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Posts Tagged ‘Joe Biden’

Saving Souls

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on May 20, 2025| Leave a Comment »

It’s rainy and thundering this morning in Nashville. Can I just say again, I HATE tornado season. But dogs must be walked, so my Grand Dogs just came for a visit.

A little rain never stopped me from strolling Ms Bean, all I needed was an umbrella and my old sneakers! And speaking of weather-aware footwear, I’m happy to report the Love Bug has chosen her Bat Mitzvah project; she’s asking her family and friends to donate gently used shoes (or money if you prefer) to the non-profit, Nashville Soles4Souls. I’ll have to look through my shoe rack since my options have been limited to flats and sneakers, I’m sure I’ve got a few fancy heels I’ve hardly worn.

The Bug was surprised to learn that I wore Weejun loafers all the time and ‘kitten’ sling-back heels to dress up in college. Back in the 60s, we had to wear a skirt on the streets of Boston – no pants for us. And one pair of Keds was essential for dressing down. Not sure I ever wore high heels. I was happy to read that Kristen Stewart changed the rules for female footwear on the red carpet a few years ago by throwing off her stilettos! Supercilious symbols of sex appeal!

Tweens of today have the right idea. Most wear sneakers with anything and everything. I mean, if a retro pair of Converse was good enough for our almost Madame President… I’ve been wearing Asics for decades; through tennis, paddle ball, dance aerobics, and even a try at pickle ball, my gel-cushioned Asics have stood the test of time. Sneaker brand loyalty is definitely a thing. I once tried wearing a pair of HOKA sneaks I found on sale, and was nearly crippled! In fact, that pair can be donated if I didn’t already give them to the Bride – we wear the same size!

“As Soles4Souls, we give goods a second life—and people a second chance. Whether you’re donating, fundraising, or volunteering, your support reaches people near and far—helping those in crisis, empowering entrepreneurs, and reducing waste.” https://soles4souls.org/volunteer

This feels like my second chance at life, a do-over. Ever since the dreaded erev election fall, I’ve sworn off lug soles and slip-on mules. Did I ever tell you, after our Year of Living Dangerously, the Flapper could only wear chunky, two inch heels? The car’s engine had crushed her legs, and after months of immobility, when she was finally allowed to walk, one leg had healed two inches shorter than the other. My Mother simply adjusted her gait rather than limp.

My heart goes out to President Joe Biden and his family after his cancer diagnosis. Two Catholic kids from Scranton, PA, our stories are strangely similar. Only my Father died before the car accident that changed the trajectory of my family’s life. His wife and daughter were killed when a truck hit her car just weeks before Biden was sworn into the Senate. How does one go on after the unthinkable happens? Of course I was too young to understand. My foster parents were my guardian angels.

I wish Joe well on this next chapter. It is an opportunity to be honest with the American people, to let down his guard. As for me, I’ll put on my pink penny loafers and soldier on.

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Pardon Me

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , on December 3, 2024| Leave a Comment »

There’s much ado about Hunter Biden’s pardon. One of the things I learned in Catholic School was to ‘put myself in someone else’s shoes.’ What if you were President Joe for a day – would you want to pardon your son with a history of drug and alcohol addiction who had turned his life around after a long political investigation? He lied on a gun form while high on crack cocaine and didn’t pay his taxes. OTOH, he didn’t intimidate witnesses or try to overthrow the government. So, YES, I’d pardon my son.

Then again, whenever I bump into someone in a crowd, I usually say, “Pardon me.” So I’m an equal opportunity pardoner.

It’s a habit I picked up when I was first living in Boston, Massachusetts in the 60s, and continued while living in the Berkshires. Back in NJ the usual retort was a quick, “Sorry,” but not for me. Maybe my old Catholic school upbringing was to blame; how many times had I blurted out in confession, “Pardon me Father….?” It just seemed a bit more dignified, maybe even a little royal, to pardon people. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, the word PARDON means to FORGIVE:

“to forgive someone for something they have said or done. This word is often used in polite expressions…. If someone who has committed a crime is pardoned, that person is officially forgiven and their punishment is stopped:“

Forgive me if i see nothing polite about the politics of this week’s Presidential pardon of Joe Biden’s son Hunter on gun and tax evasion issues is nothing new.

