Memorial Day 2020

Two of my great-great-grandfathers served the Union during the Civil War. In fact, I inherited a carbine that I believe was used by one of them, most likely by Private Patrick Flynn of the 2^nd New York Cavalry. Today is a day for remembering the fallen from our nation’s wars and, though neither Private Flynn nor Private Jacob Gorth (18^th Indiana Infantry) lost their lives during their service, the former was apparently wounded during the Gettysburg campaign. In fact, as I wrote in a July 2010 post, Private Flynn may have actually won the war for the Union.

In that post, inspired by a spirit of fun, I made light of cavalryman Flynn’s Gettysburg service, and I think – though I don’t exactly owe him an apology – that I do feel I shouldn’t fail to keep in mind the sacrifices he made for the Union’s cause. These sacrifices deserve more than the short shrift I gave him in my July 2010 blog. At the time I found it amusing that he was honored for his service at Gettysburg when, as I discovered, he never actually saw action on that storied battlefield.

This somewhat more serious regard for my ancestors’ Civil War service comes about because I learned that Private Flynn missed Gettysburg probably because he was wounded in a cavalry clash against Jeb Stuart’s rebels in June of 1863 just as Robert E. Lee was leading his army out of Virginia toward Pennsylvania. On top of this, I recently read five different diary-like accounts of Civil War veterans, one of which, Three Years in the Federal Cavalry, was actually about Private Flynn’s regiment. Reading about the experiences of these veterans has imbued me with a new respect for what they went through – all-around hardship, lousy food, lousy clothing (riddled with actual lice), sleeping in the rain, slogging through muddy, barely passable roads, and, of course, the frightening bloodshed of battle. I made a point to read both Yankee and Rebel accounts, but I naturally feel greater connection with the former, given that they were not defending slavery and they were, very much, fighting for us, the Americans of today.

So, hats off to you both, Privates Flynn and Gorth.

Hats off also to two of my most worthy Orlando-area neighbors, Major Dan Mullally of the U.S. Marines and Lt. General Mark Hertling of the U.S. Army, both now retired. Dan, who was kind enough to speak to my Vietnam War class, had led a company of marines at Khe Sanh just after the 1968 Tet offensive had subsided. He has said that one of his proudest achievements was bringing all of his marines home alive despite having led them during one of the hottest periods of combat in the Vietnam War. General Hertling’s many years of service included enough combat to teach any veteran humility and sobriety about the reality of going to war. He has recently served as a commentator on CNN and sometimes offers his thoughtful and informed opinions on that network’s website.

So, to all our good veterans, men and women who have served with courage and distinction, please know that you are not forgotten, and your service does not go unappreciated. Even today, 155 years after the fact, I have nothing but admiration and gratitude for what Privates Flynn and Gorth endured.

Jacob Gorth (aka Goerth), post-Civil War, when he rode with Buffalo Bill out west.

On Girding against Trumpspeak

On his CNN show, Reliable Sources, Brian Stelter patrols the media landscape by identifying outright dishonesty as well as “spin” in its more malicious and slickly misleading forms. On last Sunday’s program he encouraged us not to get so acclimated to the lying which characterizes the current White House that we grow numb to it. There’s a danger in simply accepting outrageous lies as normal; the threat is that we may permanently lose our ability to distinguish integrity from treachery.

 The problem is, or at least one of the problems is, that President Trump has no particular interest in telling the truth. I’m not claiming that everything Trump says is a lie; I’m simply saying he doesn’t care whether what he says is a lie or not. He only cares that his words juice up his base or stoke admiration in the general public. Trump does tell the truth sometimes, but only by accident, when the truth happens to align with his self-aggrandizement obsession.

 So how do we prevent ourselves from being numbed by Trump’s constant spewing of self-serving flimflammery? One way would be to identify the key words he customarily employs to purvey his prevarications and inoculate ourselves against them by mentally substituting more accurate words for the ones he uses. For example, Trump often deploys the phrase “I will say this…” when he is about to tell a whopper. What we might do when he says, “I will say this,” is train ourselves to hear “I will bullshit you about this…”

 A well-known example of this occurred in July of 2018 when, at a press conference in Helsinki, Trump tried to claim Russia hadn’t interfered in the 2016 election, saying, “I will say this: I don't see any reason why it would be [Russia].” What bullshit-sensitive listeners should hear in such cases is “I will now bullshit you about this: I don’t see any reason why it would be Russia.”*

 In linguistics, phrases like “I will say this” are called discourse markers. Another discourse marker that Trump commonly uses to introduce unbelievable lies is “Believe me,” as in the following examples:

 On the Paris Agreement – designed to stave off climate catastrophe, “Believe me, this is not what we need.”

 And:

 “I know more about ISIS than the generals do. Believe me.”

 For the record, Trump, I don’t believe you.

 To be fair, Trump sometimes actually tells the truth when he makes a “Believe me” statement, but usually he does not. So that’s one that has to be judged on a case-by-case basis.

 But there are Trumpian discourse markers that are more reliably “lleno de caca,” as they say in Oaxaca. One of these is “People say…” When Trumps says, “People say…” what you should hear is “I’m foisting some bullshit on you here by trying to make you think lots of other people are buying it.”

 During the 2016 campaign he tweeted, “Many people are saying that the Iranians killed the scientist who helped the U.S. because of Hillary Clinton’s hacked emails,”

 The actual number of people saying that was one: Donald J. Trump.

 According to the LA Times, Trumpspeak has infiltrated our language to such an extent that the “People say…” trick may be going viral. For example, a Texas band tweeted: “Many people are saying our next album will heal the sick and end all war. It’s just what many people are saying.”

 Let me conclude by offering a few more substitute phrases that I recommend for girding yourself against the numbness that threatens us from the White House falsehood factory.

 When Trump says “Fake news” you should hear “News that reveals my incompetence or corruption.”

 For “Hoax” substitute “A problem or crisis that I can’t handle.”

 For “Witch hunt,” read “Legitimate investigation into my criminal shenanigans.”

 When Trumps says “Deep state,” think “Democratic institutions.”

 For “Failing” substitute “Succeeding in a way that pisses me off,” as in, “The failing New York Times…” Let’s pause here to point out that New York Times subscriptions surged in the wake of Trump’s election, and 2019 was a record year for this particular “failing” paper.

 My humble proposal is that if we develop the habit of replacing his endless dribble of lies with our own edited truthified versions, we may help ourselves stay mentally alert and avoid the trap, indicated by Mr. Stelter, of growing numb to his constant duplicity. And speaking of Mr. Stelter, let me take this opportunity to plug Hoax, his forthcoming book on this topic:

 

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*In the Helsinki case, Trump’s lie was so blatantly obvious that he had to tell a second lie to cover his original lie, which he did by later claiming to have meant “I don’t see why it wouldn’t be Russia.” [Editor’s note: What a lame-brained loser.]