The power elite is the real deep state

From the column: “Today, the United States spends more on its military than any other nation in the world.”

Opinion by Dave Berger

March 24, 2023 at 1:25 PM – Duluth News Tribune

During the last 200-year transition from empires to modern nation-states, national governments have been accused of being unduly controlled by small segments of their populations. Many authors have pointed out that the upper class of most nations buy elections and fund those in power to do their bidding. Others believe that large government bureaucracies are the real powerbrokers, controlling all major decision-making.

Of course, when it comes to describing national power structures, it is probably best to include both the power of the rich and the power of the state.

For example, in the 1950s, American sociologist C. Wright Mills developed the idea of the “power elite.” For Mills, it was the top leaders in the military, corporations, and the executive branch that ruled the nation collectively. Mills argued, quite reasonably, that members of these three groups have a great deal in common, including circulating members from one group to another.

Take, for example, Dick Cheney. After serving as U.S. Secretary of Defense from 1989 to 1993, Cheney served as chairman and CEO of Halliburton Company, one of the largest military contractors in the world, from 1995 to 2000. After his time with Halliburton, Dick Cheney became U.S. vice president from 2001 to 2009. Between 2003 and 2006, Halliburton received more than $8 billion in defense contracts from the U.S. military.

What does it matter that a power elite exists? The danger comes through collusion to make profit off the American people by creating a permanent arms industry that manipulates the nation into funding endless wars across the planet.

On Tuesday, Jan. 17, 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, a former five-star general, warned in his farewell speech of the dangers of what he called the “military-industrial complex.” President Eisenhower said that “we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”

President Eisenhower’s words were quite prophetic. Today, the United States spends more on its military than any other nation in the world. According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies, in 2021, the U.S. spent $738 billion on defense, more than three times that of the People’s Republic of China, whose defense budget of $193 billion was the second-largest in the world for the same year.

The size of the U.S. defense budget looks even more immense when you compare it to the next largest 13 defense budgets in the world. In 2021, those 13 nations spent a total of $729 billion on defense, $9 billion less than the defense budget of the U.S. alone.

Most people in the United States agree we should support Ukraine in its war against Russian invaders, but some also believe there should be better funding oversight. According to the Council on Foreign Affairs, the United States spent $46.6 billion on military assistance to Ukraine in 2022 alone. While this is a great deal of money, it is less than 6% of the U.S. defense budget of $782 billion in 2022. Maybe those politicians and pundits concerned with our expenditures in Ukraine should look at our overall military spending, as well and who creates and benefits from its enormity.

Recently, rhetoric has increased related to a “deep state” in America. So many are concerned that bureaucrats are somehow opposed to everything Donald Trump. This conspiracy theory reached its height when the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives created the Select Committee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on Jan. 10.

The same day, a soon-to-be-named member of the committee, Rep. Dan Bishop, tweeted, “The Deep State is on notice. To any bureaucrat who violates Americans’ Constitutional rights — we’re coming for you, on behalf of the American people.”

Rep. Bishop and the other conspiracy theorists should turn from their partisan political fictions to the reality of the military-industrial complex.

People who have a fear of a deep state should realize that that state is neither deep nor hidden. The power elite is the deep state.

Dave Berger of Maple Grove, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor, a freelance writer and author, and a regular contributor to the News Tribune Opinion page.

Corporate wolf clothed in ‘community’ lurks in Minnesota

From the column: “When you consider the Itasca Project is run at least in part by corporate CEOs, you wonder about its true motives.”

Opinion by Dave Berger – Duluth News Tribune

July 08, 2023 at 9:36 AM

Recently, I came across a February study commissioned by the Itasca Project, titled, “Housing Innovation Report: Recommended strategies to increase production and lower housing costs in Minnesota.” While the study itself was interesting, I was even more intrigued by its sponsoring organization.

The Itasca Project sounds like a water-conservation endeavor in the Northland or possibly a search for the exact source of the Mississippi River. Most Minnesotans would not have a clue what it is or why it exists. The name does, however, elicit a positive feeling indicative of an organization that has a concrete function.

