The few and the proud

March 8, 2017

There is such an abysmal spectrum of disrespect and insensitivity these days – from Housing Secretary Ben Carson ignorantly calling slaves “immigrants” to the vicious attacks on Jewish cemeteries – that it’s hard to know what to write about first. Certainly, there’s no shortage of blog material screaming for fresh outrage. But today’s ire must be reserved for Marines United sharing nude photos of women and lewd, derogatory comments on Facebook.

As someone who writes homoerotic novels, I appreciate a nude – especially a male nude – as much as the next person. And I have little interest in what consenting adults do in private. ...

The Trump Administration’s ‘Red Dawn’

March 5, 2017

Is there anyone who hasn’t talked to the Russians? I’m beginning to think I had a conversation with the Ruskies without realizing it. I love red, the Russian color of beauty, and, of course, the ballet, which the Russians perfected. The greatest American choreographer was the Russian-born, Communist-fleeing George Balanchine, who used to say it was a pleasure to pay taxes to the United States. He must be pirouetting in his grave at the twisted choreography coming out of Washington D.C. these days.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions has recused himself from investigating the Trump Administration’s ties to the Russians, because he himself talked with Russian envoy Sergey Kislyak. Or maybe not. Or maybe he did but he can’t remember what he said. Who remembers conversations? Anyway, it was before he joined Team Trump. Or maybe it happened when the dog ate his homework. ...

Is our mean streak getting wider?

February 28, 2017

Is it me or have people become less civil, nastier even?

I think of the lines from Bruce Springsteen’s song “Nebraska,” inspired by the mass murderer Charles Starkweather:

“They wanted to know why I did what I did.

“Well, sir, I guess there’s just a meanness in this world.”

But is there? As far as institutions and laws are concerned, the world has gotten more just and compassionate. Today, most of us would agree that slavery is unjust, for instance. That wasn’t true 150 years ago.

But these past two weeks I have either experienced or heard about three instances of ego-besotted, bizarro, apoplectic rudeness. ...

‘Come back, Little Sheba’: The myth of lost opportunity in Trump’s America

February 27, 2017

The horrific violence visited on Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani – two Indian immigrant engineers whose death and assault respectively are now being investigated as a hate crime – places the American workforce and immigration, particularly the notion of the immigrant as demonized other, at the intersection of crisis in the America of President Donald J. Trump.

To recap, the two engineers – who worked for Garmin, a GPS navigation and communications device company – were enjoying a workday-ending whiskey at Austins Bar and Grill in Olathe, Kan., as was their wont, when Adam W. Purinton began hurling ethnic slurs at them. After patrons complained, he was thrown out but returned in a rage and shot the two, killing Kuchibhotla and wounding Madasani and Ian Grillot, who intervened. Purinton, formerly with the U.S. Navy and Federal Aviation Administration, fled to Missouri but has since been extradited to Kansas, charged with premeditated first-degree murder and two counts of attempted premeditated first-degree murder as the FBI investigates the crimes as a violation of the victims’ civil rights. (Ya think?) ...

Trump, rape and the demonization of ‘the other’

February 24, 2017

In the Another-Country-Heard-From Department, Sweden was upset by President Donald J. Trump’s remarks at a campaign rally that implied the country had suffered an attack recently related to a refugee/immigration problem. (Gee, Australia, Mexico, Sweden – three countries down and only 193 left to go.)

"We've got to keep our country safe," he said. "You look at what's happening in Germany. You look at what's happening last night in Sweden. Sweden, who would believe this? Sweden.”

Despite the president’s problems with tenses, he was actually referring to a Fox News report Feb. 17 on an Ami Horowitz documentary that links refugees in Sweden to an increase in violent crimes – a correlation that has been debunked. ...

Trump as metaphor

February 22, 2017

When I interviewed historian David Starkey about his new documentary and book “The Six Wives of Henry VIII” in 2001, I asked him about the downfall of the most bewitching of the wives, Anne Boleyn (No. 2) How did such a smart Rules Girl lose her head?

Starkey’s response was a shrewd one: What’s attractive in a mistress is often annoying in a wife.

I thought of that as I watched President Donald J. Trump back on the stump as if it were 2020. (God, if only it were.) Not that Trump is any Anne Boleyn. If anything, his outsize ego, multiple wives and sybaritic cruelty are much more reminiscent of Henry. But The Donald is an Anne in this regard: They have proved better at the pursuit than the prize. ...

Champions (of a cause)

February 20, 2017

“Should professional athletes be allowed to use their status to talk about things more important than the games they play?”

That is the question that Jay Caspian Kang asks in his most recent “On Sports” column for The New York Times Magazine.

It’s a rich, juicy question, because it goes to the heart of our ambivalence toward outspoken athletes, artists, entertainers and other public figures who are not public servants. ...