The news from Milwaukee was sad, again. Another family lost a loved one and is grieving. However, the manner in which the ones gathered expressed part of their understandable sadness was simply inappropriate. I do not mean to sound harsh, but in 2024 the scene below should not be happening.
Amid pieces of shattered glass, white candles sit on the sidewalk near 27th and Locust on Milwaukee’s north side.
On the grassy hill above are several pieces of posterboard with writing spelling out “Forever in our Heart.”
And taped onto a nearby pole is a photo of a smiling man, with several Sharpie-d messages written around the border.
That’s the scene on Sunday afternoon, as dozens of family members and friends joined together to honor Damond Harris.
About 45 minutes into the gathering, white and gold balloons were released into the sky as another tribute to Harris.
What seemed to have gone unnoticed by the family and friends is a simple concept. What goes up must eventually come down. This becomes troubling for animals far and wide, given the miles that a balloon can travel. The deflated balloon returns to the earth where it can cause harm to both animals and the environment. Being close to Lake Michigan made the balloon release even more dangerous.
What was released in the air this weekend will not decompose quickly. Not only is the ballon a serious environmental problem, but the strings tied to them usually aren’t made of biodegradable material. Even if the ballons and strings were biodegradable versions it can take as long as four years for them to break down. Meanwhile, animals often mistake balloon fragments for food and choke or suffocate when they try to eat them. Partially inflated balloons can block animals’ gastrointestinal tract, causing them to starve to death slowly and painfully. Shorebirds flying in the Milwaukee area can become entangled in balloon remnants. The sad truth is that due to balloons many such birds have been found dead with bits of Mylar, latex, or string wrapped around their necks, beaks, or legs.
I am not certain how much more environmental education is required so that society can finally stop the senseless act of releasing balloons for any reason. I strongly believe that no one who is honored and remembered at the time of their death would wish for animals to be harmed or perish during the celebration of life.
Balloons are prohibited in the Wisconsin State Capitol, but no state law prevents them from being released, which can harm wildlife or our environment. Seems to me there is a reasonable and bipartisan piece of legislation just waiting to be introduced and worked on in the legislature.
Every year on May 3, UNESCO commemorates World Press Freedom Day. This year I need not write, given the almost hourly headlines, the day was marked by the dire and grave threats to journalists where the war on Gaza is becoming the deadliest conflict for journalists and media workers in recent memory. Journalism is delivered by reporters and news photographers to a world that needs a better understanding of the events that impact their lives. It is, again I need not write, a most valued profession.
As CBS News reported, the war on Gaza is the deadliest ever to be recorded by the CPJ since the nonprofit began to collect data in 1992. For comparison, the number of journalists killed in the first two months in Gaza surpassed the amount killed in the Vietnam War, which lasted two decades, according to the IFJ. According to CPJ, Four Israeli journalists were killed, three by Hamas during their attack on Oct. 7. Three Lebanese journalists were killed by Israeli airstrikes or shelling. 102 Palestinian journalists were also killed by airstrikes, shelling, or snipers, according to IFJ.
Think of a reporter as a pair of eyes and ears to the larger world and then think of losing those senses. That is what happens each time a reporter is killed. This past week, the BBC reported on the importance of this annual event and spoke about one of the reporters who worked as an Al Jazeera cameraman. He was killed last year. When back on my computer I did a Google search and located more information about Samer Abudaqa who was hit in an Israeli drone attack while reporting at Farhana school in Khan Younis, located in southern Gaza. He bled to death for more than four hours as emergency workers were unable to reach him because the Israeli army would not let them. Given the destruction of every hospital in Gaza, one does have to ask where he would have received vital medical attention even if humanity was allowed among the Israeli soldiers to take hold?
While researching more information about Abudaqa I came across a joined story, also from CBS News.
CPJ has tracked numerous forms of censorship: attacks, threats, assaults, and arrests of journalists covering the war in Gaza. Journalists have had family members killed. One of those is Al-Jazeera’s Wael Al-Dahdouh. In November, he received the call while on air that his wife, children, and grandson were killed after they relocated to an area they were told was safe.
At the center of why journalists play such an important role is the importance for people to know about the workings of their government, and as the college campus protests have pointed out, what is being done with the people’s money. The need for press freedom is so great, and yet the attempts by some governments to curtail the work of journalists are egregious.
