You know the tune.... "go together like a horse and carriage." The one, powerful, potentially dangerous, a kind of terrible beauty, then the carriage, outmoded, ignored by most, no longer romantic.

So here's our fated country, embedded in a struggle over death and union, fear and justice, while the Supreme...

Now that TV advertising is nearing 50% of total air time (averages 40% now) I need an Ad Guide, like TV Guide, so that I can decide which ads to watch. I don't care much about which game or show or talk or news is on, but I do care...

As we approach this crucial election, I want to reflect for a moment on the influence of one of our founding thinkers on the issues before the American electorate. Ralph Waldo Emerson is widely known for his concept of self-reliance. For many years, the idea of self-reliance has been the...

The GOP effort to deflect attention from their deeply damaged candidate by digging up a 14-year-old comment by then-state senator Obama, won't fly. When Obama dared to use the word redistribution, the GOP alleges, it meant that the president is a socialist seeking to take from the rich and give...

We know now from months of primary and now campaign rhetoric that Republican politicians and their surrogates lie about most everything having to do with Obama himself, his record over three-and-a-half years, their own record and, most importantly now, their proposed agenda if elected to office.

The question is,...

What is it with this abortion plank ratified by the Republicans? It will never hold up to the weight of public opinion, common sense and reason in a rational culture. Sweeping aside all moral considerations by asserting the right to life of a fetus created by immoral actions is perverse...

In my recent posting entitled "Why Ayn Rand is Not the Issue," I made some general comments on Paul Ryan's use of Rand's thinking to support his policy objectives. In this more complete examination of a related theme, I would like to move on to Ryan's (and now...

Let me save you the trouble of reading up on Ayn Rand in an effort to get a handle on Paul Ryan. Rand is not the issue. Her egoism and self-serving individualism is not what Ryan is all about, as he will certainly explain again and again in the coming...

On this day, when Governor Romney secures the Republican nomination for president, we now are offered our November choice. What is it? In Emerson's essay "Intellect" he put the matter plainly for us all:

"God offers to every mind its choice between truth and repose. Take which you please, --...

In the Wizard of Oz, you will recall, the loyal watchdog Toto (think media for this brief item), pulls aside the curtain hiding the sham wizard, who is turning wheels and belching smoke from behind his phony throne. He is exposed for the fraud he is (the GOP Super PACs...

As anyone familiar with the subprime housing debacle will surely see that the current student loan crisis has a similar feeling about it. In fact, now that more careful statistical studies have been done, we are beginning to know the extent of the crisis. 70% of college graduates carry debt...

In 1860 Ralph Waldo Emerson published a collection of essays entitled The Conduct of Life. One of those essays was entitled "Wealth," and in it he spelled out the basic laws of wealth in a free economy. Here is a passage from that essay:

"Wealth brings with it its own checks...

Among some of the debris washed up on the beaches of Alabama and Mississippi in the recent Republican primaries there were disturbing opinion polls, one of which asked questions about the President's religion. Only a small percentage thought he was a Christian while nearly a half thought he was a...

If you haven't already noticed, your search results on Google, the choices presented on YouTube and Netflix, are being tailored to what they think are your interests, based of course on previous choices. Search engines and big retailers like Amazon also focus on your purchases to offer items they think...

The campaign for president in 2012 has once again raised the usually dormant issue of whether or not America was founded as a Christian nation. The assertion that it was has been declared almost unanimously by the Religious Right, and now with candidates Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich making...

No one, I'm sure, is looking forward to the inundation of super PAC ads coming to our TV screens for the next eight months. For the most part, given the evidence of their present tone and content, these ads will not only be negative but also near libelous. And...

The following historical nugget appeared today in Paul Krugman's Op-Ed piece in the Times: "In 1997 Mr. Clinton struck a deal with Republicans in Congress in which he cut taxes on the rich in return for creation of the Children's Health Insurance Program." Up to the point of that deal...

In Act Two of King Lear, the old fading king's nasty daughters, Goneril and Regan, badger their dottering father about letting go of his large, expensive entourage of soldiers and retainers. They argue him down in number to the point where, finally, Regan puts the knife in and asks, "What...

In the media recently, the question is being asked: how it is that the wealthy are doing so well while the middle class is suffering in comparison? The usual villains named are outsourcing and the resulting decline of the manufacturing base. Blame also goes to NAFTA and the other trade...

A new book has been making the rounds and getting a very bad press. It is The Atheist's Guide to Reality: Enjoying Life Without Illusions, by Alex Rosenberg, a philosopher of science at Duke University. What Rosenberg has done is to take the scientific principle of reductionism and apply...