To trust or trust not

Imagine this. Driver’s licenses issued by each state as usual, but before a Massachusetts citizen is permitted to drive in Rhode Island, she must apply for a non-resident license, take additional training, provide personal references, and pay exorbitant fees. And in spite of all this, she will almost certainly be denied the permit. Because Massachusetts drivers are simply not to be trusted on the streets of Rhode Island. So she must circumnavigate Rhode Island, perhaps via Connecticut, assuming, however, that she can secure a Connecticut non-resident license. A quandary.

Indeed a quandary, for a Rhode Island driver likewise could not drive in Massachusetts nor Connecticut or New York or New Jersey without applying for and being granted separate non-resident permits. (And remember that non-resident permits are rarely approved). A road trip to Florida would require at least ten different non-resident state permits, each acquired at great expense and great difficulty, each with different experience and training requirements. Such a road trip would be nearly impossible.

This is the reality faced by persons wishing to exercise their right of self defense.

While licensing of automobile drivers and concealed carry permit holders is decidedly different, both have one major element in common: trust.

Do we trust our neighbor to drive safely, prudently, observing relevant laws and regulations? Beyond immediate neighbors, do we trust our fellow citizens from other states to operate their vehicles carefully? Witnessed by the ease and prevalence of obtaining a driving license and the reciprocity observed among the states, the answer is a resounding yes.

And for the most part, that trust is warranted. But we each see, every day, that road-racer wannabe using the rest of us as pylons as he swerves through traffic at high speed on I-95. Or the scofflaw (usually from another state) who cuts you off or blows a stop sign or red light. Every day there are reports of drunk drivers arrested for their third or fifth offense, often after having caused some heartbreaking carnage.

But we look to the common good derived from the wide availability of driving licenses and the interstate recognition thereof. We hold our noses in spite of traffic accident statistics telling us the chilling truth that getting into an automobile is by far the most dangerous thing that most of us ever do.

Trust.

But when it comes to carrying the means to self defense, that trust is much more guarded. And oddly, it tends to be political. Those in the middle and right of the political spectrum tend to trust their fellow citizens. Those to the left do not.

Concealed carry permit holders are statistically the most law abiding among us. They have willingly submitted to finger printing, background checks, training regimes, and paid substantial fees. Yet a Rhode Island permit is not recognized in Massachusetts and vice versa. Connecticut permits are not accepted by any northeastern state save Vermont (which in its wisdom requires no permits of non-criminals). Pennsylvania is likewise not recognized by New Jersey. In the liberal northeast, we claim to love our fellow (hu)man but don’t trust her if she lives across the state line.

Which is exactly what befell Shaneen Allen.

Shaneen, an African American mother of two, medical professional, and resident of Philadelphia, had recently obtained a concealed carry permit. She had been robbed twice and wanted to be able to protect herself and her family. After completing the required training and paying the required fees, she was granted her permit by the state of Pennsylvania.

Shortly after, Shaneen crossed the bridge into nearby New Jersey to attend a surprise birthday party for her son. A police officer pulled her over for a minor lane violation. Shaneen immediately informed the officer that she was a concealed carry permit holder and had a small handgun in her purse (this notification being an essential part of her Pennsylvania training). But there is something about the northeast that makes a state line a trust barrier. New Jersey arrested Shaneen and she spent 46 days in jail before being bailed out. She still faces trial as a felon and, if found guilty, will serve from three to eleven years in prison, not able to raise her young children.

In our northeastern, liberal zeal to make us all perfectly safe, we seem to have gotten it wrong. Gun crime is a terrible thing, but it is committed by sociopaths, not by the Shaneens of the world. Perhaps it’s time to trust our fellow honest citizens a bit more and redouble our pursuit and prosecution of actual criminals. There are plenty of them to keep us busy.

Our future is our kids

It’s hard to imagine how much things have changed.

