#our choices are fascism fascism and third party who is almost certain to lose

[thoughts-of-endless-night]

just voted for the first time. cried outside the voting place for like ten minutes after. some people were cheering and shit, i cannot fathom how anyone is happy to be voting this year, or any year, there are never good choices. i want to die. is it always like this. does it always feel like this.

[thinkveganworld]

Friendly Fascism

The following are updated excerpts from an article I wrote on “friendly fascism” in the U.S.  This is information our schools should be teaching on history, so that the average citizen is well-informed enough to participate in the nation’s political life and make knowledgeable choices. The article relates to the Iraq War, but it also applies to fascism in the U.S. today.   Not all kinds of fascism have to equate precisely to the classic form represented by Hitler or Mussolini. Fascism doesn’t have to involve mass genocidal slaughter, nor does it have to be equal in degree to the fascism practiced by members of the Axis powers.   Traits of classic fascism include: strong nationalism, expansionism, belligerent militarism, meshing of big business and government with a corporate/government oligarchy, subversion of democracy and human rights, disinformation spread by constant propaganda and tight corporate/government control of the press. Today all of those conditions exist in the U.S. to a degree. Let’s focus on corporate/government control of the press, specifically corporate control of U.S. television news networks. According to a March 24 article, “Protests Turn Off Viewers” by Harry A. Jessell, 45 percent of Americans rely on cable channels as their primary source of news, and 22 percent get most of their news from broadcast networks evening newscasts. Only 11 percent rely on other forms of media as their principle source of war news.

Our corporate controlled TV networks might as well be state controlled, because they promote war and policies of the oligarchy fairly consistently and have virtually eliminated all dissenting voices.  NBC fired Phil Donahue despite his good ratings, saying in an internal network memo they didn’t want to air Donahue’s antiwar views. Reporter Peter Arnett was fired for giving an interview to Iraqi TV and merely stating the obvious on a number of issues. For example, Arnett said media reports of civilian casualties had helped the growing challenge about the conduct of the Iraq war.

According to William Shirer (The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich), the Reich Press Law of October 4, 1933, ordered editors not to publish (among other things) anything which tends to weaken the strength of the German Reich … or offends the honor and dignity of Germany.’ The Nazis forced dissenting journalists out of business and consolidated the press under party control. U.S. television news networks have been consolidated under the control of a handful of corporations. America doesn’t need a press law'prohibiting the airing of anything which might weaken the strength of U.S. war policies, because the corporate owners of today’s television networks are in total agreement with the state. It is irrefutable that corporate owners of American television networks want only pro-war opinions aired, because those are virtually the only views that are in fact aired.  The Phil Donahue and Peter Arnett firings, especially when coupled with the NBC internal memo explaining the Donahue firing, also indicate this is true. Do the various TV networks do a good job of informing the public, or do they more often propagandize? Propaganda is aimed at the emotions, while news sources that disseminate factual information aim toward reason. In Nazi Germany: A New History (Continuum Publishing, 1995), Klaus P. Fischer says Hitler promoted a system of prejudices rather than a philosophy based on well-warranted premises, objective truth-testing, and logically derived conclusions. Since propaganda aims at persuasion rather than instruction, it is far more effective to appeal to the emotions than to the rational capacities of crowds. If you’ve spent much time watching the pro-war cable television news programs, you cant help but notice they manipulate (whether deliberately or not) the viewing audience’s emotions rather than appealing to viewers’ logic.That is, instead of providing the American public with a broad range of necessary facts and varied viewpoints about our wars, the TV networks exploit emotions by urging the audience to focus on and identify with the day-to-day plight of individual soldiers and their families. There’s nothing inherently wrong with empathizing with the troops. However, when that aspect of war news is heavily emphasized at the expense of hard facts and varied debate, the networks serve the purpose of managing the public mood rather than informing the public mind.

According to Klaus Fisher, the Nazis eliminated from state media any ideas that clashed with official views. He writes that permissible media topics for public consumption included war itself and the Nazi movement; support of Nazi soldiers; praise for Hitler and celebrating the thrill of combat and the sacredness of death when it is in the service of the fatherland.  

Today’s war-promoting TV networks have also deemed only certain subjects permissible,‘as evidenced by the irrefutable fact that they only cover a narrow range of subjects. Coincidentally, the proverbial network list'would read virtually the same as the list mentioned above. Permissible topics include praise for U.S.  war policies, support for our soldiers;  and celebrating the thrill of combat and the sacredness of death when it is in the service of’(in this case) the homeland, even though there is no rational link between attacking countries designated for regime change and defending our soil.

