In the news and why we MUST resist

I am not feeling hopeful about America right now, and frankly, I don't think you should be either. The news from the Evil Yam's dictatorly abode is getting worse and worse. Some recent developments:

Assaults on the media and freedom of the press:
CNN, The New York Times, The LA Times, and Politico, among others, were blocked from the White House press meeting. BLOCKED. This is unprecedented behavior from an American presidential administration. Indeed, just this past December (yes, the one just three months ago), Sean Spicer, WH Press Secretary said, "open access for the media is 'what makes a democracy a democracy versus a dictatorship.'" It seems the latter shoe is starting to fit quite comfortably.
-Meanwhile, a Chicago affiliate of ABC suspended an anchor for tweeting several anti-Trump sentiments. Speech seems to be becoming less free, eh?

Hate crimes and bigotry:
On Friday, two Indian-American men were shot, one of them killed, in Kansas by a white American who had been kicked out of the bar in which they all relaxed for such egregious racial slurs that other patrons complained. After leaving, he returned and fired on the men. It is being investigated as a premeditated hate crime. You think? Trump has made no statement about this event.
You probably also saw the horrific vandalization of a Jewish cemetery, Chesed Shel Emeth, in St. Louis, MO. Trump only made a statement denouncing this heinous act when asked directly about it by a journalist.
Trump is also still working on instating a travel ban despite not one reliable news or security source suggesting that such a ban is reasonable or is called for in any way. Homeland Security issued the article I link to.
Hate is becoming policy.

The roundups and threats of and actual deportations continue. Interestingly and concurrently, Trump rescinded "an Obama admin directive that would have ended the government's association with private prisons." As do many who have studied the systemically racist, enormously overpopulated, failing criminal justice system, Obama believed private prisons were "neither safe nor cost effective." But with Trump's deportation plans "comes the possibility of millions of illegal immigrants who will need to be detained somewhere" prior to their ouster. And it turns out according to USA TODAY, the private prison industry has already said thank you to Donald Trump.

After tweeting a promise to the LGBTQ community in June of 2016 to fight for them and their rights, Trump last week, with the support of newly installed Attorney General Jeff Sessions, rescinded an Obama directive aimed at protecting LGBTQ students in schools by tossing the decision to do so back to the states. As do I, many LGBTQ advocates believe desperately that federal protections are critically important to supersede the possible (likely; see North Carolina, for example) bigotry of state governments. 

Who's really running the show?:
Scary white supremacist WH Chief Strategist, Steve Bannon, emerged from the shadows of evil last week to deliver a forceful speech on plans to "deconstruct the administrative state" and "upend the world order." This included massive, sustained attacks on the media (see point 1, above). “Every day, it is going to be a fight.” Bannon remains on the National Security Council, also unprecedented. 

Trump's lies:
On February 21, Washington Post reporter, Chris Cilizza, published a well-documented piece showing that not once for the 33 days since his inauguration has Trump gone a day without lying. Some days those lies number one or two while other days the fib tally climbs to 7 or more.

Russia:
And meanwhile, Trump's (and his team's) relationships and involvement with Russia prior to the election and since remains exceptionally murky and unknown. Now, the Trump administration "has enlisted senior members of the intelligence community and Congress in efforts to counter news stories about Trump associates’ ties to Russia, a politically charged issue that has been under investigation by the FBI as well as lawmakers now defending the White House."

Two-protest Monday, the real meaning of our flag, democracy in action

I am starting to believe that investing heavily in foam core and Sharpie Magnums is not an unwise long-term investment strategy. 

After a school meeting, necessary workout so as to combat near-freaking out, several must-happen errands, and carpool runs, I had just enough time to make a double-sided flip sign before heading off to the two protests I wanted to attend tonight.

The first was to protest the most ignorant Secretary of Education nominee ever: the Kingdom of Heaven billionaire with zero real experience in education other than defunding public schools for no good reason, Betsy DeVos.

