Art is 80

Let it be known that we have never gone into the Oscars so unprepared. Not that I care (after all, what has the Academy ever done for me?), but we have only seen one of the films that is up for Best Picture, and that one we had not seen until yesterday when we went to see The Secret Agent. Now, I know that that Nats are more likely to win the World Series than The Secret Agent win the Best Picture Award, and (since I don’t do much pre-viewing research), I expected to see a gritty and exciting spy thriller. Au contraire (as they say in Quebec).

One review that I read said that the film is not a film noir, but a film neo-noir. I looked up neo-noir. It refers to a dark, cynical film that is in color and has increased violence. I am not sure that I would call The Secret Agent dark or cynical (whatever that means in a film), so maybe it’s really, not neo-noir, but more like, say, post-neo-noir.

Wikipedia says that it has been nominated for 165 awards (at 40 different places) and won 77 of them (at 18). It received 4 awards at Cannes, 7 from the International Cinephile Society, and 6 from the Indiewire Critics Poll. And get this: it won 5 awards at the Havana Film Festival! Now, I didn’t even know there was a Havana Film Festival. I didn’t even know that Cubans were allowed to see movies! Or rather, I assumed that Cubans saw only old American movies. You know, the ones with American cars dated before 1959.

But it turns out that this is a rather prestigious festival that takes place every December and has been held every year since the Ayatollah took over Iran and daughter Michelle was born. It is exclusively for Latin American films, but there has been one American film that has one – 90 Miles in 2001.

Well, if anyone knows about noir, whether neo, post-neo, or just plain unadulterated noir, I guess it should be the Cubans.

Now, that’s all I am going to say about “noir” films. The other reference I saw said that the film contained “magic realism”. Okay, try to wrap your head around that one.

So, I looked it up. Magic realism is defined by Google AI as “a literary and artistic genre that weaves fantastical, supernatural, or mythical elements into an otherwise realistic, mundane setting without explanation”. If this is a good definition of magic realism, the Secret Agent is an example of MAGIC REALISM!!!

Why do I say this? It’s because it contains a shark that was found far from the coast (the film takes place in Recife, Brazil, BTW), with a hairy human leg inside it. The leg is extracted at the local university’s shark research lab and sent to the police morgue, where it stays most of the film,  except that at some point, two policemen (none in uniform in this film, and none really acting like policemen) enter the morgue, take the leg out of its resting place, put another leg in its place, and take the original leg and wrap it up and dump it into a river (where it floats but does not sink, like a woman sank with a weight tied to her near the start of the film; we do not know who she was).

A digression: you, who have not been to Recife (which is where the Jews who first settled New Amsterdam sailed from in 1654), may assume that this northern Brazilian city is on the Amazon. Well, I looked that up, too. Remember this in case it becomes important later on: Recife is on the confluence of the Capibaribe and Beberibe Rivers, which flow not into the Amazon, but into the Atlantic Ocean. Which of these rivers was privileged to get the leg, I don’t know, but those of you who have been to Recife probably would recognize the (very nice, not at all noir) bridge from which the leg was tossed.

Back to the main feature. The leg, I should say, does play an additional role in that it appears in a large park, which seems to be the haunt of gay (sexual) and gay (party loving) people, and does some dastardly deeds, but these deeds seem to have nothing to do with the overall plot any more than the leg itself does.

So, you say, this film seems to have everything, right? I will tell you one thing it does not have. It does not have a “secret agent”. Scouts honor. No secret agent. Where did they get the title? Only the leg knows for sure, and it ain’t talkin’ (or walkin’).

I am not sure what the film is really about. SPOILER ALERT! A guy named Armando tells everyone his name is Marcelo. He is a handsome young guy whose wife apparently died of pneumonia, and who has a son age 7 or 8 living with his in-laws in Recife. He himself can’t live with his son, but they are out to get him. Who are the “they” who are out to get him? The they seems to be a wealthy businessman in Sao Paulo who hires a father and step-son kill team who go to Recife and find a guy who knows a guy who for 4,000 cruzeiros will locate and kill Marcelo. He locates him, but does not kill him (not that he doesn’t try), but instead kills three policemen in front of the government office where Marcelo has been trying to locate the death certificate of his mother (whom he never met and who had him when she was 14), and then kills the step-son (one of the two men who hired him) in a barber shop not far away.

That’s about where the film ends (2 hours and 40 minutes after it started), although a short sequence at the end shows you that Marcelo/Armando’s son, Fernando, has grown up and become a doctor working in a blood bank in Recife, and doesn’t even really remember his father who was apparently killed sometime between the end of the penultimate scene of the film, and the final scene where the same actor who played the father is now playing his son, the doctor.

And, by the way, the last scene, at the clinic, is not at all noir. Not at all.

Okay, so we don’t know who the secret agent was, we don’t know why Armando was being targeted, we don’t really know if the police were honest, we have no idea about the leg found in the shark or the one substituted for it, or what the leg did in the park that night, or who the woman was who was thrown over the bridge early in the film.

What have I left out? Maybe the important part of the plot played by the film Jaws (it came out originally in 1975), or the important role of Dona Sebastiana, who seems to be an old hippie who hides out people running from other people (a dentist with her young daughter, and a couple from Angola, to name a few) where Marcelo hides out. And I left out the Jewish tailor, scarred during the Holocaust, who only speaks German, and wants to be left alone.

I may have missed something, because I admit that I fell asleep for a few minutes during the film. The film is (except when the killer goes on a spree) very slow moving and I knew I could close my eyes for a while and not miss a thing, which turned out to be true.

77 awards. 165 nominations, including Best Picture tonight. How is that possible?

Maybe the Nats will win the World Series after all.

I took it seriously, I guess, when the word was: we are too much in our own silos, and need to break out. Read what the other side is saying and you will be better able to communicate with them and reach middle ground.

In order to do that, I trained my Face Book account to send me posts put up by right wing people and by right wing bots. I thought that way I would see what the other side sees and, who knows, that I may even changed some of my views.

Didn’t happen. Made me even more despondent that we will easily get out of the mess we find ourselves in. Today’s blog post required little thinking or creativity on my part. Here are the headlines, without editing, of some of the Face Book posts I have seen over the last two days:

“The Biden Administration was Monitoring Republicans instead of Terror Cells”

“You might hate me for it. But Joe Biden ruined America.”

“Christ is King” is “I hate the Jews”….Ted Cruz

“Yes, Trump says that Marco Rubio is the best performing Secretary of State in United States History. Do you agree?”

“Huge win! Tom Homan is officially investigating Ilhan Omar for marrying her brother to receive United States citizenship.”

“Women: You don’t need college. You need faith, a bible and a good cook book”

“Being a Democrat Changes a Man” (with a picture of a trans woman)

“If Thomas Massie does not want to be 100% loyal to President Trump, then he should resign immediately”.

“Democrats refuse to fund homeland security while their Muslim terrorist wing attacks Jews”

“Raise your hands if Democrats are the biggest threat to America!”

“Iran has sleeper cells on US soil. They are called the Democrat Party”

“President Trump has spoken: his ultimate goal is to go down in history as a truly great president”

“There is absolutely nothing under the sun that President Trump could do to lose my support. I’ll always back him 110%. Greatest President of my lifetime and it’s not close.”

“Iran may be losing allies around the world but there’s one that they can definitely count on: the Democrat Party”.

“Epstein’s accountant testifies under oath that Trump had zero involvement with Epstein”.

“Trump Claims the World respects the U.S. more than ever because of him”

“Jesus lived a sin free life and Muhammad banged a 9 year old”

“Raise your hand if you knew climate change was a political hoax from day one”

“I rather my tax money buy steak and lobster for our troops than house, feed, or pay for insurance for illegals”

“If the U.S. gets hit with a terror attack, its 100% the Dems fault for blocking DHS funding”

“Mike Johnson predicts big GOP midterm win”

“Olympian thanks Trump for protecting biological women while giving him her medal”

“California is $8 a gallon not because of Trump or Iran. It is because Gavin Newsom is a failure.”

“Did Obama intentionally divide America?”

“Should Trump be added to Mt. Rushmore?”

“I’m past the point of wanting to deport the illegals. I want to deport the people who want them here, too”

“Congress announces bill to ban all illegals from receiving any form of welfare. Do you agree?”

“Should AOC be removed from Congress for spreading anti-American hate?”

“Muslims hate pork, beer, dogs, bikinis, Jesus and Freedom of Speech. So I’m wondering why they come to America’

“If only the left cared as much about homeless veterans as they do about illegal aliens”

‘They say America wasn’t founded on Christianity…So why did the Supreme Court say “this is a Christian nation?”

“The first college in America (Harvard) was actually Christian and trained up ministers”

“If Democrats rise to power again, America will not survive….”

“Jesus is my savior. Trump is my president”

“He started believing things I knew weren’t true. At first, I thought it was Alzheimers…..then I realized he was watching CNN”

“Poll: is Islamaphobia a rational fear of an evil ideology?”

Obviously, I could go on and on. I tried to get my Face Book feed to send me this sort of material by opening and giving comments on right win links. Do you get this material even if you don’t do that??

The more things change, the more they don’t.

I started the morning, with my Thursday breakfast group, listening to a presentation about Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, from The Republic. The gist of the story, by analogy, is that people, no matter where they live, live in a cave, and that the confines of that cave limit the ability of its residents to see truths, to get the full picture. All you know is what is in the cave, and shadows projected on the walls of the cave.

I ended the day at the Capital Jewish Museum, at a program co-sponsored by the Museum and by the Haberman Institute, on Clay Risen’s book, Red Scare, with a presentation by the author, moderated by Judge David Tatel. It was being presented in conjunction with the Museum’s current temporary exhibit, titled “Blacklisted: an American Story”. Both the program and the exhibit deal with the campaign against Communists, alleged Communists, and perceived Communists in America during the 1940s and 1950s, the heydays of the HUAC and the McCarthy Era.

Plato wrote The Republic almost 2500 years ago. Yet still today we live in a cave, seeing only what we see. In fact, with everyone addicted to their computers and smart phones, and through the miracle of modern algorithms, it may be we are living deeper in that cave than ever before. Not the cave that is always there, a resultcof one living in a community. That cave  can not be avoided. But our cave has other facets,  additional limitations that have been purposely created to prey upon and increase the polarity of our vary polarized society.

Similarly, the Red Scare and the consequent blacklisting (ensuring that people who were alleged to be Communists could not be employed on the basis of “national security’) of the 1940s and 1950s may be over, but this is just one result of people fearing those who they believe to be “other”, and to ascribing to them not only evil intentions but potentially uncontrollable power. Today, we may not be worried about Communists in America, but various of us are worried about Muslims, Jews, Fascists, Leftists, what have you. It was cancel culture then. It is cancel culture now.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.  And you can quote me on that.

Clay Risen has undoubtedly written an important book on HUAC and the McCarthy Era. His conversation last night touched not only on those topics, but on the roles played (good or bad) by Presidents Roosevelt, Truman and Eisenhower, the execution of the Rosenbergs, and the place that antisemitism did or did not play. The Blacklisted exhibit concentrates on the Hollywood Ten, and others in the film industry. It is a good exhibit, although the signage is a little wordy and somewhat redundant.

I was reminded of two things. One of the victims of the blacklisting was actor Morris Carnovsky, a name you may not even know, butcyouvcan Google him. Morris Carnovsky’s son Steven was a classmate and friend of mine during my Harvard undergraduate years. I have not seen him since our 40th college reunion (and that was 20 years ago).

Morris Carnovsky was born in 1897 (in St. Louis, but that is irrelevant for this story). He went to Washington University, and then moved to New York where he went firstcinto the Yiddish Theater, and then moved to the American stage and film, where his career started off quite well. He was, I guess, a member of the Communist Party at one time, and was one of those listed as Communists by Elia Kazan during his Congressional testimony where he famously named names. He was blacklisted, and the entire family was turned upside down and made very bitter. Although some years later, Carnovsky did get somewhatbresurrect his career, it is clear that his his life was terribly affected. And it certainly created bitter feelings throughout his family.

Digression: Tony Hiss, Alger’s son, was also at Harvard when I was there. He was also an extraordinary bitter (and clearly very bright) fellow, who spent much energy proclaiming and proving his father’s 100% innocence as a spy for the Soviets. We later (and I am surevTony) discovered that he was wrong, that Alger Hiss was a spy. I was surprised. I am sure Tony was shocked.

