A good friend invited me to a local Buffalo Wild Wings to watch the interim UFC Lightweight Championship. He explained that it was going to be a big night. The contestants were Paddy Pimblett and […]
Culture / Literature / Media / Politics
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From Public Intellectual to Public Persona
When Jordan Peterson was at the peak of his popularity, I made the mistake of bringing up one of his ideas—”Do not let your children do anything that makes you dislike them”—at a family get-together. […]
Culture / Literature / Politics
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The Emperor Doesn’t Need Clothes—You Do
The Emperor has no clothes because the Emperor has no shame. Only his subjects must cover themselves. The Emperor, like God, “giveth and taketh away.” What he giveth and taketh away is your importance. The […]
Culture / Labor
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The Electromagnetically Odd Cashier: An Area Consumer Experience
It was New Year’s Eve. I had a 20%-off- wine coupon that was set to expire at midnight. I went to the grocery store that issued the coupon and pulled a case of wine—4 bottles […]
Culture / Drugs / Media / Technology
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Bored, Lonely and Safe
We’ve finally taken notice of how safe and boring things are. How our experience of the world has become predominantly digital and life strangely devoid of ground-breaking music, literature and art. How culture is cannibalizing […]
Art / Culture / Media / Politics
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Art and Politics, Apples and Oranges
The other day I met up with an old friend in downtown LA and visited the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA). The exhibition was called “Monuments” and featured a dozen or so statues that had […]
Academia / Culture / Literature / Politics / Technology
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Books Will Abide, Though Readers May Not
James Marriott’s essay on the “dawn of the post-literate society” supports what to me has been evident for over a decade: in the wake of the smartphone, book readership has diminished and so has the […]
Culture / Media / Politics
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The Bad News Is the Good News
I grab the remote and go to the PBS Newshour. And yes, I’m a liberal—or some kind of democrat socialist utilitarian crank. Because I think that public money (tax dollars) should be used to improve public […]
Media / Politics
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No TACO on This POTUS
It’s hard to be popular. But I think a good way to do it is to say a lot of things that aren’t true and see if it excites people. You tell them that you’re […]
Class / Culture / Politics
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Are We in Decline Yet? The Wikipedia Page
It’s obvious that the United States is in decline. But what does decline mean? According to Edward Gibbon, it’s a loss of virtue, particularly a decay of public service and civic duty. In the case of the […]