Let’s Thank Bishop Budde and All Helpers
Bishop Budde and some people who have helped me; plus book ban news
Help is out there
Almost everyone I know has had a horrible week and is looking for both allies and positive moments that will re-energize them. So rather than list all the terrible things from this week—from the truly heinous to the ridiculous (Gulf of America, anyone?), I want to be positive and point, first, to some allies, and then to the incredible embodiment of hope that is the Right Rev. Mariann Budde, the Episcopal bishop of Washington.
I’ve never understood the ethics of being a billionaire, but one thing I’ve always believed is that if you are one, you don’t have to submit to anyone. So I was really surprised when all the tech bros bent the knee for Trump. Yeah, he could affect government contracts, but loss of contracts won’t affect billionaires’ lifestyles, etc. They have the option that someone whose livelihood is threatened by not being ‘loyal’ doesn’t have—that is, they can tell absolutely anyone to fuck off.
I was talking to my friends and family about this because I still don’t understand it. I saw last week in Paul Krugman’s post “The Pathetic Billionaires’ Club” that I’m not the only person wondering about this:
Why is this self-owning by billionaires so extraordinary? Well, ask yourself: What’s the point of being rich?
Past a certain level of wealth, it can’t really be about material things. I very much doubt that billionaires have a significantly higher quality of life than mere multimillionaires.
To the extent that there’s a valid reason for accumulating a very large fortune, I’d say that it involves freedom, the ability to live your life more or less however you want. Indeed, one definition of true wealth is having “fuck you money” — enough money to walk away from unpleasant situations or distasteful individuals without suffering a big decline in your living standards. And some very wealthy men — most obviously Mark Cuban, but I’d at least tentatively include Bill Gates and Warren Buffett — do seem to exhibit the kind of independence wealth gives you if you choose to exercise it.
My favorite political cartoonist, Ann Telnaes, wasn’t allowed to criticize that billionaire self-owning in the Washington Post. And then one of my favorite columnists, Jennifer Rubin, left. So I left, too, canceled my subscription. Rubin, along with Norm Eisen started
on Substack, so I got a paid subscription. (They have a lot of free posts, FYI.) And also has a Substack that I subscribed to. (I still subscribe to two newspapers, both of which have done some crappy stuff, too. Ugh.)
The Contrarian has many writers and guest writers. Here’s a good example of what it offers from the article “How to Drink from a Firehose” by
. Litt discusses how not to despair and to work for the good. One of his suggestions is not to weigh in on Trump (don’t ask people who disagree with you to discuss his character), but rather to use specific examples of what is going on.For right now, if a total stranger asked me to sum up this week, I’d say something like this:
“There’s a guy named Daniel Rodriguez. On January 5th, 2020, he texted his friends ‘There will be blood.’ On January 6th, when he stormed the Capitol, he grabbed a police officer and shocked him repeatedly in the neck with a stun gun. A jury of peers sentenced him to twelve years in prison for his violent crime. And less than 24 hours after taking office, Trump let Daniel Rodriguez back out on the street.”
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. He always has the info on pending legislation (when to make calls to your representatives), campaigns around the country you can donate to, etc. He was too hopeful in his repeated assessment that he would rather be in the Harris camp than the Trump camp during the election campaign. (Yes, Trump was doing awful stuff and was becoming a convicted felon, but history—only eight years before—told us that America doesn’t care that a candidate is a sexual predator, grossly unethical, a failed businessman, etc. Competence and ethics are no longer the yardsticks.) Still, Rosenberg has good advice on where to focus your attention, week to week.Good people rising
Okay, let’s focus our attention on the good people. Everyone I know is lit up by Bishop Budde right now. She’s the anti-dingus in
’s “Dingus of the Week” post.The bishop presided over a prayer service held in the Washington Cathedral on January 21, which was attended by the president, the vice president, and their families.
During the sermon, Budde pleaded with the president to show mercy to the vulnerable — LGBTQ people, immigrants, and so many others who have been the target of the craven rhetoric and policies of the new president.
Her words were gentle as she stated, "Millions have put their trust in you. And as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God. In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now. There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican, and Independent families, some who fear for their lives.”
