Goodbye Nino

There have been many wonderful tributes to Antonin Scalia and I would be hard pressed to best any of them here. Scalia was the most brilliant, incisive, and colorful American legal minds of my lifetime.

Passionately devoted to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, Scalia endeavored to discover what the Founders intended those words to mean.  To Scalia, two things were true.  Words had meaning, and the Founders chose certain words carefully and deliberately.   The coming together of the Founders was a unique event in human history and the Constitution and the Bill of Rights was a document like no other before or since—circumscribing the role of government in our lives and declaring certain parts of our lives off limits to government power.  He viewed the Constitution almost as a sacred text.  In addition to possessing a mind of enormous intellectual power, Antonin had wit, charm, color, and a basic humanity that is so rare in public life.  His deep friendship with his intellectual nemesis, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, was an example for all of us in these politically charged times.  He was consistently rated the funniest justice—objectively by someone who tracks those things—eliciting more laughter than any other justice by far (I do think Clarence Thomas is at or near the bottom of that category).

I was fortunate enough to hear Scalia speak in person at the Union League Club in Chicago a couple of years ago and meet him in person.   Meeting one of America’s great minds of  past 100 years was certainly an exciting moment for me.  He did not disappoint.  He was warm, engaging and funny as hell, poking fun at some of his fellow justices that “couldn’t apparently distinguish between a penalty and a “tax.”  Scalia was a great gift to America who steadfastly defended one of mankind’s most sacred documents.

It isn’t a surprise, then, that President Obama elected to skip Scalia’s funeral in a very public display of nonattendance.  His Press Secretary offered no excuse,  and declined to even say whether he was going to play golf instead.  Obama uses these events to make statements.  This was not simply a matter of overscheduling.  As head of state, Obama has an obligation to attend ceremonies of significance and gravitas.  He is our representative in these matters.  Missing the funeral is a statement to the American people and to the entire world.  His attendance matters.

Obama has used the stature of the presidency and his presence to make statements throughout his presidency—to declare which people are worthy of his time and which are not.  Thus, he dashed off to hold the cartoonish “beer summit” when he thought Henry Louis Gates was treated unfairly by the Cambridge.  He scrambled out of town to a fundraiser and to meet with Jay-Z and Beyonce after his ambassador and 3 others were murdered in Libya.  He made a showy public appearance at a mosque in Baltimore.  And as if to underscore his contempt for Scalia, in the days immediately preceding his funeral, he announced that he would be traveling to Cuba to meet with the Communist thug Raul Castro—the embodiment of regime that Scalia undoubtedly reviled.

He has done this before to evidence his contempt or indifference.  He snubbed other European heads of state in their march against terrorism in Paris following their terrorist attacks (refusing to stand in solidarity with other European allies against barbarism, and then followed with a meek statement calling it a “setback.”).  He blew off Margaret Thatcher’s funeral as well—a woman, who, along with Ronald Reagan, steadfastly stood against Communism and changed the course of history.

Other commentators have criticized him for being petty and petulant in skipping Scalia’s funeral.  I see it as part of a much larger pattern.  These incidents are statements of inner conviction and ideology.  He burns with disdain for leaders like Thatcher and Scalia and their ideals.  To Obama, they do not even deserve the respect of his presence in the final celebration of their lives. 

No, these events are not independent occurrences.  They are powerful statements about the inner Obama and his core belief system. 

Imagine, for a moment, if Obama had attended the funeral and had either delivered the eulogy himself or made a sincere, magnanimous public statements that displayed his respect for Scalia, the Court,  and the Constitution that began something like this, “I sometimes had views that diverged from Justice Scalia, but I respect and admired his intellect, his wit and humor, and his unwavering devotion to the Constitution and to America.”  Imagine what a PR bind he would put  Mitch McConnell in. 

But that's not the path he chose.  That's not who he is.

I Miss Barack Obama--Not Really

I Miss Barack Obama is the title of David Brooks's dripping ode to our nation's 44th but first African-American president which appeared in the Feb. 9, 2016 New York Times Opinion Pages.
(http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/09/opinion/i-miss-barack-obama.html?_r=0)

While he attempts to establish credibility and fair mindedness by stating that he "disagrees with a lot of Obama's policy decisions," Brooks goes on to pen the kind of swooning love letter that you might hope your daughter would receive from a lovestruck beau.

