. I learned at an early adult age, with only minor but memorable pain, not to hero-worship. When we lionize people, we tend to forget the natural inclination of the lion to consume the person. I prefer admiration. Admiration works from the muck up. While hero worship sets up the faithful for a fall, admiration […]
Said the Sad Red Earth
. I’ve been lying low, collecting evidence… Brought to mind by recent events for David W. Blight And Allison Scharfstein in their Op-Ed at the New York Times, the little known proposal by Martin Luther King, Jr. to President Kennedy in May 1962 to issue another Emancipation Proclamation, to end segregation. Kennedy took it under advisement and […]
Limbaugh: Censor or Censure?
. My post on “Rush Limbaugh and the Free Market of Speech” drew a comment from JP that is thoughtful and challenging, and I think my responding to it at length can deepen the exploration and understanding of what opponents of Limbaugh are doing in the media campaign against him and of what it is […]
A Whole Beck of Trouble
In response to yesterday’s Ten Questions for Monday, Esteemed Commenter Kate (or E.C., a certified title with the American Honorifics Society) honors us, in turn, with her usual thoughtful considerations. Note that she both prefaces and afterwords her comments with a now customary expression of her otherwise addled state of mind. I’m beginning to take […]
“At Long Last, Have You Left No Sense of Decency?”
We won’t fool ourselves. It is not just a cruel world. It is often a monstrous one. So what is one woman’s job and reputation? Decency and honor are not the defaults among us. They are the achievements. We don’t fall from grace. We rise to it. And we have been here before, many times. […]