I already am bracing myself for a challenging 2020.  Among other things, there are the elections, worries about the economy, instability in the Middle East, North Korea, Russia, more climate change havoc, and, no doubt, at least two or three local issues that we don’t know about yet.  It’s hard to be optimistic, but do we really have a choice? Accepting the conclusion that 2020 will “suck” simply isn’t an option.

So, what is realistic to hope for? Is there reason to look forward to the coming year, knowing that while there will be challenges, there will also be pleasant surprises?  And if those surprises are realistic possibilities, there is reason to celebrate this new year as the potential start of something good.

What are some good things that might happen in 2020?  My answers reflect my own little world. For example, because I often travel west, an accelerated completion of the nightmare Bay Bridge resurfacing project is on my list.  If you crab for a living, or love them as much as most of us, you’re hoping for an abundant season. I bet you get it.

Here’s my list:

No major hurricanes or other storms this year. Although each year climate change increases the chances of our Eastern Shore way of life being changed forever, I’m hoping for the best. (I also hope the US and other world leaders step up their responses to this existential threat.)

A new President is elected. Sorry to inject politics here, but a lot of the bad that can happen in 2020 is because of what happened in 2016. We need a new President. Please!

A new sense of compassion for our global sisters and brothers. If I ever see another overcrowded border detention center, it will be too soon. I hope that the brutal scenes we saw in 2019, such as migrants drowning or children being separated from their parents, will not be repeated.

The return of political civility. This one really belongs on a list of hopes for 2021 since all indications for 2020 suggest things will get a lot uglier before they get better. But what if a few of the 2020 candidates or someone in Congress began to tear down the wall of partisanship that is destroying our democracy?

Fewer shootings. I was going to write “mass shootings,” but all gun violence is bad. I’m not holding my breath for a miracle, but one can hope that the horrors of 2019 are not repeated.

Progress on health care/prescription drugs. 2019 saw growing awareness of the fundamental outrage of prescription drugs costing thousands of dollars per month. This must stop.

Recognition that income inequality is everyone’s problem.  Although I’m fortunate enough to consider myself financially secure, it is obvious to me that income inequality is undermining America. A growing number of Americans have no rational reason to support how our government and economy work.  Put more simply: They work hard but will never, never get ahead. They will struggle to meet basic human needs while watching fellow citizens live lifestyles costing hundreds of times their annual incomes. In 2020, I hope there is acceptance of income inequality as a problem that needs to be resolved. I’m not ready to get on the Warren or Sanders bus, but something needs to be done.

New thinking on technology. More than a few pundits express grave concern about what Artificial Intelligence might ultimately mean to our future. Will the machines replace us as the masters of the planet? Will privacy disappear?  Will I tell my Alexa what to do or vice versa? We do not yet have a handle on what is happening or, more importantly, what can or should be done to ensure a human-led future. I hope for a breakthrough in 2020.

Okay, those are some of the big ones. How about a few small ones, things like a few of the more idiotic TV shows going off the air?  Here are a handful of additional hopes for 2020:

Good health for myself, my family, my friends, and, actually, everyone.  The more you know about the challenges sick people face, the more you have no choice but to hope for good health for everyone.   

More goldendoodles. I used to think a West Highland White terrier was a good dog. That may be true, but once you spend time with a goldendoodle you never go back. The more doodles on the planet, the better this planet will be. These dogs bring good cheer, peace, and wonderment to all who encounter them. 

Good weather for the 2020 Waterfowl Festival in Easton. It happened this past year. The festival is always wonderful, but it is better if you are not wet and shivering.

A safe 737 Max returns to service. Why? Air travel is miserable enough. I don’t want it getting worse. More than 400 modern, fuel-efficient airplanes would help.

Real progress on the opioid crisis. Talbot has been purple for several years now, but the drug problem remains.  Let’s hope for progress. This is a tough problem. I hope our leaders will make it the priority it needs to be and that a year from now we can all say, “there is a light at the end of the tunnel.”

I’ll stop there.  It’s okay if you add world peace, better education for all our youth, and that the Ravens win the Super Bowl.  I did. 

