Category Archives: Crime

Weep for America, but Build Leadership

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I weep for my neighborhood. I weep for Chicago.

I weep for the state of criminal justice in America when a police officer, hand in his pocket, a look of utter indifference on his face, feels the sense of impunity that empowers him to kneel on a black man’s neck in broad daylight for more than eight minutes until he dies.

I cheer for America’s resilient sense of justice when bystanders train their cell phone cameras on this officer and refuse to back down in documenting injustice while they plead for the man’s life.

These mixed feelings have haunted me for more than a week now, as events have evolved across the nation. I am glad that the state of Minnesota has arrested and charged officer Derek Chauvin for murder, not out of a desire for revenge but because justice demands it. The sense of impunity that allowed him to ignore bystanders’ pleas to remove his knee from George Floyd’s neck must be the first casualty in this crisis. Serious police department reform is a necessity. As I write this, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has announced that the other three officers at the scene have been charged with aiding and abetting the crime.

But America also faces some serious lessons in civic leadership, from top to bottom. At the White House, for at least a few more months, we are stuck with a president who, facing the second major crisis of his final year in office after failing to prepare for or respond effectively to a pandemic, now is fanning the flames of hatred while throwing matches on the fire. Emerging from his protective bunker in the White House, he used National Park Service police to clear his path of peaceful protesters for the mere purpose of standing in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church, without invitation or permission to use it as a camera prop, to hold a Bible high while threatening violence against protesters and insulting the governors and mayors who have done the real hard work to bring calm to their communities. It is thankless work, lie-awake-at-night work, very unlike the simple-minded task of tweeting empty threats to violate the Constitution. Most presidents, while asserting their proper authority, have sought to unite the country. Trump prefers to drive a wedge with the help of a Bible he does not understand and seldom if ever reads.

Amidst this dearth of national leadership, there is a shortage of leadership on the streets that reflects both deep anger and a failure of our society to create a sense that everyone has a stake in the success and prosperity of our communities. And, to be sure, there are criminal elements that are only too happy to take advantage of these gaps in equity and leadership. That is where we find ourselves now, today, this week, this summer, this year, while still seeking to recover economically, medically, and emotionally from the toll of a coronavirus pandemic whose toll in America now exceeds 100,000 lives, and counting.

As most readers of this blog know, I live in Chicago. Over the weekend and into Monday evening, at bedtime, I could hear the sirens and fire trucks and helicopters in the distance and know that not all was well. I could see on local television channels the coverage of looting that damaged familiar areas of the city, as well as protests against police brutality. But I had not left the house, for a variety of reasons. However, it became clear that Wicker Park, an area less than a mile from us, was struck by looters Sunday evening, leaving windows smashed and property damaged. Small business owners have been waiting patiently, amid considerable financial angst, for the promised partial reopening from the pandemic on June 3, a few days after many state restrictions were lifted on May 29. And then this.

On Tuesday, after both a telemedicine meeting at 2 p.m., following up on my recent hospitalization, and a team meeting for a planning consulting proposal at 3 p.m., I decided it was time to find out what had happened. I walked down North Avenue to the six-way corner of North, Damen, and Milwaukee, the nerve center of Wicker Park, an area that gentrified in the 1980s and 1990s but retains an artsy demeanor, with independent bookshops, cafes, and art stores. I chose not to drive or even bicycle because being on foot seemed to me the best way to absorb a full sense of our tragedy and dilemma, even though I knew Wicker Park was far from being the most hard-hit area in the city. Those questionable labels belong to the downtown, temporarily cordoned off to all but essential workers, with many Chicago River bridges raised to prevent access, and to the South and West Sides, predominantly black areas where the torching of stores often exacerbated the food desert that had only recently been ameliorated with the opening of new grocery stores. One owner of Subway shops saw all six of his stores on the South Side destroyed.

The urologist with whom I spoke during the 2 p.m. appointment had recently moved to a high-rise near his downtown office in the Northwestern Memorial Hospital complex. I asked him about the situation. “It’s terrible,” he said flatly, then noted that he had walked down Michigan Avenue, and “it felt like Detroit.” Anyone who has spent time on the usually vibrant Magnificent Mile until recently knows what a stunning statement that is. Buildings are boarded up, many were looted, some were torched. At a recent mayoral press conference, the city buildings commissioner noted that her department was reaching out to the owners of at least 180 damaged buildings citywide to provide support for rebuilding. It may go without saying, but the damage harms not only the business owners, but employees who had fervently been hoping to return to work, many of them black, Latino, or Asian.

The walk down North Avenue was more routine than jarring, interrupted only by pedestrians passing in the opposite direction, some with dogs on leashes, some wearing masks, some not. It was at the six-way intersection that I began to see the impact of the past weekend. As I made the wide-right turn onto Milwaukee Avenue, it became clear that perhaps 80 percent of the businesses in the next half-mile southward toward Division St. were boarded up. Many businesses may have done so proactively, seeing the damage to others and wanting to avoid a similar fate on a subsequent night. Others, like Ragstock, had been attacked over the weekend, with windows smashed, merchandise stolen or destroyed, and equipment ransacked. It was hard to tell which was which, but the overall effect was that of significant lost opportunity and delayed reopening of a vital commercial district on Chicago’s North Side. For those that had been attacked and looted, the work of restoration could easily delay reopening by weeks.

Nonetheless, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who toured the affected areas on Tuesday (June 2), reported that the overwhelming reaction of business owners when she asked about possible delays in reopening was to encourage her to move forward, which she is now doing. Not everyone is pleased because of the induced inequality of opportunity, with consequent job losses and lost incomes, due to the damages that were inflicted. The only way forward is to assist with cleanup and rebuilding, not to put everything on hold.

Nor would everyone be pleased with my focus on this question. There are many who would argue that the rioting is an expression of frustration and powerlessness, and for some, I am sure, that is true. As Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page notes, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in his 1967 book, Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, explained riots in the 1960s by saying, “A riot is the language of the unheard.” He was not condoning such activity but trying to impress upon white Americans that racial justice cannot forever be denied or delayed without serious social consequences.

A small crowd gathers in front of Walgreen’s in late afternoon for a peaceful protest.

But it is important to raise the issue of how the protests against police violence can and did, in some cases, go awry. One factor is the pent-up frustration of which King wrote. Another is the deliberate attempts by those of ill will to take advantage of unrest to advance their own purposes, which may be criminal or manipulative. The latter category would include all manner of provocative agents either seeking to undermine the protests by discrediting them or by bending and twisting them to the will of extremists who would not easily carry the day in an open, democratic discussion of protest goals.

It has never been hard to find examples of either motive. At 70, I am a veteran of the 1960s and 1970s who has joined his own fair share of marches for the environment, to oppose war, or for civil rights. I can easily remember learning, in my college years, how to identify agents provocateurs of any political stripe who would seek opportunities to redirect a discussion or a protest toward unfortunate ends. And I also know that it was the spiritual strength of leaders like King, or Nelson Mandela, or Mohandas Gandhi that helped to maintain a discipline of purpose in countless demonstrations and protests around the world. Gandhi used the Hindi word “satyagraha,” meaning “spirit power,” which he said gave otherwise beaten-down people a sense of self-respect, purpose, and moral strength. Christians may find such solace in the Holy Spirit, but the concept has its own universality.

