Salute to Matthew - Our Family Airman

I hosted a pizza party on Monday, April 16, 2018, in the common room at my apartment house in Mt.Pleasant for family and a couple of guests to honor my grandson, Airman First Class Matthew Godbold, USAF, son of my daughter Wynn and her husband Rett. Matthew is home in Myrtle Beach on leave from his service on Okinawa. This is his first home leave in about 18 months.

Matthew continues a family tradition of USAF service. I was in the Air Force (1951-1959); his grandmother (my late wife) served from 1951 to 1954 and his uncle James served four years in the 1970s. 

(Somewhere along the line my oldest son Frank, and two of my brothers went astray and were United States Marines.)

As usually happens, everyone was snapping pictures and I was no exception. Here are some snapshots from the happy event (some pictures have been removed from the original post at the request of the participants.)

 Matthew laughs at something his smiling Uncle Frank just said. 

Voter Data

Letters to the Editor (Published July 6, 2017)

The Post & Courier

Charleston, SC

Dear Editor,

I am 110% opposed to South Carolina sending any voter information to the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, beyond what is available to any South Carolinian and only if the Commission pays for it like a citizen would have to do.  

There are approximately 175,000 voting precincts in America. No one knows the exact number, as it may vary from year to year. But every one of these is usually staffed by good, local people volunteering to oversee the most important act of citizenship. 

To allege, as President Trump does, that widespread fraud in voting across America deprived him of a plurality in the popular vote, is nonsense. It is not supported by any facts from any state, or by anyone or any organization who conducts legitimate poll watching. 

The President’s comments are a vicious, undeserved slander on the good, hard-working, women and men who voluntarily staff the polls.

I have run for local and state office and won and lost. I never questioned the integrity of the process or the counting of the votes.

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Those who need Driver Training

Normally young people are the most logical candidates for driving lessons from a driver’s school. An older friend taught me how to drive when I was coming out of high school, but when he thought I was ready for my driver’s test he recommended I take some commercial driver school training. I took three hours, went for the test and aced it. 

There are exceptions. My mother and an uncle learned to drive when they were in their fifties and each learned under the guidance of driver’s school instructors.  My mother got her license but never drove. My uncle got his, bought a car and enjoyed the experience which came to him late in life.  

There is another identifiable group of people who will undoubtedly benefit from a licensed driver’s school - government executives at all levels who enjoy the luxury of chauffeurs and government cars during their service. For many years in some cases, they are ferried everywhere and then one day they are on their own. 

A reliable and knowledgeable source told me Mrs. Robert Mueller said when her husband left the FBI after 12 years, “The first thing we are going to do is get him some driving lessons. I’m not riding with him and the grandkids aren’t either.”

In 1975, Joseph L. Schott, a former FBI agent, wrote “No Left Turns” in which he told the story of J. Edgar Hoover riding in a chauffeured bureau car in Texas, and while making a left turn the car was almost hit by an oncoming vehicle. After Hoover returned to Washington, the Bureau sent out a notice to all Field Offices that when chauffeuring the director there was to be “no left turns.” 

Hoover served for 42 years. Would you have ridden in a car driven by a man who wouldn't make a left turn?

Think of presidents, vice-presidents, cabinet officials, agency heads, leaders of Congress, senior military officers, and who knows who else, who haven’t been behind the wheel for years and one day they are out of office, back in private life, and the wife says, “Honey, drive down to the drug store and get a bottle of aspirin.”

Government officials worldwide are just like Americans. They could use refresher driver training. In Nixon’s memoirs, he told the story about Soviet President Brezhnev driving at Camp David.

"He got behind the wheel and motioned me into the passenger seat. The head of my Secret Service detail went pale as I climbed in and we took off down one of the narrow roads that run around the perimeter of Camp David….

At one point there is a very steep slope with a sign at the top reading, 'Slow, dangerous curve'….

Brezhnev was driving more than 50 miles an hour as we approached the slope. I reached over and said, 'Slow down, slow down,' but he paid no attention. When we reached the bottom there was a squeal of rubber as he slammed on the brakes and made the turn….

'You are an excellent driver,' I replied. 'I would never have been able to make that turn at the speed at which we were traveling.'

Diplomacy is not always an easy art.”

At the state level, there are officials starting with the governor and the lieutenant governor and other state office holders who serve for years and ride in chauffeured cars. One day they will find themselves on their own. 

In the private sector, there are also thousands of executives - men and women - who would benefit from driver’s training after they leave the company and no longer have the privileged perk of being chauffeured. 

The late William F. Buckley, founder, and editor of National Review rode to work daily from his home in Connecticut to his office in Manhattan in the back seat of a chauffeured stretch limousine so he could work en route. If Buckley had decided to drive one day, would Mrs. Buckley have ridden with him?