Of course, who needs rationality or facts from TV news when the American public already has enough information about world events?  In a March 26 article for Editor and Publisher, “Polls Suggest Media Failure in Pre-War Coverage”, reporter Ari Berman refers to a Knight Ridder/Princeton Research poll. This poll showed 44 percent of respondents believed most'or some'of the September 11 hijackers were Iraqis. Only 17 percent gave the correct answer: none. In the same poll, 41 percent said they believed Iraq definitely has nuclear weapons. As Berman points out, not even the Bush administration has claimed that. Berman also refers to a Pew Research Center/Council on Foreign Relations survey showing that almost two-thirds of people polled believed U. N. weapons inspectors had found proof that Iraq is trying to hide weapons of mass destruction.’ This claim was never made by Hans Blix or Mohammed ElBaradei. The same survey found 57 percent of those polled falsely believed Saddam Hussein assisted the 9/11 terrorists, and a March 79 New York Times/CBS News Poll revealed that 45 percent of respondents believed Saddam Hussein was directly involved in the 9/11 attacks. TV news reporters have done little to correct the public’s misconceptions. On the contrary, network reporters and their guests have often helped bolster the false impressions by mentioning September 11, or the threat of terrorism by al Qaeda, and the threat posed by Saddam in the same breath.

Individual TV reporters aren’t always free to choose the information they pass along to the public. CNN now has a relatively new script approval'system, whereby journalists send their copy in to CNN chiefs for sanitizing. In his article, Guess who will be calling the shots at CNN,'British foreign correspondent Robert Fisk quotes a relatively new CNN document (dated Jan. 27), Reminder of Script Approval Policy.The policy says, All reporters preparing package scripts must submit the scripts for approval … Packages may not be edited until the scripts are approved … All packages originating outside Washington, LA or NY, including all international bureaus, must come to the ROW [a group of script editors] in Atlanta for approval.  

William Shirer comments on the Nazi party’s control of press, radio and film, “Every morning the editors of the Berlin daily newspapers and the correspondents of those published elsewhere in the Reich gathered at the Propaganda Ministry to be told by Dr. Goebbels or by one of his aides what news to print and suppress, how to write the news and headline it, what campaigns to call off or institute and what editorials were desired for the day. In case of any misunderstanding, a daily directive was furnished along with the oral instructions.

In an interview with TomPaine.com, Janine Jackson of the media watchdog group, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), said that the group examined two weeks of nightly television news coverage. FAIR found that 76 percent of all news sources or guests on ABC, NBC, CBS and PBS’s NewsHour were current or former government officials,'leaving little room for other diverse voices.In addition, FAIR found that only 6 percent of those sources were skeptical about the war. Jackson noted that on television news at night, there’s virtually no debate about the need to go to war. It would further public understanding if the TV networks would offer substantial debate on the following: The Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq has alienated many world leaders and lost this country the respect of millions of citizens around the globe. The Bush team has created instability in the Middle East and risked retaliation. They’ve undercut the U.S. economy with the financial cost of this endeavor. They’ve increased the likelihood that worldwide nuclear weapons proliferation will increase. And, according to a recent Red Cross report, they have likely helped create a horrifying number of human casualties and a rapidly expanding humanitarian crisis in Iraq.

The content of television news lacks range and diversity, but the way the news is presented is also disturbing. Television reporters often deliver news of the war'with apparent breathless excitement, as if they’re giving play-by-play descriptions of football games.

People are dying in this conflict. Civilians are caught in the middle, being blown to pieces or losing loved ones. Children are left behind when their soldier-parents are killed. Instead of presenting news of this war'with giddiness, wouldn’t it be more appropriate, more human, for network reporters to take a somber, respectful approach?

On TV, we see bombs dropping from a distance. Network commentators seldom offer the public close-ups. In his article, Military precision versus moral precision,'Robert Higgs, writes that the much-used JDAM bombs dropped in Iraq kill most people within 120 meters of the blast. According to Higgs, such a bomb releases a crushing shock wave and showers jagged, white-hot metal fragments at supersonic speed, shattering concrete, shredding flesh, crushing cells, rupturing lungs, bursting sinus cavities and ripping away limbs in a maelstrom of destruction.

