January 2011 Archives

The shock waves from liberal and moderate Democrats not to mention then Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's two rivals Hillary Clinton and John Edwards were palpable in January, 2008. Obama had committed political heresy when he heaped mild praise on former President Ronald Reagan in an interview with the editorial board of the Reno Gazette-Journal. Obama compounded the seeming heresy by using Reagan to take a dig at another Democrat, Bill Clinton. He strongly implied that Reagan was far more impactful on the country than Clinton. Even that didn't end Obama's Reagan praise fest. He also fulsomely credited Reagan with transforming the GOP into a "party of ideas."

Two years later, Obama piled even more praise on Reagan as a consummate leader, communicator, and inspirer. The near reverential homage presidential candidate and later president Obama continually pays to Reagan stands in gaping contrast to his slam of Reagan a decade and a half earlier in his 1995 autobiography Dreams From My Father. He branded those in Reagan's administration "minions" that carried out his "dirty deeds."

There is no contradiction, historical revisionism, or superficial revel in the Reagan deification in Obama's Reagan reversal. Obama has followed much of the Reagan template on how to govern. Reagan conciliated moderate Democrats when he needed to. Obama has done the same with GOP conservatives. Obama's gave a big hint of that during the campaign. He tweaked his liberal views on the issues of expansion of stem-cell research, immigration, faith-based social services, expanded government wiretapping, building more nuclear power plants, global warming, fair trade, and the death penalty, on health care and taxes. Once elected, he vigorously backed the Wall Street bailout and compromised on the initial tough regulatory checks on the financial industry that he had initially proposed. He dropped his early campaign promise of a speedy troop withdrawal from Iraq and said that there would be a slow, phased end to America's military presence in the country. He, of course, agreed to the extension of tax cuts for the wealthy. With the GOP in tight control of the House, compromise and conciliation will even be more the watchwords in Obama's political lexicon.
Reagan had to embed those same words during his two White House terms when dealing with Democrats who controlled Congress. He granted amnesty to undocumented workers, raised taxes across the board, piled tens of billions unto the national debt, and expanded government programs. He back-pedaled in fighting to roll back abortion rights, on the IRS exemption to segregated Bob Jones University, dismantling welfare, and gutting education programs.

His Justice Department filed dozens of lawsuits to overturn affirmative action plans negotiated with police and fire departments. Some of the court challenges succeeded, some didn't. But the Reagan administration never mounted a vigorous, and sustained legal challenge to affirmative action programs, or whittle away regulations mandating diversity in government hiring, promotions, and contracting programs that conservatives demanded. The Reagan administration actually filed more civil rights suits in housing, education and voter discrimination cases than during President Jimmy Carter's first term.
Then there was the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. Despite massive pressure from North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms, and King critics, and Reagan's deep personal misgivings about the King bill and King, he signed the bill a month later. This made him the first and likely the last American history to sign a bill commemorating an African-American with a national holiday. In 1982, despite massive GOP pressure to modify or veto Congress's approval of a 25-year extension of the Voting Rights Act, Reagan quickly signed the bill.
Reagan adhered and Obama adheres close to the tight dictate of American presidential politics. That is liberal and moderate Democrats during early stages of their presidential campaigns run make lots of base appealing defiant promises of political change and overhaul but move quickly to the center as they sniff the possibility of victory, and then plant in the center to effectively govern. Obama is no different. Republicans do just the opposite. They run to the right and slide quickly to the center as they get the victory scent, and then plant there to effectively govern. Reagan was no different.
In June 2009, Obama signed the Ronald Reagan Centennial Commission Act. Former first lady Nancy Reagan leaned over his right shoulder and beamed approvingly. He again praised her husband for doing as much as any other president to bring a spirit of hope to the country that transcended politics.

He did not say that to flatter the person closest to Reagan, his wife. It was simply Obama's frank recognition that Reagan did what he and other successful presidents routinely have done and must do and that is run a cautious, conciliatory, and above all, ideological neutral presidency. This was the price of White House governance for Reagan a quarter century ago. It's the same for Obama today.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

We are afraid of what may come after Mubarak. Israel is also afraid--or at least must say so. Most nations are most often most comfortable dancing with the devils they know. We always supported the short-timer gerontocracy that ran the old Soviet Union out of business. No matter how bad, corrupt or brutal, we always feared that the next guy would be worse.

It is true that we have also backed the wrong person when we tried to create regime change. We knocked off a bunch of leaders of South Vietnam who did not please us. We never found the right guy to help us win the wrong war. We have thrown any number of bad guys under the bus of our perceived interests in Latin America. We threw out an elected leader in Iran and replaced him with the Shah. Then we threw the Shah under the bus--much too late for masses of people--and we got Khomeini.

We have backed Mubarak, who took over after Sadat was assassinated, and promised, but never delivered, free fair elections. In three decades he failed to deliver and ruled under a permanent emergency decree. Well, his own personal emergency is here. He will fall. Every day we act as if we support him, we make the very folks we fear more powerful and less likely to forgive us.

Yes, he has been an ally and we have paid dearly in both money and integrity for his friendship. Whoever follows Mubarak whether this week or in a month or a year (unlikely) will not be as friendly but may be more democratic and representative of the people of Egypt.

What does this mean to Israel? Probably not much. The cold peace between Israel and Egypt is unlikely to change dramatically. Egypt needs peace since over 30% of its economy comes from tourism. They need a sense of safety to keep the Suez Canal open. And ultimately, Egyptians know that the great hostage that Israel holds is the high dam at Aswan. Were that to be destroyed and Lake Nasser catastrophically emptied, Egypt would be finished.

The great bus of change is coming to the Arab World. We can be in front welcoming it. We can follow it and still come out okay. But at present, by signaling in both directions, we are likely to be under the bus. Not good for us or Israel or, indeed, Egypt.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Obama, like Bush before him and Clinton before Bush, is wrong on Egypt. Supporting an unpopular dictator who has not allowed the instruments of democracy to be legitimate is a mistake. We buy--or actually only rent--short-term stability at the price of the lasting enmity of the people.

It is not our job to pick the next government. Vice President Joe Biden's expression of support for Mubarak is a disaster--even by Biden standards. Biden telling Mubarak to reform is useless nonsense. He hasn't and he can't. He doesn't know how and, more importantly, history shows that dictators who try reform are deposed even more quickly. When their power no longer seems eternal and unquestionable, they fall. As will Mubarak.
As Hamlet said of death, "if it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all." Mubarak will fall, and we are not ready. Our policies, based on fear and not principles, will fail us. To the extent that Mubarak is our man change will come with built-in hostility towards us and that means more power and credibility for both Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.
©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

President Obama uttered the words in a recent You Tube Townhall that drug reform advocates have long wanted to hear from a president. His blunt comment that "drug legalization is a legitimate topic for debate" came in response to a question from a former law enforcement officer. The response was in stark contrast to the much criticized response he gave in an interview two years ago when in a similar online session he was asked whether he thought legalizing marijuana would help the economy. Obama treated the question as a joke, flatly dismissed any such notion that legalization would have any impact on the economy, and quickly moved on.

