"West Side Story" and Whose Home is it Anyway?

Recently I wrote about the theme of home for the movies 'Spencer” and' 'Belfast '' but after seeing “West Side Story”, the theme continues, this time with who can call the United States home? Is it limited to the native born, or can those that immigrate call it home?

Who belongs has been an ongoing struggle for decades in the US, and often the pain of not belonging has made for a strong memory, and even stronger experiences; often negative. 

For those that have come to the United States, even from an island in our possession, taking the step to leave can be momentous for some, bittersweet for others. 

Often the pull is not only a better life for themselves, but for their children, a chance to grow and prosper. Along the way there are stumbling blocks, temptations to take shortcuts, sometimes illegal, but in the back of many  minds is the desire to refresh, and seize the dream. 

This is where West Side Story begins in this revival by Steven Spielberg, whose desire to authenticate the roles with those from Latinx heritages gives a freshness and honesty to not only old eyes, but towards those of a new generation. For as much as we “oldsters” loved Natalie Wood in the film version of the 1960s, she was not Latina.

Adding to the enduring appeal of the story is the elegiac score by Leonard Bernstein and the unforgettable lyrics of the legendary, and late, Stephen Sondheim; but, also the pull of place and time is a constant, as is the gritty urban area, that was later torn down for Lincoln Center.

Seeing the construction scaffolding near the extant buildings, we can see, “Coming in 1958,” underscoring the period as much as the full skirts of the women, and the pegged pants of the men.

This is not, however, a period piece, and for older viewers, this is a subtle, more nuanced piece that drives the point of belonging, and what it means to belong, to a new level, informed by a 21st century of marches, demonstrations, movements.

The music in all of its exuberance, energy and enigma, has a story line that has been beefed up to show not merely the drama, but the prejudices, and passions on both sides between the natives and the Puerto Rican immigrants, on San Juan Hill, but also the driving forces that often propel each other into a maelstrom.

It also traps Tony and Maria from the beginning of that stolen dance, behind the bleachers, at the school gym ostensibly a peacemaking social. Of note, this is a directorial innovation that uplifts the original meeting.

Taking it even further, there is Rita Moreno as “Valentina”, as the widow of a shopkeeper, who anchors the drama; especially interacting with Tony, where in one endearing scene he asks for Spanish translations to woo Maria on their first date.

Of course, where would “West Side Story” be without dance? It propels the drama with choreography by the late Jerome Robbins, whose virtuosity, and verve, were later rewarded by an invitation to him, by First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, to present his “Ballets U.S.A. in 1962 as the entertainment for a state dinner, in honor of the Shah of Iran.

The film reveals some of that hip swinging, sexy pirouetting and dips that shocked some of the society reporters present at that dinner, but is given a full range here, and nearly had most of the audience, at my showing, ready to hit the theater aisles with some energetic moves.

Returning to the theme of home, and mainstream society, It’s easy enough to dismiss the concerns of being different, and for academics to talk about cultural chasms, but living in the midst of one, can often give cruelty to even daily encounters, such as an ear punctured by a nail, in one of the film’s earliest scenes, giving us a foretaste of what is to come.

Of course, at the center of is the retelling of Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” the eternal struggle between groups is centered by another nail: true love.

Can love ever be enough? Enough to conquer the violence: plotted, palpable and possible as we see in the final scenes?

That’s an undercurrent that throbs underneath the story line, and with some marvelous moments, the “balcony” scene on the fire escape, but also the visit to The Cloisters museum, (originally a Rockefeller hunting lodge) given to The Met, whose aura of holiness, (with its collective parts of actual medieval churches) gives space to the vows of an everlasting love, that will never “nunca” depart.

As the film catapults to the end, we see that love is not enough, and that happiness, even across the psychological borders of prejudice and passion, is a hurdle that is insurmountable.

"Spencer" and "Belfast": The power of home

 One of my earliest childhood memories is being bundled into the backseat of the family Ford, after a trip to that uniquely Mid-American entertainment experience, the Drive-In Movie.  With the motor purring softly as background noise, the only light coming from the soft green glow of the dashboard, and my parents speaking in hushed tones, all felt safe and secure.

Later when they had marital problems, that sense of safety became unmoored, and it seemed to me, an act of betrayal, and I had a strong sense of that feeling when I recently watched the masterful movie, “Spencer” with Kristen Stewart, in a role of the lifetime, as Princess Diana, and the betrayal that she felt with the infidelities of her husband Prince Charles, with Camilla Parker-Bowles.