I checked Wikipedia but found no mention of the Itasca Project. Next, I tried YouTube but only found one video referencing the organization. “Transit ROI: Jay Cowles of the Itasca Project” is a short video posted in 2013 discussing the return on investment for different strategies for public transportation. Cowles notes he is co-chair of the transportation initiative of the Itasca Project. He describes the project as a “metro-regional association of leaders, primarily business CEOs but also other critical political, foundation, and nonprofit leaders.” He goes on to say, “We look at questions that we think are long-term and strategic on behalf of maintaining the region’s competitiveness.”

So, the Itasca Project, it seems to me, is like a chamber of commerce run by corporate CEOs that sponsors studies of regional significance. Cowles, a founding member, is also the managing director of Lawrence Creek LLC, a private family investment company. He also currently is on the public Minnesota State Colleges and University System Board of Trustees.

Intrigued by his connections to both corporate and public entities, I closely explored the Itasca Project website, itascaproject.org . The organization is, its site says, “an employer-led civic alliance focused on building a thriving economy and expanding prosperity for all.” That seems to me somewhat overly altruistic and not quite believable, but I pressed on.

The website also has a link to an article about the group’s leadership, titled, “Doing well by doing good: A leader’s guide.” The article indicates the Itasca Project was founded on Friday, Sept. 12, 2003, when Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak, St. Paul Mayor Randy Kelly, and about 30 business and civic leaders attended a first organizational meeting. These founding members “all believed that a group driven by private enterprises but including a broad set of stakeholders could play a constructive role in reviving the economic competitiveness of Minneapolis and Saint Paul,” the site states.

On the surface, this sounds like a community-based approach. However, when you consider the Itasca Project is run at least in part by corporate CEOs, you wonder about its true motives.

Take, for example, its recent “Housing Innovation Report,” mentioned above. The report claims that by following its recommendations, the Twin Cities area would be able to meet its production goal of 18,000 homes per year with increased affordability. Its leaders claim they want to expand prosperity for all: “Increasing housing production and improving housing affordability will benefit families, firms, and the entire MSP region for generations to come.”

The major recommendations of the report include, one, that cities should provide public land to developers at low or no cost and, two, that building-permit processes should be shortened. These recommendations reflect an employer-led organization with the interests of the elite at its core and not the interests of an entire community.

It is not a coincidence that executives from some of the largest development and construction companies in Minnesota participated in the creation of the report, including MA Mortenson Company, Ryan Companies, Andersen Corporation, and Dominium. It would make sense that they want to obtain free or inexpensive land and reduce government oversight of projects, thereby increasing profits.

Too many local newspapers and media outlets quote Itasca Project studies as if they are neutral research documents. It is unreasonable that the motives of such a powerful agent of public discourse are not more closely explored or discussed.

In my view, the Itasca Project is a corporate wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Dave Berger of Maple Grove, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor, freelance writer, author, and regular contributor to the News Tribune Opinion page.

‘All of us have become more like Scrooge’

From the column: “Looking critically at unforgivable debt would be a step in the right direction. Understanding how debts like student loans, taxes, and traffic fines are just as relentless as the debtors’ prison or the Poor Law would also be encouraging.”

By Dave Berger

December 10, 2021 at 1:00 PM – Duluth News Tribune

On Dec. 19, 1843, Charles Dickens published his novella, “A Christmas Carol.” In heavy debt after writing two successive flops (“Barnaby Rudge” and “Martin Chuzzlewit”), Dickens was under severe pressure in late 1843 to write a financially successful book. In less than six weeks he completed the 62-page “A Christmas Carol,” which then went on to be the best-selling book of the Christmas season.

For nearly 178 years, this classic holiday story has encouraged people to become less miserly and to help the less fortunate. The reader sees the magnificent transformation of Ebenezer Scrooge by three Christmas ghosts. We revel in his change of heart that leads to the joyous survival of Tiny Tim.

Scrooge states early in the story that he supports prisons, union workhouses, the Treadmill and the Poor Law. He argues that those who are badly off should go to these places. The two portly gentlemen collecting for charity indicate to Scrooge that many cannot be helped by these institutions and many would rather die than go to such places.

Scrooge infamously responds, “If they would rather die, they had better do it and decrease the surplus population.”

None of us want to be like Scrooge.

Charles Dickens’ childhood was horribly affected by those same backward institutions and laws supported by Scrooge. In 1824, when Dickens was but 12 years old, he was forced to work in a shoe-polish factory for 10 hours a day to pay for his keep, since his parents and five brothers and sisters were in prison due to the debt the family owed.

