two brief comments

The video of the high school kids from Covington, Kentucky, the native American drummers and the Black Hebrew Isrealites all milling about and semi-confronting each other is a great example America. The articles in the news drew all kinds of conclusions about the meaning of the video. My opinion is that in these types of confrontations the only information exchanged are charged sound-bites, slurs and retorts. The world views of the three groups represented are so different that only conflict can come from confrontation. No one can explain to a teenager what the history of the Native Americans or the African Americans has been just as neither of those groups knows what the world view of a high schooler from the south has been. To depict this video as meaning anything but confusion based on disharmonious world views is to make way too much of it. Each of these groups are part of America and the diversity that makes America great. As I've said in a previous blog, so far in the history of the world, no democracy has been formed and survived, in a country of diverse cultures. We need to work to do this. The conclusion from this video should only be that our country is made up of different groups who all need to tolerate one another and accept that different people see the world differently.

The State of the Union will not be a statement about the 'state of the union' but a statement about the 'state of mind' of the madman representing us. To deliver a statement on the state of our country, one must know some facts about our country now compared to previous times. Trump doesn't use facts, so he can make no accurate comparison. Facts and lies collide. He will stand up before the world and lie to everyone without blinking and call it a factual summary of our country. Who would have imagined this could ever happen in America? One comedian did and said, "In America anyone can be elected president. That's the trouble!"

Lastly, this will be my last blog for a while as my wife and I head off to explore the foundations of western civilization including Greece where the idea of democracy began. When we return in March, perhaps the government will be open, the president gone, and our allies in Europe will once again be talking to us. Perhaps Putin will have stopped fiddling around with our elections. Perhaps the Trailblazers, who are starting to play terrific basketball, will be leading the west. And perhaps all those wearing MAGA hats will have taken them off having realized how great America is already. And how much better it will be when we start welcoming the refugees of the world and making this a truly multicultural nation where all religions and cultures are integrated into the new world bastion of democracy.