In fact, George Washington dismissed charges in 1795 against two Western Pennsylvania farmer/rebels, John Mitchell and Philip Weigel, involved in the Whiskey Rebellion! It would seem prescient that our young nation’s first crisis was a result of Hamilton imposing a tax on a domestic product that was grown and manufactured on the frontier – whiskey. The farmers refused to pay the tax and the resulting violent conflict was framed as a Federalist vs Anti-Federalist issue. Indeed, when Thomas Jefferson was elected President he repealed the Whiskey Tax!

“Residents viewed this tax as yet another instance of unfair policies dictated by the eastern elite that negatively affected American citizens on the frontier.” https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/whiskey-rebellion

Let’s jump ahead, past Confederate and Jimmy Hoffa pardons, to the one I remember in September, 1974. I don’t remember where I was at the time, but I do remember the feeling. Like our nation had gone through so much pain with the Watergate hearings and someone had to pay for trying to interfere with our election. When Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon I felt betrayed, not just because of his covert shenanigans, but because he had lied about stopping the war in Vietnam. I actually hated that man!

Deep down I knew that Ford was right by not being vindictive and preemptively saving us from a long trial. After all, Nixon resigned.

Today we have a twice impeached, convicted felon about to re-enter the White House. Mr T never thought to give us the courtesy of resigning, instead he sat idly by while insurrectionists attacked the Capitol. He wanted his Vice-President to overturn the will of the People. And one of his most controversial pardons was issued to his Son-in-Law’s father, Charles Kushner in 2020 after being convicted of “… tax fraud, witness tampering and making false statements to the Federal Election Commission.”

Just knowing that one of Mr T’s first acts as President may be to pardon the Jan 6th rioters makes me sick. But like the BBC once said, one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter. It’s just that ever since a hanging chad in FL and a 5-4 Supreme Court vote stopped the five week fight in 2000 of Al Gore vs George Bush, I’ve been disenchanted with our Electoral College. Gore won the popular vote by more than a half million votes. I wonder where we would be now if Gore had been elected when 9/11 happened?

My point is, Democrats didn’t storm the Hill and defecate in the halls of Congress.

My idea of ‘freedom’ certainly differs from the MAGA crowd. They want to be free of government interference, but the funny thing is so do we. We don’t want legislators in our doctors’ offices and they don’t want them in their business either. We also don’t want religion in our public schools or censorship in our libraries, conversely MAGA wants more God in our public places and they love pulling books off shelves.

I’m nostalgic for the good ole days when Washington DC could function, when deals got done and a consensus was reached. When senators went out to lunch together and congressmen and women played baseball together. When truth and trust were collective values. Pardon me for thinking we might return to a more congenial, centrist government eventually – a time when the farmers and the cowboys, the coastal elites and the working class middle of the country could be friends.

Here is the Bride’s Thanksgiving American pie!

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Deja Vu Again

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , on July 22, 2024| 1 Comment »

Why am I always in the kitchen when momentous things happen? I was prepping for a small dinner party last night, slicing cucumbers and washing berries, when my phone played a series of bells that meant only one thing – Aunt Kiki sent a text!

“Biben Drops Out of Presidential Race.”

It was a NYT’s headline. I had to sit down. My reaction was visceral, nausea followed immediately by goosebumps. The family text chain began, my adult children all weighing in with the Rocker’s digital sound from LA and the Bride’s iconic melody from Rehoboth Beach pinging from my phone as Bob pivoted from making (yes making from scratch) pasta and turned on the TV. It was finally official, our President bowed out after succumbing to Covid and the incessant pressure of his Democratic colleagues.

The family didn’t have to take the car keys away, he gave them up willingly. I started to cry just a little with relief from the last month of speculation and an impending sense of doom. I had wanted Biden to stay the course, I wanted to believe our country would be able to differentiate between a mensch and a conman. But my son, one of the original Bernie Bros, and my daughter, a Mayor Pete believer, have grown into good Democrats with a capital “D.” I knew the younger generation was right, and I could feel the excitement rising as I dressed the salad.

Our friends walked in with a gorgeous peach pie.

I remember when Bobby Kennedy was shot in a hotel kitchen in 1968. It was the end of an era. I was 19 years old; bereft, about to marry the rebound boyfriend, and still grieving the loss of my ‘one true love.’ I stood in the long line of mourners at St Patrick’s Cathedral to pay my respects to the Senator from New York. It was a beautiful but exceptionally hot day in June; I nearly fainted from lack of sleep and a simmering depression.

