Politics

In the 1949 Oscar winner “All the King’s Men,” about a small-time southern politician who ascends to the governor’s office before really muffing it, there is an early scene in a small-town cop shop that caught my eye. Read more about The Cop Shop

Who knew?

Who knew way back in 2019 when the debate stages filled with 2020’s candidates for the presidency that we would go with the old guy in the middle? How often had he run for President? Had he ever come even close? Wasn’t there a scandal of some kind? Plagiarism, I believe it was. What kind of scandal is that, anyway? Oh, an unattributed quote? You’re kidding. Read more about Joe the Great

The phrase in the Pledge is “one nation under God.” When we recited it at the 46th District Democrats in Seattle, you could hear the volume drop at that phrase as at least one half of us left it out. Not because we objected to being One Nation. Maybe we could rewrite it? One nation in democracy? It could work. Read more about One Nation

“A date so far in the future that …”

And that is all I remember from a poem that I wrote in 1984. Except that it described the day I wrote it. All the ordinary things of life going on around me as usual. But the date itself seemed as surreal to me as a star date.

It’s now 2021, and it has been the future for almost as long as I can remember. Read more about Living in the Future

Between Donald Trump and Covid 19 and Black Lives Matter, all of which matter very much, don't forget this prime political maxim:

“All politics are local.” Read more about Politics Begin at Home

On Tuesday next, the greatest generation of the 21st Century will complete their voting for the next administration of our country. This generation, however, is composed of many more than the military men and women who answered the call to defeat fascism around the world. This generation is composed of people from 18 to a century or more, from every race, ethnicity, and gender that over 200 years of immigration, settlement, and perseverance in the cause of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all has produced. Read more about D-Day 2020

In an interview on MSNBC, Masha Gessen, author of Surviving Autocracy, reminded me recently of her six rules for living in a dictatorship.

Rule #1: Believe the autocrat. Read more about Believe It

A Very Stable Genius Read more about The Not So Stable Genius

Eucatastrophe

Eucatastrophe is my favorite new word, taught me by The Tolkien Professor. According to the online definition, a eucatastrophe is “a sudden and favorable resolution of events in a story; a happy ending.” The happy ending is signified by the prefix “eu,” meaning good. Which leaves the word “catastrophe” to be reckoned with. “Catastrophe” is unequivocally defined as something disastrous. Read more about Eucatastrophe