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In the summer of 1972 Montgomery Mall in Bethesda, MD., like its bigger counterpart across the Potomac River, Tyson’s Corner, was brand spanking new, a vision of things to come in suburbia. Transplanted from an established mid-west town with a Main Street that seamlessly accommodated  famous names like Marshall Fields along side mom and pop shops, a mall fit perfectly with the barrage of culture shocks assaulting my young sensibilities, an apocalyptic collection of commerce with parking lots conglomerated under a single roof.

Yet and still, that doesn’t mean there wasn’t cool stuff to see, nor comfort to be found with brands transcending the places they were exhibited. One of those was Sears, which prominently occupied two floors on the north end of the shopping complex, covering the full range of product offerings, and highlighted by a snack bar that provided the best chili dog to be found, resplendent in a lumpless, beanless chili that was to die for. Were  they to have a chili dog eating contest at the facility, I surely would have been competitive in the junior division. As years passed, Montgomery Mall both expanded and matured, becoming a fixture in the area, and Sears remained a touchstone, friends worked there, and the chili dogs remained as tasty as ever.

Now Sears Holdings  is bankrupt, another failed retail business done in by the internet and superstore competition that encroached into its generalist territory with specialized inventory priced to move and unconcerned with the intangibles tradition creates. As the corpse decays, investors and creditors are left to fight over the pickings, some looking to recoup investments, others actually bent on maximizing the returns on their bets against Sears’ survival.  What was a fixture of US commerce is now, not just a cautionary tale of the economic violence progress can inflict, but possibly a watershed of a future fiscal crisis other spectacular failures may ignite. For while the death of Sears signifies the end of how business was once done, the fight over its dissolution surely presages broader threats associated with investment instruments so complex as to literally defy description.

Calling the derivatives market  complicated is like calling a 5-egg brie omelet rich, the complexity of products like credit-default swaps makes for light-headed dizziness. Yet the ramifications of this marketplace that few understand could initiate another global economic panic. The example of Sears shows why.

Credit-default insurance is meant  to provide the protection necessary for lenders  to keep credit flowing through the financial system, enabling the creation of various products investors can wager on, which in turn provides creative financing for companies like Sears restructuring operations to remain competitive.

However, as the chickens come home to roost with the Sears failure, conflicts have arisen regarding what exactly does and doesn’t qualify to be insured. A 15-member “determinations committee” exists to rule on such questions; I hope it’s members are financial geniuses because one could sit for days studying the questions at hand and still be as confused as when they started. But the gist of it comes down to whether Sears, through “intercompany notes,” can essentially redefine what its debt was and how much its lenders can be recompensed through their credit-default insurance. But, according to economics writer  Sebastian Mallaby,  permitting Sears  such leeway threatens to turn the $11 trillion credit-default industry into another financial Jenga tower, with global crisis the result of jittery insurers unwilling to honor agreements they contend do not accurately reflect what they initially expected to cover. In other words, 2007’s mortgage swaps madness all over again.

All of this plays out as the Trump Administration moves aggressively in lock step with the GOP to gut reforms the hard lessons of the Great Recession presumably taught lawmakers. The conclusion we all thought was reached concerning moral hazard, the accountability Wall Street and corporations must abide for the great capitalist system our pols constantly worship to function properly, appears to no longer be a done deal. In fact, listening  to any Republican speak on the issue, one would be forgiven to mistake the subject for climate change, such is their certainty that the issue is still clouded in uncertainy.

So here is where we are: an Administration and Congress brought to power by a nihilist base of voters, far more concerned with whitening America and denouncing those with the secular temerity to exclaim “happy holidays” than anything economically substantive. Forget about derivatives, most in this group don’t have a 401K. And instilling their champions with the confidence to once again foist untenable vulnerability on, not just ours, but the world’s financial future, may indeed be their most destructive legacy… and that is saying something. Lame duck congressional sessions are capable of much malevolence, and there’s plenty of reasons to expect this vanquished caucus to do their worst.

Come 2019 Democrats will run the Longworth, Cannon  and Rayburn buildings. After they slice up each other picking a new leader, and placate  young turks not content to wait their turns, they would do well to discuss the best way to investigate and confront overt Republican sabotage of measures  designed to prevent a crisis similar to the one they created a decade ago. Few priorities are more important. BC

“General!! Get your ass in here!”

”What can I do for you, Mr. President?”

”Listen, you told me to wait until after the mid-terms; it’s after the mid-terms. Time to clean house. I need a team I can trust!”

”Who do you have in mind, sir?”

”Everybody except DeadBolt and lil Stevey Miller.  Oh, and Chubby over at State; he knows how to follow orders.”

”Have you given any thought to who will replace all of these people you want to pur… er, allow to leave for other opportunities?”

”Sean is working on the list. But they have to be team players, none of this “I am unaware of that” crap. If they can’t think on their feet, I don’t want them! Period!”

”But Mr. President, you yourself can’t keep track of all of your lie….. um, reconsiderations. How do you expect us to? We state current policy only to have you contradict us. How are we supposed to handle that?”

”Hello! Anybody home?! How did you become a General anyway?! Pretty stupid, Kelly! How hard is it to say “I stand by this historically great President 110%?!” Pence doesn’t have any problem doing it, and he’s dumber than dirt. Even Barbie Ann manages it. I can only take so much cue ball!  Instead of nagging all the time about reading a position paper or this crap about waiting 10 minutes before I tweet something, why don’t you get your troops in line?! Just one of the many reasons I want to can your ass and get Bannon back in here. At least he can scheme and chew gum at the same time. So unfair.”

”Mr. President, all we’re doing is trying to serve you. For God’s sake, you couldn’t even scan that Wikipedia I gave you on the Baltic States, and look what happened! Baltic… Balkans; is it really that hard? Did you see how horrified they were? You are the President of the United States! Blaming the wrong countries for war and genocide doesn’t cut it! Piss poor, sir!”

