Freedom From Fear

I just have a hard time agreeing with those who say that our country is the best in the world. The United States set a standard for individual freedom and democracy that the world has only begun to begin matching but in the process, we have lost the essential purpose of that freedom. Freedom isn’t just about the ability to do as one pleases. It is much deeper. Freedom is the ability to pursue one’s ambitions, free from the restraints of fear no matter what the source. 

At the time the Constitution was written, the source of fear was often government and the tyranny of British rule. It is for this reason that much of the Constitution and of the Bill of Rights subsequent to it focuses on protecting citizens from the tyranny government at that time was often responsible for. But regardless of the words used or the individual protections sought, the essential purpose of the Constitution was to guarantee that the citizens of this new country would be able to pursue their dreams and to live their lives free from fear.

In the wake of this tragedy of epic proportions, there are many out there who have taken to the pulpit to defend their right to own a gun and to argue that Americans’ freedom to arm themselves as they wish is in no way a part of the problem. In fact, many of these people continue to argue that the minimal gun control we do have is the cause of this violence, that despite a plethora of evidence it is the absence of gun owners and not the presence of these deadly weapons that has allowed deranged monsters to wreak havoc. But even putting aside a very legitimate case that could be made against the 2^nd Amendment being interpreted as establishing a Constitutional right to bear arms, there is no arguing that the 2^nd Amendment does not eliminate fear and thus fails to live up to its very purpose for being included in the Bill of Rights. Nearly 100 people have lost their lives in mass shootings this year alone, and over 10,000 will die as a result of gun-related homicides. No longer does the establishment that “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed” help to assuage peoples fears’ over the possible tyranny of government intrusion. Rather, the amendment itself has become the source and root cause of fears across the spectrum of American life.

The 2^nd Amendment has allowed the south side of Chicago to become a virtual war zone, where even a house of worship is not immune from gun violence.

The 2^nd Amendment allowed the innocence of cinema to be crushed by the terror of mass murder.

And just this week, the 2^nd Amendment contributed, along with mental illness, to a deadly cocktail that ultimately resulted in the unspeakable, in the murder of 20 innocent first-graders and 8 adults who had devoted their lives to helping those children make their dreams a reality.

Because of that 2^nd Amendment, children across the country will go to school fearing the unthinkable, fearing that their safety could be compromised in even the most sacred of nurturing places.

No matter what the Constitution says, there is an inalienable right to live free of fear that trumps any 18^th-Century text when it comes to the way we ought to operate our society. There simply is no rational way to refute the assertion that the 2^nd Amendment is a far greater danger to our modern society than the hypothetical government tyranny it seeks to provide protection against.

The framers of our Constitution did not know of and could not conceive of the power that an AR-15 assault rifle has to wreak havoc on an urbanized society. Had they been able to foresee technological advances in modern weaponry, I have not doubt they would have chosen to be more restrictive in their phrasing of a so-called “right to bear arms”.

What I do know with certainty is that they sought above all to ensure that their children had the freedom to live their lives and to pursue their dreams without unreasonable and uncontrollable fears getting in their way. Guns are today’s far too common source of such fears and for that reason alone, it is about time that we sit down and seriously reconsider our steadfast devotion to the 2^nd Amendment and to protecting an individuals right to be armed even when it is abundantly clear that such protection has become a threat to the lives of even the most innocent in our society, our children.

Badgers Losing Identity When It Matters Most

Although Wisconsin is headed to the Big Ten Championship game next week thanks to the transgressions of two Legends division foes, they are completely undeserving of the honor. But while there is no doubt the 2012 edition of Badger football doesn’t have the pleasure of a leader the caliber of Russell Wilson, they do have the talent to beat each of the five teams they have lost to thus far this season.

What they don’t have this season, in part due to offseason coaching changes, is the identity necessary to be a true championship-caliber team.

Never has that lack of an identity been more apparent than in Saturday’s loss at Penn State. After getting out to a fast start and holding a 14-7 lead at the half, Wisconsin played the remainder of the afternoon like a team with the weight of the world on their shoulders.

Rather than playing like the team with nothing to lose, having already sewn up a birth in the conference title game, the Badgers played not to lose. From the overly conservative play calling in the final two minutes of the first half to the run play called on third-and-9 late in the fourth quarter, the conservative play calling by offensive coordinator Matt Canada was a drag on the offense and a hamper on the ability of the team to put away a Nittany Lion team that had no business winning this weekend.

The ridiculous conservatism came to a head when Wisconsin decided to settle for a PAT and overtime following a 2^nd straight final drive touchdown with UW down 7 points.

Last week, settling for overtime at least made some sense. The Badgers had the momentum, were playing at home, and had failed on two straight short-yardage plays at the goal line just a few minutes earlier.