Why do I raise this issue? Because, clearly, we need a way to move beyond the stigma of riots and looting to maintain the dignity of the cause for which George Floyd’s needless death has become a catalyst. We need a way to channel the power of the protests to make the provocateurs and the criminals unwelcome, and to harness the anger of those wayward souls easily led astray. That requires the sense of purpose that spirit power unleashes in making leaders of those who have felt left behind. It requires instilling vision.

Make no mistake. I am proud of the political leadership provided at this time in Illinois by both Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Mayor Lightfoot, as well as many others in lesser posts, as well as some mayors and governors elsewhere. But the leadership needed to save and redirect the protests will not come from politicians. It will come from neighborhood leaders like Jahmal Cole, with the sense of humility that comes of building movements from the ground up, and thus understanding how to reach and relate to people where it matters. Cole spoke at Mayor Lightfoot’s press conference last Sunday (May 31), along with clergy and other civic leaders, but his impassioned speech reappeared on the op-ed page of the Chicago Tribune two days later, under the headline, “Looting isn’t the answer, but organizing is.” He distinguishes between mobilizing people and organizing them, making the powerful case that organizing is the true hard work, with fundamentals, or basic rules. Leadership does not just happen. It is trained, but it also grows organically from heart-felt commitment.

Cole closes with a “message to the cops,” stating that a badge “gives you a platform that will elevate your true character.” It will either amplify your wickedness or amplify your platform to do good. Perhaps it can be said that, in a much less formal way, joining a movement can do the same. Every protester faces a moral choice. We need leaders who redirect wayward energy and identify and exclude evil intent. They will not succeed in every instance. Many instances of crime and looting will be out of their control and depend far more on police response and readiness. But their efforts will nonetheless help our nation reframe the debate over racial injustice.

Jim Schwab

Small Gestures Matter

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Last week was for me an eventful time, including a four-hour trip to Dubuque, Iowa, on Thursday for the Growing Sustainable Communities conference, an event the city sponsors every year. I spoke in a session that afternoon, October 24, on community planning for drought, but mostly what I remember was the combination of keynote speeches that addressed the major issues of our time, notably including a luncheon talk on Friday by Dr. Katherine Hayhoe, of Texas Tech University, on communication about climate change. It was impressive and inspiring but underscored how much work lies ahead to reverse damaging trends affecting our planet.

But the week started out differently, with smaller actions that I think are extremely important in setting the tone for the way all of us relate to our fellow human beings.

My wife and I are members of Augustana Lutheran Church of Hyde Park, in Chicago. Situated catacorner from the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago on E. 55 St., our church enjoys the benefit of the knowledge that abounds among the LSTC faculty. I serve as coordinator of the Adult Forum, an adult discussion group that meets during the Sunday School hour. That makes me responsible for finding speakers, programming discussions, and promoting the events. On Sunday, October 20, we discussed actions we could take following a five-week series covering the World War II Nazi death camps, visited by Dr. Esther Menn and her husband, Bruce Tammen, in August during a trip to Poland and Ukraine, which fed into considerations of how we treat immigrants and minorities in our own time.

Our pastor, Rev. Nancy Goede, told me about an incident that occurred the prior Tuesday in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood, at Lincoln United Methodist Church. Lincoln has chosen to become a sanctuary church out of concern for the safety of undocumented immigrants, but a man shouting Nazi slogans came to the building in an angry confrontation with church staff. It was not the first time the church had been targeted for its actions. The man proceeded to smash the front window.

There is little we can do directly about an incident that is already past, but we decided that we could establish a supportive relationship with the congregation in the face of this hate crime, so we composed the following letter, eventually signed that day by at least 25 members of Augustana:

To the Members and Staff of Lincoln United Methodist Church:

We are very sorry to hear about the incident on October 15, in which a man shouting Nazi slogans smashed the glass window on the front door of Lincoln United Methodist Church.  We have learned that you have been targeted by right-wing groups for your stance in establishing Lincoln UMC as a sanctuary church.  We support your efforts and pray for your safety as you continue to follow your consciences in doing the Lord’s work.

Your Brothers and Sisters in Christ at Augustana Lutheran Church

Indeed, part of the purpose of this letter is to reassure Lincoln United Methodist Church that its members are not being left to handle this attack in isolation from the rest of the Christian community. We had learned a great deal about the high cost of silence during the Holocaust, as well as the need to forcefully address racial equality as we commemorated the 100th anniversary of Chicago’s race riots in 1919, a story detailed well in Claire Hartfield’s recent book, A Few Red Drops.

But that is not all we chose to do. Esther Menn then noted the American Jewish community on this past weekend would be commemorating the first anniversary of a violent anti-Semitic attack at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, in which eleven members were killed, and seven others wounded, by a man apparently inspired by right-wing rhetoric. Robert Bowers, a truck driver from Baldwin, Pennsylvania, was arrested for the massacre, and authorities said he used social media beforehand to post criticism of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, which has been supportive of the human rights of immigrants to the U.S.

In solidarity, Augustana announced that members of the congregation, as well as people from LSTC and McCormick Seminary, would gather last Friday evening to walk to nearby KAM Isaiah Israel congregation in Hyde Park to join its Friday evening shabbat service. Once again, Augustana would make a simple statement in opposition to hate crimes and violence against religious and ethnic minorities and immigrants. Because traffic on the way back from Dubuque that afternoon obviated the possibility of my own participation, Esther related to me that 27 people from Augustana and the two seminaries joined the effort, plus others who met them at the synagogue, and that their presence was greatly appreciated.

Supportive visitors at the doors of KAM Isaiah Israel synagogue. Photo provided by Esther Menn.

Sometimes, it is worth remembering that the simple act of reaching out to say we care and stand behind others is enough to establish lasting and meaningful bonds between otherwise disparate groups of human beings. It certainly is a place to start.

Jim Schwab

If You See Something, Say Something

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National Park Service photo

We have become so accustomed to a certain Homeland Security phrase since the events of September 11, 2001, that we have never seriously contemplated its larger meaning. “If you see something, say something,” for most people simply means that, if you notice something strange, someone leaving a package on a train platform and walking away, for instance, you need to call 911 or point it out to a nearby security official. Having done our civic duty, we can go on about our lives and hope for the best. We may save someone’s life, or we may simply be exercising caution. Check it out.

But suppose we interpreted that phrase in the context of our duties as citizens of an endangered, or even potentially endangered, democracy. Suppose the threat were to our democratic institutions and not just to the lives of those in a single public place. Suppose the threat involved policies that affected thousands of people threatened by racism, ignorance, or hatred? Ought we not to speak up? How different would the history of the world have been if millions of Germans had spoken up about what they saw even in 1933? How many Russians in the past two decades have risked their lives and their careers to speak up about the threats they see to a democracy being strangled in its cradle? In the past year, the people of Sudan have arisen against a brutal military dictatorship and forced remarkable changes. Are we Americans somehow so special as to be free from such obligations? Do we not eventually lose our moral authority to speak for democracy in the world if we fail to speak for it at home?