“He was, of course, an extraordinary man, a complex one; each time we saw him there was more to see. He could never be accurately measured, especially in terms of the past; he was always in the process of becoming. He was responsive to change, and changed himself. These changes were always attributed to his driving desire to win—except by those who knew him, who were aware of his great capacity for growth, his dedication, the widening of his concern. The people around him, we found, adored him—there is no other word. They would do anything for him, go any distance—and part of it was because they were convinced he would do the same for them.” 

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1968/06/15/When-New-York-City-Mourned-RFK

This was written about RFK, but it describes Joe Biden as well. Remember that he kickstarted marriage equality, that his first years on the Hill were forged through pain and loss. That he took the train home every weekend from Washington to be with his two young sons. We all know his story, an Irish Catholic from Scranton, just like my birth family. The Bride wrote Joe a letter when she was in 7th Grade, asking him to run for President, and he wrote back to her.

We Democrats are NOT a cult of personality. We do not blame God for political assassinations, or for surviving them intact… with maybe a little cartilage missing. We do not think there are good people on both sides of a line in Charlottesville. We don’t separate refugee children from their parents. We know where to draw that line, at corruption and sexual predation. We knew this election was an existential crisis for our country, some of us whispered this fact and some shouted. But the fear of violence, the fear of banning books and eroding our public schools, our public TRUST, the fear of a SCOTUS that would allow our fundamental human rights to be challenged is starting to abate.

Families fight, and they forgive. They also visit unexpectedly with four Scottish Deerhounds! Democrats are energized, and we are hopeful once again and for that Mr President, your country thanks you.

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Inegalite

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on March 5, 2024| Leave a Comment »

VIVA LA FRANCE!

Have you heard the news from France? They have enshrined a woman’s Right to Choose, her own bodily autonomy is now constitutionally a “guaranteed freedom.” France is the very first country in the world to write this basic human right into their constitution. And why has a Catholic country decided to vote 780-72 in favor of women at this moment in time? It’s because they’ve been watching us, the American people; they have seen how methodically and malignantly our human rights have been stripped away by judges and politicians in the pocket of Mr T.

I caught a bit of Van Jones’ CNN special the other night about what’s been happening in Tennessee. He interviewed the “Justins” and he spoke with Republicans outside of Davidson County. He tried to find common ground, but what if that’s impossible? Here’s the problem. Christian Nationalists are overtaking the GOP. It’s not just that they didn’t want the government telling them to get a Covid vaccine; it’s that they would like the government to censor books in public schools. And along with books, let’s take control of reproductive healthcare for millions of women!

One cult sect of the Christian Nationalist movement, the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), is an extreme branch of Christianity with its tentacles reaching very close to the American White House. I had to dig deeper into their mythology after listening to Terry Gross interview their founder about casting demons out of people. Yes, you heard me right. Demons.

“A central tenet of NAR’s belief system is that it is God’s will for Christians to take control of all aspects of U.S. society—including education, arts and entertainment, the media, and businesses—to create a religious nation.“

https://newrepublic.com/post/176861/mike-johnson-flying-christian-nationalist-flag-outside-office

Our Speaker, Mike Johnson, has three flags hanging outside his office: the American flag, the Louisiana state flag, and a flag representing the NAR movement that wants to turn the US into a Christian nation. Its design is from a Revolutionary War flag and is called “An Appeal to Heaven.” Many of these flags, sporting an evergreen tree in its center, were seen at the Jan 6th insurrection. That bears repeating – the flag hanging outside our Speaker’s DC office was flying alongside traitors to our country on Jan 6!

Today is Super Tuesday and the landscaping companies are out in full force in my neighborhood. Loud machinery has replaced the annual raking of garden beds in preparation for planting. I wonder how many rabbit nests are being destroyed while my forsythia begins to burst into yellow bloom. A cherry tree has pinked out and the magnificent tulip magnolias wave from bare branches. Spring is here!

