All the media world’s a-twitter about the New Yorker cover caricaturing Barack and Michelle Obama as the right’s terrorist nightmare: fist-bumping in mideast mufti in the Oval Office, burning the flag, a portrait of Osama bin Laden over the fireplace, a machine-gun slung across Michelle’s broad shoulder.
McCain denounced the cover and Obama defended the […]
One reason I keep feeling we have an opportunity to change course right now has less to do with politics than with the convergence of science and philosophy. Human beings have always been interested in our own motives, in how our minds work. Introspection helps, but research is teaching us a good deal more about […]
Have you ever had one of those scary ah-hah moments? Hurtling along the freeway or gazing out the window of a jet plane, suddenly coming to consciousness: Ohmigod, I’m in a metal capsule going much too fast to stop, surrounded by other metal capsules piloted by who knows what! This is crazy! All in a […]
The Greek root of the word “apology” refers to a speech in defense of oneself, a self-justification. Though the meaning of the word has changed, this bit of etymology does highlight the two main functions of apology: to make restitution to those you have hurt, and to protect oneself from retribution. Each theme has endless […]
People keep sending me outraged emails about Barack Obama’s pandering to the reactionary Israel lobby, AIPAC, and on the merits, of course I agree with his critics. He has taken precisely the same hard-right line on Israel and Palestine as Clinton, McCain, and let’s see…. Oh yes, everyone I can recall who has gotten close […]
I’ve been going through a whole houseful of possessions, clearing out the past to make way for the future. Last week I recycled three decades of journals without reading a single page. A couple of friends helped me do the same with Day-timers: we ripped the wire spines out of 700-plus month-by-month calendars going back […]
Here’s something I’ve learned about growing older: there’s always more growing to do. Every time I pause to draw a self-satisfied breath at how wise I am becoming—how I finally learned my lesson, avoided repeating the same sticky mistake, saw an opportunity in time to seize it—I catch a whiff of a new challenge bearing […]
A reader send me this great blog featuring lyrics and videos of songs about Barack Obama created by musicians with roots around the world—Africa, Mexico, the Caribbean and beyond.
Some of these artists vote in the U.S., some cannot. Why do musicians beyond our own borders care so much about one of the candidates in […]
It’s kind of a stressful time in my personal soap opera. Every once in a while I pause to give myself a boost, repeating two words that have a remarkable ability to lift my spirits: President Obama!
When friends are in the vicinity, I tend to add a few more words of rational exuberance, such […]
The same qualities Hillary Clinton is displaying now—commitment, tenacity, fortitude in the face of opposition and ridicule—need to be cultivated by anyone willing to stand up for an unpopular position. The thing is, it matters greatly whether that position derives from a wounded certainty of one’s own merit and therefore entitlement, as I’m afraid is […]
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