I saw the man with the tent pitched outside the electronics store, three days before Black Friday. For some reason it made me think of sweet potatoes. I wish that I didn’t have to think of sweet potatoes at all. Then again, I also wish the same about Grover Norquist. Such is the…
I hear the case made against teaching cursive writing, and it tells me this: My third-grade teacher, Miss Coleman, wasted my instructional time. And heretofore I thought her to be a wonderful lady. School reformers are saying cursive instruction is pointless because 21st century technology has made it irrelevant. Understand: School…
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is thinking about the Republican presidential nomination. Then again, considering a particular segment of the electorate whose embrace he’ll need to get it, he’d best think twice. I speak of the Thirders, a hard-right bloc from whom a bloke like Christie is — let’s be honest — irreconcilably…
Excuse me, free-market conservatives, but why the sudden concern over millions set to lose their health insurance? Did such a problem concern you before President Obama and the Democrats set out to insure more Americans? Did it? I may have to review my notes. I’m pretty sure those notes say you said…
Based on the advance news clippings, Dallas was a very bad place for John F. Kennedy to visit that day. Based on crowds that were beyond adoring, the clippings were wrong and the moment was very right. Then, gunshots. Mortal wounds. Dallas survived, but its convalescence would be excruciating. Few were willing to…
“Glitches” is miserably inadequate to describe the online fiasco that has crippled the rollout of the Affordable Care Act. An outrage is what it is. However, outrage from you, Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Pa.? You, Congressman Murphy, hammering administration officials last week in Capitol hearings? “We were promised a website where…
It had every ingredient of Election Day — the crispness of autumn, the electricity of pronouncements, the winners, the losers. It was as if Americans had voted. In fact, they had. And for the second time in two years, Republicans finally conceded defeat. They would cede to the popular will and, in this case, let…
Call it the conundrum of the New Confederacy. Call it, “All dressed up in gray and no place to go.” They passed around “we secede” petitions when President Obama won re-election. Didn’t work. They sued to stop the Affordable Care Act. Didn’t work. They shut down the…
Gather ’round, children, as the first chill of autumn presents itself. The Farmer’s Almanac forecasts a harsh winter. The Almanac of American Politics calls that an understatement. Rarely has a wind this ill so beset the nation’s capital. Speaking of magazines: On the cover of the Oct. 14 Time, “Majority Rule” is smudged out in red against dark…
Look it up. The symptoms of hyperventilation are dizziness, tingling in the lips and extremities, fainting, and in the most extreme circumstances, full or partial shutdown of the U.S. government. We are seeing hyperventilation’s fruits in the Republican Party’s frantic bid to talk away the Affordable Care Act. The duly authorized, duly…