"The truth? You can't handle the truth!"

Republican operative Charles Black caught holy hell for saying that a terrorist attack on the U.S. just before Election Day would benefit John McCain. Democrat operative General Wesley Clark caught holy hell for saying that John McCain's internment as a P.O.W. does not qualify him to be President of the United States. What is our problem with truth-tellers?! One should not have to explain or defend the obvious.

With scripted comity, each candidate offered his mea culpa; McCain disavowed his surrogate, then Obama repudiated his. I can't recollect any electioneering so dominated by apologies!

Substance is being sacrificed as both candidates vie for style points: "I love America more than you do." "Oh yeah, well I love god more than you do." I thought this was supposed to be the Change Election--it's starting to look like the Same ol', Same ol' Election!

Take the Pledge

It's crunch time! My vote counts! I don't need to be sedated, I need to be informed, inspired, and energized!

I PLEDGE NOT TO BE SWAYED OR SEDUCED BY POLITICAL BROMIDES AND BUMPER STICKERS!

My (White) friend was born in South Africa---is he an African-American?

The staggering number of autistic children raises an important question: Is the incidence of autism actually on the rise, or are providers simply "diagnosing better"? (Or could they be diagnosing worse?)

I count my successes not by how many minds I can change but by how many I can open.

Modern Warfare

In recent wars of attrition, Hi-tech weaponry has been of limited efficacy; more decisive than Super Power has been Staying Power.

The victor in guerilla warfare is determined not by brute force but by stealth and perseverence.

Stable hegemony is achieved not through force of arms but by the power of ideas.

Wild Wild West

The Supreme Court ruled that citizens have a Right to "bear arms" for self defense. If so, laws requiring that guns be kept separated from ammunition and disabled with trigger locks are nutsy. If I'm to have a gun to protect myself, I want it loaded, at hand, ready to shoot--and I want sufficient firepower to stop an attacker, with certainty, in his tracks!

If we can't be rational about our love/hate relationship with guns, can we at least stop being schizophrenic?!

In lieu of newly-unconstitutional bans on gun ownership, how about prohibiting gun manufacture and importation?

Yes, we should institute permissable restrictions on gun ownership. No, the most stringent gun controls will not make us more civil or less violent.

Melting Pot

What makes this nation so special is our willingness and ability to accommodate such disparate personalities as George Wallace and Rosa Parks, Joseph McCarthy and Jane Fonda, Jerry Falwell and Carl Sagan, Donald Trump and Rosie O'Donnell.

Dirty Words

It's high time the American Heritage Dictionary included "shit." In the real world (my world!), no one says "excrement" or "feces" or "defecation" in ordinary discourse. My Oxford, on the other hand (gotta love those Brits!), not only defines "shit" but provides numerous helpful examples of practical everyday usage, like "shit faced," "shit a brick," "shit for brains," et al. Even the magisterial Oxford lexicographers, however, were apparently unwilling (or unable) to tackle the etymology of "Are you shitting me?"

"Tit" is vulgar slang for "teat." Go figure!

There are no such things as "dirty words"--only dirty minds.

Humble Pie

Syria agreed to public discussions with the U.S. to help broker a solution in Iraq, but the U.S. refused to meet with Syria unless the talks were private (secret). Which is the despotic regime?

From genocide of indigenous peoples, to witchhunts, to slavery, to oppression of minorites and suppression of women and exploitation of children, to eugenics, to development of chemical and biological and nuclear weapons of mass destruction, the U.S. has (enthusiastically) done it all. Perhaps we should temper our self-righteousness with a dose of humility.

Sincerity for Sale

Hillary Clinton agreed to play an active supporting role in the Obama candidacy, in exchange for his payment of her own staggering campaign debt. Isn't that extortion?!

Who is more culpable, the person who offers a bribe or the one who accepts it?

Had I been a Hillary contributor, I'd be mightily annoyed that she now will be "made whole," but I will not. Birds of a feather...

Buckle Up!

With wind-chills well below zero, the homeless could not be "forced" to take shelter. By what quirk of Law, then, can bikers be coerced to wear helmets and drivers be compelled to fasten their seatbelts?

To protect citizens from themselves, government's role should be to educate, not to regulate.

I do not need government passing laws to save me from myself; I do need government passing laws to save me from you.

A Hand Up or a Handout?

Hillary Clinton's failed presidential campaign racked up $22 million in debt--an indication of how she might have managed the federal purse strings? How dare she now beseech her beleaguered supporters to bail her out!?

Hillary's demeanor belies her message of Democratic unity. Sometimes body language speaks louder than words.

Artful Dodger

First, the president proposed tax incentives to encourage purchase of private health insurance; then, to help pay for his war, he budgeted draconian cuts in Medicare and Medicaid. He offered alms with one hand and picked our pockets with the other!