”This is what I’m talking about! If I want lectures on basic competence, I’ll call Vlad; at least he understands power. You and your little bimbo at DHS are weak! Look at all those rats pouring over the border!! And now millions are on their way in that caravan. Pathetic. Lindsey is right; it’s all your fault!”

“Lindsey?! Oh, really? So now it’s Lindsey who you trust? You used to despise him. Remember the primaries?”

”He’s had a change of heart since he saw the pics… er, I mean the light. Let’s just say he’s , hee hee, flying straight now. Just needed a little reminding about how, hee hee, tenuous his position was. No more trouble from Lindsey; he’ll be very fair to me from now on.  I might even appoint him to something if Sean is on board.”

”Sir, don’t you think giving Sean Hannity a voice in the make up of your Administration is kind of crazy? What the hell does he know anyway? He’s just a “news personality.”

“You’re on dangerous ground, General! JUST a personality?! Sean has been more fair to me than anybody! I trust him. We can’t all be Henry Kissinger, Mr. Big Shot! Common sense goes a long way, and Sean has plenty of it! He was right about Hillary, wasn’t he?!”

”Right about what on Hillary?”

”Everything! He and Alex Jones were way ahead of everybody! Anyway, I trust him and that should be enough for you! Stop trying to change me, Kelly! Trump is his own man. He governs by instinct!”

”When are you going to tell everyone they’re out?”

”I’m not, you are. And make sure you remind them about the non-disclosure they signed! I don’t want to get Omarosaed again! Tell them Trump will sue their asses to kingdom come if they so much as frown when talking about me. Capice? Ungrateful bastards!” When’s my next rally?”

”What do you mean, next rally? Mid-terms are over. You lost the House…remember?”

”No duh, John! Do I look as stupid as you are?! I want to get an early start on 2020. Besides, I have to explain some new things.”

”Like what?”

”I’m taking heat for not going to that damn cemetery. The fake news is really running with that one.”

”I suppose so; it really did look awful. I told you it was an important function. Really the whole reason we came over. You could have worn a hat. I thought your stylist had a “breakthrough” spray that could hold up to hurricane gusts. What happened with that?”

”Get out!! You are on my last nerve! A lot of wind AND rain. Very dangerous combination! I have a brand to protect. MAGA means a worldclass combover, a do that stays poised to the elements, General! Never forget, it is my real hair! No, no toupee here! All real!   I don’t need second guessing from you! Very unfair! Trump made the call to stay dry and tweet!”

”Well, how do you plan to explain it to the wretc… um, your supporters?”

”John… I’m going to tell the truth. There was near zero visibility, which I said who cares about, so determined was I to get there. But then there was also the possible deep state plot to sabotage the rotor thingamajiggy, which I also scoffed at and insisted we risk it. However, there was then word Antifa assassins may have penetrated the security perimeter. Just a perfect storm of obstacles. The Secret Service still had to physically restrain me, but hey, what’s a security team to do? Of course the fake news scum ran with lies. Traitors!”

”OooKaayy now!”

”Anyway, back to the reason I called you here to begin with. Uh, let me think a minute.!”

”You wanted me to see what PGA pros I can get to join you for a round at Doral next weekend….remember?”

”Right, right. And forget that kid I played with last time. Way too much of a rules stickler. No fun at all. You’re dismissed.”

”Very well, Mr. President.”   BC

 

 

It’s doubtful there exists a greater American hero than Christy Mathewson. One of the original five inductees into the Major League Hall of Fame, “Big Six” dominated hitters for the full 17 years of his career at the beginning of the last century, amassing 373 wins, while finishing with one of the ten lowest Earned Run Averages in history. While his legendary manager, John McGraw, was reknowned far and wide for having little patience for human beings in general, he openly adored his star pitcher. Although the two could not have been more different, McGraw the epitome of a hard-drinking, near compulsive gambling Irish hothead, and Mathewson, every bit the “Christian gentleman” one of his nicknames implied, they were as close as brothers, feeding off the respect each had for the other.

In 1905 the New York Giants won the World Series solely due to the efforts of Mathewson, who pitched three games, 27 innings, and gave up zero runs. McGraw would go to his grave assuring any and all that no feat ever came close to “Matty’s“ dominance that October week. Asked for his opinion, the ever humble Mathewson admitted “I was hard to hit.” And so a legend was born.

When Christy Mathewson told his wife he was set on joining the US war effort in 1918, she begged him not to… unsuccessfully. Sworn in as a Captain, Mathewson became a member of a gas warfare division and was deployed to the WWI European theater, by then a killing field, where he was accidentally exposed to toxic gas in a training accident, promptly inviting an eventually fatal case of tuberculosis. He died way too young in 1925, recognized along with Walter Johnson as Baseball’s greatest pitcher. The day after his death, the Oklahoma daily, The Oklahoman summed up succinctly where Mathewson stood in America’s estimation: “He was loved as no American athlete has been loved.” Tough guy John McGraw was said to have cried like a baby.

Near a century later Europe is commemorating the war to end all wars, and our POTUS is attending the solemn proceedings. In flight toward Europe, in between rants about factless Democratic cheating in Tuesday’s elections, President Trump tweeted his disdain for French President Macron’s “insulting” remark that, in line with the disdainful recent statements by the US President, perhaps Europe needs to rearm with America as an adversary in mind. Trump, who has never given much thought to context or appropriateness, has no problem picking a fight with his host on the way to events meant to honor shared sacrifice. Apparently, rain and wind, always the enemy of our leader’s precision combover, precipitated cancellation of this morning’s planned visit to a cemetery of the fallen. Like his nastiness and resentment, Trump wears vanity on his sleeve. We should count our blessings he didn’t don  a MAGA hat to protect his fragile coif.

Projecting who we are as Americans is an important chore within the job description of our Presidents. Fair or  not, the world sees us through them. The noxiousness of Fox/AM, and indeed the first meaningful glimpse into America First ugliness, was on full display when our first black Chief Executive flew abroad.  Even as the world was dispatching huge crowds to raucously cheer our vibrant young leader, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh were abasing his every remark, shrilly accusing him of “apologizing” for American greatness.

