Ramblin' with Roger

Paradox of tolerance

Wikipedia

My friend Steve Bissette posted on Facebook a link to the Wikipedia post on the paradox of tolerance. It is “a philosophical concept suggesting that if a society extends tolerance to those who are intolerant, it risks enabling the eventual dominance of intolerance, thereby undermining the very principle of tolerance.”

Philosopher Karl Popper articulated this paradox in The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945), where he argued that “a truly tolerant society must retain the right to deny tolerance to those who promote intolerance. Popper posited that if intolerant ideologies are allowed unchecked expression, they could exploit open society values to erode or destroy tolerance itself through authoritarian or oppressive practices.”

It’s an interesting conversation. “Philosopher John Rawls concludes differently in his 1971 A Theory of Justice, stating that a just society must tolerate the intolerant, for otherwise, the society would then itself be intolerant, and thus unjust.” This is a valid point. Allowing the Ku Klux Klan to march in Skokie, IL in the 1970s, which which was upheld by the Supreme Court, rightly in my view.

“However, Rawls qualifies this assertion, conceding that under extraordinary circumstances, if constitutional safeguards do not suffice to ensure the security of the tolerant and the institutions of liberty, a tolerant society has a reasonable right to self-preservation to act against intolerance if it would limit the liberty of others under a just constitution.”

Turning point

I feel we are there. When we in the United States no longer have checks and balances because Congress, and especially the House of Representatives, has abdicated its constitutional responsibilities, it is our duty to protest. It is the government itself that has become intolerant.

As the Godpodcast explained, while the “military kills unidentified fishermen with missiles with the goal of ‘ending drug trafficking,’ he pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez, an actual criminal ex-president convicted of money laundering and tied to drug-running networks.” The hypocracy and scapegoating with these ones are great.

One of the boldest recent pushback occurred when six Democratic lawmakers, all with military or national security backgrounds, reminded military personnel they had the right – the obligation, even – to disobey “unlawful orders”.

Public Citizen notes the regime is “prosecuting and seeking to imprison opponents. They are deploying thousands of masked agents to abduct ‘immigrants’ (and people they think look or sound like certain kinds of immigrants). They are putting heavily armed military personnel on our nation’s streets to intimidate American citizens. And they are in effect extorting the media, major law firms, and universities.” All while enriching themselves.

Protests against these and other incursions, such as the anti-DEI bs that sideline women and “other” groups are required. As a philosophy site indicated, “For the average person, it’s about knowing where to draw the line between standing up for free speech and saying, ‘That’s not right’ when someone crosses the line into being hurtful.”

I’ve noticed that my local Indivisible group is having periodic gatherings. It is so important that we don’t feel alone in trying to create change. Here are some resistance strategies.

Freedom to read (local event)

From the NYCLU Capital Region

Please help us encourage Governor Hochul to sign the Freedom to Read Act that was adopted by the NYS Legislature this year.

Join us on Monday, December 8, at noon in the War Room of the New York State Capitol to hear local people read from their favorite banned books and call upon the Governor to act.

The New York State Legislature adopted the “Freedom to Read Act” (S01099) in 2025 to protect the availability of diverse, age-appropriate materials in school and public libraries. The act requires the Commissioner of Education to develop policies ensuring school libraries are empowered to curate a wide array of materials, reinforcing the legal obligation for school districts to provide access to diverse collections and to prevent materials from being removed based on viewpoint. The bill is intended to counter censorship efforts and uphold students’ right to read freely.

Purpose: To protect the freedom to read and to ensure access to a wide range of books and library materials in schools and public libraries across the state.
Key provisions:
- Empowers school librarians to curate diverse and inclusive collections.
- Requires the Commissioner of Education to develop statewide policies for library collections.
- Makes it clear that school districts have a legal obligation to provide access to diverse materials.
- Aims to prevent the removal of books based on disagreement with their content, viewpoint, or ideas.
Link to the bill: The New York State Senate bill S01099.

THE WAR ROOM IS ON THE SECOND FLOOR OF THE CAPITOL BUILDING ON THE EAST SIDE. WE HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE!

Immigration (local event)

As we approach the seventy-seventh anniversary of the United Nations proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we have been witness to the shocking disregard of those fundamental human rights in our immigrant communities. People are being targeted and detained by masked thugs because of the color of their skin, denied due process, subjected to cruel and inhumane treatment, deported to countries not their own, left forgotten and unaccounted for in the appalling conditions of foreign prisons. Children are being separated from their parents.

THIS MUST STOP.

Join CAPITAL DISTRICT BORDER WATCH on International Human Rights Day.

Wednesday, December 10, from 12:30 – 1:30 PM at the Leo W. O’Brien Building, corner of Pearl and Clinton, Albany

Please stand with us and with our immigrant neighbors, and let our community know that the treatment of immigrants by the Trump administration is cruel and unjust and will not be tolerated. Bring a sign. Bring your commitment and your solidarity. Please join us for a Sign-Making Party for this event on Tuesday, December 9, from 4:00 – 5:30 pm at the Albany Friends Meeting, 727 Madison Avenue.