In 1790, the first US census counted 3,929,214 of us, and 90% of the workforce were farmers. By 2010, the total US population had burgeoned to nearly 310 million while the farm-related population had declined to less than two percent.

These statistics bear witness to the enormous growth of urban and suburban populations. As of the 2010 census, 80% of us live in urban areas. The balance, 20%, is predominantly non-farm rural and very few actual farmers.

We have shifted away from the land, leaving our roots, both literally and figuratively.

What are the consequences of this historic shift? Overall, we have become far more reliant on each other. The pioneer family was completely self sufficient and today’s famer nearly so. But we urban dwellers need power and water and food delivered every day. We rely on our social constructs to keep us warm, feed us, and protect us. When these systems fail (witness Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans), the impact is massive and deadly. We have become collectivist out of necessity.

And we elect politicians that reflect these needs. This gives us such as Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley’s famous proclamation, “We really discourage people from self help.” The collective has drained us of individual initiative and responsibility.

Here is an example. In Augusta, South Carolina, this summer, a working mom was arrested and served 17 days in jail, her child temporarily taken into state custody. Debra Harrell, a 46-year old African American was the manager of a McDonald’s restaurant. She lost her freedom and her child for the crime of allowing the 9-year-old child to play alone in a city park. While you may agree or not with the outcome, the state usurped her role of parent and Ms. Harrell’s rights as a mother were abrogated.

All this seems to fly in the face of common sense. The most dangerous thing you could possibly do is to put your child in a motor vehicle or allow her to go swimming. Kidnapping from a public park is a statistical blip. But common sense is the first casualty as “one size fits all” collective dictates replace individual prerogatives.

The urbanization of America is certain to accelerate with the continued diminution of individual rights, responsibility, and capabilities. We will become a nation of codependent, neotenized softies (see “WALL-E,” the 2008 movie for a vision of that future).

But some are fighting back. Gever Tulley, in a popular TEDTalk, describes his passion for teaching kids to be creative, confident, self-reliant, and capable. In his talk, Tulley tells of  “The Five Dangerous Things You Should Let Your Children Do” and why.

He starts by describing the crazy extent to which child safety regulation has progressed, the end result being that anything sharper than a golf ball is prohibited for child play. Tulley thinks this will not end well, asserting that “When we round every corner and eliminate every sharp object, every pokey bit in the world, then the first time that kids come in contact with anything sharp or not made out of round plastic, they'll hurt themselves with it." (For those of you allegorically challenged, this is allegory).

Here are five things that Tulley recommends (among many more activities at his school camps for kids, the Tinkering School).

1. Play with fire. Children will learn much about this elemental force which changed the course of human history, and they will learn to respect and control it.

2. Own a pocket knife. The knife is a universal tool, “it's a spatula, it's a pry bar, it's a screwdriver and it's a blade.” It also gives the child an understanding of how a dangerous implement may be used safely by following simple rules.

3. Throw a spear. A primitive activity that engages the brain and muscles, “throwing is a combination of analytical and physical skill, so it's very good for that kind of whole-body training.”

4. Deconstruct appliances. This is a wonderful way to understand basic engineering and mechanics. Instead of throwing away that old vacuum cleaner, let the kids tear it apart first and try to figure out how it works.

5. Drive a car. That’s right, plop them into your lap and allow them to steer. This is wonderfully empowering and confidence building.(Best done in a deserted parking lot).

While these may seem extreme to the average urban dweller, they are everyday life for the typical farm kid. And that’s exactly the point – to give urban kids the same opportunities of growth and empowerment.

The future can be bright indeed, if we can base our voluntary collectivism on a foundation of strong, self-reliant and capable individuals. Our future is our kids.

In the Shadow of D-Day - Operation Dragoon

"Provence is free - August 1944"
A 70-year old newspaper kept by Jackie Gow

It was precisely seventy years ago that Marseille was freed from German occupation, August 28, 1944. Mademoiselle Jacqueline (Roux) Gow, now of North Attleborough, remembers. A young teen at the time, Jackie and her family had dealt with the Germans since November, 1942, when Marseille was first taken.

