Adam Schiff, Marlo & Phil, Bella Abzug, Iran, Lindsay Graham, Deadbeat Trump, Mel Brooks, & Ruth Ginsburg
LETTY COTTIN POGREBIN / NEWSLETTER #65 / MARCH, 2020
Politics, Culture, Activism, Women, Jews
While we're all trying to adjust to surrealism in everyday life -- the fast-spreading virus, quarantines, self-isolation, social distancing, terrifying mortality predictions, empty restaurants, toilet paper hoarding, virtual dinner parties, religious services, and yoga classes -- the world is still spinning and it needs our attention.
POLITICS
* Thank you, Adam Schiff! This jaw-dropping minute of highlights from the Congressman's closing speech at the House impeachment hearings is so brilliant and stirring it could win the election for Democrats. The Senate didn't convict Trump but Schiff reminds us why the President is a travesty and must be defeated.
* In the age of Covid-19, I hesitate to say the words went viral, but this song did and rightly so. Watch the founders of the Constitution sing “The Day Democracy Died.” And don't be surprised if it makes you cry.
* Lindsay Graham embodies all the shameless Republicans who've sold out to stay in power. This video tracks his pivot from Never Trump to pandering sycophant. He actually says, "I don't give a shit."
* My last Newsletter reprinted an ad offering money to actors, especially actors of color, willing to show up at a Trump rally in Phoenix and act excited. Here's more proof that the president is buying black votes.
* Already notorious for leaving contractors holding the bag at his buildings, Deadbeat Donald and his henchmen racked up more than a million dollars of unpaid bills for public safety costs associated with his campaign rallies in 12 American cities by last October. [map above j
BOOKS
* Marlo Thomas and Phil Donahue, whose 40th anniversary is in May, interviewed 40 long-married couples the likes of Arlene & Alan Alda, Lily Tomlin & Jane Wagner, Judy Woodruff & Al Hunt, and Rosalynn & Jimmy Carter, for their joyful, uplifting book, What Makes a Marriage Last. (Pre-order here.) They all speak candidly about the attitudes, strategies, and values that account for the longevity and vitality of their unions.
Happily for us, Bert and I are among them. This photo. taken on our wedding day, appears in our chapter.
[Letty Cottin Pogrebin and Bert Pogrebin, December 8, 1963]
* A different kind of love is the subject of Michael Lerner's latest book which has garnered impressive blurbs from Keith Ellison, Riane Eisler, Ariel Dorfman, Cornel West, and Medea Benjamin. Gloria Steinem says Revolutionary Love: A Political Manifesto to Heal and Repair the World "opens our minds and hearts to a fully human way of living and governing." Order here.
* Before Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, or AOC, there was Bella Abzug, the irrepressible Congresswoman from New York whose fiery rhetoric was forged in the antiwar movement and fired up in the struggle for gender parity and economic justice. She died in 1998 but I still miss her. Leandra Ruth Zarnow's new book, Battling Bella: The Protest Politics of Bella Abzug, recalls her feistiness and her fearlessness. * Like you, I'm sick of hearing about the president's bizarre, narcissistic, tyrannical behavior, and the toadying complicity of his Republican colleagues. But we can't just turn away in disgust or become inured to their steady dismantling of democratic norms and institutions. To fully grasp the amoral, unhinged madness of the Orange Menace, read A Very Stable Genius: Donald J. Trump's Testing of America.
ISRAEL/PALESTINE
* Veteran negotiator, Aaron David Miller, describes the Trump-Kushner peace plan as "the most dangerous I've ever seen." If this is "the deal of the century," we're lucky the century is only 20 years old, though the people on the ground in Palestine shouldn't have to wait another eighty years for the U.S. to act like an honest broker rather than Israel's private lawyer.
* Walking down the (produce) aisle: With gatherings in Israel limited to 10 people, people sought creative ways to include family and friends in their wedding ceremonies. A photo on social media showed an unnamed couple being married in the aisle of a supermarket, since the number of people who can be in a supermarket at any given time is 100, not just 10. Clever!