It was not pleasant to be in debt in Victorian England. Debtors’ prisons existed that were full of families whose only crime was their inability to repay their debt. Union workhouses forced people into working yet did not help them pay off their debts. Many spent years in such places for punishment for poor money management.

The Treadmill was a particularly harsh law for the poor. Debtors became prisoners who pushed a bar at chest height that was attached to a large wheel that milled grain. Constantly walking in a circle to crush grain like corn, these people were used as beasts of burden. Like Sisyphus, the penance never ends, just repeating itself over and over and over again.

All of this for the “crime” of debt.

We are smug to believe that we are nothing like Victorian England. But debtor’s prisons and poor laws have not disappeared. They have rather developed into modern-day hidden debt laws.

While it is true that you cannot go to prison for not paying a “civil debt” like a mortgage or credit card debt, you can still go to prison today if you don’t pay your taxes or other government-ordered payments or fees. Additionally, student loans cannot be discharged using bankruptcy. In 1998, the U.S. Congress declared that during the lifetime of the borrower, students’ loans cannot be included in bankruptcy. Like a modern-day Poor Law, this debt cannot and will not be forgiven, ever.

One of the most insidious poor laws today is the so-called “pay-only probation.” Under this program, private corporations manage those who cannot pay their traffic-violation fines. They make payments to these companies to stay out of jail (with an extra fee going to the company). If they fail to make their payments, their probation is revoked and they are incarcerated.

‘Tis the season to self-righteously congratulate ourselves on not being like Ebenezer Scrooge. We seem to develop an annual sense of ignorance around Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.” Instead of encouraging people to look critically at how our society treats the poor, we now support similar institutions that were defended by Scrooge.

All of us have become more like Scrooge.

Looking critically at unforgivable debt would be a step in the right direction. Understanding how debts like student loans, taxes, and traffic fines are just as relentless as the debtors’ prison or the Poor Law would also be encouraging. We need to stop being so ignorant over the unfulfilled wants of our society.

The Ghost of Christmas Present had two children sheltered under his robe, a boy named Ignorance and a girl named Want. “Beware them both, and all of their degrees, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom.” If we continue to live in ignorance of how we treat the poor and those in debt, we are indeed doomed.

Doomed like Jacob Marley to fashion heavy chains, “link by link and yard by yard,” around each of our souls as we ignore the suffering of our fellow human beings.

Dave Berger of Plymouth, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor who taught for nearly three decades at Inver Hills Community College. He also is a regular contributor to the News Tribune Opinion page.

Olympic massacre remains burden to carry 50 years later

From the column: “I read the inscription that said it was a memorial to the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches killed at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games. This startled me. It became even more frightening and personal as I read the list of the fallen and my name was there.”

Opinion by David Berger Duluth News Tribune

July 22, 2022 at 1:28 PM

Almost a half century ago, 11 Israeli Olympians and one West German police officer were murdered at the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics by eight members of the Palestinian terrorist group Black September.

At 4:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 5, 1972, armed terrorists scaled a 6½-foot chain-link fence and then used stolen keys to enter into the apartments housing Israeli athletes and coaches in the Olympic Village in Munich, West Germany. Almost immediately, they murdered Moshe Weinberg, a wrestling coach, and Yossef Romano, a weightlifter. They proceeded to take an additional nine coaches and athletes hostage.

For more than 13 hours, West German police negotiated with the terrorists. Then, at about 6:30 p.m., the authorities agreed to helicopter the terrorists and hostages to the Furstenfeldbruck airbase where they could board a 727 jet to Cairo, Egypt.

Soon after the terrorists and Israelis were transported to the airbase, at around 10:35 p.m., police attempted a rescue by shooting the leader of the terrorists, but he was only hit in his thigh. Police officer Anton Fliegerbauer was the first to die in the exchange of gunfire.

The gun battle continued until midnight. At that point, West German authorities brought in armored personnel carriers. In response to this show of force, the terrorists turned on their hostages, who were still bound in the two helicopters, and slaughtered all nine of them.

Gunned down in one helicopter were Yossef Gutfreund, a wrestling referee; Kehat Shorr, a shooting coach; Mark Slavin, a wrestler; Andre Spitzer, a fencing coach; and Amitzur Shapira, a track coach. They were shot an average of four times each.