The oldest of six and daughter of two physicians, Jackie remembers the smoke and thunder of the Allied landings. Long lines of trucks, British and American and Canadian troops, the sheer joy of liberation. And the horror of a German aircraft, shot from the sky, the pilot perishing in the burning wreckage.

This was war, but with glimmers of hope. It was the end of an occupation that had included the confiscation of homes, brutality, arrests, and the deportation of Jews to German death camps. It is no wonder that the Allied troops were welcomed with celebration and joy.

Operation Dragoon, renamed for obscure reasons from its original “Anvil,” was Supreme Commander Eisenhower’s drive to open up the ports of southern France. Following close on the heels of the much better known Operation Overlord, the Normandy D-day landings, Dragoon solved the problem of landing huge amounts of troops and materiel needed to support the Allied drive into the heartland of Germany.

But this liberation of southern France had not been guaranteed in Allied planning. Indeed, Eisenhower said, Dragoon sparked “one of the longest sustained arguments I had with Prime Minister Churchill throughout the period of the war.” Churchill preferred to focus allied troops on the Balkans, the immediate goal to deny the Germans petroleum from that region. But longer term, the canny Churchill wanted troops in Romania and Greece to withstand a post-war takeover by the Russian bear, Stalin.

Eisenhower countered that the capture of the ports of southern France would speed the landing of American divisions from the homeland, protect the flank of the hard-earned Normandy landings, and get the Free French army quickly engaged in the fray. Churchill reluctantly concurred and preparations for Dragoon gathered speed.   

The ports of Toulon and Marseille were treasured prizes and the Germans were expected to fight fiercely to retain them. Allied planning was complex and detailed, including massive bombing raids, airborne troops landing inland, and an amphibious assault on the beaches, Alpha, Delta, Camel, and the saucily named Garbo. In a prelude, German artillery outposts on outlying islands were to be taken. The synchronization and secrecy demanded of this operation was an enormous challenge, and German defenses considerable.

But the Allied battle-hardened troops, fresh from Anzio, were not to be denied. On August 15, the assault began with commandos landing on the Hyeres islands under cover of darkness. This was followed by an orchestrated assault on the mainland beginning at first light with nearly 1,300 bombers from Italy, Sardinia, and Corsica. By 0800 the amphibious troops began their landings and the airborne troops, by parachute and glider, were inserted inland. Importantly, both strategically and for French morale, a division of the Free French Army joined the fray.

The fighting was hard, and it took nearly two weeks before Marseille was liberated. Good news emerged that the Germans, in their retreat, had not totally demolished the ports. The operation became one of a long, fighting pursuit, as the Germans slowly withdrew to the Vosges Mountains. In addition to the organized American, British, Canadian, and Free French troops, French resistance fighters, maquisards, kept up enormous pressure on the retreating Germans. Nothing was easy, and success was gained in fits and starts. The American  117^th Cavalry Squadron was nearly annihilated by the 11^th German Panzer Division, proof that the Germans were dangerous in retreat.

On September 10, elements of the Dragoon force met General George Patton’s Third Army, fresh from the liberation of Paris. The Allies now had a continuous front in eastern France, from the English Channel to the Mediterranean. While there was a lot of hard fighting to come (remember the Battle of the Bulge), the handwriting was now on the wall.

Operation Dragoon was a vital part of the Allied war strategy, but it is overshadowed by the earlier D-day landings in Normandy. The D-day veterans deserve every bit of recognition that they get, but so, too, do those who fought in the south. In Dragoon, the Allies suffered losses of 17,000 killed and wounded with the Germans having similar casualties. The very few veterans who remain remember.

