Category: Observations

From John McCain:  Glory is the act of being constant to something greater than yourself.

A young person explains his decision to attend the US Naval Academy. This recent video, sent to his high school college counselors, was forwarded to family friends by proud grandparents.

His grandfather attended college on an ROTC scholarship. He became an Army ranger during Vietnam.  Afterwards he was a reporter for the Chicago Tribune and closed his many career endeavors as  a college political science professor.  A life of service beginning with the call of duty.

Ralph Waldo Emerson stated, The apple does not fall far from the tree. When values liked these are handed down, America’s future  is in good hands.

(https://youtube.com/shorts/ENDGNI_HxpI?feature=share)

Getting ready for flight or fright.

An Origin Story

Halloween has Scots’ origins. It was popularized in the 18th century by Scotland’s national poet Robert Burns in his 1785 poem, “Halloween.” The poem, which describes the gathering of locals on All-Hallows Eve to present crops, enjoy a feast, tell fortunes revealing one’s true love, trick-or-treat and frolic with the opposite sex, became a source catalog documenting folk customs celebrating All Hallows Eve, All Saints Day and All Souls Day. The three days are collectively known as Allhallowtide, that portion of the church year “dedicated to remembering the dead, including saints (“hallows”), martyrs, and all the departed.  (Source:  The Jefferson Educational Society, Book Notes # 78)

Autumn Movement

By Carl Sandburg

I cried over beautiful things knowing no beautiful thing lasts.

The field of cornflower yellow is a scarf at the neck of the copper

sunburned woman, the mother of the year, the taker of seeds.

The northwest wind comes and the yellow is torn full of holes,

new beautiful things come in the first spit of snow on the northwest wind,

and old thing go, not one lasts.

A Musical Tribute from the ’60’s

Halloween “music” from the American Bandstand TV show October 1964, The Monster Mash:  Show your grandkids music from another era.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNuVifA7DSU)

“I arise in the morning torn between the desire to save the world and a desire to savor the world. That makes it hard to plan the day.” E.B.White

We live in a era of competing viewpoints and rhetorical advocacy.

Often logic, reason and especially facts are missing in the fire of verbal combat  or when issuing public relations statements supporting a position.

The more consequential the decision or a person’s position, the more elaborate the verbal bouquets.  These communications are not meant to persuade. Rather they entertain, advocate, sometimes threaten while shimmying past critical issues.

Examples this week include the speeches by the President and Secretary of War to hundreds of senior military  commanding officers, policy utterances by single NCUA board member Hauptman, or the rhetorical display announcing NCUA’s approval of the DCU merger with First Tech.

When Words Matter Most

So it was enlightening to read  someone  explaining at length what is at stake in our often charged and sometimes flippant public dialogues.  Here is an example:

In Boston yesterday Judge William G. Young answered an anonymous correspondent who trolled the judge on June 19 by writing a postcard that said: “TRUMP HAS PARDONS AND TANKS…. WHAT DO YOU HAVE?” Young reproduced the writing at the top of his decision finding that Trump’s attempted deportations of legal residents for their pro-Palestinian speech violated the First Amendment.

Then the judge answered: “Dear Mr. or Ms. Anonymous, Alone, I have nothing but my sense of duty. Together, We the People of the United States—you and me—have our magnificent Constitution.”

 “The United States is a great nation, not because any of us say so. It is great because we still practice our frontier tradition of selflessness for the good of us all. Strangers go out of their way to help strangers when they see a need. In times of fire, flood, and national disaster, everyone pitches in to help people we’ve never met and first responders selflessly risk their lives for others. Hundreds of firefighters rushed into the Twin Towers on 9/11 without hesitation desperate to find and save survivors. That’s who we are.

“And on distant battlefields our military ‘fought and died for the men [they] marched among.’ Each day, I recognize (to paraphrase Lincoln again) that the brave men and women, living and dead, who have struggled in our Nation’s service have hallowed our Constitutional freedom far above my (or anyone’s) poor power to add or detract. The only Constitutional rights upon which we can depend are those we extend to the weakest and most reviled among us.”

 “I fear President Trump believes the American people are so divided that today they will not stand up, fight for, and defend our most precious constitutional values so long as they are lulled into thinking their own personal interests are not affected.

“Is he correct?”

When you kill time, it has no resurrection.

from Jim Blaine, retired CEO State Employees  Credit Union NC and creator of several credit union blogs including SECU-Just Asking!

Hardin and Weaver were the dominant morning radio co-hosts for the  going-to=work drive in DC in the 1980’s.   Right before the 7:00 AM news update, they would finish their broadcast hour with a morning hymn.  A moment of grace before world events, sports weather and traffic briefs.

I was reminded of their disruption of secular events by an observation from academic Ti,pthy Snyder during his current trip to Ukraine.  In a front line town, he describes moments of incredible kindness by residents living under never ending threats of drone attacks.  He writes:

Always be kind.

Does kindness seem like a naive message during a war of extermination? Not to me. I admire friendly parents and kind children in the best of times, and I will admire them in the worst of times.

To defend you have to have something to defend. It will always be out of reach, but it matters whether or not you are reaching, or teaching others to reach.

The following anthem, Until Love is Spoken,  was written in 2022 during Covid.  But the words are appropirate for today’s’fraught circumstances. In this interview  the composer Karen Marolli  relates her musical background.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZq7gLsRfrg&t=216s)

The words  call for community engagement and hope.  One verse is:

And when our path of justice leads us to the dreadful fight,

Grant us vigor and entrust us with the power to do what is right, 

Grant us courage to be kind,

Grant us singleness of mind to free the world from hate and fear,

So only love is spoken here.

While not overtly religous language, it celebrates the power of purpose for a cause. Or, what matters is that your are reaching or teaching others to reach.