Divided we fall

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.
–John F. Kennedy, September 12, 1962

Less than 7 years after President Kennedy spoke the above words, the United States, buoyed by the herculean efforts of thousands, sent Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin to the surface of the moon.

America at its best has always been about its citizens working together to achieve something great, something that would both serve as a testament to their time on earth and endure for the benefit of future generations. This ethos extends all the way back to the work of our founding fathers; it drove the Union’s victory in the Civil War, and the achievements of organized labor, women’s suffrage and civil rights groups.

Walking the streets of Lower Manhattan, one beholds the baroque wonders of its 19th- and early 20th-century architecture, residing in cramped quarters alongside sleek, modern skyscrapers. These intricately designed structures were not only built to last; they were built to impress, to announce to all who should see them, look, see what we in our time have created for you in yours.

The Greatest Generation knew this ethos implicitly. During World War II—long before the cult of celebrity was to make icons of pampered, half-cocked mega-millionaires completely detached from the realities of ordinary Americans—matinee idols Jimmy Stewart and Clark Gable joined the ranks of hundreds of thousands of citizen soldiers, flying combat missions with the 8th Army Air Force out of England. Baseball great Yogi Berra served on a rocket-launcher boat during the Normandy invasion. Director Frank Capra produced the “Why We Fight” series of films for the War Department. Bandleader Glenn Miller, overseas to entertain the troops, was killed in a plane crash on the coast of France.

Some initially opposed to the war fell in line after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, contributing their special talents to the cause. Pioneer aviator Charles Lindbergh, a onetime outspoken opponent of FDR and member of America First, the antiwar group, advised on the design of military aircraft and flew sorties with the 475th Fighter Group in the Pacific campaign.

Even the press kicked in. Edward R. Murrow, the darling of today’s left, became a household name with his radio dispatches from London during the Battle of Britain. Cranky “60 Minutes” correspondent Andy Rooney reported for Stars and Stripes magazine. Newspaper editors around the country understood that, for the duration of the war, self-censorship would at times be necessary to maintain morale on the home front.

This week, Iraq teeters on the brink of civil war following the bombing of the Askariya shrine in Samarra, likely the work of al Qaeda.

If we fail in Iraq, it won’t be because of sectarian violence stirred up by Islamic fundamentalists. It won’t be because of low morale among our men and women in uniform, as highly motivated now as they were in the days and weeks after 9/11. And as much as the left might think otherwise, it won’t be because of the “inadequate planning” and “foolish idealism” of the “neocon” Bush administration.

If we fail in Iraq, it will be because we, as Americans, have forgotten the ethos that made our country second to none. If we fail in Iraq, what a tragedy it will be for future generations.

Wookin' pa nub

Regular readers of the Hell’s Kitchen Dispatch may wonder what the situation is with Joe Bones; to wit, is he spoken for, or what?

The answer is, nobody speaks for Joe Bones; but if what you really mean is, does he have a girlfriend or wife, the answer is, how can Joe Bones have a girlfriend or wife, run and promote a startup, walk Ilsa the wonder dog three times a day, try to stay in shape, practice his chops on the ukulele and then find the time to do research for and post on the Dispatch? In short, Joe Bones is as available as tickets to a Knicks game, which is to say he’s really quite available.

For the past few weeks I toyed with the idea of posting an online personal. My job involves a lot of solitary time in front of a computer, and most of the women in my building are either married or in relationships. The bottom line is, opportunity has been in short supply. So last night, I decided to take the plunge.

I visited a website a friend told me about, a site frequented by artists, writers and other creative types, and had a look around. I browsed personals posted by straight men and women to get a feel for the place. Then I typed and submitted the following for approval:

“I'm not like other guys on [name of website]. I don't own a yoga mat. I fired my shrink years ago. I'm selective in my use of irony. I don't particularly like W., but I don't hate him either. I guess I'm something of an iconoclast around here. Who knew? I'm well-traveled and travel well. Love Senegal. Can't cook shoe leather, but I actually enjoy doing dishes. It's therapeutic, more so than my shrink was. I'm high intensity, energy-wise. I work hard; in my company I'm everything from president to mop boy. I never met a park I didn't like. Love playing music and writing, as well as sparking creativity in others. My friends are few and close. Love's a rare gem. I won't play games with you. If we click, we'll know.”

