CNN does less news and more retrospectives these days. Hence, one would have been excused to assume it was showing another century in China the other day. Missiles nose to tail, soldiers goose-stepping, China was parading every ounce and centimeter of its military might. And for what? In observing the anniversary of World War II’s…
“This is going to be felt for years.” My politically prescient son had just watched Donald Trump toss Univision’s Jorge Ramos from his press conference and a Trump supporter tell Ramos, “Get out of my country.” Ramos is a U.S. citizen. And so it goes. You’ve heard of a charm offensive. What…
While many observed in horror as a mothballed high-country gold mine shared an egg-yolk yellow stream of poison with three states via the Animas River (and the San Juan River 100 miles downstream), I thought of another stream — a river of air. Years ago I flew with a…
In the hyperbolic chariot race waged by Republican presidential candidates, we can report the first breastplated contestant to have thrown a spoke. That would be the supposed moral standard-bearer of the field (of mankind?), the estimably sainted Ben Carson. Carson can talk the talk of the GOP base, like saying the Affordable Care Act is…
Donald Trump is a misogynist. If not, he’s determined to win the title. This guy is gunning for the finals of American Chauvinist Ninja Warrior. The last obstacle will melt before him and his bare chest, and that obstacle will be a “she.” On the morning after his coming-out debate performance, Trump didn’t just double-down…
One would say that the good outweighed the bad for Ted Cruz last week, and the bad was horrid. In the Senate, he was openly scorned by fellow Republicans for his routine and rash showboating. That included calling Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a liar. Cruz. blazing a culinary trail this week with "machine-gun bacon," was…
War is hell. Post-Civil War, Reconstruction was hellish. In a beauty contest, however, Reconstruction was in a dead heat with the Redemption for ugliness. The difference had to do with the losers in both. In the former it was Dixie. In the latter, it was people with black skin. I invested a very large chunk…
Dog days. Dog days. Nothing to write about. Nothing at all. Caitlyn Jenner’s evening wear? The latest Cosby atrocity? The freshest offering of Trump idiocy? What to write about? Hmm. How about something that has affected every family of every child in every public school for over a decade? With so many people dramatically affected…
We now know that racist trigger man Dylan Roof should not have been able to purchase a firearm. The FBI’s background check system should have blocked it based on felony drug charges. To this, a Facebook post announced, “Proof positive that making it harder to purchase guns will not make it harder for criminals to…
Most Americans don’t know how long it took for a notion “conceived in liberty” in 1776 to gestate. For a notion to become a nation, that is. Eleven years is how long it took: seven years of war, four years of legal flux, before the Constitution was signed. When that was done, outside the Constitutional…