By Bob Gaydos

Trump as pope. SeriouslyPart of my morning routine, after tea and a friendly word game to get the brain cells active, is to scroll through my Facebook feed to get a handle on the news of the day.

Yeah, I check The Times, AP, etc. but for in-your-face-they-must-be-kidding stuff, Facebook gets it to me quicker and without the cautious prose of today’s major media. If You Know Who did something dumb, illegal or outright insane, I’ll know in a couple of minutes and from trusted sources.

Saturday was no exception. The hands down winner of the  “They-must-be-kidding, but-I-know-they’re-not” Award goes to the social media posting from the White House no less of Trump sitting on a throne dressed as the pope, crown and all. Seriously.

Disgusting. Crude. Callous. Ignorant. Egotistical. Obscene. Incredibly stupid. One hundred percent Trump. On the day Pope Francis was being laid to rest. After Trump having previously fallen asleep at the funeral service. An insult to every Catholic on the planet and a message to all Americans. Trump wants to be pope. Seriously.

The rest of the feed included what had to be the most obsequious cabinet meeting in history, as each member of the Trump team, seated around him with their red Maga hats on the table facing him, competed with each other to offer the most ingratiating, devoid of facts compliments to their leader, who was sitting self-satisfied in the middle. Pam Bondi and Marco Rubio duked it out for the coveted comfy knee cushion award. No one, apparently, was embarrassed, except for millions of Americans who saw this cult video and at first mistook it for a Monty Python movie.

There was also a post about, of course, Pete Hegseth installing a dressing room next to his office in the Pentagon, presumably so his eyeliner could be on straight when he has unprotected group chats on his phone with family and friends about U.S. military attacks in the Middle East. No Republican in Congress expressed any displeasure with the defense secretary spending taxpayer dollars in this manner. Because of course.

Then there was an item about RFK Junior, secretary of health, asking the Centers for Disease Control to look for some alternative treatments for measles because Kennedy believes the vaccine that has prevented the disease for  decades contains “aborted fetus debris” as well as “DNA particles” and doesn’t work. This, as the measles outbreak in the country reaches 900 cases as he bad mouths the vaccine. And, the man who says he once had a dead worm in his brain, also still insists that vaccines are causing autism and wants to conduct new testing on this theory even though it has been done and disproven.

Finally, one unrelated item on my feed informed me that May is mental health month.

Sign me up.

Pope Francis

By Bob Gaydos

  While millions of Americans marched to protest Trump policies on Saturday, millions more paused and prayed around the world on Easter Sunday, gathering with family and, perhaps, pondering the meaning of life.

   The weekend over, Monday brought some sad news and “Can you believe it?” news featuring familiar names.

    — Pope Francis died Monday of a cerebral stroke. The 88-year-old pontiff had recently been released from a hospital and had just avoided a meeting with J.D. Vance, the putative vice president, who apparently wanted to try to convince the pope on Easter weekend that the way America was treating immigrants was, well, what Jesus would do.

      Francis wasn’t buying it. An Argentinian, who in his 12 years as pope spoke out relentlessly in support of migrants and marginalized people, he altered the focus of the Catholic Church, not to the liking of many conservative Catholics, including bishops and cardinals. How that will affect the selection of a new pope is uncertain. There is no doubt, however, that his voice of courage, compassion and humility will not be easy to replace. And no, that’s not something that can be said about all popes. Francis asked that his tomb be inscribed simply with: “Franciscus.”

     — Homeland Security Director Kristi Noem, taking a break from posing as an ICE agent, took her family out for Easter dinner at a restaurant in downtown Washington, D.C. While she and her family were eating dinner, a thief stole her purse, which contained Noem’s driver’s license, medication, apartment keys, passport, DHS access badge, makeup bag, blank checks, and about $3,000 in cash.

    The Secret Service, which provides security for Noem, reviewed security camera footage at the Capital Burger restaurant and saw an unknown white male wearing a medical mask steal her bag. The key words here are “National Security Director” and “Secret Service.” Don’t you feel more secure? Noem said the cash was to pay for dinner and Easter gifts. Really? A burger restaurant? Easter dinner? Nobody’s watching her purse? You’re not in South Dakota anymore, Madam Secretary.

    — Pete Hegseth (yup, him again), was reported to have shared details of that surprise March 15 military strike against Houthis in Yemen on a second group chat on Signal, a group including his wife, brother and personal lawyer. The details were reportedly the same as those contained in another group chat on the same day over the same unsecure site. This group, unlike the first group, which was created by the White House security advisor and mistakenly included the editor of the Atlantic magazine, was created by Hegseth himself. In addition to his wife, it included about a dozen other people from his personal and professional inner circle in January, before his confirmation as defense secretary and was named “Defense | Team Huddle,” according to a report in The New York Times.

