Let’s Do Something, Whether It Works or Not
Sometimes it seems to me that we're like the person looking for lost car keys down the street, not because that's where they were lost, but because the light is better there. We spend a fortune on cancer treatment, but not
It’s About the Population of Germany
In the 2020 US presidential election, about 80 million people (one-third of all eligible voters) did not vote. That's a larger population number than all of but 18 countries in the world. I think this might be worse in 2024. People
Bleak House
In the US (and much of the industrialized world) morbidity is higher than fertility. We are not replacing ourselves. I won't delve into the sociological details here, but rather the pragmatic ones. Historically, those countries with large numbers of available
Striking
According to statistics I've read on the web, about 40% of strikes are failures, 50% effective in improving wages, and 10% "neutral." Strike funds from the union can compensate for about 40% of lost pay, but that still leaves quite
Send in the Clowns
Every time I watch a televised political debate of either party I think of a circus. The moderators are the ringmasters and the candidates are the various daredevils and "acts." It's an insult to the intelligence—shouting over each other, not
Is the Sky Falling, or Are the British Coming?
The tropism of the media is to present bad news, and even to exaggerate average news until it is bad news. What do I mean? Well a story that's titled, say, "Election turnout better than average" will have a subtitle
Wait, It Wasn’t the Middle Finger?
In an op ed piece in the Providence Journal, a woman lobbied for the state legislature to pass a law making it illegal to use one's fingers to pretend to point a gun at someone. It seems she "inadvertently" cut
Cause and Effect
The great Eric Hoffer, the "longshoreman/philosopher," said once, Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket. I find that people often grasp at any straw to prove the gravity and seriousness of their
From the Surface to the Depths
The photo of the year might be the $175 million dollar yacht picking up the survivors (and dead) of the rickety migrant boat that overturned close to Greek shores, which the Greek coast guard was not very aggressive in trying
The Fifty-Cent Outrage
I read on social media that someone was enraged because a restaurant had assessed a fifty-cent charge on the bill for an order of extra cheese to sprinkle on the food. The total bill was $124. It strikes me that to