The Unclad Soul

I would encourage every American to watch the Ken Burns series, The West. It is available on Netflix and PBS. What you learn from this extraordinary documentary is that the White Man has, from the beginning of his presence here, done everything in his power to prevent first, the Native American Indians, then the Mexicans, then the Blacks, then the Asians, from ever being given the right to be legally assimilated into the free function of American society. The White Man is an immigrant. Unless you have Native American blood in you, you did not come from this land. Your ancestors brought you here from somewhere else. Whites came to this country from Europe, Western Asia, Central Asia, South Asia, and North Africa. This land did not belong to them, they stumbled onto it and then they took it to be their own. Many came here fleeing religious persecution, poverty, disease, lack of economic opportunity, and the freedom to build a life for themselves and their families. ...

There is a large element of Democratic and Republican voters in this country who feel betrayed by their parties. Trump and Hillary and their handlers and the establishment big shots in both parties seem oblivious to this fact.  Yes, this is a great country and all of that. But folks, our political system is tragically, disastrously broken. It does not represent the majority of our citizens. Anyone who cannot see that is simply living in some kind of unyielding denial. I don’t know what will happen in the Republican Party. Their convention this summer will likely be a hot mess. But I can assure you, with all of the condescending calls from Hillary’s cheerleaders to dismiss Bernie supporters, the Democratic convention will be no less chaotic. All the pundits have declared her the nominee and many even the president. To discount so many with that kind of disdainfulness may very well create shocking consequences at the convention. There are groups of people in America who ...

President Obama’s speech last night on temporary immigration reform was excellent. He was poised, determined and intelligent. He was our nation’s leader; the one many of us have been waiting for these last few years to show real courage. The executive action he will enact is compassionate, sensible, and humane. It does not go far enough for me, but at least, finally, something tangible is being done to address the millions of undocumented living and working in our country, many of them for years.  The Republican’s freak out over this is silly and so over the top it borders on cartoonish. They know they have royally messed up. In spite of their recent election victories they have failed and lost. For now and forevermore the Latino community in this country will be grateful to President Obama, and those Democrats who have supported him in this, for actually doing something to legitimately include them in our society. This nonsense from Republicans that the president’s action has “po...