Category: American News Media
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Drowning In A Sea Of Schmucks
In Yiddish, according to Leo Rosten in his essential The Joys Of Yiddish, “schmuck” can mean three things: a penis, a fool or a son of a bitch. Looking around at the various problems pushing humanity to the precipice, I see plenty of penises, fools and SOBs. Plenty of schmucks. Hell, they’ve surrounded us as…
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Oh, To Be A Rich, White Sociopath!
Last night Elon Musk demonstrated (yet again) that not only is he a rich, white sociopath, he’s the poster boy for Rich, White Sociopaths! Elon The Rich, White Sociopath Even before he got to last night, Elon has consistently demonstrated a sociopath’s consistent disregard for right and wrong or the rights and feelings of others.…
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What Leadership Looks Like – And What It DOESN’T
President Joe Biden just gave a master class in “How To Be A Leader”, and another in “How To Lead”. Circumstances in the Middle East are pitched at a full boil. Israel is a war zone yet Biden 1) kept to his diplomatic mission despite the fact that all the Arab sides canceled on him,…
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The GOP’s Integrity Problem: They Haven’t Got Any
We all enter this world buck naked – and with our integrity fully intact. Soon enough though, we’ll stop being naked. As for our integrity, that’s a whole other matter. What is integrity? It’s our word being our bond. Our trustworthiness. How reliable a friend, a lover, a teammate, a leader are we? Can others…
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Our News Media STILL Can’t Handle Donald Trump
I’ve no doubt that KRISTEN WELKER, newly appointed host of NBC’s creaky, tired, old MEET THE PRESS, is good at something. Journalism however ain’t it. Even when she was just a regular member of NBC News’ reporting corps, Kristen regularly demonstrated that she was a mediocre little girl trying to fill a skilled, grown woman’s…
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Republicans And Magical Thinking
Kellyanne Conway – Donald Trump’s staff Crypt Keeper lookalike – famously said that Trump World preferred “alternative facts” to actual facts. That was a remarkable statement when Kellyanne made it. We still hadn’t gotten used to the idea of Trumpanistas always saying the quiet stuff out loud. But, that’s what Kellyanne did: she articulated a…
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The Cost Of Doing Nothing
The Republican Party reminds us every day how expensive it is “doing nothing”. In the face of a massive, demonstrable problem – like, say, climate change – the GOP’s invariable response to the cost of addressing it is “do nothing”. That supposes that doing nothing costs nothing. But that’s about the most false economy there…
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Why Does Donald Trump Keep Using The Word “Perfect”?
Every time Donald Trump uses the word “perfect” – to describe a phone call or a meeting or himself – “The Princess Bride” flashes across my mind. In “The Princess Bride”, Wallace Shawn’s character Vizzini keeps using the word “inconceivable” to describe things that are actually quite conceivable. Because they’re happening. Mandy Patinkin’s Inigo Montoya…