Note to reader: While I am continuing to recover from my Covid ordeal, I am posting several email posts from Embry, who spent almost three weeks this September touring “the Stans,” the Central Asian countries along the “Silk Road.” Sponsored by the Smithsonian, the tour had been postponed for the past two years due to Covid. When Embry had originally signed up two years ago, I had not elected to participate since the trip was described along the lines of “not for the weak hearted.”  Though most of the original participants had cancelled out by the fall of 2022, some six adventurous souls showed up along with a Smithsonian guide and a local guide. Two of the tourists were classmates at Smith College, graduating in 1957. 

Central Asia (2019) has a population of about 72 million people, in five countries: Kazakhstan (pop. 19 million), Kyrgyzstan (7 million), Tajikistan (10 million), Turkmenistan (6 million), and Uzbekistan (35 million). The trip started and ended in Uzbekistan covering almost three weeks. They visited all but one of the “Stans” spending a day or two in each country. Her first post which follows was on Day two from Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan.

This is Day 2 on my trip to the “Stans,” and I am in Tashkent. I’m also pretty worn out, both from jet lag, a touch of “tourista”, and what Joe calls the “forced march” aspect of these kind of tours. Every local guide wants to show you everything about their city. Afterall, it’s their job. We have been to two cities so far, and both are still in their Post-Soviet phase, with old Soviet statues and buildings around.  Since there is not that much else to see, we ride the bus to this monument and that one.  Here are the highlights:

Tashkent: We spent an afternoon here yesterday, but  there really isn’t lots to see. (We will be back at the end of the tour and will go to the market.)They are proud that they have taken down all the Lenin paraphernalia, and also are slowly changing the signs from Cyrillic to Latin script (which they call “Uzbeki script”). Many children no longer take Russian in school, another part of slow de-Russification.

The most interesting part of the afternoon was a visit to the craft museum.  The crafts are truly beautiful.  However, we did not need to see the Soviet era statue honoring the earthquake of 1966 victims, which was devastating (The government refused to publish the number of deaths.) They are anxious to have more private enterprise, which their new leader encourages. I was told they have three parties, but one dominates. Still, they are drifting towards the West, which I imagine does not please Mr. Putin. They were essentially a colony of Russia dating back to Czarist times. The crop was cotton (same in Tajikistan), and the irrigation drained the Aral Sea, which is now an empty, polluted wasteland. 

Now there is evidence of prosperity, including lots of cars bearing a Chevrolet insignia due to a collaboration between Chevy and a local business. There are also small shops and nice restaurants. We had dinner at a very charming one last evening and stayed a second night at our excellent Korean-owned hotel. 

Our guide told us about his time in the Communist Youth where he was very good at picking cotton in the summers, which enabled him to get into a good university. 

24-hour day trip to Tajikistan:  We drove to the border (only 70 km away) on one bus, walked across and picked up the local bus and guide. Just getting across the border (on foot) was quite tedious. I had to wonder who on earth they are looking for: terrorists or smugglers?  (About 10 people checked my passport.) But is this a way to encourage tourism? Maybe it’s a jobs program. 

Along the way, from the bus I enjoyed seeing food crops, animals, and cotton in the fields with very high, dry mountains as a beautiful backdrop. You still see a lot of manual labor in the fields (few tractors and even a donkey cart or two), so the level of development seems like Sub-Saharan Africa. We arrived mid-morning to Tajikistan’s second largest city, Khosand, which is located on the Syr Darya River, a (formerly) big river which seems to be slowly drying up and changing to marsh. (I’m sure this is partially due to climate change, although the local guide never mentioned this.) 

This local guide speaks English very well and has entertaining stories. He told about the arranged marriage system, which is still prevalent and apparently similar to what exists in Uzbekistan. The parents of a boy (who has finished his education and mandatory military service, usually) begin to shop for a bride while the young man often goes to Russia to work and make money for the wedding, which is very expensive.  They must buy all the costumes (I got pictures) and pay a dowry.  Pity the family that has more than two boys (the younger boy is responsible for the parents in their old age). They have very large families, an average of 5 kids with more in rural areas. Apparently, the young people have very little to say about their mate. 90% of marriages are arranged, although the guide said this is going down and may now be 80%. Another example of traditional values is that women never go to the mosque. However, they like to have female teachers and doctors (for girls and women), so if a girl finishes secondary school, she can go to university. She is allowed to get married and have children while she does this (since girls are generally much younger than the boys), and they get some government support.

We had a heavy lunch (3 courses), but I only had soup and RC Cola (made in Columbus, Georgia according to the label), which they apparently love here.  Then we started our “forced march” which consisted of visiting various Soviet-era parks. They had the largest Lenin statue in Central Asia, which I guess some people wanted to I keep. The compromise was to take him down and put him in a very neglected park out of town, where he keeps company with some pictures of other Soviet heroes. Maybe this will happen to Robert E Lee in the U.S. South. 

He was replaced by a statue of another ancient hero. They have many to choose from, because of the many invasions. While not comprehensive these include: the Sassnids, who were Persian and practiced Zoroastrianism; Alexander the Great, who built a huge castle/fort which they are trying to restore with help from UNESCO; Arabs (who brought the arts and sciences along with Islam,  which seems to be practiced rather casually here by most people); Genghis Khan, who apparently passed through the area during the Mongol invasion; Timur (his descendant, known in the West as Tamerlane) , who brought more literature and arts/architecture; and the Russians at the time of the Czars and continued under Communism. (This is the history of all Central Asia, which is bloody and sad.)

A final sad phase was at the time of the breakup of the former Soviet Union. There were three factions: one wanted to continue Communism, one wanted to establish an Islamic state, and one (with many youth) wanted democracy. To figure this out, they fought a bloody Civil War in which 150,000 were killed. I do not remember reading much about this at the time.  I still do not understand why these gentle, and apparently peaceful, people put up with all this, but I’m guessing it must be leadership.

At end of this really exhausting day, we went to the market which is a true market, used by all the farmers of the surrounding area, and where everyone shops for food. A long exhausting day and the start of a great adventure.

 

 

 

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Note to reader: This essay was composed almost a month ago when I was visiting my  daughter’s family in Maine and Embry was touring the “Stans” on a Smithsonian tour. The week I returned to DC, I collapsed with what I have self diagnosed as Long Covid. Embry has her doubts about the accuracy of my self diagnosis, but in any event I am happy to report that I am finally beginning to feel better and hopefully am on the mend.

As is now common knowledge, mainline Protestant churches have been shrinking for the last several decades. I am what is called a “cradle Episcopalian,” which means, “born and bred in the Episcopal Church.” In the 1950s Episcopalians numbered about 3.5 million. Now we are about 1.8 million. Presbyterians—the other denomination which like Episcopalians have been referred to as “God’s Frozen Chosen” — have declined even more. And Methodists, Congregationalists, American Baptists, Lutherans, and even Southern Baptists are experiencing similar trends. The only growth that is reported is in The Church of the Latter Day Saints (or Mormons) and what are labeled “evangelical churches” and “community churches with no denominational affiliation.” Some also call themselves “praise churches.”

I have been curious as to what is going on for some time; and for this reason, when recently visiting my daughter’s family in Portland, Maine, I asked if I could accompany their young “extended family member,” who is a college student from Africa, to attend church with her. From my daughter’s description the church she attends, which I will call “The Point Non-Denominational Christian Church,”(not its real name) sounded like one of the non-affiliated community churches—probably evangelical– with a growing membership. Maybe this experience would provide some clues.

The two of us arrived for the early service starting at nine about 20 minutes early and found ourselves in a long line of cars trying to enter the parking lot of a regional shopping center. The line moved very quickly, however, because there were a dozen or so people with bright yellow shirts directing traffic into the huge parking area in front of the shopping center. As we got out of the car, we joined a throng of people of all ages, almost all white, eagerly headed toward the center of the shopping center where there was a huge structure with a sign, “The Point Christian Church.” Except for the sign the massive, three-story building blended in with the rest of the shopping center and could easily have been mistaken for an office building. The energy and excitement all around us reminded me of going to a high school football or basketball game. I looked around and noted the vast parking lot was already almost full, and no stores in the shopping center were even open yet.

As we approached the front door of the church, we were immediately greeted by several smiling people—mostly men wearing name tags that said “greeter” — who shook our hands vigorously, told us how glad they were to see us, and thanked us for coming. Everyone else got the same welcome. Many were embracing. (And no one was wearing a covid mask.)

Good heavens, I thought, when was the last time I got a welcome like this?

