Archive for November, 2017


Matt Lauer’s dismissal flashed across the television screen while attending to my father’s aid.  After a Thanksgiving stroke, my father’s condition left little time to review and assess anything more than a few sips of coffee is a silent cafeteria or quick naps listening the ‘beeps,’ ‘burps,’ and ‘swoosh’ of medical devices. Still, even I felt momentarily paralyzed.

Did this paralysis come forth because I knew Matt Lauer? Nope. Never met him or any other morning show host. In fact, I’ve only seen snippets of the ‘Today’ show in the past ten years. Neither have I been a regular purveyor of CBS, ABC, or FOX. If any show does standout, it would be ‘Morning Joe.’ My paralysis came forth not because I was surprised by Lauer’s termination, but rather from having incessantly witnessed harassment throughout my first 15 year career path. ‘Witness’ may be a bad term. Maybe the right word should be ‘trained.’

My early years included stints in the military, a non-for-profit, and an Asian automotive manufacturer. A lot of scenes weren’t pretty and were crude, ugly and demeaning. I simply cannot recall the amount of times I heard ‘pussy,’ ‘nipples,’ ‘dick,’ ‘suck,’ ‘anal,’ ‘breasts’ and whatever. Morning breaks included tallies of women conquered as if one were free-climbing a mountain’s summit. Lunch was about measurements, was she filled, did she scream, ‘glazing the donuts,’ and what’s left on the ‘to-do’ list before dumping the victim like trash strewn off an interstate.

The culture of my era did not tolerate non-compliance, neither male nor female. Intolerance resulted in an immediate career death spiral.  Twenty-years ago, as an employee of the aforementioned Asian automotive manufacturer, I lost my career protecting a female colleague against harassment. Job reviewer particularly noted “… not an effective fit for current company culture.” Seven years later, working as a consultant during an assignment in London, United Kingdom, just across the river from the Parliament building, I again defended a female co-worker being publicly and sexually harassed. The result? Same as before, I was released as part of department restructuring. Strange how I was the only employee ‘restructured.’

While I considered my father to be an upstanding man, he, like all father’s, was not perfect. He did, at one time, have an affair. As such, after reading the accounts of current victims, I wonder if the harassment witnessed in my era engulfed my father’s. There appears to be little difference. And therein lies the problem. Our harassment problem is broader than television or political icons. Harassment is a decades old, even hundreds and hundreds of years.

Over the years, I was never in a position to effectively require ‘sex on demand.’ I was never allowed that type of management position. Looking rearward, the lack of morality or corporate culture witnessed is not an excuse, then nor now. Harassment and sexual control remains just as much part of this world as it was my father’s. What’s changed is the dialogue. And the dialogue is greatly needed.

Many of us who worked and labored came to our workplaces to establish a career. Some found additional power in sex. It’s the leaders of my era who left a trail of pain in our wake. We were practitioners who disgracefully abused roles as leaders and mentors, betraying the trust of coworkers. However, most of us kept a silence on disturbing events swirling about. As told, protect the company. We coddled ourselves into believing the opportunity to learn valued more than our lack of moral strength. And if we said anything, we’d destroy the very careers we were cultivating. Like the good soldiers of A Few Good Men, we justified our actions via words like honor, code, loyalty.

I’ll end with a quote from the movie listed above.

Downey: What did we do wrong? We did nothing wrong!

Dawson: Yeah, we did. We were supposed to fight for people who couldn’t fight for themselves.

As Buddhists, Christians or Atheists, we’re supposed to fight for everyone equally. The problem is, we don’t. We didn’t in my day, neither do we today.

I just noticed my last post, A Recollection of Five Thanksgivings and Lessons Learned.  My last changes were edited at 9:16 AM Eastern. In turn, there are thanks which went unmentioned.

I am thankful for my family, for all they given, for all the effort in which they’ve loved me. Surely, there has been countless times I challenged them otherwise. If not for their love, I would not have overcome my own inadequacies and fallacies.

