Tag: Michael Broad

Shoeless Joe, Pete Rose, That Guy, and My Old Man.

Today would have been my dad’s 84th birthday had he not died in a hospital not long after his 80th. Since he is not here to give his opinion, let me share it with you: He told me many times that the lifetime ban from baseball for Shoeless Joe and Pete Rose should only apply to the span of their mortal time on Earth. He believed Shoeless Joe belonged in the Hall of Fame and he believed that Pete Rose ought to be posthunously inducted there. I agree with Pops. Pete’s lifetime ban is expired.

He also insisted that you not mention the name of that guy that is now running against Vice President Kamala Harris.

My dad was a proud independent conservative. He served in Vietnam and he was weirdly proud to have voted for Barry Goldwater. He was not so proud about Vietnam, though he made his peace with it and started wearing his Vietnam Veteran cap later in life… and he started displaying his medals on a plaque on the wall. Prior to that, he kept them in a drawer for a couple decades.

But he never made his peace with that guy. In his last year, he opened up considerably about the war. It was more than I wanted to know. Like I said, he made his peace with it. He said the one thing that never made sense was being with a buddy talking to him one minute and then a minute later he’s gone, because of a small hole. He got over Vietnam somewhat, made his peace with it, but it took almost half a century and there wasn’t that much time for that guy that insulted the gold star parents of a fallen soldier and got away with it and became President, anyway… my dad didn’t live to see Joe Biden elected, nor see that other guy behaving like a disrespectful clown at Arlington Cemetery.

You couldn’t mention that guy’s name around my dad, so I won’t mention it, but f*ck that guy.

If you vote for that guy, I respect your right as an American to vote your conscience, but as my father’s son, I must say again, f*ck that guy. He deserves a lifetime ban more than those other guys did.

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1CTD71zr4d/?mibextid=wwXIfr

This is a personal blog and it is not approved by any candidate, campaign, or political party.

I don’t always speak for my affiliations and my affiliations don’t always speak for me.

Thinking of the fallen, those that mourn, and a prayer for peace.

The legacy I inherited from my father included a hand-me-down Dick Butkus jersey and the last gifts he gave me just before he died: a book by Abraham Rabinovich, The Yom Kippur War (The Epic Encounter That Transformed The Middle East), and a vintage Panasonic Radio.

I wore the jersey to work this past Friday to honor Butkus, whose death was announced the previous day.

Friday was also the anniversary of my dad’s death. October 6, 2020. Six days after he turned 80 in the hospital, and also the anniversary of the Yom Kippur War in 1973.

Anyone close to me knows Pops was a Vietnam veteran. He was also a US military advisor to Israel.

In addition to books like Ethics of Our Fathers, or My People, the Story of the Jews by Abba Eban, he gave me The Tanks of Tammuz by Shabtai Teveth. The book was personally inscribed to him by an Israeli General.

When my dad’s family fled what is now Ukraine, Some went to the British colony formerly controlled by Turkey that became the modern state of Israel. We had cousins in the Irgun. Other family came here. The rest disappeared.

My last name comes from a city in modern Ukraine called Brody (pronounced Brawd-dee). 9,000 to 10,000* Jews lived there before the Nazi invasion. Most** of them were murdered by the Nazis and their Ukrainian auxiliary.

I’ve been trying to write about all this for the past few days, but I’ve been pretty blocked up until I started using my Facebook status as a composition platform.

I was hoping to make some sort of grand statement, but right now I’m just trying to cope and get through the day. The world was really closing in on me a few weeks ago. I dealt with it responsibly and got by with a little help from my friends. My spirits lifted. Now it’s closing in on me again. This is a good opportunity to stop brooding and get out of my own head.

Here’s a prayer for those that mourn, whether they are family, enemies, strangers, or related to departed football players:

Shalom.

The Righteous of all Nations will have a share in the World to Come.

(*Broad note 9/1/2025: I originally cited over 100,000 off the top of my head. Further research indicated that I unintentionally exaggerated the Jewish population of Brody just prior to WW2. Over a decade prior to the original post of this blog, I started a research project on Brody. My error was based on faulty memory of what I had read years earlier. When I resumed studying the history of Brody I realized I made a terrible mistake.)

Wiki: History of the Jews in Brody https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Brody

Holocaust Historical Society UK: Brody https://www.holocausthistoricalsociety.org.uk/contents/ghettosa-i/brody.html

(** Broad note 9/1/2025: Originally I stated “less than 20 survived” There’s a report of hundreds that survived in the woods as partisan fighters. Again, faulty memory and not fact-checking myself while writing off the top of my head. A simple google search would have given me pause.)