I want to return to the story of my personal moral and political evolution. Several blogs ago, I outlined a substantive transformation that occurred to me during my college years. The crux of that tale focused on the seemingly abrupt transition from a conventional Catholic, ethnic, working class kid who (mostly) reflected the conservative values of his culture into a raving leftist, if not revolutionary. Okay, not quite that bad, though it must have looked so to my despairing parents.

Nonetheless, the change appeared to be quite dramatic, if not inexplicable. Still, there were prior signs perhaps suggesting  such a transition, if one were paying attention that is. Again, in the spirit of transparency, memory is a very fickle mistress.

Given faulty recollections, I remain cautious about how much faith to put into the narrative shared below. And yet, if history is any guide, I’m more likely to understate as opposed to overstate events and especially my qualities. Such, alas, is a reflection of my ever present imposter syndrome.

No matter, here is what I recall. I believe I had strong empathic impulses from an early age. Unlike girls, boys don’t have best friends. We hardly have friends at all, just ruffians to pummel occasionally and whose asses you hope to whip in future athletic contests. Yet, I recall times when my buddies would have some form of conflict between them and, heaven forbid, would want me to take sides. Perhaps they confused me with someone who gave a damn. My instinct, however, inevitably was to be the peacemaker. I never wanted anyone to feel rejected or left out or inferior, as I often did myself. Apparently, I hated conflict right from the start or perhaps was overly sensitive to the feelings of others.

Then there were these social and political positions I adopted at early age. In an earlier blog, I’m sure I mentioned the vignette where I strongly supported the nation’s Supreme Court decision to desegregate public schools. I went off on this rant (at age 13?) when I heard visitors from the South criticizing the top Court’s legal strike for racial inclusion. My passion on this matter seemed to emerge from nowhere. Surely, no one in my environment felt like this, or at least not this strongly.

And then there was this whole set of thoughts about globalism. I was convinced as a kid that we needed to get away from all this patriotic, jingoistic nonsense. And this was during the height of the Cold War when we all worried the Russkies would fry our butts one day with a nuclear bomb. Still, I had this instinctive, non-tribal need for a world without borders even as I retained considerable pride in being an American. I may even joined (or thought about joining) something called the World Federalist Society, probably a Commie front now that I think on it. Nevertheless, I never could understand why we didn’t use our nation’s great bounty more aggressively to meet the many humanitarian needs so evident across the globe. Is that not what Jesus would do?

These remembered vignettes, among others, have always puzzled me. Perhaps they shouldn’t. I’ve become more convinced over time that while nurture is important, one should never discount nature. It could well be that I was blessed (or cursed) with these strong empathic impulses right at birth. These were basic or instinctive foundations that inexorably drew me to reject the tribalism and exclusionary world in which I had been raised. Such dispositions may all be hard wired. I guess you can’t ignore what God has put in.

But what happened when I was about to go out into the real world … after college and the Peace Corps and earning a Masters Degree. This juncture in life happened during the latter days of the Vietnam protest era. I recall, upon coming back from India, that the younger cohort of leftists on campus seemed to lack what I viewed as authenticity in their political positions. They appeared to be going through the motions, acting according to a given script, mouthing slogans absent serious thought. A few years earlier, I had arrived at my world view after enduring a crucible based on hard and passionate internal struggle. I wasn’t convinced that they had done the same.

I do have this sense that I worried a bit about my future, perhaps more than a bit. When I was young, I couldn’t imagine anyone being foolish enough to hire me. I had no marketable skills from what I could see, except for the inherent Irish ability to generate copious amounts of BS on command. Still, I had never seen a want ad looking for someone who could spout BS on a moments notice 😞.

I do recall someone from my neighborhood, a few years older than I, who was starting his career in the FBI. He pulled me aside one day to give me what he thought was well-considered advice. He warned that ‘my politics in college could easily interfere with my future.’ Essentially, he strongly suggested that my youthful indiscretions were screwing up any remote chance of me being successful in life. I couldn’t easily dismiss his dire warnings.

In fact, I did worry about having an FBI file somewhere. Really, didn’t everyone have a file back then? I remember this one guy who suddenly showed up at the meetings of the student antiwar group I had organized at Clark University. He always tried to be so helpful though I could not place him from anywhere on our small campus. I was quite positive he was a government plant. They were omnipresent during those years.

