The Short Legacy of Brown

When Linda Brown died at age 76 last week, it marked 64 years since her central role in her dad's case against the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. In the three decades that followed the Brown decision, schools in the U.S. became increasingly integrated, achieving a high in 1988, when 45 percent of African-American students attended majority-white schools.

Then came the '90s, and the courts' quiet but rapid reversal of that progress. Oklahoma City was allowed to revert to neighborhood schools (a quiet name for segregated schools). The Supreme Court set a goal of local control (a quiet name for the racial divide). By the beginning of the 21st century, schools were described as "resegregating" by a project at Harvard, and in a 2007 Seattle and Louisville case that I noted at the time, the Supreme Court narrowly found that schools could not assign students to schools on the basis of race. School integration was effectively killed, 53 years after Brown. Today it is estimated that school segregation is equivalent to what it was in 1968, the year Martin Luther King, Jr., was killed.

When I was a kid, there were a couple of things that seemed to guarantee a sort of equity across households in America. One was Brown and the guarantee of a sound, basic education in our public schools. The other was the half-hour evening newscast on the big three TV channels, which gave everyone who watched the same general view of the world.

What are our sources of equity today? Fast food, Facebook, and TV sports?

Required Reading

These supporters will not change their minds, because this is what they always wanted: a president who embodies the rage they feel toward those they hate and fear, while reassuring them that that rage is nothing to be ashamed of.

There is very little in this analysis with which I disagree. Not economic hardship. White backlash.

OMG

I know, I haven't had anything to say in a long while. Although so much has happened, everyone else has said so much that there doesn't seem room to opine. We are living at an adrenaline level that can't be good for anyone; thus, the worst flu season in years. I'm going to posit that a lot of this Ohmygodding is unwarranted, because as bad as things are, it's not like it's a shock.

Omg, Trump!  Sorry, but this is like Ohmygodding over that teenage boyfriend who told you up front he wasn't looking for something serious. Donald J. Trump has told you who he was since he played the short-fingered vulgarian playboy and wrote The Art of the Deal. He has been that same guy for at least 35 years.  "Controversy, in short, sells," he told you.  "A little hyperbole never hurts." "I play to people's fantasies." "Sometimes, part of making a deal is denigrating your competition."

Omg, the Republicans in Congress!  When were they last NOT craven? Certainly not since before Newt Gingrich, and before him, you have to go back another 40 years to find a Republican Speaker. Did you think Paul Ryan would be a good guy? The guy who said, "We don't want to turn the safety net into a hammock that lulls able-bodied people into complacency and dependence"? That guy?

Omg, the Trump voters!  Are you surprised that a hate-filled message works in America? The America of the Klan, the Know-Nothings, the John Birch Society, the Chinese Exclusion Act, Executive Order 9066, the White League, Joe McCarthy, and the Patriot Act? Are you really surprised that Americans would cast a vote out of fear and racism? The Americans who elected Millard Fillmore, James Polk, Calvin Coolidge, Andrew Jackson, and FDR?

Omg, the Russians!  Look, the Russians were better than we were at the satellite launching thing, too, for a while. They have been masters of disinformation since Stalin. If you want a good analogy in the US, try Fox News. On the other hand, if you want to see some serious election interference, study the history of the CIA in Iran, Guatemala, Congo, the Dominican Republic, South Vietnam, Brazil, or Chile. I'm not saying such interference isn't serious. I'm just saying it's unsurprising. 

Omg, Facebook!  What did you really imagine was happening when you responded to online quizzes or compared your face to a famous artwork? Did you notice how the minute you ordered shoes from Payless, ads for shoes started popping up on your Facebook feed? Now, why would that be true?

Omg, the Democrats!  Well, it's painful to say, but while we're busy arguing over the use and meaning of the word progressive, the world is going down the tubes. But really, did you expect the Democrats to save you? Which Democrats? The Democrats of Nancy Pelosi or Claire McCaskill? The Democrats of Amy Klobuchar or Kamala Harris? Do you want to follow Democrats who are over 70 or Democrats who are under 45? The Democrats who ousted Franken or the ones who welcomed Jones? I would love to believe that we can rally and fight as one, but I have seen no evidence of it thus far. We're pretty good at fighting among ourselves, though. I guess that's easier.

