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Pleiku, part two

I have a confession to make. I spent thirty years in DC. That makes me a swamp creature. I was part of the deep-state back when we just called it the bureaucracy; deep-state sounds so much sexier, no? Let me re-engage my deep-state, lizard brain and try to explain what’s going on.

Better tunes this time, yes?

The intersection between high-minded idealism and cynical political calculation exists at the power of position. You can have all the right ideas and best policies and accomplish nothing if you lack the power of office and majority. Likewise, the one who wins can implement even the most hare-brained schemes. You would like to think that the best ideas always win, but we know this is not the case.

Why would Speaker Pelosi change her mind on impeachment? Remember, she and Senator Mitch McConnell are among the most successful Congressional leaders in American history. People hate them for their ruthless pursuit of their respective agendas. What is she up to?

First, impeachment rallies the Democratic base, especially in the suburban districts which went from purple to blue in 2018. It might imperil some of the new members in districts which voted for Trump in 2016 but elected a Democrat in 2018; she left those members an out by allowing them to vote their consciences, but their fate is probably sealed. I believe she has read the tea-leaves, done the math, and thinks she has secured the Democrats a majority in the House after 2020. Think I’m wrong? Have you noticed all the red state, safe-seat Republicans in the House who are retiring (twenty at last count)? They don’t intend to sit around for another two years as powerless ranking members.
Second, impeachment plays for time and moves the spotlight off the party’s Presidential nomination. Yes, it does pull several Senators off the campaign circuit, but it also gives them a chance to shine during the Senate trial. Meanwhile, the party may be able to pare down the list and start to get behind a nominee. While Speaker Pelosi would prefer a Democratic President, arranging for one is not her job, so if impeachment retains the House majority but loses the Presidency . . . “Oh, well!” as my lovely wife likes to say!
Third, it lays a trap. The President will trumpet (sorry, couldn’t resist) his exoneration in the Senate, but the obstruction claim will only be considered by the Supreme Court between March and June next year. If they hold (as they did for Nixon and Clinton) that the President must release information, his refusal would come just before the election, and even if he won re-election, it would set the stage for another impeachment!
Finally, it pacifies the progressive Democratic members who have bridled at the Speaker’s reticence to impeach, and willingness to work (e.g., USMCA, appropriations, Space force) with the President. No Speaker wants a loud caucus constantly tweeting against her. She can tell them to sit down and relax–and if it doesn’t work, she can (figuratively) purge them as the cause of the disaster.

I will bet the Speaker has a few more political reasons up her sleeve: I have only a half-lizard brain, and she is a political genius. If you want to believe this is all about military aid to Ukraine, God bless you. I missed where all that fervor was when the Russians were actually invading Ukraine, and all we sent was non-lethal support. This was politics (first Trump, then the Democrats), pure and simple.

Why did the Democrats focus on impeachment? From the election night when the nightmare began, many Democrats could not stand the notion of another moment of a Trump presidency. That is why they started from the conclusion (getting him out of office) and looked for justifications. Remember the discussion of the 25th amendment (removing the President for incapacity)? Much the same thing.

What should they have done? Before I answer that question, I want to remind all my friends that I believe that President Trump should have resigned long ago, when he realized he was not suited to this peculiar job. Yes, he won the position, but it’s not El Jefe, it’s more the persuader-in-chief. He should have said this isn’t right for me (he probably would have said “it’s not good enough for me”) and moved on. As a businessman, he certainly knows that not every leader is right for every situation. But he didn’t.

So-o -o -o -o ? The Democrats should have made it clear his mafia-esque phone conversation with President Zelensky was beyond the pale. They should have censured him, a symbolic punishment which only Andrew Jackson received. Don’t knock this as only symbolic: this impeachment will end up being only symbolic. They should have passed a bill defining –using the President’s own language in the phone transcript–this type of activity as a “high crime or misdemeanor” as used in the Constitution, thereby notifying him (and his successors) that any repeat of such activity would result in impeachment. Imagine the latter scenario: forcing Congressional Republicans in the House and Senate to either support the Bill or explain why this behavior is ok with them! It’s one thing to vote against impeachment or conviction; it’s another thing altogether to vote defending unethical behavior in general. Imagine President Trump with that Bill on his desk, forced to either swallow his ego and sign it or veto it and face being overturned.