Bob wants to vote today, but I’m less enthusiastic. In TN you can vote for blue or red in the primary, which is funny don’t you think? Each state is different, in some you must vote for the party you’ve registered with, but not here. Doesn’t seem very “united” to me. So I could vote for Joseph R Biden or:

Republican Primary Ballot:

  • Ryan Binkley
  • Chris Christie
  • Ron DeSantis
  • Nikki Haley
  • Asa Hutchinson
  • Vivek Ramaswamy
  • David Stuckenberg
  • Donald J. Trump

Too bad it’s not November. Right after Halloween, in the presidential elections, Tennesseans will be able to vote for Joe and Gloria Johnson to replace Marsha Blackburn in the Senate! Johnson stood alongside the Justins demanding gun control legislation but wasn’t expelled from the state house, because, well maybe because she’s … a woman? Even Taylor Swift has called Marsha Blackburn “Trump in a wig.”

But it’s only March with a looong election season ahead of us. I’m hoping that TN Democrats will show up today, in the rain, and vote for Joe. We need to vote like our lives depend on it today and in November.  Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité.

TO THE BARRICADES, I mean POLLS!!! Here we are on a French island.

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Rooseveltian?

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , on April 30, 2021| Leave a Comment »

We listened to part of Joe Biden’s speech, did you? Everyone knows he’s accomplished quite a lot in his first 100 days, but free pre-school and community college sure sounds like a stretch. A guy named Tucker said so, I mean who needs a mom anymore?

No matter how much we’d like our government to function rationally and in a bi-partisan manner, it looks like the great divide between fact and fiction has deepened. And even if you happen to be a conservative who doesn’t believe in conspiracy theories, you still want to stay in power. And it almost always comes back to the Culture War.

Like calling parents who insist their children wear masks outside “child abusers.”

At our Cypress Tree Ceremony in the park last weekend, our L’il Pumpkin said he’d rather wear his mask even though all the adults were vaccinated and we were all outside. Why? Because our friend Yoko’s granddaughter was there, an eight month old baby, and he was being considerate of her. Imagine, a 6 year old with more grace than half the country.

The latest National Geographic is all about whales, and even they have culture wars! Depending on where they live, some whales will only eat salmon while others like to catch baby seals. And some orcas love to roll around on the beach! “Beach rubbing is routine among this population, called northern residents because they ply inland seas during summer and fall between the Canadian mainland and Vancouver Island. Not so their neighbors to the south. The orcas around the border with Washington State, where I live, have never been documented performing this ritual.”

It’s funny to think that there are northern and southern whales. And although Biden and FDR grew up on the east coast, comparing them isn’t quite fair. FDR came from a patrician New York family; Biden’s family was salt/of/the/earth/middle/class Delaware via Pennsylvania. Yet Roosevelt created new policy, in order to fund our response to the Great Depression, that angered his wealthy peers. And yet, he wasn’t taxing anybody – he appointed Jesse Jones to the Reconstruction Finance Corporation – to create a synthesis between government and banking.

His main mission was to restore trust in capitalism; to help turn around a risk-averse banking industry.

Under Jones, the RFC worked across economic scales, from local construction contractors to giant corporations. It did not try to fulfill a particular utopian vision of how the economy “ought to be” but worked within the system to fix the system. It relied not on abstract economic ideas like socialism or capitalism, but on practical business methods. And it worked. There was no single magic bullet, but a portfolio of opportunities.

Under Jones, the RFC did not ask Congress for money. It could borrow billions from capital markets or banks. And borrow it did. But with Jones at the helm, overall, it made money. The RFC developed different projects that turned cutting-edge technology into self-sustaining commercial enterprises. Nervous businessmen said it couldn’t be done. Jones—and the rest of the RFC agencies—did it anyway.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/03/surprising-truth-about-roosevelts-new-deal/584209/

Biden must restore our trust in government after the last administration. Reading this article in the Atlantic helped me understand the other big lie of “big government spending.” Sure taxing the rich will help, but so would public and private partnerships. If Biden does want to create a Green New Deal, help women get back to work after this past year, and do something about police reform and gun violence – while the Supreme Court will be simultaneously dealing with a citizen’s ‘right’ to carry a gun around outside of his or her home – he’d better get busy in the NEXT 100 days.

Because I’d like to hang Joe’s picture in my kitchen, just like the Flapper hung FDR over her sink!

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Momala Kamala

Posted in an expository essay, Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 14, 2020| Leave a Comment »

I stood up clapping and yelling in my empty office after Kamala Harris spoke to an empty auditorium in Delaware on Wednesday. It was her first time appearing with Joe Biden as his running mate, and I was on pins and needles waiting for them. When she said the case against Mr T was “…open and shut,” I swooned. When she called our Toddler-in-Chief a whiner, I Tweeted; then I followed her husband – possibly the first ever Second Gentleman – on every social media platform!

