by Patrick B. McGuigan
Pat McGuigan
Oklahoma Metropolis – Jack Webb, star of the previous ‘Dragnet’ tv collection well-liked in my youth, had a number of variations of the weekly opening of the present. My favourite included his line, as an aerial view of Los Angles was proven on the display screen: “There are 1,000,000 tales within the metropolis. That is one among them.”
Listed here are some latest occasions upsetting not-so-random reflections about tales from the world, nation, state and metropolis the place I dwell:
The important thing components of an in depth information story from NonDoc.com (an internet information service primarily based in Oklahoma Metropolis) had been captured (as was as soon as the custom in American journalism) by the story headline: “Hofmeister: Diet program fraud ‘being investigated by federal authorities’.”
By and huge and on the entire, I’ve been dissatisfied (utilizing a gentle phrase, on function) by the tenure of Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction Pleasure Hofmeister.
However credit score her and the state Training Division for this:
Reporter Megan Prather wrote that the company has “deemed $1.6 million in claims for federal funds at baby vitamin websites to be ‘fraudulent’ since April 2023.”
Prather — whose work is incessantly “aggregated” by the information websites I administer — offers the main points. I encourage readers to check them. Finest place to start out, at this level, is at this hyperlink to the NonDoc report:
With apologies to the late U.S. Senator Everett Dirksen (for roughly the one-hundredth time in my writing profession) adapting his memorable quip about “billions” in federal spending: $1.6 million in state authorities spending right here, and $1.6 million there, and fairly quickly you’re speaking actual cash.
That’s money that may very well be used, properly and prudently, for broadly-agreed upon functions.
Or contemplate a not-so-random thoguht:
Taxpayers may maintain the cash within the first place, permitting these so inclined to step up and assist others in want?
* * *
There was a number of concern expressed in latest days about insufficient sports activities services for girls, not less than when in comparison with these for males.
I by no means had a brother. Nonetheless, I’ve 4 sisters.
They helped me, a thin child, learn to be not less than type of robust.
The 4 women had slightly spectacular abilities taking part in softball, basketball, volleyball and … effectively, typically even variations of soccer.
That’s a protracted story, and never the purpose of this reflection, however here’s a not-so-random thought:
I bear in mind when alternatives for feminine athletes had been rather more restricted than at present. In fact, typically, any good factor could be improved. Nonetheless, the latest dominant latest narrative about girls’s athletics has been somewhat off-key.
A colleague from days at The Oklahoman, sports activities reporter Berry Trammel, wrote a nice essay simply a few weeks in the past outlining the method by which the ability which now homes the Ladies’s School World Sequence got here into existence.
(https://www.oklahoman.com/story/sports activities/2021/05/31/ncaa-softball-stanley-draper-jr-had-wcws-vision-wcws-okc/5253621001/?fbclid=IwAR2TOWP5c-BImqj2zsMGOJ_fLCyvTe3PSlCSxkcOJgta-97nMTPkzTaooL8 ).
Tramel fantastically distilled how the ladies’s softball world championship (or, not less than the ability the place it’s performed every year) grew from the imaginative and prescient of 1 man (the late Stanley Draper, 1923-2006).
I bear in mind Draper however didn’t know him effectively. What stands out in reminiscence is that he was prepared to work with others, patiently, on necessary issues.
One step at a time, he and so they constructed it, after which – slightly shortly, within the historic sense – they (the groups and the crowds) got here. If the Oklahoma Metropolis house of the WCWS didn’t exist, it must be invented. And odds are, it might by no means have emerged as properly anyplace else.
Latest information tales and commentaries from media retailers primarily based in locations that don’t host probably the most important (and well-attended) softball event on the earth conveyed an outline of Oklahoma’s softball venues that delivered to thoughts the adage a couple of glass of water that’s, at greatest, half-full.
However contemplating issues by the prism of economics and philanthropy, of human limitations and potentialities, it might sound as if the glass is (after many years of labor) not less than half-full.