It is no surprise that this annual observance, and what it represents matters to us all since it is a foundational fact that journalists do the valued work for those who live in a democracy, or where people strive for more freedoms. For journalists working in places where rights are fewer this past week was a reminder to those governments that they must be aware that the rest of the world is watching. May 3rd was a day about recognizing the universal truth–whether or not it is applied in practice in each nation–that there must be a commitment to press freedom.
Al-Dahdouh was covering the news live when his son was killed by an Israeli bomb. The blast was heard by viewers and listeners. Later that day, he was back on the air reporting. That is the sign of professional steadfastness we call attention to on World Press Freedom Day.
Having not seen a public thanks on the listserv to Alderwoman Marsha Rummel or Dane County Board Supervisor Yogesh Chawla about their public actions in support of the UW-Madison protesters and the right for freedom of speech to remain a benchmark at this prized place of higher education, I now take a brief moment to do so.
I was very heartened to learn not only that the city council will likely pass a resolution to ask Chancellor Mnookin to authorize a continued peaceful encampment on Library Mall, but framed their argument, in part, due to the “spirit of the Wisconsin Idea”. This week that concept was talked about by a protestor and a professor at the Mall and strikes to the core of why we all need to care about this event now playing out on the isthmus. Those who have spent time at the Mall this week know the description from Republican Speaker Vos was a lie. There is no violent mob. (Just like there were no palm trees in winter in Madison with rioting people as shown on FAUX News when they wished to paint another lie during the union protests at the statehouse.) I was on the Mall two different days this week both in support of stopping the killing of Palestinians by the Israeli military, but also to see how the conduct of those on the Mall was playing out. Long conversations and great interactions and not even one belligerent slogan was heard.
This leads me to thank Yogesh for signing a much-needed letter to Dane County Sheriff Barrett where several supervisors were rightly disgusted that county resources were being used for the unneeded and unfounded reason to break down the tents and make arrests on Wednesday.
At a time when too many of the elected class are timid and meek, I am most proud that our most local elected officials are in one with the mood and temperament of the citizenry concerning the right to protest and the reason we should care about stopping the killing in Gaza.
It has been interesting over the past weeks to follow one aspect of the Gaza protests occurring at colleges and universities nationwide that has not made for top-of-the-fold coverage. While we are all aware that protestors from UCLA to Columbia University have pitched tents and made demands of the top brass in places of higher education, less known are the attempts made to stymie reporters and others from reporting the stories that have captivated the nation. While we are most aware of how people and organizations want to try and control their own press coverage or steer it in a positive direction be it from a White House press secretary or spokespeople for large corporations, the degree to which these protests at times have been handled regarding reporting has been concerning.
One of the nagging aches occurred over the weeks at Columbia University where the campus was closed to the press during the protests. The glaring hypocrisy between the shutdown of on-the-ground reporting from the scene of the news will come Monday, when at that same university the announcements of the always prestigious Pulitzer Prize journalism awards will be made. One can assume reporters will be offered unfettered access to that event.
Attempts made to limit press coverage of the protests or to limit access or stifle the ability of reporters to get the accurate ‘temperature’ of the crowd and its reasoning is galling. CNN reported thatjournalists who were tasked with covering violent unrest on college campuses across the US have been arrested and barred access as police moved in to crack down on pro-Palestinian protesters.
At UCLA, reporters for the student-run newspaper The Daily Bruin, said they were violently attacked during the clashes Tuesday night, including being followed, slapped and sprayed with irritants, the newspaper said. Student Editor Anna Dai-Liu told CNN that she was gassed, and other student reporters were assaulted, with one reporter being taken to emergency care.
“Shortly before 3:30 a.m., four Daily Bruin reporters were walking on campus when they were followed and then assaulted,” the newspaper reported. “Five to six assailants also sprayed reporters with an irritant. As some reporters went to help a reporter that was pulled to the ground, assailants began to record on their cellphones.”
Wednesday night at UW-Madison it was not the police who were trying to limit coverage of the pro-Palestinian rally, but a member of the protest organization who made an effort to limit my work as a blogger. I have been writing at Caffeinated Politics for 18 years so I was taken aback when approached by a young man who told me there was a requirement to ask permission to take pictures of people at the protest. At first, I thought he was joking and smiled at him while inquiring how that would happen when tens of people filled my camera lens when taking photographs. He seemed unsure how to respond to that so he simply repeated I needed to ask permission. I informed him I was a blogger and would not ask people for permission. He got huffy in tone and with words but I stayed in a low volume mode and with no sense of hesitation alerted him that the protest was on campus grounds, and open to the public. I told him when people make a protest for public policy changes with the UW administration on an open campus it disallows him to ask me to get permission for my work. I added, though in reflection I am sure he did not connect my argument to the present situation, that my refusal to follow his requirement would be akin to him signing a petition to obtain an outcome through governmental channels but then wanting to make sure nobody knew he had signed the petition. Needless to say, I kept talking with folks and taking my photos.
