The Washington Post - USA (2021-12-25)

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 25 , 2021. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

A

mid ever-rising coronavirus cases, and a bitter and corrosive political climate, what better time for the inspiring Christmas message of the Most Rev. Michael Curry, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church? “The story of a baby born is the story of beauty, a story of hope,” he wrote, “whereas the Jewish tradition says every child who is born is a reminder that God is not finished with the world yet.” Noting the accounts of tyranny and hatred arising from King Herod’s fear of a coming rival to his throne, Curry found an expression of God’s love in the actions of Mary and Joseph to save their baby from destruction. The context of Jesus’ birth is the story of overcoming a tyrant’s wrath. That biblical setting has a contempo- rary contexture: Death-dealing covid-19 and a corrosive political life are eating away at our very founda- tion. Are children born today to suffer the consequences? The message of Christmas is a reminder that even with the gift of life, overcoming life’s hardships and doing justice are unfinished works that must go on. That Christmas-themed message was also reflected in the December 1949 edition of my copy of the Stevens Star, the student newspaper of Thad- deus Stevens Elementary School in the West End section of Northwest Wash- ington. Our third edition, dubbed “Tuberculosis-Christmas Edition,” was a carefully chosen designation. TB was the covid-19 of our day. And as with today’s coronavirus, that airborne-transmitted disease landed harder and lasted longer in congested Black neighborhoods. Wrote The Post in a 1930s exposé: “Tuberculosis is the curse of the alleys. There is not enough light and there is not enough air.... Disease starts in the alleys, and it spreads. The Wash- ington citizen who has never taken the trouble to inspect an alley, still may

fall victim to the disease arising in the alleys.” Tuberculosis was a problem across the country, but the disease hit few places as hard as it hit D.C. in the 1930s. At Thaddeus Stevens, we knew nothing of The Post’s exposé. But there were plenty of alley dwellings in our West End community. “Many grown-ups and children die from this disease each year,” wrote fifth-grader Sandra Smith. The report by Shirley Moses, also a fifth-grader, came down hard on slackers. “There are some cases of tuberculosis now, just because of some careless people,” she wrote. “Everyone should cover his mouth when he coughs or sneezes in any public place. Everyone should be care- ful of spitting in public places for that is a way that the disease may spread.” In those days, mouth-covering masks were worn only by outlaws and bandits. Still, the holiday loomed large. The page ended: “Buy Tuberculosis Seals for a penny apiece. This will help the victims of tuberculosis, as well as make a happier and merrier Christ- mas for you.” Young as we were, we knew Christ- mas was not the end of unfinished business. Frankly, I can’t recall any Christmas Day when behavior born out of hatred and “the ugliness of unbridled selfish- ness” — as the bishop said of King Herod — have not seemed loose in the land. The cherished Christmas sentiment “Peace on Earth” didn’t make an ap- pearance until I was about 5 years old. I was born into a world at war. Beside me is a copy of the front page of the Sept. 20, 1939, edition of The Post — my birthday. I still can’t get over the cost: “THREE CENTS,” it read. Front-page headlines: “No Peace, Allies Tell Hitler; Belgian

Defense Planned; Reds Blockade Esto- nia... Fuehrer’s Talk Called ‘Travesty of the Facts.’ ” “Congressmen Call for More Men and Arms... But Roosevelt Says Any Further Increase Is in Lap of Gods.” “War Cuts Party Lines as G.O.P. Voters Echo Democratic Views,” by George Gallup. It read: “Democrats and Republican voters polled in the surveys are in substantial agreement that we should not send our Army and Navy to fight Germany, that American ships should be kept out of war zones, that American citizens should avoid traveling on non-neutral ships, and that a national referendum should be held before America could draft... ” There the page ends. That sentiment also ended on Dec. 7, 1941, when Japanese forces launched a devastating surprise at- tack on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, near Honolulu. The next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt asked Congress to declare war on Japan. On Christmas Day, the United States was at war once again. “Peace on Earth,” then as now, re- quires more than wishful thinking. Because of my faith tradition, Christmas has always served as a cel- ebration of Jesus’ birth. And yes, it is an occasion to reach out to family and friends, hang wreaths, send cards, ex- change gifts, and fill up with food and good cheer. But with the birth comes a promise and reminder that “God is not finished with the world yet.” The Christ- mas Spirit also floodlights the ugliness of racial, religious and gender injustice. It draws attention to the cruelty of poverty and hardships that break lives. It speaks to work left undone — defeating the global pan- demic; disinfecting rancid politics; bringing equity to the underserved, and to the ballot box. Bishop Curry’s message speaks of “the Christian vo- cation.” It is a holiday message for all.

