Can’t you people take a joke?

Carlton E. Spitzer

    Perhaps the most reviled practical joker in Maryland’s history is Jacob Gibson, who pulled off his notorious stunt almost 200 years ago to frighten the 300 inhabitants of Saint Michaels during the War of 1812.

    A blacksmith by trade who’d acquired land and become a plantation owner on Sharp’s Island, Gibson was shunned by the elite gentry whom he disdained as, “those stiff-necked, down-your-nose scholars.”

     Gibson’s speech was brusque, his manner caustic, and he belittled anyone who disagreed with him.  His frequent letters to the editor of The Republican Star criticized his neighbors, local leaders and national figures with equal passion.   Some were so vitriolic the editor refused to publish them.

      His defense was a cynical smile, a hearty laugh, and a perverse sense of humor.  Had his reputation not preceded him on April 18, 1813, Gibson might have received much sympathy from the people in St. Michaels, for the feared British Fleet Commander John Borlase Warren had invaded Sharp’s Island and kept Gibson captive for five days, while permitting his men to take from Gibson whatever they chose.  But no person was injured and no building was destroyed.  Upon his release, Gibson was paid a handsome sum in British Bank Notes to compensate for the cattle and sheep and other possessions Warren’s men had taken before they returned to their ships anchored in the Chesapeake.

      Alone and brooding, Gibson drank a copious amount of rum as he devised his greatest practical joke.  He continued to imbibe from kegs his slaves rolled aboard a barge as they set sail up San Domingo Creek toward St. Michaels.  Gibson took off his red bandana and hung it on the mast.  At his slurred command, slaves rapped a muffled drum roll on the top of empty rum kegs. 

      On patrol that day, Captain Robert Banning was greatly alarmed to see a barge flying what he thought was the dreaded Union Jack, with muffled drums signaling attack.  He rushed ashore, alerting citizens who dashed house to house, farm to farm.  Farmers fled their fields and drove off their livestock to keep them from the British.  Militias were assembled.  Arms were loaded.  Families summoned slaves to pack wagons hurriedly, preparing to flee.  

      But when the barge came into view, drums beating more loudly, someone yelled out from shore that it was a barge recently built by Captain Richard Spencer of Beverly, and that the crew was a group of ragged slaves under the command of a sloshed Jacob Gibson whose red bandana was tied to the mast.

      Dragged ashore, Gibson was manhandled and roundly cursed.  Had not militia officers intervened, there is little doubt he would have been seriously injured.

      Holding him fast, people screamed in his ear: “Did he not appreciate the dire consequences of his ruse?  Look around you, Gibson.  Wagons are packed.  Children are crying.  Livestock must be rounded up.”

      Laughing and slapping his knee, Gibson bellowed, “Can’t you good people take a joke?” When they closed in to pummel him again, he protested plaintively with wringing hands that he intended no harm, and was only trying to spare them the fate he himself had suffered.     

         Gibson’s story was rejected, his joke despised, and the people left him there in a heap in his torn clothing torn and bloody nose.

         A young man smiled down at the prankster, assuring Gibson with a bright smile that he was on his way to give a full report to the editor.  Gibson could read all about his practical joke in The Republican Star.

                                                    ***

Hypocrisy rode the segregated Freedom Train

By Carlton E. Spitzer

     Two years after World War II, and 7 years before school integration was declared mandatory, attorney general Tom Clark persuaded President Harry Truman to send a “Freedom Train” to southern cities, following the courageous example of civil rights leader James Farmer, whose Freedom Riders stood up to segregationists and reminded them our nation was built on the principle of equality.

     It is difficult today to comprehend the depth of their conviction, or the magnitude of their courage.

     The KKK’s  inhumanity to blacks had not been diluted one iota by the sterling performance of black troops who defended freedom in World War II.   Blacks who came home with Purple Hearts, Silver Stars and Battle Ribbons were expected to resume the second-class citizenship they and their parents and grandparents had endured before the war.  But these veterans were defiantly determined to take their rightful place in the mainstream of American society.

     When Tom Clark sketched out his plans for a Freedom Train at the White House, whites were demonstrating in city streets - in the north and in the south -  against any suggestion schools’ should be integrated.  The idea that a white patient might share a hospital room with a black was totally unthinkable.  Segregation dominated political philosophy and action, and was as evident in Chicago and Buffalo as it was in Memphis and Dallas. 

     So it was no small undertaking when Clark assembled representatives of business, labor, religion, the news media, the American Legion and Daughters of the American Revolution, to promote his plans for a Freedom Train that would carry historic documents to cities throughout the land, including the Emancipation Proclamation, the Bill of Rights, and the Charter of The United Nations. 

    Winthrop W. Aldrich, chairman of the Chase National Bank, raised private funds through a coalition called the American Heritage Foundation, to still rumors  that public money would be used.  The only African-American member of the coalition was Walter White, executive secretary of the NAACP.  Black writer Langston Hughes wrote a poem, “The Ballad of the Freedom Train,” which protested the “white version” of freedom and democracy and pleaded for racial equality. He noted that every Marine who guarded the Freedom Train was white.

     Clark understood their anguish, and was persistent.  “When you find a man who is prejudiced against some certain group because of color, race or religion,” he said, “ you can set it down that he is an ignorant man.”  Powerful words from a cabinet officer in 1947.  That whites and blacks would travel on the train together further infuriated segregationists.

    Southern members of Congress were outraged that Truman, a native of Missouri,  would “humiliate them” by sending the train to their cities, and were determined to  enforce historic Jim Crow laws that strictly segregated whites from blacks, blocked blacks’ right to vote, and excluded them from adequate education and meaningful employment.  The war was over.  But blacks were still blacks.

