Reality in politics (06/21/06)
How are we supposed to know the real mind of a national political candidate when his persona, the thing that makes him "him," is being redone, shaped, and sold to us by "image" merchants? In these times when our country's substantial issues are enormous, such as cutthroat economic competition by the European Union, the certainty (no matter which party is in power) of a lingering dangerous war with Islamic Nazism, and our aging population's retirement and healthcare needs, just to name a few, we don't seem to have authentic leaders in the wings? Fact is, our store-bought political process seems no longer capable of dealing seriously with those major issues facing this nation. ...

Poisonous professors (06/14/06)
There are about 620,000 college and university professors in the United States. And, if you have ever been to college, you know that it is not too unusual to run into an obsessed professor who is so caught up in his area of expertise that he appears a little nutty. ...

Education, anyone? (06/07/06)
It's a great pleasure to have one's columns discussed, and used by some to duel with their friends at those breakfast seminars around the area. And, it's good to hear from readers who challenge me on my firm belief that today's educational standards, both in high schools and universities, are way below those norms of thirty years ago. ...

A teaching moment (05/31/06)
With all this talk about the book and the movie, "THE DA VINCI CODE," one wouldn't want to miss the "teaching opportunity"of writing about the real Leonardo da Vinci. He was the most fascinating figure of the Renaissance [meaning the time of a new birth of learning, a time of new and daring ideas, kk]. ...

Preserving freedom (05/24/06)
In last week's column ("Reckless congressional action," dddnews.com, May 17, 2006), we ended with Senator Frank Church challenging President Ford by attacking the secrecy surrounding the CIA's actions in the war against communism. But, that was no surprise to President Ford. ...

Reckless congressional action (05/17/06)
"Sweeping attacks, over generalization against our intelligence activities jeopardize vital functions necessary to our national security. Today's sensations must not be the prelude to tomorrow's Pearl Harbor. . . . Any reckless Congressional action to cripple our intelligence services in legitimate operations would be catastrophic." (Personal Papers Ford 1975, vol. 2, p. 492)...

Next 9/11 cannot be prevented (05/10/06)
We Americans expect the "intelligence" community to protect us from surprise attack, but we're putting way too much faith in intelligence. The best intelligence agencies (ours and the British) in the world can't assemble data, and make accurate predictions, about when, where, and by whom, the next "guerilla" raid will kill some of us. ...

Uneasily distracted (05/03/06)
We hear a lot about "madmen" taking power in far-off lands -- most often lands with large oil reserves. A few pertinent questions: Has the White House lost its collective mind? Do the president and his minions believe that Americans can be stampeded into another needless war to save his party from the consequences of the catastrophe in Iraq? Is the Bush administration seriously thinking of bombing -- possibly nuking -- Iran for political purposes? Is it actually possible, as has been reported, that Bush believes himself to be on a divine, messianic mission?. ...

Marooned on a mountain top (04/26/06)
We had a wonderful extended Easter vacation, living in what the Swiss would call a mountain chalet, but what we Americans label a lodge. I was the guest of my sister-in-law and my late brother's family on the traditional Easter gathering of their family. ...

Insane or evil? (04/19/06)
Last week we reviewed some aspects of the case of the confessed killer Marry Winkler, and we tried to make an educated guess as to her mental state when she shot and killed her husband. To do that, we had to agree on what certain psychological terms meant. ...

Mary Winkler, psychotic? (04/12/06)
Mary Winkler, as you will recall, was arrested a few weeks ago on murder charges, and shortly after her arrest she apparently confessed to the shooting of her husband of 10 years. The fact that her husband was a popular, and presumably successful, preacher at a mainstream church in the quiet and beautiful community of Selmer, Tennessee says nothing about why his wife would shoot him in the back. ...

Reform or politics? (04/05/06)
I write essays to myself in a struggle to see what I really think about a subject in the news. Those subjects have included significant local happenings, or some inspirational event, or some extraordinarily colorful congressman's unique way of betraying the public trust, or some senator trying, like a lady of the night, to justify political prostitution with the senatorial equivalent of "a girl has got to make a living?" One has written more than 500 hundred such mental exercises in the past three years, and some of them, about 150, have appeared here as columns.. ...

If you leave Islam, you must die (03/29/06)
It's old news (Is that an oxymoron? Ok, shoot fire, boys, an oxymoron ain't someone dumb as an ox, get out that ninety-seven-cent dictionary, it's there on the shelf by the clippers and comb sanitizer, and look it up for your "ownself") that Abdul Rahman was arrested and charged in an Afghanistan court for the "crime" of converting from Islam to Christianity. ...

