Memories of MLK.

January 16, 2023

          My wife and I grew up in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles. We lived six blocks from one another and attended the same grammar school (in the same classroom) for eight years. Born in 1956, our childhood and pre-teen years were remarkable for the national trauma that repeatedly shook our world with seeming regularity.

We remember being dismissed early from second-grade class the day in 1963 when President Kennedy was shot (after saying the rosary, led by Mother Anthony over the P.A. system). We remember the “Watts riots” in 1965 (now referred to as the Watts Rebellion); we could smell the smoke from the fires burning in south Los Angeles. We had a vague notion that “Black civil rights leaders” were being assassinated in 1965 (Malcolm X). Anti-war rallies were a staple on the nightly news.

Walter Cronkite’s intonation of the weekly toll of US and Viet Cong soldiers “killed in action” served as a proxy to assure Americans that we were “winning” the war in Vietnam. I stayed up late as a 12-year-old to watch the 1968 California primary returns and listened in disbelief as a reporter said, “Senator Kennedy has been shot.” (I woke my parents to tell them the news.)

          Two months before Senator Kennedy’s assassination, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. I remember standing on my front lawn after school, discussing the news with my next-door neighbor (“Denny”) and telling him that I thought there would be more “riots” and that Martin Luther King would have been the first Black president. (Why I thought that I do not know. But I believed it.)

The news reached us after the school day had ended. If that Thursday afternoon was like most others, our 11-year-old selves spent the rest of the day trading baseball cards and collecting empty soda bottles for return to a local grocery store for the “deposit” money. (That is how we funded our baseball-card habit.) The man who would have been the first Black president had been shot but because we lived in a white, working-class neighborhood in Los Angeles, our adolescent lives trundled on as usual.

          But nothing was “usual.” As pre-teens, we accepted the reality of regular political assassinations, social upheaval over the Vietnam war, and widespread civil violence in reaction to persistent discrimination against Blacks and Hispanics. Looking back to that period in our lives, it was an aberration, the convulsion of a society forced by WWII to shake off its segregationist past and re-enter the post-war world as a modern democracy, kicking and screaming in protest all the way. We are still kicking and screaming in protest.

          Leading our nation’s progress on that difficult path was Martin Luther King. His drumbeat of nonviolent civil disobedience and demand for equality was so powerful that it thrummed the distant alluvial sand that passes for soil in the San Fernando Valley. Two eleven-year-olds too naive to understand the profound loss suffered by America that day understood, nonetheless, that a man who could have led our nation as president had fallen victim to the latest round of violence. We felt the aftershock of his death as surely as we felt the tremors of earthquakes ripple the ground of our suburban desert like choppy waves on a troubled sea. A great man had passed. That much we knew.

          The influence of some men is so pervasive and deep that it takes time to appreciate their true greatness. Distance and perspective are necessary to see the ways in which they changed the world. If I could transport myself back in time to the day when I first learned of Martin Luther King’s death, I would tell my eleven-year-old self: “Yes. A great man has passed. He can never be president. But do not worry; he will forever change our nation for the better.”

Unsettled waters ahead.

          Kevin McCarthy’s Faustian bargain to become Speaker included a pledge to hold the national debt limit hostage for drastic reductions in spending on Social Security and Medicare. He also gave away parliamentary control of the House to radicals in the Freedom Caucus, thereby hobbling his ability to craft an emergency workaround to prevent a default on the national debt.

          The prospect of a default is rightly upsetting to every American who understands the possible ramifications of such a default. But before discussing the specifics of a default and the likelihood of its occurrence, let’s focus on the political reality facing Republicans. The financial and social consequences of a default would be catastrophic. Wall Street will revolt. Economists estimate that the nation will lose $15 trillion in wealth and 6 million jobs. Retirees will revolt as Social Security payments are threatened and retirement accounts shrink. Hospital systems that depend on government payments will revolt. One million military personnel will face reduced or skipped paychecks. Two million federal workers face the same risk.

          In short, if Republicans carry through with their plan to risk a default, they will incur the wrath of nearly everyone in America. They would be idiots to follow through with such a plan—and they know it.  

          In a sign that Republicans are already preparing to blink, the Washington Post disclosed a previously unreported agreement made by McCarthy to blunt the worst effects of a potential default. The plan to be proposed by Republicans would “prioritize” payments by the Treasury to ensure that interest on existing US debt is paid, as will be payments for Social Security, Medicare, veterans benefits, and military funding. See WaPo, Jan. 19 debt limit deadline looms; House GOP prepares contingency plan.

          The GOP “prioritization” plan demonstrates their understanding of the pain a default will cause—but will do nothing to avoid many of the worst effects of a default. As the White House has noted in response, the prioritization plan would favor “Chinese bondholders” over Americans dependent on services from the federal government. And by exempting the military, Social Security, and Medicare, the GOP would gut many other operations of the federal government—which is their double-secret agenda. But that agenda will lead to millions of job losses, disruption of commerce, and unmanageable chaos throughout the federal government.

          We are months away from a true default. Although the US will likely reach the current debt limit on January 19th, it will not run out of cash until sometime in June—which would be the first likely date for a debt default. See Treasury secretary warns US could default on its debt as soon as June | CNN Politics.

