Michelle Goldberg had an interesting piece in the New York Times last Sunday entitled “To Understand The Midterms, Meet Joe and Marie.” They are the Republican and Democratic candidates for Washington state’s 3rd congressional district seat and, as you likely suspect, they are quite different from one another. Goldberg explains that Joe Kent has . … [read more]
Integrity
You’re Not God, Mob Boy So, you want this to be a Christian nationalist country, a Christian theocracy. Got it. You’re all about Jesus and have carefully picked Bible quotations, as well as excerpts from the Federalist Papers that you think justify your actions. Got it. You’re certain that some elite others are a cabal… [read more]
The Week
Required Reading of the Week John Pavlovitz writes a regular column and his post this week is entitled, One Day to Save America. He’s asking the key question, “How much is America worth to you?” Your answer is critically important and, no, it hasn’t anything to do with a dollar sign. Read the entire essay… [read more]
We Can Make This Worse – Or Better
In 1974 Gerald Ford, the guy whose only professional ambition had been to one day be Speaker of the House, found himself to be President of the United States. That followed the crystal clarity of the breathtaking criminality of Richard Nixon that drove Nixon from office just ahead of a Senate impeachment posse. With Nixon’s… [read more]
Gimme a Break
Caution: This post was made in a facility known to contain snark. Sensitive readers are advised to just get over it. Maybe eat some comfort food like chocolate chip cookies as they read. Gimme a Break, Jim Jordan Apologies, Jim. I’ve been meaning to write to you for a long time, but you know how… [read more]
Divine? Not So Much
Hey – it’s September 11. 9/11. That date rings a bell, right? In this constant blizzard of the absurd, where everything is BREAKING NEWS! our attention is easily diverted. Nevertheless, it’s important that we hold on to the truth of it – the horror, the political ineptitude, the generosity of strangers, the selfless courage of… [read more]
What Should We Do About That? – v2.0
Basic Human Decency Naomi Judd died by suicide in April at the end of a long battle with mental illness. That’s bad enough, but this story gets worse. Law enforcement did their investigative work following the suicide, creating a dossier of private, intimate conversations and information that may be released to the public. Daughter Ashley… [read more]
What Should We Do About That? – v 1.0
Sun Tzu The great soldier, leader and philosopher Sun Tzu offers wisdom from 5th century BC China that is valuable even today. Here’s a case in point. Donald Trump has shown repeatedly that he doesn’t care a bit about America, democracy, the law, truth, reality – this list could be quite long. All he cares… [read more]
Over Just The Past Few Days
Education Ron DeSantis blasted President Biden’s student debt relief program – just another entrant in the “Nothing So Stupid That the Republicans Won’t Say It” contest. We established publicly funded public schools 170 years ago to educate our people. From How Stuff Works: “Massachusetts passed the first compulsory school laws in 1852. New York followed… [read more]
Rent, Rights, Stupid & The Best
Rent Recognizing the reality of the very present question of whether we can still govern ourselves, I offer to you two questions from a Thomas Friedman essay, flavored by a quote from Muhammad Ali: “Do [we] want a country that is inclusive and capable of offering respect and dignity to all of its citizens or… [read more]