But in State College, overtime was not a place the Badgers had any reason to venture. Win or lose, overtime made no sense for Wisconsin.

Having already lost four times, it was already Rose Bowl or bust for this UW team. The formula had become fairly simple, with a Big Ten Championship game victory sending the Badgers to Pasadena and a defeat likely sending them to either Jacksonville or Tampa.

So the result of Saturday’s game meant virtually nothing for Wisconsin. As simply as ever, the Badgers had nothing to lose.

What they had to gain was momentum. They had the momentum of another last-second comeback and the emotional lift of a two-point conversion to quiet a loud Beaver Stadium crowd.

And perhaps most importantly, they had a running back that had just become the all-time touchdown leader in FBS history.

But even had Wisconsin failed on a two-point conversion and fell one-point shy, they would have been better off than they would heading to overtime. Forget the percentages (43% success rate on conversion attempts), going for two was the only call.

First of all, overtime brings in the possibility of injury. Without anything to gain from a win, there was no reason Wisconsin should have extended the opportunity to suffer an injury any longer than it already was with the game on the line in the final seconds. One bad step and UW could not only lose a chance to win the game, but also a shot at winning next week’s title game.

Add to that the fact that Wisconsin had already lost two straight overtime games. The confidence simply wasn’t there for the overtime and the Badgers’ recent history likely curbed any momentum Wisconsin had following Jeff Duckworth’s touchdown catch. Now that UW has lost three straight in extra frames, frustration is likely to set in. That is not a good formula heading into a matchup with Nebraska that will almost certainly be decided down the stretch.

The general rule is that a two-point conversion for the win is the right call for a visiting team but not a home team. As the adage goes, “you play for the win on the road and play for the tie at home”. Wisconsin had this rule on its side and plenty of evidence to support it as the correct decision for the moment in question.

But right now, Wisconsin doesn’t have an identity. Wisconsin doesn’t have the belief in its offensive line that it has had for years, the belief that they can get two-and-a-half yards at any time when they absolutely need it.

Part of the problem is certainly the personnel. The Badgers lost four NFL offensive linemen in the past two years and have a line that is clearly not as polished as UW would like. Still, this is a team that racked up over 550 yards on the ground just two weeks ago against Indiana. While Indiana is by no means Penn State, a team that can put up those numbers against a conference opponent has to have at least the belief that they can gain two measly yards on command.

After last year, you could say that the losses at Michigan State, Ohio State, and in Pasadena were the result of bad luck, of coming so close, anything. But after losing five games that hung in the balance (and add a lucky win against Utah State) in 2012, there is no other place to point the finger than at Bielema and his coaching staff.

I have tried to defend Bielema for most of the past two years. His numbers speak for themselves and are impressive even in the shadow of the almighty Barry Alvarez. But this year he and his staff have shown an impeccable ability to lose control of the game and to panic down the stretch that is simply unacceptable at a program with the pedigree of Wisconsin.

Teams win close games by sticking to what they do best and by doing it better than ever when it matters the most. Over the past two seasons, Wisconsin has lost its identity and become a shell of itself when victory hangs in the balance. A missed field goal early this season and a miracle catch in Indianapolis last December gave the Badgers a few close wins, but other than that they have come up empty.

From Paul Chryst lining up in the shotgun and throwing in the two-point conversion against TCU to the decision to settle for overtime in State College, the Wisconsin coaching staff has lost a sense of what it means to play Badger football in tight games. Sure it is up to players to make plays, but it is up to coaches to give those players a chance to make those plays. Right now, the UW staff is doing anything but. Unless they regain that identity and stick to it when the going gets tough, Wisconsin will continue to descend from its place atop the Big Ten ranks. 

Muhammed Case and Others Put Arbitrary Nature of NCAA Enforcement On Full Display

The fact that UCLA freshman guard Shabazz Muhammed was ruled ineligible by the NCAA prior to the Bruins’ season opener against Indiana State came as a surprise only to those within the Westwood bubble who were unwilling to acknowledge a set of facts that clearly pointed toward a violation. But while the ruling in Muhammed’s case seems to be correct, albeit poorly timed, other cases in which the NCAA handed down rulings this week weren’t based in nearly as much common sense.

For example, nine-game suspensions handed out to Indiana freshmen Peter Jurkin and Hanner Mosquera-Perea came as a result of their having done nothing more than play on an AAU team coached by a man who had given $185 to the school between 1986-1992, apparently enough for that coach, Mark Adams, to be deemed a “booster”.

Given that the way the letter of the law stands right now does indeed mean these suspensions were “by the book”. But if that is the case, then the book needs to be rewritten.

Because right now, the book that is NCAA rules on amateurism is simply too big and too onerous to effectively enforce.

