Trump and his minions jeopardize 50 years of arts progress in Wyoming

I missed The Idea of Trump postcard tsunami on March 15 since I was out of town. But did pick up some postcards from Ernie November and sent them on their way yesterday to Congressional delegation. Thanks to Melanie Shovelski for the postcards, yours free for the asking at Ernie November in downtown Cheyenne. The local group 307 Craftivists are fully engaged in The Resistance.

Dear Americans :

Trump's proposed 2018 budget stinks.

It cuts or eliminates all of the programs that I care about, programs used by my family members and neighbors in Wyoming. Eliminate Meals on Wheels? Come on, what kind of heartless bastards are these people? School lunches? The Arts Endowment (NEA)? The Humanities Endowment (NEH)? NPR? The list is endless. The Trumpies are following Grover Norquist's admonition to make the federal government so small you can drown it in a bathtub. Except for the Department of Defense budget -- that grows like Trump's ass. We can see Trump and his minions following the script of the strongman. Impoverish the citizenry, take away their rights and voices, and wage endless war.

Eliminating the NEA cuts me to the quick. The National Endowment for the Arts turned 50 in 2015. It began as one of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society programs. Johnson left a fantastic legacy, except for a little skirmish called the Vietnam War. The NEA thrived under Nixon, Ford, Carter, even Reagan, for God's sake. Bush 1, and then came Clinton and the Republican culture wars. The NEA was devastated due to Newt & Co. cuts. Rebounded under Dubya and Obama. And now, we have Dufus in the White House and he doesn't read books and others in his cabinet have only read Ayn Rand, over and over again. I read Rand too, back when I was a teen and didn't know any better.

I worked at the NEA for two years and the Wyoming Arts Council for 23. We did great work during that time. The WAC, which was spawned by the NEA and turns 50 this year, gets about 40 percent of its budget from the NEA. If that funding disappears, and state government continues to get cut due to lack of foresight among state legislators, Wyoming will be in trouble.

As an arts supporter, I received this dispatch from the Wyoming Arts Council -- you can also find it on the WAC web site. It cautions Wyomingites and arts orgs to please remain calm and keep doing the good work that you do. The work is important. Civic engagement is yuge. Without it -- sad.

Here's the letter:

On March 16, 2017, the White House released a budget blueprint for Fiscal Year 2018. This proposal calls for reductions to a range of government programs, including the elimination of federal support for the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities.  

It is important to remember that the legislative branch ultimately decides how to allocate federal funds. This is not the final word; this is the beginning of a conversation. The budget process will likely last well into late summer/early fall.  

As a state agency, the Wyoming Arts Council does not design or coordinate advocacy efforts. However, part of the Arts Council’s mission is to ensure that constituents are informed about the impact of the arts in every community across the state. We invite you to look to us as a resource for information and continue to engage us as a connector. Please feel free to visit our website for information about the value of the arts and the reach of both state and federal funding of the arts.

Should you be interested in advocacy efforts at the state and national level, we suggest you connect with the Wyoming Arts Alliance, National Assembly of State Arts Agencies, and Americans for the Arts.  

Please continue to apply for open grant applications from the National Endowment for the Arts, Wyoming Arts Council, and the Western States Arts Federation. The proposed budget will not influence any open application deadlines.  

We invite you to welcome this situation as an opportunity to articulate the impact the arts have had on your life and in your community.  

We encourage you to actively engage in this process by which our nation proclaims its values and vision. 

During this time, please know that the Arts Council staff will continue our work to ensure the arts are a driving force in building a stronger Wyoming. Thank you for all you do to support the arts in Wyoming.

Sincerely,
Michael Lange
Executive Director
Wyoming Arts Council

Trumpcare is a huge issue as we prepare for Children's Mental Health Awareness Week in May

Republicans are trying to sell us Trumpcare or, if you prefer, Wealthcare -- I also like Tryancare.

Everyone deserves quality, affordable mental health care. The system we have now is not so much a system as a scattershot approach that includes mental health professionals, emergency rooms, state hospitals, and treatment centers. Obamacare has helped insure millions and parity laws passed under both Democratic and Republican administrations have helped put mental illness treatment on par with other illnesses. Some mentally ill have found coverage with Medicaid Expansion (we didn't get it in Wyoming, thanks to the troglodytes in the legislature) or through disability clauses under SSI and SSDI. Negotiating the maze of local, state and federal coverage options can be a nightmare for someone who understands bureaucracy as I do. For a schizophrenic or bipolar person -- not so easy.

This announcement comes from the National Federation of Families for Children's Mental Health:

As national events continue to illuminate the critical need for mental health care reform in this country, we must increase our efforts to educate the nation about the importance of prevention and early identification of mental health challenges. We must also highlight the fact that children are an integral part of a family unit and create an understanding amongst policy leaders and practitioners that healthy families are better equipped to support resilient children. Legislation, policies, and practices must fully endorse the undisputed importance of full family engagement and participation in the care and treatment of their children. Further, we must advocate for a holistic approach to children's mental health that includes the provision of supports that strengthen the family as they nurture resiliency. 

Please join us as we create a national dialogue about the importance of finding help, finding hope.  FFCMH is tracking events for Children's Mental Health Week, May 1-7. 

Send them your activities. Here's more info:

What are you doing for Children's Mental Health Awareness Week?  Please share the activities that your organization or group is planning for National Children's Mental Health Awareness Week with us. We would also like to see any photos of your event after the week has concluded. Please fill in the event submission form with information about the events and activities you will be holding in your community for Children's Mental Health Awareness Week.

I don't know of any events in Cheyenne planned for May 1-7. If I find one, I will post here.

Oklahoma artist Jack Fowler releases Woody Guthrie image to activists

Your message here: Oklahoma artist Jack Fowler released his image of Woody Guthrie to the rest of us, hoping we will make art and possibly political messages with it. Fowler projected this image on the Oklahoma State Capitol along with his own customized message, "How Did It Come To This" as a protest against the wingnuts in the Oklahoma State Legislature, which may even be worse as the Wyoming State Legislature, which is hard to believe. Fowler told Hyperallergic: “I released the blank image so people could write in their own statements. I have no more plans for ‘Woody’s Guitar’ except for encouraging and fanning the flames of the positive, tangible things that have started to result from it.” The authorities were not pleased, telling Fowler that next time he does any projecting of images on the state capitol, he faces a fine and/or seizure of property. I guess Oklahoma authorities are only proud of Woody's folk hero status when it suits them. FMI: http://hyperallergic.com/364138/this-projection-art-kills-fascists/

List for St. Patrick's Day: Top ten traits of Irish-Americans

What does it mean to be Irish-American?

Skin cancer, for one thing. We are light-skinned, except for the Black Irish who are not so much black as black-haired and dark-eyed. My mother was Black Irish, as was her father who came over from County Roscommon. Her brother John -- my uncle -- was often mistaken for a dweller of the Mediterranean, Italian or Spanish or even Basque, or possibly French like the Norman invaders. The Basques sailed the Atlantic and visited Ireland, maybe even made landfall in North America before other Europeans. Irish DNA maps are similar to those of Spain and Portugal and Normandy. You can look it up.

My initial question is important because we are in the midst of March and St. Patrick's Day arrives next week. It's the same week that March Madness begins and gives us two good reasons for day drinking. We also take a page from Mardi Gras in New Orleans and try to celebrate the entire month, or at least for a week or two leading up to The Big Day. Many St. Patrick's Day parades will be held this weekend, including the one in Denver which I will be attending. I was birthed in Denver, surrounded by Irish Sisters of Mercy, and my Irish grandfather is buried there. That gives me some claim to Irish-Americanism, Mile High City-style.

