Monthly archives: May, 2009

Gov. Quinn Honors Fallen Soldiers Throughout the Year

I have to say, I’m impressed with Governor Quinn.  Not sure how successful he’ll be convincing the Illinois Legislature to pass his budget.  Frankly, bumping up the income tax is long overdue.  If there is any fairness in taxes, the income tax comes closest.

But that’s an argument for another time.

Today, I was  impressed to learn that Governor Quinn has attended funerals for all 30 Illinois soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq over the past year.

Remember when we were criticizing President George Bush because he had not attended a single funeral for a fallen soldier?  His record remains unblemished.  Bush never attended any funerals.

I suppose there was stress enough sending young men and women to their deaths.  Now, the former president is relaxing, says it’s liberating to be out of office.

Liberating for us as well.

Another digression.  Back to Governor Quinn.

From the Sun-Times:

As the Memorial Day parade was set to kick off, Quinn stood with Mayor Daley in Daley Plaza handing out Gold Star banners to families of the 30 Illinois soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq over the past year. Quinn has attended every funeral.

“I know all of them,” Quinn said. “Those funerals are heartbreaking days. We have one coming up Tuesday. We had one last Monday.”

But the state needs to also be concerned about the veterans returning from service. To best help them lawmakers need to fix the state’s broken funding systems, he said.

“Some . . . men and women coming back form Iraq need post-traumatic stress disorder help and counseling,” Quinn said. “We have a wonderful program, a national model. We can’t kick that program off to the side of the road because we don’t have money for it.”

I give the guy credit for showing up, standing in to honor the fallen, again and again and again.  Quinn puts his money where his mouth is.  That counts for something.

Sunday’s Chicago Tribune asks if Quinn can close the deal.  Can he pass his budget?

Two months after Gov. Pat Quinn proposed a $26 billion public works plan, he called top lawmakers into his office and asked them to give him a few projects in the massive bill that he could call his own.

The legislature’s top four leaders, including the fellow Democrats who control the House and Senate, turned down most of his suggestions.

The quiet scene in the governor’s office last Tuesday demonstrates perhaps the most important political dynamic in state government these days: Quinn’s struggle to harness the power of his new position and the willingness of wily legislative bosses to take the lead.

Lawmakers and others with a stake in Statehouse politics cheered Quinn’s call for a new level of cooperation when he replaced the divisive Rod Blagojevich in January. But now they are questioning the untested governor’s ability to engage in the nitty-gritty of legislative dealmaking — in short, to be a closer.

So far, it looks like legislators aren’t giving an inch.  The governor needs learn to play the Springfield game.

With a week left before the General Assembly adjourns for the summer, friend and foe alike say the governor has not taken charge on his signature issues — a dramatic call to close a $12 billion budget gap with a 50 percent increase in the income tax and a blue-ribbon plan to reform state government after the Blagojevich scandal.

They question why he hasn’t lobbied harder in the Capitol for his tax plan and say that members of his special reform panel often have had to fend for themselves on ethics recommendations.

“I would like to see a lot more vigor. I think [ethics reform] should be his issue. This should be the issue he owns,” Cynthia Canary, the director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, said, noting Quinn’s long activist history as a self-styled reformer.

“A lot more vigor?” So the governor needs to dance for the legislature?

No, I don’t get it either.  Springfield must be a political minefield, that place where dreams go to die.

How many funerals of fallen soldiers have legislators attended over the past year?  Perhaps that’s not a fair quesiton, but Quinn showing up at funerals shows me that he’s grounded.  A brush with reality might be good for some legislators.


OUTRAGE Targets Closeted Pols Who Campaign, Vote Against Gay Community

From Academy Award-nominated documentary filmmaker Kirby Dick (This Film Is Not Yet Rated) comes OUTRAGE, a searing indictment of the hypocrisy of closeted politicians with appalling gay rights voting records who actively campaign against the LGBT community they covertly belong to. Boldly revealing the hidden lives of some of the United States’ most powerful policymakers, OUTRAGE takes a comprehensive look at the harm they’ve inflicted on millions of Americans, and examines the media’s complicity in keeping their secrets.

