Your generous
donations help keep
this site running.
Visa/MC/PayPal accepted.
Apparently, Ben Affleck's distant relatives once owned slaves. Now, in the history of this blog I don't think I've ever started an article by dishing celebrity dirt, but this story unfortunately goes a little deeper. Because I didn't learn that fact on PBS. I learned it as the spark which set off yet another integrity problem for both New York's WNET and the Public Broadcasting System in general.
I write today to challenge what is fast becoming conventional wisdom in the political world. In particular, the notion that Hillary Clinton really needs a strong primary challenge to "toughen her up" for the upcoming race with whomever the Republicans decide upon. When you deconstruct the logic behind this idea, however, it falls apart.
Strange but true, the "Scooby van" is now part of our political lexicon. Hillary Clinton herself is apparently to blame for this one, as this was the playful name she came up with for the van she used to get from New York to Iowa this week. The media, as it will be doing for the next year and a half over pretty much any new aspect of Hillary Clinton's campaign (and we do mean "any new aspect at all -- even the laughably trivial"), quite predictably, freaked out.
The question of when it is permissible to show death on television is in the news today because of a scathing commentary by Jon Stewart over the media's relentless showing -- unedited, unpixelated, and in full -- the recent video of a man shot in the back while running from a cop. Stewart didn't get into several aspects of the editorial decision to run the video, instead he was mostly focused on what he called turning the video "into screensaver mode... running as background wallpaper in your discussion," on cable news shows. He then detailed why he was so annoyed:
Yesterday, Senator Marco Rubio became the fourth candidate to officially announce his intentions for the 2016 presidential run. He now joins Ted Cruz and Rand Paul in his own party, and Hillary Clinton across the aisle, as official candidates. I have to say, one thing about Rubio's candidacy is impressive, even if you don't agree with anything the man stands for. Rubio is going "all in," in poker terms. If he doesn't win his party's nomination and go on to win the White House, then he will almost certainly be out of a job when the dust settles. That shows a degree of commitment that few other politicians ever make these days, casting aside a cushy Senate seat for the chance at becoming president. As in poker, he's shoved all his chips to the middle of the table for one bet that could leave him at the top or flat broke. And, I have to say, that in and of itself is an admirable thing.
And so it begins. Hillary Clinton is now officially in the race for the White House. Her announcement, like pretty much everything else about her upcoming campaign, will be microscopically analyzed within an inch of its life. Was she too generic? Was she appealing enough? Where were the specifics? What about Bill? And what was up with that laughably 1970s campaign logo? Most of these deep-dive analyses won't make a tiny bit of difference, in the long run (well, OK, that logo is pretty bad, hopefully that's the first thing Team Hillary decides to change...). But it'll certainly give all the pundits something to do in the meantime.
On this day, 150 years ago, the Civil War began its end. The fighting didn't stop immediately, but today was the significant turning point in the conflict. Exactly one and a half centuries ago, Robert E. Lee surrendered his army to Ulysses S. Grant in a tiny Virginia hamlet called Appomattox Court House. This was the beginning of the end for the Confederate forces, and for the Confederacy itself.
Not since the line "Let them eat cake!" was supposedly uttered have delicious baked goods been so central to a political upheaval. Yes, we have entered what might be called the political era of "Cake Wars," it seems. Now, I don't mean to trivialize an important civil rights issue by relegating it to the dessert cart (as it were). But with all the political frenzy about both religious freedom and discrimination, the pundits always seem to come back to the same classic case: a baker contemplating whether to bake a cake for a gay wedding. It reduces the moral and legal arguments to a case that is both easy to understand and downright ordinary. What strikes me, though, while listening to the argument rage, is that most people on both sides of this argument haven't really come to grips with the larger implications of what they're advocating. To stretch the metaphor one last time, things could get a lot messier, as when a mischievous spouse mashes a slice of cake into their newly-wedded loved one's face at the reception (an admittedly bizarre ritual some couples feel honor-bound to perform, for the entertainment of their guests). That's right, folks -- the Cake Wars haven't actually gotten sticky enough, yet.
President Barack Obama is finally earning his Nobel Peace Prize, it seems. A few months back, he announced a major shift in U.S. policy towards Cuba, ending a half-century of frostiness, and this week the outlines of a deal to avoid a war with Iran were unveiled, thawing a relationship that froze over back in 1979. Both of these foreign policy accomplishments go a long way towards deserving the Nobel Peace Prize Obama was prematurely awarded in 2009. At the time, many (this column included) joked that the Nobel committee was really awarding the prize to Obama for the sole achievement of "not being George W. Bush." But it seems now that by the time he ends his term in office, Barack Obama will indeed have earned the world's foremost peacemaker's prize. Since this is Good Friday, perhaps a Bible quotation is in order: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God."
But back to Ireland. Whiskey -- like parades, colors, religion, and everything else on the island (carrots included) -- is political in nature here. For instance: I've never seen Bushmills served in the Republic of Ireland. Never. And I've personally been in many a pub, throughout the years. If you order whiskey at the bar in the Republic, it had better be Jameson. I assume the same is true in Northern Ireland, for Bushmills, as well. Yes, even after a long day when you retire to the pub, politics is never all that far away from Irish life. In other words: keep in mind which side of the border you're on when you order that shot at the bar!