During the heat of the 1994 mid-term elections some 23 years ago, Republican Congressional Representatives Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey rolled out their Contract with America, a pledge to pursue a conservative legislative agenda once the Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives. The Contract listed eight reforms the Republicans promised to enact and […]
At first listen, Donald Trump’s speaking style when he eschews the teleprompter seems chaotically free form, as if he tossed a few dozen tweets and sound bites into one of his “Make America Great Again” caps and picked a few out, one at a time, not bothering to supply connective material or an overarching direction. […]
Read More… from Trump acts and talks like a stand-up comic, but the joke is on the American people
Politicians of both parties seem to take for granted the idea that a tax cut leads to economic growth and more jobs. As it turns out, they are only half right. Tax cuts to the poor and middle class lead to growth and jobs. Tax cut on the wealthy create no new jobs and generate […]
Whenever I contemplate the fact that many leftists and left-leaning centrists believe charter schools are a good idea, I am reminded of Reinhold Niebuhr’s premise in The Children of Light and the Children of Darkness that it is not the evil children of darkness who cause most of the world’s problems, but foolish, misguided or […]
The agenda of the Trump Administration and Congressional Republicans includes raising military spending by billions of dollars. A lot of that money will go to developing a new generation of smaller, “smarter” nuclear weapons and to developing weapons that will inflict damage on the enemy without prior command by a human, so called automated weapons […]
Since the election pundits have from time to time compared Donald Trump to various former presidents, most frequently Andrew Jackson because both were racist populists with tempers who liked talking tough and using the military. But I’ve also seen writers find similarities in Trump’s temperament to both Adamses, in incompetence to Buchanan and in dishonesty […]
I wanted to let my OpEdge readers know that I’ll be taking a break from posting articles for from three to six months. I’ve been working on a novel for a number of years and am partway through a very polished second draft. I’ve decided it’s time to focus all my efforts on getting the […]
I had the strangest dream last night. I was sitting on a bench against the wall in a large ballroom filled with people dressed in formal wear. I was watching the glitterati and listening to the band play swing music when Donald Trump sits down beside me, shakes my hand and starts to brag about […]
I’m not sure whether it was the author or the headline writer, but someone in the New York Times produced a headline that certainly constitutes false news: “Dismal Results from Vouchers Surprise Researchers.” The problem with it is that those researchers who have been paying attention already know that public policy driving families to put […]
The latest Trump-GOP assault on human and civil rights has arrived: the rollback of Obama administration rules that have allowed transgender students to use the schools’ public bathrooms of the sex with which they identify. Legal arguments on the issue seem always to reduce to the question of whose rights are more important — the […]