In the other helicopter Yakov Springer, a weightlifting judge; Eliezer Halfin, a wrestler; and Ze’ev Friedman, a weightlifter, were shot and killed instantly. David Berger, a weightlifter, survived the initial hail of bullets, even though he was shot twice in his legs. He later died of smoke inhalation from the explosion and fire caused by a grenade thrown into the cockpit of the helicopter.

Five of the eight terrorists were killed, and the other three were apprehended.

Being only 9 years old, I have no memory of this atrocity happening. However, in just 2½ years, I did become vividly aware of this terrorist attack.

I went on a field trip with my sixth-grade class from Jenny Lind Elementary School in Minneapolis in early 1975 to the Jewish Community Center by Cedar Lake in Minneapolis. We spent the day enjoying the cultural and athletic facilities. As we lined up in the lobby to leave, I noticed a large bronze plaque on the wall.

I read the inscription that said it was a memorial to the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches killed at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games. This startled me. It became even more frightening and personal as I read the list of the fallen and my name was there, David Berger.

The next day I went to the Webber Park Library in Minneapolis and found the book, “The Blood of Israel: The Massacre of the Israeli Athletes: The Olympics, 1972,” by Serge Groussard. This book chronicles the events in Munich on Sept. 5 and 6, 1972, including details on how David Berger was brutalized and killed.

As an 11-year-old, I read how 28-year-old David Berger was pistol-whipped in the head, shot in the left shoulder, and beaten at the shins. Later, the book details how David Berger was tied up in a helicopter, shot in the legs, and then blown up by a grenade.

Up until that moment, my life was filled with school, chores, playing with friends, reading, watching television, and delivering newspapers. I had never really thought about the world beyond this tiny uncomplicated sphere of life. Now I was faced with the cruel crush of the outside world.

I learned all I could about weightlifter David Berger, who was an American lawyer from Shaker Heights, Ohio, moved to Israel, got engaged, and joined the Israeli Olympic team. I learned of his heroism on that terrible September day in Munich in 1972. I learned that I carried a heavy burden to try to burn as bright and as proud as another David Berger.

David Berger of Plymouth, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor who taught for 37 years. He is now a freelance writer and a regular contributor to the News Tribune opinion page.

Wonderful life? Looks more like old-man Potter won

From the column: “Unfortunately, relying on the existence of people who are willing to fight and sacrifice for others is not sustainable in a culture that rewards excessive individualistic profit-making above all else.”

By Dave Berger – Duluth News Tribune

January 10, 2022 at 9:00 AM

On the evening of Friday, Dec. 20, 1946, “It’s a Wonderful Life” was screened for the very first time in public at the Globe Theater (now the Lunt-Fontanne Theater) in New York City. The world premiere was a preview charity event for the Boys Club of New York. Over the last 75 years this production has evolved into one of the most popular holiday film classics in American history.

A key element in the movie is the Bailey Brothers Building and Loan Association. George Bailey becomes a hero to Bedford Falls by saving this institution twice from Henry Potter, the miserly robber baron of the town. The first time George saves the building and loan, he does so by convincing the board of directors that the town needs the institution so people would not have to crawl to Potter for a loan.

Potter wants to dissolve the building and loan because he feels that giving home-ownership loans to members of the working class is a waste of funds. He states, “What does that get us? A discontented, lazy rabble instead of a thrifty working class.” George responds by saying, “This rabble you’re talking about … they do most of the working and paying and living and dying in this community. Well, is it too much to have them work and pay and live and die in a couple of decent rooms and a bath?”

Building and loan associations were created in 1831 in the United States. The basic idea was to have people in the lower and working classes pool their money so they could take turns getting loans to buy houses. For over 100 years, building and loan associations flourished in the United States, and the dream of homeownership was realized by millions who otherwise wouldn’t have.

In “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the second time George saves the Bailey Brothers Building and Loan Association is during the Great Depression. After a run on the bank, depositors at the building and loan also want their money. Potter offers to buy their shares for 50 cents on the dollar.

With the help of his wife Mary and the $2,000 they saved for their honeymoon, George is able to save the building and loan by giving short-term loans to its members so they can weather the bad economic times. In this heroic scene, George explains how the building and loan benefited everyone in the community. He said, “You’re thinking of this place all wrong. As if I had the money back in a safe. The money’s not here. Your money’s in Joe’s house … right next to yours. And the Kennedy house, and Mrs. Macklin’s house, and a hundred others. Why, you’re lending them money to build, and then they’re going to pay it back to you as best they can.” 