Lamar Alexander, the mealy-mouthed "head" of DeVos' confirmation hearing was, this afternoon, addressing the National School Boards Association annual meeting here in DC. I cannot imagine that the other speaker, the illustrious Doris Kearns Goodwin, felt awesome about Lamar following her, but perhaps she didn't much care.

If the support we received from NSBA attendees was any indication, DeVos has zero support from within their ranks and maybe Lamar should have done some good listening. But I doubt it. Not even kidding, they were pouring out of the Marriott to come and high-five us, take selfies, dance with our cheers, and even lead our cheers. The Michigan delegation loudly told us that for their public education system, "DeVos has been a nuclear bomb. A NUCLEAR BOMB."

This should come as no surprise to anyone who watched any bit of DeVos' confirmation hearing and/or who actually knows anything about American public education. It should make all congressional votes run for the Hills of No, but we heard tonight via a woman who'd met with Senator Kaine that he expected a straight party-line vote. Great. Said no one.

After that protest wrapped, I inverted my sign and asked two young spitfires if I could tag along with them to the Supreme Court as we all planned to attend the Senate Democrats press conference and vigil against Trump's heinous #MuslimBan. There I planned to try and meet up with my friend, Mina. And there I happened to run into my cousin via marriage, Sonia. So cool!

Mina and I did meet up, and we were both very pleased by the size of the crowd. Mina said it compared to that protesting at the White House yesterday. Good! Because this ridiculous ban on Muslims from only some countries is OFFENSIVE beyond belief. 

That's me.

Tonight, Senators Bernie, Elizabeth, Nancy, Al, and Tim all addressed us from the Court's grand steps. And Senator Leahy walked right past me and said "Thank you for being here." He's much taller in real life than I expected, more robust too, but still with those kind, smart eyes and recognizable face. 

All of chanted and cheered. Everyone was so kind and just brimming with solidarity. I was wearing that flag because some guy walking towards the SC with us kept dropping a giant box, and the two young spitfires and I asked if he needed help with it, and he said "No, but do you know what this box is full of?" 

"No," we said, "What?"

"American flags," he said. "They keep trying to say they are America, that they're going to make America great. But WE are America, and we are what makes it great, and we need to wear these flags proudly and show what the truth of America is."

That's one of the spitfires I met, in front of the Capitol. I love this pic!

And he was right. I have become viscerally opposed to flag pins in recent years. They make me want to gag because too often they're worn, with fake and sycophantic reason, by people who use what the flag truly represents to mask all that they don't. They've taken a real symbol of patriotism and bastardized it. 

But this guy helped me think differently. About reclaiming our stars and stripes. I am thankful for that and to him and his generosity. So hey, if you're going to a protest, please, honor this real patriot and buy an extra flag and give it out to someone just because.

It was another special night of coming together, one I needed desperately because earlier today I felt more worried than I have yet. 

Tonight, as strangers, friends, senators, and even some children sang "This land is my land, this land is your land" together, I took a snapshot and plugged it away inside my mental reservoir. This is what is at stake, and this is what we're fighting for.

Nanny, history (hidden and false), and otherwise

Tomorrow is Nanny's birthday, and were she still alive, she'd be turning 96. I miss her. At times, my memories of her slip into the background, but without fail and like the tides, they always flow back into the fore. I am thankful for that, but I recognize that keeping her with me does take some effort, and it should. Time heals, assuages. It covers naturally, like sand dunes that build up imperceptibly by day but noticeably over years. Without awareness and thought, what was once a flat land is suddenly a towering peak- what was underneath? Can it be reclaimed? Remembered? Found?

I keep Nanny with me in the way one must when someone or something is, and should remain, both important and honored. I don't want to lose any bit of her. My life and the lives of my children would be lessened without her guiding hand.

Nanny surfaced in my mind earlier while I was at the movies. Tom and I took the kids and one of Jack's friends to see Hidden Figures, a film about, literally, hidden women. Three incredible Black women who positively altered our country's trajectory but were, nonetheless, rendered voiceless, nameless, influenceless, until now.

