Flawed first drafts of history are written by flawed writers about flawed subjects and flawed policies, and read and believed or disbelieved by flawed readers. The word flawed rhymes with fraud, especially and particularly in politics. So when a flawed man such as Donald Trump who is not a fraud emerges in full public view, it is as refreshing as a cold shower on a cold winter morning, and just as startling in its effect. Donald Trump is the cold shower of reality that is so rare in public life that when it does appear it is undoubtedly sung about by the angels.

We give some slack for we’re all flawed
Until the saint becomes the bawd

A long time ago I spent many hours in a small boat, fishing the back bays of the southern New Jersey coast. On rare occasions, when slack water, dead calm and the sun was at just the right angle, the bay would be like a sheet of glass, and when I looked over the side of the boat I could see my reflection in the water. On those rare occasions I would always think, I live on the surface and see only the surface, and see or know nothing of what lies beneath the surface. That is where we are. We live on the surface of events, seeing nothing of the roiling currents below. Yes, we know the Little Rock FBI field office is investigating the Clinton emails, but are they investigating Clinton or the fake FBI investigation of the emails? Or both? We know two District Court judges have questioned the legitimacy of the Mueller investigation, and we are constantly being told the FBI Inspector General’s report will be out any day now. But this is just the surface, and all we see are reflections. We know nothing of what is going on in the deep water. But slack water does not last forever. Come the change of tide and the deep water starts to run again, and then we shall know.

Beneath slack water lay the clues
Deep hid from surface and fake news
The baitfish dart like spattered rain
As viscera the surface stain
But who the baitfish and the shark?
At change of tide the deep still dark
Yet as the tide begins to run
The hidden currents have begun
To lift the veil on who’s the bait
And who’s the shark to settle fate

I was born in 1929 so I missed being of the Greatest Generation, and have had to live my life in the shameful knowledge that my generation was not called so much as adequate, and in fact had no name at all. Looking back I can see that my generation were ‘tweeners; between the Greatest Generation and the generation that invented rock and roll. But our children built the Internet and the smart phone, and now our grandchildren are preparing to start all over from scratch. Fine with me. Civilizations always outgrow themselves and inevitably suffer a correction, often violent. We may, with luck, escape the violence, but we will not escape the correction. We live indeed in interesting times

The times are racing breathless on
Gen Z in wings awaiting
The entrance of the deathless dawn
And calendars re-dating
Who knows what wonders lay in store
What brilliant flashed advances
It may be less, it may be more
I’ll nap and take my chances

“I don’t know about you, but I’m used to when people legally certify that they are going to do something, that they do it. But I think this was clearly a mistake in retrospect,” Zuckerberg said. “We need to make sure we don’t make that mistake ever again.”

“How dastardly that loathsome shark
Could make of me a simple mark
Never again,” cried Zuckerberg,
“will I be such a suckerberg!
As mea culpas often go
This one is merely meant to show
How virtuous is giant tech
Without a single tiny speck
Of lying, fraud or sly deceit
That can be laid upon our feet
With Facebook one can rest assured
If caught we’ll fall upon our sword
So tell your friends ignore the apps
Their data should be safe, perhaps.”