Being in a constant state of angst is exhausting. Waking up each morning to some new horrific or stupid or humiliating or potentially life-threatening event is debilitating. Maybe we can take a few deep breaths and count at least some of what's happening as the inevitable culmination of a lot of bad decisions, unheeded signs, and blithe miscalculations. Take a little responsibility. Don't assume that our current situation was and continues to be someone else's fault. Change the things you can. Reach out to the people most likely to be harmed. Fix some stuff. March. Read history. Support the vulnerable. Vote. Educate. Don't panic. Repeat.     

So Many Crooks So Little Time

Nixon was a crook, but on such a tiny scale. If the month of February taught us anything, it was that it's all about the money. Did Manafort and Kushner promise people jobs in return for loans? If they got the quo without coughing up the quid, is it still a crime? The hustling, the shady deals, the adrenaline expended in running just paces ahead of bankruptcy or arrest. It's a wonder anyone in the White House ever got a top secret clearance when it's clear any of them is easily purchased.

Has It Come to This

I've been going to Central New York School Board Association legislative forums for a lot of years now. Sometimes we've had five legislators. Sometimes we've had two. They hear a brief presentation on the local districts' state funding for the year, based on the governor's budget, and we send them into the world to come up with a better plan. It's pretty formulaic but not at all contentious.

Last night we had the 2018 version at TST BOCES. I know that Senator Helming attended one at Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES, which is closer to her home base. But it sure looked as though no Republican wanted to bother coming to Ithaca. Only Assemblywoman Lifton showed up. Not Fred Akshar (Candor senator), not Chris Friend (Candor assembly), not Jim Seward (Dryden/Groton/Lansing), not Tom O'Mara (Ithaca/Newfield).

If we only talk to "our people," we're not really doing "our job." 

Tinfoil Hat

Just wondering. If you reject the whole Russian-interference story because you don't believe you or anyone else was affected by Russian trolling and social media bots in 2016, why is the language you're using to reject the story picked up from current Russian trolling and social media bots? P.S. Dislike of Putin and the corrupt oligarchs who keep him in power is not xenophobia.

Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird.

Things are bad when I'm quoting Nietzsche. Truly, I'm not a fan. But it's an apt quote for something that's bemused me this week.

Our local NY Progressives plan to endorse a candidate for Congress in the NY 23rd. In fact, two of the chapters have already endorsed, so only one is left, and that one is requesting statements from the candidates despite warning them that 2/3 of the vote may go against them unless someone in this chapter can re-convince the other chapters of their righteousness.

These are (some of) the same people who railed against the Democratic Party—rightly, I thought—in the 2016 primaries for having a thumb too heavily on the scales. There was a lot of conversation about the unfairness of the primary system and of the endorsement system and of straw polling, and I, who have always disliked straw polling and consider endorsements simply a power play on the part of parties, agreed with a lot of what was said. Endorsements are about power. Some people think that's a good thing and the job and purpose of parties, and they are probably right, too. But complainers, and I've been one in the past, are also correct that all of this in-house cogitation is a giant step away from democracy, especially the part of democracy that pretends to support "one person, one vote."

It turns out that the NY Progs realized quite soon in their growth that a way to be relevant in the process was to endorse the candidate they found most appealing. Whether that was to narrow the field or to pump up their own status or to excite their membership, I don't know—it may have been all three. But the message I hear is, "When it's our thumb, it's okay."

How rapidly we become the thing we hate when we gain a modicum of power! You can see it sometimes with labor unions, whose organization over time often reflects corporate structure, and you can see it in small agencies that purport to hate lobbyists until suddenly they grow big enough to lobby for themselves. 

Why does it seem impossible to create something new that, once it achieves influence, actually approaches the problems it fights in a new way? Why does battling monsters have to lead to monstrous behavior? (Okay, endorsing candidates may not qualify as monstrous, but you know what I mean.)

After #MeToo became a thing, Paul wanted me to write a short story in which women gained governmental and corporate power and over time became just as bad as men ever were. I'm not doing it, first because it's not a new idea, but mostly because it makes me so damn sad.