An almost evenly divided federal government is the main product of the Great Stalemate Election of 1996. Either the two parties now will pursue their aims through more fruitless confrontations or they will seek out at least a few areas where statesmanship might serve the best interests of both. The toughness legislative problems facing the country may be Medicare and Read More ›
Never have so many politicians worked so hard and spent so much to achieve so little change. With the White House still in Democratic hands, Congress still Republican and exactly the same partisan division of governors, the nation’s politics are roughly where they were a year and a half ago when history’s longest presidential campaign began. What was achieved? Altogether, Read More ›
The theory of evolution is the great white elephant of contemporary thought. It is large, almost entirely useless, and the object of superstitious awe. Richard Dawkins is widely known as the theory’s uncompromising champion. Having made his case in The Blind Watchmaker and River out of Eden, Dawkins proposes to make it yet again in Climbing Mount Improbable. He is Read More ›
The historically significant Washington State campaign on school reform is continuing to develop in curious ways. There is an old political adage, “If you can’t win an argument on an issue, argue about something else,” and that is just what opponents of the two school reform initiatives are doing. In the past week, with the election fast approaching, proponents of Read More ›
Initiatives are blunt instruments, but they sometimes are necessary to get the attention of the establishment. If the common sense of the people had been heard earlier on the issue of mandatory bussing, it would not have taken five years to reverse that misguided policy. Washington state residents soon will vote on two initiatives to give parents real choices in Read More ›
Pontius Pilate’s cryptic question “What is truth?” is a phrase that launched a thousand sermons, maybe millions, over the intervening centuries. It also haunts any attempt to discuss the volatile questions asked about Christians and other religiously motivated citizens when they take their faith into politics. For the followers of Jesus, he is the “Truth,” which converts an abstract answer Read More ›
Let’s not hear any more about “character’, okay? This country is moving to a values neutral, non-judgmental consciousness in which such outdated concepts are irrelevant. “Character” is just another device by which the power elite seek to instill guilt in the masses and bring everyone under the control of old fogies and their retrograde values system. Character is not an Read More ›
If you contribute to your church or synagogue, the arts, charities to help the poor, civic or environmental groups, dear old alma mater or any number of public causes, you are supporting the so-called “independent” sector of society. Because more people are doing the same, that sector is growing faster than either government or business. Hundreds of thousands of new Read More ›
Garry Trudeau, creator of the comic-strip Doonesbury, is one of your star Boomer celebrities, a self-appointed guru of perpetual ’60s cool. It was Trudeau who invented the jaunty Mr. Butts character that mocks the tobacco companies and the politicians who take their contributions. Today Mr. Butts figures haunt only Republican rallies, despite the annoying fact from the National Library on Read More ›