The Good, The Bad, The Powerful

The pernicious power of the slaveholder, not the purity of the slave, distinguishes the privilege of the former from the plight of the latter.

Tip the scales to alter the balance of power, and the roles of victim and victimizer are often reversed.

Power used well empowers others.

Free Speech?

"Nightline" titled its report on an activist Atheist organization: "Is it Free Speech or is it Sacrilege?" OR?! Of course it's sacrilege!---it's Atheism! Further indicative of the program's negative bias, the interviewer asked, "So you think you're right and everyone else is wrong?" Of course he does!---just like every Theist! I'm waiting for the "Nightline" feature on Christianity: "Is it Free Speech or is it Proselytizing?" (But I'm not holding my breath.)

Beastie Boys (and Girls)

Americans are obsessed with children. Wherefore this veneration? A child contributes nothing and has contributed nothing--it just takes. Young children, unconstrained, are amoral, antisocial, avaricious, totally narcissistic bundles of rapacious appetites--bottomless pits of needs and wants! Those qualities we find endearing in a toddler would warrant commitment or incarceration of an accountable adult. A child is a wriggling, giggling, booger-picking amorphous mass of malleable potential who is at least as likely to become a Manson as a Mozart. Hillary Clinton got it right: it takes a whole village--just to civilize the little beasties!

Go team!

What distinguish professional from high school football are beefier players and bustier cheerleaders.

Superbowl Sunday, America's finest hour: "We gone whoop they ass!"

Compassionate Carnivore

Yes, I eat meat and wear leather shoes---it's gratuitous cruelty and killing for entertainment that offend.

When the suffering thoroughbred was "put down," his veterinarians were lauded for their compassion; when Dr. Kavorkian did the same for suffering human beings, he was jailed as a criminal!

That's Amore!

Hate feeds on itself; Love needs nourishment.

Lust is blind; Love sees but overlooks.

Love is not a quid pro quo; if I give you mine, you are not obliged to offer me yours in return.

Competence matters.

Flawless logic fails to prove a flawed premise.

Rich Man, Poor Man

Let's stop idealizing the Poor---they are inherently no more virtuous, no more enlightened, no more "human" than the Rich.

Many Poor are victims of circumstance; many others are limited by lack of ambition or ability.

The odds are better that a camel will squeeze through the eye of a needle than that a rich man will gain entry to god's kingdom. If god is so well pleased with the Poor, why are so many of the godly so intent on eliminating poverty?

We can never eliminate poverty; those at the bottom of the economic ladder will always be considered Poor.

Would you like butter on that?

In a stark example of anachronistic in-your-face parochialism, the Catholic Church condemned the (yet to be made) movie as an "offense to god." With the zealot's absolute conviction, a Vatican spokesman unabashedly explained, "We usually read the script, but in this case, it wasn't necessary; the name (of the author) was enough." Is the Church really concerned that the film may offend god, or are they more worried that it might arouse their slumbering sheep? (With an OG rating, watch attendance soar!)

Memo to Clerical Censors: god can edit for himself--if sufficiently offended, he will smite the offenders--he doesn't need your bowdlerizing!

A Rose is a Rose

Good news! The U.S. has eliminated "hunger." We did so by substituting the phrase "very low food security" to describe the 35,000,000 Americans without enough to eat. Is this a great country---or what?!

Happy Days Are Here Again

To listen to the candidates, you'd think each had personally authored every bill since the Bill of Rights!

The candidate believes that every American should have the same ultra-generous health care coverage as members of Congress. No, sir, they shouldn't---and neither should members of Congress!

The Republican senatorial candidate had the gall to insist that the fledgling Iraqi regime "take care of its borders...the primary responsibility of every national government." I remind him that the current (Republican) U.S. administration has had eight years, and failed miserably, to secure our own porous borders.

I favor politicians who have succeeded at something other than politics.

Examine Your Premises

Why are some sectarians so adamant (that they will kill to defend their ideological boundaries)? Perhaps because to allow even a single chink in their armor would be to cast intolerable doubt on their entire elaborate but shaky enterprise.

The (Christian) commentator dismissed the tenets of Mormonism as "unbelievable." This from one who accepts virgin birth and resurrection from the dead!

Religion is the irrational defense of an unsound premise.

Let's Party!

The editorial opined that closure of half the parishes in the local Diocese was "sad but inevitable." I, for one, shed not a tear whenever any religion is forced to loose its tyrannical grip. The retreat of medieval superstition before the juggernaut of modern knowledge and sensibility should be cause not for sadness but for celebration.