With analysis from prominent members of the gay community such as Congressman Barney Frank, former NJ Governor Jim McGreevey, activist Larry Kramer, radio personality Michelangelo Signorile, and openly gay congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (Representative, Wisconsin 2nd district), OUTRAGE probes deeply into the psychology of this double lifestyle, the ethics of outing closeted politicians, the double standards that the media upholds in its coverage of the sex lives of gay public figures, and much more.

Source: http://www.outragethemovie.com/

Learn more about OUTRAGE on Facebook.


Texas Mayor Resigns for Gay Illegal Immigrant Lover

Some day, things like this will not be news.

But it’s news today.

From The Houston Chronicle:

It was, simply put, the most stunning abdication since King Edward VIII in 1936 gave up the British throne for Wallis Simpson, the twice-divorced American socialite.

Only two weeks after being elected to serve his fourth term, Mayor J.W. Lown of San Angelo submitted his resignation letter Tuesday from an undisclosed location in Mexico.

No, being mayor of San Angelo is not exactly the same as being the King of the United Kingdom and Emperor of India, but the reason for Lown’s abdication is the same as Edward’s.

Love.

What made it stunning wasn’t the status of Lown’s office, which pays $600 a year, but the status of his lover.

Lown fell for an illegal Mexican immigrant.

A man.

Lown told the San Angelo Standard-Times he had fallen for the man in March, after he had already filed for re-election. The man came to the U.S. five years ago to study at Angelo State University.

It was unclear whether he had a student visa, but if he did it apparently had expired.

No word on the man’s party affiliation.  According to the Chronicle, it wouldn’t matter if Lown went to Iowa and married his partner by proxy. The federal government doesn’t recognize same-sex marriages for immigration purposes.

So it goes.


Mancow Gets Waterboarded, Admits It’s Torture

Friday morning, WLS radio show host Erich “Mancow” Muller agreed to be waterboarded on his show.  He wanted to find out for himself if it was torture.  He didn’t think it was.

He lasted all of six or seven seconds before finally “throwing in the cow” and giving up.

From NBC 5 Chicago:

“I want to find out if it’s torture,” Mancow told his listeners Friday morning, adding that he hoped his on-air test would help prove that waterboarding did not, in fact, constitute torture.

The debate over whether waterboarding constitutes torture reached a fever pitch this week as re-ignited claims that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) knew as early as 2002 about waterboarding techniques being used, and former Vice President Dick Cheney and President Barack Obama gave “dueling speeches” Thursday.

Listeners had the chance to decide whether Mancow himself or his co-host, Chicago radio personality Pat Cassidy, would undergo the interrogation method during the broadcast.  The voters ultimately decided Mancow would be the one donning the soaked towel and shackles, and at about 8:40 a.m., he entered a small storage room next to his studio that was compared to a “dungeon” by Cassidy.  “The average person can take this for 14 seconds,” Marine Sergeant Clay South answered, adding, “He’s going to wiggle, he’s going to scream, he’s going to wish he never did this.”

With a Chicago Fire Department paramedic on hand,  Mancow was placed on a 7-foot long table, his legs were elevated, and his feet were tied up.

Turns out the stunt wasn’t so funny. Witnesses said Muller thrashed on the table, and even instantly threw the toy cow he was holding as his emergency tool to signify when he wanted the experiment to stop.  He only lasted 6 or 7 seconds.

“It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that’s no joke, “Mancow said, likening it to a time when he nearly drowned as a child.  “It is such an odd feeling to have water poured down your nose with your head back… It was instantaneous…and I don’t want to say this: absolutely torture.”

Next up: George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and Sean Hannity.  Hannity still has to make good on his promise to be waterboarded.  Keith Olbermann has offered to do the honors — for charity.

What’s the problem, Hannity?  Gonna let Mancow show you up?


CA Supreme Court to Issue Prop 8 Decision Tuesday

The Human Rights Campaign issued a press release today indicating that a decision on California’s Proposition 8 is imminent:

Just moments ago, we learned that the California Supreme Court will issue its decision in the challenge to Proposition 8 on Tuesday at 10 a.m. Pacific. We’ve been awaiting this critical decision for California families for months and will have all the latest information and analysis for you then – tune in to www.hrc.org.

So the deciders have decided: will the rule of law move in the direction separate and not equal, restricting human freedom?  Or will they move toward fairness.


