James M. Redwine

Gavel Gamut

D-Day

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“Throughout the 200-year history of the United States the American nation has been at war.” That was how author William Koenig led into his 1980 book, Americans at War. Although ostensibly a study of American warfare from about 1775 at Lexington and Concord to 1975, the end of the Viet Nam War, Koenig actually starts with the arrival of the Mayflower in 1620 and Native Americans meeting the ship. Had he waited until today to publish he could have included another fifty years of Americans at war, right up to Ukraine.

In general, we Americans view our involvement in foreign wars, that is, non-Native American warfare, as justified by the belligerence of others who have forced us reluctantly into “making the world safe for democracy.” The beginning of our provision of armaments, intelligence and training to Ukraine dates back to soon after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the “breakup” of the Soviet Union. The current U.S. commitment of over 50 billion dollars is only a fraction of our huge military and economic support for Ukraine over many years. Russia has often taken note.

George Soros, the Hungarian born American billionaire, stated on May 24, 2022 that the Russia-Ukraine war may be the start of World War III and result in the end of human civilization. Such doomsday statements are not a new phenomenon. Ever since the days of The Flood people have warned that human behavior, usually by someone other than the Jeremiad of the moment, was going to lead to the end of the world. They mean the end of homo sapiens’ short 200,000-year reign on our 4.5-billion-year-old planet. Earth will survive, but without us.

I have no estimate how many predictions of mankind’s demise have been made from the time of our common really great-grandmother, Lucy, in Africa until 1945. Until America came up with and used the atom bomb, the philosophers who had previously cried wolf were doing just that. However, now with numerous countries possessing nuclear weapons and itching to use them, we may have finally made honest men out of Noah and all the other survivalists. I am not going to address climate change and pollution as doomsday machines as I only have about three pages of print available. I will stick with nuclear war in this column.

With nuclear powers, such as Russia, North Korea, China, America and Israel all claiming they fear for their survival, I am reminded of my onetime acquaintance who told me in 1973 that if Egypt were about to destroy Israel that Israel would be justified in destroying the whole world to avenge itself. Fortunately, he was not an Israeli and Egypt stood down. I do wonder if Putin might feel so threatened he would believe Russia would be justified in starting the nuclear daisy chain.

These thoughts of World War III came scrambling into my brain when I thought about June 06, 1944 and D-Day. Americans and many others thought the World War of 1914-1918 with its inane carnage, over no one knew what, was going to end world-wide war. Then the courage and sacrifice of 150,000 American soldiers on D-Day was touted as the beginning of the end of totalitarian regimes. Later we thought we had learned something from Korea, Viet Nam, Iraq and Afghanistan. Now, George Soros, hardly a war monger, fears we may be at the beginning of WWIII raging in Ukraine.

As for me, I will place my confidence in that part of human nature that has pulled us back from self-immolation many times. History leads me to have faith we will not self-fulfill such a dire prophecy. Of course, if I am right everyone will be around to say so, and if I am wrong, what difference will it make?

Memorial Day

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My earliest memories of Memorial Day involved hot cemeteries where all the adult women spent a great deal of time loudly hushing all the children and the few men in attendance furtively smoked cigarettes while shifting from foot to foot. Any attempt by me or my brother, Philip, to chase butterflies or engage in horseplay was met with stern stares and an occasional knock on the head or a swat on the tail.

Mother had three brothers and one sister who had served in the Army in WWII and Mom observed the service of all veterans solemnly and reverently; she demanded her children properly learn the ritual. Our role was to honor the dead soldiers and show gratitude to those veterans who were still with us.

Memorial Day has slowly metamorphosized from a national day of honoring veterans to a general recognition of all who have passed on. And Mother and her mother and their mainly female friends and relatives saw their duty to include the graves of deceased loved ones in various cemeteries in divergent locales. Mom would load all four of us kids and bunches of freshly cut ferns and flowers into a black Ford without air conditioning and without a thought on her part of a cold pop or an ice cream cone for us. She would say that was scant penance on our part to repay the sacrifice of our service people and their families.