Betrayal can be shattering, in any sense, but when it comes to a marriage the effects can drill down on every insecurity and threaten nearly all within reach, and then some, and home can become a prison, rather than a refuge. 

While Diana’s story of being thrown into a public role, as the Princess of Wales, (with nearly no support, or advice), at an age when most girls have just left high school, is legend, but for my generation, it was also an emotional high: the wedding of the century, replete with the elegant facade of St. Paul’s Cathedral, its bells pealing, and Charles in a splendid military uniform, and the bride swathed in satin and silk emerging from a golden coach with the longest train, in recent memory, it seemed that all would be right in that marriage, and endearing even when Diana charmingly, and nervously, reordered Charles' names during her vows.

Already shattered from her parent’s divorce, at an early age, she longed for a secure home with a man to look after her, and her children. Little did she know that Charles, the headstrong heir to the throne of England, was not the best choice. And, little did he realize her burgeoning star power, and insecurity.

In this film we meet her ten years later frustrated with both her marriage, and the forced gaiety and regimen of royal life, epitomized with the traditional royal Christmas at Sandringham, a crown estate, with its equally traditional weight check at the start of the feasting, a tradition as old as the Christmas gathering, replete with every imaginable, and delectable food.

Her minor rebellions began by ditching the driver and driving herself to Sandringham, without a security detail, primes the audience for more to come. As she navigates the vast country landscape, in her zippy sportscar, she gets lost and asks aloud, “Where the fuck am I?” -  saying more than her words convey.

The film details the dietary delights of the season, as green boxes arrive in military fashion, that initially seem to be coffins, (a death metaphor) puzzling the viewer, but later with lids open, only reveal the food that is to be prepared for the family, described by the chef in revered tones, quietly so as to not disturb the family.

The food itself is almost another character, as Diana struggles with what is expected of her, and in a far less spontaneous time, sees not only her anxiety rise, but her bulimia, as she tries and fails to cope with her elegantly planned appearances, and scheduled meals with the entire family; (often preceded by a face down over the toilet) the only joy is being in the company of her sons, William and Harry, who arrived before her.

Hunger takes on several meanings in this film: Diana’s hunger for love, then freedom for she, and her sons, from some nearly nonsensical, but meaningful exchanges the path ahead seems murky, even confusing, at times.

For example upon arrival, when DIana complains of the cold house, the Queen’s equerry says, “I will order more blankets,” as Diana murmurs ``why don’t you just turn up the heat?” 

As we see later he does, with near constant surveillance of her every move.

Her lovely clothes are tagged for each meal, and outing, tagged as P.O.W. (circling in on the war  metaphor) and it’s indicative of the downward spiral from betrayal, to fear to anxiety, to silent rebellion,as she wears them all out of order, sick as a parrot, as the scene with her pearl necklace, a gift from Charles, that he also gave to Parker-Bowles, shows.

Directed by Pablo Larrain, who also made “Jackie” that encapsulated her unwanted fame, and near imprisonment that Jacqueline Kennedy felt after the assassination of her husband, President Kennedy; this is a companion piece, but edgier than that equally episodic masterpiece, in the near drowning that this ill-fated marriage dealt to Diana’s psyche.

Her battered psyche encounters the ghost of Ann Boleyn, as she explores her shuttered childhood home, Park House, and that of her grandmother, before her father inherited the Earldom, and the move to the Althorp estate in 1975,

The boarded up home, the ghostly encounter, all jibe with her need for emotional security, as well as freedom from a bad marriage, and a royal regimen.

The theme of home also resonates with another masterwork of a film, “Belfast” that takes the Time of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, in the late 1960s and again the spirit of home, as little Billy plays securely in the streets, just before  a Protestant mob, replete with bombs and gasoline threatens their Catholic neighbors, “You fuckers, get out of our neighborhood!”

Sectarian violence aside, the neighborhood is as much to Protestant Billy, and his family, as it is to the much maligned Catholics

With various scenes of dancing, biting Irish humor, that warms the soul as it nicks pretense, redolent of Director Kenneth Branagh’s childhood, shows the joys of home, with the contrast of who belongs in that home, Protestants, not Catholics with their sacrament of confession, a long held joke within the family.

Childhood is not always halcyon, but from a child’s point of view, home takes on a special place and Branagh gives his idea of home, not simply as a place of nurture, but also of identity, and as Dad struggles to play the bills and suggests that the family move, maybe to England, Bill breaks down at Christmas, in a meltdown of even the idea of losing his home to the bomb throwers.