    A new General Electric diesel engine, “The Spirit of ’76,” pulled three exhibit cars decorated in red, white and blue.  Pullman cars segregated staff. The train was warmly received in northeast cities,  but was banned by city fathers in Memphis and Selma.  Famous black achievers came aboard for a day or two, among them Joe Louis, the “Brown Bomber” heavyweight boxing champion; educator W. E. B. Du Bois; singer Marion Anderson, United Nations negotiator Ralph Bunche.  Former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt  rode the train for several days to show her support for desegregation.

      But the little secret no one acknowledged until long after the train had been retired was that the only time blacks and whites actually mixed was when they exited the Freedom Train and lined up together to hear children sing a song composed by the great Irving Berlin to commemorate the traveling exhibit: “Inside the Freedom Train you’ll find a precious freight; those words of liberty, the documents that made us great.”  Robert Parker, who worked as a waiter on the train, and later helped to integrate the Senate Dining Room, tells us in his book, Capital Hill in Black and White, that whites and blacks actually rode and ate in separate cars.  And in southern cities that allowed the train to stop, they stood outside in segregated lines as well.

       The hurt and humiliation of our black brothers and sisters can only be imagined by white citizens today, especially young people who did not live through those degrading times.  The conviction of a Tom Clark, the courage of a Jim Farmer, the wisdom of a Harry Truman, all made the Freedom Train of 1947 a worthy precursor of Congressional legislation that eventually desegregated schools and hospitals, opened the doors of colleges and universities to black students, and executive suites and professions to qualified black candidates.  But it was not accomplished easily, or neatly, or without blood on our streets.  The remnants of those Jim Crow attitudes still surface from time to time at universities, in business circles, and on Capitol Hill, making us cringe.  We have come a long way but still have a long road to travel. 

      Hypocrisy rode that segregated Freedom Train in 1947.  Too much of it is evident in our society today.

                                                              ************

Synopsis: INSIDE UNCLE ROSY’S WHITE HOUSE

A monologue for performance on the life of Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Playwright, Carlton E. Spitzer

Produced by The Hugh Gregory Gallagher Motivational Theatre, Inc.

This fast-moving play covers FDR’s presidency, 1933-1945, focusing on his personal relationships, dynamic leadership, physical disability, and extraordinary ability to restore confidence among a citizenry devastated by the 1929 stock market crash.  His bold initiatives immediately upon taking office bolstered a nation in shock, with revolution in the air.  Within his first 100 days he established programs to build schools and highways and repair the nation’s infrastructure that gave steady work to millions of unemployed citizens.   FDR restored confidence in bank deposits, stabilized food prices, and calmed a fearful nation by his positive attitude, assuring the people they had nothing to fear but fear itself.  His fire side chats kept people informed and encouraged. 

The play reflects on FDR’s privileged youth, his experiences at Groton and Harvard, and old classmates who felt he “betrayed his class” by helping the poor and destitute, and creating old-age security.  The actor speaks to the audience, confiding anecdotes and personal opinions never before dramatized.  At other times, the actor converses candidly with unseen colleagues, such as Louie Howe and Winston Churchill.  At other moments, the actor is at faux microphones, delivering excerpts of inaugural addresses, fire side chats, and key speeches.  FDR’s attempt to pack the Supreme Court, and his deteriorating health as he led the war effort from his wheelchair are fully revealed.

FDR was devoted to the development of Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation.  He loved being there among other “residents” recovering from polio, where he was affectionately addressed as, “Uncle Rosy.”  He retreated to Warm Springs following  his exhausting 14,000 mile journey to Yalta to negotiate post-war arrangements with Churchill and Stalin.  And ended his days there, preparing a speech for the United Nations he created.

The audience will learn many new things about the personal life of the 32^nd president, and the many lessons he provided for today.

  

                                                    

Benjamin O. Davis helped desegregate military

O. Davis had been on foreign military assignments three years and was in the Philippines in 1968 when Dr. King was murdered in Memphis in April and Bobby Kennedy shot dead in Los Angeles two months later.

       Yet he must be counted among the fighters for justice and equality.

The tall, disciplined soldier had been breaking down the wall of discrimination for 32 years by demanding at every turn that he and the men he commanded be judged by the content of their character and performance, not the color of their skin.

        Silence surrounded Davis the four years he attended West Point, 1932 through 1936.  No one spoke to him other than to give a direct order.  He lived alone, studied alone, took his meals alone in a dining hall filled with classmates. 

       The native of Washington, D.C. who grew up in Cleveland, Ohio was handsome, bright and charming, the son of a career military officer.  He wanted nothing more than to graduate with good marks and become a 2^nd lieutenant in the U.S. Army.  His dream was to fly.

       He’d barely started his plebe year when he read a bulletin board notice of a “special meeting at the sinks” that evening.  The sinks were lavatories in the basement of the dormitory.  As he hurried down back steps a voice with a distinctive southern drawl stopped him cold:  “What are we gonna’ do about the damn nigra?”  The purpose of the meeting was to make life so miserable for Davis he’d quit in frustration.   His classmates decided on the “silent treatment,” not a new device to push unwanted cadets out of the academy, but cruelly applied to Davis for being born black. 

       When Agatha, his fiancé visited, she was included in the silent treatment.  The couple kept their eyes on the prize and endured it all.  He ranked 35th in his graduating class and applied for flight training.  Sorry, Lt. Davis, blacks aren’t eligible for flight training. You are assigned to the infantry.  

       Ben and Agatha married and traveled to Fort Benning, Georgia.  The silent treatment followed them.  Ignored by fellow officers and their wives and barred from the officer’s club with the silent acquiescence of the base commander, Ben and Agatha supported each other.  Strict segregation in the nearby town of Columbus and visible presence of the KKK discouraged thoughts of an evening stroll outside the gates.