COLBERT I. KING

The promise of Christmas

includes work still to be done

ABBAS MOMANI/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES Worshipers light candles at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem on Dec. 19.

M

ary, who was self-employed, was betrothed unto Joseph, a carpenter. And lo, Mary and Joseph had both always as- sumed they would have kids one day, but they had not really had the discussion. And lo, one afternoon in Nazareth, Joseph went unto Mary and said, “Mary, I know that I at least had always as- sumed we would have kids. It just seemed like one of those milestones. But I have been looking around at the world lately, and I am not certain. I think we had better actually have the discussion.” And Mary nodded in agreement. And they did sit down in that place that is called Couch, and lo, they began to discuss. “Yikes,” Joseph said, and Mary nodded. “The world right now just does not seem to me like a great place to be bringing a child into.” “No,” Mary said. “Everything these days is bad, and when I look at the world, it fills me with absolute dread. Disease is everywhere. We belong to a persecuted religious minority, and it is not a good time to belong to a religious minority.” “When is it a good time?” Joseph asked. “No, I take your point,” Mary said unto him, “but now seems bad. Also, we — haven’t lived in a functioning republic for, like, a while.” “For decades now,” Joseph said. “I guess Augustus is still elected, kind of, but it really does not feel like a system in which the people have their accustomed say... not that we would really have had a say anyway, you know, given our status and where we live.” “No,” Mary said. “But in theory, it was still better to have a functioning repre- sentative system.”

They sat there. “Earning a living is hard,” Mary said. “And women don’t have many rights, and that seems unlikely to change in the foreseeable future.” “No,” Joseph said. “That’s true.” “And also from a simple logistical perspective, we are supposed to travel in nine months, and the inn we have booked is not only not kid-friendly, but I would describe it as actively kid-hostile,” Mary added. “Yes,” Joseph said unto her, making a rapid note unto himself, “that inn we have definitely booked and not forgotten to book.” “The world is very bleak,” Mary went on, “generally inhospitable to refugees and the poor, and everybody is compet- ing for resources that aren’t distributed well.” “No,” Joseph said, “they aren’t. I don’t get any parental leave at all.” “I was going to count on my cousin to help out, but she just conceived,” Mary said. “Wow, Elizabeth!” Joseph said. “At her age!” Mary rolled her eyes. “Technically, anything over 35 is considered a geriat- ric pregnancy,” she said. “It starts to be ridiculous. Also from what she’s been saying about how she plans to parent, she might end up with a kid who was somehow both really into bathing and not quite into bathing enough.” “Mm,” Joseph said. “Should I be making a list?” Mary asked. “This is getting pretty bleak.” “Life expectancy isn’t great,” Joseph went on, and lo, Mary did write that down as a bullet point. “There’s no guarantee that a child brought into this world right now would have a better life

than we had, and that’s sad to think about.” They looked at the list. “Do we have anything to put on the other side?” And, lo, they were silent for a bit. “Figs,” Mary said. “Figs are great. And at night right after the sun sets, the sky is always a fascinating color, different every time. And people are all right.” “Are they?” “And — everything so bleak like this — it just seems like a sad place to stop the story.” Mary fiddled with a thread on her garment. "Maybe we could raise someone who had hope, who could help fix things that are broken.” “Through carpentry!” Joseph said. “Sure,” Mary said. “Or something.” “Besides,” Joseph said, “some things are constants.” “The climate is still fine,” Mary agreed, “and that’s one thing we know is never going to change.” “That’s true,” Joseph said. “How could that even happen?” They laughed. “Things are bad,” Joseph said. “But I think they used to be worse. They must have been worse before aqueducts.” “And the only way they ever get fixed is if people don’t get discouraged and have hope and want to work together to make them better. That would be the point of bringing someone into the world. To help with that.” Joseph nodded. “If we did that, that could be all right. That could be worth doing.” They sat there and looked up at the sky. The sun had set, and the sky was royal purple, bleeding into blue, with stars starting to peer out. “Actually,” Mary said, “on a related note, I’ve got some news.”