In the two years since then, the Obama administration has continued the top heavy funding for prosecution and incarceration of drug offenders over treatment and prevention programs. Attorney General Eric Holder has repeatedly warned that the federal government will continue to aggressively prosecute drug offenders no matter whether state laws or voter initiatives have softened or even voted to legalize the use of marijuana.
Last May, White House drug czar Gil Kerlikowske sent a similar blurred message on the administration's drug policy. He touted the importance of treating drug use as a public health rather than a criminal problem. There was a small increase in the amount of funds for treatment and prevention program. But the czar gave no indication that a major reshift in the administration's drug spending priorities was in the offing. A few months later, Kevin Sabet, special adviser for policy at the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, reaffirmed that the administration would not prosecute those who legitimately used medical marijuana in the states that allowed its use. Sabet warned, though, that the Justice Department would vigorously prosecute those that abused the law as a cover to legalize its use which the Obama administration firmly opposed. The administration was also concerned that medical marijuana use could be a front for drug traffickers.

But in the past two years, the drug war has taken some sharp turns. More state legislators, including a fair number of GOP state legislators, have branded the drug enforcement policy as failed, flawed, and cost ineffective. More law enforcement officials, including the group, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, have called for repeal of the drug laws. They contend that the sole focus on prosecution and prisons has bloated state budgets, destabilized families, and most importantly put the lives of more law enforcement officers in danger from the incessant state and federal drug raids and sweeps. The mild sea change in legislative and political opinion on drug law reform was in evidence when Congress at President Obama's urging last year eliminated the sentencing disparity for crack and powder cocaine. That mild shift in how Congress looked at the drug law enforcement came in the wake of several other drug policy reforms since Obama took office. Obama signed a measure repealing a two-decade old ban on the use of federal money for needle-exchange programs to reduce the spread of HIV. In California, voters came closer than ever to passing an initiative that legalized marijuana use.

Obama's thoughtful response to the drug legalization question was in effect a return to a position that he openly stated during the 2008 presidential primaries. Then he was the only top presidential contender who supported eliminating criminal penalties for marijuana, and that included making marijuana legal for medical uses. This got relatively little media attention. But it was the first hint that if he was elected he would be willing to rethink how the drug war was being waged. His reiteration of that view in the You Tube Townhall was tacit recognition that the nation's policy has been a colossal failure. The numbers tell just how much of a staggering drain the drug war has been on state and federal budgets while hitting a hammer blow at the economy. Taxpayers shell out nearly $70 billion annually on corrections and incarceration. In 2010, there were more than 2 million Americans warehoused in state and federal prisons. One out of four of them were jailed for drug offenses. Studies show that they earn roughly 40 percent less than they did before being jailed. In other words, drug incarceration has not just strained the federal and state budgets at a time when states and the feds are preaching austerity it have also drained the economy.
President Obama will unveil his budget for the coming year on February 13. Drug reformers will watch closely to see if there is a shift in the balance in his budget from the standard top heavy amounts that go to criminal prosecution and prisons to more funds to expand treatment and prevention programs. This will be a sign as to just how serious the president is about making the nation's drug policy worth the legitimate debate he spoke of.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

When we remember great speeches, with the exception of the 90 seconds of the Gettysburg Address, we remember only phrases. Teddy Roosevelt, "Speak softly and carry a big stick." Winston Churchill, " We will fight them on the beaches...we will never surrender, or "Never was so much owed by so many to so few." FDR memorably said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." JFK exhorted us "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country." Ronald Reagan called forth a vision of a shining city on a hill and promised that our best days are ahead of us.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Two things are clear about Obama. One is that the man is a master of oration. He could read the ingredients off a cereal box and make it sound good. Few were as compelling in that area. Regan had this gift and Abraham Lincoln apparently had it as well.

But after listening to some comments about his speech, not the whole thing, of course, because it was full of hope and glory and all those other American virtues, but after listening to John McCain's rumblings afterwards, methinks that our president may not play as well with others as it appears.

Of course there are two sides to every story. And for at least for a fortnight, we've been hearing reports that the GOP may not be such a good old party after all especially because they shoot down his every proposal like they are skeets on a range. For a while, I thought it was because the proposals themselves were full of holes. Then I thought that the GOP was or that they just didn't like him and his natural charm and perhaps entitled ways.

Now it appears that under the guise of "Hey, guys, can't we just all get along and serve the American people, that his definition of this falls somewhere along the lines of "it's my way or the highway."

Perhaps McCain had his motives. Maybe he's peeved about not getting elected. Maybe he's peeved at Sarah Palin and is projecting it onto Obama, or maybe, just maybe, he was talking in earnest that our president wants others to play but only by his own rules and ideals. There may be a gap to bridge, a chasm, a divide, but only by learning to play well with others and including them in the game will he be able to get anywhere.

The Arab revolt, begun in Tunisia, is now in Cairo and may be succeeding. In Tunisia it became viable when the army decided not to kill its own people and not to stick with Zine El-Abadine Ben Ali, the old and tired tyrant. They cast their lot with the revolution, and so far have worked for stability, not personal power. The hero is their leader General Rachid Ammar.

We have known that Mubarak's time was running out. We have wanted a more democratic Egypt, but we have understood--both Bush and Obama--that one election does not make a democracy. Three or four elections and the peaceful transfer of power are evidence of democracy. Too often there is only one election and that elects the president for life. Life could be ten minutes or 30 years. Egypt's future is likely to be chaotic.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

President Obama's State of the Union address was measured, moderate, and in the wake of the Tucson massacre, the paragon of civility. The speech was less of a presidential annual report card on the shape of the nation, and his administration, than a treatise on what the Obama administration will do to create the one thing that the administration has been roundly raked over the coals for and that's not saying and doing enough to create jobs, jobs, and more jobs. President's know that they can talk eloquently about foreign policy, defense, and wars, the environment, deficits, education and immigration, trade, clean energy, tax code reform, and in recent years the war on terrorism, in their State of the Union addresses, and Obama lightly hit on all these points in his SOTU address. But the success of their administration, their re-election, and their legacy rests on jobs and the economy. The line "It's the economy stupid" has time and again proven to be anything but a stale cliché.

The perception that Obama slipped badly in that area was a colossal factor in the "shellacking" that he and the Democrats took in the mid-term elections. The message still hung heavily in the air on the eve of Obama's second official STOU address when polls showed that while he has gotten a solid bump up in his approval ratings, a majority of Americans still give him a D mark on the handling of the economy. He used the time tested reference to Sputnik. That was the nation's overdrive rush to beat the Soviets into space, to prod business and political leaders, and the nation to launch a massive program to improve technology, transportation, research and education. This is all aimed at one thing, and that's to create jobs, and more jobs.
But to do that, it takes money, lots of it. That money can only come from one place, the federal government. Left unsaid in the President's reference to the Sputnik space and weapons race, was that the country spent billions to reassert its superiority over the Soviets in bombs, and missiles, and to put a man on the moon. It did not shirk on the spending. The political will and unity and funds to do it were there then. Not this time. The GOP's priority is jobs but not at the expense of more federal spending. And with a $1.4 trillion dollar deficit, and a sizeable number of Americans in jitters about the debt, spending the requisite billions is not in the official cards. The official attack point for the GOP has been to paint the Obama administration as reckless, out of control, in its spending. And then heap more blame on Obama for allegedly single-handedly creating the deficit nightmare.

