I like movies that have something relatable and uplifting to say.  October Sky, a movie based on true events, qualifies. Like many good story lines, it operates on two levels.  A group of high school students use science to escape from a poor coalmining town that they intuitively understand, and the audience knows, is doomed.   As a son (Homer Hickam) and his father, who engage the world very differently, both learn that the details of a person’s life does not always describe who they really are.  In the culminating scene, the students win a national science fair and Homer honors his father by looking past those details and embracing the man underneath them.

In a way, I was luckier than Homer. My father, Charles Leven, died in 2021.  I am proud of the details of his life. Growing up in poverty, enlisting in the Army at age 14 under an assumed name, experiencing combat and death as a child soldier on the battlefields of Europe (where he sustained a near fatal chest wound), returning as a middle school drop-out and graduating college, my father ended his career as Chairman of the AARP Board of Directors.  But what I admire most is the man who he was.  An only child who grew up without a father, my Dad was committed body and soul to protect us – my Mom and us kids – from a very difficult and at times cruel world.  His embrace of that fundamental responsibility formed who I am, and what I hope to be.

For some decades now, we have all heard Americans speak about their rights.  With almost never a mention of their responsibilities.

One of our most basic rights is the power to hire and fire our leaders through our vote.  That right rests on the blood and treasure of those who came before us.  What is the responsibility we owe to this nation, our families, and ourselves to sustain this right?

It is to comport ourselves in the voting booth with the same basic common sense, using the same basic life’s experience, that guides our everyday reality.

If a work colleague calls in sick and we see him on Facebook that same day playing beach volleyball, we know what that is.

Donald Trump endlessly parrots the Big Lie about the 2020 election.  His own Attorney General (William Barr), the Director of the FBI (Christopher Wray), his own Defense Secretary (Mark Esper), over 60 federal judges, and his own Cyber Security head – to name just a few – have debunked Trump’s election fraud claims. Even Fox News and Newsmax, when challenged in court, walked away from those claims.  Indeed, no single senior state campaign official – Republican or Democrat – in any one of the 50 states has supported Trump’s ego driven idiocy.  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/10/us/politics/voting-fraud.html.

We know what that is, too.

So does Kevin McCarthy.  Right after January 6, he told the truth. Until McCarthy concluded that too many members of my party – the Republican Party – support Trump’s Big Lie. McCarthy went to Mar-a-Lago to kiss Trump’s ring.  And since then McCarthy has done everything he can to obstruct and delegitimize any investigation of an attempted coup.

Tom Kean, Jr. made the same calculation.  Kean, Jr. invited McCarthy as the featured guest at Kean, Jr.’s campaign kickoff and, since then, Kean. Jr. has formed a “legal defense fund” to combat nonexistent election fraud.  All without ever calling out the Big Lie.

I am a Republican because I do not support most of the Democratic Party’s policies.  At the same time, I have watched my party relentlessly damage the fabric of American exceptionalism in a way that no foreign foe could. Why? For the worst of reasons.  A lust for power resting on a culture of cowardice. Tom Kean, Jr. is part of that culture.

Meaning that the upcoming election is not about Critical Race Theory, Build Back Better, inflation, climate change, or Ukraine.  In truth, it is not about any policy at all.

It is about us. Me and you.  And whether we will meet our basic responsibility to protect what this country’s people need it to be.

As a father, I well understand the complexities that exist inside all families. So it is with great reluctance that I speak of another man’s family.  Particularly the Kean family – whom I do not know personally. There is, however, a time for every season, and this is not the season of civility.   Tom Kean the elder has a consistent record of authentic public service.  I do not believe that the man who chaired the Kean Commission after 9/11 would lack the character to call the Big Lie what it is or purposefully weaken the basic structure of American democracy to win an election.  Yet Kean, Jr. – his son – is doing exactly that.

We know what this is. And isn’t. This is not an honest difference of opinion between father and son.  It’s the embrace of a culture of cowardice that no member of the Kean family can be proud of.  Including – in the dark hours of the early morning – Kean, Jr.

Will Kean, Jr., having walked away from his father’s legacy to further his own political aspirations, suddenly change if elected?  Will he then stand up for me?  Or for you? Or for this country? Not really. Not when it matters. Not if it risks irking his base.

Malinowski is not perfect. No one is. But he is a smart moderate who does not kowtow to the Big Lie. I am voting against the Big Lie. I am voting for Tom Malinowski.

Not to support the Democratic Party.  Or even to support democracy, writ large.  I am doing it to honor my family.  And my father.

I ask but one thing of you. Honor yours.

It is not easy to do.  Nor is it supposed to be. Responsibilities rarely are.