I received an e-mail today saying that my personal was approved and posted. Joe Bones has officially entered the world of online dating. I briefly dabbled in this arena last year, to no avail. Believe it or not, I’m pretty shy when it comes to the fair sex, and the idea of initiating an e-mail exchange with a photo and a few paragraphs you see online still kind of freaks me out. I’ll see where this experiment leads. If anything interesting materializes, you’ll read about it here.

Sophie redux:

I saw “Sophie Scholl: The Last Days” last Saturday. It’s an intense film, dark and sad but ultimately inspiring. Apparently much of the screenplay was based on recently discovered historical records and transcripts. Stephen Whitty, of the Newark Star-Ledger, compares ‘Sophie Scholl’ with “Find Me Guilty” and “End of the Spear,” two films I haven’t seen. But he’s definitely on the same page as me in his review, particularly in this passage:

“[U]nlike the missionaries of ‘End of the Spear,’ Scholl's Christianity isn't portrayed as the answer, but simply her answer. It gives her comfort, it gives her strength and -- in the film's true moral center, a series of wrenching interrogation scenes -- it gives her the perfect response to the Nazis' cold philosophy of racial superiority and moral relativism, a living example of everything they don't understand.”

And a living example of everything Stephen Holden doesn’t understand.

Secularizing Sophie Scholl

An Oscar nominee for Best Foreign-Language Film is currently playing in Manhattan. It’s called, “Sophie Scholl: The Final Days,” and it’s based on a true story about a 21-year-old college student and member of a dissident group called the White Rose who is arrested for treason in 1943 Nazi Germany after she's caught distributing anti-Nazi leaflets at the University of Munich.

In today’s New York Post, Kyle Smith begins his review of the film thusly:

“The name ‘Sophie Scholl’ could become a synonym for principled, Christian resistance to evil, but this often wrenching true story about six days in the life of a college student who stood up to the Nazis does not quite turn Sophie into a hero.”

That stoked my curiosity, especially since Smith gives the film three stars. Why isn’t Sophie a hero?

Toward the end of the review Smith writes:

“A hero is someone who is brave, has definitely accomplished something and may or may not have suffered for it. But today’s media seek to redefine a hero as someone who is brave, may or may not have accomplished anything and definitely suffered for it. The distinction between heroes and victims is becoming lost.”

Hmmm. Well, I agree with Smith insofar that I think the word “hero” is used rather liberally nowadays. I’m not sure I would have expressed this thought the same way he does, however. And if Sophie’s not a hero (or heroine), I would much prefer calling her something other than a “victim.” Martyr, perhaps? Especially given this statement, from a pamphlet on Sophie Scholl published by the White Rose Foundation: "In Munich Sophie met artists, writers and philosophers, particularly Carl Muth and Theodor Haecker, who were important contacts for her concern with the Christian faith. Of foremost importance was the question of how the individual must act under dictatorship."

Given my lifelong fascination for all things World War II, I will definitely check out "Sophie Scholl: the Final Days" this weekend. In the meantime, I was curious what the New York Times thought of a movie about “principled, Christian resistance to evil.”

So I logged on to the paper's website and clicked on the review. Reading the headline, I saw that the Times would agree with how I’d characterize Sophie. “The Quiet Resolve of a German Anti-Nazi Martyr,” it read. Then I started reading the review, by Stephen Holden.

Right out of the gate, Holden strips away any notion of Scholl’s idealism being driven by her religion:

“’Sophie Scholl: The Final Days’ conveys what it must have been like to be a young, smart, idealistic dissenter in Nazi Germany, where no dissent was tolerated.”