Happy New Year.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.  

 

 

Last year I was Director of Human Resources for a nonprofit in Washington, DC.  Like most nonprofits, space was at a premium. Three of us worked in a very small office which created challenges but also offered an opportunity for interesting conversations. One Monday morning I asked my 23-year-old colleague how she spent the weekend. She said she played video games with friends. I asked if everyone got together at one of her friend’s homes. “Oh no,” she said. “We were all in our own homes. I was in my pajamas for most of the weekend.” 

That got me thinking about the ongoing human interaction situation in America. A recent millennial study showed that many millennials have intense feelings of loneliness and admit to having few close friends. More people live alone in the US than ever before—almost 25 percent. More than half of Americans are not married. Then add to that the fact that almost 30 percent of married people have strained relationships and feelings of isolation. Then consider the strata of older Americans whose spouses have died, in addition to many of their closest friends. I remember visiting my mom who was in assisted living the year before she died and recall my dismay at how many residents never had any visitors. They would stop me on the porch before I entered the building, just to have the opportunity to talk with someone. Emily Dickinson described the quiet devastation of such loneliness as the “the horror not to be surveyed.”

I read an article in the New York Times last year concerning Theresa May’s appointment of a Minister of Loneliness in the United Kingdom. Due in part to Brexit, Brits were feeling increasingly isolated. A report had been issued that more than 200,000 Brits had not had a conversation with another human being in more than a month. She reported that such loneliness can result in heart disease, strokes, Alzheimer’s, depression and anxiety. The aim of this new department would be to connect Brits to appropriate community and volunteer activities.  

The irony, of course, which has been mentioned by many, is that we are all more connected than ever before. Through the Internet, Facebook, 24/7 news, etc., it seems almost impossible to disconnect.  Teens commit suicide because they don’t get enough likes on their posts. Studies have shown that the more time spent on Facebook, the more depressed people become. Why? Because such time spent creates the illusion that everyone else is happy and active but you.

When you ride the Metro or walk the streets in DC, few people talk to one another. So many have earbuds listening to music or podcasts or something else. It’s as if they are in their own world—shut off from everyone. How many times have you gone out to dinner and seen a couple both looking at their phones and not speaking?  I went out to breakfast a few weeks ago and sat next to a couple who literally did not speak to one another the entire meal until the check arrived. She was endlessly texting on her phone; he was reading the newspaper.     

So, what to do about all this loneliness amid so much connectivity?

One long-term solution might be mandatory national service by a certain age. Everyone would have to sign up for one year of such service—Peace Corps, Vista, the Armed Services. These services stress the importance of involvement, connectivity, and responsibility.  

Another hopeful sign is that many millennials have resurrected game night—getting together in person to play board games such as Monopoly or Scrabble, Trivia, etc.  

Also, memberships in clubs—book, theater, art, hiking, biking, birding– are ways to get together around a common theme and meet people with similar interests.

Volunteer activities such as Habitat for Humanity, tutoring children, working at food banks, are also excellent ways to connect with the community.  

Participating in mindfulness and meditation seminars has been proven to increase emotional intelligence, productivity, reduce stress and anxiety and in general improve the state of your psyche. 

Taking workout classes at a local gym offers an opportunity to meet new people in a different setting as well as becoming more fit.

Mastering an instrument and then developing an informal group can also be rewarding.  (I always feel a sense of accomplishment after learning even a simple piece on the piano.)

For those with strong religious affiliations, church groups are another excellent means to connect with others.

Families with small children also find ways to make new friends through soccer and hockey games and practices.

Many corporations are forming softball teams, walking groups, or discussion forums to offer ways to promote a sense of community.  

In closing, each of us bears a responsibility to make a concerted effort to have a richer personal life and to contribute actively to our communities. We also need to remember that kindness goes a long way. That means being kind to yourself—less self-critical and more mindful of your inner being, as well as being kind to others—reaching out, giving a helping hand, and being less worried about reciprocal acts.  Kindness releases feel-good hormones, reduces stress, and can improve physical health. And as the wise Bruce Springsteen once said, we all need “just a little of that human touch.”    

