Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has long been a holiday dedicated to expressing our gratitude for the good things which have happened in our lives during the preceding year. Lately, however, we have been inundated in the media by a three-pronged attack on Thanksgiving. First, they tell us that the Pilgrims really didn't celebrate Thanksgiving. Then, we're subjected to a guilt trip regarding the treatment of Native Americans. Finally, the animal rights' extremists want us to give up eating turkey.

Of course, the real isue is that they don't want us to give thanks because there is only one being to whom thanks could logically be given: the Creator of Everything, He Who Bestows All Blessings, the Being Formerly Known As God (before liberals tried to make "God" a dirty word.)

Let's address these "issues" briefly:

One - It doesn't matter whether or not Governor Bradford and the other Mayflower travelers celebrated Thanksgiving. You see, for them, the reality of Divine Providence's daily involvement in their lives, making their very survival possible, was something impossible to question. As far as the Pilgrims were concerned, every day was Thanksgiving Day. Whatever minor blessing or gift they were bestowed, they thanked God for it. The real question is not whether the Pilgrims picked one day to be thankful. It is why would we be thankful on only one day.

Two - I firmly believe that the Native Americans got a raw deal. That is beyond dispute. Europeans came into the Americas, exploited both the Natives lack of technology and their differing attitudes about ownership of the land and took over. However, from a historical perspective, this was not a race issue. It was not white versus non-white. Literally dozens, if not hundreds, of ethnic groups have been exterminated in Europe over the centuries. The same has happened worldwide for millenia. Does that make it right? Of course not. On the other hand, blaming racism for a phenomenon which was business as usual for white and non-white alike at the time is a complete warping of history. In fact, the Indians themselves had been known to engage in ethnic cleansing throughout the New World long prior to the arrival of the Europeans.

I believe we should do what can be done to help them become equal (financially, politically and so forth) partners in our society, keeping in mind that the dominant Anglo-American culture should be protected and nurtured. We must not, however, under any circumstances allow our misplaced sense of guilt to prompt us to turn the current order of things upside down. People who live in homes they purchased must be considered the rightful owners. What happened centuries ago has nothing to do with who owns the land now. The courts have no right to even hear these silly cases about giving land back to the Native Americans, much less to rule in their favor.

The vast majority of Americans - black, white, brown or otherwise - are descended from those who arrived here long after the Indians became the victims of European discovery and expansion into the Western Hemisphere. Those who do hail from those early days are centuries removed from their ancestors. Punishing any of us for the acts of those whose names we don't even remember is cruel, inhuman and senseless. Trying to mete out justice centuries after the fact is misguided and irrational. There is a reason that all legal systems establish statutes of limitations. This is a perfect example.

As for the turkey thing, what can I say? Conversation with people so ungrounded in reality is all but impossible. People are people. Animals are animals. People have rights. Animals don't. People need to treat animals with kindness and dignity and to avoid cruelty not because animals are our equals, but because we scar our own spirits when we are cruel and capricious. On the other hand, we need to eat and they are there for our benefit, as well as each others. I can hear the PETA people now howling with indignation at my words: "Exploiter! You can't see that animals are our brothers, our equals!" Really? Hundreds of species of animals eat meat and would, in fact, go extinct if they did not do so. If animals were, in fact, our equals, we would have exactly the same right to eat meat as they do. If they are not our equals, then there is no moral reason for us not to eat meat. Either way, I'm having white meat cut from a roasted bird raised for just that purpose.

Hey, maybe they ARE our equals. The bird's already stuffed and I'm about to be. (Yes, I mock the animal rights extremists, because their fairy tales are laughable.)

What this long-winded diatribe comes down to is: "Give thanks, help your fellow man where you can and enjoy the feast God has provided us."

I, for one, am thankful for my wonderful wife and four beautiful children (the fourth won't be gracing our home with joyful noises until just before Christmas, but he or she is a child, a living human being with all the rights we all possess, nonetheless), my parents and in-laws and all the blessings with which the Living and Loving God, the Creator of All, has gifted us. I am thankful for all the good people of our Town, who are quickly becoming an extended Family. I am thankful that we will be taking our Town forward on a new, positive, joyful path and for all of you who made that possible. There's so much for which to be thankful, it's impossible to list everything.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Reconciliation and a Better Town for All - An Experiment

My last post seems to have gotten a discussion going on how best to thank our First Aid and Fire volunteers. That discussion made me think that we might be able to brainstorm online about what we can do to (1) heal the rifts between the two "sides" in Town and (2) what we (as a community) and the new Town Board can do to make our Town a better place to live. I would invite everyone to post their ideas in the comments section and I'll make sure Carl and the members of the new Board (including Councilmen Miller and Spano) get them.