The Democrats lacked imagination, because they remain obsessed with a single thing: removing the President. It is not a condition unique to them: the Republicans did the same thing with President Clinton. For all the evil that Richard Nixon did, he had real respect for the office, and his resignation–short of impeachment–was laudatory even if forced. He did the right thing in the end. If Bill Clinton had a shred of human decency, he would have resigned when his affair with an intern became public. If he had any respect for the office, he would have resigned before lying under oath. If his Republican opponents had any imagination, they would have censured him and passed a Bill defining the reception of oral sex from an intern in the Oval Office as behavior so disgusting it qualifies as “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

After all, that is what Congress does: it makes laws. Imagine Congressional Democrats defending that one; picture President Clinton facing the same Hobson’s choice.

But no, here we are. The streetcar is pulling up to the station. The outcome is predetermined and will satisfy no one. We have set several terrible precedents: looking for reasons justifying impeachment, impeaching before the relevant court cases are completed, and simply making impeachment a more routine thing. Based on recent political history, I guarantee the next Republican-majority House under a Democratic presidency will be a real circus. Meanwhile, the morning news brings word that the House may simply hold on to the Bill of Impeachment and not forward it to the Senate. I wonder how many additional weeks of coverage they can get out of that move?

The Progressives’ singular focus on President Trump is misguided, if only because he is a symptom, not the problem. Impeachment, even if it succeeded in removing the President, would not resolve the issue. There is a political realignment going on in the Western world, and until it shakes out, there will be little tranquility. But that is a topic for another post, another day.

Some have complained that President Trump thinks he’s a king. Remember Emerson’s quote: “When you strike at a King, you must kill him.”

Pleiku, part one

+1 to anyone who recognizes this title. +1 more if you can anticipate the quote I’ll introduce below. +1 more still if you guess where the analogy leads! Take credit in the comments, please.

In August, 1964, the US Navy reported that it had been attacked in the Gulf of Tonkin by North Vietnam. President Johnson responded by deploying US ground forces into South Vietnam. The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong attacked these forces, but the President resisted a major response until after the Presidential election in November (foreshadowing here). In February, 1965, the Viet Cong attacked Camp Holloway, an American helicopter base in the central highlands near the village of Pleiku. The battle was little more than a large raid: it lasted about twelve hours, involved some fierce hand-to-hand fighting as the Viet Cong penetrated the perimeter, resulted in eight American KIA, 126 wounded, and US military escalation. It was the first blood of the US war in Vietnam.

McGeorge Bundy was one of Kennedy’s “best & brightest” who argued for greater US involvement in Vietnam under Johnson. When asked years later about the importance of Pleiku, he said “Pleikus are like streetcars” in that one comes along regularly, and you just pick one to get where you’re going.

You had to wait 15 minutes to figure out this was an anti-war song, be patient

Where’s this going? In case you have been out of contact the last week or so, there is an impeachment going on in Washington. The proximate cause is President Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky. But that phone call was just a streetcar called Pleiku: a way to get where some always wanted to go.

Let’s get one thing out of the way here: what President Trump did on that call was anything but “perfect”–his term. It was base, demeaning, and unethical. He placed personal objectives above national security concerns. He crudely bargained with a foreign political leader for domestic political advantage. Is that impeachable? Sure, since impeachment is a matter for the House and Senate to define and try. Impeachable is whatever the House majority decides it is; guilty is whatever two-thirds of the Senate says it is. It is a political activity using judicial terms and methods.

That said, the hand-wringing about mixing politics and national security is overwrought. Recall Johnson’s actions before Pleiku: US forces were attacked prior to the election but didn’t get the airpower/retaliation the administration had already planned, because it was before the election. Nixon lied about a special plan to end the Vietnam war leading up to his 1972 re-election. Leading up the 1984 election, Senator Edward Kennedy offered to arrange favorable news coverage for the Soviet leadership hoping to forestall Reagan’s re-election. President Trump’s actions were (as usual) over the top, but hardly unprecedented. If you’ve never been to Washington, ***Newsflash***: politics happens there, even with national security issues.

Just eight months ago, Speaker Pelosi said “Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.” (that last part was an A+ troll, btw). I don’t care which party you party with, those conditions are not met, especially when it comes to last one (bipartisan). It could have been different (has in the past), but it isn’t.

If the Speaker was serious about impeachment, she would have delayed the process long enough to get court rulings on the “obstruction of Congress” charges. Remember it was the Supreme Court’s decision against Nixon along the same lines that paved the way for his resignation in the face of a bipartisan impeachment. Trump’s cases remain in the courts, so there is no there, there (yet).