 Maria Grant served as principal-in-charge of the Federal Human Capital Practice with Deloitte Consulting. Since her retirement from Deloitte, she has focused on reading, writing, music, travel, gardening, and nature.   

I’ve been in a wine cave, but Mayor Pete, wealthy donors and the $900 wines weren’t there.  But I get the idea: Somehow the electoral process is corrupted if the voices of some candidates are made louder with the help of money from “the rich.”  That’s what Senator Warren implied, reflecting her new philosophy on how to finance campaigns. She may be a bit of hypocrite, as Buttigieg pointed out, but is she wrong?

Those who would publicly finance election campaigns, or worse, reimburse or pay voters to make political contributions, are wrong. 

Let’s start with banning or severely capping individual contributions, corporate contributions and PACs, all of which are viewed by many as the means through which “the rich” buy elections, power, and ensure the poverty of the rest of us.  Although many of us would welcome fewer campaign ads, especially the nasty ones, this “reform” would effectively impose something of a black-out on campaigns. Gone would be most commercials, especially in major markets, and, most likely, a lot of campaigning and campaign staff.  It would take unique individuals to want to run for President in these circumstances, especially if they did not already enjoy high name-recognition.

Mind you, the above is only the start of a litany of problems that would be caused by radically reducing the amount of money available to candidates to run for local, state, or federal office. 

What about simply giving each major party an equal amount of money to spend in the general election?  First, there is no reference to a two-party system in the Constitution. More importantly, the recent track records of both parties in selecting Presidential candidates is not great. In 2016, the Democratic party effectively ran interference for Hillary Clinton.  That was their business, but should federal money have been spent on the product of what many see as a flawed process? And then there are the Republicans. Should federal dollars have been spent to broadcast Trump’s offensive ads or to hold his rallies?

And, what happens if there is a viable third-party candidate, or, as some think likely, the emergence of a new, national third party, out of the ashes of the Republican party and refugees from a Democratic party that may be veering hard right?

 But are there alternatives?  

The answer isn’t easy. Let’s look at the Democrats.  Although all major Democratic Presidential candidates support campaign finance reform, there is no core agreement. Warren wants the federal treasury to give a six-to-one match on every contribution made under $200.  Sanders wants to ban corporate contributions from both campaigns and to national party conventions. Most other candidates support federal funding for elections as a means of eliminating the opportunity for voters to increase their voice by contributing.

All public financing proposals raise the question of what party or what types of candidates would benefit.  Conventional wisdom suggests that Democrats would benefit under the presumption that many Republicans are “rich.”  Also, candidates who run on promising large new federal benefit programs, things like free college or student loan forgiveness, would certainly benefit the most.  

Questions also are raised about when to give an individual candidate federal funds—is it only after they have achieved their party’s nomination or some minimum level of documentable support?   I haven’t seen good answers to these and many other questions. Research to understand what impact any specific proposal might have could take years to conduct.

And what about “in kind” contributions?  What is an endorsement from Kim Kardashian or Snoop Dog worth?  Should celebrities be banned from making endorsements that effectively will win candidates’ support?  Should entertainers be permitted to perform at campaign rallies for free? I know a lot of people who would attend a Trump or even a Tulsi Gabbard rally if Kelly Clarkson or Drake were performing. Both scenarios are unlikely, but who can doubt that a celebrity endorsement is the de facto equivalent of a big-dollar contribution.

If I’m right, there is a national consensus that US elections are a mess.  Even attempts at creating a fair process are flawed, most likely as evidenced by concerns that the Democrats’ criteria for participating in the televised debates has resulted in the elimination of every candidate of color other than Andrew Yang.  Should special rules be made up to exempt candidates from fundraising requirements under the presumption that the voters likely to support certain candidates don’t have the money to contribute? Should some candidates be exempted from showing poll support under the presumption that early caucus and poll states racial composition favor white candidates?  I see dozens of problems with this type of “election engineering.” The current, admittedly flawed system seems preferable.  

