The Voice of Treason

“Of course, he has a knife. He always has a knife. We all have knives. It is eleven eighty-three and we’re barbarians.”

– Eleanor of Aquitaine to her sons Richard, Geoffrey, and John in James Goldman’s “The Lion In Winter”

As I’ve said before, I attended a public elementary school in Chicago. When I say North Side, not South Side, people make assumptions. Even today when I meet a Chicagoan and I’m asked where I lived, the response is different if I’m asked by a South Sider. The perception has been that the North Side is made up of rich whites and only poor blacks live on the South Side. White Sox fans are blue collar, Cubs fans are yuppies. This isn’t accurate now and it wasn’t accurate then. I meet transplanted South Siders all the time (I can hear it in their dialect - it’s a tad harder than on the North Side), and there’s plenty of diversity.

My North Side neighborhood was just as diverse. What I’m trying to do here is look at my own school experience and find racism in it to explain why there are these “ethnic tensions” at local schools today. At that time, there was a broad mix of kids - there should have been conflict. I recall that a lot of the students were Jewish but they were too busy excelling to beat up anyone. Same with the Asian students. Now someone can point to that and call it racism. Oh, so you’re assuming that if a student is Asian they’re automatically superior? And if I say it depends on which part of Asia, that could be racist, too. All I’m saying is that in that particular system at that particular time, the smart kids weren’t picking fights. And not all the smart kids were Jewish or Asian.

A lot of Irish kids there - all Catholic. English, Scottish, German, Polish, French, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Lebanese. No problems between Jewish kids and Christians. The only tension was that the Jewish kids had so many days off for holidays and the rest of us were a little jealous. The upside is that teachers took off, too, so those days were spent watching movies and working on art projects. Fun stuff.

A lot of foreign kids from Eastern European countries would show up. Sometimes they’d be treated badly because they were different, but eventually they fit in. The kids who were picked on the most, I felt, were the ones from poor Southern families. The kids who wore the same clothes all the time and didn’t have the box of 64 crayons.

I lived in a good neighborhood but we weren’t rich. A lot of my friends were, but just as many were not. My siblings and I always collected a variety of friends - people who got along with us, but wouldn’t necessarily get along with each other. I’ve written about my sister’s friend Sharon before, but she had another friend who had the most foul mouth I’d ever known. I loved to be around her just so I could increase my vocabulary. Words I’d never repeat, but at least I had them.

When her mother would walk into the restaurant where my mother worked, no one would wait on her. The owner didn’t want her anywhere near his business. She had a reputation for sitting on gum, then making the restaurant owner pay for all her dry cleaning; and she complained about everything and didn’t tip. But my mother would serve her and was always friendly. “She’s my daughter’s friend’s mother,” she’d tell her boss. And there was never a problem.

My brother collected his own assortment. Since he lived his life as if they’d made a terrible error at the hospital, and that he’d been born into a wealthy family but a mix-up resulted in a life with us, he sought friends who had cash. Since he’d sell his toys for spare change, he couldn’t afford to waste his time on ones with empty pockets. As a teenager he hung out with kids who “dressed sharp” and formed a band. They looked like, but didn’t sound like, The Beatles. As he got older his taste in friends changed. One day my sister walked past his room and looked inside. When I saw her she was peeved.

“What’s wrong?”

“It appears our illustrious brother is bringing home heroin addicts.”

“Frank Sinatra?” (Apparently I’d just seen The Man With the Golden Arm.)

“No, not Frank Sinatra. Those hoodlums he hangs around with. The ones who wear sunglasses at night.”

You just knew that anyone who wore sunglasses in the dark had to be up to no good. One night my brother came home with a broken jaw. My mother insisted that if he hadn’t been with that “Jose,” he wouldn’t have gotten into trouble. My mother didn’t dislike him because he was Mexican, she disliked him because she knew he was a bad influence. On some level we knew our brother wouldn’t mess with needles - he was much too fastidious - but we suspected he probably thought it was cool to rub elbows with “bohemians.” We always hoped that the hospital would realize their mistake and his rich family would come and collect him. (The Air Force was kind enough to take him off our hands.)

I had a few hooligan friends myself. They saw me as a shy, introverted goody-two-shoes who needed to be corrupted. In turn, I would find even more introverted kids and drag them out of their shells and into trouble, so their parents thought that I was a bad influence. It was that way with Marina. She looked just like the Italian doll my mother bought for me but wouldn’t let me touch. She had shiny black hair, chin length with bangs and huge brown eyes. She wore the most beautiful clothes - a lot of them custom made. She’d take me to her family’s apartment but her parents were never there. An older woman cleaned, cooked, and took care of her. She had an accent and baked the most amazing banana bread for us. Marina always said her mother was a model and her father was a businessman. We’d spend hours looking at her mother’s things and touching her fur coats.

One day Marina was at my house and said she needed to go home. I ignored her. The doorbell rang. There stood a good-looking but nervous man with dark hair and eyes, a suit, dark overcoat and hat. “Is my daughter here?”

He took Marina and left. My mother looked at me. “What did you say her last name was?” I’d told my mother before that Marina was Greek, but her last name was unusually un-Greek. It almost sounded “too American.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Her father.”

“What about him?”

“What did you say he did for a living?”

“He’s a businessman.”

“He’s Mafia.”

I was confused. “But they’re Greek.” She said they weren’t, they had a made-up last name, and now she knew why her parents were so strict and never wanted that kid out of their sight. Maybe she was right. Marina was never allowed to come over again. She barely talked to me at school.

That’s one thing my mother could spot. When she first came to Chicago and waited tables, there was a group of men who’d come into the restaurant and look her up and down, discussing her “attributes.” It was like that seen in The Godfather when Michael first sees Apollonia. Anyway, they started talking about her in Italian. Then, like in the movies, she “accidentally” dropped a plate of pasta on one of them. They knew she did it on purpose when she said: “Oh, and by the way, I’m Italian.” My mother was the only one in her family who never learned Italian, but she was familiar with enough of the choice words to know that what they were saying wasn’t appropriate.

