“One thing that qualifies me to run a journalism organization is the fact that I don’t have a journalism degree.” — Roger Ailes The day Donald Trump became the Republican Party’s presidential nominee, Fox News CEO Roger Ailes lost his job. History rarely delights us with such ironic symmetry. No one has done more to […]
Hello?
Frat boy follies
Despondent over the Republican convention? Cowboy up. You could be Queen Elizabeth II. The 90-year-old monarch, England’s longest reigning, is the human bookend presiding over the demise of an empire that began than more than four centuries ago with Queen Elizabeth I. Last month — thanks to just the sort of buffoonery on display at the […]
Getting what we’ve earned?
“Hurt people hurt people.” – Leon Wieseltier, Brookings Institution fellow Let’s change focus, people. Enough of Trump already. Nothing more can be said about him, or said by him, that will change what we know him to be: unfit for office. But what about those who think he is fit for office? They should compel […]
The Founding Fathers’ nightmare
“I play to people’s fantasies.” –Donald Trump, The Art of the Deal It took 229 years, but one incarnation of the Founding Fathers’ worst nightmare has arrived: Donald Trump. He’s just the sort of charismatic charlatan who surely would have inspired queasiness among the Founders about the wisdom of heaving off a king and crowning […]
Let’s have one state, one vote
Exhausted and dismayed? Pull up your socks and stagger on, people. We’re still six months away from choosing a new president. Why do we persist in doing this to ourselves? How is it that other people choose their leaders in short order, sans fisticuffs and foolishness? What’s the matter with us, anyway? This, partly: Our […]
Who represents Okanogan County?
Citizens dissatisfied with the performance of Okanogan County’s three commissioners recently formed Represent Okanogan County (ROC, www.rocon2016.org) in an effort to replace them. ROC hopes to support viable challengers on the fall ballot who, in its view, are more attuned to the true interests of the county’s residents than incumbents Ray Campbell and Sheilah Kennedy. […]
Flirting with socialism, theocracy and tyranny
We’ve been devising arrangements to manage the tricky business of living together in groups since the dawn of human time. These arrangements have acquired a fancy name: governance. We’ve tried nearly everything — mostly brutal, occasionally enlightened. Now, after 240 years of governance that strives imperfectly toward enlightened, some citizens of this nation […]
Uncivil society is sown with dark money
We’ve reached a strange moment of unity in our nation’s political life: Democrats and Republicans alike admit they’re frightened by the front-running Republican presidential candidates. Many Republicans fear they don’t have a winning candidate. Democrats fear that Republicans do. So who likely has the most to fear here, besides the citizenry? Probably the Republicans who […]
A Christmas gift from Paris
With all the excitement caused by having a Republican front-runner for president of the United States unmask himself as a fascist fruitcake, you might have missed the happier news. So let’s try to focus on what just happened in Paris. Not the thugs who murdered 130 people, but those who came to the City of […]
And now, the Democrats …
Let’s face it. As entertainers, the Democratic presidential candidates are a disappointment. They not only lack the Republicans’ comedic gifts, but also the Republican entrepreneurial enthusiasm for burnishing resumes with failed presidential bids. Fifteen Republicans entered the race. But only six Democrats showed up, and already they’re down to three. Martin O’Malley, a credible candidate, […]