ALEXANDRA PETRI

Carpenter and fiancee hesitant

to bring child into troubled world

BY JAYSON HARPSTER

P

lease don’t let my friends die. It’s a simple plea to the U.S. gov- ernment from many American veterans of the Afghanistan war. And so far, that plea is being ignored. My friends Nabi and Kohee are what our political class calls “Afghan allies.” They were Afghan intelligence officers whom I served with during my second deployment to Afghanistan. God blessed me the day I was assigned to work with such fine men. They taught me about their country, I taught them about intelligence analysis, and together we tracked Taliban threats. Now our immigration system is leaving these men and their families to die at the hands of the Taliban. The special immi- grant visa (SIV) for interpreters excludes Afghan soldiers like my friends. The Refu- gee Admissions Program is backlogged. And now Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS) is blocking Afghans from accessing humanitarian parole, their only remaining lifeline. Director Ur M. Jaddou of CIS and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas need to fix humanitarian parole for our Afghan allies. The Army gave me a Bronze Star for the work that I did with Nabi and Kohee. That helped get me into a good school, get a good job, a good life — the American Dream. But for my friends, the fact that they worked with the Americans is a death sentence, and I dare not use their full names given the ongoing threats to them and their families. The Taliban raid- ed Nabi’s house the very night it con- quered Kabul. If he had not already gone into hiding, he’d be dead. Kohee and his family had to flee their home when their pro-Taliban neighbors threatened them with death and promised to “take care of ” their teenage daughter. “Take care of ” means forcibly marrying her off to a Taliban fighter to be raped.

Working with fellow veterans and volunteers, I desperately tried to get Nabi, Kohee and their families into the Kabul airport so they could escape. But U.S. guards turned them away, all while some planes were taking off with unfilled seats. Nabi evaded a half-dozen Taliban checkpoints to get within six feet of his assigned pickup location, only to be at- tacked with tear gas by American guards and whipped by a Taliban fighter. It was only after days of failure at the airport that we made the difficult decision to help them flee to Pakistan. In Pakistan, they live with the risk of being deported back to Afghanistan. They can barely go outside. The kids can’t go to school. And they can’t go to another country that will accept them. Every time I see a message notification on my phone, I’m afraid. All we can do is wait and see whether the United States will keep its promise to our Afghan allies. We’ve filed for humanitarian parole and paid more than $7,000 in filing fees to CIS so my friends can come to the United States, just like the thousands of luckier Afghans who got into Kabul airport. Our bipartisan team of volunteers submitted letters of support from Army officers and noncommis- sioned officers, photographic evidence of their service with U.S. forces, certificates from U.S. and NATO units, and affidavits attesting to the threats to their families. We’ve raised tens of thousands of dollars and built a support team to provide these families with housing, food, medical care, education and anything else they need to resettle in the United States. We got them out of Afghanistan and could get them to the United States if only CIS chooses to let them live. Please, Director Jaddou, don’t let my friends die. I don’t know what to do for the Afghan allies who are still stuck in Afghanistan. But I know that my friends aren’t the only ones hiding in other countries. CIS knows that they are in serious danger, yet it seems the agency has started rejecting their applications. If it is actually the policy of the United States to turn away veteran-endorsed Afghan allies, then our bureaucracy isn’t just passively “letting them die”; it is actively killing them. Please, Secretary Mayorkas, don’t let my friends die. For my friends and other Afghan allies, it is humanitarian parole or eventual deportation and death. If we won’t do it for the Afghans, then we should do it for our veterans. Too many of us have too much survivor’s guilt already. There’s already a grave at Arlington I ought to visit more often. I know that I couldn’t bear 13 more souls on my conscience. Please, President Biden, don’t let my friends die.

The writer is a U.S. Army veteran. He lives in D.C.

