By Joel Bowman, on February 20th, 2019% The two principal problems in the US today are Democrats and Republicans. The Democrats tend to be inept. The Republicans tend to be evil. Neither considers the needs of the nation as a whole but instead concentrate on the narrow vested interests of its affiliated group. As a result, the country is not only polarized, but also paralyzed. It is easy to blame President Trump for our problems, but Trump’s presidency is a result of—not the cause of—our problems. Our problems won’t disappear if we remove Trump from office; they would simply coalesce around whomever replaced Trump as president. The . . . → Read More: Two Serious Problems
By Joel Bowman, on October 14th, 2018% I’m old enough to know that the U.S. hasn’t always enjoyed a peaceful political process. At one point, we had a major bell curve, with the right and left extremes representing only a few, and the big bulge in the middle consisting of those with more moderate views. We now seem to have bimodal distribution with the big bulges representing the extremes. The divisions lead to class conflict, which at its worse can become class warfare.
Class warfare begins when the division between rich and poor is extreme. The poor outnumber the rich, and when they decide that they . . . → Read More: Civil Unrest
By Joel Bowman, on August 18th, 2018% We seem to have been voting for the “lesser of two evils” for a long time. Back in the days of the Vietnam War and the associated political unrest, a musical group calling themselves The Fugs wrote and performed a song entitled “Wide, Wide River.” The song focused on the concept of voting for the lesser of two evils:
Two of the musical questions in the song were, “Why must we always be voting for the lesser of two evils?” and “Was George Washington the lesser of two evils.” The person with the best answer to those . . . → Read More: Lesser of Two Evils
By Joel Bowman, on August 2nd, 2018% One of the stories from the French Revolution is about what Queen Marie Antoinette said of the peasants’ inability to buy bread: . . . → Read More: Let Them Eat Cake
By Joel Bowman, on April 2nd, 2016% The wish, “May you live in interesting times,” is assumed to be an Ancient Chinese Curse because “interesting times” typically meant war, rumors of war, and loss of economic and political stability. Regardless of whether it really is an ancient curse, when you read and/or watch news of today’s events, you’ll see just how many of the factors that make times “interesting” are present today. Here’s a partial list:
In the Mid-East, we have ISIS, an on-going war, the destruction of ancient cities, and millions of refugees.
In Europe, we have millions of refugees seeking a place they can . . . → Read More: Living in Interesting Times
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