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Leaking sensitive government information

President Trump has pledged his administration will get to the bottom of alleged leaks of information coming out of the government and put stop to this practice. He is not the first president to stake out this position, particularly when it puts him in a bad light.  Not only presidents but cabinet officers, senior government officials, Generals, and Admirals, also have made the promise to “get to the bottom of this” and send someone to prison. Much of this is bombast to placate the public. 

Many leaks from the government are planned, well-thought out, desirable, and often serve an official purpose. An official can leak something and if the public outcry is against it, the official’s identity, reputation, sanity, and job are not at stake. Masters of the convenient leak are found in the executive branch of government and the Congress. Supporting all these officials are thousands of workers from attorneys to file clerks who may also leak information for various reasons. Leaks have occurred since the Founding Fathers gathered in Philadelphia in 1787 to form a more perfect union. 

In 1953, I was a young airman in the USAF and assigned as the senior clerk in the Sabotage & Espionage Branch, Counterintelligence Division, HQ, USAF Office of Special Investigations, (OSI). There were six officers serving under the Branch Chief, a Lt. Col. We had two civilian secretaries. We all shared a rectangular office with four desks lined up on one side and five on the other side. Conversations among the officers were open affairs. 

These were the days when hardly a week went by that muckraking columnist Drew Pearson didn’t publish something that someone in the government fed him. Whether it was true, accurate or fair, did not matter to Pearson.

One day a particularly inaccurate and offensive Drew Pearson column dealing with Air Force business appeared in print and the matter came to the attention of OSI. Senior Air Force officials were furious and characterized the story as a mixture of bad information, half truths, and blatant inaccuracies. Three officials in the Air Force were suspected of being the source who leaked to Pearson. 

A plan was hatched by the officers in the S&E Branch. It called for putting together a classified report to be circulated to the three suspects with minor variations in each suspect’s copy. The fabricated report would be close to reality and the type of story Pearson would jump at. Based upon what Pearson published it would be highly possible to identify the source based on the variation revealed.

The plan was worked and re-worked and ready to be put in play. Appropriate officials in the hierarchy of OSI and the Pentagon were briefed. Then the word came down from on high. Scuttle the operation. No one wanted to learn the identity of the leaker.  

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After the first 100 days

The first 100 days of the President Trump administration has gone by. Nothing spectacular has been accomplished, although much was promised. The Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare as its detractors like to call it, is still with us. 

Tax reform is promised for this week, although many in Congress are skeptical until President Trump releases his earlier tax returns and legislators can see how and if he will benefit from proposed tax code changes. And, everyone should be concerned about who will benefit from proposed changes - the top 1 or 2 percent, the middle class or even those lower on the economic ladder.

I had a discussion last week with a lady who is a Trump supporter and who believes the news media has been too critical of the new president. There is no doubt the media has been robust and reporting on the flaws and goofs coming out of the administration. But better a free and reliable media with its criticisms than a cheering section for ignorance and stupidity. 

One action, in particular, disturbs me: the Attorney General’s decision to stop looking at police departments across the country when citizens and groups file protests. AG Sessions tried to delay implementation of a continuing review of the Baltimore police but a court ordered it to go forward. The majority of American police departments are stacked with good men and women and conduct themselves in the ritual of Preserve and Protect. But when citizen complaints are made they need to be looked into, and this has been the responsibility of the Justice Department. This must continue.

It appears that Steve Bannon’s role as chief strategist to President Trump is a thing of the past. His “America first” ideas are ill-advised and out of touch with reality. Since World War II, America and the American President have been at the forefront of world leadership and we cannot neglect, ignore or discard that duty. The world is too big and volatile for the number one super power to step aside and let things sort themselves out. I told a friend a couple of weeks ago that Bannon will be gone by Labor Day. I stand by that statement. 

Global warming, terrorism around the world, security of nuclear weapons, world trade and finance, poverty, refugees, roads and bridges in America, are all calling for leadership and action. 

New jobs must be created and an aging workforce assisted with training to fill those jobs. Opening up the mines and other industries will not automatically result in more jobs. Robots and automation are always going to cut into what were once good jobs for men (and women). 

There is not much to show for the first 100 days of this Presidency, but we can hope that the administration ship will be righted to an even keel and sail on to better days for the U.S. and the world. 

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Equal Opportunity, voters and polling

On this day in 1948, July 26, President Harry S Truman
signed Executive Order 9981, desegregating the military of the United States. This bold stroke accomplished two major feats: it opened the door for African-Americans to advance in the military in multiple new ways and it helped President Truman at the polls in November. The desegregation order and later the civil rights platform adopted at the 1948 Democratic convention helped Truman win large majorities among black voters in the populous Northern and Midwestern states and may well have made the difference for Truman in states such as Illinois and Ohio.

