Welcome! This is an unapologetic, agenda-free zone. Just commentaries on current events that’ll move you to think, laugh, rage, and even cry.
Ever since reports about prison guards abusing Cuban refugees at a detention center in Nassau, Bahamas went viral last month, the Bahamian government has been trying to weather a public-relations hurricane. Unsurprisingly, these reports incited regional outrage. Nowhere more so than in Miami, from where Cuban exiles (aka Miami Cubans) exert apparent political influence in the… Read more.
North Korean President Kim Jong-Il is a temperamental and insecure man. Only this explains his habit of making nuclear threats from time to time. Whenever he does, he commands the international attention he craves so pathologically and extorts the aid his people need so desperately… When it comes to psychological warfare, this North Korean gnome is… Read more.
Here, in part, is how I explained why I am far more impressed with music stars like Adele and Beyoncé than those like Lady Gaga and Nicki Minaj: Lady Gaga literally personifies the triumph of packaged and formulaic acts over talented performances. Which is rather a shame because this girl can sing… Come to think of… Read more.
It never takes long for national tragedies in America to devolve into rubbernecking TV spectacles. The shooting rampage at the Navy Yard in Washington, DC this morning is a case in point — complete with wall-to-wall coverage, 99 percent of which is peddling misinformation and stoking fear, and hourly law-enforcement/political press conferences, 98 percent of which is… Read more.
Marathon negotiations between U.S. and Russian diplomats at a Geneva hotel produced a sweeping agreement that will require one of the most ambitious arms-control efforts in history. The deal involves making an inventory and seizing all components of Syria’s chemical weapons program and imposing penalties if President Bashar Assad’s government fails to comply will the… Read more.
Once again, like Pavlovian dogs, practically every news program in the United States reported yesterday on the latest message from the new leader of al-Qaeda as if it were a message from the president of the United States. But, besides scaremongering to generate ratings, can you think of any reason why they played video clips of… Read more.
Much is being made of a Russian proposal to resolve the “Crisis in Syria.” In sum, it calls for Syria to turn over its chemical weapons arsenal to international demolition experts and sign the international convention against their use to avoid military strikes by the United States. Notwithstanding understandable skepticism … on both sides, a fearful… Read more.
I knew long before I published my very first commentary online that I was inviting insults – not only to my intelligence, but also to my very being. Which, incidentally, is why my heart goes out to all of the kids whose online chats, pictures, observations, etc., incited such degrading and dehumanizing abuse (aka bullying) that… Read more.
I applaud NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg for decreeing this week that, henceforth, the area where the twin towers were destroyed shall no longer be called ‘Ground Zero.’ Instead, it shall revert to its original name, The World Trade Center. But I urge him to decree also that, henceforth, the city shall no longer mark this… Read more.
Author’s Note: President Obama is scheduled to make his case for war (um, er, a “shot across the bow”) against Syria in an address to the nation tonight. He’s hoping the art of persuasion that got a record number of Americans to support his re-election less than a year ago will get at least one… Read more.
