In Sept. 23’s Letters, a gentleman with impressive resumé wrote of recent health trouble in his household followed by severe injuries to himself from a staircase fall. His readers can surely empathize as I do, having also known a share of painful mishaps. Hopefully, he’s medically insured. He goes on to give us an example […]
High in the politico-economic stratosphere, ultra-right strategists pull GOP strings while jump-starting the Tea Parties. Striving to control both ends of the play, they pulled a flanking maneuver on Democrats by faking conflict within their own ranks. Strangely, they fell prey to the Law of Unforeseen Consequence. The fakery turned real. Conflict broke out in […]
Harvey Rifkin’s “rants” do anything but rant. Well informed, he writes intelligently with substance, balance, humor and wit. (Wit is not always good humored. The reverse of humor is snideness.) Rifkin offers enjoyable reading whether or not I always fully agree. I admire and appreciate his input. Roger Simon is also fun to read, witty, […]
Several weeks ago, local Tea Party Patriots met in a public rental room at N.W. Benicia’s Hastings Drive Fire Station. I counted about fifty people attending. Key members wore red tee-shirts with “Tea Party Patriots” printed in white letters on each front. I couldn’t guess where all the young people were. Maybe some other chapter? […]
These days move me to recite William Butler Yeats’ poem, The Second Coming, but I quote only lines 7 and 8: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” Yet, the best are all around us on both sides and in the middle. Often, they seem to have no […]
To hear, or not to hear are the issues that split extremes not only from each other but from reasoning moderates, including those just to right and left of center. In the center, some say, lies only road-kill. People of small mind but peaceful aim can get crowded to the center. Fence-sitting, at least, may […]
Coming out of Bookstore Benicia at Southampton Center, last evening I noticed a copy of Deepak Chopra’s best seller of a few years back, Ageless Body, Timeless Mind. From the rolling, used book rack outside the store front, I picked it up and briefly flipped through. It set me to thinking again of physicality and […]
At least one of my friends is brave enough to respond to my “Seeing Through RED” in written email. Should it astonish me that others will not, who perhaps identify with targets caricatured in that blunt piece? It seems that many lack confidence and fluency to debate an issue. Maybe they just lack time and […]
A funny thing happened on my way through the emails, yesterday. I had delivered a scathing assessment of Glenn Beck with admonishment to his ga-ga worshippers. One respondent threw me a blanket accusation of being a hate-filled liberal. Liberals, he says, typically flaunt their intellect to demean poor or righteously rich, conservative Tea Party folks […]