Upon entering the large lobby there was no hint that we were entering a Christian church—no crosses or pictures of Jesus or banners or anything else suggesting that this might be a church. On our right in the large lobby was a section with  tables and chairs and large sign that said “Café,” and on our left was a Starbucks lookalike with a sign that read “Coffee Shop.” Behind that was a lounge area with chairs and sofas arranged around a large fireplace. Signs directed the crowd to five options—”Christian Education and Meeting Rooms,” “Soccer field,” “Basketball Courts,” “Church Offices,” and “Auditorium.” As we joined the line headed toward the Auditorium, we snuggled between adults returning from dropping off their kids in the Christian Education area. While there were only a few people of color besides my young, African partner—after all, this was in Maine, which is 95% white—there was a wide variety of ages. I was particularly impressed by how many young people and Gen Zs there were. I was also impressed with what people were wearing. I was over dressed, wearing khaki pants and a golf shirt. The dress code for the day was mainly shorts, cut offs, jeans with fashionable holes at knee level, running or walking shoes and tee shirts. Had I not known better, I would have thought we were headed to a rock concert.

To get to the Auditorium you must pass by the regulation-size, indoor soccer field and the regulation-size basketball courts with small galleries for spectators. The One Point website also boasts of pickle ball courts and an indoor golf center. For a moment I thought I was in one of the new, over-the-top, elite college athletic facilities. However, at that time no one was using the basketball courts or artificial grass soccer field as we inched along with others headed for the Auditorium, which was a couple of floors up reachable by stairs or a bank of elevators. I wondered why they had not put in escalators.

At about five minutes before nine, we reached the top of the stairs and were finally at the Auditorium. At the entrance area we were met by more smiling greeters thanking us for coming and saying how glad they were to see us. Some were hugging and embracing. I heard voices all around me saying, “Brother, it is great to see you!” “Sister, we love you!”

Before we passed into the Auditorium, my young friend pointed to a large bowl containing tiny, plastic capsules, which she pointed out contained the grape juice and a wafer for communion. We each took one and entered. No bulletins or information about the service were available although on the wall was a list of numerous ministries and activities which were happening during the week. One that caught my eye was a “women’s prison ministry.”

The Auditorium was a vast, windowless, dim space the size of a Broadway theater, with seating on the main level and in a large balcony area. (Later I looked up the size of the space on their website and found it to have 1,600 seats.) I guessed that about 1,400 seats were already occupied as we found a couple of empty seats near front and close to the stage. There was no hint that we were in a church—no symbols, crosses, pulpit, hymnals, or anything like that.  I sat down between my young friend and next to another African, a young man in his 20s with a strong accent. I looked toward the large stage area, which was empty at that time but accommodated a large drum set on one side, a huge keyboard on the other, and five or six microphones at the front of the stage. Three large video screens were on the wall behind the stage, and two enormous screens were on each side, the size of a movie screen in a typical movie theater. Between the drum set and the keyboard was a string of Broadway-style, festive lights at the back of the stage that spelled out something like “Serving Greater Portland.”

As the clock approached nine, the chatter began to diminish, and anticipation began to build. I could feel the excitement, the kind of feeling I remember from attending a Judy Collins or Nina Simone concert in the 1960s and 70s. The dim lights went out completely as a hush came over the congregation in the pitch-black dark. For five or six seconds all conversation ceased.

I thought “Oh my goodness, what’s next?”

Then the theater lights above the stage burst on, the music started, and the congregation jumped to their feet and roared approval. Think what it is like when Notre Dame or University of Alabama football players enter a packed home stadium for a crucial game.  Ten folk rock musicians appeared on stage—five guitar players, three acoustic and two electric, all young men in their twenties or early thirties with the Maine scruffy look—long hair, beards, jeans, tee shirts and running shoes; a woman a little older playing keyboard, and a very large young man playing the drums. Three fabulous vocalists were off to the side, two women, one African American, and one guy who was dressed just like the guitar players. The musicians were not rank amateurs but polished professionals. “Oh, I said to myself. Now I understand: It’s the music.”

Their first piece was part folk and part country song with an up-tempo beat that could have come out of a Paul Simon, Garth Brooks, Taylor Swift, or a Brandi Carlisle songbook except for the Christian lyrics, which appeared on the three high-definition screens behind the band. Everyone around me was standing and singing at the top of their lungs, some jumping up and down, and most raising their arms in the air as they swayed back and forth to the beat of the music. The high-definition, massive screens on each side of the stage showed closeups of the performers and occasionally the entire performing group. I found myself standing up and swaying to the beat of the music and even raising my arms in praise. Feeling a tad awkward, I was relieved that no one could see me in the dark theater. Afterall, I am one of “God’s Frozen Chosen.” I could not help thinking that somehow, I had gotten confused and made a wrong turn, thinking I was going to a church but ending up at a country/folk rock concert. I smiled and had to admit that I was captivated by the musical performance, which over the course of just about 90 minutes included over a half dozen, very polished, extended pieces all of which had variations the same basic lyrics: Praise God, God is great, God is good, God is love, Jesus is great, you are forgiven for your sins, your life has meaning, you will live forever if you accept God’s love and believe in Jesus!”

In addition to the fabulous music, there were announcements made by the youth minister who could not have been all that many years older than a teenager himself, who listed a couple of dozen important activities that would be happening during the next week including a community picnic with inflatable slides, activities for kids, and entertainment.  Later in the service came a 30-minute sermon by another young pastor, who was probably in his mid 30s.  Since he did not introduce himself, I do not know if he was the senior pastor, but suspect not. (Five pastors, all men, are listed in their website along with 20 other staff.) Both pastors had the same scruffy, Maine look of the band performers and were dressed like most of the males in the congregation– sports shirt, jeans and running shoes. While he had prepared a written sermon, which was on an electronic tablet resting on a small podium, he glanced at it only occasionally and casually walked around the stage talking into the mic in a conversational tone as if he were in a personal conversation with each of the enthusiastic members of the congregation. His subject was the “Fourth Core Value” of the church and why it was important. The first three core values were these: “Know God, Find Freedom, and Engage Community.” “His sermon was on was “Share Your Story” –spreading the word through personal testimony and sharing God’s love, forgiveness, and reconciliation.

Other than his one long, extemporaneous prayer toward the end, there were no group prayers that I can recall, not even the Lord’s Prayer, no creeds, and no Bible readings except for a passage in the Gospel of John on which the sermon was based. At one point he showed a 10-minute clip from the movie, “The Chosen,” which was about Jesus saving a Samaritan woman at a well found in the Gospel of John, which illustrated a point he was making in his sermon. At the end of his sermon, everyone applauded, then opened their tiny container, ate the small wafer, and sipped down the grape juice.

Other highlights included two full-immersion, adult baptisms, numbers 103 and 104 for the year. The first one was accompanied by a 3 or 4-minute recorded testimony on the huge high-definition screen of the person being baptized, a serious looking woman in her 30s, wearing a black “Jesus is Lord” tee shirt. The second baptism, a woman in her late 30s or early 40s who had found Jesus while the minister was giving his sermon, happened at the tail of the sermon. The congregation exploded with applause following both baptisms.

When the band reappeared on the stage, the lights in the auditorium seating area darkened  again for the final song. Everyone jumped to their feet and joyfully sang the words on the high-def video screen about loving God, being saved and praising Jesus.

The enthusiastic greeters appeared again as people poured out of the auditorium, thanking us for being there and saying, “See you again next Sunday, brother.” The parking attendants got the cars moving out of the parking lot quickly following the service to make way for those coming to the eleven o’clock service, which my young friend told me was the more popular of the two services and often was standing room only. In all, that Sunday, there were over 3,000 people attending the two services with more than 1,000 others online. The five or six hundred children and teenagers who  were in Sunday school were not counted in these numbers.

So, the question is what to make of this. As a representative of God’s Frozen Chosen, I was and remain speechless.

Important in my thinking is that what did not happen that morning is just as important is what did happen. There was no fire and brimstone, no hollering or screaming by pastors, no hostile comments about anyone or group or about going to hell if you don’t own up to your sins. Not a hint about Trump or stolen elections—something I was carefully looking for. There was also no offering, no talk about money (except a message on the high-definition screen that you could give as you leave or online), and no hint of anything political or controversial. There was not a word about abortion. Who knows, maybe I was just lucky   that morning. The experience for me seemed genuine, sincere, and essentially theologically consistent with the fundamental message of Christianity: God loves you. You are forgiven. Your life has meaning. There is a silver lining in the suffering you have experienced. Afterall, this message over the centuries has been what has drawn people from all cultures around the globe to become Christians, who now are found in every country and number over 2.5 billion, more than any other religious faith including Islam, which is not far behind. Estimates are that in the United States, evangelicals account for over a fourth of all people who call themselves Christians.

