Gayness: An Immoral choice?

Romney was for gays before he was against them. Huckabee thinks that being gay is an immoral choice. Guiliani dances around the issue saying that being gay is not a sin, but what a gay person does is sinful. Huh? Tancreado probably thinks all illegal immigrants are gay. While having an opinion about gay people is not the central issue of this presidential cycle, how these men feel about the issue serves as a barometer to their thought processes. Do they consider all available evidence before they make a decision or do they stick a finger up in the air to see which way the wind is blowing? As someone who has studied the issue rather extensively (in researching my novel "Rx for Mass Murder") one of the most likely explanations for 'gayness' is the level of female hormones the male fetus is exposed to during his mother's pregnancy. A substantial amount of scientific evidence supports this hypothesis. How does this scientific explanation square with the labeling of homosexuality as an immoral choice? Millions upon millions of pregnant women were indiscriminantly administered synthetic sex hormones during pregnancies in the 50s and 60s and there is a remarkable correlation between the incidence of homosexuality (and AIDS) in various geographic regions with the sales of these products years earlier. It is my belief that anyone who truly wants to have an informed opinion on this subject would be aware of the scientific evidence before they express an opinion that is obviously intended to pander only to the semi-literate belief systems of those who choose to keep their heads buried in the sand.

An Attorney's Pro Bono Rebuttal

An article appearing in this morning's New York Times decribing the indictment of Richard Scruggs, a Mississippi attorney, in his purported attempt to bribe a judge has motivated me to write this essay. My reason for so doing will hopefully be obvious by the end of my rant. Lawyers take a bad rap. They are viewed by the public as greedy, vicious and dishonest. My experience, with few exceptions, has been quite the opposite. I know hundreds of lawyers who give freely of their time and energies to help others. These people participate willingly and lovingly in all manners of civic and church-related activities. Throughout my life I have been fortunate; as a lawyer I took the concept of helping others who needed my help seriously. Various state bar associations, including Michigan's, have established guidelines for lawyers to follow in the rendering of pro bono help. In Michigan, as an example, if a lawyer does not actually perform pro bono services, he/she may contribute $300 annually to various organizations who do. During the course of my professional career I have rendered pro bono services to a number of clients which greatly enriched my life and I am offering my example, not to blow my own horn, so to speak, but to describe some of the matters in which I have involved myself to the public, other members of my profession and my grandchildren to illustrate how lawyers can and have contributed to what is good about this country. As a back drop to this discussion let me briefly describe my current activities; I am serving as an Florida Supreme Court-approved emeritus attorney in Bradenton, Florida for Manasota Legal Aid which provides free legal services in civil matters for those who cannot afford a lawyer. The Florida Supreme Court has established a program whereby retired attorneys, unlicensed in Florida, but in good standings in their home states, can render pro bono services in Florida if certain conditions are met. I am also serving as a guardian ad litem through a nationally recognized GAL organization in Manatee county which serves as a model for the nation in how to deal with children subjected to the foster care system. My first pro bono case in the mid-1970s was on behalf of John Pilarowski, a health care administrator for the Macomb County (Michigan) Department of Public Health. John, acting as a private citizen and not on behalf of his employer, wrote a series of letters to the editor of a local newspaper that were highly critical of various elected officials. He was fired for his letter writing activities. After reading of his dilemma in the newspaper, I called John and told him I would represent him for nothing. After the case was thrown out of the local court by a judge who was a target of one of the letters, I appealed and obtained a wonderful opinion from the Michigan Court of Appeals which clearly spelled out the constitutionally protected rights of expression of an individual in our society and restored employment to Mr. Pilarowski. The essence of that opinion was that if this was the way this local government did business then the county "needed more letter writers, not less". On behalf of the taxpayers of the Chippewa Valley School system, in the late 1970s I sought injunctive relief against striking teachers by suing the school board and asking the judge to order the board not to negotiate with the teachers. There is a two paragraph Michigan statute in which the first paragraph forbids public employees from striking. The second paragraph forbids public employees from condoning illegal acts. I asked the trial judge to prevent the board from condoning the illegal act of the striking teachers. The teachers went back to work the next day. Then in the early 1980s, there was the Kalamazoo case in which a local judge refused to consider making a decision as to whether or not to allow an abortion to be performed upon a 12 year old girl who was raped and impregnated by her mother's boy friend. The pregnancy was at about its tenth week and time was running. The local appointed attorney in that matter was quoted in the newspaper stories that followed that ruling as saying he didn't know what to do next. I called him on the phone and on his behalf I presented a full blown evidentiary hearing, expert testimony and all, to a federal judge in less than 36 hours of my phone call which resulted in the federal judge ordering the local judge to make a decision. My activity in this matter ended at that point but it noteworthy that the local attorney I represented received the Attorney of the Year award for his efforts from the Kalamazoo County Bar Association. The longest pro bono case was on behalf of Dave Davis who was charged with the murder of his wife. The contention was that he injected her with the drug succinylcholine and made it appear that her death was as a result of a fall off her horse striking her head. I began representing Mr. Davis in January, 1989 and continued to represent him until the early 2000s. My representation was total and included one lengthy pre trial exam, a two day Davis-Frye hearing where I contested the validity of the testing procedure which purportedly demonstrated the presence of the drug in the deceased's body, the trial, and two appellate efforts to both the Michigan Court and Appeals and the Michigan Supreme Court. Finally, after exhausting all state remedies I sought federal court habeas corpus protection for Mr. Davis. All in all, I expended several thousand hours of effort on behalf of Mr. Davis. My final pro bono effort in the State of Michigan was on behalf of all of the taxpayers of the State of Michigan in the mid-90s. My wife and three daughters were the designated named plaintiffs in this class action suit against the State of Michigan, the Governor, the Attorney General and the tobacco industry. Basically, this was a two pronged suit in which I asked the federal court for relief by way of mandamus against the Attorney General to compel him to take over the suit against the tobacco industry. While the federal judge held her ruling on the standing of the Plaintiffs to bring this lawsuit in abeyance, the Attorney General agreed to file the case in state court in Ingham County. It is noteworthy that while I agreed to represent the interests of the State of Michigan pro bono, the Attorney General subsequently negotiated a deal with out of state lawyers, including the recently indicted Richard Scruggs from Mississippi to represent Michigan which netted those out of state lawyers a fee of 450 million dollars! The $450 million award "works out to an hourly rate of $22,500, based on claims by the law firms in South Carolina and Mississippi that they spent an unbelievable 20,000 hours on the Michigan portion of the tobacco case," reported the Detroit Free Press's Dawson Bell. Arbitrators conceded that lawyers had done only a "modest" amount of work specifically on behalf of the Wolverine State, but said their efforts on the litigation on a national level deserved kudos, besides which it had been a coup for them to have recruited then-Michigan Attorney General Frank Kelley, considered influential among his fellow AGs.