Without the ability to enforce each and every regulation, the organization has forced itself into a situation in which enforcement is necessarily arbitrary. Sometimes the rulings handed down from headquarters in Indianapolis are “by the book”. Other times the ruling seems grounded more in the common sense of the case, even if that common sense isn’t exactly in line with the letter of the law. Consistent enforcement is simply impossible with the way the NCAA has its bylaws written at this point.

The solution? Simplify things.

I hate the idea that student-athletes should be paid by the schools for their participation in intercollegiate athletics. Not because they don’t deserve compensation, but instead because they are already compensated to the tune of up to $50,000 of free tuition, room, and board.

But what I do object to is the prohibition placed on these student-athletes by the NCAA when it comes to obtaining funds from elsewhere.

If a student-athlete gets offered the opportunity to appear in a commercial, they should be free to take it. Just as free as any other student would be.

Should the NCAA shed its unnecessary regulation of student-athletes’ outside employment, it would not only make enforcement easier and thus easier to streamline, but would also eliminate the need for schools to try a circumvention of the rules.

The objective of creating an even playing field in the recruiting process is a noble endeavor, but an endeavor the NCAA takes that is destined to fail and ultimately contradictory to the interests of the student-athletes it is designed to protect. After all, if there is no objection to a free market for academic, musical, research, or need-based scholarship money, then why is the same not acceptable when it comes to financing the education of student-athletes?

Too often I think this argument over athlete compensation is narrowly defined by its application to the “1%” of NCAA athletes that dominate our television sets. Beyond the glitz and glamor of big-time college football and men’s basketball are thousands more student-athletes who truly will “go pro in something other than sports”, even if that slogan is quite cliché.

Ultimately the endeavor to make recruiting happen on an even playing field works against the interests of that majority of student-athletes. It prevents them (in some cases) from accepting academic grants that supplement athletic scholarships when such funds would put their team above its scholarship allotment. It prevents them from taking on summer jobs that could be the result of a connection made through the athletic department, a summer job that could perhaps provide both a source of funds and an entre into their industry of choice.

After all, if the manager gave $185 to the school, he or she could be deemed a booster and then suddenly the summer job in a civil engineering firm turns into a secondary NCAA violation.

The onerous nature of NCAA regulations makes their enforcement both unfair and by nature arbitrary. It allows for a coach with a history of cheating like John Calipari to move up the chain without consequence while at the same time cracking down on an innocent rower who might take a job from an alumnus who gave $150 to the athletic department 25 years ago.

Ultimately the problem with the NCAA bylaws is not that student-athletes are prevented from getting special treatment that they deserve, but rather that those bylaws prevent many student-athletes from taking advantage of opportunities open to their classmates who are not burdened by the watchful eye of the compliance department.

So What: A Rosh Hashanah Sermon

So What? It’s a question that very few of us ever think about. Think about it now: When you want to focus on discovering the meaning of an action, a rule, an event, whatever, you often ask another question: Why?

But that question of why is a question that only leads to further questions, complicating whatever conclusions you may find with more complex issues that often get left unresolved. And when you do this in your life as an individual among the masses of humanity, you are far from alone.

After all, the repositioning of the “So What” aspect of life into the unanswerable question of “why” is what has led to much tragedy and unexplainable atrocities throughout the long history of human life.

After that grandiose introduction, I am sure you are sitting in your seat thoroughly confused.

Perfect. That confusion will get you thinking.

In order to help clear away that confusion and get you on the path toward understanding why I have positioned the question of “why” as the root of all evil on this earth, let me take you back through an experience in my life that led me to realize we have all been asking the wrong questions of ourselves and of our society.

During my sophomore year in high school, I decided to challenge myself and take AP US History. Most students at my high school took US History, AP or not, during their junior year. But there were a handful of us who were ready for the challenge and decided to jump the gun a bit.

The first week of APUSH, as it was affectionately called in the local lingo of Deerfield High School, was one of the tougher weeks I have had to go through in my admittedly sheltered life. From the first sentence out of Mrs. Kaplan’s mouth, I knew I was a bit in over my head.

Homework on the first day? I had enough trouble keeping my wits about me during the 3-hours we had to sit through classes.

But I did the homework and did it well.

Then came Day #2. Class was fine, beyond the whole “sitting in my desk” thing, but the assignment handed out in APUSH was another story.

Never mind the fact I had a golf meet that wouldn’t end until around 8 that night, I didn’t think I could finish the first of the famous “So What” assignments in a whole night.

I know you have no idea what a “So What” is at this point but hang on, I promise I will explain.

Anyway, I put the assignment out of my head during the meet and worked tirelessly to get it done that night. Not just done, but done right.

Here’s the timeout you were waiting for. What is a “So What”?

