Addressing a sea of red, white and blue clothing and military-themed hats at Mount Olivet Cemetery, William “Bill” Hartmann recounted an experience from March 2003 that, to this day, prompts a profound debt of gratitude he feels for service members killed in war.
Americans hate to hear it, but other countries do a lot of things better than we do. Mass transit, health care, paid vacation, family leave, recycling, rehabilitation of criminals, support of the arts — there are several nations that do all of those things better than we do, despite the U.S. being one of the five wealthiest countries in the world. Above all, the most troubling comparison emanates from the very thing that stands before us again this week — the amount of gun violence inflicted on Americans from sea to shining sea.
On the third Saturday in May, a national spotlight shines on Baltimore for the running of the Preakness Stakes. The true meaning of this annual occurrence sometimes gets lost on all of us who care deeply about the city. But it is an opportunity for us to show the country what the real Baltimore is — welcoming, resilient, vibrant and incredibly diverse. Some have said that it’s like having the Super Bowl every year at the corner of Haywood and Belvedere venues.
With the passage of the Maryland Police Accountability Act of 2021, the Maryland General Assembly replaced the Law Enforcement Officers Bill of Rights with a new disciplinary framework mandating that all Maryland counties create a citizen-led police accountability board, an administrative charging committee and a trial board. The intent of the bill is clear: we need more community involvement in the investigation and discipline of police officers accused of misconduct, and we must remove unwarranted impediments to administrative discipline of police officers who commit misconduct.
“Mom. We’ve been doing drills for this our whole lives,” my 15-year-old said when I tested his mood after the classroom massacre in Texas this week. “We know this stuff happens,” he said, barely containing an eyeroll before slinging a backpack over his shoulder and heading toward the metal detector at his school entrance in Georgetown, one of the wealthiest enclaves in America.
The future of the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future is in the hands of the next governor. According to recent internal polls, the candidate who has, by far, the strongest education credentials — John King, the former U.S. secretary of education under President Obama — is well behind several other better known and financed candidates in the crowded Democratic field. Otherwise, it’s hard to pick an education favorite. In forums, gubernatorial candidates are usually lobbed softball questions that are easy to knock out of the park, and the Democrats tend to trot around the bases in lockstep.
When did I become me? I suppose I would have been conceived in January, at which point I would have been a mere single-celled, fertilized zygote. That zygote met pretty much all of the properties of life biologists typically use to distinguish what is alive and what is non-living: It was organized by molecules and organelles, had a metabolism, could maintain homeostasis and was growing. It is at this point that 95% of biologists would consider me “alive.” Some cultures protect this zygote’s life, with countries like Honduras, Montenegro, and the Philippines banning even the morning-after pill.
It will take weeks, if not months, to get a complete picture of exactly what happened in Uvalde, Texas, on Tuesday when an 18-year-old opened fire in the Robb Elementary School killing at least 19 children and two adults before he was killed by police. The gut-wrenching terror as youngsters ran for their lives. The agony of families learning their children’s fate.
In Maryland’s solidly Democratic 4th Congressional District, anchored in Prince George’s County, the party’s primary this summer is a contest between two relatively well-known “formers.” It pits former representative Donna F. Edwards, running to regain the seat she held from 2008 to 2017, against Prince George’s former top prosecutor, Glenn Ivey. Both are able, savvy, qualified candidates, but Mr. Ivey would make a more effective member of Congress. He has our endorsement.
In the Washington area, we are emerging from an intermittently chilly spring into the full glory of May’s greening trees and blooming wildflowers, the return of migratory birds and the awakening from slumber of turtles, frogs and other creatures for whom warmth is essential. At the National Arboretum, the azaleas have passed their peak, and trillium, increasingly hard to find, are blooming here and there throughout the arboretum’s winding paths and woodlands.