Now their champion, met with near uniform derision, embarrasses us at every port he visits. Macron, auditioning this weekend to replace Angela Merkel as Europe’s preeminent advocate, has learned the hard way about Trump’s vapidness. The  ugly memories of our petulant toddler’s last visit to Brussels and Helsinki are still fresh in the French President’s mind, and his  domestic constituency exhibits little patience for acceding to L’Enfant Terrible’s guiding impulse to bully.  Tolerance for anything less than Trump’s best behavior will surely be in short supply.  Expect at best stilted politeness, at worst recrimination.

World War I claimed near 55,000 Americans in and around miserable trenches across France and Belgium. Associated deaths, many produced by a Spanish Flu pandemic every bit as lethal as a German machine gun bullet, also  killed more than 50,000. All told, more than 116,000 Americans fell in a conflict history makes clear resulted from grievous human miscalculations, which evolved rapidly into a series of events its instigators quickly lost their ability to control.

The Treaty of Versailles, which ended one world war while planting the seeds for another far more destructive conflagration, is a monument to how vengeful nationalist impulses threaten mankind. America First embodies most of what we hoped the deaths of millions of innocents taught us to forsake. Trump’s behavior on the world stage unabashedly displays our worst for all to see. Meanwhile, we sit across the Atlantic flummoxed at the pox we have unleashed, overwhelmed by the manic chaos on which his relevance depends.

It is not a question of if this President will start a cycle of ill will that could blossom into war, he’s already done it.  The same division he bestows on his home country he is hard at work exporting to Europe and beyond, something they need like a bullet to the temple. The country that blessed the world with Christy Mathewson, sacrificing him to the insanity concocted by Czars and Kaisers, has now addled it with our nastiest malignancy. This all plays out at a critical juncture, a familiar crossroads where it will be decided whether or not obsessions about national sovereignty, conjured up by consciousless troublemakers like our President, will be permitted  to incite events that lead to only one place… graveyards, sacred sites visited decades later by leaders unconcerned their hair weave will betray them in the wind and rain! BC

 

Authoritarian government is readily defined, not only by the pronounced lack of quality its executers display in making the trains run on time, but also in their careers prior to being tapped as “public servants.” Far from the sparkling resumes that should be part and parcel of those at the levers of public power, repressive regimes most always make expendable sycophancy the paramount concern when filling out government positions.

This isn’t to say that political patronage is not an enduring feature of representative government, it is. However, slots in pluralist government trees always demand much more career gravitas from applicants if for no other reason than the assumption transperancy will surely shine an unfavorable light on toadie imposters and create a political problem that didn’t need to exist. Tyrants are unconcerned with such optics.

Joachim von Ribbentrop became Hitler’s Foreign Minister on the basis of nothing more than a cogent knowledge of international affairs, absent among the other Nazis in Hitler’s inner cabal… oh, and his willingness to let them use his house for meetings. While it can be said he did excel in mathematics as a young student, Leventriy Beria owed his entire rise toward the pinnacle of the Soviet security state to Stalin’s satisfaction with his loyalty. Rulers are ruled by paranoia; it has always been thus.

World Patent Marketing, established in 2014, was a fraudulent company shuttered by the Federal Trade Commission. It convinced inventors to invest money with a promise to get their inventions patented and fully licensed, but then simply pocketed their contributions and deceived them about its efforts on their behalf. Cut and dried, $26 million scammed from hopeful creators, abject fraud. Matthew Whitaker, our new acting US Attorney General, now fully in charge of the Mueller Investigation’s well being, served on World Patent Marketing’s board of directors,  an ignominious bullet point on a resume sorely wanting in the career achievement category.

Like many of the Administration’s higher ups, Whitaker’s career path shows considerably more failure than success, more mediocrity than excellence. While listed as a “politician,” Whitaker actually sought elected office only twice. In 2002 red Iowa voters decidedly rejected him for State Treasurer, awarding his campaign only 43% of the vote, his incumbent opponent never breaking a bead of sweat. In 2014 he entered a crowded GOP Senate primary field and obtained less than 8% of the vote despite his best efforts; as the Daily Racing Form often asserts in the racing lines of well beaten thoroughbreds, he was “never a factor.”

Like many during Obama’s Presidency, Whitaker sought income and relevance within the non-profit cottage industries dedicated to all things conspiracy. In October, 2014 Whitaker became the executive director of the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT), an organization dedicated to, aside from soliciting donations from gullible right wing true believers, getting to the bottom of Hillary Clinton’s private email server shenanigans.

Whitaker came to Trump’s attention after penning a column for CNN lambasting the Mueller Investigation for becoming a fishing expedition. Specifically, Whitaker labeled Trump finances a “clear red line” Mueller could not cross. A month later, Whittaker was in the Justice Department, heading toward a the top spot in Attorney General Sessions’ Office. Now he is in charge of everything, owing it all to a patron with a single reason for promoting him to a position  his past mediocrity never allowed him to even dream about. Calling Whitaker a Trump loyalist is like saying Johnny Carson enjoyed a day off. There is no mystery where this is going. The only two words Whitaker has for our POTUS are “how high.”

More than 40 years ago Attorney General Elliot Richardson told Richard Nixon to shove it rather than  fire Watergate Prosecutor Archibald Cox. His deputy,  William Ruckelshaus, followed suit, leaving the task to a then unknown Solicitor General and Nixon lackey Robert Bork, which clarified corruption, sparking a leadership crisis that led to the first resignation by an American President. At the time, next to the likes of Richardson and Ruckelshaus, Bork rightly appeared a featherweight yes man, eager to perform dirty work in the service of ambition. But here’s the thing, next to Matthew Whitaker, Bork is a titan of government, a rock of achievement and service. In Whitaker, Trump has exactly the expendable patsy he needs to carry out monumental obstruction of justice capable of providing the harshest stress test yet of this ugly Administration.

When Bork did carry out Nixon’s wishes, the bipartisan response on Capital Hill was swift and decisive. For months now, GOP leaders have been all but declaring their willingness to get past any repeat massacre at the Department of Justice. Expect muted GOP voices when Whitaker does his worst.

