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OPINIONOPINION

Mountain View News Saturday, September 13, 2025

MOUNTAIN 
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STUART TOLCHIN

PUT THE LIGHTS ON

RICH JOHNSON

 REMEMBERING 

CHARLIE KIRK AND AMERICA


TRYING TO DO THE IMPOSSIBLE


It was and still is my 
intent to create a positive 
article for this 
week’s paper. Prior to 
beginning the article, I 
watched the PBS News 
Hour and that has 
made my task even more difficult. Israel 
has bombed Qatar; Russia has bombed 
civilians picking up their pensions in the 
Ukraine near where my father was born. 
The recent Supreme Court has issued a 
decision concerning immigration enforcement 
in which a conservative majority 
granted a stay of a lower court order 
preventing federal immigration officers 
from conducting stops without reasonable 
suspicion taking place right here in 
Pasadena This decision as explained in 
the dissent by Justice Sotomayor warned 
that the Court’s decision may legitimize 
racial profiling potentially forcing people 
who “look a certain way, speak a certain 
way, and appear to work a certain type of 
legitimate job” to carry documentation to 
prove their right to be in the country. 

 

So, congratulations to those of you who 
had the foresight to be born not looking 
that certain way. I was one of the lucky 
ones and so was my daughter, an Immigration 
Attorney, overworked as she attempts 
to protect those clients of hers who 
are presently being mistreated. Whatever 
it was that our Constitution was intended 
to protect is being ignored as the United 
States continues its march toward autocracy. 
Perhaps we are already there. Nevertheless, 
I shall continue my attempt at 
positivity.

 My old friend and his wife have arrived 
on a visit from France intending to attend 
the 60th Wedding Anniversary of his 
brother. It was our intent to meet tomorrow. 
We go back a long way since meeting 
at the Los Angeles Airport following 
an invitation to The Southern Christian 
Leadership Conference. (I feel honored 
even to mention that name even though 
I don't remember the mechanics of the 
referral.) As I continued at UCLA Law 
School, he became one of my roommates.

 A few years later, after my marriage and 
divorce he assisted me in caring for my 
children. He’s a very talented guy and 
wrote musical themes for my son and 
daughter which I wish I could remember. 
Over the past fifteen years, while living 
abroad, he has read and managed to reply 
with something positive to all my articles. 
He is quite a guy, and I looked forward to 
seeing him.

Unfortunately, the meeting will be bittersweet. 
On the day after his arrival his 
brother suffered a stroke that has left him 
on life supports with little chance of survival. 
His brother is about the same age I 
am which leaves me to wonder what my 
future is like. Nevertheless, I think we 
will be able to meet tomorrow along with 
my son and daughter, wife and grandchild. 
What is positive is my realization 
of the importance of connections and 
memories. 

 

I often complain that abundance and mobility 
have made it unlikely that families 
will stay living very close together. During 
the holidays many, many people are flying 
great distances at tremendous expense to 
visit family members and old friends that 
they barely ever get to see. I am not one 
of these people and I guess that’s positive. 
I have lived at this very same address in 
Sierra Madre for over 45 years and am so 
fortunate to have my son and daughter 
living in the Pasadena area. 

We all get together two or three times a 
week and on Sundays my granddaughter 
stays with my wife and son and I while her 
mom rushes off to do the things she has to 
do for a couple of hours. It is absolutely 
beautiful to watch my wife and 6-year-
old granddaughter interact and bake together 
or whatever else they do. I was a 
single parent for a long time and wonder 
today how my kids survived with a completely 
inept parent like me. But survive 
they did, and I believe my daughter came 
back to Los Angeles to open her own legal 
practice where she would be around and 
available to help care for my son and myself. 
Hooray, that realization allows me 
to even feel positive about my ineptitude 
and my son's developmental problems.

Yes, I suppose there is a positive and a 
negative side to most things. Sometimes, 
it’s hard to remember but really, it’s not 
impossible. You see I have completed 
this article and as I finish it, I am about to 
ask my wife to proofread it. I am feeling 
pretty okay and urge you to do the same. 
It often isn’t easy but it’s not impossible.

