TIME FOR A FEW BRIEF WORDS

     Yes, I 'fess up. I am guilty of writing many words where perhaps a few would do, but there it is. Too old to change that habit, so what does the title mean? It tells us that there are some times a few words that just about carry the day, explain an issue or highlight the problem. Here are a few.
     So it comes down to this:   if you have a rigged trial there's no exoneration in acquittal."  Well, what have we been saying all along. Murkowski came the closest to this issue, at least from the Republican side, but how about all of those Senators read these few words and acknowledge the truth, acknowledge that despite the truth of these words, the fear, their cowardice, their lack of moral fiber are driving them to ignore it and continue down the road to perdition as they sell their souls to Trump.
     Out of the mouth of the Devil's right hand man we get this: My advice to Giuliani would be to share what he got from Ukraine with the IC [intelligence community] to make sure it’s not Russia propaganda. I’m very suspicious of what the Russians are up to all over the world.”  Well, hello! What have we been saying all along and now the wacked out, ugly faced, screaming Graham warns that the Russians have done something naughty and it is not Ukraine!!! Really?! How nice that he voices what he has been denying all along. Now how about he admit that, put on big boy pants, square his shoulders and admit he was wrong, do the right thing. It is not see no evil, hear no evil, but speak a hell of a lot of evil. It is see it all for what the truth is and do the right thing.
     Oh, yes. More to come. Yesterday I wrote against and about the growing poison and horror of anti Semitism in the world, and most shockingly, right here in America. “This is a national phenomenon that we are seeing and it’s frightening and it’s disturbing,” Cuomo said at a news conference Sunday. “If anyone thinks that something poisonous is not going on in this country, then they’re in denial.” As stated before, this hatred, this poison, these awful deeds go on and overtake and erase boundaries. Shootings are extended to schools, to churches, to people walking along a street on a beautiful afternon. The nature of terrorism, and that is what this is, is to grow, to feed upon its hate, to drink the blood it sheds and spread and spread and spread until there is no stopping it, its ugly tentacles all over and reaching all. Certainly not without a monumental struggle that could have been avoided if we would have recognized it as terrorism, as hatred, as wrong, right in the beginning and stomped on it. But we don't, we did not, and here we are. All the words, all the platitudes, do not make up for machetes swinging through the air, slashing and cutting, the whistle of bullets flying through the air, the screams and the fright. These are for a lifetime and it is about damn time that we stop pussyfooting around.
    Finally, the shocking news that an icon of America, a hero of the civil rights fight and movement, John Lewis, is ill with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. While I did not always agree with him, the courage he displayed during his lifetime, the courage he displays now as he fights this sentence of death, well, would that we all would have the courage to follow his path of treading the walkways of right, of courage, of honesty, of freedom, of inclusion, of justice, of fierce fighting against terrorism and hatred. These words about him, “the conscience of the U.S. Congress.”  are words that we should all aspire to reach in our own lives. 
     We need to join the fight of life for us all, no matter the difficulty, no matter the demands put upon us. There is no separating society permanently, and be it protest here, or the brave people of Hong Kong, or in countries where corruption is rife and the people have had enough, we need to join the fight and take our guidance from his words.
      “I have been in some kind of fight — for freedom, equality, basic human rights — for nearly my entire life,” Lewis said. “I have never faced a fight quite like the one I have now.”
     We, too, have never had to fight the evil we are facing in our America. Fight the good fight, no matter what the evil of the opposition is. This is our only hope, the only pathway that remains.