Did I mention that I have never traveled to Ireland to look up my ancestors? This is supposed to be on every Irish-American's wish list. I have gone 66 years without checking this off on mine. What's holding me back? Nothing, especially that I am now retired. I want to experience Bloomsday in Dublin, June 16. This is on my list because I can't seem to finish Joyce's 265,000-word masterpiece, Ulysses, hard as I try. I read Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Can't finish Ulysses. This makes me a member of a large club of people who have not finished Ulysses. I decided that a trip to Joyce's Dublin will help me with this task. And I will get to drink many pints of good beer in the process. I will get to hear Irish brogues and good music for a few days. That's enough.

I will make a list of "top ten traits of every Irish-American." Online top-ten lists are the bee's knees right now. A list will be instructional for us all, me included.

Ten traits of every Irish-American:
1. We are a freckle-faced, light-skinned people except when we are not.
2. At least one of our ancestors comes from Ireland. It's helpful if all of your ancestors came from Ireland, but not everyone is perfect.
3. We are Catholic, except when we are Lutheran or Episcopalian or Buddhist or Zoroastrian or Coptic or atheist or transcendentalist or.... Maybe that should be: We were raised Catholic but came to our senses once we were adults.
4. At least one of our ancestors fled the potato famine of the 1840s. When I lived in Boston, everyone's relatives seemed to have arrived on the Mayflower. That must have been one wicked big ship. And the potato famine? It was terrible, but we can't all use this as an excuse to blog about our Irish ancestors who almost died in the famine and then crossed the ocean in a leaky ship to be told "Irish need not apply" for jobs when they arrived in the U.S.
5. We all tell tales about our Irish ancestors who almost died in the famine and then crossed the ocean in a leaky ship to be told "Irish need not apply" for jobs when they arrived in the U.S.
6. We attended Catholic school. This may be a generational thing. I attended Catholic school as did  most of my eight brothers and sisters, for a little while, at least. We have stories of berserk nuns and cruel priests. Rulers across knuckles. After-school detentions where nuns smote us with cat-o'-nine-tails as we labored in the nunnery's vineyards. Our children and grandchildren think we are making up these stories because they all went to public schools.
7. We have big families. We did until some godforsaken Protestant told us about birth control. In the old days, we weren't allowed to consort with Protestants. The sixties changed all that.
8. We all have Irish names. My name is Michael Thomas Martin Shay. My wife is Christine Marie. My son is Kevin Michael Patrick. My daughter is Anne Marie. Yet, I have a nephew named Sean Martinez. America!
9. We celebrate St. Patrick's Day. It's almost mandatory to drink a green beer or a pint on March 17. We march in St. Patrick's Day parades unless we are LGBT veterans or twelve-steppers or disgruntled about the state of American politics. Everybody is Irish on  this day except when they are not.
10. We are inconsistent and stubborn. Except when we are not.

That's my top ten. Perhaps you have another list?

BTW, Erin go bragh, whatever that means. And slainte -- I know what that means. I plan to use it often on St. Patrick's Day.

Poetry matters in a time when words are devalued

When words are devalued, poetry matters.

It hit me on Monday night at the Poetry Out Loud state competition at the LCCC Theatre in Cheyenne.

Students traveled from high schools in Riverton, Jackson, Sundance, Worland, Buffalo and Moorcroft to recite poems. Prizes are involved, including a trip to Washington, D.C., for the winner where he or she might win a college scholarship. Still, Wyoming offers its best and brightest Hathaway scholarships and a host of financial aid packages to its lone four-year state university and seven community colleges. It may be that these students like poetry, or like the way it sounds. Some are theatre people who know how to memorize. Some are speech-and-debaters who know the tactics of presenting in public.

On this night, they and their chaperones had braved blizzard conditions to drive hours to Cheyenne.Some didn't make it as roads closed.

My role was prompter. I provide lines when the student got stuck. If they did, which they didn't. So I listened closely. I knew some of the poems. I can still recite Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade." The nuns made me memorize it during detention at St. Francis School in Wichita. That was detention in 1963 -- memorize a poem and recite it before you depart. The nuns had corporal punishment at their disposal.

Catholic school student: A nun hit me today at school.
Catholic school parent: That's nice, dear. Go wash up for dinner.

They could have made us memorize the Book of Exodus. In Latin. They chose poetry.

Last night, as I listened to Tennyson's poem, I realized that it was about a suicide mission during the Crimean War. Six hundred British cavalry rode into a Russian barrage and many never came back. The poem was meant to rally the Brits against the Russians or any foreigners who threatened John Bull. On the other side was Leo Tolstoy, recording the war from his P.O.V. The Crimean War was nasty and brutish, as are most wars. Listening to "Charge" now, I couldn't help but think of World War I and Korea and Vietnam.

Vietnam. Two of the students recited Bill Ehrhart's "Beautiful Wreckage." Ehrhart is a Vietnam combat veteran. He knows a few things about war.

In Vietnamese, Con Thien means
place of angels. What if it really was
instead of the place of rotting sandbags,
incoming heavy artillery, rats and mud. 

Ehrhart's words coming from the mouth of a 16-year-old holds a poignancy that only an older person can understand. Ehrhart went to war right out of high school so he wasn't much older than these students when he was in Con Thien with the rats and mud. In Trump's America, are we looking at the next generation of young people about to be transformed into warriors for a nebulous cause?

One poem that surprised me was Mina Loy's "Lunar Baedeker." The poet and the poem were new to me. The British poet was a Paris bohemian, mother, and artist. Her warfare was gender-based. A few lines from "Lunar Baedeker:"

A Silver Lucifer
serves
cocaine in cornucopia

Loy was a futurist, a member of the avant-garde who specialized in word play. My question: how come this is the first time I heard any of her poems?

Today is International Woman's Day and, in the U.S., #ADayWithoutWomen. Makes me curious about women poets such as Loy, Emily Bronte, Mary Cornish, Sara Teasdale, Brenda Cardena, Adelaide Crapsey, and Robyn Schiff. These were some of the poets the students decided to memorize and recite. They choose different subjects than male poets. No "Charge of the Light Brigade" from Loy. Instead, she wrote "Human Cylinders:"

Simplifications of men
In the enervating dusk;
Your indistinctness
Serves me the core of the kernel of you

Or, from "Parturition:"

Rises from the subconscious
Impression of a cat
With blind kittens
Among her legs
Same undulating life-stir
I am that cat

Avant-garde poets were not easily understood. But more erudition exists in these poems than the daily natterings of our current president.

Probably goes without saying. But there it is.

Get more info about Poetry Out Loud at the Wyoming Arts Council web site.

March for Science Wyoming steps off in Laramie on Earth Day 2017

Official logo of the March for Science Wyoming, set for Laramie on April 22. T-shirts are for sale with this design. All of the proceeds go to March for Science Wyoming. Go to  https://www.bonfire.com/mfs-wyoming/

March for Science 2017, Wyoming version, will be held on Saturday, April 22, in Laramie. This is one of the 300-plus satellite sites to the main march in Washington, D.C. Cheyenne residents will be bused in, returning the favor by Laramie folks who carpooled and rode the bus to Cheyenne on Jan. 21 for the Women's March.

April 22 is Earth Day, a good day to cut air pollution by pooling our resources. Also a great day for a march in Laramie, which is home to the state's only four-year university and a vibrant batch of science-oriented academics and researchers. An artistic bunch, too. The head of the UW Creative Writing Program is Jeff Lockwood, a writer and noted entomologist. J Shogren is a Nobel Prize-winning environmental economist and professor who leads the "pulp Americana" band J Shogren Shanghai'd.

Students come from all over the world, studying water hydrology, geology, computer science and many other majors. UW international students have additional worries under Trump's most recent batch of anti-immigrant policies. One wonders what effects these travel bans will have on international athletes. In a January 2017 article, Fox Sports reported this:

According to a study done by Rukkus Blog on 2016-2017 rosters, 11 percent of college basketball players are born outside of the United States. The total number of foreign-born prospects on college rosters is up 40 percent in the last 10 years.