Like Brooks, I will attempt to establish credibility by stating that my counterpoint is not personal.  In fact, Mr. Obama and I would likely get along swimmingly.  We have a great deal in common and would have a lot to talk about.  We both have South Side of Chicago and University of Chicago roots.  We were both reared largely by grandparents.  We both have an affinity for pickup basketball and golf.  At one time in life, I even shared the vice of being a closet cigarette smoker.  We would likely get on great on the golf course and for a few beers after.  As Chris Christie would say, "It's just business."

Brooks starts with the general decline in the behavioral standards in public life, and his assertion that Obama represents a departure from that trend.  True, Obama did not have a tryst with a young intern and lie about it like our 42nd president did, but his mendacity was of a decidedly more pernicious kind--- it was about policy.  The sales pitch used to peddle the ACA- his signature legislative accomplishment--was riddled with untruths, from "if you like your plan, you can keep your plan (which won the biggest Pinnochio in 2013," to "the average family will save $2,500 in premiums" (premiums have skyrocketed in most states), to "it won't add a single dime to the deficit" (it does-many dimes), to "illegal immigrants will not get subsidies," (they received $750 million worth).  More dangerously, Obama claimed that only a "handful" of Gitmo releasees returned to jihadism.   That is absolutely false.  The recidivism rate is about 30% and in his eagerness to clear the detention center (based on his wholly unsubstantiated claim that it aids the recruitment of jihadists), recently released an Al Qaeda bomb maker.  Add to these flat out deceptions, Fast and Furious, the IRS/Lois Lerner scandal, Benghazi, and Hillary Clinton's ongoing email investigation, we see that Brooks's assertion that "he and his staff have generally behaved with basic rectitude" looks pretty flimsy.  His rhetoric has been atrocious toward his own countrymen.  After calling for more "civility in discourse," he attacked Republicans as "crazies" and "extremists" and  regularly mocked political opponents ("the 80's are calling and want their foreign policy back," "Are they afraid of widows and orphans?") rather than engage in open debate on the facts.

His second assertion-- of Obama's basic humanity is also terribly flawed.  For that assertion he cites his visit to the mosque and that he would be great on a charity board.  The facts, though, show someone quite different.   After a journalist was beheaded, he dashed off to yuck it up with a round of golf.  After our ambassador and 3 others were murdered at Benghazi, he immediately zipped off to a fundraiser and to meet with Beyonce.  His actual responses in a number of instances belied a lack of empathy. We did not see real emotion from him until he issued executive orders on gun control.  But worse, his misguided policies caused or exacerbated real human suffering.  His incoherence and waffling in Syria and his abrupt exodus from Iraq facilitated the expansion of ISIS and the refugee crisis that is overwhelming Europe.  Worse, if you take the position that the Iraq War was a mistake, Obama doubled down by taking out another secular dictator and leaving a vaccuum.  Under the premise that he was preventing genocide, deposed Qaddafi in Libya, now an ISIS stronghold.   He didn't prevent genocide.  He enabled it.  Closer to home, he generalized the proposition that white cops were singling out black youths and shooting unarmed innocents from a couple of situations (one where the officer was exonerated).  The "Ferguson Effect"--police taking a much more passive approach-- has resulted in a spike in violent crime in U.S. cities. Both here and abroad, the "humanity" of Obama policies has been ultimately devastating to humanity.

Third, Brooks cites Obama's sound decision-making process.  You mean the decision-making process that led him to jump through hoops to do deals with mullahs, yet uses a pen and a phone to govern because he can't get deals done with members of the opposing party?  Or, the decision making process that has led the court system to stymie the Constitutional law professor's overreach on carbon fuels, immigration, and NLRB appointments?  Our Constitution is designed to force some sort of consensus around big policy matters.  Obama has done more end runs than the old Green Bay Packer offense.  His decision making on domestic matters often looks more like that of a Latin American dictator than that of an American president.   In military matters, he dithers and then withdraws.  He failed to leave behind sufficient troop strength to maintain a stable Iraq.  He telegraphed his timetable for withdrawal from Afghanistan. His generals and admirals had to hound him to assert navigation rights in the South China Sea vis-a-vis China.  And most egregiously, drew a red line with Assad, then did nothing.   He even managed to alienate the Canadians by his stalling  and ultimate rejection of the Keystone pipeline.  His decision making style seems to be "dictatorial at home, vacillating and accommodating abroad."

