Politics

It’s fair to say I’ve been a lifelong Democrat, although that may actually have begun with Kennedy. My father was an Eisenhower Republican; my mother likely a closet Kennedy Democrat like me. But I had no qualms at all in voting for a Republican woman, Senator Margaret Chase Smith, in the Illinois Republican primary back in 1964 when she was running against Barry Goldwater. Was that the beginning of the end of the respectable Republicans? Lincoln, Grant, TR, Eisenhower. Were there more of which the country can be proud? I don’t remember. They are all gone now. Read more about The Loyal Opposition

This latest wave of feminist uprising has gotten me thinking about my own life, my own choices. I'm still trying to figure it all out.

I have not been treated badly by men. Read more about Men – A Litany

I am glad you are here with me. Here at the end of all things ...
(Frodo to Sam, The Return of the King, JRR Tolkien)

We come at last to the end of 2017, and I am in an apocalyptic mood.

Why?

I tried listing the reasons, but there are too many to list. All around us, agency after agency, courtroom after courtroom, police and fire and local administrations, structures and strictures that we have long counted on to be there when we need them are being gutted almost behind our backs. Read more about The End of All Things

“Hope,” I wrote recently in a Facebook post, “is raising its ugly head once again.”

This was in direct response to the results of Tuesday’s elections in Virginia and elsewhere which seemed to repudiate the election results of 2016. “Maybe,” I could hear Hope whisper, from the deep recess of my soul in which I had stuffed her a year ago. “Maybe there’s Hope.” Read more about Dash It All, Hope

Almost everything I can say about guns and gun safety issues has been said and is being said a thousand times over and a thousand times better. I offer only a couple of thoughts I haven't heard lately. Read more about About Them Guns

I never knew that Houston was built on bayous. That it is called the Bayou City. That when the rain came down like jets from a thousand fire hoses, there were so many banks to burst. That’s when Houston began to drown. Read more about Our Dunkirk Moment

The question that we liberals tend to ask of those who would deny healthcare to the most vulnerable of us is, Where is your compassion?

I’d like to ask them, Where is your common sense? Read more about Why Healthcare?

My housebuddy talks about why he always folds clothes when he empties a drier, even if it’s not his stuff. “You mean, there’s an option?” He grew up in foster homes and was well-trained. You don’t just throw other people’s stuff in a pile. You handle it with care. Read more about Brave New World

Lately I’ve been trying to figure out why folks seem to have a problem caring (i.e., paying) for the welfare of other people. As in health care. As in water quality. As in clean air. As in education and housing and transportation taking people to work, to school, to grocery stores and back home again.

I get why they want these things for themselves. We all want these things for ourselves. The problem comes when folks start thinking of our welfare as a good, and the welfare of others as, well, Welfare. Read more about House Buddies

I have never wanted to get a job.

I have needed a job, applied for a job, gotten a job, been fired from a job, walked off a job – even loved a job - but I have never ever wanted a job.

And up until two, maybe three hundred years ago, nobody had a job. Most people worked their fingers to the bone, but they didn’t have jobs. They had “stations in life.” Few, if any, people had ever gone out looking for a job.

The industrial revolution created jobs. Read more about Finishing the Job