Not the best of all possible worlds: A litany of distressing news in my local newspaper

 This morning, I scanned my local newspaper as I sipped my first cup of coffee and was slammed with a litany of depressingly lousy news. 

First, Anthony Robinson, a 17-year-old high school student, was shot and killed just after getting off a school bus. The police arrested a 16-year-old and charged him with first-degree murder. 

Second, the Baton Rouge police charged a third student with felony hazing after Caleb Wilson, a fraternity pledge at Southern University, died from injuries he received during a hazing ceremony.

Third, a federal judge halted the scheduled execution of Jessie Hoffman Jr., a convicted murderer, to consider Hoffman's argument that execution by nitrogen gas constitutes "cruel and unusual punishment" in violation of his constitutional rights.

And there's more. Ashley Lights, a 39-year-old mother, was arraigned on charges of criminal abortion for reportedly giving her teenage daughter abortion-inducing drugs that Lights ordered online from New York.

All these news stories are depressing, but they're particularly dispiriting because they highlight our society's inability to solve our most profound and pervasive social problems.

The United States has struggled with the issue of school violence since the Columbine school massacre more than 25 years ago. Yet a 16-year-old Baton Rouge kid was apparently able to obtain a loaded pistol and gun down a high school student.

Louisiana strengthened its anti-hazing law after Max Gruver, an LSU fraternity pledge, died of alcohol poisoning in 2017. One LSU student was sentenced to prison for negligent homicide in the wake of that tragedy, but fraternity hazing continues in Louisiana.

And then there's the ongoing litigation to stop capital punishment in this country, which has stretched out over decades while more than 2,000 men and a few women sit on death row.

I'm adamantly opposed to the death penalty for one reason: the practice brutalizes our society. Nevertheless, I don't understand why one man's execution is delayed in Louisiana to determine whether death by nitrogen gas is unconstitutional while a man in South Carolina is executed by a firing squad.

I'm also troubled about the criminal case against Ashley Lights, the mother who allegedly obtained abortion-inducing drugs from a state where such drugs are legal and then gave them to her daughter in Louisiana, where abortion is a crime.

Like most Americans, I believe abortion is wrong, but I'm sympathetic to women caught in desperate circumstances or who become pregnant through incest or rape. The prosecution would not want me on the jury if Ms. Lights's case goes to trial.

Most of the issues highlighted in my morning newspaper will be resolved in the courts, but the larger issues that these cases symbolize will continue to fester for many years. These events remind me that I do not live in the best of all possible worlds and that my puny efforts will do little to make the world a better place.

Voltaire is right to remind us that all we can do in this world of violence and injustice is cultivate our gardens.

My spring garden is planted in tomatoes, eggplants, potatoes, and popcorn. If my popcorn is a success, I can at least take comfort in knowing that my homegrown popcorn is better than Orville Redenbacher's.

Jesse Hoffman Jr., scheduled for execution on March 18

90 second movie review: The Brutalist is a fine movie with a few flaws

 The Brutalist, a period drama that takes place in the aftermath of World War II, stars Adrien Brody, who plays a Hungarian Jewish Holocaust survivor. Film critics have widely praised the movie, which garnered ten Academy Award nominations and won three Oscars, including Brody's award for Best Actor.

Brody's Oscar is well deserved. Brody plays the character of Laszlo Toth, a Hungarian architect who emigrates from Germany to the United States after surviving the Buchenwald concentration camp.  Traumatized by the Holocaust and separated from his wife, Toth struggles against various obstacles, including antisemitic prejudice, until Harrison Van Buren, a wealthy industrialist played by Guy Pearce, hires him to create a monumental structure in a small Pennsylvania town to commemorate Van Buren'sdeceased mother.

Toth's anguish and pain are perfectly portrayed on Brody's tortured face, along with his pent-up anger, which Toth displays from time to time throughout the film. Indeed, the energy in Brody's performance carries the entire movie.