If you see something, say something. Let me tell you what I see:

I see children housed in filthy cages at the southern border by the U.S. government, separated from their parents, their eyes full of fear and bewilderment, when their only alleged crime was to be brought here by parents from Central America who sought to remove them from gang warfare, violence, crime, and corruption in desperately poor countries. I see a U.S. President, as a form of retribution, cutting aid to those countries that was meant to promote reform and economic opportunity to reduce people’s need to flee such chaos in the first place.

I see Temporary Protective Status (TPS) denied to survivors of Hurricane Dorian in the Bahamas, a neighboring country with deep ties to the U.S., even as that nation struggles to rescue and house its own people in the face of mind-numbing devastation. The rationale from the President was that “very bad people” would harm our country if this were allowed, although TPS has been standard practice in the past in the very same circumstances. It is unclear, other than being people of color, what makes the Bahamians especially dangerous in his eyes.

I see neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and Ku Klux Klan members marching and chanting “Jews will not replace us” through the campus of the University of Virginia and the streets of Charlottesville, defended ardently by a President who sees “very fine people” on both sides while an innocent young woman is run over and killed by a young Nazi sympathizer with his car. I see this rhetoric emboldening an ever-widening circle of mass shooters who sow terror in American cities with unlimited access to weapons of war, but I also see a widening circle of brave citizens rising to demand effective action against such terror.

I see America losing the moral courage of the Emma Lazarus poem at the Statue of Liberty, pleading for the world to “give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” and nearly mocking Lady Liberty as she seeks to lift her lamp beside the golden door. The Golden Door is becoming instead the Great Border Wall built with money never legitimately appropriated by Congress, and members of the President’s own party unable and unwilling to stop him or even raise the weakest of objections lest they be expelled from the halls of power—or are they becoming halls of obeisance, like the Roman Senate in Nero’s time?

I am telling you what I see because I understand the moral and civic obligation to say something. We must all be whistleblowers for the future of democracy. What do you see? Are you prepared to say something as well? And what shall we do once we have spoken?

Jim Schwab

Prisoners of Profit

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Cover photo provided by Random House

It is hard to know where to start in describing why the privatization of prisons is a terrible idea. The effective abandonment of public responsibility for the fate and welfare of people sentenced to incarceration after being convicted of various crimes—some of whom, in recent years, have been exonerated because of revelations of sloppy or corrupt police work—should speak deeply to the conscience. Apparently, in some legislative circles, however, money counts for more. The lobby for private prisons has made headway over time at both the federal and state levels.

To find out whether and how private prisons are particularly dysfunctional, Shane Bauer, a senior reporter for Mother Jones, went undercover at Winn Prison in Louisiana, an operation of Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) under contract with the state. Not totally undercover, mind you. He used his own name, and had CCA checked him out as he applied for a $9-per-hour job as a corrections officer, they might have wondered why someone with his background would want to work there. But CCA has a problem. Guards working just above minimum wage tend not to last long, and CCA needs bodies in uniforms, so the hiring process appears less than diligent. He was hired easily and worked at Winn for four months before it was time to leave. But more on that later.

For the record: Guards at public prisons in Louisiana, Bauer reports, started at $12.50 an hour. Not a lot, but almost 40 percent more than CCA was paying. Undoubtedly with better benefits.

Let me state at the outset that the resulting book, American Prison (Penguin Press, 2018), which follows his reporting in Mother Jones, is not my normal reading. Regular followers of this blog can figure out what I like to read, for the most part. But I am currently a judge in adult nonfiction for a book awards contest for the Society of Midland Authors, so this and many others arrived at my doorstep, day after day, until the deadline arrived earlier this month. Prisons, correctional policy, and the business of punishment are well outside my areas of expertise, and I am glad of that, but I know a book that demands public attention when I see one. This one will be an eye-opening experience even for some cynics. It will also be heart-wrenching for anyone with a moral core or a sense of human decency.

Before I delve into the details, I must express my admiration for Bauer’s courage in even undertaking this project. For one thing, he had prior experience with prisons—as an inmate. Several years ago, while Bauer was covering the Middle East, he and two friends, Josh Fattal and Sarah Shourd, went hiking and wandered too close to the Iranian border in Kurdish Iraq. All three were arrested. He was taken to the notorious Evin prison, where he spent considerable time in isolation before his eventual release. Shourd was released after about a year in a separate prison. That experience might very justifiably have kept most other people from even considering working in a prison, but Bauer has instead developed a commitment to prison reform. Meanwhile, the CEO of CCA, Damon Hininger, earned $4 million in 2018, according to Bauer, 20 times the salary of the director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Just sayin’.

Bauer does not simply relate his experiences at Winn Prison. He has done his homework on the history of making money from prisons and prison labor. He points out that many immigrants to the American colonies were convicts exported from England as indentured servants. Many fortunes in the United States, sometimes vast fortunes, have been built on free (meaning forced) labor from slaves and convicts. But the business of prison labor being used for profit took wing mostly after the Civil War, when the 13th Amendment abolished slavery with one loophole: “except as punishment for a crime.” The opportunity to convict multitudes of African-Americans, as well as a fair number of hapless poor whites, for even minor crimes, opened the door for leasing convict labor. That, in turn, led to horrific conditions as legislatures, especially in the South, sought ways to reduce the costs of penitentiaries by making them profitable—thus, the institution of the prison farm, and later, chain gangs.

That conditions were often horrid on plantations and chain gangs is beyond dispute. Bauer provides ample statistics and documentation including large percentages of deaths in places like Alabama. But individual stories sometimes often serve better to illustrate the moral degradation of prisons for profit. Bauer supplies us with the once infamous case of Martin Tabert, a white, 22-year-old middle-class kid from North Dakota who in 1921 set out to tour the country as a personal adventure. He ran out of money in Florida, between odd jobs along the way, and was arrested and pulled off a train by the sheriff for not having a ticket. Tabert wired his family for money, but before it arrived, he was sold off to the Putnam Lumber Company for three months of work in a turpentine camp. He worked all day in swamp water in “tattered shoes that didn’t fit.” When he had an aching groin and lagged behind other convicts, the “whipping boss” made him lie on the ground for thirty lashes in front of the other convicts. After additional beating and being hit over the head with a strap, he died the following night. The company sent a note to his family saying he died of fever. Not satisfied with the explanation, the family convinced the North Dakota state attorney to go to Florida to investigate. His findings, including the company’s agreement to pay the sheriff $20 for each prisoner he sent to them, produced a major scandal, a lawsuit, and an investigation by the Florida legislature.

All of that highlights the fact that, for decades, some states wavered between episodes of investigation and reform and a desire to limit the prison budget and make the penal system earn money. One might think that, in more enlightened times, we might get past that sort of moral cowardice and come to terms with public responsibilities to provide opportunities for at least the less violent or nonviolent prisoners to make amends, acquire skills, and rehabilitate themselves for participation in what we might hope would become a less dangerous society.