We’re  left to hope that Mueller is indeed the savvy insider our imaginations have created and bobs and weaves effectively enough to get the job done and serve justice. Democratic control of Congress assures Mueller a platform, and he has been hard at work.

Yet and still, it is certain the breadth of Trumpian malfeasance is wide and evolving; he and his remain in it up to their eyeballs. Crippling Mueller’s team can’t hurt in his eyes, and we know he couldn’t care less about blowing out envelopes concerning presidential propriety. The damage being permitted to do that free from swift and enduring consequences is just one more chapter of our ruinous civic failure. It’s all uncharted now, and regardless the caliber of public servant, from the pinnacle embodied by Mueller’s steadfast group, to the dregs reflected by the man now aiming to shut them down, where it leads may soon be out of anybody’s control.  When dominoes begin to fall, they often don’t stop…. and they crush things. BC

 

 

 

 

 

In the summer of 1982 I resided in Ocean City, MD. One night a friend and I, after several hours at an uptown bar, were awaiting a city bus to take us back downtown. My friend had recently been injured and was on crutches. As the bus came into view several streets north of us, a stranger approached and asked some inane question, to which we responded innocuously. The bus had now arrived and I turned my attention to helping my friend negotiate its steps. Suddenly I was taking a barrage of punches to the head. Stunned, I helped my friend into the bus while fending off blows.

The attack was fierce but I somehow made it up the steps and, standing next to the driver, who appeared indecisive on what to do, looked down at my nemesis, now joined by two of his friends, all demanding I exit and take more of a beating. I will never forget the wild, rabid look of hate on their faces, and as the driver mercifully closed the door and sped away, my buddy and I looked at each other bewildered at the senselessness of what had just occurred.

Time has dulled the painful recollection of that incident, except for the look on my assailants’  faces. I  hoped to never see such visceral malice again, but have continually recognized it watching Trump rally goers gesticulating toward those in the press pen their champion has repeatedly labeled enemies of America, “evil” liars, the worst of his always expanding list of the worst.

There simply is no sugarcoating it;  if Republicans are not decisively rebuked this Tuesday, America is well on the way to ruin. Anything less than a national rout of candidates unconcerned with mimicking one of US history’s ugliest politicians, will confirm the worst of us now defines and guides our body politic.

To watch a recent Trump rally is to withstand a torrent of blatant lies and racist tropes. Anybody who disputes this contention has checked rational discernment at the door. Of course that doesn’t include attendees, they are not bashful about embracing the President’s every word….the nastier, the better.

The best nations, the most successful nations, cultivate processes that promote public officials dedicated to creating community. The greatest asset to any country, the very  lifeblood of its national identity, is the common bonds of its citizens. That this sensible conclusion is now lost on so many is fully the result of duplicitous efforts by opportunists, headed by the POTUS,  who prefer division for reasons aligned only with their personal ambitions and emotional frailties.

Nothing happens in a vacuum, and past is often prologue to present, but in America, right now, the assaults on our commonality are overt and very easy to identify. Seeing old friends this weekend and regaling in shared experiences lent full appreciation for what is truly most important. Yet and still, the reality that we now so often make conscious and prolonged efforts to cordon off treasured friendships, even family ties, from national discussions critical to our country’s well being strikes me as a crisis.

The DR has noted often the luxury American politics so long afforded us… a meadow between how our leaders are chosen and our daily lives. The enduring reality we could take the most important component of governance  – the peaceful, indeed cooperative, exchange of power – for granted ensured the piece of mind required to organize life priorities independent of any preoccupation with national events. The other edge of that sword was the accompanying apathy and indifference fostered by false certainties it could not be lost was permitted to  evolve. Such false security became fertile ground for manipulation.

Fox/AM recognized what was in front of all of us and siezed the opportunity. We now live with the devastating consequences. The difference between pre-Ailes and today lies wholly in our perceptions of what our common bonds should be, what should nurture them, and  what causes them to fray.

That millions of our friends and neighbors have been beguiled into disdaining previously shared and established presumptions of our civic commonality is a testament to powerful, intensely focused and relentless messaging that eventually succeeded in crowding out unifying premises with resentful proclamations of exclusivity.

Instead of a thoughtful consensus that heterogeneity benefits us all, we now have debates guided by an obligation to prove to xenophobes that those who look or worship differently don’t threaten their safety. Where once we all casually accepted that military weaponry was for… er, the military; now it is intertwined for millions with twisted interpretations of constitutional principles, despite the AR-15 repeatedly being employed in mass shooting after mass shooting. Even basic civic no brainers like the paramount importance of our children’s education are immersed in a toxic brew of “competing agendas” and, incredibly in states like Kansas, whether state tax relief should be allowed to compromise school resources. When grievance and resentment overwhelm common sense all bets are off. That is where we are.

Of course these examples seem subtle compared to the hourly assault that is the Trump Presidency. That we now have to parse his constant lies indicts our situation more than any reflection on shared beliefs that have fallen by the wayside. Considering what we may again be able to agree on assumes we will survive a nihilist President’s determination to irreparably alienate us from each other, which comes part and parcel with the end of our democracy.  That that presumption itself is now openly questioned says everything one needs to know about our predicament.

Make no mistake, these mid-terms are a referendum on whether or not America doesn’t mind at all becoming fearful and bigoted. Those who claim “it’s the economy, stupid” are disingenuous and have purposely stuffed cotton in their ears. Those who spin Trump gibberish and contend he has a point are simply the racists they constantly whine “leftists” unjustly label them as. Meanwhile, those who don’t care a wit about the optics, wearing unbridled enthusiasm for Trumpist nihilism on their sleeve are our future if the GOP, who they now steer, is not forcibly rebuked Tuesday.

Not since the Civil War has America faced a crossroads so proximate to cataclysm. What happens tomorrow will both reflect and fully determine our future prospects as a united people. One side, on display in the now daily conscious sedition of an enemy of state we somehow elected our President, is prepared to scrap once and for all virtually every lesson our national experience has ever taught us in favor of a noxious river of inclinations fully responsible for virtually all of our past calamities.