       Davis told friends in 1990 the best week he ever spent at West Point was more than 50 years after he graduated.  He returned a much decorated Lt. General with Agatha on his arm and smiled with pride and some amusement to see his photo included among outstanding West Point graduates between 1819 and 1950 on, ‘The Great Train of Tradition’.” 

        He’d long forgiven misguided and bigoted classmates in the 1930s and faculty members that permitted their injustices.  But scars of discrimination remained throughout his life.  He relished overseas assignments because he was accepted on the basis of his ability and character in other countries and discrimination was less onerous on U.S. military bases far from home. 

       World War II persuaded our 32^nd president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, to launch the “Tuskegee Experiment” that for the first time welcomed black flight cadets.  The First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, was passenger in the back seat of a Piper Cub flown around Tuskegee by a black pilot, Charles “Chief” Anderson.  Her public support discouraged efforts of Southern legislators to kill the program.  Davis got his wings in the first class of black aviators in 1941.  He commanded the 99th Fighter Squadron and the 332nd Fighter Group in combat over Africa and Italy in 1943.  The “Red Tails,” as they were known, lost very few bombers they escorted. 

       A dwindling number of Tuskegee Airmen still meet today, often at the Air and Space Museum in the nation’s capital where General Davis narrated a film for the “Black Wings” exhibit he helped put together on the mezzanine level. 

      Davis kept breaking down barriers of discrimination within the military his whole career.  In the summer of 1949 he was the first black admitted to the Air War College.  He commanded a racially mixed flying unit in Korea and later headed the 13^th Air Force in Taiwan.    He dreamed equality would one day be the norm and that a special month to honor black achievers would no longer be appropriate. 

        We elected a mixed race president in 2008 and have begun a new day in America.  But we still have a long road to travel to achieve Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream of a colorblind nation.   Desegregation’s heroes have often been hidden from view and deserve recognition.  Benjamin O. Davis is one of them.

                                                       ***

                

Time to review FDR’s economic bill of rights

Carlton E. Spitzer

     Even as war continued to rage in Europe and the Pacific in 1944, our 32^nd president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, set forth an Economic Bill of Rights  to guide post-war reconstruction at home and throughout a shattered world.

     His State of the Union message focused on rebuilding cities and the peaceful interdependence of nations.  We cannot be content, he said, if even one-tenth of mankind is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.  He hoped for an enduring peace monitored by the United Nations.

      FDR did not live to see the end of the war in Europe, although he knew it was near and had met with Britain’s Winston Churchill and Russia’s Joseph Stalin early in 1945 at Yalta to negotiate post-war arrangements, albeit not to his satisfaction.  Use of the atomic bomb, which would end the war with Japan the following August, was authorized by his successor, Harry Truman, who had not known of its existence before he entered the Oval Office after FDR’s death at Warm Springs that April. 

       As assistant secretary of the navy in World War I, FDR admired  Woodrow Wilson’s League of Nations and was deeply disappointed the United States failed to support it.  He saw development of the United Nations following World War II as a means of implementing his second Bill of Rights throughout the world. 

        Today America is winding down two wars fought concurrently for dubious justifications and constantly changing objectives.  As America  reduces its military spending, our leaders should review FDR’s message and concentrate on helping people who’ve been dominated by dictators the U.S. supported to maintain the flow of oil.   Those people now risk their lives seeking freedom.

         Although it’s doubtful that the present Congress, at war with itself, can unify behind a common set of principles, voters must insist that their representatives put nation before politics and principles before campaign rhetoric.  That is the standard the electorate has a right to expect.   

        Elected 80 years ago in the midst of a devastating depression, FDR stabilized banking and gave hope to a desperate nation by telling citizens they had nothing to fear but fear itself.  He had learned that lesson personally, having lost use of his legs to polio at age 39.

        The world has changed, in great measure because of misguided military adventures.  But it is not too late for today’s leaders to put nation first, seek enduring peace, cut unnecessary spending with no sacred cows, and look forward as FDR did, reaffirming principles that made our nation great and inspired the world.

                                                      ***

     

Sharing responsibility for error would help

Carlton E. Spitzer

     It would help restore our nation’s credibility and strengthen peaceful negotiations if our leaders acknowledged past error and shared responsibility for current disharmony throughout the world.  No groveling, and no apology.  Just an objective review of the facts.

     Vietnam  Iraq and Afghanistan should have taught indelible lessons.  Yet there are those in power today who approach Iran with military threat rather than a grasp of history and a determination to resolve issues peacefully.

      In 1953, the Eisenhower administration, for strategic reasons it thought justified, engineered a coup that overthrew Iran’s popular prime minister, Mohammed Massadegh, and replaced him with a man more attuned to U.S. interests, the Shaw of Iran.  While the Shaw strengthened Iran’s economy during the next 25 years, the coup that put him in power was a major set back to Iran’s political development, and the Shaw was widely hated for repressing dissent.  As one might expect, millions of Iranians have not forgotten.  And distrust runs deep.

       No one can excuse the brutal take over of the U.S. Embassy in Iran that ended President Jimmy Carter’s administration and imprisoned American diplomatic personnel for many agonizing months, but one can comprehend the deep resentment toward the U.S. that had developed over time.

      Yet, despite this bitterly troubled history, Iran stood with the U.S. in the days following 9/11, and leaders were in constructive dialogue.  That dialogue ended quickly when President George Bush included Iran in his “Axis of Evil.”

       The U.S. has stumbled many times.  Evidence suggests President John Kennedy was determined to pull back from engagement in Vietnam before his assassination.  President Lyndon Johnson propelled us deeper into that quagmire. 