GOP Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan in "rebutting" Obama's address vowed that the GOP would trim $100 billion from the federal budget. Obama tried to walk the fine political tightrope between the public's thirst for jobs and an improved economy and the GOP's bellicose call for slash and burn spending cuts by calling for a five year spending freeze. The freeze would halt all non-security discretionary spending. This came on top of his earlier call for a pay freeze by all federal employees. Budget analysts and political experts have already branded the multi-billions that the GOP says can and should be hacked from federal spending as pie-in-the-sky political rhetoric. This is the same GOP that has virtually institutionalized earmarks, pork barrel spending, and given the company store away in tax breaks and in spending to the defense industry. The GOP draconian budget reduction plan would wreak havoc on vital arts, education, health care, transportation, small business lending and support and programs.

That's just the dollars and cents of the talk of massive spending cuts. The real battleground is the political war that the GOP intends to wage against the Obama administration to hack away at federal programs. Obama acknowledged that despite the congressional calm and civility during his STOU address that the fight over spending and jobs versus cutting the debt will be fierce. The fight won't be long in coming. Obama will unveil his budget proposal for the 2012 fiscal year on February 13, The GOP almost certainly will scream, nit-pick, and slam the spending proposal as too big, and burdensome, and will step up the attack on Obama as a tax and spend Democrat who will continue to bloat the deficit.

President Obama in his address repeatedly struck the theme that bi-partisan unity is needed to solve the nation's problems, first and foremost meaning creating jobs and growing the economy. However, with the GOP gearing up for a full court press to take back the White House in 2012, and the GOP banking on using spending and the federal deficit as its political trump cards against Obama, GOP and Democratic congresspersons sitting together is one thing, working together, as Obama noted is a far different thing.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

Tonight President Obama will attempt to reawaken the spirit of JFK and the New Frontier. In a clarion call to move forward through the vitriolic partisanship, he will challenge us to seize the day and reach for the stars.

Though the moon will not be his destination, the can-do attitude of JFK and the optimism of Ronald Reagan will be employed to motivate us past the petty divides of politics and towards meeting the economic, educational, environmental challenges coming particularly from China.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Keith exemplifying his subtle under-stated style

Saying goodbye to Keith Olbermann should be easy. It seems like I've been doing it for decades. Well, yes, actually, I have. From sports guy at LA's KTLA to KCBS, Keith established early a penchant for wandering. Then off to ESPN radio, Fox Sports, MSNBC, back to ESPN and then again to MSNBC, Keith doesn't seem to stay in one place too long.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

The pictures we paint with our words, as well as the words themselves, express our feelings and also create feelings. I believe our metaphors become embedded, our similes become no-longer examined truths and can poison both ourselves and others.

We are good at demeaning and slurring our opponents and making enemies out of adversaries and dangerous revolutionaries out of dissenters. While yelling at each other is easy and sometimes fun, it is seldom serious. Take patriotism. In another decade conservatives told liberals who objected to a lack of civil rights or a war in South East Asia, to either love America or leave it. Now some conservatives (particularly in Texas) love America so much that they threaten to leave it. Patriotism and rhetoric like theology don't have to make sense or be logically consistent.

This is true of slurs too. Anti-Semites in Germany accused Jews of being the capitalist bankers who exploited poor Germans and the communist revolutionaries trying to destroy the banks. Jews were marrying into the best families and acting like real Germans or Austrians--and were clannish and refused to assimilate. These slurs and stereotypes are still playing out today in America, but now are focused mainly on Asian-Americans. Asians are too aligned with the American Dream and are too focused on achieving. Take Tiger Mothers and the current controversy. It seemed to me to be pretty generational rather than Asian. Read Death of A Salesman and you'll find the prototype for the drive 'em to achieve dad.

So far, in our current public examination of rhetoric, most have concentrated on the hyperboles--every conservative is a fascist, every liberal a communist or socialist. Every right that is questioned is threatened by extinction. To limit a bullet magazine is the first step in taking guns away. To question the strong metaphor is to begin to take away our freedom of speech. This is coming from the right which tends to be as pro first Amendment as liberals--except while liberals call abridgement censorship, conservatives call it political correctness. By either name it is slippery slope absolutism.

There is a certain adolescent grandiosity in our charges against each other. A bill or policy is the worst ever, the climate (social, political or the actual climate) is more toxic than ever, the opposition more crooked than ever. At some point the hyperbole becomes not just inflammatory and potentially dangerous, but paradoxically so commonplace that it loses its sting--like profanity that no longer shocks.

Then there is the rhetoric of framing an argument, grabbing a label and controlling the thinking and perception--or at least influencing it. Hence the debate over abortion is Pro Choice (Choice is a good thing) versus Pro Life (Life is another good thing.) The estate tax (estates are large, right?) against the death tax. Oh my God they're taxing death!


It seems to me that our human journey towards wholeness, a journey never completed, is to see more broadly more expansively the humanity in every human, and to open our eyes and hearts wider. Watching our words, images and metaphors is not an exercise in political correctness or in not telling important truths. It is an exercise in being effective in both our thinking and our communicating.

When speaking, we should ask ourselves just what we want to accomplish or convey. Do we want to shock? Okay, do the Ricky Gervaise and go for the vulgarity. Do we want to hurt? Go for the Gervaise again and slur. Do we want to inform or inflame? Our choices of tone will make a difference--possibly all the difference.

Those of us who are parents know that we can build up expectations and performance with appropriate positive reinforcement or crush creativity under constant criticism. We know that there is a tendency, not certainty, of people living up to expectations or down to expectations. This is true of interpersonal relationships and also of general discourse. Our choices can create cooperation or confrontation. We have power in our choices.

I don't know if you read the advice columnists. But people are always sharing some problem about someone else and asking if they should confront that person? Well, they should confront the problem but probably not the person. We have made confrontation our default position instead of speaking, talking and reasoning. How I act is influenced by the words I use--even to my self! We don't talk. We confront. Our politicians always campaign on the promise that they will "fight for us." Couldn't they maybe, just sometimes, reason for us or advocate for us? Must it always be a fight? Well, yes, if that's how we think of it.

Our labels can indeed libel and limit both our vision and the potential of others. We can influence outcomes, not control them, with our conscious choices of how we choose to communicate.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

President Obama's second State of the Union Speech scheduled for Tuesday, January 25 is under fire before he has even uttered one word of it. This was predictable. The State of the Union speech is generally one of the most watched and listened to political speeches. It's a President's report card on the accomplishments, the present and future planned initiatives of his administration and his vision for the country. GOP and Democratic presidents are keenly aware that their Democratic and Republican opponents know that State of the Union Addresses boost the stature, prestige, and power of the presidency, and usually bump up the president's approval rating by a point or two. They also know that the opposition's response to the speech is feeble, pale, and little watched or counted by Americans. In some cases the opposition response can even backfire. That happened last year when GOP Louisiana governor Bobby Jindahl fumbled and bumbled through what most political observers deemed a mean-spirited, petty retort to Obama.