Brooks also cites Obama's "resilient sense of optimism" as a reason to miss him and accuses Republicans of "wallowing in the pornography of pessimism." Unfortunately, only 28% of the country currently believes that the country is on the right track.  Again, the facts on the ground say something very different.  We have had the worst postwar recovery on record, an abysmal labor participation rate, a middle class that is getting crushed, and no wage growth.  We may, in fact, be headed into another financial crisis and recession.  Businesses aren't investing and are being suffocated by the Obama flurry of regulations.  Obama has virtually killed the coal industry through unilateral regulatory directives.  Dodd Frank has buried community banks and completely halted new bank charters.  As one bank executive confided to me, "Everyone is just f--ng tired." Abroad, we have been pushed out of the Middle East by a resurgent Russia, and Iran has openly humiliated our navy.  North Korea and Iran fire missiles in blatant violation of UN resolutions and there is no real response.  Even Europe is endangered by the abrupt withdrawal of American moral and military leadership. "There's a shared assessment that the European security architecture is falling apart in many ways", observes Camille Grad, director of the Foundation for Strategic Research in Paris.   Obama may have a resilient sense of optimism, but he is pretty much alone in that view.

Brooks gushed that "Obama radiates an ethos of integrity, humanity, good manners and elegance that I am beginning to miss."  What Obama is likely to leave behind is an economy weighed by debt, taxes and a nightmarish thicket of labyrinthian regulatory schemes and super charged regulatory agencies.  It's an America in which the hottest job is now "compliance officer" not "inventor" or "entrepreneur."  

Most damning is Obama's blown opportunities.  The Obama appointed Simpson Bowles group did good work and showed promise of a truly bipartisan solution to our debt and deficit problem.  Obama failed to champion the proposal and budget negotiations deteriorated into bitterly partisan fights and the counterproductive sequestration (which Obama blamed on Republicans).  He came into office promising a "different kind of politics," and instead brought Chicago style political thuggery.

And most harmful was in the area of race relations.  Our country was big enough to overcome slavery, segregation, and a racist past to elect an African American president.  Although I did not support Obama, at the time of his election I thought, "Well, at least we will have completely exorcised that demon."  Instead of putting the demons to rest, he (and his appointees) resurrected them and brought them back to life.  Eric Holder bluntly asserted, "We are a nation of cowards," (no, thousands of men died for your freedom and people marched and we passed laws to rid ourselves of racism and segregation).  Obama himself declared, "Racism is in our D.N.A." (no, actually entrepreneurship, tolerance and a can-do attitude are in our D.N.A., Mr. President).  The false narratives of "Hands Up Don't Shoot" and giving "room to destroy" in Baltimore caused racial friction that we had not seen since the death of MLK.  Instead of advocating healing and togetherness, Obama picked at an old scab and promoted divisiveness and made assumptions about people as if they were stuck in amber in 1952.  

Finally, and most importantly, I will not miss Barack Obama because of his lack of appreciation for what America is all about.  And I believe a significant factor in Donald Trump's rise has been the need of Americans to feel that we are special---because we are.  Donald Trump talks about winning.  Great Americans from George Patton to Vince Lombardi talked about winning.  Ronald Reagan often referred to John Winthrop's "city upon a hill."  Abraham Lincoln referred to America as the "last best hope on earth."  Even rock star Bono said, "Ireland is a great country.  But it is a country.  America is an idea."  In contrast, beginning with his Cairo speech and throughout his presidency, Obama denigrated and apologized for the U.S.   "I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism, and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism," he proclaimed.  We're special.  Just like everyone else.  Talking about his Middle Eastern policy, he pondered, "This isn't about America winning."  He derisively referred to much of middle America--the backbone of the country--as people that "bitterly cling to their guns and religion," and went on to allude to their inherent racism.  An American president MUST be concerned first and foremost about America winning.  That's the job.   An American President MUST believe in this country's primacy as a force for good in the world, as a bastion of liberty, and an unwavering opponent of tyranny and guardian of human rights.   We are not perfect.  We are still the "American experiment"  and are still a work in progress, but Americans need to be told that they have a special place in the world and a special duty.  