And of course, this impeachment did not occur in a vacuum. Calls for impeachment (including petitions, websites and a leadership PAC) started before Trump’s inauguration. Democratic Representatives introduced a motion to begin impeachment proceedings in December 2017; it received 58 positive votes (all from Democrats). Reasons for impeachment changed over time: foreign business ties, collusion to undermine the 2016 election, the emoluments clause, obstruction of justice, fomenting racial hatred, bribery and finally abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

In the few choice words of newly-elected Representative Rashida Tlaib, “we’re gonna impeach the m*therf*cker!” There are numerous other, less pithy but equally adamant quotes from Democratic office holders.

So we’re all riding a streetcar to get to the same destination: impeachment. Oddly enough, we all know exactly what awaits us there. There will be no surge in public opinion, for or against. There will be no conviction in the Senate. What is really going on here? What were the Democrats supposed to do, just ignore President’s Trumps gross overture in Ukraine? What else could they have done?

If you haven’t shut down my blog’s window in partisan disgust yet, I hope you’ll come back tomorrow for part two and my thoughts on the answers to those questions.

Look a lot like Christmas

We paired down Christmas when we lived back in the States. Once the kids were grown and moved away, starting families of their own, our Christmas traditions narrowed down to the basics. We still attended the children’s mass on Christmas Eve (with close friends) at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in DC and ate till closing at a local Italian Restaurant that always expected us. Christmas morning was homemade cinnamon roles. The tree (now fake) went up sometime in mid-December and back in the box the first weekend in January. Sent out Christmas cards, but did little decorating, and certainly no exterior lights.

During our move to an apartment, downsizing in preparation fo retirement and expat life, all that was left of Christmas past was the religious observance. We put the old ornaments away, and even stopped exchanging gifts, since that just added to the stuff we needed to get rid of.

That paired-down approach continued once we got to Mexico. Without the change of seasons, Christmas falls into the same perfect weather as the rest of the year (yes, I know, as youse NOB shiver in the snow, you feel SO SORRY for us!). Gradually, we’re adding back to the Christmas traditions.

Of course, my official Charlie Brown Christmas Tree makes its annual appearance, along with one of Judy’s amazing quilts:

Here’s our new Mexican tree. Not enough evergreens here, so this captures the spirit:

In case you missed them in the last photo, yes, that is the complete set from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer!

Another of Judy’s holiday quilts which made the cut to Mexico:

A child’s handicraft which survived the years:

and our latest additions. Expats drink a lot of wine–or at least we do–so you need to fashion up those ubiquitous bottles. We have little sombrero and poncho kits for them, but nothing says Christmas like a Santa wine bottle!

¡Feliz Navidad!

Everything you know is wrong VI

Normally, I am supportive of almost anything that encourages a deeper look at history: it is my favorite subject, and I firmly believe everyone can learn from it. In the case of the New York Times 1619 project, I’m willing to make an exception. The effort commemorates the initial shipment of slaves to the colony of Virginia. It is a slick, interactive, multimedia presentation. The Times seems to be telling us “everything you know is wrong.” Let’s see.

The problem starts with its stated purpose. To whit: “It aims to reframe the country’s history, understanding 1619 as our true founding, and placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of the story we tell ourselves about who we are.” It is very useful to study the contributions of different groups to the American story, especially when the groups in question have been historically marginalized. But “reframing” history and asserting a different foundation are another story, literally a manufactured one.

What’s the harm, you might ask, and surely the Times will provide some balance in the work? Not so much. For example, one article posits that the American prison system is so violent because it is a direct descendant of the plantation system. Maybe the author was unfamiliar with the Stanford prison experiment, which showed quite clearly that prison environments breed violence. Perhaps the author has never heard of Chinese prisons, or Turkish prisons, or Mexican prisons, which are even more violent and have no link to American slavery.

This is what happens when you look at history through a soda straw: you might really believe the little circle you see is the whole truth, but you might also be totally missing the point.

Of course, slavery played an important role in the story of America’s founding. It is not for nothing that the phrase “(s)lavery is America’s original sin” has been bandied about since the nation’s founding. But was slavery unique here, and does American history need to be “re-framed” around it?

Let’s start with 1619. The Times gets the date wrong, as slavery in America began when the Spanish imported the first slaves to what is today South Carolina in 1526. The Anglo-centric version of history is grist for another blog post, another day, but you would think the nation’s ‘paper of record’ would have a little more, say, diverse view.

