Good morning!
TIME FOR SOME BRAND MARKETING
My friend Glenn Raines was commenting on the bad press perfectly reasonable ideas get. They need professional public relations help from people like him. He noted that “defund the police” is among the worst of phrases to describe the perfectly reasonable goal of redeploying police assets.
He says “good luck when you call 911” if you really think there should be no police. He suggests as a brand marketer something like:
“Smarter Policing” or…
“Fund Community Policing, Not Police States”
I might suggest “let’s redeploy assets.” After all, most people would believe that “defunding” really is reallocating toward conflict resolution, social workers, de-escalation of violence, and youth programs.
WOKENESS AND FREE SPEECH
We are at a strange point in our history, when speech is being dissected at every turn and those who might waver from the accepted orthodoxy are labeled, shunned and “cancelled.” This is most prevalent—and disturbing—on our college campuses, formerly known as being safe spaces for thoughtful debate and policy analysis.
My nephew, Johnathan Kopkin, offers both a serious discussion of this phenomenon and a humorous video on the similarities of free speech limitations from left and right—really worth reading and viewing:
THE INFAMOUS “YO SEMITES” CLIP
This is classic. Is it “Yo, Semites,” as a call-out to the Jews? Or is it “Yo, Seminites,” as he corrects himself? I’m so very confused… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrTHJmgkPeM.
It’s worth listening to the entire three minutes, as it seems clear that Mr. President has no idea about the speech and its subject matter. He so obviously is reading the words of someone else about a topic with which he has little knowledge, in a speech he didn’t read once over before presenting it.
HAMILTON, RACE AND HOPE FOR THE FUTURE
Let’s end on a positive note! From David Rochkind, a sign of hope:
As the parent of young children (8&10) I find it so amazing that I need to teach them about race. They simply don’t see it. In their mind, people look different but leave it at that. It proves that racism and intolerance is a learned behavior. Current events have led us to many discussions about race/ethnicity/gender and they generally understand it but I have hope for the future in that that they don’t “see color.” We can only hope that future generations continue that trend. I think that living in a melting pot like Los Angeles full of immigrants and transplants helps. I think those who have grown up in towns without multi-ethnic populations or in the South will lag for some time.
We watched Hamilton as a family (closed captioning helps us keep up with the fast dialogue and yes, I know there is some profanity) and at the end they ask if the real historical figures looked like the actors. I had to remind them about slavery and that despite the founders’ amazing ideas, they still had faults. That led us to a discussion on cancel culture and the topics you have mentioned in your rants. I read Andrew Chernow’s Hamilton many years ago and am still pissed that Hamilton preemptively published the details of his affair. I am also pissed that he fell into that honey trap in the first place.
Best regards,
Glenn
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