Ok, so what do we do?  It would be nice if the two parties might voluntarily agree to a set of fair rules (or fairer rules) and then require candidates running under their banner to accept them. Santa might also be planning on bringing me a pony this week.

The answer is that we have a flawed election system. Money does influence voting, but so do a lot of other things.  Personally, I welcome Michael Bloomberg spending his own money to make his voice heard. I also am interested in whom former President Obama might eventually endorse, even though that endorsement will have a market-equivalent value in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.  More importantly, and perhaps more important than even workable and fair publicly financed elections, is more citizenship education. If citizens understand the influence of money in politics, as well as a lot of other things that candidates use to win votes, votes might be cast more carefully. Maybe some future “mistakes” can be avoided.

America must be careful in changing the rules for elections. A mistake could be catastrophic. If a system was adopted that intentionally or not gave one party a permanent advantage over the others, our democracy could end. If elections are engineered to produce predictable results, why hold them?

The risks outweigh the benefits. Agree?

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.  

 

I confess to mixed feelings about Sweden’s surprise world spokeswoman on climate change, the 16-year-old non-flying vegan Greta Thunberg.  I was not ready for the harsh words of a child for world leaders, whom she chastised forcefully with the words, “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.”  She added, “The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, I say we will never forgive you…”  That speech put her on the world stage, in a spot that often seems designed for her unique persona. She is credited with wisdom well beyond her years and a sophistication that puts other world leaders to shame.  Example: She has refused to accept awards offered her for her leadership on the issue, implying that the meaningless gesture of recognizing her efforts is not a substitute for doing something about the climate crisis.

Despite her obvious stature, there is mumbling, including among some of us who self-identify as “correct” on the climate issue. Is Thunberg an arrogant brat?  How dare she lecture the world leaders on climate change without any credentials as a scientist. Is her appeal, the widespread public acceptance of her as a world leader on climate change, based on the forcefulness of her words and her stern demeanor and little else?  Is she the world’s greatest actress? When she addresses the climate crisis, she is instantly credible. She believes the inaction of the current generation is robbing her generation and those that follow of a future.

With all this in mind and after weighing the evidence, I have accepted Thunberg as a legitimate leader on the issue. Looking at her simple message—we are not doing enough—through the lens of our fragile ecology of the Eastern Shore, leads one to question whether Maryland’s political leadership is taking the climate issue seriously enough. Though it isn’t clear what exactly can and should be done, I fear the answer is no, despite the record of most of our elected representatives. With some exceptions, all Maryland’s leaders are considered progressives on the issue, especially our two Senators.  Even Republican Larry Hogan accepts climate change as a threat to the state and has proposed an action plan. But do all the proposals, both federal and state, do enough to address the pending climate crisis? Probably not.

Amazingly, a year without a major disaster is viewed by some as evidence that “weather is weather.”  For many of us, consciously or unconsciously, a sense of immediate crisis escapes. We keep or buy gas-powered cars, keep our boats in the water, fly to Europe and elsewhere without a second thought, keep the AC cranked up, and maintain our diet of red meat.  We think we should reform our ways, but there’s tomorrow to start that, right?

I am fast concluding that we need some sort of shock that will result in immediate, concrete steps to address climate change.  This means not only enactment of some of the more painful proposals already out there, but also adoption of some actions that are currently inconceivable—things like deterring driving, rethinking food production and what we eat, and banning construction that guarantees decades of climate unfriendly practices—things such as AC, use of gas stoves, and lawn maintenance on the huge lots that are common practice in our rural area.

That’s a tall order.  A few friends I discussed this piece with suggest that a huge climate-related event, or even a series of them, won’t succeed is shifting the global focus sufficiently to make change happen.  Most also not only doubt but assume that actions in the US won’t be complemented by action elsewhere. If the US engages in huge sacrifices to save the earth but others don’t, what’s the point?  I don’t have answers, but does that mean I should give up?

So, I am ready to listen to a 16-year-old (and others) if it means that the Eastern Shore (and, of course, the rest of the planet) will be here for my grandchildren to enjoy.  I fear, however, that I will fail to act on my new-found commitment to be a “friend of the climate.” My record to date is not a good sign. I’m not sure I’m ready to abandon my comfortable home, move into a yurt, and go off the grid altogether. Like the rest of us, I need to figure out how to connect the dots, but don’t have a lot of time to do it.  