Free speech and responsibility (03/22/06)
Last week in this column we lamented the lack of free speech at Harvard's Red University, and now I find myself confronted with a dilemma, because now I want to limit the speech of a high school teacher in Colorado. But, is there actually a problem between my advocating for free speech among faculty members at an Ivy League school, and restricting the speech of a high school teacher in the classroom? The facts concerning the high school teacher's suspension for comparing President Bush to Hitler need to be examined.. ...

Phony bias claims (03/15/06)
The viewpoint expressed in this piece is doomed to be misunderstood by some, and gleefully exploited by those who "do" understand it. Some readers will use the information here to decorate their existing attitudes and biases. However, this is a short, inadequate, piece not about "inferiority" and "superiority," but about scientifically unremarkable statements concerning historical observations and modern comparisons of the differences in groups labeled "women" and "men." We will also look at free speech at Harvard, since the indirectly forced resignation of Lawrence Summers, the president of Harvard University, has been recurrently aggravating me, because of its effect on what John Stuart Mills called the "liberty of thought and feeling, absolute freedom of opinion and sentiment on all subjects, practical or speculative, scientific, moral, or theological.". ...

A discussion of aging (03/08/06)
"The old dog barks backward without getting up. I can remember when he was a pup." Robert Frost. Like any other age, late life has its unique challenges and rewards. And most of our declines and losses are inevitable as we eventually become living/dying proof of the laws of nature. ...

Unwelcome visions (03/01/06)
I find myself fantasizing about the endless possibilities of political figures appearing to us in ways that we don't ordinarily expect. And, I confess that sometimes I scare myself, more than I'm self-amused, with what the imagination insinuates on one's sense of fair play. ...

'Displaying' behaviors (02/22/06)
This past Saturday morning was one of the more enjoyable and generally entertaining that I've had in the last three years of living, while balking at any sign of senility, by reading, researching, and writing, in this, ideal for me, "penthouse" apartment. ...

There's something addicting about hypocrisy (02/15/06)
I watched the funeral of Coretta Scott King until I had to run an errand. When I left the televised funeral, I had been watching a dignified loving service for a woman who surely deserved such an outpouring of warm respect. When I returned to the televised ceremony, I was somehow insulted to see and hear that it was becoming a service not about Mrs. ...

Here's to beer (02/08/06)
I'm not an expert on football, but there was something for everybody in the Super Bowl, including those who collect recordings of the worst renditions, ever, of the National Anthem. I'm thinking about doing a piece about the history of football, and a commentary on the vocal mutilation of our National Anthem at major football events, but not today...

Vernichtungslager (extermination camp) (02/01/06)
The worst thing that can happen to those that we love is to forget them, no matter how long they have been dead. In our family, one generation seems to "resurrect" past generations, especially at such holidays as Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas. We tell "let it all hang out," humorous and sometimes tragic, stories about those family members we knew, and we retell stories told to us by those who've passed on about those we didn't know. ...

National newspapers, bleached of objectivity? (01/25/06)
What do you think about what George Santayana had to say, way back in 1915? He wrote to his sister explaining that, "I'm too old to be influenced by newspaper argument. When I read them I form perhaps a new opinion of the newspaper, but seldom a new opinion on the subject discussed?"...

Fool, a stupid person, or jester (01/18/06)
Professional fools or jesters appear to have existed in all times and countries. Not only have there always been individuals naturally inclined and endowed to amuse others, there has been in most communities a definite class, the members of which have used their powers or weaknesses to act a fool so successfully that they made a good living from it, and still do...

Crazed impulses, meandering and instinct control (01/11/06)
If it were true that "man exists by instincts," I'd be up a creek with no rudder, and a paddle would be a liability, a weapon. Living by my instincts would get me, and probably many of you, in a lot of trouble. My instinctive reaction to a lot of things nowadays is just too bizarre, but I've so far managed to stay in control. ...

Dear Amy and Abby (01/04/06)
It's always a great pleasure to read "The Ledger," my nomination for Central Florida‚s best newspaper. Unlike at home, I often find myself reading columns like "Dear Abby," and "Ask Amy," which tend to strengthen my strong belief that the general American public is a great psycho-social zoo. ...