Mr. President,

hear this plea

from Afghan

war vets

If it is U.S. policy to turn

away veteran-endorsed

Afghan allies, then our

bureaucracy isn’t just

passively ‘letting them die’;

it is actively killing them.

S

ome political scientists argue that campaigns don’t matter — that economic indicators determine the outcome of elections and everything a candidate does or says is pretty much irrelevant. But even if you buy that (and I don’t), this much is clear: The way you campaign has an awful lot to do with how you ultimately have to govern if you win. And President Biden is finding that out right now. Biden had decisions to make in the spring of 2020 after he roared back from near- obsolescence to secure the Democratic nom- ination. In an impressive show of resolve, Biden had flat-out rejected the faddish posi- tions in his party — defunding police, Medicare-for-all, free college — that most of his rivals had embraced or tried to finesse. He had earned the right, at that point, to tell the loud populists in his party that he’d won the primaries, they’d lost, and he was going to run a campaign aimed straight at the broad center of the country. In fact, Biden made that very argument on the debate stage when Donald Trump tried to portray him as a tool of the socialist left. He presented himself, to the broad electorate, as a stabilizing presence who would restore integrity and normalcy to the White House. At the same time, though, Biden and his team foresaw a problem. If the passionate leftists in his party couldn’t be rallied to his cause, he might lose enough votes to meet the same fate as Al Gore and Hillary Clinton before him. And so Biden tried to have it both ways; even as he stressed his moderation and desire for bipartisanship in speeches and interviews, he set about mollifying the ac- tivists. His campaign set up a joint policy committee with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and encouraged stories in elite news outlets signaling his newfound love for huge, trans- formational social programs.

Borrowing from his primary campaign rhetoric, Biden called his agenda “Build Back Better,” which had the benefit of being totally meaningless and thus reflecting none of the hard choices to come. When it came time to choose a running mate for vice president, Biden opted for someone who would satisfy all the identity requirements of his activist base — Kamala D. Harris would be the first woman to hold the job, the first Black and Asian American — rather than someone who had demon- strated any notable strength as a campaign- er or legislator. I’m not suggesting that these weren’t sensible or even necessary decisions at the time. The overriding priority of the moment was unseating Trump before the country sunk irrevocably into an existential crisis. Biden’s team ran a brilliant campaign. But brilliant campaign strategies don’t necessarily make for workable governing agendas. In fact, the two things are often incompatible. Biden’s dueling promises — to be a Gerald Ford-type normalizer for most voters and a Franklin D. Roosevelt-like change agent for his base — were never going to be recon- ciled. His strategy to somehow be both things once in office, by moving two different spending bills tailored to two different constituencies at the same time, fell under the category of “so crazy it just might work.” Or maybe just crazy. The smarter move was always to break off a few of the worthiest and most widely supported spending priorities in the mas- sive Build Back Better bill — climate invest- ment and child care, say — and try to pass a more modest program alongside the $1 tril- lion infrastructure bill that Biden signed into law in November. But that would have required Biden to backtrack on the more expansive program he telegraphed this past year when all he was thinking about was unifying the party. He was boxed in. So here we are: Moderate voters are furious at Biden for springing on them an agenda meant to evoke the New Deal, and leftists are angry because they seem unlikely to remake the entire social contract in the brief window they have before the voters kick them out again. The weaker Biden gets politically, the closer his party gets to fracturing among the various camps eyeing 2024, which could essentially reduce him to a spectator in his own presidency. That might not be a problem right now had he decided to choose a running mate who seemed clearly prepared to take the reins of the party and win the next election, but he didn’t. Instead, the second year of Biden’s presidency will start out with potential candidates in Washington and in statehous- es around the country thinking mostly about what comes after the midterms and how they can position themselves to be the one who emerges from the ruins to lead the party. As they ponder that question, potential successors should bear in mind the main lesson of Biden’s predicament: You can’t govern on your own terms if you couldn’t take the risk of winning on them.

MATT BAI

The bill has

come due for

Biden’s dream

of party unity

The weaker Biden gets

politically, the closer his party

gets to fracturing among the

various camps eyeing 2024.

The Washington Post - USA (2021-12-25)

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 25 , 2021. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

BY JAYSON HARPSTER

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