They aspire to nothing but some momentary satisfaction their latest narcissistic complaint is being addressed by a cadre of cowardly frauds, completely indifferent to this nation’s enduring interests. The other side is now simply geared toward resistence, as they should be. Content to make the statement that it stops here, come what may. The choice could not be clearer. A pivotal moment of national reckoning is upon us! BC

 

I doubt one could find a more priviledged youth than growing up in Potomac, MD. In the mid-70s it was steadily maturing from farm country to part of the widening expanse of DC suburbia. Unlike today, there existed few enclaves of mansions; rather, comfortable colonials and split-levels defined its landscape. Yet and still,  there was no “bad side” of town, the most modest in income living in wholly adequate townhouses that nobody would describe as run down.

Churchill High School was near entirely white, but for a small sprinkling of internationals and an African American contingent from a historical black community called “Scotland.” Hailing from Evanston, Ill., where integration came with a good deal of stress and conflict, I was fascinated with how seamlessly my black classmates moved throughout a snow-like landscape, always sticking together, yet effortlessly picking and choosing wherever they wanted to play a role. I’m sure they had another take on it, but that’s how I saw it.

When I first moved to the area it was viscous culture shock, coming from a firmly established middle American university town to an infant outlier filled with transients assaulted me. Scotland felt much more comfortable than the Brady Bunch world the rest of Potomac seemed like. Indeed, I made every effort to meld with the Scotland kids, but alas, they afforded no outsiders membership; you could hang with them, but wholly on their terms. Again, they may argue that point, but it was as I saw and felt it.

Churchill fulfilled every stereotype of high school life, none more than its indulgence of cliques. I don’t recall groups being set apart by title, yet they fully existed nonetheless. And like most teen social structures, they really represented three different realities. There was inside looking only inside (the A list not given to abiding inferiors), there was inside looking out (the very cool yet very nice, those everybody loved), and outside looking in (those feeling the angst of exclusion.) Everyone knew where they fit then as well as they do now, after 40 years of reflection.

High school may be life’s cruelest trauma because, as long as it seems to last, as pivotal as its experience is in defining our temperaments and self-esteem, it’s events, good and bad, memorable and forgettable, pleasant and painful, always seem just ahead of us, unfolding despite us rather than with us. Time does nothing but recall opportunities we allowed ourselves to miss, or perhaps even more cruelly highlight the triumphs we somehow could never again achieve. As good as it will never get again, or as bad as you hope to never again experience, and every other thing in between…. such is the spectrum for our lives high school mercilessly creates. And always, for everybody, it begins the point of departure of life’s relentless march, its subtle yet wholly frontal assault on the hard edges of our youth. Time can’t change where you were, but it surely defines how far you’ve come, or how little progress you’ve made…. and that is more than enough.

The Class of 78’s 40th reunion is a two-event affair, the first far more exclusive than the second. I felt exactly zero compunction to attend the Homecoming football game. Why would I? I never attended a varsity game at 17; I doubt I’ll do so at 58. Yet and still, it’s wonderful to see pictures of old classmates drinking in the joy and comraderie my aloofness foolishly cheated me out of as a youth. Maturity’s wisdom is meant to force accountability on all of us. The memories high school sports provide are there for the taking; who could begrudge those who took them? Still, 40 years has done little to strengthen bonds that never really existed. Pretending they did seems a pointless distraction for those who actually participated

Part two is tonight and should prove much more popular and better attended. Drinks will come from a bar instead of a keg, but everybody gets to party, free of the distractions that seemed preeminent in 1978! Tonight we can fully appreciate the fellowship many of us scorned as youths, and enjoy the common identity of our shared circumstance during a minuscule, yet gigantic, time span 40 years ago. Who we are now surely owes to what we were becoming then.  And how we assess then is a function of what we became. That’s life folks! Simple as it is devastatingly certain.

Twenty years ago, which seems like last month, my wife had to convince me to attend my 20th reunion. When I returned home, she asked how it went. I shrugged my shoulders and responded “not bad”…  “not sure what I was afraid of.” Two decades later fatherhood, as well as the certainty our political life can no longer be innocuously compartmentalized, has redefined who I am. Twenty years ago I walked around goofily showing a picture of my new born daughter, surely producing eye rolls from savvy parents who got started years earlier. Tonight I am as hardened to the vicissitudes  of parenthood as any, but will gladly enjoy tales of grandchildren I can’t yet share. Of course, social media has fully transformed the nature of class reunions. Most will have at least some impression of me garnered from my use of such platforms, good or bad. I’m ok with that; it’s simply who I’ve become. Who I was? … Give me a break! It was 40 years ago, for God’s sake! BC

McLean Bible Church is a sprawling campus just west of Tyson’s Corner, VA. It’s main auditorium accommodates several thousand congregants, and is full most Sunday services. Recently retired Lon Solomon was the mega-Church’s pastor for several decades and is as articulate and charismatic an orator as one will find; seldom is the sermon he delivers not sufficient to make the listener ponder deeply its themes. Unlike many garish and vexatious leaders of large evangelical congregations, Pastor Solomon is humble in pursuit of his aims, content to talk about Jesus and the church’s mission to spread his word, and ever vigilant to avoid any circumstance that could compromise his duty.

Indeed, Pastor Solomon is an artist, his canvas the Bible. The weekly messages he crafted integrated scripture with real life in a way the newly introduced and lifetime follower alike could appreciate. He actually has it down to a formula. After parsing several pages of either the Old or New Testament, Solomon would ask  “our most important question.” He then led a loud unified “So What!” To which he responded with all the ways words transcribed by ancients affect us today, intersecting with basic routines. Yes, Lon Solomon is exactly the kind of godly, incorruptible man any church hopes and prays they will be lucky enough to have lead their godly pilgrimage….. He’s also a fanatic.