Just yesterday I heard a TV reporter describe certain casualties with the sterile phrase, “This is what war does”.Well, it isn’t “war” that bursts sinus cavities and rips away limbs - nothing as nebulous as that. George W. Bush and his administration have done these things. They have directly ordered that these things be done. The bombs’ shredding of flesh and crushing of human cells didn’t just passively happen.

In an April 5 article for The Mirror, “The saddest story of all,” reporter Anton Antonowicz describes an Iraqi family’s loss of their daughter. Nadia was lying on a stretcher beside the stone mortuary slab. Her heart lay on her chest, ripped from her body by a missile which smashed through the bedroom window of the family’s flat nearby in Palestine Street. Nadia’s father said, “My daughter had just completed her PhD in psychology and was waiting for her first job. She was born in 1970. She was 33. She was very clever. Everyone said I have a fabulous daughter. She spent all her time studying. Her head buried in books. Nadia’s sister Alia said, “I don’t know what humanity Bush is calling for. Is this the humanity which lost my sister? It is war which has done this. And that war was started by Bush.”

Today we’re again getting a whiff of fascism from U.S. promoters of regime change war, including war with Iran,  This isn’t the equivalent of Hitler or Mussolini - just sort of a creeping fascism light, and the corporate controlled television news networks are only one example of the way even light fascism undermines what little democracy remains in the U.S.  

[punkrockpolitix]

Trumpism and the Tyranny of the Minority

by Mitch Maley — I'm often asked why self-described patriots seem to be okay with fascism or how those who scream in defense of concepts such as liberty and freedom can fail to be troubled by our slide toward totalitarianism, but such questions seem to miss the larger point.

Trumpism isn't a new phenomenon or even unique to the man at its helm. It is simply the logical end point for the so-called Tea Party movement that has completely taken over traditional conservatism in the past decade, a movement that aims to fully impose the will of a minority, even if their views are grossly out of step with most Americans.

In that sense, 2010 was the official end of bipartisan government, the moment the opposition became the enemy. It became more dangerous to reach across the aisle than to sit on your hands and do nothing, unless you could do everything your constituents wanted. It became a zero sum game in which half a loaf of bread was worse than none at all.

Make no mistake, extremism—whether it comes from the right or the left—is always about minority rule. Otherwise, the beliefs would be mainstream. Donald Trump was only the fourth president in U.S. history to lose the popular vote and win the electoral college, and he did it with less of a share of the total vote (46.9) than any of the others. Not once during his presidency has his approval rate hit 50 percent, and it's recently been as low as 35.

I point this out because to hear his supporters tell it, they are part of a silent majority, despite what the math tells us. However, minority rule has been at the core of this movement from the beginning—at least for its architects. From restrictive voting laws clearly meant to suppress opposition turnout (including the current misinformation campaign on vote by mail) to packing the courts with judges that hold views grossly out of step with the majority of Americans and seeking to subvert the Supreme Court decision on a woman's right to choose with laws meant to curtail the ability of women to access abortion under bogus pretenses, the right-wing platform has increasingly become about a minority of people imposing their beliefs on a majority who find them objectionable.

Sure, there are memes, slogans and talking points that attempt to rationalize things like voter ID laws, limitations on early voting, requiring OBGYNs to have admitting privileges near their clinics or that the clinics to be expensively retrofitted to meet arbitrary codes, and on and on across a broad spectrum of issues, but when you read the literature of the think tanks and policy groups that craft such legislation, their objective is clear: How do we get what we want, without the power of the majority behind us?

One way is to argue that the rules favor the minority view, which is why there are always so many lay constitutional scholars ready to tell us how things like universal health care, mask mandates during a pandemic, sensible environmental regulation and other policies favored by a majority of Americans run afoul of the founder's intent, even if those same experts fail to find their voice each time this president tramples on the Constitution on behalf of something they agree with.

But gerrymandering districts so that you can keep at least part of Congress under your control despite getting less total Congressional votes cycle after cycle, or packing courts with sympathetic judges who might uphold the unconstitutional laws you are able to get passed is part of the kind of long game most people don't have patience for. In the end, if you want to see your country look exactly the way you want—and most of your fellow Americans do not share your vision—there is only one route: ceding power to a totalitarian dictator who has been able to turn minority support into presidential power and is willing to dance to any song his supporters play, so long as they provide the means for him to remain in power—legitimately or otherwise.

