ANOTHER GENERATION

I believe that the Millennial Bernie Bots and third part supporters realize what the boomers who just might be willing the choose the lesser of two evils have in our psychic photo albums.

November 1963. Snapshot of the vice principal holding a piece of paper for the home room teacher to read, That's how we learned about Dallas. Snapshot. A woman in black holding the hands of her children as they said goodbye to a husband and father who just happened to be the president. Snapshot. That same figure leading the mourners through the streets to the cathedral. Snapshot. A new president who basically told the secret service that if he was afraid to march where the people could see him he didn't deserve to be president. Snapshot, The horse with no rider, boots reversed in the stirrups. Sounds. Those damn drums I'll hear into eternity.

Snapshot. The faces of three missing civil rights workers. They found their bodies in an earthen dam in Mississippi. Snapshot. A woman named Viola Liuzzo gunned down in a drive by on the lonely highway at night. Sanpshots from different times. Police dogs set on school children. Fire hoses blasting non violent civil rights protesters, Four girls killed when a coward bombed their church one Sunday morning.

It went on year after year. A little girl, naked and screaming, running from her village that had just been napalmed. A Vietnamese officer caught on film as he shot a prisoner in the head. Napalm, B52's, we had to destroy the village to save it, Agent Orange,

A southern governor standing on a college campus promising segregation forever. That same governor gunned down in an assassination attempt. A man of peace gunned down in front of a motel in Memphis. A presidential candidate gunned down in a hotel kitchen minutes after winning the California primary in 1968.

The totally out of control Democratic convention in 1968. AKA as the Chicago police riots. And it went on.

What did all this have in common? Individuals or groups of people who were so damn sure they were right they were willing to kill for it. Burn down the neighborhood for it. Blow up a church for it. A few, a very few, were willing to die for it.

I guess I could go on. But I suppose this is my answer to the "true believers." Most of us learned to temper our idealism. "Hey, what he or she is saying sounds good. What are their chances of actually accomplishing this."

Well, we have a nightmare in the making on our hands. And a reminder. Every vote you didn't cast because the candidate didn't suit you was a vote for a candidate that was even worse.

DENMARK 1943 OR RESISTANCE IS NOT FUTILE

In late September 1943 Denmark had been occupied by the Germans for over three years. Denmark had a fairly small Jewish population and they had been left alone. Until a few days before Rosh Hashanah.

The plan was take the Jews on the eve of the Jewish New Year when they would all be at home. That was the plan, A German attache told a Danish politician who told other Danes who warned he Jews. They were hidden in hospitals, warehouses, private homes, shops while the Dane negotiated with the Swedish government. The Swedes agreed and nearly seven thousand Jews were smuggled across the straits to Sweden. When they returned after the war they found their houses, shops, gardens and pets pretty much as they left them.

The Germans managed to arrest about four hundred people and most of them survived the war. Song writer Fred Small wrote a song, Denmark 1943.

The song can also be found on YouTube.

 DENMARK 1943

And it's Eichmann and Himmler are turning the screws
The Fuhrer they say grows impatient
"How can it be Denmark's Jews still walk free
After three years of kind occupation?
We will take them like sheep in their beds as they sleep
On the second night of their new year
Devoutly at home they'll be helpless alone
When they cry out no one will hear"

But Duckwitz the German tells Hedtoft the Dane
"My friend I have dangerous news
In three hours the transport ships will set at anchor
You must warn them warn all the Jews"
Soon good Rabbi Melchior stands in the synagogue
"There'll be no service today
The raids come tomorrow, dwell not on your sorrow
By nightfall we must be away"

Refrain:
And it's fire up the diesel and look out for swells
We're leaving Espergaerde behind us
Who strike at our friends strike us as well
We'll pray the patrol boats don't find us
When the sirens are wailing and shouts fill the night
Never will you stand alone
So it's over the Oresund
Till the day we can welcome you home

Sompolinski the tailor on the eve of Rosh Hashana
Gathers his family near
"The Lord is my light and salvation
Whom on this earth shall I fear?"
When a young Danish gentile steps into the glow
Of the candle with tears flowing down
"Good neighbors flee - I pray you believe me"
And as quickly the young man is gone

Christian policemen, shopkeepers, and teachers
Tell their friends of the quickening storm
While students on bicycles race through the streets
Searching for Jews to be warned
And Katlev the foreman blurts out to the trainman
"My family has no place to hide"
"Well bring 'em to my house," the stranger replies
"And we'll spit in the damn Nazi's eyes"

Refrain

And it's fire up the diesel and look out for swells
We're leaving Espergaerde behind us
Who strike at our friends strike us as well
We'll pray the patrol boats don't find us
When the sirens are wailing and shouts fill the night
Never will you stand alone
So it's over the Oresund
Till the day we can welcome you home

