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Martyrs

A True Depression

August 1, 2020 by Jim 1 Comment

If a recession is when your neighbors lose their jobs but it is a depression when you lose yours, what is the analogy for our society’s losses due to ’Ole 19? Let me suggest that for Peg it was when she finally submitted herself to asking me to cut her hair. Yep, it’s complete capitulation; 19 can claim total victory. I should be able to show you photographic proof but it turns out that a wife’s hirsute humiliation is in the same category of bad husbanding as failing to separate the whites and colors for the laundry. No pictures of my artistry were allowed. In fact, Peg has found a new use for the flowered bandana she uses as a face mask; it now covers the top of her head too. And my attempts to assure her that within a few months her hair will grow back just seem to exacerbate the situation. Please allow me to digress.

Gentle Reader, you may have noticed it is hot in July and August near the latitude along the Mason-Dixon Line. Well Peg, who was born in upstate New York, had not quite acclimated to the previous weeks of 100-degree temperatures. Her Joan of Arc length hair tended to stick to her forehead and the back of her neck whenever she lugged water to her flowers and her vegetable garden. The martyr-type comparison will make sense by the time you finish the column. I was understanding and sympathetic, but my advice that Mother Nature would eventually provide rain was not received gladly. She stubbornly persisted and even suggested I could get involved if the TV re-runs of old golf matches didn’t interfere. Surely, we need not revisit that painful discussion.

The real problem is not me but ’Ole 19. Peg used to go to the beauty shop to get her hair cut. Or, when we still lived in Indiana, our daughter, Heather, who is a beautician would take care of it. However, now, as we do not wish to contribute to 19’s macabre statistics, we have socially isolated since our last foray out to eat which was March the 5th. We wear masks, we wash our hands, we ignore our friends and family, we shop online, we eat lots of tuna. But we both knew the Corona Virus had achieved complete domination when Peg said last week, “Jim, I just can’t stand this heat and having my hair string down my face and neck. Nobody but you is ever going to see me again anyway (I thought that a little overly dramatic) so you are going to have to cut it. Come watch these YouTube videos and try to pay attention.”

Well, it didn’t look that hard to me. I remember when I got my hair cut in Pawhuska, Oklahoma by Clyde Ensley or Bob Butts or in Mt. Vernon, Indiana by Steve Burris. Heck, it appeared about like cleaning a squirrel or a chicken. Just slice here, snip there, shear off the sides. No problem. After watching for ten minutes or so I was pretty sure I could give Vidal Sassoon a run. “Peg, get a towel and I’ll grab a pair of scissors and the electric clippers you used to use on our dearly departed dog and meet you on the front porch.”

It probably would have turned out better if Peg had not sat as if she were an unfortunate customer of an electric chair and if she hadn’t jumped and squirmed each time the clippers whirred and the scissors snipped. Regardless, in my unbiased opinion I did a fine job. If the bowl I used had fit better it would have helped. I can only guess at Peg’s opinion as she hardly has spoken to me for three days and when she does it is difficult to make out what she is saying amid the shrieks, sobs and expletives as she tries to pull her hair back to its former length.

Hair on the porch floor

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Filed Under: COVID-19, Females/Pick on Peg, Gavel Gamut, Indiana, JPeg Osage Ranch, Martyrs, Mt. Vernon, Oklahoma, Pawhuska, Personal Fun Tagged With: 'Ole 19, a true depression, beautician, beauty shop, Bob Butts, Clyde Ensley, Covid Virus, electric chair, electric clippers, expletives, Gentle Reader, hair cut, Indiana, James M. Redwine, Jim Redwine, Joan of Arc, martyr, Mason-Dixon Line, Mother Nature, Mt. Vernon, Oklahoma, pair of scissors, Pawhuska, Peg, recession, shrieks, sobs, Steve Burris, upstate New York, Vidal Sassoon

Do We Want To Fool Mother Nature?

April 12, 2019 by Jim Leave a Comment

China’s National Science Review reported in March 2019 that Bing Su of the Kunming Institute of Zoology has inserted human genes into monkeys. His apparent goal was to investigate how the brains of early primates developed along different paths with monkeys remaining in the trees and Homo sapiens progressing to the Internet.

Chinese scientist He Jiankui while at the Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen, China claims to have modified the genome, the DNA, of twin female humans in an attempt to preempt the possibility of them someday contracting the HIV virus.

Both of these researchers dealt with DNA and CRISPR. DNA is familiarly known as deoxyribonucleric acid and CRISPR is an acronym for clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats. The genome is the famous Double Helix discovered by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953. DNA is our 23 pairs of intertwined chromosomes that make us us. CRISPR is the DNA from viruses that might protect us from other viruses such as HIV.

