A Man Nine years ago I wrote about “being a man” and the Trump Administration.  I titled the essay, John Wayne Had It.  I grew up with a view of what a man was, and John Wayne, regardless of his personal political views, played that guy in the movies.  Now, almost a decade later, the Trump Administration has embraced a version of manhood that John Wayne would distain. 

This is a Sunday story – no politics today. Just a story about aging – the truck, that is, not us!! Pick-em-up For decades I always had two vehicles. One was a “personal” vehicle, usually a Jeep. The other was a “transportation” vehicle, one I could use to haul kids to track practices or cross country meets. There was a long line of those vehicles, starting with a VW Bus, the old “hippie van” back in the 1980’s.

Mr. Parker I was a horrible tenth grade geometry student.  The subject combined two of my least favorite subjects:  art (shapes and drawings) and math (numbers, numbers, numbers, or worse, letters, letters, letters).   And then there was Mr. Parker, Wyoming High School boys basketball coach and my geometry teacher.  I was a new student at Wyoming that year, trying to find my way “in” the school society.  

Senate Judiciary The Judiciary Committee of the United States Senate is a long-hallowed institution.  Every Justice of the Supreme Court, every Federal judge, passes through this committee.  If changes are made to the number of Supreme Court Justices, it will begin there.  The Judiciary Committee dates back to 1816.  Famous Chairman include Martin Van Buren, John Crittenden, Lyman Trumbull, Patrick McCarran,  James Eastland, Strom Thurmond, Orrin Hatch,  Ted Kennedy, Patrick Leahy, Arlen Specter, Dick Durbin and Lindsey Graham. 

Negative Ads There are some essays that might be better left unwritten.  This might be one of them, but here goes.  If you live in Ohio, you’re likely to be familiar with the battle between appointed Republican Senator John Husted and former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown.  In fact, you’d have to be near dead not to know about it.  Republicans are spending over $100 million on ads, and Democrats are countering with about $60 million of their own.  

10 Millionths of a Percent No matter what you hear on social media, or on grainy black and white commercials on TV, or on your favorite podcast; Democrats want US citizens to vote, and non-citizens not to vote. That, quite literally, is still the American way. And if you think that’s “doubtful”, go to that conservative bastion of thought, the authors of Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation.

At the State House 2010 – sixteen years ago.  That was the last time Democrats controlled one side of the State Legislature, or the Governorship here in Ohio.  In fact, for the past fourteen years, Republicans have held a “veto-proof” majority in the Legislature.   So it’s always kind of a “hoot” when you hear Republicans blame Democrats for what’s wrong here.  

The Federalist Judge I was listening to Judge Michael Luttig the other day.  If you don’t know, Judge Luttig was a “shining star” of the Federalist Society, retired from the Federal Appellate Court.  He was (and to many, still is) the conservative alternative to “liberal” folks like Harvard Professor Lawrence Tribe.  Judge Luttig speaks slower than he did “back in the day”, a stroke took its toll.  

School funding in Ohio is brutal. For decades, the state government has put less and less into public schools (but more and more into private schools!!!) So local communities struggle to finance good public education. Here's what's happening in our local schools in the Pataskala area. Bond Issue First, let’s get one thing straight.  There are two separate issues on the November ballot for the Southwest Licking Schools (SWL).  

The Constitution of the United States All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives. (Art 1, § 1) The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. (Art 2, § 1) "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." (Art.

Deficits and Debts I know, I’m not supposed to use profanity, and particularly in the title.  But here’s my problem:  either President Trump thinks we are all dumbasses, or he is a dumbass.  I’ll let you determine which is right at the end of this essay. There are two kinds of deficits, and one kind of national debt.  The National Deficit is simple to explain (tough to fix).  

Senior Prank We all know what vandalism is.  I was the Dean of Students, the “discipline guy” at a public high school.  Vandalism drove me crazy:  damaged lockers, trashed restrooms, “tagged” walls,  scratched cars, and aimlessly destroyed equipment.   It just seemed like such a waste of energy and time.  My time, running down the vandals themselves.  And their time, by not putting their destructive efforts towards something more positive.  