          The negotiations over the debt limit will be deeply upsetting and unsettling to many Americans. But the first glimpse into the GOP’s thinking suggests that they understand they cannot follow through on their threat—and are already looking for an escape from the Faustian bargain that will determine Kevin McCarthy’s final destination.

Biden’s discovery of classified documents at office and residence.

          The story of Biden’s discovery of classified documents at his residence and private office will continue to worsen until his staff has exhausted the supply of documents to be discovered and revealed in an unbearable drip-drip-drip manner. More documents were discovered last week and disclosed on Saturday. See CBS, More documents marked as classified found at Biden's home, White House says. My wife and Managing Editor, who is a bellwether in all things, says she simply can no longer listen to coverage of this story.

          Last week I wrote that (a) there was no justification for Garland to appoint a special counsel to investigate Biden because there is no reason to believe a crime has been committed, and (b) the appointment might nonetheless be a good thing for Biden from a political standpoint. Readers focused only on the first fourteen words of (a) above, which has now become the least popular opinion I have advanced in seven years in this newsletter, leap-frogging over the unpopularity of expanding the Supreme Court and my criticism of Garland’s delay in indicting Trump.

          So, let’s try to do a reset on this issue. Rather than me spouting off my opinions, I will refer to experts who have a better basis for commenting on the developments. The most essential point is discussed in an op-ed in The Atlantic by Donald Ayer, Mark S. Zaid, and Dennis Aftergut, Biden's Classified Documents Should Have No Impact on Trump's Legal Jeopardy.

          As Aftergut et al. write,

The current state of facts strongly suggests that Biden’s errors are not criminal. It is not even clear that these incidents can be tied to him personally, unlike Trump’s conduct at Mar-a-Lago. But whatever [special counsel] Hur finds to be true, the facts and law regarding Trump’s concealment and evasion are a separate matter. The administration of justice must advance swiftly and not be influenced by those attempting to create a false equivalence between the two cases.

          Hold firmly to that thought: “The facts and law regarding Trump’s concealment and evasion are a separate matter . . . [and cannot] create a false equivalence between the two cases.”

          Many commentators are filling the airwaves with the false equivalency that Aftergut et al. warn against. In a truly bizarre op-ed in the Washington Post, the deputy opinion editor, David Von Drehle celebrates his belief that Biden’s document discoveries will “let Trump off the hook.” See WaPo, Opinion | If the Mar-a-Lago case against Trump collapses? Disaster dodged. Von Drehle writes,

The discovery of classified government documents in President Biden’s Wilmington, Del., garage should spell the end of any realistic prospect of criminal charges against former president Donald Trump over his Mar-a-Lago portfolio of pilferage.

          What? [Expletives deleted.] How does Von Drehle get to that conclusion? Quite simply, he claims that the DOJ will be compelled to treat Biden and Trump the same without regard to the differences in their cases—because the DOJ must “protect” its reputation for fairness. Per Von Drehle:

But now that case [against Trump] will probably not be brought, no matter how many side-by-side charts are created to distinguish between the known allegations against Trump and the (so far unknown) culpability of Biden. According to the latest Gallup data, 45 percent of Americans identify as Republicans or leaning toward the Republicans; 44 percent are Democrats or lean in that direction. The Justice Department serves them all, and its credibility rests on being perceived to play fair.

          Von Drehle is committing the offense I regularly level against Garland—putting the “reputation” of the DOJ above the need to serve justice. If the DOJ begins making prosecutorial decisions based on “being perceived to play fair” then we will have abandoned the rule of law. And yet, many commentators are urging that the “politics” of the competing investigations are “good” or “bad” for Biden or Trump. We cannot afford to be seduced by facile political analysis. Aftergut et al. are right:

The administration of justice must advance swiftly and not be influenced by those attempting to create a false equivalence between the two cases.

          The coverage of this story has already become tiresome—but so did the “But her emails” stories that tanked Secretary Clinton’s bid for the presidency. Major media outlets blew it with their coverage of the Clinton email story—including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Washington Post. Let’s hope they do not repeat that mistake. Indeed, if you are a subscriber to any of those publications and want to join in their online forums, it might help keep them (more) honest in reporting on the Biden and Trump document stories.

Concluding Thoughts.

          In writing about my memories upon learning of MLK’s assassination, I was struck by the seemingly unimportant details that I remember: Standing on my front lawn, talking to my next door neighbor, and that the conversation happened after school had finished. That I remember those details fifty-five years later demonstrates the impact that the death of Dr. King had on my eleven-year-old self.

          In honor of Martin Luther King Day, I am opening the Comment section to all readers. If you are so moved, share your remembrances of Dr. King and the impact of his legacy on your life. There is a reasonable chance that some of you marched with Dr. King. We would love to hear your stories. But so, too, we should hear the stories of everyone who marched, protested, boycotted, “sat in”, skipped class, organized, published and distributed “underground” newspapers, and otherwise helped to change America for the better. As always, be respectful and “like” worthy comments to promote them to the top for other readers.

          Talk to you tomorrow!

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