The blue-eyes must have fooled them - they didn’t know she’d know what they were saying about her. But she got by with it. “They were crude. No good Mafia.” She said they still came into the restaurant after that, but they never talked about her in any language again and they were polite. She suspected they liked her because it didn’t faze her to wait on them and their wives one night, then wait on them and their mistresses the next. “As long as they tip, I don’t care who they bring into the place.”

But it was normal for my mother to be suspicious about everyone and she’d make assumptions about the people we dragged home. She even had suspicions about my best friend Vanessa.

To be continued…

“We are the world in small. A nation is a human thing. It does what we do, for our reasons. Surely, if we’re civilized, it must be possible to put the knives away. We can make peace. We have it in our hands.”

– Henry Plantagenet in James Goldman’s “The Lion In Winter”

Notice how words suddenly appear in the media? Soon everybody’s saying them - whether or not they know their definition or proper usage. The word of the moment is “xenophobic.” A couple weeks ago, when radical Muslims were burning flags and embassies and banning Havarti, the word was “fomenting.” Pundits on TV start it, then talk radio listeners pick it up. And then it’s everywhere. I swear I heard a woman in the produce aisle last week complain that the fruit in the store was already fomenting.

There are several meanings, but I think the one people intended was “to stir up, agitate, incite.” At the height of the Islamo-fascist rioting, our local paper printed a story about unrest at one of our city’s high schools. They referred to the problem as “ethnic tensions.” I have ethnic tensions myself. Every time I make pasta sauce I fret about the quality of the sausage. You think it’s easy finding good Italian sausage west of the Mississippi? It’s like finding a good bagel or edible bread. Good luck!

I didn’t read the article, but after I listened to local talk radio I realized the problem has nothing to do with cooking. Parents and former students called to say that this has been “fomenting” for a long time. Hispanic students hate both white and black students and beat the crap out of them whenever possible. Then the calls came in to say it isn’t true; it’s actually the Mexican students - from Mexico - who are forming violent gangs and making life miserable for everyone. Mixed kids aren’t even spared - everyone’s a target.

Angry parents called to complain that the teachers do nothing and things have gone from bad to worse since that new principal took over. That would be the one who was recently arrested for cocaine possession when he was pulled over for drunk driving. I love government schools.

I know this particular one because I spent three years at a non-profit that was spitting distance from it. The little hoodlums - er, I mean students - walked past my office window every day and banged on it for no apparent reason. They scratched the finish on my car and the windows, too. I still have a large smudge on the door where one kid ran a black marker across the white paint. Nice.

Sometimes I’d catch a glimpse of them as they sauntered by. I didn’t really notice what they looked like in relation to color or ethnicity - to me they all looked pretty much the same: surly. Life used to be simple: black and white. Now when we talk about race, the color wheel has spun out of control. When I lived in California the diversity was almost overwhelming. So many languages and dialects, and people from countries most of us can’t even find on a map. Like I’ve said here before, the potlucks at the company I worked for were legendary.

And that’s where I met T. When he and his brother were little, they raised themselves on the Berkeley campus while their mother was working on her master’s in Statistics. Not only is T one of the smartest people I know - maybe even the smartest - but he’s also the least racist person I’ve ever met. “Least racist” still makes it sound like he’s racist, just not much, so it’s not accurate. I’ve known him for over sixteen years and I haven’t found any propensity in him at all. I used to bring in a woman to facilitate seminars at the company we worked for a few years ago and she pulled me aside one day to say how much T impressed her.

“I watch him with other people and he talks to men and women, subordinates and management, and he doesn’t change for any of them. He’s the same person and he treats everyone the same way. With respect and fairness, but he’s honest and straightforward, too. I’ve never seen that before.”

“Yeah,” I said, “He just hates stupid people. Doesn’t care about color, religion, origin, politics, education - he just has no patience with stupidity at all. That’s his prejudice.”

Like Scalia, he doesn’t suffer fools gladly. And I’m not talking about intellect or educational background here. It’s how I’d describe the behavior - or lack of it - at this high school. These kids are acting stupid. T claims that the younger generation isn’t racist and they’re color blind, but it’s all the talk about racism that’s causing trouble. I don’t know what it is. To me, you put a group of kids together and you’ve got Lord of the Flies.

To be continued…

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was on C-SPAN this week. It’s not like this is a common occurrence so I was intrigued. Why is Scalia making himself so available? The trouble, of course, is that C-SPAN sometimes feels like NBC’s coverage of the Winter Olympics. There’s a hint of what’s to come, so you wait…and wait…then look for something somewhere that will tell you precisely when the event will actually appear so you don’t waste any additional time waiting…and waiting.

What happens while I’m waiting for an Olympic event or a particular bit of C-SPAN coverage is that I’ll surf to something else and get involved with that so I miss what I was waiting for in the first place…or I’ll leave the room to grab a beer or refill the bird feeders and forget to come back…or I’ll simply slip into a coma and wake up near the end of the coverage or miss it entirely.

Yes, I know C-SPAN has a TV schedule on their site, but I’m trying to say that it’s not terribly accurate or helpful. Doesn’t always match reality. So what generally happens is that I’m surfing and I land on C-SPAN or the Olympics and find myself in the middle of what I wanted to see. Happened last night when I finally got to see Scalia’s remarks at the American Enterprise Institute.

He was there to discuss the impact of international law on U.S. law. I don’t care if you disagree with Scalia - you’re a damned fool if you don’t recognize that his brain is bigger than most of the ones taking up precious space on the planet. Mine included. That’s why, if I had been a law student who had the opportunity to listen to Scalia speak on such an important issue AND had the chance to formulate an intelligent question to put to him, I would have been grateful to be there and would have behaved accordingly.

There’s that word again: behave.