Maybe Tom Wolfe was right when he said, “You can’t go home again,” and in some fashion, it seems that young Billy and his family realize that, replete with the elegiac Judy Dench as his grandmother, slowly climbing the steps at the film’s end, when the family finally departs for destination unknown - Scotland, Canada? - but by contrast, home might be the place that you can’t go back to, at least not in the immediate future, as Billy says farewell to a childhood crush.

Diana, on the other hand, seems to find a home, and freedom, as she roars off from Sandringham, with her two sons, in her top down convertible sports car, singing at the top of their lungs, “All you Need is a Miracle.”

Thank heaven for Mike and the Mechanics! And, KFC!

Harry and Meghan retreat due to intense racism

In what was to herald a new era for the British Royal Family, and the United Kingdom, the marriage of Prince Harry and American actress Meghan Markle was deemed pivotal to understanding, a new world, and a new cultural legitimacy, albeit inclusiveness, for England, and for some little girls that looked just a bit different than their peers.

“It’s worth standing back and restating – the British family will now have, at its heart, at its future, a British woman who isn’t white,” the BBC’s former royals correspondent Peter Hunt told us prior to the royal wedding. “That imagery and what it says to people in the UK is a powerful, potent and positive development.”

The biracial Ms. Markle and the beloved younger son of the late Princess Diana seemed ripe for a fairy tale wedding and the day did not disappoint with sunshine smiles, and an A-list crowd of American film stars, with the likes of Amal and George Clooney, Oprah, and most of the cast of “Suits” - Markle’s hit show.

In less than a blink of an eye, the scene shifted to racist tropes, and descriptions of a slum house where the bride was supposedly raised, all of which was false.

As The Washington Post reported, in 2018, “Markle is many of the things that Fleet Street would typically scoff at — an American, an actress, divorced, biracial and older than her betrothed, Prince Harry. And scoff they did back in 2016 when the two first started dating. The coverage of the romance was so invasive — and the commentary on social media and elsewhere so ugly — that Harry took the unusual step of publicly confirming the relationship by issuing a statement denouncing “the racial undertones of comment pieces, and the outright sexism and racism of social media trolls and web article comments.”

Sadly after some noteworthy praise and a concentration on the less than helpful relationship with her family, mother excepted, tattered by revelations of the financial and health problems by Markle’s father, Thomas, and the many-headed hydra of a step sister, all seemed calm for a bit. Just a bit.

Then it began again with the British tabloid press, and more scurrilous “accounts” and references to more slums, and Los Angeles gangs, then all was quiet, one again, as Markle took on a hefty schedule of appearances, as the latest member of the Firm, as the Royal family refers to its work --- much of which helps to shore up the coffers of charities and organizations designed to help improve the social fabric of Britain, be it orphanages, adoption centers, educational scholarships, etc --- and as the example of Diana had shown: with one mention that there is royal patronage, financial donations increase tenfold.

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Additionally, the charitable efforts of Prince Charles notwithstanding, and the many royal patents from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, and the Duke of Edinburgh, make more than a dent.

Suddenly it all began again, and a rather typical headline revealed, even then how things were going to be: “UKIP leader Henry Bolton removed after lover made racist comments about Meghan Markle”

“Mr Bolton publicly fell out with the party's national executive committee, which had tried to remove him after his 25-year-old lover, Jo Marney, made offensive comments about Prince Harry's fiancee Ms Markle in text messages to a friend.

She said black people were "ugly" and Ms Markle would "taint" the royal family.

The text messages, obtained by UK newspaper the Mail, also said Ms Markle was a "dumb little commoner" with a "tiny brain".”

What began as a simple pregnancy -- both desired as well as expected, things began to unravel with the press shifting gears into the negative lane, faster than a race car driver on a speedway.

Harper's Bazaar gave a succinct analysis:  “The shift began in earnest after Meghan fell pregnant, which is interesting given how many loaded comments were made about her age and ability to have children. Anyway, so Meghan proves herself fertile and bears a child as the right-wing press wanted, but her way of being pregnant somehow started to annoy everyone. A lot was made about how she held her baby bump – “What a narcissist. We get it. You’re pregnant. [...] Meghan Markle is a complete diva,” sniped one Twitter user. “Why can’t she just stand normal [sic],” said another angry tweeter. “She is just constantly showing off and this is really disgusting and repelling.”

One insightful report likened the demand for the Sussex family to give them more, and more, like sex-obsessed old geezers at a local strip bar, crying, “Give us more!”