Couric, Gibson Dead Wrong on Congress and Gitmo Detainees

So it turns out Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson are just deat wrong when they said no member of congress offered to take Guantánamo Detainees.

Yup.  Dead wrong.

From Media Matters for America:

During the May 20 broadcasts of the CBS Evening News and ABC’s World News, anchors Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson, respectively, falsely claimed that “no member” of Congress wanted detainees being held at the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, transferred to prisons in their districts. In fact, as Media Matters for America has noted, at least two congressional representatives have offered to hold detainees from Guantánamo Bay at prisons in their districts.

During the broadcast of the CBS Evening News, Couric stated, “The Senate today followed the House in blocking the president from closing the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay because no member wants any of the detainees there sent to his or her home state or district.” Similarly, on World News, Gibson said of the detainees: “No member of Congress wants these guys transferred to prisons in their districts.” Chief Washington correspondent George Stephanopoulos responded, “That’s right.”

In a May 9 op-ed in The Washington Post, Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) offered use of the Albert V. Bryan U.S. Courthouse and Detention Center in Alexandria, Virginia. In the op-ed, Moran noted that “the ’20th hijacker,’ Zacarias Moussaoui, who participated in planning the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the Pentagon, was held and prosecuted in the Alexandria courthouse” and stated that “should President Obama determine that Alexandria needs to play a reasonably limited role in a nationwide effort to bring justice to the Guantanamo detainees and close this unfortunate chapter of American history, I am confident that Alexandrians will stand strong as they always have.”

Rep. Jack Murtha (D-PA) has also said that he is willing to house detainees from Guantánamo Bay at a prison in his district.

Maybe none of their people read the news?

Oh, wait.  There’s more.  Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) said California is ready to step up.

Turns out Katie and Charlie are just dead wrong.


The DA is Right: Robertino DeAngelis Should Be Tried as a Juvenile

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

In yet another twist on an already strange case, the family of a Mt. Lebanon girl injured in a 2007 hammer attack yesterday launched a public campaign to force the district attorney to press to have her alleged attacker tried as an adult.

Calling it “Adult Time for Adult Crime,” the family of Sarah DeIuliis has retained a South Hills public relations firm, and opened a Web site as well as a page on Facebook to demand that Robertino DeAngelis, 17, be tried as an adult for the attack. The Web site provides an e-mail address and telephone number for the DA’s office for visitors to use in pressing the case.

“It is our contention that the district attorney’s office presented an ineffective case against DeAngelis,” said Grace DeIuliis, Sarah’s mother, in a release issued by Forge Communications. “Trying this defendant as an adult should have been a no-brainer.”

The family hired a PR firm to force the case to adult court.  Without knowing all the details — and we do not — the case is tragic on many levels:

The hiring of a PR firm for a public campaign to force the case back into criminal court marked the latest turn in a public spectacle growing out of the Oct. 31, 2007, attack. Police charged Mr. DeAngelis with attempted homicide, saying he beat Ms. DeIuliis with a hammer when the pair met to exchange property after they broke up. Police said the attack was halted by an off-duty county detective who was nearby, and Mr. DeAngelis then attempted to kill himself by jumping in front of a light rail transit train.

He survived, but his lawyer, Patrick Thomassey, says he has undergone multiple surgeries.

The criminal justice system must seek justice at all times, not vengance.

The DA is right in this case, and the victim’s family can do irreperable harm to the case by these continued attempts to try the Mr. DeAngelis in the media.


Domestic Partnerships to Become Law in State of Washington

From KXLY in the state of Washington:

Gov. Chris Gregoire is scheduled today to sign Washington’s new “everything but marriage” bill — giving gay and lesbian couples all the state-provided benefits that married heterosexual couples have.

It’s the latest step in a three-year effort to expand rights for same-sex couples.

However, state Sen. Ed Murray of Seattle, who has spearheaded the effort, cautions that the debate for actual same-sex marriage may still be a few years off.

Besides the fact that this is the right thing to do — legally, ethically and morally — this is a good move.

The tide has turned.


Text of President Barack Obama’s Speech at Notre Dame

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President Barack Obama receives an honorary degree from the University of Notre Dame Sunday. (Photo: Tim Spear)

Notre Dame, IN – Text of President Barack Obama’s commencement address Sunday as the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind., as prepared for delivery. The Rev. John Jenkins is the school’s president. The Rev. Theodore Hesburgh is Jenkins’ predecessor.

