If Money Corrupts

In his farewell speech, President Eisenhower famously warned of the undue influence of the military-industrial complex on government and politics. Perhaps less famously, in his very next thought, he also cautioned about the growing domination of government funding in...

The Rise of American Fascism

The most common descriptor in American politics is the Left-Right axis. Democrats and liberals are considered to be on and embody the Left, and Republicans and conservatives are considered to be on and embody the Right. The axis is woefully inadequate for the task...

Trading Places – A Liberal Bestiary

Life lessons can sometimes appear in the oddest places. Today, it occurred to me that the movie Trading Places, the 1983 comedy starring Dan Aykroyd as a blue-blood snob and Eddie Murphy as a street hustler (and one I’ve watched many times), provides superb and...

Revenge of the Nerds

It’s a good time to be a nerd. All across the landscape, nerd culture is paramount. The top-rated comedy on television is The Big Bang Theory, a show about a group of very smart, very nerdy science types who work at CalTech on science stuff. Police procedurals,...