Slavery neither began in America nor ended here: in fact it continues to this day. Slavery began long before recorded history, when one family tribe fought another and had to determine what to do with the defeated survivors: kill them, set them free and fight them again, or enslave them. Slavery was such an endemic condition of history that even the Bible treats it as given, while suggesting it is unjust and should be abolished. Slavery happened whenever the strong confronted the weak. St. Patrick was a Roman slave of the Celts. The feared Janissary warriors were Christian slaves of the Ottoman Sultan. And so it goes.

Slavery was not unique to Africa, but Africa was certainly the continent most affected by slavery. Arab slave traders in 8th century focused on Africa since Muslims were prohibited from taking other Muslims as slaves; demand only accelerated when the Europeans colonized Africa in the 15th and 16th centuries. Yet the reason Africa was such a target for slave traders was that slavery was already endemic within Africa! Africans enslaved each other, and then traded their slaves to outsiders. The notion that Middle Ages Europeans wandered about the African continent catching locals as slaves is transparently silly. Arabs and Europeans provided the gold, and Africans provided the slaves.

In the New World, where did most of the slaves go? Of the eleven million slaves who survived the transatlantic passage, less than 400,000 (<4%) went to North America, 35% went to Brazil (the most frequent destination) with the Caribbean being the other large collective destination.

Was American slavery more brutal? All slavery was inherently dehumanizing and brutal, so we are talking about the subtle differences in inhumanity. Still, the reasons the American South didn’t need to import as many slaves was the natural rate of increase. By the outbreak of the Civil War, the slave population in the Confederacy had exploded six-fold to almost four million slaves, approximately one-third of the total population! This increase was due to obvious factors: more births, fewer deaths, and a longer life-span, since cotton plantation life (as horrible as it was) was nothing compared the Carib sugar plantations or the mines of South America. Sugar plantation and mine owners estimated their slaves were good for seven years of labor, at which point they died from chronic mistreatment. Americans in the south actually encouraged slaves to have children (even as they broke the families up for sale) and found uses for the youngest and oldest slaves. Both systems were horrible.

Was slavery uniquely essential to the US economy? Hardly. While the “molasses-to-rum-to-slaves” trade route is well-documented (remember the musical 1776?), and slavery was the basis of the southern plantation economy, it was not nearly as important to the overall US economy as slavery was to Brazil or Spanish colonial Cuba. Still, the 1619 project states “(i)n order to understand the brutality of American capitalism, you have to start on the plantation.” And this howler: “Perhaps you’re reading this at work, . . . (where) you report to someone, and . . . Everything is tracked, recorded and analyzed . . . . It feels like a cutting-edge approach to management, but many of these techniques that we now take for granted were developed by and for large plantations.” Phew! Missing a few centuries of Medieval economic development there.

“They’re willing, for a Shilling”

Is there anything that makes American slavery unique? Well, the most unique aspect of American slavery is our continuing fascination with it. About every other decade there is a renewed interest in the “peculiar institution.” No other former slave-holding nation spends more time or effort reconsidering the experience.

A second unique aspect is that while American slaves were considered property, they counted for purposes of political enumeration. Most people are rightly horrified at the Article I language in the US Constitution that dictates slaves be counted as three-fifths of a person. Few stop to think that this was exactly three-fifths more of an acknowledgment of a slave’s humanity than they received anywhere else. This provision was indeed a cynical political ploy to gain more representation for slave-holding states, but the fact remains–they counted.

By far the most unique aspect of slavery in America is this fact: America was the only country which fought a war to end the practice. Most nations outlawed the practice and let it gradually die. Haiti had a rebellion to forestall the re-imposition of slavery by France. Only in America, which was in Lincoln’s phrase “half slave, half free” did the sides battle it out. While the war was ostensibly about saving the Union (in the north) and state’s rights (in the south), the underlying cause was always clear: the Union was threatened by the challenge of slavery, and the ONLY state’s right in question was slavery. In the end, the cause of abolition made clear the real issue, and the pro-slavery side was decisively defeated.

The Times’ 1619 project is a thinly-veiled attempt to engage the fraught nature of US race relations today by polemicizing history. Racial tensions are indeed high these days, but the Times’ effort provides too much heat and too little light. We won’t solve the racial issues of today by inventing a new truth about the past. Perhaps the NYT should do a 2019 Project on itself, where only eight percent of the staff (and five percent of the leadership) are African-American.

The price of everything

Perhaps you’re familiar with the Oscar Wilde quote that “a cynic is a man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.” A witticism, yes, but prices are an important part of expat life, just as they are for any retiree or those still working. How many friends and family do you know who are furiously running on the career hamster-wheel, trying to make enough to pay-off college loans, provide quality daycare, and save for retirement, while simultaneously maintaining a standard of life driven by society’s dictates?