Gentle Reader, if I were you I would not rely upon this exposition of biological knowledge from me for answers you may wish some paid tutor to give on your child’s SAT test. Please remember, I was an English major.

Instead of science, let’s you and I turn to literature for our analysis of genetic engineering. We can start at the beginning. In Genesis, that was written about 400 BC if we look to the Dead Sea Scrolls for a date, Yahweh was doing a little human manipulation when he decided Adam needed a companion. The DNA from Adam’s rib was used to create Eve. The Bible does not explain why two Adams was not the result. However, blissful ignorance was the life these humans led until fruit from the Tree of Knowledge was eaten. Some may think it’s been all downhill since.

About 300 years before Adam and Eve those marvelous Greeks were writing about Achilles who was the product of a human, Peleus, and the immortal nymph, Thetis. This mixing of DNA’s of differing species helped lead to the sack of Troy.

Of course, Jesus, about 2,000 years ago, was a similar product of the human Mary and a god who used genetic merging to create a Prince of Peace. To my way of thinking this was evidence there may be some true benefit to Mankind from such genomitry.

As for me, I could support the manipulation of human genetics if we could create drivers who would not clog up the passing lane and who could survive at least a few moments without a cell phone stuck in their ear. Also, as a husband, could we not embed in wives a gene that allows for beer and football instead of yard work?

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Filed Under: Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Personal Fun Tagged With: Achilles, Adam, Bing Su, Dead Sea Scrolls, DNA CRISPR, Eve, Genesis, genome, Gentle Reader, Greeks, He Jiankui, HIV, James M. Redwine, Jesus, Jim Redwine, Mary, Peleus, Prince of Peace, Troy

Merry Christmas to Us

December 27, 2018 by Jim Leave a Comment

If the message of Christmas were simply gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, etc., etc., it would have died out about as unceremoniously as the current stock market. Therefore, we should probably consider if there are other possibilities.

When the Jews were conquered by the Romans they reacted as most oppressed people would. Their cultural myths concentrated on deliverance. In general, deliverance from an omnipotent force can take three approaches: armed rebellion; assimilation; and/or peaceful coexistence.

To some of the Hebrews their hoped-for messiah would be a warrior who would throw off the Roman rule. To others the approach was more of total capitulation. But for many the thought was a Prince of Peace would provide the best hope. To fight Rome, as the destruction of the Jewish temple in 70 A.D. showed, was to court annihilation. As the Jewish historian Josephus Flavius chronicled, revolt by the Jews brought total devastation to their society.

On the other hand, the Romans and Jews of that time did not appear to be interested in peaceful coexistence except upon terms set by Rome. That left real deliverance from bondage for the Jewish people to be more metaphysical, that is, through philosophy not armed resistance. And it took 2,000 years, the horrors of WWII and the benevolence of the world’s new Rome, the United States of America, before Jewish self-determination could be realized. Still true peace as called for by Jesus is elusive. The Middle East continues to be an area where armed rebellion is both ubiquitous and futile.

Perhaps we should give the true message of Christmas a chance. I know President Trump has his faults and I carry no brief for much of what our government does in our name. However, to withdraw from foreign conflicts that simply kill thousands, destroy cultures and cost trillions appears to me to be the course Jesus would call for. Merry Christmas and welcome home to our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and wherever else we are engulfed in endless counterproductive conflicts. And if we really are the new Rome maybe we should learn from the military fiascoes of that ancient one.

The debacle on Wall Street might best be addressed not by quarrelling over interest rates but by investing our treasure in ourselves instead of squandering it in the vain pursuit of a Pax Americana.

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Filed Under: America, Christmas, Democracy, Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Middle East, Patriotism, War Tagged With: armed rebellion, assimilation, debacle on Wall Street, frankincense, gold, Hebrews, hope-for Messiah, invest our treasure in ourselves, James M. Redwine, Jesus, Jews, Jim Redwine, Josephus Flavius, Merry Christmas to Us, Middle East, myrrh, Pax Americana, peaceful coexistence, President Trump, Prince of Peace, Romans, Rome's military fiascoes, stock market, true message of Christmas, withdraw from wars, WWII

Taps

February 17, 2017 by Jim Leave a Comment

I do not play the bugle so any veteran’s farewell from me must come in words. I wrote this tribute to Gene McCoy, Harold Cox and all Korean War Veterans in September 2005. When my friend Gene McCoy passed away February 12 (Lincoln’s birthday), I was reminded of his many years of service to the rest of us about which I had written twelve years ago. Gene told me then he appreciated the bon mots. Because he was such a considerate friend, I am confident he would say the same thing now.