Happy almost Halloween! 

I wish I could be funny right now. But I suspect like most 
of you, the horrific and untimely death of a good person 
weighs heavy on my soul. Charlie Kirk was definitely a politically 
conservative person. That being said, here are some 
of Charlie’s quotes, meaningful and relevant to all of us despite 
our differing political preferences.

“If you believe in something, you need to have the courage to fight for 
those ideas – not run away from them or try and silence them.”

“I’m far more interested in what God wants from me than what I want 
from God.”

“What God wants from me is a life fighting for truth.”

“When you deliberately distort and selectively present the truth, you lie.”

“Just because you are offended doesn’t mean you are right.” 

“Greatness, on the other hand, requires the liberty and drive to make the 
most of yourself.”

“Education should focus on teaching students how to think, not what to 
think.”

“It is the responsibility of the individual to protect their own freedom and 
secure their own happiness.”

“When you deliberately distort and selectively present the truth, you lie.”

“Conservatism is not about hating change; it’s about preserving what is 
good and proven.”

“Never give up. Never surrender. Always go for the win.”

“When people stop talking, that’s when you get violence.”

“I want to be remembered for my courage for my faith.”

“Political correctness is the deadliest of political weaponry.”

 We should celebrate the divide between conservatives and liberals. Our 
differences emphasize the greatness of America as a whole regardless of 
political preference:

“America is the greatest experiment in freedom the world has ever seen.”

What people have said about Charlie Kirk:

Joe Biden: “There is no place in our country for this kind of violence. It must 
end now. Jill and I are praying for Charlie Kirdk’s family and loved ones.”

America works because we are permitted to hold our own political views 
and share them without restriction. Actor Tom Selleck said, “It’s not that 
conservatives don’t care. We do. We just have different answers than liberals 
do. It’s a difference of the mind, not of the heart.”

As I have written about in previous columns, President Ronald Reagan 
and Speaker of the House, Tip O’Neill shared an uncommon but strong 
friendship. Reagan, became an icon of the Republican party in the last half 
of his life and O’Neil, was a lifelong Democrat. Describing their political 
friendship, O’Neill said “After 6pm, we can be friends”. To which Reagan 
responded, “Before then, it’s politics.”

Ironically, Reagan and O’Neill’s friendship began when Reagan was shot. 
“Tip” was the first nonfamily member permitted to visit Regan in the hospital. 
The two most powerful politicians in America recited the 23rd Psalm 
from the Bible. As Tip was leaving, he kissed Reagan on the forehead. Mutual 
compassion from both sides of the aisle helped to break down political 
divides. The friendship of the liberal and conservative were accomplished 
much for the good of the country.

I close with what Reagan said at O’Neill’s retirement party: “…Mr. Speaker, 
I’m grateful that you have permitted me in the past – and I hope in the 
future -that singular honor, the honor of calling you my friend. I think the 
fact of our friendship is testimony to the political system we’re proud of 
and the country we live in.”

Pray for Charlie’s family. Pray for our country. Welcome friends with differing 
viewpoints. A yo-yo isn’t any fun if it only goes down. And what do 
you call a boomerang that doesn’t return? I call it a stick.

Let’s celebrate our differences. It will give meaning to this terrible tragedy.

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HOWARD Hays As I See It


“The guardsmen themselves looked stunned. We looked at them 
and they looked at us. They were just kids, 19 years old, like us. But 
in uniform. Like our boys in Vietnam.” – Chrissie Hynde, recalling 
four killed, nine wounded as National Guardsmen opened fire on 
protestors at Kent State University, 1970

With certain events, personal recollections remain clear on how 
they first hit. I wasn’t around, but family recalled that when my mother was in her 
teens, Grandma was in the kitchen on a Sun-day morning stirring a bowl of pancake 
batter held in her arm. The entire household heard it smash on the floor, dropped as 
news came over the radio of Japan having attacked our naval base in Hawaii.

 

Japan’s Imperial Army was in service to the Emperor; Germany’s Wehrmacht in service 
to the Fuhrer. Our military, while segregated by race and gender, was led by FDR in 
service to our country. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is now focused on a white male 
“warrior ethos” – in service to Donald Trump.