Now why would Holden do that, I thought. I continued reading. Ah, I see. He's done that so he can drag the Bush Administration’s handling of the war on terror into his review of a film about Nazi Germany. I get it. First, remove Christianity from the equation, and then challenge your readers to place themselves in Scholl's now secularized shoes and think how they would react if Bush turned into Hitler and eliminated all their civil liberties.

Also from Holden's lead paragraph:

“This gripping true story, directed in a cool, semi-documentary style by the German filmmaker Marc Rothemund from a screenplay by Fred Breinersdorfer, challenges you to gauge your own courage and strength of character should you find yourself in similar circumstances. Would you risk your life the way Sophie Scholl (Julia Jentsch) and a tiny group of fellow students at Munich University did to spread antigovernment leaflets? How would you behave during the kind of relentless interrogations that Sophie endures? If sentenced to death for your activities, would you still consider your resistance to have been worth it? In a climate of national debate in the United States about the overriding of certain civil liberties to fight terrorism, the movie looks back on a worst possible scenario in which such liberties were taken away. It raises an unspoken question: could it happen here?”

In the eighth paragraph of his ten-paragraph review, Holden does allow this: “At each turning point, Sophie, who is deeply religious, prays to God for help.”

In a word, unbelievable.

Battery Park at dawn

Here are some pictures I took yesterday and today in Battery Park, featuring Ilsa the wonder dog.



Tuesday morning: Knee-deep snow and a frigid temperature shortened our daily romp. I did, however, manage to snap this photo of Castle Clinton, so named in 1817 for then Governor DeWitt Clinton.



Wednesday morning: Already a considerable amount of snow has melted. The barely visible blue lettering to the left marks the entrance to the Staten Island Ferry terminal.



Here's Ilsa, posing for her profile. That's New York Harbor in the background.



You've always wondered about that "wonder dog" appellation? Check out those ears, looking like angel's wings ready for takeoff. Now you know.



Here's Ilsa romping along the riverwalk. Behind her a water taxi shuttles Wall Streeters to work.



Fritz Koenig's "The Sphere," or what's left of it. This metallic sculpture originally stood in Austin Tobin Plaza, between the World Trade Center towers. About 6 months after 9/11, the damaged piece was moved to Battery Park, where it was unveiled, along with an "eternal flame," in memory of that tragic day. The blue fence behind it recently went up to wall off the ongoing expansion of the Bowling Green subway station.

Tom jitterbugs the forecast—and comes up short

It’s official.

According to the New York Times:

“The National Weather Service said 26.9 inches of snowfall was measured in Central Park at 4:10 p.m., exceeding the previous record of 26.4 inches, set in December 1947.”

That’s December 26 and 27, 1947, to be precise.

So we got dumped on this weekend. The funny thing is, you wouldn’t really know it here in Lower Manhattan. I don’t know if it’s because most of the snow wound up on the rooftops, what with the buildings standing so close together in these parts; or if it’s because Manhattan Island narrows at the southern tip, and the howling winds of this nor’easter just blew the bulk of the white stuff by us.

Or maybe it just didn’t snow as much down here. If I had to guess, I’d say we got about 18 inches. But over two feet? Nah, not here.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of snow around. The building outside my window, a stately, red-brick structure that went up in the early 20th century, now looks almost edible, the snow along its ledges resembling wedding-cake icing. And early this morning Ilsa the wonder dog and I had to cut short our walk—or rather, trudge—after about three blocks because the sidewalks had yet to be cleared. At one point Ilsa almost disappeared as she inadvertently bounded past the curb and into the unplowed street.

Martin the doorman tells me he just got back from the Poconos, and up there only five inches dusted the roads. Queens, where he lives, is another matter entirely. “Buried,” he says. He dreads driving home. “I’ll bet I’ll need around two hours just to find a parking space,” he says without exaggeration.

Meanwhile, on Long Island my brother Tom is reveling in this, the biggest snowstorm to capture his imagination. Tom’s a big fan of snowstorms and hurricanes. The more awesome the display of Mother Nature, the more he cheers. He’s also a bit of a jitterbug boy. Let's just say if tall tales played basketball, his would play center.

