"you have been heard making unpatriotic remarks"

[Jon Ford]

Stephanie, I am no longer going to fight to get Don back on the list, even 
though 14 or so people have voted that way. It's not worth the struggle, and 
I don't want to split the group up by starting a new list sans Mike and his 
fans. However,you wrote me a little note a few minutes ago about how it 
wasn't the case that Don had just "been heard making unpatriotic remarks"(a 
little metaphor of mine in which I compared Don to a refugee trapped in a 
detention center--maybe a bit too flamboyant!). You said that the real 
reason he was being tossed off the list was because he wasn't known to 
enough of us as a creative, humorous, eccentric individual from the old 
days. However, we have let others onto the list, including a young man who 
was making a video at Tary's on our first reunion--don't you remember him? 
He wasn't even born in the days of the "ghetto"! I think we are getting more 
rigid as we go along,and I enjoy hearing new voices, particularly those from 
the "left". I'm not paranoid enough to think these would-be members are FBI 
agents-- give me a break! The Bureau has better things to do with its 
agents.

THe fact is, and this is the last time I'll say it, is that Don was cast off 
because he disagreed with the "dominant paradigm" of some of our self-styled 
leaders--which is pretty much  a pro war, revenge-over justice position. Bob 
Simmons' recent post about how he is a born-again patriot pretty much spells 
out that way of thinking, and we see it it the posts of Mike, of Wayne, of 
Connie,of James Holland, and in a few other vociferous posters. So please, 
Stephanie, let's not whip up some sentimental stuff about the "good old 
days"! We both know what's happening here.

Jon




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