 

By recent decree, it’s no longer “Defense” but rather the Department of “War”. Our 
military spent months scrubbing hints of “diversity, equity and inclusion”. Now it’s 
scrubbing references to a Department of “Defense” (websites, letterhead, wearables, 
gift shop souvenirs) at 700,000 facilities worldwide, potentially costing billions - despite 
the fact that without Congressional ap-proval for the name change, it’s nothing 
more than an ego-stroke, anyway. (There’s never been an administration more demanding 
of ego-strokes.)

 

I was at my desk in the fourth grade, our teacher up at the blackboard. The principal 
came in, went over and said something quietly in her ear. She buried her face in her 
hands, sobbing. We were sent home for the day. Mom asked why we were back so 
early, and I said it had something to do with President Kennedy being shot. Looking 
as if she was going into shock, Mom asked if he was killed. I said I didn’t know – but 
we got out of school.

 

I recall Jackie Kennedy on TV showing off the Rose Garden. There were White House 
concerts – from Pablo Casals and Leonard Bernstein to Dave Brubeck and Tony Bennett. 
Trump replaced the Rose Garden with a mediocre Caesars Palace annex. Our 
nation’s 250th birthday will feature a UFC cage match on the South Lawn.

 

As a high school junior, we’d cut class and head to whatever anti-war rally. This particular 
one came days after Nixon expanded the war into Cambodia, right after draft 
deferments were end-ed for college undergrads.

 

I recall cramming into (senior) Paul’s Ford Falcon, heading out to join thousands of 
others in an-other nationwide “mobilization”, Credence Clearwater’s “Down on The 
Corner” cranked-up on a portable radio. Then Paul turned from the steering wheel 
yelling, “Shut up! Shut up!”. Credence went silent, Paul turned up the car radio and 
we listened as reports came in of four students killed by National Guardsmen at Kent 
State. Suddenly, it all became deadly serious.

 

Trump posted, “Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR”. 
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker responded, “The President of the United States is threatening 
to go to war with an American city. This is not a joke. This is not normal.” And I 
recalled, as a high school junior, hearing that news from Kent State when suddenly it 
all became deadly serious.

 

Twenty-four years ago this week, I recall getting ready for work as Peter Jennings on 
ABC was trying to explain the smoke billowing from an upper floor of one of the 
World Trade Center twin towers behind him. As he spoke, the tower collapsed downward 
on itself – and then another plane hit the remaining tower. On the way to work, 
it was news of planes making U-turns in the sky and the crash of Flight 93 in Pennsylvania. 
At the office, we confirmed with each other that those specks we saw dropping 
down the sides of the buildings were in fact what we thought they were.

 

There was Donald Trump on a local station, pointing out that the Trump Building, 
40 Wall Street, was now the city’s tallest. Fourteen years later, running for president, 
Trump claimed to have seen “thousands and thousands” in New Jersey celebrating the 
fall of the twin towers, “where you have large Arab populations”. He was lying.

 

Since Trump assumed control over the JFK Center for the Performing Arts, performers 
have can-celled bookings, there have been 80%-empty houses and a 50% drop in 
subscriptions. The 9/11 Memorial & Museum, at the site of the World Trade Center in 
Manhattan, has had 90 million vis-itors since opening, hundreds of millions in private 
funds raised with revenues outpacing costs. Now Trump wants control of that, too. 
Along with the Smithsonian. And our nation’s universities.

 

Another Kent State witness, Chris Butler, recalled that as the guardsmen knelt and 
aimed their rifles, “Everybody laughed, because, c’mon, you’re not going to shoot us”. 
Gerald Casale re-members, “I was a white hippie boy and then I saw exit wounds from 
M1 rifles out of the backs of two people I knew.”



A coming generation might someday ask us for our own personal recollections of 
events hitting today. They might ask which side we were on. And they might ask perhaps 
the most important question of all: What did we do about it? 


9/11 NEVER FORGET WE WERE UNITED


Mountain Views News

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Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com