The text of the speech follows:

Thank you, Father Jenkins, for that generous introduction. You are doing an outstanding job as president of this fine institution, and your continued and courageous commitment to honest, thoughtful dialogue is an inspiration to us all.

Good afternoon, Father Hesburgh, Notre Dame trustees, faculty, family, friends and the class of 2009. I am honored to be here today and grateful to all of you for allowing me to be part of your graduation.

I want to thank you for this honorary degree. I know it has not been without controversy. I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but these honorary degrees are apparently pretty hard to come by. So far I’m only 1 for 2 as president. Father Hesburgh is 150 for 150. I guess that’s better. Father Ted, after the ceremony, maybe you can give me some pointers on how to boost my average.

I also want to congratulate the class of 2009 for all your accomplishments. And since this is Notre Dame, I mean both in the classroom and in the competitive arena. We all know about this university’s proud and storied football team, but I also hear that Notre Dame holds the largest outdoor 5-on-5 basketball tournament in the world — Bookstore Basketball.

Now this excites me. I want to congratulate the winners of this year’s tournament, a team by the name of “Hallelujah Holla Back.” Well done. Though I have to say, I am personally disappointed that the “Barack O’Ballers” didn’t pull it out. Next year, if you need a 6-foot, 2-inch forward with a decent jumper, you know where I live.

Every one of you should be proud of what you have achieved at this institution. One hundred and sixty-three classes of Notre Dame graduates have sat where you are today. Some were here during years that simply rolled into the next without much notice or fanfare — periods of relative peace and prosperity that required little by way of sacrifice or struggle.

You, however, are not getting off that easy. Your class has come of age at a moment of great consequence for our nation and the world — a rare inflection point in history where the size and scope of the challenges before us require that we remake our world to renew its promise; that we align our deepest values and commitments to the demands of a new age. It is a privilege and a responsibility afforded to few generations — and a task that you are now called to fulfill.

This is the generation that must find a path back to prosperity and decide how we respond to a global economy that left millions behind even before this crisis hit — an economy where greed and short-term thinking were too often rewarded at the expense of fairness, and diligence, and an honest day’s work.

We must decide how to save God’s creation from a changing climate that threatens to destroy it. We must seek peace at a time when there are those who will stop at nothing to do us harm, and when weapons in the hands of a few can destroy the many. And we must find a way to reconcile our ever-shrinking world with its ever-growing diversity — diversity of thought, of culture and of belief.

In short, we must find a way to live together as one human family.

It is this last challenge that I’d like to talk about today. For the major threats we face in the 21st century — whether it’s global recession or violent extremism, the spread of nuclear weapons or pandemic disease — do not discriminate. They do not recognize borders. They do not see color. They do not target specific ethnic groups.

Moreover, no one person, or religion, or nation can meet these challenges alone. Our very survival has never required greater cooperation and understanding among all people from all places than at this moment in history.

Unfortunately, finding that common ground — recognizing that our fates are tied up, as Dr. King said, in a “single garment of destiny” — is not easy. Part of the problem, of course, lies in the imperfections of man — our selfishness, our pride, our stubbornness, our acquisitiveness, our insecurities, our egos; all the cruelties large and small that those of us in the Christian tradition understand to be rooted in original sin. We too often seek advantage over others. We cling to outworn prejudice and fear those who are unfamiliar. Too many of us view life only through the lens of immediate self-interest and crass materialism; in which the world is necessarily a zero-sum game. The strong too often dominate the weak, and too many of those with wealth and with power find all manner of justification for their own privilege in the face of poverty and injustice. And so, for all our technology and scientific advances, we see around the globe violence and want and strife that would seem sadly familiar to those in ancient times.

We know these things; and hopefully one of the benefits of the wonderful education you have received is that you have had time to consider these wrongs in the world, and grown determined, each in your own way, to right them. And yet, one of the vexing things for those of us interested in promoting greater understanding and cooperation among people is the discovery that even bringing together persons of good will, men and women of principle and purpose, can be difficult.

