[NOTE: This story brought me out of my usual Sunday blog-hibernation.] The news story of the Catholic high school students in MAGA hats who were captured on video supposedly harassing a Native American Vietnam vet was a tale I ignored … Continue reading →
Did you ever notice that young people sometimes write and/or perform as though they’re old? Some do it very successfully; the best example that comes to mind is T. S. Eliot—who perhaps was born old—who began writing his masterpiece “The … Continue reading →
The lyrics were written in Scots dialect by the poet Robert Burns in 1788. That’s a lot of auld lang syne ago. But the song—set to a traditional folk tune—has endured, particularly at New Year’s to be sung right after … Continue reading →
So-called “internet poetry” is a phenomenon I knew nothing about till I saw this critique of it by Rebecca Watts. Although the author finds the genre completely abominable, nevertheless her piece contains within itself some answers to the question of … Continue reading →
Commenter “CatoRenasci” writes: Consider that urban areas have been more ‘liberal’ or ‘progressive’ or ‘radical’ (pick an adjective) since time immemorial – at least as far as we have any sort of reliable history: classical writers, both Greek and (especially) … Continue reading →
…some say in ice: Professor Valentina Zharkova gave a presentation of her Climate and the Solar Magnetic Field hypothesis at the Global Warming Policy Foundation in October, 2018. The information she unveiled should shake/wake you up. Zharkova was one of … Continue reading →
I’m not at all sure the Democrats are pleased about the timing of this: More Honduran migrants tried to join a caravan of several thousand trekking through Guatemala on Wednesday, defying calls by authorities not to make the journey after … Continue reading →
This new book by Jonathan Haidt seems very promising. It’s entitled The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure. Now, I’m not sure the people coddling the American mind … Continue reading →
[Part I here.] I have come to conceptualize many of the people who are drawn most powerfully (and obsessively) to these extreme activities this way: they don’t want to live without them. And for some of the most extreme practitioners, … Continue reading →
I’m a lover of poetry, as you can probably tell from the number of posts listed in that category on my right sidebar (as I write this, it’s 161). But the poetry of the last twenty or thirty or even … Continue reading →
I’ve never read anything by Bret Easton Ellis before. One reason is that I don’t like fiction all that much unless it’s fabulous, and I definitely don’t like violent fiction, which by all accounts American Psycho (Ellis’s most popular novel) … Continue reading →
Commenter “Ariel” addresses these remarks by another commenter in this way: …”but [Trump’s] policies are overall working pretty well” How the hell can you know that? I say this from watching George Bush blamed for the housing crash when it … Continue reading →