 

AN UNKNOWN VICTORY

You name the WAR:

Two countries are created from one by the greatest military power in the world and are monitored by the United Nations;

One country led by a ruthless dictator invades the other in spite of the United Nations warnings not to;

The Secretary General of the United Nations declares, “This is a war against the United Nations.”;

A United States President leads a coalition of world leaders to unite to drive the invaders out and re-establish the status quo;

An American general was placed in charge of the United Nations forces;

While many countries offered some help, the American military provided more than half of a million personnel in the war;

The aggressors were driven out of and liberty was restored to the invaded country; and

The mission for which Americans fought and died was accomplished.

 

If you said The Gulf War of 1990-1991, that is understandable. Almost all Americans supported that war and recognized that victory. However, I am talking about the Korean War of 1950-1953. It too was a great victory for American and United Nations interests and helped prevent World War III. We owe a huge debt to our Korean War veterans.

Two of those heroes (they just hate to be called that but, hey, it’s my column and facts are facts) are Posey County natives and brothers-in-law Harold Cox and Gene McCoy.

Harold fought with the U.S. Army’s 25th Division which suffered many casualties and bore much of the fighting in Korea. Harold was an infantry rifleman and was the jeep driver for his company commander.

Gene was a combat engineer with the Army’s 84th Engineers Battalion and, also, served as a courier/mail deliverer.

Harold was on the frontlines and Gene was building wooden bridges about 1000 yards behind those lines. Gene says Harold had it a lot rougher than Gene.

Both suffered the 20 below zero cold, the stifling heat and humidity, the loneliness, home sickness and fear in what those not there called a “police action.”

Harold said one of his worst memories, outside of dodging enemy mortar rounds for a solid year of combat, was the stench of the human waste the impoverished Koreans would save all winter and fertilize their rice paddies with in the spring. Gene, also, mentioned that nauseating smell and the mud and flooding caused by the lack of vegetation due to constant shelling.

When Gene first arrived in Korea they put his outfit on a train which stopped frequently. Each time it stopped the young soldiers were given a few rounds of ammunition and ordered out to guard the train from sabotage. Gene said this initiation to Korea was more than a little unsettling.

Harold told me that the traffic signs in the war were a bit more to the point than those back home. On one particularly dangerous stretch of road a sign advised:

“Get your ____ in gear and drive like ____! The NK can see you.”

Harold paid attention.

Harold and Gene came home and re-started their lives. Harold served as Mt. Vernon’s Water Superintendent for several years in the 1980’s and1990’s. Gene served as a Mt. Vernon City Councilman and the Posey County Recorder. Gene is (in 2005) currently Posey County’s Veterans Affairs Officer. They both raised families and went on publicly as if there had been no Korean War. However, privately what General Douglas MacArthur called “the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield” never left their consciousness.

Of course, there was a Korean War and it helped save you and me from another world war. It was a largely unappreciated “mission accomplished.” Thank you Harold and Gene and all your fellow Korean War veterans.

 

As General MacArthur might have said, both the old song and those it honors quietly fade away:

Sun has set, shadows come,

Soldier rest, your race is run.

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Filed Under: America, Democracy, Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Patriotism, Posey County, War Tagged With: An Unknown Victory, Army 84th Engineers Battalion, combat engineer, Gene McCoy, General Douglas MacArthur, Gulf War, Harold Cox, infantry rifleman, James M. Redwine, Jim Redwine, Korean War Veterans, Mt. Vernon City Councilman, Mt. Vernon Water Superintendent, police action, Posey County Beterans Affairs Officer, Posey County Recorder, Taps, U.S. Army 25th Division, war

Heroes to Their Hearts?

July 1, 2016 by Jim Leave a Comment

Peg and I are going to Istanbul soon. We planned our trip, and paid for it, a couple of months ago. We will fly out of the airport that was just bombed by three Russian-speaking people from Uzbekistan, Dagestan, and Kyrgyzstan. All three are part of the old Soviet Union. Their leader may be a Chechen known as Akhmed (One-Arm) Chatayev who now lives in Raqqa, Syria. ISIS claims Raqqa as its capital.

When Peg and I were sent to Russia in 2003 by the National Judicial College to teach Russian judges, we had an incident as we prepared to fly from Volgograd back to Moscow. Our clearly marked American luggage was suspected of having been used by Chechen rebels to smuggle a bomb onto the plane with the Russian judges and us. Although a ticking sound had been detected, our luggage was cleared. It was good to walk away from the plane when we got back safely to Moscow.

