James M. Redwine

Presidential Campaign

It’s Just A Number

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An ABC News/Washington Post Poll taken Sunday, May 07, 2023 of likely voters in the 2024 Presidential election had 68% of Americans saying Joe Biden is too old to be president next term. The same poll says only 44% think Donald Trump could be too old to serve. Biden is now 80 and Trump is now 76.

Joe Biden is claimed to have a fetish about sniffing the hair of women who are not his wife. Trump is alleged to have sexually assaulted several women to whom he was not married. If the American public’s fascination with sexual activity by characters on TV, in movies and books is considered in the choosing of our political leaders, we can postulate there may be a virility factor in play in choosing between our current and former president.

Apparently, the four-year difference in what will be two octogenarian relics by the end of the next term is of material importance to most voters. Neither old guy is the John F. Kennedy sex symbol he may see himself to be but the public appears to prefer its senility a little more virile, at least by reputation. Of course, it is possible neither Biden nor Trump will be on the ballot in 2024 as some dark horse may yet rush in to take all the perks of the presidency.

Of course, sexuality is only one element of a candidate’s character. We should examine the policies and performance of both Biden and Trump. In that regard, some like Trump’s stance on immigration and some like Biden’s. The same is true on the economy, cultural issues and international relations among many other issues. That is why we have elections and campaigns. But just as the coronation of King Charles III seemed to find the media concentrating on which crowns and robes Charles and Camilla donned as well as which handbag Kate carried as opposed to the substance of Charles’ vision for Great Britain’s future, it will not surprise any of us if the national media miss all the policy differences any of the candidates may have as the media focuses on the titillation of each person’s peccadilloes. Of course, the reason the media will do this is because that is what most of us are interested in. Policy is just so common.

Superannuated lotharios may be past their prime but they are more interesting than policy differences. As for me, Gentle Reader, for personal reasons, I choose to believe either Joey or Donnie or some other codger or even a 35-year-old could serve okay if the only consideration is age. Now whether we happen upon anyone who should lead this great country for the years 2025-2028, well, I must leave that lucky guess to each of you and the fickle folly of fate.

 

The World In Ruins

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Photo by Passer-By in Coliseum 2014

Donald Trump has declared he will make a third run for the presidency in 2024. Joe Biden claims he will seek re-election. Several Republicans, Ron DeSantis, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo, and others are not so secretly hoping lightning strikes them, or maybe strikes Trump. Democrats Gretchen Whitmer, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, and others are feigning fealty to Biden but may be looking wistfully at the effects of Father Time.

In other words, American politics remains unchanged from the days of Jefferson and Adams. It also has regenerated its tiresome media circus of peeking under tent flaps and salivating at the probability of political gaffs. So, buckle up or just tune out for the next two years. As for me and Peg we have been looking at the past, as the present is just too fractious. So, as the pundits and politicians squabble like infants with dirty diapers, Peg and I have been interested in viewing the ancient ruins that became ruins when the cultures of the past let their tantrums get the better of them.

A couple of years ago we visited Rome and walked around the Coliseum. One gets images of gladiators and emperors who had no thought their pretentious edifice would be a mere pile of rubble one day. Then just last week we visited another ancient fort less than ten miles from our home in the country of Georgia. Georgia claims, according to the book Georgian Folk Traditions and Legends, to be situated at the juncture of Europe and Asia and to “[b]eing the most invaded country on earth.” For example, Russia that is Georgia’s neighbor to the north has most recently invaded Georgia in 2008 and 2014.

Photo by Peg Redwine

However, the fort we visited was built by several conquerors over thousands of years but was constructed in its present form on the orders of Roman Emperors Nero, Pompey, Julius Caesar Tiberius and Hadrian during the era 65 BC to the reign of Constantine, 306-337 AD. The name of the fort is Gonio-Apsaros Fortress and it is an impressive structure with ancient stone guard towers, sewage and water systems and Roman hot baths. Of course, today it is all just remnants of past glory. It is on the outskirts of the resort city of Batumi, Georgia near the shore of the Black Sea and about 3 miles from the Turkish border.

Photo by Peg Redwine

Gonio reminded us of the hauntingly impressive Native American pueblo village at Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado. This extensive cliff city was home to many Native Americans for over 700 years from 600-1300 AD. Was it simply abandoned, and if so, why? But once again we observed an impressive series of homes and a mountain stronghold that now is interesting and beautiful, but not lived in by its creators.