It is in this effort that fascism becomes quite useful, for it allows the minority to actually claim defense of our freedoms against an enemy that can now be identified as the other, an outsider group who they don't need to count among their numbers, as those people are now the enemy, making for a false reality in which they are no longer a minority but rather a majority of real Americans who love their country and are therefore intent on stopping the evil others at all costs.

Fascism is, at its core, not an ideology. Most simply put, it is an attack from the right on the left, on the basis that the central tenets of liberalism represent a constant threat of socialist takeover that is always close to being upon us. Draped in nationalism and an appeal to a brand of inherent righteousness most commonly found in religious movements, it should be no surprise that its adherents often espouse rhetoric that is just as dogmatic and evangelical.

Conversely, socialism is, in many ways, a similar attack on the perceived inherent evils of capitalism. Like fascist revolutions, socialist ones routinely justify violent insurrection, theft and even the execution of those who do not bend their knee, as necessary nearly to the point of being benevolent—regardless of the majority's will. One need not look further than the recent upheaval in Seattle, where a group of left-wing radicals vandalized private property while occupying six city blocks and making ridiculous demands until eventually devolving into the deadly chaos of a miniature failed state. The means to take power already exist through democratic channels, but because a majority is needed to seize it, the malcontent convince themselves that such a system is inherently corrupt to the degree that such criminal reappropriations are not only justified but completely necessary in order to force their minority view on the rest of the community who so desperately needs to live by it, even if they don’t realize it yet.

What the extreme left and extreme right have in common is an unwavering belief that there is but one way to do things—theirs. The big difference, however, is that while the extreme left doesn't even like the Democratic Party, even the progressive left is but a fringe force in a party almost wholly controlled by right of center NeoLiberals who drape themselves in progressive slogans, while remaining contemptuous of progressive politics.

Meanwhile, the Tea Party movement has, in just 10 years, completely vanquished the NeoConservative forces that preceded it as the power center of the Republican Party. Trump's election in 2016 signaled the passing of the torch, or rather it being pried from the cold, dead hands of the House of Bush. The extreme right, very much unlike the extreme left, is in control, with both the White House and the Senate under its wing. Those who haven't bent their knee in fealty to Trump and his tribe like former NeoCon stalwarts Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley and Mitch McConnell have, have either been marooned in a political no man’s land (Mitt Romney) or have gotten out.

What's left of the NeoConservative Republicans is now part of team Biden, seeing far more commonality with the NeoLiberals than Trump's crowd. That should be no surprise. The majority of Democrats and Republicans of 2000-2010 disagreed on little when it came down to brass tacks. Sure, they dangled identity politics, social issues and class warfare as red meat for the crowd, but when it came to Wall Street, globalization, bad trade deals and forever wars, they had much in common and were happy to divy the loot.

Of course, if you're a Trump supporter, you might be inclined to think something totally different. To hear his campaign frame the 2020 election, he's not running against the guy who wrote the crime bill, voted for every war and military spending bill ever put before him and routinely worked across the aisle to make deals. No, they're running against Antifa, AOC, looters in Portland and the impending socialist revolution that will always be on the verge of taking over, lest Donald J. Trump protects us.

Why? Because there's not a very sound argument for minority rule or trading democracy for autocracy to get it, unless the wolves are at the door and your only choices are giving up your freedoms or being eaten alive. For many Trump supporters, the constant rhetoric and propaganda has led them to a place where they truly believe there's that much at stake in November. It doesn't matter that the streets were peaceful when he took office or that Americans have never been as divided as they have become under his rule, at least since the Civil War. That's not because of his actions. In their minds, it's in spite of them. If Biden were to win, every American city would be overtaken by violent leftists, AOC and the Squad would be pulling his strings, and their country would become unrecognizable. Of course they would hand over any power needed to the one man who could save them from such horrors.

For the rest of us, the country has already become unrecognizable since 2016, and in the worst way possible. We're living their nightmare and the notion that four more years of Trump (or perhaps more, given his regular references to deserving a third term) might indeed see the United States slide into a totalitarian autocracy in which dissenters or even those deemed insufficiently enthusiastic about Dear Leader could be sent off to the gulags seems all too possible. The only thing that remains certain is that it won't be over on November 3, no matter who wins. America is at the crossroads of a cultural reckoning, and it will take more than just a presidential election for it to fully play out.

Dennis “Mitch” Maley has been a journalist for more than two decades. A former Army Captain, he has a degree in government from Shippensburg University and is the author of several books, which can be found here.