I'm Not Inspired

There! I've finally been able to verbalize what it is that bothers me about Hillary Clinton. She doesn't inspire me. Nothing she has ever said or done has caused this jaded soul to sit up and take note. The same can be said for most of the presidential candidates. Two moments that occurred very recently during the last Republican debate will best exemplify what I mean; McCain's statements on waterboarding (It is torture) and Huckabee's on scholarship money for children of illegal immigrants (It is morally wrong to punish children for their parents' misdeeds). Each of these men managed to connect with me on a visceral level because they took a politically unpopular stance that differed from the 'party line'. Contrast each of these men's statements with that of Romney. Romney says he would consult with men like McCain to determine his position on interrogation tactics and whether waterboarding is an appropriate means. Romney's reply to Huckabee's principled stand on the children of illegal immigrants was less than profound, "This is taxpayer's money". I am seeking in my choice for the next president is someone who is willing to say what I need to hear, not what I want to hear. Example: I may not want to hear that a major tax increase will be absolutely necessary to pay for the nearly trillion dollars that has been squandered on the Iraq war, but I need to hear how this debt can be wiped off the books without encumbering future generations. I need to hear how our national honor will be restored based upon the truly magnificent principles spelled out so clearly in our constitution. I need to hear someone say they will put principle above politics in doing the things they intend to do as our next president. I need to hear someone say that it is just plain wrong to put special interests at the head of the line. I need to hear someone say that each and every one of us has a vested interest in the outcome of what is going on in the Mideast and needs to make some sacrifice for that purpose, something like the paying of a dollar a gallon tax on gasoline. I think the country is ready to hear the equivalent message so elegantly put forth by Kennedy at his inauguration; "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country". I'm ready to hear this message. I need to hear this message. I don't think I 'm alone.

Can I Ride my Bike?

About half of my neighbors recycle their garbage. Virtually 100 percent of us, including myself, hop in our cars to perform the simplest of chores. One of my three daughters lives in a subdivision in which it is impossible for children to walk to school so they are driven either by the school bus or the parents. My other two daughters live in neighborhoods where their children can walk and to their credit they see that their kids do walk every day past the substantial number of young parents who drop the kids off. I read recently that in Japan all non-essential lights are turned off in government building at 5:00 P.M. to save energy and the environment and that in Tokyo residents are required to separate out 7 different kinds of products for recycling. At my home in Florida I have two different patterns to my workouts. Every other day I ride my bike for about an hour in a circular pattern through and around various neighborhoods avoiding traffic as much as I can. On the alternate days I hop into my car to drive to the athletic club which is about two miles from home where I ride a stationery version of my bike for the same time so that I can add some weight training to my regimen with the various machines that are at the club. I talked to my buddy, Stan Kazul, yesterday. Stan lives in Palo Alto, California and recently went to a wedding in Culver City, a suburb of Los Angeles. It took him one and one-half hours to drive from the airport to Culver City, a distance of less than five miles on an eight lane (each way) highway where the speed of his automobile never exceeded five miles per hour. We hear about global warming and the energy crisis. Common sense alone tells us that the earth's supply of oil is not endless. The point of all this is that we need to think big and act small. Without doing the little things that, collectively, would make a real difference in our shepherding of the planet, concern for the big picture is meaningless. We all have it within our power, in one way or another, to do the little things that count. President Jimmy Carter was widely mocked when he suggested during his presidency that one of the ways that people could deal with the energy crisis of the 1970s was to turn down their thermostats to 68 degrees during the winter. He wore a cardigan sweater when he gave the speech that made that suggestion and he was ridiculed for it. If I was teaching a sixth grade class I would have them sit down and list ten things that each of the students in the class could do on a daily basis to reduce their so-called carbon foot print on earth. Come to think of it, I'm going to make my own list. I'm going to ride my damn bike to the athletic club.