I am thankful to have been a child under my father’s home. By all accounts, his childhood was extremely difficult and nearly lost his mind. Yet he lived to prosper in his own way, married and gave birth to both me and my brother. I don’t believe I would have made it through my own challenges under another. Then again, maybe I was meant to have been born by him for that very reason.

I am thankful for friends who, regardless of my faith, prayed for my father. I remain quite unsure of prayer’s power, but I saw a sight of Christ never previously experienced. It was the truest form of agape prayer rarely seen, one that has shaken my soul and breathed a power of support I will need. To that experience, I thank my friends and Christ.

I am thankful for Apple FaceTime. Everyday, for the last five years, I was able to connect to my mother and father. Whether it was five minutes or hours, FaceTime provided moments I couldn’t otherwise experience. Just as the song Seasons of Love captured, our days were filled with daylights, sunsets, midnights, and cups of coffee; there were inches, there were miles, there was laughter, there was strife. There was hope, there was reconciliation, there was heart, but most of all, there was love. If not for Apple designers, technicians project managers and leaders managers, my father and I would not have gotten one more hour.

I say all these thanks for one more hour. For an hour after my last post, I potentially witnessed the last moments of my father’s life – via an iPad, through Apple FaceTime. Mid-sentence, my father straightened and fell over. At once, I became the ultimate Buddhist, a witness, a ghost who could see, but could not alter the events on screen. I could see my father and I witnessed the horror of my mother’s futile attempts to assist.

I am thankful for all the countless medical clinicians in a Tucson, AZ hospital who’ve cared for my mother and father. Tests remain – MRI’s, blood tests, physical assessment and so on. But these medical clinicians are direct hands of Christ, God, Buddha or whomever. They are God’s love, given to all.

After 86 years of life, I presume my father’s stroke prepares him for an exit from this life. As I await this final moment, I will no doubt give many more thanks to countless people that I should, but will never remember. I will thank them all for that extra hour.

If my father were able to speak here tonight, he would ask all of you to reach out, hug those you love and tell them how much them mean. So I will ask all you, for him. I know it’s late. But do it. You may get nary an hour more.

God, I am thankful for one more hour.

Bless you all.

This blog of “thoughts” started over five years ago. And with exception for a few sabbaticals, I continue to provide something to anyone willing to stop and read. November 2012 found me in Ocean City, Maryland. November 2013 Vermont saw me host the holidays as I looked over Lake Champlain. In 2014, I opined on Jameis Winston and our inability to provide credibility to victims of sexual violence. On a personal note, we’ve learn little in the waning years. Missouri University and Black Lives Matter decorated the nation’s table in 2015. Last year, I was on sabbatical, as I traveled five countries while briefly discussing Trump’s “War on Christmas” – to which I’ve not seen.

So, what have I learned?

America remains a great country. The economy is rolling. Granted we need to improve wages for poorer folks; create some form of national healthcare that everyone can use, and create a better world for our children.

Despite the fact most people don’t know the complete words of our national anthem, America has sports. In America, we can choose to protest by kneeling or rioting in the streets. I am thankful our sports teams can give us a momentary pause to think while enjoying something rich and wonderfully diverse.

God bless America’s immigrants. Each person coming to America adds their own flavor and layer of life to America. Like all living things,  we require injections of new thinking and energy, and rearranging our identity and heritage is a wonderful process. Most arrive from desperation, but they learn and like others before them, they reshape America. Diversity is our strength.

I am thankful to have gotten this far in life. Wasn’t meant to. I am thankful for my doctors who provide me the opportunity to defy the odds. These medical professionals, researchers, clinicians and physical therapists are the real gifts from God. They’ve arbitrarily decided my net worth from some big office based upon my healthcare policy. And even though I will eat some Hickory Farms beef sausage, don’t take my momentary weakness personally.