[lewepstein]

Your Values and Your Health

Values and health.  At first glance they may seem unrelated.  After all, aren’t values the things that we believe in, like being honest and teaching our children right from wrong?  And isn’t health about how we treat our bodies - the way that we eat, exercise and manage stress?

What I have discovered is that our values and our health are profoundly connected.  Those deeper convictions to which we subscribe but sometimes don’t pay enough attention have a significant  impact on our well being.  I have also come to believe that we place ourselves at risk and jeopardize the wellness of our families and others when we compromise our core values and stray from those things that matter deeply.

In my own life, I have always been what might be called, “political.”  That has meant different things to me at different ages.  In my twenties, I was a 1960s radical activist, in my thirties a delegate in a progressive union.  At present, I am involved with several grass roots organizations that I see as part of the resistance to the Trump regime.   What is different for me at this age is that I have made a more conscious and committed choice to be involved.   Being “political” is a stated value of mine involving goals, strategies and responsibilities.  My career as a therapist and maintaining my health are also valued areas of my life to which I consciously devote time and energy.  

Our values are usually connected to certain domains in our lives such as personal growth, intimate relationships, recreation, career, parenting and spirituality.  Our lives can also become so busy that it doesn’t seem we have the time to even think about these areas.  Unfortunately, that is often how individuals, families and organizations can drift from their core convictions and become compromised.  A  periodic re-examination of values - something that we might describe as reviewing and renewing our “mission statements,” can be an important part of retaining our vitality and our health.

The connection between family values and health became clear to me when I began working with middle class adolescents from communities in Brooklyn and Northern New Jersey in the 1990s.  A number of  teenagers who were referred to me by their guidance counsellors were anxious, depressed and at risk for substance abuse.  Often, I would find the driving force behind their symptoms to be loving but pressure-ridden parents who only wanted the best for their kids.  Sadly, in their attempts to propel their children into Ivy League colleges from the time they were in pre-school, well meaning parents had  produced a group of worried, moody and sleep deprived adolescents who had begun to self medicate with marijuana and beer.                                                                                     

As psychologist Madeline Levine illustrates so well in her seminal work, “Parenting for Authentic Success,”  values and coping skills matter more than grades, trophies and “fat envelopes” - those acceptance letters from colleges that have become the hallmark of success for many middle class high school seniors and their families.  Ironically, a number of studies have shown that there is “no significant difference in job advancement or pay,” between students accepted at Yale and those going to less prestigious schools.  And when parents were able to let go of their insistence that their children get into the “best” colleges so that they could make the “right” connections and earn the highest salaries in the most lucrative careers, something began to change.  Students who had been trained to be hyper-competitive and were being “driven to distraction” began to revise what was truly important to them.  This included re-examining their current  values and adding new ones such as  being conscientious, becoming more resilient, developing new interests and devoting energy to social causes.

A few months later, students who were emotionally and academically “checked out”  had begun to join clubs, make new friends and overcome their obsession with their grade point averages.  Outlooks changed, moods lifted and the need to self medicate with addictive substances began to diminish.  These rejuvenated students didn’t all make it into Princeton or Yale, but some of them were accepted into schools that turned out to be a great match for them, with departments that coincided with their true interests.  A number of them made connections with fellow college students that turned into enduring friendships.     

It is not only students and their families who can revitalize their lives by re-examining their values.  Adults and couples who come to therapy complaining about their symptoms - most often anxiety, depression and recurrent relationship problems -  can also benefit from taking an inventory of what truly matters to them and explore how they may be ignoring these critical areas of their lives.  We all need to respect and honor differences, but the people with whom we have our most intimate relationships - our partners and our closest friends - need to share our deepest values, without which fault lines can begin to form.  

I once worked with a couple in their late thirties who met, quickly fell in love, married within the first year of knowing each other and had a daughter soon after.  There was a strong, initial attraction between them, but values were almost never discussed, and, as often happens with people in the early phase of a romantic relationship, a lot was assumed about who their partner really was.  As I began to explore why things were falling apart in their third year of marriage, a “values gap” turned out to be high on the list of what wasn’t right between them.  He had no intention of giving up his renewed hunting hobby, something that was anathema to how she felt about animals and life.  Her liberal world-view was an unrealistic “hippie fantasy” to him and light years away from his more conservative, business oriented pragmatism.  The things that she didn’t like about his values did not feel right to her on a number of levels and had begun to affect her outlook and her mood.  A thorough examination of their value differences eventually led to a negotiated and amicable separation that turned out to be the best and healthiest choice for both of them.  