Moving on…

There has been a lot of news about Dubai recently in light of some Iranian drone strikes there. I had never been to Dubai until last night when I dreamed I was there. The city and its high rises were visible in the distance, but I was staying at a nice b and b in the country, and decided to take a walk along the highway leading to the city. There were no sidewalks, unsurprisingly, but the land was flat and easy to walk on, and pleasant enough, and the traffic only moderate. I never got to the city (that would have taken more time than my dream had) but did get to a spot where I could get on the Metro to go into the city. The Metro was spacious and attractive (all in shades of tan and beige) and very clean. I asked someone how much it cost (I knew nothing about Dubai’s money) and he told me that if I used American dollars (he said you could use American money anywhere in Dubai), all Metro rides were $22 each, whether the ride was long or short. I told him I thought that was a lot of money for a Metro ride and he told me: “This is Dubai; we can afford anything.”

That’s all I remember about Dubai. But I also remember last night being in a group home (sort of) with a bunch of my real life friends. We were happy that one of them was there because we hadn’t known where he was for a long time, but he seemed happy and fine. Then, he disappeared. Just vanished. We called his three kids, thinking he would have said something to them, but he hadn’t. They were surprised, too. He had no money.

Finally, last night, I seem to have been enamored by the charismatic young governor of Tennessee, who was running for reelection. I told him that I wanted to go to Tennessee to help him with his reelection. He told me that I shouldn’t do that because I was a journalist and couldn’t get involved in political activity. But I attended a big meeting with his supporters. One of the people there was a lawyer that I used to work with, now in his late 80s, who I know has slowed down a lot mentally. He raised his hand and said that he wanted to go campaign in Israel. He said he had been to Israel once before and thought there were a lot of voters there. I told him that there was a war going on and this was not the time to go to campaign there for the governor of Tennessee. He was adamant. He was not, by the way, Jewish. But he was determined.

That’s about when I woke up.

A week or two ago, I went to get into my faithful 2019 Prius on a parking lot, and noticed that it had a puncture wound on the passenger side in front of the front tire.  It appears that, although the wound itself is relatively small, the entire front bumper piece will need to be replaced, and – as of now – although small, it is pretty unsightly. I have been the only driver of that car for months, and I know that I was not in an accident, and that I don’t remember running into a sharp item at a curb, or anything else that could have been the cause. My initial reaction was that someone had run into the car when it was parked. It didn’t happen when I discovered the problem, because at that time there were no cars near me. And I didn’t remember any time parking so near another car that this type of a wound seemed really possible.

I told Edie about it when I got home, and she thought she had seen it before, and that it did not happen the day that I spotted it. I guess that is possible, since it is on the passenger side, but it seemed at the time unlikely that I hadn’t noticed it.

But let’s assume that it is possible that I just did not see the tear, that I just hadn’t looked down at that exact spot. Let’s just assume that for a minute.

Last night, being in the middle of a very nice dream about an exhibit in a small art museum and talking to someone (in the dream) about all of the small art museums that I could think of, I woke up abruptly for unknown reasons. I looked at the clock, expecting it to say something like 5:30 a.m., and was surprised to see it was only 2:57. That surprise woke me up completely, and just lay there wondering if I would ever get back to sleep again, thinking about first one thing, than another. One of those things that I thought about was the damage to my car. How could it have happened?

I then had an “aha” moment. Unlikely perhaps, but “aha”, nevertheless. Is it possible that this injury to my car has been here since January 27? It was on January 27 that we had someone come to dig us out of the ice and snow storm that caused Washington to slow down for two weeks. You may remember the story (or may not, more likely). We had about 7 inches of hard, hard snow and a friend gave us a name of someone to call, which we did. It was a landscape company that also would do snow removal (for a hefty price).

Two men came, we told them we needed to get the walkway to the street, the walkway to the driveway, the driveway, and the sidewalks both on Davenport and on 32nd Street done. Whether I mentioned in particular the two cars parked in the driveway, I don’t remember, but my assumption was that if you clear the snow from the driveway, you also clear the snow off the cars. Otherwise, why clear the driveway? Right?

The two men, who seemed very nice, started to work. I was impressed, looking out the front windows, with their energy and hard work. I assumed that, when they were finished, they would knock on the door again, tell us they were done and ask us if everything looked okay, and probably ask for their money. I didn’t look out of the window again, but after a few hours, wondered why we hadn’t heard from them. I saw that their truck was gone – perhaps they went to lunch?

They didn’t return and about 3:30, I went outside to make sure that everything had been done. All of the walkways and the driveway had been done perfectly. But the cars were untouched, and I spent an hour or so myself freeing my car, and a few days later, freeing Edie’s. When we got an invoice from the landscape company, I told them what had happened, and suggested a price that knocked about 1/3 off their price. I did not know what the reaction of the company would be, and was surprised when their reaction was “okay, but don’t ever call us again”. Jeez, I thought.

This was, as you might know or recall, a very unusual snow storm, or perhaps it was a very unusual ice storm. The 7 or so inches of snow was packed so hard that you could walk on top of it, without sinking in at all. So shoveling it was not a normal job where you could push some or all of aside without a lot of heavy lifting. Nothing could be pushed, and nothing could be shoveled without first breaking apart the ice. It was very hard work. Not for the fainthearted, as they say. For obvious reasons.

What if????

What if, when breaking up the ice to clear the driveway, our shovelers had used something hard (they undoubtedly did) which, when they were working so diligently near the car, had actually hit, and torn, the car? Perhaps, they didn’t even notice what they did until they finished the driveway? Then, when the saw the car damaged, they decided two things: first, they were not going to knock on the door and ask us to look at their work, and second, they were not going to stick around and do the cars themselves for fear that, at some point, we might come out to see how they were doing. They simply decided: let’s get out of here as quick as we can!

Likely? I don’t know. Possible? I think so. Another alternative? I can’t think of one.

This will cause us the deductible on our auto insurance policy (I think that is $250) and some aggravation. I don’t think it will affect our premiums, based on the insurer’s accident forgiveness policy (if this is even considered an accident). And I hope we don’t have to leave our car (fully able to be driven, obviously), but can bring it in when the part is ready to replace the old part. We shall see.

I also thought that maybe we should just get a new car and trade our old friend in, so he can be rejuvenated or put to pasture. I remember years ago hearing an ad on the radio which started with, “If you have a flat tire, you don’t go out and get a new car, do you?” As if the answer to that question was obvious.

Can you even imagine another country dropping a bomb on an elementary school in the United States, killing 175 young girls, and the president of that country saying that he thinks the Americans did it themselves? I’m sorry, but I just can not wrap my head around that.

Clearly, President Trump doesn’t give a damn (at least, doesn’t give a public damn) about those girls. Nor does the Secretary of War. And, yes, we should call him the Secretary of War, who has been put in charge of the Department of Defense. A mismatch.

Did anyone else hear Hegseth’s press conference yesterday? Much of it was devoted to the recitation of a biblical psalm, and to thanking his God for leading him in every step he is taking and protecting him. Do I remember an Ingmar Bergman fim from 60 years or so ago where both warring armies were accompanied by almost identical religious leaders assuring both sides, in almost identical words, that God was on their side, and would see them to victory? I probably don’t remember that, but I can see it clearly enough as if I did. And, it appears that, in 2026, I can choose my own historical truths.

I am writing quickly this morning. No Wikipedia research. But did you follow the results of the election last night in the 14th District of Georgia? My numbers won’t be fully accurate  but they will be close. The mail in votes were counted first (about 30% of the total vote), and the Democrat had about 44% of the vote. When the final tally was made, the Democrat had about 37% of the vote. In this Republican district, it won’t make much difference. But in swing districts, you can see why Trump wants to abolish mail in votes.

Okay, let’s change subjects. I am still reading Rez Life, and enjoying it. And I had a revalation. Growing up, I learned the name of many Indian tribes. But I never heard of Ojibwe until I was  well grown. But David Treuer said that the Ojibwe Nation was the largest in the US and Canada. How could I have not heard of them growing up? It’s because the Ojibwe are the Chippewa. Did everyone else know that?

It has been a busy morning. I am sitting for a casual lunch at a Filipino restaurant. That brings up two questions. First, why isn’t it Philippino?

Second, how do you decide between an adobo, lechon kawali, dinuguan, tapstlog, pancit bihon, bangus or lumpia? Maybe I will just have some crispy pata. Or a longanista sandwich.

And take note of the handwriting on the wall? “Huwag pong itapon ang mga kutsara, tinidor at bilao sa basurahan.” You want to see the remnant of 333 years of Spanish control of the Philippines? It’sho “Basurahan”.

When we first got married, we lived on the corner of Military Road and Chevy Chase Parkway in Northwest DC. Our first next door neighbors were the Treuers. They were an interesting family.

Bob Treuer was considerably older than me. Had he lived longer, he would have turned 100 in January. He was born in Vienna, left Austria with his family in 1938, wound up the the U.S. with degrees from Antioch and Bemidji State University. I don’t know his full work background, but he lived in Bemidji before moving to DC, where he worked with HEW (now HHS). He left HEW in 1979, and shortly after that, they moved back to Minnesota. Bob then became a tree farmer and a writer. I read his book, Tree Farm, years ago.

His wife, Margaret, was much younger, 17 years younger in fact. She was also almost a year younger than me.

Margaret was an Ojibwe Indian from Minnesota. She was a lawyer, and later she became a judge, the first female Native American judge in the U.S. Bob was Jewish. It was an unusual mix. They had two elementary school sons, Tony and David. They also had two younger children, twins, whom I don’t remember. Perhaps they were born later in Bemidji. Bob and Margaret have both passed away. Bob first, in 2016 at 89, and Margaret   in 2020.

The four Treuer children are now in their 50s, and it looks like all have had successful careers. One of the twins is an emergency room physician, the other followed her mother’s career path and became a judge. Tony, now apparently known as Anton, has become an expert on dying Native American languages and has taught at Bemidji State for over 25 years. The other interesting thing about Anton, the 8 year old (or so) that I remember, is that he now has 9 children. The four Teuers together have 25.

David Treuer is also an academic,  teaching since 2010 at the University of Southern California. He has now published seven books, one of which I started to read last night. Published in 2012 by Grove Press, it is called Rez Life, a “blend of memoir and history”, and reads very well.

Anton and David are members of the Ojibwe nation. Whether they also identify aa Jewish or not, I don’t know. But I did see a brief excerpt of a talk by one of them (don’t remember which) discussing his feelings towards Austrians and Germans in light of his father’s experiences.

Two anecdotes. I don’t remember exactly what Bob did at HEW. I think he directed an office and I remember that he thought the function of his office was no longer necessary. So he lobbied to have it closed down. And hecwas successful

As to Margaret I remember something at their house with a number of neighbors present. The two Treuer boys, and a few other kids, were playing and having a good time. One of the neighbors said, “Boy, are they a bunch of wild Indians!” You can imagine that that was just the wrong thing to say in Margaret Treuer’s house. I later wondered if that is when they decided to move back to Minnesota.

I remember my seven years in New England, when March was still winter, April still cold and disappointing, and May heavenly. Not the case in DC, where warmer weather comes sooner. In fact, as you see the daffodils begin to pop up out of the ground, and the occasional crocus already in bloom, you tend to think that spring begins in March. In fact, it does, of course, around March 21.

But, no, March in DC is like April in Boston, more disappointing than hope filled. Today is the 9th of March. Looking at my phone, here are the high temperatures coming our way for the next ten days: 66, 70, 75, 59, 50, 66, 71, 50, 35, 37. So little consistency.

But, I guess it is much better than it has been the last several months, when DC had such a cold and snowy winter. As I got older, I learned that my tolerance of weather variations became much constricted. I decided that I was only happy with the weather if it was between 65 and 75; other than that, I was too cold or too warm. But yesterday, when it was about 73 and I stepped outside, I thought it was too hot.

