A Dilemma

Is it better to seek tangible or intangible results? When the now outgoing president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, pushed for a peace accord with leftist rebels known generally as FARC, it was with the goal of securing an end to a half-century of horrible civil war, terrorism and suffering. Amnesty, social reintegration and political representation […]

Just Incentivize It

Why is it that our elected officials at the city and state levels are so quick to promise the moon to corporations looking to expand, relocate or establish themselves? The short answer, of course, is that they are not looking for long term returns or benefits for their constituents but are instead looking only at […]

The Great Undoing

There is a coup underway in the United States of America. Some have made an excellent argument that this coup has been going on for several years and is nearing a point of completion. The American electorate has been conscious participants and unwitting victims, but this coup has taken place all the same. This isn’t […]

Once Again

So… here we are again. It doesn’t seem like that long ago, does it? Where was it? Orlando, wasn’t it? That’s right. That’s when that guy killed all those people at that nightclub. It’s just like old times, isn’t it? Only this time it’s Las Vegas and even more people got killed and, oh yeah, […]

The War in Our Heads

Is there a war against conservative free speech in this country? If we are to believe the tirades coming from such right-wing organs as The Daily Caller, there is no doubt that a war is raging between the Quixotic champions of the First Amendment (the vilified, threatened and intimidated voices of the political right) and the […]

Kids > Bombs

There seems to be two unassailable truths when it comes to policymaking and government budgeting: 1) military spending is sacrosanct and 2) education related spending, however much it’s praised during campaigning, is always a viable source of savings. Let us, for a moment, consider the case of a program called 21st Century Community Learning Centers, […]

Whose Bathroom is it, Anyway? Redux

What we in North Carolina have witnessed over the past few days is, in many ways, a nearly perfect demonstration of how we would like our governments to work: neither side emerged fully satisfied, but both sides could still claim some degree of victory. The most despised element of the original S.L. 2016-3, the requirement […]

Care: Right or Privilege?

In all the discussion, debate and hyperbole surrounding the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) and its efforts by reactionary forces in the US Congress to dismantle and/or replace it, there seems to be one issue left out that, I believe, is the core issue in the entire conversation over healthcare in America: is healthcare a […]

Voting in the Age of Supression

As states across the country continue to undermine the voting rights of their citizens, let us look briefly at one of the simplest, yet most effective barriers to the exercise of voting rights. In an effort to halt the great specter of “voter fraud” state governments have established regulations that force voters to present ID […]

The Road to Tyranny

Passive genocide, I think, is an appropriate phrase to describe the misguided, nonsensical and unconscionable actions recently taken by Donald Trump and his cadre of toadies in the Executive Mansion. Rather than directly targeting, bombing and massacring a certain group of people (i.e. Muslim refugees from the list of 7 countries), the syndicate in the […]