The history of the State of the Union speech underscores the power to shape policy and bolster the president's image. President James Monroe announced the Monroe Doctrine in 1823. In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln flatly called for the end of slavery in the rebellious states. This was the prelude to the Emancipation Proclamation he issued a year later. Woodrow Wilson warned of the dangers of impending war in 1913. Franklin Roosevelt outlined the famed Four Freedoms in 1941. Lyndon Johnson unveiled the outlines of his Great Society program to fight poverty in 1965. Bill Clinton unveiled his health care reform plan in 1993. George Bush in his State of the Union speeches in 2002 and 2003 prepped the nation for the Iraq invasion. Presidents quickly latched on to the media to give their State of the Union speech more exposure and political wallop. Calvin Coolidge gave the first radio broadcast in 1923. Truman gave the first televised broadcast in 1947.

The attacks on President Obama before he's spoken have been partisan, familiar, and absurd. Absurd when GOP Georgia Rep Paul Broun with no inkling of what President Obama would actually say, told a radio caller that he would not sit next to a Democrat during the speech "when Obama spews his venom." Broun reacted to the Washington DC policy think tank, Third Way's proposal that Democrats and Republicans mix up their seating during the President's address. GOP Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell took a different tact from Broun's loony outburst. He jumped on reports that Obama will call for more increased federal spending on infrastructure, research, and for small business. McConnell blamed Obama's supposed runaway federal spending for getting the country into the economic mess of the last two years. This of course belies and ignores the political and economic damage that the Bush's administration's giveaway to Big Business and the banks, and Wall Street's push of the economy to near collapse did. But Obama's renewed call for more strategic spending fits in with the public's loud demand that the Obama administration refocus its time, talent and energy on jobs and the economy.

Obama has gotten that message, his stimulus measures in the tax cut extension, the high profile appointments of business friendly William Dailey as Chief of Staff, and GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt and Wall Street insider Gene Sperling as key economic advisors, and talks on business and investment during the Chinese President's state visit put business and the economy at the front of Obama's front burner.

Obama critics have even reached back a year and picked apart his first State of the Union address and harangued him for allegedly lashing out at Republicans. Business Insider headlined its STOU piece with the question, "A Less Partisan State of the Union Speech?" It scolded Obama for his criticism of the Supreme Court for its conservative majority decision in Citizens United in 2010. The decision opened the floodgate for corporations to pour unlimited dollars into political campaigns with minimal checks and accountability. Major corporations and financial institutions wasted little time in doing that. They poured millions into the mid-term election campaigns. The bulk of money as Obama and the Democrats knew went to corporate friendly GOP candidates and incumbents. In singling out the Court for its politically lethal ruling, Obama did what other presidents have done and that's use the State of the Union Speech to warn of the threat to Democracy of in this case a court ruling that threatened to turn elections into the exclusive preserve of the super rich.

The shrill warnings that President Obama will give a partisan State of the Union speech makes even less sense this year. Polls show that Americans applaud the president for his even handed, Tucson speech, his willingness to compromise with the GOP in its demand to extend tax cuts for the wealthy, and that Americans overwhelmingly want the Obama administration and Congress to end the rancor and work together on the problems and issues. Expect President Obama to say that on Tuesday.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

It is no surprise that former President Reagan's son, conservative political consultant Michael Reagan would add his unabashed and wildly inaccurate historical revisionism about Reagan with his absolutely ridiculous assertion in a Fox News op-ed piece that dad, Reagan was a "better friend of blacks" than President Obama. Normally that would be the cause for hysterical laughter except that that fits in with the inevitable sanitizing of former President Reagan's image and legacy as the nation approaches the centennial commemoration of Reagan's birth in February.

Race is exactly the one issue that Mike can make absolutely no claim to truth about Reagan on. Reagan and Reagan officials waged a by now well-documented open war against civil rights leaders and did everything politically possible to roll back civil rights gains during his eight years in office. That war began months before he took office. At his now infamous presidential kick-off campaign rally at Neshoba, Mississippi in 1980, held virtually a stone throw from where the three civil rights workers were murdered in 1964, Reagan shouted to a lily white crowd that "I believe in states' rights." He laced his campaign speech with stock racial code words and phrases, blasting welfare, big government, federal intrusion in state affairs, and rampant federal spending. The message was that if elected he'd not only say and do as little as possible to offend the white South, but actively undermine civil rights. At his first press conference the week after his inauguration, Reagan lashed out at affirmative action programs. He told reporters, "I'm old enough to remember when quotas existed in the United States for purposes of discrimination and I don't want to see that again."

That was just the start. During the 1980 presidential campaign, he publicly branded the voting rights act "humiliating to the South." The implication was that he would not back an extension of the Voting Rights Act when it came up for renewal in 1982. He backed away from that only in the face of strong support from Congressional democrats (and many Republicans).

The checklist of Reagan anti-civil rights initiatives however soon grew to be telephone book thick. They included his gut of the Civil Rights Commission, his attempt to eliminate and slash and burn of an array of federally funded job and training programs, his borderline racist depiction of welfare recipients as "queens," his stack of the federal judiciary with strict constructionist, states' rights leaning judges, the wave of Reagan approved Justice Department indictments, prosecutions and harassment of black elected officials, his foot drag on imposing congressional mandated sanctions on then apartheid South Africa, and his repeated mock of civil rights leaders.
The Reagan assault on civil rights was so intense that the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights in 1982 issued a lengthy report that meticulously documented the measures the Reagan Administration Justice Department and especially its Civil Rights Division did to stymie and obstruct enforcement of civil rights laws. Then there was his dogged fight to prod the IRS to reverse its decision to deny a tax exemption to all white Bob Jones University in South Carolina in 1982. Reagan backed away from this only after a firestorm of congressional and public outrage at his naked effort to prop up a blatantly segregated institution.

The one civil rights act that Reagan is praised for as an example of his racial enlightenment, the signing of the King Holiday Bill, was anything but that. Reagan staunchly opposed the King Holiday bill. And he did not oppose it as later historical revisionists claim solely for cost reasons, that is that the federal government couldn't afford to give federal employees another day off. This is the politically palatable cover.
At a press conference October 19 two weeks before he grudgingly signed the bill he quipped that he'd sign it only "since Congress seemed bent on making it a national holiday." It took every ounce of the congressional bent that Reagan ridiculed to get him to put his signature on the bill. Congress passed the bill with an overwhelming veto-proof majority (338 to 90 in the House of Representatives and 78 to 22 in the Senate).
Reagan didn't stop at simply voicing reservations about Congress's action in passing the bill. At the same press conference he also added with a wink and a nod that the jury was still out on whether King was a communist sympathizer or not. Reagan revealed even more of his true thinking about King in a letter to ultra-conservative former New Hampshire governor Meldrim Thompson. He unapologetically told Thompson that the public's view of King was "based on image, not reality." Reagan was roundly criticized for besmirching King, and he subsequently publicly apologized to King's widow, Coretta Scott King. In assailing King, Reagan simply followed the well-worn ultra-conservative and racist script that King was a radical, racial agitator, and a closet communist.
Michael Reagan can absurdly twist history decades later to make his father a paragon of civil rights. But the Reagan record of hostility, obstructionism, and outright opposition to civil rights gains and civil rights leaders stands. This is hardly the action of a "best friend" of blacks.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

I may know what it's like to be a lot of things, but I have no idea what it's like to be black. The closest I've come is when people thought a biracial neighbor and I were sisters, which we were unfortunately not because she would have made one hell of a sister.