I do not consider myself a working journalist but rather a writer on the Op-Ed page of a newspaper. I have always highly respected the working profession of journalists and reporters and have been mindful of what they dealt with over the past weeks when trying to best cover this fast-paced story.
In a statement, Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins, president of the Society of Professional Journalists, said that journalists “have a constitutional right to be present at these protests so the public may stay informed and law enforcement agencies and administrators at higher education institutions can be held to account.”
She urged law enforcement “to allow journalists to do their work without interference or threat of arrest and detainment.”
What student protests will look like going forward is an open questions. So, too, is how media will cover them.
Despite her concerns about what she sees as distracted news coverage, Iqbal is glad the protests are dominating national news.
The Barnard student said she wants the issue to become “inescapable.” But she would also prefer that the public turn to students’ Instagram accounts for updates on what’s going on, “as opposed to CNN.””
That last line is most telling about the lack of awareness from some younger people about the importance of objective news coverage. If one considers Instagram more aligned with news coverage than the working professionals at an all-news network then we clearly have bigger problems we must address in both higher education and also generally as a country.
For the second night this week, I spent time at the UW-Madison Library Mall talking with both protestors of Israeli military policy in Gaza against Palestinians and with others who were gathered in solidarity with the issue. Wednesday night I sat on the lawn and talked with two women who were both journalism students (one was from Hurley and laughed when asked if all the snow had now melted in her hometown as her friend from Appleton smiled) and each was planning to pursue their careers as foreign news reporters. Each told me in their ways why the Palestinian issue was of interest long before October 2023, and why better-informed citizens would react differently in these moments of high tension and bombastic rhetoric. They were but two of the bright, earnest, and focused students I talked with, and each in their own way, gave me a dose of hope. There are various views around our city about Israel, Gaza, and the Palestinians. But there can only be one way to sum up and view the men and women who joined together, as one, at the Library Mall this week. They are hopeful. They know a better way forward starts with a dream of solving a slice of the problem. They know and are in their ways showing they understand problem-solving requires personal actions to try and bring that dream one step closer to reality. Older adults get jaded about what is possible. That is why it was refreshing to see young people wishing to better steer the nation away from the failures of our past. I am so proud that these young men and women have been peaceful and focused on their message. I am proud of the individual symphony orchestra musicians who brought their talents to the Mall and other folks in the city who brought pizza and water to the protestors. I am proud to live in a city where humanity is much in evidence.
The third evening of the UW-Madison protest against Israeli military aggression in Gaza had a far larger number of people at Library Mall than when I walked among the students 48 hours ago. I noticed former State Senator Fred Risser and former Governor Jim Doyle in the crowd along with a couple state representatives and Madison alders. One can strongly surmise the topic of discussion was the police raid on the protestors Wednesday morning.
After talking with eleven people for over 90 minutes this evening, including sitting on the ground with two journalism students for the best conversation of the night, it is clear the blowback about what law enforcement did earlier in the day runs strongly. One of the students who has been on the Mall since Monday morning, said nothing had precipitated the arrival of officers and nothing threatening had occurred which warranted the action. One of the students living near the campus was told police had arrived and biked quickly to the scene. He watched as police changed tactical formation to adjust to the linked arms and determination of the protesters. “There was more of a premeditated will to remove the camp, than a justified threat for taking action”.
Talking with people underscored that a most willful spirit remains as tents were again erected, but this time versus on Monday, they were formed in a more tactical nucleus. It was not stated as such in conversations, but protestors will be more prepared for what law enforcement might do when making a return visit. The Mall area was filled with people both supportive of the mission of standing alongside those in Gaza and supporting the protestors making it happen locally. People were, obviously, unsettled about the safety of the protesters given what had played out only hours earlier.
Thanks to the professional musicians well-known in Madison who stood alongside the people of Gaza
One of the questions I asked of each person who allowed me some time was to better understand what motivated them? How engaged were they about the plight of the Palestinian people before October 2023? I was surprised and heartened to hear about a family tree with Middle Eastern roots, or a tradition within a young woman’s Jewish home where fighting for the rights of others is ‘simply what we do’. She spoke about her relatives involved in the Civil Rights struggles in the 1960s as Freedom Riders in our Southern States.
