As I read David Cay Johnston's book on the U.S. tax system, I kept thinking of Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle." I first read "The Jungle" the summer before my junior year of high school for my Advanced Placement U.S. History class. Sinclair's novel is the story of an immigrant family trying to make it in […]
For those hoping that the Kerry campaign would take a civil, high-minded approach to the 2004 contest following the Democrat convention, those hopes have been quickly dashed. From Kerry's acceptance speech: I want to address these next words directly to President George W. Bush: In the weeks ahead, let's be optimists, not just opponents. Let's […]
UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh has been looking at the threatened lawsuit against the JibJab parody of "This land is your land." (If you haven't seen it, you need to.) After reading all of those posts and Volokh's considered opinion that JibJab has a relatively weak legal position, I wonder why the Capitol Steps haven't […]
The other day the Kerrys and Edwards stopped at a Wendy's fast food joint to celebrate the Edwards' anniversary. Apparently, according to some news reports, Mrs. Heinz Kerry had to be enlightened by her husband about what exactly "chili" was (that's the meal, not the country). Well, it turns out that it was only an […]
Buddhist Muslim terrorists killed at least 15 Christians exiting church Sunday morning throughout Iraq.
Thanks to Neflix I've been watching the first of three DVDs of the old Dukes of Hazzard TV series. The video quality is pretty good, but they should have spent some time cleaning up the audio before transfering the shows to DVD. The show first aired in 1979 and it's interesting, 25 years later, to […]
Sen. John Kerry appeared on various Sunday morning shows promising that his election as president would usher in a renewed relationship with our "allies" -- understood to be at least Germany and France (and occasionally Russia) -- that would result in those countries sending troops to Iraq to help alleviate the burden on the American […]
Vietnam vet Sen. John Kerry apparently isn't all that popular with the Marines. The Marines — two in uniform and two off-duty — were polite but curt while chatting with Kerry, answering most of his questions with a "yes, sir" or "no, sir." But they turned downright nasty after the Massachusetts senator thanked them "for […]
I'm often quick to criticize the media for shoddy reporting, lack of research and inaccurate headlines, so I'm pleased to point out examples of really good journalism -- this time by the Union-Tribune. Reporter Rick Rogers and photographer Nelvin Cepeda were with the U.S. Marines in Iraq as they battled for Fallujah. The story is […]
I've been keeping a close watch on Jim Romenesko's Letters page over at Poynter Online to see what sort of reception New York Times public editor Daniel Okrent's admission that the Times is a liberal newspaper received from professional journalists. Surprisingly, the answer is: "Not much." In the four days since Okrent's column appeared, only […]