Those costs show up in real terms as prices. So I decided to list some of the prices we face as expats today at lakeside, using an approximation of the dollar-peso exchange rate (actually 19.4 MXP per 1 USD, but we’ll round to 20 to simplify the math). Some of these costs are a little higher, based on our personal preferences: for example, I could get a haircut at a local barber for 100 pesos ($5 USD), but I choose to go to a salon. I won’t add tips, as that is a whole ‘nother story.

Here goes:

Weekly newspaper in English: 20 MXP, 1 USD.

Haircut at a salon, with wash and scalp massage: 200 MXP, 10 USD

Basket of fresh fruit/vegetables at market: 140 MXP, 7 USD

Sorry, we ate one avocado before I could snap the pic!

Mexican landline (w/internet), monthly: 390 MXP, 19 USD

Electric bill, monthly average: 1000 MXP, 50 USD

Lunch for two, Italian restaurant, with wine: 300 MXP, 15 USD

Repair concrete and stone work on driveway: 400 MXP, 20 USD

Which reminds me, I HAVE to get that stone replaced!

Two movie tickets (first run, English): 100 MXP, 5 USD

Dinner for two, Thai: 600 MXP, 30 USD

Property tax, annual: 2,600 MXP, 130 USD

Maid, three hours weekly: 165 MXP, 8 USD

Gardener, 1.5 hour biweekly: 165 MXP, 8 USD

Monthly private club fees (pool, restaurant/bar, guest rooms): 2000 MXP, 100 USD

HOA, quarterly: 3,542 MXP, 173 USD

80 minute sports massage at spa: 750 MXP, 37 USD

Water bill, monthly: 272 MXP, 18 USD

Gas fill-up with Premium (17 gallons): 1100 MXP, 55 USD

Concrete/stone driveway repair: 400 MXP, 20 USD

Gym membership (annual): 5000 MXP, 250 USD

Tequila, 1 liter: 265 MXP, 13 USD

Whole milk, 1.8 liter: 29 MXP, 1.50 USD

Coca cola, 1.75 liter: 21 MXP, 1 USD.

Pedicure: 250 MXP, 12 USD

Taxi ride to the airport (30 miles): 400 MXP, 20 USD

Doctor’s visit: 400 MXP, 20 USD

Dinner out (2 entrees, 1 app, two cocktails, 2 wines): 565 MXP, 29 USD

Beef carpaccio (already gone), chicken cordon bleu, stuffed pork, margaritas and cabernet sauvignon

Bus fare: 8 MXP, .4 USD

We don’t really buy clothes here, only because most Mexicans are so much smaller than us (we’re tall for Americans) that nothing fits: shoes are an impossibility! That will change, as I increasingly see younger Mexicans–especially muchachos–topping six feet in height. Likewise, electronic devices in general are more expensive here, but the Mexican peso has lost so much value (it was 14 MXP-1 USD when we bought our home) that such items are now competitively priced with the US.

Not the price of everything, mind you, but a useful survey and a brief explanation of how it is possible to retire–even early–when your costs in retirement are so low. Expat friends, feel free to add items you think are relevant in the comments, and others, ask if there is something specific you would like to know the price!

Italian Restaurant?

I may set some kind of record for misleading blog title with this one! The only Italian restaurant you’ll find in this post is this one:

Just an excuse to link to this song.

We’re in Playa del Carmen, at our favorite resort, the Valentin Imperial Riviera Maya. We spent a long weekend over Veterans’ Day (Remembrance Day throughout the rest of the West) back in the States doing our customary early celebration of Thanksgiving. I know I have covered this before, but it bears repeating:

If you face the challenge of getting an extended family together for Thanksgiving (might work for other holidays, but it really works well for this one), consider celebrating it on another week. Really. The date is arbitrary, first selected by Abraham Lincoln in 1863.

Think about it: choose a different date, and it is suddenly easy to get time off from work, to fly without crowds or drive without congestion. If you have a blended family, you can cede the traditional date to the other side, making you a hero . . . or at least less of a villian.

The post-turkey walk requires a photo op.

There will still be football on the telly, turkey to cook, overeating to indulge, and likely the same weather. The same crowd will show up; more, in fact since there are fewer excuses or challenges in getting everyone together, and less stress in travelling. It works, I swear!

Since we saved money by creating a movable Thanksgiving feast, we opted to hit an all-inclusive resort in Quintana Roo afterward. Again, taking a non-traditional route home allows us to access low-cost (SouthWest and Volaris) airlines and get a better rate for the stay, too.