Seventy It was my seventieth birthday yesterday:  Seventy, 70, SEVEN-OH.  I lived in the fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties, the oughts, the teens, and now the twenties – parts of eight decades. And I take a pill for each decade, every day!!  Not only have I lived through fourteen Presidencies, but I’ve seen all three Bengals appearances in the Super Bowl, quarterbacked by Kenny, Boomer and Joe (heartbroken each time – and for real Bengal fans, I remember Greg Cook too).   

Building the Bomb In the 1940’s, nuclear physicists in the United States were curious.  They worked to understand the nature of nuclear interactions.  And they  seemed surprisingly unconcerned about the ultimate dangers of their atomic experiments.   The first atomic “pile”, what we would call today a controlled nuclear chain reaction, was built beneath the stands of the University of Chicago’s Stagg Field, about twenty minutes south of downtown Chicago.  

A Quarter Century Ago It’s been twenty-five years, a quarter of a century, since the attacks on 9-11.  For more than a third of Americans 9-11 is history, like the December 7th attack on Pearl Harbor is for my generation.  There is no real memory of planes, buildings, debris or empty skies.   As a government teacher at the time, the weeks after 9-11 were, I think, my best work.  

Coxon Jacob Coxon is a twenty-seven year old researcher.  His field is in Artificial Intelligence, and he worked for two of the top companies, Open AI and Anthropic.  He recently resigned from Anthropic, and put his reasoning up for public scrutiny on Twitter.   I resigned from Anthropic today. I spent the last three years doing pretraining research at both Open AI and Anthropic.

Good as Your Word Registering to vote used to be an easy and personal process.  A new voter would fill out the registration form, signing on the “bottom line” to demonstrate the truthfulness of their citizenship and residency.  The form was taken to the Board of Elections, where officials verified the information.  And, subject to that verification, the new voter was “enrolled” on the voter list, a registered voter.  

Union Man It’s Labor Day.  What does that mean?  The first Monday (after the first Sunday) of September is a day dedicated to those who work in America.  Traditionally, Labor Day is for those who “labor”, or, as Sherrod Brown puts it, those who take showers after work, not before. Labor Day also is traditionally a day celebrating Labor Unions. …

This is a part of the “Sunday Story Series”. No politics today, just reminiscing about the purpose of Jeeps. The TJ Flip-Mobile In the early 1990’s, I spent some time in the Virgin Islands with family. We rented a Suzuki Samurai, nicknamed a “flip-mobile”, to bop around St. Johns. Top down in the tropic sun, speeding along the narrow two lane roads, the smell of tropical forest and coconuts in the air; it opened me up to the concept of a four-wheel drive, all-terrain vehicle.

Bessent Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is the erudite and arrogant representative of the Trump Administration.  He is the face of “there’s nothing to see here” when it comes to inflation and affordability.  In fact, his general affect is:  if you think there’s an affordability problem, you just aren’t smart enough to handle money.   It’s no surprise that Bessent is constantly coming up with creative ways of letting Trump off the hook for the rising cost of living.  

Article 1, Section 4 Let’s see if I can get this straight.  The US Constitution (Article 1, Section 4) puts the power of conducting elections to the states.  But, to be fair, the Congress has some authorities when it comes to Federal elections.  They exercised those powers in the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which banned gerrymandering for the purpose of segregating or diluting racial groups.  

Nixon In August of 1974, I was a seventeen year-old graduate from Wyoming High School in Wyoming, Ohio, getting ready to go to Denison University. And, I was a “budding” politician, with multiple campaigns under my belt, including working on headquarters planning for the Get Out the Vote operation in a US Congressional Special Election.   And for the past two years, I was steeped in the Watergate scandal.  

A Track Story Back in the early 1980’s I was what I would call today, “a kid coach”.  I became an Assistant Track Coach at Watkins Memorial High School in 1978 when I was just twenty-one, three years older than my seniors.  And I became the Head Coach when I was twenty-four.  Like most of the “kid coaches” I run into today, I thought I knew everything.  

How It Worked First things first.  The Constitution of the United States (Art. 1, Sec 4) gives the power to conduct elections to the individual states.  Further interpretation of the 14th Amendment allowed Congress to make some rules and adjustments.  And the 15th (race), 18th (gender) and 24th (18 years old) Amendments expanded who was eligible to vote in Federal elections.  

Luddites In the early years of the 19th century, a group of textile workers in the North of England fought against the addition of machinery into their factories. They were opposed to the modernizations because they were afraid of losing their livelihood to “machines”. They took their name, Luddites, from a legend. The story goes that an apprentice worker, Ned Ludd, got so angry that he destroyed two “stocking frames” (mechanical knitting machines) after being criticized for his work.