This worried me, for obvious reasons. I think maybe the only temperature at which I am comfortable is the temperature I set on the thermostat indoors. That can’t be a good way to live………

In case you haven’t noticed, when I sat down at my computer this morning, I had no idea what to write in today’s blog post. I still don’t. Like the character we saw on stage yesterday who was waiting for Godot, I am sitting here waiting for the plumber. He is supposed to be here between 8 and 10, and it is now 9:07. I have had breakfast, gone through the print edition of the New York Times, and have been watching Morning Joe. I see that, nine minutes after opening, the DOW is already down almost 600 points, oil is over $100 per barrel, Tehran is today a very dangerous place to be if you have to breathe, the most dangerous urban area in the world is the southern part of Beirut (will there be a building left standing?), Mayor Mamdani was safer in Astoria than in Gracie Mansion (who was Gracie, anyway?), three synagogues in Toronto were shot at within a few hours, and Darryl Hannah is upset at the portrayal of a woman named Darryl Hannah in the new TV series about John F. Kennedy, Jr. (as she should be). It’s hard to believe, isn’t it, that Darryl Hannah is already 65 (and her husband Neil Young 80), when, say, Bo Derek (whom you would assume would be 110 by now) is only 69. Wouldn’t you assume they were of very different generations, rather than both Boomers? I would. And, of course, Bo Derek’s husband, John, if alive, would be celebrating his 100th birthday this August. That would seem to mean that there was a 31 year age gap between male Derek and female Derek. That would also mean, if I had married someone with a similar age gap to me, and if I had married (as I did) when I was 34, I would have married a 3 year old.

Speaking of Bo Derek, as I was, you can picture her, right? Very attractive lady, who couldn’t really act? Guess how tall she is. If you would say, 5’9″, you would be wrong. She is only 5’3″. Hard to believe for me. Darryl Hannah, on the other hand, is 5’10”. Neil Young is 6′, so it’s all okay. John Derek? He was 6’1″, so he would have been okay with Darryl Hannah as well, except that she would be 35 years younger than he, and there are limits.

Speaking of height, as you know, Robert Reich is only 4’11”, but his wife is 5 inches taller. And Danny DeVito is only 5′ even, and Wikipedia says that his wife, Rhea Perlman is also 5″. I do find that hard to believe, because every photo of the two of them together shows Perlman to be several inches taller than her husband. Maybe you know why this is.

I want to end this with everybody knowing that I did see the Country Joe McDonald has passed away at 84. He was 84, but born the same year I was. Can you even imagine how that could be possible?

Now, I have one more thing to admit. I don’t think I knew Country Joe McDonald, although good friend and current house guest Simon Aronin can’t believe that.

So I will assume you knew him and his protest songs. I will leave you with one thought about him. Do you know his mother was Florence Plotnick, who was a Communist and Berkeley CA politician, who was arrested 24 times before she was 18?

I don’t know how tall she was.

El Presidente Trump, while planning the collapse and takeover of the Cuban government, continues his war against Iran. He, based on his feelings supported by no facts, has concluded that it wasn’t a United States bomb that killed over 150 school age girls, but it was the Iranians who bombed their own daughters. This is how history is made. If the president of the United States in 1945 had been Franklin Delano Trump, we would undoubtedly have learned that the Japanese dropped atomic bombs on themselves.

This was a two event weekend, and the second event explains why this post is being written so late in the day (it is now almost 5 p.m.).

Last night, we attended the first performance by the Washington National Opera of Scott Joplin’s Treemonisha. It was also the first performance of the 70th season of the WNO, and the first of three American operas being presented this spring in celebration of the 250th birthday of the country. It was also special in that it was the first performance by the NSO since it elected to leave its long time headquarters at the XXXXX-Kennedy Center. Treemonisha is being performed at the Lisner Auditorium of the George Washington University, a 2000+ seat venue that is going to see a lot more usage by the community in general over the coming years, as the XXXXX-Kennedy Center undergoes its “rehabilitation”.

You probably don’t know Treemonisha and are surprised that ragtime composer Scott Joplin wrote an opera. In fact, he wrote two, the first of which was lost when a fire burned what were apparently the only scores. Joplin, born to musical, if quite poor, parents in or near Texarkana, Texas. His father had been a slave; his mother a free Black. He was born in 1868, and died at the age of 48 in 1917. He was an ambitious composer, to be sure, and his biography, although short and often (rather, mostly) quite sad, would be interesting to read. There have been at least two published; I have not read either.

You wouldn’t call Treemonisha grand opera. Perhaps it is more of an operetta. But it is a professionally composed piece, to be sure, with appealing music of various genres, and (as with much opera) lyrics that could have been a bit better. It’s the story of a young girl found as a baby and raised by a couple who made sure she would learn to read and write, something no one else in her plantation community could do. There was a “conjurer” who brought superstition to the community and kidnapped Treemonisha (that was her name) because they were afraid that she would draw the people away from superstition into more progressive thinking. She is rescued by her future husband, the conjurers decided to be good, not evil, from then on and everyone lives happily ever after.

I don’t know exactly for whom Joplin wrote Treemonisha. Was it for white audiences, or for Blacks? I would like to know what was in his mind.

How did a poor Black boy from a small town in mid-America become such a talented musician. Not only someone who could play an instrument (many could do that, of course), but someone who knew various types of music, who could compose, who knew music theory and who could say, and defend his saying, that ragtime was just a form of classical music?

The trick was that when he was 11 he came to the attention of a Jewish music teacher from Germany, Julius Weiss, who taught Joplin and was a mentor to him for five or more years, and with whom he stayed in contact long after. But read the Wikipedia entry on Joplin to get more of his interesting, and much too short, life story.

Today, we went to the Shakespeare Theatre to see a one-man show, called On Beckett, performed by actor Bill Irwin. I wasn’t familiar with Irwin, a 75 year old actor and choreographer, and graduate not only of Oberlin College, but the Ringling Brothers Clown School, but he is clearly a very talented (and very limber) fellow. He has played in many of Beckett’s plays, is apparently enamored of his use of language, and put together this one act, 80+ minute show, which is a combination of readings (really, more than readings – what is the word? it isn’t “actings”) of excerpts from Beckett’s prose and plays, interspersed with commentary about them, and with comic/clown routines, and ending with a long take on Waiting for Godot. I must say that, except that I found out that Irwin was a very talented man, the recitations from Becket, to the extent that they made any sense to me whatsoever, left me pretty cold. Some of his clown routines were very clever, although I never laughed out loud – he is a physical actor. But I couldn’t quite get the purpose of the show – it did not increase my appreciation of Beckett (if that was the purpose), and it contained a bit too much of “Look at all the clever things I can do!!” for me.

And, by the way, I did go back to the Bethesda-Chevy Chase used book sale this morning. It was “bag day”, so I knew I wouldn’t spend more than $15. And I didn’t expect to find much. But I did find 6 books. One was by an old neighbor – no value to that one, but for nostalgic. But I found a book signed by Angela Merkel (former Chancellor of Germany) (Freedom), and one signed by former British Prime Minister, David Cameron (For the Record). Not bad for $15.

Three things for today:

(1) Donald Trump says that we (i.e., he) will hit Iran harder and harder and he will only accept unconditional surrender as a way to end the war against Iran. Tough talking from the Donald, right? But of course you can’t take him seriously for several reasons. One of the reasons is that this is not only our (i.e., his) war, but it is Israel’s war as well, and I have not heard similar language coming from Israel (i.e., Bibi and friends). A second reason is that we don’t know what unconditional surrender means in this situation.

The last time we forced unconditional surrender, I think, was during World War II. We certainly didn’t end Korea or Vietnam or Iraq or Afghanistan with an unconditional surrender. In fact, we didn’t end any of those more recent wars with a victory. So, our models for unconditional surrender have to go back to Germany and Japan.

And what we found in both countries is that, after unconditional surrender, there was no way for either country to pick themselves right up and start governing themselves in a way friendly to the victors. In the case of Japan, the United States became an occupying power for about 7 years. In Germany, the four allied powers occupied the entire country for almost 5 years and occupied Berlin until 1991. In both cases, the occupying powers had an enormous number of military troops on the ground during the occupation and today, in 2026, over 80 years since the end of World War II, the United States still has troops in both Germany and Japan. This is what seems to be required after an unconditional surrender.

In Iran, we have no troops now. Without troops on the ground, we cannot have a post-war occupation. Without a post-war occupation, we have no way to police the dismantling of the Iranian military, the Iranian Republic Guard Corps, or the civil rights of Iranian citizens, free of Islamic oversight, that we seem to want.

There has never been successful regime change with only an air campaign. And without regime change, we cannot get unconditional surrender, because the regime itself is based on opposition to us.

(2) I didn’t have any real plans for yesterday. But I certainly didn’t expect, when I turned on the funeral services for Jesse Jackson at about 1 p.m. that I would still be watching well over three hours later. But that is what happened.

As you may know from earlier postings, I have long been a fan of Jesse Jackson. And when I heard that Presidents Clinton, Obama, and Biden, and Vice President Harris were all going to speak, I became very curious about what they were going to say. But, from the opening of the service until its end, I was glued to the television, interested in what everyone said, whether what they said was interesting or not.

The service was heard at the House of Hope, a megachurch in Chicago which holds, if Wikipedia can be believed, about 10,000 congregants. The founding minister of the Salem Baptist Church, which is housed in the House of Hope, James Meeks was the emcee of the proceedings, and did a fine job.

There were many speakers, including two of Jackson’s sons, several clergymen (including a rabbi), several other politicians (the mayor of Chicago, the governor of Illinois, Congresswoman Maxine Waters), and representatives of the business and sports world, and – although each of them had something different to say – they all talked about how their lives were influenced, and often changed, by Jackson, and I think they were all sincere.

There was little pure religion. There was a large and quite good chorus, and at least three soloists who sang with the chorus, including Opal Staples (wonderful) and Jennifer Hudson (I had to turn off the sound). And yes, there was one big mistake, when the President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, was introduced and spoke, in Spanish with a live translator and went on for about 20 minutes talking more about Simon Bolivar and about everyone he has ever known who was Black than about Jackson. I don’t know how he got on the invite list.

Obama spoke wonderfully, as you would expect, and (did you know?) he spoke about the current administration in less than glowing terms. Harris spoke well. Biden and Clinton? Not so much. You would expect that Biden, given his current physical and mental condition, would have trouble speaking. But Clinton, in fact, seemed as confused as Biden. James Zogby, the American Arab leader, didn’t seem confused at all; in fact, after giving a meaningful and short talk, he said that he had only one more thing to say…….and then he couldn’t remember what it was. He told the crowd that he excused himself when things like that happened – after all, he was 80.

(3) We went to the annual used book sale this morning at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School. There are about 8.5 billion people in the world; at least 2/3 of them were at the book sale. The pre-opening line of people holding their tote bags stretched half the way to Pittsburgh. There were about 2 books for every person – so that makes about, what?, 10 billion?

I had pledged to limit myself to 5 or 6 books, and I came home with 9, well within my limits. All in perfect condition, all signed on inscribed. The most valuable were books singed by Buzz Aldrin and Jeffrey Sachs. I found a signed copy of Joyce Carol Oates’ memoir The Lost Landscape. And a signed copy of Alexander Vindman’s The Folly of Reality, about the failure of the west to serve Ukraine.

The sale will be much less crowded tomorrow. Should I return??

Tonight we have tickets for the Washington Opera’s staging of Scott Joplin’s Tremonisha.

Yesterday, on C-span, I listened to part of a panel discussion which included Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, who was incarcerated in Tehran from July 2014 to January 2016, a total of 544 days. Also on the panel was his American attorney, whose name I did not catch (and did not bother to look up). He was charged with and convicted of spying and spreading anti-government propaganda.

A portion of yesterday’s program dealt with Rezaian’s trial. Without going into great detail, it is best simply to say that it was not a fair trial and there was no possibility of any result other than ‘guilty’. He met with his court-appointed lawyer only two times before the trial itself began, and those two times only with someone from the prosecution present. There was a meeting with the judge prior to the trial at which the judge questioned why any of these pretrial procedures were necessary, as it was clear that the prisoner would be found guilty and sentenced. The judge himself was apparently someone with a strong reputation for finding everyone guilty, and for his free use of the death penalty. Rezaian’s lawyer said, after Rezaian went through his experience with the Iranian judicial system something like: “This sure is not the way it would have worked in America”.

Cut forward to this morning. My occasional Friday morning breakfast group had as its guest a young woman who is a documentary film maker, and who has been working for 7 years on a film about a woman from Guatemala who entered the country more than ten years ago with her daughter, and who applied for asylum. She has not been involved in any criminal activity since she came to this country, and has fulfilled all requirements for asylum seekers. Nevertheless, since ICE does not seem to care that she is following a recognized governmental process, she is presumably fair game for capture, detention and deportation at any time. This of course makes the making of this film itself risky, and the makes the question of what to put in the film, and what to leave out, even more risky.

For a while, when she first crossed the border, she was held in detention, but then released. Because of the backlog of such proceedings, her detention hearing is set in 2028, and may be postponed beyond that date.