So the other night we were sitting in a French restaurant under the tropical sky (which is full of clouds and rain).

Surfs up! Note the near-total absence of Sargassum (seaweed), a problem which they have solved.

Being a mix of Celt and Saxon, I didn’t miss the hot tropical sun: my people learned to fear the great glowing orb in the sky, as it turns us a very unnatural shade of red.

The entire coastal area near Cancun was a mix of jungle and swamp before the Mexican government agreed to commercialize it. This is beside the path from the restaurant.

I always wondered how they control mosquitoes in such an environment. In more than eight visits, I have nary a bite. Yesterday in the afternoon, I saw a thick smoke wafting past my balcony. I asked one of the workers what was on fire, and he explained they were fogging the mosquitoes. Glad to be only briefly exposed!

The resort getting in the spirit of the season

We’ll rest up for another day then back to the grind of retirement as an expat!

Affiliations

Have you ever run across the meme about “describing yourself in x words,” designed to make you choose among a limited number of possible descriptions and pick the most important? It’s supposed to be hard, and generally done to make you draw some hard conclusions about yourself and your priorities.

What makes it so hard is all of us have multiple affiliations: positive associations with groups, teams, tastes, beliefs, parties, species, regions, and countries. There are (of course) blood relations and marriage, faith and politics, sports teams and pets, languages and hobbies and interests. And they are good. Think about the pleasure of getting together with old friends, or family holiday gatherings (should they go well), being with fellow fans when victory is snatched from the jaws of defeat: does it get any better?

I have commented previously about the role college football has played in my life. I used to tell my daughters to spread my ashes in the north end zone of Notre Dame stadium (that was before they went to artificial turf, a story for another day). I’ll always fondly remember when my son-in-law Cody (like my daughter, a fervent Ohio State Buckeye) first met my fanatical Irish extended family. He deftly defuzed what could have been an explosive moment by saying “At least we can all agree that we hate Michigan.” Affiliations bringing people together!

By definition, such affiliations also divide us, and can become a source of real evil. The subject came up in the news recently when some political pundits were attacking a US Army Lieutenant Colonel for possible competing loyalties because he was Ukrainian-American and came to this country as a child. But set all those details aside; what I want to focus on is why the man was attacked in the first place. He was the target of attacks because it was politically expedient in the no-holds-barred political deathmatch that is Washington, DC, today!

Political mudslinging is nothing new, but it has reached epidemic proportions. I regularly receive social media reposts of the most vile sorts from both my progressive and conservative friends. I’m not talking about a reasoned explanation of why “Medicare for all” is the wave of the future; I’m talking graphic comics or pithy mis-quotes designed to fuel rage. I find these reposts very helpful, since FaceBook has a “hide all future posts from” function that helps me avoid these sources without losing my friends. In this way, my friends are providing a useful service: they send me things to show me what NOT to see ever again!

What surprises me is that most of the people engaging in this behavior simultaneously decry the level of discourse. They’ll claim ‘the other side started it’ (has that ever worked?) or ‘they’ll say something worse’ (preemptive bad behavior? a novel approach!). Sorry, folks, the level of hate out there is so high because many of us consciously choose to participate in it. If you second something offensive, or even fail to rein in the worst behavior by your friends, you’re complicit.

Affiliations work that way.

The Nationals just won the World Series. Somewhere, some Nats fans had a little too much to drink and the raucous, post-game celebration verged on a riot, but that didn’t happen, because some other Nats fans snuffed it out. When someone on my side of the political divide makes an outlandish claim in my presence, it’s my responsibility to correct them. It really is that simple.

It’s a good thing to profess a belief (political or religious), to really embrace it, to put its precepts into action. But when you run across opposition, you have to convince or proselytize or reason: not attack or condemn or cancel.

“OK, Boomer,” I hear some Gen Z out there thinking, “but we face REAL EVIL today. We can’t play by those outdated rules! We have to win by ANY MEANS NECESSARY!”

I admire the commitment to virtue, I really do. But today’s long list of challenges do not measure up to Slavery, Fascism, or Communism, to name just the 19th and 20th Century challenges. Those enormities were confronted by the truth, which is always more powerful than hyperbole, propaganda, or hate. So put down your phone, delete that tweet, and take a deep breath.

Affiliations work best when we accentuate the positive. Cheer on your team, promote your agenda, profess your faith in public. We are all the better for it.

Our former President did a pretty good job discussing this.

‘Nuff said

20/40/60

We are all products–perhaps even captives–of our experiences. Here’s how people from different generations see the same thing.