Now, as you well know, normally I do not censor this blog, which makes for a bit of a free-for-all at at times. However, as the comments for this one post are meant to be a sort virtual brainstorming session, I am going to suspend the lack of rules here and only here. I am asking you to post only ideas for reconciliation or for improving the Town here. Please, no nastiness about past, present or future candidates, officials or persons otherwise involved in local politics (or anyone else, for that matter). Also, constructive criticism of others' posts is fair game, childish or rude remarks are not. I will not remove posts just because I happen to disagree with them. However, any post which is clearly not in the spirit of this experiment will be removed (assuming I can do so; I've never tried to censor a post, so I'm not certain the system will allow me to do so.)

I'll even avoid criticizing people for posting anonymously. The idea is more important than the source.

Ladies and gentlemen, please. Let's try - for once - to be civil in the interests of our community. If we can make this work, maybe we can take a step towards becoming one Town once again. It seems worth a try to me.

They Still Can't Play Nice

Well, they did it again. Between the close of the Election Day polls and the Public Hearing on the 2008 Town Budget, Supervisor Duke and her Board reduced the Supervisor’s salary for 2008 by roughly $8,000 and the Budget Officer’s salary (which also goes to the Supervisor) by $3,000. Note that this isn’t Pam Duke’s salary, it’s Carl Chipman’s. At the Hearing, she claimed that this was done at Carl’s request, in a letter he wrote to the Board. Several people who were there heard that claim. When Carl arrived and it was pointed out that he denied writing any such letter, the story changed to the letter having been written to a newspaper.

When those present became outraged that she would change her story, the Supervisor became indignant, even threatening to throw me out after I pointed out the fact that for the next two months or so, she still works for us. Of course, I was wrong about that. She never worked for the people of this Town, so why should she start now?

Naturally, the supporters of the current Board will start up the spin machine, saying that Carl should take the pay cut because he criticized Supervisor Duke’s pay raise when she took it. Just as naturally, that is completely beside the point.

Carl had made it clear that he was interested in giving back a portion of the Supervisor’s salary, preferably to the First Aid Squad. Supervisor Duke took that option away from him. By doing what she did, she literally took money away from the First Aid Squad, not just from Carl. She also took away the prerogatives of the man the Town voted, by a historical margin, to replace her and clean up her messes.

You see, we elected Carl to run our Town the way we want him to. Pam Duke decided that she was going to have one last spin at making us dance to her tune. This is not a question of salary or budget. It is a question of principle. This is exactly why Pam Duke was defeated this Tuesday, because she simply doesn’t understand what the Town wants.

Carl is going to have the most difficult job of any Supervisor in the Town’s history. Like all good Supervisors, he has to manage the Town in accordance with the will of the people of Rochester. However, he also has to rebuild all that Duke and Company have destroyed. He has to build good will and tear down the stone walls of divisiveness intentionally erected by his predecessor. He has to make sure that Town institutions such as the Youth Commission (among many others) are re-established not as political wings of the Town Board but as organizations which serve the needs and desires of the people. He has to make sure that Town employees and volunteers who had been subjugated by the Supervisor and Board and subjected to constant micro-management will be able to function with the autonomy necessary to actually do the work they were meant to do. He has to fix everything Pam Duke broke.

To deny Carl Chipman the right to decide how much to give back and which of our service organizations to give it to is not just unacceptable, it is petty and mean spirited. Even after being given her Pink Slip by the people, Pam Duke is still rewriting the rules. This time, she decided that spitefulness and vindictiveness is an appropriate tool for forming a Town Budget.

It is just this sort of uncivilized, primitive behavior that the people of this Town rejected on Election Day. This would be unacceptable from a child, never mind a Town Supervisor. Apparently being fired is not enough to teach her to play nice. Perhaps being sent to her room without supper would be more effective.