But private prisons, and major problems even at public prisons, persist because America has not yet moved beyond moral indifference and hard-nosed, but short-sighted notions like “throw away the key.” I do not say that to minimize the very real challenges involved in incarcerating felons in the first place. Bauer himself, as he details his experiences as a corrections officer at Winn, confronts much of the moral ambivalence of handling such responsibilities, including the head games and manipulation in which prisoners often engaged at his expense. The moral turmoil of maintaining control of a potentially violent setting is significant, but it also serves to underscore the moral turpitude of trying to do so in a private prison staffed by guards who are earning barely above the minimum wage. That, of course, cuts costs, as does minimizing medical care for inmates and many other short cuts. Bauer plies us with statistics including comparisons of suicide rates between public and private prisons. But again, a personal story highlights a major problem. Bauer tells of one inmate, Damien Coestly, who hangs himself. His suicide is not reported by CCA, he tells us, because he died in the hospital, not at the prison. Never mind that the scenario played out at the prison. Just get the guy out of our prison before he dies on our watch. Good grief.

Now, at some point, you know this whole undercover operation must end. I will not spoil the story for you, nor even share how he got so much information out of the prison on a daily basis. But the epilogue details how and when he decided the time had come to pack up and leave, reporting his resignation by phone from the safety of neighboring Texas. Just read it. It is high drama, making Bauer’s subsequent arrival at the annual shareholders meeting of CCA in Nashville almost anticlimactic, but revealing, nonetheless. If this book does not affect your outlook on the whole subject of incarceration for profit, I swear, there is something wrong with you.

Jim Schwab

We Must Be Gandalf

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It is a dramatic and evocative scene. In The Two Towers, the second novel of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, Grima Wormtongue, a spy at the service of the evil wizard Saruman, has gained control of the mind of Théoden, the king of Rohan, which is on the verge of being attacked by the Orcs, Saruman’s army of vicious creatures. Just in time, Gandalf, the wizard who is aiding the hobbit Frodo in his quest to destroy the Ring, succeeds in freeing Théoden from the influence of Wormtongue, at which point he rallies his beleaguered people to relocate to Helm’s Deep to defend them from the oncoming attack.

The Lord of the Rings is, of course, a fantasy, but a literarily sophisticated one that mirrors many classic human moral and political dilemmas. Tolkien might never have anticipated anything like the current relationship between Donald Trump and VladimirPutin, but he clearly understood how an aggressive enemy would seek to weaken its opponent from within by kneecapping its leadership. The Monday press conference in Helsinki of the Russian and U.S. presidents is as close an analogy in real life to the Rohan crisis as one can imagine.

Clearly, Trump’s pitiful performance has earned opprobrium from both Democrats and Republicans, though many of the latter are still cowering in the shadows and reluctant to speak out. The mere idea that a U.S. president would defend a Russian dictator while casting aspersions on the findings of his own intelligence agencies concerning a well-documented effort by Russia to subvert American elections would have been the stuff of wild fiction just a few years ago. Today, Trump is not only under the spell of the evil KGB wizard but is apparently a willing apologist, if not an accomplice. Robert Mueller is a skillful investigator but not a wizard. There is no Gandalf to free Trump from Putin’s influence, and he will not be rallying his people to defend our nation against further sabotage. Donald Trump is clearly more interested in defending what he perceives as his legitimacy in the presidency than in defending the interests of his nation. Call that what you will, but it is our current state of affairs.

Those still deluded enough to give Russian President Putin the benefit of the doubt could benefit, if they still have an open mind, from reading “Nyet” (Know Thine Enemy), a chapter of John McCain’s recent book, The Restless Wave, in which he delineates his two decades of experience with Putin and his dismal record of aggression and human rights violations. His 40 pages of documentation are probably more than enough for the average voter, but those willing to probe further could also benefit from Russian-American journalist Masha Gessen’s incisive exposé, The Man without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin. Want more proof? Try Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible by Peter Pomerantsev, an eerie tour of the surreal world of news production inside Putin’s Russia. There is more, but those books should constitute adequate persuasion. Putin is anything but a benign force in the world.

Like everyone else following the news, I am well aware of Trump’s lame attempt on Tuesday to walk back some of what he said, once he was safe in the White House again and not standing alongside Putin in Helsinki. He claimed he meant “wouldn’t” when he said he didn’t see “why it would be” Russia that had interfered in our 2016 election. Frankly, it reminds me of a skit from the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in 1968 that I have never forgotten. Comedian Pat Paulsen played the part of a candidate for the presidency, and Tom and Dick asked him about something he had said. He claimed he never said any such thing, so they rolled the videotape, which showed him saying verbatim exactly what they had just alleged. Paulsen’s curt but absurdly comic reaction: “I was misquoted.” It makes me wonder how the brothers and Paulsen captured the essence of Trump 50 years before his time. Some people are just prescient, I guess.

The situation affords two paths to American redemption, regardless of all the silly hearings Republican-led congressional committees may stage to divert our attention to hapless individuals like Peter Strzok, who had the misfortune of being exposed for the unwise use of his FBI phone to exchange political messages with his lover. The idea that this tempest in a teapot represents some vast conspiracy of bias in federal law enforcement is ludicrous. Congress should be spending its time on real issues, including Russian interference in U.S. elections, but Republican committee chairs would rather waste their credibility to protect Trump from further scrutiny.

So, what are those two paths? One is clearly legal and involves the ongoing, probing, extremely professional work of Mueller and his team of investigators, who have already brought dozens of indictments and several guilty pleas, as well as jail for Paul Manafort when it became clear to a judge that he was attempting to influence potential witnesses. That will move forward unless Trump proves rash enough to attempt to fire him. So far, that has been a bridge too far.

The other path is political and involves democracy at its best. Even long-time conservative George Will, referring to Trump as “this sad, embarrassing wreck of a man,” is now urging voters to put Democrats in charge of Congress in the November election. Will has not changed parties. Instead, he feels Republicans need a thorough electoral thrashing at the hands of voters in order to come to their senses. Democratic takeover of the U.S. House would mean a complete shift in committee leadership, with hearings on critical issues taking on real meaning, leaving the President with nowhere to hide. Voter activism need not be limited to voting, however. Rallies in the streets, knocking on doors, letters to the editor, and all the other tools of advocacy are available to the patriots who care about their country and are willing to demand better leadership.

This nation remains a democracy despite Trump’s dubious intentions. We have met Gandalf, and he is us. Gandalf in our dilemma is the collective power of our democratic resistance and our votes. It is up to us to protect our republic from the influence of Putin and his cyber-agents.

Jim Schwab

Frog-Marching Illinois into the Dark Past

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Photo of Gov. Bruce Rauner, from Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Rauner.

Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, elected in 2014 and up for re-election this year as the Republican nominee, has made manipulative politics the centerpiece of his first term, at the expense of passing a budget through a Democrat-dominated legislature. Illinois has had such split governance before, but other governors at least understood that their first responsibility was to pass a budget so the state could pay its bills, even if that required some compromise. Rauner instead has thrown down the gauntlet repeatedly, often on issues such as right-to-work legislation that were not directly related to the budget but became his bludgeons to get what he wanted. The result was a two-year stalemate that saw Illinois continue many of its programs under court mandates rather than through legislation. Finally, enough Republicans bucked their own governor last year to force the issue and approve some tax increases to begin to pay down the state’s backlog of debts to social service providers, school districts, and state universities, among others.

You might think that, by now, Illinois would have had enough of such counterproductive, divisive politics. Compromise and disagreement always have co-habited in politics, mostly by necessity. Even in the era of Donald Trump, even in a gubernatorial election year, acting like an adult should still count for something.

Instead, Rauner on Monday used his line item veto power to revise a gun law passed by the legislature to attempt to reinstate the death penalty. The gun law would establish a 72-hour “cooling-off” period following the purchase of an assault weapon. Legislators have considered several proposals in response to the recent wave of incidents of gun-related violence around the nation and in the state. Rauner also stated that he believes the 72-hour rule should apply to all gun purchases, and proposed other gun-control measures, but it is hard to take him seriously when he makes the legislation contingent on an unrelated death penalty provision. Rauner understands all too well the political divisions inherent in gun policy, having barely survived a primary challenge from St. Rep. Jeanne Ives, a right-wing Republican from Wheaton, in the conservative evangelical heart of the Chicago suburbs. It is far easier to see a streak of raw cynicism behind Rauner’s move: How desperate are gun-control advocates to get something passed? Desperate enough to split the Democratic base by supporting reinstatement of the death penalty?

It is important to understand just how cynical this is in the context of recent Illinois history. The last Republican governor, George Ryan, placed a moratorium on the death penalty in 2000 because he found himself increasingly troubled by the number of wrongful convictions in Illinois and the possibility that, in denying clemency, he could be signing the death warrant for an innocent person. In 2003, before leaving office, Ryan commuted the sentences of all death row inmates. Despite considerable criticism at the time, Ryan mounted a stout defense of his actions.

This has been no small matter in Illinois. The list of exonerations in recent decades runs on for pages. The City of Chicago has already paid out more than $100 million in reparations for wrongful convictions resulting from forced confessions, extracted through torture, by police detective Jon Burge, subsequently convicted himself in federal court for obstruction of justice and perjury. That is not even close to the end of the story; the overall total of settlements for police misconduct, according to the Better Government Association, totaled well in excess of $500 million by 2014. Thus, the move by Ryan served to open the floodgate of grievances and reservations that finally led the legislature to abolish the death penalty in 2011, signed into law by Gov. Pat Quinn.

In the meantime, Ryan himself went to federal prison on corruption charges, followed a decade later by his Democratic successor, Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who himself seemed intent on proving that one need not be an adult to hold high office. Blagojevich is still appealing a 14-year sentence and hoping for clemency from President Trump. Illinois has had a colorful, but hardly confidence-inspiring, political history.

It is thus small surprise that there is little voter sentiment for what Rauner has now suggested. The notion that it may be better to let a murder convict sit in prison, where at least he or she may still be alive if or when a wrongful conviction is overturned, seems to have become the dominant sentiment among most of the body politic. Illinois does not need to revisit that conclusion so soon after achieving this historic landmark in its long history of criminal jurisprudence. We still don’t know what other innocent persons might be sitting on death row if the state had not ended the death penalty.

Rauner is trying to parse the distinction between potential wrongful convictions and legitimately convicted murderers by limiting the application of the death penalty in his amendatory veto language to those who murder police officers or kill two or more people. Asked why his proposal should not include murder of firefighters or teachers, Rauner declared himself open to expanding the list of victims for which the new death penalty would apply.

And thus, Rauner begins the process of frog-marching Illinois back into its dark past, picking scabs and reopening old wounds from a past that most of us have already chosen to put behind us.

Rauner also introduced in his amendatory veto a new standard of “beyond all doubt” in place of “beyond all reasonable doubt” for such convictions. But in practice, how does a jury, or a judge, truly distinguish one from another? If any doubt exists about convicting a defendant in a murder trial, shouldn’t that doubt be “reasonable” before it is even considered? In light of past miscarriages of justice, who will guarantee a just result before imposing the death sentence? Rauner’s tweaking of language does almost nothing to resolve the manifold doubts that moved public opinion toward the elimination of the death penalty in the first place.

The legislature, as always, has two options. One is for enough Democrats and Republicans, bipartisanly sick of this brazen manipulation, to override the amendatory veto with a three-fifths vote in both houses. The other is to do nothing, in which case the legislation goes nowhere. Legislators are also actively pursuing other measures concerning state licensing of gun dealers. The possibility of approving Rauner’s version of the bill creating the cooling-off period is, in fact, almost nonexistent, and Rauner’s true goal may be to satisfy the Republican right wing by killing the gun-control measure that passed and blaming its failure on Democrats. If so, voters may want to consider just how cynical they want their governor to be.

Jim Schwab

Related links for this article:

“Rauner’s death penalty ploy,” Chicago Tribune editorial

“In Rauner’s gun proposal, politics ahead of policy,” Chicago Tribune column by Dahleen Glanton

“Lawmakers revise plan to license Illinois gun stores,” Chicago Tribune

Resilience in Utah

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Amid all the necessary attention to current disasters, small community conferences across the country are steadily training and educating local government staff, emergency volunteers, and local stakeholders in hazard-related issues to become more resilient. Because hazards vary widely with geography and climate, the specific focus of these meetings varies widely as well. The quiet but important fact is that they are happening, and people are learning. This is one particularly salient reason why, in my new post-APA career, I have made myself available as a public speaker. These conferences provide an excellent opportunity to feel the pulse of America regarding hazard mitigation and disaster recovery.

All is far from perfect, as one might expect, but the progress can be encouraging. My latest presentation was on December 6 in Salt Lake City, at the Resilient Salt Lake County Conference in the Salt Palace Convention Center. About 240 people had registered, I was told, for this one-day event.

While, for many people outside Utah, the word “Mormon” comes to mind quickly in connection with the state, one important fact to know is that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS) is itself active in encouraging members, congregations, and communities to become more resilient and aware of the disaster threats around them. One interesting feature of the conference was that it focused as much on individual attitudes and resilience as it did on community planning. Given my background, I tend to focus on the latter as a public speaker, but I do not underestimate the value of personal emotions and outlook in handling stressful situations. In fact, for me, the most valuable takeaways from my visit dealt with those issues, even though many people attending may have felt the opposite after listening to me. Sometimes, the issue is simply what you need to learn at a given moment. But communities are composed of individuals, and whole-community resilience depends on the sum of its parts.

My own after-lunch presentation certainly started with a personal element, as I walked people through what I called “an emotional journey” through Sri Lanka and New Orleans in 2005, and events beyond, to regain a human perspective on why our community-level planning for hazard mitigation and disaster recovery remains important. I then highlighted many of the tools we had developed during my tenure at the American Planning Association to advance such planning, and concluded with a primer on the most practical aspects of adaptation for climate change. But I want to focus instead on what others said that I found important.