The film maker this morning discussed how hearings are now working in our broken administration system. As we know, people are being kept in detention, being whisked off the street (sometimes whisked out of scheduled hearing rooms) and sent to far away detention centers or far away countries. There are hearings being held, but they are extremely cursory and some judges have ruled in favor of the government and against the asylum seekers 95% of the time. Other judges, who have been more favorable to seekers, have been summarily fired.

As to these proceedings, Rezaian’s lawyer could not say that the fairness of our procedures are much better, if at all, than the procedures used in the Islamic Republic of Iran. We should be ashamed of ourselves.

But this is the Trump administration in action, and it is not clear if things will be any different now that Kristi Noem is out of HHS. That, we will see.

The administration, whose leader wants to be able to choose (or at least to hold a veto over) the next leader of Iran, is in deep trouble. The dismissal of Noem is just one matter. I saw this morning that, across the country, the average price of a gallon of gas is $3.44, and presumably the idea of $1.95 gas is now only a dream. I saw that the country lost 92,000 jobs last month, that unemployment has risen. Trump’s 50,000 DOW that Pam Bondi loves to boast about, may fall below 47,000 by close of the markets today. Everything is a mess, and we will see how Mr. Trump responds. It will not be pretty.

In the meantime, we still have not had a replacement toilet for the one we are told has been clogged over time. After dealing with one plumber for over a month looking for the right replacement, we have a new plumber coming Monday morning with a promise of fast and good service. The problem is that the toilet sits under a window, and normal toilet tanks are too high. The related problem is that we don’t want to overpay for a replacement toilet. We don’t need anything fancy.

Yesterday, I saw the first segment of a Netflix show called Love & Death, apparently the story of a true incident in Texas in 1980. In that first episode, there is a poetry group that meets in a church, and the members of the group are asked by the facilitator to read their poems. The first member says that he wrote a short poem which is meant to attack materialism. It went like this:

“On my new toilet,

I do the same things.”

That was it. I identified.

I don’t always know why I read what I read, but last night, I picked up a copy of The Twilight of the Elites by MS NOW host Christopher Hayes, and I read the first chapter of the book which I think provides a summary of what the rest of the book contains. I watch Hayes’ show only now and then, but always find him one of the more intelligent and insightful of the cable news show anchors.

Hayes has written three books, one about the American prison population, one about the causes and consequences of the shortening of everyone’s attention span, and this one, about America’s political, educational and economic elites. The Twilight of the Elites is the first of his books, published in 2012, during the first term of the Obama presidency. Because I have only been through about 15% of the book, my thoughts about it may change as I go on, but I think there are a few points made in this opening chapter that ae worth thinking about.

First, Hayes believes that the United States (and much of the rest of the world) is run by the “elites”, a group of well educated, and increasingly wealthy individuals, who deal only with each other, are concerned mainly about their own welfare, and are out of touch with most of the country. Their decision making (and they are the decision makers) tends to increase, rather than decrease, inequalities, perpetuating their increasingly closed status as “elites”.

Second, as the country went through its civil rights struggles, which resulted in the elimination of much of the bias and discrimination that had been so pervasive for so long, the goal was to convert the country into a “meritocracy”. But the meritocracy has not resulted in the changes in society that were hoped for the goals of the shift. Those who benefited by the American meritocracy have simply become the “elite”.

Third, as the elite has become more powerful, trust in the decision making of the elite in the eyes of the rest of the populace has diminished. A large number of scandals in business, poor policy judgements by regulators, and mistakes by those at the top of government have led to a lack of confidence in all of those institutions that hold power in both government and business.

That is what I got out of the first chapter, broadly speaking. What struck me about this is that this chapter, written about fifteen years ago, could have (with few name changes) been written today. But I think that the problems Hayes saw in 2012 have increased and worsened by 2026, as our trust in our leaders and trust in our important institutions have been shaken to the core today. This either means that Hayes is a seer, or that today’s problems should have been obvious to us (but weren’t) even before the era of Trump, although they have clearly accelerated since Trump first came to power.

I look forward to the rest of the book.

Speaking of books, I just read a book of the type I rarely pick up. I had taken a walk to the Cleveland Park Library the other day (the first day that the temperatures have been comfortable enough for a leisurely outside walk), and looked at their “for sale” rack, picking up (for $1) a signed copy of Head Wounds by Michael McGarrity. It is one of a series of books by McGarrity featuring a police official named Kevin Kerney. I don’t know what you would call the genre. A mystery? A detective novel? I am not sure. But you know what I mean.

The most interesting thing about the book is its setting. On the border between Texas and Mexico, and in New Mexico, the book concerns Anglos and Mexicans, to be sure, but also Native Americans, both Apache and Kickapoo. And yes, there are drugs and cartels, and cultural and generational challenges, and law enforcement bureaucracies, and, more than anything else, murders. A lot of murders.

The book was an easy read, which is surprising since it has many too many characters to keep straight, and the plot line is composed of several different plot lines that intersect mysteriously with each other. So, you enjoy reading it, although you don’t always understand what is going on or how things fit together.

When you finish, you say to yourself both “that was pretty good” and “that was sure a waste of time”. That is why I rarely read that kind of book. (By the way, it gets over a 4 our of 5 rating on Goodreads.)

Yesterday, I had lunch with my old law partner Tim Aluise, which is always fun. The day before, I went to the National Symphony rehearsal with my old law partner Alan Vollmann. And this morning

at my Thursday morning breakfast meeting, I heard a presentation by my old law partner Chuck Edson. Do you see a pattern here? What do you guys who don’t have old law partners do with your time?

Chuck, who specializes in talks on “Jews in ………” today spoke on Jews in Congress, and it was nice and low key, but led to an extensive discussion by the 20+ who were there. It turns out there have been 40 Jewish Senators (starting with David Yulee in Florida) and over 200 members of the House of Representatives. The most interesting statistic was that there are only 5 states which have never had at least one Jewish Senator or Representative – North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Arkansas and South Carolina, if I remember what he said. What is also interesting is that there is no sense that antisemitism has ever been a major (or even minor) issue in any of their election campaigns.

One last point for today, having to do with the Senate, but not having to do with Jews in the Senate. Republican Senator Steve Daines of Montana has decided not to run for reelection. Perhaps this opens the opportunity for a Democratic or independent win in that heavily Republican state. After all, Montana was served by Democrat John Tester from 2007 to 2025.

I know nothing about Montana politics, but there is an independent candidate with quite a resume. His name is Seth Bodnar, and he has most recently been the president of the University of Montana. Before that, he was a graduate of West Point, where he ranked first in his class, was both a Rhodes Scholar and a Truman Scholar who earned two masters degrees at Oxford, one in Economics and Social History, the other in Comparative Social Policy. He was a member of the 101st Airborne Division and a Green Beret, who served in Iraq. He is still an officer in the National Guard. He taught economics and West Point, and then worked for General Electric for several years, where he became a senior officer dealing with railroad technology. He served as president of the University of Montana for 8 years. His wife, a pediatrician, was also a Rhodes Scholar.

He sounds like someone to watch. He is only 47, which by the way, is the same age as Chris Hayes.

Sorry for the delay today. I left the house early this morning to go with a friend to the open rehearsal of this weekend’s National Symphony Orchestra concert at the XXXXX-Kennedy Center. It was my first visit to the XXXXX-Kennedy Center since XXXXX added his name to it and announced that it would close in a few months for a renovation which would take out everything but its steel supports and start all over. I had vowed not to go into that building again, but the NSO is pretty much stuck there for various reasons and the NSO is worth supporting.

Does the building need a top to bottom redo? Not from anything I (or any one else) can tell, but I did realize what XXXXX doesn’t like about it. One thing that XXXXX doesn’t like is open space (XXXXX abhors a vacuum) and the XXXXX-Kennedy Center has a lot of open space in the concerts venues, and in all of the common space, where the hallways and rooms are wide, and ceilings very very tall. The thing that XXXXX craves is gold, and there certainly is insufficient gold in the XXXXX-Kennedy Center. The building’s architecture is, in a sense, minimalist (at least closer by far to minimalist than to maximalist), and there is no frivolous wall decor. All that will, I am sure, be remedied in the makeover.

The rehearsal itself was interesting. One of the pieces on this weekend’s program is Tchaikovsky’s First Symphony, and the entire 2 plus hour rehearsal was devoted to the third and fourth movement of that piece. At first, the orchestra played the entire third movement. It sounded very good. Gianandrea Noseda, the conductor of the NSO, then announced that the orchestra had never played that movement before (it rehearsed the first and second movements yesterday), which surprised the few of hundred of us listening. He then went through an hour of very intense rehearsing, sometimes playing a portion over several times, discussing various things with the members, and so forth. After an intermission, he went through the same process with the fourth movement. I have never been to an open rehearsal which was so intense, so detailed. Usually, they are more like dress rehearsals of a play.

Before I went to the rehearsal, I did turn on the press conference given this morning by Pete Hegseth and General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. about the status of the war XXXXX is waging against Iran. I missed most of what Hegseth said, but was surprised when Caine referred to members of the military at his “teammates” and then to the assembled members of the press as his “teammates”. Teams are what you put together for games and sports. Not for killing other people.

I have no idea how this war will turn out. It will be complicated. You think Ukraine is a big country, and therefore difficult for Russia to conquer? Well, do you know that Iran’s area is almost three times that of Ukraine? 220,000 square miles in Ukraine; 636,000 square miles in Iran. And as to population, Ukraine has just under 40 million, while Iran has a little more than 90 million. 90% of Iranians, or about 80 million Iranians are Shiite Muslim. The Supreme Leader of Iran, by its 1979 Constitution, is required to be an educated cleric who is not a religious leader per se, but who is the final authority on how the Islamic Republic of Iran interprets and enforces Islamic law.

Notwithstanding the overwhelming number of Shiite Iranians, a large survey conducted less than two years ago by a Dutch based company, GAMAAN, concluded that, irrespective of citizens’ religious identification, between 70% and 80% of the population do not support the current form of government.

What to do with that information, I don’t know. After all, what are we trying to accomplish in Iran? My best guess is “we want to make Iran disappear as if it never existed”. This, as you can see from above, is not possible. But anything less than that seems unsatisfactory to XXXXX and his crew. If Iran surrendered today, for example, we would not know what to do. So it would have to be a surrender, along with what? Disabling all means of carrying on

warfare? Getting rid of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards? Making sure there is a satisfactory government in place?

Each of these things seems impossible. Are we going to leave Iran to fight it out in a civil war? That doesn’t seem to serve our interests. How are we going to deal with the members of the IRGC? Or the high ranking Shiite clergy? Or the officials in the current government? If there is to be a transition to a new form of government, there will have to be a transition period. Who will police Iran and keep its society in control while that transition is taking place? Will we, or we and allies acting in concert, become an occupying power?

We clearly don’t have an exit strategy (we never seem to), but in this case it seems to be worse. In this case, we don’t know to whom, when we choose to exit, we will cede power, or how we will be able to do that without the eruption of serious violence. In other words, XXXXX’s exit from Iran may be bumpier that Biden’s from Afghanistan.

So far, the U.S. and Israel have proven their ability to inflict pain on a country exceeds that country’s ability to defend itself. But we already knew that. What we don’t know is how having a war which has already touched more than a half dozen countries and threatens more will be accepted by those countries’ citizens, or what the individual responses might be. We do know that American military bases and diplomatic quarters are fair game. And we now know that high level American civilian government personnel have been made fair game by our making Iranian high level officials our targets. What do they say about chickens coming home to roost?

And what about the 1 million (yes, 1 million) Americans who are now stuck in Middle Eastern countries bound up in this war. The XXXXX administration has told them two things: First, “Get out!” Second, when both air space and ground routes are blocked, “Too bad, but we can’t help you.” This is, is it not, unconscionable when connected to a war whose existence and timing was of our own choosing. This is potentially exponentially worse than our exit from Afghanistan.

I will stop here. After all, in Tehran it is already tomorrow.

So, tonight (Monday) is Purim. At Adas Israel, and all other American synagogues, there is the reading of the Book of Esther, and most likely a satiric Purim spiel, alcohol, food, costumes, fun and games. I said on Sunday that I was not going to go to the reading of Megillot Esther this year, because it tells the story of Jews vs. Persians, and ends with the massacre of Persians by the almost-killed Jews, and I thought that was a little too close to the situation in Iran today for comfort. But that is only me, and the mass of synagogue-going Jews will not let contemporary affairs affect their standard ritual practices. Okay, I accept that. To quote our great president (from another context), “that’s just the way it is”.