Wonder if those well-heeled athletic supporters will lobby their man Trump to keep the overseas pipelines open. They will, if Gonzaga and Kentucky and Duke start losing. Face it, Trump responds to muscle, especially when it comes from rich white guys. We gotta have our March Madness!

Meanwhile, we march for scientists and researchers and women and immigrants and writers and artists and all the other targets of Trump and his authoritarian policies.

CRMC sponsors first Culture Fest Promoting Health and Justice April 29 at LCCC

This comes from a press release:

Culture Fest sponsored by Cheyenne Regional Medical Center

The first Culture Fest Promoting Health and Justice will take place in Cheyenne on Saturday, April 29. The goal of this festival is to celebrate the various cultures represented in our Wyoming community and address social determinants of health that often contribute to health disparities of minority groups. During the festival, there will be opportunity to display your cultural arts and educate community members. There is also opportunity for performance on the “big stage. 

The main event will take place on Saturday, April 29, at Laramie County Community College’s Pathfinder Building, 1400 E. College Drive, from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. 

Check out the Participant Letter and and the Market Registration Form2. 

FMI: Monica Jennings at 307-432-3640 or monica.jennings@crmcwy.org

A line in the participant letter caught my attention:

We sincerely appreciate your willingness to devote your time and share your expertise with the multicultural communities in our state. Your commitment to the well-being of others does not go unnoticed.

Sounds as if this might be a good event to talk about the ACA, Medicare, Medicaid expansion, and any number of timely topics. Wyoming has many health challenges, not least of which is mental health care. I've written often about the challenges my daughter faced in getting the appropriate mental health treatment in Wyoming. She finally found resources in Aurora and Denver. The feds played a role, too. Which raises concerns about the Trump administration's proposed gutting of health and mental health agencies. If Trump continues to wage endless wars, veterans will continue to have mental health challenges. No aircraft carrier task force or joint strike fighter jet can effectively challenge a stubborn case of PTSD.

U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera speaks about poetry and migration April 21 in Jackson

This news just came in from the Wyoming Arts Council Literary News e-mail blast: 

Presenting U.S. Poet Laureate: Juan Felipe Herrera 

Friday, April 21, 7–9 p.m.  

Center for the Arts, 265 S Cache St, Jackson, WY 83001  

The first Mexican-American U.S. Poet Laureate, Juan Felipe Herrera, presents “Because We Come from Everything: Poetry and Migration.” In 2015, Librarian of Congress James H. Billington appointed Herrera the 21st U.S. Poet Laureate. Herrera grew up in California as the son to migrant farmers, which shapes much of his work. A Washington Post article tells the story that “As a child, Herrera learned to love poetry by singing about the Mexican Revolution with his mother, a migrant farmworker in California. Inspired by her spirit, he has spent his life crossing borders, erasing boundaries and expanding the American chorus.”  

Tickets available APRIL 3. 

FMI: http://jhcenterforthearts.org/. Box office: 307-733-4900.

Newspaper ad asks Enzi, Barrasso and Cheney: Why Are You Hiding?

This ad was funded by a GoFundMe campaign by "just people" in Wyoming. You can still contribute -- I did -- at  https://www.gofundme.com/uu43mk-newspaper-ad (thank you, Emily Siegel). The copy is hard to read here but if I make it any bigger on my site, it will crowd the sidebars. You can save the image as a jpg, open MS Word, insert it into a template and it should appear in its original size. If not, you can enlarge it. Then you can print out copies and give to all of your friends and family members who voted for Trump and his gang. One of the things I like about this is the plug for the National Endowment for the Arts toward the end. You may not know this, but Wyoming's own Sen. Enzi is a member of the U.S. Senate's arts caucus and a long-time supporter of the Wyoming Arts Council, which receives almost half of its funding from taxpayer funds provided by the NEA. Sen. Enzi had a working relationship with the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, back when those sorts of things were allowed in Congress. Sen. Enzi reads books, unlike the current president who is giving marching orders to Enzi, Barrasso and Cheney. Would you blindly takes orders from a boss who didn't read? 

Healthcare march and forum set for Feb. 25 in Cheyenne

How many marches, rallies and rabble-rousing events can one be expected to attend before collapsing in a heap?

That's what people are asking themselves. In normal times, exhaustion already would have settled in. But these are abnormal times. Protests seem to have a bigger impact than just getting on the phone to your elected reps or mailing them a postcard. Trump got to the White House via the adulation of crowds. He will be ushered out of the White House the same way. So, here are a few more ways for concerned citizens to gather together to stump Trumpism which is a mean-spirited, destructive philosophy that will ruin our country.

Healthcare march on Saturday, Feb. 25, 10 a.m., Depot Plaza in downtown Cheyenne, 16th St. and Capitol Ave. Free. Bring a sign. FMI: https://www.facebook.com/events/1348316418561808/

Save the Affordable Care Act forum on Saturday, Feb. 25, 3-6 p.m., at the Laramie County Public Library, 2200 Warren Ave., downtown Cheyenne. Free. FMI: https://www.facebook.com/events/1861553744059620/

Here's a short description:

Do you want to know what is included in the Affordable Care Act? Are you worried about having health insurance for you or your family? Would you like more information about the Affordable Care Act? Are you wondering what "pre-existing conditions" means? Do you have children covered on your health insurance who are young adults? Come and find out these details & more!

Refreshments will be served.

Lots of activities for liberal activists this week in Cheyenne

Sixty people attended last night's Laramie County Democratic Party's monthly meeting in Cheyenne.

That may not seem like a lot to you, dear readers in more populous places. But here, that's a good crowd.

Why so many people, and newcomers, at that?

Donald Trump -- he's making our Dem meetings great again.

New Faces. New energy. Groups represented that didn't exist this time last year, groups such as Indivisible Cheyenne. Juntos has been around for awhile but their mission helping immigrants has gone from necessary to critical. "People are in danger of losing everything," said Juntos leader A.J. What he means, of course, are the people who are being rounded up in ICE raids. They can be snatched, Gestapo-like, in the middle of the night and spirited away to camps and then back to their countries of origin. These raids are a byproduct of Trump's immigrant ban, announced a few weeks ago in a fever and promptly shut down by the courts. Trump doesn't have his multi-billion-dollar wall yet, so the ICE raids will have to do for now. Juntos needs volunteers. If you can help, go to the Juntos Facebook page. Juntos hasn't had a chance to work with local faith communities interested in becoming sanctuary churches. Kathleen Petersen announced at the meeting that the Unitarian Universalist Church has taken steps along this path. The congregation held a "community conversation of becoming a sanctuary church" on Feb. 5. Other churches will follow. UUCC is always a leader in social justice issues.

Attendees elected ten new precinct committeemen and women. Anyone signed up by the close of last night's meeting now can vote for county party officers at the March 20 meeting. Many of these precinct people were newbies and one was a Republicans this time last year. The precinct is the trenches of the political wars, one we haven't fought very well. We know that grassroots organizing is the way to get people elected. But it's hard work and you have to actually talk to people, engage them on a one-to-one basis. People -- you know how annoying they are! But without them, well, look what happens. Take a look at our current legislative session. More extremist legislation this year as a result of the Republican juggernaut. Mary Throne was House minority leader from Laramie County but was beat by a clodhopper on Nov. 8. She spoke about the horrors of this session. As is the case with many of us, her kids are out (or almost out) of the local K-12 system. "If I had kids in the K-12 system now, I'd be really worried," she said, noting that we are looking at the "potential destruction" of our education system, recently ranked as one of the top ten in the country. A scary thought. But that's the Republican plan nationally, now that we have the anti-education Education Secretary Betsy DeVos at the helm. The Wyoming Republicans have their marching orders -- scorched earth for public education.