Yes, I believe in free speech, but I also believe in the rights of others who are there to listen. It reminds me of the English class I facilitated during my student teaching days. There were two boys in class who were determined to make it impossible for anyone else to learn anything because of their constant disruptions. These two - now eighteen and expecting to graduate - had to pass my class because they’d failed every other one taught by the seasoned English instructors. None of those teachers wanted these kids back in their classes, so when I went to them for guidance they told me that they didn’t want to see them again - just pass them and get them out of the system.

Mistake. I wasn’t about to hand out passing grades to punks who didn’t deserve them. One day I looked at the exasperated expressions on the thirty-eight other faces in the room and it occurred to me that these kids were being cheated because of two miscreants who wanted attention. It might not have been the right decision, but I made it. Point blank I told the students in front of every other kid in class they there was no possibility whatsoever that they would pass the course so they were wasting their time showing up to class. I suggested that the spring weather was lovely and that they should go enjoy it and get out of my classroom.

It was the first time they shut up. Then they left, and every now and then I’d see one having a cigarette in the parking lot and he’d wave. But they never walked into my class again.

Horrors! How could I do that to these youngsters? My theory was that they’d made a choice, their school administrators and parents didn’t care, and I could try to fix them or concentrate on the other thirty-eight kids. I chose the other thirty-eight.

So when the smarmy little hecklers wasted Scalia’s time and cheated everyone else, someone should have escorted them out. Since that wasn’t going to happen it was up to Scalia to shut them down. He did. The man doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and these were some big time fools. Their remarks were not clever, smart, funny, or cute. They were, in fact, painfully stupid and revealed their complete and utter ignorance. If anyone watched this and believed that these were the lawyers and political scientists of the future, they would have shuddered. I did. And hoped that they weren’t wasting their parents’ money and were only paid hecklers. At least one was - he appears to be a regular at these events.

Scalia was brilliant and tough and gracious. A couple people thanked him for his patience. He made it clear that he was there to answer specific questions about the topic and wasn’t getting any. What he got was stupid commentary, so he refused to address anything that didn’t relate to the subject at hand. One little creep shouted that he was only taking “friendly” questions. Obviously this cretin wasn’t paying attention. He was answering all questions - friendly or unfriendly - that related to international and U.S. law. That’s why he was there.

These obnoxious little brats squandered an opportunity. I’m tired of college students whining that education is underfunded and that it isn’t fair that a college education isn’t free. Waste my tax dollars on these dolts? I think I’ve frittered away enough on government schools. If students aren’t willing to open their minds to facts - whether or not they’re “friendly” - then screw ‘em.

“I’m a Libertarian. You know what a libertarian is? A Republican in show business!”

– Tom Shillue

Childhood events can shape your life. I’ve written here about my little Italian mother who waited tables to keep us in a nice apartment near the lake in a nice Jewish neighborhood in Chicago. A single woman with kids, two cats, a raccoon and the unremitting fear of eviction. She taught us to (read: threatened to kill us if we didn’t) behave ourselves and be quiet. Like corpses. We learned early how to check pulses.

Individual pursuits were good for us. We read; we drew pictures; we colored in our coloring books; we played with paper dolls; we watched old movies, Cubs games, and documentaries. We weren’t particularly an athletic, exuberant bunch. Again, we excelled at individual pursuits. In school, I could out run any kid in my class. I was fast. I perfected my track skills by dashing from school to home, and up four flights of stairs in time for Garfield Goose. In high school I developed a talent for archery, then fencing.

Team sports, and anything associated with balls, were a challenge. I liked baseball and could run the bases and occasionally hit, but fielding was a different story. Volleyball, basketball, soccer - probably average. Utterly miserable at tennis. Small balls, I think, were the problem. I guess I couldn’t see them. And, frankly, I didn’t really want to.

Swimming, diving, skating, skiing. Gymnastics. Hopeless endeavors all. I don’t know if it’s a lack of coordination or balance or…well, a lack of desire. I am, I fear, a mere spectator in life. I like to watch other people who are better at these things do them. That’s why I enjoy the Olympics.

I’d planned to be glued to the set this year because they’re in Torino, but I’m only catching bits and pieces. I wept the other night after Silvia Fontana skated. And even though I’ve always had a special fondness for Irina Slutskaya, I had to root for Shizuka Arakawa. That Italian, Enrico Fabris, who won the gold when Davis and Hedrick took silver and bronze? I cheered for him and was glad to see him victorious. That South Korean speedskater? How does he manage to come from behind and get to the lead spot so quickly?

How do these people get their bodies to do what they do? How do they train their minds to dismiss a mistake and continue, knowing that it’s all over? To get up and keep going even though it hurts and they just can’t win? How do they get from not knowing how to do it to being the best at it? How do they train every day even if they feel sick or sad or tired? How can they accept defeat and be so gracious?

Drew Carey was interviewed by Bill O’Reilly the other night. He’s a Libertarian, but he wasn’t interested in talking about current events or politics. What he wanted to talk about was his passion: U.S. soccer. Soccer is serious business in other parts of the world. I don’t pay much attention to it because I don’t have kids and I’m not driving them to practice and games every day. It gets interesting for me when people in the stands try to kill one another.

Considering the level of passion, you’d think that would happen more often. Didn’t Drew Carey say that every time two teams play - who? Villareal? Real Madrid? Barcelona? who knows! - they are, in fact, refighting the Spanish Civil War? When the U.S. team played in Mexico, Mexicans chanted during our national anthem: “Osama! Osama!” Cubs fans are much more gracious hosts.

Yet, for the most part, people can come together despite these rivalries and sit side by side in a stadium, cheer for opposing teams, and not beat the life out of one another. Fascinating. It’s another reason why I watch the Olympics. People come from all over the world to compete, despite political and religious differences, and only occasionally does anyone die. I watched the 1972 Olympics. Like I said, childhood events can shape your life.

So what does this have to do with Drew Carey? Well, the other night I was trying to watch Ann Coulter debate Arianna Huffington and T was in the kitchen making it difficult to hear what they were shouting at each other. He despises these “debates,” he hates the penchant for taking sides, and he loathes Ann Coulter. I like her - she’s a hoot. But to him it’s all noise and a waste of time and energy. He walked into the room and stared at me.