Utah’s Threatscape

First, I might note that a presentation early in the day by Matt Beaudry, from the Utah Division of Emergency Management, provided an effective handle on the state’s approach to resilience, which seems to involve a serious effort to take a holistic approach. Beaudry used the term “threatscape,” not one I have heard much before, to talk about the comprehensive array of hazards facing Utah communities. This threatscape, he noted, is “evolving daily,’ and that we are “planning daily for things unimaginable 10 or 20 years ago.” Most of these new threats are not natural but involve the critical infrastructure we have built in our communities and include cybercrime as well as active violence such as vehicle rammings.

Nonetheless, the natural hazards remain. Utah has fault zones and is subject to seismic disturbances, but are communities prepared for earthquakes? It is easy enough to understand when the wildfire season starts, but earthquakes provide no warning. The best preparation is seismically resistant construction, but what about older buildings? Beaudry discussed numerous acronym-laden state programs to address these needs, many of which can be found on the Utah Department of Public Safety website, but one was refreshingly non-acronymic and easy to understand—“Fix the Bricks,” a Salt Lake City program offering grants for seismic retrofitting of older buildings.

Utah has also experienced floods, wildfires, and landslides. Beaudry noted that catastrophic disruptions to water supplies threaten life itself. Hospitals cannot stay open without water. What happens when that lifeline is cut off?

Michael Barrett, resilience program manager for Salt Lake County Emergency Services, followed up by noting that Salt Lake County wants “to ensure that all plans include resilience.”

The ComeBACK Formula

The last morning speaker, Sandra Millers Younger, whom I had never met before this trip, provided the most powerful perspective of the day on individual resilience. Her story began from personal experience, which is not surprising, nor is the fact that she converted that personal experience into a book, The Fire Outside My Window. That fire, the largest in modern California history and known as the Cedar Fire, consumed 280,000 acres near San Diego in 2003.

It also destroyed the house she and her husband had built on a hill they called Terra Nova, which, she says, afforded lofty views “all the way to Mexico.” I must confess that I might have hesitated to build in that location, but what matters for her story is what happened after she awoke to see fire outside, “grabbed our pets and belongings,” including many of her photographer husband’s images, and jammed everything into an Acura Coupe. They headed downhill along a steep route, lost visibility amid the smoke, and feared going off the road and over a cliff until a bobcat leaped in front of her headlights. She followed the bobcat into the smoke to safety. But twelve neighbors died. It was Younger’s struggle with the aftermath that ultimately yielded her story and her approach, which she now calls the ComeBACK formula. At the core of that approach is a quote she uses from Victor Frankl, a Holocaust survivor who wrote a highly regarded book, Man’s Search for Meaning, in which he writes, “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

That underlay the simple statement that, confronted with crisis or disaster, we can choose to be victims or survivors. Younger noted that a current subset of psychological research deals with “post-traumatic growth,” ways in which we grow our personal resilience as a result of our experience with disaster. This is not to gainsay the reality of post-traumatic stress, which has gained far more attention, but to acknowledge that we do have choices about the ways in which we respond. To give reality to her approach, Younger stepped the audience through an exercise, pairing up at their tables to share answers to questions based on her approach.

Younger’s five points in the ComeBACK Formula are straightforward enough, but not always easy for people to internalize:

  1. Come to a place of gratitude.
  2. Be patient; believe you can.
  3. Accept help; be tough enough to ask.
  4. Choose your story.
  5. Keep moving forward.

I found it interesting that a female speaker and counselor would use the phrase, “be tough enough to ask,” in reference to accepting help from others. As a man, I wonder how many men would even think of framing the question of accepting help in those terms; yet it feels instinctively true. Asking for help, especially when you are a professional helper, means having the courage to expose your own vulnerability, but also your willingness to learn and grow by doing so. As she notes, it is “hard to call 911 when you are 911.” On the other hand, it is hard to be a hero without understanding what it means to be rescued. To become a better giver, learn how to receive.

The Extreme Example

All this may well have set the stage for the closing keynote, 93-year-old Edgar Harrell, a World War II Marine Corps veteran who survived the sinking of the USS Indianapolis on July 30, 1945, as it was returning to the Philippines from Guam. A lurking Japanese submarine had spotted the ship and launched six torpedoes, two of which struck and literally cut the vessel in half.

Unbeknownst to its crew, the ship had delivered to Tinian Island the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima a few days later. Most of the crew, 880 men, perished while a shrinking contingent that included Harrell, then 21, struggled in tropical seas for five days to survive without food and drinkable water. Finally, a U.S. airplane spotted them, and a seaplane rescue was underway. Here was an example in which the only route to survival was to accept help because no one would have lived otherwise. Harrell lived and retold his story in Out of the Depths.

Younger had earlier noted that she met a man who had lost only his garage in the wildfire, yet was bitter about the outcome, while others who had lost relatives or suffered grievous burns had far more positive attitudes about the future. When any of us think we have seen the worst, it is these stories that remind us of the truth of Victor Frankl’s observation. We do indeed choose how to respond.

Jim Schwab

Short Visit to Charlottesville

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Few people live for the excitement of radical demonstrations. Most of us want to enjoy life and, if we can, contribute something positive to society along the way. Thus, it is small surprise that, when hundreds of Ku Klux Klan members, neo-Nazis, and white supremacists arrived in Charlottesville, Virginia, on August 11, and engaged in open intimidation of counterdemonstrators the following day, almost no residents were happy, and many made their displeasure clear. In the end, one Nazi sympathizer from Ohio chose to drive his car into a crowd, injuring numerous bystanders and killing Heather Heyer, a young local paralegal with an admirable history of assisting the disadvantaged.

Thanks to extremely unfortunate and ill-considered comments on the matter by President Donald Trump, Charlottesville has become shorthand in many people’s minds for a controversy about intolerance. But what really happens as a community tries to resume normal life after such distasteful episodes? What happens after the intruders, who among other things took issue with the proposed removal of statues of Confederate leaders, finally leave town and go back where they came from? Only one organizer was a Charlottesville resident, not a particularly popular one at that, and the vast majority of right-wing demonstrators were from outside Virginia—a point emphasized by Gov. Terry McAuliffe in his condemnation of their activities.

I had the opportunity to visit Charlottesville last Monday. To be clear, my primary motive was to visit two retired friends who moved there from suburban Washington, D.C. They had invited me long before the demonstrations took place. I took them up on the offer largely because I had been asked to speak at the North Carolina state conference of the American Planning Association, which began on September 26. I flew into Richmond the previous day and drove to Charlottesville that afternoon. They wanted to show off their new home town and took me to the University of Virginia campus and then downtown, where we eventually had dinner followed by some late-night conversation. I drove to Greenville, North Carolina, the next morning.