Christmas 2005 (12/28/05)
Christmas is always a "hoot" with my Florida family, and this year is no different, except the trip down here was less eventful than last year's trek. Last year, I started to Florida just after an ice storm, and slid off the half inch of ice that covered the new four-lane highway. ...

Christmas, questions, country (12/21/05)
The first question your children will ask their brothers and sisters and friends on Christmas day is what did you get for Christmas? It's a perfectly normal question, asked by perfectly normal children, who have been taught by their perfectly normal parents how to successfully commercialize Christmas...

The Mass of Christ (12/14/05)
The word "Christmas" developed from a religious service known as the Mass of Christ (Christ's Mass, after centuries, shortened to Christmas). To be clear, a Mass is the celebration of the Eucharist, the celebration of Holy Communion. "Communion," among those who easily warm to an argument about religion, is a subject brimming over with opportunity for Christians to become distinctly un-Christian. ...

Recognizing our enemies (12/07/05)
Five people are in police custody in connection with the beheading of three Christian schoolgirls in Indonesia, according to "AsiaNews." Apparently, the girls were decapitated during an Oct. 29, massacre on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. Such attacks on Christians by Muslim militants are common all over the world, from Russia to the Philippines, and in France, the heart of Europe, as we recently wrote about in this space. ...

Competing rants (11/30/05)
There are so many thoughts competing to be shared in this column these days that, as I write this first sentence, I don't know if I'm going to end up ranting about the UN, raging against the New York Times, or being irritated with KAIT's insipid [That means dumb, empty, and gushy, boys] recent feel-good "series" on "Islam in Region 8," or, ending closer to home, examining the idea that the voters of Kennett can't be trusted with voting directly for a police chief. ...

Good news from Notre Dame (11/23/05)
My favorite "Thanksgiving Day" football game was played a couple of Saturdays ago. Notre Dame won the game, but Navy gave the Irish a couple of shocks during the last half. Navy fought hard to the very end, but the game is not the real story. What happened next on Notre Dame's about to be enhanced field of honor was incredibly inspiring. ...

"Brennt Paris?" (11/16/05)
I'm sorry, but I couldn't resist it. Just before he committed suicide, Hitler asked, "Brennt Paris?" Meaning, "Is Paris burning?" He had given the order, as Germany itself was going up in flames, that Paris was to be burnt to the ground. Well, it never happened, but it looks like the French are pretty worried that gangs of Islamic Algerian young men and boys might bring their torches into Paris from the French countryside...

Uncomfortable awareness (11/09/05)
"History without tragedy does not exist, and knowledge is better and more wholesome than ignorance," said A. G. Adler, and he's right. Humanity progresses best when thoughtful people keep in mind that all races and all religions have shameful past behaviors in their history. ...

The devil hates cell phones (11/02/05)
God sent cell phones to save marriages, because two thousands years of Christianity have failed to scare more than just a few American males into remaining faithful to their marriage vows. We start this discussion with the proposition that "natural man," like all species of warm-blooded male mammals the world over, has a preprogramed animalistic directive to roam the earth, impregnating as many females of his breed as he can find. ...

It's not a bad thing (10/26/05)
While I've been concerned about involuntarily demonstrating basic signs of becoming an age-induced cartoon character, like unknowingly pulling my pants way over my ample belly, till my belt is just up under my embarrassingly corpulent breasts, others of my ilk are out running down jinxed pedestrians with their 20-year-old, perfectly functioning, Cadillacs. ...

Mingo Wildlife Refuge is safe (10/19/05)
It is a grossly false assumption that Mingo Wildlife Refuge is in danger from the proposed Prairie State Energy Campus coal-fueled power plant that's located near Marissa, Ill., about 85 miles or more from Mingo. In fact, if the power plant were to be built within 10 or 20 miles of Mingo the wildlife refuge would still be perfectly safe. ...

Fervently agitated (10/12/05)
You know if we had a major depression today, the results would be more catastrophic than the Great Depression of 1929, mainly because the characters of individual members of the House of Representatives, and to some extent the Senate, are of such low quality. ...

New Orleans' colorful history (10/05/05)
A few years ago, an extremely wealthy "nouveau riche" (that means tons of new money and 6 ounces of enlightenment, boys) Canadian couple that I know well returned from a visit to New Orleans to their home in Calgary, Alberta. They complained to me, "I don't know what all the fuss is about with New Orleans, everything down there is so old." Last week (Daily Dunklin Democrat, Sept. ...

