OPINION

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BY DAVID LEIBOWITZ Peoria Times Columnist

The argument began, as so many do, over words. A friend, male, late 40s, Jewish, was detailing an anti-Semitic insult he’d suffered at the hands of a client. Then he wanted it to be my turn.

“You must be the victim of discrimination like that all the time,” he asserted.

My response? “I’ve never been the victim of anything in my life. Have I experienced anti-Semitic language or insults? Sure. A lot. But victimized? I don’t think so.”

Our conversation descended into semantics and harshness over what constitutes victimhood. My friend argued that we’re all — all 7.6 billion Earthlings — victims of slights and people we may never admit or never know harmed us. I argued that his definition of victimization trivializes real injury.

“If everyone’s a victim, then no one’s a victim” was my final salvo. The server mercifully delivered the check. “I’ve been to murder scenes. I’ve interviewed survivors of concentration camps and rape. I just don’t see a parallel between how they’ve been hurt and some idiot calling you a hebe.”

It’s true that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Mine probably cost me a friend.

I thought about this exchange for days, about why being called a victim so lodged in my craw.

I guess it’s because in America today, the prevalent narrative — one I reject with great force — is that we are a nation of victims and victimizers, the afflicted and the afflicting, and I try every day to live my life as neither one.

To consume news in 2021 is like reading an endless scroll of society’s victims.

Violence, racism, income inequality, police brutality, bullying, ageism, sexual harassment, gender inequality, COVID-19, LGBTQ discrimination, kink shaming, sizeism, and countless more stigmas and prejudices.

If I sound intolerant, cold or sarcastic — or like I’m “mansplaining” in a discriminatory huff — that’s not my intention.

But lately I find myself experiencing an “empathy deficit,” the sense that my well of compassion might be running lower than Lake Mead on a blazing June afternoon.

A confession: I do everything I can to empathize with victims in proportion to the injury done to them and the theft committed against them.

I grieve the murdered dead. I want justice and greater compassion for all who suffer sexual assault or hate crimes. I loathe Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein for their criminal acts. I want police officers to seek out wrongdoers without seeing skin color.

I donate to charity. And yes, I “hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,” and that we, one and all, possess “certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

I was raised to honor the Golden Rule. Or, as Jesus put it in Matthew 7, “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you.”

That’s an old-fashioned way of thinking, of course. Today, it’s insufficient to treat others as you hope to be treated. Instead, we’re asked to treat everyone exactly as they would like to be treated or risk being branded a victimizer.

Alternately, we are expected to empathize with anyone who has not been treated up to their own exacting standards. Don’t believe me? Check the scathing Yelp reviews authored by anyone who has ever been served a not-quite-medium-rare burger.

There are victims in the world, and I do feel for them. But there are also people who seem to define themselves chiefly by the injuries they have suffered, every sickening insult, every deprivation, every last inequality.

That is their prerogative, I suppose. But they probably shouldn’t invite the rest of us to lunch anytime soon.

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David Leibowitz has called the Valley home since 1995. Contact david@leibowitzsolo.com.

By Carrie Snider

Louis and Kristen Rodriguez purchased a small rock supply business from her father in 1999. At the time, the little company was a one-truck operation in Apache Junction. They had no idea what the future held.

From the beginning, the couple focused on what buyers wanted. When customers came in to purchase rock, they asked where they could buy artificial grass. Those conversations piqued Louis and Kristen’s interest. They added items to their supply so they could be a one-stop shop.

“We listened to our customers,” Kristen said.

The more they listened, the more All Rock Supply expanded. Thanks to their customer-focused business approach, what was once a one-truck operation has turned into a Valleywide company.

All Rock Supply has three locations — Chandler, Glendale and San Tan Valley. They offer landscape rock and gravel, sand and aggregates, pavers and construction blocks, tools and accessories, and artificial grass, with delivery available.

Kristen said Phoenix-area residents come to All Rock Supply for the staff’s knowledge and trustworthy nature. Louis and Kristen have years of experience, as do their employees.

“We hire individuals with landscaping or rock backgrounds who can really help them,” she said.

