Happy Independence Day

I've posted a link to the recording, below, on previous July 4ths. 

It is of Frank Sinatra singing "America the Beautiful." 

The recording is from the 1963 album The Concert Sinatra; the album's songs were arranged and conducted by Nelson Riddle. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0xC9xFuBvo

Here is one detail from the song, which I especially enjoy; it concerns Mr. Sinatra's lyrical/musical phrasing (which is, certainly, often commented upon).

It is heard at approximately 44 seconds from the song's start.

Mr. Sinatra sings:

America, America, God shed his grace on thee...

Yet, in his exquisitely distinctive way, he adds a pause between the words "grace," and "on"--which, I think, adds a subtle, after-the-fact emphasis to the word "grace."

America, America, God shed his grace (pause) on thee...

I love this brief pause (in addition to the overall superb rendition of the song).

Judicial vertigo

Yesterday's Supreme Court decision regarding presidential immunity is deeply distressing, and dizzying.

Here is an essay by the Editorial Board of The New York Times. The piece is titled: "The Supreme Court Gives a Free Pass to Trump and Future Presidents."

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/01/opinion/supreme-court-presidential-immunity-trump.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4U0.ZQwL.tV3OAWRwqS5H&smid=url-share

After the debate

What is to be done?

My immediate response to Thursday's debate (admittedly not a unique view), was that President Biden (for whom I have long felt, and for whom I continue to feel, genuine admiration, and affection) should step aside.

But--at least as of this (disquieting/disorienting) moment--I am not (as, simply, one Biden supporter) confident concerning what the next step should be.

I just know, really, that I feel stricken, because of what has taken place.

The Editorial Board of The Washington Post wrote in part, on Friday: 

If President Biden had weekend plans, he should cancel them in favor of some soul-searching. His calamitous debate performance on Thursday raises legitimate questions about whether he’s up for another four years in the world’s toughest job. It’s incumbent on this incumbent to determine, in conversation with family and aides, whether continuing to seek reelection is in the best interests of the country. 

Former president Donald Trump proved emphatically on Thursday why preventing another Trump presidency is the paramount consideration. Mr. Biden faces a personal decision but also a presidential one: What would be best for the country, his personal feelings notwithstanding?

The Post editorial also said this:

Little good ever came from panicking. Mr. Biden cannot be coerced into doing something he doesn’t want to do. Nor should he be. What he can do is what many Americans are doing this weekend — wondering whether he is up to the job.

https://wapo.st/3VFagj4

The Editorial Board of The New York Times had this headline, for an opinion piece on Friday: "To Serve His Country, President Biden Should Leave the Race."

Columnist Thomas L. Friedman, of the Times, wrote a piece the same day, titled: "Joe Biden Is a Good Man and a Good President. He Must Bow Out of the Race."

Mr. Friedman wrote:

I watched the Biden-Trump debate alone in a Lisbon hotel room, and it made me weep. I cannot remember a more heartbreaking moment in American presidential campaign politics in my lifetime, precisely because of what it revealed: Joe Biden, a good man and a good president, has no business running for re-election. And Donald Trump, a malicious man and a petty president, has learned nothing and forgotten nothing. He is the same fire hose of lies he always was, obsessed with his grievances — nowhere close to what it will take for America to lead in the 21st century.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/28/opinion/joe-biden-tom-friedman.html?unlocked_article_code=1.3k0.NqW6.NjOc0tH4I37a&smid=url-share

Other columnists, as well as the Editorial Board of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, have also suggested that Mr. Biden leave the presidential race.

One of the most interesting Editorial Board recommendations, however, was the following contrary view on Saturday, from The Philadelphia Inquirer.

The headline of the Inquirer's Editorial Board essay (in what appeared to be a response to the headline, noted above, of the New York Times's Editorial Board piece, the day before) said this:

"To serve his country, Donald Trump should leave the race."

