I’m going to make a guilty confession here: During\u00a0much of his \u00a0lifetime, Nelson Mandela mostly existed at the periphery of my political awareness. When he was in the headlines, I, read about him and\u00a0admired his courage and power to inspire.\u00a0 In high school, I wrote a term paper about apartheid–I still have it somewhere–and I remember that it was one of my best research papers, because it made me aware of what was going on in South Africa at the time [the mid-1960’s, when our own Civil Rights movement was something I actually was aware of.] But\u00a0I’m not sure my high-school\u00a0term paper even mentioned Mandela [what an oversight!], and Mandela’s\u00a0struggle and journey was not at the center of my consciousness the way it was for many other people.<\/p>\n

I’m not proud of that fact, but that’s the way it is. Later, when my awareness expanded to include issues farther afield from my own back yard, I learned a lot more about Mandela,\u00a0\u00a0and the amazing transformation he helped bring about in South Africa, eventually shunning violence in favor of reconciliation. Unfortunately, the Reagan Administration\u00a0 officially listed him as a terrorist–a status not rescinded\u00a0until\u00a0the administration of\u00a0George W. Bush in 2008. (That’s one of the few things Bush got right.)<\/p>\n

It could be a long time before another Nelson Mandela comes along. And I’m not sure–in\u00a0our current situation,\u00a0 where negativity and tear-down politics are the norm–if we’d even recognize, or give a Mandela the chance to emerge, if one showed up.<\/p>\n

Here’s a gallery of editorial cartoon tributes to Nelson Mandela:<\/p>\n

[cincopa AUBA0XL8H_ZD]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m going to make a guilty confession here: During\u00a0much of his \u00a0lifetime, Nelson Mandela mostly existed at the periphery of my political awareness. When<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":26906,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[767,384],"tags":[1954,2146],"yoast_head":"\n