But interestingly, in Israel, with Iranian drones blanketing the country, there will apparently be no public readings of the Book of Esther this year, no Purim spiels, no costumes, fun and games. I have read that, by order of the military, all public gatherings have been banned, including gatherings for the purpose of celebrating Purim (even if they are held in bomb shelters). The reason for this is obviously different from my reasoning, although the two rationales are obviously related. But it does show that it is not impossible to cancel religious observances (at least those characterized in Jewish law and practice as “minor” observances) in appropriate circumstances. I rest my case.

But I want to raise another problem, one that is more worrisome. Edie and I generally have supper while watching MS NOW, and tonight (Monday), that is what we did. We were watching the Weeknight show (7 p.m. to 8 p.m. EST), whose hosts tend to be very much against the current war for all of the reasons you may suppose.

No one on MS NOW or anywhere else knows how this military action will end and what will happen after it does, and no one at MS NOW or anywhere else knows why Trump ordered it in the first place. Is it because there was an “imminent threat” to this country? Is it because Iran was not negotiating on its nuclear plans in good faith, or because Iran refused to negotiate about its development of long range missiles? Is it because Trump wanted regime change in Iran? Or to totally destroy Iran’s military capacity? Is it because Trump wanted to divert our attention from his other problems? Or because Iran was simply a self-stated enemy of the United States? Was there intelligence that the government can not share with us normal folks that would have convinced us this was the time to do what we are doing?

Any, all or none of these reasons may be correct, but this afternoon (I am writing this Monday), Secretary of State Rubio gave a different reason, something that administration officials had not stated before. Rubio said that there was an imminent threat because “another country” was going to attack Iran and when this “other country” attacked Iran, Iran would strike back not only at this “other country”, but at the United States. Thus, presumably because we were not able to (but aren’t we all-powerful?) or didn’t want to stop the “other country” from attacking Iran, we had to attack Iran first because their threat of retaliation was imminent (or, I guess, imminent-ish).

There is no question what country the “other country” is. And since Rubio has made those remarks, I have heard several anti-Trump voices on television state that (and I paraphrase), “It looks like the United States is just the pawn of Benjamin Netanyahu, and it is Netanyahu, not Trump, who is calling the shots, while Trump is just following his lead.” And, from the right wing, people like Tucker Carlson are saying the same thing.

The latest CNN poll, released today, shows that only 27% of Americans approve of our attacking Iran. And it means that many many of the 73% of Americans who currently disagree with Trump may believe that this misguided war is not Trump’s, but is Netanyahu’s. At a time when antisemitism is rising all over the world, there is now another reason for antisemitism, a war caused by Jewish power, Jewish wealth, and Jewish everything else. The powerful Jews wherever they may live are all led by Netanyahu, and have turned Israel’s long battle with the Iranian regime into a battle between the United States and Iran. We, the Americans, are fighting Israel’s war. The war with Iran is not Trump’s fault. It is the fault of the Jews.

So, how to fight against this dangerous conclusion? For one thing, we need to realize that, while the Trump administration will deny it, it just might be to some extent true. Just like American policy today is to turn Gaza into a world class resort and to move Palestinians out of the West Bank (and maybe out of Gaza). Trump and his family and friends want to profit from the transformation of Gaza, and American Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee has announced that the West Bank is legitimate territory of the State of Israel (deeded to them by God, of all people).

I have long suggested that the Netanyahu government believes this is the time for Israel to take extraordinary, often unpopular, and often cruel steps to secure Israel’s long term future. Whether this is appropriate and will be successful over time is unknown. It is a gamble. And it helps Netanyahu to have America on its side. And with Trump in charge of the United States, the two countries seem to share Netanyahu’s goals. In the short run, these goals will lead to destabilization and create dangers. In the longer run, we do not know.

And these dangers go beyond the veryy serious dangers of war itself. There is the danger of increasing world wide antisemitism and all the ills that that can bring about.

The 17 million Jews of this world of 8.5 billion people (less than .002% of the world’s population) remain, as they seem to always have been, at the center of major world events (and therefore the cause of major world problems).

There seems to be nothing we Jews can do to escape our fate. We  are thought  to control world finances, world politics, world culture, world everything. And if it ever looks like we don’t, the assumption is that we are going through a phase where we are being very clever hiding our power. If we perform acts that benefit the world, that just shows both that we are arrogant show-offs, and that we are pretending to be good, when deep down we are evil.

Yes, the war with Iran will increase anti-Israel, and therefore anti-Jewish, sentiment across the world. What else is new?

You know the old question: Is it good for the Jews?

But you may be deluded into thinking that there is more than one possible answer. In fact, the answer is always “no”.

We needed a break on Saturday, so we drove to Baltimore to visit the American Visionary Art Museum. We had not been to this unique and wonderful museum for years.

We needed lunch before our visit, didn’t want to battle downtown or Inner Harbor Baltimore, so drove a little south and wound up just outside the city line in Brooklyn Park, Maryland.

While wandering around looking for a decent place to eat, we were reminded not to be totally distracted by the war in the Middle East.

We found a Salvadoran-Mexican restaurant, Les Esperanza. It’s a fairly large, and remarkably clean restaurant that was almost entirely filled with family groups. I counted more than 80 customers, and they all looked Hispanic. I asked the waiter if we were the first non-Hispanics that he had ever served. He laughed, and said, “Oh, no. We get 4 or 5 every day.” The food was very good.

The Visionary Art Museum specializes in what Wikipedia calls “outsider art”. You have not heard of the artists, and they include folk artists, artists who learned their craft in prison, in hospitals, in orphanages, in mental institutions, and in concentration camps. The signage tells you a lot about the artists’ unique backgrounds, and often equally unique world views. For the most part, the quality of the art is first class.

And in addition to wall art and sculpture, there is a large model of the Lusitania. Anything unique about this model, other than its size? Yes, it is made entirely of 194,000 toothpicks.

After the museum, we strolled around Federal  Hill Park, with its high-up views of the city.

And then, we came home, but went out again, to see our old friends, Little Red and the Renegades, playing in Silver Spring.

Then, as the not young crowd thinned out by 10 p.m., we slowly drove home.

Monday night begins the holiday of Purim. A “minor” holiday, in that it does not require one to cease work and spend all day at a synagogue, but a major holiday in that it is a celebratory day, a day which is a response to the biblical story of Esther and her cousin Mordecai, and evil Haman. Haman, an advisor to the King, determines to kill all the Jews. But Esther, the King’s choice to succeed his wife Vashti, and who is Jewish (something she keeps from the King) convinces the King that this would be wrong, and the King turns against Haman and has him hanged.

So far, so good. And the contemporary Purim celebrations at synagogues world wide, are very celebratory, and are more and more concentrated on children. Carnivals, and costumes, and games and fun, along with the reading of the Megillat Esther, where Haman is booed with voices and groggers, each time his name is mentioned in Esther, and that would be 54 times. And then there is the tradition of the Purim Spiel – generally a comic play, often interspersed with the reading of the Megillat Esther – often raucus, showing off the talent of the amateur players. SNL skits writ large.

Our synagogue, Adas Israel, probably does Purim more lavishly than any other synagogue in the history of synagogues. Well, of course, I don’t know that to be true, but the staff works very hard turning large parts of a large building into a make believe world, serving food and frivolity both before and after the reading of the Megillat. And, oh yes, there is another tradition – a strange tradition that says you should get drunk on Purim, so drunk that you can no longer tell Haman from Mordecai.

But, as usual, there are complications. Two that I can think of this morning.

First, the story of Esther (as far as we know, it is only a story….but you never can tell what the next generation of archeologists might turn up) takes place in Shushan. Shushan, also known as Susa, and today the mid-sized Iranian city of Shush, is located on the western edge of Iran, near the Iraqi border. It was a major Persian city in ancient times, and the home of a large palace built by Darius and finished by Xerxes. Archeological remains of the palace have been found. And, in fact, King Ahasueros of the Book of Esther has been identified historically as Xerxes I, who ruled a kingdom that stretched as far east as India in the 5th century BCE.

Second, the Megillat Esther is more than just a story of the Jews being saved from an antisemitic tyrant who was out to destroy them. I quote from Chapter 9, from a translation found on the website Sefaria.org.

“For Mordecai was now powerful in the royal palace, and his fame was spreading through all the provinces; this man Mordecai was growing ever more powerful.

“So the Jews struck at their enemies with the sword, slaying and destroying; they wreaked their will upon their enemies. In the fortress Shushan, the Jews killed a total of five hundred of them. They also killed Parshandatha, Dalphon, Aspatha, Porata, Adalia, Aridatha, Parmashta, Arisai, Aridai and Vaizatha, the ten sons of Haman, son of Hammedatha, the foe of the Jews. But they did not lay hands on the spoil. When the number of those slain in the fortress Shushan was reported on that same day to the king, the king said to Queen Esther, “In the fortress Shushan alone the Jews have killed a total of five hundred, as well as the ten sons of Haman. What then must they have done in the provinces of the realm! What is your wish now? It shall be granted. and what else is your request? It shall be fulfilled.

“If it please Your Majesty”, Esther replied, “let the Jews in Shuham be permitted to act tomorrow also as they did today; and let Haman’s ten sons be impaled on the stake.” The king ordered that this shall be done, and the decree was proclaimed in Shushan. Haman’s ten sons were impaled, and the Jews in Shushan mustered again on the fourteenth day of Adar and slew three hundred men in Shushan. But they did not lay hands on the spoil.”

“The rest of the Jews, those in the King’s provinces, likewise mustered and fought for their lives. They disposed of their enemies, killing seventy five thousand of their enemies; but they did not lay hands on the spoil. This was on the thirteenth day of the month of Adar, and they rested on the fourteenth day and made it a day of feasting and merrymaking……..”

So……

I think we have a double problem here. I have always had a problem with Chapter 9 of the Megillah, with Jews killing more than 75,000 and then merrymaking and feasting. But today, Purim 2026, we have a second problem.

Israel and the United States are engaged in a heavy bombing campaign in Iran, today’s Persia, the country of Shushan. This is happening in large part because of the strong anti-Israel stance of the Iranian government since 1979, and its actions to support groups determined to destroy Israel. I could argue both sides of the question as to whether or not this is a legitimate war (although I think one side of that argument is the right one), but we must remember there are at least three reasons why this war is being fought (forgetting a possible fourth – that Trump was looking for an Epstein diversion):

(1) Iran was out to destroy Israel

(2) Iran was out to destabilize the entire Middle East

(3) The Iranian regime was an enemy of the Iranian people, who deserve better.

All three of these statements are correct. But in the attempt to safeguard Israel, stabilize the Middle East, and “free” the Iranian people, the country is being bombed in a campaign that as of yet sees no end. Innocent Iranians, as well as Iranian political and military leaders, will be killed and wounded, and their country and properties and lives will be badly hurt or destroyed. It is not a time for celebration, for frivolity, for Purim spiels.

To celebrate with hi-jinks the revenge taken by the Jews in Chapter 9, while Israel and the U.S. are bombing the same country, and descendants of the same people, today seems to me to be the height of disrespect and arrogance. Disrespect of, and arrogance towards, those very people we say we are “freeing”.

I for one do not intend this year to go to tomorrow night’s Megillat reading and party. I understand the investment of creativity, work and money that has gone into the preparations for Purim this year at Adas Israel, but I still think the celebration should be cancelled. A simple reading of the Book of Esther would suffice.

As for the kids and their Purim Carnival, I think that could go on. The kids have nothing to do with the war currently being staged, and they deserve and need a good time. So I wouldn’t stop that (that is going on today, by the way), but I would make an abrupt change to what is planned for tomorrow night.

Of course, the Adas Israel  festivities will go on. No one will be swayed by what I say. Many will disagree with me.

But……

I will be brief.

He is attacking Iran. His partner in doing this is Israel. He has asked the Iranian people to rise up. He wants regime change. He is the head of the Board of Peace.

Iran’s people rose up at his request several months ago. He did not support them. Thousands were killed, wounded, or arrested. He did not care. He did not intervene. He is the head of the Board of Peace. He is not the head of MIGA.

He attacked Iran before, the head of the Board of Peace did. They did not fight back, although they did send rockets to Israel, which damaged property more than life.