“I just want to ask you something. How exactly do you see the world? What is it precisely that you envision? What do you want the world to look like? Can I just ask you that and get a simple answer?”

I thought for a moment and said:

“I guess I’d like it if everyone would just behave.”

“So you want everyone to agree with you. No dissent.”

“No, I don’t mind dissent and I don’t want everyone to agree on everything. I just want people to be responsible and decent and behave. I think a sense of decorum is in order.”

“So if everyone just behaves the world would be perfect?”

“Maybe not perfect, but it would be better.”

So when I heard Drew Carey explain his personal philosophy, I said: “Ah-ha!”

“My theory of life is to take care of myself, my family, and the people I come into contact with every day. As long as I’m showing them love and being nice to people, I’m doing pretty good. I don’t have time to worry about what President Bush or Hillary Clinton said. I don’t listen to actors, I only listen to people who are experts in their fields. I honestly don’t care what actors have to say about politics.”

Then he said that if everyone would just do the same - take care of their business and treat everyone well - the world would be a better place. True, we are the world in small. We, too, can be Olympians: work hard, do our best, and weather both victory and failure. We can cheer for others and encourage their success. We can feel others’ pain and empathize when they experience defeat. We can mix and mingle with people who are different from us and learn more about them and ourselves. We can do this.

If only we could just behave.

On Tuesday, I offered my opinion on the ports issue but wonder now if I was too subtle in making my point. The title affixed to that entry is “Controversy, Crap, and Confusion.” I’d thought it was clear that my reaction was pretty much: “Yeah, so?” In a world of free markets, we do business with foreign companies and foreigners do business with us. I also suggested that the Democratic response was misguided and that we shouldn’t dis an ally. Since mine appears to be the minority position, I’d like to take some time to spell out why I am for the transaction.

First, the Democratic response. They call Republicans fearmongers and profilers, but they’re starting to sound like they’re the ones who are ready to round up Arabs indiscriminately and put them in camps. They’re trying to demonstrate that they’re the party of national security, but to my ears it sounds like Isolationism. Also, they’re not telling the truth about the deal and that’s just irresponsible. Hillary came out against Dubai, and it only highlighted the fact that Bill has been there on several occasions to speak and accept payment for these engagements. So is it fair then to assume that Bill has no issue with accepting filthy terrorist lucre? Oh, so it isn’t filthy terrorist lucre. So why are we acting like the UAE is a bunch of criminals? Already Hillary has softened her position; I can only assume that Bill has pulled her aside to remind her that Dubai is subsidizing their mortgage. Since Democrats have long been in denial that we are engaged in a real war, it seems peculiar that they have now taken the opposite position by identifying an enemy. We should ask ourselves which special interests they’re representing when they fight to kill this deal. The unions? That right there is a reason to support the transaction.

Second, it’s simple economics. I always like a controversy in Washington because it’s an opportunity to teach the voters something about how our world works. Like I said on Tuesday, in high school I had my money in a foreign bank. It was a few blocks from my parents’ house but it was not an American institution. Friends and family wondered why I would trust them to keep my money. Frankly, it never crossed my mind that because the bank was run by “furreners” they would abscond with my savings. We should appreciate that the UAE would even want to deal with us and our regulations and bureaucracy. They aren’t in charge of port security and it doesn’t behoove them to encourage any breaches. This is about making money, pure and simple. I’m amused by the people who are unnerved by foreign ownership. There are U.S. companies doing business outside our borders; how would these people feel if a country decided to nix a deal with us? After spending the majority of my years in California, I can tell you that there are plenty of Arab owned businesses within our borders. Are we prepared to seize these businesses and deport the owners? Puh-leeze. Our borders are wide open and there’s nothing to prevent homegrown terrorists to build bombs right here on American soil. Terrorists of any origin. The argument against Dubai is just weak.

Third, the Republican response is embarrassing. It’s very clear to me that they are less concerned with national security and more concerned about their own insecurity. Allow me to illustrate. A few years ago I interviewed a person for a position and rejected him even though I felt he was bright and had an interesting sense of humor. I just had an instinct about these things; I knew he wasn’t going to work out. Yet another supervisor did hire him and a few months later I was forced to take over her shift. My shift was a well-oiled machine, hers was just kamikaze. I inherited him and there was friction. Every time I looked at him cross-eyed he’d run to management to complain. Ironically, as much as we despised each other as coworkers, we appreciated one another’s opinions. He’d wander into my office on breaks and we’d chat about issues of the day and politics. He was smart and wickedly funny. We would have been friends, I think, if work hadn’t been part of the picture. We were on different sides of every issue, but we enjoyed debating. He even ran for mayor and was quoted in the local paper. I can’t remember the exact comment, but it had something to do with Canadians and it was derogatory. We worked for a Japanese company and our new president and plant manager, unbeknownst to this employee, was Canadian. (I’m certain he still remembers the remark.) Anyway, what I liked best about him was that he could sum things up in such a way that even if I disagreed with his position, I had to give him points for style and execution. We had two local Republicans running for office. One was male - good looking, rich, and well-connected. But he was an empty suit and dumb as a stump. The other was female, but to some voters that wasn’t too obvious. The line that I will never forget was when he analyzed the two candidates and said:

“One has the mind of a twelve year-old boy, and the other has the body of a twelve year-old boy.”

In one sentence he nailed it perfectly. The twelve year-old body won and has been winning elections ever since. I know people on both sides who have worked with her and they feel that she’s effective. I’ve voted for her consistently and I’ve long suspected that she was being groomed for something bigger within the party. But lately she has begun to distance herself from the President. When he was in town recently, she was unable to meet him for dinner. She has called for congressional hearings concerning the NSA, and she isn’t comfortable with the ports deal. In short, she’s worried about November.

Republicans are backing away from Bush like he’s a stinking corpse. This is fun to watch because when they do this it always comes back and bites them. I hadn’t considered not voting for this particular Congresswoman, but now I’m going to have to take a hard look at the competition. Tsk.