As does Jackie Gow, who through the horror of war, still remembers the intense joy of liberation. And in her heart is compassion, not just for the foot soldiers on both sides, but for the countless mothers and wives and families who lent their treasured sons.

Let’s remember them all.

Let's laugh together, shake hands and get to work

What does it take to lift oneself from poverty? A topic of great debate, it is often argued stridently across an ideological chasm, light of fact and heavy of slur. So it is refreshing to see some actual data.

Researchers at Baltimore’s John Hopkins University have just concluded their life’s work. Karl Alexander, Doris Entwisle, and Linda Olson’s new book, “The Long Shadow,” documents the trials and tribulations of nearly 800 inner city children from the first grade in 1982 through adulthood. The 25-year study tracks the childrens’ educational achievements, family status, and eventual economic outcomes.

The results could not be simpler: family matters.

Nearly half of all children from poor families remained poor as adults. Children from families with more resources tended to be more successful as adults.

Children from low-income families were 10 times less likely to complete college than those from higher-income families. Only 4 percent of children from low-income families achieved a college degree as opposed to 45 percent from middle class or affluent families.

Women benefit from marriage. Those in stable relationships had a larger household income than single women.

As the study involved a mixture of races, there were race-based observations as well.

For non-college degreed men, white men found better paying jobs than black men – on average $43,500 vs. $21,500. These jobs were typically in the trades or the remaining industrial base of Baltimore. (This income discrepancy diminished with educational achievement).

For those without a high school diploma, the results were even more dramatic. The unemployment rate for white male high school dropouts was 11 percent; for blacks, 60 percent.

Black women had fewer family resources than white women. This is compounded by their lower marriage rate versus white women (31% vs. 55%).

Black men were six times more likely to be incarcerated than white men. Very disruptive to black family structure, this contributed to the lower household income of black women.

These are all facts. Incontrovertible. But here is where the argument starts – in determining the “why.”

Why are poor children stuck in poverty? Why do children from more affluent families do well? Why is educational achievement so difficult for poor children? Why do white men have better paying jobs than blacks? Why do black women have fewer financial resources? Why is their marriage rate lower? Why are black men incarcerated at such a high rate?

The answers to these questions are not trivial. They spell the difference between effective and failing (but feel-good) programs. Worse, bad programs that can actually do harm.

We spend enormous resources on social programs in an attempt to salve these ills. Nearly $3 trillion per year is poured into means-tested governmental and private charitable welfare programs (not including Social Security and Medicare). But more than the waste of well-intended but ill-performing programs is the human tragedy of lives not actualized, dreams not achieved.

One would think that the debate would be rigorous, rational, wide-ranging, and thoughtful. It is not.

Instead, political correctness constrains what can be said and who can say it. Ad hominem attacks substitute for reasoned rejoinder (“I don’t agree with what you just said, so you are a worthless blob of human waste”). There are many articles on the web describing the Alexander (et al) study. Reading the comments following the articles is quite revealing. A poster may pose a hypothesis only to be shouted down in a storm of vituperation terming him or her as racist, brainless, or “a hater.” It is an emotional mob, incapable of reasoning.

Unfortunately, the same is true in the wider public sphere. Letters to the editor lean heavily on personal attack, light on debate. Politicians, with few exceptions, avoid reality, speak in platitudes, and attempt to buy more votes. There is no holding to account for actual results.

Here is the truth. Racism still exists. But so, too, does tolerance. Progressives are not idiots, conservatives are not evil. Both want the best outcome for the most people, but differ on how to achieve it. These are chasms that can be crossed, common purposes achieved.

What stands in the way? Political correctness is a scourge. It must be fought resolutely as the fundamental danger that it is. Rigid ideologies are even worse. The truth always exists in the grey netherworld between extremes.

Here is a quote from a great philosopher, comedian Bill Cosby. “You can turn painful situations around through laughter. If you can find humor in anything, even poverty, you can survive it.”

Let’s laugh together, shake hands, and get to work.