At the time of this writing, we have just learned that the heroic efforts of Japanese nuclear-generated electrical power workers have failed and the last remaining workers have evacuated the Fukushima nuclear power plant. It seems all but certain that some amount of poisonous radiation will escape the containment and carry into the atmosphere to […]
I always love to peruse the photos, jobs and wages of the 150 or so people that Parade Magazine features in its annual review of people’s wages in the United States. This year, only a sampling of the featured made it to the print addition. To see the full survey, you have to go to the […]
Am I a delusional paranoid liberal, seeing a conspiracy in every corner? Over the past few weeks, I’ve gotten the subjective impression that our elected officials and other leaders on all levels of government were inundating the marketplace of ideas (AKA the news media) with demands and plans to cut budgets, especially in the areas […]
Sometimes the logic in an ad backfires by creating a situation in which no matter what the viewer concludes, the astute thing to do is not buy the product or service. Take, for example, the current Direct TV “reading of the will” TV commercial: The scene is a large conference room in which all the […]
Charles G. Koch’s justification in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal for the millions of dollars that he and his brother David throw at ultra right-wing causes, organizations and politicians reminded me of a very old “Saturday Night Live” bit: the one in which Dan Akroyd, Bill Murray and John Belushi are short-order cooks in a restaurant […]
Among the flotilla of right-wing online publications that clog up the waterways of the Internet is the American Thinker, described by Wikipedia as “a daily conservative Internet publication dealing with American politics, foreign policy, national security, economics, diplomacy, culture, military strategy, and the survival of the State of Israel.” A recent issue featured an anti-union […]
I wanted to pose a question that only time will answer: Will the energy nationwide among progressives aroused by the Wisconsin public union fight grow and lead to a truly national movement that would sweep not Democrats, but progressives into office? Will it happen? Only if we—meaning you, me and everyone we know—make it happen. […]
Imagine seeing the following movie: Hitler learns that on his visit with Mussolini, he will have to attend a formal ball. It will be expected that he dance at least three or four dances, certainly with Mrs. Mussolini and perhaps also with some of the wives and daughters of the German high command. But Adolph […]
Read More… from Who killed more people: the Nazis or the monarchs of England? It’s an open question.
The Science Times, the New York Times’ weekly science section, just can’t get enough of those pseudo-scientific stories in which the reporter tries to connect contemporary sexual mores with the theory of natural selection. The argument, always, is that we do it because in early times those who did it were more likely to have […]
Every once in a while I read a news story that’s so slimy and in which civilized humans act so poorly that it makes me want to take a shower or disinfect. The latest skin-crawler comes from Dr. Phil Haeck (probably pronounced “hack”!), president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS), who has advised […]