        President George Bush refused to let arms inspectors complete their work in Iraq in 2002, convinced Saddam Hussein housed weapons of mass destruction he might use against neighboring countries, and even the U.S.  The U.S. invaded.  There were no such weapons.  We are finally withdrawing troops, after losing 4,500 of our fighting men and women, a high percentage to improvised roadside bombs.  Another 38,000 are recovering from physical wounds, many having lost limbs, and thousands are suffering post traumatic stress.  Two million Iraqis were driven from their homes, and 100,000 or more were killed and maimed.

     U.S. leaders were impatient and shortsighted, convinced our military “shock and awe” would settle things quickly, with little thought to life in Iraq in its wake.

      Let us deal more intelligently with Iran.  It is not too much to expect a great nation to bear responsibility for its errors, just as it rightfully expects praise for its achievements and humanitarian contributions..

     The whole world has a stake in peaceful exchange and reconciliation.  More than a million Iranian-American citizens contribute to life in the U.S. every day, and many other Iranians are educated here and return to their homeland prepared to harmonize relationships between our nations.  It is time to make a fresh start toward peace. 

                                                      *

World War II really never ended

Veterans returning from World War II were grateful to get any kind of employment as they married, started families and attended college on the G.I. Bill.  They were unconcerned that old line companies like General Motors, General Electric and Westinghouse continued to produce military weapons and supplies, even as they resumed production of automobiles, refrigerators and washing machines for a starved domestic market.

In Upstate New York, old line cotton mills and glove factories that had supplied uniforms and parachutes during the war, closed their doors.  Chamber of Commerce officials heralded the “Loom to Boom” transition that brought in military contractors to take their place.

By the 1950s, the military-industrial complex was entrenched, and Uncle Sam was the principal customer.  When Dwight Eisenhower completed his second term in the White House, he warned that reliance on war production to provide jobs in peacetime would change the character of our nation.  He was prescient.  But few were listening.  It was as if World War II had never ended on America’s production lines.  The military services continued to prepare for battle, vowing never again to be caught as short handed and as ill-equipped as they were when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.  Industry and the defense department collaborated on the design and production of new jet aircraft, tanks, machine guns, submarines and landing craft.  The Army, Navy and Air Force were the principal customers. Foreign customers were welcome, even if their people were starving and their leaders had to borrow the money from us to purchase the weapons.

We became the world’s biggest arms merchant, and the world’s superior military force.  We located our troops in many parts of the world, bolstered our intelligence capability, and believed we were ready for any contingency. Militarily.  Even if we had to deal with despots to assure a flow of oil and permission to locate our airfields and to secure deep harbors for refueling and repairing our ships.

But many observers believed we contributed to making the world a more dangerous place and that we added to our list of adversaries. Involvement in Korea was deemed unavoidable.  But Vietnam was a quagmire to be avoided.  Once engaged there, we would not admit error.  President Johnson’s contrived Bay of Tonkin episode drove us deeper into the muck.  We would not admit error when we knew we could not win, and thousands upon thousands of our men had lost their lives.  The nation was subjected  to Defense Secretary Robert McNamara’s weekly body counts: we killed more of them than they killed of us, so of course we were winning.  Sickening.  McNamara knew it was cruel folly and eventually resigned.  Johnson did not seek re-election, knowing his defeat at the polls was as certain as our country’s defeat in Vietnam.  We left that country in chaos.  Military leaders said lessons were learned, that we would be wiser, better informed in the future.

But the horror of September 11, 2001 revealed our sleuthing was woefully inadequate and that there were outrageous communication gaps between our CIA and FBI.  We did have military might, and used it, as if we were responding to an attack from a nation state rather than a band of terrorists operating from several countries.  We sent thousands of troops into Afghanistan to find a single individual said to have planned the horrendous attacks on American soil, Osama bin Laden. 

Intelligence identified his location in Pakistan nine years later, and a brave, highly-trained group of Navy SEALS killed him and brought back his plans for further destruction for review by our military and CIA.  But by then our financial surplus had evaporated into staggering debt from fighting two unnecessary wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, chiefly on borrowed money from China, with little thought to the long-term political, humanitarian and economic consequences.  We really had learned nothing from our experience in Vietnam. 

Looking back, the whole world was in chaos from the 1930s through the 1940s, and in the early years of that global conflict, the outcome was uncertain.  So the idea of building an enduring military defense following World War II was entirely appropriate.  But we have gone far beyond that.  

The character of our nation has been changed.  We have conducted torture, sanctioned by the White House; ignored The Geneva Conventions, and intervened in other nations selectively, based on political considerations, not consistently on the basis of professed American values.   At home, divisions deepen, economic disparities widen, and the sense of unity that kept us working together through World War II is missing.  We cannot restore America without it.  ***

Carlton E. Spitzer                                                                                                                          

Similarities, but no match between FDR and Barack Obama

Political pundits often compare the challenges faced by Barack Obama in 2008 to those faced by Franklin Roosevelt in 1933.  Both entered the Oval Office after the nation’s wealth had plummeted from a huge surplus to a devastating deficit. 

      But times were quite different.  FDR had to create mechanisms to restore stability and replace fear with hope.  Obama’s challenge was to skillfully use  mechanisms FDR had invented.

      FDR worked with a panicked Congress that welcomed his leadership and supported his programs.  Albeit, with mixed emotions. 

     Obama had to convince a sharply divided Congress to come together to preserve the republic.  Both men had to urge legislators to put nation before party, and seek middle ground. 

      FDR heard the rumblings of war in Japan and Germany, but at that moment faced no immediate threat from outside his own beleaguered nation.  Those threats would materialize soon enough into World War II, with devastating consequences.

