Maybe it’s because these days contain so much of ugly, but this morning I decided to meander back to another dreadful time in America. The Civil War, to be precise. I used as my guide one of those musical albums where the talents of many artists are brought together to tell a tale. This one is called Dark River, Songs of the Civil War Era.
It’s a beauty. That is if you like mournful in hefty doses. Lots of stories of comings and goings, especially goings, because the War Between the States was a nasty piece of business.
The war resulted in at least 1,030,000 casualties (3 percent of the population), including an estimated 698,000 soldier deaths—two-thirds by disease. Based on 1860 census figures, 8 percent of all white men aged 13–43 died in the war, including 6 percent in the North and 18 percent in the South. About 56,000 soldiers died in prison camps during the War. An estimated 60,000 soldiers lost limbs. As McPherson notes, the war’s “cost in American lives was as great as in all of the nation’s other wars combined through Vietnam.”
These are not “war songs” specifically, but more reflect a time in our history when life could be especially hard and was often short. As mentioned in the quote above, two-thirds of the Civil Was soldiers that perished were not killed by bullets, but disease.
There, I’m starting to feel better already. I am ready to face today whatever CNN scrapes up to throw at me.
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It was Indigenous People’s Day this week. Sort of a weak tribute, when you think about it, but at least the day was rescued from the clutches of the infamous Christopher Columbus. But giving such a diverse and important group of people one day and feeling that we’ve done our best … nope.
Twenty years ago Morgan Freeman had this to say about Black History Month when interviewed by Mike Wallace. I get his point. And the Indigenous Peoples get not a month but only one day.
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Here’s a piece of music by a group named Blackfoot, most of whose members are Native American. This song is definitely not one of those sung the night before George Custer and his troops came across the ridge at the Little Bighorn. Different vibe entirely.
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About half of the letters I send to the editors of our local paper are never published. I think this shows a commendably high standard on their part. They are sent in electronically and on more than one occasion I have regretted pushing the “send” button almost immediately after doing so. My writing does not always hit it out of the park.
But once in a great while, I feel that one of my small essays would have received perhaps a C+ grade back in high school. The following was one of the missives that was published:
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The upcoming election is crucial for America. This choice is bigger than the political group we belong to, as we must now choose between fascism and democracy. I believe that most of us who are living in Montrose County know that what has been going on in Washington, DC is an aberration, a corruption. Scores of our senators and representatives have completely forgotten that they were sent to serve their country.
We can’t fix everything in one midterm election, but we can begin the process.The once great Republican Party has been taken over by its most brutal faction, which has produced a government that is failing us. What needs to do be done is to vote out many of the present generation of Republicans. MAGA has shown that it can wreck but is incapable of governing.
I am suggesting that if you are a Republican, this one time you vote against your party. That you send a very clear message to party leaders that you want your leaders to be chosen from among the best of you, rather than the worst.
If you are a Democrat, perhaps the choices are less stark, but you also have been failed by your leaders, or we would not be in the perilous state that we are. Chose among the candidates who remember that most Americans are not living lives of comfort and ease, but are struggling against unfair social and economic systems.
There are models we might learn from as a start. In traditional Cheyenne culture, becoming a chief meant taking on profound spiritual, moral, and social obligations. Rather than gaining power or authority to command others, a newly elected peace chief entering the traditional Council of Forty-four was expected to transition into a model of selflessness, peace, and generosity. A chief was expected to look after the poorest members of the tribe, often giving away his own food, blankets, and horses, until he and his family had the least of anyone in the camp.
I would ask that our representatives remember that they are elected to serve and not to self-aggrandize or enrich themselves. We must show them that when they forget this, we will remind them forcefully of their duties.
Let’s all get together and vote out those who have failed us. Let’s clean up America.
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Our home is surrounded by a board fence about five feet high. Keeps out the skunks and dogs (but not the raccoons). Until this year I never made use of its utility as an area for posting political statements, but these are special times. I suspect that I am not making a lot of new friends in the neighborhood, but as MAGA folks meander down the public path they can’t avoid being assailed and their walk tainted.
If I cannot strike a blow for freedom, I can at the very least annoy.
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At a Cluck rally this past week in Syracuse, one senior citizen made the news by getting herself tossed out of the gathering. During her expulsion she flipped the bird at someone more than once, and in this video it doesn’t take an expert lip-reader to see what she is saying to the jeering crowd.
And then I ran across an image of another older citizen being taken out of a rally while she flipped a double bird at the crowd. A stirring image, one to warm the heart of any liberal viewer. Problem is that this lovely photo isn’t real. It’s an AI creation. But it made it to my button of the week anyway because I liked it.