But not even Tom could stretch the truth about the magnitude of today’s precipitation. Last night, as the snow just started sticking to the wet street outside Patty’s Inn, one of his local haunts, Tom stood at the bar, diet Coke in hand, and proclaimed to all the patrons within earshot, “We’re gonna get up to two feet! It’s gonna be a monster! Woo-hoo!”

“Sure, Tom,” answered the barman, pouring a draft and rolling his eyes. “That’s why the weather report says 12 inches at most.”

Like I said, Tom is in his glory today. Today his jitterbugging was actually outdone by Mother Nature.

'Climate change' heats up

An old cartoon theme reemerged in my thoughts today like long-lost flotsam. Now, with the power of Google, I can unleash it on the world. Take that, Muslim Brotherhood!

What a wild and crazy week this has been. Just when I thought I was barking up a tree about climate change, along come 86 evangelical Christian leaders with their “Evangelical Climate Initiative.”

According to a story appearing in yesterday’s New York Times, the statement announcing the initiative notes, “millions of people could die in this century because of climate change, most of them our poorest global neighbors.”

The initiative calls for federal legislation to curb carbon dioxide emissions and encourages solutions to global warming through “market-based mechanisms.” Backers of the initiative plan to get their message out through radio and TV ads, church campaigns and educational events at Christian colleges.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out, both with the greater evangelical community and conservatives in general. Already, other evangelicals are crying foul. According to the Times story, “Some of the nation's most high-profile evangelical leaders, however, have tried to derail such action. Twenty-two of them signed a letter in January declaring, ‘Global warming is not a consensus issue.’"

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal’s position on climate change has been rather curious of late. After President Bush’s State of the Union address, the paper ran an editorial, “Addicted to Polls,” that criticized the president’s turnabout on energy policy as caving in to public opinion—specifically fears over gas prices—in the run-up to the 2006 elections.

James Taranto, in his February 1 “Best of the Web Today” column, had this to say about Bush’s energy proposals:

“One decidedly false note came when Bush complained that ‘America is addicted to oil’ and promised new government programs aimed at a great goal: to replace more than 75% of our oil imports from the Middle East by 2025. This seemed just like wrongheaded palaver, boob bait for bobos. If we're going to democratize the Middle East, why do we need to reduce imports of oil from the region?”

(Um, perhaps because it’s going to take decades to democratize the Middle East, and we can no longer wait for the oil sheikhs to stop funneling petrodollars to those who would harm us?)

What I find particularly interesting about these pieces—and indeed about the president’s “addicted to oil” remarks—is that there’s not a peep anywhere about climate change. For the president, it's about national security. And for the Journal, it's about, depending on who you're reading, the president playing to either public opinion polls or "bobos."

It’s almost as if the president and the Wall Street Journal were hedging their bets. Just in case the meteorological freak show again rears its ugly head this summer.

Endnote:

Anyone see the Grammys? What a snore. Well, maybe not entirely. McCartney’s “Helter Skelter” packed a wallop. And seeing Sly Stone, one of my musical heroes, on stage again was a joy to behold, even if he only stuck around for a minute or two. God bless, Sly. I dug that Mohawk! The Bones jury is still out on the teaming of Macca with rappers Jay-Z and Linkin Park for a postmodernized “Yesterday.” If you missed it, you can catch it here. Crazy, man. Crazy.

Talking the “tawk”

The neatest thing happened tonight. As Ilsa the wonder dog and I waited in the lobby for the elevator to take us up to our apartment, a young cop who was talking to the doorman stopped to watch Ilsa play with her leash. (Ilsa likes to carry her leash in her mouth on the way home from our walks, to the delight of anyone who has witnessed this stunt.)

The cop leaned over, held out his hand and began to approach her, whereupon she crouched, front paws spread out, and started barking through clenched teeth. The cop paused, and in the coolest New York accent since the Bowery Boys, said, “Oh, I see…you’re afraid of ewe-ni-fawms, huh?”