Victory in Rochester

Something remarkable happened yesterday in the Town of Rochester. No, wait… “Remarkable” doesn’t seem to be the right word. What do you call it when something many once thought impossible takes place anyway?

A miracle.

It’s not that our victory on Election Day was a miracle. I’m referring to what led to that victory. Two years ago, we didn’t even know our neighbors. We had allowed our community to become a group of strangers. Our circles of friends consisted of small groups which rarely overlapped. And we thought we were happy.

Over the course of the past couple of years, we went from strangers to friends to community to family. That, without a doubt, is a miracle. That, without a doubt, is what led to us taking our Town back yesterday.

So, what leads to a miracle?

We found ourselves living in a Town which had been taken over by people who didn’t understand who we were, our values, our aspirations, our spirit. They thought that by taking control of the Democratic Party, they could simply tell Democrats how to vote and they would stay in power forever. What they didn’t realize is that Rochester Democrats are just like their neighbors. Conservatives, Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Non-Enrolleds. Those are all just words for neighbors and deep down, we’re all the same. We may vote differently for Congress or the President, but our values, our dreams, our love for this Town are the same.

We proved that yesterday.

So, now where do we go? How do we heal the rifts that were caused by the Town Board’s acts over the past several years? Forgiveness. At one of the recent Public Hearing’s Keith Kortright looked right at the Supervisor and at her allied Councilmen and told them “I forgive you.” Keith is a bigger man than I was that night, bigger than many of us have been over the course of our ordeal. He forgave the Board before we won on Election Day. The rest of us waited for victory.

Regardless of the order, however, we have to forgive them, if for no other reason than to preserve the integrity of our own spirits. Anger is an emotion we no longer need. Hatred is one we never needed. Forgiveness is what we need more than anything right now.

Of course, that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy our victory. I saw so much pure joy and happiness last night, it just about made me high on unadulterated emotion, energy and adrenaline. It’s only natural to be overjoyed at the extent of our victory. By all means, be happy. Laugh, smile, shout for joy, jump up and down. Do it without hatred in your heart.

Just as importantly, let’s reach out to those on the other side. Let them know that we don’t harbor ill will, that we just want to heal our Town. There was a lot of talk in Town during the campaign of how we don’t accept outsiders. Obviously, that was nothing but election propaganda. After all, we just elected two people to the Board who moved here only recently. We embrace all who embrace us.

Those on the other side can still choose to love this Town as it is without trying to change us. That’s all we ask. We don’t ask them to agree with us, we don’t ask them to compromise their own principles. Just stop trying to change what this Town is, what has made us great. The direction of our Town for 300 years has been one of progress and will continue to be one of progress. Progress, however, is not a single path, but a series of choices. We follow the choices which lead to true rural life and always will.

As long as they are willing to accept the fact that our Town will remain traditional small town America forever, we are happy to accept them. The one thing they have to accept: our homes are our castles. Don’t interfere in our property rights and we’ll all be just fine. Refusal to accept that simple principle is the one sure sign that they are still trying to change us, the one sure demonstration of the fact that they don’t want to belong to our community. I, for one, hope it’s the one sign we never see.

Let’s reach out, give them the opportunity to accept the character of our Town and to join our community. Let’s give them the choice of healing and unity.

Last night, one of the celebrators told me, “One of the lowest points of my life was two years ago, when I saw that we had lost our Town.” I thought about that for a moment and realized, we never lost our Town. We just misplaced our sense of community. Last night, we showed the world that we found it again.

This is our Town and no one will ever take it from us again. Ever.

Work and Pray

Less than 24 hours to go until the polls open tomorrow morning. Now is the time to take one last look at what we can do to give Carl, Tavi, Manuela, Wayne and Al every possible vote. Is there anyone you can still call or talk to in person? Do you know someone who needs a ride? Is there someone you know who is confused about the issues or facts surrounding this year’s election? These are all questions we can go over one final time, to make sure there’s nothing we missed, but it’s not likely we have, not at this late stage.

There is, however, one thing we can do.

I spent my high school years at Coleman Catholic in Kingston where we were taught by the Marist Brothers. Their slogan was “Ora et Labora” or “Pray and Work.” No one can doubt the number of hours we have all put into this campaign or the intensity of our work. We can be justifiably proud of what we have done and what we’re about to achieve, but what about the other side of the equation?