     The Defense Secretary reportedly used his private phone to set up the chat. No, his wife, a former producer for Fox News who has also accompanied Hegseth in meetings with foreign officials, does not work for the Defense Department. His brother and lawyer do, but not in jobs that require them to know about surprise attacks against Houthis in Yemen.

   Trump, of course, immediately attacked the source of the information. Not denying it, or expressing concern about a possible security leak that could jeopardize a military operation, just railing about leaks. However, there were some reports that Trump was wearying of mistakes by his fun-loving Defense Secretary. And Trump is well-known to be only too happy to tell those who cause him embarrassment or require him to do his actual job, “You’re fired.“ Hegseth’s career may soon be where he apparently likes it — on the rocks.

rjgaydos@gmail.com

By Bob Gaydos

John F. Kennedy

The first editorial I wrote for the Times Herald-Record in Middletown, N.Y., appeared on the 20th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I wrote the headline, too: “The measure of the man.”

Trying to “measure” the meaning of the life of a man who was literally loved and idolized by millions of people is no easy task, especially for a rookie editorial writer’s debut effort. But that’s what newspapers do and, in truth, I took it as a good omen that remembering JFK was my first assignment. He was a hero to me as to many young men my age when he was elected president. It was a combination of things: his youth, his wit, his easy-going style, his intelligence, his words, his sense of justice. Plus, we shared the same birthdate: May 29.

As fate would have it, JFK would come to be remembered, not on his birthday, but on the anniversary of his death. And not so much for what Americans received for having him as president for 1,000 days, but rather for what we lost by not having him much longer.

That first editorial said, in essence, that it would take more than 20 years to measure the meaning of the man. It acknowledged the things we had learned about JFK in the years since the shooting in Dallas — the flaws that made him human — as well as what I felt were his positive contributions.

Thirty years later, no longer a rookie editorial writer — indeed, retired after 23 years of writing editorials — with Nov. 22 approaching, I realized I had to write about JFK 50 years after his death (because that’s what old newspaper guys do). Before I started, I asked one of my reliable sounding boards, my son, Zack, what he knew about JFK. Zack is 19 and better informed than a lot of young people his age, so I figured his answer would provide me with a fair sense of what our education system had been telling kids about Kennedy.

“He was the first Catholic president,” Zack said. Correct. “He had an affair with Marilyn Monroe.” Uh, correct. ‘There’s still some theories that there was more than one shooter.” Right. “Do you think the Kevin Costner movie (“JFK,” directed by Oliver Stone) was true?” Well, the people portrayed were real. “The Bay of Pigs didn’t go too well.” No, it didn’t.

I took the opportunity to point out that Cuba was the site, not only of Kennedy’s biggest failure in global affairs, but also his biggest success. I was a little older than Zack is now when the world stood at the brink of a nuclear war over the presence of Soviet missile-launching sites in Cuba, aimed at the United States. I was a senior in college and knew full well, as did all my classmates, than no 2-S deferment was going to exempt me from what might happen if the Soviets did not — as Kennedy demanded — remove their missiles.

Kennedy ordered the U.S. Navy to blockade Cuba to prevent the shipment of Soviet missiles and equipment. Nikita Khrushchev, Soviet president, who had initially denied the existence of the missile sites, sent a naval fleet to Cuba, loaded with supplies and armed for battle. As the world watched and waited and prayed, Kennedy and Khrushchev exchanged messages. Kennedy prevailed. The Soviet fleet stopped short of Cuba and turned around. I lived to write this remembrance. Kennedy was dead not long after.

So here I am 50 years later, still looking to take the measure of the man and still wondering how that is possible. Kennedy had the gift of engagement. He appeared to be comfortable with whomever he was speaking. He had tremendous appeal to young people, being so different from the older, stodgier presidents who preceded him. He created the Peace Corps — a legacy that continues to this day with not enough fanfare. He made many Americans — and this is not a small thing — truly proud to be Americans. Not in an arrogant, flag-waving, we-know-better-than-you way. Just proud.

And he cheated on his wife and kept his serious health problems a secret from us and sometimes needed to be prodded by his brother, Bobby (another tragic loss) to take the proper (courageous) stand on issues. So the question I still ask myself is, what might JFK have done, what might he have meant to America and the world, if he had lived longer? What did we lose at Dealey Plaza?

Certainly, whatever innocence we still possessed. The wind was sucked from our sails as a nation and our domestic politics have slowly and steadily deteriorated into such partisanship that is virtually impossible for any president to speak to the minds and hearts of a majority of Americans the way Kennedy did. Maybe it would have happened even if Kennedy had lived a longer life and gone on to be an ambassador to the world of what America stands for. Or maybe not.