At the beginning of the Great Depression, there were more than 11,700 building and loan associations. By 1946, however, there were just over 6,000. Additionally, they were transformed from locally owned and controlled associations to federally chartered institutions whose deposits were insured by the federal government. As they morphed into a new form of institution, a new name for them followed. After the 1940s, they became known as savings and loan associations.

The number of savings and loan associations remained stable from 1946 until the 1970s, with about 5,669 remaining in 1970. Unfortunately, their decline then accelerated, and their fate was sealed by the savings and loan crisis of 1985 to 1996. In those years, about one-third of the remaining savings and loan associations failed. By the late 1990s, only a little more than 2,000 associations remained.

Many people in the financial industry blamed the failure of building and loan associations in the 1930s and the failure of savings and loan associations in the 1980s and 1990s on the inability of these institutions to focus on making money. It was said they cared more about their members than making profit. In a sense, their organizational structure was inspired by the selfless nature of people like George Bailey.

Through self-sacrifice and a great deal of pain, George Bailey was able to save the Bailey Brothers Building and Loan Association twice. He was able to defeat his arch nemesis Henry Potter and protect the interests of the members of the association. 

Unfortunately, relying on the existence of people who are willing to fight and sacrifice for others is not sustainable in a culture that rewards excessive individualistic profit-making above all else.

Today, only 659 savings and loan associations remain in the U.S. Most are more like banks. Due to shortsighted government regulation, deregulation, and re-regulation, the main focus has shifted from a mutual financial help association to a strictly profit-making institution.

So, the next time we watch “It’s a Wonderful Life,” we can take stock and realize the greed-filled, selfish values of old-man Potter have won out over the community-based values of George and Mary Bailey. 

Dave Berger of Plymouth, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor who taught for nearly three decades at Inver Hills Community College. He also is a regular contributor to the News Tribune Opinion page.

Preserving evidence not enough justification for no-knock warrants

From the column: “A (2017) study … showed that between 2010 and 2016, a total of 81 civilians and 13 police officers died in no-knock police raids. The same study indicated that twice as many officers died in no-knock-warrant situations compared to standard knock-and-announce warrant cases. No-knock laws must be repealed.”

Opinion by Dave Berger – Duluth News Tribune

March 08, 2022 at 1:58 PM

The horribly tragic deaths of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, on Friday, March 13, 2020, and Amir Locke in Minneapolis on Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2022, have spawned nationwide protests and calls to ban no-knock warrants. In both cases, police forcibly entered the homes of Black people without announcing before entering who they were. In both cases, the occupants appeared to try to defend themselves against unknown armed assailants, resulting in innocent civilians being killed by police.

A number of recent newspaper and magazine articles have claimed that no-knock warrants are the product of the war on drugs started by President Richard Nixon in the 1970s. This is false. In order to understand the nature and inherent issues with these types of warrants, we need to better understand their origins.

The constitutional right that supported the doctrine that a person’s home is their castle was eroded significantly by a series of California state court decisions in the 1950s. Case law in that state consistently allowed police to make forcible entries into homes without notice if “exigent circumstances” existed. The major reason given by the courts to allow varying from the “knock and announce” practice was that evidence could be destroyed if suspects were aware of imminent police entry, especially illicit drugs and gambling slips.

This California court construction was first tested by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1963 in Ker v. California. In that case, police entered an apartment without notice after getting the key from the landlord. The court decided in favor of California on a close vote of 5-4 and allowed for forcible entry into a home without notice, if evidence, in this case a brick of marijuana, would otherwise be destroyed.

This federal decision opened the possibility of other states creating laws allowing police entry without notice. In the very next year, the state of New York passed the first no-knock warrant law in the U.S. This legislation was signed into law on Tuesday, March 3, 1964, by Republican Gov. Nelson A. Rockefeller, who later became U.S. vice president under President Gerald R. Ford.

From the beginning, no-knock-warrant laws have been controversial. When New York was creating its statute, many civil-rights groups actively opposed it with protests, lobbying, and letter-writing campaigns. They argued the law could be used to discriminate against people of color. Objecting organizations included local chapters of the NAACP, the Congress of Racial Equality, and the Organization of Afro-American Unity.

