Good Things
My wife says the blog is increasingly "ragy" and dark and angry. Some commenters countered that I should be angry, that the unfairness and injustice of everyday life in America warrant it. But I am outwardly a happy guy, always looking for the next hill of knowledge to climb or political debate to have. So with that, for this week, a list of Good Things I saw, read, and experienced that give me hope, in no particular order of importance.
As always, you can listen to this post as a podcast HERE. Rest assured, we shall return to the tough stuff.
Now The List
Lou Dobbs's show on Fox Business was canceled. It was racist and stupid. Capitalism responds not to principle but viewer apathy for bad products.
Joe Biden called Michele Voelkert of Roseville, CA., on the telephone. Sure, it was staged and scripted and prepped by White House communications people. But he did it. He called an American citizen who had lost her job and had written him a letter.
The Tom Brady story. It's not how he plays or how he wins. It's how he brings leadership to groups of people and how he parents his kids with such obvious love and dedication.
A friend posting on Instagram her driving up to her childhood home during a snowstorm.
A niece had twins. Another niece had a baby, and a third niece is pregnant.
Steph Curry from the logo for THREE! What is it about a smallish, slightish athlete that makes him otherworldly?
Reading "Remembering America," by Richard Goodwin, a literary, political memoir of the 60s inside the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. It was Goodwin who wrote the "We Shall Overcome" speech delivered by LBJ in 1965, urging Congress to pass the Voting Rights bill.
"Every American citizen must have an equal right to vote," he said. "There is no reason which can excuse the denial of that right. There is no duty which weighs more heavily on us than the duty we have to ensure that right."
My mother and father got vaccinated by the United States of America and the states of New York and New Jersey and the people in those states that care for people.
Finished Alicia Garza's book - The Purpose of Power - about the founding of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Listened to Christopher Plummer singing Edelweiss in The Sound of Music, over and over.
Marty Baron retired from the Washington Post. He is the Tom Brady of newspaper editors, bringing the Post back from the brink - along with millions from Jeff Bezos.
Enjoyed recurring dreams about personal connections forged through sports that did not become lifelong friendships, but the kind of guys who, if you saw them at a party, all would be as it was, for at least a moment. Billy Harrison, Marsh Chambers, and others.
What’s your list? Respond in the comments below.
We are always looking for comments and suggestions for subjects to cover. Coming posts include money in politics, Trump's impeachment trial, the future of the Republican and Democratic parties, an ongoing list of what makes people great at what they do, and interviews with key people you don't see in the modern media.
