Thoughts in Winter

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Poets often use winter as a symbol for death. The winter of our lives is considered doddering old age. It connotes bleakness and desolation in many minds. That is not my reality.

The morning after a snowstorm in our neighborhood is noted for bustling activity. The notion of community revived. Folks digging out cars and shoveling pavements. Hard work, yes. Disagreeable, no doubt. But you want to see bleak and desolate in the city, try looking outside on a hot Sunday afternoon. You can see for miles and see only an occasional straggler. The icy winter brings with it the community working together outside to free ourselves from what the freeze has inflicted upon us while inside we search for warmth, snuggling indoors under blankets or over a cup of steaming coffee.

Paradoxically, perhaps, winter also brings for me a time of quiet contemplation. I exchange views with my mostly conservative readership and e-mails with my mostly liberal friends. It may surprise some of you who view me as some kind of wild-eyed radical aberration in the midst of South Philadelphia that while I’m among my friends, sometimes my liberal credentials are severely questioned. I find everything is relative and subject to the individual’s perspective. This is an age without nuance. No shades of gray, only black and stark white. Thus folks on the right seem convinced our president is a socialist while those on the left tend to view him as a betrayer of liberal causes. In reality, a president can’t govern so that he satisfies liberals or conservatives, even most of the time.

I view myself as a liberal, one who believes government can ameliorate the worst excesses of capitalism and in so doing protect capitalism from carnivorous capitalists. I tell my liberal friends that sometimes I may be more critical of liberals than conservatives because I expect more from liberals, and too many, not all, of today’s conservatives seem to be merely bigots parading under a more respectable label. I don’t see a William F. Buckley or Robert A. Taft or Ronald Reagan feeling comfortable among many of today’s “conservatives.” Lately I find myself increasingly taking a more pragmatic view on major issues.

I am somewhere between those who want to canonize Edward Snowden and those who want him executed for treason because they think he is a Russian spy. I think there is a role in national security for wiretapping. I believe we will put more teeth into oversight, as we must, but I also believe there is a need for secrecy and we can’t cheer every self-styled patriot to decide for him or herself which secrets are legitimate and which should be disclosed. I don’t believe the collection of meta data is the same thing as listening willy nilly to our phone conversations. While some object to the use of drones to kill our enemies, I find them a useful substitute for putting the lives of American soldiers in danger.

I think there is too much discussion about the size of our military and not enough about how to use our military more effectively to meet the challenge of terrorism. The threat we face today is not the same as we faced during the Cold War. I don’t think there is much doubt we are currently prepared to face the wrong kind of war.

I believe in freedom of choice for women’s reproductive rights because women are better suited to make that choice than the government. But I also believe, using the same logic, in freedom of choice for parents in choosing the schools their children attend. So, yes, I am for school vouchers, especially for the poor. I have no vested interest in any school system; I am only vested in the belief that parents who choose the schools for their kids are parents who become more interested in their children’s education. More interested parents should translate into more widespread interest in the voting booth for supporting the cost of educating children.

Much of what is wrong with our health-care system today is the profit motive. Remove it. Medicare for everyone. Get rid of the idea that we should care more about protecting the insurance companies. The American birthright should be first class medical care.

Capitalism is not a religion; corporations are not people. Capitalism is the best economic system we have yet devised. Robust capitalism requires the profit motive, but don’t expect corporations to act altruistically. We need stronger regulations.

I believe politics is an honorable profession, and politicians’ often dishonorable actions doesn’t change that fact. By and large, politicians are no more corrupt than any other profession, but the opportunity for corruption is greater, as is the politician’s responsibility to act in the public interest. A disinterested citizenry is not something a democracy can afford and still survive. We get the politicians we deserve. We need to work at making democracy work.

I believe that the tide of social justice is inevitable, as inevitable as spring following winter. On this bitter cold morning with the winds blowing and the snow piled in drifts on streets and sidewalks, I can hear the chatter of people and activity outside my window, and I’m comforted by those sounds, and the thought that it won’t be long before the thaw. 

Contact the South Philly Review at editor@southphillyreview.com.

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