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.  

 

   

Aesop tells us, “A man is known by the company he keeps.”  Although it would be convenient to hope that in the case of President Trump he is wrong, the evidence is to the contrary. A quick look at the President’s company produces a rogue’s gallery of convicted felons, ethical question marks, and incompetents. If Aesop is right, we all need to run for the hills.

At the risk of both missing some of the more egregious cases and perhaps being too harsh on a few others, here is a sampler of the President’s men and woman:

Roger Stone.  He frequently wore stripes before his conviction. Now he gets to wear them permanently.  That tattoo of Nixon on his back will be a big hit in the prison shower.

Manafort. Trump needs to find someone else to run the 2020 Republican convention in Charlotte unless someone can get him a contraband cell phone and a 5G signal.

Rudy. How far can “America’s Mayor” fall?  Did he simply go insane or was there a hidden side to Mayor Giuliani all the time?

Lindsey Graham. Proof that ghosts do not come back to haunt.  If the late Senator McCain had any awareness of the ethical decline of his friend, he would be shaking his head and muttering an expletive. It’s one thing to become Trump’s chief defender in the Senate.  It’s another to initiate an investigation into the Bidens on the President’s behalf. Biden, you may know, is Senator Graham’s “good friend.”

Sarah Huckabee Sanders. For 23 months, Mike Huckabee’s daughter attempted to break the Guinness Book record for lying. Now, she indicates that she has been “called on” to run for Governor of Arkansas.  Arkansas isn’t the greatest place on earth, but what could be going on down there for God to wish for Sanders to occupy the State House?

Sean Spicer.  Best known for “Dancing with the Stars,” but he redefined the role of White House Press Secretary.  Have you read his book, The Briefing?  I passed. It has been described as “a bumbling effort at gaslighting Americans.”

Hope Hicks.  A key distinction Hicks enjoys over most of the rest of Trump’s associates is that she has publicly admitted that she lied for him. Don’t be too hard on her.  They were only “white lies.” Now, she has cashiered her White House experience into an EVP job at Fox.  

Michael Cohen.  Cohen repented his loyalty to Trump but only after his wing of the house of cards collapsed.  Everyone now knows what a “fixer” is even if his efforts with Stormy Daniels did not work out. He once said he’d take a bullet for Trump.  Now he’s behind bars serving a three-year sentence.

Steve Bannon. The “Chief Strategist,” also referred to by Trump as “Sloppy Steven,” was “dumped like a dog” by him. We should all be grateful he was dumped when he was.

Steven Miller. This documented racist not only writes emails like a Nazi, he also looks a bit like one. Yet this white nationalist still is at work at the White House.  (Okay, the crack about Miller’s appearance is a bit much, but read his emails.)

Kellyanne Conway.  Her White House role is best summarized in the words “alternative facts” but what about that Trump-hating husband of hers? 

Devin Nunes. Not only has he shared confidential Intelligence Committee information with the White House, but he allegedly met with Ukrainians to discuss “dirt” while on a taxpayer-funded Congressional trip.

Jared Kushner and Ivanka.  This selfless pair are key advisors to the President. They work for free, no doubt because they don’t care about money. Both are already laying plans for their future presidencies. 

Scott Pruitt. Because there have been so many rogues in this Administration, you may have forgotten about Trump’s first EPA Administrator.  He spent more than $3 million in his first year in office on “travel and security,” more than three times what his predecessor did. Add to that more than a half dozen serious allegations of ethics violations.

I’ll stop here, intentionally, because discussing Bill Barr, Mick Mulvaney and giants such as former wrestling coach Jim Jordan would make this piece too long.  I’m also not mentioning any “exceptions to the rule,” people like Mad Dog Mattis and John Kelly. Both need to be thanked for their service. The others, and the President, need to be held accountable for theirs.