I suppose there are many reasons we enjoy visiting these sites of once vibrant communities gone dormant. The inventive genius of our human ancestors gives one a sense of awe and appreciation for the hard work and perseverance of people who were probably quite similar to us. If we could transport them to modern times or transport us back to their times, everybody would most likely fit right in with just a little movie make-up and a change of clothes.

The conclusion or question that keeps us awake, for example I am writing this at 3:50 a.m., is that just as the country of Georgia has been conquered numerous times (as has Jerusalem by Jews, Muslims and Christians on a revolving basis, and Rome and Greece by Vandals and Visigoths and North and South America by Spanish, English, French and Portuguese invaders) are our ruins going to provide interest to tourists of the future?

Do Not Cross the Potomac River

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At the Rubicon

In 49 BC the Senate in the Republic of Rome ordered Gaius Julius Caesar to not bring his army across the Rubicon River into the city of Rome. Caesar said, “Let the die be cast”; that is, I’ll take my chances. He did, Rome as a Republic collapsed into civil war and instead of a representative government the Roman people got a dictator. Five years later, on the Ides of March, Caesar was deposed by force.

The people who founded the United States of America came from a tradition of great fear of military power over civilians. In fact, in our Declaration of Independence one of the main complaints against King George III was that, “He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the civil power.”

This great fear of military control over the civilian populace of America was guarded against in our Constitution. Article I, section 8 endows Congress with the power and authority to declare war, and to raise armies and militias to suppress insurrections. Article II, section 2 establishes that the democratically elected President shall be in control of the armed forces as the Commander-in-Chief.

In his exhaustive and exhausting treatise, The Framer’s Coup, The Making of the United States Constitution, Professor Michael J. Klarman points out the vital importance to our Founders that “[I]n all cases, the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power.” See p. 330.

We Americans profess pride in and support of our military as long as we are assured our military remembers its place. That system has worked pretty well and we are likely to maintain it in spite of political pressure being brought upon the generals to undermine their Commander-in-Chief. As I recall from my service days, I did not always recognize as wise what my military superiors thought was wisdom. Joseph Heller in his prescient novel, Catch-22, had a pretty firm grip on the banality of much of the military. On the hand, our politicians sometimes also fall a little short of a full deck. Still, at least we have the opportunity to have some say in who our civilian leaders will be and we can fire them.

Therefore, for me, I’ll chose to bob and weave with the occasional civilian loser versus a palace military coup. Back off oh ’ye purveyors of a Banana Republic. As Scarlett O’Hara said, “Tomorrow’s another day” and as Annie said, “Tomorrow is only a day away.” I can wait. Elections, yes, coups, no.

Another look at the Rubicon

The Sky’s Falling

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The national media push a highly addictive drug called paranoia. If one wants to get a reliable weather forecast or find out if a local kitten is not lost, local T.V. and regional newspapers are the best source. But if we are in need of a rush brought on by fear of catastrophe or schadenfreude, we flip the remote incessantly between CNN and FOX. CBS, NBC and ABC are available but boring. PBS can be interesting but is about as exciting as a library. No, if we want cataclysm or the satisfaction of seeing the rich and powerful fail, we must have cable. You might wonder about MSNBC but we can only take so much self-indulgent cynicism.

Gentle Reader, if you were awake, as I was at 4:00 a.m. staring at the peach-colored ceiling and wondering if I should use the restroom again or make a cup of coffee, you may have defaulted to cable T.V. That is where I saw the bobbleheads of CNN and FOX fervently seeking our advertising eyeballs by continually ratcheting up the partisan rhetoric. In between the machine gun fire of five minutes of adds were crammed five-minute exhortations camouflaged as news. Today, as usual, CNN was frothing about Donald Trump and FOX was exorcised about Cuba and communism, which FOX posited was one and the same.

CNN was giddy with the no-so-breaking story that former President Trump was unhappy about the last election, so much so that General Mark Milley, Trump’s choice for Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the military, was concerned about a peaceful transfer of power. FOX apparently either did not know who Milley was or did not care. FOX made no mention of this “bombshell” possibility. FOX was excitedly showing Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ campaign coozies which attacked Anthony Fauci as FOX repeatedly rolled film of protests in Cuba. CNN did not take note of Cuba nor communism as its commentators were busy extolling the virtues of giving away trillions of dollars of borrowed taxpayer money.