Both of the journalists to-be want to pursue their professional careers as foreign reporters, and they along with the other bright, earnest, and focused students I talked with gave me a dose of hope tonight. There are clearly various views around our city about Israel, Gaza, and the Palestinians. But there can only be one way to sum up and view the men and women who joined together, as one, at the Library Mall tonight. They are hopeful. They know it starts with a dream of a better world but then requires personal actions to try and bring that dream one step closer to reality. Older adults get jaded about what is possible. That is why it was refreshing to see young people wishing to better steer the nation away from the failures of our past.
When asked who is the politician most divorced (no pun intended) from facts it would be Donald Trump. His whole life has been of a con artist grifting to make money, and since 2015 playing to voters without regard for the truth. But we keep asking, how is it so many of his supporters are gleeful to follow along? New data strongly suggests as NBC reported this week, that his base is easily led by Trump due to the fact they are utterly uninformed about the facts of the political world around them.
Since 2015, the year of the infamous escalator ride followed by the disgusting racist language about Brown people, I noticed a trend among our friends to have like-minded people sit around a fire pit or gather for dinner and commiserate about the state of our politics or the fate of our democracy. More than in prior years there seemed a real need for a community of logic-based conversations and connections with others who care about our core values of the country. In these gatherings of friends, I started to note not so much a polarization but a higher awareness about the type of people who gathered and the types of people we talked about. It was not elitism, snark, or disdain but a clear realization that there was a very distinct undereducated subsection of the country that had fallen for the antics and crudeness of Donald Trump. But why did they exist in such numbers and what accounted for their lack of awareness about the issues of the day?
In 2018, two political scientists at Brigham Young University, Michael Barber and Jeremy Pope, carried out online surveys of almost 1,600 respondents who completed a political knowledge quiz, which asked five questions. Group loyalty, they found, “is the stronger motivator of opinion than are any ideological principles.” Republicans use partisan cues to judge peers’ political knowledge to a greater extent than do Democrats, coinciding with the polarization in the American electorate: “Low-knowledge respondents, strong Republicans, Trump-approving respondents, and self-described conservatives are the most likely to behave like party loyalists by accepting the Trump cue.”4
As we were to learn from data in all 50 states Trump attracted a disproportionate and in historically researched terms an unprecedented number of what have become termed “low-information voters”. They were easily duped into whatever Trump was spewing, be it from xenophobic anti-Muslim rants, fear-mongering about Brown people at the border, the Chinese taking jobs from these shores, or racial stirring over Black people and the American Dream regarding housing. Redlining was again a dog whistle in Trump Land. If the conservative partisan appeal could be made into an easy-to-understand emotional rallying cry,forget the facts and just sign up the under-educated Trump voters.
The president has made politics about culture—not just policy. He found a way to attract new voters, particularly rural and non-college educated whites who previously thumbed their nose at conventional politics. Because he’s a pure attention merchant, he doesn’t care what screen he appears on, as long he is there. Because he lacks an ounce of shame, it all works, with or without the blessing of the legacy press.
I find it troubling for our political culture and democracy to have these low-information voters continually creating negative impacts on our nation. What we know from data collected over the years is a large section of Trump voters simply do not know certain basic facts about government be it the process of law-making or the basics of law and order within the framework of governing. As a friend pointed out this past week during a conversation on our lawn there is a more powerful undertow within the Trump base in that they do not come to their news reading or viewing with the necessary tools to reason or think about not only complex issues but how to evaluate new information. What they are left with then is listening to harsh right-wing media and politicians such as Trump for their ‘information’. Or as I say, their talking points.
My parents were not college graduates, in fact, my father was a Depression-era kid who never had more than an 8th-grade education. But in our home, the concept of thinking being fun was a foundation that was instilled in our family. Dad would urge me to do the crossword puzzle in the daily newspaper as it would challenge me. I do not sense that the Trump base desires to be challenged mentally, and as evidenced by their lack of political education preferred to do things with little thought being required. I would love to be proven wrong. But since 2015, there has been too much data to show what we long suspected is indeed true.
The latest evidence is reported by NBC’s Ben Kamisar with illuminating details from a new poll on where voters get their news. Or more to the point of this post do not get their news. Biden has a notable advantage among registered voters who still rely on traditional news sources (newspapers, TV), while it is shown that Trump has a massive lead — 53 percent to 27 percent — among the uninformed, who don’t follow political news at all. The tossup category is people who get their news mainly from digital and social media: Trump has a narrow 3-point edge among this group.