Having traveled to all fifty states, I am thankful to understand just how big America is. As such, America is not under siege. Our size, depth and global position of our country prevents us from being under siege. And the world is thankful our reality TV star, who has promised to “bomb the shit” out of our enemies, attack the families of terrorists, and reinstitute torture, has remained relatively ineffective. As such, most Americans will die from old age versus anything terrorism.

Taking a message from Thich Nhat Hanh, I will recite “The Five Contemplations” at mealtime. The verses have been handed down through twenty-five centuries. Each is known for their depth of compassion and wisdom and remind us to walk lightly on this earth and consider our purpose. They remind us to be mindful of unwholesome acts, such as greed, anger, and delusion, and to transform them with insight, wisdom, and loving-kindness.

  1. This food is the gift of the whole universe—the earth, the sky, and much hard work;
  2. May we live in a way that makes us worthy to receive it;
  3. May we transform our unskillful states of mind, especially our greed;
  4. May we take only foods that nourish us and prevent illness; and
  5. We accept this food so that we may realize the path of practice.

Peace to all.

On the eve of his Thanksgiving holiday departure, President Trump gave an accused pedophile in the Alabama Senatorial Candidate some huge support. And, in the early morning hours, on the anniversary of President Kennedy’s assassination, with all that’s wrong in the world, Trump found time to disgrace the NFL, LaVar Ball, and retweeted a post from a London-based radio host “… If Hillary got my kid out of prison, as much as I hate the woman, I’d thank her corrupt ass.

No America, this is not your parent’s Grand Ol’ Party.  As CNN’s Chris Cillizza noted, the message from many establishment Republicans used to be that it wasn’t worth sacrificing moral principles solely to hold control of a single Senate seat. Today, the GOP nickname might become Grand Ol’ Pedophile’s.

So what happened? Where did moral integrity flee?

Rev. Ed Litton, senior pastor of the Redemption Church said “We can’t say, well, that doesn’t matter because some people in the other party do the same thing. These are serious allegations. And our faith, our worldview, demands that we take seriously the victimization of people.” However, all we’ve heard from many candidates and pundits is repeated vitriol toward anyone who professes serious conflict of interest against their candidate.

Trump’s business executive councils imploded because corporate CEOs realized it was ethically untenable to be associated with the president. However, we “the people” remain willing to accept the cup of bitterness offered by a demagogue.

I wonder if there are any “normal” Republicans anymore. If there are, they have a couple problems. First, they can’t displace Trump because they don’t have an alternative to Trump’s white grievance as a core message. Second, their stuck arguing against Obama policies, because arguing against the white grievance message would expose the failure to develop any meaningful policies to help anyone. Third, Obama is gone. So it’s easier to blame everything on Obama.

In June 2017, author MJ Lee wrote, “In recent history, presidents have turned to their faith in moments of crisis. Bill Clinton, a Baptist, called on the Rev. Jesse Jackson, the famed civil rights leader, to counsel his family in the fallout of his affair with Monica Lewinsky. The night before he announced his resignation, Richard Nixon, a Quaker, is said to have gotten down on his knees to pray in the Lincoln Sitting Room of the White House, weeping.”

Unfortunately, faith seems to only play a role when speaking at evangelic conferences, breakfasts or dinners. As such, moral faith of current Congressional leadership seems awash in the same faith of those that killed Christ. Just as in days of old, our nation’s leadership has been tested daily and we’ve watch personal moral flee.

One time or another, all of us flees from moral integrity. Republicans, Democrats, Buddhists, Christians and atheists alike. However, if you’re called to be a leader, you are called to a level of moral integrity that prevents candidates like Roy Moore.

The Devil You Get

Some thirty years ago, coworkers complained, whined and suggested they required new management to solve office malaise and downtrodden funk. Without batting an eye, a middle level manager piped up, “Be careful, the devil you get may be worse than the devil you got.”

It’s in that context that I look upon Mark Lee, a recently interviewed Trump supporter who offered that if Jesus Christ told him Trump colluded with Russia, he’d still defer to the president on whether or not it was true. Of course, he’s one guy who’s hopefully exaggerating for effect, but then again, thirty-years ago, nearly half of Louisiana voted for a Klansman. And we (the John Q. Public struggled to explain why.