What came through quite clearly, even as I dozed in and out while desperately seeking facts hidden among the rushes of opinion, was that CNN and FOX both believed that Chicken Little was correct. Each of their favorite evil acorns that fall upon us is a harbinger of the sky’s collapse upon America. We must eliminate all vestiges of Trumpism, and now DeSantisism too, along with President Biden and any federal help for poor people. Of course, we can do this by buying the products hawked among the invective spewed by the incredulous news anchors. Just as grade school teachers emphasizing that we children should obey the crossing guards, cable news claims it is our best source for gospel; critical analysis is just too much trouble and no fun besides. Most importantly, run out and buy more stuff before prices rise again.

Attenuation

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From The Ford Library Museum Website

The season of our discontent is set to begin February 08, 2021. Soon we will be forced to talk to our spouses again and eat an actual meal instead of gobble chicken wings during commercials or at half-times. I can feel the ennui closing in. ♫ It is a long, long time from February to September ♫ when football season returns. It is not that I have no interest in other sports, but other than the Olympic downhill ski race and the baseball World Series I just do not want to watch them on television. On the other hand, I will gladly spend four hours watching Goadie Bowl Tech and Reyfert Hogart Junior College drop passes and fumble kick-offs. Such pursuits as yard work and household chores quickly fade in the afterglow of a football game. Ah well, perhaps it will give me an opportunity to ask Peg what she has been doing since September 2020. Also, I might give some thought to such things as our battle with ’Ole 19 and our political malaise.

Perhaps I can combine my concerns about the end of the football season, the Corona Virus and such political madness as the January 06, 2021 assault on our Capitol including its impending impeachment imbroglio. After all, President Gerald Ford was the hero or villain, choose one, of the President Richard Nixon impeachment controversy and President Lyndon Johnson often alleged Ford’s decisions were affected by Ford’s having played too much football without a helmet. Gerald Ford played center on the University of Michigan football team. Ford graduated from college in 1935, an era when leather helmets were in vogue. For safety reasons leather has been gradually replaced with the rock-hard plastic we now use. Hello, spearing or targeting penalties and TIB’s (traumatic brain injuries). However, from an esthetic viewpoint, the hard plastic provides a better surface for team logos and sticker awards for hard hits.

Football and politics do have some similarities, and when it comes to dealing with misdeeds in either, the legal concept of attenuation is relevant. With football a hard hit with his helmet by one player against the head of another player can be analyzed by re-tracing backwards from the hit. While not even the player himself, or now perhaps herself too, may know for sure if he intended permanent harm, the referees and the re-play booth can carefully review and discuss the event. This may disclose guilt or innocence of the player but is he the only one to blame?

The fanatics who cheer on teams often call for the players to “fight’ or even “kill ’em”. One’s teammates may urge super aggression. Coaches spend months in conditioning drills and two-a-days pre-season practices explaining how starters push the limits while bench setters are more timid. And what about the player’s parents? Who is responsible for engendering mayhem instead of mercy?

The same type of analysis is an element of our criminal justice system. When there is a lynching, how far back the causal chain should punishment go? Is it just the one person who slips the noose over the victim’s neck? What about the on-lookers, the news media that fanned the flames, the leaders who gave rousing speeches, the sworn law officers who did not intervene and the rest of the community who acquiesced in silence either during or after the lynching? Perhaps an entire country might be responsible or even a silently accepting world. How do we decide whether we are applying appropriate punishment or simply burning a few witches to shoulder the blame for everyone?

Then, of course, we need to look at the dynamics of the attenuation itself. Who is making the choices about whom to burn? Are the decisions just or are they just decisions because the ones who execute them have the power to do so? And most importantly, are we a better society because of the choices or are we simply fomenting more targeting? Finally, where and how does it end?

Briefly Speaking

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I.

The Salient Issue 

One method of grappling with what are the most vital issues America must resolve is to first eliminate those issues that blur our thought process. Five years of partisan ill will have sapped our nation’s psyche. Our health and our economy have suffered as we have found it more entertaining to castigate those who disagree with our political views than to make the hard choices required to battle COVID-19 and its devastation of our society. The events of January 06, 2021 and our reactions to them will either continue us on our downward spiral, or perhaps, America can remember and apply the healing lessons from our history.

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) and Gerald Ford (1918-2006) would address the January 06, 2021 attack on our Capitol Building differently. Kant, the great German legal philosopher, would hold it immoral to not require retribution against President Trump for the death and destruction that occurred after Trump’s call for a march on Congress even though President Trump had only fourteen days left to serve when the riot took place. Kant’s position on the legal duty to punish is set forth in the following example. If we envision an island society that decided to dissolve itself completely and leave the island at a time prisoners sentenced to be executed were awaiting their fate, it would be immoral to leave the island without first carrying out the executions. Kant’s rationale for this seemingly needless act was that the blood guilt of the prisoners would attach to the general society if justice was not administered. An eye for an eye would be called for according to Kant.