J.E. Dean of Oxford is a retired attorney and public affairs consultant. He is a former counsel to the House Committee on Education and Labor.  For more than 30 years, he advised clients on federal education and social service policy.

 

All through the impeachment hearings, I couldn’t help but think of “Catherine the Great” and my grandfather, Nelson.

Maybe it was the HBO series of the same title starring Helen Mirren. (More on Nelson later.) But most likely it was because both the hearings and the miniseries were about Russia invading Ukraine and stealing Crimea. Oh, I know. You’re probably wondering to yourself—depending on your political persuasion—weren’t the hearings about Democrats trying to overturn the 2016 presidential election or saving American democracy from a dictator-wannabe?

I doubt President Trump knows anything about Catherine the Great—either the Russian empress or the miniseries. Does he suspect that Catherine, famous for demanding favor from every bed-worthy male in sight, is the title character in “Kiss Me Kate”? Unlikely. Trump was never inclined to brush up his Shakespeare. Maybe he thinks “Macbeth” is a bloody-rare McDonald’s burger he hasn’t tried yet. Or perhaps a broken chicken leg.

You think I’m kidding? Donald is an astonishingly encyclopedic ignoramus. Ask any actual reporter who’s interviewed him. Fake news? Sure. Polar ice caps are not melting and Russia is not screwing with our elections. Donald’s counting on the latter in 2020.

Name the subject, other than cheating on little people, his wives or his taxes, Donald is clueless. (Of course, he denies it all, though he paid off, or tried to, at least two of his co-fornicators.)

Trump was president for less than two weeks when, on the first day of Black History Month—that would be February following his Jan. 20, 2017 inauguration—he responded to a White House staff suggestion that the president should acknowledge a notable African-American. Apparently, he forgot the “history” part, proclaiming: “Frederick Douglass is an example of somebody who’s done an amazing job and is getting recognized more and more, I notice.” Trump later “noticed” that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican, as if reporting a scoop. “Almost nobody knows that,” he said, assuming collateral ignorance.

At the time, I was tempted to write a commentary proclaiming “Frederick Douglass Was My Neighbor!” Trump clearly had no idea who Frederick Douglass was nor that he was long dead. As for Douglass being “my neighbor,” well, I was a century or so late. I grew up on the 600-acre farm next to Chesapeake at Easton Club East on Dutchman’s Lane, where my wife and I moved after retirement two years ago. Just a mile east, you come to Dover Neck Road and a farm (and Choptank Electric substation) that was once among several Lloyd family plantations, one of which claimed Douglass as human property upon his birth along the Tuckahoe River. Nelson, my maternal grandfather, free and white, was born at Lloyd’s Landing, east of Trappe, a former Choptank River port from which his grandfather captained a riverboat similar to one that inspired novelist John Barth’s “Floating Opera.”

Trump has failed, conspicuously, to appreciate the heroism of another former mid-Shore slave, Harriet Tubman. Thanks to him, Tubman’s image will not appear on the 20-dollar bill next year as ordered by President Obama. Trump instead preserves Andrew Jackson’s face on the currency that every ATM in America dispenses. That Jackson was a populist denigrator of people who don’t look like “us”—native Americans in Jackson’s case and Hispanics in Trump’s—is the president’s racist motive, reflected in his obsession with undoing everything Obama accomplished in his two terms, twice elected by a majority.

Trump can’t stand that he lost the popular vote to Hilary Clinton. So, he peddles the ludicrous conspiracy theory that Ukraine hacked a DNC server with the help of the California firm CrowdStrike and still hides it somewhere within borders not currently encroached by Russian invaders. That accounts, also, for Trump’s twin demands—“do me a favor”—of newly elected Ukrainian President Zelensky: Publicly proclaim investigations into the 2016 election, which would absolve Russia, and into Hunter Biden’s problematic association with Ukrainian energy company Barisma, which in turn would stain Democratic presidential candidate Joe’s reputation.