There have been many imitators, but no one can peg a “New Yawk” accent like a native New Yorker. And I’ve heard more New Yawkese in Lower Manhattan than anywhere else in the Big Town in the almost 13 years I’ve lived here. That’s probably because Lower Manhattan—what with the New York Stock Exchange; city, state and federal office buildings; the Staten Island Ferry, and other potential terrorist targets all in close proximity—has what has to be the most intensive NYPD and security protection in the five boroughs.

Seeing this blue-uniformed omnipresence was a little unnerving to me when I moved down here last year. I mean, every weekend, returning to my apartment with a Mini Cooper full of groceries, I have to stop at a security checkpoint, tell the guard why I’m there and then wait for one of two mammoth pickup trucks parked diagonally to back up and make room for me to pass. That brings me to another area where I have to shut off my engine, unlock all the doors and wait for a bomb-sniffing dog to be led around my car. Once that’s done, the dog’s handler signals the driver of another mammoth pickup truck parked diagonally to back up and let me through.

What can I say? You learn to live with this new reality. And you take comfort in little things, like hearing all of these men in uniform speaking New Yawkese. The lingo was not exactly unknown to me growing up on Long Island. Several uncles and horse-playing friends of my father all talked the “tawk.”

Last Sunday, again returning to my apartment with a Mini Cooper full of groceries, one of the guys at the checkpoint started asking me about my car, and for all the world it could have been my cousin Pat, another fella who likes cars and talks the "tawk." Except this guy was in uniform, and he carried one big-ass gun.

Endnote:

And the best commercial to air on Super Bowl Sunday is…

Leonard Nimoy on his cellphone with his manager. “I can’t do it.” Then he takes Aleve, an arthritis pain reliever. Cut to Nimoy walking out on stage. A crowd of nerdy, costumed Trekkies waits in silent anticipation. Nimoy holds up his hand, smiles and gives the Vulcan “live long and prosper” hand sign. The audience goes wild. Advertising perfection.

Hotheads prevail

You’re an artist of so-so talent starving for wider recognition. What do you do?

Paint a picture of Osama bin Laden as Jesus Christ!

That’s exactly what the artist who calls himself “Tafa” did. His painting is currently on display at the Puck Building here in Manhattan as part of the National Black Fine Art Show. Judging from what he created, it appears that “Tafa” is yet another angry leftist who somehow equates Christianity with radical Islam. Call it secular chic in the pomo world.

Oh well, it’s a free country. It’s not like this brand of guerrilla artistry is anything new. Anyone remember Piss Christ?

Some Christians are adamant in their belief that such works of “art” should not be publicly displayed. Most of us, however, have learned to turn the other cheek, so to speak. There will always be some artist somewhere who, short on talent and long on ambition, will go the “controversial” route for his 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, the Muslim world has completely lost it over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad appearing first in a Danish newspaper and then in papers throughout Europe. Apparently the latter papers ran the cartoons in response to the initial outcry against the Danish paper, and as a gesture of solidarity in support of freedom of expression. I haven’t had the time to really research this story, but I have seen the news footage of incensed throngs, burning buildings, and a placard that read, “Freedom go to hell.”

You can’t get more polarized than that.

It’s times like these that I’ll log on to Victor Hanson’s website. He hasn’t commented on the cartoon flap yet. But in his essay, “Three Pillars of Wisdom,” historian Hanson’s verdict on the Middle East, its rage, and its nuclear ambition, confirmed my worst fear:

“[U]ntil we arrive at liberal and consensual governments that prove stable, there will be no real peace. And if an Iran, Saudi Arabia, or Syria obtains nuclear weapons, there will be eventually war on an unimaginable scale, predicated on the principle that the West will tolerate almost any imaginable horror to ensure that one of its cities is not nuked or made uninhabitable.”

Why do I suddenly feel like it’s 1936 all over again?