Ellen Nielsen the fishwife in the port of Dragá¸r
Has no use for political views
She'll call out the catch, "Fresh salmon, fresh cod"
Comes a whisper "Please help, we are Jews"
"But if you are Jews you're not safe on the street
I know a man with a sail"
Till moonrise they sleep in the shade of her eaves
And escape on the fisherman's keel

Rabbi Melchior hires a young trawlerman
To ferry his family across
After twelve hours afloat in a scurfy old boat
Morning light shows the same Danish coast
Says the skipper "I'm afraid of the German blockade
So we've motored in circles around"
The rabbi gives a shout, with one blow knocks him out
And steers a straight line 'cross the sound

Refrain

And it's fire up the diesel and look out for swells
We're leaving Espergaerde behind us
Who strike at our friends strike us as well
We'll pray the patrol boats don't find us
When the sirens are wailing and shouts fill the night
Never will you stand alone
So it's over the Oresund
Till the day we can welcome you home

Frozen with fright in the October night
Families huddle in basements and barns
Mistaking each breath for the angel of death
The Gestapo, the shot, the alarm
Then down into the hold with the stench and the cold
And drug all the babies with schnapps
Someone shouts, "Valkámmen till Sverige
You are in Swedish waters at last"

Seven thousands of Jews smuggled over to Sweden
By fishermen, nurses, and priests
Hitler sends Eichmann to hunt them down
But his quarry have vanished like mist
When the war's over the Jews return
Cheers and flowers adorn their way home
"We're not heroes or martyrs," so say the Danes
"We were just looking after our own"

Refrain

And it's fire up the diesel and look out for swells
We're leaving Espergaerde behind us
Who strike at our friends strike us as well
We'll pray the patrol boats don't find us
When the sirens are wailing and shouts fill the night
Never will you stand alone
So it's over the Oresund
Till the day we can welcome you home

And today we will welcome you home
And today we welcome you home

STEPPING ON SOME TOES

"So nice to keep seeing these things that tell me I must not be a Christian because I voted for Donald Trump. I mean here I was thinking that my personal relationship with God is more important than who I voted for to be president...... 

But of course ostracizing people over their choice of President is a great way to spread the kingdom of God right?"

Spotted this comment on this FB page.   He also blogs at Formerly Fundie. The writer is a Mennonite with a couple hard earned doctorates in branches of theology. Please follow the link and check out the picture of him with his adopted daughter. A girl who just might have a target on her back.

There are so many comments I could make, most of them unkind to say the least, But if you'll notice there are no names named. No one is called out. If this individual sees himself in this picture he's put himself there not Ben Corey. And that is his problem, not Ben's.  

WE'VE TRIED BEING UNDERSTANDING

and empathetic. It hasn't done a damn bit of good.

There were a couple of left leaning Christian pages on Face Book yesterday with the themes that we need to be more "understanding" of Trump's supporters. Have a dialog. Show some empathy, Goddess I think I''m going to throw up.

Those of us on the so called left who happen to be Quakers, semi pagans, outright pagans or fellow citizens who trying to keep this country from being dragged back at least a century have talking, trying to be more understanding, forgiving, whatever for the last forty or fifty years. It hasn't
accomplished anything except the growing contempt from the religious and political fundies.

In case you haven't been paying attention the Great Orange One has been endorsed by the KKK, white power militants, gun nuts and all around nutty nuts, I've seen websites calling for a race war and what sounds pretty much like ethnic cleansing.

Ever here of The Turner Diaries? It's the Bible for some of these haters. Google the title you can probably find a version on line. Read part of it if your stomach can take it. I have two nephews and a foster niece who would all have targets on their backs if these people ever came to power. The guys married beautiful young women who just happen to be mixed race. Indonesian and Japanese if anyone is interested.

They'd be in danger because of who their parents were and the guys would be in danger because they married them. Race defilement they call it. As for unofficial niece? She is engaged to a very good looking, smart, successful young man who just happens to be an African American. Race defilement again,

I also have no intention, nor do I see the need to be"understanding" or "empathetic" towards individuals who spout Bible verses that would turn women into baby making door mats. I don't have much use for individuals who use the C word to describe the democratic candidate, have indicated they'd be really happy if she were in prison or worse, Don't have much use for politicians who want us to believe that only Republicans can appoint justices to the Supreme Court.

I could go on, but I believe you get the picture.

Oh, and I don't want this bunch anywhere near my library. All those books on liberation theology, gods and goddesses, I think that is pretty self explanatory too.

THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING THE TERRORISTS ARE COMING

Whatever. Keep people scared by whoever or whatever and maybe we won't notice that they're stealing the country out from under us.

Another Mauldin piece. This was drawn around the time the so called Red Scare was heating up.  Never mind that we were technically on the same side at the time. Nothing much has changed has it.