Captain of the Canal Street ferry (09/28/05)
I was about 11 or 12 years old when I first saw New Orleans, and it was the beginning of a fascination with the city that continues to this very day. I was captivated by the sights and sounds of the river and the smells of the French Quarter. I was a country boy who had never been farther away from the familiar sights of the MidSouth than St. ...

A Southern town (09/21/05)
Each time I go to the library, or post office, or grocery store, or wherever my fancy takes me, I am comfortably reminded that I live in an authentic, and unusually prosperous, Southern small city, a place where we're not strangers to each other, or at least not strangers to the parents and grandparents of the vital young people who are replacing the pillars of our community who have died, or who are too old to face more than just the challenge to get out of bed in the morning. ...

Words that ambush the mind (09/14/05)
Now that the mornings are cool and inviting, I've resumed my walks around Lake Jerry Paul. During the extremely hot months, I've gotten my exercise by walking up four flights of stairs, instead of taking the elevator in my apartment building. I've never had a challenging thought in all those walks up the stairs. ...

Sam, the bank runner (09/07/05)
Sam, the bank runner I don't know why, but it seems that writers to "Dear Abbey" always write their wackiest stuff when I'm spending time in Winter Haven, Florida. Dear Abby's column of August 24, 2005, in The Ledger, the most wide read, and best, newspaper in the counties surrounding Winter Haven, was a dooser! I brought a section of The Ledger home with me to share with you all (yawl). ...

Lunches,dogs, tests, soccer tryouts (08/31/05)
When in the course of human events parents are called on to help move their firstborn child to far off Notre Dame University, a call goes out to an aging bachelor uncle, a sort of geriatric, weak webbed, Spider Man, to present himself in Florida. The challenge: Stay a week with three kids (ages 5, 11, and 15) and three dogs, one of which is insane (talking dogs here, folks), one of which is normal (a chocolate Lab), and one of which is almost normal for a Basset hound. ...

Hoping Muslims don't reclaim their faith (08/17/05)
The next time I need to vomit, I'll not stick my finger down my throat, I'll reread Cokie and Steven Roberts, "Helping Muslims reclaim their faith," Daily Dunklin Democrat, Sunday, August 7, 2005. If Cokie and Steve lived in a country where Muslims have "reclaimed their faith," Cokie and Steve would be in prison or dead, so splendid are the Roberts' transgressions against the Koran...

Anti-American lefty-sob-fests (08/10/05)
It's odd that this August, and for a few years now, there's been no big deal in the press about the anniversary of the incineration of the Japs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Why is that? Or, don't you remember programs like ABC's "The Last Day," and the Russian play "Peace Day" back in the early 80's? In those days it was Cold War standard fare to beat up on us Americans for, in 1945, raining righteous revenge on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with technically superior, and exquisitely effective, new weapons from hell. ...

Phony 'news' (08/03/05)
I closed my book, and turned from the muted Weather Channel to NBC's Meet the Press just in time to hear Tim Russert announce that, in effect, "space" would be the subject of the program. I'm telling you, I'm sick of "spacey" so-called news programs. ...

Go ahead, offend me (07/27/05)
It wasn't one of those days when there are four people ahead you. There was one, thirty-something-professional-looking, man in the barber chair. He looked to me like the kind of new-age husband who usually gets a haircut in a "beauty shop." I didn't know him nor, it seemed, did the barber. ...

Benny's channel surfing God (07/20/05)
I read the Religion Page of the Daily Dunklin Democrat, but not always with the best of results, irritated-bowel-wise. That's why I save Pastor Jocelyn Vanbuskirk's column for last. It's always thoughtful, to the point, and reassuring. She always brings context to the Gospels. ...

Awake America! (07/13/05)
What's going on here? From the "G-8" Summit in Scotland and the Kyoto Treaty on Global Warming, and the latest international political fad of "uplifting" the backward masses of the continent of Africa, the world, with the help our poorly informed pretty-girl-pretty-boy talking hollow heads on TV, always seems to accuse us Americans as the bad guys...

Paved by Pendergast (07/06/05)
The approaching "public corruption trial" (Daily Dunklin Democrat July 1-2, 2005) involving Lobbyist Bill Waris, a Kansas City Democrat, tends to prove the point, recently discussed in this space, that today's little pecuniary political peccadilloes can't hold a light to "old fashion" indigenous Democratic dollar depravity. ...