For more info. contact: kuehlcarrie@gmail.com

Top Country Christmas Hits

Eddy Arnold

From Joel Whitburn’s Christmas in the Charts, 1920 to 2004, Top Country Christmas Hits lists the peak positions these seasonal songs reached on the country charts.

If We Make It Through December– Merle Haggard, from 1973, four weeks at #1 CW, #28 pop

Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer – Gene Autry with the Pinafores from 1949, one week at #1 CW, #1 pop for one week. It eventually sold eight million copies, second only to Bing Crosby’s White Christmas. A new version of the song got to #70 pop in 1957.

Blue Christmas – Ernest Tubb from 1949, one week at #1 CW, #21 pop in 1950. “The song was originally recorded by American country singer, musician, and actor Doye O’Dell in 1948. It was popularized the following year in three separate recordings: one by Tubb, one by musical conductor and arranger Hugo Winterhalter and his orchestra and chorus, and one by bandleader Russ Morgan and his orchestra. Elvis Presley cemented the status of the song as a rock-and-roll holiday classic by recording it for his 1957 LP Elvis’ Christmas Album.

Snow Flake – Jim Reeves from 1966, three weeks at #2 CW, #66 pop

Jason Ritter’s grandfather

Christmas Carols By The Old Corral – Tex Ritter from 1945, one week at #2 CW. Maurice Woodeward Ritter was the star of c. 85 Hollywood westerns from 1935 to 1945. The late John Ritter was his son.

Thank God for Kids – Oak Ridge Boys from 1982, two weeks at #3 CW

Here Comes Santa Claus (Right Down Santa Claus Lane) -Gene Autry from 1948, one week at number 4 CW. It reached #8 pop in 1948 and #24 pop in 1949

Frosty the Snowman – Gene Autry with the Cass County Boys and Carl Cotner’s Orchestra, from 1950, one week at number 4 CW. #7 pop in 1951, #23 pop in 1952

Will Santy Come to Shantytown – Eddy Arnold from 1949, one week at #5 CW

C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S – Eddy Arnold from 1949, three weeks at #7 CW, co-written by Arnold

Movie review: Rental Family

emotional entanglement

I loved the premise of the movie Rental Family: “An American actor in Tokyo struggling to find purpose lands an unusual gig: working for a Japanese ‘rental family’ agency, playing stand-in roles for strangers.” Especially around the holidays, an increasing number of my acquaintances are looking for, or grafting onto, family.

Traveling throughout Tokyo, where he’s lived for seven years, the struggling actor Philip (Brendan Fraser) is uncomfortably large. Even the ceiling in his apartment seems too short.

He has moral ambivalence about his first couple of jobs and complains, “I’m messing with people’s lives.” His boss, Tada (Takehiro Hira), the owner of the agency, counters, “We sell emotions.” Another actor in the business is Aiko (Mari Yamamoto), who, among other roles, played a phony paramour of a cheating husband hired to apologize to his wife.

Philip takes on more complicated gigs. A mother (Shino Shinozaki) wants her bright, biracial daughter, Mia (Shannon Mahina Gorman), to get into a prestigious school, but the girl needs a “father.” A fading, but feisty, old actor Kikuo (Akira Emoto) wants to escape his controlling daughter for a brief return to his past. Both of these situations become more complicated than initially conceived.

Rental Family was directed and co-written by Hikari. I’ve learned, after seeing the film with my wife at the Spectrum theater at noontime the day before Thanksgiving, that the final scene was not in the original script.

Reviews

Sarah Vincent wrote: “While some may find ‘Rental Family’ treacly and television fare, others will walk away inspired.” We were in the latter category. “Mia and Kikuo’s stories feel like the real center… and Phillip just feels like a supporting character in their respective movies,” which worked.

The film didn’t explain everything, and that was fine. Roger Moore – no, not THAT Roger Moore – noted: “Hikari… doesn’t judge and doesn’t take sides in a ‘which culture gets it’ sense. There are merits and drawbacks to both the Eastern and Western ways of living.”

Critics were 87% positive, and audiences were 96% positive on Rotten Tomatoes. Many of the negative views complained that there was “little interest in uncovering the causes or conditions of loneliness,” which I thought was both unnecessary to do and somewhat obvious.

Not incidentally, there are real family rental service companies in Japan. As in the movie, “There have been times when the role has led to emotional entanglement.”

My only regret was that my wife and I were the ONLY two people in the theater.

Top R&B Christmas Hits

Sister Rosetta Tharpe

From Joel Whitburn’s Christmas in the Charts, 1920 to 2004, Top R&B Christmas Hits lists the peak positions these seasonal songs reached on the Billboard rhythm and blues charts.