      Obama, on the other hand, inherited two unnecessary wars financed with borrowed money, chiefly from China.  The staggering costs of those wars were not included in the nation’s budget.  And they continue to burden our nation and take the lives of our troops;  wars seemingly without end.

FDR’s first 100 days: 

     Within his first 100 days in office, FDR regulated the banking system and created millions of jobs that would, in a remarkably short time, restore the nation’s infrastructure, provide flood control, and build schools, dams, roads, and parks.  He stopped foreclosures, worked with farmers to assure a return on their investment, and created the Tennessee Valley Authority. 

      Obama propped up the automobile industry until it could again function  on its own, infused failing markets with cash, but believed private industry in all fields would provide the jobs.  Sadly, employers’ confidence is not yet fully restored.  Major firms tend to build up reserves rather than create jobs.  Too often, they transfer manufacturing facilities offshore where operating costs are lower. Unemployment in the U.S. remains disturbingly high, except, of course, on Wall Street where market manipulators who created the financial crisis are still operating handsomely with few constraints.

      Both FDR and Obama crossed swords with the Supreme Court,  believing its decisions undercut their initiatives and blunted the will of both Congress and the people. 

      FDR clumsily tried and failed to pack the Court with his own appointees, an effort roundly criticized by his supporters and his opponents.  Obama has publicly voiced his displeasure with the Court’s rulings. 

       FDR-type programs had a rebirth in the 1960s under Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society,” with the passage of Medicare, Civil Rights legislation, expanded educational opportunities, the “war on poverty,” and the Freedom of Information Act.  But conservative have been trying to destroy Franklin Roosevelt’s programs ever since the 32^nd president put them in place during his unprecedented four-term administration that stretched through the Great Depression almost to the end of World War II. 

       And those efforts to destroy the last remnants of FDR’s “New Deal,” John Kennedy’s, “New Frontier,” and Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society,”  have never been more strident than today.  Social programs are anathema to those who believe government should shrink overall and abandon or dilute its hand in the social welfare of the people.

Medicare as a single payer system:

       When Medicare was written in 1965 as a single payer system managed by government, with major, essential participation of insurance and pharmaceutical companies, conservatives screamed to the white House and Capitol Hill that a single payer concept was blatantly socialistic.

       After fierce lobbying, and with great reluctance, the bill was substantially modified.  Medicare’s primary author, Wilbur Cohen, who as a young social welfare professor at the University of Michigan had helped to draft FDR’s Social Security legislation, was then undersecretary of Health,
Education, and Welfare.  He was bitterly disappointed.  But as a veteran of dozens of legislative battles, Cohen was a key force in implementing the version enacted, with the fervent hope the original concept might be employed at a later time.

         Cohen’s original draft would have avoided the multi-layered, unnecessarily costly program legislators are trying to rewrite today.  Only the very bold even speak of single payer today, although privately most agree it would work most efficiently and cost-effectively.  The basic, long unresolved question, of course, is the legitimate role of government.

       Conservatives do not revere Franklin Roosevelt’s memory, or the course he set for the nation.  But the poor and voiceless of that era revered him.  The rich and powerful said he was a traitor to his class.  Their descendents on Capitol Hill and in the marketplace are the ones who rail against President Obama today.

       Obama has had to defend himself against ridiculous, scurrilous accusations about his citizenship, his scholarly achievements, his community accomplishments, and even his commitment to democracy.

       FDR was compared to Italy’s strutting dictator, Benito Mussolini. When he ran for a second term in 1936, his opponents circulated thousands of fliers saying his disability from polio was actually third stage syphilis.  FDR’s satisfaction was a resounding victory.  But he did not forgive the outrageous attempt to defile his character.

        In FDR’s time, national radio was the principal means of communicating with the people, and he used it masterfully, delivering dozens of “fireside chats” to inform and inspire the people.  In a conversational style, he took the people into his confidence, explaining his plans, later reporting on the progress of  the war, and emphasizing the need for national unity.

        He could not have imagined the range of instant communication media that Obama has at his fingertips today.  President Obama is a masterful orator.  He has a brilliant mind and a thoughtful demeanor.  Perhaps he will  learn to be more conversational. 

        The question today is how well and how honestly leaders in government and business employ modern communication. Truth is still elusive.  Clever propaganda is too often applauded.  And vicious, unfounded accusations still characterize political campaigns.

        On that President Obama and FDR would fully agree.

                                                      ***    

Carlton E. Spitzer

Success comes from how well one listens

What motivated a girl from New Jersey to study journalism in Maine, theatre arts in the nation’s capital, and then move to the Eastern Shore to eventually become Talbot County’s economic development director? 

      Paige Bethke says her youthful career transitions and diversified responsibilities in private industry and state government over the years help her do her job every day.  She’s been director since 2006. 

     The oldest of six children, Bethke grew up in New Jersey, not far from Philadelphia, and has worked since she was 14.  “My first job was a part-time telephone bill collector for a hospital.  I learned I never wanted to do that again,” she laughs.

     She attended college in Maine chiefly because living in New England had always appealed to her.  “But my dad, an engineer with advanced degrees, lost his job when I was in my second year.  I learned from his experience that no job is absolutely secure, and that the general economy, more than one’s degrees, governs stability.”

     Her father’s new job brought the family to Maryland. Bethke entered  Montgomery Community College before studying theatre arts at Catholic University, graduating in 1977.   “Between journalism and theater, I learned how to present ideas creatively.”   

     She developed training materials for satellite tracking stations for a NASA contractor, maintained retail and commercial accounts for a newspaper chain, provided marketing and sales expertise for a tri-sate computer company, directed the Center for Business and Industry at Chesapeake College, and was business development representative for the State of Maryland’s Department of Employment and Economic Development.  “I learned that success comes from how well one listens.”