Mr. Brooks and I attended the same undergraduate school at about the same time (although I do not remember him).   We have such starkly different views on President Obama, his integrity, his humanity, and his leadership that it's hard to believe that Brooks and I are assessing the same leader. I can only hope that history will view him as an aberration following the financial crisis and that our next commander in chief can restore the American spirit here and abroad. 

Son of Saul

Son of Saul was the most important film on the Holocaust since Schindler’s list, and provides a more intimate, personal perspective.   Written and directed by Hungarian director Laszlo Memes, Son of Saul centers around the ordeals of Saul, a Sonderkommando (Jew pressed into working at a Nazi death camp) at the notorious Auschwitz-Birkenau camp.   The film uses the similar technique of shaky, close up, hand held shots as Spielberg used in Saving Private Ryan to give the viewer the perspective of the prisoners.  You are taken inside the facility to see the mechanized industrialization of death that the Nazis imposed.  One is struck by how the Nazis treated the extermination of Jews  as if it were a mattress factory.  The Sonderkommandos helped herd men, women and children into the chambers, grimly stood outside the bolted doors and could hear the screams and pounding while deadly Xyclon B was suffused through the chamber.  The work crews were then charged with hauling the corpses (inhumanly referred to as “pieces” by the Germans) out of the chambers and scrubbing it down.  Memes mostly blurs out the piles of dead bodies so we are spared the worst of the horror, but the scenes  grip us—Meme forces us to see the dark reality of the Nazi death industry and its sick and twisted affront to humanity.

Saul Auslander grimly performs his duties but then he takes it upon himself to spare the corpse of a young boy, who he claims is his son, the indignity of the ovens, but rather makes it the focus of his existence to give the boy a proper Jewish burial.  While his fellow prisoners surreptitiously plot  an uprising, Saul surreptitiously tries to find a rabbi for a secret service.  Ironically, both activities carry the same risk--death at the hands of their captors.  On one level, Saul's quest seems irrational.  He should be putting his efforts toward helping his fellow prisoners plot an escape.  But viewed somewhat differently level, his focus is entirely understandable.  Part of our humanity is ritual around important life passages--birth, bar/bat mitzvah, first communion, marriage, anniversaries, and death. Saul has made it his purpose to bring humanity to one person in a world in which all humanity has been deliberately obliterated by the Nazis.  One is struck throughout the film by Saul's grit and grim steadfastness in the face of almost certain doom.

The release of this film last fall coincided with the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. 70 years later, we are once again faced  a violent, malignant creed that is attacking the very things that make us human.  Pernicious branches of Islam in the form of ISIS and Boco Haram are menacing the globe threatening humanity just as the Nazis did 70 years ago.  Once again, the world has underestimated this movement just as it did the Third Reich.  Our president mocked them as merely the "J.V." and "guys in pickup trucks," as they took over huge territories in Iraq, Syria, and Libya, committing atrocities not seen since the Nazis-- beheadings, crucifixions, immolation, raping women, killing children... and perhaps the most abhorrent, declaring a fatwa against children afflicted Down's Syndrome.   In Paris and San Bernardino, they have shown an ability to take their murderous show on the road.  With their destruction of antiquities in Palmyra and their destruction of Iraq's oldest monastery, they are telling the world that all of the symbols of humanity are fair game for them.

The film Son of Saul is important because we can almost touch, smell, and hear the atrocities committed by an evil regime on an unimaginable scale.  Despite blurring some of the most ghastly parts, it is a film that will likely affect your emotional state for days.

But I can't help but wonder if was just the film that affected me, or the knowledge that it is happening again.   Not since the Nazis has humanity itself been assaulted in this way.  Once again, the civilized world reacts slowly and tepidly.