This bold stroke was taken by President Truman because he believed desegregation was a moral issue. His chances of winning the 1948 election were considered by practically everyone - except the President himself - to be less than nil.  Many officials in his administration had already lined up new jobs and it is said that even Mrs. Truman doubted her husband would win. So certain were they that the race was over by September, the polling services stopped polling. They would never make that mistake again.

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A Hundred Years Later

This Saturday, June 28, 2014 is a most significant date in world history: the 100th anniversary of an event leading thirty days later to World War I, also called the Great War, the European war, and many other such titles. 

If we look only at books on the history of World War I which we are likely to read because English is our native language, we have 5,962 books published in the United States and another 1,295 in England to choose from.  (Figures courtesy of Amazon.com.)

Think about it. An average of 73 books has been published in the English language each year over the last 100 years dealing with World War I. Talk about a growth industry.

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It all started on a Saturday in Sarajevo, June 28, 1914, when the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife Sophie, were assassinated by a young Serb, Gavrilo Princip. He was one of five Serbs and one Bosnian Muslim, all under the age of 20, who set about the assassination that day. The political objective of the assassination was to break off Austria-Hungary's south-Slav provinces so they could be combined into a Yugoslavia. The assassination led directly to the First World War when Austria-Hungary subsequently issued an ultimatum against Serbia, which was partially rejected. Austria-Hungary then declared war, marking the outbreak of the war on July 28, 1914.

Before long all of Europe was at war with one nation or the other. Sides were chosen based on self-interest, earlier treaties and opportunities perceived. Stalemate eventually set in. It was only when the Unite States threw its hat in the ring and brought its manpower, industrialization, and money to the conflict that the balance shifted and the war to end all wars was ended.

Many historians and scholars hold to the view that World War I led to the Second World War; that issues raised between 1914 and 1918 were never fully put to rest and another war was inevitable.  This debate goes on today and you can pick it up among the 7,257 books available in English on Amazon.com.

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The most significant date of the 20th Century

Seventy years ago this week I was a 7^th grade student at St. Patrick’s Boys School in the Acre section of Lowell, Massachusetts. Shortly after arriving at school on June 6th, we were all marched over to the adjoining St. Patrick's church by the Xaverian Brothers who taught us, and where we joined the girls and the teaching sisters from the Girl’s School. We were all on our knees in the pews Our aging pastor, Father Meehan, kneeling at the foot of the altar in the lower church, led us in prayer for the success of the invasion of Europe. When the prayers were concluded, Father Meehan declared a school holiday. Naturally we were all thrilled, even if we – middle school students - didn’t really understand the significance of what was happening more than 3000 miles across the ocean.

Today some South Carolina and other veterans of WWII and the invasion are visiting in France where the invasion took place on June 6, 1944. Most of these men are in their 80s and 90s. Sadly, most will not be around in another 10 years. They will be joined on Friday by President Obama, Queen Elizabeth, and Russian President Putin.

For them and for us and for history so no one will forget, Time, Inc. has published a memento volume of pictures and commentary. The pictures are from LIFE magazine, and many were originally printed within days of being taken on the battlefield. These and the accompanying text are stark reminders of how courageous the invasion was. This was a plan that had no alternatives. If the allies were unable to gain a foothold and begin the march on Germany, today’s world would be a much different place. All of this is laid out in “D-Day: 70 Years Later.”

It is impossible to express what we and the world owes those courageous, fighting men and women who invaded Europe in unquestionably the most significant date of the 20^th Century. Just be glad in your heart they succeeded.

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Joyous Greetings at Easter 2014

Joyous greetings to all in this new Easter season. It is a time for reflecting on all the good and many years we have enjoyed in the company of each other and with friends gone on. For renewing our camaraderie with family and friends, many of whom we do not see every day but carry in our hearts. And, last but not least, for giving thanks to a forgiving and blessing God our Father, and for all those who are near and dear to us. We are truly blessed. We live in a great country surrounded by mostly good people. We have taken advantage of great opportunities. It doesn't get any better than this.

New growth symbolizes the new Easter season.

The 15 minute telephone call

   After 34 years it is a remarkable diplomatic opening for the presidents of Iran and the United States to have a 15 minute telephone conversation. Even more remarkable for the President of Iran, Mr. Hassan Rouhani, to say he wanted to talk to the President of the United States, and for Mr. Obama to quickly place the call. The road ahead for relations between the two countries is long and will have some potholes in it, but it can be successfully navigated for the benefit of all.

   Two things to watch out for: One, the inclination to think it is sanctions against Iran that alone are responsible for this breakthrough. Iran has survived for 34 years and to deny or ignore good will on the part of President Rouhani does a disservice to him and the people of Iran. Two, Israel and Iran are at loggerheads over realistic fears about nuclear weapons. The United States is not going to leave Israel’s side but we cannot let this chance to improve relations in the area evaporate because of Israeli intransigence.

   It is to be hoped the 15 minute telephone conversation on September 27, 2013, will come to be recognized as a milestone in improved relations. 

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