The soldier and the lawyer may both love this country with equal passion, and yet reach very different conclusions on the specific steps needed to protect us from harm. The gay activist and the evangelical pastor may both deplore the ravages of HIV/AIDS, but find themselves unable to bridge the cultural divide that might unite their efforts. Those who speak out against stem cell research may be rooted in admirable conviction about the sacredness of life, but so are the parents of a child with juvenile diabetes who are convinced that their son’s or daughter’s hardships can be relieved.

The question, then, is how do we work through these conflicts? Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort? As citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy, how do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles, and fight for what we consider right, without demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side?

Nowhere do these questions come up more powerfully than on the issue of abortion.

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President Barack Obama addresses graduates at the University of Notre Dame. (Photo: Tim Spear)

As I considered the controversy surrounding my visit here, I was reminded of an encounter I had during my Senate campaign, one that I describe in a book I wrote called “The Audacity of Hope.” A few days after I won the Democratic nomination, I received an e-mail from a doctor who told me that while he voted for me in the primary, he had a serious concern that might prevent him from voting for me in the general election. He described himself as a Christian who was strongly pro-life, but that’s not what was preventing him from voting for me.

What bothered the doctor was an entry that my campaign staff had posted on my Web site — an entry that said I would fight “right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman’s right to choose.” The doctor said that he had assumed I was a reasonable person, but that if I truly believed that every pro-life individual was simply an ideologue who wanted to inflict suffering on women, then I was not very reasonable. He wrote, “I do not ask at this point that you oppose abortion, only that you speak about this issue in fair-minded words.”

Fair-minded words.

After I read the doctor’s letter, I wrote back to him and thanked him. I didn’t change my position, but I did tell my staff to change the words on my Web site. And I said a prayer that night that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. Because when we do that — when we open our hearts and our minds to those who may not think like we do or believe what we do — that’s when we discover at least the possibility of common ground.

That’s when we begin to say, “Maybe we won’t agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this is a heart-wrenching decision for any woman to make, with both moral and spiritual dimensions. So let’s work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions by reducing unintended pregnancies, and making adoption more available, and providing care and support for women who do carry their child to term. Let’s honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women.”

Understand — I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. No matter how much we may want to fudge it — indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory — the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature.

Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words.

It’s a way of life that has always been the Notre Dame tradition. Father Hesburgh has long spoken of this institution as both a lighthouse and a crossroads. The lighthouse that stands apart, shining with the wisdom of the Catholic tradition, while the crossroads is where “differences of culture and religion and conviction can coexist with friendship, civility, hospitality and especially love.” And I want to join him and Father Jenkins in saying how inspired I am by the maturity and responsibility with which this class has approached the debate surrounding today’s ceremony.

This tradition of cooperation and understanding is one that I learned in my own life many years ago — also with the help of the Catholic Church.

I was not raised in a particularly religious household, but my mother instilled in me a sense of service and empathy that eventually led me to become a community organizer after I graduated college. A group of Catholic churches in Chicago helped fund an organization known as the Developing Communities Project, and we worked to lift up South Side neighborhoods that had been devastated when the local steel plant closed.

It was quite an eclectic crew. Catholic and Protestant churches. Jewish and African-American organizers. Working-class black and white and Hispanic residents. All of us with different experiences. All of us with different beliefs. But all of us learned to work side by side because all of us saw in these neighborhoods other human beings who needed our help — to find jobs and improve schools. We were bound together in the service of others.

And something else happened during the time I spent in those neighborhoods. Perhaps because the church folks I worked with were so welcoming and understanding; perhaps because they invited me to their services and sang with me from their hymnals; perhaps because I witnessed all of the good works their faith inspired them to perform, I found myself drawn — not just to work with the church, but to be in the church. It was through this service that I was brought to Christ.

At the time, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin was the archbishop of Chicago. For those of you too young to have known him, he was a kind and good and wise man. A saintly man. I can still remember him speaking at one of the first organizing meetings I attended on the South Side. He stood as both a lighthouse and a crossroads — unafraid to speak his mind on moral issues ranging from poverty, AIDS and abortion to the death penalty and nuclear war. And yet, he was congenial and gentle in his persuasion, always trying to bring people together; always trying to find common ground. Just before he died, a reporter asked Cardinal Bernardin about this approach to his ministry. And he said, “You can’t really get on with preaching the Gospel until you’ve touched minds and hearts.”

