This is the birthday of my favorite President of the United States, by far. I’ve seen a lot of Presidents in my day, and find it hard to imagine (especially with what we are enduring now) having the nation led by someone so intellectually vibrant, rhetorically gifted, educated in history and philosophy, convinced of American exceptionalism, innovative, dedicated to ferreting out corruption, personally trustworthy and politically skilled. Theodore Roosevelt had many flaws; to begin with, he was an extreme narcissist, an occupational hazard of political leaders, but few reachTeddy’s level. He loved war, a malady of manhood at the time, one that looks bad in the rear-view mirror, and there’s no getting around it: he was a white supremacist. And as one commentator put it in the Ken Burns documentary “The Roosevelts,” he was “quite mad”—but he knew it, and managed his problem very well.

All leaders are flawed, indeed being flawed is one of the factors that make them leaders,. The great ones still deserve honor and study, because we can learn much from their lives, including their failures. I doubt today’s students leave high school knowing anything about Teddy other than, perhaps, his creation of the National Parks, because environmentalism GOOD.

The other birthday that occupies my thoughts today is that of my son, Grant, 27. He began life in the wreckage of the communist tragedy in Russia, an orphan given up by his birth mother, in one of the grim, underfunded and over-crowed state orphanages in Samara, a hell-hole by anyone’s standards. He grew up in the USA a thoroughly American young man, independent, confident, suspicious and defiant of authority (including mine), choosing his own path and not bowing to peer pressure or conventional wisdom because that is what this nation was created to foster.

Happy birthday, Grant. I’m very proud of you.

1. Bill Buckner, martyr to moral luck. Yesterday was the anniversary of the iconic moment in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series when Mookie Wilson’s bouncing grounder rolled under Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner’s legs. The play completed a nightmarish 10th inning Mets comeback rally that won the game and stopped Boston from finally ending a World Series “curse” that had endured since 1918. [Notice of Correction: before commenter Curmie alerted me to the error—much worse than Billy Buck’s—I had erroneously cited the 9th inning rather than the 10th. I am awash with shame.]

That streak of failure finally stopped 18 years later with the Sox beating the St. Louis Cardinals to win the 2004 Series on this date, October 27. Buckner was singled out by unethical sportswriters and vindictive fans as the scapegoat for the ’86 loss, which was as unfair as it was absurd (if the Red Sox had won the next game, which they led 3-0 at one point, nobody would remember Buckner’s error.)

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I am no longer inclined to be charitable or passive about the facemask nonsense. Yesterday I accompanied my sister to a clinic and waited while she had a medical procedure, requiring me to sit a couple of hours. The waiting room had enforced “social distancing” (though we now know that’s arbitrary), and there was no one closer to me than ten feet anyway, because only four other people were in the room, all much younger than me, and all vaccinated (I asked). However, when I took off my mostly useless mask (which was paper—I was handed it when I entered) because I was reading a court document and my glasses were fogging up,the woman behind the counter gestured to me that I had to put my mask back on. That did it: I jumped out of my chair and asked why. “It’s our policy,” was her non-explanation.

“But why is it your policy? Nobody’s near me. I’m fully vaccinated. I’m not talking to anyone. I have to wait here, and I can’t read or breathe with this thing on,” I asked, not hiding my pique.

“We’re just trying to be careful,” she said. Now I had her! “Really?” I said. “Then why is the young woman three feet from you wearing the mask under her nose?” (I had noticed that when I checked in.) The cheater quickly pulled it into position and turned towards me in a silent “”Mask out of place? What mask out of place?” gesture. The first woman then repeated, “It’s policy. We don’t make policy.”

“You don’t make policy, you just enforce policy you can’t explain or justify even though you’re the sole representatives here for us to question. Okay. I’ll be sitting outside.” And I picked up a chair and left.

I didn’t even bother to mention that the two staffers I could see through the door to the room adjoining the space behind the counter weren’t wearing masks and were giggling about two feet from each other.

I did say “Morons!” audibly as I left.

1. The acorn doesn’t fall far from the unethical tree…The oldest Trump son, Donald Jr., is promoting the $27.99 T-shirt below on his official site.

Anyone wearing or endorsing such apparel is signaling to the part of the world that isn’t vicious, vindictive and full of hate for vocal progressives that such an individual doesn’t believe in the Golden Rule, civility, or basic decency. Yeah, it’s funny in an extremely nasty way, and I wouldn’t advocate censoring it or banning a Netflix routine in which the comedian said the same thing. But Donald Trump’s spawn isn’t Dave Chappelle, and as a political statement, which the slogan on the shirt is, that line is below the belt..much like much of the criticism that was aimed at Don Jr.’s father, and yes, by Baldwin among others. Still, that’s not how a society makes public discourse better or defuses division and hate. It just feels good.

Jake Tapper of CNN opined that Baldwin deserves “basic decency” from Republicans. No, he doesn’t deserve decency; he deserves to be treated with exactly the same callousness as the arrogant, wise-ass thug treated Donald Trump specifically and conservatives in general for decades. Society, however, not only deserves civil discourse but needs it. (Not that anyone who represents CNN, a prime offender, isn’t estopped from calling for fairness for the foreseeable future.)

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