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LATEST ARTICLES ( 1455 )

• A Different Idea About Health Care

  

  As Republicans try one more time to pass a bill to strip millions of their health care, a huge policy crap-shoot without benefit of hearings, public debate, or... Read more

  Posted on 22 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• 101 Stumbles in the March of History

  

  This 2016 book, by Bill Fawcett, is a compendium of historical might-have-beens. Decisions and choices the author deems mistakes, along with speculation about... Read more

  Posted on 19 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Political Extremism and Moderation

  

  This is a time of extremism. Marchers with torches and swastikas chant “Jews will not replace us,” and the president sees there some “very fine people.” Maybe m... Read more

  Posted on 15 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Moving Pictures, Myanmar, and Rohingyas

  

  My masthead declares me an optimist but a rationalist. Humanity is on an upward path, but nothing is ever simple, it’s strewn with pitfalls. Seeming triumphs... Read more

  Posted on 12 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• My 70th Birthday Speech

  

  Holding one of my wife’s gifts: my paternal grandparents’ 1910 marriage certificate. It shows their parents’ names, which I’d never known. Read more

  Posted on 09 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Another Day, Another Disgrace

  

  Trump has killed the DACA program — “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” — allowing people brought to America before age 16 to stay.Most of these 800,000 ar... Read more

  Posted on 07 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Was Jesus Christ a Real Person?

  

  Long ago a customer sent me a book, to convert me, titled Who Moved the Stone? I read it. The whole book sought to prove by logic that Christ must have risen... Read more

  Posted on 04 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Good News from Kenya

  

  Did you hear the big news from Kenya? Its Supreme Court annulled the president’s re-election. And he accepted it.Africa’s post-colonial history has been mostly ... Read more

  Posted on 02 September 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• The Economist: A Love Letter

  

  On this blog I’ve frequently cited The Economist. It’s a news magazine (though Britishly calling itself a “newspaper”). I’ve subscribed for about thirty years. Read more

  Posted on 31 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Interesting

  

  Note the “Found in supposedly empty equipment” stamp. Apparently this situation happens enough that the Postal Service has a rubber stamp for it. (This package... Read more

  Posted on 31 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Trump Pardons Arpaio: America Sinks Lower

  

  After outraging decency with his putrid rant about Charlottesville, welcomed by white supremacist Neo-Nazis, Trump compounded it by pardoning former Arizona... Read more

  Posted on 28 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Statues and History

  

  Trump has attacked removal of “beautiful” monuments to Confederate icons like Stonewall Jackson, Jeff Davis, and Robert E. Lee. Will Washington and Jefferson... Read more

  Posted on 26 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• For Women Only

  

  My wife has attended an annual writers’ retreat in Indiana. Now she’s been invited to a “girls only” gathering of former attendees. She was very critical. I... Read more

  Posted on 24 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Eclipsed

  

  Me, viewing eclipseWith all the pre-eclipse coverage, I somehow initially didn’t grasp there’d be much to see here in Albany, NY, quite far from the totality... Read more

  Posted on 22 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• The Bonobo and the Atheist

  

  Our closest biological relatives are chimpanzees. They’re not as cute as you might think; often nasty and violent. How nice then to have discovered the bonobo... Read more

  Posted on 20 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• White Supremacists, neo-Nazis, and the President They Love

  

  When white supremacists march with Nazi swastika flags, and one of them, an avowed Hitler flan, intentionally kills and injures counter-demonstrators, the... Read more

  Posted on 17 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Feminist PC Thought Police Strikes Again: the Damore Memo

  

  Google engineer James Damore wrote a memo titled “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber,” criticizing the company for suppressing honest discussion about why women... Read more

  Posted on 16 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Groupthink in the Divided States of America

  

  I remember, on Election Night 2008, when the result was declared, a middle-aged black woman in Chicago jumping up and down crying, “God bless America! God... Read more

  Posted on 12 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• North Korea: Fear the Madman

  

  We keep hearing about the “madman” in Pyongyang. Is Kim Jong Un bad? Yes. Mad? Probably not. It’s the guy in D.C. who’s both.Kim doesn’t have to be told that... Read more

  Posted on 10 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY

• Venezuela’s Tragedy: Be Careful How You Vote

  

  Chavez his mentorIt began in 1992 when paratrooper Hugo Chavez tried a military coup. He failed and was jailed, but vowed he wasn’t done. Released, in 1999... Read more

  Posted on 08 August 2017 CULTURE, POLITICS, SOCIETY