Oprah recently ran a clip of a white teenage boy who risked his health by taking some pills to turn himself black. As a black man, he was stopped by police for walking by a school and being denied service in restaurants that were empty. He never experienced that when he was white and stopped taking the pills so he could turn himself back. If nothing else, it was telling.

Although they are the only immigrants to be brought here against their own will and started off with all that negative press, their leaders have done little to dispel any myths. Instead, they have added to them by creating a bandwagon for every slight. Reverend Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson aren't their friends but their enemies. When they run out whooping and hollering at every injustice against a black person but remain mum about other ethnic group, there's bound to be a PR disaster. For all I know, they ma be CIA or KGB operatives.

Even though I know a darker skin brings out different expectations than the paler ones, there are things that other members of the black community have done that lead to sabotage. One is their high crime rate given their number and their racism towards each other. The rate of black on black violence is legend as are gangs like the Bloods and the Crips, and there are neighborhoods in seamier parts of town that they have created where even the police are afraid to go. Some say it's all because of poverty and white oppression and how much harder it is to get a job inside a black skin, but other ethnic groups have been oppressed at some point yet don't resort to a life of gang affiliation, abandoning their children and crime. Many blacks are successful, so why not more? Why aren't they hoping and dreaming and leading themselves in any direction they choose?

Nothing lasts forever. Not Sara Lee foods, which is slated to be bought out later this year along with their crumb cakes, nor Office Depot, which may explain why I haven't seen many lately, nor Borders Books.

Now the Society of Professional Journalists has swung the gauntlet towards Helen Thomas and her journalism award. They didn't do it. They were merely the messengers. She was the catalyst.

Maybe part of it was her age. Maybe it was that let it all hang out, I've lived long enough, so get out of my way, Sonny frame of mind that people reach when they get anywhere beyond 35. I remember my paternal grandmother, who at 103 had Thomas beaten out by about thirteen years. She was very sweet when I was younger and even used to hook rugs for me on a loom. Then she hit one of those milestones, all hell broke loose, the loom went to the attic, and she announced that she was going to say exactly what she thought, and some of it wasn't very flattering.

So maybe Thomas had been bitten by the same bug last May when she told a rabbi that the "Jews should get the hell out of Palestine and go home" after he asked her if she had any comment on Israel. When he asked her where home was, she said Poland, Germany (the wrong choices) or the United States (one of the better ones.) She was later fired from her job at Hearst Newspapers.

Then in December of that same year, she wrung down the final curtain on her career and that award when she added that the Jews own the media. Helen Thomas is not entitled. She's senile.

The SPJ was right in nixing the award because it would be like having a Sadaam Hussein Award for curbing inner-city violence or a Mussolini Award for urban planning. It just wouldn't fly in the face of the messes that some people make.

Sargent Shriver, Tunisia and Martin Luther King are very much in my thoughts today. When I was in Tunisia serving in Peace Corps Sargent Shriver was the director, the founding director of the Peace Corps. While Sargent Shriver died on Tuesday Jan. 18, possibly peace was born in Tunisia--and if so, it was midwived by Dr. King.

With Tunisia in the news this week, I am watching with great interest. My government made one promise to me that it has kept. Before going into the Peace Corps they said that whatever our experience--good or bad--we would forever feel connected to our site and would faithfully read every story in the papers. This was an easy promise for me to keep. Tunisia seldom shows up on our RADAR--except when it hosted the exiled leadership of the PLO and some terrorists blew up a truck outside the oldest continually operating synagogue in the world, on Djerba.

There is still rioting in the streets. The outcome is still uncertain. Opposing factions and the demonizing of anyone who had anything to do with the old regime could wreck any hope of competency or continuity, but the Tunisian people have, at least, a chance--thanks to the fact that they were not armed sufficiently to pose a threat to the army. Something to think about as we remember Dr. King and Sargent Shriver.
©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Oh Gail, why was an unarmed black man shot to death by the police this weekend? Were the police fearful that he had a weapon? Oh, yeah, he was naked. Nothing short of deadly force was needed by two strong MALE police officers? There were no batons? No tasers? No beanbag-firing shotgun? They just had to kill him?

Yes, certainly, local culture plays a part in all this but so do history, racism, education and unequal justice.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Since Bobby Kennedy's assassination one million Americans have been killed by domestic gun violence. In anger, by mistake, in the course of robberies and as suicides we have been involved in egregious self-slaughter. Yet our second amendment right to bear arms--from knives to AK47s--are as sacred as the religious services we offer for the souls of the slaughtered.

Is it possible to have a sane discussion, even debate, around limiting firepower? Doesn't seem so. Thus these rights will continue to create religious rites of grief and mourning--and tears in human flesh will be both substance and symbol of the tears in our hearts.
©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Tea Party leaders, Sarah Palin, most of Congress, and of course the NRA can prattle on all day with the empty, self-serving, and false line that guns don't kill people, people kill people. Their stock line used every time some nut case goes nuclear and commits mass carnage. The gun mania crowd never says that if all alleged Tucson triggerman Jared Loughner had was access to a knife, slingshot, bow and arrow, or had to strangle a crowd with their hands that he could never in the few seconds it takes to pull a trigger wipe out dozens.

The hard and bitter reality is that guns, yes, guns, lots of them everywhere, with minimal to no constraints do kill people. We didn't need a Tucson massacre for the umpteenth tragic time to prove that. The fact that anyone can get a gun is nowhere more evident than Arizona. This is the state that now says folk can carry guns into bars and is even considering letting students pack guns on campuses.

The bottom line is there should be and should have been ages ago the most rigid restrictions on who can own a gun. There have been a bevy of proposals that would apply uniform standards and restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns. And none of them would violate the 2nd Amendment. They've all gone up in smoke thanks to the NRA and the gun lobby. The Tucson massacre sadly should but won't change that.

In truth, the Constitution made this country, and parts of it may break this country, too if we aren't really careful.

Take the Fourteenth Amendment. If the Founding Fathers had known that women were going to come here just to sire and hatch babies, they would have amended the amendment because adults who don't pay taxes and don't fear April 15th are sure to put a pinch on the economy. The posiive thing, though is that they are helping Americans, who generally like to learn only one language, get out and learn another one from the comfort and safety of their own shores.

Then there is the Second Amendment, which raises its hoary old head just about every time someone reads a paper or magazine, watches TV or turns on the Internet. Of course people have the right to bear arms, though which people is now the question especially after the Arizona shootings. Rather than arming the whole country, we should have categories of those who should never own militia of any kind let alone be allowed near a butter knife. They fall into the same category as Jared Loughner, the Arizona shooter, and include those who are deranged, psychotic, unstable, addicted to drugs and alcohol or have had continual scrapes with the law. If these guys want to protect themselves inside their homes, let them do it with some mace. No German Shepherds or bulldogs for them as they may abuse them as well.

People know who they are. Jared Loughner's teachers knew who he was. They were allegedly afraid of him because they knew what he was capable of doing. It's unfortunate that no one took them seriously. But hindsight always is 20-20. An amended amendment wouldn't stop any goofball from owning a gun; it would only make it illegal for them to do so and it may help curb our mean, violent streak in the long run.

