Tom Bartel In the introduction to his comprehensive history of Rome, Livy invited his readers to “trace the process of our moral decline, to watch, first, the sinking of the foundations of morality … then the rapidly increasing disintegration, then the final collapse of the whole edifice, and the dark dawning of our modern day when we … Read more
More interesting than the news of the bridge collapse itself is the immediate attacks going on in the blogosphere by liberals and conservatives blaming each other for blaming each other. Here’s how it’s going so far, in case you have other things on your minds: liberals suggest that we should have raised taxes by now … Read more
What is being handed over in this illustration is the fasces, the Roman symbol of power. Look up “fascist” in the dictionary, if you wonder where the word came from. I was on vacation two weeks ago and so missed most of the tempest in a teapot blown up by Keith Ellison’s conflation of Bush’s … Read more
There is a famous cartoon in the World War II memoir Up Front by Bill Mauldin, the editorial cartoonist for Stars and Stripes. Mauldin’s main characters, GIs Willie and Joe, slump against a wall, exhausted and unshaven, as a spit-shined soldier struts aggressively past them. “That can’t be no combat man,” Willie says to Joe. … Read more
I know you’ll find this incredible, but it seems that the last several presidents have tried to keep their Surgeons General quiet about politically sensitive scientific and medical issues. From Reagan trying to silence Koop about AIDS to Clinton being sensitive about the news that needle exchange programs were actually working to limit disease, presidents … Read more
Zheng Xiaoyu died for our sins When one thinks about the rule of law here in the United States, it can only lead to confusion. The Bush Justice (is that an oxymoron?) Department can put innocent people in prison for political reasons, but lets the guilty ones go. China, on the other hand, who isn’t … Read more
OK, it’s a little premature, but I couldn’t help laughing at the first reports out of the Par Ridder hearings today. Question: what’s the difference between a little rich girl driving while drunk and a little rich boy driving a newspaper while drunk on power? UPDATE: Mnspeak’s worth a look on this. Lots of funny … Read more
As I was watching the mid-June press screening of Michael Moore’s new movie Sicko, I could almost hear the lips of the conservative bloggers and talk show hosts beginning to smack as the smell of fresh meat wafted over the media landscape. Moore, whose Bowling for Columbine won the Academy Award for best documentary, won’t … Read more
The story in the NY Times this morning says that NBC has outbid ABC for the right to have the first interview with jail bird Paris Hilton when she gets out next week. NBC indignantly protests that they “don’t pay for interviews.” However, it does seem that they pay the Hilton family other fees for … Read more