The editorial said, in part:

President Joe Biden's debate performance was a disaster. His disjointed responses and dazed look sparked calls for him to drop out of the presidential race.

But lost in the hand wringing was Donald Trump's usual bombastic litany of lies, hyperbole, bigotry, ignorance, and fear mongering. His performance demonstrated once again that he is a danger to democracy and unfit for office.

In fact, the debate about the debate is misplaced. The only person who should withdraw from the race is Trump.

Trump, 78, has been on the political stage for eight years marked by chaos, corruption, and incivility. Why go back to that?

https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/editorials/first-presidential-debate-joe-biden-donald-trump-withdraw-20240629.html

The debate

I hope, during tonight's debate, that voters will be reminded, in significant ways, that President Biden is an intrinsically decent and honorable man.

Former President Trump is not concerned with either decency or honor.  His plans for America (and the world) are dark, and perilous. One thinks of his perverse affection for dictators; his self-involvement; his bitterness, rage, and promises of revenge and retribution; his endless lies.

President Biden, I have no doubt, will continue seeking to strengthen and unite the country. Former President Trump likes nothing more than division, and chaos.

Willie Mays (1931-2024)

As is true of so many people, I was very saddened, this week, to learn of Willie Mays's death, at age 93.

Since childhood, I have thought of Mr. Mays--and his brilliance as a ballplayer--with awe.

Willie Mays, "The Catch," 1954 World Series

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I wrote about Mr. Mays, in this space, in 2021, the year he turned 90--and wrote, in the post, of what has long been referred to as "The Catch":  his astonishing catch, in the 1954 World Series, of batter Vic Wertz's long drive to center field; it is, surely, one of the most exciting moments in baseball's history. The post, at the link below, includes video of the play--and also concerns the remarkable throw Mr. Mays made to second base, immediately after making the catch.

https://andrewleefielding.blogspot.com/2021/05/willie-mays-turns-90.html

In the 1980s, I visited the Baseball Hall of Fame, in Cooperstown, New York.  During the visit, I bought the following postcard, of Mr. Mays's Hall of Fame plaque.

 

 

Juneteenth

Best wishes for the holiday...

 

Father's Day

In July of 1948, my father began his medical residency at Manhattan's Bellevue Hospital, in training for a career as an obstetrician and gynecologist.  He remained at Bellevue for a year.

My parents met, and began dating, in early 1949, as my mother's television career was starting. They would soon become engaged.

In July of 1949, the month my father turned twenty-eight, he left Bellevue for a stint at the Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital, in Jersey City, New Jersey.  

The hospital, which had opened in the early 1930s, was named after the mother of Frank Hague, who for three decades was Jersey City's Mayor (a tenure which ended in 1947).

From January to March of 1949, my mother had been a singer on a weekday musical program on television's DuMont Network, The Stan Shaw Show. In March, the month she turned twenty-one, she began singing on a new nightly DuMont musical program, Teen Time Tunes. The program went off the air in July, the same month my father began working at the Jersey City hospital.

The picture above is of my father, from 1949, standing outside the hospital.

In August of 1949 my parents were married in Manhattan.

My father worked at the Margaret Hague hospital until the end of 1949.  In December of 1949, my mother began singing on bandleader Kay Kyser's TV program on NBC.  

In 1950, my father continued his OB/GYN residency at New York's Harlem Hospital.  He completed his residency, at the hospital, at the end of 1952. 

At the start of 1953, my parents left New York for the Boston area. My father had been hired by a medical practice in Boston; he later opened his own office.  He left private practice in the late 1980s.

Not long after my parents left New York, my mother sang for a time on a morning radio show in Boston, and in 1954 and 1955 had her own weekly TV program on a Boston station. She appeared on other Boston TV programs through the years, and in the 1960s began a decades-long voice-overs career.

She died in the spring of 2001, at 73. My father died on New Year's Day, 2022, at age 100.  I miss them both.