Wyoming Republican senators spend their days bashing educators when they are not busy waging war on women, gays, wolves, Mother Earth, wind power, etc.

Mary Throne summed it up this way: “No family is going to want to move here, no business will want to move here, without a great education system.”

So much for diversifying the state's economy.

This sums up the attitude of Republicans in Wyoming: “Let’s make Wyoming worse than it is now.” Some wags have called Trump’s ascendancy “the Alabamafication of America.” You know those polls that always show Alabama dead last in education, children’s health, income levels and almost everything else? Well, the folks who gave you Alabama now give you America which includes Wyoming last time I looked.

The Dems argued a bit last night, as is their wont. We should be arguing after our piss-poor showing in November. There is energy in the discontent. That must be turned into action.

Wonder what you can do?

Attend the Laramie County Democratic legislative reception on Thursday, Feb. 23, 6-10 p.m., at The Suite Bistro, 1901 Central Ave., in downtown Cheyenne. Admission is $15, which includes a free drink and cool jazz by the Jane Robinette Trio. Also schmoozing with Dem legislators and other local liberals. A chance to get acquainted.

If coffee or tea is your bag, attend the letter-writing party on Wednesday, Feb. 22, 5:30-7:30 p..m., at the Paramount Café, 1607 Capitol Ave. Materials and letter-writing experts will be available to help with ways to write the most convincing dispatch to your legislator. Helpful hint: no cussing.

If you were part of the Trump post-inauguration Women’s & Allies March in Cheyenne, and you’d like to participate in upcoming marches, including the March for Science and The Tax Day Rally, come to the Laramie County Public Library, 2200 Pioneer Ave., at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 26. This energetic group gathered more than 1,000 people on a cold day in January to register our disgust with Trump and Trumpism. Fed them all, too.

I am at our local library right now using the public wi-fi because my home wi-fi is not working correctly. If you are looking for a place to blog surrounded by books that our president doesn’t read, this is the place. Support your local library in any way you can!

Indivisible Cheyenne also is planning events. You can find a link to its site on the right sidebar.

Just how do we get this alien life force off of our starship?

Sitting in my blogging chair since 2005....

I am not a member of the press. I do not represent the mainstream media in any way.

I am a blogger. A progressive blogger, prog-blogger to those who still use the term. An attendee of Netroots Nation. A sometimes blogger on Daily Kos. An embedded blogger (courtesy of the Dean brothers) to the 2008 Dem convention when we thought we entered a new and glorious era of truth, justice and the American way.

I am a Liberal in almost every way.

When it comes to telling the truth, I am s staunch conservative. Truth must be proven. It must be based on facts.

How do I talk about the post-truth Trump administration? A very good question. Fortunately, I do not have to experience press gatherings in Washington, D.C. How would I discern Trump's very strange press conference this past week? It's easy to call him an idiot, a fool, a madman. None of that seems to put a dent in Trump. He just keeps babbling on, no matter what sort of verbal ammunition you use on him.

Trump seems to be an alien life form who feeds on the fear and confusion of his enemies. Remember that Star Trek episode when a shimmering alien life force pits humans against Klingons? The force stokes the fears of both sides and then feeds off of that fear. The only way to get the alien force off the Enterprise is to declare peace and laugh it off. Go see "The Day of the Dove," season three, episode 11.

Scorn and satire doesn't work with Trump. He feeds off of the name-calling. He doesn't get the satire. You have to have a knowledge base to get it upended by satire and irony. Trump doesn't read books. He makes deals. He's using fear and anger against us. And he doesn't get any of our jokes.

Just how in the heck do we get this alien off of our ship?

No easy answer, especially to those of us who pride ourselves in being decent artistic types who pride ourselves in not ranting and raving at the drop off a hat. Will that be our downfall?

Nothing stopped Hitler except brute force. He cheated and lied and schemed to take over his country and then tried to take over the world. No wonder we can't let go of World War II. It was a titanic struggle. The forces of good triumphed over evil. The forces of good used horribly violent means to do so. We never quite got over the rush. Some say that Trump's U.S. looks like like Nazi Germany with the swastika, imperial Rome with to the togas, and Il Duce without the pouting Mussolini. We have the pouting Trump. America First!

Sabrina Tavernise writes today in the New York Times, Are Liberals Helping Trump? In it, Ms. Tavernise posits that the wise-ass and snarky and condescending attitudes of the liberals are driving away moderate Republicans. Where else do they have to go?

She wants to compare the current strife to the late 60s and early 70s, when every public discourse erupted into a fight about Vietnam, civil rights, or how long you could wear your hair. But her prime example goes all the way back to the Civil War years. That's scary.

Liberals are angry at themselves, too, that we didn't prevent this. We just took for granted that the intelligent liberal candidate would win. We didn't treat seriously those big rallies of Trump's. Yes, some of those people were unhinged but many more were just angry at the state of the nation. They turned out to vote on Nov. 8. I helped Dem voters get to the polling stations, visited many around Cheyenne, and long lines were the rule rather than the exception. They were Trump voters. Even worse, they were people who usually didn't vote but by God were going to vote for Trump this time. They were former Bill Clinton and Barack Obama voters who couldn't stomach a liberal woman lawyer in the White House after watching Fox News blather against Obama for eight years. Fuck you, they said to liberals. And now we're returning the fuck yous.

That's as far as my political punditry goes. The Republicans are going to dismantle everything that I care about: Corporation for Public Broadcasting, NPR, NEA, NEH, ACA, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public transportation, clean air, clean water, public lands -- the list goes on and on. There's nothing to hinder this process but a few judges and possible outrage from the citizenry. But a lot of the citizenry love Trump's attacks on liberals and media. And we only have the satisfaction of our witty social media posts,

We will all be stuck in the coming Dark Ages together. Maybe then we can find common ground.

Here are some tips to avoid those typo gremlins

Nobody in the Trump administration asked me for help, but I am offering it anyway.

First of all, a bit of history about typographical errors. They have been with us since the advent of the printing press. And spelling errors, well, they have been with us since humankind began sketching out a language on mud tablets or papyrus or cave walls, whatever was handy.

Humans are fallible. When  you combine that with high visibility, it's an invitation for trouble. I know this from almost 40 years as a writer and editor.

#45's first poster featured either a spelling error or a typo. SCSOE Betsy DeVos's office misspelled African-American activist's W.E.B. Dubois's name on a press release for Black History Month and compounded the problem by apologizing with the wrong form of apology.

We know that these people have the advantage of higher education. In other words, they're not uneducated. Gross negligence is another problem. Impulsivity, maybe, as we know that POTUS is impulsive on Twitter at 5 a.m.

I offer some tips on avoiding these little gremlins in your written documents, whether they appear only on social media or on thousands of posters, one of which will end up in the National Archives. The term "gremlins" is a good description for these little devils. It comes from British pilots in the 1920s, who needed something (rather than somone) to blame for the failings of their rickety aircraft. It really caught on during WWII, when pilots in the Battle of Britain referred to gremlins as the thing that gummed up the throttle, caused fuel leaks and generally ran amok over the whole works. Gremlins persist, which may be the cause of constant dysfunction at the Trump White House.

 One more thing. Do not treat Spell Check as the last word on your document. Apology, apologies and apologize(s) are all correct. Too and to are both words. Their use depends on context. Can you say context?

Some recent examples:

1. Michael Flynn, former National Security Advisor, wasn't too careful when he talked to two (or maybe two-and-twenty) Russian sources about U.S. national secrets.

You can see how to, too and two are used. Two-and-twenty is antiquated, best relegated to nursery rhyme and blogs. Besides, it could have been two million for all we will ever know.

2. Betsy DeVos offered no apology for giving money to all of the Republicans who voted for her nomination as Secretary of Education. She does apologize that it wasn't more, but that will be taken care of shortly.

Apology is a noun and is used here correctly. Apologize is a verb and it is also used correctly here. One of these days, all of these hacks will apologize to the American people but we won't hold our breath.