Nevertheless, The Brutalist has a few flaws. First, the movie is far too long--three and a half hours, so long that it includes an intermission. Gone with Wind needed an intermission. Doctor Zhivago needed an intermission, The Brutalist needed to be shorter.

Second, Director Brady Corbet included some scenes that added nothing to the movie except gratuitous shock value. Van Buren, Toth's wealthy patron, rapes Toth in Italy.  The audience already knew that Van Buren was a creep. The rape scene should have been cut.

Finally, the film's title, The Brutalist,  links Toth's architectural style with Brutalist architecture, but that association was probably unclear to most moviegoers. Perhaps Corbet sensed this and included an epilogue in which Toth's niece explains that Toth's Brutalist architectural design was Toth's way of processing his traumatic experience at Buchenwald. The film would have been stronger if Corbet had connected Toth's trauma to his Brutalist architectural style earlier in the movie.

All told, The Brutalist is a fine movie. Laszlo Toth, Brody's chain-smoking, grief-stricken, agonized character, compellingly displayed the lifelong damage of trauma for those who survive it. Toth drew on his creative architectural talents as a way of coping with his psychic injuries, but, like every victim of profound trauma and violence, he never recovered from the pain. 

Buchenwald Concentration Camp. Photo credit: West Virginia University.

People die too soon in Flyover Country: Do the Democrats care?

 The New York Times published a story a few days ago about Sam Runyon, a homecare nurse in Mingo County, West Virginia. Eli Saslow, a Times reporter, accompanied Ms. Runyon on her home visits to several working-age people suffering from chronic diseases.

Runyon's patients suffered from such illnesses as diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity, liver disease, and kidney disease. These chronic afflictions are reducing life expectancy in Wingo County and working-class communities nationwide.

Indeed, Wingo County is typical of rural, low-income communities across America, where life expectancy has gone down dramatically over the past twenty years due to a rising rate of chronic disease, drug addiction, and suicide. Americans spend more money on health care than any nation in the world, but they don't live as long as people in other developed countries.

As Saslow pointed out, Wingo County was once solidly Democratic, but 85 percent of the county's voters cast their ballots for Trump in the last presidential election. Statewide, Trump carried West Virginia by a margin of 40 percent. 

Poor and working-class Americans living in Flyover Country don't live as long as their parents did, and millions spend the last decades of their lives suffering from chronic diseases. The Democratic Party doesn't seem to care. 

If they cared, they wouldn't have given Robert F. Kennedy such a hostile reception during his Senate confirmation hearing. Kennedy has spoken out tirelessly on health issues for many years, raising the alarm about the American diet of ultra-processed food and the overconsumption of sugar.

 Kennedy was the perfect choice for Secretary of Health and Human Services. Nevertheless, Democrats tried to paint Kennedy as an opportunist whose stance on health issues was based on greed. Not a single Democrat voted to confirm him.

The Democrats have abandoned Flyover Country, and Flyover Country has abandoned the Democrats. The Dems fuss and fume over President Trump's policies, but their disdainful attitude toward the American working class handed Trump his victory. 

In my opinion, the Democrats have lost their core constituency forever and will never get it back. An effective political party may rise up to oppose Trumpism, but it will not be the Democratic Party of the coastal elites.

Photo credit: Erin Schaff/New York Times

Democrats dig in on transgender sports: Are they nuts?

 President Trump gave a speech to a joint session of Congress last night while Democratic legislators sulked in their seats, looking very much like small children who didn't get what they wanted for Christmas. Nancy Pelosi appeared particularly unhappy. She wore a sullen expression, angry perhaps that no one gave her a copy of Trump's speech to tear up.

The Dems are digging in, making it clear to Americans that they hate President Trump and will resist anything he tries to accomplish. Like lemmings rushing to the sea, they are scurrying toward total irrelevance. 

Nowhere is the Democrats' urge to commit collective suicide more apparent than their opposition to Trump's efforts to ban boys from participating in girls' sporting events. The vast majority of Americans think it's nuts for a boy to be allowed to compete against girls simply because he identifies as female. 