Well, besides being the bane of existence for the four or five of my classmates who took one look and said, “I think I’ll just switch into regular US History this year”, it was a challenge from Mrs. Kaplan to her students. Sure, it was a challenge that we at the time hated her for giving us, but also a challenge for which would leave those of us who made it through alive will be forever indebted to her.

The challenge was to move beyond the traditional: What happened and why, instead answering a third question: SO WHAT?

George Washington famously crossed the Delaware River. Why? Because the British Army was chasing his fleeting force to the river’s edge.

That is easy.

Answering the question of “SO WHAT” is a much more arduous task.

In other words, why should I care that Washington crossed some river on the east coast?

Why should I care that Neville Chamberlain did not adequately assess the threat that Hitler posed when he signed the Munich Pact?

Why should I care that FDR steamrolled his New Deal programs through a reluctant Congress?

These answers are not as simple as the answers we seem content with on a daily basis. That in itself is a problem, but not the biggest of problems with our being content to know “why” something happened and yet remaining unable to explain the “SO WHAT” that takes that question another level deeper.

Still confused? That’s fine. But hopefully that confusion will begin to clear as I bring all of this to the present day.

So now lets take the current “protests” against the anti-Muslim movie recently thrown out on YouTube.

Muslims around the world were offended by the video, a video that disparages their religion and gives them every right to be offended.

That is the “why” being the protest movement.

But because no one seems to care about the “So What”, a simple event of offensive media has escalated into a deadly serious of violent riots and protests.

First, the protesters: Ok, you are offended. You have every right to be offended. If you want, you even have the right to assemble and protest against the video. If you think the US had something to do with it, sit outside the embassy and protest. Suit yourself.

But before you go burning flags and climbing walls (Libya is a more complex situation), please take a moment, by yourself, to think about the “So What” in this whole ordeal.

So What if you are offended? Is burning down a US Embassy going to help erase your being offended? Is that going to affect the fact that the movie is out there and propagating across the Internet?

No.

So you have to ask yourself: So What?

When you finally do sit down and think about it, there is no reasonable answer to what is clearly a pivotal question. There is no So What?

Now since I am probably not giving this sermon to you in the Muslim Middle East, lets turn the attention back toward home. Toward you. Where it matters.

This failure to address the So What isn’t just a problem for religious extremists, but for all of us.

I get reprimanded for being late to a meeting. Why? I got stuck in traffic. Does that even matter? no, it probably doesn’t.

But if you want to start thinking deeper, does it even matter that I was reprimanded? Again, the probable answer is no. Why is that a bad thing? Because it sets a bad tone. So what?

Nothing.

You are a social conservative and find out you are living next to a gay couple. That doesn’t sit well with you. Why? Because you find that lifestyle deplorable.

So what?

Again, silence.

But the problem is that often we act when we have an actionable answer to the “why” question and not the “So What”.

We lash out against what we feel is wrong with the world around us before even contemplating whether that perceived wrong has any impact on us, our families, or even on our communities.

And it goes both ways. So what if you are a Jewish liberal and end up rooming with an evangelical Christian?

The bottom line is that there are too many rules, too many hot button issues in our society today that simply have no bearing on the important question in human life, the “So What” we all must answer when assessing the world around us.

What the Jewish High Holidays are supposed to do is to get us all to take that time to think about the “So What”.

So what if there is a YouTube video that offends me and disparages my faith? If I believe in the principles of the religion, what does it matter that someone else disagrees?

So what if a neighbor chooses a different lifestyle path than I have chosen? Will that force me down an unwanted path of sin? Instead, maybe it’s a blessing, a chance to learn a thing or two.

And so what if I end up rooming with someone of a different faith? So what even if they try to sway me over to their side? Even the evangelism is simply an opportunity for me to gain a glimpse into the tenants of a faith I myself have no interest in joining. But nonetheless, it’s a learning opportunity.

In the end we all fail ourselves and we fail society by skipping past the “So What” and taking action without true reason. On a macro scale, the result has been the radicalization of minute differences in the innate beliefs we as humans are born and bred with. Over time, these differences have been allowed to fester and have been pushed apart by the divisive actions that have resulted from our unreasoned actions, both as individuals and as a society.

And that brings us to today.

Sure, it is a long shot, but if each and every one of us took the time to think about why we take action based upon belief, our world will gradually become a better place for it.

This is definitely going to have to involve leadership across human societies taking the lead, but each and every one of us is a leader in our own life, a leader that has the power to make a difference, even if that difference goes unnoticed on a larger scale.

These holidays are a perfect opportunity to take a moment to yourself to address your life. To ask the necessary “So Whats” to guide you forward. Do that, and you will be a better person for it, no matter what effect you might have on society.