Cottage Days

I am so proud to step aside and introduce a guest author today. What follows was written by one of my grandchildren, Matt Giacona, who occasionally, according to his parents, also likes to get 'the last word.'


It was a cool, crisp summer day in Williamsburg, Michigan. I stepped out onto the weathered oak deck that dominated the front of my grandparents’ cottage, strapping down my grey and blue life jacket, and trotted down the stepping stone path that led to the beach. At the end of the path, I looked down over the beach. The morning sky was overcast, but there was no humidity. I walked down to the beach and waded out into the calm, glassy water. The red and white Yamaha S2000 wave runner bobbed lazily up and down. As I mounted it, a chill ran down my spine. It was not one of those creepy forms of chills that you get when you walk into a dark room but the kind of chill that happens when you get a real good grade on a test. I jammed the key into its groove, twisting it as I went. Once the engine was running, I popped the choke into place and revved the engine. To the east, the sun was poking up from the tops of the low clouds signaling it was getting close to noon. Wanting to be back and dried off before lunch, I gave the throttle a gentle squeeze, propelling me towards the deep blue. Once I was out far enough, I scanned the water. It was calm with rolling waves and a nice breeze. I had three quarters of a tank left of gas: more than enough for barely an hour’s ride. I floored it, heading directly at a wave. Crash, thunk, thunk! I hit the wave at 45 mph, creating an explosion of water. The thunks were caused by the wave runner skimming the surface a few times before coming to a halt. I started up again, this time heading in the opposite direction so I could jump the waves instead of destroying them. I was approaching a wave fast with my head down and eyes up. Just as I hit the wave, I flicked the nose controls up. I soared over the water, pulling at least 2 G’s. The flight could have been compared to a swan. However, the landing was more along the lines of a crow. Shredding the placid water, the wave runner floated to a halt. Suddenly, the tranquil moment was gone as my cell phone’s ring tone interrupted the silence, “Soulja boy up in it, ohh! Watch me crank it, watch me roll!” The ringing came from inside the airtight compartment where I had stored my cell phone. I flipped the phone open, “Hello?” It was my dad. “Matt, it’s Dad”, he announced. “Come on in now - its eleven o’clock”, he said in a stern voice.
I looked at my gas gauge, which was almost on E. Zooming in toward the shore, I moored the wave runner, leaving my cell phone in the compartment. As I slowly waded back in, I turned around. Looking at the wave runner, I said, “Same time tomorrow, right?” The wave runner bobbed up and down as if agreeing.

One Question

With all the biased and deceitful questions being asked of the presidential candidates for both parties, I have yet to hear anyone address the most important issue of our time. My question to candidates of both parties is: How do you propose to deal with the estimated one trillion dollar debt incurred by the United States as a result of the war in Iraq? From that central question flows a multitude of ancillary ones, such as 'Is it fair to saddle future generations of Americans with the crippling debt of this war?' Or 'How will you ensure that our returning veterans are adequately compensated or treated for their efforts in Iraq?'

A Challenge

This is a challenge issued to any one who might be reading this essay. I ask that you print this challenge or store it on your hard drive in such a way that come November, 2008 you can retrieve it and see if my prediction has come true. This is it; my prediction is that Huckabee and Obama will be the presidential candidates and that Obama will win in a near landslide. You can almost sense the forces grinding away from the supposedly inevitable outcomes that hold current sway. The tectonic plates of political thinking are shifting and most Americans are coming to realize that, no matter what, they prefer civilized candidates who speak and act with a measure of humanity about their fellow human beings. We, the American public, cry out for candidates who give us hope that a sense of decency will prevail over special interests in the new administration. As an example, the most revealing part of the recent Republican debates was Huckabee's touching defense of his providing educational grants to children of illegal aliens in Arkansas during his tenure as governor of that state. A message of hope; that is what we need. Both Huckabee and Obama provide us with a glimmer of that hope. By my reckoning, all other candidates (other than McCain) fail to pass that test for a variety of reasons. The most subtle example is Edwards' apparent need to demonize the wealthy (two classes in America, etc.) I mention McCain who I like very much, but in the current political climate I think he is unelectable simply because of his pro-war stance. Keep this article someplace. I may wind up with egg on my face and this may turn out to be nothing more than my simple wish list for a potential outcome, but I don't think so.