We hope that today’s “Readers Forum” will provoke honest and open dialogue concerning issues that we, as responsible citizens of this community, need to address in a rational and responsible way?

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Todays “Readers Poll” question is: Do you feel that changing the route of the access road to Fielding Manor Court without any discussion with the adjoining property owners was inappropriate?

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By Michael Leppert
www.michaelleppert.com

My first Father’s Day, as a father, was on June 18, 1995.  We were at my sister’s house in Virginia for some reason that none of us can now recall, and Corey Pavin won the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club in Southampton, New York.

The Open is back at Shinnecock this year, and I will likely see more of Pavin’s final round through replays this week than I actually saw 23 years ago.  My older son will also.  He was only four months old in 1995, and I don’t recall him paying attention to important things on TV just yet.

That I am able to fondly remember that day surprises me.  It turns out Father’s Days in America are memorable.

Thursday’s episode of The Daily, the New York Times podcast, featured an interview with a woman using the alias “Mariam.”  She is in America as a result of being granted asylum.  She fled the African nation, Burkina Faso, to escape a horrific experience with domestic violence based on a dowry system.

Earlier this week, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the end of our nation’s rule to grant foreign victims of domestic violence asylum here.  Mariam would have been sent back, if she had arrived at JFK this week instead of two years ago.  Had she arrived with children this week, Sessions would likely have also instructed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)  to separate and detain them.

When asked in her interview if anything has surprised her during her time in America, Mariam gave an answer that shocked me.  She said the most surprising thing is “when I see men taking care of kids.”

I wonder what families in Burkina Faso do to celebrate their nation’s dads.  More importantly, if they don’t take care of the kids, for what reason should they even be celebrated?

So, welcome back to Father’s Day in America.

Both of my sons were at my house Wednesday night and they will both be here on Sunday.  We will watch a few hours of golf, grill out, take naps, and repeat.  That sounds pretty boring when it is written down like that, but it’s not to me.

And it is what my dad would want to do too. If he were still here.

Love it or not, there is no denying that golf is time consuming.  Fewer and fewer people are willing to sacrifice four or five hours for a round of golf these days.  I try to keep my game in shape and even I think it just takes too damn much time.

Except when time is all you really wanted in the first place.

We are a golf family.  I married into a golf family.  My wife is celebrating Father’s Day early by playing golf with her dad and his buddies on Saturday.  They get to spend some quality time together, and he gets to show off his daughter’s superior golf skills to a bunch of has-beens.

In the last month, our nation has celebrated its moms, and now its dads.  We honor them as the foundation of family here and we look to them as the primary source for our culture’s progress.  The “breakdown of the family” that my dad used to holler about when I was young, I hear echoed by others almost daily in adult life.  And for myriad reasons.

Not all of us are mothers or fathers. I am a dad, though my boys don’t need me most days anymore.  But being a dad has defined my life, and so I need to behave more like a parent even when my kids aren’t around.

We all do.

A country of parents would never turn Mariam away.  That would not be the solution to the problem her arrival presented.  Not to a parentally-minded country.  Children would not be separated from parents who are desperately bringing their families here to survive.  Especially not as a policy.

My dad did not talk about politics much.  He would have talked about this stuff though.  He would have said there is no reason the richest country on the planet should even think about treating other human beings this badly.

I can hear his voice, even though he’s gone.

Golf will take up most of the day for my family on Sunday.  Let’s face it – it’s a good excuse to waste a day with my boys, and for them to waste one with me. And since neither of them reads my column, it’s a great opportunity for a good long dad-talk about some key differences between what is right and what is wrong.

Michael Leppert is a public and governmental affairs consultant in Indianapolis and writes his thoughts about politics, government and anything else that strikes him at MichaelLeppert.com.

JUDICIAL BIAS

GAVEL GAMUT By Jim Redwine

The National Judicial College has asked me to submit an article on Implicit Judicial Bias for inclusion in its magazine, Judicial Edge, because unfortunately, as proven by the #MeTooMovement, Ferguson Missouri, and our current political climate, implicit bias is all too explicit in the good ‘ole U.S. of A even in our courts. Therefore, I have submitted the following article to NJC and since judges throughout America may be wasting their time reading it, why, Gentle Reader, shouldn’t you? Here it is.

A syllogism: All sentient humans have learned implicit biases, all judges are sentient human beings, ergo, all judges have implicit biases. The issue is not are judges biased. The issue is how can judges guard the people affected by the judge from her/his particular biases.

Bias is a learned characteristic. Churches, mosques, synagogues, schools, news media, entertainment, sports organizations, hobbies, political parties, legal institutions, families, and friends are just some of the many teachers. I discovered some of my own predilections as a law student at Indiana University School of Law in Bloomington. In the entire student body, there was one African American male, three white females, fewer than five Jews, no Arabs and one Oriental male. In 1968-1970 that mix seemed fine to me. Most students looked and sounded like me. Those who did not did not raise any issue about it nor did I.

As a practicing attorney for ten years, I never appeared in front of a female, Black or Asian trial judge. I did appear in front of one Jewish trial judge a few times; it was okay. I realize the demographics of law schools and trial courts have changed greatly in fifty years. My concern is the learned biases may have survived the new order, at least in the general behavior of the judiciary. Or, if some implicit biases have withered in the face of changing faces, have those prejudices morphed into others?

When faced with trying a case with a Black protagonist or antagonist I sometimes remind myself of a case I prosecuted in 1974. The defendant was a coal-black, dreadlock wearing frequent flyer whom I had prosecuted for two prior felonies. His experienced white attorney pleaded for the defendant to not take the stand in front of the white judge and white jury and subject himself to my fiery cross-examination and the exposure of his unappealing rap sheet. However, the defendant loudly professed his innocence, of at least the crime in question, and demanded to tell his story. I was salivating.