     She was regional manager for Maryland’s Department of Business and Economic Development in the 1990s. and worked as a commercial real estate appraiser before being named Talbot County’s economic development director.  “I’ve had good mentors, perhaps the very best mentor was Jim Brady, Secretary for Maryland’s Department of Economic Development.  I’ve always tried to live up to a sign he had on his desk: ‘No whining. No Surprises’.

      “I fell in love with the Eastern Shore years ago and decided to move here in 1982 with no job offer.  I’ve never had second thoughts.”

     As Talbot’s economic development director, Bethke manages an office of one, and says all of the experience she’s acquired is put to use  planning future activities, contacting prospective industries, creating new jobs and increasing revenues for the county.  “The principal task is building partnerships with current employers, prospective investors, town, county and state officials, educational institutions, Chambers of Commerce, and the real estate industry. 

     “We won’t be disappointed if we’re realistic about the kinds of firms we  can attract,” she says.  “Environmental companies and research groups are well established here and their expansion is important.  Cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay and maintaining its health is a top priority for business and government, working together.”

      While each county is focused on boosting its own economic base, sometimes the best way to do that, Bethke says, is to collaborate to bring a major industry to the Eastern Shore, no matter where that industry might settle and build.  “A big employer is going to benefit all of us.”     

                                                    *** 

Carlton E. Spitzer

Stigma delays help for brain-damaged veterans

In all wars, soldiers who lost limbs were welcomed home as heroes.  Their mentally scarred buddies were shunned and pitied. That cruel stigma continues to burden veterans suffering from post traumatic stress disorder.

    A wounded infantryman, captured by the Germans in World War II, could not erase the experience from his mind after he came home to work in his father’s automobile agency. He committed suicide two months later.

     A veteran fighter pilot in Korea taxied to the end of a runway for his 30^th sortie, but could not bring himself to open the throttle and takeoff.   He was sent home.  “Had I been shot down I’d have been a hero,” he said.  “But I had the shakes and went home in shame.”

     A Marine who served two combat tours in Vietnam came home a mental wreck, and for 20 years rampaged through dozens of menial jobs and three brief, unfortunate marriages before he was diagnosed with PTSD and put in a Veteran’s Hospital in Denver.  He still receives weekly VA counseling with a dozen other Vietnam veterans in Cambridge.

      “After combat, a soldier wants to go home, not to some hospital,” he said.  “And if he admits he has screaming nightmares and tremors during the day, he knows he’ll be a marked man, whether he stays in service or tries to get a civilian job.  One of my pals said we’re ‘lepers without lesions’. I agree.”

      Only in recent days have military commanders sent condolence letters to families of veterans who took their own lives, whether in a combat zone or after returning to the United States.  That negative attitude toward mental distress has delayed evaluation of brain-damaged veterans and contributed directly to an increase in suicides, family violence, broken homes and homelessness.

      Since 2005 the Veterans Administration, Walter Reed Hospital Center and the Pentagon have promised to speed diagnostic and rehabilitative services for veterans with PTSD.  It hasn’t happened.  The unconscionable waiting time, even to receive evaluation, much less rehabilitation, affirms stigma’s power.

     “Frankly, I’m dismayed that a whole new generation of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan fare little better than we did when we came home from Vietnam 40 years ago,” said the Marine combat veteran.  “It’s inexcusable.”

     William Schoenhard, the VA’s deputy undersecretary for health operations and management, agrees the VA has not been as quick as it should have been, and that simply tracking only the time it takes for new patients to get their first appointment is unacceptable.

     George Arana, VA’s acting assistant deputy undersecretary for clinical operations, apologized for delays that spawned hundreds of horror stories across the country when he testified last week before the Senate Veteran’s Affairs Committee, chaired by Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.).

      Stigma has placed a heavy burden on brain-damaged veterans in every conflict and motivated soldiers to deny their illness, knowing admission would diminish any chance of promotion should they stay in the military, and be detrimental to civilian employment should they leave.

      Apologies from VA’s mid-level administrators don’t solve the long-festering problem. Only a mandate from the president, the VA administrator and Murray can break through the logjam of pending cases and give top priority to treating the signature wound of the Iraqi and Afghan wars: brain damage.

     

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Carlton E. Spitzer

Crusade for freedom gives hope to the world

In late June, China’s Premiere Wen Jiabao surprised his British hosts by calling for more freedom and democracy. Corruption and income disparities were harming China, he told his London audience.  Skeptics pointed to China’s recent crackdown on mere talk of a people’s uprising.  But Jiabao has consistently called for reforms to safeguard his nation’s economic growth, and his latest message was received with a measure of hope.

     That same week in Cambodia, four surviving Khmer Rouge leaders went on trial in Phnom Penh before a United Nations-sponsored tribunal seeking belated justice for an estimated 1.7 million people slaughtered by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s.  Few had imagined those responsible would ever be brought to account.  

     But the most powerful evidence that a crusade for truth and freedom is underway throughout the world is displayed by the courage of  thousands of average citizens in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Syria who braved armed resistance as they demanded removal of tyrants and a voice in their governments.

     They have succeeded with minimal bloodshed in Tunisia and Egypt, but Libya is engulfed in a desperate civil war, with NATO forces aligned with insurgents.  The outcome there  is uncertain.  Syria’s armed repression has already taken many lives and no nation has come to the aid of  the oppressed. 

     America’s engagement in these uprisings has been hesitant and selective:

Aggressive military support for insurgents in Libya, on-the-scene diplomatic assistance in Tunisia and Egypt, but only distant pronouncements on Syria.  . 

     America has courted despots who could assure access to oil and would  permit us to build airbases on their land.  Others let us use their deep water ports to service our Navy.   Thus we maneuver carefully in the midst of uprisings to protect our interests, even as we support their people. Our professed values are often in conflict with political and commercial realities.