But naturally, I could not help comparing this experience to the neighborhood Episcopal Church, which Embry and I have been attending since the late 1980s. The neo-Gothic building is beautiful, and the sung mass is solemn and at times uplifting. However, seated in the 300-seat nave on a typical service nowadays are only four or five dozen people, mostly old folks. This is due in part to covid, in part to our last rector leaving in a huff, giving us three weeks’ notice, and in part to the secularization of our society, but still the comparison is stark. We now have a terrific interim priest and have always  had a welcoming congregation; but long term if we can’t get our numbers up to 150 or so where they were pre covid, we will not be a going concern. And we are not alone. Over a third of the Episcopal churches in the Diocese of Washington are listed as at risk of surviving, and many others are struggling. This is true of all the mainline Protestant churches, and it would be true for the Catholics as well were it not for immigration.

I could not help wondering: Is there anything to be learned by traditional, mainline churches from Evangelical churches like The Point where 3,000 plus members show up on most Sundays?

When I have told friends about my experience at One Point, my comments have often been received with puzzled, skeptical looks. One person exclaimed, “Oh my God, you are not even an orthodox Christian yourself, and you, of all people, see value in an evangelical church? What is happening? Have you gone nuts?”

My reply has been mostly the same, “Different folks, different strokes. One destination, many pathways.” I should add that the pathway must be legitimate and genuine. That seemed to me to be true at One Point.

Then the next question often follows, “But those people are probably Trump supporters and election deniers, right? And you imply that they are essentially good people?”

This question illustrates the predicament we find ourselves in today. We look at people who disagree with us politically—or have different values– as fundamentally bad people. Both Democrats and Republicans are guilty of this, and there are few who dislike Trump and his hard core followers more than I do. I plead guilty as charged. The truth is that there probably were Trump supporters at One Point that morning, but what I saw and experienced was a feeling of love and acceptance and not a hint of hatefulness. We humans–all of us–have the capacity for good and evil and for loving and hating. The challenge is to try to see the good in everyone and to nurture the better angels that are in all of us while keeping the devils at bay and at the same time doing what we can to try to make this troubled planet a better place.

So much, I think, boils down to leadership. Without a Hitler there would not have been the Holocaust; without a Stalin, the gulags; without a Mao, the Cultural Revolution. We humans are basically herd animals. A few bad apples who manage to make it to the top can and often do untold damage.

 I know that a lot of evangelical churches have gone to the dark side mixing right wing, extremist politics with religion, and promoting social causes like the Anti-abortion Movement and anti-immigration. Few evangelicals would agree with my progressive politics. Yet there are also many traditional evangelicals who have stayed the course and have resisted becoming radical right-wing Republicans. “The Daily,” a podcast of the New York Times, which aired on Friday, September 23, featured a story on how there is now a huge exodus of traditional evangelical pastors, many of whom have been run out of their churches by congregations who have gone all-in for Trump, whom some call “the new Jesus.”

As for me, I say, “Praise for the praise churches!”  While they aren’t for everyone and there are those who have wandered off course, there is surely much to learn—and frankly, to admire– from what I experienced at One Point Christian Church.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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To all who have been faithful blog followers: the blogger has Long Covid!

I am now two weeks into this hideous punishment with no improvement so far, but stay tuned, I will get a post out shortly (which I had written but not posted before Covid returned)  and hopefully will be able to get going again albeit at a slower pace.

And thank each and everyone of you for following the posts. I am truly grateful!

Joe

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 I could understand the distressed look of the nurse at Mercy Hospital and why she abruptly departed. Mercy now had definitive information showing they had a patient in the surgical unit with Covid– a fox in the hen house, an assassin in their midst, a poison pill, a nuclear time bomb. If I were in the nurse’s shoes, I would have felt the same way. Over the past two years Covid has devastated hospitals, depleting staff, causing burn out, depression, despair, and even suicide in some instances. The loss of life of so many innocent people has been traumatic. Suffering has been endless. We all know this. It has been horrible. But at last, hospitals have gotten the pandemic more or less under control thanks to vaccines, therapeutics, rigorous masking, and an ironclad protocol: no Covid patients except in Covid wards. Good for the hospitals! They have figured it out and have come through it.

But not so good for an alledged Covid patient, sitting alone in an emergency room, who had just witnessed a nurse tip toe out his small room in anxiety.

About an hour later the surgical team arrived. Two or three doctors or surgical assistants followed the surgeon. The first thing I said  the minute they entered the room was, “I don’t care what the test shows, I do not have Covid!”

The entire team paused and scrutinized me, pathetically lying on my stretcher tethered to a post holding tubes to my wrist and my nose. They looked all business and focused.  I was bracing to hear the verdict, “I am sorry, Mr. Howell, but we have no choice, we have to discharge you.”

I could see myself tossed out into the parking lot, shivering, trying to figure out what to do next. However, to my surprise, the surgeon quietly replied, “We know you don’t have Covid, Mr. Howell. Don’t worry. We will get you through this.”

“Halleluiah!” I moaned quietly.

They briefly talked quietly among themselves and departed. As they left, the surgeon said. “I will see you in the OR at 3:30.”

“Whew.” I sighed, “Dodged a bullet!”

I had been admitted late the previous evening, and though it had gotten off to a rocky start, I had put to rest the Covid issue figuring it was done and over with. So, Day 2 turned out to be a pretty good day. Embry arrived just after the surgical team had departed, and we had a quiet day together in the tiny, windowless, ER patient room, waiting for a real hospital room to open up. At 3:30 she accompanied me to the staging area next to the OR where they performed an exploratory colonoscopy, the first of two procedures, to try to figure out the cause of the BVS. When I came out of the anesthesia, the surgeon cheerfully said that the procedure had gone well and had not identified anything to be concerned about. She admitted she had fears about colon cancer. That was the good news. The bad news: no culprit yet for the BVS. She said she hoped the next procedure scheduled to happen in two days would shed light on that—a laparoscopy, where she would make several small incisions in my stomach and go in with a scope to see what she could find in the small intestine.

Following the colonoscopy procedure, I was pushed up to the fourth floor of the main hospital where I would have my own room, 4019, a decent-sized room with a small window overlooking the Fore River, one of the main estuaries emptying into Casco Bay. So far so good.

Unfortunately, this would not last for long.

Thursday, Day 3, got off to a bad start when at the main entrance around 10 in the morning Embry was denied entry to see me. She was told that no one under any circumstances would be allowed to visit the patient in Room 4019 except authorized personnel. She protested to no avail. I do not know what nursing staff had to say about the situation but gather there was some uneasiness about violating rigid hospital Covid protocol. I could have hollered every time I saw one of the brave nurses that entered my room, “No! No! No! The test was wrong! I do not have Covid,” but everyone who entered my room could not have missed the huge sign on the door that said something like: “Strict Quarantine, No Admittance Without Authorization. Covid dress protocol required.” Whom to believe, me or the hospital?

Anyone entering had to be fully clothed in protective gear—cap, gown, gloves, shoe covering, double N95 masks, and a face shield. One of the nurses complained that it took over five minutes for her to put all the gear on and almost as long to take it off. This explains in part why no one dropped by just to check on me from time to time as nurses typically do. They did not have the time to suit up. It also explains why when I was forced to hit the call button every so often, it was a minimum of 15 minutes before a figure in a hazmat suit timidly would open the door.

Now to put this pitiful picture into perspective, it could have been a whole lot worse. I had a splendid view from my window, and there was a small tv set with something like 300 cable channels, one of which was broadcasting the U.S. Tennis Open. The only problem was that the sets were so small it was very difficult to see the names of the tennis players or the score of the game. All this would have been manageable, however, except I had no idea when I was going to be liberated from this solitary confinement. I am a pathological extrovert and a claustrophobic. I could endure isolation and boredom but only for a while; and not knowing what was going to happen next or when the isolation would end sent me into a tail spin, inching toward a panic attack. I noticed a white board with instructions where there was a space for the nurse’s “care plan for the day.” I lurched toward the white board with a black magic marker to scribble “get me outa here!” The tethers held me back, only inches out of reach.

The highlight, if you could call it that, was a brief visit by a shy, young nurse I had not seen before and whose presence brightened the day until she looked at me and commented in a kind but firm tone,” You know that you are putting us all at risk.”

“But I do not have Covid!”

But it says so on the door, and everyone knows it. This is a surgical ward.”

“Well, I am having surgery. I have had one procedure and I have another tomorrow.”

“But you have Covid.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Yes, you do. It says so! Look at the door.”

The conversation was getting nowhere. This was when I demanded that they give me another test.