3. White House spokesman Stephen Miller msaid out loud that we shouldn't dare question POTUS's decision, whether it by on national security or Ivanka's clothing line. We can only conclude that he speaks with great precision, but obviously is batshit crazy.

That's all for today, language nerds. Your humble narrator signs off until I am needed again, which will be soon.

In memoriam: John Clark Pratt

I called him Dr. Pratt because it seemed appropriate. John Clark Pratt possessed a deep voice, military bearing, steely gaze. No surprise after 20 years in the Air Force, some of those in Vietnam (and neighboring countries), and then a stint teaching at the Air Force Academy.

At Colorado State University, he taught creative writing. He was the only writing prof hanging around the Eddy Building as I prowled around on a summer day in 1988. I dropped in. He gave me some of his time and, when I left, thought I had found the right place to get my M.F.A.

I was right. Dr. Pratt conducted one of my first writing workshops. He helped me fine-tune a sci-fi story that he thought was pretty good. You don't read too many sci-fi pieces in writing workshop. It's mostly dysfunctional family minimalism (DFM). No surprise, since most of the students are in their 20s and fresh out of their undergraduate experience and not too far away from their tormented youth. I was older, late 30s, fresh from a corporate PR gig and before that, years as a journalist and then a free-lance writer. If I had a tormented youth, it was way behind me.

I wasn't a better writer than my younger peers. I just wrote different stuff. I was used to being edited and revised and wasn't upset when others took a hand to it. So I published and kept writing, going through critiques, stopping to chat with Dr. Pratt along the way. He had published two great books about the Vietnam War, The Laotian Fragments and Vietnam Voices. In the latter book, he put together a pastiche of poets and writers, veterans and peaceniks. He had helped start the CSU Library's Vietnam War special collection. Nosing around in that collection, partitioned like a bunker in the basement of the old library, which in the late 1980s still had its card catalog and a new but rudimentary computerized system. While hanging out in the bunker, I discovered its future wars section. My first novel manuscript rests in that collection. It's the only way you can read it, if you're interested.

Dr. Pratt passed away Jan. 2 in Fort Collins after a long and gallant battle with cancer. We'd been in touch a few years ago when he was looking for a publisher for his new novel. Still writing, even as he battled the Big C. He wondered if my Denver publisher might be interested in the book. I asked. They were, but I don't think it worked out as the press vanished shortly thereafter. It felt good to do him this small favor. Then two weeks ago, I found out from a writer friend that Dr. Pratt had passed away.

Last week, I received a call from a woman whose club was preparing Dr. Pratt's household for an estate sale. She said she found in Dr. Pratt's library my business card and letter in a copy of my short story collection. She invited me to FoCo for a preview of the estate sale. I went.

It's too bad I no longer am accumulating books. My shelves are full, I have many boxes of books in the basement and I am retired. But I thought it might be a way to help in some way, maybe use it as a way to say farewell to Dr. Pratt.

My friend John met me there. He taught with Dr. Pratt and he too is retired. Linda showed us into the room containing Pratt's research books. The director of the Vietnam War collection had already been out to sort through the material. John and I found some collectible books that hadn't been priced as well as well as some wonderful early editions, especially of books from the 1960s. A row of Joseph Heller's books, including early hardcovers of Catch-22. John Updike, Ken Kesey, Kenn Babbs, Timothy Leary. Pratt knew them all, and was interested in all of the voices of the sixties. I thought, "Wouldn't it be great to have books that a mentor cared enough to keep?" The answer was yes. But I resisted. John and I found excellent copies of 1984 and Sinclair Lewis's It Can't Happen Here, both of which we turned over to Linda for pricing. I found a first edition of James Burke's first novel,The Lost Get-Back Boogie. It was an LSU Press original and back before the author became Best-Selling NYT-Author James Lee Burke. English majors would like the fact that an excerpt of the book was first published in CutBank, University of Montana's excellent litmag. I found a big box of Vietnam War research material, including a Look Magazine cover with the header, "We're Winning in Vietnam." It was fall of 1967, just a few months before Tet.

I attended Dr. Pratt's funeral at Spirit of Joy Lutheran Church. His adult children recounted their memories and we had a few laughs. The Poudre River Irregulars, minus its banjo player, played a few tunes, closing out with "When Those Saints Go Marching in."

I am thankful that I had Dr. Pratt as a mentor. He saw things in my writing that I did not. He encouraged me when I needed encouraging. You never know what kind of impact people will have on you. It's important that you give them a chance and see what happens.

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness a great read

Imagine it's 2009 and you're a 24-year-old newspaper reporter living and working in New York City. An exciting life, sprinting all over town for stories and interviews. At night, hanging out in bars with your main squeeze and young friends. One day, you wake up with bites on your arm and imagine that your body and tiny apartment are infected with bedbugs. Then you start to hallucinate. Paranoia grips you and you are convinced that your boyfriend is cheating. You have trouble speaking and then erupt in epileptic convulsions.

I'm going crazy. That's your first thought but it's wrong. You are in the beginning stages of autoimmune encephalitis. Your brain is on fire. Your immune system is attacking your brain. Seizures, convulsions, hallucinations are part of it. You speak in tongues, as it says in the Bible, and if you lived in medieval England, your contortions and babbling might be mistaken for demonic possession. If you lived in 2009 America, your loved ones might think you were in the grip of schizophrenia or some other mental illness. You might end up in an institution for the rest of your life, which could be short if you contract the illness in its most lethal form.

Susannah Cahalan was lucky. She found the right neurologist and became the poster child for the disease which, before her, had only been diagnosed 217 times. She recovered and, being a dedicated journalist, wrote a book, Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness. It's now a movie.

It's scary reading. Compelling. My daughter Annie gave me her copy. She is bipolar and devours books on mental illness or supposed mental illness. She intends to become a music therapist once she and her therapists get a handle on her illness. She will be a good one, too, as she has experienced a good decade of struggles within the mental health system. It's not really a system. It pretends to be but not enough attention or time is devoted to it. We tend to warehouse those with mental illness, especially those who have the more challenging schizophrenia or schizo-effective disorder or are bipolar, which used to be known as manic-depression.  These people are challenged every day. They can be treated but it takes so much time and attention and money which could be spent on more important things,, such as a billion-dollar aircraft carrier to fight Islamic terrorists lurking in an alley in Mosul. Or more tax cuts to the ridiculously rich. Heaven help the needy amongst us now that Trump is running things.

I just finished reading Brain on Fire. It's well-written and, as I already mentioned, scary, especially for those of us who struggle with mental illness -- or have loved ones who do. Highly recommended. Not sure about the movie -- haven't got around to watching it. It screened in September at the Toronto International Film Festival and received lukewarm reviews. Read the Hollywood Reporter review here. Read the book instead. A 2012 New York Times review by Michael Greenberg offers insight.

Is corporate America really our enemy?

I watched the entire Super Bowl, from its hope-filled opening to its bitter end. I saw an hour of the pre-game show but didn't watch the post-mortem, when Trump's boy, Tom Brady, celebrated in style. Or I assume that he did.

Funny how this football game became a forum to challenge #45. Big corporations paid big money to air their inclusive views on race, immigration, history. Budweiser told the story of its German immigrant founder, including a scene at the docks where nativist Know Nothings harass him and other "foreigners." 84 Lumber aired the story of a Latin American mother and her young daughter and their trek to the U.S., to reunite with the father. Unfortunately, the imagined Trump wall almost got in their way. Air B&B addressed intolerance by exhibiting the many faces of our neighbors. All of the ads featured Americans of varying colors and creeds and statuses. The America that exists now, not the fear-plagued, hateful nation summoned by Trump. Creative people imagined these ads, wrote them, shot them, acted in them, edited them. Creativity is one of our greatest strengths. It can reveal, in creative ways, the xenophobic ways of the fascist, who hates creativity and humor and the First Amendment.