Accordingly, America was so eager to rid the world of Obama and Clinton era’s, they voted Trump. And now they’ve to a new Devil.

The problem Mr. Lee and other Trump have supporters is that they bought into the candidate’s vision of himself as a savior of the working class. In a lot of ways, Trump mirrored campaign pages of the Klansman. Trump abhors welfare, foreign aid, affirmative action and outsourcing. He attacked Washington’s political-action committees, big money and the subversion of the common man. He even tried to appeal to black voters.

So, who’s the model? Klansman David Duke.

Writer Adam Serwer accurately denotes America’s current paradigm. “These supporters (Trump) will not change their minds, because this is what they always wanted: a president who embodies the rage they feel toward those they hate and fear, while reassuring them that that rage is nothing to be ashamed of.

As a Buddhist, when someone states they are the one true information source for followers, competing ideas and facts are not just wrong; they are demonic. As such, anyone not with you becomes “liars” and “sick people” “trying to take away your history and your heritage.” Pat Robertson said those who oppose Trump are “revolting against what God’s plan for America is.” Paula White, Pastor of New Destiny Christian Center in Florida and a Trump spiritual adviser, told her congregation that resisting Trump is tantamount to “fighting against the hand of God.”

It is important to remember that diversity is a strength. And if God actually said something important, leave the President out of it. Why? Because the President just supported Roy Moore’s senatorial candidacy. Like Alabama State Auditor Jim Zeigler, a Moore backer, said in support of Moore:

“… take Joseph and Mary. Mary was a teenager and Joseph was an adult carpenter. They became parents of Jesus.”

And Trump, in supporting Moore:

I can tell you one thing for sure: We don’t need a liberal person in there, a Democrat.

So, we’ll accept a potential child predator.

Sigh … the devil’s we openly accept.

Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said President Bill Clinton “more than paid the price” for his affair with Monica Lewinsky while he was in office, basing it in part upon the fact he was impeached. Vice President Joe Biden echoed similar themes.

The same can’t be said for Lewinsky.

As the Huffington Post noted in 2012, Lewinsky floundered. She’s designed handbags and received an advanced degree in social psychology from the London School of Economics, but nothing seems to have stuck.  No one will hire her. In the past few years, Lewinsky has reemerged into the public spotlight as an anti-bullying activist. As such, if she lived near me, I would be proud to call her my neighbor.

For the accuser, life outcomes tend to be different. The harassment sequence is familiar to anyone who has followed the Harvey Weinstein scandal. Power and imbalance. Professional invitations really disguised for assault. One person trading upon connections, plum jobs, pressuring the younger person for sex, followed by the “public outing,” and indignation of being falsely accused.

As Vox wrote earlier this year, Weinstein’s community rejected him. Yet Trump and Alabama Senatorial candidate Roy Moore continue to receive support. Why? Well, they’re needed. The Republican party needs both Trump and Moore. They certainly don’t need Al Franken.

People may think sexual assault is unacceptable, but when push comes to shove, there are circumstances under which they’ll tolerate it because there are other things that matter more to them.

Should you be the accuser, the window of light is very small, then you’re discarded.  While I understand that as humans lying may seem to be a common practice, the public automatically assumes “victims” would lie and “the accused” be believed because they have a public presence.

Repeated presentations from law enforcement, FBI, therapists, and state providers provide hard evidence that “false allegations are very minimal.” The overwhelming majority of victims drop their charges because the implications and pressure to convict the accused are too costly. They shared how difficult it is just to try and convict those guilty of sexual assault, pedophilia, and neglect. It was difficult to not only hear but to swallow.

Throughout the years, I’ve taken an extensive personal inventory of the man I had become. For quite some time, it was not a pretty picture. Many years later, I now take responsibility for speaking out, for listening to those who claim to be victims, and holding men accountable for their language and actions.