When Kamala said, “I’ve had a lot of titles over my career and certainly vice president will be great, but ‘Momala’ will always be the one that means the most,” I got it.  I’m pretty sure only Italians and Jewish people use Momala as a token of endearment. She married Doug Emhoff, an entertainment lawyer, in 2014 and her two step-children started calling her Momala. Great Grandma Ada, who btw I’ve called Momala for years, called me up to tell me Emhoff was from Brooklyn; and then I read that Kamala broke a glass at their wedding to honor his tradition.

Wait, I misspoke. I wasn’t entirely alone watching Kamala on CNN. Ms Bean had been napping peacefully on her bed, only slightly medicated because of those pesky afternoon  thunderstorms, when my cheering started. I guess I must have been jumping around too much because she joined in with ferocity, barking and climbing up on me. She hasn’t seen me that excited in almost six months, or maybe even four years.

The Flapper was a realist when it came to politicians. Except for the great FDR, I remember her saying, “They’re all crooks.” But my foster parents were dyed-in-the-wool Democrats. I remember them getting dressed up to vote at night after Daddy Jim came home from work. And try as I might, they’d never say who they voted for, although it was pretty clear to me that they voted a straight line Democratic ticket.

After all, the Democrats were for the “working man,” the great “middle class.” I was also told the Irish vote blue, so there ya go. And once Kennedy, the first Irish Catholic president was elected and later assassinated when I was just 15 years old, my tribal loyalties were sealed in stone. McGovern was my first presidential vote, and I’m still proud of it to this day.

Many Dems I know felt discouraged after voting for Hillary in 2016 and watching the electoral college – a holdover from the southern slave states – trample our desire for a woman president. Discouraged and depressed. But this time there is something in the air. Systemic racism has crawled out of the shadows, and sitting on a fence for this election is simply unacceptable. Thanks to this administration, the American people will be asked to make a choice:

Continue running our government into the ground, chipping away at affordable healthcare during a global pandemic, and ignoring the economic plight of our people? Should we vote for a man who has single-handedly destroyed our trust in institutions like the Post Office and makes a mockery of the Justice Department? Or shall we vote for a return to truth and dignity with a Biden/Harris ticket?

She broke a piece of crystal under her heel at her wedding, and she will be the one to shatter the glass ceiling. Painting of Wonder Woman by Ashley Longshore.

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A Kiss is Just a Kiss

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 2, 2019| 2 Comments »

Today is #EqualPayDay across the globe, meaning any woman who thinks she isn’t a feminist isn’t paying attention. For every single dollar, or euro, a man makes, a woman will collect only 80 cents. Think about it, we make almost one quarter less than what men make for doing the same work! Maybe back in the day, where MAGA-hat-wearing people long to live, men went out to work and plunder leaving their mates at home, barefoot and pregnant. But today, we ladies are half of the workforce, maybe the “better half?”

Last week, the D Majority House passed the Paycheck Fairness Act. Why should that matter? Certainly some industries are fair when it comes to the payroll – historically women-centered careers like healthcare and teaching have been gender-neutral for the most part. But now the Paycheck Fairness Act will help to close the 20% wage gap in a broader way by banning employers from asking about former salaries. And maybe most importantly, prohibit companies from firing or retaliating at workers who share their wage information!

So step over to the next cubicle and talk about money people!

I remember my first real job. Before my days of teaching at a Head Start in Jersey City, I was hired to interview temp workers for a large American firm. This entry HR job meant I had to administer typing tests and ask the kinds of questions above and beyond what your last salary looked like – “Are you married?” “Do you want to have children?” Those were the good ole days, when it was more of what your body actually “looked like;” the days when my older sister Kay had to keep her child a secret if she wanted to continue to work as a stewardess in the airline industry.

And she had to starve herself too, in order to stay at a certain weight. We women of a certain age have these memories floating around in our hippocampus, judging ourselves in the mirror every day.