More about Democrats (06/29/05)
I've gotten a lot of questions about the column, "Old fashioned Democrats." People say to me, "I couldn't figure out if you were knocking the Democrats or the Republicans." The answer is, both. A few of my fellow Democrats have said to me, "You sound more like a Republican than a Democrat to me." That caused me to ask them, "Where to you think all these (majority) Republican votes in Missouri and Arkansas, chief among the heartland states of the nation, are coming from?" The answer is simple: the votes are coming from former Democrats. ...

"Old-fashioned Democrats ..." (06/22/05)
Joshua Green ("The Atlantic Monthly," June 2005) has recently written that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are "old-fashioned Democrats," and that they are an "odd [political] couple." They are "odd and odder," in my books, but not because of their early backgrounds. ...

My brain and yours (06/15/05)
Remember, if you've heard this old joke once before, raise one finger, ever so discretely, but that won't stop me. However, if you've read this "three fingers worth," it means that you've read too many outdated editions of Readers Digest-type recycled magazines and/or have spent too much time being bored in the waiting rooms of miserly dentists or doctors, and that too can't stop me. So here goes...

When we resist aging (06/08/05)
Why is it that it's usually only our young who act as if there is a limited right time to do the things that we older folks still dream would be rewarding? Do the young somehow know that it's now or never, and that as the poet says, "we always hear/ Time's winged chariot hurrying near?" Teenagers don't typically and seriously consider that there are clearly established handicaps to life, do they? I don't think so. ...

Philosphy, fun and fat (06/01/05)
Well, I guess you guys have opened the new Aquatic Center by now. I'm on an Alaskan cruise, the guest of my generous, but vigorous, family, and won't be back until June 5, 2005. I've been giving considerable thought as to how best to use our wonderful new pool/recreation facility. ...

Teutonic-American terorist? (05/25/05)
By the time you read this, I will have bitten my tongue dozens of times to keep from upsetting federal airport "screeners." I am flying to Anchorage to join three of my family members on an Alaskan cruise ship. To get there, I will have to be searched before boarding a plane in St. Louis, delayed in Salt Lake City while others are frisked, and, finally, I am alerted by the cruise company that my body and baggage will be searched again before I am allowed on board the ship...

Crimes against commonsense (05/18/05)
Public education has gone steadily downhill since the creation of the U. S. Department of Education (DOE), and the loss of local control of schools, and parents' freedom to make vital local decisions about how to educate their children are largely the result of the DOE's crimes against commonsense. ...

Civilizing children (05/11/05)
Let me caution you that this is a self-serving piece, brought on by a series of irritating dining experiences, the last of which was recently in an upscale Memphis restaurant, where I was the guest of a group of old friends. My friends effectively "raised" their children, but some of their grandchildren are living on the edge of civilization, like Tarzan returned home to the English manor house of his grandparents. ...

When I grow up (05/04/05)
If you missed the special section in last Thursday's Dunklin Democrat (April 28, 2005), entitled "When I grow up," I urge you to read it. It's filled with heartwarming and encouraging messages from the area's second graders. It encouraged me to modify what I had planned for today's column, "The wretched manners of children." Or, maybe I would have used the title, "When to spank parents?" But, all that changed when I happened onto "When I grow up."...

Elite media, entrails and preachers (04/27/05)
Gee whiz! Guess what? There are more "cafeteria" Protestants than Catholics who pick and chose what they will believe! Yet, all we've been hearing from the press, especially since the election of the new "conservative" Pope, is the effect he will have in the further "alienation" of "cafeteria" Catholics. ...

So live that ... ? (04/20/05)
I want you to know that I'm appropriately dressed for the opinions that I'm about to voice in this column, which some of you will find somewhat "redneck" in their basic simplicity. I have the A/C set on 65 degrees in my penthouse apartment overlooking beautiful downtown Kennett, and I'm comfortable in my well worn sweat pants. ...

Third Reich: Rise and Fall (04/13/05)
Opposition to Hitler began not as an organized political movement but as the reaction of individuals with religious and moral conviction against both the theories and the practices of the Nazis. Hitler‚s earliest opponents had enough foresight to imagine, at least to a certain extent, what would happen if the cancer of Nazism were allowed to spread and one day gain control of the country. ...

