To Tea Partiers
You hate our president. I know the feeling well. I hated our previous president. His policies struck me as wrong-headed, and his way of expressing himself rubbed me the wrong way almost every time....
View ArticleThe End of the Kayapó People? Eat Your Dinner and Shut Up?
The Brazilian government has finally done it. Like a sadistic child with a stick beating a dog to death, it has authorized the Bel Monte dam. We are talking here of a region that functions as the lungs...
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Hustings Hustler: Iowa Straw Poll Draws Blood
What a wild few weeks it’s been in the Republican Presidential primary race, AKA America’s Top Celebrity Presidential Candidate Rehab Survivor’s Got Talent! First, a certain vote against raising the...
View ArticleWow, I Got An Interview with the Head of the Brazilian Communist Party!
As I enter the simple youth hostel in Rio de Janeiro where Mr. R. Belo has agreed to be interviewed, I am struck by how very ordinary this man looks. I am reminded of something Winston Churchill once...
View ArticleHustings Hustler: Straw Polls Suck
Man oh man oh man oh man. It’s what, FOUR months until the first primary and the Republican field has been bludgeoning itself like a bunch of tweens at a razor party listening to My Chemical...
View ArticleExcerpt from Killing the Cranes—A Reporter’s Journey Through Three Decades of...
It was a warm Thursday afternoon on August 5, 2010, in a remote woodland of the Hindu Kush mountains when a band of men with full beards and ankle-length white gowns appeared out of nowhere....
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Embedded Protester at Occupy Portland
Before I rode my bike downtown to the kickoff march for Occupy Portland I scoured my office for a press pass. Although I’ve worked for several large media conglomerates ( I think they’re separate but...
View ArticleOccupy the Spaces Between
My people come from what is often referred to by banks as LDC’s (least developed countries), little brown tropical countries, drenched with religious fanatics, stalks of sugar like magic wands picked...
View ArticleDropping the Ball
You’ve heard all about it, maybe more than you want to know, but to recap: Last week Jerry Sandusky, a former defensive coordinator for the Penn State football team, was charged with sexually abusing...
View ArticleBarack, Meet Mary Jane
Two weeks ago, the local press went into a frenzy when a man named Don Kerr was arrested for possession of marijuana. His alleged offense was to sign for a package, delivered by the crack agents at the...
View ArticleThree Amendments to the Constitution That We Need Right Now
Congress is the 1 percent. If I’m off here, I’m not off by much. Two-thirds of our senators, and over 40 percent of our congressional representatives are millionaires. The family of the average member...
View ArticleRomney: Can He or Can’t He?
Taking a gentlemanly, congratulatory phone call from Sen. John McCain after he stuffed former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney in the Iowa caucus in January of 2008, former Arkansas Governor Mike...
View ArticleAll Quiet on the Western Front: Media Reacts to SOPA Debate with Resounding...
The U.S. House of Representatives is debating legislation that could fundamentally change what types of content we’re allowed to access over the Internet, and the resulting outrage has sparked a heated...
View ArticleFirst Amendment Confusion Over the Obama Contraception Rule
Recently, I have been struck by how misinformed many Americans are about their Constitutional rights. The debate over the new federal rule requiring most employers, including religious-affiliated ones,...
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Romney’s America
Mitt Romney is staking his presidential candidacy on his long business career and the values reflected in the photograph below, taken from a Bain Capital Christmas card in the 1980s. If recent polls...
View ArticleField of Fallacies
As a writer with a Masters of Fine Arts in creative writing, I make most of my living teaching composition, argument and rhetoric to college students. This means I have the often-unenviable job of...
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Limbaugh, the Ladies and Consumer Activism: Women are Good at Math After All
Unless you live in a sound-proof cave protected by fire ants, you know that ten days ago, right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh went on a tirade and deemed Georgetown University Law School’s Sandra...
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Excerpt: Delirium: How the Sexual Counterrevolution is Polarizing America
Asked for “one single word to describe your impression of the budget negotiations in Washington,” Americans volunteered “crazy,” “disgusting,” “stupid,” and “juvenile.” Two-thirds of the American...
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Top Ten Dick Cheney Heart Transplant Punchlines
On Saturday, Dick Cheney got a new heart. That doesn’t require a punchline any more than did the news that he shot his friend in the face because he mistook him for a deer. But that doesn’t mean...
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Hold Your Breath and Do Not Panic
Tear gas, for the uninitiated, really does make you cry. And not in the gradual fashion of an organic cry, with the palpable build-up of liquid emotion that your body ultimately can’t contain and...
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