Oh, Now You Want Civility?

Oh, now you want civility?

After years of talk radio hostility,
A campaign of absurdity,
Calls from the podium for brutality,
Assaults on liberty,
And daily Twitter stupidity,
Now you want civility?

The flip side bears some responsibility,
By breathlessly flaming the anxiety,
Indulging in overreactivity,
Choosing to match the animosity,
(Here I just want to rhyme Synchronicity),
And believing in hopeful audacity.

Can we fix a gulf of such enormity,
A divide so fraught with radioactivity,
Pushed to the brink is our collective fragility, Can we retain our bend but not break elasticity,
Will we demonstrate the necessary flexibility,
To achieve our founders' domestic tranquility?

We have the ability,
But it will take great temerity,
To change the tribal mentality,
Stow the vulgarity,
And erase the ideological rigidity,
Yes, we have the ability.

Oh, now we want civility...

(You know, calls from the right for "civility" drive me crazy. They are disingenuous at best, calculated base-baiting at worst. Do I think Trump officials should be shouted at in, or asked to leave,  restaurants? No, I do not. But to decry these actions while defending the bully-in-chief is laughable. The roots of today's culture war were planted long before Trump became president, yet he does his best (worst) each day to escalate  the battle.  If today's lack of civility is a raging wildfire, Trump may not be the smoldering campfire that started it, but he is the Santa Ana winds fanning the flames until they are out of control.

Finally, for funsies, if you haven't already, go back and read my "poem" in Don King's voice.)

Children In Cages

Children in cages.  Three simple words.  Three simple words that should be enough to cut through all the clutter.  To cut through the breathless talking heads, the purported policies and laws, the unconfirmed audio, and, if it is your cup of tea (party), the "fake news."  Three simple words that should make us, all of us, wonder what the hell is going on in this country we all claim to love.  Though, there were moments and simple words that previously should have been enough.  Grab 'em by the pussy.  Mocking a disabled reporter.  "Many sides" and "good people" in Charlottesville.  Endorsing Roy Moore.  Lie after lie with some untruths mixed in for variety.  Exhibits A through Z of evidence proving that Donald Trump's supporters, flattering Fox News  flunkies, and spineless Congressional Republicans are with him no matter the fuckery he trots out.  The blind loyalty somehow remains both astonishing and unsurprising. 


Back to today's issue.  (Which I assume is still the most recent forehead-slapping thing I need to worry about.  But I haven't been on Twitter in like five minutes, so who knows.)  There's no doubt we need immigration reform.   However, this zero-tolerance garbage is more like zero-compassion.  I've heard a bunch of arguments today from our President, from his administration, from his staff pundits at Fox News, and from friends and family defending separating kids from their parents.  Some of them are good; almost as good as PizzaGate and Birthers.  Let's check in on the latest. 


They're illegal!
Yes, some of the refugees are illegally crossing the border.  Deal with them accordingly.  But what about those showing up, at the proper designated ports of entry, willfully turning themselves in to seek asylum?  Do they not deserve to have their cases heard in a timely manner?  Can't we find a way to keep their families intact in decent living conditions while the legitimacy of their requests are considered? 


The holding facilities are like summer camps.
Laura Ingraham, to what kind of summer camps are you sending your kids?  Doggie day care?
Of course, I could be wrong. I am woefully out of style.  Maybe mylar blankets will be the next fidget spinners or Hatchimals dotting every kid's Christmas list this fall.


President Trump's hands are tied by a Clinton-era law.
Show me the law.  Seriously, point to it, send me a link, show me. And, no, the meme Uncle Don't Tread On Me just posted on his wall doesn't count.


The policy is a deterrent.
No, it's not.  It is a cruel, base-pandering, fear-mongering, brown people-punishing, fulfillment of a campaign promise.  And, if what you say is true, that migrants/refugees/animals/breeders/ insert-callous-word-Trump-has-used-here are indeed still flooding the borders, then this really isn't such
a hot deterrent after all, eh little chum?


Obummer (look at how clever you are) separated families, too.
Yep, and that was shitty, as well.  And protested. No, it did not get major media publicity.  I'm not here to debate the hypocrisy of the media; that ground is pretty well tread.  Obama also didn't send his Attorney General out like the town crier declaring war on refugee kids.  Damn, now I can't shake the image of tiny, elfin Jeff Sessions struggling to drag around his "Down with The Brown" sandwich board. Here's the thing, though.  Donald Trump has spent the first eighteen months of his presidency trying to dismantle every single policy enacted by Barack Obama.  But this one, splitting toddlers from their parents, putting boys on lockdown behind chain link in a refurbished Wal-Mart, this is the predecessor's policy that you leave in place?  Whatever, man.


Uh, if you don't want to lose your child, don't bring them here. 
Holy shit, listen to yourself!


