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It’s daunting to make sense of senselessness or reason with unreason. In the past I’ve used a chess comparison where a pigeon lands on the board, defecates, scatters pieces, and flies off victorious. The pigeon won. I’m happy for it, truly.

But my happiness may be seeing the pigeon fly elsewhere with its gifts.

The worst of pigeon behavior is when the fowl stays to deliver a chess master lecture. Most times, sadly, the talk isn’t informative or amusing. Could be (by that I mean a strong possibility) not understanding pigeon debate is my failure to grasp concerns or understand a different language of truth. But wait, that’s what may save me.

If it’s my fault, I get it. Being at fault, told I was misinformed and need to try harder, etc. is home base. Recognizing that makes it easier for me to be at peace with new carrier pigeons. Different birds (schoolmarm to peaceful protestor) share behavior. Orthodoxy in dissent may not be recognized, but it’s there.

My brushes with authority have been more than few. While I was at the U the FBI visited my parents and our neighbors about my politics. (Student Peace Union and flying the UN flag along with the U.S. at home). I was too stupid to feel intimidated or get angry.

These days I find the UN beside the point or sidetracked, reminding me of the WHO with a great program on seatbelt use in the Third World.

Should I have been angry about the FBI? Don’t know what good it would have done. Anger doesn’t actually say much, except maybe about the angry person possibly running short on inner resources.

Is it your experience angry people are difficult to be around?

At the end (pray God it comes quickly because the aggrieved and offended can drag on) I’m left little wiser. I personally don’t get a lot from or find much use for anger, but that’s just me being insensitive, a skill I perhaps possess to excess. Can tell you this, though – There’s one suitable never-fail reply I use after a heated outburst. “Thanks for telling me.”

How good are any of us (and I suspect the toll on personal energy is substantial) at making sense of confusion?

A big box store in Duluth recently refused to admit me without a mask, but thoughtful of my safety offered to sell me one. It seemed strange, however, a Duluth outlet was insistent (aggressive would be another term) about masks while its Iron Range branch wasn’t. Is hardware in Duluth more infected?

Are Rangers tougher?

My hardware need wasn’t critical so I went on to other things, a medical appointment.

Believe there were curious mask issues there as well? A clerical employee was unmasked in the background. Numbers of unmasked went in and out; is there immunity among delivery drivers?

For all the requirement we mask for safety how much instruction have you been given?

In no situation I’ve been in has anyone made an effort to check my mask. For all they know (you’ll likely need to be of a certain age to appreciate this) I’m using part of an Esther Williams swim suit. What if a mosquito net or cheese cloth over your head was effective as a mask? Is there a standard to follow?

Not that it matters, because if there were an approved mask how could use be enforced, certainly not by police?

For now we trust that assurance “wear a mask” is for the best. I can tell you this. If you wear your mask atop your head as a beanie you’ll be chased away despite the injunction to wear a mask doesn’t specify where you’re to wear it.

It’s good hearing compulsion in an argument. That’s why I follow along with the vision of America as a systemic failure starting with Columbus, slave supporting Revolution, race states War of 1812, Civil War for slavery and business, Reconstruction, segregation, Civil Rights Act, voting rights, fair housing, affirmative action, legal and sentencing reform, Black History Month, etc. can all be called fruit of the same failed system.

The great visionary Pol Pot in Cambodia sought a clean start with Year Zero. For millions Pol’s new beginning began in ditches outside Phnon Phen.

If we hold a problem or condition as systemic and see past fixes as failures of a failed system then the only cure (as with COVID) is a cure to rid us of failed efforts branch, root, subsoil and groundwater. It all has to go, including everyone in office now brought in as cooperative parts of systemic disease.

The whole system, starting with Trump, would have go, but also the Obama part, tainted forever with its complicity in systemic failure. I’m ready to believe the reformers who say systemic problems need much more than a little weeding.

If a model of progressivism and diversity such as the Twin Cities is the prominent example of societal failure that, then, says it all. Time to fix the whole.

There might seem to be an incredible amount of problems facing the U.S., but there is some amazing news as well.

Many now see us (I imagine Trump can be given the full credit deserved) as the planet’s premiere racist state. How we zoomed to first place ahead of the competition is an incomparable accomplishment.

Think of the contenders we beat. A mere three generations ago (1960s and ’70s) Saudi Arabia officially abolished slavery. That was around the same time Portugal gave up the fight for its African colony of Mozambique and France was still holding its Asian colony, Indochina, better known to many Americans as Nam.

The U.S. breezed by any other contender as demonstrators in London, Paris and Australians in tens of thousands will attest. We have accomplished the seeming impossible capturing the International Racism Cup. Seems all other nations exceed us in amicable relations.

How ever did we do it? But there we are, Number One on the despicable list. I’d pause a moment to wonder how Australia is doing with its native population, an issue for Australia and the U.S. that cuts much deeper than current events.

Could say Native rights are THE fundamental issue, but right now who’d listen?

One area of whole-fix I look forward to is election reform. Systemic failure, seems to me, requires a revamp of practices and qualifications.

I’ll go on a limb to say any person elected to office must have a criminal record of at least two decades. This doesn’t differ too much from current politicians except for candidates required to prove they were honest crooks.

Why shouldn’t they have to show they are truly on the other side, the right side of the left side of being victims of law and order. If people stopped reporting crime we’d be crime free in no time. Now there’s reform that works.