Month: November 20, 2020 4:50 am

Dear Editor:

When Donald Trump first announced his interest in running for president of the United States, he said some things that aroused my interest: that he wanted, and knew how, to change the political stagnation in Washington. His business experience would help.

But it wasn’t too long before the dark side of the man appeared. He insulted his fellow Republican presidential aspirants by demeaning and ridiculing them with nicknames. He publicly mocked a man who had a severe physical disability. He publicly disrespected a deceased military man and his Gold Star family.

Early in 1932 Mendel Osherowitch journeyed to Soviet Ukraine on assignment for Forverts (Forward), a Yiddish-language newspaper in New York City boasting a daily circulation of 275,000 copies. Born in Trostianets before the Great War, and speaking Yiddish, Ukrainian and Russian like a native, Osherowitch astutely recorded life under a Communist system he found markedly dysfunctional, sometimes criminal.

He documented a pervasive fear of the secret police, the GPU, recounting how parents were scared their children might betray them. He watched hordes of peasants clambering onto trains escaping to the cities in an anguished search for bread. He heard stories about rural uprisings brutally suppressed, saw how Western reporters self-sequestered in Moscow were failing to report what was happening and observed growing tensions between the beneficiaries of Bolshevik rule and those for whom it was an enervating nightmare.

NEW YORK – A wedge of cabbage… hanging over a cocktail glass? Yes – but only for a “Borscht Martini”! Conjuring such a rara avis (recipe at close of this article) was one of many prequel videos on the website of the Ukrainian Institute of America (UIA) prior to kickoff for its October 25 “2020 Gala Honoring all Ukrainian Medical Personnel.” The goal was to raise $72,000 (this year is the 72nd year of the UIA).

UIA board members spun lively commentaries in real time. The center-piece was an informative “Fireside Chat” about COVID-19, flanked by many pre-filmed messages from artists and notables, plus assorted musical performances from near and far. For online viewers, UIA’s website offered videos of past events at UIA.

CHICAGO – Voting is a basic civic duty in a democracy. In 1975, the U.S. Congress added language-access provisions to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Under Section 203 of that amended act, jurisdictions must provide language assistance if more than 10,000 or 5 percent of voting-age citizens belong to a single language minority group, have depressed literacy rates and do not speak English very well. The Ukrainian community of Cook County in Illinois has a population that fits this description, based on the 2010 Census.

One of the goals of the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America-Illinois Division (UCCA-Illinois) is “to coordinate and consolidate development of organized Ukrainian life in the U.S. and strive to increase the importance and role of the Ukrainian American community in the civic and cultural life of this country.”

JENKINTOWN, Pa. – Manor College held a Virtual Ukrainian Dialogue via Zoom in what was the latest in its series of discussions on Ukrainian-American issues. Panelists included the ambassador of Ukraine to the United States, Volodymyr Yelchenko; a member of Ukraine’s Parliament, Solomiia Bobrovska; and the chief editor of the Kyiv Post, Brian Bonner.

The president of Manor College, Dr. Jonathan Peri, facilitated the discussion on “[Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelens­kyy’s First Year Leading up to American’s Presidential Election.”

CLIFTON, N.J. – Tom Hawrylko, owner, editor and publisher of Clifton Merchant Magazine, which serves Clifton, N.J., marked the 25th year of its publication in October.

While the magazine began in October 1995, it is predated by Tomahawk Promotions. Tomahawk (short for Thomas Andrew Hawrylko Sr.) began in March 1990 by doing public relations, advertorial writing, fund-raising and advertising for regional and local clients.

PARSIPPANY, N.J. – Ukrainian American chiropractor Dr. Andrew Brodyn, and his associate, Dr. Jamie Sacco, have launched their practice, Landmark Family Chiropractic, based in Yardley, Pa.

The office handles cases related to chiropractic care (adjustments – manual and activator), cupping, kinesiology taping, functional neurology, as well as nutrition and wellness (including nutritional counseling, food sensitivity testing, as well as laboratory testing and supplemental pure encapsulations) to treat their clients.

Each doctor has different specialized training in chiropractic services.

This is a brief feature story about a college guy, who in two-plus years, found religion and managed to transform himself from a hard-partying jock with severe depression issues to an honors student, team captain, married man and future San Jose Sharks defenseman. Heck, he was even a Hobey Baker nominee for most outstanding college hockey player.

It would be a dramatic understatement to declare Brinson Pasichnuk’s life is pretty good these days. In his final home game for Arizona State University he tallied a hat-trick. NHL general managers were very much interested, some with guarantees of an immediate roster spot. He’s happily married, secure in his life and feeling most comfortable.

KYIV – On November 9, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy informed the public that he had tested positive for COVID-19. “Despite all the quarantine measures, I also received a + result. I have 37.5. I wish everyone 36.6!” Mr. Zelenskyy wrote on his Facebook page. (The reference was to his body temperature.) He added that he was feeling well and would continue to work in isolation.

“I was even a little surprised how I escaped the infection when my family fell ill [in June]. Unfortunately, we have to accept this axiom: everyone is at risk until there is a reliable vaccine. The only thing we can do is try to break the chains of infection and thus significantly reduce the load on the hospitals,” the president added.

As final counting of the votes continued in the U.S. presidential election, by November 7 it had become clear that whether or not the incumbent, Donald Trump, accepted the result, the victor in the presidential election was Joe Biden.

While the U.S. and international media have focused on what his victory would mean for the U.S. and global politics generally, both in Kyiv and in the U.S. itself there was also immediate recognition that Mr. Trump’s replacement by Mr. Biden will have significant implications for East-West relations and Ukraine in particular (and in the present context, probably also Belarus).

SOUTH BOUND BROOK, N.J. – Hierarchs and clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the U.S.A., Ukrainian American Veterans and Ukrainian community members gathered on November 11, Veterans Day, before the Ukrainian American Veterans National Memorial here at the Metropolia Center of the UOC-U.S.A.

A service at the memorial began at the 11th minute of the 11th hour, on the 11th day of the 11th month, to mark the anniversary of the signing of the armistice that ended the first world war. Officiating were Archbishop Daniel, himself a veteran, Metropolitan Antony and clergy, assisted by seminarians.

From the earliest days of war in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, some bloggers and security experts noted key similarities between the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk and that of Azerbaijan’s Karabakh and surrounding areas. In both cases, war had de facto created self-proclaimed and unrecognized republics, the separatists enjoyed quasi-unofficial support from a neighboring country, and popular desires have burned for liberating the occupied territories. Even the international platform for solving the Karabakh crisis – the Minsk Group under the auspices of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) – superficially resembles the Trilateral Contact Group for Ukraine, mediated by the OSCE and having negotiated two ceasefire documents in Minsk.