George Willie …, the defendant, took the stand, looked each juror in the eye and said, “I may be a criminal, but I did not break into that building and steal that television.” Then he turned to me and said, “Redwine, why is you always after me? We should be on the same side, the white man stole your land!”

Well, the jury agreed with George Willie and I learned a lesson about my own implicit bias and George Willie’s. I just hope I never forget to apply this knowledge when I am judging others. I must acknowledge my implicit biases, bring them up in my analysis and then prevent them from affecting my judicial behavior and judgments. Of course, the knowledge a problem exists and the understanding it should be addressed do not guarantee a sentient judge will apply lessons learned from learned biases.

George Willie’s bias as represented in his assumption I was a Native American and therefore must be prejudiced against the white power structure was a revelation to me. I was born on the Osage Nation where Indians were an assimilated part of the power structure. My friends were Indian and white but to me, they were just friends. Until George Willie’s bias placed me in a minority, I had never experienced the sense of being different or less than the majority. Thanks, George Willie. It was instructive that where I saw no difference in whites and Indians, I had learned in the segregated culture of Oklahoma in the 1940’s, 50’s, 60’s and 70’s to make negative judgments about African Americans.

The following is another example, there could be many, of my own implicit biases. I served in a case in which a twelve-year-old African American girl claimed she was raped by five teenaged African American males. My instincts led me to believe her in that case of sexual misconduct because she was first of all female and secondly young. But, I regret to admit, because the defendants were young, Black males, I found myself almost apoplectically unable to fairly judge the young men who had been waived to adult court and faced many years in prison. Fortunately, the local Black community was not subject to my particular biases. Several Black witnesses stepped up and established the girl was more a juvenile Jezebel than an ingenue. As the evidence developed, I realized I could have easily allowed my prejudices to help create several grave miscarriages of justice. Fortunately, the jury saw things more objectively.

So, as a judge, I endeavor to remember the all-white church where I spent my first eighteen years, the mostly white law school where I studied precedent while failing to recognize prejudice and the practice of law in which what I thought was open-mindedness was nearer myopia. Today when judging I strive each day to unlearn those lessons.

FOOTNOTE: For more Gavel Gamut articles go to www.jamesmredwine.com Or “Like” us on Facebook at JPegRanchBooksandKnitting

As a married man with three daughters, I enjoy the occasional moment of solitude when I can reset, recharge, refocus, and stand at the open refrigerator in my underwear eating aerosol whipped cream and drinking milk directly from the jug. I was looking forward to reveling in this kind of reclusively boorish behavior recently when I had a week of vacation to myself while the girls were still in school and my wife was at work – wondering if I d be out of bed by the time they got home.

Unfortunately, I found myself unable to continue ignoring those chores usually assigned to the man of the house and which require a full set of clothing. Based on my experiences that week, I thought I d offer a few tips to other men like me whose tools all still have that new hardware smell and whose yardwork always begins with untangling an epic mass of electrical cords.

Tip #1 – Prior to spending a significant amount of time outdoors in the sun for the first time since the previous August, generously apply sunscreen to the back of your neck until it reaches the consistency of spackling paste. Failure to do so will result in your neck looking like an inflamed Louisiana hot link, which, in turn, will prompt friends, family and your barber to joke incessantly about the fact that you ve finally become a real redneck, which, in turn, will prompt all of them to tell mostly the same You might be a redneck jokes, which, in turn, will make you wish you d thought up the whole redneck comedy shtick so you wouldn t have to be doing yard work in the first place.

Tip #2 – If that plastic safety cover thingy comes off the end of your electric weed whacker while in use, refrain from raising the weed whacker to waist-level in order to get a better look, especially when wearing a pair of old Nike shorts. If you do happen to raise the weed whacker and you accidentally hit the on button while doing so, immediately assume a fetal posture and holler out curse word alternatives like Shatner s Fusty Skunk Nuggets! Then quickly concoct a story to tell friends, family and alarmed neighbors about an altercation with an unusually athletic possum. Thereafter, put the offending weed whacker out of its (and your) misery – and violently so.

Tip #3 – Be prepared to replace all toilet seats in the home at least once every decade. (Apparently, certain family members are opposed to performing acrobatic moves on the commode to avoid splinters and other injuries requiring a tetanus shot.) When shopping for toilet seats, be willing to laugh politely when an elderly fellow-customer walks up to the display and jokes (hopefully) about the high cost of those large, white picture frames. Before attaching a new toilet seat, maintain a healthy suspicion of all marketing gimmicks on the box that claim, Installs in minutes and No need to get on hands and knees. You won t be on hands and knees because you ll be on your back with your head wedged underneath the toilet bowl, embracing it like an awkward prom date. Once you ve installed the new seat and extracted your melon from the forbidden zone, flush the toilet to be sure it still works properly.

Tip #4 – Expect your children to interrupt all of the above tasks daily when they activate your parental guilt reflex by requesting that you bring them lunch to school from a fast food restaurant. On the way to the school, position your air conditioning vents such that the icing on the gourmet cupcakes you bought as an excuse to eat one yourself doesn t melt. At the same time, balance the kids Raising Cane s Box Combos in your lap to keep them warm. Before delivering what s left of their food, remember to lick Cane s Sauce residue from your fingers to remove evidence.

I hope these tips provide you with the guidance needed to avoid selfishly enjoyable and relaxing alone-time while you re off from work. And if you ever do find yourself desperate for a minute to yourself, there s always the refrigerator.