Welcome! This is an unapologetic, agenda-free zone. Just commentaries on current events that’ll move you to think, laugh, rage, and even cry.
Angelina Jolie famously elected to replace her healthy breasts with implants because she feared she might develop terminal cancer … someday. And she won near-universal praise for doing so. TIME magazine even ran a May 27, 2013 cover heralding “The Angelina Effect” she would have on women. I, however, stood virtually alone in pooh-poohing the hosannas to her.… Read more.
I’m embarrassed to admit that I know even less about Folk Music than I do about Theoretical Physics. (I flunked Physics 101.) But it’s a testament to the impact Pete Seeger had beyond his genre that I know far more about him than I do about Stephen Hawking. I actually began singing the Seeger song… Read more.
Below is what I wrote after last year’s State of the Union Address. Alas, this occasion has become such a redundant and irrelevant spectacle that I’ve decided to mark it this year and henceforth by publishing an equally redundant and irrelevant commentary. It is noteworthy, though, that last night’s spectacle was compounded by Republican members of… Read more.
The Obama presidency is as replete with historical firsts as it is with historical ironies. Nothing demonstrates the latter quite like those who have benefitted most under his leadership being the ones who are complaining most about it. Mind you, it would be one thing if, like billionaire Warren Buffet, they were complaining about Obama… Read more.
I don’t care too much for his acting (as seen on NCIS: Los Angeles), but LL Cool J is so good hosting the Grammys that he’s fast becoming as identified with this awards show as Ellen DeGeneres is becoming with the Oscars. Tonight was his third-consecutive gig (for The 56th Grammy Awards), and he did… Read more.
Like me, you probably find this cartoon chilling and amusing in equal measure. President Vladimir V. Putin has offered one clear new direction for the country: the development of a conservative, nationalist ideology… The Kremlin is dipping into a deep pool of history: Cossacks are revered here for their bravery and pre-modern code of honor, like… Read more.
I’m not a stock analyst, and I don’t play one on this site. That said, here’s what I wrote two years ago about the social contagion Facebook had become: [L]et’s face it, haven’t you had enough of the mundane and often-recycled crap your ‘friends’ share … every day, several times a day? Even worse are the hucksters… Read more.
It speaks volumes that the media have spent more time replaying and analyzing Richard Sherman’s postgame rant about being the best cornerback in the NFL than they have replaying and analyzing the play he made that sealed the Seattle Seahawks’ win over the San Francisco 49ers, 23 to 17, in Sunday’s NFC Championship game. For… Read more.
The irony seems completely lost on American media that they’re the ones terrorizing us by featuring so many politicians and security experts stoking mundane fears about Russia’s ability to prevent terrorist attacks during next month’s Winter Olympics. Not to mention their hysterical reporting on a cell of black-widow suicide bombers now allegedly lying in wait… Read more.
No doubt you recall how governments around the world made quite a show of pledging billions to help relief and rebuilding efforts in Haiti after that catastrophic earthquake in 2010. While those governments were basking in praise for their generous pledges, however, I was sounding this cautionary note: I just hope this outpouring of support is coordinated… Read more.
