Friday Thoughts: What Rights Are You Missing?

August 25, 2023August 25, 2023

Friday Thoughts: What Rights Are You Missing?

The other day I ran across an FB post with the hashtag “LGBTQ rights are human rights” and it got me thinking. What rights, exactly, do people who use that hashtag believe are not recognized for LGBTQ folks or what rights are LGBTQ people unable to exercise due to government or social restrictions? Seriously, what are they missing? Marriage? Got it. Speech? Got it. Access to healthcare? Got it. Religion? Got it. Housing? Got it. Jobs? Got ‘em. What are they missing?

May 11, 2023May 11, 2023

Back in the Game

I’ve been going through a few weeks of… not really malaise, but just a sort of checked out feeling. I haven’t been writing like I want to/need to/should be in order to keep to my self-imposed publishing schedule and while I have been following news and events, and have opinions on things, I haven’t mustered up the energy or whatever to write about them here either. But over the last couple of days, I’ve done some introspection and pulled apart some things and reminded myself that this sort of disconnect is not really productive nor is it conducive to keeping my creative side, which is still newly emerging, engaged and active.

March 17, 2023March 17, 2023

Friday Thoughts: Equity, Equality and Outcomes

In A Wrinkle in Time, Charles Wallace Murray, Meg’s little brother, responds to a seemingly unworkable conundrum, posed by IT, shouting triumphantly “like and equal are not the same thing!” In our own version of Camazotz ruled by IT and the Black Thing, we are told that “equality” and “equity of outcomes” are the same thing. Like Charles Wallace Murray, we should all be shouting at IT “Equality and equity of outcomes are not the same thing!” because they are not.

March 13, 2023March 13, 2023

Progressives Announce: Men Are Better Than Women!

Reading an article in The College Fix describing how several universities are changing “women” to “womxn” (I don’t even know how you would pronounce that) in order to be “more inclusive” during Women’s History Month, is the latest salvo in what is clearly a war on women by progressives. Women’s History Month celebrates women in history. How can it become more inclusive? And what, exactly is a “womxn”?

January 26, 2023January 26, 2023

Is Florida Really Forbidding African-American Studies?

For the last several days I’ve been seeing breathless articles describing the “racist” actions of Ron DeSantis, governor of Florida. DeSantis announced that African-American studies classes will not be taught in public schools. Of course, the left went absolutely ballistic over this announcement. But what, exactly, did DeSantis do? Let’s look at this latest kerfuffle.

January 13, 2023January 13, 2023

Friday Thoughts: Disagreement vs. Misinformation

I know I’m likely preaching to the choir here, but I wanted to take a few minutes and examine the issue of disagreement vs. misinformation. “Misinformation” is flying about a lot lately and in most cases it is mildly to egregiously misapplied. “Misinformation” is a word that conjures up images of propagandizing evil dictators. People think “Soviet propaganda” or similar when they hear that term. Characterizing statements as “misinformation” conveys to the listener that the statement is not only false, but deliberately misleading and therefore dangerous. Put your hands over your ears immediately before you become contaminated!

November 9, 2022November 9, 2022

Why No Red Wave? Or A Labor of Love

What happened? We were promised an almost unstoppable red wave in yesterday’s election. What we got was one or two upset races and it was business as usual for the rest. Fetterman – Fetterman! – won in Pennsylvania for God’s sake. The corrupt, criminal-loving, now cognitively impaired candidate won over a TV famous medical doc who actually had some good ideas. In Georgia, it looks like the corrupt, racist slum lord will win over the former football player, who yes, has some gaffe issues, but far less than Biden. In other races (check out Real Clear Politics for more results) what should have been clear Republican wins became nail biters and I don’t think it was all fraud.

November 4, 2022November 5, 2022

Demonization and Segregation

It’s a thing among hard-core political partisans to demonize and “other” (to use the language of the left… ostracize, unperson) their opponents and anyone who even hesitates to go along with their ideas. The left, with their capture of the major news outlets, is very good at demonizing, othering, ostracizing, unpersoning, and segregating all those with whom they disagree, dislike, and otherwise want/need to silence and do away with.

October 28, 2022October 28, 2022

Creating Monsters

A generational temper tantrum is occurring. There’s been a lot in the news lately (well, at least on the sites that I read. I don’t know if the mainstream media has said much) about childish adults throwing soup on Van Gogh’s sunflowers and gluing themselves to the wall of the museum, or gluing themselves to a street in Paris, or gluing themselves to other paintings, and other stupid, senseless, and destructive gestures with far less cool and panache than the brothers of Delta House. But they’re out there, throwing temper tantrums.

September 29, 2022September 29, 2022

Defining Terms

With the election of Giorgia Meloni as Italy’s new prime minister, the terms “fascist” and “fascism” are being tossed around even more than they were when Trump was president. In almost every case these terms are wrongly defined. Reading all the ignorant garbage “reporting” about Meloni and her “far right-wing” party with its “fascist” ideology, has brought out the political science professor in me. For those who don’t know… yes, I have a Ph.D. in political science. I spent over twenty years teaching college students about not only the American political system, but about political systems throughout the world and over the last two hundred years or so. I worked hard to be this pedantic and sarcastic.