The Board of Peace head’s first attack on Iran turned out okay, he believes. He obliterated Iran’s nuclear facilities, he said. Not quite, so he is doing it again.

When Putin moved troops to the Ukraine border, some said it was for show. Yesterday, I had lunch with a friend (who does not read these posts), who said the military might moved by the Board of Peace chief into the Gulf of Arabia was just “kabuki”. “Au contraire”, I said, showing both my disagreement and bilingual strength.

Now, Iran is again attacking Israel. I have two thoughts about that. First, it will be a more serious attack and, second  it is totally unnecessary. It is Israel, maybe more so than Iran, which should rise up against its “leaders”.

In the meantime, the head of the Board of Peace talks about further conquests. We know about Gaza and Venezuela and Greenland and the Panama Canal. We will learn more about his plan to take over Cuba peacefully. What can be hard about taking over a little (well, not so little) island in the Sea of Trump?

March comes in like a lion, they say. Sometimes, it goes out the same way. Not with Eliot’s whimper, but with Vachel Lindsay’s “Boomlay, Boomlay, Boomlay……Boom!”

The two burning questions of the day. First: why do so many people (okay, 40% of the electorate qualifies as “many”) support Donald Trump? Second: why do so many people (more than 40% of the electorate) distrust the Democrats?

I think the answer is the same. Trump supporters believe that the current system is stacked against them, and that Trump and MAGA generally will destroy that system and that whatever they put in place will be better for them than what they currently confront. Trump supporters believe that the Democrats (and you can add to that those traditional Republicans, now known as RINOs) are the ones who have created and control the system they find stacked against them.

Of course, you have to add something to that to get the full picture. You have to add Trump’s cleverness, and Trump’s ruthlessness, and Trump’s chutzpah. His cleverness allows him to lie continually, convincing his supporters that his lies are a necessary part of his plan, that they are strategic lies and should be ignored as lies. His ruthlessness allows him to approach potential enemies, especially those with access to enormous resources, and tell them that they will follow his wishes or wind up (along with their entire business enterprises) in the gutter. His chutzpah allows him to ignore standards, norms, laws, the courts, constitutional standards, really anything, and claim his actions all as necessities.

Only he can fix it: people believe that. He can murder someone on 5th Avenue: there are always casualties in a war. People who disagree with him are his enemies: you have to quash them, or they might win.

I have said it before. We are lucky that Donald Trump is 79 years old. If he was 29, or whatever Castro was, when he took over Cuba using many of the same techniques (putting aside his very different vision for his country’s future), he was able to stick around for 58 years. And the one thing that Trump has not, and can not, take into granted, is what will happen after he is gone.

And, although we presume he will be gone in 2028, you never know what is up his sleeve. He could try anything. The most likely of the very unlikely scenarios would require the Republicans to win the presidency (Vance or Rubio or someone else) in 2028, and win at least the House of Representatives. The House, when it convenes in 2029, for the first time elects a Speaker who is not himself a member of Congress, a man named Donald Trump. (An alternative would have Trump, as his presidency winds down, run for Congress in, say, Palm Beach County or somewhere in, say, rural Mississippi, and be elected to Congress.)

Once Trump is Speaker of the House, the wheels will be set in motion. The newly elected President of the United States resigns, and the newly elected Vice President resigns, and – according to the Constitution – the Speaker of the House is next in line. Donald Trump becomes president for his third term, without violating the Constitution which says that no one can be elected more than two times to the presidency.

The biggest stumbling block to this scenario might be the president’s age. In 2028, he will be in his 80s. But, in spite of the Big Macs and Diet Cokes, he may be a healthy octogenarian, providing that his mental capacity does not continue to decline.

For that reason, perhaps the most troublesome problem we have is the sanctity of our elections. And Trump and his crew are going to try very hard (they already are trying) to limit the number of people who would vote against him by controlling or patrolling voting places, by limiting mail in and other forms of early voting, by placing ID requirements on voters that many would be unable to meet (at least on a timely basis), by challenging voters at the polls, by challenging close elections after the ballots are counted, by general intimidation, and by actions that we may not even yet contemplate. All these must be opposed – both through the courts, and on a precinct by precinct, state by state basis. How this will play out…..we just don’t yet know.

As you can see, I haven’t even mentioned the Democrats, who need to find a way convince so many (perhaps the majority) of the populace that they are not the enemy. To have Democrats moving to the left with progressive policies at this time is probably not a good idea. That time may come, but it is not now. Now, the attempt must be to convince that great center of the American voting public – the “independents”, whose votes most count, and especially the independents in the “swing states”. And, equally important, the Democrats have to get out the vote in the urban centers (thinking particularly in Pennsylvania) where the turnout will decide the race.

The question is: can the Democrats unite where there is such a danger if they fail to capture Congress in 2026 and again in 2028? Unity is not something that Democrats are very good at. That is one thing on which we can all agree.

I wrote this last night. A more professional or thoughtful writer might have erased it and started over this morning. Not me.

I am just sitting here on a Wednesday night thumbing through today’s newspapers with the television on across the room, not clear that any thing I see, hear, or read makes any real sense. Look at what I mean.

We all know that Kash Patel, who should never have been named head of the FBI, went to Italy over the weekend to see the U.S. – Canada Olympics final hockey game. We know he went on the FBI’s jet. The New York Times tells us that he is the FBI director is not allowed to fly commercially because he needs to be in contact through a secure communications system at all times. Why this is necessary, I don’t know – after all, there are deputies and others at the FBI who could man the ship for a while, as they would if the director, say, got sick.

Digression. In Letters From Groucho, Groucho Marx wrote Joe Dimaggio balling him out for going out to eat wearing a normal business suit. What would you have done, asked Groucho, if a ball game had broken out?

Yes, some people are indespensible.

End of digression.

Patel has been director of the FBI for under a year, but has taken at least the following taxpayer-paid trips, none of which are cheap:

1. His trip to Milan for the hockey game.
2. A trip to play golf in Scotland with a bunch of his Navy buddies
3. A trip to see his girlfriend perform in State College, PA
4. A trip to a Texas hunting lodge

In each case, he has said that his trips were really for important meetings, and that the frivolity was just coincidental. And if you believe that….

Next, on CNN, I was listening to the story about Texas Congressman Tony Gonzales, who had an affair with one of his staffers (married, with children), at least partially the result of a boss pressuring an underling. Heis being pressured to resign. He is not going to resign, he says, and he is running for reelection, with an endorsement from President Trump. Will this hold?

By the way, Gonzales, who is 45 years old, also has a wife. And he has 6 children. And, I haven’t yet mentioned it, but you probably know this. The woman with whom he had the affair committed suicide by setting herself on fire! Can this just be ignored?

And then what about Trump and Epstein? I think we know that, even with all of the material that the DOJ has released, and with all over the over redactions and the under redactions (all in favor of the men involved), the DOJ has not released everything. Maybe not even mostly everything. And now we have a prime example. It turns out there was a woman who claims that, when she was underage, Epstein introduced her to Trump. What happened after that, I don’t know. But this survivor told her story, and was apparently interviewed by the FBI several times. Nothing concerning her is among the papers being reduced, but there are documents relating her story that clearly must exist. Unless they have been somehow erased.

And what about our Peace President, whose Board of Peace, is beginning with the reconstruction of Gaza and in theory going on from there to pacify the rest of the world? While managing his Board of Peace, and while claiming to have ended eight wars, he has assembled half of the U.S. military’s attack forces (outside of ground forces) near the Iranian coast, with promises to attack the country again and again if they don’t do his bidding. He sees no conflict between war mongering towards Iran and maintaining he is the Peace President. And I guess he doesn’t think we should see a difference either.

And finally tonight, I heard that Trump is taking credit for the death of cartel king El Mencho over the weekend. I guess this is because the U.S. provided some intelligence to Mexico. Well, my question is: if Trump is the force behind the capture and murder of El Mencho, isn’t he also the force behind the 60+ people who were killed in the riots and attacks in Mexico over the weekend? Or is this just like the 100+ who have been killed in Venezuelan and Colombian fishing/drug boats? As to these folks, his response seems to be “who cares about them, anyway?”

Switching gears, this evening there was a Haberman Institute program (you can see it on YouTube or on the Haberman website, habermaninstitute.org) featured Rabbi Daniel Zemel, recently retired from over 30 (or is it over 40?) years at Temple Micah in DC, and now co-chair of Truah, a rabbinic civil rights group. The topic was the relationship between Judaism and civil rights, both historic and today. I thought Zemel summed it up pretty well in discussing the moral failures of today. They stem, he thought, from failure of people to recognize all people as equal, with the same rights as others, irrespective of skin color, nationality, religion, or personal ancestry. Okay, that is simple enough. But he thought we were at a crisis today, both in American and Israel, where a strong form of nationalism is taking over, and people of other nationalities, religions, or cultures are less valued. People, he said no longer seem to believe that you can be both a nationalist and a universalist, that you have to be one or another. He said, and I agree, that should not be any reason one cannot be both. I would add that finding the proper balance might not always be obvious, but that this is part of the challenge of being both, and it is a challenge we should take up.

Zemel quoted his grandfather, who was also a rabbi, who said that the problem was ……… well, I don’t really remember what he said his grandfather said, but it again led to that illusive balance. We should not be so nice that we put ourselves at risk, nor so mean that we don’t take into consideration the rights of others.  Something like that.

Sort of like what I quoted a day or two ago about Ukraine – too weak to win the war, too strong to lose it.

This also relates to the discussion of yin and yang, as described last Shabbat by Micah Goodman at Adas Israel. But how it relates to yin and yang, I don’t really remember.

You can see that I have a lot of things in my mind. Maybe it isn’t worth the effort to cram them in if all they do is jingle around in there.

Friends of the right and the left…

I speak tonight about the condition of the left in my world. But I will start with the conclusion.

The state of the bunion is good. And there is no reason to think that it will grow any worse during the next year.

The bunion first appeared on the inside side of my left foot sometime between thirty and forty years ago. I did not know it was a bunion, because at the time I had no idea what a bunion was. I just thought my foot was acting a bit weird, swelling a bit at the side toward the front, becoming a little red, sometimes sore to the touch. But it did not seem like a bite or anything like that. It just seemed like my foot bone.

Now, you who do not know, ask. What is a bunion? According to Google AI, a bunion is: “a painful, bony bump at the base of the big toe caused by misalignment of the metatarsophalangeal joint, forcing the toe toward the others.”

At some point after my strange condition first appeared, I learned that I had a bunion. I don’t remember exactly how I learned it was a bunion, but it seemed weird to me because if you had asked me what a bunion was, I would have told you something much different. Not that I know what I would have said, but I would have probably come up with something more like a callous or something. But the bunion itself isn’t a new something that appears on your foot. It’s just that one part of your foot changes shape.

It didn’t take long for me to learn that my bunion decided to hurt, especially when I wore certain of my shoes that rubbed against it. And when I said it hurt, it wasn’t like a slight discomfort but a sharp pain, a shooting pain. I quickly learned to avoid certain shoes, those that were narrow, or whose leather was particularly stiff.

At some point, I went to a podiatrist. I don’t remember who he was or where his office was, but he told me that my bunion would not disappear, that it might grow and get more sore, and that while I could get by for a while, that eventually I would need surgery to repair it.

I remember asking him that, if I was eventually going to need surgery, why should I wait until it gets worse? Shouldn’t I get it now? He told me that I could certainly do that, and that some people would do that, but that others would wait until some time later. Then I asked him the possible downsides of surgery.

He told me that there were many. Assuming that he did not operate on the wrong foot (he had never done that yet), he might bungle the surgery, there might be an infection, it might not work, or even if it does, that the bunion might reappear and that more surgery might be needed, and that the recovery might be long, painful and slow. It was a different speech than I heard from my eye doctor, who would give me a list of all the things that could go seriously wrong with my cataract, by ending with the words “but you are more likely to be hurt driving to the surgery center before the procedure”.

I never saw the podiatrist again, although I left his office knowing that some time, some time soon perhaps, I would have to have the surgery. But I learned that, by not wearing shoes that made my foot ache, and instead wearing shoes that were wider and softer, I could walk, run, really do anything, and forget that I even had a bunion. Yes, now and then, I would feel a shot of pain, but it was much less often than I assumed it would be. And it would ease up soon.

I stopped buying expensive dress shoes, and began buying my shoes at Payless, and found their less expensive shoes were often much more comfortable to wear. It was a tragedy in my life (of course, a mild tragedy), when Payless closed their last store in 2004. Since then, most of my shoes have been bought online. Turns out, for the most part, okay.