I do not know how many veterans’ gravesites Mom dragged me to before I joined the Air Force myself during the Viet Nam War. I did not get sent to Viet Nam but several of my childhood friends did. One of them, twenty-two-year-old Gary Malone, went twice but he only came back once. That changed my understanding of Mom’s dedication to Decoration Day. I may be generally obtuse but I no longer needed a pointed stare, a tap on the head or a kick in the behind to appreciate Memorial Day. I sure wish Gary were here so I could tell him but his veteran’s memorial marker is close to my Mom and Dad in the local cemetery so I can, at least, salute Gary as I visit the folks on Decoration Day. I now get it; as always, Mother knew best.

Changes

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They tore down my grade school and built a church. It is a nice church that regularly fills up with nice people, some of whom I do not know and some I do. In fact, some of the church members whom I do know I first met in the first grade in our old sandstone elementary school that is now their church. I expect almost every time one of those old classmates pulls up to their new church, they get a nostalgic image of our old school. I know that every time Peg and I happen to drive by the fine new brick church with its lovely green lawn and flowering shrubs, images of a sward of almost non-existent short grass interspersed with small pebbles and an occasional anthill fiercely guarded by large biting red ants come wafting through my contemporary thoughts.

The large two-story sandstone building with a bell tower on top and a basement below was one of the first truly substantial buildings in my hometown and had once, or so I was told by my Osage Indian Sunday School teacher, Violet Willis, served as a school for other Osage girls. Miss Violet and my family attended another church that has now been abandoned with some of its congregation now joining with that of the new one that replaced both my old school and my old church. The new church thoughtfully preserved the large stain glass window from my old church that was the sanctuary’s focal point. The stain glass scene was of a beautiful stream that gave worshipers an impression the water was flowing right into the baptismal vault where I and my sister and two brothers were baptized. That old sanctuary was also where we four siblings all sang in the choir and where our Father and Mother both served as elders and were honored during both of their funerals.

The new church that replaced my old school and my old church also replaced that congregation’s original church building that had been located about one block from my old church. That old church served its congregation well for many years and also served me and other Explorer Scouts as our meeting place because the civic minded father of one of my best friends from our old elementary school both formed and financially supported our Explorer Troop and, as a member of that congregation, got permission for us to meet there. My old friend and his family still attend that church in its new location. I bet he thinks about both our old school and his family’s old church building frequently when he goes to his new church.

Gentle Reader, you may get a sense from these reflections that somehow I am casting some sort of shadow over those who have seen fit to make the changes in my old school or the two old churches or my old beloved community at large to whom and what I owe so much. You would be far from the mark. I was blessed to learn many treasured lessons from my old school and several old churches, only one of which was mine, and countless friends, teachers and wise elders. How could I rue the decisions they made that helped make me so gratified today?

Changes must happen and hopefully they will be positive. One lesson I learned from those halcyon days of now bygone buildings was that the generosity and wisdom of those who populated those structures and that of those who now frequent the new ones are what matters most.

To paraphrase Martin Luther King, Jr., it is not the structures that are most important but the character nurtured by those who dwell therein. Old schools, changing old churches and changing communities are inevitable. However, it is not inevitable that change is good; good people must make them so. I was fortunate to grow up where the people did.

♪ All The Grass Is Green ♪

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Photo by Peg Redwine

I like brown grass. It matches the unfallen brown leaves I don’t have to rake and the brown stagnant water in the pond that hides my fish from the ravenous blue heron. Also, brown grass does not engender chiggers. Ah, chiggers, Mother Nature’s reminder that we humans are, in fact, at the top of the insect world’s food pyramid. Here’s how the internet waxes eloquent about chiggers:

“They bite their human host (who invited them?) and by embedding their mouthparts into the skin

cause intense irritation with intense itching.” Ugh!

The omniscient internet says chiggers prosper in grasslands, like the Osage County, Oklahoma prairie, and are most numerous in early summer when grass is heaviest; you know, like now! I have been doing my own field work on chiggers since the mowing season has returned. I can attest that for once the internet is correct; chiggers proliferate in tall green grasses.

