(9/11/11: the first in a series) Long ago loosed from popular memory, the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 was not only a natural catastrophe but a crisis of the enlightenment mind as well. The quake is estimated to have lasted ten minutes, with three distinct jolts. Modern seismological estimates, based on recorded observations of the […]
Labor Day & 9/11
This is a photo of the North Tower of New York’s World Trade Center under construction. Accompanying text from the source reads: The World Trade Center project in lower Manhattan last week entered a new phase of construction. A crane placed the first of 76 huge steel columns, shaped like short-handled pitch-forks, that will […]
“Special” Rights and the Accomplices to Discrimination That Are Those Who Call Them So
In a recent Indian Country Today essay, Peter d’Errico, the eminent Native American rights advocate, argued that “we need to be careful with the phrase ‘special rights.’ Perhaps we shouldn’t even use it.” In this instance, I think d’Errico is too moderate in his judgment. d’Errico was writing about the term specifically in its application […]
Wikileaks, Anonymous, LulzSec, the MSM and the Entropic Drift toward Crap
The problem with government is not government. It’s people. People make up government, so of course it represents all the flaws we find in people. But as Churchill remarked of democracy, that it “is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time,” the only form […]
How We Lived on It (38) – Amen, Brother
The riddle is “What’s the difference between Rick Perry and Osama bin Laden?” The answer is “Mohammed Atta.” The mainstream news media played carnival barker to this man’s entry into the GOP presidential primary race, then immediately turned on Perry’s implication of treason against Fed Chair Ben Bernanke as if such behavior from Perry – […]