Finally, there’s the DP factor. I hesitate to discuss this because it’s going to sound…well, nuts. Whenever I make a decision I go to logic and reason first. I analyze things to death and weigh the pros and cons. Then weigh them some more. Once I have an informed opinion I run it past the little voice in my head. It’s like car maintenance. I’ve always been consistent about it because I’m one of those people who would be happy to buy one car and have it last a lifetime. But lately I’ve put off routine maintenance and now I’m having car issues. I’m addressing each one now and rejuvenating my vehicle. With each decision - whether it’s a new battery, tires, or brakes - I do extensive research and comparison shopping. I know what I’m going to do, how I’m going to do it, and where I’m getting it done. And then at the last possible second I switch gears and do the opposite. That little voice again. Maybe you’d call it instinct or a gut feeling, but I’m not prepared to give myself that much credit. I tend to look for signs. Really obscure signs. When I try to explain this “reasoning” to T his eyes glaze over and he tells me he doesn’t want to hear it. I want to justify decisions that, on the surface, make little sense. Signs again.

So this will sound crazy, but when I heard the name of the company in the ports deal, I was immediately on board. DP World. I’m of a certain age and I grew up with a lot of colloquialisms that aren’t heard much today. Holy Hannah. Hell’s bells. Dollars to donuts. He’d give his eye teeth. Down the pike a piece. And some you just wouldn’t say in today’s PC world. One of those is the expression “DP.” I used to hear that all the time when I was a kid. That DP who lives on the second floor. The DP who runs the corner store. Those DPs who moved into the house down the block. Her DP relatives are coming to visit. That DP landlord.

I went to the dictionary to look it up but couldn’t find it. What is a DP? This was one of the first mysteries of my life and I just had to solve it. I started to analyze how it was used in sentences and made the connection to people who appeared to be foreign. They were here, but weren’t born here. Keep in mind that I was raised in a Jewish neighborhood on Chicago’s North Side and I went to school with kids who had grandparents who didn’t speak English. They came from countries that aren’t even on the map anymore. I started to put the puzzle pieces together. DPs are people who came here from other countries - ha! Like my mother’s dago family! So who’s callin’ who a DP?

Displaced persons. Something you don’t hear much these days. During Katrina, when people were being referred to as refugees, some didn’t take kindly to it. But in fact, hurricane victims truly are DPs. People who are forced to migrate, to leave their homes. But did anyone call them DPs? When did we stop using the term? When did it become offensive?

Well, I think we can figure that one out. But my grandparents were, technically, DPs. I went to Ellis Island just to experience what it was like for my relatives to come here from Italy and see what they saw when they got off that boat. Did they see that statue? Did they get the same reaction that I do when I see it? Were they frightened when they went into the buildings there and stood in lines, not knowing what would happen to them? Or were they excited to be in a new place with prospects of a new and better future? Were they happy that they didn’t have to change the family name?

DPs. They’re what makes America great. So how can we reject a company that will run the ports where DPs entered America when it is so perfectly named? DP World! That sounds pretty darned American to me.

Told you it would sound nuts, but sometimes liberty seems a little crazy. But in a good way. My hope is that President Bush stands by his decision to veto any opposition to the deal. And once he exercises that power he’ll be comfortable exercising it more often. I want him to stick to his guns on this and not back down.

Uh, perhaps he has learned a thing or two from the VP.

The big news story is that mosques have been destroyed in Iraq. If you Google “mosques destroyed” you’ll find article after article about mosques being demolished in other parts of the world. Churches are being targeted, too. How many have burned in Alabama so far?

The golden dome was obliterated and other Shiite mosques were turned to rubble, and who gets blamed? America and the Jews. And we did this because…? Well, that part hasn’t been explained. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad offered his version of reality:

“They invade the shrine and bomb there because they oppose God and justice. These passive activities are the acts of a group of defeated Zionists and occupiers who intended to hit our emotions.”

Yeah, whatever. Ironically, before any of these holy places shattered, Deroy Murdock wrote an article - “Needed: Mature, Moderate Muslims” - and started it with two words: “Grow up.” He suggests that “this should be the civilized world’s two-word response to the staggering overreaction to those cartoons.” He calls the rioters “brats,” “infantile,” “homicidal babies,” “pillaging pre-schoolers” who “cannot express themselves with words rather than things that burn or go ‘boom.’” It is up to the rest of us “grown-ups” to teach them some manners.

He goes on to illustrate how we can support the Danes (there’s a petition, I’ve signed it online, and I’ve read with utter disgust the Islamo-fascist spam that has defiled it) and carefully documents worldwide incidents of religious intolerance and responses to them. Allow me to list just a few of those here:

“Al Qaeda used an exploding fuel truck to demolish a synagogue in Djerba, Tunisia, on April 11, 2002. That bombing killed 19 people, namely a French citizen, four Tunisians, and 14 German tourists. Worldwide, Jews kept their cool.

In October 2000, Palestinian mobs capitalized on the withdrawal of Israeli soldiers who had guarded Joseph’s Tomb, a Jewish holy site, in Samaria. Two hours after the Israelis departed, hoodlums burned Jewish books, set furniture ablaze, and then demolished the tomb and an adjacent yeshiva, brick by brick. Security forces with the Palestinian Authority, who had agreed to protect the site, did no such thing. Jewish riots have yet to erupt.

On April 2, 2002, 39 gunmen with the late Yasser Arafat’s Al-Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade launched a 39-day siege at Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity, the spot where Christians believe Jesus Christ was born. The Muslim terrorists held hostage 30 priests, nuns, and monks, as well as 150 Palestinian civilians. After they were released, most of the terrorists returned to the Gaza Strip, where they were received as heroes. On May 15 it was reported that the shrine was scarred with bullet holes, splattered with cooked rice, and strewn with empty wine and liquor bottles, cigarette butts, and other rubbish. Catholic priests at the church said the Islamic thugs stole sacramental objects and used pages ripped from the Holy Bible as toilet paper. Christian violence over this defilement of the reputed birthplace of Jesus never occurred.

