The critics are mostly raving about Spike Lee's latest movie, BlacKkKlansman. And, as usual, the critics are mostly wrong. Based on the autobiographical account of the first African American cop on the Colorado Springs police force, the film opens with the words: "Some fo real, fo real shit." It's the first clue that the film will be almost pure fiction, despite what the PR flackeys and media lackeys profess. And, just as advertised, Lee's fo real narrative resembles the true story as much as a McDonald's FishWich approximates a rock cod fillet.
Posts published in “Essays”
So I’m doing a little online shopping the other day, as I will during slack periods of my day—and let me tell you, I am just as pleased as plum pudding that the process has…
A little over a year ago this space covered the case of Harvey Mortier who was tried, convicted, and hanged for the murder of a young man named Richard Macpherson. The murder took place in…
Fly over Napa County, California, and what you see below are vineyards and industrial buildings for the mass production of wines. Roads crisscross the valley and climb into the hills and mountains. They also carry…
This is the story of Shirley and Spike, as much as I know and can recall. A very odd couple from Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It was 1967 or so and my band was playing at…
Tom Clark lived, for decades, as his health declined, on a busy street in Berkeley, in a house with many steep stairs. Crossing, haltingly, one of those streets he was struck by a car and…
The airwaves these days are thick with concerned talk about the world we are leaving to our children and grandchildren. Occasionally statistics are even thrown in – usually compiled by old folks like we are,…