She turned her back and exited, not giving an inch, but a few minutes later another nurse showed up and swabbed my nose for a second PCR test, telling me that if it was negative, they would let me know within the hour. One hour passed, then another. I assumed the worst.Then the night nurse showed up around 8:00 PM and casually mentioned when she was taking vital signs, “Oh, by the way, the second PCR test came out negative.”

I refrained from shouting, “I told you so!”

Then she added, “But you are still subject to quarantine protocol. No visitors. No exceptions.”

That was when I demanded to see the CEO of the hospital.

The first thing the next morning, the CEO did not show up but the director of all the nurses did; and if I had had my say, I would have promoted her to CEO. She was kind, empathetic, supportive and understood why I was reaching my limit. Unfortunately, the conversation got off to a bad start when she said that while the second Covid test, which was negative, proved what she knew all along, that I never had Covid during my stay, hospital protocol required a second negative test after another 24 hours before the quarantine could be lifted and that until I was cleared, the no-visitor policy had to be strictly enforced.

I lost it. “You know I don’t have Covid. The doctors know it. The second test proved it, and you are telling me I still must remain in isolation because of some idiot policy of the hospital?” Trembling, I told her that this was unacceptable and would surely result in my transfer to the Psyche Ward.

She nodded, managed a sympathetic  smile, apologized for the policy, and agreed with me. In departing she said she was immediately issuing an order to allow Embry to join me.

Embry arrived in my room mid-morning, and we waited around for the second procedure, a laparoscopy, which was supposed to happen at 3:30 but was delayed until 6:30. The good news was that the procedure did not reveal anything serious and did provide a clue as to what was going on, which  could be corrected by surgery, which will happen once confirmed by a second opinion, when I return to DC.

 I was discharged from the hospital the next morning—Saturday, September 5^th, my fifth day in Mercy Hospital.

Happy ending: I made it to the last two days of the family reunion and am now doing fine, a week following the procedure. Embry is off to the “Stans,” and I will return home in a week.

Kudos to the fabulous surgical health care staff in Mercy Hospital! In the Covid Era, the hospital doctors and nurses are the heroes of our time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Some readers may recall my first emergency room saga in February of this year,  caused by  BVS, short for  “Black Vomit Syndrome.”(my term) If you Google “Black Vomit,” you get a message, which goes something like this, “If you are vomiting black liquid, go to nearest emergency room NOW, do not pass Go, do not collect $200.”

On a cold February evening Embry rushed me to the Washington Hospital Center, the biggest hospital in Washington, located near some of Washington’s distressed neighborhoods, where I spent 24 hours in the emergency room alongside people with gunshot and knife wounds, drug overdoses, car wrecks, heart attacks, and Covid, before being moved into a hospital room where I spent another two days. The way you treat BVS is to drain the fowl liquid out of your stomach with a long suction tube, which is inserted up your nostrils until it  finally reaches your stomach. It took several hours before the tube quit pumping, producing a couple of pitchers of black gunk. The nurse who inserted the tube said I might experience “mild discomfort,” which is de facto proof that she had never had a suction tube up her nose.

There was a happy ending to that story. Only a little over three days in the hospital and with the medical diagnosis of “bowel obstruction,” I seemed to be doing fine after the draining, and the ordeal was described by the several doctors who had worked on me as “probably a fluke and unlikely to happen again.” One doctor commented that I “had dodged a bullet.”

My last day in the hospital, another doctor, a middle aged, African American, with a serious look, entered my hospital room and said, “Mr. Howell, we are not going to release you from this hospital until we figure out what caused this.”

I groaned, thinking what it would be like to spend one more horrible day in a tiny, double occupancy room, where there was no place to sit, no window view, and where people were dying all around you. Staying more days or even weeks was unthinkable. A half hour later, however, the head nurse appeared, smiling, informing me that I was being discharged.

“Cautious doctor overruled,” I surmised, but grateful that I was finally liberated.

It was a questionable decision.

Fast forward to Tuesday, August 30, 2022. Embry and I had flown up to Portland, Maine, where our daughter and her family live and which was to be the location for the first Howell-Cole reunion where one of my first cousins from Nashville and his intergenerational family would join Embry and me and Jessica’s and Andrew’s families, about 20 people in all. I started feeling woozy on the flight up and within an hour of arriving was throwing up. You got it—another bout of BVS!

Emergency! When Jessica got home from work, Jessica, Embry, and I jumped in her car and within minutes were entering the emergency waiting room of Mercy Hospital. Jessica had checked with a friend who was a nurse, who recommended it as the best hospital, and it happened to be nearby.

Unlike the madhouse at The Washington Hospital Center, which was buzzing with activity with bodies on stretchers being accompanied by armed police officers, this emergency waiting room was clean, quiet, orderly and as far as emergency rooms go, pleasant. When we were checking in, I counted the number of people waiting –only eight, a homeless-looking guy asleep on two chairs, a woman with a white sheet over her head, an elderly couple, a large middle-aged lady beside us, and two older men.

“Well,” I commented when we sat down, “looks like a pretty short wait.”

The large woman sitting next to me whispered, “Well, I have already been here two and a half hours, and most of the people in the waiting room now were here before me.”

Embry and Jessica left after an hour for a dinner out that had been planned and returned a couple of hours later. I was still waiting. I had positioned myself between the men’s room and the door to the ER so I would not miss my name when it was called and when needed could dart into the men’s room to throw up. Just after they arrived, the door opened and a guy in a green outfit called my name. We had arrived at the waiting room shortly after 6:00 PM. Embry and I entered the ER at 9:30.

Totally exhausted, nauseated, and aching from toe to chin, I was on my last leg, but at least we were inside, were assigned a hospital room, and over the next two hours met the GI surgeon, the surgeon’s assistant, and several nurses.

We were impressed—all were youngish, friendly, knowledgeable and sharp. The surgeon, a blond, petite woman probably in her early 40s–though with masks it is hard to tell—was particularly impressive. It was already close to midnight, and she was still working. Good heavens! She explained the first procedure, which would be scheduled the next day for around 3:30, an old-fashioned colonoscopy performed by her colleague, and advised that an additional procedure would probably be required. After the doctor left, the nurse, a 30-something man and a former cop, got a hospital gown on me, and  inserted a suction tube up my nose, but not without difficulty or excruciating pain. I already knew what this involved and got through the pain with a little help from morphine, which he kindly provided following my desperate plea. By midnight everyone had departed. Embry returned to Jessica’s house, and I collapsed and dozed off in the haze of the “morphine sweetener.” The tube in my stomach was already sucking out the bad stuff.

Before I fell asleep, I heard the nurse mutter, “Oh my God! the Covid test just came back. You’ve got Covid! Oops!”

Covid? Impossible. Hey, I had paid my dues. I had  been vaccinated and boosted twice. I had worn my  N95 mask 24/7, done everything I was  supposed to. And I still got Covid on a cruise from Copenhagen to Norway and Iceland –five weeks of this torture. And to come down with another case only three weeks after testing negative for the last episode? Oh my goodness! No way.

That is why the first thing I said to the nurse who woke me up early the next morning for testing vital signs was definitive:” I-do-not-have-Covid!”

The young woman’s eyes above her mask signaled a puzzled look. She started to read my chart; and when she got to the end, looked up again, this time with a look of concern, exclaiming “Oh my God!  You’ve got Covid!”

“No, no!” I protested. “I don’t, I mean, I can’t. I have already had it, just weeks ago and a bad case. I have had all the shots, the boosters. The test is wrong, I swear it! I tested negative weeks ago.”

She put the chart down, timidly backed out of the room, shutting  the door behind her.

Not a good way to start off the day.

So began the ordeal at Mercy Hospital, the second ER and the second Covid experience of 2022.

To be continued….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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When we met this morning, Clancy apologized that this would be the last coffee for a while. He was being called overseas for a consulting assignment to advise the United Nations in efforts to stem the tide of dictatorships in former democracies in the West like Hungary, Turkey, and Poland.

I began the conversation asking, “Is there a way out of this mess?”

“That is the question, isn’t it? “Clancy responded, “I know that I may sound pessimistic at times and have painted a scary picture of what could happen, but it does not mean that it has to happen. If there is a solution, it must be political. An armed rebellion as some are predicting could trigger the end of our democracy. The decisive factor will be in the election results: can the Democrats hold off the radical Republicans in the hostile climate we are in? Since we last talked, I have become more hopeful about the mid term elections coming up in only a couple of months. Polls now show very close races, which could mean the Democrats might hang on to majorities in both houses.”

I chimed in,” A long shot, and if this happens, we will have the Supreme Court to thank with its 6-3 unpopular ruling against abortion along with a thank you to Trump for championing a bunch of weak candidates and nut cases. Another one of life’s ironies.”