A quiet moment in the library is interrupted by the loud ring of a cell phone.

The twenty-year old ponders “Who makes phone calls anymore?”
The forty-year old thinks “Who has the original telephone ringer as their personal ringtone?”
The sixty-year old wonders “Why are my pants vibrating?”

Hunger strikes in the late evening, and there’s nothing in the fridge.

The twenty-year old thinks “Got a cell and GrubHub, problem solved!”
The forty-year old wonders “Can you make a snack from saltines and mandarin oranges?”
The sixty-year old begs “I found my keys, but where’s my car?”

Your boss makes a decidedly political comment which conflicts with your views.

The twenty-year old wonders if “Six new jobs in five years is too many?”
The forty-year old considers “How long until I can retire?”
The sixty-year old muses “I was here when you arrived, and I’ll be here when you leave.”

Local elementary school kids stage a walkout at school to protest.

The twenty-year old beams “Kids today are so active and involved!”
The forty-year old practices saying “NO, you cannot skip all Friday classes to protest.”
The sixty-year old nods “Nice job; we had to fake death to get out of school.”

Politicians are promising free university tuition.

The twenty-year old exclaims “Woo-hoo, restart the four-year clock on my bachelors in self-directed study!”
The forty-year old thinks “Wait, I just finished my last UNDERGRAD payment!”
The sixty-year old knows “If it’s free, it ain’t good. If it’s good, it ain’t free. If it’s free AND good, it’s a politician’s rotten promise.”

There’s an explosive-but-unverified story making the rounds on social media.

The twenty-year old “<follows>👿👿💩💩💩🙏🙏🙏”
The forty-year old “<likes> and <shares> with 500 ‘friends.'”
The sixty-year old grumbles “There’s something wrong on the internet and I’M GOING TO FIX IT.”

Overheard on a train ride: “Oh-oh, the rabbit died!”

The twenty-year old fumes “I bet the cosmetics industry was testing something on the rabbit!”
The forty-year old feels a wave of sadness at the thought “Someone lost a beloved pet.”
The sixty-year old hoots “A baby changes everything!”

There’s a young lady in a short dress, earrings, make-up, and a tattoo standing on the corner in front of the liquor store at 11:00 am on a Monday.

The twenty-year old thinks, “She’s hot! I wonder where the party is?”
The forty-year old tutts, “You shouldn’t have to wait for an Uber.”
The sixty-year old mutters “Even the hookers are working mornings now.”

The news anchor chronicles a rally for President Trump where he said former Vice President Biden was only qualified to “kiss Barack Obama’s ass.”

The twenty-year old exclaims, “How can our democracy survive such unprecedented conduct?”
The forty-year old thinks, “No more television news for the kids.”
The sixty-year old asks “Didn’t anybody read the LBJ biographies? Listen to the Nixon tapes?”

There’s only one parking space available: a tight parallel space.

The twenty-year old grins “It’s Lyft, not my problem!”
The forty-year old engages his smart auto park feature: “Watch this.”
The sixty-year old says “Hold my beer . . .no, wait, I got this” (backing in, using knees to steer).

At a party, someone asks you about your carbon footprint.

The twenty-year old proudly replies “I’m carbon neutral; have you tried my new recycled vegetable dip?”
The forty-year old mumbles “The kids are all over me to get an electric car.”
The sixty-year old replies “Turn around, and I’ll plant my carbon footprint somewhere you can’t recycle!”

There’s an ad for men’s grooming products featuring whole-body shaving.

The twenty-year old: “Why would anyone NEED to be reminded to shave all over?”
The forty-year old considers “How did I ever live with all that hair?”
The sixty-year old is bumfuzzled: “If I wanted to look like a twelve-year old, I never would have gone through puberty.”

You’re on a road trip, and you have the sneaking suspicion you’re lost.

The twenty-year old chants “Trust the Waze.”
The forty-year old thinks “Did I update my GPS?”
The sixty-year old yells “There’s a page missing from my AAA trip-tik!”

Finally, you see a man standing on the corner with a sign that says “will work for food.

The twenty-year old looks up from his iphone and seethes “The government has failed us again.”
The forty-year old looks away and thinks “There but for the grace of . . . um . . . god, go I.”
The sixty-year old hands him a bill and says “Me too, me too.”

Making Friends

One stark challenge facing an expat is “how does one make new friends?” It is easy to forget how dependant we all are on our extended series of relationships: our friends. Leaving your friends behind–the people from your hometown, where you worked, where your children grew up–can be daunting enough, but is easily surpassed by the next step: where to find a new group of friends?

