Archive - June 19, 2020

    Bill Josephson Responds to Wendy Melillo’s “How the US Government Sold the Peace Corps to the American Public.”   I have tried to make sure that what I have received is the complete document that she published in Conversation.  I’m not sure that I have succeeded. I disagree with Ms. Melillo’s statement that “Peace Corps advertising emphasize myths about heroes, adventure . . . But fighting communism was among the agency’s original foreign policy purposes, according to Peace Corps historians and other scholars.”  Ms. Melillo cites virtually no authority for that statement. The origins of the Peace Corps include the bills sponsored by then Senator Hubert H. Humphrey for a point four youth corps, Representative Henry Reuss and others, particularly Congressmen who had had missionary experience. Point four, of course, was President Harry S Truman’s proposal for technical assistance worldwide. “Fighting communism” was not a theme of the University of . . .

Thanks for the ‘heads up’ from Steven Saum (Ukraine 1994-96) GUEST ESSAY Northern Express Traverse City JUNE 13, 2020   THE PANDEMIC, OR HOW PEOPLE ARE LIKE BUTTERFLIES by Kathleen Stocking (Thailand & Romania) When did I become more interested in reading about the plague than daily dealings with it? The internet mediates all information. The telephone is part of every conversation. I have not seen a friend face-to-face in so long I can’t remember what it’s like. I am sick and tired of my hot and germ-infested blue-green surgical mask, dangling from one ear when I’m not wearing it, and the pervasive smell of hand sanitizer. Please God, when I die, let me not smell like hand sanitizer. It’s early June in the year 2020 on the northern shores of Lake Michigan. The stores are starting to open again, but there will be no National Cherry Festival in Traverse . . .