Saudi Arabia, home of the Grand Mosque, is the Mecca of Islam. Its respect for other faiths stops there. It is illegal to observe non-Islamic religions in that absolute monarchy. ‘The Saudi government desecrates and burns Bibles that its security forces confiscate at immigration points into the kingdom or during raids on Christian expatriates worshiping privately,’ Ali al-Ahmed, director of the Saudi Institute in Washington, wrote in the May 20, 2005, Wall Street Journal. ‘Saudi Arabia bans the importation or the display of crosses, Stars of David or any other religious symbols not approved by the Wahhabi establishment.’ Saudi anti-Christian bigotry can be fatal, al-Ahmed reports: ‘The Bible in Saudi Arabia may get a person killed, arrested, or deported. In September 1993, Sadeq Mallallah, 23, was beheaded in Qateef on a charge of apostasy for owning a Bible.’ Nonexistent Christian mobs, thus far, have left Saudi facilities untouched.

For their part, Buddhists did not detonate falafel stands after the Taliban used mortar shells to pulverize the world’s two tallest statues of Buddha, located in Bamiyan, Afghanistan, in March 2001, about the time Osama bin Laden and his henchmen orchestrated their surprise attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. What a pity, by the way, that al Qaeda could not simply have mocked those American icons with pen, paper, and some zany captions.”

The article is accompanied by a photograph of protesting Muslims - one carries a sign that reads: “God Bless Hitler.” I just watched a documentary this week about a pathetic group of Nazis in Alabama and the similarities between the cross burning Aryans and the embassy burning Islamists is startling. It’s very clear: they’re all fascists.

The Nazis who were interviewed for the documentary whined that their world wasn’t the way it should be because certain groups were ruining it for everyone else. They were angry because things just weren’t going their way. It wasn’t their fault - it was the Jews, the niggers, the faggots. Everyone was to blame but them. They were right, the rest of the world was wrong. And if they had to beat it into our heads to make that point, they would. If things had to burn and people had to die, so be it. Temper tantrums. Behaving badly to get attention. Breaking things. Making noise. Biting, kicking, screaming. Look at me! Why is everybody picking on me? Everybody’s happy but me! It’s not fair, so I’ll show them!

These are not Christians. So let’s stop calling the fascists who are rioting and calling for the destruction of Jews and infidels Muslims. History repeats itself and it’s freakin’ 1940 all over again.

Murdoch continues:

“These ongoing Islamo-fascist spasms indicate that the long twilight struggle against this enemy will be arduous and incredibly challenging. It would be nice if civilization simply could put these Islamo-infants back in their cribs so they could cry themselves to sleep. Alas, it will take much more than that — as Paris’s Le Figaro explained February 8 (in my friend Vance DeWitt’s translation) — for those ‘who want to modernize Islam to override those whose goal is to Islamize modernity.’”

This is a fight for our future. Our ancestors lived in caves; it’s up to us to make sure our descendants don’t move into them.

Why do I do it? Why do I tune into the local news and read our newspaper? Every time I hear what’s going on around me it confirms my suspicions of what I think is going on around me and my first impulse is always: Call the realtor. We’re outta here.

Where do I live? It’s a Third World state - just turn left at Haiti. No, no - still west of Louisiana. Keep going. The great irony is that there’s a lot of sage here - but it’s just the gray-green stuff that grows in sand.

There’s a town north of here that’s always the subject of jokes like: “Did ya hear about the tornado in ********? Did five billion dollars worth of improvements.” I know a lot of people who grew up there, but got out. It’s a touchy subject for them.

Well, it sounds like there’s some sort of mayoral election going on up there and now there’s evidence of irregularities. People are claiming that they were paid for their votes. Fifteen dollars. So that’s what a vote is worth these days? I guess that’s better than a pack of cigarettes or a bottle of Thunderbird.

Ever the optimist, I see the good in this story. At least people are getting out and voting. The problem in this state is that a lot of people don’t vote, while others vote repeatedly - unfortunately in the same election. “Vote early, vote often” isn’t all that funny when it’s the norm. That’s why I was so fired up a couple weeks ago when I heard that poll workers were violating the new law that requires voters to show photo i.d. I’ve written here about past voting scandals - I won’t revisit all of them now.

Wasn’t it a few weeks ago in Haiti when they found smoldering ballots in the dump? We’ve had burned ballots here, too. Lost ballots. Ballots and voting machines discovered in the trunks of cars. In 2000, we had found ballots. Just enough to turn the state from red to blue. How convenient.

Just when I thought paper ballots were going the way of the passenger pigeon, our governor and attorney general have announced that we are going to return to the paper ballot. We will be an all-paper voting state. Those newfangled electronic ones just confuse the voters, dontcha know. And paper burns.

Every Leftist blogger in the state is waxing poetic over this decision and the grassroots efforts that made it possible. VerifiedVoting.org wants a nationwide system. Hmmmm. This is the 21st century, is it not? Yet we’re moving to replace technology with paper ballots. That’s one hell of a lot of dead trees. I guess annihilating forests is okay if it makes it easier to steal elections for the cause. And the environmentalists are justifying this decision how?

Democrats were against photo i.d. but they’re for paper ballots. Should we be suspicious? Here’s a blurb from a website urging people to help end electronic voting:

“Important: If you or a friend of yours experienced any difficulties related to electronic voting system please write it down as a signed affidavit and send it to us. We need to collect actual voter testimonies on this topic. Even simple things like long lines, confusing instructions, difficulty pressing choices, lack of supervision by poll workers or observation of machines out of service are important to make note.”

Long lines? Confusing directions? You push a button. If you can’t push a button, what else can’t you do? The argument for paper ballots is that they provide a paper trail and can be recounted endlessly if need be.

Dimpled chads, hanging chads…and you’re telling me that this is progressive? Say, how ’bout we start dipping our fingers in indelible ink after we vote? I just want to know why we voters weren’t allowed to vote on this, that’s all.