Alpha Centauri Forty Trillion dollars: it’s really an unfathomable number. Forty trillion kilometers takes you to Alpha Centauri, the nearest star to our solar system. A stack of forty trillion one dollar bills would go to the Moon and back; six times. The $100,000 bill (used in 1934-35 with Woodrow Wilson as the portrait): well it would take four hundred million of those to cover forty trillion.

Lessons The recent actions of the United States are teaching lessons throughout the world.  Some of those lessons might be valuable.   They are teaching the world to be self-sufficient.  But, even those have a price in American influence.  And other lessons are dangerous to world stability. To understand the problems, we need to understand recent history.  The post-World War II world “order” was dominated by two competing powers:  the United States and the Soviet Union.  

Byron Byron Donalds is the Congressman from Southwest Florida (Ft. Myers down to Naples) and candidate for Governor in the Florida primary on August 18th.  In an exceptionally long answer to MSNOW's Peter Alexander on Monday, he spoke for five minutes straight. It was a "filibuster", designed to ignore the more specific fact-checking questions that Alexander tried to interject. Donalds used MAGA-Republican "Joe Biden" talking points.

(Randy Newman’s 1972 solution to world problems – Political Science) Greatest Ever The United States prides itself on being the most powerful military in today’s world. In fact, we go even farther. We have the largest Navy (more tonnage) and Air Force ever assembled in world history. The US does not have the largest Army (China, then India) nor the largest total forces.

Brave New World We live in a “Brave New World” of gambling.  Sure, you can still go down to the nearby casino (here in Columbus there are two), or even hang out at the local Bingo Hall (but don’t go at the first of the month, the Social Security checks are in!!).  But there are so, so, many new ways to gamble.  

America’s in Trouble America is in trouble.  The cost of everything is going up, and wages aren’t keeping pace.  And if you think that’s bad, think about trying to live on 90% of what you made in 2013.  That’s what retired folks on fixed income are looking at, down 30% in purchasing power in the last twelve years.  (For a retired public school teacher; the promised thirteen years of 3% annual Cost of Living Allowance has turned into a total of only 5.5%.  

October 7th It’s campaign time for the 2026 election, and you’re going to be hearing about this one.  Republicans are going to claim that some Democratic candidates are “anti-Semitic”, because they are horrified at Israel’s actions against Palestinians in the Middle East.  To Republicans (and by projection, for you), Israel’s actions in the Middle East since the October 7th attack by Hamas should be totally justified.   

This is a “Sunday Story”. No politics today, just a story of “modern life”. Enjoy!!! Old Can Openers Our home is now a heavy consumer of can openers.  But for decades, I didn’t even own an electric can opener.   I had one of those (really) old metal ones, that required a grip of steel and a right handed person to manipulate.  

Alligators The state of Louisiana is known for a lot of things.  There’s gumbo, bayous, New Orleans, and the LSU Tigers football team.  And, down in the bayou, there are lots of alligators.  There are supposedly three million in the wild, and another million on alligator farms.  And while there are almost as many alligators as people in Louisiana, the one thing there “ain’t”, is crocodiles.

Old Phrases It’s an old phrase, one that my coaching mentor, John McGowan taught me:  “If you always do what you always did, you always get what you always got”.   It explains the irrational expectation that doing the same action without change will result in a different outcome.  Run the same first mile of the race, get the same finish.  

It’s been a while since I wrote a “Sunday Story”. So what better way to get back to it than one about dogs – our dogs – and the “Dog Union”!!! A Dog House We are a “union” dog house. Our dogs are charter members of “Dog Meals United”, local number 200. And, as a former union President myself, I understand their organizing.

Wuhan Once Again Wednesday morning, Dr. Anthony Fauci was dragged in front of Senator Rand Paul’s Committee on Government Affairs.  For the past several years, Paul and Fauci fought a running battle over the Covid virus: where it came from, how it was controlled (or not), and what drugs were effective in treating it.   With Republicans in control of the Senate, the junior Senator from Kentucky (does McConnell still live?) is a powerful committee chairman.  

