I Really Do Believe There Must Be Heaven Somewhere

Here is your open thread for March 20, 2020.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe was born 105 years ago today.

The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq began on March 20, 2003. Seventeen years, millions of lives, and trillions of dollars later, it’s still going on. It was a terrible, terrible idea that millions of people, before the fact, pointed out was a terrible, terrible idea.

Five years ago today, a solar eclipse, equinox, and “Supermoon” all occurred on the same day, leading many of the chief astrologers of white evangelicalism to predict the end of the world. They were wrong. Again. (John Hagee’s book of “prophecy” bore the vague and infinitely elastic subtitle “Something Is About to Change,” and somehow he still got that wrong.)

Henrik Ibsen was born 192 years ago today. I suppose An Enemy of the People might be performed a few times a year or so from now if the theaters ever re-open.

March 20 is the birthday of Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856) and B.F. Skinner (1904) who both had Big Ideas about how to reshape unruly humans. No thank you.

Watergate henchman John Ehrlichman was born 95 years ago today. Ehrlichman died in 1999, but before he left us, he provided this stark confession about the real purpose of Nixon’s lawless “Law and Order” politics:

You want to know what this was really all about? The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

Fred Rogers would have been 92 years old today. “Look for the helpers,” he told children. For those of us who are not children, that means be the helpers the children can look to. We’ve talked about Mister Rogers here quite a bit, including:

Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn? She turns 103 today.

Here’s hoping we get to celebrate Carl Reiner’s 103rd birthday five years from today. He’s still only 98.

Newberry-winning author Lois Lowry (The Giver, Number the Stars) turns 83. Mike Francesa, a man of strong opinions, turns 66.

Knicks fan, director, and Academy award-winning screenwriter Spike Lee turns 63. Let’s say: Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, Get on the Bus, Inside Man, and 4 Little Girls.

Academy award-winning actor Holly Hunter turns 62. Let’s go with: Broadcast News, Raising Arizona, The Incredibles, Swing Shift, and Season 1 of “Saving Grace.”

Finally, it’s World Sparrow Day, so let’s hear again from Sister Rosetta:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmmOokyrd8g

The readiness is all. Talk amongst yourselves.