Humans — particularly of the American variety — will knock you for a loop now and then. They seem down; they seem out — licked, run over, beaten to a pulp. Then lo! Then behold! They pull off something big…
We just can’t kick the habit. Or the media can’t, which comes to the same thing, given the media’s habitual deference to its customers — you and me and Neighbor Jones. We’d rather hear about Donald Trump than about the…
The second most extraneous topic in American politics is the effect on the Democratic presidential race, and maybe life in general, of Joe Biden’s invasion of Lucy Flores’ personal space by kissing her noggin. Which leaves in first place the…
The show’s over. The monkey’s dead. — Tennessee Williams, Orpheus Descending Notwithstanding, please, that “dead,” in contemporary political parlance, is a relative term. No political stink ever entirely evaporates: We may expect the general public, through the media and its…
I mean, yeah, you’re right: The quest to get your kids into a top college has gotten crazy. We know as much from last week’s news reports about slimy dealings meant to give rich and powerful families an advantage over…
Crazy times give rise to crazy notions; e.g., socialism’s the ticket for modern America. Well, you know — maybe not socialism of the sort that lighted V.I. Lenin’s cruel eyes. Certainly not socialism in a systematic way: each economic piston…
Hoping for a knockout blow to battered, bedraggled remnants of the Confederate army, the starched and ready ranks of… Hold on. If memory serves, the Civil War wound up at Appomattox Court House, with Lee’s surrender to Grant. Maybe not….
Did I hear correctly? The pope blew it? Called a global summit in Rome to deal with sexual abuse, then spoke mainly in generalities? Skimmed over the need for better means of policing abuse? Left out of his opening speech…
In case you hadn’t noticed, everything is in crisis these days. Race relations, the climate, male behavior, government shutdowns, immigration… Except that immigration, as crises go, was pretty small beer until President Trump swooped down last week with his proclamation…