White Christmas – Bing Crosby with the Ken Darby Singers, orchestra conducted by John Scott Trotter (Berlin) from 1942, #1 for three weeks RB, #1 for 11 weeks pop, from the film Holiday Inn. It was the “1947 Bing remake that piled up the majority of the title’s sales from its subsequent reissue throughout the decades on nearly all 78s, 45s, LPs, cassettes, and CDs.”

White Christmas – The Drifters from 1954, #2 for one week RB. Not only is this one of my favorite carols, it’s a wonderful video cartoon by Joshua Held. Featuring Bill Pinkney on lead bass and Clyde McPhatter on tenor.

Let’s Make Christmas, Baby – Amos Milburn from 1949, #3 for four weeks RB. Is it just me, or is this song blue, and I don’t mean sad?

The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You) – Nat King Cole from 1946, #3 for three weeks RB, #3 pop. Every year, Mark Evanier shares a story about this song some know as “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…'”and Mel Tormé, who co-wrote the song

Merry Christmas, Baby – Johnny Moore’s Three Blazers with Charles Brown from 1947, #3 for two weeks RB. Co-writer Moore also is the guitarist; Brown does piano and vocals.

This is rhythm and blues?

The Chipmunk Song – The Chipmunks with David Seville (Ross Bagdasarian) from 1958, #5 for one week RB. #1 for weeks pop in 1958, then #41 pop in 1959, #45 pop in 1960, #39 pop in 1961 and #40 pop in 1962. My house had a copy of this single when I was growing up; the label was greenish.

(It’s Gonna Be A ) Lonely Christmas -The Orioles from 1949, #5 for one week RB

Faraway Blues (Xmas Blues) – Johnny Otis Orchestra with Little Esther and Mel Walker from 1950, #6 for two weeks RB. I wrote about Otis here back in 2008.

Silent Night (Christmas Hymn) – Sister Rosetta Tharpe with the Rosetta Gospel Singers from 1949, #6 for one week RB. She was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018 as an early influence. “Sister Rosetta was the first guitar heroine of rock & roll. Her heartfelt gospel folksiness gave way to her roaring mastery of her trusty Gibson Les Paul Custom, which she wielded on a level that rivaled the best of her male contemporaries.”

Lonesome Christmas (Part 1 and 2) – Lowell Folson from 1950, #7 for one week RB

Ending the HIV Epidemic in the U.S.

40 million people worldwide were living with HIV in 2024

HIV AIDS On the HIV.gov page is What Is Ending the HIV Epidemic in the U.S.? (EHE) “The initiative aims to substantially reduce HIV infections in the U.S. by focusing resources in the 57 jurisdictions where they’re needed most. It does that by scaling up four science-based strategies: diagnose, treat, prevent, and respond…. The bold plan… aims to end the HIV epidemic in the United States by 2030.”

Here are some statistics. “Approximately 1.2 million people in the U.S. have HIV. About 13 percent of them don’t know it and need testing…

“According to the latest estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), approximately 31,800 people acquired HIV in the United States in 2022. Annual infections in the U.S. have been reduced by more than two-thirds since the height of the epidemic in the mid-1980s. Further, CDC estimates of annual HIV infections in the United States show hopeful signs of progress in recent years.

“The decline [in new infections] was driven by a 30% decrease among young people aged 13-24 years. Increases in pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) prescriptions, viral suppression, and HIV testing likely contributed to the decline.”

Worldwide

In 2024, a “report from UNAIDS showed that the world is at a critical moment that will determine whether world leaders meet their commitment to end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030. The report, The Urgency of Now: AIDS at a Crossroads, brings together new data and case studies which demonstrate that the decisions and policy choices taken by world leaders this year will decide the fate of millions of lives and whether the world’s deadliest pandemic is overcome.”

Worldwide, approximately 40 million people were living with HIV in 2024. Over a million people became newly infected with HIV that year, and over half a million people died from AIDS-related illnesses.

Since the start of the epidemic, more than 75 million people have become infected with HIV, and more than 40 million people have died from AIDS-related illnesses, including my high school friend Vito.

Not “over”

I point this out periodically because occasionally, I run into comments suggesting that HIV/AIDS is “over.” It certainly isn’t the death sentence that it was when first defined in the 1980s. New HIV infections have been reduced by 61% since the peak in 1996, while AIDS-related deaths have decreased by 70% since the peak in 2004.

In July, my old buddy Amy Barlow Liberatore, a/k/a Sharp Little Pencil, posted a song she wrote years ago for World AIDS Day, in memory of her dear friend Jeff French. It’s called “The Day I Saw an Angel Fly.”

I’m reminded that this is the 35th anniversary of the album Red Hot + Blue: A Tribute To Cole Porter, which “raised nearly $1m for the activist group ACT UP. It was the first of a series of compilations designed to fight the scourge of HIV/AIDS. You can hear the album here; I was and am very fond of it.