I realize that my blogs about the antiwar events of yesterday may have sounded a bit grumpy all around, so I want to take this opportunity to say that we had a blast!
Demonstrations are always good for both the body and the soul, but this was one of the most exhilarating experiences in my memory, being out there in the streets with so many kinds of magnificent, happy people [we spent much of the day in the block Jimmie Breslin describes, though we did not see him], and I believe actually making a difference this time, because we were so many.
I can understand a thinking American's considered decision to not cast a vote in the elections which have been entirely arranged for us by undemocratic process, especially in recent years, or recent decades. Our democratic institutions are an absolute mess right now. What I do not understand is the refusal of that same person to walk into the street on an occasion like yesterday, in the purest form of democratic expression. If I walk to the barricades, literally and figuratively, I'm walking with millions; if I stay away, no one is there. I cannot expect my neighbors to save the world for me on their own.
At the end of the day, we went to a performance of "Brundibar," Hans Krasa's charming children's opera which was performed dozens of times at Terezin, until the child performers were sent to the gas chambers. The opera is about the strength of numbers overcoming evil. Unfortunately those numbers never accumulated in the 1930's. We can have them today, but we're not there yet.
There I go again, grumpy.