Clancy continued, “If the Republicans win either or both Houses, it will be a different story and a grim one. I am not so sure about the long term. There are plusses and minuses, room for hope and room for despair. The American population is becoming more diverse as the minority populations increase. While we would hope that would result in more compassion and support for corrective action on race issues and economic disparities, I am aware it does not always work out that way. Nevertheless, I remain cautiously hopeful.”

“On the negative side,” he continued, “liberal or progressive policies might further energize the Right Wing extremists including armed militias and hate groups, leading to an armed rebellion that some are predicting. Ditto, if Trump gets indicted or convicted. It could become very messy. Also, politicizing the election process like counting votes by party operatives could also spell doom. Gerrymandering and dark money remain huge obstacles titling the scales toward Republicans. The 2024 election will be one of the most important in our lifetime. In the best of all worlds, we need to move back to center right and center left candidates and elect officials who are more pragmatic and want to get things done rather than cram their ideology down the voters throats or start a revolution. The stakes have never been higher.”

“So you are saying that the answer is nominating candidates on both sides who want to get things done?”

“I know,” Clancy sighed, “Wishful thinking; and  if we are looking for a silver bullet, we won’t find one. If I had to pick one thing that is most important, however, I would say it is presidential leadership. Exhibit A is Donald J. Trump. Trump may be a symptom, but he is also a cause. His outrageous and irresponsible behavior is responsible for aggravating the divisions in our country, energizing extremists, and taking our country down a dangerous path. A second Trump Administration would be a disaster and could mean the end of our democracy. The wannabees waiting in the wings for a Trump misstep, or a jail sentence might be as bad or worse. Most echo his tone, and most are smarter. What the Democrats need going forward is a charismatic, smart, center left, Democratic candidate for President of the United States, who can relate to all types of people. While I give Biden high marks on some things, and given the hand he has been dealt, consider him a good–but not great– president, charismatic he is not. Plus, he is too old for a second term. Hey, he was born in November 1942, making him about eight months younger than you. He will be in his early eighties in 2024. Please. I am in my early seventies and can’t imagine taking on a job like that at my age. Should anyone your age even be allowed to take on the presidency of the United States of America? Would this ever happen in corporate America?”

“Heavens no! From my own experience 80 feels different from being 70. We start to slow down, and frailties become more apparent. Several friends my age are dealing with serious health issues. Dementia is a challenge for some, and some are dying. But who would be the best person? If only Obama could run again. I love that guy!”

Clancy continued, “What Joe Biden should do is announce after the midterms that he will not run for a second term and let the sorting out process begin. There are a lot of good people out there, though I realize that it may not be all that easy, and it depends on whom the Republicans put up, especially whether it is Trump or a Trump wannabe.”

Clancy paused for a moment, sighed, and then continued, “I know that we are living in dangerous times, but I also have got to tell you this: I have faith in the American people. Basically, we are good people. Sure, there are bad apples and some with dangerous intentions, but they are in a minority. We have faced challenges before and come through them—the American Revolution, the Civil War, the Great Depression, two World Wars, the Cold War, the Kennedy and King assinations, Vietnam, segregation, and the period of Jim Crow. Look, we can survive the Trump Era. I know that this is a statement of faith rather than a fully researched fact, but I refuse to throw in the towel.”

“Well, I replied, “I will say this: I admire your unexpected but guarded optimism. We will know soon if you are right about the 2022 election.”

 We both were silent for a moment realizing how high the stakes are. I told Clancy that I want to believe he is right about the American people but also know that it means getting strong Democratic candidates to run for office and working hard to get them elected, and this will not be easy. Also, we need to level the playing field on economic disparity issues, continue the fight for racial equity and social justice, and make America a kinder and gentler place. And if we fail, things could turn very bad.

“Joe,” he said, “I never said it would be easy.”

 I sighed and gave Clancy a big hug. “Hope the assignment with the UN works out well,” I said.

Clancy smiled, gave a thumbs up sign, and headed off. I am not sure when I or if I will see him again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Clancy was late today and apologized as he rushed in to order his coffee and pastry returning to our usual outside table a few minutes later.

“Let’s begin with January 6^th”, I said,” and the question is how close did we come to losing our democracy.”

Clancy looked me in the eye and replied, “A hair’s breadth.”

Clancy went on to say what we all know, that if Pence had given in and declared that Trump was the winner or sent the vote back to the swing state legislatures controlled by Republicans to decide, it would have made Trump the winner.  With the 6-3 majority of Republican justices in the Supreme Court, the call about whether this move would have been Constitutional or not could have gone either way.”

“Pretty scary,” I said.

“The thing is we do not know what would have happened. I have to praise the work by the House Select Committee as we continue to hear information that tells us that it was worse than we thought, but to realize that it could have come this close just shows us how fragile our democracy is and that we cannot take it for granted.”

“So, who were these people who stormed the Capitol?” I asked.

“Well,” Clancy answered. “Of the several thousand people who stormed the Capitol, so far almost 900 have been arrested and charged with insurrection. Over 350 have pleaded guilty, and there have already been a few—around 70– convictions, but this process is going to take a while. My guess is that rioters’ charged will number over a thousand before it is all over, and convictions or guilty pleas will number over 500, but who knows?”

As to the question as to who they were, Clancy smiled sheepishly and said, “Well, I knew you were going to ask this question, so I looked it up on Wikipedia, and here is what I found.”

He showed me his printout:

“The attackers included some of Trump’s longtime and most fervent supporters from across the United States. The mob included Republican Party officials, current and former state legislators and political donors, far-right militants, white supremacists, conservative evangelical Christians and participants of the “Save America” Rally. According to the FBI, dozens of people on its terrorist watchlist were in D.C. for pro-Trump events on the 6th, with the majority being “suspected white supremacists”. Some came heavily armed and some were convicted criminals, including a man who had been released from a Florida prison after serving a sentence for attempted murder. A Boogaloo follower said several groups under his command helped storm the Capitol, taking the opportunity to strike against the federal government.

Also present during the riot were parts of the Black Hebrew Israelites, the National Anarchist Movement, the Blue Lives Matter Movement, supporters of the America First Movement, the Stop the Steal Movement,  the Patriot Movement, remnants of the Tea Party Movement  the Traditionalist Worker Party, QAnon followers, the Three Percenters, the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, the Groyper Army; as well as  Holocaust deniers, among other far-right organizations and groups. Anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi groups (Nationalist Social Club) were at the event, although it is unknown to what extent.  Following the event, members of some groups detailed their actions and claimed they were the “beginning of the start of White Revolution in the United States.”

“Hey,” I exclaimed sarcastically, “Is this a great county or what!”

“Well, probably the majority were simply Trump supporters who came to DC because they thought that is what Trump wanted them to do. They got caught up in the excitement of the rally and followed the organizers to the Capitol after Trump directed them to. And as to these hate groups and organizers of the insurrection, they are just the tip of the iceberg. The Southern Poverty Law Center has been tracking domestic hate and terrorist groups for years. The number of such groups has tended to fluctuate between 750 and 1,000, and we are close to the 1,000 now. Note that the list includes groups the FBI is monitoring, and some are foreign terrorists. Domestic groups, however, now comprise most of the terrorist and hate groups.”

“Most seem like a bunch of whackos and nut cases, if you ask me.  What is wrong with these people?”

“You can blame it on a lot of factors—stress, financial insecurity, poor education, broken families, lost jobs, mental illness, broken relationships, old fashioned racism and antisemitism, bad luck, the sermons some hear in their politically-motivated, evangelical churches, or just hanging out with the wrong people. Who knows, maybe Covid has something to with it. Some of these people are, as you say, ‘nut cases,’ but certainly not everyone. To me, however, the number of hate groups and domestic terrorists are the canaries in the mine warning us that something is terribly wrong with our society. I have already talked about some of the societal and political causes, and there are surely a lot more.”

“Okay,” I replied, “We already know a lot and will learn more about the January 6^th insurrection as the Select Committee continues its hearings in the fall. Let’s turn to ‘Stop the Steal’ and Trump’s claim of election fraud.”

“This, my friend, is the existential threat we now face. Here is what we know: there was no voting fraud. Period. In fact, this election has been called by many experts probably the fairest in history with the fewest mistakes. Trump’s claim that it was ‘stolen’ is the Big Lie. Yet we also know that   70 percent of all Republicans believe him.”

I could not help shaking my head and muttering, “Nut cases!”