Solomon can best be described as a biblical hyper-purist; he believes both testaments to be “perfect” publications, that is, every word on their pages is true. After all, were one utterance to be false or misleading, how could there be faith the whole enterprise wasn’t  just a long sequence of falling dominoes? Jonah and the whale? You bet.  The world created in seven days? How else could it have happened? Stonings and what not for otherwise innocuous activities in the Old Testament? Tough love, everything to God’s purpose. While Solomon goes to great pains to validate the New Testament’s historical accuracy, often delving into archeology to confirm the steps of Jesus, he exhibits and expects  full faith toward the more sensational aspects of the Old Testament’s guidance, lest  one be tempted down the road toward heresy.

Perhaps most controversial about Lon Solomon is his ardent membership in “Jews For Jesus.” Raised Jewish with full semetic lineage, Solomon inspired the wrath of his parents when he accepted Jesus as his savior. Yet and still, that doesn’t half cover much of the disdain he receives from the greater Hebrew community for essentially labeling them unrepentant sinners, unwilling  to recognize Jesus Christ as Messiah.  Asked how he feels about such visceral emotions toward him, Solomon merely shrugs it off and asserts “I am only the messenger.” His mission is first and foremost to save souls from damnation;  he can do no less.

The race for Congress in Michigan’s 11th district is labeled a toss up. Lena Epstein, an unabashed GOP Trumpie, believes turnout will decide things. On that score she had VP Mike Pence in town Monday to motivate the base out of their recliners. With news of eleven Jewish innocents gunned down by a Nazi in Pittsburgh gripping the nation, beginning the event with a prayer for the fallen was mandatory. Bloomfield Hills  has a number of synagogues –  including the one Epstein later made clear she has assiduously attended throughout her life – led by Rabbis one could assume would have obliged to offer thoughts and prayers for the fallen if asked. Or maybe not, given who was asking. Regardless, Loren Jacobs was selected, he of the “Messianic Jewish” persuasion, that is “Jews for Jesus.”

The Trump Administration is notoriously indifferent to bad optics. Yet and still, the stunning absurdity of a “Rabbi” beseeching the heavens on behalf of Jews victimized within the sanctum of their own synagogue, even as his guiding theological tenet maintains all of the slain are headed to hell’s depths, assaults the senses.

It’s a good bet Mike Pence would be enrapt by Lon Solomon’s preaching. Certainly there is no daylight between their respective takes on Christianity, what they see as  nonnegotiable duties for furthering its mission. Perhaps most importantly, neither is overly concerned with recognizing where the line for church ends and state begins. And make no mistake…. all religions are not equal. Solomon’s oratorical gifts and insights aside, his words would have been little different from Jacobs had he been tapped in Michigan. Duty is not a flexible thing.

The worst man in America happens to be our President. The ridiculous efforts of American evangelicals to provide Trump, as secular and theologically vacant  a POTUS as has ever come down the pike, with pious bona fides has been pathetic and laughable, kabuki nonsense punctuating outrageous hypocrisy.

However, number two in line for the big seat, and arguably the second worst our nation can offer, needs no elevation from Graham and Falwell Jr. or any of the rest of born again America’s false prophets; Pence is  a true believer. Even Lon Solomon could not be more devoted, or less given to accepting other roads to eternal salvation. Unfortunately for the fallen in Pittsburgh, only one route heads to a glorious hereafter and they are too late. Both Lon Solomon and Mike Pence could not be more certain of that fate. But remember one thing before you get too upset with them…. they’re just the messengers.  BC

In the fall of 2002 I came home one evening and my wife, Susan was upset to the point of tears, which was not like her. She said there was something wrong with our two-year old, Luke and we needed to start figuring out what to do. This wasn’t the first time we had this discussion. Since the previous Thanksgiving, when on the beach in Nags Head he literally refused to stop staring out at the ocean, transfixed to the point of immobility, our concerns had been steadily increasing. Yet and still, I stubbornly maintained kids developed in vastly different ways, and despite a growing number of odd eccentricities, he was still our Luke; mislabeling a kid was a terrible disservice. Give him time, he’d find his way. I was sure of it.

Sue told me the staff of Huckleberry Cheesecake, the Rolls Royce of DC daycares, had expressed concerns to her that day when she picked Luke up. It wasn’t simply her worrying too much anymore, others saw things similar; and  they advised seeing a developmental specialist. I angrily scoffed at the notion. BS, I said, he does everything other kids do, just because he likes to play by himself more often, and enjoys some odd types of entertainment doesn’t demand a clinical diagnosis! Give him a chance I fumed! Sue calmly suggested I stop by Huckleberry next time I was downtown and observe how Luke was interacting with peers. I agreed to it, still certain the whole thing was a fishing expedition.

The next afternoon I swung by the daycare. Luke’s playroom had a large observation window where parents could sit and watch their children while chatting with staff. Ms. Colleen, a wonderful administrator, told me I had arrived just in time for the afternoon storybook presentation. I sat down and looked into the room, which offered a comfy corner book area complete with  arena seating that allowed the tots to sit in tiers and listen to one of the attendants read a story while asking questions and encouraging participation. The kids were already seated with their backs to us. I focused intently on the sandy blonde boy in the front row.

As the story began he laughed and clapped, sometimes interrupting a bit inappropriately, others looking off before refocusing, but on balance seemed not vastly different from the other kids. I glanced at Colleen, who had a very sad, empathetic look on her face, like she wanted to hug me. I was confused, even humored by this, and exclaimed I saw nothing much out of the ordinary, and asked what I was missing. Now it was her turn to look confused. I motioned to the kid in the front row and again demanded she tell me what he was doing that had her so concerned. Mr. Carey, that isn’t Luke, she said, he’s over there, pointing to the other end of the room by the kitchen. I looked over to where she directed and there was my son, walking on his tip toes, staring vacantly at the lights in the ceiling, having a conversation with himself, wholly disinterested in the group he had abandoned.

I’ve taken a couple of bad beatings in my life, and actually been hit by a car, but nothing ever slammed me worse than the truth of that moment. From that image on my son had autism; nothing was ever the same again. Reality had pummeled me to a pulp, knocking to kingdom come every last bit of denial.  My son’s life was going to be different… that was simply a fact I could no longer spin away.

