Recently I was pondering Donald Trump’s inexplicable behavior on the campaign trail, allegedly on behalf of GOP nominee Mitt Romney. I was only able to conceive of two possible explanations that would account for his ludicrous Orly Taitz act: either he is secretly working for Obama or he’s actually a covert performance artist working on a long, episodic political satire
Read moreToday, if we choose to listen, we’ll hear a great deal about America, about the last decade, about the lessons we’ve learned. Football will be played. Flags will be waved. Tears will be shed. And tomorrow we’ll be exactly what we were yesterday, only moreso. Maybe today is a bad time for critiques. Or maybe it’s the perfect time. Hard
Read moreThere is a particular narrative about Ronald Reagan and the end of the Cold War that has always struck me as compelling. I bought the argument at the time and I think I still do, to some extent, even though I’m hardly a Reagan fan. The story goes like this: Reagan was able to finally win the Cold War and
Read moreIn September 11, 2001, al Qaeda terrorists hijacked four passenger jets. They flew three of them into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The fourth was retaken by the passengers and crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. These things we know. Since then, much has transpired. For example: The US invaded Afghanistan, the nation that had harbored the terrorists
Read moreSome months back, I attended a convention on behalf of my employer. One of the honored guest speakers was former Texas Congressman Charlie Wilson. Wilson, whose story was Hollywoodized in Charlie Wilson’s War, died today at the age of 76. Wilson was primarily famous for two things: fucking anything he could catch, and funneling arms to the Afghani mujahedeen during
Read moreSomething wicked this way comes. Item: Former White House Press Secretary Dana Perino says “we did not have a terrorist attack on our country during President Bush’s term.” Item: GOP apologist Mary Matalin says President Bush “inherited the most tragic attack on our own soil in our nation’s history.” Item: Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani says “We had
Read moreTen years ago, at the turn of the millennium, Nostraslammy took a stab at predicting the 21st Century, with a promise to check back every ten years to see how the prognostications were turning out. Odds are good I won’t be able to do a review every ten years until 2100, but I figure I’m probably good through 2030, at
Read morePrediction is a big, big business these days, and even those of us who aren’t explicitly in the prediction business probably do all we can to make sense of the future. For example: Does your company do marketing research? (If it’s a business of any size and sophistication, the answer is probably yes.) Do you track the financial pages? Do
Read moreYou’re honey child to a swarm of bees Gonna blow right through you like a breeze Give me one last dance Well slide down the surface of things You’re the real thing Yeah the real thing You’re the real thing Even better than the real thing – U2 Fantasy stories, myths, legends, tall tales, fairy tales, horror, all these have
Read moreTwo people have been shot at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. The shooter has been identified as James Wenneker von Brunn, a man with ties to various right-wing hate groups. His Web site is here. At the risk of putting too fine a point on it, we should note that since September 11, 2001, more innocent American citizens have
Read moreIn years to come, it seems likely that the ongoing civil suit brought against the University of Colorado by former professor Ward Churchill will provide students in many law classes with a lively case study to debate. If you aren’t already familiar with the details of the clusterfuck story, you can catch up at the NY Times and Boulder Daily
Read moreI recently offended some people, quite unintentionally, with my modest suggestion that perhaps it wasn’t in the best interests of the nation to hand over so much decision-making power to people who aren’t informed about the issues and their own system of government. (Responses ranged from “thoughtful disagreement” to what I believe is referred to as a “galloping hissy fit.”)
Read moreThe following is reconstructed out of a running e-mail discussion I had with Greg Stene (my old roommate) the other day. Smith: I’ve been thinking about the question of freedom versus security a bit lately. 9.11 is obviously the impetus for a lot of what drives my pondering, but the fact is that 9.11 really has only coalesced and sped-up
Read more(Warning: Reality is never as neat and clean as theory, I’m afraid, but humans are inherently theoretical animals. So bear with me. The following may be a tad obscure in places, but it’s going somewhere worthwhile.) University of Texas-Dallas Professor Frederick Turner has penned an interesting take on the current WTC memorial debate, and makes some very well-considered arguments about
Read moreDo I look like a terrorist? No, seriously – I’ve been told I look “intimidating,” and cameras all seem to hate me on sight – but if you saw me boarding a plane with you would you worry that I posed a threat to your safe and timely arrival at your chosen destination, especially if I were wearing a business
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lullaby pit 