Newsman

When NBC's Tim Russert died unexpectedly, he was accorded the typical immoderate tribute that celebrities reserve for the loss of one of their own. Russert was a skillful interviewer, particularly adept at lobbing incisive--sometimes ascerbic--follow-up probes at evasive politicians; and he seemed to relish his "Gotcha!" moments. In his diligent search for telltale droppings, he earned and received the recognition and respect of a grateful audience.

Following Tim Russert's death, a flurry of interest in preventing sudden cardiac arrest. (What better way to go?)

The Language of Religion

I have studied sufficient Theist and Atheist literature to conclude that there will never be a meeting of the minds. We are wired differently. The cogent argument sincerely presented by one side is sincerely heard as "Blah, blah, blah" by the other. Neither should expect to "win" by persuasion. Both sides need to tone down the rhetoric and turn down the volume. The most/best we should hope for is grudging toleration; the least/worst we should be prepared for is escalating reprisal.

Religious apologists often argue that the scientific enterprise, too, must ultimately rest on faith. True enough, since all human endeavors must be based on incomplete knowledge and limited experience. But, just as the Inuit have numerous words to describe variants of our "snow," my "faith" that the sun will rise tomorrow morning is not equivalent to your religious faith in an intelligent unseen supernatural agency who could willfully stop the sun in its tracks (or reverse its direction, or make it do figure-eights) anytime he chooses. To deliberately blur that distinction is to misuse language to obscure rather than clarify.

Natural Law

If Nature appears to obey certain laws (of Thermodynamics, for example), then surely, so the Theist argument goes, there must have been a Lawgiver. I contend that such "laws" do not dictate or direct Nature's behavior; rather, that they are clever contrivances of Man to describe Nature's behavior, the ultimate causes and origins of which remain unknown and perhaps unknowable.

What bothers me most about religion is not that it doesn't provide all the answers, but that it does.

Evolution & Empowerment

If Atheism is a more highly evolved cultural state, as some posit, why (so the contrary argument goes) aren't there more Atheists? Why aren't there more Mozarts, Van Goghs, Shakespeares?

"Social Darwinism" is not Charles Darwinism.

It is not god that empowers believers, it's their faith in god that empowers them. I contend that faith in themselves would be far more empowering.

Big Brother, can you spare a dime?

Americans need more and better jobs, not a piddling one-time "stimulus" check. How many jobs did FDR create with his WPA? How many jobs did Eisenhower create with his Interstate Highway construction? How many jobs did Kennedy create with his moon-landing mission? How many jobs might we now create with an infrastructure-restoration program or an energy-independence program or a manufacturing-revival program or an inner-cities revitalization program or...

Some tasks are of such magnitude that only government can undertake them---we need a domestic Marshall Plan, not a dole, to resuscitate our moribund economy.

Divine Entomologist

Bugs---a vital link in the food chain that sustains us, but also the cause or vector of a host of nasty afflictions that kill us by the millions---god's such a spoilsport!

Obscenities

The definition of "Obscene" should be expanded to include Eating Contests and Combat Sports.

When I compared dogfighting to "extreme mixed martial arts," some protested that humans have a choice. True enough. But the fact that beings possessed of free will would choose to indulge their primal bloodlust by willingly (enthusiastically) engaging, either as participants or spectators, in such bestial spectacles compounds, doesn't mitigate, the offense to aesthetics and morality.

America lacks an essential sense of irony---one can become a felon for putting fighting cocks in a ring, or a successful entrepreneur by putting Toughmen in a cage to do the same thing.

Pontifical Pontificating

The pope lamented U.S. injustices to Blacks, Indians. What about Catholic injustices to Muslims, Jews, heretics, witches, unwanted pre-persons, sodomized altar boys, women, homosexuals, responsible sex educators and family planners, potential stem cell beneficiaries and HIV victims, lingering flatliners, etc.? Perhaps the pontiff should refrain from judging---lest he be judged.

Infallibility can go a long way to compensate for a modest intellect.

War and/or Peace

In his latest campaign ad, John McCain tells us, "I know the costs of war." OK, senator, but what you don't seem to "get" are the alternatives"!

Revisionist Lexicon

Within 24 hours of Hillary Clinton's grudging concession, Revisionists were busily burnishing her tarnished image; Gloria Steinem, for one, artfully proclaimed Hillary's "grace under pressure."

grace >n. 1. self-absorption 2. petulancy 3. volatility 4. obstinacy 5. stridency

BIG 3 SUFFER HUGE LOSSES, QUADRUPLE PRICE OF NEW VEHICLES!

Can you imagine such a headline? Of course not! Competition would not allow it. Stockholders would not stand for it. Rather, heads would roll! Painful but essential emergency cost-cutting measures would immediately be implemented. Ineffective and redundant managers would be shown the Exit. Staff would be trimmed to the bone. Wages and benefits would be renegotiated. Inefficiencies would be ferreted out and exorcised with missionary zeal. The Public Sector, insulated from marketplace pressures, opts, instead, for "revenue enhancement"!