At the end of last night's game, I wondered: Will it be the corporations that save us from Trump? You must be a huge entity to afford Super Bowl ads. To be a huge entity, you need to appeal to the largest possible audience. For years, Coke and Bud and McD's have featured a rainbow of talent in their commercials. Look at ads from your childhood in the 50s-70s. White people. Look at commercial TV now and you see America as it actually exists. We have African-Americans and Latinos, Somalis and Salvadorans. We have hearing-impaired people signing a language that it as foreign to most of us as Urdu. We have people in wheelchairs.

This apparently irritates Trump supporters, who tend to be rural and white. They look around their small town and see people like them. They watch cable TV and see a changed America, one that is foreign and scary. It's mainly urban and young. They go to Denver and Salt Lake City and Albuquerque and see this America in living color. It's intimidating. Almost like a foreign country.

Many of my city friends laugh when I say that I'm a city boy. I say I live in a capital city, the largest one in my state, one of only two Metropolitan Statistical Areas. If asked, I say that the population is 68,000, the size of some suburbs in their state. They think I'm funny.

Back to corporations. Many liberals see them as the enemy. They are trying to take over the world, make everybody live in a cookie-cutter world. They are the enemies of craft brewers and locavores and indie bands.

But corporations employ smart people and see what's going on. Corporate brewers buy up craft brewers and try to duplicate their appeal. Fast-food giants try to be like the mom-and-pop neighborhood bistro, offering artisan this and handmade that. They know things are changing. But we sneer at them, superior beings that we are. Meanwhile, they hire people of color who are dependable and smart. These companies understand that Trump's prejudices will kill their businesses.

Look around you. See who works at your favorite restaurant and coffee shop. Investigate their politics. See who they are connected to in public. You can hate Starbuck's if you want, but it is an open-minded company, one that challenges the Trumpsters. Buy a coffee there and one at your locally-owned coffee shop. Thing is, your local shop may be owned by rabid Republicans just following a proven business model. Maybe Starbuck's is more attuned to your beliefs.

Some wingnuts are calling for a Budweiser boycott. Last summer, Bud changed its flagship beer's name to "America." I didn't drink any America. I thought it was silly, and that only bikers and cowboys would fall for it. But now I will drink a Bud for every Fat Tire or 90 Shilling I drink. Not sure if my heart can take too many fast-food meals, but there must be something I can eat at Wendy's. It's important to support those companies who dared to challenge a despot on the biggest sporting event of the year

"Be kind of everybody. Make art. Fight the power."

"Be kind to everybody. Make art. Fight the power."

Colson Whitehead's advice during his acceptance speech in November for the National Book Award in fiction. I am in the mood to take Whitehead's advice as I just read thousands of words he strung together for The Underground Railroad, his award-winning book. That's trust, isn't it? To be willing to give over your time and imagination for someone else's version of the world? That's what all writers hope readers will do. And if we can trust the writer with this, we can also trust that he or she will give us good advice. Maybe not. Ayn Rand was a writer and she dispensed lousy advice. I read her books as a young, impressionable reader. Good people write books. Bad people write books and give bad advice. What is one to do?

Be kind of everybody. Keep reading the good stuff. Keep writing. Make art. Speak truth to power.

For some context, here is a longer quote from Whitehead's NBA speech (from Vulture):

This time last year I was finishing up the book and was like, Don't mess up the last 20 pages, Colson. Every day I'm like, Only 19 pages to go, don't mess it up, Colson. And you never know what's going to happen in a year. And now the book is out and I would never think I would be standing here. And who knows where we're gonna be a year from now. We're sort of happy in here, outside is the blasted hellhole wasteland of Trumpland which we're going to inhabit. But who knows what's going to happen a year from now. And because I'm still promoting the book, people have been like, "Do you have any words about the election?" And I'm like, "Not really" — I'm sort of stunned. And I hit upon something that was making me feel better, and I guess it was, I think, hopefully applicable to other folks: Be kind to everybody, make art, and fight the power. That seemed like a good formula for me, anyway. So B, M, F, and if you have trouble remembering that, a good mnemonic device to tell yourself is, They can't break me because I'm a Bad Mother Fucker. Thank you. 

Learning to Breathe, Part IV

Read Part III here.

In Part IV, our concluding episode, the Hailie Salassie automaton comes to life and chases down some fascists. 

“Here he comes.” Bobby the cowboy pointed the front doors of the depot. They opened, and an entourage stepped out. Several photographers, three uniformed policemen and, finally, the lanky and lucky Mr. Lindbergh. He blinked when the sun hit his eyes. He was dressed in a gray suit. He didn’t look like a famous aviator. He didn’t look like a guy whose baby had been kidnapped and killed. He didn’t look like a guy who was Hitler’s buddy.

“Let’s go boys,” said Doherty.

He stepped forward and others followed.

Weaver had rigged the truck’s tailgate to serve as a lift. He and Doherty rolled the Lion of Judah to the tailgate, Weaver hit a lever on the side of the truck and Ras Tafari dropped slowly to the ground. They rolled the statue off of the tailgate onto the pavement.

Weaver always referred to his creation as Halie Selassie, Lion of Judah. He had tried and failed to get his statue to walk. But he did figure out how to make him move. Doherty didn’t understand it all. A coal-fired boiler turned some gears that turned other gears that powered wheels on the bottom of the statue. Smoke escaped out of an exhaust pipe at the back, which added an ominous fire-and-brimstone element to the scene. Weaver had also rigged a phonograph which played a recorded version of Selassie’s League of Nations’ speech from speakers on the truck cab roof. Not a bad set-up, and effective as long as the automaton didn’t get too far ahead of the truck. He and Weaver had even used their sound system to play music at hobo jungles and tent camps. One night Weaver tried to get Ras Tafari to spin with the music. He played with the gears but the best he could do was get Ras Tafari to stop and go in four-four time. That was at an encampment near Des Moines. They had a fine time that night with the dancing and the moonshine. And Weaver had his reefer.

Weaver walked next to his contraption, making sure it kept on course. Ras Tafari had his eyes on the fascist Lindbergh. Doherty stood in the open door of the truck. He waited for Weaver’s signal. Their goal was to drown out Lindy’s speech. And to cause a commotion. Lindy now stood behind a microphone in front of the depot. He and his entourage had certainly by now seen the coal-powered Selassie coming their way. The automaton’s exhaust added to the day’s haze caused by dust from farmers’ fields hundreds of miles away. A fire burned in Cheyenne. It joined thousands of other fires burning all over the world. And this was just the beginning.

Lindbergh stepped up to the microphone. “Good afternoon,” he said. “I’m Charles Lindbergh.” A smattering of applause. Two men held up signs that read “Defend America First” in big black letters. A group of women dressed in old-fashioned black mourning attire huddled by the microphone. One held up a sign that read “Mothers Against War.”

Weaver turned, grinned and smartly saluted Doherty. That was the sign. Doherty dropped the phonograph's arm on the record. Scratching noises erupted from the truck-top speakers. Lindbergh paused. Some in the welcoming crowd turned to see the truck. Their gazes alighted on Ras Tafari chugging toward them. Doherty thought he heard a gasp.

“It’s OK, ladies and gentlemen,” said Lindbergh. “Just a stunt. Communists try to interrupt me all of the time. They fear my message.”

Hailie Selassie addressed the League of Nations in Geneva on June 20, 1936. He told them that “God and history shall remember your judgment,” just as his automaton told the crowd in Cheyenne three years later.

Doherty now could hear only Selassie – the distant emperor was doing a terrific job of drowning out the words of America’s heroic aviator.

“What answer shall I take back to my people?” Selassie said.