“It’s almost comic. If you’re one of the remaining Americans who say you read a newspaper to get news, you are voting for Biden by 49 points,” said Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who conducted the poll alongside Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt.
Girl chalks her sentiments at UW-Madison Library Mall 4/29/24
Partly sunny skies gave way to clouds and chilly winds off Lake Mendota as UW-Madison students gathered on the Library Mall to protest the military actions in Gaza and the funds the university has invested in Israeli interests. By the standards of campus protests from UCLA to Columbia University the turnout in Madison was small. But as I walked around and chatted with people it was clear though there was a low turnout that was made up for in passion and conviction.
Tents were slowly being erected with small camplike chairs arranged for sitting. There was a table of food with water arranged for what some predicted would be a many-day demonstration. As I turned on a sidewalk and was about to venture in another direction a man dressed in Islamic attire passed me, stopped, and asked what was happening? I gave the obvious one-sentence explanation, and he interrupted and said, “No. I mean do they need to leave by 6 PM? I heard the administration had said there was a deadline.”
I had not heard that news, but since he was friendly and dressed in a thawb and a kufi I asked what brought him to the campus. He lived in Madison, told me he was a Muslim, and had a deep concern for the Palestinians. I mentioned how dismaying it is to see countless Arab governments who give only lip service to the people in Gaza and the West Bank. We had already talked for five minutes, and it was very clear he was a devout Muslim, having been of the faith for 22 years. He would say the name of Allah in our conversation, but always added, (I believe) with the words, “Blessings of Allah be upon him”. With that, I knew it would be fine to broach a topic that has intrigued me for many years.
I told him about 15 years ago having read No God But God by Reza Aslan, and mentioned it was a profoundly interesting book where the arguments are that Islam is going through its own reformation. What were his views of such an argument? That is when, had a camera been trained on my face, large eyes and a stunned countenance would have been clearly seen.
“I was a part of the reformation.” In less than a minute I knew I was talking with Joshua Van Haften, who made headlines aplenty around the nation and Wisconsin.
He briefly told of being arrested by federal authorities at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport in 2015 after returning from Turkey. He had flown to the Syrian border to try to join the Islamic State terrorist organization. News reports at the time added that he was apparently swindled by middlemen who only wanted his money. They dumped him on a dusty road, but his intentions were a federal crime that he admitted committing.
I was so surprised by who I was talking with I miserably failed the Number One lesson Dan Rather said was of importance to journalists. That being the follow-up question is key! I should have asked what he meant by being a part of the reformation; was he hoping to encourage it, or rather intent on reversing it? Sitting at my desk this evening and recalling his prediction that the caliphate was coming and it would be centered in Jerusalem, means that we were not examining the Islamic reformation, if that is what the long-term process is all about, from the same page. But, throughout our 20-minute discussion, he was forthcoming, conversational, accessible, and an engaging personality.
Once his identity had been made known I noticed my conversational tone had changed from chit-chatty to pressing for answers. I did not want to sound hard-edged so I told him about my radio reporter years and political background. I let him know I found him of interest before continuing. I told him he was clearly a bright man, living in the modern world, I spread my arm across the mall area and added a world of diversity around us. “So, if the religion of Islam is universal how is this a place you feel comfortable but others of the faith in this country or around the world would not abide this modernity? For instance, women without head coverings?”
I was not trying to tackle his faith in any manner, but Aslan and other writers note the war in Islam is with modernity. He stated it was impossible to know which women in the crowd were of the Islamic faith. That did not address the larger core question, but I did not press him. Midwestern sensibilities of being polite rule my life.
It was the last question I asked him that might have been the most important, however, given the rancor and shouting over Gaza, Israel, and well, everything in our land. “Why did you start talking with me, given all the others you could have struck up a conversation with?” He seemed unsure what I meant and then said I was heading in one direction, and he was coming my way and we both said hello and started talking. The world needs more such conversations. We do not need to agree or even have a bevy of questions from an overly curious mind to toss into the back-and-forth. Really all that is required is to talk in a low-volume polite way and discover the ideas and views of another. Upon parting Joshua and I shook hands, we each smiled, and I thanked him for his time.
I do not know if the warmer temperatures and abundant sunshine will ramp up the number of protesters at UW-Madison this week. I hope that each person giving their views about an important international event finds another person they might not otherwise talk with and spend some time talking and learning something politely. After all, everyone is a stranger until we say hello.
CAFFEINATED POLITICS 