When Meghan and Harry opted for a private and hopefully natural birth (a hospital was at the ready, just in case) and to forego the private wing at The Great Ormond and the requisite photo call endured by Diana and Catherine  - cruel in its nature to demand a woman to give birth, and then be made up, and coiffed, to stand weakly in the chill as cameras click away with her baby in arms - roused them to a fever pitch of criticism.

“Show us the kid, C’mon!”

To add insult to injury, “After the Royal baby’s birth recently, a BBC Radio 5 Live presenter, Danny Baker, took to Twitter to post a black and white picture of a man and woman walking out of a hospital with a baby monkey and the caption, "Royal baby leaves hospital."

Must this vitriolic racism even be extended to their infant son?

Cruelty comes in many forms, but what has remained largely unspoken is the sheer volume of racism directed toward this young woman, with a new life, title, religion, country citizenship, baby and least of all, a new husband, who has done his best to protect his wife; but, also the marriage became to be viewed as an act of betrayal by a white man, no less a royal one.

Then the hashtag of #Megexit appeared accompanied by wild accusations of fueling battles between Harry and William, insulting the Queen, or Prince Charles, depending on the source, and most social media gleefully citing the tabs as “reliable” sources.

Photo shopped photos of the former actresses face on nude models, quickly appeared on the internet, as her detractors saw these as the final proof of her vulgarity.

Some outlets filled their daily digests with nothing but derisive sentence -- in the know of course, about Meghan’s extravagance, greed and petulance, and even the renovations on their home, Frogmore Cottage, with a private yoga studio and a suite for her mother Daria Ragland, all of which proved to be false in legal documents filed with the local authorities.

If racism can be nationalized, then the fallout with Meghan and Harry departing for an independent life --- away from the brutalizing tabs - is to be expected, but as Harry noted recently, it was sad that it all had to come to this.

With echoes of the past, some of this damnation seemed to be built, in part, on the 1936 comments on Wallis Warfield Simpson, who later became the wife of Edward VIII, after he abdicated, when it was clear that Wallis could not be his consort, (and became the Duke of Windsor), as common, scheming, and manipulative.

It became apparent that Meghan had now become a black Eve with the forbidden fruit in one hand, and a supposed desire to have her way, at all times, as a hapless Harry stood mutely by her side.

A disembodied voice on the radio recently opined, over the breakfast table, that since Meghan was divorced and biracial, “that did not go down well with the English.”

Even that was a smokescreen, of sorts, with divorce rampant in the family: Prince Charles, Princess Anne, and Prince Edward. 

 For some reason, glaring in its omission, few have wanted to mention the ugly reality of racism, far exceeding even the extreme cruelty meted to Sarah Ferguson, after her marriage to Andrew and the comments on her weight, the “Duchess of Pork” - granted some of her antics, like goading Diana, Princess of Wales to join her in poking their rolled umbrellas into the well-tailored rear ends of some of the younger male guests at Ascot.

While that episode ended with a dreaded conversation with the Queen, much of Sarah’s sins were eventually cleaned up, especially the financial, but much of what she endured, by the royal household staff combined with the petty cruelty of Fleet Street, seemed wildly excessive.

She recently noted that she knew how Meghan felt, having been in her shoes, but would not offer public advice, since it would be taken out of context.

While it is true that Harry was the “spare” and William the “heir” - ironically coined by American born Consuelo Vanderbilt who later became the Duchess of Marlborough after she married Sunny, the 9th Duke in the late 19th century; it was just as true that carving out a role beyond that of the little brother was in plan, and only the barrage of what the Queen later politely coined “intense scrutiny” by the press forced a new plan to be financially independent and to not use their primary titles of HRH, and spend only part of their time in England.

As shameful as this has turned out there is some possible “good” in outing our cousins across the pond as they try to duck from abject racism.

Ella Alexander in Harper's Bazar seemed to sum it all, so well, even with British restraint, when she said, “Of all the unpleasant, racist and sexist high-profile figures currently living in our country, we naturally seem to have reserved our highest anger and upset for a young woman adjusting to motherhood. We seem to have lost all proportion and perspective in favour of old traditions about how a royal woman should behave. How classically, depressingly British.”

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Jackie Kennedy gets fresh treatment in new film

It’s been a good decade or so since I wrote theater, or movie criticism, and while it was always a source of great delight to discover new talent or to see old classics served with a new twist; as my homes, and interests moved, so did my subjects, and the march towards political analysis and reporting became my new hallmark. But, a recent viewing of the movie, “Jackie” gave me the old itch for a review.

