MILK IS GOOD FOR YOU

Milk is good for you. Learning about Milk is also good for you. I’m talking about Harvey Milk. This dude led a full life and fought for positive change. He served in the Navy, and there is even a ship named after him. I think having a ship named after you would be pretty badass. All I have is a sandwich named after me, and I suggested it in the first place. As far as I know, there is no street, building, town, or anything else named after me. Mr. Milk however….

A Navy ship, an outdoor plaza, an airline terminal, several streets and buildings, at least one high school, and I also found that he was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which is the highest honor a civilian can receive as a citizen of The United States.

There is also a major motion picture about Mr. Milk. He was played by Sean Penn.

From Milk’s bio on his website:

“Harvey was born May 22, 1930, in Woodmere, New York. Harvey and his one sibling, Robert, worked in the family’s department store, “Milks”; his Lithuanian born father, William, served in the U.S. Navy and as did his spirited, independent mother Minerva, also of Lithuanian heritage, who was a Yeomanette during World War I. Harvey came from a small middle-class Jewish family that had founded a Jewish synagogue and was well known in the New York  “Litvaks” community for their civic engagement. He attended Bayshore high school, where he was a popular student with wide-ranging interests, from opera to playing football.

While in college at New York State College for Teachers (now State University of New York) in Albany, he studied math and history. He graduated in 1951 and enlisted in the Navy. He attended Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island, and subsequently was based in San Diego, where he served as a diving instructor. In 1955, he resigned at the rank of lieutenant junior grade.

Following his time in the Navy, Milk entered the civilian working world in New York, as a public school teacher on Long Island, as a stock analyst in New York City, and as a production associate for Broadway musicals, including Jesus Christ Superstar and Hair. During the 1960s and early 70s, he became more actively involved in politics and advocacy and he demonstrated against the Vietnam War.”

Quite the guy, that Harvey. If I had him in class, he would have been called 2%, skim, or possibly lactose or something like that. You know me and my nicknames…..

Anyway, Milk settled in San Francisco (before it was $6,000 a month to rent a shack) and used his voice in politics. He ran unsuccessfully for several city offices and was finally elected to a supervisor position in City Hall. From what I have read, the role seems similar to an alderman, who helps oversee his/her ward (area) of the city and reports directly to the mayor. Sweet.

Causes that were important to Milk included promoting larger and less expensive child care facilities, free public transportation, and the development of a board of civilians to oversee the police. He advanced important neighborhood issues at every opportunity. Milk used the same campaign tactics that he used when he was running for office previously: hours of handshaking, and dozens of speeches calling on people to have hope.

Quite a guy, that Milk…..He was also known as a prankster and used to mess with people in the Mayor’s office by playing jokes and bringing humor to a place where seriousness is the rule. We all know that big important decisions are made in government offices. Mayors have serious work to do in order to serve the people that elected them, but now and then, there’s nothing wrong with a bit of laughter right?

Well, as you may or may not be aware, no human being is 100% perfect, and politicians are no different. Sometimes I think they want us to THINK that they are really smart and have all of the answers to the most difficult problems that face society. Some elected officials even tell us that they can fix all the hard stuff all by themselves. Those are the snake oil salesman. Think about it…a really hard problem. Solve by yourself? I don’t think so……Hmm. Let me give you an example:

My muscles cannot make a certain type of protein. Well, let’s just synthesize the protein in a lab and shoot it into my muscles. Sounds easy right? Well, that idea first surfaced in the late 1980’s. Here we are 40 years, thousands of scientists and millions of dollars later and……no protein shot yet. Gee I hope the people in charge keep supporting research dollars for me, and cancer, and diabetes, and all the other bad stuff that happens to all of us if we live long enough. I’m willing to be that a guy like Harvey Milk would have fought for stuff like that.

Where was I? Oh yea….Milk AND the mayor of San Francisco were in office in the late 1970’s. Tough times. Bad wardrobe, Disco and shitty bands like Hot Property and poor Elvis cover groups playing at Ramada Inn’s all over the place. I’m glad I grew up in the 80’s….