My favorite story, which some of you might be tired of hearing, involved my military draft physical. Yes, they caught up with me as I was finishing up my masters program in Milwaukee. Oddly enough, I didn’t recall giving them any trouble, as I recall some of the other kids doing. I had always been the good boy. On that day, I was compliant, going through the process absent complaint.

My moment came during a set of paper and pencil tests (the academic stuff was easy, the mechanical questions utterly baffled me). Included in these skills assessment exercises, they included some queries about our political beliefs and associations. Most were dated or innocuous. However, there there was an open-ended question about whether one had belonged to any organization that advocated the violent overthrow of the U.S. government.

I paused at that one, then raised my hand. I asked a grizzled sergeant whether the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) qualified under question Q. “You bet your ass it does, buddy, he redponded.” So, I dutifully filled in the space provided to those with positive responses for recording the required explanatory information, being the honest cuss that I was.

When we got to the end where we dropped off our papers and exited to freedom, things went awry. The person at the exit door looked at my papers, then at me, then at my papers again, then back at me. This was taking way too long. Was I drooling or something? Had I spawned horns from my skull? Then he said, ‘you report to floor number 3.’ 🙄 No one else was going to the third floor. I sensed doom.

You must understand, I had joined SDS rather early on. It was radical at that point but yet still rational. Most members, as I recall, were really smart college students who were questioning what they saw about them. That definitely was me, except for the part about being smart. I was never close to the nutty stuff that soon emerged as frustrations for some kids overwhelmed their common sense.

In any case, these three guys in uniform ushered me into a conference room. I relaxed a bit when I saw no rack or other instruments of torture. Then, each claimed to work for some intelligence agency or other, though they all sounded the same to me. That they worked in intelligence, however, seemed unlikely based on what happened next.

I was grilled for some two or three hours, virtually all of it inane to the extreme. Most escapes me now though I recall vividly that they asked if I would fight any and all enemies of the United States. By this time I was having fun. I recall leaning back in my chair as if deep in thought before replying … ‘I think we should start by defining enemy.’ They replied to that classic Corbett witticism (though sincerely meant) with something about dropping a-holes like me into North Vietnam. That prospect, admittedly, was quite disconcerting. But I suspected they would not do that in the moment.

Back to my main theme! What is the classic trajectory for one’s political and normative life? Is it not that we are liberal in our youth but grow more staid and conservative as we face adult responsibilities. After all, we have careers to pursue, mortgages to pay, and especially families to care for. Who can expect to sustain their political passions or beliefs in light of those pressures? I recall thinking on such matters as the freedom of my youth was coming to an end, assuming my military inquisitors were not successful in dropping me into the middle of a Vietcong stronghold. Little did I know then that I would find a way  to largely evade real adulthood by falling into a most rewarding niche in the best refuge for those wishing to escape reality … the University academy.

One potential pitfall attached to my early radicalism never materialized as I feared it might … that of pursuing a reasonable career in life. I never did decide on a specific professional path nor determined what I wanted to do as an adult. It turns out that’s a remarkably difficult decision to make when you have no skills. I simply enjoyed the luck of the Irish.

Having given the matter remarkably little thought back then (unlike the college kids I taught later), finding my life’s work proved to be a matter of total serendipity and dumb kismet. In school, I simply took classes that interested me. As I completed my masters, I was adrift. I had no idea where I might be going or what I night do .

I got my first real job (I actually worked continuously in menial jobs from my freshman year in high school on) when a professor I did some work for called to tell me I had a job interview in Madison the next morning. (There is a back story here but the call came as a total surprise.) All he had was the address of a government office and a room number. I arrived to discover it was a three-person Wisconsin civil service interview for a position with the title of Research analyst-social services. I knew little about either so thought my prospects for employment nil. After a second interview with the hiring supervisor, I got the job. It was an early example of how bizarre some bureautic decisions are. That odd personnel choice got me involved in human services and in a form of research activity.

About 4 years later, my agency bosses told me to work with a Professor from UW-Madison on a research grant to the federal government that needed state approval. I did and quickly forgot about it. Some time later, the Prof called to ask me if I would come to the University to run this complex project on a daily basis. He did need someone who knew how government worked, a skill which he mistakingly thought I possessed. I pondered that offer for 8 to 10 seconds before saying yes. I was not one to labor over things at length.