My heart and mind were touched by the words and deeds of the men and women I worked alongside with in Chicago. And I’d like to think that we touched the hearts and minds of the neighborhood families whose lives we helped change. For this, I believe, is our highest calling.

You are about to enter the next phase of your life at a time of great uncertainty. You will be called upon to help restore a free market that is also fair to all who are willing to work; to seek new sources of energy that can save our planet; to give future generations the same chance that you had to receive an extraordinary education. And whether as a person drawn to public service, or someone who simply insists on being an active citizen, you will be exposed to more opinions and ideas broadcast through more means of communications than have ever existed before. You will hear talking heads scream on cable, read blogs that claim definitive knowledge, and watch politicians pretend to know what they’re talking about. Occasionally, you may also have the great fortune of seeing important issues debated by well-intentioned, brilliant minds. In fact, I suspect that many of you will be among those bright stars.

In this world of competing claims about what is right and what is true, have confidence in the values with which you’ve been raised and educated. Be unafraid to speak your mind when those values are at stake. Hold firm to your faith and allow it to guide you on your journey. Stand as a lighthouse.

But remember too that the ultimate irony of faith is that it necessarily admits doubt. It is the belief in things not seen. It is beyond our capacity as human beings to know with certainty what God has planned for us or what he asks of us, and those of us who believe must trust that his wisdom is greater than our own.

This doubt should not push us away from our faith. But it should humble us. It should temper our passions, and cause us to be wary of self-righteousness. It should compel us to remain open, and curious, and eager to continue the moral and spiritual debate that began for so many of you within the walls of Notre Dame. And within our vast democracy, this doubt should remind us to persuade through reason, through an appeal whenever we can to universal rather than parochial principles, and most of all through an abiding example of good works, charity, kindness and service that moves hearts and minds.

For if there is one law that we can be most certain of, it is the law that binds people of all faiths and no faith together. It is no coincidence that it exists in Christianity and Judaism; in Islam and Hinduism; in Buddhism and humanism. It is, of course, the golden rule — the call to treat one another as we wish to be treated. The call to love. To serve. To do what we can to make a difference in the lives of those with whom we share the same brief moment on this earth.

So many of you at Notre Dame — by the last count, upwards of 80 percent — have lived this law of love through the service you’ve performed at schools and hospitals; international relief agencies and local charities. That is incredibly impressive, and a powerful testament to this institution. Now you must carry the tradition forward. Make it a way of life. Because when you serve, it doesn’t just improve your community, it makes you a part of your community. It breaks down walls. It fosters cooperation. And when that happens — when people set aside their differences to work in common effort toward a common good; when they struggle together, and sacrifice together, and learn from one another — all things are possible.

After all, I stand here today, as president and as an African-American, on the 55th anniversary of the day that the Supreme Court handed down the decision in Brown v. the Board of Education. Brown was of course the first major step in dismantling the separate but equal doctrine, but it would take a number of years and a nationwide movement to fully realize the dream of civil rights for all of God’s children. There were freedom rides and lunch counters and Billy clubs, and there was also a Civil Rights Commission appointed by President Eisenhower. It was the 12 resolutions recommended by this commission that would ultimately become law in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

There were six members of the commission. It included five whites and one African-American; Democrats and Republicans; two Southern governors, the dean of a Southern law school, a Midwestern university president, and your own Father Ted Hesburgh, president of Notre Dame. They worked for two years, and at times, President Eisenhower had to intervene personally since no hotel or restaurant in the South would serve the black and white members of the commission together. Finally, when they reached an impasse in Louisiana, Father Ted flew them all to Notre Dame’s retreat in Land O’ Lakes, Wis., where they eventually overcame their differences and hammered out a final deal.

Years later, President Eisenhower asked Father Ted how on Earth he was able to broker an agreement between men of such different backgrounds and beliefs. And Father Ted simply said that during their first dinner in Wisconsin, they discovered that they were all fishermen. And so he quickly readied a boat for a twilight trip out on the lake. They fished, and they talked, and they changed the course of history.

I will not pretend that the challenges we face will be easy, or that the answers will come quickly, or that all our differences and divisions will fade happily away. Life is not that simple. It never has been.