First of all it’s an excellent movie, somewhat traditional in its approach, but with the advent of technology, it manages to deftly insert actual video footage of Jacqueline Kennedy, interspersed with Natalie Portman’s portrayal of the winsome, reserved, mercurial, and strong willed woman that she was. Concentrating, on the assassination in Dallas, and the week afterward, when she attempts to construct the legacy of those 1,000 days, that she named Camelot, the use of flashback is given a real life twist with the use of a reporter - in real life Theodore White -  who Jackie asked to come up to put a positive spin on what many saw as a huge blot on the American consciousness. The results were published in LIFE magazine, and has Jackie framing her husband as a hero, despite the horror, and loss, in Dallas, as it jointly ushered in the modern American presidency.

The memories are fresh, and the wounds raw, as Jackie, a fierce protector of her privacy, opened herself up to do this interview, a last act of service for John F. Kennedy (portrayed by Danish actor Caspar Phillipson), her beloved husband, and the nation’s fallen president. While in reality, White drove up to the Kennedy compound in Hyannis in a pouring rainstorm to meet the grieving widow, not the sunny day, portrayed in the film, Portman, reminiscent of Katherine Hepburn, with her range of dramatic emotion, alternatively shows Jackie’s aristocratic side, along with the tragedy that has etched itself on her features, and made her a fierce warrior and image maker.

When the White figure raves about those magical, and imaginative, White House parties, Jackie, the character, looks at him with a mixture of disbelief, and almost near disdain, and drawls in response, one eyebrow slightly raised, using that low alto, and whispery, voice, (that was so uniquely hers, and which Portman captures so well), “You want me to give parties?”

The film shot in France and in the United States, is by Chilean director Pablo Larrain, (his first English film) and the script written by the Today show’s executive producer, Noah Oppenheim, uses about 99 percent of Jackie’s actual words captured in memoirs, the more responsible biographies, and her taped interview for the JFK library with Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., is destined to become a classic. Considering its accuracy, it also reveals much about the very private Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, who in actuality dreaded moving into the White House.

As she famously said, after the Inauguration, “I feel as it I have just been turned into a piece of public property,” but later learned to love her role as First Lady, and the “old house” that she refurbished with authenticity, and historicity. As the film character states, “I raised every penny for that restoration,” with the first ever White House guide book, and when needed, charming such people as Walter Annenberg, Jr, for the donation of the famous, and very valuable, painting of Benjamin Franklin, by David Martin, that hangs in the Green Room.

In that famous televised tour of the White House, she showcased the results, and as the script demonstrates, her fervent belief in showing the American public not merely, redecoration, but a history of the American presidency, and an artistic legacy not only that they could be proud of, but so richly deserved.

A read of those better bios: J.B. West, “Upstairs at the White House,” Letitia Baldridge's “Of Diamonds and Diplomats”, and books by Carl Anthony, and Sally Bedell Smith, to name a few; plus some of the candid,but but not bitchy, remarks of those who knew her well equally support the picture of a dynamo of a woman. She was also both of her time, and beyond her time, and had steel behind her lace. West, said she was one of the most determined people he had ever met.

Jackie could also be fey one moment, and an intellectual powerhouse, the next; then a fashion icon, and tastemaker, soon after.. Her fluency in French could also give her the assurance to dismiss a professional translator at that famed dinner in Versailles in 1961, so that Jack Kennedy would be understood by the often frozen visage of President Charle de Gaulle.

Natalie's Jackie also has Miss Porter’s famous graduate, throwing a well-aimed F-bomb at Peter Skarsgard's version of Bobby Kennedy, when she discovers Lee Harvey Oswald’s televised murder the day she took her children to the Capital for JFK’s lying in state. She has been well-documented as a fiercely protective mother, and the script has her say, “John and Caroline are all that I have now!”

Skarsgard's Bobby is a bit cool and withdrawn even for a grief stricken portrayal, and I was a bit bewildered that he did so little, except to look handsome in a Gary CooperIsh way. But, then since it’s Portman’s show most of the auxiliary characters are given a two-dimensional treatment, including Jackie’s formidable mother Janet Auchincloss, her devoted aide, and former prep school and Vassar roommate, Nancy Tuckerman; Lyndon Johnson; and a rather one dimensional portrayal of Lady Bird Johnson, who practically screams, ‘Welcome to Dallas darling,” on the tarmac at Love Field, on that fateful day. It seemed like a Southern woman, giving a performance as a Southern woman, by a Southern woman. Baffling, to be sure  - true to life as the actress Beth Grant is from Alabama - but also discordant, as well as irritating.