* Video of Israeli mother of four reacting to the first 2 days of the shelter in place rule. She's ventilating better than most people and you've never see anyone talk this fast. (In Hebrew with hilarious English subtitles.)
FILM
* Paula Weiman-Kelman has produced a beautiful film about Rabbi Rachel Cowan (above), the foremost proponent of Jewish healing and spirituality who touched so many lives before she died of brain cancer 18 months ago. Contact paulawk123@gmail.com to bring the film to your community.
* I've not yet seen the documentary but the trailer had me at Hello. "Shared Legacies: The African-American Jewish Civil Rights Alliance looks like an immensely valuable, if slightly idealized, recounting of the coalition between blacks and Jews that many of us remember well (some with a nostalgic glow, some with critical complexity). I wish we could rejuvenate the alliance in a new form for a new era.
WOMEN
* Belated kudos and much gratitude to Senators Warren, Amy Klobuchar, and Kamala Harris whose long, strong, substantive campaigns did us proud. Here's hoping one of you, or Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, another remarkable woman who ran for president, or another of the women leaders who've distinguished themselves in today's political landscape, becomes Biden's running mate.
* Women candidates aren't allowed to be funny. Read what happened when Sen.Elizabeth Warren zinged a questioner with a great comeback.
* I missed this months ago but it's worth applauding California Congresswoman Norma Torres (above) for calling out "sex-starved male colleagues"who lecture to women about their reproductive choices. A chorus of outraged male voices responded and "the gentleman from Georgia" forced her to withdraw the phrase. She agreed, after first repeating it, then pressed on with her point. Pity that Republican men are upset about being called "sex-starved" but not ashamed to tell women how to run their personal lives. * Roe v. Wade's guarantee of legal abortion doesn't mean much if you can't access safe procedures close to where you live. The Brigid Alliance helps women travel from states with with restrictive reproductive rights laws and few clinics to states where they can access safe, compassionate care. Please donate now.
MIND-BOGGLING NEWS FROM IRAN
* The Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh (above) was sentenced to 148 lashes and 38 years in prison for defending Muslim women's right to not wear the hijab (head covering).
* Iran's conflation of the U.S. with "the international Jewish conspiracy" couldn't be more stark than it is in the symbol painted on the wall of the former U.S. embassy in Tehran. (below)
[Photo: Reuters Jan 7, 2020] Woman walks past the former U.S. Embassy in Tehran]
JEWS & JEWISH LIFE
(Photo: Abigail Uzi)
* It won't be long before the last of the Holocaust survivors are gone. Thankfully, 250 photographers from more than 20 countries spent last year traveling around the world to find aging survivors and take their portraits for the project described here. Above, Moshe Hayalon, 94, a Greek Jew, reveals the number tattooed on his arm in Auschwitz. His mother and sister were killed in Birkenau. * An ultra-Orthodox rabbi is fighting for transgender rights. His advocacy shouldn't be so extraordinary but unfortunately, at this moment in Jewish history, it is.
Best Menorah Ever. A friend found this picture on the internet. I have no idea if the menorah is photoshopped or real but if it exists, let me know so I can buy it in time for Chanukah.
There's nothing funny about the Coronavirus but in the absence of a cure, I'll resort to a cliche -- laughter is the best medicine. Here's an image and a public service message that made me smile this week, and a note encouraging you to send something to V.P Mike Pence, head of the Coronavirus task force.
* Mel Brooks promotes social distancing: In a PSA narrated by his son, Max, the 93-year-old actor/comedian/producer plays a nearly non-speaking role standing behind a glass door to encourage social distancing. Max points at him and says, “If I get the coronavirus, I’ll probably be OK. But if I give it to him, he could give it to Carl Reiner, who could give it to Dick Van Dyke, and before I know it, I’ve wiped out a whole generation of comedic legends.”
* A funny friend of mine suggests: "Everyone get tested ASAP! The US is taking the Coronavirus seriously. New testing methods are being used and you don’t have to leave your house. No hospital visit is necessary. All you have to do is mail a stool sample to: Mike Pence, The White House, Washington, DC 20515."
STAY SAFE, STAY STRONG, STAY HOME. -- Letty