Sean Hannity described the sermon as a "disgraceful prayer full of fear mongering and division."
Lawrence Jones, Fox & Friends co-host, called Budde a “radical leftist.”
Matt Walsh declared that "hell exists for people like Mariann" and called her "exhibit A for why women should not be pastors, priests, or bishops.”1
And Rep. Mike Collins, a Republican from Georgia, said that Budde should be added to the deportation list.
And like, listen, I grew up Baptist. So I am going to tell you that in a Christian religious context, if you are the one trying to nail the soft-spoken religious leader to a cross, you are the bad guy.
Yeah, the bad guys are trying to take her down, but it’s not working. The reason I included the photo of my tea mug with the words “This nasty woman gets shit done” is because Trump called Budde “nasty.” (She has a ‘nasty tone.’) But then, that’s his favorite word for women who oppose him, isn’t it?
Some of the usual MAGA suspects just posted in socials like they are followers of the antiChrist. (See excerpt from Lyz Lenz, above.) Saying empathy is a sin? Are you fucking kidding me?
In his Book Club newsletter, Ron Charles discusses Budde’s most recent book, How We Learn to Be Brave.
And so, Budde cradles our doubts and reassures us that cowardice is natural but never final in the long arc of salvation. “The message throughout Scripture is that whenever God, or life itself, issues the summons, it’s normal to feel both unworthy and unprepared, but it doesn’t matter,” she writes. “We are to step into the gap between our current capacity and what’s needed anyway.
“This country needs leaders now, and citizens who can face things as they are, work to change what can be changed, and not give up hope for the future.” Amen.
I was delighted when, a few days ago, I saw that Budde had written this book. A high school friend posted that it was already sold out everywhere. True. And yay! I bought it as an audiobook. I could have gotten the ebook, but I have an unfortunate failing: my ebooks are out of sight, out of mind. I buy them, but I usually don’t read them.
Showing my gratitude
I’m grateful for the support I have received in bringing my novel Keep Sweet to life. It launches on June 21st—the first day of summer! Yes, good people are everywhere in life! Three of them wrote ‘blurbs’ (quick, positive comments for the back cover) and one made very helpful editorial suggestions. While blurbs must be brief, a person needs to read the book in order to write one. So it’s a solid ask of another author to do so.
I wanted to make something in return. I had a narrow piece of high-quality denim given to me by a friend as well as cotton fabric scraps from my own and my friends' projects. Scraps far too small for most projects. In the past, I posted about making bookmarks from them. (See this post for some bookmark photos.) I decided I could now make book totes. I didn’t have a pattern, but all the 12 pattern pieces would be rectangles. So I just needed to use some elementary math to plan. And, of course, I used the narrow strip left over from the front pocket design to make a bookmark for each. Yeah, I like matching stuff. Book tote matches bookmark? Happiness.
What I’m reading
I stopped reading The Bog Wife because I am going to write a blurb for an upcoming novel, Carlos Cortes’s Scout’s Honor. So far, it’s an incisive look back at mid-twentieth-century Boy Scouts, ages 12-14, when ‘boys will be boys’ excused all sorts of terrible behavior, including sexism, prejudice, and bullying. But when one of the boys turns his bullying against his own close friends, patrol members, and a scout leader, he ends up dead. (This is not a spoiler—he is dead in the first paragraph of the novel.) I’ll continue to read this week and find out ‘who done it’ and why.
I’ve been listening to the audio version of The Algebra of Wealth by Scott Galloway. It’s about how to plan and invest in order to be able to retire. It’s a general overview and probably not informative for those in the know. But I’m guessing readers here weren’t finance or accounting majors. (Except you, Lisa. And thank you for reading and supporting me!) You might be thinking, “Aren’t you a bit late, Vic?” And, yes, you are right. But I listened to see if it would be useful to my adult kids, who majored in humanities and science subjects. I think it is very useful. I didn’t want to buy the book twice, so I put a copy on hold in the library (Yay libraries!) I’m going to see if I can get my guys to read it.
I started listening to How We Learn to Be Brave, discussed above.