John Hurt as “The Priest” that Jackie consults to try to understand Jack’s death and God’s role is both painful and intimate, giving the film a gravitas, and an insight into the very real woman underneath the facade of her role. Hurt with a lilt of an Irish accent, at one point, I found amusing as he struggles to deal with this intense woman, and questions why they even go the gravesite, is alarmingly familiar as he struggles to help., Yet the accent made me wonder if every Roman Catholic film priest has to sound like Barry Fitzgerald.

Returning to the crafting of the Kennedy Years, Oppenheim revealed in an interview with Deadline’s Mike Fleming that he felt that Jackie had not been given “the credit she deserved for being a public relations genius and a master of image sculpting.” This picture dispels that omission, and also supports her own early heartfelt and youthful desire to be the “art director of the twentieth century” as she wrote for her Vogue Prix de Paris contest, which she won, but later turned down. In that essay, she described the artists and writers whose paintings she would have, and books she would read.This  “puckish” remark as historian Michael Beschloss called it, came to life as a service to her husband, the nation, and ultimately to herself.

Portman gives an Oscar worthy performance and will undoubtedly become one of her standout roles in her repertoire --- and while she looks less like Jackie, and more like her sister Lee Radziwill, her performance is flawless as she carries the range of emotion, and is in practically every scene. Performances of this kind especially with famous contemporary figures can flag, from immersion, but Portman never stumbles.

One of the hallmarks is the recreation of the Kennedy private quarters in the White House, Jackie’s bedroom, and the West SItting Hall, are given authentic strokes as well as the luscious color - reminiscent of the emerging color of the time --- just a bit beyond the more garish technicolor of earlier years. Interestingly enough most of the interior was shot in a film studio just outside Paris, and Larrain’s staff scoured the world for genuine antiques and artwork - mostly accurate; although not all of Jackie’s art collection was in the public domain, and a keen eye caught some substitutions.

While a soupcon of profanity and some details of a bloodied Jackie and JFK’s shattered skull, prevent this from being a family movie, it’s doubtful that this year end entry will quickly be forgotten, for as many of us noted at the time, our sincere loss of ideals and youth, and vigor. But, perhaps no one said it better than “the legendary columnist and Kennedy admirer Mary McGrory [who] declared disconsolately to Daniel Patrick Moynihan, then a Kennedy aide: “We’ll never laugh again.” Moynihan replied: “Heavens, Mary, we’ll laugh again. It’s just that we will never be young again.”

America at the crossroads: Violence is tearing us apart

In the aftermath of Orlando, and now Dallas, and the ongoing gunplay in Chicago, it should give us pause about the increasing violence that plagues America. While there can be no doubt that there is, and was, a history of mental illness on the part of the former, Omar Mateen, the latter had a profile that demanded an intervention.

Angry, violent and demanding attention from already overburdened teachers, Mateen would not cooperate with them, until he got their undivided focus. Without he would attack his classmates and threaten them - and this was in grammar school.

Whether this rage stemmed from repressed homosexuality, or an urge to always, and under any circumstances to have his way. Reading these facts one wonders where were the school social workers, the psychologist,and the parental concern, as this walking time bomb erupted, later as an adult at the Pulse nightclub.

For many, it seems, mental health is the stuff of movies and late night television, and not the stuff that reality is made of. In other words, crazy people scripted for the camera, and not real life; as easy to dismiss as leaving the darkened movie theater. But, mental illness is as real, and as palpable, as the days are long, yet many Americans have failed to grasp the enormity of unaddressed problems, and how they must be addressed.

After the memorials are gone, and the headlines changed, we move on as a society, yet the failure to address in a multi-pronged manner those that suffer can result in carnage, whether it is Mateen, or Oklahoma bomber, Timothy McVeigh. The problem before us demands attention, yet, when discussing the motives, often the response is “Who cares”? We must, in order to address public safety.

We need a multi pronged approach that encompasses teachers, school social workers, local agencies and government agencies, on all levels, including a revision of FBI protocols and best practices, that won’t allow someone like Mateen to slip through the cracks. The goal is good mental hygiene, as much a concern as good medical care.

The Leviathan seems to be the National Rifle Association, and its powerful lobbyists are ruling the day, but are losing the care that we must embrace as a nation. Many wondered at the deaths of grammar school children at Sandy Hook Elementary, if there would be a change, yet their hearts remained hardened.

Both Orlando and Sandy Hook show that the targets, in many cases, are the most vulnerable of our population: children, and sexual minorities - targets for gun violence. For Chicago, where racial segregation has been historic, can there be a beginning to what has been a tortuous and long-losing struggle to quell economic justice? Can there be an end to where those who fought the enemy, and came home to a dream of freedom, and bought their homes in the first flush of a post war era, find themselves nearly held siege, and where black on black crime spares no one, not even children, or babies.

