Yesterday, as we worked our way through the narrow single-lane
streets in the center of our rural French village of 1,800 souls to our parking
space near our home, we came upon a work truck slowly inching forward,
blocking our way. A work crew walked behind the truck, its open flatbed loaded
with hot-mix asphalt, filling small potholes and tamping the fill down with the
backs of their shovels. As the truck moved into the last short stub leading to
our little plaza, the workers waved to the driver, directing him to back up and
turn into a side street, letting us move ahead. I waved and they waved and we
went our separate ways.
We had benefited from a small act of kindness. But it was
instructive. Our car, an older, freshly-painted bright red Renault station wagon, is certainly
recognizable. And we‘ve lived in the village long enough not to be surprised
that the workers knew that we lived close by. But the fact is that I didn’t
honk our horn or express impatience, that I actually made a calming gesture to
the workers with my hands when they first noticed us, clearly indicating that we would have
had no trouble waiting an extra minute or two while the truck navigated the
final 100 yards or so to our plaza. Instead, the truck backed up and changed
its route to save us that extra couple of minutes of time. A small, wholly unnecessary bit of
consideration. But not atypical.
After living in France permanently for the past twelve
years, I wouldn’t say that we are fully integrated in the highest sense of the
word. We are by no means fluent in the language, although we have little
trouble being understood and conducting our daily business. Our primary social
interactions are confined almost exclusively to folks who speak English, whatever
their native tongue might be, although we can and do interact every day with
folks with little or no English at all. And although we have secured a 10-year
residency card that gives us certain rights in France and throughout Europe
that aren’t available to shorter-term visitors, we have no interest in pursuing
French citizenship.
But we love living in France. We love the little courtesies
that are a part of daily life here, regardless of the universal caricature of
the rude Parisian. Our experience is more consistent with the attitude of those
village workers who inconvenienced themselves just to save us a negligible amount of time. We say 'Bonjour' to everyone that we walk past on the street in
our village, including school kids, whether we know them or not. We wait
patiently while Nadine dispenses and gathers news of family and the village at large from
behind the counter with every customer of the butcher shop, no matter how long
it takes, no matter how many people are waiting for service. (When it’s your turn, you will
receive the same level of undivided attention.) The servers at the village
bar/brasserie shake our hand or kiss our cheeks when we walk in because we are
regulars. They don’t expect a tip because they make a living wage. (But being
American, we give an extra little bit that would be considered insultingly
small in America but that shows appreciation here. And is indeed appreciated.)
And then the United States joined Israel in bombing Iran.
We are asked for our thoughts as Americans. (I won’t go into
the fact that Europeans realize that the definition of America includes the
entire hemisphere in which the United States resides. One of the follies that
Europeans generously abide is that most folks from the USofA don’t understand that distinction.) For
most of us who have settled here, our reaction to current events is a cross between sadness and outrage.
Sadness that the good will that most Europeans have felt towards Americans
since the end of WWII has been squandered in such a short period of time.
Outrage that the country of our birth has become unrecognizable. Men in
military gear and wearing masks demanding ‘papers’ from random people on the
street? Kidnapping the leaders of other countries? How could this have happened? I won’t pretend to have an answer. Historians
may come to a consensus a hundred years from now. But I will venture a few
thoughts on the matter.
The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the
United States were written contemporary with and influenced by the writers of the French
Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen. At their core, those documents
take as their central tenet that rights are not granted by governments but are
inherently human rights which governments must not be allowed to infringe upon.
In the case of the French, within less than a generation, Napoleon was crowned emperor. The First Republic of France thus lasted all of
12 years. (Rights are apparently a fleeting thing. We should all know that by now.) There have been five French Republics in all, responding to the fall
of autocrats, the ends of wars, or the influence of major political figures. During
the same 250 years, the United States has amended its founding Constitution,
primarily to adjust to the inequities that were a given in the late 18th
Century, but the US is still working with that same original Constitution as the
framework of its first and only republic. Can a document written in the late 18th
Century serve as the ultimate legal basis for a 21st Century society? We are
learning that it probably cannot.
What caused the breakdown of a social order that seemed to
be going so well? I’ll list what I see as a few key factors.
With the exception of Trump, the wealthiest US President in
the past 100 years was John Kennedy. And a cornerstone of Kennedy’s economic
policy was to lower the tax rates on Americans with incomes over $1,000,000 in
the name of economic stimulus. I’m convinced that the failed notion that a
rising tide lifts all boats began then. I’m convinced that the inability to find the money to maintain the massive infrastructure that was built
on that higher tax rate began then. And I’m convinced that the creation of a
class of uber-wealthy Americans with the power to put and keep Donald Trump in
office began with that seemingly insignificant bit of wrongheaded economic policy.
The growing power of the 1% also coincides with the politicization of the
United States Supreme Court. Only a Court beholden to a perverse political ideology,
and unfettered by the ethical guidelines that constrain all other federal
courts, could find written into the Constitution that corporations are people
and that money equals speech, thus dumping billions of unregulated money into
the political process, a result that hardens in concrete the creation of a
professional political class concerned with reelection and building personal
wealth before serving a constituency. We are seeing the Supreme
Court practically daily overturning the carefully wrought rulings of lower federal courts through
twists of logic that are best applied to the baking of pretzels.
And finally, at least for this rant, I rue the lack of
generally recognized trusted authorities when it comes to speaking truth. There
used to be guys named Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow. Cronkite cried on-air
when he announced assassination of JFK. He put the Vietnam War on television for all to
see. He joined us watching in awe as NASA took men to the moon. Not a saint. No. But at least we could tell that Cronkite believed what he was
saying. And we could hear the bombs dropping in the background as Murrow
described in real time and in person the stoic determination of an England at
war. His reports were both brave and eloquent. Now there are guys like Alex Jones, making a fortune calling the parents
of dead school children crisis actors. And there’s the gang at Fox, giving
credence to bald-faced lies to further the agenda of their 1% owners.
Just today, I came across deepfake videos on Facebook
purporting to be Michael Caine and Steve Martin pushing some voodoo memory-enhancing product. It was so
convincingly real that if it hadn’t been so patently absurd, I might have
believed it. I’m certain that some did believe it, enough to make the cost of production and distribution of the video more than worthwhile. That I didn’t believe that the videos were really Caine or Martin is a tribute
to the fact that my parents were educated and educated me. I wish that more parents valued education, the kind of education that our parents did. Education that rewarded achievement above participation.
OK. Enough. I feel better now. Thanks for listening.