One of the branches of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is an approach called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.  The “acceptance”  part has to do with mindfully allowing one’s thoughts and feelings to arise without suppression or self-judgment.  The “commitment”  part relates to values.  It has to do with the process of defining what truly matters to us, and then following through with strategies that further our stated goals.  The core of this treatment embodies the fundamental wisdom that it is not our symptoms that cause us the most misery.  Our deepest suffering has to do with not living a vital life.  Or, said another way: we all need to live a vital life that is forever moving in the direction of that which we value - even as we continue to relearn the lesson that life includes some inevitable pain and disappointments.  

It is not only individuals, couples and families that suffer when they lose their way in the values arena.  Organizations, social movements, and even nations can stray from their core principles and thereby compromise their institutional health.  Evangelical Christians before the age of Trump held claim to some of the moral high ground and were more than just a rubber stamp to an unethical, authoritarian leader.  The Democratic Party once was more than the representative of millionaires and the “educated class.” They were, “the party of the people”- a core value that united workers and minorities and led to Democratic majorities in Congress and Statehouses for decades.   Republicans were once, under the leadership of Theodore Roosevelt, the anti-monopolist party - the conservative guardians of our public lands and natural resources. They were not exclusively the party of oligarchs and corporate greed as they are today.  And America was once a nation that united to fight a war against tyranny and fascism, not a people who would even consider electing  a president who embraces these kinds of leaders and societies.

Maintaining  our health by sustaining our values requires a heightened awareness of the ways that we can all stray from what truly matters in our lives.  The following are some additional reasons why it is important to periodically re-examine our mission statements and some guidelines on how to redirect our energies and restore wellness in this area:

Even if it feels that this is all too abstract - that you are just trying to get by and can’t be bothered with this values stuff - your values still underpin your actions.  If we keep asking ourselves, “Why do I do what I do?” in the many areas of our lives from  “Why am I working at this job?” to “Why am I taking my child to the playground?” to “Why do I visit my aging father once a week at the nursing home,?”  values are somewhere in the picture and it may be helpful to clarify what they are, and recommit to them with a new awareness.

 Whenever we stand up for ourselves on an issue it is almost always a    values statement.  It can also be helpful to identify what those values are.  If people have very clear “bottom lines” about how they expect to be treated in a relationship and what they are unwilling to tolerate, that is often about valuing intimacy, equality and integrity - good things to clarify for oneself and to communicate to others.  

The values/health connection comes out of values clarification in the following way:  recommitting to core values leads to a stronger, more cohesive sense of self;  better relationships and a stronger sense of self leads to less chronic anxiety;  less chronic anxiety and psycho-physiological stress leads to better overall health and well being.  Even if our anxiety temporarily spikes or our mood drops,

When something feels wrong to us, or is going wrong in some aspect of our life or the life of a family member be prepared to look beyond the symptoms and the behaviors.   As a society, we are quick to diagnose, but in our rush to psychologically label someone or something we may be ignoring the underlying values issue.  The teenagers and their parents who had over-valued the trophies of “success” and the marriage in which a values-gap had never been discussed are examples of the malaise that can ensue.

One way to begin our value’s work is to write down, reflect on and rank order our core values.  After that, we may want to consider what Madeline Levine describes as “translating those core values into broader guiding principles and a family action plan.”  That might include things like, “not doing for my children what they can do for themselves.”

Be willing to examine whether what you call your values have been really chosen by you or are mostly mirror images of what your family or your “tribe” has prescribed for you.  Our strongest and most solid convictions are usually arrived at painstakingly through our own life experiences and independent reflection.

It can be hard to believe that others don’t necessarily share our values and tempting to characterize them as everything from ignorant to evil.  Our level of emotional maturity is tied to our ability to see them merely as different - not less than or better than ourselves.  That is the only way we will ever begin the intimate conversations and the national ones that may eventually change hearts and minds.

Filmmaker Michael Moore produced and acted in a one-man, Broadway show in 2017 titled, “The Terms of My Surrender.”  It was a very political play packed with audience participation.  Reflecting on what he took away from the experience, he said that he was left with one burning question: “Who are we as a people?”  It is a very timely question, and one having to do with values at its core.  It may also be connected to the many so-called, personal values questions that we all need to be asking ourselves.  There are no easy answers in this quest for meaning, but I see the work as crucial.  No less as is at stake than our personal well being, the health of our families and the soul of our nation.