Morning Joe Joe Scarborough of  MSNOW’s “Morning Joe” made big news this morning.  In his daily “rant”, he made a major statement:  “I am not a Socialist”.  Duh… Joe was a conservative Republican back in the day when he represented Pensacola in the US Congress.  He came in as one of Newt Gingrich’s “Contract with America” boys in 1994.  When he left the Congress in 2001, he embarked on a new career, this time in New York with what was then called 

In Harness I’ve been writing about politics for almost a decade.  And I’ve been living American politics, and particularly Democratic Party politics, since Mom stuck a JFK for President button on my blue sweater in the summer of 1960. I was three.  So let me tell you a little bit about my Party. I’ve used this analogy before, but it still applies.  

Dominoes I never learned how to play dominoes.   I guess there’s a “game”; kind of a tabletop thing where you match the dots.  But that’s not what I thought dominoes were for.  As a kid, dominoes were for toppling.  If you lined them up just right, you could knock down one, and the line of dominoes snaking around the floor would continue the chain until all were flat on the ground.  

The Balance It has always been a balance in our society, the scale measured between two different values.  One is the value of a free press, so important that it’s directly stated in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.  The Founding Fathers, like all politicians, were bothered by the “press”.  But they also used it, even from the beginnings of the American Experiment.  

McCain John McCain ran for President in 2008 against Barack Obama.  Whatever you thought of his politics, McCain had a tremendous resume.  He was a US Senator from Arizona, and a Naval Aviator during the Vietnam War who flew twenty-three combat missions over Vietnam.  The seminal event of his life was during that last mission, when he was shot down, injured, and captured by the North Vietnamese.  

Retirement I’m a retired teacher and coach, of that I’m sure.  But retired is kind of a “fuzzy” word.  I officiated over seventy track and cross country meets last year.  I gave presentations about pole vaulting to multiple groups. And I coached a “pit” at a track and field camp over the summer.  I’m even consulting as an “expert” on a track related lawsuit.  

Future Classroom Fifty years from now, there will still be classrooms.  Students will still be studying, listening to teachers, and exploring ideas with their classmates.  The idea that Artificial Intelligence will replace all of that is foolish.  AI will have its place, capable of Star Trek like conversations and searches. It already is. But human interaction, reasoning, and argument will remain an important part of education.  

Bad Movie Here’s a trivia question for you.  You turn on a movie, twenty minutes after it starts.  As you “drop in”, you see multiple random vehicles chasing a car or van.  A close up inside the chased car shows a group of men, or a man and his child, struggling to avoid getting overtaken.  But the random vehicles are relentless, and finally the chased car is boxed in and slows.  

So Much E-Mail My email is voluminous.  I get well over one hundred emails a day. If I don’t check every few hours, it's overwhelming.  Most, not surprisingly, are for various Democratic candidates around the country, pleading their  case, and asking for donations.  Some are more persistent. I get multiple messages from Sherrod Brown and Amy Acton.  No, they aren’t asking for advice – but since I’m local to Ohio, they just send a lot more donation requests.  

Full Sprint Lindsey Graham, Senator from South Carolina, died Saturday, at 71 years of age. He dropped, as they say, in full sprint.  He was Ankara, Turkey on Thursday, his birthday. And he was in Ukraine on Friday, trying to bridge the gap between his friend, Donald Trump, and the one of the few issues where Graham stood firm; support for Ukraine.  

Powerball $749 million dollars is a lot of money.   When the Powerball jackpot reached that amount, there were various articles about how to spend the winnings.  With the Powerball, about half would go to taxes.  That leaves $324 million left to spend – still not bad.  Financial advisors suggest the winner should spend 10%, $32 million, on whatever they might want.  

Collins Senator Susan Collins of Maine is an adept politician.  In her thirty years in office, she’s cultivated her political image as a “moderate”.  That’s not easy.  She’s a Republican that the good people of  majority-Democrat Maine (Maine voted for Harris by seven percent) can accept, because she’s appears to be in the middle.  Collins famously joined John McCain (thumbs down) in saving the Affordable Care Act in 2017.  

Progressives The Democratic Party is having an interesting primary season.  In more “progressive” areas, several moderate Democrats, including incumbents, lost their primary to much more progressive candidates.  Some of those progressives ran under the banner of the Democratic Socialists, while other avoided it.  But many progressives are aligned with the Bernie Sanders-Elizabeth Warren-Alexandria Ocasio Cortez wing of the Party. There’s a lot going on there.