With all of the wars in the world, with all the violence--both domestic and foreign--with victims of disease and disasters in the millions, should 24 deaths in little Tunisia even make to our radar? Should we care that Tunisia is seething and that their schools and universities have been closed--theoretically to calm things down? Why a government would believe that freeing students from being in class and accountable for schoolwork and setting them free in the streets would induce calm is beyond me. But neither governments nor individuals tend to act rationally in a crisis.

If we do not have a plan with simple little Tunisia, what will we do when Egypt falls further into chaos--as it will? How about Jordan and even Saudi Arabia? Should we care about Tunisia? You bet. It is a laboratory creating a perilous future.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

The loops that Tea Party leaders, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and more staid conservative analysts, and even Barbara Walters has been amazing to watch to let Sarah Palin off the hook for her lethal crosshairs map that targeted House Democrat Gabriella Giffords and nineteen other Democrats is absolutely amazing to see and hear. Their argument mostly boils down to two points of defense. Palin's map and her bulls eye target of Giffords and the other Democrats was politically savvy and focused effort to target vulnerable Democrats, and galvanize GOP voters in those districts. There was absolutely no personal or hint of violent animus in her political ploy. The second point is that her map is just a standard eye catching political graphic that Democrats have also used to target vulnerable Republicans and rally Democrats to defeat them.
Neither is remotely true. Let's look at Palin's map and compare it to the widely published and cited Democratic Leadership Council map by Palin apologists. The DLC published their political map not as a prelude to the midterm elections as Palin's map was, but a month after the 2004 presidential election. George W. Bush had already won a second term. The graphic was part of a lengthy, and fleshed out assessment of the reasons why the Democrats lost the 2004 election and what the party had to do to be competitive in 2008. The DLC political manifesto ticked off a list of issues, course corrections and outlined a strategy that the party had to undertake to win toss up states in and outside of the South and the Midwest to have any chance of victory in 2008. The DLC map did not mention one single GOP congressperson or senator by name for defeat. It focused exclusively on the states that the Democrats needed to ramp up their time, energy and resources in trying to make a political dent in the GOP's decade long dominance in those states. It crunched the political numbers and showed that Bush won the potential swing states by single digit margins and stressed the strengths and weaknesses in those states of the Democrat's strategy, approach and organization. The nine bulls eyes on the DLC map carefully explained that the Bush margin of victory in the swing states was less than 10 percent. Palin's map was no political assessment of the strengths and weakness of the Democratic Party, did not lay out a blueprint or grand strategy for increasing the GOP influence in the states, let alone make any effort to educate voters on the crucial issues.
It was nothing more than a crude, calculated, and cynical, inflammatory political hit piece on individual Democrats with the inflammatory appeal in bold "Let's take a stand" and hammering on the issue that was the most caustic and inflammatory for many conservatives and that was the health care reform bill. Palin's hit list of Democrats was designed not to educate and inform voters on the range of issues in the elections, but to politically wipe out Democrats that Palin thought were easy pickings. Gabriella Giffords was, tragically, one of them. She instantly recognized the danger of Palin's crass map. She pulled no punches in interviews warning that "words have consequences" and that she did feel that Palin's map targeting her posed a threat that went far beyond mere political bad theater; that there was the real possibility that some unbalanced individual could in fact take her admonition to take a stand literally, and do serious harm to one or more of the targets on Palin's hit list.
Giffords sadly was right. It wasn't hard for her to make that warning. For months, millions have been relentlessly bombarded with images of a gun toting Palin on hunting forays, and exulting the virtues of guns. The spectacle of Palin's Tea Party devotees packing guns and weapons, and issuing bellicose saber rattle threats to liberal and moderate Democrats with President Obama right at the top of their list as a target of their shrill violence tinged abuse have been looped repeatedly. Palin and her defenders spin it every which way that her political map was a perfectly acceptable political blueprint for defeating Democrats, and that if some nut case decides to blast away at a public figure don't smear the blood of that figure and the innocents that go down in the crossfire on them. That blood is on their hands, or more accurately on their hyper-charged incendiary rhetoric against Democrats. Polls and surveys show that a majority of Americans did see the real consequences of the vitriol and pure hate and potential incitement to violence behind maps and rhetoric like Palin and company as Giffords. They are fed up with it. The great tragedy is that Gifford's prophetic words about the hate behind Palin's map weren't heeded. The nation paid a steep price for ignoring that. Any effort to chalk that up to politics that everyone engages in defames the Tucson dead.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

Words have power. They can inspire a nation to greatness or stampede it to disaster. Words can move women, men and mountains. They can wound, heal, build or destroy. The words we use in political and social discourse influence how we feel and how we act. This is not about political correctness but a statement of fact. What words we choose are important. We cannot believe that our choices are without power or importance.

Pundits will make the point that the shooter is an unstable deranged person and not the representative of any particular faction. And this may be true. But in some ways the mentally marginal are the canaries in the mineshaft of our society. When it gets too heated and the currents of anger rise too fast, they are the first affected, the first victims of a society's toxicity.

Sticks and stones do break bones, and words can set the sticks swinging and the stones flying. This is a time to stop the rhetoric and engage people across our political divide. This is an opportunity to tune in to each other, turn on our compassion towards each other and stop dropping verbal bombs.

We can avoid our own responsibility for tone by making this partisan, by making it about guns or the lack of mental health--all real enough as issues. But healing starts with us. This is a seemingly small but immensely powerful step: We can stop throwing verbal bombs and look to build bridges of understanding. We will not always succeed, but our nation is worth our efforts.
©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

The instant Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 18 others were gunned down at a public meet-and-greet in Tucson, leaving six dead--including a federal judge, several retirees, and a 9-year-old student council representative--Tea Party grandmaster Sarah Palin and leaders of her movement swung into damage-control mode. Palin offered condolences to the families of the shooting victims and called for prayers for peace and justice. Tea Party Express chairwoman Amy Kremer went further and condemned the shootings as "an attack on the democratic process."

Palin's and Kremer's expressions of outrage are undoubtedly sincere and heartfelt. But those fine sentiments don't absolve them of blame for helping to create the hyper-vicious, borderline-vigilante climate that has provoked more than one unbalanced kook --as the alleged shooter Jared Loughner clearly is--to blast away at innocents, under the guise of striking back at someone or something whose politics, ideas, religion, or race they hate.

That this country had entered a new era--where it was some thought it permissible to take the law into their own hands and bombard public officials with life-threatening letters, texts, phone calls, and in some cases physical attacks--was plainly evident during and after the health care reform debate last year.

Nearly a dozen Democrats and Republicans received threatening messages. Republican Rep. Eric Cantor got a bullet through his campaign-office window. Other legislators had their windows broken and their tires slashed. Palin didn't help matters with her oft-quoted exhortation to conservatives to "reload"--complete with photos of her on hunting forays, gun in hand. Palin and GOP leaders drove home their message that political opponents--i.e. liberal and moderate Democrats--were ripe for attack when she plastered an image of crosshairs in a Facebook post listing 20 vulnerable House Democrats who had voted for health care reform. Giffords was one of them.

Palin sensed the dangerous line that she had edged up to with her depiction of Democrats in the GOP's gun sights. She protested that she was not calling for anyone to slaughter them with weapons but to vote them out of office.