Lindbergh talked on. Some in his entourage glanced nervously at the mobile and articulate Ras Tafari. A man in a suit walked over to a policeman and had some words with him. The policeman nodded. He gathered two of his officers and walked toward Weaver and Ras Tafari. Doherty had seen this happen before in other towns. Officials become alarmed and attempt to stop Ras Tafari as he delivers his message. Smarter ones go to the truck and tried to interrupt the broadcast by confiscating the equipment or smashing the record. After this happened twice, Weaver and Doherty got wise. Doherty now locked himself inside the truck cab. The cops would stand outside and stare, not knowing what to do. One enterprising cop in Grand Island, Nebraska, ripped the speakers off of the top of the truck. They got wise to that and, next time someone tried that, Doherty sent a jolt of electricity along the wires. The cop screamed and went flying off the truck, landing on his keister on the asphalt street. He then took out his billy and broke the truck window and then the phonograph. They got arrested that time.

But here in Cheyenne? The cops walked over to Ras Tafari. The burly police chief barked orders at his minions. They stood in front of Ras Tafari. They put up their hands and yelled, “Halt.” Ras Tafari must not have understood because he kept on rolling. It’s tough to tell the Lion of Judah to halt. The automaton reached the cops’ hands but kept right on going. The cops tried to lean on Selassie, but were finally pushed back and then parted, each moving to the side of the automaton. The one closest to Weaver grabbed him and his compatriot came over and grabbed Weaver’s other arm. Weaver didn’t resist – he knew better. One of the officers said something to Weaver. He shrugged, pointing over at Selassie and shaking his head no. The police chief came over. He barked at Weaver who shook his head again and probably said, “There’s nothing I can do Mr. Police Chief sir.” Meanwhile, by the depot, Lindbergh continued to speak and here at the truck, Doherty chuckled.

Then, the unexpected. Ras Tafari, obviously impatient to meet Lindbergh, sped up. Lindbergh didn’t seem to notice but his entourage did. They began to drift away. One man in a dark suit walked up behind Lindbergh. The man whispered something to Lindy, who looked up to see the automaton closing on him fast, not at running speed exactly, more like a brisk walk. Lindy shook his head and returned to his remarks. The crowd made a path for Ras Tafari. The police chief now walked over to the truck. He banged on the closed driver’s side window with his fist. Doherty had taken all precautions. Windows up, doors locked.

“Come out of there now,” the police chief said, “or you will be arrested.”

Doherty did what he always did. He put his hand to his ear and said, “I can’t hear you.”

“Turn it off,” yelled the police chief, pointing at the photograph.

“What?” yelled Doherty?

The police chief had a decision to make. He looked at Doherty and then over at the automaton. He saw that America’s hero was in danger of being run over by the emperor. Doherty knew that the man would love to smash the window and then smash his face. But he also knew that police chief’s don’t let Lindbergh get killed in their town. It wouldn’t look good and it wasn’t the right move as far as job security. Fuming, the police chief took one final look and yelled, “I’ll get you” and then sped off toward the depot.

The two photographers on the scene were having a field day. They were lined up and ready to snap the moment when Lindy got run over by the Lion of Judah. This would be big news and they’d get paid well for their shots.

But Lindy was wise to the situation. He let Selassie get to within two feet and backed away from the microphone. Ras Tafari was still moving and closing fast. Lindy shook his fist at the automaton. The automaton kept coming. Weaver looked over at Doherty and smiled. This was the best yet. Lindy backed up. The automaton advanced. The photographers were getting their shots. The crowd murmured. The police chief came to Lindy’s aid. He inserted himself between the aviator and the emperor. He and Lindy both gave way. The police chief wore a determined look. He wasn’t sure about the look on Lindy’s face. It wasn’t anger. More of a bland acceptance. He just backed slowly while Selassie chugged. The police chief barked at Lindy. He took one more look at the automaton, turned and walked quickly for the depot doors. He disappeared inside. Now it was just the cop and the statue.

“It is us today, it will be you tomorrow.” Selassie ended his speech and applause rang out from the august body sitting on their asses in Geneva. They would do nothing, of course. They would congratulate the dark-skinned emperor on his fine speech and then adjourn for lunch. Selassie would return to the safety of England. Italians would continue to gas illiterate tribesmen. Franco killed Basques in Spain. Japanese raped and killed women in Nanking. Hitler put Jews and communists in concentration camps.

The automaton collided with the depot wall, tilted slightly and then changed direction. It was hard to say how far he would go. The fire would go out, eventually, the smoke would dissipate. Selassie would once again be a big mute mass of metal. He and Weaver would spend at least one night in jail. He’d call one of his old union buddies to bail them out.

Lindbergh, meanwhile, would be on his way to Laramie and Rock Springs and Ogden. Maybe they’d catch up with him, there. Maybe not. But they would, somewhere along the line. He had his mission, they had theirs.

Doherty unlocked the truck and stepped outside. The cops had cuffed Weaver and marched him toward the truck.

“I’ll go peacefully,” Doherty said.

The cowboy returned. “Can I take care of the statue while you boys are being detained?”

"Sure,” said Weaver. “How do we get in touch?”

The cowboy’s grizzled face beamed. “I’ll know where you are.”

“OK,” said Weaver.

The cop urged Doherty forward. “You’re in trouble, boy,” he said.

“No, you are,” said Doherty. “You just don’t know it yet.”

#          #          #

On Monday, Jan. 30, the author talks about the roots of this story. 

Learning to Breathe, Part III

Read Part II here.

In this episode, Doherty and Weaver wonder about the motives of the three cowboys hanging around outside of the train depot. 

Three cowboys stood across the street, eyeing Doherty and Weaver. They spoke to each other briefly, and then set off toward the truck.

“Might want to get out that billy club,” said Doherty.

“You get the tire iron.” Weaver nodded.

It had come to that, more than once, in their journey from New York into Wyoming. Sometimes it was fists. Sometimes billy clubs and tire irons. They knew where their weapons were stashed and moved toward them. Doherty and Weaver were not harbingers of peace but of war. They brought sad tidings to the heartland.

Two of the cowboys looked like brothers – tall and thin, youngsters. The third cowboy was older, short and stout, with a dark beard and mustache. They all wore dungarees and battered cowboy hats. They didn’t say anything, not at first.

“Hello,” said Doherty.

“Howdy,” said the older cowboy. “What ya got here?”

“Hailie Selassie, Lion of Judah.”

“He’s putting up a fight against those fuckin’ fascists, the Italians. They’re using poison gas.” He tapped his chest with a calloused hand. “I got gassed in France by the Huns.”

“We’ve both been gassed,” said Doherty.

The older cowboy looked him up and down. “You been in the fight, ain’t ya?”

Doherty nodded.

“You too,” said the older cowboy to Weaver. “You got iron in your face.” He turned his head to spit a stream of tobacco into the dusty street. “These two boys,” he said nodding first at one of his companions and then the other. “They ain’t been in the fight. You’ll be good hands when the next war comes, won’t you boys?”

They both nodded.

“They don’t say much,” said the older cowboy. “What you got planned for that pansy-ass Lindbergh?”

Doherty gestured at the statue and then the banner. “That’s our message,” said Doherty. “It’s aimed at Lindbergh and his appeasement pals. We usually get some pushback from crowds. We always get other people who know we are facing a mess and have to do something about it.”

The cowboy reached over and grasped Doherty’s left hand. “Fights?”

“Sometimes.”

“This black fella,” he said, nodding at Weaver. “He can hold his own?”

“Jesus taught us to turn the other cheek,” Weaver said. “Sometimes you run out of cheeks.”

The cowboy laughed. “True enough.”

“He’s also one hell of an artist,” Doherty said.

“He do that statue?”

“Made from spent Italian artillery shells.”

“No shit?” He walked over to the truck bed and ran his hand along the statue. He peered closer and looked over at Weaver. “I see numbers from the shell casings. That is something. Come over here, boys.”