For Micah Johnson, the Dallas cop killer, a tour of duty in Afghanistan -- possible PTSD? -- seems to be the trigger for his violent departure from a tradition bound middle-class life, to one where he stockpiled weapons, with a history of egregious sexual aggression.  With such a sudden departure from his general temperament, and personality, could no one, no family member seen the dramatic change, and become suspicious?

Each day, it seems, we are confronted with the drumbeat of violence, unceasingly,  and maybe, for those that are desensitized, inexorable? The sites of the carnage have almost replaced Lexington and Concord, once seared into our historical consciousness, as American battlegrounds.

If the road ahead, is the one less travelled, then new solutions, and new ideas must be brought to stem the tide, and brought to bear on the challenge that faces America..

Muslims in America: The fear of the other

Now that terrorism now seems to be part and parcel of our global lives, opinions are flying back and forth across the media, or a conversation at the coffee shop, or the gym. Coming close on the aftershock of the Paris attacks, and the equally horrific carnage in San Bernardino, the debate on how to fight these acts, and to identify how to stave off future events seems to be on everyone’s minds, including the by-now infamous remarks by the leading Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump, that there should be a ban on Muslims entering the country, the issue is front and center in our consciousness.

While widely, and justifiably, condemned by all, including the Republican National Committee, excepting his wildly enthusiastic fans in South Carolina, gave me pause to think, not only of the verbal rhetoric of Trump, but also that this type of fear mongering can take place in American minds. But, a backward glance in the historical mirror gave me some answers.

In the not too distant past Roman Catholics were a target of hatred and misunderstanding from many in the United States, and while there was no call to ban them, the huge wave of immigration of Irish Catholics, after the potato famine in the 19th century, gave many supposedly “native” Americans pause for suspicion. In fact, the spate of “Irish, need not apply,” signs seemed to be merely tip of the iceberg. Shortly after one could see editorial cartoons of rapacious priests, and alligators with mitre-shaped heads snapping at the shores of America, a young girl on the shores, recoiling in fear.

Most of this anti-catholicism was sponsored by the Nativists, a socio-political party, also known as the “Know Nothings,” because if they were ever questioned by the authorities, they would say that they knew nothing.

While this all seems to be part of long-ago history, it is important to see the connections between then and now: the unfounded fear of many, at that time, was that the Pope would come to America to topple our still youthful democracy, it was also easy to see the foreignness of this religion with its foreign tongues, it's robed and soutained priests, and a worshipful and obedient,l membership

Much of the vitriol erupted during the New York Draft Riots where Irish immigrants, who faced the draft while wealthy whites could avoid it by paying a commutation fee to hire a substitute.caused a deadly riot. Some say 2,000 people were injured and killed, although that figure is debatable, the distrust of the “other” and the fiery condemnations led to violence. Within that event, the deadliest since the CIvil War itself, was the fear of job losses to emancipated blacks, the fear of the other.

While it would be difficult to draw a bright line around that event, as an antecedent, it is easy to see that in America, fear mongering can have a deleterious effect on our society.

Now we enter a new era of people from another far-off land, whose clothes, behavior, worship style and speech seem threatening to our understanding of American life, as we see it. We’ve also entered it with the same level of fear and ignorance, as we did before, but now linked with those that have hijacked Islam, from  its established roots, our fear alert has been ratcheted up. While violence and murder is always a game change, our minds already acutely alerted to disaster has intensified the efforts at demonization.

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The pushback against an ever increasing diverse society, aided and abetted by demagoguery, has created a climate of hate, and religious prejudice, that makes the Catholic question (which prospered till the election of JFK) seem benign, although the historically slim victory of Kennedy made it real.

Fear Mongering is not new -- what is new -- is the depths that we have taken it in American society - from the forced internment of Japanese Americans to Muslim women having their veils (the hijab) torn from their heads, in some places, across the country.. This is an issue that is larger than Trump, albeit one that he has exploited, but it must give us pause to see the link between exploitation,and fear, on a such a deep level of intolerance.

The role of mainstream Christianity - indeed one that seems to be in the abeyance - as a social fulcrum, fuirher complicates the matter as evidenced, by the unrelated, yet relevant campaign against Starbucks red holiday coffee cup, without the label of Merry Christmas printed on it. And, while the seeming demise of Christmas is unwarranted, what is rearing its head again in this country is religious intolerance, for diversity, often mislabelled as “political correctness”, is an oft quoted mantra, and which some see it as a sign of imminent apocalypse.

