Erictheblue

LATEST ARTICLES ( 375 )

• Annette Meeks on the Electoral College

  

  Annette Meeks is one of the big thinkers of the local wing-nut faction.  She's known, among other things, for arguing that the position of lieutenant... Read more

  Posted on 22 April 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Anticipating Mad Men, Season 7

  

  It must not be the story.  I just read the Wikipedia article to make sure that I remembered how things stood at the end of last season, and discovered tha... Read more

  Posted on 14 April 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Much Ado About Shakespeare

  

  Discussing the options at Southwest High's "summer enrichment" program at the supper table, our 11-year-old made it pretty clear that "Much Ado... Read more

  Posted on 12 April 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Someone Else Speaks up for the Electoral College; I Demur

  

  Frank Bures, like other defenders of the Electoral College (Commentary, April 3), seems determined to ignore the world in which he presumably lives. Read more

  Posted on 07 April 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• McCutcheon: I Agree with the Girls

  To someone like me, unburdened by a legal education, the decision of the Supreme Court in the McCutcheon case is as odd as the notion that the Constitution... Read more

  Posted on 04 April 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• While Watching Sports Center on Opening Day

  

  Curtis Granderson is a Met?  I'm the kind of fan who has to get reacclimated each April.  It's not like when as a boy walking out of Metropolitan... Read more

  Posted on 01 April 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Basketball. Baseball.

  Boy, some highly entertaining games in the NCAA basketball tournament last night.  One of my wife's Facebook friends had a post concerning  how, lat... Read more

  Posted on 29 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Bracketology

  

  I'm not too surprised that Warren Buffet could stop feeling nervous about having insured Quicken Loans' billion-dollar payout for a perfect NCAA basketball... Read more

  Posted on 25 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Books of the Bible: Leviticus

  The book of Leviticus is read today by scholars, by weirdos like me who have determined to read the whole Bible, and, if cherry-picking skimmers count, by... Read more

  Posted on 23 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• W.H. Auden, Meanderingly

  

  Here's something about the taxonomy of twentieth-century poetry that I don't get.  Why does T.S. Eliot, who was born in St Louis and educated at Harvard... Read more

  Posted on 16 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Cal and Lizzie

  

  Sometimes I imagine the private conversations of the poet Robert Lowell and the critic and novelist Elizabeth Hardwick, who were married to each other for over... Read more

  Posted on 11 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Getting Exercised in the Morning

  

  The gym I exercise at before work is remodeling.  One consequence is that most of the TVs are shut off and anyone who wants to pedal a recumbent bike is... Read more

  Posted on 06 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• A Modest Proposal from 12 Years Ago

  Encouraged by our IT Department to remove "personal files" from a drive on our work computers, I found the following old LTE--letter to the... Read more

  Posted on 04 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Power Outage

  

  Over at the Power Line blog, John Hinderaker, who is so perpetually out of breath that his brain has not received any oxygen since Reagan was president, cites... Read more

  Posted on 01 March 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• The Sporting Press

  

  I understand the Winter Olympics have ended.  I saw nary a quintuple axle, not because I have no interest but because they were on NBC, or ABC--something... Read more

  Posted on 28 February 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• The Electoral College: Judge Posner Lays an Egg

  

  Googling myself to see what might turn up, I ended up reading some editorial commentary with which I strongly agree, mainly about the electoral college, as... Read more

  Posted on 23 February 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• The Power of Neutral-tinted Haps and Such

  

  In a post called "The Powerlessness of Positive Thinking," Adam Alter describes social science research indicating that your mom and your second grade teacher... Read more

  Posted on 22 February 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Sue Grant, Michel De Montaigne, Roger Angell

  

  I can always remember when our neighbor Dr. Sue Grant died, because when Amanda was pregnant with our youngest, she (Dr Grant) told us that one thing she... Read more

  Posted on 16 February 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Abortion on TV

  

  Since I don't watch a lot of TV, and when I do it's often ball games, I'm not an expert on the abortion theme in television dramas.  I would have guessed... Read more

  Posted on 12 February 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Home Thoughts

  What might euphemistically be called a "stomach bug" is touring our household.  I am the most recent victim and so am home from work today... Read more

  Posted on 05 February 2014 POLITICS, SOCIETY