To sum up a couple of day’s actions:
The College of Oklahoma girls’s softball crew simply gained its fifth world championship, and bought to compete on the facility (which has modified fairly a bit since I first visited it) that Draper and Marita Hynes (as soon as upon a time, the OU softball coach) and others delivered to life. It rests on a rolling hilltop in northeast Oklahoma Metropolis.
It’s a true “impartial website” as a result of school softball groups every season promise themselves to work exhausting sufficient to earn a visit to … Oklahoma Metropolis.
For this yr’s OU Sooners, it was not a protracted journey.
And Thursday afternoon (June 10), it was House, Candy House.
Congratulations to the crew, and to all those that made a day like that attainable, constructing on the desires of Stanley Draper, Jr., and due to Tramel for telling Draper’s story, yet another time.
As for the longer term? Nicely, that is dependent upon us – and on the willingness of people that may disagree on another issues to work collectively.
If, that’s, individuals who disagree with one another on some issues are nonetheless permitted to work collectively on different issues.
***
Not too long ago, a graduating educating assistant at my alma mater, Oklahoma State College in Stillwater) garnered worldwide consideration when she mentioned, throughout an internet session primarily based at a Connecticut college, that she had determined – with a view to confront her “internalized white supremacy” — she ought to cease educating Spanish. (https://www.foxnews.com/us/oklahoma-state-teaching-assistant-spanish-white )
Her musings garnered numerous consideration, to place it mildly. I’m not a fan of “cancel tradition” or what individuals now characterize as being “woke.” Studying about her was one other despair-inducing second.
Not-so-random reflections:
The very best math instructor I had in highschool was Black. He was an aged gentleman with a gravely voice. I’ve by no means forgotten him, and may nonetheless imitate his speech sample 50 years after my final class with him.
The kindest French instructor I ever had was in highschool.
Then, school: The very best French instructor I had was an Englishman.
My Classical Greek instructor was a superb historian, a White American.
I truly don’t bear in mind my highschool Latin instructor, aside from that I realized rather a lot.
After time to mirror and get better reminiscence, I recalled that my school Latin instructor specialised in historical past, however guided me by two programs in Latin and that one in Classical Greek (sure, in Stillwater).
My German instruction (for studying solely) was unmemorable however I used to be in a position to make use of the language in analysis for a couple of years. (These days, all however a couple of phrases in German appear to be, effectively, like Greek to me.)
My Russian professor was an American who had served in Europe on the peak of the Chilly Warfare – and realized the language by eavesdropping on Soviet Pink Military radio transmissions.
I did poorly in school (I by no means fairly ‘bought’ the Cyrillic alphabet) however turned buddies with the professor.
Russian stumped me, however my admiration for the best Russian author of my lifetime (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn) later led to a singular alternative.
Years after I graduated from OSU I returned to ship a lecture about Solzhenitsyn’s literary and historic works in translation. I got here on the invitation of my previous professor.
Close to the top of faculty days, I realized each day conversational Italian in an off-the-cuff approach – from day-laborers at an archaeological website (San Leonardo al Lago) in Tuscany, close to Siena.
I suppose the final expertise (at a summer time program sponsored by Villanova College) could be the one one to qualify as legit by the requirements articulated by that educating assistant at my beloved alma mater. Presumably, it’s okay to study Italian from an Italian.
The lads from whom I realized idiomatic Italian weren’t privileged, they had been merely affected person with a graduate scholar from Oklahoma. I suppose my demonstrated willingness to get my palms soiled made me appear value their educational efforts.
What would these educators of various types from my previous take into consideration an informed girl who decides to not share her data of language with others due to a self-designation as “privileged.”
I used to be “privileged” – not due to my pores and skin tone, however as a result of these talked about above had been prepared to teach me.
It was certainly a blessing to come across succesful academics throughout the years.
The very first thing I bear in mind about every is what they taught me, not their pores and skin tone.
***
Presently I work below the specter of a Fb ban.
Within the night time, I typically think about the threatened ban as one thing just like the Sword of Damocles about which I first realized at Bishop McGuinness Excessive Faculty in Oklahoma Metropolis.