The young men joined the older cowboy. All three of them eased their way around the truck bed, looking at the statue. When they rejoined Weaver and Doherty, the older cowboy asked: “How can we help?”

“Well,” said Weaver. “We want Lindy out here where he can see our message.”

“He coming out?”

“We don’t know,” said Doherty. “We just knew he was coming into the station for a stop on his speaking tour.”

“Let’s see if we can get him out,” said the older cowboy.

“I can go into the depot and yell fire,” said one of the younger cowboys.

“No, boy, we’d have a stampede then. The cops will come and the first to be arrested will be our Negro friend here.” The cowboy pointed at Weaver.

“I’m not a Negro anymore,” said Weaver. “I’m Rastafari.”

“Huh?”

“Jamaican,” Doherty said. “It’s a religion they have down there.”

The cowboy nodded, but Doherty could tell that he didn’t understand.

After a moment of silence, the cowboy asked, “So how are we going to get Lucky Lindy out here?”

One of the young cowboys said, “Maybe somebody could go in and ask Mr. Lindbergh nicely to come outside.” He gave a tentative grin.

Everyone stared at him. The older cowboy sighed. “These boys are still wet behind the ears. You going to ask those Nazi dive bombers to nicely stop bombing you when the war starts?”

“No,” said the young cowboy.

The older cowboy spat a stream of tobacco juice into the street. 

“What if we go inside and announce that there’s an air show?” That was the other young cowboy. He smiled.

“Sure, why not,” said the older cowboy. “Lindbergh flew into our airfield when I was a kid. Didn’t get to meet him but saw his plane. I bet he loves air shows.”

Doherty looked at Weaver. “What do you think?”

“Might work. Lindy is an airplane guy.”

“He is that,” said the older cowboy. “That’s a fine, idea, Bobby. You surprise the hell out of me sometimes.”

Bobby beamed. His brother looked down, scuffed his right boot against the pavement.

But Lindy didn’t have to be lured outside. That’s where the cameras were, and Lindy liked the cameras. The sun pushed back the dust cloud, brightening up the day. 

Doherty surveyed his impromptu group. The future was a dangerous place, He would walk into it with a black sculptor from Detroit and an odd trio of cowboys. So many of them, all over the world, regular folks tired of being stepped on. Bullies like Lindy and Hitler and Mussolini and Franco and the bosses of industry. Their time was done. He had witnessed their deeds in Madrid and San Sebastian. Doherty was angry. He often was up nights, awakened by visions of shell bursts and open wounds. He was surprised to be 28 and alive. He’d been a paid soldier for the capitalists and a piss-poor mercenary in Spain. He had to laugh at that. Yes, he had a satchel filled with his book of poems. He gave one to each person who put two bits or more into the collection box. It was his cry for justice, no matter how small. All he knew was that the world’s bullies needed a shellacking and he was here to start the payback.
To be continued...
Read Learning to Breathe, Part IV, on Friday, Jan. 27. Next week, the author talks about the background of this story. 

"Sailor off the Bremen" shows that punching Nazis is nothing new

It's only a movie -- or is it? Indiana Jones punches a Nazi in "Raiders of the Lost Ark."

USA Today offered its summary of the past weekend: "Analysis: One weekend, two Americas. Are we falling apart?" It examines this past weekend in the U.S., in which Trump was inaugurated as president and concerned citizens protested millions-strong around the the U.S. and the world.  

The article leaves us with chilling words from pollster Frank Luntz:

"We've never had as many people who don't trust the media, don't trust the politicians, don't trust economics, don't trust business," Republican political consultant Frank Luntz said on CBS' Face the Nation. "I think we're going to remember this weekend for a long time to come as not the end, not the campaign being over, but this is the beginning of the most tempestuous ... awful conflict between left and right, between men and women, between young and old." 

He warned, "I think we are breaking apart."  

Luntz works for Republicans. As a pollster, he interviewed scores of potential voters leading up to the election. I watched many of those segments on CBS This Morning, back when I was watching TV news. They were illuminating and scary. Give credit to Luntz for showing us the inklings of the cataclysm that was to come. 

What's next?

Punching Nazis. U.S. Neo-Nazi Richard Spencer was punched in the face Saturday during D.C. inauguration activities. It was filmed, and the vid went viral. The #punchingnazis hashtag became a sensation.  Facebookers posted old cartoon panels of Superman punching Nazis during WWII. Hitler memes were big. 

Liberals had a big laugh. Conservatives were silent. Nobody wants to be on the side of the Nazis, even though we thought that this abbreviation for German's National Socialist Party had been consigned to the dustbin of history. Now we call these people alt-right or purveyors of white pride or white identity or white nationalists. They shouted "Hail Trump" at their post-election rally. 

So why not punch Nazis? Because Trump will use public violence as an excuse to clamp down on public protest. One of the reasons we peacefully gathered out in the streets this weekend is that we fear that very thing. Vice President Pence has already stated that it is time to curtail protests. We knew this was coming. 

Punching Nazis is nothing knew. One of Irwin Shaw's best short stories is ":Sailor Off the Bremen." In it, Nazi sailors off the ship Bremen attack anti-fascist demonstrators on the New York docks. One demonstrator is so injured that some of his compatriots decide to punch Nazis.

Shaw has always been one of my favorite short story writers. He lived during the golden age of short story writing and publishing. Yes, short story writers got paid to write in the 1930s. Shaw was featured in some of the best mags of the era. He wrote for radio. He went off to war and kept writing. Many of his novels became best-sellers. One was made into a Brando movie, The Young Lions. Two were made into blockbuster TV miniseries, Rich Man, Poor Man and Beggerman, Thief. Shaw lived in Paris. For the most part, he is not studied in M.F.A. writing programs due to his potboiler novels. A shame, really. Many of us could learn storytelling skills from this master.

"Sailor off the Bremen" serves up a pre-war cast of Nazis, communists and tough guys. Nobody really comes off as a hero. A young communist activist gets beat up at a protest against the Nazi-flag-flying Bremen. He loses his eye. His football-playing brother avenges the crime by beating a Nazi almost to death on the streets of New York. Nothing gets solved. The war will begin in September. The beatings and killings will commence on a global scale.

A white nationalist gets punched in the face in D.C. We cheer. White nationalists in Whitefish, Mont., target the Jews in their community. How do we respond to that? Peaceful protest may be the answer. Until it's not.

Lawrence Block included "Sailor off the Bremen" in the 2008 anthology he edited for Akashic Books, Manhattan Noir 2: The Classics. It's a good thing. Shaw's stories are hard to find these days. 

I leave you with a quote by James Fallows from the latest issue of Atlantic Magazine Online. Fallows recently spoke at a conference in Cheyenne. In the Atlantic article, he mentioned Laramie as one of the many places where local citizens are transforming their communities. At the same time, they hold a jaundiced view of national politics.

Fallows wrote this:

And now we have Donald Trump. We have small-town inland America—the culture I think of myself as being from—being credited or blamed for making a man like this the 45th in a sequence that includes Washington, Lincoln, and FDR. I view Trump’s election as the most grievous blow that the American idea has suffered in my lifetime. The Kennedy and King assassinations and the 9/11 attacks were crimes and tragedies. The wars in Vietnam and Iraq were disastrous mistakes. But the country recovered. For a democratic process to elevate a man expressing total disregard for democratic norms and institutions is worse. The American republic is based on rules but has always depended for its survival on norms—standards of behavior, conduct toward fellow citizens and especially critics and opponents that is decent beyond what the letter of the law dictates. Trump disdains them all. The American leaders I revere are sure enough of themselves to be modest, strong enough to entertain self-doubt. When I think of Republican Party civic virtues, I think of Eisenhower. But voters, or enough of them, have chosen Trump.

How many of our fellow citizens do we have to punch to make this right? If you punch, are you prepared to be punched back? Or worse?