“Not only that,” he continued, “Right Wing talk radio and TV celebrities like Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and their Fox News colleagues hammer  this lie in every day, which also resonates on social media. And it gets even worse. Over half the GOP primary winners say the 2020 election was rigged. Most Republican Congressmen and Senators remain silent. So, if all or most of your information comes from Fox News, conservative talk radio, your buddies who love Trump, the obsessed, right wing minister at your evangelical church, and the Republican candidate you voted for in the primary, you would believe it too, right? This is the big problem. We live in alternate universes. We are fundamentally divided as country.”

“So, this helps explain the January 6^th insurrection. Most really believed Trump’s Big Lie. They felt it was their patriotic duty to be there. When he asked them to go to the Capitol, many followed his wishes. I must admit, if I were one of the people you just described, I probably would have at least been to the rally. I am too much of a wimp to storm the Capitol.”

Clancy continued “And the problem is that most of his followers have not changed their minds. If anything, they have become angrier and more radicalized because they think the government was wrong in arresting ‘innocent’, freedom loving Americans. They do not read the NY Times or the Washington Post. They do not watch CNN or MSNBC or the PBS News Hour. They do not talk to people with different opinions. They have not watched any of the hearings of the Select Committee on the January 6 Insurrection. Some have stated that the revolution has already started and believe the Trump followers will ultimately prevail. They will make America great again, whatever it takes, including armed insurrection.”

“Very scary,” I groaned.

“But what is even scarier is what is happening at the state level and the local levels. Republicans have out foxed and out performed the Democrats in grass roots organizing. In many red states and in some purple or swing states, energized Republicans have elected Trump supporters as Secretaries of State, who are responsible for overseeing the election process including vote counting. The Secretaries of State in key states like Georgia and several Midwestern swing states were the heroes of the 2020 elections resisting pressure from Trump and his followers to declare fraud where none existed. They are being replaced by extremists who are 2020 election deniers, some of whom have already boasted that under their watch no Democrats will be elected. Talk about the fox in the hen house! Other pro Trump people are being appointed to replace the neutral election oversight staff that were in place in 2020.”

“In other words.” I said, “Fraud did not happen in 2020, but it most likely will happen in future elections, in 2022 and certainly 2024 when more of the Trump extremists are in place. Plus, as I understand it, these states are also passing legislation making it much harder to vote, which is aimed at reducing turnout by minorities, who usually vote Democratic.”

“Correct,” Clancy replied, shaking his head in dismay. “And it is not just at the state level. Trumpers are winning school board elections and mayor and city council elections, which are becoming nationalized based not so much on local issues but your political identity. So, this is even actually a greater threat in my view—and more likely to happen– than an armed insurrection although that also could happen. The Democrats would be the ones crying foul, but Republicans would ignore them and say ‘we told you so. What is good for the goose is good for the gander.’ A huge crisis of confidence in free and fair elections would follow, and who knows where that will take us.”

“But you are speculating. This has not happened yet.” I protested. “Do you see any signs of hope or a way out of this?”

“That  will have to wait until next week.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Clancy had promised at our last coffee that he would focus on the political side of the picture rather than the sociological and cultural side, which we had been talking about. I turned to him and said, “Ok, so how does politics enter into the picture of what  you described as the ‘Great Alienation’?”

Clancy put down his coffee and eagerly responded. “Well, as we have been discussing, Trump is more  a symptom, than a cause. We have talked about the reasons—lingering racism, the feeling of losing ground by so many in the white working class and others, how technology enables us to listen to only our side of the story and confirms our own biases. Trump has keen marketing instincts, saw an opportunity, and jumped in. But all this did not start with Trump. You have to go back a a long way.”

“Like how long?”

“Like the Civil War. Yes, the North won that war but within only a decade or so the South had clawed back with Jim Crow laws, and lynching was commonplace. Our country is still fighting the Civil War. It took almost 100 years to get rid of Jim Crow, but issues remain. Slavery was our national curse-and the vestiges of that national curse live on.”

I asked, “But the Republicans have been reformers in the past. They were the ones who were against slavery.  It was the party of Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt, for heaven’s sake.”

“Well, I am a political scientist and sociologist, not a historian, but the two parties have changed over time. Since Franklin Roosevelt, the parties have divided along the lines of liberal versus conservative. But here is the difference today: The Republican Party has been radicalized and no longer can be described as conservative. The “new” Republican Party is populist and has been able to capture a large part of what used to be the base of the Democratic Party. For this you can thank two people, Newt Gingrich and Carl Rove.”

“Well,” I commented,” I can remember both of those guys along with Lee Atwater, the guitar playing South Carolinian, who was behind George H W Bush’s plan to seal the deal with Southern voters who before Lyndon Johnson had been Democrats.”

Clancy shook his head in dismay  and continued, “Gingrich is the guy who realized that Republicans as ‘Mr. Nice Guy’ was not working, and something had to change. He had been a college professor, was smart, and saw the opportunity to steel the Democrats base in the South through a scorched earth, take no prisoners approach, starting with the disaffected, white Southerner. Remember when Johnson signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Johnson commented that this would be the last time the Democrats would win the South. He was right. That act and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 for the first time made America truly a democracy for all people, not just white people, but it also created winners and losers. White voters in the South were the losers. Gingrich realized this and believed if they could be mobilized and motivated, bringing the disaffected Southerner into the Republican fold could change the political landscape. But he also knew that to accomplish this he had to turn up the heat and in his words, ‘get nasty.’ But it was not just white Southerners. This message resonated with a lot of people all over the U.S., not all of whom were from the white, working class.”

“And why Carl Rove?”

“Carl Rove was the political consultant who was able to convince the movers and shakers of the Republican Party around the time of the presidency of George W. Bush that courting the swing voters was less productive than turning out the base. To do that you had to throw them red meat. And that has been their approach for the last several elections. It took some time for the message to harden, but it has gotten more extreme over the years, peaking with Fox News daily diatribes and the Trump rallies and tweets. I am sad to say, it has worked.”

“Yes,” I responded, “And this antagonistic approach began when Republican talk radio was taking off with the likes of Rush Limbaugh, and Fox News television was just getting started. All this helped get the message across and radicalize and motivate the Republican base, right?”

“That is right, and I date 1994, the year Newt Gingrich got elected as Speaker of the House as the turning point. He had been in Congress as a representative from Georgia in a district near Atlanta since the late 1970s, but his election to a leadership role in 1994 changed the rhetoric and tone of the Republican Party.  That year the composition of the House changed to a Republican majority for the first time in decades. Some 52 seats changed from Democratic to Republican. Gingrich instilled a combative approach in the Republican Party, where hateful language and hyper-partisanship became commonplace, and where democratic norms were abandoned. Gingrich frequently questioned the patriotism of Democrats, called them corrupt, compared them to fascists, and accused them of wanting to destroy the United States. Gingrich also oversaw several major government shutdowns. All this is spelled out in a recent book by Dana Milbank, an op ed writer for the Washington Post, called The Destructionists. I highly recommend it.”

“What about the Tea Party?” I asked, “They seem to be big factor in all this.”

“You are correct,” he replied. “While the seeds for Tea Party were sown much earlier as the tone of the party changed to hostility, anger, and self righteousness, the Tea Party did not become a major factor until 2010, the midterm election during Obama’s first term. In theory the Tea Party described itself as being for fiscal responsibility, low taxes and against federal social programs. They adopted the Gingrich approach of forcing  government shutdowns and voting against anything that the Democrats wanted to do even if the legislation would not have affected them. The message was to make Obama and the Democrats look bad and incompetent, and as you know, they were behind the efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, whatever it took.”

“Well,” I chimed in, “I surely remember those days, and frankly I thought racism was behind a lot of the rhetoric, and ‘fiscal responsibility’ was the cover  that they used.  They hated Obama. And the Tea Party was funded largely by the Koch Brothers and other Republican fat cats and right wing, so called think tanks, right?”

“Yes, and while they never were a whole lot of Congressional, formal members of the Tea Party—only around 60—they had a huge impact on the party, especially in terms of the in-your-face tone and refusal to vote for anything Democrats wanted to pass. They also voted as a block, so they had to be taken seriously. Now the Tea Party has sort of faded away since the entire Republican delegation on both sides of the aisle has adopted their aggressive posture. There essentially are no more moderates left. You can call Romney and Collins moderate, but they fall in line on almost every vote. The party has been totally radicalized. Look who you have sniffing out presidential opportunities in 2024—Cruz, Hawley, and DeSantis, all trying to out-Trump Trump.”

“But all this was going on during the George W Bush years; and despite his huge mistake on Iraq, he does not come across to  me as a radical or malcontent. I remember he campainged initially as a ‘compassionate conservative,’ and he did select some good people like Condelessa Rice and Colin Powell.”

