Because of instant satellite communication, many feel bombarded by TMI - too much information, particularly about wars on the other side of the sky, rising body counts and suffering children.
Despite gang wars, drug fatalities close to home and getting the kids to school, Americans today strive to be upbeat in the face of whatever is on the news, and just get on with it, praying for tortured innocents in combat zones and relief for "good guys" who we really hope are actually that.
I find it a no-brainer to support Ukraine with prayers and encouragement, costing me zero as I'm no longer commuting to Washington and have zero concern for offending Senator So-And-So.
I am dismayed at the dissolution of reasoned election campaigns for public office. Character? - out the door. Honesty? - for suckers. Cooperation in the interests of those governed? - If they're minority, shoot 'em first, ask questions later.
Civil War excepted, lies and vitriol now spew from U.S. media which can only be matched by former duels of honor and lies smearing the opposing candidate's family and morals.
This went on between Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams during their campaigns for the Presidency of the new United States, a couple of hundred years ago.
In 1830, a very young nation had newspapers and no internet to hype up rhetoric, but matters of conscience in governance carry import now as in the 18-teens.
Jackson despised Adams; Adams' father, the famous John Adams of Declaration of Independence days, disliked Jackson's raw, frontier justice style and tirades. Jackson was certain that his first election effort had been stolen and he had been robbed of high office.
He began the next four years of vocal and printed mud-slinging at his opponent, the incumbent President of the United States, who slung dirt back.
Poor Rachel Jackson was the vulnerable casualty: families were not off limits from gossip. As Adams' term in the White House ended, he declined to "receive" the new victor who had pushed him out the door. This meant no tea, coffee and biscuits would await the new Presdent Jackson, and no welcome carpet, either, even to honor him in his grief.
Jackson's beloved wife Rachel had just died of heart failure, destroyed by vicious gossip. A gentle, kind soul, she had been beautiful in youth, and after a brief, unhappy marriage to her first husband, she mistakenly trusted him to file divorce papers.
Perhaps from spite, he never did. Rachel's subsequent frontier wedding to the besotted General was discussed afterward as invalid, adultery and worse. Her character, in an age when disgrace could destroy women, was held up to public ridicule.
Deeply wounded, she died of grief, but to Jackson it was murder. The hero of the Battle of New Orleans had been powerless to prevent his wife's suffering; once in public life, one is fair game, no less in Rachel Jackson's time than in ours......hostile gossip campaigns can be scripted, and if shame can kill a person, that finished the sensitive Rachel.
Fast forward....disadvantaged minorities in Jackson's day were Native American Cherokees who had lived on their lands for millenia; now the granite-minded new President insisted that they leave, for white settlers. The tribe took its case for ownership to the Supreme Court, and won:
The Justices decided that to force peaceful people from their homes and livelihoods was morally wrong, which it was. Ha! President Jackson sent troops to enforce the Indians' removal from their homes and didn't bat an eye. "Humph! Mr. Chief Justice has given his verdict. Now let him enforce it!" The Court had the high ground; Jackson saw only would-be owners of new territories. It was no contest.
Members of my own family came in with mules, wagons and axes, clearing 600 acres of what is now Winston County. Rightly or otherwise, we have been here ever since. Other family members to the east owned slaves. One great-great grandfather rode with the Confederate cavalry throughout the Civil War.
Morality during this period was up for grabs, depending on which side had the big guns, and those of us, like me, who still love history, need to take a deep breath and look at its underside.....white man's benevolent justice has often proved to be neither.
Linda Berry is a Northsider.