Part 2: Library and book ban news
Kootenai County library system approves adult-only room for books with mature content as 140 titles pulled from shelves for review from The Spokesman-Review
Books with mature themes will soon be relegated to an adults-only room in most public libraries in Kootenai County.
The private room is a requirement of an Idaho law passed last year, and the Idaho-based Community Library Network board voted Thursday to set up such a room at the Post Falls Library.
The library board also voted to stop children’s Community Library Network library cards from accessing other library systems that may not be subject to the Idaho law.
Utah students can no longer bring personal copies of banned books to school From kuer 90.1 (NPR)
While the 2024 law focuses on materials that schools own or use, one line in the state code explicitly states, “Sensitive materials are prohibited in the school setting.”
According to the state board’s updated FAQ, any books banned statewide are prohibited on any school property. Similarly, those banned by a local school district for being “sensitive material” are prohibited on any of that district’s school grounds.
“These titles should not be brought to school or used for classroom activities, assignments, or personal reading while on school property,” the FAQ page states.
Authors Guild Files Lawsuit Against Book Bans in Colorado School District From The Authors Guild
discontinuous excerpts:
The Authors Guild, the NAACP, and individual plaintiffs filed a federal lawsuit on December 19 against the Elizabeth School District in Colorado for removing books from school libraries based on their content and viewpoints. The lawsuit challenges the school board’s decision to permanently ban 19 books, many of which are highly acclaimed and widely taught across the country.
Beyond removing existing books, the board directed librarians not to order any new books for school libraries, banned classroom libraries entirely (causing teachers to cover their book collections with brown paper or take them home), and prohibited students from sharing books with each other in school. It switched from Scholastic to SkyTree Books, a vendor that promised book fairs without any LGBTQIA+ content, Critical Race Theory, foul language, explicit content, or dark magic. [Vic here—that’s a book fair that isn’t going to raise any money 🤣]
The board also implemented a system requiring parents to be notified whenever their child checks out a book on the “sensitive list,” with no way for parents to opt out of these notifications. These actions stigmatized books by and about racial minorities and LGBTQIA+ people by labeling them as inappropriate or dangerous, creating an environment where parents and teachers feel afraid to disagree with or challenge these policies publicly. The board threatened disciplinary action against staff members who provided “harsh feedback” about its decisions, compelled teachers to create inventories of their classroom libraries for review and potential further removals, and ultimately caused some families to withdraw their children from the district entirely.
To add insult to injury, board members admitted they had not fully read many of the banned books before deciding to remove them. The board’s actions appear politically motivated rather than educationally justified, with board members explicitly stating they were acting to impose “conservative values.”
Education Dept. Ends Book Ban Investigations from the New York Times (gift article—worth reading in its entirety)
The department said it would relinquish its role investigating schools that had received civil rights complaints after removing books dealing with sexual and racial identity.
By proclaiming that the department would not intervene in cases where students or parents felt they were harmed by the removal of certain titles, the announcement appeared to clear the way for states to enact more restrictive policies.
The headline for this change in the new Department of Education press release is:
U.S. Department of Education Ends Biden’s Book Ban Hoax
From Every Library:
If you worry about libraries and want to take action in helping them, go to Every Library (a registered 501(c)4 organization) and sign up for their newsletter. They will give you actionable ideas. Here are some of the things they are writing about now:
One of Trump's first actions was to rescind Biden's Executive Order 14084, titled "Promoting the Arts, the Humanities, and Museum and Library Services."
This action will dismantle the Committee on the Arts and Humanities and deliver a devasting blow to America's commitment to preserving the arts, the humanities, and museum and library services.
Trump's previous administration proposed eliminating all federal funding for libraries.
This action is the first step in dismantling the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
We know his supporters are enacting state legislation to arrest librarians, ban books, and defund libraries.
We'll have actions for you to take in the coming weeks, but we made it easy for you to write to your legislators today to ask them to support libraries.
What I will agree with is that this is the kind of thing women do when you make them Christian church leaders. Jesus-centered things. Imagine that.
Excellent. Substack today. Informative while providing options for actions in a time when one feels ineffective. Thank you, Vic.
Really great newsletter today! Thanks for mentioning Every Library! I joined and sent a donation. I’ll be damned if scared parents are going to ruin libraries on my watch.