As a Buddhist, I understand people don’t always tell the truth, but we should not immediately assume that those who are dishonest. As leaders, in both community and household, we required to act, to fight for victims.

Biblically speaking, I suggest the following:

“Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. For the rights of all who are oppressed speak up, judge fairly, defend the rights of the vulnerable and needy.” (Prov. 31:8-9)

The Monica Lewinsky’s of the world need us.

I had an affair 30 years ago. The woman was my administrative assistant. Eight years ago, I almost had another affair. As to the second affair, the physical part never occurred. However, the second affair was brutally and publicly painful.

In both cases the women joined a silent majority. In both cases, I joined a silent majority. Both woman joined a silent majority of those who suffered silently. I joined a silent majority of men who used position and power that ultimately degraded another in some way. In light of the sexual scandals crossing the news outlets, I wonder how much I “retriggered” them during the past decades. How many days passed without suffering some form of humiliation?

I suffer from my own internal judgement, from the guilt and shame I inflicted. It never leaves. In decades of travel, I have found apologies are of little value. Even after apologizing and requesting forgiveness, I’ve sat on the shores of Hawaii, walked the forests of New Zealand, overlooked the Andes and sailed the Atlantic. Both women remain ever-present.

After hearing victims from Fox News, Roy Moore, Donald Trump, Mark Halperin, Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Louis C. K., Steve Jurvetson, Eddie Berganza, Andrew Kreisberg, Benjamin Genocchi, Ed Westwick, Jeff hoover, Andy Dick, Ohio State Rep. Wes Goodman, Al Franken and others I wonder just how public testimony will abide the anvil that binds their soul. Will Thanksgiving really be more peaceful? Will Christmas? Will the public let you forget? Will your mind really let you forget?  Will the victims be more open, more loving, and more welcome in a newly refined “24/7” news cycle? Could each victim abridge public persona against the private?

What I failed to understand was that these women placed themselves in the hands of others. The women of my affairs trusted me. I failed them. And the misogyny of my heart will forever impact them. Yet no amount of reconciliation will give back the years sawed from their soul. More so, why should I be forgiven?

If there’s any tidbit of truth from the darkness is that the public treats these cases subjectively. Donald Trump was quick to denounce Franken via Twitter, labeling Franken as “Frankenstien” [sic]. However, Trump’s been silent on Senatorial Candidate Roy Moore. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, who holds Hillary Clinton’s former seat, said Bill Clinton should have resigned the presidency after his inappropriate relationship with an intern came to light nearly 20 years ago. Yet twenty years ago, we the public willingly chose to humiliate Lewinsky, not Clinton. Yes. “We,” the public, did that.

In Trump’s case, women alleged Trump had either touched, grabbed or kissed them without permission. Over the course of his campaign, more than a dozen women came forward. Without exception, Trump continues to claim there is “no merit” to any harassment claim against him, adding that the allegations were based on events that either never occurred or nothing more than a politically-motivated.

Accordingly, I make six predictions. First, I predict Al Franken’s career is over. Second, I predict Roy Moore will win. Third, I predict Donald Trump’s accusers will suffer for the rest of their lives, for “we,” the public, choose to allow them to suffer in vain. Fourth, Monica Lewinsky should be embraced, but I predict “we,” the public will not. Fifth, I predict to continue to wear the forged anvil and chains. That’s good. I forged them, I deserve them. Lastly, I predict Franken’s picture of groping Leeann Tweeden will give the millions of women living the silent majority a roar.

And for others? Donald Trump’s “Al Frankenstien” [sic] tweet received over 60,000 “likes.” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders stands by President Donald Trump’s previous comments when asked whether the more than a dozen women who have accused him of sexual assault were liars. Yes. All of them were.

So that’s leadership in action. Add Sander’s to another majority …

“The Silent.”

The ideas I stand for are not mine. I borrowed them from Socrates. I swiped them from Chesterfield. I stole them from Jesus. And I put them in a book. If you don’t like their rules, whose would you use?