Forty-five Democrats in the U.S. Senate filibustered against a Republican-written bill that would bar transgender athletes from female sports teams--a bill that was supported by a majority of legislators in both houses of Congress. Not a single Senate Democrat voted to allow the bill to go forward for an up-or-down vote.

Sixteen Democratic senators are women, and 15 joined the filibuster, which is astonishing. Do any of these female senators have daughters or granddaughters who participate in girls' sports? If so, how can they oppose a law banning biological boys from competing against girls at school athletic events?

My granddaughter plays soccer on her high school's varsity team. She could get hurt if she were forced to compete against a transgender six-footer.

I hope voters remember that 15 Democratic women in the U.S. Senate voted to stall the bill that would bar transgenders from playing on girl's school sports teams. They should all be voted out of office.

Angela Alsobrooks (MD)

Tammy Baldwin (WI)

Lisa Blunt Rochester (DE)

Maria Cantwell (WA)

Catherine Cortez Masto (NV)

Tammy Duckworth (ILL)

Kirsten Gillibrand

Maggie Hassan (NH)

Mazie Hirono (HI)

Amy Klobuchar 

Patty Murray (WA)

Jacky Rosen (NV)

Jeanne Shaheen (NH)

Tina Smith (MN)

Elizabeth Warren (MA)

The list of 45 Democratic senators who filibustered the bill banning transgenders from competing against girls in school sports.

"The status quo sucks." Trump's enemies would rather prolong the Ukraine war than let Trump get credit for ending it.

 Someday, the Ukraine war will end, and the outcome is predictable. Russia will retain Crimea and much of the Donbas. Ukraine will not join NATO but will get security guarantees from the United States and many Western European countries. Russia will promise not to invade its Western neighbors again.

The war can end now on these terms, or the war can stretch on for several years. In the end, however, after the killing has stopped, Russia will hold Crimea and much of the Donbas.

President Trump moved the peace process forward by forcing Ukrainian President Zelensky to face reality. The U.S. is not going to prop up the Ukraine military forever. 

Trump also pressured the Europeans to take more responsibility for their defense and actively participate in peace negotiations. Indeed, the Europeans recently put forward their own peace proposal.

In the U.S., the slimy D.C. swamp dwellers are doing all they can to prevent Trump from getting a peace deal. As I wrote yesterday, President Zelensky met with Senator Chris Murphy only a few minutes before going to the Oval Office to sign a mineral rights agreement with President Trump.

I do not know what was said between Zelensky and Senator Murphy, but the upshot of that meeting was that Zelensky went to the Oval Office, spoke rudely to President Trump, and refused to sign the mineral rights deal.

President Trump's political enemies, led by Senators Murphy, Blumenthal, and Schumer, prefer the status quo in Ukraine to peace. But, as the comedian George Carlin once remarked, "The status quo sucks."

Most Americans support President Trump's efforts to bring peace to Ukraine. If his efforts fail, they will place the blame where it belongs--on the insidious Democrats in the U.S. Senate.

As for Zelensky, he needs to realize that he will be jeopardizing his own safety if the war drags on. Russia launched a new hypersonic missile into Ukraine a while back, a weapon that the Russians claim is nearly impervious to Ukraine's anti-missile defenses. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he might aim his new missile at "decision-making centers" in Ukraine. What do you suppose he meant by that remark?

Senator Chris Murphy plays the demagogue. Photo credit: The Irish Times

Did Senator Chris Murphy sabotage President Trump's Oval Office meeting with President Zelensky to sign an important mineral rights agreement?

 Like an overprotective mother comforting a spoiled child, progressive Democratic politicians were quick to comfort President Vladimir Zelensky after his acrimonious meeting with President Trump last week. 

As widely reported, Zelensky appeared at the Oval Office to sign a mineral rights deal that would pave the way for a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine. Zelenski behaved disrespectfully toward President Trump, and the mineral agreement didn't get signed. Indeed, the President sent Zelensky packing without feeding him lunch.

