Politics

Years and years ago, when the Phil Donahue Show still came out of Cleveland, Ohio, there was an episode featuring a group of American citizens who had decided to rebel against the "consumer society."

They had decided, they said, to think carefully about their purchases. Did they need it? Would they use it? So - if they bought skis, they would also take skiing lessons. Skis and ski gear would not be allowed to pile up unused in the basement or garage. They would, indeed, ski. Read more about Citizen Consumers

Setting aside the percentages of the now infamous 47% who, like me, are on Social Security, veterans' benefits, Pell grants or Medicaid for conditions that inhibit independence, there does persist a percentage of those who are, otherwise, poor. This is for them. Read more about Poor 'r' Us

Put a sock in it.

That's what I'm advising any and all out there who feel compelled to instruct us all on the evils of Islam. It being a religion, I'm sure it contains its fair share of what some folks might construe as evil - at least as much as any other ol' time religion. I don't think I need to mention proving one's allegiance by knocking off one's son or stoning this, that and the other guy for this, that and the other thing. And then there's that little incident of blaming the Jews for what was obviously a public relations ploy that got out of hand. Read more about Put a Sock In It

Pecos Bill and Buffalo Bill. Billy the Kid and Wild Bill Hickok. Read more about The Power of Bill

Met my next door neighbor last night at the mail boxes. (We're in the city, but our neighborhood still has remnants of the time when it was a rural outskirt - our mailboxes are clustered together at the curb.)

"Watching the Republican Convention?" he asked.

And I had to confess. I just don't have the stomach for it.

I used to watch everything. I don't remember having to leave the room when Richard Nixon came on the air. I wasn't much interested in what he had to say and disagreed with most if not all of it, but he didn't actually make me feel a little queasy. Read more about Cowering in the Kitchen

I remember a commercial for an evangelical christian college that ran sometime in the 70's claiming to "send your children back to you exactly as they were when you entrusted them to us."

I read that as a promise from the college to refrain from educating your children at all. My mother-in-law du temps, visiting at the time, sighed audibly and said, "Oh, I wish I had sent Barry there." Read more about We Don't Need No Education

If there is one thing we know about Paul Ryan, aspiring VP, it's that he is a Rand fan. He's so enthusiastic about her that he gave his entire staff a copy of Atlas Shrugged. What I didn't know until recently was that his father died when Paul was 16, and I'm wondering if, by some awful trick of fate, that is when he found Rand. It was a vulnerable time at an impressionable age.

I have a confession to make. Well, it would be a confession if I hadn't already confessed to it numerous times, but let's pretend you don't know this.

From the ages of 16 to 18, I was an Ayn Rand fan. Read more about Ryan Shrugged

I'm short on time and topic today and don't think I can do any better at the moment than channel Time Magazine's James Poniewozik's Tuned In post today, schooling us on the difference between a lie and an un Read more about Channeling James

Is there anything less colorful in our political narrative than a primary campaign season without a shootout between inter-party gangs? Actually, here in SEAWA, that shootout would have taken place during an earlier caucus anyway. So no matter the national, by the time our August primary rolls around - and why we're having both escapes me at the moment - there's naught left to get excited about except the state legislature. And maybe a judgeship, Commissioner of Public Lands (huh?!) or a referendum or two.

Yawn. Read more about Primary Colors

Over the past few weeks, I've had more than one bone to pick with Jonathan Haidt and the results he has drawn from his Moral Foundations Questionnaire. This questionnaire covers six general areas which Haidt defines as providing a moral core: Care, Fairness, Liberty, Loyalty, Authority, and Sanctity. Read more about The Sacred