I had a lot of experience making friends growing up. In the seventeen years between my birth and taking the oath on the Plain at West Point, my family lived in eight different houses. Which may not seem that dramatic, but it also included one, six-year stretch in a single house! I attended three different high schools. I pretty much dreaded most moves, since as a card-carrying introvert each move required the dreaded “hello, I am the new guy here, please be my friend” routine. I finally mastered the process at my last high school, and it served me well in a brief military career.

Then Judy and I settled into Washington, DC, for the next thirty years. We did move around, gradually pulled ever closer, inside the beltway, like some comet being sucked into a black hole. Overstatement? DC is the place famous for Harry S Truman’s apocryphal quote: “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.” He didn’t say it, but it lives on because so many Washingtonians recognize its fundamental truth.

The answer is the same as it always was: to get out there and find people with similar interests. The challenge as an expat is exacerbated by the twin aspects of foreign languages and cultures. As Sam Cooke crooned:

Not really about friends, but you get the point!

“If I can meet ’em, I can get ’em, . . .” Luckily, an expat lakeside has numerous opportunities to meet people. This probably is the ‘secret sauce’ explaining why Lake Chapala is such a draw for North American expats. An expat here has all the ability to engage that friendly Mexican culture I wrote about earlier, but also can rely on a huge number of English-friendly groups and activities.

Our weekly English-language newspaper, the Guadalajara Reporter, lists fifteen different religious services each week, as well as some spiritual-but-not religious activities. We have at least three dramatic theaters, two cinemas, and several galleries. There are numerous classes for dance, crafts, languages, card games, and groups galore, ranging from a motorcycle club to Democrats Abroad. El Ojo del Lago, our monthly periodical, has two solid pages (small print) of non-profit organizations full of active individuals performing good deeds.

It’s digital: blow it up if you want to peruse the offerings!

Several expats acquaintances tell me that our area and San Miguel de Allende (SMA) are similar in that they both have well-supported expat infrastructure. Those who started in SMA but ended up lakeside say SMA is more stratified, more expensive, more cultured, and just busier. I’m sure the reverse set of expats (Lakeside>SMA) would call lakeside too blue-collar, too provincial, too small-towny. For beach-going expats, there is always PV, the Cabos, Cancun and Cozumel and Playa del Carmen. Merida is up and coming for a more authentic, but still tropical, experience. To each his own. Whatever your take on expat life, there are several locations in Mexico to try out, but not all have the same welcoming infrastructure!

Fall

The feel of warmth from camp fires roasting marshmallows. The aroma of turkey cooking in the oven. The sight of browns and oranges and reds and greens in the trees. The sound of a leaf’s crunch underfoot. The taste of pumpkin, naturally. The sense of summer gone, winter too soon arriving, yet an interlude of good weather and even better holidays.

We don’t have Fall here in Mexico. There’s a word for it (otoño) and officially it is a season, but otherwise hard to distinguish from the rest of the year. The plants flower, fruit and drop their flora when they will. The bugs are always with us, although the mosquitos do seem a little easier to swat nowadays. This close to the equator, the daily dose of sunshine is nearly a constant. Oldtimer expats swear it changes by many hours, perhaps body memories of days gone by in the States or Canada.

We expats mostly know the rhythm of the rainy and dry seasons, which just tells you whether you need to remember to water your garden plants. As retirees, we have no work rhythm either, just six Saturdays and a Sunday (for those hold to a Sabbath of some sort). This makes the traditional holidays almost sneak up on you, as you lack those climatic hints and Mexican culture hasn’t quite embraced the omnipresent marketing NOB (are the Xmas decorations up yet?).

Fall always was my favorite season. Perhaps living near DC, this was inevitable, since Fall is the one season where the swampy Potomac marshland that became the nation’s capital is habitable. In Fall the tourists were (mostly) gone, the students were (mostly) in school, the politicians were (mostly) away campaigning, and the money was (mostly) spent (Note: the federal fiscal year ends on 30 September), so there was a normalcy to match the decent weather.

This one has the Fall spirit, several times a year.

I wouldn’t say I miss Fall. I can still visit it whenever I want. When we took care of the grandkids last week, the leaves were turning, and that last morning, before the crack of dawn flight out of BWI, the dawn air was crisp and clear. We’ll be back again in November for early Thanksgiving, and those tastes of Fall are plenty. When the climate is as special as it is here lakeside, the sameness of the days are a blessing, not a curse.