This for that. Forget the Latin quid pro quo to which Trump claims exquisite innocence. Does his legal team count on their client’s certifiable idiocy as a defense? Was he too stupid to rob the bank? Is botching a stick-up a defense before Judge Judy? Should would-be bank robbers be acquitted because the getaway driver ran out of gas a block from the target bank? Never mind that Trump’s sons, oldest daughter and son-in-law are all up to their necks in sweetheart deals with Russian/Ukrainian oligarchs.

In TrumpWorld, hypocrisy and hyper-incompetence apply only to suckers.

We’re asked to believe that Democrats conspired to hack their own server in order to leak emails embarrassing solely to their presidential nominee. Evidence of Ukraine’s perfidy against candidate Trump? A couple of critical op-ed columns. The plot, according to such Trump toads as Rep. Devin Nunes, is that Democrats conspired to lose the election so that they might later impeach and remove him from office. At the cost so far of two Supreme Court nominations—one stolen, both confirmed.

We can be sure now that Trump will be impeached. And unless Rudy Giuliani & Thug Associates do something stupider than usual—physical violence against such impeachment witnesses as Iraqi war hero Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman or courageous and unflappably articulate coalminer’s daughter Fiona Hill—Trump will be “exonerated” in a Senate trial.

Which brings us to still more Maryland links to the impeachment of Donald J. Trump. Although impeachment is constitutionally sanctioned, Article II (which Trump obscenely claims allows him to do whatever he pleases), Section 4 provided no means for the House of Representatives to enforce its prescribed duty until Oxford shipbuilder and Revolutionary War financier Robert Morris demanded to clear his name against media gadflies charging that he enriched himself on the new nation’s dime. Morris insisted in a letter to George Washington and both houses of Congress that he be investigated, essentially establishing the power of subpoena to which the current White House flips its middle finger. Congress acquitted Morris of “maladministration,” but he wound up in debtor’s prison near the end of his career. Still, I recommend lunch at Robert Morris Inn.

To most observers, with the encouragement of Trump sycophant-in-chief Nunes, who gives dairy farmers—my dad was one—a bad name, the Russia and Ukraine inquiries are separate and serial issues. If at first you don’t succeed, try something else, the GOP see-no-evils say. Hey, he didn’t succeed in shaking down the Ukrainian president, so what’s the problem? But both the Mueller and House investigations into Trump’s assault on American democracy draw directly from the same playbook.

I don’t know what Vladimir Putin has on Donald Trump. I suspect Putin owns him—he and his Kremlin enablers—perhaps explaining why the president’s tax records are, for now, a state secret. But I do know, and everyone who pays attention knows, that Trump bows to Putin’s every wish, most likely owing to a time when no U.S. bank would loan to bankrupt-prone Donald. Is that why he’s subverted our NATO and European Union commitments? Not yet accomplished, though Trump does his best. How about abetting Russia’s Mideast ambitions in Syria? Mission accomplished. And how about betraying U.S. ally Ukraine so Putin can start fulfilling his perceived destiny—to re-establish the Soviet Union? That begins with Ukraine. It was Catherine’s greatest ambition more than two centuries ago at the time of our own independence—to secure a warm-weather port on the Black Sea with access to the Mediterranean. Such hegemony persists in Moscow today, though if Putin is patient enough—his re-election fix is guaranteed—global warming avails thousands of miles of navigable ports on the Arctic.

But I digress

If Ukraine falls to Russian aggression, what’s to stop Putin from taking over Georgia—no, not you guys in Atlanta—or Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Armenia? You get the picture. Donald’s at Vlad’s service. He is compromised, somehow. Not an agent so much as a useful and semi-literate idiot.

Just after Robert Mueller stumbled haltingly in his testimony before Congress, Trump took it as a green light. Our president tried the very next day to extort political favors from the Ukrainian president facing existential threats engineered by Putin’s global ambition.

In his closing remarks after the final witnesses testified, Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff quoted the late Oversight Committee Chairman and Baltimore champion Elijah Cummings: “We are better than this!” Not since Francis Scott Key wrote “O’ say can you see” in the harbor within cannon-fire of Fort McHenry has American resolve been better articulated.

Steve Parks is a retired journalist and lifelong patriot now living in Easton.

Feature cartoon by DonkeyHotey