The polar icecaps are melting even faster than predicted. Smoke from the California wildfires has smudged the skies above New England. Hundreds of migrant children remain imprisoned indefinitely for the crime of having parents who didn't want them to starve or be murdered. White middle class American citizens are murdering members of their own families, and … Continue reading A Good Reason to Pray

Harper Lee’s ‘To Kill a Mockingbird”, as adapted for the stage by Aaron Sorkin, and directed by Bartlett Sher, is skillfully presented, and very well acted, but ultimately feels less like a play about racism in 1930's Alabama, than an elaborate example of liberal white privilege. After all it’s a Broadway production of an iconic … Continue reading The Mockingbird Disconnect

I’ve been sad a lot in my life, but not like this. I can’t write. I almost certainly won’t finish writing whatever this is. In fact I’m already hating everything about it, including the font. I can’t feel much except grief. I’m drinking at a rate I haven’t in a couple years, even though I’m … Continue reading Afternoon Demon Redux

Both are, or have been, almost admirably inappropriate. Trump blew up the flimsy decorum of presidential politics, exposing the pervasive rot beneath the surface. And Weinstein smoked, dressed, socialized, bullied and negotiated like a mobster, while championing some of the best movies of the last three decades. Both became successful despite their complete lack of … Continue reading Harvey & Trump: American Dinosaurs

Who is in charge now? Not that Donald Trump was ever in charge. In fact some would argue that actually no US Presidents have really been in charge for at least a half a century, since Presidents are transient whereas the so-called Intelligence Community is free to set, and execute policies unburdened by the need … Continue reading I Guess We’ll Find Out

The President just announced his absolute intolerance for transgender people in the US military. He's never expressed this sentiment before. And his motivation for bringing it up now seems as impulsively random as his stated reason. Medical costs? Experts agree it's a non-issue. So, another preposterous tweet from the unhinged individual who happens to be … Continue reading We Are Being Played

In my heart I’m biased in favor of people of color, especially African Americans. It’s because although I am Caucasian, I stopped being white a long time ago. Few things will erase whiteness faster than seeing one’s black child, handcuffed and seated on a curb surrounded by heavily armed cops less than a hundred feet … Continue reading I’m a Bit of a Racist

So, former NBC Today Show ‘personality’ Billy Bush has reemerged after going into seclusion for seven months following last year’s revelation of an eleven year old recording of sexually explicit banter between him and, now President of the United States, Donald Trump. Bush’s very serious face is on the cover of this week’s Hollywood Reporter, … Continue reading Billy Bush is Back

In 1962, when I was three and a half years old, our family moved from a big brick house in suburban New York, to a 400 year old castle on an estate near the village of Glin, in the south of Ireland. Our father, who came up with this idea, went back and forth to … Continue reading The Boy from Ireland

Two nights ago my wife and I went to see ‘I Am Not Your Negro’, Raoul Peck’s fine film about James Baldwin, and his unique role in the struggle for civil rights in America. Today we watched a DVD of Ava Duverney’s, documentary, ‘The 13th’, about America’s ongoing national disgrace, which is mass incarceration of … Continue reading 13th Amendment, 21st Century