Ye Gads! Great Scott! Great Jehosafat! They never stop! It was devastating enough that corporate CEOs succeeded in achieving the standard of minimum wages for American workers while they "earned" billion dollar profits through outsourcing. It was devastating enough that they, Wall Street, bankers and mortgage companies, nearly destroyed our economic system through criminal skullduggery. ...more

March 26, 2009

The root cause of our current economic disaster is very rich people continually getting much richer at the expense of nearly everyone else. While some of this is attributable to recognizing and exploiting legitimate opportunities, much is a result of stacking the deck. Years of deregulation crippled government oversight while Congress rewarded the rich with generous tax cuts while the deficit and debt soared. Hedge funds, totally unregulated leveraged markets providing astronomic profits for their investors. Wall Streeters and CEOs rewarded themselves with multi-million salaries and bonuses while the rest of us lost ground. Privatizing and the Iraq war created opportunities for lavishing government funds on favored private entities, all accomplished under the aegis of the Republican Congress and the Bush White House. ...more

January 24, 2009

I've been thinking a lot lately about Tom Brokaw's book "The Greatest Generation," that classic about our parents and their incredible sacrifices during World War II. ...more

December 10, 2008

We all know that the federal budget deficit is huge and will continue to grow as long as Congress continues to bail out one company after another. So here's a budget item that Congress can freeze immediately if they choose to do so: Both the U.S. House and Senate should vote to forego pay increases for themselves and their staffs until the budget is balanced. ...more

November 28, 2008

Columnist David Brooks is the sort of writer who passes for a conservative. ...more

October 15, 2008

Congratulations, or perhaps condolences, fellow taxpayers. On Sunday we all became mortgage bankers. ...more

September 9, 2008

One of my favorite songs has always been Merle Haggard's "The Fighting Side of Me," in which the country legend sings about the hippie protestors whose politics got on his "fighting side." Recently, my "fighting side" was riled up when I heard of the controversy over the new Ben Stiller comedy, "Tropic Thunder," in which the word "retard" is repeatedly used so as to further ridicule the developmentally disabled. For many, this was the last straw in a history of hurtful insults. ...more

August 22, 2008

Seems like a stupid enough question. Of course we care about schools. Aren't we spending numbers that now are in the billions on education? Isn't the state government obsessed with fiddling with the school system? Isn't the University of Florida now the No. 1 party school in the country? Obviously we care about something. ...more

August 1, 2008

So, in the first two months of using cameras to surveil certain troublesome intersections, Port Richey has tagged 570 scofflaw drivers for running red lights. ...more

July 6, 2008

The '60s, the legendarily spasmodic decade that, even now, looms uncommonly large over life in America, wrought plenty for which its survivors are properly rueful. ...more

July 1, 2008