      We work through the United Nations where we can, but do not hesitate to go it alone.  America’s military might is second to none and we are called on to be the world’s policeman.  Our diplomats are global mediators.  And our intelligence services monitor the world.  Our drones are so effective that adversaries are in a fierce competition to replicate them.

     Precise intelligence, verified by multiple sources, guided a small band of SEALS to Osama bin Laden’s walled compound in Pakistan.  Proof that our sleuthing has vastly improved since 9/11.

      Lack of communication between the FBI and CIA was a contributing factor in failing to stop terrorists who took over jet airliners and used them as weapons.   Flight schools had notified the FBI that Arabic students paying cash had shunned jet simulator instruction on takeoffs and landings and wanted only to learn to control big jets in flight.  That they were not apprehended still boggles the mind. 

      Today the thirst for freedom is palpable and persistent, even in Syria where peaceful demonstrations are met with gunfire, and in other nations where women have suffered second class citizenship for generations, denied the right to vote, to travel alone or drive a car.

      Technology aids in the quest for freedom.  Instant messages, including photos, are transmitted from hand-held devices to every corner of the earth.  Dictators can no longer control communication.   But the people can.. 

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Carlton E. Spitzer      

Do actors have hidden brain powers?

I am in awe of actors.  Spencer Tracey said it was all a matter of remembering lines and not bumping into furniture.  But memorization alone is a formidable challenge.  And literally becoming the person one is portraying to bring a rapt audience to tears and laughter is a rare gift.

     Perhaps actors synapses work overtime between the brain’s Hippocampus and Neocortex, giving them extraordinary powers of memorization and creativity.  My friend David H. Foster, who has played dozens of roles over the years with amazing skill, says one memorizes a page at a time, then focuses on character development.  He makes it sound so simple.  Admirers know it is not.

     The late Jim Peyton, a frequent performer with local theatre groups for many years, personified an actor’s determination to “get in character.”  He often performed, “Lepers Without Lesions,” a monologue on the life of Frank Spillman, a Vietnam veteran who still suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.   He met Frank, and they talked for hours.  Frank sometimes accompanied him to performances to respond to questions from the audience.  They did not resemble each other physically.  But on stage, Jim was Frank.   Eric Mihan has performed the role with equal conviction since Jim’s passing. 

     Bob Chauncey, executive director, the Hugh Gregory Gallagher Motivational Theatre, Inc., is a strong believer in educating the public through dramatizations of real life experiences.   But performances must be convincing as well as entertaining, he says.  Chauncey often performs, “My Black Bird Has Flown Away,” on Gallagher’s life.  He studied films of Gallagher’s presentations, read his books, and had long discussions with Gallagher’s friends and family before he premiered the play.

     Actors bring stories alive, and make us believe the characters they portray live once again.  It is enormously hard work.  The best actors make it look easy.  The shrug of a shoulder, the raised eyebrow, the movement of a hand, the change of tone, or the pregnant pause add meaning to the words. 

     Washington, D.C. actor Jabari Exum performed my monologue on Frederick Bailey (Douglass)  June 17 as part of the Frederick Douglass gala weekend, culminating in the unveiling of a statue of Douglass on the Talbot Courthouse green.  Exum was to have performed from a small stage.  Lighting was arranged accordingly. But when the moment came, musicians had failed to remove band instruments from the stage.  Sizing up the situation as he entered the back of  the Tidewater Inn’s Gold Room, Exum chanted slave songs as he made his way to the front of the room, casually placed a chair in front of the stage he used as a prop, and interacted with the audience for the next twenty minutes as if it had all been arranged that way. 

     Not only did the versatile actor give a brilliant performance, but adjusted so smoothly to the unexpected circumstance that no one but the two masters of ceremonies and myself knew.  Synapses in Exum’s extraordinary brain work overtime.   No doubt about it.   Little wonder I’m in awe of accomplished actors.

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Carlton E. Spitzer

We can defeat stigma, day by day

Inspired by the late Alan Reich, the first person to address the general assembly of the United Nations from a wheelchair, 1981 was designated The Year of the Disabled Person.  It recognized that millions of blind, deaf, paralyzed, and mentally challenged men, women and children in developing nations were shunned by their governments, ignored by their neighbors, and often abandoned by their families.

      In the United States at that time, a White House Conference on The Disabled Person, designed and directed by persons with disabilities, addressed issues of parity in education and employment.  It recommended workplace accommodations, such as audio instruction for the blind and visual instruction for the deaf, to enable qualified persons with disabilities to be employed in factories, shops and offices. 

      Reich, a brilliant scholar fluent in several languages, including Russian, had been an All American track star at Dartmouth.   He became quadriplegic from an accident while picnicking with his family.  He’d been a corporate executive, but after rehabilitation formed the National Organization on Disability and devoted his life to helping other persons with disabilities.

      But it would take another decade of unceasing effort to pass the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), and even today, compliance with its provisions often meets with resistance.  

      Progress has come slowly, with no easy victories.  Twelve years after passage of the ADA, James D. Wolfensohn, then president of the World Bank and former board chairman of the International Federation of Multiple Sclerosis Societies, said the lives of 400 million persons with disabilities in developing countries were further burdened by poverty, isolation and despair.  “Stigma prohibits them from going to school, finding work or even being visible in their own neighborhoods,” he said. 

     Vaccines available in industrialized nations prevent childhood diseases, such as measles and polio, but those diseases continue to plague children in developing countries.  A partnership between Rotary International and The World Health Organization has greatly reduced polio cases throughout the world, but polio still disables thousands of children every year who have not received vaccines.  Sadly, misinformation plays a role.  Some parents have been conditioned to fear vaccines and prohibit their children from receiving them.