One purpose for the threats obtained from Fb’s ’bots was rooted in my quotation and posting (clearly in a unfavourable gentle) of an internet put up a couple of (now former) contributor to CNN who uttered deeply evil ideas concerning the Jewish individuals and historical past.
The opposite purpose for the threatened ban — not less than as defined (a charitable time period) by the Fb ’bots – was my use of a narrative from The New York Submit describing the acquisition of upper-high-end properties throughout the land of the free (America) by an individual who has described herself as Marxist.
Not lengthy after Fb blocked The New York Submit’s first story, the difficulty went worldwide (what they deem “viral,” today). It was vetted by different sources. After it turned a narrative which decidedly “liberal” publications agreed was true, Fb stopped making an attempt to forestall distribution. If this reminds any readers of different tales panned and banned, solely to be later transformed into standard knowledge, it’s as a result of these readers are paying consideration.
I’ll chorus from additional particulars, and maybe keep away from, for the second, one other ban-threat.
Listed here are not-so-random ideas: In a protracted profession within the information enterprise, I’ve supervised the work of a variety of individuals. Throughout my decade working in Washington, D.C., I labored with 55 interns, college students from universities and prep colleges all through the nationwide capital space. They had been an eclectic group, over time – giant sufficient that over the course of ten years I encountered almost each “sort” you may think about. None of them had been stereotypes, they had been human beings.
I loved the work, and realized rather a lot about guiding younger writers.
For 12 years, I ran the editorial/opinion pages at The Oklahoman. I used to be blessed with an excellent workers of writers. I had the chance to type a Board of Contributors that was consciously cut up 50-50 when it comes to underlying political leanings, though I discovered a number of the characterizations of “liberal” and “conservative” insufficient then, as I do now.
Nowadays, I administer a newspaper with an internet site, and likewise run an all-online information group.
Many of the writers at each of those web sites are Oklahomans, though often we print or put up work originating from outdoors Oklahoma.
I describe myself as a Reagan conservative as a result of that’s one of the best ways to sum up what I search for in public coverage. As for journalists, my heroes are Robert Novak and David Broder. Every of them spent their careers engaged in each straight information reporting and commentary.
Any listing of my heroes in news-gathering should be partial, to make sure. It options individuals who, like me, have truly needed to run a information group or an necessary division inside one.
As years handed, named like G.Ok. Chesteron, William F. Buckley, Jim Lehrer, the Edward L. Gaylord (all deceased now) and others have secured a spot on my listing.
Within the area of commentary, I look to the late Walter Williams, Thomas Sowell, Cal Thomas, Peggy Noonan, John Fund, Jeff Jacoby, Don Feder, and others when crafting a “most admired” abstract.
Presently and up to now I’ve had individuals help me in my work – as editorial writers, reporters, aides in technical/web issues and in different features of my labor – who’ve coverage and private preferences completely different from my very own.
This ongoing train of liberty in the way in which I conduct my enterprise and my life is totally in line with my understanding – I suppose it may be known as a “conservative” mindset, nevertheless it appears to me extra American than political – of the operate of journalists who function below the safety of the U.S. Structure and its magnificent protections for “the Press.”
The concept pc applications for a worldwide Huge Tech agency can methodically and more and more restrict the attain of my work – and now elevate the specter of a ban – appears deeply un-American.
There is no such thing as a chance I’ll change my method to writing, and pondering, and all the remainder 52 years after my first sports activities story was printed within the scholar newspaper at McGuinness.
With all that in thoughts, for many who like my work here’s a story and a hyperlink to save lots of, to assist discover me ought to customary technique of entry go darkish:
“Heads Up: If my posts go lacking in motion throughout these fascinating occasions”
(https://www.city-sentinel.com/?s=If+my+posts+go+lacking)
The web sites I administer are www.CapitolBeatOK.com and www.Metropolis-Sentinel.com.
Exhausting copies of the latter can be found in racks across the coronary heart of Oklahoma Metropolis.
Hold studying and, if that’s the case inclined, pray for this work to be sustained.
Notice: Pat McGuigan is a member of the Oklahoma Journalism Corridor of Fame.
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