Within a year after New York’s law went into effect, the controversy it created spread nationally via a popular national network television drama. On Thursday, Feb. 25, 1965, CBS aired an episode of “The Defenders,” starring E.G. Marshall and Robert Reed, called “No-knock.”

While no-knock warrants predate the war on drugs, they dramatically increased during the war’s ill-fated, five-decades-long debacle. In 1980, there were an estimated 1,500 no-knock warrants issued per year nationwide. By 2000, that number exploded to an estimated 40,000. By 2020, that number skyrocketed again to an estimated 80,000, with more than half of those involving marijuana cases, as justice-studies professor Peter Kraska of Eastern Kentucky University stated in a commentary last month in the Portland Press Herald in Maine.

While anyone could be a potential victim of these overzealous laws, data clearly show that people of color are much more likely to be victimized by no-knock warrants.

Hopeful change is happening across the nation. Five states now ban no-knock warrants: Oregon, Florida, Virginia, Connecticut, and Tennessee. Three of these enacted legislative bans in the last two years. Additionally, the city of Louisville passed an ordinance banning no-knock warrants, calling it “Breonna’s Law.”

A study done by the New York Times in 2017 showed that between 2010 and 2016, a total of 81 civilians and 13 police officers died in no-knock police raids. The same study indicated that twice as many officers died in no-knock-warrant situations compared to standard knock-and-announce warrant cases.

No-knock laws must be repealed. The risk to civilians and police is too great for the small payoff of preserving evidence. Furthermore, these racist laws have a long history of discrimination, which we must end now.

Dave Berger of Plymouth, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor who taught for 37 years. He is also a freelance writer and regular contributor to the News Tribune Opinion page.

Russo-Ukrainian war makes nuclear apocalypse more likely 

by Dave Berger03/28/2022. – MinnPost

Between Nov. 9, 1989, and Dec. 26, 1991, the Berlin wall toppled, the iron curtain was lifted, and the Soviet Union ceased to exist. In just a little more than two years, the Cold War came to an end and the daily threat of nuclear war dissipated. For the past 31 years we have slowly forgotten our fears and the real possibilities of nuclear Armageddon.

This all changed on Thursday, Feb. 24, 2022, when the Russian Federation invaded Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin justified his war by saying it is a “special military operation to demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine” and to prevent a genocide against ethnic Russians in the Ukrainian provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk. Just two days later, Putin placed his nuclear forces on high alert and threatened that any nation that interfered with his actions against Ukraine would face “consequences they have never seen.”

A new nuclear red line has been drawn by the autocrat Putin. Most of the world sees the Russian invasion of Ukraine as unjustified and horrific. Many want to help Ukraine remain independent, but they realize any direct confrontation of nuclear powers could lead to an escalation and the end of the world as we know it.

Both Pope Francis and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres have recently commented on the increased threat of nuclear war.  On March 14, the UN Secretary-General stated, “Nuclear conflict, once unthinkable, is now back within the realm of possibility.” A few days later, the Pope commented, “Our imagination appears increasingly concentrated on the representation of a final catastrophe that will extinguish us … such as that which would happen with an eventual atomic war.”

Not since the Cold War, have we felt this overwhelming dread of a possible nuclear holocaust. According to the Federation of American Scientists, Russia has the largest stockpile of atomic weapons in the world with 5,977. The United States has 5,428 such weapons with the United Kingdom having 225 and France having 290. That means NATO has 5,933 nuclear weapons at its disposal.

The old doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) has come back to the world forefront. Basically, MAD prevents all out warfare between two or more nuclear nations because each side would be wiped out in an atomic confrontation. Having nuclear weapons, oddly enough, prevents WWIII from occurring.

However, the world is in real danger now because it is becoming difficult to see where Putin has drawn his nuclear red line. If NATO aids Ukraine too much an escalation could occur to nuclear war. But what is too much aid?

Apparently, it is all right to allow some 16,000 to 20,000 volunteer foreign fighters from Europe, America and elsewhere to join the Ukrainian war efforts. It also seems acceptable to place incredibly severe economic sanctions on Russia to force it to withdraw from Ukraine. Finally, it also seems “safe” to send Ukraine billions of dollars of conventional weapons to defend against the invading Russian military.

It is clearly not acceptable by NATO to send in ground troops to help Ukraine. NATO has also decided against creating a no-fly zone over Ukraine that has been repeatedly called for by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Poland tried to negotiate a clever way of sending fighter jets indirectly to Ukraine but that was also rejected by NATO and the United States.