In contrast, President Ford invoked the wisdom and healing of Jesus when Ford issued a pardon to disgraced ex-President Richard Nixon (1913-1994) for Nixon’s role in covering up the burglary of Democratic National Committee Headquarters. Ford issued the pardon in September only one month after Nixon resigned in August 1974 to avoid impeachment. Instead of retribution, Ford chose mercy, but not just for Nixon; America needed relief too.

Of course, neither revenge nor mercy can, by definition, be perfect justice. However, when it comes to crimes against the State there are larger issues than justice for individuals. The greater good may require a more involved response. Fortunately, we have the wisdom of our Founders and the courage of such leaders as President Ford to aid us in our decision-making process. 

II.

Separation of Powers

Our Founders built our Constitution on the general theory of three equal branches of government. The events since the election on November 03, 2020 give evidence of the abiding legacy left for us in 1789. After the election the Judicial Branch rendered numerous decisions that upheld the Rule of Law. Vice President Pence in the Executive Branch has refused to use the 25th Amendment for political purposes, and the Legislative Branch has resisted attempts to usurp the will of the electorate to de-certify the Electoral College results. Our governmental framework has been stretched but has accommodated pressures from many angles.

All three branches are working together to identify and prosecute those individuals who violated our seat of government with physical destruction and death. With the cooperation of numerous law enforcement agencies and the courts, along with the laws previously enacted by our federal and state legislatures, those who brought nooses, pipe bombs and twist-ties to their pre-meditated crimes are being identified; and if probable cause to commit crimes is shown, and guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is proven using due process of law, just punishment should result. Gentle Reader, next week, if you are available, we can consider the differing treatments of individuals and the issue surrounding the legal concepts of attenuation of culpability. As to President or ex-President Trump, I respectfully submit that continuing to have our country divided about half and half concerning Donald Trump is akin to President Lincoln’s prescient declaration that a house divided against itself will not stand.

With that in mind I submit for your consideration a Gavel Gamut article I wrote right after President Ford died in which it was suggested Ford sacrificed his political career for his country in 1974. I have slightly modified the original article:

III.

Pardon Me, President Ford

(First published 08 January 2007)

President Gerald Ford died December 26, 2006. In a life filled with public service, he will always be best known for his pardon of President Nixon in 1974. President Nixon had personally chosen Gerald Ford to replace the disgraced Vice President Spiro Agnew who resigned in 1973 amid disclosures of bribery while Agnew was Governor of Maryland. Vice President Ford served under President Nixon until Nixon resigned in August of 1974. One month after Nixon resigned, President Ford issued him a full pardon for any crimes Nixon may have committed while president.

At the time, many Americans, including me, were calling for a complete investigation of the Watergate debacle and especially Nixon’s involvement in it. It was a time of a media feeding frenzy and blood in the water. President Ford took the unprecedented step of going personally before Congress and flatly stating that President Nixon and then Vice President Ford had no deal to pardon Nixon if Nixon would resign.

I recall how dubious I was when President Ford stated that he issued the pardon only to help our country to start healing from the loss of confidence caused by Watergate. Yet, after a few months I began to have second thoughts about my initial reaction to the pardon. I realized how much courage it took for President Ford to go straight into the anti-Nixon firestorm sweeping the United States. As a country, we were almost paralyzed by the partisan fighting at home and the War in Vietnam. [Insert 4 years of partisan bickering during the Trump presidency and include at least 1 year of COVID-19.] We needed a new direction and a renewed spirit in 1974 just as we do today. Surely President Ford with his twenty-two (22) years in Congress knew he was committing political suicide by not giving us our pound of flesh. Still, he put his country first. Of course, the country rewarded his sacrifice by booting him from office and electing President Jimmy Carter to replace him.

But during the campaign of 1976, when President Ford came to Evansville, Indiana on April the 23rd, I took our son, Jim, out of school and we went to the Downtown Walkway to see the man who put country above self. For while William Shakespeare almost always got his character analysis right, when it comes to President Ford, “The good he did lives after him.” Julius Caesar, Act III, sc. ii.

Even President Carter, one of America’s most courageous and best former presidents said of his erstwhile political opponent President Ford: “President Ford was one of the most admirable public servants I have ever known.” And when it came to the pardon of President Nixon, Senator Ted Kennedy, while admitting that he had severely criticized the pardon in 1974, said that he had later come to realize that:

“The pardon was an extraordinary act of courage that historians recognize was

truly in the national interest.”