Clancy nodded in agreement, commenting, “Well, as you know Nine-Eleven changed everything. I agree that W. was not a bad person or a product of the alienated Right, though his presidency was borderline disaster and he did not discourage the seething Right Wing hostility. But it was really the reaction to having an African American president that fueled the fires of hatred, and this  heated up in 2008 with the Obama Administration. Eight years later Trump saw the opening and jumped on it.”

“Well,” I remarked, “One of the great ironies in history is that brains behind the W. presidency was Dick Cheney, whom we liberals despised. Then in 2022 along comes his conservative daughter, Liz, who becomes Exhibit A in profiles in courage and is a star of the Select Committee investigating January 6. Go figure. Plus her father supports her!”

“Yes, and this should be a lesson that life is full of ironies, that you should never give up on anyone, and that redemption does happen, albeit not as often as we would like.” 

Clancy glanced at his watched and  noted that he had to leave for an appointment. “But before I leave,” he said, “Keep in mind that all the seething hostility, which became the Trump base, was moving from mainly under-the-radar to mainstream in 2016, the year Trump got elected.”

He paused for a moment and the with a serious tone, replied, “Joe, the situation is not all bad. Don’t give up hope. Remember that Hillary was a very controversial candidate and actually got more popular votes than Trump did. A less controversial candidate probably would have won. Biden swamped Trump in 2020 in both the popular vote and the electoral college, which is very biased toward the red states, as we all know. So, it is not all doom and gloom. Biden has managed to get some very important legislation passed. Some swing voters are put off by the Supreme Court’s ruling on abortion and the radical laws passed by red state legislatures. The House January 6 Commission investigation is continuing, Trump is being investigated by the FBI and the attorney general of Georgia, and he is being sued by numerous people and companies. It now looks like he held on to a lot of top secret papers at Mar-a-Lago, maybe even nuclear secrets, which he might have been thinking about selling to the highest bidder. Who knows? But at least it is getting the attention of swing voters. So, I believe it is not a given that the Republicans will take over both houses of Congress though still I realize  many pundits think that it is probable.”

“I agree. All is not lost, at least not yet. But you have to admit: It is a scary time. But isn’t the real issue here that democracy as we know it is at risk and that the times we are in are so divided, that the country could go to the dark side, and that we could lose our democratic system? What about January 6 and what that all means? And all the ‘Stop the Steal’ talk?”

“That, my friend, will be the subject of our next conversation.”

 

 

 

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Clancy was already seated outside Starbucks at a table when I arrived, sipping his coffee and motioned for me to sit in the empty chair. I rushed in, got my coffee and returned. After the usual pleasantries, I got straight to the bottom line.

“Look,” I said to Clancy, “I get it. I get why many in the white working class are upset having lost their security and place in the world, and in many cases their income and benefits have gone down. I get it that many feel dissed and that this is partly our fault as ‘coastal elitists.’ I still do not understand why they landed on Trump as their savior, but I will put that aside for the moment. What I want to know is this: What are the underlying causes behind this troubled time we are in?”

“Funny you ask,” he replied, “I am just putting some finishing touches on a talk that I am preparing for a luncheon at the Cosmos Club next week.”

Clancy paused for a moment, wiped off his glasses and took a long sip from his Starbucks mug.

“Ok,” he said, smiling, “Are you ready to take notes?”

“Not exactly but go ahead anyway.”

“There are four reasons, some of which are interrelated.  First, the civil rights movement. The second is Jack Welch. Third is the collapse of labor unions, and perhaps most important, the fourth is technology and how it has affected transformed the way we live.”

I quickly jumped in, “The civil rights movement? How could that be?”

“You grew up in Nashville in the 1950s, right? All schools were segregated at that time. African Americans had to sit in the back of the bus and use separate bathrooms and all the rest. If you were a poor or working class, white person, you could admit that your life was far from perfect, but at least you had others you could look down on. Were it not for the civil rights movement it would have been more of the same. The civil rights movement was the beginning of a sea change, eventually electing an African American as President of the United States. Surely there is a long way still to go to achieve racial justice, but it is no longer so easy for white people to conclude they are part of a superior race. Make no mistake, however, racial hatred remains a huge issue and a major factor in motivating hate groups like the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, and many others supporting Trump. That is what all the fuss concerning CRT and ‘Black Lives Matter’ is about. Disaffected white people are fighting back. That is why if Trump or his wannabees win in 2022 and 2024, it could be a grim day for America. I should point out, also, that it was not only working class people who were and are racists but a lot of other white people at all income levels. Racism in America continues to be a national sickness.”

“Well, one of the things that I am most proud of in my life is playing a very small role in that effort. My senior year at Davidson College I led a march in Charlotte voicing support for the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and Embry and I worked on the front lines of the movement in southwest Georgia in 1966.”

“Another reason,” he chuckled, “that you could be considered the enemy.”

“Ok, but what does Jack Welch have to do with it?”

“Jack Welch was head of General Electric for about 20 years starting in 1981 and was considered by many the greatest CEO in the country, some have said ‘of all time.’ He was responsible for making GE one of the most profitable companies in the world, constantly beating financial forecasts. He was revered throughout the business world. Obviously he did a lot of things right, but his business style was ruthless toward underperforming employees, firing the ‘least productive’ 10 percent of employees every year. He was known as ‘Neutron Jack,’ kill all the workers and leave the factories in place. Many other companies followed his lead, focusing mainly on increasing quarterly earnings and dismissing underperforming employees. Compensation for CEOs and high level managers skyrocketed while pay for the average worker stagnated or even diminished. The result was a huge cut in jobs, including well-paying jobs with benefits and huge disparities in income, which is partly responsible for the vast income gap today. The top one percent accounts for almost 20 percent of all household income.”

“But,” I said, “Surely it was not just Jack Welch. It was a lot of other CEOs too.”

“Of course, I just use ‘Neutron Jack’ as an example of a change in philosophy of putting shareholders ahead of employees and focusing almost exclusively on the bottom line. The social contract that existed in the U.S. between labor and management in the 1950s and 1960s which rewarded loyalty and treated workers as corporate ‘family’ was replaced by every man for himself and let the chips fall.”

“So what about labor unions?” I asked, “And why have they shrunk so much?”

“Well, it is remarkable how much they have shrunk and how irrelevant they have become in most industries. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, about 35% of the U.S. workforce were in labor unions, many of which were very powerful—both in achieving higher wages, more benefits and better retirement for their employees, and also, they were powerful politically. Now the percentage is only around three percent, and the most active and effective unions tend to be public sector unions. And keep in mind, unions took elections seriously, they got out their members to vote, and they voted for Democrats. That is not happening today. If the unions were still strong, we would not be in the mess we are in with the MAGA world.”

“How did this happen?”

“There are a lot of reasons including mismanagement, graft, and corruption in some unions. But the main factors boil down to three things, first, an aggressive anti-union posture in many companies beginning in the early 1980s and continuing today, second, more legislation in states for right to work and other anti-union laws, and third, and, I think, most important, the global economy and the relative ease of moving factories and jobs overseas. If unions appear to be a threat, management can threaten to close operations and move them to China or some other Asian or South American country, and many have done just that. Unions have no recourse.”

“Do you think that unions will come back and will they make a difference?

“I am not able to answer that question yet. I certainly hope so. We need strong, progressive unions. Let’s table it for discussion later.”

“So, what about technology?”

“Well, of course, this one is a no-brainer and has affected everything we do. First the impact on jobs.  Elevator operators, secretaries, bank tellers, and newspaper print setters have almost disappeared, along with countless other jobs, but on the other hand, new jobs are being created every day. The challenge is that many of the new jobs require retraining and often more skills, and our country does not have the infrastructure in place to provide the retraining and proper education. Also, it may require moving from a town or city to another location some distance away where the new jobs are being created. We are not doing a good job at that.”

Clancy scared off a hungry pigeon eating the crumbs from a  pastry under the  table and continued,”There is one other impact of technology that is responsible and that is television, more specifically cable television. Almost everybody has cable tv today allowing them to watch whatever they want to. There used to be only three and then four broadcast television channels–NBC, ABC, CBS and then Fox. We Americans all saw the same commentators every night, and all broadcast networks were generally middle of the road, mainstream. You could also throw PBS into the mix though the viewers were fewer. Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, David Brinkley, Chet Huntley, Robin McNeil, Tom Brokow–you know the names. While cable actually started in the late 1940s,  it was not until the 1980s  that it began to become mainstream. CNN premiered  in 1980. Fox News and MSNBC did not become live until 1994. Now people watch what they want to, and it is usually the news coverage they agree with. We do not see the news from the other side.”

“Well, I favor MSNBC,” I volunteered,” And do not think it is biased at all.”

