7/5/2022

My Dear Friend & POTUS, JRB,

            My intention for the day is to laugh at myself. The Dali Lama & Desmond Tutu find themselves quite funny & bond with folks by sharing the humor in their own foibles. I have plenty of imperfections, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find something to joke about. You are pretty good at being self-deprecating which must help you stay in the joy zone.

            It’s going to be hard work to get in the joy zone today. Word of the shooting in Highland Park is disturbing, as is the news from Akron, Ohio about the killing of Jayland Walker. I share Rashawn Ray’s consternation, expressed on NPR today, about how it is that a white man who killed 6 innocent people can be taken into custody alive while a black man without a gun is shot 60 times. Our police force needs a makeover.

            I continue to be worried about Brittney Griner. I hope you read her letter to you & are doing everything you can to get her out of Russia.

            My concerns for Burma continue unabated. Human Rights Watch has some gruesome footage of military atrocities that I won’t be viewing. The violence there is just as soul crushing as the destruction of Ukraine. Please keep that in mind.

            Your Medal of Honor ceremony today should be encouraging, & I mean that quite literally. I’m sure that being in the presence of folks like Dwight W Birdwell (DWB) of the Cherokee Nation will strengthen your heart. The thousands of Native Americans who have served in the military will be proud that his heroics from 1968 are being recognized.

            DWB & the other 3 medal winners illustrate the kind of attitude that makes our nation great. As Prof. Eli Merritt is quoted in today’s KCS as saying, “moral courage as a locus for Americans to place hope, the willingness to stand up for what is right and true in spite of negative consequences to oneself, that is an essential glue of constitutional democracy.”

BYBS,