Last week, in the McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission case, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the narrow (5-4) majority that "Money in politics may at times seem repugnant to some, but so,…
Posts published in “Essays”
Rather than heading south with the droves of springbreak-bound students fleeing the endless winter of Upstate New York, I spent a couple hours last week in a local venue at least somewhat warmer than my…
“What do you know about Winsted’s firemen?” my mother asked me one day when I was eleven years old. “They jump into fire trucks and go put out fires fast,” I replied. “Well, you should…
Another baseball season begins with nobody, including myself, expecting much of our Minnesota Twins. The satellite dish company sends a nice letter every three days urging me to hook the dish back up for a…
In his famous essay on parenting, Punishment Versus Discipline, Bruno Bettelheim wrote that children do what their parents do, not what their parents say to do. My father, a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, was a big fan of Bettelheim, but he did not heed Bruno’s advice in rearing my siblings and me.
You’re driving at night in a General Motors compact car, a Cobalt or Cruze or Ion, and without warning the brakes, gas pedal and airbag suddenly give out. You hurtle into a tree and kill…
Pretty much like today, those – like me – who lived in Anderson Valley from the 1950s through the 1980s depended on cars to get around, pickup trucks to handle hauling (except for logs, lumber…
The recent drought in Northern California made me think of the last one back in the mid-seventies when I was living about six miles up Sherwood Road on a friend’s 20-acre property without electricity or…