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.

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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.

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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. 

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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.

     

                                                          ***

Carlton E. Spitzer