But last year, I bought a pair of sandals from some company in China, after seeing an ad that intrigued me on Facebook. The sandals took quite some time to arrive (there are reasons to use Amazon, in addition to the reasons not to use Amazon), and they really looked nice when they came. It was spring, 2025, and I started wearing them in place of my aging Rockport XCS sandals.

Unfortunately, I found that, the more I wore the sandals, the more I noticed my bunion, and the soon, it was only that I noticed the bunion, but that the bunion was really bothering me. The strap was wrapped around my foot right on the bunion, and this turned out not to be a good thing. After several weeks, I stopped wearing the sandals, but the pain did not go away. For most of last year’s summer, my bunion really bothered me and I thought, once and for all, I would have to find a new podiatrist and probably have surgery. It was no longer a question only of deciding what shoes to wear. Now, my bunion hurt even when I was barefoot.

In late October, we went to St. Louis for my 65th high school reunion, my foot hurting. I was holding off until this event because one of my closest high school friends has been a podiatrist for the past 60 years (still practicing), and I thought I could get some free advice.

Miracle of miracles, a day or so before the reunion, my bunion stopped hurting. I didn’t even mention my bunion to my old friend Ed because I felt fine. Whatever the Chinese sandals did to the bunion, that was now history.

That was four months ago, and my bunion has not bothered me since.

The state of the bunion is good.

As to the state of the union….

I am caught today between two topics. I don’t think they are related, but maybe I will see that they are as I write this post.

First, I want to tell you that I will accept your congratulations for finishing reading Ladislas Farrago’s The Game of the Foxes, all 659 pages. It’s a fascinating book and, for some reasons (although I am not sure what they are), an important one. It tells the stories of British, German and American spying in the years before and during World War II. It was written after certain German archives were opened to scholars, allowing Farrago to see things that had been hidden from view, and to get a picture of the extensive spying that occurred that never could have been seen before.

I pretty much doubt that the type of spying that went on the 1930s and 1940s goes on now. We now rely more on technology.

As you probably know, we have been watching the eight years of Homeland, which fictionally deals with CIA activity, largely in Europe and the Middle East. While there are a few undercover agents in the story (such as the husband of the American Ambassador to Germany, who it turns out is working for Iran), the plots are not at all based on networks of spies ferreting out information that they hope is factual and turning it over to their handlers.

But in World War II years, there was an unbelievable amount of it, and this book outlines the big picture, and is also filled with fascinating stories of individual spies, some successful, many not so.

I will just give a bare outline (I am not going to remember details, anyway). During the pre-war years (1933-1939), the Germans set up quite a network of undercover agents in the United States. It was not difficult to do this for a couple of reasons. First, the U.S. was filled with individuals who had immigrated from Germany and still had ties with their homeland. Second, spying for Germany was not necessarily at that time spying against the United States, because the United States and Germany were not at war with each other, and were not official enemies. Thirdly, the United States was not using great efforts to root out German spies. And fourthly, Germany paid well.

There were two basic types of spies recruited by Germany during those years. The most important I would call technical spies. These were people who worked for enterprises that manufactured items that were important for military use. Items that Germany did not have. It must be remembered that Germany, with its military history and with loss in World War I, was carefully monitored to ensure its keeping with restrictions on military development implemented as part of the Treaty of Versailles, and subsequent agreements. There was a lot that we knew how to do, that Germany did not. So photographs, drawings, and outlines of manufacturing techniques were very important.

At the same time, there were other spies that I would consider sociological spies. Their job was to survey American culture and especially American feelings towards Europe, towards Germany, and towards its own government.

And then, of course, at a higher level, there were the individuals who were the handlers of both of these groups, whose job it was to make sure the information collected got to Germany, who monitored the performance and trustworthiness of each spy, to make sure they did not know more than they needed to about each other, and to recruit new agents.

As time went on, Germany’s priorities switched. The technical spying, while it did continue, was not as important as the Germans developed their own expertise. But spying within the U.S. government and military became more important. For several years before the U.S. got into the war, the question was whether the U.S. was going to enter the war, and when it would being doing so. And before it entered the war, when we were nominally a neutral country, was the United States secretly supporting the allies, and how, and could that support be disrupted?

Germany was putting agents in Britain just as it was putting agents in the United States. A⁹nd Britain (much more than the United States) was putting agents in Germany. But sometimes these agents were not what they were cracked up to be. A large segment, perhaps the majority, of German agents placed in Britain were, or became, double agents, serving Britain as well as Germany, and serving Britain much better. It’s an interesting story, how a Brit recruited by Germany had second thoughts and became an agent of the British. For the Germans, he became the individual who would meet Germany’s new assets (often just after they were parachuted into the country) and quickly find a way to blackmail them into becoming part of the Double Cross (XX) system.

And you learn that not all spies are careful or good, that it was hard to tell good information from bad (and the wrong choice often made), and that there was both success and failure. The Germans, Farrago determined, failed more than the Allies. The Germans were not aware that their agents in Britain were mainly double agents, they were caught unawares when the Allies invaded North Africa and, in spite of that, were fooled by deceptive British actions designed to hide the date of D-Day, and where the British and American troops would land in Europe. The Nazi bureaucracy was also complex, and there were competing German spy networks stumbling over and competing with each other.

Interestingly, although spies got caught and paid the price (sometimes the ultimate price) for their activities, there was no violence described in the book. No one was injured or killed as result of what they were asked to do. And while some of the spies were poor, uneducated men with no real chance for success in their society or with a grudge as to what had already happened to them, many were sophisticated, educated, suave, wealthy men, and there were many equally sophisticated and educated women, generally young and attractive, who used their desirability to help them reach their goals.

The book contains much more than I have conveyed to you in these few paragraphs, and because it goes into such detail, and contains very detailed notes and sources, this book is a great resource for anyone interested in any of the many people whose activities are described.

You would think that, after reading 659 pages about spies, I would choose another topic for my next book. But, no. I am now going to start reading Getting Smarter. If you can’t tell a book by its cover, can you tell it by its name? Getting Smarter is a memoir by Barbara Feldon, otherwise know as…..Agent 99.

I will just mention my second topic. I can pick it up later in more detail, after I get a chance to think about it more. It is about the relationship of the Democratic Party to Israel. It appears that the Republican Party is 100% pro-Israel, primarily based on the number of Christian Nationalists/Christian Zionists in the G.O.P., and that this has attracted some Jewish voters, especially members of the Orthodox communities, and many very wealthy (and therefore visible) Jews. The Democratic Party, on the other hand, is the more traditional home of the majority of American Jews, but a sizeable number of Democrats are what are now known as “progressives”, who have disdain for the way Israel has been handling itself and/or support, at least to some extent, the Palestinians under occupation either to free themselves from occupation or in some cases to displace Israel one way or another. The disaffection of the progressives from the Democratic Party could influence Republican victories no matter how generally unacceptable the Republican candidates may be, and the disaffection of Jewish voters would hurt the Democratic fundraising, and would threaten Democratic victories in a number of states, including swing states, with sizeable numbers of Jewish votes.

What should the Democratic Party do?

The headline obviously is not original with me. It’s a quote used often when talking about what might happen if a leader of the Executive Branch of the government decides to ignore what the Supreme Court says. We now may actually find out.

I expect that our president will do three things at once. He will continue to berate the Court and the majority of its Justices. He will say that, irrespective of that, he will always follow the Supreme Court. He will then ignore the Supreme Court and do whatever the hell he wants, and no one will stop him, except perhaps (and only perhaps) the voters. And by the time the voters react, it just may be too late. Even if the 2026 midterms put one or both of the houses of Congress into the hands of the Democrats, the president will still have the ability (because this is his greatest talent) to continue to do what he wants, no matter what the legislature or courts say.

The immediate issue of course are the tariffs and I have not read the Supreme Court’s decision or the many, many dissents and concurrences, so I may not know what I am talking about. But, as I understand it, the United States has put tariffs on most items coming into the country, some of them based on the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, and some of them based on other authorities. Those based on the IEEPA were struck down, and that covers the majority of his arbitrary tariffs.

In response to the Court, the president has placed a 15% tariff on everything coming into the country under another law, Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, which gives him the right to do so for a period not to exceed 150 days, unless approved by Congress. For some countries, this means tariffs are now higher than they were before the Supreme Court decision, for some lower, and for some (I guess) the same. Rationality is obviously not part of this policy.

At the same time, the president and advisors like Treasury Secretary Bessent have said that the president has many, many, many, many, many alternative ways to put tariffs on good coming into the country. “Just you wait and see”, more or less. And to complicate things even more, the U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer (who he?) has said, in a BBC interview, that nothing has changed in trade policy.

And then there are the countries that have made “deals” with the president under the pre-Court ruling situation, where the tariff levels for their countries have been kept lower than otherwise threatened by our president. Do those deals still hold? For those countries whose tariffs have been raised under the new 15% assessment, are they still bound by the deal?

The answer to that question is unclear. The president says that he expects all countries to keep their side of the deal, and that no one has so far said that they will not. But no one has said that they will, either, and (as I listened this morning to Andrew Ross Sorkin, who by the way is the son of old friends, on MS NOW), the answer to this question may take many forms. In some countries, the deals made with the US are politically unpopular and viewed to be the result of American coercion. In other countries, the deals violated their own laws and, to legitimize them, laws had to be amended and passed. Presumably, in some places, this has been done, and in others legislative changes are in process.

And one more thing about tariffs. The Court did not tell the president what to do. Business are very confused. Some people think refunds are in order. Chaos may result. If so, the president will not be the only one at fault.

Tomorrow night, of course, is the State of the Union address by the president. I don’t want to watch it, and I really want to watch it. You, too, I assume. Some of the Democrats are not going to come (I don’t think that is smart), and it is unclear if all of the Supreme Court Justices will be there (as they usually are). Typically, the Justices of the Supreme Court come and are very clear not to show any bias or emotion. They don’t clap, they don’t boo. They just sit there (presumably listening) and stare. But tomorrow, you can expect that the president will attack some of them (to be clear, 6 of them), presumably by name. Will the Justices just sit there as they are attacked and belittled? And if so, will the president’s attitude change the way they look at the cases now pending? There are many such cases. One is, of course, the birthright citizenship case, which again seems to be one which the president will obviously lose, perhaps not 6-3, but 7-2. We will see how that plays out.

We may, in his speech, also learn the latest on Iran, where the president has placed military resources in the neighborhood ready for an attack. He has said that, unless negotiations on Iran’s nuclear future look successful, he might order a “limited” attack and then, if they are not successful after that, a stronger attack. When the US attacked Iran’s nuclear facilities a year ago, Iran did not respond with its own military. The same is true when the US a few months ago moved into Venezuela to arrest its president and take over its natural resources. This might give our president a big head, no? He can do anything with no response.

I wouldn’t count on it, with all of the US resources in striking distance of Iran, and with possible retribution attacks on Israel as well. There may be quite a mess ahead.

As to Israel, the Haberman Institute and Americans for Ben-Gurion University of the Negev had a joint program last night featuring Professor Ehud Ohana of Ben-Gurion talking about advances in medical research, particularly in ways to treat diabetes and certain cancers. One of the rockets sent by Iran into Israel last year hit the building at the Soroka Medical Center in Beersheva, destroying Professor Ohana’s labratory, among many others. A video recording of this presentation should be available on the Haberman website (www.habermaninstitute.org) today or tomorrow. It is about an hour long. Professor Ohana is a very clear speaker, and I really suggest you listen. Go to the Program Recording Archive.

(1) Ukraine has basically been out of the news recently in American media. But for the Ukrainians, the war continues, deaths continue, Russian attacks on energy sources continue, the fighting continues, and like during the heart of World War I, nothing much seems to be happening to change the facts on the ground. There was a line in Homeland that I thought was applicable to the situation Ukraine finds itself in: “We are not strong enough to win the war, and we are not weak enough to lose it.” The line was a complaint, not a brag, and I think it typifies the situation Ukraine finds itself in.