But as you leave here today, remember the lessons of Cardinal Bernardin, of Father Hesburgh, of movements for change both large and small. Remember that each of us, endowed with the dignity possessed by all children of God, has the grace to recognize ourselves in one another; to understand that we all seek the same love of family and the same fulfillment of a life well-lived. Remember that in the end, we are all fishermen.

If nothing else, that knowledge should give us faith that through our collective labor, and God’s providence, and our willingness to shoulder each other’s burdens, America will continue on its precious journey towards that more perfect union. Congratulations on your graduation, may God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Source: WhiteHouse.gov


Baldwin Borough: Dump Marian Joseph, Shirley Kuchta, Mark Nix and Joan Etzel

Residents of Baldwin Borough, PA, have a decision to make on Tuesday.  Incumbents on the Borough Council Marian B. Joseph, Shirley A. Kuchta, Mark S. Nix, and Joan T. Etzel need to go.

Boy, do they need to go.

In their place, residents need to vote for John Conley, Larry Brown, Ed Moeller, and Bob Collet.

I grew up in Baldwin, and I’m back in town this weekend spending time with family.  The community of 19,999 is only 5.44 square miles, a few miles south of Pittsburgh. The borough is currently littered with lawn signs, the incumbents attempting to pawn themselves off as pseudo-Steelers (In fact, using the Steeler logo in their campaign literature — are you paying attentiong, Mr. Rooney?).

Joseph, Kuchta, Nix and Etzel are extremely unethical.  Four years ago, a letter bearing the name of Baldwin’s Tax Collector Gail Dobson Mikush was sent to voters with fraudulent information.  The letter claimed that Mikush supported Joseph, Kuchta, Nix and Etzel.  She most certainly does not support them.

Mikush did not send the letter.  The letter was a fraud.  These four clowns are frauds, and they have to go.

These four have worked overtime to limit access to the Baldwin Borough Building.  The building used to be accessible to residents 24 hours a day.  Dispatchers were removed when  Baldwin signed on to a county-wide emergency dispatch center.

There is no place in Baldwin Borough right now for citizens to walk in and ask for the police.  That is gone, now.

Thank Kuchta, Nix, Joseph and Etzel for that.

The 911 system used now by Baldwin is a joke, often taking 10 to 12 rings to answer.  It is now impossible to contact police after normal business hours.

Joseph, Kuchta, Nix and Etzel ousted Police Chief Christopher Kelly.  The four tried to cover by saying Kelly left on his own accord.

This is a lie.

Chief Kelly knew something was up when council gave him a $21,000 raise.  Up to this point, Kelly had received a the same modest pay increases rank and file members of the Baldwin Police Department received.

It was Mark Nix who recommended the boost, claiming that he had personally compared salaries of police chies in Allegheny County.  Council members who backed this based on the so-called research of one member of council are fools. The raise was a ruse, pure and simple.  Why else would the same council members who had tried to oust Chief Kelly a few years ago now demand that he get a raise?

Because the pay increase was so large, the borough’s insurance company insisted that Kelly go for a physical, then the insurance company doctor told him he was going to declare him disabled.  His only choice was to retire.

Think Joseph, Kuchta, Nix and Etzel know someone in the insurance company?

Of course they do.

Marian Joseph did not like Chief Kelly.  Baldwin residents are now suffering because of Joseph’s personal vendetta.

I met Kelly a few times.  Very honorable.  He did incredible things as police chief in Homestead, PA.  I have personally heard many wonderful things about him through the years.

Baldwin residents should also be very interested in the $107,000 received when the Green Meadows property was sold.  Councilman Dave Depretis made a motion to put that money into a capital reserve fund for repairs to the borough building.  The vote passed unanimously.  When these four individuals took office, the $107,000 was squandered on pet projects for Joseph, Kuchta, Nix, and Etzel.

Baldwin Borough residents should read carefully the letter sent to them by Gail Dobson Misush, and follow her lead.

My family in Baldwin supports Conley, Brown, Moeller and Collet.

Conley, Brown, Moeller and Collet put Baldwin first.

Vote for John Conley, Larry Brown, Ed Moeller, and Bob Collet for all of Baldwin on Tuesday, May 19.