Clancy laughed and then added, “Do not forget about Facebook, Twitter and all the social media. This is also relatively new. Facebook did not become live until 2004. I will tell you without  all the revolution in technology it would be a different story. Somebody like Trump could probably not get elected.”

“All of this is very interesting, and I think spot on, but I also think there is something you are missing.”

“Really?”

“I may be a bit naïve, but my image of the ‘old fashioned,’ blue collar worker is an Archie Bunker kind of guy that had a decent factory job, maybe in the industrial Midwest, who got paid a living wage, had decent benefits, good health care insurance and a generous, ‘defined benefit pension.’ His wife stayed home and kept house and raised the kids, and they lived in a modest home that they owned in a modest neighborhood. It might not have been fancy, but they could get by, maybe go out to a movie or a restaurant every week or so, and every few years they could take a beach vacation. They felt pretty good about their lives. Many of their children were able to get college degrees and jump to the middle class.

“Fast forward to the 21^st Century and we find something different. Now to get by you need two incomes in a household. The stay-at-home mom is now working at Giant or Safeway or in some kind of service job. Pensions have been replaced by 401Ks, health care coverage is lower, and the factory worker is now working at a Home Depot or Target. Families are dealing with a lot more stress, trying to work, and at the same time to keep a family together, often without affordable day care for kids or affordable rents or housing prices. This added stress has been a factor in opioid addiction and deaths along with mental health issues leading to even more stress and unhappiness. For all these reasons, a lot of working class people are not happy campers. So are others who may have white collar jobs but also are struggling. I read the other day where almost two-thirds of the working population live paycheck to paycheck. This explains some of the anger and the need for something different. Along comes Donald Trump, recognizing the unhappiness in people’s lives and promises to shatter the old way of doing things and to punish the elitist snobs and arrogant uppity ups that have no clue as to how ‘ordinary people’ live.”

Clancy smiled and replied, “I think I will add a fifth reason.”

As we parted, he replied, “But if we are talking about the rise of Trump and Trumpism, it did not begin with the Donald. It began with the Newt. Next time we get together let’s talk about how the Republican populist rebellion began about 30 years ago led Newt Gingrich and  and his ‘contract with America’ and fueled by energy from the Tea Party. See you next week.”

 

 

 

 

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Note to readers: Here begins a new miniseries on the political issues of the day. Clancy is not a real person and any similarity between persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

Now that the guru has departed, it is sadly time to return to the real world. But I have fabulous news! The guy who moved into his apartment is a retired political science/sociology professor at one of Washington’s most prestigious universities and a well known author and pundit on political issues. I met him at the bar on the lobby level of my apartment house, and we hit it off immediately. We agreed to talk over coffee at Starbucks the next day. I told him I would be sharing our conversations on my blog, which he agreed to if I did not use his last name so that he could speak more freely. Naturally I agreed to his request since he does not have a last name anyway, being a figment of my imagination.

Clancy is probably in his early 70s, balding, thin gray hair, a tad overweight with a wry smile and occasionally a twinkle in his eyes. After getting our coffee, we found a table outside on Connecticut Avenue looking out on the entrance to the National Zoo.

I started off the conversation, “Clancy, thanks so much for taking the time to chat. My first question is just how scared should we be that our country seems to be teetering toward authoritarianism?”

Clancy took a sip of his latte and replied, “Here is what we know: Following the trouncing of Liz Cheney in the Wyoming House race this week, Trump has now demonstrated that he has complete control of a Republican Party that has lost any resemblance to the Grand Old Party of yore. It is now a populist party anchored in part by the white, alienated working class and funded by superrich supporters who are aligned with Trump’s agenda and style. Traditional Republicans in the House and the Senate, except for Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, have cowardly thrown in the towel and become sycophants, afraid that they will be ‘primaried out’ if they speak up. It is a critical time for our country.”

I interrupted, “But what I really want to know is what do his white, working class supporters see in this guy? When he was president, he did nothing to help create jobs, expand health care benefits, increase the minimum wage, or provide more family support with expanded child day care or improved education. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth and has lived the life of Riley his entire life. He has treated workers unfairly and is anti-union. The CFO of his company just copped a plea on something like a dozen criminal charges related to the Trump organization. I do not know how many homes he has but read today that his Versailles palace in Mar-a-Lago has something like 59 bedrooms and 33 bathrooms. He is a self-absorbed narcissist who cares only about himself. What is going on? Why would working class people be attracted to somebody like him?”

Clancy paused for a second and responded,” I think part of what is going on is this: ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend.’”

“But why is the enemy the ‘coastal elite’ and others who are liberals and progressives? Why does there appear to be so much anger toward people who are well educated, have professional jobs, and are financially secure? You know, people like us. Why is there so much anger toward people who support such things as increasing the minimum wage, making health care more affordable, providing child day care, increasing tax credits for the working poor, raising taxes on the rich, providing income support and affordable housing, and trying to make the country more egalitarian? These are the programs that benefit the working class.”

“I think there are two main reasons,” He answered. “The first is that our country is quickly transitioning from being white dominated country to a multiracial one. Many in the white working class believe that this has come largely at their expense and that the government programs have mainly benefited ‘the class below them,’ especially Blacks, Latinos, other people of color and non-European immigrants. Part of what is driving this is old fashioned tribalism, which in the U.S. unfortunately also means old fashioned racism. The vestiges of slavery—our great national sin—live on. Clawing back after the Civil War in the South ushered in the Jim Crow era. It is happening again. This time around it is Custer’s Last Stand: Fight to the finish.

“The other reason, I think, has to do with us progressives and liberals who have turned up our noses at the white working class. Yes, Democrats are partly responsible. Whether intentional or not, we have given the impression that we look down on these ‘ignorant, prejudiced, Trump supporters.’ They feel we have dissed them, and I think they are right.”

I chimed in, “Well, I know that I am prejudiced toward Trump supporters. If I had a child or a close relative who was a Trump supporter, I do not know what I would do. I do not have any friends who I know are Trump supporters. I do not know how a Trump supporter could ever be a friend. I can’t imagine even knowing anyone who participated in the January 6 insurrection. Hillary was right. They are deplorables.”

“So, you admit that you are as responsible for this mess as much as anyone else?”

“I guess so.”

“Yes, he sighed, “But you are hardly unique. Almost everyone I know thinks pretty much like you do, and I suppose that is the problem, isn’t it? We have divided ourselves into two tribes. Do you feel superior to all of the white working class?”

“No, no!” I responded. “ I admit that everyone who is a Trump supporter is not racist. In fact, I do have some experience in this area. Embry and I lived in a low income, white, working class neighborhood in 1970, which I have written about in Hard Living on Clay Street. We got to know our neighbors very well and respected them and became friends. Some were fighting demons with alcohol addiction and mental illness, and many were struggling financially and psychologically, but essentially, they were good people and were dealing with the same issues of human relationships, economic security, and meaning in life that many in our country are dealing with.”

Clancy interrupted, “So you think the people you wrote about would be Trump supporters today if they were still alive?”

“Probably, and that is why I am so confused. The people I wrote about were not “deplorables,” They were not “bad people.” And from that experience I think I can understand their sense of alienation. Yet here we are—demonizing and dehumanizing one another. Not a pretty picture.”

“Yes,” he replied. My historian friends tell me that the times right now are eerily like the times preceding the Civil War where we have divided ourselves into two opposing camps with little room for compromise, making amends, or trying to understand the other side.”

“What are we going to do about this mess? How are we going to get out of it?”

“The fear now is that it may be too late. Many fear that if Trump is indicted or convicted, that this will be the spark that ignites the fire of revolution.”

“Yes,” I replied, “But it is not just Trump. DeSantis, Cruz, and Hawley are waiting in the wings. Sarah Palin is back. Marjorie Taylor Greene has entered the fray, all waiting for Trump to stumble and to grab the mantle. None of these people, like Trump, have a philosophy of governance or legislative programs. They are opportunists, just like Trump, seeing a vacuum and opportunity and waiting to take advantage of it….”

I paused and then looked him straight in the eye. “So, should we be scared?”

“Yes, we should be scared. What Trump and his wannabees have in common is a thirst for power and contempt for democracy. Human nature being what it is, there is an appetite for non-democratic governments ruled by strongmen. Many great countries have fallen into the trap of worshipping a powerful ruler—Germany, Italy, Spain, Russia, China, and many others. Remember democracy is a new idea. Before the American experiment monarchies and dictatorships were the only options.”

“Is our day in the sun coming to an end? Is democracy on the ropes?”

“We can talk more about that next time we get together and more about what I think is behind the ‘Great Alienation’ as I call it.”

 

 

 

 

 

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