My ankles still display chigger bites from those halcyon childhood summer days when I would gayly traipse through the green prairie grasses in short pants and bare feet while the chiggers were rejoicing at the opportunity to embed their heads permanently into my skin and scar me physically and mentally for eternity. Surely someone should have kept me out of tall green grass for the first ten years of my life and surely I should not be communicating with chiggers now as beautiful dry brown grass turns into tall green chigger heaven.

Unfortunately, I cannot convince Peg our yard looks just fine with waving green stems interspersed with golden dandelions. She insists that I do battle with the vegetation that is being protected by battalions of chiggers as ferocious as Ukrainian freedom fighters. I don’t get it. Peg plants countless flowers and even decorative grasses while she insists I attack our yard with a smoking, noisy grass decapitating Kubota dragon. No wonder the chiggers launch counter attacks. I say let bygones be bygones. I’ll forgive those childhood chiggers if today’s marauders will leave me alone. But how can they if Peg demands I destroy their homes?

I say the blames for my chigger discomfort falls squarely upon Peg’s pathological need to impress the neighbors. Neighbors? We live in the country! Our cabin is a quarter of a mile from the main county road. Nobody ever sees our yard unless you count FedEx and UPS drivers who deliver Peg’s ever regenerating plants for her to plant and the chiggers to nest in. If I did not mow the yard all summer no one would see or care; well, except Peg of course.

But the real problem is not Peg. The real problem is the United States government that can send out trillions of borrowed dollars to encourage people not to work and trillions of borrowed dollars to help Ukrainians blow up Russian tanks, planes and ships but cannot spend a Depression Era dime to eliminate chiggers. It is time we returned to those thrilling days of yesteryear when instead of spreading armaments we spread insect killer, not DDT, of course.

Let’s hear it for dead chiggers and live, itch-free people. That’s a better campaign slogan than “Ban the U.S. Supreme Court” or “Raise a statue to Sammy Alito.” Well, excuse me a moment. I’ve got to go get Peg to type up this column for the paper and I can see out the window she is gleefully planting even more insect habitat.

Lemonade

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Photo by Peg Redwine

Liberals are upset that the leak from the U.S. Supreme Court may signal that the case of Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), may be overturned or, as is more likely, modified. Conservatives are upset there was a leak from the Supreme Court that may allow public pressure from Liberals to influence the Court to not modify Roe’s holdings.

Neither Roe v. Wade nor the case that followed it, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992), is before the Supreme Court for decision. They could be referred to and overturned or reaffirmed by the Court within its decision of the pending case of Dobbs v. Jackson, No. 19-1392 that will be decided in 2022. As there has not yet been an official decision in Dobbs, it does not have an official public citation.

Liberals celebrate the leak and abhor the substance of the draft opinion authored by conservative justice Samuel Alito. Conservatives celebrate the preliminary opinion and abhor the leak. Both Liberals and Conservatives find reasons to attack the institution of the Third Branch of our democracy as they clamor for it to be fundamentally changed. Liberals want to “pack” the Court so as to dilute its current conservative majority. Conservatives want a vigorous investigation into the leak with the hope the public will be outraged if some left-leaning leaker is identified as the culprit.

I agree with Shakespeare’s character, Mercutio, in Act III, scene 1 of Romeo and Juliet when his imminent death results due to an irrational feud between the families of the lovers:

“A plague on both your houses!”

However, if we are to be constantly accosted by railings of both Liberals and Conservatives about the need for modifications in the United States Supreme Court, let us consider making some constructive changes. After all, no rational American wants to do away with the Court. We all know one of the main reasons our country has outlived every other constitutional democracy on earth is our equally competing three branches of government. We must support the maintenance of all three, including the Judicial Branch.

When it comes to the Judicial Branch, political commentators often assert it is non-political and must remain so. They are correct if they mean the actual decisions of the Court. No judge should allow political influence to affect his or her decision. But when it comes to maintaining the public’s confidence in the non-political basis of a judge’s decision, it is the processes of judicial selection and retention that are most important.