I mention all this because I am sharing casual observations, not dedicated reporting or profound knowledge of the city, which I had never previously visited. Even so, I think my observations have some modest value. For one, Charlottesville is a normal, mostly attractive city, a university town of average size (just under 50,000). It is well forested in places and sports some attractive scenery, like much of Virginia. It is easy to see why people would like living there.

It is also largely a progressive city, not unusual for a community with a strong academic history. The Rotunda, the original core of the University of Virginia campus, was designed by Thomas Jefferson in the years after he retired from the presidency to his home at nearby Monticello. The campus thus has a noteworthy history dating back more than two centuries to America’s earliest days. The university has a noteworthy academic history and has produced its fair share of meritorious scholarship. Historic preservation clearly is part of the university’s DNA.

But that history contains a dark side that long remained unacknowledged until more recent times. Much of Jefferson’s architectural handiwork was achieved with slave labor. The slaves who helped build the campus spent many decades deprived of access to the educational opportunities the university provided. Social justice has become a significant focus of the university’s attention in recent decades, once the civil rights movement had forced the entire state to think seriously about racial equality. This is the state, after all, that in the 1960s gave the nation Loving v. Virginia, a U.S. Supreme Court decision that outlawed state laws prohibiting interracial marriage.

To its credit, however, the University of Virginia has been coming to terms with its history. Surely, one can credit Jefferson for remarkable skills and a certain practical genius in both politics and architectural design. His achievements are not to be gainsaid. At the same time, there is no question that much of his life was predicated on and enabled by inequality and the suppression of opportunity for people of color, enslaved or free. His political courage never extended to the liberation of his African-American servants. University walking tours now include very factual discussions of the role of enslaved African Americans, some of whom were openly abused and maltreated on the antebellum campus. Their story deserves to be told along with that of the leaders who created much of the university’s unique heritage. Brochures and information related to historic buildings suggest that university historians have spent time documenting this history for the benefit of future generations. The contributions of African Americans, willing or involuntary, to the university need to be part of the public record. The educational displays in the Rotunda acknowledge that history.

But it was through this very campus that the Klansmen and Nazis marched on that August night, carrying torches and chanting offensive slogans like “Jews will not replace us.” They made a point of marching in front of a downtown synagogue. I may be Christian, not Jewish, but I can easily imagine how angry I would feel if that were my place of worship. It has never even occurred to me to disrespect someone else’s house of worship in any way. Part of being American, in my humble opinion, lies in respecting other people’s ethnic or racial heritage and freedom of religion. I am aware that there are plenty of examples of disrespect for diversity in American history, but they should fill us with shame, not pride, because they contradict our stated principles as a nation.

Shrouded statue of Gen. Stonewall Jackson in downtown Charlottesville.

As in any such city, the university is a major presence in the life of Charlottesville. But it was downtown where the Saturday rally and confrontations occurred. There seems to be some serious public discontent with the role of the police that day in containing the violence that occurred, quite possibly because public safety officials failed to take seriously enough the full extent of the threat, expecting a much smaller demonstration. Certainly, no one expected James Alex Fields, a 20-year-old Nazi sympathizer from a Toledo, Ohio, suburb to drive his vehicle through a crowd with the express purpose of producing mayhem among those opposed to the right-wing protest, but it also is not clear to all concerned that police had taken all appropriate measures to secure the area to prevent such an outcome. I am not judging; I am merely reporting the apparent public sentiment.

Two statues whose preservation was the object of the protest, those of Confederate Generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, have been shrouded from public view with a “no trespassing” sign to bar fans of the Confederacy from removing the shrouds. I will not take up the arguments about the fate of the statues here. I am merely noting that many would like to see them go, even as others make a case for preserving them. But it does seem to me that there is a serious difference between exploring and understanding the history of the Civil War and providing people who fought to preserve slavery and against the United States with a place of honor on public property. Equating knowledge of American heritage with statue preservation strikes me as simplistic and even disingenuous.

But most striking in this city seeking to reestablish normal life after a harrowing episode involving domestic terrorism and racial hatred is the simple campaign that has been launched to demonstrate a municipal identity in the wake of those events. Throughout downtown, posters and displays proclaim that “Charlottesville Stands for Love.” It is a simple, almost unsophisticated declaration that captures a sentiment that informs the Klan and the Nazis that they are out of place in Charlottesville, that the community simply is not interested in fomenting or disseminating hatred. This is a city looking to the future, not interested in perpetuating the animosities and bigotries of the past. It is time to move on.

The display in the photo above appears in the middle of the downtown pedestrian mall, which reminded me in its design features of the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado. It is a place of small shops, of funky and independent restaurants, of people who accept diversity. It is a place for people to find locally oriented businesses, to relax, to meet each other, and to foster a culture of mutual respect. It is its own message: We all just want to get along and lead productive lives. We have our problems, like any city, but hate is not welcome here.

Jim Schwab

We Are the Cure, We Are the People

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Our nation is suffering from a terrible social disease. It is not a sexually transmitted disease, though it can be spread orally, through the things we say to each other and over the Internet and the air waves. Since everything seems to need a name, I will call it BJ Disease, which stands for blanket judgment. It has been with us for a long, long time, latent in our political system and society, but it has gone viral, it seems, and become an epidemic in a very bad political year.

If there is one thing I personally learned long ago, it was to view people as individuals rather than as monolithic groups. In part, that is because I learned as a Christian that this is the way in which God values us, and it saddens me when I see people use religion as a weapon or a tool of exclusion rather than an opportunity for moral and spiritual growth. It has paved the way for my wife and me adopting two girls of varied backgrounds and becoming grandparents of a passel of children of racially mixed backgrounds, each with their own unique characteristics.

Adopting such an outlook has allowed me to see many more shades of meaning and value in the ways people speak and behave than if I were to see them simply as blacks, whites, Hispanics, or adherents of one faith or another, or of particular ethnic groups or sexual identities. Yes, many people in all these groupings have limited things in common, but there are far more that differentiate them as individuals and many more that we share in common as human beings across all those lines. But far too often, we refuse to see them. It is costing us lives and endleDSCF1345ss heartache, and that is a very sad thing.

Amid the uproar over black lives taken by police officers, most often though not always white officers, there is among a vocal minority of protesters an unfortunate tendency to paint all police as racially biased and prone to violence against minorities. There is, no doubt, a small segment of many of our police departments with such tendencies, though I am inclined to think it is a much smaller segment than it used to be. It is, however, far more visible today as a result of technology. Certain members of police departments have not yet adapted to an era in which the ubiquity of cell phone cameras virtually ensures that bad judgment in handling suspects, often in minor incidents such as traffic stops, will end up on the evening news. But lest I be accused of BJ disease myself, let me note that there are instances in which traffic stops have resulted in the deaths of police who did not soon enough realize that someone had a gun and intended to use it. Traffic stops can escalate, and there are reasons why police may be wary of the drivers they have pulled over.