Besides the role of ignorance on the anti-Muslim stance is the role of immigration in America, and who, or perhaps more exactly, who should we admit. Not too long ago it was Mexicans, and the desire to build a fence at the border between the two countries, but now the Muslim barrier must be one that is legislated, if not of brick and mortar, but instead, born of a  nascent nativism.

I hear near weekly, from a senior friend of mine, bemoaning the fact that he has to deal with immigrants, in this case, Russian immigrants; a point that is lost on him with his family that immigrated from Germany in the late 19th century. Again, the spectre of the other.

The question remains for those who are discontent with the coming threat to American values: can we take it from the top, instead of the bottom? If the 1960s saw the rise of the Cold War, then we are ready for another seismic shift from our country's founding values.

I was gratified when my friend Lesley Williams, of Evanston, organized a rally last week to protest Islamophobia, and I was particularly gratified to hear a young Muslim woman,  Bushra Amiwala, a  senior at Niles North High School say this: “We may be unaware of these things since it doesn’t directly affect us, but we are one nation, one city, one community, one family. And if Islamophobia affects one of us, it affects us all. I have been blessed to be encapsulated in such an accepting community filled with diversity and such open minded, accepting people. A school where we can come together during a time of disparity and sit in a safe space. We are the generation of change, so together, let’s create a more beautiful tomorrow.”

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America is trapped by gun violence: is there a way out?

At one time in our country guns were not as commonplace as they are now - they used to be associated with Chicago gangsters, cowboys, and political assassinations, but now they are as ubiquitous as the corner gas station’s mini-mart.

The recent shootings of unarmed policeman, movie theatre goers, church members, grade school children, toddlers (as unintended targets of bullets meant for thugs), and the untold deaths from handguns, especially in Chicago, has made me incredulous at the widespread violence, but even more so at the desensitization of the American public, as we shrug our shoulders at yet another senseless killing, random acts of violence that don’t seem random anymore, just another fact of life in America.

A few years back I wrote about the death of Hadiya Pendleton, for my Examiner column, and the bright promise of her dreams deferred, and now the bullets are flying faster, and faster, be they intentional, or not.

Our lawmakers seem near mute on these occasions, except, the by now, cursory condolences to the family and those that suffer. I wonder are they afraid of the powerful gun lobby, headed by The National Rifle Association, or are they silenced by the horror of the deeds? This silence seems to lead to more deaths, than we can account for, or keep track of.

Something has to occur, but at multiple levels: the government, the schools, the counselors, but perhaps most of all early intervention for those that perpetuate these crimes -- so often after the shock, we learn of teachers that warned school officials, like the shooter at Northern Illinois University, or the teachers at Columbine, who saw the black shrouded students, far removed from student life, but also remained silent.

If it takes a village to raise a child then, it’s going to take a country to save the lives of its citizens, but beginning now ----  but it will require courage to fight those that give specious arguments, such as “guns kill people, people don’t.”

At one point there seemed to be some hope after the attempt on the life of President Reagan, and his press secretary James Brady, and the efforts of he and his wife - admirable, and while gun control is part of the picture, as I’ve stated, we as a nation, need to understand that a paucity of inaction can lead to even greater tragedies, something that we can ill afford.

One possible area that seems ripe for improvement and that is recognizing the symptoms of mental illness and the behaviors that accompany them: social isolation, weak, or non-existent social skills, poor family interaction, and a million other psychological factors that that, when combined with guns, can lead to violence. This is an area ripe for reporting. I remember reading that the killer at Northern Illinois University had written an essay that had greatly disturbed his teacher, but that her complaints and the counseling intervention were ignored - to the great detriment of the students that were shot that day.

In these days of ever-tightening budgets, money must somehow be found and spent on a multi-faceted approach to ensure good mental hygiene, because we are seeing the risks, and the results far too soon, and far too often.

Our urban areas are pockmarked with gang and drug related violence, where no one’s life is valued, just another way to deal with those that have betrayed the gang, or tried to grab a part of the ever lucrative drug economy. While volumes have been written on that, and ink, and funds spilled, these efforts seem to pale besides the statistics, and the gang bullets that fly, especially in communities of color.

Are our hearts, or our hands not large enough to embrace the loss, or is the issue so large, the magnitude too great, to even create a blueprint for the battle. Because as Lincoln so well noted, the “better angels of our nature” must rise to the surface and not be buried with those that have fallen.