Trying to kill Hitler (04/06/05)
"I tell you Hitler is dead," Stauffenberg insisted. "It was though a fifteen centimeter shell had hit the place. It is impossible that anyone could have survived." [From Joaquim Remak, "The Nazi Years," Prentice-Hall, 1969]. Count Stauffenberg had acted with bravery that had earned him a place in German history as one of the rare good guys in the Third Reich. ...

Germans against Hitler (03/30/05)
Last week we visited the life and death of Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, one of a number of "decent" Germans, who seriously opposed Hitler as early as 1933, while American and French and English mainstream politicians, polluted by the impotent League of Nations, were pussyfooting around "Der Fuhrer," giving him what he wanted, in a way the world hasn't seen since, except for the way the corruption-impaired UN gave in to Saddam Hussein...

Some Germans died trying (03/23/05)
I'm going to express some "religious" opinions here, but my beliefs or judgements are no more valid than yours. I don't have the gift of complete certainty, and my opinions don't rise to the level of the absolute "truth," because, like all opinions, yours and mine, they lack sufficient grounds to be called facts. ...

Distorted judgement and politicians (03/16/05)
When's the last time you heard a politician take a stand that goes against the media's current view of a particular issue? For example the press is all over professional baseball because of the use of steroids, and the politicians are taking every opportunity to get their mugs on television fifteen times a day decrying the use of "growth hormones" in sports. ...

Is your neighbor dangerous (03/09/05)
You know you would think that with 27 million adults and about 7 million children with diagnosable mental disorders in the United States more "crazy" people would be killing their family, friends, neighbors and people in the street. But that's not the case. ...

Prince Charles and Henry VIII (03/02/05)
History is not boring and neither are historical accounts of the sex lives of famous princes and kings. But, it is a sign of the times that while Prince Charles is marrying a divorcee, no one is losing his head, that is actually getting it chopped off, and placed, in all its horror, on display as a warning to the unwashed masses of Princess Diana freaks. ...

Carpe Dementia (02/23/05)
It means seize the insanity. Most of us are more familiar with the T-shirts that "say," seize the day, or seize the moment, meaning make the most of the day that is given us, enjoy it while you can because you might not be here tomorrow. However, perhaps from an overdose of TV commercials, I have suddenly become severely shaken by the base lusting for physical flawlessness of the American consumer. ...

Dresden, February 13, 1945 (02/16/05)
The Nazis (called neo-Nazis now days) are at it again, this time in Dresden during the 60-year anniversary of the bombing of Dresden by the allies in WW II. About 5,000 Nazis have tried to disrupt the wreath laying ceremony that was attended by ambassadors of the US, UK, France and Russia. The BBC says the message of the day was "supposed to be one of remembrance for the dead, and hope that past wounds can be healed."...

Optimistic about the square (02/09/05)
Is our county "Court Square" a promising place for new businesses? Is Kennett a better city for business than it has ever been before? Has Wal-Mart helped destroy Court Square businesses, while drawing thousands of new people monthly to Kennett who otherwise wouldn't come here to shop, and eat, in the dozens of new successful businesses that have developed off the square as a direct result of the "draw" of the Super Center? And how does one measure business growth in a community?...

The weathered visitor (02/02/05)
I have had a great month in Winter Haven, but it's now time to get home. Anyway, I need a real haircut, and you can't get a genuine buzz cut unless you can see the Dunklin County Courthouse at the same time. So, by the time you read this, I will have been back home a couple of days, with my hair whirred to a cue ball, and I will have had a thorough political reeducation...

Beware of columnists bearing advice (01/26/05)
Who are those poor miserable wretches who write to "advice" columns and receive answers variously addressed to such creatures as "duped, miffed, loved, very worried, and confused?" Here's an example: a woman wrote to Dear Abby (DearAbbey.com) asking why her husband of twenty years hit the roof when she "thought it was finally time to answer all his questions regarding her past life," including confessing a onetime consummated love affair that occurred before they were married? Remember, the woman claimed the single event was over twenty years ago and never repeated, with anyone. ...

Successful aging (01/19/05)
Successful aging, is seems, "demands" taking a hard look at who we are and what makes our lives worthwhile. But before we try to do that, we must first remember the fact that most of us, when we were young adults, never asked the question, "What can I do to be happier?" Or, "What will make my life worthwhile?" However, as older folks, we are too prone to be dependent on our children too early. ...