At the same time, it is also perfectly clear that the shooter in Dallas made statements to the police, as they were trying to negotiate with him, that he hated white people and police. His indiscriminate shooting of officers at the end of what had been a peaceful protest not only bloodied and sullied the message of the protest but made clear that, in his mind, the people he was shooting were not individuals with families and unique perspectives and experiences but a single mass of people not deserving of such differentiation. It is hard to see the difference between that outlook and the views of a white racist who sees blacks as an undifferentiated force for evil. Both perspectives simply deepen the propensity for violence in our society.

At a time when it would be extremely helpful to have political leaders who can help us to escape the bonds of blanket judgment disease, which can become contagious through peer pressure and the desire to conform in the condemnation of outsiders, however they may be defined, it is disappointing in the extreme to have instead candidates for the presidency who engage in spreading the disease through inflammatory rhetoric. Take, for instance, Donald Trump’s proposal to bar Muslims from entering the country. Trump may well understand that many Muslims condemn the violence of terrorists, and that many are fleeing their countries in search of safety, but the careless lumping of all Muslims into a suspect category that must be denied admission to the United States does nothing to further that understanding. It does nothing to foster our awareness of Muslims as distinct individuals, any more than racial fears of American Indians or Mexicans or Asians fostered such understanding in the past. But let’s be clear. While he emerged as the winner of the Republican nomination by dominating debates with such reckless proposals, Trump was hardly the only candidate to offer such blanket condemnations or stoke such fears. In fact, his ascendancy within the Republican party was made possible precisely by years of such pathetic pandering before he chose to take it to another level.

So—I have said my piece for this week in an effort to make peace. There are no links in this particular blog post because the links that matter are not on the Internet but between all of us as Americans and as fellow human beings. We need to foster those connections across racial and political and ethnic and religious lines. We need to reach out even when it takes courage to do so. We need to spend more time understanding each other and less time criticizing each other en masse. We need to focus on the eradication of BJ disease. I will pray for that tonight and every night until we can achieve a more civil and respectful dialogue. Is it too much to ask? Or, as Rodney King once famously asked, “Can’t we all just get along?”

 

Jim Schwab

 

Incident below the 606

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The 606 is, if anything, ordinarily a very safe, quiet space full of people enjoying the outdoors. This photo is from opening day in June 2015.

The 606 is, if anything, ordinarily a very safe, quiet space full of people enjoying the outdoors. This photo is from opening day in June 2015.

One of the more disquieting aspects of urban life is an occasional confrontation with the irrational. I have debated telling this story, but I decided that enough other people either have had or will share such experiences that sharing it may have great value. One must be prepared somehow to handle these unexpected situations.

In my very last post a week ago, I noted my workouts with a trainer at XSport Fitness. One of those occurred yesterday, Saturday morning, at 8 a.m., after which I walked home with my gym bag, stopping for a snack and coffee at McDonald’s, after which I crossed Western Avenue by going up the ramp on one side to the 606 Trail, about which I have written more than once, and crossing to the other side. It is when I came down I encountered trouble, in broad daylight in the middle of a sunny, beautiful morning.

I was heading down the sidewalk to my home when a young man stood in front of me and demanded to know where I was going. “I’m going home,” I said in a matter-of-fact voice that was intended to suggest that the rest was no one else’s business. Nothing about his manner suggested that this was a friendly question.

“This is my neighborhood,” he asserted, “and I don’t know you.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, and began to move down the sidewalk. But he moved to block my path. I moved out toward the street to pass him, and he moved again. He reasserted that he did not know who I was, and I made clear that was irrelevant to my right to continue on my way home. But he would not get out of the way, prompting me to ask, with increasing exasperation, “What is your problem?”

I had both the gym bag and a mostly full cup of coffee in my hands. Before I could truly absorb just how determined he was, I saw his punch coming toward my jaw. I moved back just as quickly, so that his swing only barely connected with my cheek, but now he had really angered me. I threw the coffee at him, and it splattered across his shirt. But I lost my footing and fell backwards, landing on my rump on the planter strip below the trail 16 feet above. He picked up the gym bag and threw it at me while I was down. I quickly got back up, but it was clear this confrontation was not over, and I might just have to throw a few punches of my own if he continued.

But by then, something else happened that I think is one of the redeeming glories of the 606. A small crowd of witnesses to the scuffle had gathered above, and it was very clear to all of them that he was the aggressor. Some began to try to talk him down, threatening to dial 911 for the police. I would have done that myself, except that it was a rare trip in which I had not brought my cell phone. “Do it,” I yelled to them, signaling, I suppose, that I did not have a phone with me. At that moment, I would have liked nothing better than to see a squad car show up. But it did not happen.

What did happen is that one of the men on the trail had made his way down the ramp to usher me away from the confrontation while the young man watched. Amazingly, considering all the witnesses to what had happened, he loudly protested that I had thrown my coffee at him, to which I replied, “Yes, after you took a damned swing at me!” In effect, I retreated at the other man’s urging, continuing further down the trail and then circling back to my home. Equally interesting, though, someone came out of the nearby building and ushered the young man inside. It was over; no one was hurt.

I subsequently made a police report at the station, cycling there after I got home. As soon as I told my story, the officer behind the desk indicated they knew who it probably was, showed me a picture, and I verified him as the individual who had assaulted me. They told me he was mentally ill. I know his name but will not share it. I know where he lives and will not share it. I have learned from detectives shortly after originally posting this that they are still looking for him. This was not the first time he had accosted someone. Moreover, they said it was consistent with his “M.O.”

One important feature of this story is that it highlights a problem we all know exists, but that our society does a remarkably poor job of confronting: the management of the mentally ill, including, in his case, the apparently violent mentally ill. I do not profess to be an expert in this area. There are social workers and psychologists who are much more conversant with all the issues and bureaucratic complications of a system that copes poorly, in part because most of us do not want to spend much time thinking about such people, let alone funding programs to treat them. Our jails and prisons are full of them. Many of the homeless are victims of mental illness. Yet, in Illinois, we have a governor more focused on union-busting than on funding needed social services, despite persistent pleadings from churches and social service agencies, and a legislature that is more focused on re-election than on finding solutions to our fiscal mess. We are at a standstill.

I am not saying, of course, that there is any foolproof solution that would prevent encounters such as mine. Mental illness is a fact of human life that may never disappear no matter how many medicines we invent. There will always be the problem of someone who needs those medicines not being willing to take them. There will always be those who slip between the cracks. It will fall to those of us with enough poise, enough mental stability, and enough judgment to try to defuse these situations. In this particular case, I am enormously grateful to all those people on the trail because, in their absence, I am not sure what else might have transpired. It was a somewhat unnerving incident in part because, rational creature that I am, it took a minute or two for me to grasp that this individual was simply not operating with the same set of perceptions that were part of my universe. In my universe, the street belongs to anyone who wants to use it, and other people’s rights end at the beginning of my nose, as they say, or in this case at the edge of my jaw. In his universe, I constituted some sort of threat merely by trying to walk past him.

If I had been more elderly than my 66 years, less physically fit, or a mother with a child, the incident could have been terrifying, and I suspect it has happened and may yet happen again. And in the process sometimes, we end up with even more of the walking wounded among us. It is a sobering thought on an otherwise sunny Sunday morning.

 

Jim Schwab