Gordon Parks’ 1946 photograph “American Gothic: Portrait of Government Cleaning Woman Ella Watson” plays off of Grant Wood’s iconic painting of the same name, stating in no uncertain terms that Watson’s contribution to American society was no less important or dignified than Wood’s dour White farmer and his wife. *Courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs.*

The paintbrush and the gun

October 28, 2023

Many years ago now, I interviewed Renaissance man Gordon Parks — photographer, composer, writer and film director (“Shaft”), a man whose photojournalism in the 1940s through ’70s captured both the civil rights movement and Hollywood.

Parks had grown up poor and Black in Kansas. I asked him what kept him from being embittered by poverty and racial prejudice. He said something that has stayed with me ever since and that I have thought about a lot in the past few weeks of war and other violence: “It’s easier to pick up a paintbrush than a gun.”

The once and future war: Israel and 'The Iliad'

October 15, 2023

Do we believe in coincidence or predestination? Is everything happenstance or is it a case that there are no accidents (Freud) and that “God does not play dice with the universe” (Einstein)?

Is that universe sending us a message by releasing a new translation of Homer’s “The Iliad” by University of Pennsylvania classics professor Emily Wilson just as Hamas savagely attacked Israel and Israel responded with a ferocious declaration of war? It would seem so, for the ancient Greek epic has much to tell us about issues that speak to our time, not the least of which are overweening male pride and rage, power as a zero sum game and stupefyingly bad leadership.

A world of immigrants

July 4, 2019

As America celebrates its 243rd birthday today, we are reminded that we are a nation of immigrants — and yet that nation and that notion are both under siege. Squalor at detention camps at the border. A Washington state judge subsequently ruling that asylum seekers can’t be kept in detention indefinitely — a Trumpian policy that has created the crisis. President Donald J. Trump — so good at the trappings of America’s birthday, with his tanks in Washington D.C. and his speech at the Lincoln Memorial — defiying the Supreme Court ruling that bars a citizenship question on the U.S. Census.

Taking it on the (double) chin re: North Korea

May 28, 2018

Do you think it was the premature commemorative coin, in which “L’il Kim” Jong-un is portrayed with two chins and President Donald J. Trumpet with only one? (Which is laughable. Melania could do a step workout on her husband’s triple chins.)

The much-“Trump”eted summit between the two narcissists – which Donnie Two Scoops suddenly called off after Kim essentially pulled out – may be on again for June 12 in Singapore. Or not. We don’t know. Because that’s the way Trumpet rolls.

He sent Kim a letter that set new standards for passive aggression in what can only be described as a cross between a threatening lawsuit and an insecure society hostess’ thank you note…

The art of the ‘no deal’

May 10, 2018

So, President Donald J. Trumpet has gone and done what he said he would do, what many feared he would do, and backed out of the Iran nuclear agreement. There were sunset clauses, Iran could still produce ballistic missiles that could reach Israel, blah, blah, blah. Then, too, President Barack Obama was an architect of the deal and we all know of the obsessive psychodrama that is Trumpet’s hatred of Obama. So, the Iran nuclear agreement was nuked the moment The Donald became president.

But if it were so terrible, why not go to our allies – alias Emmanuel Macron, who’s left to pick up the pieces – and work with them to strengthen the deal, revamp it or put a new one in place?…

Saying goodbye to UNESCO, again

October 14, 2017

Well, in a week in which President Donald J. Trump decertified the Iran nuclear deal, eliminated subsidies for insurance companies that underwrite poorer Obamacare enrollees and warned Puerto Rico that the federal government can’t buck it up forever, the American withdrawal from UNESCO may seem like small potatoes. But as a longtime cultural writer I noted it with a heavy heart.

As with these other issues, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is more complex than it seems. The U.S. helped found it after World War II, but in recent decades has had an off-and-on again relationship with the organization, which is well-known for its significant World Heritage Sites list. ...

Trump and the soundtrack of our lives

May 22, 2017

What can you say about the past week in Washington D.C. except that God is the best screenwriter. I mean, who else could come up with such a beta-ameloid and tau tangle of plot twists and turns replete with a depth of characters – which is not the same as depth of character.

In the latest scene in our saga, Don Donald Trumpet – cue “The Godfather” theme – had sought an oath of loyalty from would-be consigliere James Comey. But Comey had demurred, necessitating his “termination.” ...