Bernie Madoff and the Hype
I have a voracious appetite for news concerning Bernie Madoff, the victims of his fraud, and the enablers of his fraud. Even though I don't have a background in finance, I pretend to understand what...
View ArticleArtificial Intelligence
The next day the papers would read, "GRIDLOCK: Snow came fast and furious, drivers were just furious." I decided to park around Church Street and walk the extra two miles home across strangled arteries...
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Dive Bar Experience: Dino's Restaurant
When you see Dino's restaurant in Nashville you might thinks it's closed. Your suspicions are warranted because there's a Ford F-250 with two flat tires parked out front with the word "BARBER" printed...
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Detritus
Things usually transpire in the internet age whereby a person stumbles upon information that is unfounded, unimportant, or outright despicable. Often what one stumbles upon in cyberspace is directly...
View ArticleLibya: Let's Pretend I Know Something about Foreign Affairs
Recently, every morning it seems as though I awake to find a new report of a new nation in a state of chaos. The upending of repressive leaders is inspiring to witness through compressed satellite...
View ArticleTennesseans Respond to Republican Legislation
From Tennessee Citizen Action executive director Mary Mancini:As we've seen in Wisconsin, Americans are standing up to politicians who are launching political attacks on firefighters, teachers, nurses,...
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Thursday Commentary
Most of what I write is a partial reflection of my daily stream of consciousness. To the five people who have read this blog, you know that I'm distracted by a lot of news and events: Bernie Madoff and...
View ArticleBred and Butter
Former Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen in a short op-ed to the New York Times emphasizes that governors around the country should "focus on schools and jobs." Leading off with a nautical metaphor that...
View ArticleRamsey Prefers the Hokey Pokey
Lieutenant Governor Ron Ramsey admitted recently that sales tax holidays are "hokey." Yes, I know this is the same guy whose cowboy boots became the most substantive part of his campaign for governor....
View ArticleWendell Berry & the Pacific Earthquake
I don't really know what happens between the time I fall asleep and the dawn's new light that comes streaking across our kitchen table. I sleep like the dead, and it's because of this that I never know...
View ArticleEntering Spring 2011
This is an incredible mix of beautiful songs for today (via FuelFriends):
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Lost Record: Astral Weeks by Van Morrison
After spending the weekend perusing every record vendor at Nashville's flea market, I have two very serious regrets. A man who arrived 25 seconds before me at a booth picked up a first press "Are You...
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A Tornado, Bomb, and Bottle of Booze
Tornadoes down in Dixie and suicide bombers in Marrakech, Morocco (the place where we spent our honeymoon). People across the world attribute human suffering to God's vengeance or somehow God's passive...
View ArticleVoting made more difficult
Thank God I've never known what it's like to be denied a vote in an election. For my generation, it's more likely that we choose not to vote. Some of us are turned off by the political class and their...
View ArticleThe Affordable Care Act Did Not Kill Health Care
There was a lot of talk about the Affordable Health Care Act in 2009, mostly dealing with the places that President Obama and Congress could shove the nearly 2,000 page bill. The rhetoric was of course...
View ArticleMuch Ado About Voting
I get so preachy on blogs, and perhaps that's why I stopped blogging for so long. My distaste for hearing my own preaching is why I'm not a preacher. Politicians and preachers have a lot in common; in...
View ArticleSo I Spend Some Time in the Woods
Since I mentioned preaching in my last post I find it appropriate to point out that I started today with this song, via songsfortheday. Go to their website and download this ballad by Evening Hymns....
View ArticleMy small, vocal and unscrupulous minority
When Ron Ramsey sent out a Facebook note yesterday about the voter ID bill and subsequent controversy surrounding it, he dusted off Merriam-Webster and gave us all an English lesson. Now we know that...
View ArticleAn 18th Century Jobs Plan
Whenever there are in any country uncultivated lands and unemployed poor, it is clear that the laws of property have been so far extended as to violate natural right. The earth is given as a common...
View ArticleSexual Congress
Borrowing the popular refrain from Tom Jones, "it's not unusual to be loved by anyone," amorousness seems extraordinary to some Tennessee Republicans who are scurrying in the next few weeks to pass...
View ArticleA Place I Once Called Home
Last night in Sumner County, Tennessee the School Board decided to open school. The decision came thirteen days after a standoff began with the County Commission over $2.7 million needed to fund 45...
View ArticleBefore Tennessee Turns Blue
"Genius never makes a mistake. All mistakes are volitional and are portals of discovery." -James Joyce"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography." -Ambrose BierceWhat the Tennessee Democratic...
View ArticleExchange We Can Believe In
Governor Bill Haslam caved to the far right wing of his party over the decision for Tennessee to set up a state-based health insurance exchange. He says federal government can't do for Tennesseans that...
View ArticleClear Eyes and Vision
In politics, the same as in life, situations change rather quickly and it is often difficult to have clear eyes for what is truly in the best interest of a party such as ours. As a candidate for...
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The Greatest Poverty is Resentment
Photo credit Josh Anderson PhotographyI've spent one thousand and eight hours in developing countries in Africa, most of that time in Ethiopia. I've wiped snot from the noses of HIV positive children...
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