Senator Bernie Sanders, who never misses an opportunity to show Americans he's a grumpy, superfluous old geezer, said Americans are "embarrassed" and "ashamed' of President Trump for the way the President is handling the Ukraine war. Senator Chuck Schumer accused Trump of "doing Putin's dirty work," disingenuously implying that Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are allies in the Ukraine war.

Senator Chris Murphy, whose attack on President Trump verged on hysteria, said this:

[Trump's Oval Office meeting with Zelensky] "was a planned ambush designed to embarrass President Zelensky to benefit Vladimir Putin. That was an embarrassment. That was an abomination. What you watched was American power being destroyed in the world as everybody watches President Trump become a lapdog for a brutal dictator in Moscow.

Indeed, Senator  Murphy may have deliberately undermined President Trump's effort to bring peace to Ukraine when he and perhaps some other Democratic senators met privately with Zelensky just minutes before the Russian president's scheduled meeting with Trump and Vice President Vance. 

According to the New York Post, Senator Murphy may have encouraged the Ukrainian president not to sign the mineral deal, which was the chief reason Zelensky was slated to meet with President Trump less than an hour later.

If the Post's surmise is accurate, then Senator Murphy used his meeting with Zelensky to undermine the Trump administration's diplomatic efforts to end three years of bloodshed in Ukraine.

In my view, Zelensky is a scoundrel, and Senator Murphy is a sneak. I would like to see the Ukrainians kick Zelensky out of office and the U.S. Senate censor Senator Murphy for attempting to sabotage Trump's noble effort to bring peace to Eastern Europe.

Thuggery afoot in Washington, DC

Reality bites: Trump and Vance aren't buying Zelensky's Joan of Arc routine

Yesterday, President Vladimir Zelenskyy arrived at the White House to sign a mineral rights deal with the United States. This deal was intended to be a prelude to a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia, and the media was on hand in the Oval Office for the signing.

Zelensky apparently saw the event as an opportunity to chide the Americans for what he regarded as inadequate support for his nation in its war with Russia. Thus, the little Ukrainian showed up at the Oval Office wearing his signature pajama combat fatigues and a What-have-you-done-for-me-lately attitude. Zelensky told President Trump and Vice President Vance that he wanted to end Ukraine's war with Russia but only on his terms, which included an open-ended American security guarantee for Ukraine in perpetuity.

Unfortunately, Zelensky overplayed his hand. The meeting imploded in heated recriminations, and Zelensky left the White House without signing the mineral rights agreement. 

The Democrats--never known to pass up an opportunity to bash Trump--chastised the President for mishandling the meeting and for failing to fully back Ukraine in its war with Russia. Democratic Senator Chris Murphy bluntly accused Trump of being "a lapdog" for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Here's my take on this imbroglio. First, the Trump White House should not have allowed the media to view the mineral rights signing event, given the possibility that Zelensky would go off script and embarrass the President.

Second, as several commentators noted, Zelensky failed to read the room. He woefully miscalculated when he lectured President Trump and VP Vance in front of the TV cameras.

Nevertheless, this little kerfuffle will blow over, and the Trump administration will eventually get a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine. Negotiations often have heated moments when one party or the other breaks off talks and stalks out of the room. Nevertheless, as football coach Darell Royal famously observed, you gotta dance with who brung you. Zelensky arrived at the Russian war with the U.S. by his side. Put another way, President Trump pays the orchestra, and he gets to call the tune.

"Laws are like sausages,' Otto Bismark is said to have remarked. "It is best not to see them being made.” For good or ill, Americans and the world got a glimpse of the messy negotiations to end Ukraine's disastrous war with Russia. We saw how the sausages get made, and it wasn't pretty.

I have confidence in Trump and Vance to end the bloody conflict in Ukraine. I believe a patriot must support our President as he tries to to bring peace and security to Europe.

Now is the time for the Democrats to set rancor aside and support Donald Trump as he deals with Zelensky and Russian President Putin. To undermine our popularly elected President during these delicate peace negotiations is to promote more bloodshed; in my mind, it is treason.