Ah, that’s right. It’s because the current system is just so confusing. We need one uniform system. One way, one choice. Decided by our government. Just one. So suddenly diversity is a bad thing?

Doesn’t matter. My ballot in this state is a lost cause. Literally.

Alan Simpson again, summing up Washington. But I suspect it’s the same wherever you go. I was listening to the radio and heard a local news report about a woman who stole a new red Hummer. Her explanation was that she was cold and hungry, and that it was the owner’s fault for leaving the thing running. It’s just peculiar how we humans interpret the world.

How I see it, how you see it; how I say it, how you hear it. It’s like that horrible question pollsters keep asking. The one that says the country’s headed in the wrong direction. How do you answer that one? It’s always interpreted the same way: the majority of Americans feel that the country is headed in the wrong direction - it’s George Bush’s fault. Maybe that’s one way to interpret it. Liberals think we’re living in a totalitarian state, just waiting to be rounded up and put in camps. Conservatives might answer that we’re headed in the wrong direction because there are so many irresponsible people in the world who can’t even manage to teach their kids to stay off a neighbor’s property. We have education program after education program and people are still contracting STDs, littering, getting knocked up, letting pets get knocked up, driving drunk, and, in general, acting stupid.

Maybe we’re headed in the wrong direction because the government’s getting bigger and spending too much of our money. Maybe we’re headed in the wrong direction because there are too many stations selling Girls Gone Wild videos in the middle of the night. There are a million ways to answer that question, but no way to interpret it accurately.

The latest story up for interpretation is the one about our ports. When I heard Americans were horrified because “foreigners” owned them, I had to laugh. It appears that Americans are oblivious to who owns what. In high school I had a savings account in a bank and everyone assumed because the bank was in this country it was an American bank. I knew it wasn’t. People work in buildings in America that aren’t owned by Americans. People work for companies and don’t even realize they aren’t American companies. What are people looking at when they read product labels?

No one seemed to mind when the British owned these ports and I suspect that’s because few people knew about it. The Redcoats owned our ports? Not an issue. No one remembers the Revolution, but people do remember the Beatles and they were cute. Besides, the British are considered our friends these days. But we also have friends in the UAE and there’s every indication that Dubai Ports World has an impeccable reputation. Why, then, is there a problem?

Because UAE is the United Arab Emirates. This is the part that has me confused. When Bill Clinton went to Dubai and said “it was a big mistake,” and he wasn’t talking about Monica, a lot of people were…concerned. When Algore recently announced at the annual Jeddah economic forum that, after September 11, Arabs were mistreated on American soil, a lot of people were even more…uh, concerned.

And they were told they were overreacting. Algore and friends have made it a habit to tell the world that Americans are racist, sexist homophobes and xenophobic to boot. We think all Arabs are the same, all Muslims are the same. All the same terrorists. But now they’re suddenly the ones who are using the T word. We can’t turn our ports over to these people! They’re terrorists! They can’t be trusted! Whoa - talk about profiling.

On the surface, it does sound odd that we’d turn our ports over to the UAE. But it’s also going to be odd when we tell our allies - and we need all the friends we can get in that region - that we’re nixing the deal because well, you guys just can’t be trusted.

Talk about being between Iraq and a hard place.

That’s what Alan Simpson is calling last week’s birdshot episode. I’d mentioned on Friday that I’d seen Dick Cheney in town a few years ago - he had Alan Simpson with him. The two of them in the same room are a hoot. Simpson’s a hoot in any case; he’s someone I’ve always liked because he reminds me a little of Everett Dirksen. Just says whatever’s in his head, so there.

Sometimes, when Simpson is talking, you wonder if he’s lost his mind. This past week it was clear that he was one of the few who hadn’t. The flurry of insanity whipped up by the events in Texas made nearly everyone a little loony.

The press went batty. It was another opportunity to excoriate Cheney and they were quick to accuse him of everything short of child molestation. Let’s see…there were accusations of animal abuse, arrogance of power, criminal activity, drunkenness, adultery, secrecy, disdain for the press and our way of life, and murder. This was a cover up, he didn’t abide by the rules, and he owes the American people an apology. Why? Because they have a right to know.

The right to know. It took a few hours for the news to break - Cheney believed it was more important to see to his friend and his family and get all the facts before running with the story. Something the media might want to jot down (um, think coal miners). I’d just like to point out that it was a matter of hours that news was withheld. A series of political cartoons were first published in September and the media still hasn’t let Americans see them. It’s been months. Talk about arrogance of power. When are they going to apologize for keeping that information from us? After all, as the media says, we have a right to know.

And then there was the pouting over Cheney’s decision to interview with Brit Hume. Hume is the best: he asks smart questions and he listens to the answers. Something the media might want to jot down. I do like it when CNN and others insult FNC, because every time someone attacks FOX News it’s clear that he or she is attacking FNC viewers. And, frankly, that’s a big group to offend. Just keep it up.

It’s funny how this was the big story that overshadowed all others. Ironically, some of that worked in the administration’s favor. Haven’t heard much lately about “domestic spying,” have you? Hmmm…was this yet another instance of strategery?

The MSM made themselves look like monkeys (”Would this be much more serious if the man had died?”). David Gregory, who’s always first to demand apologies and admissions of mistakes from the White House, actually apologized himself this week. After running the radio special, “The VP Shooting: Hunting For Answers,” everyone at ABC should have done the same.

Then Peggy Noonan wrote a column suggesting Cheney be replaced. The media jumped all over it: Even Peggy Noonan says he should step aside! I’m not so sure. I don’t believe Noonan was advocating Cheney’s resignation - I think she was intentionally fanning the flames. She was close to the Bush-Quayle campaign of 1992 and is familiar with what happens to politics when disloyalty runs rampant. It had been suggested then that Bush dump Quayle and it didn’t happen. Would this Bush dump Cheney?