One reason the public believes the members of the Supreme Court are politically motivated is because the public has no influence on how the justices get their life-time jobs nor any realistic way to remove them. Presidents are elected every four years with the possibility of only one more four-year term. Representatives are elected every two years and Senators are elected every six years. The public has a right to remove them. Supreme Court justices are nominated by one person, the President, as the President sees fit. The public’s influence is greatly attenuated, in fact, virtually non-existent.

At a minimum, the public should have the assurance that many of the most vital issues of their lives will not be at the mercy of the same five-member majority of the Supreme Court for an unknown period. Perhaps our current national furor could be a catalyst to, at least, set term limits for the Supreme Court justices. A ten-year term is what I suggest but the public, through its federal Legislature, should decide such issues. It is fair and in our own best interest in getting well-qualified justices who are willing to serve, to grant the retired justices generous life-time pensions once their term is up. But in return, the retired justices would agree to neither seek nor accept another judicial position ever again.

The possibility of term limits for the Supreme Court might help assuage the current calls by Liberals and Conservatives to radically control what must remain one of our three independent branches of government. Term limits is a better solution than a continuing loss of public confidence in and, perhaps, a loss of independence for, our Supreme Court. In other words, we do not want to make the same types of mistakes as did Romeo and Juliet in their final Act. We do not need to continue on our road toward possible suicide for our democracy.

p.s. Gentle Reader, Peg and I have two upcoming book signings for our new historical novel, Unanimous for Murder, that is a sequel to JUDGE LYNCH!. The first is May 17, 2022 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Osage County Historical Society Museum at 700 Lynn Avenue in Pawhuska, Oklahoma. The second is May 20, 2022 at Capers Emporium, 602 Main Street, New Harmony, Indiana from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. Please drop by and say hello!

Good Things Come With Time

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Photo by Peg Redwine

As did Athena, the goddess of wisdom who sprung full grown from the head of Zeus, occasionally a Mozart-type creative genius is born into the world already with great mental acuity. But most people only develop wisdom over a substantial amount of time. That is why virtually every culture honors its older citizens, not because they have lived a long time but because they may have accumulated knowledge and may possess sound judgment as a result. Of course, good judgment often is earned the hard way, that is, in response to earlier bad decisions. If one survives enough poor choices, better choices and better advice become more likely.

When it comes to good choices, I have been impressed by the simplicity of the dietary decisions of two elderly women. France’s Jeanne Louise Calment lived to be over 122. She quit smoking at age 120 and she claimed her long life was due to her penchant for chocolate and port wine.

Her fellow Frenchwoman, Sister Andre, is now the oldest person on earth at 118 years of age. Sister Andre survived the Spanish Flu in 1918 and recovered from COVID-19 in 2020. The Catholic nun stated that chocolate is her favorite food and she drinks a glass of wine every day. That certainly sounds better to me than kale and exercise. I am changing my approach.

One recent phenomenon of reaching an old age that as a male concerns me is that since the beginning of the 21stcentury of the 24 oldest people on earth only two have been men. Now I do not know the ages of many Biblical women but according to the Old Testament at Genesis 5:27, Methuselah lived to be 969 years old and Genesis at 9:29 tells us Methuselah’s grandson, Noah, lived until he was 950. What happened to men? I say we are now short about 900 years and women are now greatly outliving us. Please do not mistake my intent. It is not that I want women to live shorter lives than men, I just want all of us to, at least, make it to well over 100 or even receive a Biblical allotment of a long tenure.

In that regard, I must replace my granola bars with an assortment of chocolate. As to the wine increment, Peg and I bought a wine cooler at the Pawhuska, Oklahoma Chamber of Commerce auction last Saturday and Pawhuska’s Blue Sky Bank, that contributed the cooler, filled it with fun brands of wine, including some from the Prairie Rattler Winery in Shidler, Oklahoma. I feel heathier already. In fact, Peg and I now qualify to be full members of my sister Jane’s so-called women’s book club, Inspiritice, that ostensibly meets to discuss good books, but in reality, just gets together to drink good wine. I think they may all live forever; at least I hope so.

Photo by Peg Redwine
Photo by Jim Redwine