I'm out in New Mexico in the heat. Have traveled here for a 70th birthday reunion of those of us who lived out here for many years, born in 1943. It feels a little like a ghost town here, with so many having passed on, so many living elsewhere, so many… more »

Just read earlier in the day two memoirs by Flaubert about the death of two of his best friends. The poor medicine of those times, as well as the acute presence of illness and death was palpable in a way I think we would find unfamiliar. I think with al… more »

Peter Baker lays out some of what Obama tried to do in his recent speech about revising the whole war on terror scenario.  Criticized from both left and right, Obama's attempt in this speech was to answer where he thinks all this is heading. The drone p… more »

I saw the very good '42', the new film about the first year of Jackie Robinson's major league life. Harrison Ford does a good job with Branch Rickey and the young guy who plays Robinson is fine. The story is told and it is a harrowing one, and it is tol… more »

As I begin planning an MRI and a possible surgery on a damanged knee, I saw this piece in the WaPo and remembered all that pain involved in one of the US's most popular sports. I had a knee surgery in the 60s from an injury while linebacking at UCLA. Th… more »

By way of background, the decision in 2010 to target groups with certain words in their names did not come out of nowhere. That same year, the Supreme Court decision in the Citizens United case substantially liberalized rules around political contributi… more »

As suicide rates soar since the Recession of 2007 onward, researchers David Stuckler (Oxford) and Sanjay Basu (Stanford) examine the whole scenario of austerity vs. stimulus, especially when it comes to public health policy.  They point out that countri… more »

  Saw new Redford film The Company You Keep and thought it oddly not all there. It seemed like an attempt to bring the radical elements of the Weather Underground, a violent player in the anti-Vietnam movement, into some kind of narrative focus. But… more »