I would advise against it. George Bush is loyal as a Labrador, and Dick Cheney is probably the most qualified public servant in history. Unpopularity doesn’t ruffle George Bush. He likes Cheney and he put him there for a reason. The problem now is that even if Cheney wanted to leave he couldn’t. I can picture him telling the press that he’s decided to resign so he’ll have more time to go hunting (read “Now go f*ck yourselves.”), but that’s impossible. It will look like he’s being dumped and you just don’t dump someone of Cheney’s caliber. No pun intended.

I’ve talked about the fringe who feels Cheney isn’t conservative enough. He has that daughter and doesn’t he know that that Mary Matalin runs and tells everything to that Carville person? Again, that’s the fringe. The majority of us who voted for Bush liked him as governor but weren’t enthusiastic about voting for him until Cheney appeared on the ticket. I like Bush, but I voted - primarily - for Cheney.

So the Democrats don’t like him. He’s bad for the Republicans, bad for the administration, and bad for the country. When Charlie Rangel was asked if he thought Cheney should step aside, Rangel looked serious. A new vice president - a moderate one, he said — would be good for the Republicans and it would be good for America. But it would be bad for the Democrats.

What does this mean? The Dems were in a panic over Dan Quayle and did everything they could to destroy his reputation. If he was such an empty suit, why the campaign to annihilate him? He was a threat. A young, good looking Conservative. Same thing with Cheney. Why the campaign to smear him?

I know who I’d want to see in Cheney’s place, but that won’t happen. Peggy Noonan even said as much. The “right” person would never get past the Senate. So Cheney, unless there is a serious health issue or death, will stay and finish the job. And that’s a good thing. But, following Rangel’s logic, that’s bad news for Democrats. He said they’d like to see Cheney replaced in that it would be good for the Republicans and for America.

Um, since when did Democrats start worrying about what’s good for America?

Bill Buckley’s got it. Dick Cheney’s got it. George H.W. Bush? Got it. As I’ve said, Harry Whittington’s got it. Peggy Noonan’s got it. Brit Hume? He’s got it. What is it? I’m not so sure anymore. I used to call it class, but I really don’t know what that means these days. Back in July I’d written something called “1992-2005: The End of Class.” Maybe it’s something that’s on its way to extinction, like the passenger pigeon.

My little bugaboo with American culture. We all think we know what it is, but I’m not so sure we do. Too many people think class has something to do with money. That’s preposterous. There are a lot of classless rich people out there. And there are poor, uneducated ones who ooze class.

Look up the word and you get “elegance of style, taste, and manner; in dress and in behavior.” Hmmm, close. Manner and behavior are part of this. A way of acting. Bearing. How one conducts himself.

Harry Whittington appeared before the press the other day and exhibited it. What we saw was a true Southern gentleman. Texas is a big state and it’s a blend of many elements. It combines the genteel South with the wildness and ruggedness of the West, yet it’s not all Southwest. Harry demonstrates an old time Texan charm, refinement, fortitude, and decency.

Decency. Respectabilty. Uprightness. Integrity. Propriety. Dignity. Discretion. Modesty. Are these elements of class? Again, I think I have some idea what I mean when I say the word, but I’m not sure how others define it. In the middle of the night I’ll wake up and surf the channels, and inevitably I’ll land on something repellent. I discovered a tawdry little program on MTV called Parental Control. The premise is simple. Parents who dislike the individual who is dating their progeny interview several candidates and choose two for the progeny to date in hopes of said progeny ditching the current squeeze for a new one. The current squeeze is forced to watch the dates with the parents.

The word “class” comes up a lot on this show. One female squeeze watched her beau with a candidate who stripped; rubbed herself on a pole, his lap, and his face; then licked food off his hands and sucked his fingers. Her reaction: “That f*ckin’ skanky ‘ho’ s got no class!”

I haven’t dated in a few years, but it appears that the average date is identical to Nine And A Half Weeks. (Liked the book, hated the movie.) The mother, who chose this particular candidate, defended her: “She’s got energy!” The father, who’d had the intention of choosing a “hottie” for his son, wondered why he hadn’t picked her. After all, he’d asked each candidate to read, in her “sexiest” voice, a sleazy passage from a book. Only a couple girls seemed uncomfortable. One might have blushed.

Tell me — do girls blush anymore? When I was young, I was teased relentlessly about how quickly and how frequently I would blush. I still blush. I probably even blushed when I was watching all parties on this show - parents included - exhibit utter classlessness both in behavior and speech. Yet everyone was criticizing everyone else for not “having class.” Each person was convinced he or she had it and no one else did. The sole bearers of urbanity.

I made T watch an episode and, when a couple decided to have the inside of their lips tattooed on their date, even he recoiled. I also watched Bush at a town hall meeting the other day and was fascinated by his response to a question about how he sees the future. Bush said that he’s an optimist. He’s watched the culture change but firmly believes it will change again. He thinks people will choose to be responsible and decent. They’ll understand what virtue means.

Virtue. Decency. Consideration. I can’t help think about the days after September 11 when I’d sit at a four way stop and watch four drivers all gesture to the others to go first. You. No, you. No, you first. No, you go ahead. After you.

We let pedestrians cross the street and the guy in line behind us at the store holding one item go ahead of us. We smiled at each other. We greeted one another. We behaved like human beings. Well, at least we behaved the way human beings are capable of behaving when they’re considerate of one another. Treating others the way we ourselves would like to be treated.

I heard a discussion on the radio this week about vile behavior at a local high school and thought back to when I was in school. I remembered the year in Arizona when I attended an elementary institution that practiced corporal punishment. Each classroom had a smaller room, like a large closet, attached to it and that was where teachers would lead a student who had violated some rule or acted inappropriately. There, the student would be punished. I remember how the other students would sit straighter in their chairs and focus all their attention on the tasks at hand. Everyone was on his best behavior after a student took that trip to the side room.

I hate to say it, but I know it’s on our minds. Do we have to be “punished” again to remind us to remember our manners? As we examine what we mean by “freedom,” we might also examine what we mean by the word “class.”