As the project came to a close after two years, I concluded that the academy (even with all the pressures of an R-1 research institution) was better than working for a living. So, I entered a doctoral program at UW even as I continued to help several faculty on other projects. Unlike my student peers, my doctoral studies were not my primary focus at the time … the policy issues in which I was emerged were. I was hooked on trying to solve impossible social problems. More or less, I would remain at the University (primarily the Institute for Research on Poverty and the School of Social Work) for some 30-plus years. 

When I reconnected with my old college crush after some 40 years, she remarked how I had turned out doing exactly as she had envisioned I would way back in school. Apparently, she knew I would find a niche in the world of ideas while focusing on social issues and the betterment of society. She intuited me far better than I did myself. In some way, she sensed that I had a plan (or perhaps fate) right from the beginning … which I clearly did not.

The other issue that caused me to pause on the precipice of adulthood was the specter of family responsibility … marriage and children. I had spent my entire youth denying any interest in marriage, considering it a fine institution only if you wish to be institutionalized. Still, I would succumb as do most men. But I did marry someone who was smart, independent,  and successful. She really did not need me which begs the question of why she put up with a loser like me for 50 years. Still, her not needing me took pressure off the marriage decision.

The bigger issue by far was children. After all, they are totally vulnerable for many years, perhaps decades if you are unlucky. Of course, there are many reasons for not issuing offspring. For example, I had a dark vision of the nation’s future back then. Then again, being half – Irish, my visions were always dark. Still, it struck me as unfair to any child to bring them into a world that held so little promise.

In addition, I was overwhelmed by the difficulty of raising a child. While I took on many hard tasks and responsibilities in life, that particular obligation (child- rearing) seemed way beyond my pay range. Many decades of watching others raise kids has not disabused me of that singular opinion in the least. I am totally in awe of good parenting.

And then there was the concern that is most germane to this blog. If I took on this awesome task. I might not be able to be true to myself, and to my beliefs. If I had to choose between my personal commitments and supporting others (especially a child), I would be torn indeed. I really never wanted to be in that untenable position.

So, I did what any coward would do … I got a vasectomy as a very young man. The physician I contacted to perform the dirty deed made me undergo psychological testing, just to see if I was into self-mutilation or whether I was just plain nuts. Somehow, I passed this exploration of my psyche. I always was a slippery cuss.

Adulthood did smooth the edges off my revolutionary fervor. While I was ensconced in the academy as a researcher and teacher and consultant and general policy wonk, I was swallowed up in the intricacies of doing public policy as an avocation. I did all the stuff of a traditional academic, but I was first and foremost a policy wonk. 

What I quickly discovered is that the doing of policy is a complex, multifaceted undertaking. You are forced to see both sides. Besides, little was straight forward. There were unintended consequences to even the best of ideas.

Back then, when it was possible, I worked with people from both sides of the political spectrum. We could find common ground if we tried. Reaching out to broad array of folk representing diverse points of view necessitated listening carefully and well. It demanded the kind of empathy based on appreciating views distinct from your own.

Now, my so-called area of expertise was social change with an emphasis on welfare reform. Okay, continuing to have the attention span of a firefly, I was all over the map. Still, I was in the trenches during the the bitter state and national fights over the nation’s approaches to helping our most vulnerable citizens. As Joseph Califano (President Carter’s HEW Secretary) once said, welfare reform is the Mideast of domestic policy. Trying to reform those programs was not an undertaking for the faint of heart.

I always sought a common ground where possible. One of my most impactful articles was a piece titled Child Poverty: Progress or Paralysis. In it, I articulated a metaphor (peeling an onion) through which I managed to argue that seemingly oppositional policy positions were, in fact, complementary. They merely addressed the needs and circumstances of distinct layers within the dependent population. For years, that article would crop up wherever I went. The federal General Accountability Office (GAO) routinely distributed it when Congressional offices asked for background information on welfare issues.

There were times, of course, when I was caught up in the moment. In those moments I would confront  difficult decisions and faced complex pressures. If you were in the middle of the reform fights, they could not be avoided. But, they will have to wait for a future blog. Perhaps I will master the virtue of brevity one day. But that day is not today.

Until my next rant, stay well.