How did my education overlook these women? How did my education overlook so many things that aren't part of "the" American narrative? That lovely, jovial narrative in which white settlers gave peaceful Thanks with native Americans (rather than the truth which involves a whole lot of slaughter and intolerance) and difference was tolerated rather than condemned as it had been when religious settlers fled England because of religious persecution. 

In truth, white Americans slaughtered the native ones and then proceeded to enslave Africans and racialize skin color. And forever subjugate women. And we continue to do all this but now also want to build a wall and stop people at borders. 

The racist and male fears (not always simultaneous, but sometimes) behind these ugly actions are why the figures in today's film/the real history were largely hidden and likely why my Nanny never boasted an outward voice as loud as I think her inner one may have been. Why I've spent my life unlearning a lot of what is expected of me as both southern and women -and, also, as Southern Woman- and why I have worked so emphatically, conscientiously, continuously to do so, despite the negative feedback I've sometimes received. 

I thought about this prior to Christmas when the boys and I decided to craft books for each set of grandparents. Each child would write a Top 10 list of things I like to do with you and also write a story or essay about one or more of those memories.

Lists were easy, stories for the grandfathers were easy. But the grandmother-specific tasks were harder: was there one thing? Some things? A specific thing that stood out? Not really. This vexed me for days and then I realized: It's because we are always here. We are the under-girdle, the pit crew, the foundation. We are the ever-present white noise, the hidden figures of nurturance and support. 

My boys are deeply connected to their grandmothers. I'd venture to say that beyond me, their Misse and Nomna are their closest relations. And yet they struggled for specifics. Sort of in the way I'd struggle to share something about myself of which I'm very proud. In the way Nanny never took much credit for all she'd one. In the times Katherine Goble Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson kept quiet, spoke up, and decided when and how to do either. And because they were Black, a lot more was risked and at stake. This is largely true today. 

I thought of all of this yesterday when a close friend, who is Persian, told me that she didn't know now when she would see her parents and sister again. My friend has lived in the US for years, but her parents and sister are Iranian-German dual nationals wholly impacted by Trump's ban on entering folks from Muslim nations. 

Not all Muslim nations, of course. Just the ones in which the Vulgar Yam doesn't own a Tower. His offensive ruling has nothing to do with anything but his own bottom line. We are, again, shunning people for no good reason. People who have made this country better and would continue to do so.

Like the many Mexicans who have come here and done the jobs Americans felt were beneath them, and paid taxes, and cared for our kids, and worked harder and with more dignity than many white Americans do or would. Who have picked tomatoes and cleaned homes and acted in ways far more patriotic than too many lazy white Americans I know. 

One of my cousins today said about that fucking wall, "Build it long and tall." And I was so ashamed I nearly melted into myself. You can't pick your family, eh? Nanny would rather have died than say something so ugly, despite the fact that she too struggled with a Black first lady and a Black first family. But she struggled with it honestly and respectfully and came, at the dawn of her 90s, to see the errors of her past learnings. To address her unconscious but pernicious racist views and to confront them head on. To, ultimately, celebrate the beauty and dignity and complete realization of Americanness the Obamas embodied. That all the hidden figures in our past embodied. And to change her ways and vote accordingly.

As Trump shits on the core of what has made America a great place, I refuse to accept him and his mean, cruel, heartless, small-minded minions. You are what lessens us, and history will prove that theorem true. Now, more than ever, I see the value of voice and courage. I see how Nanny lived decades longer than anyone in her family had before her, and I know, in part, just why. Because she was the truest model of American exceptionalism: the rare bird to acknowledge her limitations, to address them, to change them, and to act on those changes.

THAT is the essence of what once made this country great, and I'll be damned if I don't try to live up to what she, and all the fighting and hidden figures before me, worked and fought for. We are better than walls and turning people back in airports. We must be, or we are nothing.