We cannot not communicate.
There is no such thing as “keeping to ourselves.”
No matter how hard we may try to conceal what goes on inside of us, it will out one way or another. (This fact completes the triad of certainties in life, death and taxes being the other two.)
To communicate is like playing whack-a-mole: the instant we flatten with our mallet the mole hill over here, it will … Read More →
Climate change can now be considered another weapon of mass destruction, perhaps even the world’s most fearsome weapon of mass destruction. (John Kerry)
Speaking of weapons of mass destruction, remember those stockpiles allegedly harbored by Saddam as per intelligence reports widely deemed credible save by a handful of dissenting skeptics?
In 2002, referring to France’s reluctance to join the then-coalition of the willing, David Letterman famously quipped that “the last time the French asked for more proof, it came marching into Paris under a German flag.”
If these stockpiles existed, it stood to reason that the Iraqi regime could have plied terrorist organizations with chemical and biological warfare … Read More →
In order to engage in any meaningful debate—emphasis on meaningful—the contending parties must first determine exactly what is in dispute, i.e., identify the true heart of the controversy.
In classical rhetoric, the term stasis, which literally means a “point of rest,” refers to the fulcrum point a dispute revolves around—the point where neither force can proceed because the other force opposes it.
Unless the stasis of a given squabble is clarified, one invariable gets the sense that the disputants are talking past each other. … Read More →
A woman cannot possibly understand what it is like to get kicked in the balls.
Although technically accurate in the narrowest of senses, the above statement also happens to be blatantly condescending toward women, as it implies that, in general, women are incapable of grasping the relatively simple concept of physical pain.
Or, in case they might indeed be familiar with said concept as a result of having experienced physical pain themselves at one point or another, that they couldn’t possibly project the experience onto sentient creatures outside of themselves.
To declare that a woman cannot possibly understand what it is like to get kicked in the balls is tantamount to saying that … Read More →
How big is Israel really, its present borders notwithstanding?
The other day, in a televised discussion on Israel’s occupation of and settlement-building activity in a particular part of the geographic region referred to as Palestine that is claimed by both the Jewish state as well as its less recognized Arab neighbor, one of the participants—who, I suppose, would be characterized as a hardline “Zionist” by his detractors—held up what he described as an ancient Hebrew coin allegedly dredged up during the construction of said settlements in the disputed territory and presented it as evidence that Jews had been there first and that it was impossible to “occupy” what is yours to begin with.
In other words, that, when it comes to the construction of Israeli settlements in Palestine, the Arabs ought to recognize that … Read More →
When you have a problem, what’s the last thing you want to hear?
As for myself, I dread the shopworn consolation staple “You’re not alone.”
Talk about adding insult to injury.
Sure, whatever spot of bother I happen to find myself in may well turn out to be a rather crowded place, and one ought not to curse one’s counselor for speaking the truth, nor for offering an opinion with sincerity no matter how potentially tenuous its alignment with the facts.
What irritates me to no end, though, is when the assurance that I have plenty of company in my plight is presented to me as if it were … Read More →
Fox News’ Megyn Kelly, who plumes herself on being a “straight news anchor,” as opposed to the—presumably gay—opinion hosts whose programs flank her new prime time show, has nonplussed the straight-news-seeking among her viewers, as well as handed an early Christmas present in the form of some juicy grist for the “Fox lies” mill to the Media Matters of the world, by anointing with the chrism of “verifiable fact” the notion that both Santa and Jesus were “white,” i.e., of Caucasian ethnicity … Read More →
When people die, what happens to their guns? Who gets them?
My technical understanding of firearms—of anything, actually, firearms included—is sketchy at best, but I imagine that when properly stored and maintained, or at least unless exposed to corrosive influences like excessive humidity or whatnot, modern heat remains fully operational for many generations. I suppose plenty of Wild-West-era colts and Winchester rifles still exist today whose basic functionality has eroded little to none.
Commendable as background checks are, these checks necessarily extend to no one but the original purchaser of a given firearm and not to, say, his or her mentally disoriented great-grandson that will one day … Read More →
If I like to go mountain-biking in my spare time, my employer surely isn’t required to cover the cost for the helmet I may wish to wear on the trail.
Ergo, if I consider it safer to pedal about the woods with protective headgear on, I must foot my helmet bill out of my own pocket.
If I enjoy playing ice hockey in my downtime, my employer isn’t required to cover my shin pads. So if I’m worried about damage to my tibia from its colliding with an opponent’s unyielding hockey stick, I’ll have to spring for the pads myself.
In fact, that’s what a salary is for. We go to work to make money not only to be able to afford life’s necessities, such as food and rent, but also … Read More →
Dr Phil seems to have fluttered some hyper-sensitive dovecotes by tweeting the following survey question:
Seems like a perfectly harmless and legitimate question, does it not?
Yet somehow it caused such an uproar that the good doctor, or his Twitter staff, saw no alternative but to delete it “almost immediately” according to The Daily News, which promptly ran a story headlined “Dr. Phil sexual assault tweet sparks outrage, prompts petition”.
While hooking up with plastered tail may indeed constitute a form of sexual assault—after all, being intoxicated impairs a person’s capacity … Read More →
The Huffington Post recently ran a piece by a lady named Eternity E Martis titled Why I Don’t Sleep With White Guys.
In it, Ms Martis, a “mixed-race girl” generally classified as black but residing in a “predominantly white city,” laments that “nothing comes without a race.”
Specifically, when meeting white men (i.e., the most plentiful variety available at her geographic location), she found that her ethnic otherness, as it were, invariably tended to be “at the forefront” of these encounters—not in the sense of racial animosity being directed against her, but, quite on the contrary, in the sense that white men either seemed disproportionately intrigued by her exotic features at the expense of all other qualities she would bring to the table (or the bed, for that matter), or they would resort to peculiar pickup lines like … Read More →