Palin was far from alone in cavalierly tossing about violent images to make the point that Democrats were fair game for attacks. Tea Party member Catherine Crabill, who ran for the Republican nomination in the Virginia's 1st Congressional District, flatly declared that the right to carry firearms was the way the Founding Fathers meant for citizens to fight off tyranny. Failed Nevada senate candidate Sharron Angle was unabashed in proclaiming that the Constitution gave citizens the right to oust a "tyrannical" government--which, she cryptically added, meant removing her opponent Harry Reid from office. Angle backpedaled fast, insisting that she meant vote him out, not kill him. Whether a retraction or "a clarification," Angle's words had a definite wink-and-nod feel to them, and Reid was neither amused nor mollified.

The scariest threats from the right--and the deranged feeding off their hate--have been aimed at President Obama. A year ago, hundreds of Facebook respondents answered a poll question, "Should Obama be killed?" The poll was quickly yankedbut the fact that it was even briefly on the site for a brief gave de facto dignity to the bizarre and murderous question.

Obama has been in danger from the moment he announced he would seek the presidency in February 2007. He had the dubious distinction of being the earliest presidential contender ever to be assigned Secret Service protection on the campaign trail. This didn't ease the jitters over his safety. Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson fired off a letter to Secret Service officials practically demanding that the agency provide all the resources and personnel at its disposal to ensure the safety of Obama and the other presidential candidates, notably Hillary Clinton.

As the showdown with John McCain heated up in the fall of 2008, the flood of crackpot threats vowing murder and mayhem toward Obama increased. This prompted the Secret Service to take even more elaborate measures to protect his and his family's security.

In the wake of the Giffords shooting and the murder of Chief U.S. District Judge John Roll, federal officials have again tightened security around Democratic and Republican elected officials. This is welcome. But it does not address the climate of fear and hate that ultra-conservative extremists and unreconstructed bigots and hate-mongers have created. Unbalanced individuals feel they have license to send a hate message, toss a brick, or--as the tragic events in Tucson amply prove-- rampage against a public official and other innocents caught in the crossfire. Palin and company can't evade blame for that.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He hosts national Capitol Hill broadcast radio talk show on KTYM Radio Los Angeles and WFAX Radio Washington D.C. streamed on ktym.com and wfax.com and internet TV broadcast on thehutchinsonreportnews.com
Follow Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/earlhutchinson

What kind of a world are we living in that people can't even go to a rally without incident? I am talking about the shooting incident of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, her aide and several others at a political rally at a Tucson, Arizona grocery store earlier today. As of this writing, Congresswoman Giffords is in critical condition and her aide, 30 year-old Gabe Zimmerman and five others have died including a nine year-old child.

There have always been kooks out there, people whose idea of adding to this world is to detract from it, those whose answers to this world is a gun and who are so disconnected with themselves and others that they would take away another's life with the same insouciance it takes to buy an ice cream cone.

It appears, though, that it's been happening more lately than less. It could be because there are more people, so statistically more of everything is bound to happen, more marriages, more births, more deaths, more of everything Or it could be that we are so disassociated from each other, do hardened and calloused that we couldn't empathize if a hot poker were placed up our backsides. In a world where people can lie in the streets nearly dead with no one at least calling for help, anything's possible.

The answer is with each of us and doing something. As for me, I want to enjoy my life. I want to have it make some difference that I passed this way at all, but I would never want it to be in such a detached way.

Upon hearing there would be new editions of Mark Twain's "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and "Tom Sawyer" substituting the N-word with "slave," I quickly became a 15-year-old again. I was back in that cramped classroom, one of three black students, uncomfortably listening to students of other races read "Huck Finn" aloud.

Granted, the teacher took the right precautions: a pre-lecture on inappropriate use of the N-word, a separate conversation with the black students asking how they felt about the rest of the class using the term and a no-questions-asked option for all students to skip over the word during recitation. Still, I remember it being a few incredibly uncomfortable weeks of my secondary school experience.

Though I can remember being offended by the students who used the word more brazenly than I liked or the stares by students wanting to catch my reaction to use of the word, I now laugh off the memory as a growing pain, something me and many friends have commiserated about.

The reality is, Twain aimed to bring the language, attitude and actions of the people of a certain time to life through his literature. If read in the right context, with appropriate teaching methods, "Huck Finn" becomes both a historical and social learning experience. To erase the N-word from the text is to say it didn't exist in history. Doing so would be a disservice to our youth.

It was bound to happen some time. The planets were bound to align so that we would agree on something, though not for the same reasons. I agree that the dread N-word from Mark Twain's great American novel, Huckleberry Finn, should stay not only because it would be expensive to remove it for future reference but for the sake of authenticity. Even though we know Huck and the widow Sally for who they were, they wouldn't sound authentic if they replaced one N-word for another. Rather, they would sound like a bunch of debutantes at a coming out (not in that way) ball.

Not only does it reflect the speech reflect an era, but in the name of fairness, the publishers would then have to remove all similar words about other ethnic groups. So the following words would have to go: the K-word for Jewish people, the WB-word for the Mexicans, as those who are coming here illegally no longer swim through the algae-ridden water but come up through drainpipes instead, the W-word for Italians, and someone would have to correct a Limey, scratch that, an Englishman, whenever he wanted a "fag," unless he really wanted one.

It would turn many of us into mutes, though it could open up other avenues of discussion like more talk about the weather, but in the name of historical accuracy, fairness and cost, that word should stay.

Where is Lenny Bruce now that we need him? Lenny was not a dirty comedian. He used banned words to make a serious point. He defanged taboo words and made us think about the context.

So, where is Lenny Bruce? Rolling over in his grave on top of George Carlin. They understood what we don't: Context is everything.

©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

This is not the old Jerry Brown that takes the rein at the top spot in Sacramento that took the same spot three decades ago. It has nothing to do with his age, experience, personality, or temperament, or the state's radically changed political and economic circumstance. The new Brown is not the old Brown in philosophy. And frankly I'm not sure I like this new Brown's philosophy. He's not labor friendly. He's not spend on needed education and social services friendly. He's not minority friendly. And he's certainly not criminal justice reform compassionate friendly. At the end of the day, we're likely to see a Jerry Brown that will be more of a tough a law and order, budget tight fisted, corporate leaning, governor than the one that we mercifully just got rid of.

Even worse, the new Brown has given absolutely no sign that he'll push the desperately needed political reforms that his predecessor took a stab at. That includes breaking up the good ole boy and girl, cozy, chummy special interest, Democratic and GOP legislature and stacked districts that have choked off any semblance of citizen input, participation, and engagement. This has done more than anything else to fuel the intense public loath of any and everyone in Sacramento and that includes the man at the top. Don't expect the new Brown to change that.

New South Books press people had barely sent word out that the editors would remove any mention of the N word from their upcoming edition of Mark Twain's immortal classic Adventures of Huck Finn then the squeal began that its censorship, a slap at freedom of speech, and a gross distortion of Twain's intent. His intent was to show the ugliness and evilness of slavery and to do that Twain had to use the rawest racist language of his day. This guaranteed that the book and the language he used would sooner or later draw protests. It's certainly had its colossal share of them over the years.