Chechen rebels have been struggling against the dominant Russian culture for many years. Akhmed One-Arm is reported to be a Chechen rebel turned ISIS leader. Other than some bizarre misinterpretation of Islam and a sense of bitter impotence against the governments of Russia and Turkey I see no logic in Syrian terrorists teaming with Chechen ones to kill innocent civilians in Turkey. My guess is they could not explain it either.

What they do have in common, I think, is a willingness to kill and die for a cause they see as greater than their miserable lives. The fact that most of their victims are innocent Muslims does not appear to enter their calculus of indiscriminate carnage.

I suppose they see themselves as patriots and martyrs. But to what end? For what purpose? Are they martyrs who die for their religion? Are they patriots who kill to establish their caliphate?

The one and one-half billion Muslims who go about raising their families and paying their taxes are surely as perplexed as the rest of us at the counterproductive insanity engaged in by a few thousand madmen. I say they must be insane because they keep engaging in the same terroristic behavior and expect a different result other than causing the rest of the world to coalesce against their goals. In dealing with illogical behavior we humans usually apply logic then we are puzzled when the result we expect to effect does not materialize.

As for me and Peg and our trip to Istanbul, we plan to follow the approach of Admiral David Farragut: “Damn the Terrorists, full speed ahead.” Hey don’t quibble it got us out of Russia didn’t it? Do you believe Peg is always complaining that I never take her any place exciting?

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Filed Under: America, Democracy, Females/Pick on Peg, Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Patriotism

Jesus of Palestine

January 1, 2016 by Jim Leave a Comment

During these Twelve Days of Christmas my thoughts have been occupied with the birth of Jesus. According to Matthew, Chapter 2, and Luke, Chapter 2, Jesus was born in Bethlehem during the reign of Herod the Great, which was from 37 B.C. to 4 B.C. The Roman emperor Pompeii conquered the area of Palestine, which included Bethlehem, in 63 B.C. Bethlehem is an ancient city whose history dates back a thousand years before Christ.

Today Bethlehem is in the West Bank area of Palestine about ten kilometers south of modern day Israel, which was carved out of Palestine in 1948 by the United Nations.

Jesus was born in the city of Bethlehem. Bethlehem was then and is now in the country of Palestine. Some who wish to deny ancient or biblical or Roman or contemporary borders may cling to the fiction that Palestine never existed and Bethlehem today is part of the so-called “Palestinian Authority”. Such legerdemain simply pours fuel on the conflagration that is the Middle East. Call it a rose or call it a thorn; Palestine is Palestine.

Just as so many who reach our shores from foreign lands know, if your child is born in the United States, he/she is an American citizen. Ergo, either Jesus was born and died a Palestinian or, if one is a believer, Jesus was born and still is a Palestinian.

When the National Judicial College had me teach fourteen Palestinian judges and lawyers, including Palestine’s Attorney General who lived in Bethlehem, I found them evenly divided between Christians and Muslims. The Attorney General was Palestinian Christian and very proud to live in the “Little Town” of Jesus’s birth. He held out hope the Prince of Peace would return and bring peace to His birthplace and the world.

In this season of hoped for peace, my thoughts have turned to the origin of our troubles in the Middle East. Until the country of Palestine was occupied by forces enabled by our power and money, America had no problems with Palestinians. There was and is no just reason for us to help oppress Palestinians. We have somehow gradually stumbled our way into a morass of injustice and intrigue.

It would be interesting to see what today’s government of Israel would do with a group of rabble rousers such as the twelve apostles as led by that radical Palestinian, Jesus. Would Jesus today, just as Jesus two thousand years ago, be arrested at the behest of the Israeli hierarchy and held in jail?

Perhaps the people of contemporary Jerusalem would call for the release of some other alleged criminal, such as a contemporary Barabbas, and call for the crucifixion of Jesus as a terrorist. If so, would we in America finally have the scales fall from our eyes or would we play the part of new Romans and be complicit? At a minimum, now that we find ourselves in this deep hole, maybe we should at least stop digging.

Anyway, Merry Twelve Days of Christmas to all and to all a peaceful New Year.

 

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Filed Under: Gavel Gamut, Martyrs, Middle East, National Judicial College Tagged With: Attorney General of Palestine, Barabbas, Bethlehem, Christians, crucifixion of Jesus, Herod the Great, Israel, James M. Redwine, Jesus of Palestine, Jim Redwine, Middle East, Muslims, National Judicial College, Palestinian Authority, Pompeii, Prince of Peace, Romans, Twelve Days of Christmas, West Bank

© 2020 James M. Redwine

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