DON'T BLACK LIVES IN CHICAGO MATTER?

These are tumultuous times. Things are changing so fast it’s hard to keep up, much less put events into perspective. It’s reminiscent of a similar struggle to understand things during the sixties when a prosperous, stable, post-WWII America started unraveling with the Kennedy assassination in 1963. I was in 7th grade and lacked the experience and historical knowledge to interpret what was happening. By the time I graduated high school in 1969, societal decline had advanced.

My first year of college included basic courses in western civilization which offered some historical grounding, but my professors weren’t gifted enough to compare and contrast ubiquitous race riots, anti-Vietnam War protests, and ongoing civil-rights struggles with similar events in western history. My English Composition professor tried by offering writing prompts that challenged us to reflect on what was happening around us.

Things were changing fast and my professors hadn’t experienced such tumult before. They were flying by the seat of their pants. After two years I dropped out, worked various jobs, and found myself rubbing elbows with disciples of Saul Alinsky — community organizers who were trying to channel societal unrest toward a communist revolution. One put a copy of Alinsky’s “Rules For Radicals” into my hands — the first copy I ever saw.

Nearly all smoked marijuana and I did too. It was a leftist ritual of the era. At one point I found a half-dozen leftist radicals in the living room of a tenement we owned in Lowell, Massachusetts. Some belonged to the Socialist Labor Party, some to the Socialist Workers Party, and one was communist. All argued  vociferously about how to foment revolution. I wasn’t too stoned to notice how disorganized and contentious the left was.

Never did I want to make revolution or overthrow the government, but radical leftists around me spoke freely about trying to. I thought they were crazy and moved away from them, but that experience give me perspective on what’s going on in my country today. Again the left is trying to steer public outrage toward a communist revolution, and unlikely as revolution was a half-century ago, the widespread violence of recent months has me concerned.

Leftists still fight amongst themselves, but today they make up an increasingly large part of the Democrat Party which for decades has controlled the cities in which we’re seeing widespread rioting, looting and toppling of statues. Ironically, most of the statues depict historical figures who were Democrat slave owners. As today’s Democrat mayors and governors do almost nothing to stop the violence, the rest of us wonder if that’s because they’re afraid a strong response will trigger more or because they approve of it all.

Some of last weekend's victims in Chicago

After a violent Fathers’ Day weekend in Chicago when 102 mostly black people were shot, very likely by shooters who were also black, those shouting “Black Lives Matter!” sound increasingly hypocritical. White cops are not the problem. So-called “systemic racism” is not the problem. “White Privilege” is not the problem. Gangs of fatherless, young, black men are the problem.

Alleged shooters in Chicago last weekend

These shootings go on every weekend and have for years — in Chicago, and in many other Democrat-controlled cities. Where’s the leftist hand-wringing about that? We don’t hear it. The Marxist “Black Lives Matter” movement looks like a massive red herring to divert attention from what the real problem is: fatherless black boys from dysfunctional families — all the result of bankrupt Democrat social policies of the last fifty years.

It’s getting increasingly tiresome to hear over and over about George Floyd’s death. Yes, the video of his asphyxiation under the knee of a police officer was horrifying, but we keep pretending that the relentless murder of young black men by young black men isn’t far more horrifying. Calling attention to that, however, doesn’t serve the Democrat narrative that it’s a “systemic racism” extinguishing black lives.

Kerry in Lowell, 1972

In 1972 I arranged a meeting in my living room between radical leftist revolutionaries and liberal-Democrat congressional candidate John Kerry. Back then it was unusual for rising Democrats like Kerry to fraternize with leftist revolutionaries, but it isn’t anymore. Today’s Democrat Party willingly plays with fire as senior officials like Deputy DNC Chairman Keith Ellison and others openly support violent, leftist Antifa thugs and Marxist Black Lives Matter organizers.

While John Kerry was considered a far-left Democrat during his failed 1972 congressional campaign, he looks downright moderate compared to Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, Ilhan Omar, and the rest of today’s rising Democrat stars.

Left & Right September 11, 2019

Occupying the left chair for this show is my old friend, Jim Wilfong. He's a Democrat former Maine state representative, a selectman in Stow, Maine, a former Small Business Administration official in the Clinton Administration, a former trade advisor for the Bush and Obama Administrations as well as other titles which you can see at the beginning of the show. I hope he'll come back for future shows as well.

The first question from the producer asked if we think it was appropriate for President Trump to have the Taliban on US soil during the week of 9/11. Jim did not and neither did I. From there, we discussed Afghanistan both historically and today. We discussed where each of was on September 11th.

We discussed how some aspects of the long Cold War between the US and Russia continue. Jim claims our #1 export is weaponry, which was surprising to me. We discussed the positive and negative aspects of that.

From there we discussed the Democrat field of candidates for president, and I recalled Jim's early support in the 1980s of Joe Biden. Now he's intrigued by Andrew Yang and Elizabeth Warren. Yang because of his discussion of technology's impact on employment, especially in the future. He likes the way Warren is critical of Wall Street and big business, him being a small business guy.

Jim goes into the feasibility of alternative energy sources in light of the importance of fossil fuels in developing third-world economies.

I call attention to the rise of socialism in the Democrat Party, especially polls showing a majority of young Democrats favoring socialism over capitalism. I cite Alexandria Ocasio Cortez's election and Democrat chairman Tom Perez saying she's the future of the party. I cite her chief of staff's claim that the Green New Deal is primarily a vehicle to take over the US economy, and not a remedy for climate change.

Jim says the future direction of the Democrat Party remains to be seen, that political winds shift quickly. I hope he's right, but I'm not so sure. He's optimistic about young entrepreneurs he's working with and sees them as capitalists with a concern for their community. I take that to mean that believes free enterprise will prevail among the young so long as small business survives as a big part of our overall economy.

We reflected on the benefits of teaching for a long time in the same community. We get to meet with them and hear from them as they become adults and work in the community.

We end with me citing recent New York Times news-shaping strategies as revealed by a transcript surreptitiously recorded and published in Slate Magazine. We speculate about what news outlets come closest the ideal of straight news sans opinion.