I’ve thought about that day more than a few times over the last two years or so, wondering when, or if ever, Trump supporters will experience some similar epiphany capable of  knocking them to their senses and forcing a reckoning with the truth that reasonable millions recognized long ago. What will it take? When will it happen?

Unhinged rally monologues have only seemed to increase enthusiasm. Bundist wannabes marching through Charlottesville were prevaricated. A ghastly meltdown on the world stage in Brussels was ignored. Treason in Helsinki failed to do the trick. I was sure human rights violations at our southern border would force a good many to gasp and reassess, but no, seems not. A near year-long investigation by the New York Times that chronicled the foundational  lie of Trump as a self-made man, instead of a sponge for $413 million in today’s dollars of daddy’s wealth raised not an eyebrow, failing to survive even one news cycle. Multiple bombs sent to his enemies list, the  result of his relentless stochastic terrorism, only invites “false flag” denial from his wretched core, or the false equivalence that “the left’s hate” invites what they get.  And now eleven  more innocents dead in a Pittsburgh synagogue, literally gunned down by a Nazi, who a torrent of Fox News site commenters swear is a liberal!

Trump has made the results of next Tuesday’s balloting a referendum on him. Anybody asserting anything else is as much in denial as the hordes he loves to incite. Next week we will have a better idea whether the myriad of his outrages have snapped anyone at all out of the stupor responsible for our predicament.

Thus far, nothing seems able to budge the arrow. Regardless, one thing is unfortunately certain, this Administration will not be bashful in pushing the envelope of its supporter’s tolerance for uncharted ugliness. Those of us cognizant of Trump’s moral and intellectual vacancy are left to hope that some pivotal moment will provide the body slam necessary for a relevant portion of his heretofore entranced adherents to finally blink and recognize their grevious  misjudgment. Of course as time passes and each opportunity is discarded such hopes grow increasingly dim. But really… what else is there? Don’t answer that! BC

 

In the immediate aftermath of Dylann Roof’s mass murder of nine African-Americans in a Charleston church, Rush Limbaugh was anxious. Even a cursory glimpse into Roof’s life revealed an alienated young bigot, filled with grievance and resentment toward minorities in general, blacks in particular. It was clear he was an avid consumer of right wing grievance, and the Carolinas were Rush country, a ratings refuge in his increasingly shrinking nationwide footprint.

Nothing gets the Fox/AM “personalities” touchier than any implication their repetitive toxin may have produced real world consequences, ugly violence carried out by one of their rabid consumers; the Charleston horror was no exception. Limbaugh wanted distance between himself and lone wolf Roof, immediately painting the teenager as “sick” and “disturbed,” even as he assured his audience he was not going to jump to conclusions. Indeed, right-wing terrorist events stand alone in that regard within the Fox/AM universe. Just like Trump, it’s the only time they seem at all deliberate. But early on it was clear Roof was a product of right-wing hate, fully exhibiting its many brands in photos and social media. And so the Rushster was edgy and quick to preempt any sort of speculation that he had any influence at all on the disturbed youngster.

In between attacking then President Obama for politicizing the mass killing, even though Obama had made it a point to say he was waiting for the investigation to proceed before issuing a statement, Limbaugh let his listeners provide him with cover. He couldn’t agree more with Anthony from Henderson, North Carolina, who declared “nowadays you just can’t do anything with a person with mental problems.”  Case closed. Hands washed.

A stochastic terrorist is defined as one who “publically demonizes a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable, but whose specifics are not predicted.” I admit, until very recently, I had no idea such a term existed, yet there it is. Never has one sentence so clearly described so much.

That this has become a Fox/AM Presidency is beyond dispute. Not only does our Chief Executive completely rely on Fox News and the AM talk radio universe for all of his messaging, but also fully depends on it to inform his own worldview, as well as primary advice for carrying out his duties and staffing White House and other high-level government positions. In other words, as clearly articulated by the definition above, US government is in the hands of stochastic terrorists. Hey! ….blame Webster’s!

Our President’s disdain for the toil of governance has left him with a lot of time on his hands. Trapped within the White House gates, and wholly disinterested in performing the job he never wanted, Trump has gone stir crazy since his inauguration. With only so much golf to be played, a ridiculous number of rounds even he can recognize as bad optics, what to do?  Such is the dilemma of a lazy imposter hopelessly over his head, desperately seeking relevance. Rallies to the rescue! Trump rallies have provided him something to do he actually likes, while getting him away from the White House, where all agree he can only destabilize the planet. Even the Trump-branded GOP leadership embraces the benefits of firing up the base for mid-terms. Grievance and resentment gets nihilists out of their recliners!

Yet and still, to watch a Trump rally is to witness the very essence of stochastic terrorism. The press are literally kept in a pen and continually referred to as “evil” and “enemies of the state,” pointed to and continually maligned as Trump’s wretched core jeers and boos lustily. His defeated opponent is regularly denounced, instigating a Pavlovian chant of “lock her up.”  Desperate Central American migrants are continuously decried as the scum of the Earth, rapists and criminals invading our sovereignty. Kneeling black football players are denounced as traitorous rabble. Democrats are existential threats to the country, with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer bent on destruction. On and on… Low IQ Maxine Waters… Lying Pochahantas Elizabeth Warren.

If that isn’t public demonization it’s impossible to imagine what is. Of course, anyone with even a passing familiarity with Fox’s prime time line up, or tired AM talk radio routines, knows the President’s attacks are merely part and parcel of what’s on offer every day, all day, year after year. His is simply the bully pulpit, the ultimate platform.

Now bombs are being mailed to anyone and everyone on Trump’s enemies list; the “statistically probable act” has happened. To hear Trump and his creators tell it, the victims have nobody but themselves to blame. Like Rush with Dylann Roof and every other Fox/AM inspired Travis Bickel, whose hateful dulusions are elevated to shining acts of patriotism, there is nothing to see here; the most we’ll plead to is being part of a wider problem the other side is even more guilty in creating.  It takes two to tango! Start being “fair” and things will resolve themselves.