While many customers come in knowing what they want, others need assistance. Expert employees asking the right questions make a world of difference.

While the family-owned business prides itself on being personable, it also knows price is imperative. Its “meet-orbeat” policy has helped build a strong customer base.

Keeping the latest trends in stock is always a priority. And while travertine and tile styles tend to come and go, Kristen said one thing that customers always seem to want is pavers.

“Pavers never seem to get old. As soon as we get them in, they go right back out again,” she said.

Louis Rodriguez and his family own All Rock Supply, which has a store in Chandler. (Photo

by Pablo Robles)

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BY J.D. HAYWORTH Peoria Times Columnist

Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin spent a mid-June day in Geneva, talking to each other at a summit conference.

NBC News headlined its preview of the event: “Biden begins long, tense meeting with Putin.”

Don’t believe it.

NBC and the other alphabet networks, plus their cable cousins, along with the New York Times and the Washington Post, no longer disseminate news — they construct narratives.

In a world where the true news cycle would change by the nanosecond, the old-line press organs in the United States have remained remarkably consistent, especially over the last decade. Collectively, they spout varied narratives under this broad theme: Conservative principles are wrong and dangerous, while leftist goals are somehow “forward thinking” and to be embraced.

You may be tempted to file that general theme under the heading “Wrong is Right,” and you would be correct.

But when it comes to the pre-summit headline from NBC, further analysis is in order. The National Broadcasting Company is better defined these days by the words “Never Believe Conservatives.” Accordingly, the pro-Biden press partisans wanted to project an image of the 46th president as the “tough guy in the aviator shades.”

If only.

Sadly, we saw a very different image of Joe Biden during the G-7 meetings, just prior to the Russian summit. The swagger was replaced with a shuffle. Confidence gave way to confusion. Statements of certainty became mumbled, incoherent mutterings. The “Leader of the Free World” had to be led by his wife.

Joe Biden has cognitive problems, and the press has a real problem with credibility.

Our international adversaries suffer no such delusions. Neither should we.

Russian “President” (in reality, Neo-Soviet Dictator) Putin resembles the cat who ate the canary. He remembers the days of the old USSR, when he was a young KGB agent and “old” was the operative term in Moscow. The Soviet Politburo was a gerontocracy. When President Reagan was asked why he had not held a summit with the USSR during his first term, he responded, “My problem for the first few years was they kept dying on me.” Brezhnev. Andropov. Chernenko.

Now, in the United States, there’s an aging Democrat Troika on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. Pelosi. Schumer. Biden. Of the three, the Senate majority leader is the “spring chicken” at age 70; the House speaker is the most senior at 81; and the president is 78.

What’s Russian for “Now the shoe’s on the other foot?”

Over a year ago, when he was a little more spry, candidate Biden challenged a Marine veteran who criticized his son’s unsavory associations to a pushup contest.

During the one-day U.S.-Russia summit, President Biden meekly pushed a list across the table to Putin — a list of 16 critical infrastructure targets “off limits” to Russian cybercriminals. So, can the internet thieves begin with No. 17 on the target list, or should Vlad have thanked Joe for helping Russia’s cyber warfare experts by doing their work for them — or both?

Instead, Putin took the typical Russian approach: He simply denied any cyber connection.

Back home, there’s no denying the curious paradox of President Biden: Our chief executive, so confused during his trip abroad, leads an administration that is singularly focused on what it perceives as the top domestic threat.

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Attorney General Merrick Garland spelled it out during the “off day” between the G-7 meeting in England and the summit in Geneva. “In the FBI’s view, the top domestic extremist threat comes from racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists — specifically those who advocate for the superiority of the white race.”

Got that?

Never mind the more than 8,500 extremists of BLM and Antifa arrested during the riots last summer. They did billions of dollars in damage, but many made bail, courtesy of the Hollywood left and Democrat politicians, including Kamala Harris.

So, rioters from the left are mere protesters.

Protesters from the right are rioters, insurrectionists and, likely, white supremacists.

Quite the narrative. Dark days ahead.

J.D. Hayworth worked as a sportscaster at Channel 10 Phoenix from 1987 until 1994 and represented Arizona in Congress from 1995-2007.

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