I’m no movie buff, but there is this list of films in my head that I return to from time to time. One of them is African Queen (Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn, 1951). I saw it at Fair Park…
Authentic patriotism
Recently, my wife and I were glued to the TV, watching the return of the three U.S. citizens who had been falsely imprisoned in Russia. The hour was late, but we couldn’t pull ourselves away. It was a truly rare…
Our most basic freedom — deciding one’s own religion
My most recent column was on Christian nationalism and the threat that movement poses to religious freedom. Some would say that is our most basic freedom — to make our own way through the thicket of religions that clamor for…
‘You can’t forget history you never knew’
On July 2, I was on a Zoom gathering for a discussion of the new book by Brian Kaylor and Beau Underwood: Baptizing America, How Mainline Protestants Helped Build Christian Nationalism. During the discussion, one of the authors observed that…
What if everyone forgets?
Remember Tiananmen Square? I was reminded of those halcyon and tragic days last week when I ran across an article in the New York Review of Books from May 20, 2014. It marked the 25th anniversary of that fervent outbreak…
Democracy dies in darkness?
Democracy dies in darkness. Sure enough: in the absence of a free press to throw light on the actions and decisions of our political leaders, we the people are left in the dark. We don’t know what they decided, what…
Loneliness and tyranny
“What prepares men for totalitarian domination … is the fact that loneliness … has become an everyday experience of the ever-growing masses,” according to Hannah Arendt in The Origins of Totalitarianism, written in 1951. Loneliness, it seems, has moved from…
‘A failure of imagination would be fatal to democracy’
On Jan. 6, 2021, “a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked” by ground forces loyal to then-President Donald Trump. They interrupted the constitutionally required certification of electoral votes from the…
J.D. Salinger, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and why Christmas is in trouble
Christmas has been in trouble for a long time. This year, decorations were out in Home Depot just past Halloween. And have you seen some of the yards around town? The Star Wars characters in the display down the street…
Robert Reich was right in 1994, and we must pay attention now
Thirty years ago, Secretary of Labor Robert Reich saw something on the horizon most of us missed. He spoke to the 1994 Democratic Leadership Council: My friends, we are on the way to becoming a two-tiered society composed of a…
The inertia of history
Inertia. Think back to high school, maybe physics class. Yes, that inertia: “a property of matter by which it remains at rest or in uniform motion in the same straight line unless acted upon by some external force.” History certainly…
Anthony, Aldean, Dylan and Guthrie
First there was Jason Aldean topping the Billboard Hot 100 with “Try That in a Small Town.” Then, two weeks ago, Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North of Richmond” became the first song ever to top the Billboard Top 100 by…