The dangerous and uncharted territory this Administration has taken our nation gets sketchier and less stable by the day. Trump and his Fox/AM facilitators have created a powder keg they appear fully willing to detonate. This week’s events seem merely an early salvo of a nihilist horde unfazed by the lasting damage it can inflict on the country demagogues have convinced them needs saving. One thing is certain, whatever Trump whines to his wretched core, whatever Rush hisses to his faithful, we have a name for them now….. Stochastic terrorists. Look it up!  BC

When you think about it US democracy is just an honor system. The whole exercise is based on the assumption, tradition, practice, habit – whatever, that the results of nationwide tabulations, monitored state by state, will be accepted by all parties and fully observed. I suppose of all the “miracles” of the American experiment, this peaceful turnover of tangible power is the most amazing. But what if one side refuses to abide the results because they are beholden  to a narrative their base imbibes that equates broad electoral defeat, and accompanying loss of power, with national catastrophe? What then? We may soon find out.

The GOP approaches these midterm elections with the same trepidation Democrats felt in 2010. Despite a booming economy, their President, who has been wildly successful placing his brand on the party’s national profile, limps  into November with personal approval ratings stuck in the mid-40s, a figure that has in the past assured a mid-term trouncing. The most polarizing politician in American history, Trump has limited GOP strategy for maintaining control of both chambers on the Hill to one option… turn out the base and hope the plethora of voter suppression schemes flyover legislatures have introduced bear adequate disenfranchisement necessary to carry just enough shaky incumbents over the finish line. Not exactly juggernaut aspirations.

On Election Day 2016 I came home, after experiencing not a moment’s wait to vote, and told my wife we were in trouble. Low turnout is the Republicans’ best friend, always has been. Apathy amplifies the voices of the elderly white, blue collar, male GOP base, which now has morphed into Trump’s wretched core. The inclinations of a majority of today’s America are at odds with views that Fox/AM narrows and makes more exclusive and intolerant by the day. It is simple math: The more citizens vote, the better Democratic prospects become.

Latest polling implies historic levels of enthusiasm across US demographics to vote this election cycle, a large chunk of it motivated by disdain for the President; that can’t be good for the GOP. But Republicans understand the implications of the latest data and have been overt in efforts to make it as hard as possible for certain blocs of voters to participate, literally tossing out ballots in some cases. The cold fact that the GOP views new voters as inimical to their fortunes translates into a narrative, relentlessly hyped by Fox/AM, that equates voter registration efforts with fraud, most often with “illegals” front and center, but also targeting black get-out-the-vote efforts for the type of scrutiny typical of suppression protocols.

The Brennan Center for Justice catalogs every legal challenge to state laws and technical amendments designed to disenfranchise voters. Not surprisingly, the lion’s share have been filed in southern states, where nothing like what is currently happening has been seen since the 60’s,. Georgia exemplifies how brash suppression efforts have become, as Stacey Abrams, a black Democrat running for Governor, looks to motivate the 31% African-American share of the state’s population.

The national GOP leadership have kept straight faces while Brian Kemp, the Republican candidate, has kept his day job as Secretary of State, responsible for actually overseeing the election’s legitimacy. This is the same Brian Kemp who boasted in a campaign ad, he was prepared to drive his own truck throughout the state and round up “illegals”. Meanwhile, just to tilt the playing field, Kemp has pursued an “exact match” policy which requires voter registration information to mirror to the hyphen data in state computers or the application is thrown out. As many as 50K voters stand to lose their status, more than two-thirds African-American.

Alabama actually passed a voter ID law that allows election officials to vouch for voters without appropriate credentials, essentially granting poll managers arbitrary powers to pick and choose who has to obey the law. In Kansas, Chris Kobach, the head of Trump’s Voter Fairness Commission, tasked with proving his fantasy that millions of immigrants voted for Hillary, is locked in a tight race for Governor, and, like Kemp, is the Secretary of State in charge of electoral credibility. Kobach earlier wasted plenty of taxpayer funds uncovering a grand total of nine cases of state voting irregularities, most addled seniors who forgot they had voted already. The list goes on, and it is exclusively Republican. Democrats want more voters, the GOP doesn’t… that simple.

But what if, despite the Republican’s best efforts, a blue wave does crest this November? What if a perfect storm of unprecedented Democratic turnout and a higher degree of Trump repudiation within the GOP combine to deliver Democrats control of both chambers? Who says Trump and his co-conspirators will do the right thing? Anybody simply assuming they will hasn’t followed Trump very closely, or his congressional abettors.

Before he got the terrible news he actually won, Trump was fully prepared to declare 2016’s election a fraud. And while he has been playing the game at his rallies lately, sporadic references to the “rigged system” are not unusual. Just yesterday he tweeted urgently that government monitors were poised and ready to catch election cheats for full punishment. Nobel laureate Paul Krugman warned confidently that the Trumpist GOP is more than capable of rejecting results they don’t like and throwing the country, and the world, into crisis.

What lends the extraordinary possibility credence is how easy Trump can ignite events and start the dominoes tumbling. A tweetstorm here, a reckless statement there.  Some calls to Nunes and company in the House, a collective refusal of vanquished Trumpie candidates to concede while echoing his rubbish. McConnell and company in the Senate refusing to outright refute it and calling for an investigation “out of an abundance of caution” for the integrity of the system. Fox/AM going 24/7 with all of its “personalities” pushing the lies. Really very easy to start the fire and fan the flames until it takes on a life of its own.

What has always made a Trump Presidency particularly dangerous is the fact he doesn’t care. Not only doesn’t he care, he is attracted to creating chaos for the attention it gets him or the distraction it provides. The idea the world depends on the stability of US elections as the foundation of global order is fully lost on him. What he is utterly unconcerned about beginning will quickly move beyond his ability to control, and all bets will be off. As ugly as Trump’s self-proclaimed “winning” has been since he took office, his losing could be a whole lot worse. Careful what you wish for.  BC