Legions of teacher's groups, library associations, and school district administrators have agonized over Twain's use of racist language in the book, particularly the N word. They've put out manifestos, curriculum aides, and special texts guiding teachers on how to deal with Twain's racial word usage. Twain probably would have found this amusing, and with good reason. He got it right then and a century and a quarter after publication of Huck Finn it's still right to use the N word and all the other vulgar and crude racial epithets and language that he used in Huck Finn and his other writings that touched on race to make his protest against the vileness of racial bigotry.

But in the era of political and racial correctness run amok that won't cut it. Excising the N word from Twain's classic is not simply a case of trying to conform to the times, nor is it a case as Twain's defenders say of censorship, though a strong argument can be made for that, an argument that I happen to agree with. The real issue, no contradiction, as always is that a white man writing more than a century ago can be called on the carpet for using a word deemed racially offensive and inappropriate in modern times. But those who aren't white, aren't literary icons, and did not write a century ago still get a pass when they use the vile racial loaded words, especially the N word, with abandon, and to add insult to it, go through hoops to justify it the use of the language.

This was the case back in August when talk show host Laura Schlessinger got run out of radio Dodge when she had the temerity to spew the word to make the valid point that the word is just that a word and has no value or power to hurt, maim or defame other than what someone gives it. This is the precise point that the pack of black comedians and rappers that have virtually canonized the word make. They sprinkle the word throughout their rap lyrics and comedy lines; and black writers, and filmmakers go through lengthy gyrations to justify using the word.

N word users and apologists say that the more a black person uses the word, the less offensive it becomes. They claim that they are cleansing the word of its negative connotations so that racists can no longer use it to hurt blacks. Comedian-turned-activist Dick Gregory had the same idea some years ago when he titled his autobiography, Nigger. Black writer, Robert DeCoy also tried to apply the same racial shock therapy to whites when he titled his novel, The Nigger Bible.

A handful of black activists have waged war against the N word. Their target is those rappers and writers that have turned the N word into a lucrative growth industry. They have been the exception. Blacks have been more than willing to give other blacks that use the word a pass. The indulgence sends the subtle signal that the word is hardly the earth-shattering, illegitimate word that black and white N word opponents brand it.
Twain had no such compunction about using the word and what today is deemed racially inappropriate language in his magnificent classic. A classic that captured for all time in all it beauty, human warmth, as well as ugliness and brutality the relationship between a young white kid and an escaped slave "Nigger Jim." That term interestingly never appears in the novel but was used by twentieth century critics, including Leslie Fiedler, Norman Mailer, and Russell Baker in discussing the work. They were not called on the carpet for inserting "nigger" in front of Jim.

Twain could not have conveyed that sentiment and that part of America's shameful racial legacy by sugar coating the language, and guarding his vocabulary against racial epithets. In doing that Huck Finn with all of its racial crudities provides insight into a time and place in America that should not be forgotten. To sanitize any part of that to conform in timeless literature to an artificial and hypocritical standard of official civility is a far bigger absurdity than Twain's use of the N word. Keep the N word in Huck Finn.

I loved the inauguration of Jerry Brown. What a neat bookending: The youngest governor in California history is now the oldest. But a lot has changed in three decades. When Jerry was first elected governor California was in serious economic trouble, the taxpayers were in open revolt (remember Prop 13?), we were trying to get out of an unpopular war and he followed as governor an actor. Okay, so not that much has really changed. It's kind of like "Everything old is older now."

Jerry has added lots of experience to his resume. He's been in private legal practice. He's been the mayor of a major city, Oakland--a city beset with all the problems of poverty and crime. He's been the Attorney General of California. It is fair to say that he is no longer a naïf. He may still have his ideals, but experience has taught him pragmatism. He is now tougher on crime and tighter with our bucks.

To be fair, even his most conservative critics have to admit that he was never personally a spendthrift. I mean he never lived in the Governor's Mansion. (We had one back then) He drove a Plymouth and slept on a mattress of the floor of his apartment. The man is seriously thrifty. He was and is a uniquely California creature--a Roman Catholic, former student for the priesthood, Zen Buddhist, meditating lawyer.

He's always had a great and creative imagination--hence Doonsbury's sobriquet of Governor Moonbeam. But satire aside, he is very smart, intellectually curious and filled with ideas. He's willing to experiment and is not afraid of learning from his mistakes. I suspect that Rose Bird will not be on his shortlist if another opening were to occur on the California Supreme Court.

He has always been clear about his values and holds both education and compassion for the poor at the highest level. Now, working within the fiscal limitations of reality, as he must, I will be interested in how he reconciles our unlimited desires and our very limited means. Jerry Brown will not always make the popular choices, but he will certainly be interesting to watch. And beside himself to follow, he does have his father, Pat Brown, as a role mode. It was, after all, his dad who helped build the UC system and complete Eisenhower's vision of interstate highways.

The other thing about our colorful governor, Jerry Brown, he has always been green. Though frankly I'm not green with envy of his job. If I were he, I'd demand a recount!


©2011 Jonathan Dobrer
www.Dobrer.com

Okay, so I missed my holiday wish list for peace on earth and goodwill towards men and women, so here's my top three for Jerry Brown now that he's going to be running the fair Golden State.

One is that I hope and wish he'll restore the economy. We didn't get from near the top of the economic climate to the bottom without a lot of work, so it's going to take a lot of work to get from the bottom to hopefully near the top again.

That man won't be able to do it without taxing people, and by people I mean taxing the rich, which at this point doesn't include me, so for now, that's okay.

Now that that he says he's more centrist and over his Moonbeam days, I hope that he'll do something about our wild and wooly immigration problem. If I were traipsing around a country, causing mayhem and not paying any taxes, I wouldn't expect the consequences to be reduced tuition at the universities for my progeny plus "a free and appropriate public education" for my other ones that haven't come of age yet, which exactly what I would have gotten. If you want to be here at least make an attempt to do it legally.

I hope he'll find a way to teach people who signed those shady mortgage loans to read. And to those who can't do so yet who want to sue the companies that gave them the loans, I hope he will find a way to get those cases thrown out of court. It's too bad that we can't pass a law for being stupid, but that would clog up the legal system even more.

Most of all, I wish him god speed. I broke rank and voted for him. But based on his past record (aside from the Rose Byrd affair and his views of capitol punishment), we are banking on him because for now anyway, he is our man.

On a recent trip with girlfriends, a discussion regarding appropriate social network behavior arose. One friend said she's reluctant to post pictures of herself with alcoholic beverages fearing its effect on work prospects. Another argued that bosses, execs drink too. The discussion ended abruptly, with no consensus.

Four Kansas nursing students must have not come to a consensus either. They were temporarily dismissed from their program at Johnson County Community College after posting a picture with a placenta to Facebook. One of the students has filed a lawsuit claiming she didn't violate any school policy and wasn't notified by the instructor that such practices were prohibited.

I'm reluctant to side with either party in this story as I'm unaware of JCCC 's mission statement or privacy and behavioral policies. What I do know is that for the most part, social network etiquette has thrived on one rule: use common sense. Would an employer want to hire me if they saw me chugging a beer? Or, scantily dressed? Probably not.

But, what about a placenta? The answer isn't too cut and dry. Most know what too far looks like, but what about the realm between too far and appropriate? Cases like this will continue to pop up if businesses, educational institutions do not begin to provide concrete social network behavioral expectations.