      Stigma has burdened persons with disabilities generation after generation.  Sometimes with brutal consequences. In Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, the Third Reich systematically murdered thousands upon thousands of helpless disabled persons.  In less barbaric form, stigma is always deeply hurtful and demeaning.

     On the Mid Shore, an Anti-Stigma Coalition has held annual events for many years to reduce stigma and open doors for persons with disabilities.  The disAbility Coalition of Talbot County is a staunch advocate for improving public transportation and accessibility.  The Hugh Gregory Gallagher Motivational Theatre dramatizes real life experiences to educate the public through entertainment.  All of these efforts are commendable and deserve support. 

        But stigma is a daily burden that cannot be addressed by occasional exposure to those who suffer from it.  Their lives are restricted in ways able-bodied persons could not imagine.  So a constant drum-beat is needed to defeat stigma’s presence.  The words we use when we speak of persons with disabilities, the acceptance we demonstrate, the employment opportunities we provide, and the personal responsibility we assume for making sure a neighbor or fellow parishioner with a disability can get to church, attend the theatre, or dine out is important.  It’s a matter of reducing stigma person to person, day by day.  

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Carlton E. Spitzer

Yes, we have come a long way, baby

Franklin Roosevelt’s long cigarette holder held the same lethal cancer-causing cigarettes as the ones inhaled by the man on the street.  Tobacco has always been an equal opportunity destroyer.

     Consumption of booze and smokes increased in the 1930s as prohibition vanished and the economic depression worsened.  But even then, in the midst of rampant unemployment, malnutrition and homelessness, addiction to nicotine and its effects on the human body were questioned by medical researchers.

     It wasn’t a new concern.  Although King James 1^st in the 16^th century thought tobacco, “loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, and dangerous to the lungs,” it became the mainstay of Virginia and Maryland economy in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, and has been strongly identified with the history of the Chesapeake Bay.  Profits have often collided with principles in the development of our nation.  Slavery was a lucrative business.  So was growing tobacco.

      Research reports of the 1930s, indicating that smoking caused a decline in physical and mental efficiency, were largely ignored.  But researchers labored on during the war years and into the 1950s, confirming statistical relationships of smoking to lung cancer, bronchitis, emphysema and heart disease.   

     The public, however, was captivated by cigarette advertisements featuring fearless cowboys, handsome men in uniform, and beautiful women at the seashore, personified by the Virginia Slims Cigarette girl celebrating women’s right to smoke, “We’ve come a long way, baby.”

      Smoking was accepted.  Thousands of physicians smoked.  And during the war, hometown newspapers often sent cigarettes to men and women in uniform, provided by tobacco companies.   It seemed the nation was addicted to nicotine, and that most citizens viewed smoking as a harmless, social habit; some even thought it a bit glamorous.

     Surgeon General Leroy E. Burney’s report in 1957 that the U.S. Public Health Service had evidence of a causal relationship between smoking and lung cancer was denounced as alarmist by Tobacco companies.  Its executives blamed the rising rate of lung cancer and emphysema on asbestos contamination, air pollution, and most anything but cigarette smoking.  Their denials persisted for decades, culminating in the spectacle of tobacco company presidents assuring a congressional committee in unison that they had never been made aware of nicotine’s harm to those who smoked. 

     Persistent efforts of a coalition in 1961, headed by the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, the National Tuberculosis Association, and the American Public Health Association, persuaded President John Kennedy to convene a national commission on smoking.  Surgeon General Luther L. Terry invited the Tobacco Institute, the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Trade Commission, and the American Medical Society to join the effort.  Ten representatives from diverse fields were named to the commission.  None had publicly stated their views on tobacco use.  They included experts from pharmacology and medicine, but not psychology. 

      Consultants helped the commission review more than 7,000 scientific articles and studies between 1962 through 1964.   Knowing the report would stir the political pot and upset the tobacco industry, Terry selected a Saturday to announce the commission’s findings to minimize the immediate effect on the stock market.

      Smoking and Health: Report of the Advisory Committee to the Surgeon General, was front page news and the lead story on radio and television. It said cigarette smoking was responsible for a 70 percent increase in the mortality of smokers over non-smokers, and that smokers were at high-risk of developing lung cancer, emphysema, chronic bronchitis and coronary heart disease

      The public paid heed.  Gallup compared its poll in 1958, when only 44 percent of the people believed smoking caused cancer, to its 1968 poll,  when 78 percent believed it.  Angered rather than chastised, the tobacco industry applied enormous pressure on elected representatives from tobacco-growing states, as well as the White House.  Scientists were paid handsome sums to write articles questioning the commission’s conclusions.

      When John W. Gardner, Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare,  sought support from the White House for placing warning labels on cigarettes, President Johnson put a big arm around Gardner’s shoulder as he escorted him from the Oval Office, “Now, John, howd’ya feel if your pappy was a tobacca farmer?” 

        Postmaster General Larry O’Brien made silly excuses for failing to place a public service banner on Postal vehicles that read, “100,000 doctors have stopped smoking.”  Tobacco companies remained in denial, even as warning labels on cigarette packages were finally approved: “Smoking may be dangerous to your health.”  They responded  by stepping up marketing efforts to recruit young smokers and paid celebrities huge fees for touting their products, and producers for using them on stage and in films. 

       Yes, graphic, disturbing photos of tobacco’s devastating consequences will appear on cigarette packages this year.  They will present a realistic picture for the first time, affirming that King James’ assessment was spot on centuries ago, and fulfilling the Virginia Slims girl’s proclamation in a way she could not have imagined: we have come a long way, baby.

                  

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Carlton E. Spitzer