But, so, there was this other guy elected to the mayor’s office who was mentally ill and resigned, stating that he couldn’t live in San Francisco on his lowly government salary. A few days later, he asked the mayor to reinstate him. The mayor said yes, and then no (politicians do that sometimes). All of us do it. It’s ok to change your mind if you explain why. You can also make a mistake and admit that you were wrong. I do it all the time with my wife. I am wrong more often than I am right.

Anyhoo, the mayor was about to hold a press conference in November of 1978 to announce the mentally ill dude’s replacement, when said ill dude snuck into the building, shot and killed the mayor and then invited Milk to step into his old office where he shot and killed him also. Double murder in a public building in broad daylight. Imagine what kind of chaos the city fell into learning that the mayor and Harvey Milk had their lives cut tragically short on the same day, while at work, serving the people that elected them to be there. On a personal note, unless my life was in grave danger, I cannot imagine a rational reason for taking the life of another human. Then again, as I said, the shooter was found to be mentally ill, as you will also understand by reading the next paragraph.

The guy went to jail, got out years later, and then completed suicide. We clearly need elected officials to help with mentally ill people getting a hold of guns. Over and over again we see bad outcomes. I’m not sure what the people in power are waiting for. If Milk was here, he would likely be speaking loudly about problems such as these.

The 1970’s were rough years in San Francisco. Like a lot of big cities, there was a lack of affordable housing, fighting among ethnic and religious groups and arguments and riots over which people were created more equal than others. It’s too bad. As I have learned, all religions teach peace, friendship and love of one another. Jeez, even in the Constitution it says that we all are created equal. That makes me feel better since I’m sitting down all of the time. I am equal to the person who is reading this. I am not more or less equal, although just to be sure, laws have been written to allow disabled people to go to public school. I guess sometimes being equal can be expensive if the school is old and has stairs or narrow doors.

Anyway, after this awful tragedy with the death of Milk and the San Francisco mayor, the city decided to honor both of these men with some of the monuments, and naming of things that I wrote about at the beginning of this post. Then came the Navy ship. How cool is this next paragraph?

The USNS Harvey Milk (T-AO-206) is the second of the John Lewis-class of underway replenishment oilers, operated by the Military Sealift Command (MSC) to support ships of the United States Navy.

In July 2016, Ray Mabus, then United States Secretary of the Navy, advised Congress that he intended to name the John Lewis-class oilers after prominent leaders, with this ship to be named in honor Harvey Milk.  It was officially named at a ceremony in San Francisco on 16 August 2016.

The first cut of steel for Harvey Milk occurred on 13 December 2019, marking the beginning of construction of the vessel. The ship had her christening ceremony and was then launched on 6 November 2021, with Milk’s nephew Stuart Milk, and Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro.

On 11 July 2023, Harvey Milk entered non-commissioned U.S. Navy service under the control of the Military Sealift Command. Badass. That’s a photo of this massive hunk of metal, paid for by my tax dollars (and yours) that I used for the featured image in today’s post. All credit to the U.S. Navy for the photo to be shared.

Sadly, the people that have been put in charge of the defense and protection of our great nation have just announced that they are going to rename this cool ship. Any sailor will tell you that it is bad luck to do this. It might be an old superstition, but then again, President Reagan consulted astrology charts to decide when some decisions should be made, so I guess some people believe in luck and superstitions as much as they believe in all people being equal.

Mr. Milk was murdered in his office. He was only 48. His biography states that he was a Republican AND a Democrat at different times. He achieved hero status in San Francisco through the lens of thousands of people who are as equal as you and me.

With all of the terrible problems in the world, such as affordable housing, effective health care, poverty, lack of food and clean water, war, people stealing from one another, people killing one another and stuff that makes all of us feel less equal…..I don’t understand why the people that keep our country safe would strip this poor guy of his ship name. I’m sure that it will cost money to do this.

Is there a good reason why Harvey Milk shouldn’t keep this honor that has already been given? I can’t seem to find one. Maybe I need to do a bit more research. Something doesn’t make sense here. I’m going to visit the Gulf of Mexico later this summer. You better believe that I’ll do Harvey Milk research while I sit in the sun and look out over the gulf.

I hope I feel equal there as well.

Stay safe, stay awesome and stay tuned.