At the recent White House Correspondents\u2019 Dinner where it is traditional for the President to roast journalist and vice-versa, Obama revealed that he is often asked what is on his bucket list. Obama named a list and responded with \u201cBuck it!\u201d Parental permission advised if Googling the term!<\/p>\n
Moviegoers will recall a Rob Reiner movie called The Bucket List, with two terminally ill men on a road trip to do their wish list before they kick the bucket! \u201cBucket list\u201d meant those things we hold dear and would do everything within our powers to perform before we keel over!<\/p>\n
The \u201cbuck it\u201d phrase is reminiscent of Harry Truman who displayed a sign on his desk clearly defining the line of responsibility. \u201cThe buck stops here,\u201d it said. He made final decisions, one of which occurred three months after he assumed the top WH office and let loose the power of uranium fission and plutonium implosion over the skies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.<\/p>\n
Oswald C. Brewster, an engineer who helped separate the uranium isotope, changed his mind about the bomb after Germany\u2019s defeat. He wrote Truman: \u201cThis thing must not be permitted on Earth. We must not be the most hated and feared people on Earth, however good our intent may be.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brewster\u2019s lone voice in the wilderness proved prescient on this side of the nuclear arms race. We may not be the most feared people on Earth but being the most hated is close.<\/p>\n
Ironically, the absence of any word of remorse by Shinzo Abe in his address to Congress is reminiscent of the U.S. absence of contrition after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.<\/p>\n
Neither love nor hate of what Franklin Delano Roosevelt began as the New Deal that defined a broad-based coalition in politics and enlarged the federal government\u2019s role in U.S. affairs is the intent here.<\/p>\n
It is to underscore decision making in the American understanding that is based on \u201cWe the people,\u201d and if formal structures of governance no longer reflect the will \u201cof the people, by the people and for the people,\u201d and the exercise of voting on elections too lengthy between intervals, a recourse to a \u201cparliament of the street\u201d accommodates warm bodies on the front lines. Either method is very red-white-and-blue.<\/p>\n
FDR died a good 70 years ago in 1945, and the third VP, Missouri farmer Harry Truman, ascended into an unfamiliar role. FDR was such a decisive figure that Garner, his VP for the first two terms, turned against him when FDR acceded to a third term, getting indecisive liberal Henry Wallace as VP.<\/p>\n
This is neither to glorify FDR and\/or Harry Truman. It is to remember that popular referendum do not always hold water, e.g., the vote against casinos on Saipan. Nor decimating the turtle eggs and the tutut on Tinian and Pagan per the EIS\u2019 design a decision that popular choice will unmake. The EIS hearings are genial to local opinions but uniformed personnel will exercise the \u201cbuck stops here\u201d option, regardless of local sentiments.<\/p>\n
The parliament of the street may be the only local remaining recourse. Buck it!<\/p>\n
\u00a9 2015 Saipan Tribune<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" At the recent White House Correspondents\u2019 Dinner where it is traditional for the President to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[102],"tags":[4473,4474,67,4475],"class_list":["post-201286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editorial","tag-fdr","tag-harry-truman","tag-people","tag-vp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201286\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}