NATO is sending in additional troops into Eastern European nations that are members of the alliance including Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. It wants to send a message to Putin that they have a nuclear red line as well. If Russian forces attack one of these nations, NATO will defend them.

With such heightened tensions between NATO and Russia, a miscalculation by either side could trigger a direct confrontation and escalation to World War III.

We no longer train our students to duck under their desks or to hide in fallout shelters, but we still live under the daily threat of destroying ourselves. At times we forget how close we are to our own demise. The Russo-Ukrainian War has brought back the terror of a possible nuclear apocalypse front and center.

Dave Berger of Maple Grove, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor who taught for nearly thirty seven years.  He is now a freelance writer and author. 

Culture war engulfs transgender youth

I believe that there are well-intended and honest people on both sides of these transgender youth issues.

By Dave Berger, Plymouth, Minnesota – Duluth News Tribune

April 24, 2022 at 6:05 AM

It has been 31 years since sociologist James Davison Hunter published his landmark work “Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America.” 
Hunter identified the growing schism in American society between two camps he labeled “orthodox” and “progressive.” He argued that most cultural conflict is based upon these two very different approaches to moral authority.
The orthodox or conservative side believes that moral authority comes from traditions that are based upon an external, permanent and universal truth while progressives or liberals see moral authority constantly evolving based upon changes in society, scientific knowledge and personal experiences.
This philosophical division has been highlighted in the last month by a flurry of new state laws aimed at transgender youth. Over a dozen states have passed laws ranging from school sports teams and bathroom use to healthcare restrictions and prohibitions on discussing transgender identity in classrooms. Conservative lawmakers feel they are protecting children by restricting transgender behavior, while liberals see these state laws as attacks on the civil liberties of young people.
For example, on April 8 conservative lawmakers in Alabama passed the Alabama Vulnerable Child Protection Act. This law bans transgender healthcare such as hormone treatment, puberty blockers and sex reassignment surgery to minors. After signing this law, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey made it clear that she believes in one universal truth on gender when she stated, “I believe very strongly that if the good Lord made you a boy, you are a boy, and if he made you a girl, you are a girl.”
Many conservatives believe that gender is binary with only two possible choices. Liberals point out that decades of scientific research show that this is not accurate. They see the Alabama law as an act of overreaching politicians interfering with private and personal medical decisions that should be made by families and their healthcare providers.
Liberals see transgender healthcare as essential “gender-affirming” intervention that will assist young people in their development of a healthy gender identity. They point out that research has shown that, without treatment, many of these trans children will commit suicide. Such transgender medical intervention, including surgery, is considered best practice by professional associations including the American Psychological Association, the American Medical Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Many conservatives see this gender-affirming healthcare as child abuse. They believe that children are too immature to fully develop transgender identities. They fear that such radical treatments could damage these children, forever.
I believe that there are well-intended and honest people on both sides of these transgender youth issues. I also believe that we need to have extended, open and direct conversation on these subjects if we are going to reach lasting solutions. In many cases, we need to use reflective common sense and empathy if we are to truly understand and support our transgender youth.
The use of bathrooms can serve as one such example. On the same day Ivey signed the Alabama Vulnerable Child Protection Act, she also signed the transgender bathroom bill. This law requires students to use the bathroom based on the gender on their birth certificate.
Those conservatives that support this law argue that it is unsafe to allow transgender youth that were originally male to share bathrooms with females. Those liberals that do not support this law feel it is unhealthy to force transgender girls to share a bathroom with males.
Many schools, restaurants, theaters and other institutions have already done away with the need for such a law by having unisex, one-seat bathrooms with floor-to-ceiling walls and lockable doors. This seems like a solution that could be used in most places. Such private arrangements should satisfy the concerns of both conservatives and liberals by increasing safety for all students and prevent them from being segregated into sharing bathrooms with gender groups they do not identify with.
Repealing bathroom laws like the one in Alabama and making unisex bathrooms universal are necessary steps to demonstrate that compromise is possible. We can then turn our attention to collectively solving the more complex issues of transgender healthcare, sports teams and classroom gender-identity instruction.

Dave Berger of Plymouth, Minnesota, is a retired sociology professor who taught for 37 years. He is also a freelance writer and a regular contributor to the News Tribune opinion page.