AMERICAN LIFE
THE STILL, SMALL VOICE
This past Fourth in Washington, wishing America “Happy birthday” was a sad affair. Love and respect for the nation and our Declaration of Independence are always called for. But the celebration was manhandled with overkill. The traditional fireworks staged in the nation’s capital fizzled in a misguided effort to make the Guinness Book of World Records with…
Read MoreAMERICA AT 250
Two hundred and fifty years post-Declaration of Independence, is America’s glass half-full or half-empty? I’m no Pollyanna. I junked my rose-colored glasses and other items from the ’60s a long time ago. But last week, in “Flying With Resilience,” I wrote that air travel these days demands resilience—the ability to roll with the punches when…
Read MoreFLYING WITH RESILIENCE
What’s worse than one badly delayed flight to a far-off city? Two—within 48 hours. But these flights reinforced a valuable lesson. Two weeks ago, Carolyn and I flew to Dallas-Fort Worth International to connect to a flight to Waco, Texas. We’d attend her 60th high-school reunion. Two days later, we’d fly to New York. People…
Read MoreLIFE AND DEATH IN JUNE
June means a great deal to me as an individual, an American and a Jew. Sunday is the 123rd birthday of my father, Morris, in Warsaw, Poland. In February, 1906, age two-and-a-half, Dad came to America with my grandparents—Sam and Kaylah—along with Aunt Alice (older) and Aunt Etta (Younger). As half the team of Morris…
Read MoreCAN’T ANYBODY HERE PLAY THIS GAME?
The 1962 New York Mets, 2026 San Francisco Giants and current White House administration share a lot in common. Incompetence. On May 28, 1957, the National League gave permission to the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants to leave Gotham for Los Angeles and San Francisco. I was a Yankees fan but felt the loss.…
Read MoreAMERICAN MOSAIC
The Getty Villa in Malibu and California State University Northridge offer a key message to America. A week ago, Carolyn and I—along with our sons Seth and Aaron, and son-in-law Jeremy—flew down to Los Angeles for our son Yosi’s graduation ceremony. Yosi completed the demanding bachelor’s coursework for CSUN’s music therapy program—hard to get into,…
Read MoreHATE WORDS MATTER
A few days ago, a swastika was sprayed on the Rego Park Jewish Center, my childhood synagogue in Queens. Some people accept the old saw that “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words (or images) can never harm me.” Jews cannot. A university professor in Europe emailed about my post, “Artemis II and…
Read MoreSCANNING THIS WEEK’S POLITICAL HORSESHOE
A political theory holds that the extreme left and extreme right draw close at the opposite ends of a horseshoe-style curve. Differing views between traditional left and right leave a wide, but respectful, ideological gap in the middle of that curve. The extremes narrow the gap because they share similar views about exercising power and…
Read MoreTHE SECOND MOST INTERESTING MAN IN THE WORLD
My favorite TV advertising campaign consisted of humorous commercials for Dos Equis beer featuring “The Most Interesting Man in the World.” Frankly, I could have been Dos Equis’ spokesperson. The spots ran from 2006 to 2018, and were brought back last January. (“He had a staring contest with the sun. And won.”) Fine. But I’ve…
Read MoreTHE CRUELEST MONTH
“April is the cruelest month,” T.S. Elliot wrote in his 1922 poem, “The Waste Land.” I disagree. Those words begin Part I, “The Burial of the Dead” and present a world filled with post-Great War despair. I find more gloom in my own choice of cruelest month. March? They say it comes in like a…
Read MoreTHREE VALENTINES
Tomorrow being Valentine’s Day, I want to launch three Cupid’s arrows. I’ll work backwards. My first valentine goes to America. Not the America of MAGA, Christian (white) nationalists and antisemites. People like them have been here since Colonial Days, but I won’t sell this country short. We are a nation of immigrants who, going back centuries or…
Read MoreSETTING THE CLOCK—AND AMERICANS—BACK
Sunday at 2:00 am, we’ll turn our clocks back one hour. Sadly, the month-long federal government shutdown is turning the national clock back to eras when millions of Americans went to bed hungry and sick. Venture capitalists, bank executives, senior tech bro—they’re fine. But tens of millions of Americans live from paycheck to paycheck. Others…
Read MoreAM I GOING TO PRISON?
Last Saturday, a friend offered to send me muffins if I went to prison. His generosity responded to ABC taking the late-night comic Jimmy Kimmel off the air. Kimmel remarked about the man who killed Christian-conservative advocate Charlie Kirk. He said the shooter was a MAGA follower. No evidence has been presented tying the shooter…
Read MoreCHEAP WEDDING, RICH MARRIAGE
Carolyn and I celebrate our 56th anniversary on September 4. The size and expense of our wedding had nothing to do with our marriage’s longevity. Note that in late June, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez basically rented Venice, Italy, for a three-day wedding extravaganza. Bezos, 61, had been married to MacKenzie Scott for…
Read MoreGUESS WHO’S HOSTING THE OSCARS
Donald Trump is clearly demonstrating to America that busyness is next to godliness. Last February, Trump appointed himself chair of D.C.’s Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. This past Wednesday, Trump announced the—his—Kennedy Center honorees. They include Sylvester Stallone who, along with Mel Gibson and Jon Voight, will be his “eyes and ears” in Hollywood. Americans…
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