Prayer is one of the greatest forces influencing mankind throughout our history. The Declaration of Independence tells us that we are endowed with our Inalienable Rights by our Creator. Our Constitution talks about the “Blessings of Liberty.” Not gifts, but blessings, which can only come from God.

Our Founding Fathers believed in a God Who took personal interest in the course of humanity. While giving his farewell address, George Washington declared “You can't have National Morality apart from religious principle.” Thomas Jefferson called the Bible the “Cornerstone for American Liberty.” James Madison said, “We've staked our future on our ability to follow The Ten Commandments with all our heart.”

Prayer and a deep and abiding faith in the God Who answers our pleadings has long been the engine which drove this nation forward. Even the work of our hands was inspired by sayings such as “God helps those who help themselves.”

That same God directs us to love those who have done us harm, to turn our backs on hatred and spite. He also tells us to defend those who are being harmed. With clean consciences, we can and will remove from positions of power those who are destroying our Town. Just as important is our ability to forgive them the damage they have done us, all the times when they disregarded our rights and trampled on our freedoms. We forgive them because hate and anger will eat away at our own spirits.

We have done everything we can. The work is finished. All that is left is prayer.

Let us pray that God will Touch our neighbors’ hearts and bring them to the polls tomorrow. Let us pray for a new, brighter future for our Town. Let us pray for the strength and Grace to forgive our opponents and Love them as God Wills.

Let us pray for both victory and for the ability to show the other side compassion.

God willing, we will emerge from years of darkness tomorrow night.

God willing, our Town will move forward into light, towards a future bright and full of hope and unity.

God willing.

Countdown to the Future

Last night I attended one of the most magical events of my life. The bonfire staged by United Rochester was a true community occasion, where several hundred people of different backgrounds shared music, laughs, good times and a true spirit of unity. Four years ago, many of us didn't even know one another. Last night, we were a family.

Tuesday night, after all the votes are counted, this family will pick up the pieces of a Town shattered by the selfish desires of a select few and move us into the future. In their desperation to retain power over our lives, the supporters of this Town Government which has done so much harm are claiming that they want to "take our town forward." They coined this phrase in response to the popular movement to "Take Our Town Back," hoping to confuse the people of Rochester into thinking that they want progress while we want to go back to something which was less than what they have given us.

To a certain extent, that's true. We want to go back to a time when there was less backstabbing. We want to go back to a time when there was less divisiveness. We want to go back to a time when the Town Board served rather than dictated. We want to go back to a time when neighbors helped one another whether they agreed or disagreed about politics. We want to go back to a time when Rochester belonged to the people and not to the wealthy, elitist, extremist minority. We want our Town back.

This is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a desire to stop progress. Imagine, if you will, a man driving a car who veers off the road into a cornfield. He has two choices: stop, back up and get back on the road or keep going forward through ruts, over rocks, knocking over someone else's precious crops. If you are going forward in a direction you have no right going, a direction which is destructive to both yourself and your neighbors, that's not progress. Finding your way back to the paved road and following that to a civilized destination is progress.

One cannot go forward, one cannot have progress by destroying that which went before. If one does so, one does not progress, one simply replaces that which was already there. One does not have more than before, just something different and, in fact, one has lost all that which came before, all that precious history.

Progress is building upon that history, adding to it, giving the next generation everything we received and a little bit more. Giving them less is not an option for an enlightened society. We have a responsibility to pass along everything our forebears passed on to us and then some.

Taking our Town back is the only way to take our Town forward. The only part of that ideal which the Town Board is capable of understanding is the word "take," which is something they have done over and over again. They take our tax dollars. They take our sense of community. They take our rights to control our own homes and our destinies. They take our history and they are doing their very best to take our children's futures.

As a teenager during the 80s, I was inundated by TV shows, movies, newspaper and magazine articles, radio and TV commercials and more all hammering away at one simple, necessary message: "No Means No." Apparently, that is a message which our Town Board is unable to comprehend. Our Town, our futures, our values and principles and yes, our very virtue, belongs to us.

No Means No.

We will not allow ourselves to be taken by force. We recognize your less than honorable intent. We will take back what is ours and move forward with our lives, healing the wounds you have created in our extended family.

No Means No.

Come this Tuesday, Supervisor Duke and her cohorts will learn that lesson.

The countdown has begun and we will soon be soaring towards the future.