You're no prize either (01/12/05)
I watched my grandmother grow older, I watched my parents and my friends' parents grow older and now, at 70 years of age, I am qualified to comment on what it feels like to be old, and growing older by the day. Let me confess that my cultural prejudice against aging folks persists to this day, and continues to distort what I "see" and think about my age group. ...

United Nations, a failure (01/05/05)
The United Nations is, has been, and will always be, an organization that works against the interests of the American common man. We allow this because of "UN-think." We Americans have been completely brainwashed by the bureaucracy of the United Nations, and its obedient servants, the has-been "mainstream press." Somehow, too many Americans have bought into the idea that it's all right for the UN to take an American common man's tax dollars, and the blood of his sons and daughters, to use as it sees fit, while accusing, abusing, and using the generous American public as a punching bag and a piggy bank, and a free insurance company.. ...

America: 2005 (12/29/04)
Despite the "Chicken Little" attitude of the old "has been" CBS, NBC, ABC networks, and their nightly news readers, the sky isn't falling, and in fact, things are getting better and better in this country, and thus the world. As a matter of fact we are much better off than the best of earlier predictions and observations regarding our future. ...

It's a wonderful life (12/22/04)
I did a little Christmas shopping last week "On the Square," and I enjoyed going into Mitchell's bustling drugstore/ boutique, with its display of hundreds of high quality "giveables," and "selfishables." For clarification, selfishables are those things you buy strictly for yourself, because one tries to keep this "joy of giving" thing in check. ...

When the chips are down (12/15/04)
July 02, 2003 (dddnews.com "Murder Reality TV") we offered the theory that Scott Peterson murdered his wife and unborn child because of out of control borderline psychotic narcissism (bizarre excessive self-admiration or self love, and a tendency to overestimate one's abilities and importance). Scott, as we observed at the time, acted in ways, particularly during the search for Laci, that seemed to have completely ignored the humanity of Laci...

Don't 'happy holidays' me (12/08/04)
You know, about two hundred and fifty years ago the men who wrote our constitution used to worry about the "safe" limits of religious toleration in this country. They debated whether complete toleration of the many different forms of Christian worship was a danger to the State. ...

Creative loafing (12/01/04)
I'm not sure that loafing is the right word to use to describe getting out and about to see what's going on, and what folks are thinking, and doing. And I guess that loitering would be the better word to use when, after submitting my essentially bald head to a haircut, which, by the way, is the most expensive three minutes in my day, I can hardly bring myself to leave the shop, for fear that I will miss something...

Can't stand aside from life (11/24/04)
There are so many "political" things to write about, such a mess in the world, and such an abundance of unrealities and idiocies of life around me, I just don't know which swamp to muck through. I'm sometimes tempted to stand aside, to surrender writing about any of it, and just go with the flow. ...

Hatchets and things (11/17/04)
The New York Times is to objective journalism, as prostitution is to love. Nearly everything that Thomas Friedman has written in the past year or so about the Middle East has failed the tests of the smallest, to the largest, of time frames. First, he told us that we're responsible for the "hopelessness" of the Palestinian youth, and that the Palestinians are suffering from lack of money for their "infrastructure," and then he said that Palestinian poverty is all our fault. ...

The Rexall, more than a store (11/10/04)
All that I have to say in this piece is that I was somehow lucky enough to have been raised in a community where just the right balance of villainous hypocrisy, and gentle ignorance-enhanced imbecility, shared the same life spaces, and localized triumphs and tragedies, with genuinely good, and often brilliant, men and women. ...

Unfaltering conviction (11/03/04)
I'm writing this before the elections results are in, and before I know who will have won the election, Bush or Kerry? I know a lot people are concerned that the election will be as close as the 2000 results, and that the popular vote winner might not be the electoral college vote winner. ...

We need them (10/27/04)
The Fathers of the Constitution drew up an admirable blueprint of government--and went off and left it. They made no practical provision for the day by day business of politics or administration of their marvelous plan. It seems to me that they neither anticipated nor recognized political parties. ...

Liberty and Order (10/20/04)
I believe in the full power of the people to write and say what they please about government at all levels. But I don't believe that when we have soldiers in Iraq and elsewhere fighting and dying on our behalf that we can tolerate men like Michael Moore taking advantage of the ignorance (or is it herd worship of the "famous?") of average Americans by writing a book chocked full of lies, and worse, "fact sounding," half-truths that have the effect of creating a clear and present danger and aiding Islamic savages in killing our troops. ...