Gorging at the Public Trough

I'm tired of government workers whining that they simply seek parity with their private-sector counterparts. I don't question the abilities, contributions, or commitment of public employees. But when is the last time a civil servant lost a job or watched a pension vaporize because of fiscal irresponsibility or mismanagement by his/her employer? The private sector is a competitive milieu, and private-sector employment always (and increasingly) involves risk. How much is job security worth? Poll the queue at the Unemployment Office!

Bushspeak

When the president said that soaring unemployment and plummeting consumer confidence are signs of "slow economic growth," he meant the economy is in the crapper!

Where Have All the Statesmen Gone?

Self-serving politicos act, first and foremost, to secure and expand their personal fiefdoms.



Crooked politicians always indignantly protest their innocence right up until the moment they sheepishly admit their guilt.



When one consorts with the Powerful, one is likely to be stained by the Corrupt.

Climatologists can't accurately forecast the weather for this weekend; perhaps they should forgo predicting the 50-year impact of Global Warming.

There is no stronger unifying force than fear of a common boogieman.

Creationism seems appealing not because it makes sense but because it makes us feel special.

The New Apostles

In the "Classic" defense of his personal religious beliefs (Mere Christianity), C.S. Lewis offers a stunning smorgasbord of flawed premises, tortured logic, and non-stop non sequiturs; from a master wordsmith, jabberwockey.

Francis Collins (The Language of God) on Jesus: "He claimed to be God...He also claimed to be able to forgive sins...He was humble..." A humble man who proclaimed his divinity and his power to absolve Man of sin---sometimes Believers (even the "smart" ones) say the darnedest things.

Theologian John Haught (God and the New Atheism) declares that we should be grateful for the imperfect Creation ("the ambiguities and evil") of his perfect god---thank god for our manifold pain and suffering; without it, there would be no "freedom," no "adventure," no "grand cosmic story," no "opening to infinite horizons up ahead." In a startling (unwitting?) conflation of heaven and hell, he concludes: "Locked eternally into splendid perfection," Man would be "mere puppets and statues"!
On behalf of the New Atheists whom Haught excoriates, I rest my case.

Politics as Usual

To be seriously considered for the vice presidency, Hillary Clinton would have to be vetted---and so would husband Bill---scrutiny (including full financial disclosure) that analysts uniformly, and matter-of-factly, seem to agree the former First Couple could not withstand. Why aren't such tacit assumptions of impropriety a bigger story? Is no one investigating? Does no one care? Has political corruption become so commonplace, so expected and accepted, it is no longer considered newsworthy? Where is the outrage?

The most remarkable thing about the 2008 Democratic presidential primary race--a Black man versus a White woman--was that it didn't really seem all that remarkable!

Once we allow that Truth doesn't matter, we cede our future to the illusionists and deceivers.

Final Exit

I have previously speculated that Man would more likely stumble than march into Oblivion. The anachronistic worldwide resurgence of religious fundamentalism now causes me to suspect that we may end our days goose-stepping toward the Abyss shouting "Hosannah!"

Believers cope with fear of death by denying Death; Rationalists deal with fear of death by taming their Fear.

Law & Order

My state senator introduced legislation requiring that TVs be labeled with a Warning that the set could present a danger if it falls on a small child. Do we really need a Law to remind us that accelerating heavy objects can prove hazardous to one's health?!

Addlepated federal legislators passed a Resolution affirming the importance in America of Christmas and Christianity. Non-Christian Americans never had a doubt!

When one insists on winning at any cost, one is more likely to pay too high a price.

Domestic Terrorism

Our failing educational system is a far greater threat to U.S. national security than Al Qaeda!


One day, our uneducated, disaffected inner-city Minority youth may become our own insurgency.

The world's arsenal of nuclear weapons could incinerate 400,000 Hiroshimas. None of those WMDs belonged to Saddam Hussein. How many are ours?

Where's the beef?

John McCain's "Big Ideas" ad (a quixotic litany of hollow promises) may be the silliest, most inane and insulting (to the intelligence of the electorate) political commercial I have ever seen. How 'bout a few Doable Ideas, senator?

Hillary Clinton's early tenacity was admirable; her subsequent mulishness was not. I want a Commander-in-Chief with the judgment to recognize and accept moments of inevitability, when it may be prudent to cut one's losses and stop fighting.

Making a Difference

To cynics who question the capacity of any individual to effect significant change: Didn't Jesus? Didn't Gandhi? Didn't Martin Luther King, Jr.? Didn't Jefferson, Lincoln, FDR? Didn't Guttenberg? Pasteur? Edison? Didn't Hitler? Didn't Stalin? Didn't Mao?