Beads from the Week of May 31, 2020 to June 6, 2020

I read twenty five or thirty articles a week. In lockdown I have begun a discipline of capturing their essence, pulling a quote and wondering how they might string together.

The beads I have strung together this week comprise a Venn diagram of four overlapping plagues - Racism, lawlessnes, Trump and Covid. They begin with a powerful metaphor offered by Kareem Abdul and Jabbar and end with a deep truth about us expressed by Carolyn Tallsalt, a Navajo police woman.

“Racism in America is like dust in the air. It seems invisible even if you are choking on it - until you let the sun in.” (1) As if to prove Jabbar’s pronouncement, even though a white CHP officer drove the car taking Tony Thurmond (the chief of public schools in California) home, he instinctively put his hands on the dashboard when a policeman pulled the car over this week. Thurmond explained, “I will not demean police officers. But you betcha that every time one is behind me, I’m scared because of the pattern of black men being pulled over and black men losing their lives.” (2) The difference the way the patrolmen in Minneapolis treated George Floyd and the Departments subsequently treated them cannot be missed. “If the criminal system treated African Americans at the arrest-decision point the way it treats police suspects — such as Chauvin and his three colleagues — George Floyd would still be alive.” Along with demands for reform of police tactics comes insistence to think about reparations. “The killing of George Floyd happened in a context — and that context is racial disparity.

The response to this moment will be inadequate if it’s just police reforms. There has to be a greater effort to tackle the wider disparities.” (4) What hope there is for change grows from the multiethnic character of the crowds at protests around the country. Earl Hutchinson, LA resident who witnessed the Watts and Rodney King riots along with their aftermath says “the protests now look vastly different. The earlier events were mostly black people protesting in the streets. The current civil unrest looks like a little United Nations….”

A second plague nihilistic lawlessness took advantage of the legitimate protest of racism. “As darkness falls, it can be difficult to tell protester from agitator from opportunist. One thing is certain: They are all there.” (6) State Senate leader Toni Atkins (D-San Diego) issued a statement the day after the first night of looting that declared: “We have seen violence and looting spurred by those who are out to commit crimes of opportunity, out to divide our communities for political gain or out to cause damage for damage’s sake. … We are on to you and you will not succeed in tearing us apart.” (7)

So far it seems Atkins is correct, that protests have been in the main lawful and impactful. This no thanks to President Trump, patient zero in the third plague besetting us. “This weak person’s idea of a strong person, this chest-pounding advertisement of his own gnawing insecurities, this low-rent Lear raging on his Twitter-heath has proven that the phrase malignant buffoon is not an oxymoron.” (8) Would that everyone saw through Trump’s Bible stunt, that he “using religion as a cultural wedge to deflect attention from the consequences of his own ineptitude.” (9) Not in months, perhaps years, has there been an antiseptic released in our country like that by Retired General James Mattis who “made clear his preference for American unity as opposed to Trump’s and Nazism’s “divide and conquer” tactics.” (10) A thorough cleansing of the Trump plague depends on the election in November. Stacy Abrams acknowledges that “Voting feels inadequate in our darkest moments,” “will not save us from harm” but reminds us “silence will surely damn us all.” (11) We must vote to lift the scourge.

And finally three people on the frontline of the battle against the fourth plague….almost lost this week, Covid 19.

Danny Ambriz serves on the City Council in the California Central Valley town of Atwater. In a bravura display of macho magical thinking the civic leaders of Atwater have decided to declare their town immune to Covid 19. No masks,, no refraining from handshakes and no enforcement of social distancing directives from the governor. Danny has to go along to get along so he pressed the flesh will all gathered at the Council meeting. But he has new baby at home and the conflict comes out this way - “ “Yes, I shook hands with the officers tonight,” he said. “But I know afterwards I’m going to go home, and I’m going to wash my hands. I’m going to change out of my shirt, and then I’m going to love on my child. I know the steps I’m supposed to take. I’m hoping the rest of our residents know as well.” (12) Francine Orr went, like a war correspondent, on assignment to Martin Luther King Jr. Medical Center in South Los Angeles to chronicle the lives and struggles of doctors, nurses and patients battling Covid 19. She braided their stories together with her own story of becoming a journalist. That journey began early in High School in an encounter with the school newspaper advisor at her parochial school, Sister Marie Brinkman. At that first meeting Orr says “I confided that I wanted to be on her newspaper staff but couldn’t. She slyly smiled, as she does, and asked, “Why?” I told her meekly, “I can’t spell, so I can’t write for your newspaper.” “That’s what editors are for.” And in that one sentence, I had a future.” (13) Orr tells Sister Marie is now in hospice care in Kansas. May light enfold her. Carolyn Tallsalt is police woman on the Navajo reservation near Tuba City Arizona. Covid 19 has taken the lives of loved ones and her work demands closely monitoring and often handling likely carriers of the virus. She takes all the precautions she can and yet life is sustained anxiety. After stopping to help a mother with a distraught infant get the taillight on her truck taped back in place she told reporte Kurtis Lee, “Even when there’s a pandemic, everyday life is still happening. People need service and protection” (14) Yes we do...Officer Tallsalt...yes we do and thank you.