Flashlights hypocrisy gossip (10/13/04)
Joshua Lionel Cowen invented toy trains, batteries and flashlights, and "Let There Be Light" was on the cover of the 1899 EVEREADY catalog. But, how do we get from that little nugget of info to hypocrisy and gossip? Easier than you think. And readers of this column, think, I think?...

Maintenance of freedom (10/06/04)
Democracy means the perfect equality of opportunity, especially in education, without the hypocrisy of voting. What do you think about that? What, then, does democracy mean to you? What do you mean when you say, "I believe in Democracy?" For example, do you believe that public officials should be chosen by voting on candidates that have been paraded before us by special interests' cliques pulling the unseen wires of democratic pretense? Or, should our nominees be chosen from those with specific training, or at least from those who have firstly filled a lower office well? That is, should the ideal candidate start with being elected to the school board, then the city council, mayor, state representative, state senator, and finally governor, before "running" for the presidency? Or should we choose our presidential candidates from the aristocracy? Don't be biased about the word "aristocracy," for it is only a word. ...

Straight from the gut (09/29/04)
Embolden is a good word to know now days. It means to give courage to; cause to be bold or bolder. Now, can we use it in a sentence? Sure! Jimmy Carter emboldened people like Osama bin Laden when, as President of the United States, he never lifted a significant finger to punish the Iranian Islamic savages, then called "Iranian students," who took more than two hundred American citizens from our embassy in Tehran, and held them hostage for over a year. ...

The political problem (09/22/04)
Justice would be a simple matter, says Plato, if men were simple. And for thousands of years many of the best minds have preached that man should "return to the simple life." That is, return to nature, to the primitive simplicity and justice (Utopia?) of a world that never was, and will never be. ...

Escaping hurricanes and politics (09/15/04)
By last Friday afternoon, I'd had a bellyful of TV reruns of hurricanes and politics. Bad hurricanes can swiftly kill you, but bad politics kills you one cut at a time, with TV "analysts" inflicting thousands of relentless dissecting dreadful dubious obvious obfuscating intelligence-wounding insults to one's nervous system with their incessant, "Chinese water torture," drop, drop, drop of near paralyzing brain droppings of political pundit prattle! Clearly, it was time to relieve my frustrations by having a really big meal, alone, but in public. ...

Schools, always impelled (09/08/04)
The schools of America began as children of the Church. That's a fact. And now we find the schools slipping, ever so slowly, from local control by locally elected school boards, and becoming agents of the state, and pawns of politicians, and "trade" unions such as the NEA. ...

Passion for education (09/01/04)
A man who was once asked why he did not weep at a certain sermon, when everybody else was shedding tears, replied: "I don't belong to this church." I hope I am just as emotionally detached as that man when it comes to observations about educating "our" children. ...

Consultants (08/25/04)
A consultant is a person we pay to tell us what we already know, but just can't seem to face it. I'm satisfied with the direction of remarks attributed to Dr. George Byers, one of two consultants hired by the school board, but I'm not comforted by some of the remarks of the other consultant, Dr. ...

CIA needs Porter Goss (08/18/04)
Congressman Porter Goss started in the CIA soon after he graduated from Yale (with a degree in Greek) and, starting with the early 1960's, he began his training as an expert in Latin American, and Mexican, affairs. And even though his activities in the CIA have been unexplored ("unexplorable?") for more than forty years, he has informed the public that, in the distant past, he had recruited and "run" foreign agents for our country. ...

CNN's "Warsaw Uprising" (08/11/04)
Last Saturday night, CNN presented the story of how 150,000 poorly equipped Polish patriots attacked the German garrison (their brutal Nazi occupiers and murderers) in the historic city of Warsaw on August 1, 1944. The program was advertized as the untold story of how a handful of patriotic Poles fought bravely against a huge German war machine. ...

Howling dogs and bad performances (08/04/04)
I was playing the piano the other day when my niece and nephew's Bassett, "Georgia," decided to join me. I was playing a Beethoven sonata , but not badly enough to warrant the fuss Georgia kicked up when I played in the higher register of the piano. ...

Pretending deafness, what? (07/28/04)
I'm about to wind up a month long visit with my family here in Florida. These visits are always a learning experience for all of us. For example, I learned, quite to my surprise, that I am deaf (!), according to every man, woman, child, Bassett Hound, Rat Terrier, Chocolate Lab, and the very aloof "Rosie" the cat, who lives somewhere in this large house, but nobody's quite sure when they saw her last. ...