(2) Last week I complained about the play The World to Come and wondered, since it got such good reviews, if I no longer can enjoy theater. Last night, we saw Jodie Foster’s French language film Private Life (I know that is not a French title, but….give me a break, please) at the Avalon with our friends, the Gandals, and none of us enjoyed the film. Jodie Foster (who was quite good) plays a unhappy Jewish psychiatrist in Paris, who is surprised to learn that one of her long time (nine year) Jewish patients has suddenly died, and even more surprised to find out that the death was ruled a suicide. I described both Foster (a/k/a Lillian Steiner) and her patient as Jewish, because none of us were expecting this to be a Jewish-themed film, which perhaps it was. And I saw “perhaps” because the film is so unusual (should I instead say “so French”) that it is hard to understand what is core to the film and what is incidental. Foster (Steiner) determines to find out who murdered her patient, shows up at the funeral and at shiva (she is kicked out because the widower thinks his wife’s psychiatrist drove her to death), determines first her patient was murdered by her daughter and then by her husband, and then determines that ……The film involves not only therapy and psychoanalysis, but also a hypnotist, and dreams, and past lives (at one point Steiner decides that her adult son was, in a previous life, a Nazi-supporting member of the French militia who wanted to arrest her in an opera house where she was playing the cello, and that that explained why she never loved him).

I admit to two things. I have never understood French intellectual thinking — all of those famous French intellects and philosophers. None of them have ever made any sense to me, try as I might. And, I have never understood psychoanalysis as something that has ever benefited anyone who has undertaken to be analyzed. I have always viewed it as an expensive hobby – more expensive than, say, doing crossword puzzles or putting together jigsaw puzzles. The film did not change my view of either.

(3) My old friend Jeff Dwyer made a comment on yesterday’s post, suggesting that it is time to find a wormhole that could take us to a parallel universe. He asked if I would join him. It’s not a bad idea at all, but my thought is that if there is a parallel universe (and, to be truthful, there are probably an infinite number of them, if any), how would we know that we would be better off there than we are here? And our universe still has plenty in it for us to explore, doesn’t it? After all, we have only really explored in some detail one planet, and touched upon other planets in one solar system. Our solar system is, so they estimate, one of between 100 to 400 billion solar systems in the Milky Way (our own personal galaxy) alone. And, they estimate that there are about 2,000,000,000,000 galaxies in the universe. That is two trillion. Now, even if you take the low number (100 billion) as the average number of solar systems/or stars in each of 2 trillion galaxies, and multiply 2 trillion times 100 billion, and you ask AI to give you the answer, you don’t get an answer. That is how many stars are in the universe. I think you would write the number: 2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. Is that 2 quintillion?

I myself would be satisfied if we were able to explore those 2 quintillion (or maybe even 8 quintillion) stars and their planetary systems. I would be looking for a planet with life on it (I see there may be up to 500 million planets in the Milky Way alone that may have some form of “life” on them). And not just any life, but life similar to human life. Specifically, I would like to find a planet where the highest form of life can do everything we do, but also have three, rather than two, arms. A planet where, when you to a lunch buffet, say, you are able to hold your tray, and a drink, and still pick up your desert. That is all I ask. And I would hope that be three-armed would not be a recessive trait.

The sermon at yesterday’s Shabbat services at Adas Israel was on the concept of an omnipresent God (is God omnipresent, or only located inside of you, or do you have a choice of putting God where you would like God to be; that isn’t doing it justice, obviously – or maybe it is). But if there is an omnipresent God who is (as he must be) present in 2 trillion galaxies, can you expect him to be present in all of those parallel universes that Jeff would like to explore? Eager minds would like to know.

(4) Have I rambled on long enough this morning? Maybe not.

Yesterday afternoon, at Adas Israel, having nothing to do with the morning sermon, we heard from Israeli thinker Micah Goodman. Goodman, born of American parents in Jerusalem, author of several well respected books, and scholar at the Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, talked about everything in the 2 trillion galaxy universe except for the omnipresence of God. He is a charming, and obviously very bright individual, easy to listen to and watch, and able to answer any question put to him with ease. Starting with talking about how Jewish religious texts are constructed with rules and then with narratives often challenging the rules (sometimes successfully), he wandered into the discussion of many European thinkers, and then into the details of Zoroastrian thought and more. His mind is brilliant, but very crowded. Perhaps overly crowded. He is trying very hard to sort things out, and perhaps he is succeeding. But perhaps just confusing himself more, although I must say that he really enjoys the confusion, it appears. But if you ever have met someone who raises a question and gives it a brilliant answer which raises more questions, and where this goes on infinitum, I think you have Micah Goodman. And I am not criticizing him for this. More power to him. And, cousin Kiku Day, he clears his mind by taking ice baths.

(I dedicate this answer to (4) to friends Mel and Barbara Gelman, who were curious as to what I was going to write about Micah Goodman.)

(5) After the film, we went to a new (to us) Indian restaurant in Silver Spring, Spice Street Restaurant on Georgia Ave. Add it to the list of Indian restaurants we like and go to: Cafe of India, Malabar, Delhi Spice, and Maya. And I am leaving one out, I think (not on purpose).

See you tomorrow (I hope), when perhaps we will talk about the attack on Iran that might happen between now and then.

You will see that I broke my normal rules by mentioning 6 people today. A good thing to do? Or not?

In sort of a hurry this morning, wondering about how much snow we will get tomorrow in Washington. The estimates (the “first calls”) seem to range between 1″ and 20″. Can we put it up to a vote?

Before we get to tariffs, let’s talk about Black History Month. That would be this month, and the federal government’s initial thought on the matter seemed to be to ignore it all together. But then, under some pressure, Mr. Trump…..

A digression: “Tariff” is Trump’s favorite word, as we all know. But none of you know what my least favorite word is. It is “trump”. And not only when used to name our president. Even when used as an uncapitalized, standard English word. I have banned it from my vocabulary.

……..did mention Black History Month and even talked about some of the wonderful Black people in our history…..

Another digression: Marco Rubio (i.e., the Cuban) spoke to the Europeans about how central to the continuation of civilization are the Europeans with their history, and of course, for this purpose we Americans are Europeans – white folks who came from Europe before we came to this continent. He talked about how we shared those great musicians Mozart and the Rolling Stones, and he ignored the many Americans of either Western Hemisphere indigenous backgrounds, or the many Americans of African backgrounds, and he pretended that all Europeans were good guys, who never fought, knew how to share, and really loved each other.

……, including that wonderful guy Herschel Walker. Remember him? Former football player, who wanted to be U.S. Senator from Georgia, while he lived in Texas? That’s the guy. And Trump appointed him to be the United States Ambassador to The Bahamas. Well, when mentioning him this week at a Black Month event, he described him as the Ambassador to The Bahamas, or Bermuda. “One of those places. Nice place.”

And then, of course, yesterday, Trump, when asked about his two Supreme Court appointees who voted against his tariffs, he said he thought it was an “embarrassment for their families”. This remark is even odder than his failure to know the difference between The Bahamas and Bermuda. What could he have been thinking when he said that their families would be embarrassed? I guess we will have to wait and see. I hope that some news service follows up and asks their kids how embarrassed they are.

I bet they are not nearly embarrassed as the children of former Prince Andrew (and how embarrassed his grandchildren would be, if his children are not able to shield them from this information). And here is where embarrassment will come into play. As the Epstein investigations continue and deepen, and the alleged perpetrators of or witnesses to Epstein’s sexual crimes are made public, it is their families who will become embarrassed. Maybe that is what was in the recesses of Trump’s mind as he stood there and projected that embarrassment on the families of Justices Barrett and Gorsuch. Maybe that it what was looming somewhere in his mind as Howard Lutnick was standing right behind his left shoulder. Who knows?

And then of course he said that the Justices of the Supreme Court were (all?) influenced by foreign powers in making their decision on tariffs (and maybe on everything else). Like Carrie Mathison on Homeland, a lifetime of service to one’s country cannot stop presumably intelligent people from deciding that, all along, she was working for the Russians. Maybe the Justices of the Supreme Court are really assets of Vladimir Putin or Benjamin Netanyahu. Maybe they are involved with deals with Arabs to pour money into their children’s ventures, to buy their crypto currency, to invest in their outside business interests, to give them a jet plane, to give them permits to build skyscrapers in their major cities. Perhaps that is why Justice Barrett voted the way she did.

And then there was our Federal Communications Commission chief, who spoke this week and suggested that, at least from now until July 4, 2026, the 250th anniversary of the country, all American broadcast stations should start their day with the Pledge of Allegiance. And should have programs of music by American composers, and stories about the wonderful events in American history (there may be fewer of those than he thinks).

And the Secretary of the Treasury, who parroted his boss, Mr. Trump, in saying that the tariff decision of the Court was in fact a victory. A victory not only for the president, and for the American people, but a victory for the use of tariffs, and a victory for the use of presidential power. He said this, by the way, in the same speech where he compared Olympic gold medal skier Eileen Gu to George Soros. Now I ask you. Did you ever see George Soros ski?

Yes, the United States government, like the old, gray mare, is not what she used to be. And the spillover effect continues. I read this morning that Harvard (yes, the same Harvard that seems to be fighting the Trump administration in court) has cancelled its annual Women’s Research Symposium, because speakers would be selected by gender. Think about that for a minute. Harvard, which some would criticize because of support for trans-gender individuals, is now cancelling programs that support a clear male-female divide. What is next? Hillel must allow in Christians? You never know these days.

Okay, I gotta go now. You see my mind is a bit scattered these days. And you see why.

What was my favorite Wall Street Journal headline yesterday? 

“Top Lawyers’ Fees Have Skyrocketed. Be Prepared to Spend $3,400 per Hour.”

It reminds me of a cartoon I saw years ago, which I will now update: A man opens an envelope from his lawyer and looks at the invoice, which reads, “Saw you on the street, crossed to say ‘hello’, realized it wasn’t you, re-crossed the street. $1,700.00.”

When I stopped practicing law in 2012, I think I was charging $500 or $600 an hour. That seemed outrageously high to me. But then, in many cases, when you looked at what the clients would gain from the transaction or from a positive end to a dispute, you realized that, compared to the client’s gain, your fee was small potatoes.

Many of my clients were developers and managers of government subsidized housing projects. The programs designed by Congress provided for several groups to benefit. One group of course were the residents, who were able to get good rental housing at rates they could afford. Three other groups were those who provided funding for the construction of the properties. One of these groups was comprised of the mortgage lenders, who made market interest rate loans without any real risk, because their loans were insured by the federal government. Then there were the investors who provided equity money in return for federal tax write-offs. And then there were the various middlemen, who received large, industry-standard fees for putting the deals together.

If you were one of these middlemen, collecting syndication fees, asset management fees and what-have-you, you could maybe do well if you did one deal, although that one deal would take some effort and risk because you were doing it for the first time. But if you then did a second deal, and a third, and maybe a thirtieth, the transactions would become easier and more routine, and you would become richer and richer.

After construction was finished, the biggest jobs were maintenance, renting and rent collection, and property management. Many subsidized properties were managed by companies affiliated with the developer through common ownership. Other properties, particularly those owned by non-profit entities, were managed by companies who specialized in these types of properties. Subsidized housing management can be a very difficult business, and takes a degree of dedication, as you might imagine, and this should not be ignored. But management of subsidized housing can be very, very lucrative.

The management fees for these properties are not negotiated (you can’t negotiate fees between affiliated owners and managers, anyway), but are set by government regulators. This means that, if you manage only one property, you will likely go broke. The cost of the equipment you need, the expertise to comply with all of the arcane government rules, and so forth, make management of these properties a specialized business.

But your management fee is not related to the number of properties you manage, so that once you have three or four under your belt, and the necessary personnel and skills to ensure complance, every penny you collect as a management fee is gravy. And there are companies with 100 or more subsidized properties under management. You can imagine how much the owners of these companies earn every year.

Of course, the governmental mortgage insurance for the lenders and the tax write-offs for the investors are not enough to keep these projects going, especially if they are designed to serve very low income (and sometimes, no income) residents. So you have to add monthly government rental subsidies, which normally equate to the difference between 30% of tenant income, and a rent approved by the government based on a set formula for fair market rents.

You see what this means. It means that for larger operators of government assisted housing, taxpayer dollars, often in excessive amounts, go directly into the pockets of increasingly wealthy developers and owners of subsidized housing.

Maybe, there is a better way, but no one has found it.

We started this post with excessive legal fees. And now we see it is not only the lawyers. And all of these people are members of the top 1%, or close to it. They are all beneficiaries of the system I described, as are the very low income residents of these properties. As to the largest segment of Americans, who are neither one bor the other and who work to develop and manage these properties, what about them? By and large, their salaries are not in the least reflective of what their bosses are making, and like many today, they struggle with the increasing cost of living.

So what else is new?