It dawns on me in writing this that it is an ultimately frustrating task to try to take the measure of another man or woman. I know what JFK meant to me personally. I know a lot of others feel similarly and others do not. I know what history has recorded (he was also the youngest man to be elected president) and what the tabloids have told us. I have a sense of what I would like to think Kennedy would ultimately have meant had he not died so young. But it’s only speculation.

The only man I can truly take the measure of is myself. It is 50 years since that morning when I was waiting at home to go to Fort Dix, N.J., to begin six months of active duty training. How do I measure up today? That’s a question I work on every day. It wasn’t always thus, but the years have a way of insisting on perspective. Maybe the answer will appear in some other writing. I have neither the space nor the inclination to do so here. I will say that, on balance, I’ll probably give myself a passing grade, but there’s still some stuff I’m learning.

For now, I’m through trying to take the measure of JFK, as man or president. Let the historians have at it. I’m going to try to take his advice and ask not what life can do for me, but what I can contribute to life. And I’m also going to remember to honor him not on the date he died, but on the date we both were born.

bob@zestoforange.com

Pope Benedict XVI .. stepping down

By Bob Gaydos

Kings and popes don’t resign.

Except when they do.

In the case of popes, that’s every 600 years or so, it turns out. Pope Benedict XVI proved to be the exception to the socially accepted truism about kings and popes when he announced his retirement Monday, stunning a billion-plus Catholics worldwide.

Benedict, who is 85, is one of but a handful of the 265 recognized popes to resign and the first pope since Gregory XII in 1615 to do so.

Gregory faced a serious challenge to his power, since three other popes had also been elected by different factions of the church. Benedict faces no such challenge. Indeed, if anything, in his eight years in the papal chair he has created a collegiality of doctrinaire conservatism among the cardinals he has appointed and who will select a successor from their midst.

The point being, if the accepted wisdom proves to be correct and a conservative European cardinal is elected pope, nothing will change in the Roman Catholic Church. That could be a serious problem for an institution that has adamantly resisted adapting to the modern world and which is losing parishioners and financial support at a troublesome rate and is seeing ever-declining numbers of men entering the priesthood.

Benedict cited his declining health as the reason for his resignation, saying he felt he could no longer properly handle the demands of the position. He wasn’t talking about saying Mass or issuing decrees. The Church has been rocked by a series of scandals and challenges from within and Benedict himself has been central in some of them. That might lead a skeptic to wonder if his leaving for health reasons is the equivalent of an American politician stepping down to “spend more time with my family.”

Pass the grain of salt, please.

Next month, all cardinals under the age of 80 will meet to select their new leader. Whoever it turns out to be will have to deal with these major issues Benedict leaves behind:

• The sex scandal. Most of the sexual abuse of young boys by priests apparently happened on his predecessor’s watch, but Benedict has been implicitly connected with the church-wide coverup of the abuses. To this day, revelations and lawsuits plague the Church and some leaders still try to avoid taking responsibility for their part in the scandal. No whitewash will cover the stain. Only full revelation and penance.
• No place for women. This is beyond comprehension. That a bunch of old men don’t want to relinquish any power at all to women, refuse to accept women priests, to allow altar girls, to, in fact, deny women of any meaningful say in the celebration of their religion or how it is interpreted is, in my view, sinful. American nuns have tried to force the Vatican’s hand in this regard, so far to no success other than not having been punished for their uppitiness. The new pope will have some very curious nuns — and women parishioners — to deal with.
• Contraception. The Church refuses to accept it even though 90 percent (or more) of Catholics practice it. Benedict himself infamously worsened the situation by going to Africa and urging residents of AIDS-plaqued countries to shun condoms. Doctrine over common sense and, some might say, humanity. Surely, none of the original fathers of the church could have foreseen such a situation in writing the Gospels. The fact that acceptance of contraception in general would significantly reduce the need for abortions, an outcome people of all faiths desire, has not persuaded the Vatican either.
• Homosexuality/gay marriage. If the church chose to ignore the pedophiles in its midst, it has not been silent on homosexuals — who represent no threat at all to it. They are unacceptable.
• Divorce, married priests. The one would make life for thousands of Catholics more livable, the other would swell the ranks of new priests immediately. Don‘t bet on either.

There are other issues, such as how to meet the needs of a church whose members are increasingly from the southern hemisphere when the majority of the cardinals are still from Europe and endorse Benedict‘s conservative philosophy, and when much of the non-Catholic world views the Church as hopelessly behind the times. It all points to the likelihood that, while the resignation of a pope might seem like a momentous decision historically, in the real scheme of things this one might be no big deal. That could be the saddest outcome of all.

bob@zestoforange.com