A wrong right is always left behind

A friend of mine recently sent me an e-mail telling me she had taken a comment I had made off her "Facebook" page. The comment was about Norm Coleman and the GOP hijacking democracy in the Minnesota senatorial race with Al Franken. It wasn't dirty or nasty or anything like that. It seems to me that Norm Coleman is trying to make the argument for dragging this thing out by saying that he's "trying to protect the vote of the little guy." It's all about the "little guy." The GOP? Norm Coleman? When has that ever happened? I found her action very surprising since she is such a strong Democrat and is not shy about that.

Anyway, she took it off her page because she has some relatives who are staunch "GOPers," as she calls them, who might get upset about my comment. She said, "I have to sort of do that delicate dance!" Now, by no means am I upset with her. (Who could be? She's a really great person). I'm just sad about the fear that is running over our society and smudging the face of honest discourse.

Below is most of my response to her:

Dear ...

I understand what you are saying about having to do a "delicate dance." It must be difficult for you to have to protect one group of friends from the thoughts and ideas of another group of friends.

That's a big job these days for anyone and it takes a lot of psychic energy. It's too bad your "GOPers" are unable to differentiate between the reasoned thoughts of one of your friends as distinct from your own thoughts. I believe that inability may be part of the birth defect they all seem to suffer.

Or maybe that's the way it is with those on the right — they think their political designation as "right" also applies to their political philosophies, which means that if they are "right" (in this black and white world of theirs), then the rest of us (those on "the left") must be wrong. After all, haven't left-handed people always been suspect?

If I were you, I'd give up the "dancing" with GOPers, but only after I told them that I don't have the power or energy to protect them any more.

Don't worry. I'm not upset with you at all. But on a national scale, I am just amazed and worried about the frightened and confusing spirits that have overtaken so many people on "the right" since the election. (And by "spirits" I do mean "spirits"--something outside of the visible world that is causing all the frantic lashing out and crazy thoughts.) We can talk more about that when I come home in July.

I never thought I'd find myself longing for the likes of Arnie Carlson, Al Quie, Dave Durenberger, Elmer L. Anderson, and other real Republicans. And in the same way, I also long for some rock-ribbed Democrats like Humphrey and Mondale who were not afraid to stand up and defend the progressive cause.

But you know that I am almost a socialist (ala the Danish variety). I hope that won't freak out some of your friends. But then, maybe that's okay. They may come to see that all socialists don't have fangs and want to take all your money.

Enough.

Peace,

Tom

Remember: Wilbur Wright did not have a pilot's license.

Rescue Us, Father

What follows is a Father's Day poem I wrote in the spring of 2003. In March, the U.S. had invaded Iraq and my son Peter was at the point of the invasion with the 3/7 Marines. We only knew of his location by reading the reports online from the "St. Louis Post-Dispatch" who had a reporter and a photographer embedded with the 3rd Marines.

At the same time as the invasion, I was in the middle of writing a series of daily devotions for Christ In Our Home and the text for the day was Isaiah 43:

But now thus says the LORD,
he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel:
Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.
For I am the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

Rescue Us
We await the homecoming of our son from war. He is a Marine,
Weapons company, boots on the ground, tip of the spear, target.
Forty nights and days and more from March through April and into May
We heard no word, no delay of distant voice, no letters, no sound.
Was he brave? Was he lost in the fog of war, frightened?
Was he the reason or comforter of the dying
    whose faces we did not see.
What we knew we gleaned only from electronic images,
   sleepless dreams,
And each day’s sad hope sustained from no somber Marine at our door.

Isaiah sang his song to his people exiled in that far country—
   exotic and prodigal.
He sang his promises to a people
    terrified by the same inflamed spirits—
Hot winds from sacred fires threatening to consume
    the air they breathed,
Hardened metals hurled like lightning through swirling red sand skies,
Dervishes, spinning, exploding up from hidden places none could see,
All threatening to conceal with soot and blood the very face of God.

On many days during the waiting, I read aloud Isaiah’s spirit song.
I read it for myself. I read it for my son and those who fought.
I read it for all caught in the cross-fire of our precision terror. Then,
Tears dropped on the page as witnesses to a father’s heartache.
God’s heart aches for the homecoming of his children. Now,
I know in such times there is nothing a father hopes for more.
They will come. They will come home singing. Redeemed.

My heart still aches for the 4,500 who have not yet come home and the fathers who still wait for their children.