Wednesday’s Child: A Spoonful of Tar
“A spoonful of tar,” goes the Russian proverb, “spoils a barrel of honey.” Such was my instinctive response to a Twitter poll I happened on while scrolling aimlessly as one does.
“A spoonful of tar,” goes the Russian proverb, “spoils a barrel of honey.” Such was my instinctive response to a Twitter poll I happened on while scrolling aimlessly as one does.
In 1962, Frank Morris and John and Clarence Anglin escaped from Alcatraz prison. In 1979, Don Siegel made a movie about this event starring Clint Eastwood, Patrick McGoohan, and Fred Ward
Keir Starmer, is considering sending British troops to Greenland. His transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, quickly reassured the public that such considerations were nothing to do with US military threats but were rather “business as usual” and related to concerns over the “High North” and the building of an “effective deterrent” against “Putin
I abhor the shootings of two Americans in Minneapolis. But in this article I want to report on a root cause of the tragedies: the militarization of all police forces in America, from the DHS/ICE at the federal level, to state police, to your local county sheriffs and city police.
The gentle reader may recall the famous moment in the film comedy The Gods Must Be Crazy when a Coca-Cola bottle falls from an airplane and lands in a bushman camp in the Kalahari.
This is a slightly revised version of an essay (published about 9 years ago) inspired by a re-reading of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. I had earlier exchanged letters with the author and published his brief introduction to a re-edition of his masterpiece.
When the revolution broke out again in 1848, Pius IX had been Pope for only two years. He had spent those two years well, reforming the government of the papal states especially the criminal justice system, rooting out corruption, imposing stricter discipline on the clergy.
Cautious hope has proved to be warranted because many of the hopes of his supporters have disappointingly failed of implementation. His statesmanlike inaugural address is far from becoming his reality in office.