Category: Politics

THE GODFATHER

OCTOBER 13, 2022 – Today I’d intended to watch the January 6 House Select Committee hearing in its entirety. Before Liz Cheney had completed her opening statement, however, I decided that to stay glued to the TV would be akin to watching The Godfather for the umpteenth time, except with key scenes screened in slow …

CIRCLE OF PARROTS

SEPTEMBER 23, 2022 – When I was a corporate warrior, a fellow lieutenant remarked periodically that we were in trouble—again—because our corporate general believed his own (latest) “press release.” I think of that observation when I hear today’s circle of parrots—leaders of a major political party, personalities on a popular cable news channel, and followers/supporters …

“IT’S OUR APPETITE FOR STEAKS, STUPID!”

JULY 23, 2022 – Is “breaking news” making you crazy? Try consuming only “financial journalism.” First, if we were to follow only news reported by financial media—e.g. Bloomberg, Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal—soon half the population would be snoring in la-la land. The calming effect on society would be transformative. Second, the remaining half …

MY REACTION TO JAN 6 COMMITTEE “PRIME TIME” HEARING

JULY 22, 2022 – Last night I watched the Jan 6 Committee hearing, which lived up to its billing as a “barn-burner.”  Outside the cult and the Kool-Aid exist two possible reactions to the proceedings. On the negative side, given the raw evidence of Trump’s depravity—and the fealty he still commands—a person can sink into …

RETHINKING THE WHOLE DEAL

JULY 20, 2022 – I’m finding that the James Webb telescope images of the edge of the universe have radically altered my view of life here on earth. Perhaps that changed perspective is the mission of all “space” exploration. If we earthlings, including the subspecies, homo americanus, get a lot of things “right” . . …

GOLF DAY AND ROE V. WADE

JULY 19, 2022 – Late yesterday morning I hiked to my make-believe scale model of “Europe’s Rooftop.” (Actually, it’s (still) a local, hilly, municipal golf course.) Switzerland was abandoned, which I figured was because of extreme heat. Rather than exercise good judgment, I pretended I was an alpinist. With ski poles I “scaled” the (60-foot-high) …

“JIM” WEBB, PHILOSOPHER

JULY 15, 2022 – If you’re like me—semi-normal—you’ve beheld in awe, the recently released images captured by the James Webb telescope. Perhaps you’ve explored the science behind those pictures, but again, if you’re like me, you haven’t—beyond a cursory narrative. Inside my personal universe the images prompt a feeling of déjà vu. Is NASA deploying …

A THEORY OF “GOV”

JULY 14, 2022 – As a college freshman, I took a “gov” class. Elsewhere it was known as “political science,” but for reasons unclear to me then and now, “poli-sci” was “gov” at the Maine alma mater of such luminaries as Franklin Pierce, who, in case you forgot, became POTUS, and Melville Fuller, who was …

WARSZAWA (PART III OF III)

APRIL 13, 2022 – During my days in the capital, which included mass, pro-Solidarity demonstrations that I joined to get a closer look, I learned three things about Poland that would’ve escaped me without on-the-ground exposure. First was the psychological proximity of WW II. For many Americans, that conflict was epitomized by Pearl Harbor, D-Day, …

WHAT’S HAPPENING . . . AND WHAT’S NOT

DECEMBER 9, 2021 – Recently I gained some investment guidance and insight into politics when I visited . . . the doctor. After dispensing with medical advice my doc answered a general question about the Omicron variant. He’s highly educated, well-read, well-informed. In both mainstream media and medical literature, he’d read the latest news on …

THINKIN’ “THANKS”

NOVEMBER 25, 2021 – Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. First, its centerpiece is culinary abundance, and at the center of the centerpiece is a stuffed turkey, my favorite land-based food. Second, I enjoy the story of the Original Feast, which occurred exactly four centuries ago this year. However mythicized and romanticized, it’s a …

MAY HIS ELOQUENCE BE REMEMBERED

NOVEMBER 22, 2021 – This was the day that we who are old enough to remember . . . remember. By November 22, 1963, however, people had largely forgotten a key issue of the 1960 campaign: Kennedy’s Catholicism. His speech before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, however, buried the fear that if elected president, he’d …

NUANCE VS. PRECISION

NOVEMBER 19, 2021 – Simon Winchester wrote a book entitled, The Perfectionists, an interesting work about precision engineering. In the world of machines and micro-machines, precision to the nth-degree marks the difference between function and failure. Perfection applies with equal force to many fields, from music to medicine. It even rules in the practice of …

TAX TALK, TAX ACT

OCTOBER 28, 2021 – I’m not a tax lawyer, but throughout my career I’ve had more than a passing brush with tax law. Currently, I’m working on a protracted deal with lots of “tax angles,” and to my consternation, the tax accountant I work with characterizes these angles as “complicated.” Over the years, I’ve developed …

AT FRONT AND CENTER STAGE

OCTOBER 24, 2021 – Yesterday evening my wife and I and four friends (our theater group of yore) attended a play for the first time in nearly two years. To gain admittance to the Guthrie Theater, you had to show your ticket, a photo i.d., and proof of Covid vaccination. All good. The name of …

PERIL

OCTOBER 15, 2021 – Given the inner calm I’d achieved by avoiding “breaking news,” I worried about the detrimental effect of reading Peril by veteran journalist Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, national political reporter for The Washington Post.  The flap copy starts with, “The transition from [You-Know-Who] to President Joseph R. Biden Jr. stands as …