And being a card-carrying feminist means one should fight against sexual harassment in the workplace, or anyplace really. But listen up, I may offend some of you here, maybe we’ve gone a step too far? I mean, I LOVE ex-Veep Joe Biden! He hails from my hometown, and has the most authentic, warmest smile. His son died of the same kind of brain tumor that killed my biological father. He reminds me of my foster father, Daddy Jim; I’d share a cup of tea with him anytime! And guess what…

If he kissed the back of my head, or leaned in for some Eskimo kisses or even butterfly kisses… why, I’d hug him right back! There, I said it. Most women can differentiate between a lecherous old guy who is too handy and goes for your lips, and a Mensch. The first kind of man makes you instantly turn your face away, he hugs too hard and too long, we can see it in their hungry eyes. Great Grandma Ada had a friend like that, even into his 90s he’d put the moves on you.

But Uncle Joe just doesn’t strike me that way, you know, the way Mr T strikes me.

So let’s settle down Dems, we will never win in 2020 by fighting amongst ourselves. Let’s teach our little boys about consent, without scaring them away from intimacy. Teach them how to know when to shake hands or hug hello. Here is Pop Bob (a genuine Mensch) teaching the L’il Pumpkin about tools with his very first tool box. Clap your hands if you believe in fairy houses.

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The Power of our Example

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , on November 13, 2017| 1 Comment »

It’s been a busy weekend. Not busy like Great Grandpa Hudson’s busy Veteran’s Day celebrations, but busy enough. On Saturday, Bob and I stopped by a new Vietnamese restaurant opening in our neighborhood; and that evening we saw the spectacular “Jane” documentary with the Bride’s family, about Jane Goodall and her beloved chimps of the Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania. As we were leaving the theatre, I remembered interviewing Dame Goodall in Rumson in the 90s.

She was slight like the Flapper, elegant in an easy way, no makeup with her grey hair pulled back in the proverbial ponytail. Wrapped in a long poncho. I remember the determination in her eyes, so focused and bright.

Last night we walked down our alley to meet our 90 year old neighbor, Burdell, and walk to a presentation on the history of Germantown. Our little outpost neighborhood in Nashville started out with an abundance of slaughterhouses in the 1840s and began developing into a mixed residential area until the 1950s. It was an old-school slide presentation and when a certain house on Monroe St appeared, Burdell whispered, “Turnip greens.” Seems a woman would sit on that front porch yelling, “Turnip greens!” all day long.

And I thought I had entered into a Southern novel and was wishing my sister-in-law Jorja  was here.

Burdell and the man wielding the laser light single(or double)handedly rescued Germantown from becoming an industrial zone in 1979. The city wanted to build an emissions testing garage across the street from those venerable old homes, so our buddies ran quite a protest with press coverage and champagne and donuts! Certain homes became historic landmarks and an architectural review board convened to save the tiny row houses and bungalows from extinction.

Now we are back to being a mixed residential zone, only the new condos and apartments being built are hardly affordable. In fact, a new town home next to an old funeral home and across from a pet store just sold for over 1M.

At least that’s what Bill told me. This is how I get my news these days, from neighbors walking past our porch to the coffee house; from Bob’s “damage report” every morning; from BBC and Nashville Public Radio; and for up to the minute “breaking news” from Twitter. I’m changing my habits. Gone are the days of yelling at Morning Joe over coffee. Instead, this morning I watched a video clip on my laptop from the Today Show of Joe Biden.

First I just watched his facial expressions, without sound. Then I punched in the sound as he answered Savannah Guthrie’s question about some juvenile Tweet Mr T sent regarding North Korea’s leader being “short and fat.” Biden was measured and serious, we are no longer laughing at Mr T’s buffoonery. He said he’s known many presidents, and that our children and grandchildren are watching, that our country used to lead by “The Power of our Example.”

We all know you can teach a child through lessons, words and workbooks, but it’s our example as teachers and parents that sifts through their consciousness. I wanted the Love Bug to see “Jane” because she also loves animals, and being outside collecting bugs. If you want your child to not develop an eating disorder, you don’t grab their arm or threaten at the dinner table. One models a healthy lifestyle by living it. Just thinking about two man-baby leaders trading sarcastic middle school Tweets with those same fingers that can access nuclear codes is more than horrifying.

They are putting humans on the endangered species list. When Jane’s chimps ventured south on the Gombe, they were systematically annihilated by a different group in that area. Territory is hard-wired in our brains I’m afraid. And Mr T goes to China and comes back with a branding agreement for his name to be used on hotels and escort services among others, but nada on North Korea. There is a move to impeach this president, have you signed the Need to Impeach Trump petition yet? https://www.needtoimpeach.com

We are walking on a tightrope.

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