, sitting in seats designed to limit any kind of blood flow necessary to thrive. Apologies will be provided, lawyers fees will be paid, videos will surface, but I bet our bottom dollar, All of this violence will continue…oh yeah, the airlines will also be mystified, just how all of this stuff could have happened, because well you know its not their practice to best us up!