~~ Dale Carnegie ~~

I leafed through a copy of Chris Matthews new book “Bobby Kennedy: A Raging Spirit” and glanced through the book’s Prelude, I read Matthew’s words, “That Bobby’s background was different from his own didn’t matter; only his principles did.

I was eight years old when Bobby Kennedy was killed. Not completely unlike today, between March 16, 1968 and June 5, 1968, the country survived a series of events. Bobby Kennedy challenged his brother’s successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, for the Democratic presidential nomination. To which, LBJ withdrew. April brought the brutal assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., followed by urban rioting. And June 1968, the national would have to grieve again, as Bobby Kennedy would be assassinated.

Pushing democracy aside, our nation has not had to endure political assassinations. However, years of The Black Lives Matter movement, a Presidential race touting body parts, racial discord of white supremacy, sexual discrimination and the utter inability to work as members for a common good suggests our society has fallen behind the ideology of all men being equal.

Another small snippet led me to compare Trump to Bobby Kennedy. In reality, Matthews noted Joseph P. Kennedy (Bobby’s father) thought Bobby was devoid of any valuable qualities. Anguishing for a moment, I sat in a bookstore chair, closed my eyes and thought of Trump as he told FOX News “I’m the only one that matters.”

What Trump doesn’t understand is that Kennedy knew vulnerability alongside privilege and power. I fear this unwelcome gift the Trump children have applied well.  For instance, Ivanka Trump seems unwilling to acknowledge that there could, hypothetically, be a difference between what’s good for women and what’s good for her brand. In The Trump Card, Ivanka broadcasted her similarity to the President. “That’s what you get from this particular Daddy’s girl,” she wrote.

“As the first daughter goes around touting herself as a champion of women,” Sarah Newell, a representative for International Labor Rights Forum told Newsweek, “women are literally facing abusive conditions as they stitch her [brand name] into her products, and they aren’t being provided a structure where they can advocate for themselves.” NYT Opinion writer Lindy West phrased it well.

You’d think that a passionate anti-wage-gap crusader like Ms. Trump would relish a broad, ever-expanding data set illuminating her pet issue so that she could go after it with laser focus, but no. The first daughter strode into Washington with two big promises: She was passionate about helping “working women” and she was going to close the gender wage gap. However, Ms. Trump endorsed the President’s decision to abandon an Obama-era initiative. 

But remember, Trump is about brand – Trump brand. Not your brand. Not my brand. It’s as if Trump has been repeating, “I’m the only one that matters.”

The Trump brand will never intermingle with our brand. I’ve never heard President Trump ever express outrage at hunger in in the inner cities, mistreatment of blacks, or  unfair work conditions faced by migrants, regardless of how legal or illegal they be. Yet he will discuss nuking North Korea while simultaneously and unapologetically stating he received a high draft number and never served. Damn those bone spurs. And lastly, I’ve never heard Trump having the same empathy for white workingmen and women for blacks, Latinos and foreigners.

Trump’s true soul showed and we ignored it. As such, former Barack Obama voters swung the election by supporting Donald Trump. “It’s now the accepted wisdom,” Matthews wrote, “that the interests of the discarded factory worker and the ignored inner-city youth cannot be met together, so why try?

As a Buddhist, I find peace in Robert Kennedy’s sympathetic words from the night Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated.

“For those of you who are black and tempted to be filled with hatred and mistrust of the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I would only say that I can also feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling.  I had a member of my family killed — but he was killed by a white man.  But we have to make an effort in the United States.  We have to make an effort to understand, to get beyond or go beyond these rather difficult times.”

Contrary to Trump, we are “that” which counts. And returning full-circle, I would much rather borrow principles from Socrates, swipe them from Chesterfield or steal them from Jesus versus living by Trump’s. Accordingly, every day, each of us must choose which principles to honor. Trump’s values are not my true north. Neither should they be yours.

America must make an effort … an effort to understand, to get beyond or go beyond these rather difficult times.

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