Saturday, July 25, 2009

THE eminent Stanley Fish, dean emeritus of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago, provides some useful background related to the Henry Louis Gates imbroglio. The comments are instructive, too.

Friday, July 24, 2009

IF you missed the PBS broadcast on WQEC of Time Team America's visit to New Philadelphia, site of the town founded in Pike County by Free Frank McWorter in 1836, click on this link.

AND no matter the positive side of this piece of our history, internalized, institutional racism is still alive in America.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

ADDED this tell-it-like-it-really-is blog (Who Hijacked Our Country) to my Some Favorite Places list, lower right. To get a feel for it, here's Sunday's post:

According to these two articles (here and here), Americans aren’t sufficiently fired up over health insurance reform because there’s no villain. The public won’t be galvanized until there’s someone to crystallize all of this fury and frustration. We need an Osama bin Laden; a Communist infiltrator; a drug pusher selling heroin to YOUR fourth grade child.

OK then — imagine a 9/11-type terrorist attack occurring in America six times a year, every year. THAT’S how many Americans die every year because they don’t have health insurance. Even knowing that number — 18,000 deaths each year — the public isn’t mobilized because their fear and anger aren’t channeled and directed. These emotions just flare up and then diffuse into the ozone.

And that’s probably because of the bland neutral sterile presentation of these stories. “The patient didn’t have insurance.” “Coverage was denied because of a pre-existing condition.” “The insurance policy didn’t cover the required procedure.” WHOA!!! Doesn’t that just send your blood pressure skyrocketing? Careful, your hands are shaking.

Let’s call it what it is: Murder! This isn’t something that just “happened” because of some faceless anonymous insurance company. These murders were the result of somebody’s conscious decision. An actual flesh-and-blood person was calculating how much more money he/she could make by killing X number of sick people.

Instead of “after further study, the HMO concluded that the policy…” — how about “this motherfuckin’ shitbag killed hundreds of sick people so he could afford another yacht!” And now it’s time to put names and faces to these murdering douchebags.

Monday, July 20, 2009

A. E. Hotchner provides more than adequate reason to NOT buy the new edition of Ernest Hemingway's book about Paris, "A Moveable Feast."

Sunday, July 19, 2009

CHARLES Blow provides an interesting analysis of the impact, past and potential, of the Hispanic vote.

NOW and then, Maureen Dowd is a good read, especially if her topic is Republican hypocrisy of which there seems to be no end. And Frank Rich this morning is even more scathing.

The Statue of Liberty taken in 2008 from a boat in New York Harbor as the sun sets over New Jersey.