Artwork by Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter We hear a lot about rights in this country. After all, the concept of inalienable personal rights is woven into the very fabric of our democracy and is explicitly delineated in the Constitution. The right to enjoy a free press, to peacefully assemble, to practice free speech, to …
Read
Category:Social Commentary
Dialogues on Building Big: The Gridlock Letters
Photo by Ian Hutchinson on Unsplash Featuring the Fabulous Dadbots By Mark Mamerow, Mark O., Dave S., Dennis Curley, and Geoff Carter Flaming’ Dadbots, Joe Manchin has pulled out of Biden’s BBB bill. If he maintains this position, progressives will never trust moderates again. It’s getting as bad in the Democratic Party as the Republicans have had …
Read
Polar Bear Diary
Photo by Mark Mamerow Article by Mark Mamerow Mara and I arrived at Wahl Avenue and parked at about 11:30 am—X minus 30 minutes to the January 1st Polar Bear plunge at Milwaukee’s Bradford Beach. People were getting out of their cars. You could identify the Polar Bears. They carried cloth shopping bags of towels and shoes, and …
Read
A Few Good Things
Artwork by Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter I’ve been mentoring new teachers in our local public school system for the past few years now. One characteristic I’ve noticed both with them (and myself, during my own career as a teacher) is that every instructor, no matter how experienced, always has one of those classrooms that …
Read
Oh, Christmas Tree
Artwork by Michael Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter (Originally posted in December, 2019) Each year, in the family holiday tradition, my wife and I venture out to buy our Christmas tree. We’re lucky enough to live across the street from a big tree lot so we don’t have very far to go—we can walk right …
Read
Kickass Under the Christmas Tree
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that with the Christmas tree safely in Phyllis’s capable hands—trimmed beautifully in a corner of the living room, the keeper is free to wallow in Christmas tree memories that illustrate why he has finally been demoted from any meaningful Christmas tree participation. It …
Read
Dialogues on Freedom from Choice: The Sleeping Giant Letters
Becker1999 from Grove City, OH, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Dave S., Mark Mamerow, Mark Orlowski, Dennis Curley, and Geoff Carter Dadbots, After this week’s arguments over abortion in front of the SCOTUS, both the Washington Post and the NY Times ran articles discussing the potential political impacts if the Court decides, as it well …
Read
Dialogues on Sleeping In: The Counterpoint Letters
Photo by Russ Ward on Unsplash By Dave S., Mark Mamerow, Dennis Curley, and Geoff Carter (Recent Dialogue) I’ll spare you my take, other than the subject line….as, in counterbalance to our recent, dialogue (as seen above). New York Times: McWhorter –Dave McWhorter pulls a fast one in his column. The thesis is that we are all being forced …
Read
Don’t Look at the Big Picture
Photo by Thomas Def on Unsplash By Mark Mamerow It’s just common sense, isn’t it? James and Jennifer Crumbley behaved irresponsibly, and now they’re being held accountable for it in court. The Crumbleys are the parents of the 15-year-old who shot up a suburban Michigan high school in America’s latest numbingly familiar school massacre. But in the case of Michigan …
Read
Kickass and Santa Belief
Jon Sullivan, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper wonders if there is some way to use the universal belief in Santa Claus to at least slow down the global collapse of democracy due to dissemination of misinformation to the gullible? Perhaps in the mode of …
Read
Blackish Friday
Artwork by Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter Black Friday, that orgy of rabid consumerism—a stampede sometimes as dangerous as the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona—was a bit of a disappointment this year. A number of stores did not open at four a.m. for shoppers to rampage through their aisles like a legion of Vikings; …
Read
Dialogues on the Art of Name Calling: the Gasbag Letters
DonkeyHotey, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Dave S., Mark Mamerow, Dennis Curley, and Geoff Carter So many of our recent topics are at least partially echoed in the below. Do you gents ever read this NY Times version of the old 60 minutes: Point-Counterpoint? Gail Collins and Bret Stephens. I find it humorous and informative. Collins & Stephens …
Read