9/29/2024

My Dear Friend & POTUS, JRB,

            I just watched some of your remarks for the NABTU event. I got a chuckle out of your comment that your career has lasted 800 years. That was a new one. The rest of your talk was quite familiar including your dad’s adage about the dignity of work & your enumerations of jobs created & new construction projects. I winced every time you said, “damn,” but I doubt you can stop doing that. I did NOT hear a wife joke, YEAH!

            Have you heard of Mondoweiss? I found it this AM as I explored, “the truth shall set you free (TTSSYF).” I got there via Jonathan Kuttab, a Palestinian Human Rights lawyer working for peace & justice in Palestine/Israel. He wrote a memoir with the title, TTSSYF & also wrote an opinion piece in Mondoweiss in July with the headline, “There is no path to peace that does not involve Hamas.” He points out that folks need to recognize “you don’t make peace with your friends but with your enemies,” & get over the taboo of talking to Hamas. I encourage you to reach out to him to get his ideas.

            I was disappointed to read that you said Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination was “a measure of justice for his many victims.” How can an extrajudicial killing be “just?”

            Did you see the piece in the G today about the young men in Yangon being “Snatched from their beds, taken on the streets … forced to fight the junta’s losing war.” The CSM had an article about the women of Burma in the pro-democracy movement “challenging longstanding age & gender norms & hierarchies.”  You & I are aware of these things, but it’s good that Burma is getting some media attention.

            Your decision to funnel money from a Medicare trust fund to offset prescription premium increases reinvigorated my attempts to understand how Medicare works. My investigation lasted about 15 minutes & then once again, I gave up. Universal health coverage would be much easier to understand. Please push for that!

            BYBS,