So here we are, unable to move on to important matters like establishing a Space Force because I have to rage against children in cages.  Fortunately, others have taken up the cry.  SOME religious leaders, SOME Republicans, SOME  Trump voters.  But not enough.  It is not enough until ALL of us call for a better way.  It's not hard to do the right thing.  Sometimes all we need is a simple reminder.  Three simple words.  Children in cages.

Worth the Wait

Life is a series of moments.  The life of a sports fan is measured by these moments, the highlight  reels forever burned in our memory.  The plays we watch, the I-remember-exactly-where-I-was-when-that-happened memories we make, the shared joy and disappointment, all become touchstones in our families and our fan communities. They are how we communicate, both with best friends  and fans we barely know.


For Washington Capitals fans there have been electrifying moments.  Hunter in alone on Hextall.  Joe Juneau poking a loose puck behind Dominic Hasek. Joel Ward eliminating Boston in overtime.  But, especially in the playoffs, most of the memories are of bitter failure and disappointment.  We know them all. The brutal ones even get their own nicknames.  We lament them, we write about them, we curse them.  The Easter Epic.  Nedved.  Gonchar falling in OT.  Tikkanen missing a yawning open net.  Marty St. Louis in the third overtime.  Too many crushing Game Seven losses to count. Blown 3-1 series leads.  Dinged posts.  Deflections off defensemen's skates.  Bad calls and no calls.  Close calls and pratfalls.  In the postseason, the Caps routinely made the impossible seem inevitable, and NOT in a good way.  Each time, after remote controls  were flung in disgust and red sweaters ripped off in despair, we would lick our wounds, settling into our summers of discontent confident that we would never see the Capitals win it all.  We would console each other with the trite notion that all the heartache and dismay would make it that much sweeter when the Caps actually, finally, impossibly won the Cup.


Guess what.  On that last point, trite as it may have been, we were absolutely right!  Last night, we watched OUR guys do the impossible.  And vicariously sipping from Lord Stanley's Cup was sweeter than I could imagine.  The victory doesn't sweep away all the past disappointments, in fact, it does  the opposite.  The victory galvanizes those bitter memories into a healthy resolve, into a fun righteousness proving us correct for sticking with our Caps for all these years.  Look at what those guys accomplished.  During a season in which some thought they might not even make the playoffs, the boys in red, faced and exorcised all the demons of yesteryear.  It is easy to say the law of averages finally worked out, but we know better.  The hockey gods make you earn your breaks, and earn them Washington did.  On the ropes in Columbus,  The Holtbeast returned in the nick of time as the Caps stormed back to win four straight.  Evgeny Kuznetsov bookended goals in the first minute of Game One and the winning goal in overtime of Game Six to get by Pittsburgh.  Just when it looked like another here-we-go-again demise after coughing up a 2-0 series lead in Tampa, Andre Burakovsky returned from injury and the doghouse to propel Washington to the Stanley Cup Final.  Brandishing a team defense and depth of scoring that previous Caps' teams have so often lacked, Washington swaggered into Vegas and cashed in on their first title.  It was not without difficulty.  Facing nemesis Marc-Andre Fleury, and one last demon in holding a 3-1 series lead, the Caps endured things in Game Five that would have sunk them in the past.  A deflected goal against, hitting the post twice, untimely penalties.  Yet, this time the Caps backed up their talk by actually being different.  A new identity was formed as new memories were etched.  Gone are the choking dogs, replaced by clutch champions.  New memories and new heroes immediately legendary among the fan collective.  THE SAVE.  Bottom six heroes like DSP, Lars Eller, and Chandler Stephenson emerging.  Orpik standing tall.  Shot blocks by the grinders and the millionaires. Tom Wilson pulverizing anything in opposing colors. THAT power play saucer pass from Backstrom to Ovechkin symbolizing the excellence of an entire era.


So, now we've got it.  The big honkin' silver chalice on which the players's names will be engraved  in immortality.  We have the Stanley Cup.  And yes, I say we.  I didn't earn it on the ice, of course, but I have been with this team for thirty-plus years.  So I like to think this victory was for all of us.  Players and fans, past and present.  This win was Ovie and Backy.  For Kuzy and Trotz.  For Ted and Abe.  But it was also for Dale and Kono.  For Bonzai and Calle Jo.  For Olie the Goalie and Donnie B.  It's even for ketchup-faced Brucie and George McPhee. And  it is for the fans.  For everyone that braved the traffic to reach the big potato chip in Landover.  For everyone that rocks the red at F Street.  For a group of guys that lept off the couch squealing like little girls when Juneau scored twenty years ago and wept when Dale Hunter's number was raised to the rafters. For a group of guys that invested so much emotionally in what others consider a frivolous passion. For a group of guys that has cheered and cursed together, wondering  if we would ever see this day.  The day has arrived.  Enjoy it.  For today, whether you have been with this wonderful, enigmatic, torturing, amazing team for thirty years or thirty days, we are ALL CAPS.